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A vDiscovery job retrieves information about virtual entities in cloud environments that are managed through cloud management platforms (CMPs) such as VMware, OpenStack, AWS, Azure, and GCP. The current vDiscovery feature supports tenants, networks, and compute VMs only. It does not support data that is retrieved from load balancer networks, load balancer VMs, Kubernetes platform VMs, application gateways, service VMs, SQL VMs, or any other VMs that are created using cloud services such as Kubernetes service or analytics service, where the IPAM is handled by the respective orchestration engines of the cloud provider.
Note that if the vDiscovery job retrieves unsupported data from AWS, Azure, or GCP, then it impacts the performance of the vDiscovery process.

You must first select a member to run the vDiscovery job. To ensure that the job is executed properly, verify the connection between the discovering member and the discovered endpoint. If you select HTTPS as the protocol for communication, you must upload either an SSL CA (Certified Authority) certificate or a self-signed SSL certificate to the Grid. If the certificate has expired, ensure that you delete the expired certificate and then upload a new certificate. For more information about uploading certificates, see Managing Certificates.

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1. For a new vDiscovery job: From the Data Management tab, select the IPAM tab, then select vDiscovery -> New from the Toolbar; or from the Cloud tab, select vDiscovery -> New from the Toolbar.
   or
   To modify an existing job: From the Data Management tab, select the IPAM tab and click vDiscovery -> Discovery Manager from the Toolbar, or from the Cloud tab, select vDiscovery -> Discovery Manager from the Toolbar. In the vDiscovery Job Manager editor, click the Action icon next to a selected job and select Edit from the menu.

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2. In step one of the vDiscovery Job wizard or in the General tab of the vDiscovery Job Properties editor, complete the following:

   • Job Name: Enter the job name for this vDiscovery. It might be helpful to use a name that is unique to this specific discovery if you plan to configure multiple vDiscovery jobs.
     Note that you cannot update the job name after the vDiscovery job is run for the first time.

   • Member: Click Select to choose the Grid member that will perform the vDiscovery job. If only a single member is active, the appliance name automatically appears here. When you select a Cloud Platform Appliance to perform vDiscovery, it communicates directly with the CMPs to obtain information that is not available through the provisioning process from the cloud adapter.

   • Comment: Enter information to describe this discovery.
     The new job will not execute until you have completed all configuration steps in the wizard. You will not be able to save this job until you have completed all job settings.

3. Click Next to select an endpoint server on which you want to perform the vDiscovery job, as described in the Selecting the Endpoint Server section, or save the configuration after you have modified data in this tab.

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1. For a new vDiscovery job: From the Data Management tab, select the IPAM tab, then select vDiscovery -> New from the Toolbar; or from the Cloud tab, select vDiscovery -> New from the Toolbar.
   or
   To modify an existing job: From the Data Management tab, select the IPAM tab and click vDiscovery -> Discovery Manager from the Toolbar, or from the Cloud tab, select vDiscovery -> Discovery Manager from the Toolbar. In the vDiscovery Job Manager editor, click the Action icon next to a selected job and select Edit from the menu.menu.

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2. In step four of the vDiscovery Job wizard, or in the Data Consolidation tab of the vDiscovery Job Properties editor, complete the following:
   Under When inserting discovered into NIOS, select one or both of the following:

   • Merge the discovered data with existing data: When you select this checkbox, the appliance merges the discovered data with the existing data. It appends newly discovered data to existing data and preserves the existing data when there is no newly discovered data. This checkbox is selected by default.
     Note that if you clear this checkbox, the appliance replaces the existing data with the newly discovered data and if there are no newly discovered values for some fields, the appliance removes the existing values for these fields and the fields become empty.

   • Update discovered data for managed objects: Select this checkbox if you want the appliance to update discovered data for all corresponding NIOS objects (if they exist in NIOS). If you do not select this checkbox, the appliance updates only the discovered data for unmanaged objects. None of the managed data will be updated. This checkbox is selected by default.

   • For every newly discovered IP address, create: Select this checkbox to enable NIOS to automatically create or update DNS records for discovered network entities and VM instances. It does not include cloud adapters such as AWS or DDNS. This is applicable if the records were originally created by vDiscovery. If you select this checkbox, NIOS considers all records created in a zone as one and calculate it as one serial number change. For more information about this feature, see the CreatingDNSRecordsforNewlyDiscoveredVMs section.

     • Host: Select this to automatically create Host records for discovered entities.

     • A & PTR Record: Select this to automatically create A and PTR records for discovered entities. Note that the DNS zones and reverse-mapping zones to which the records belong must exist in NIOS before the vDiscovery job is executed. Otherwise, vDiscovery does not create the records.

     • The DNS name will be computed from the formula: Enter the formula that NIOS uses to create the DNS records for each discovered VM address. For example, if there are two IP addresses associated with a VM, NIOS creates two DNS records, or a host record with two IP addresses, depending on your configuration. You must use the syntax of ${parameter name} for the formula.

       For AWS, Azure, GCP, OpenStack, and VMware cloud platforms, this field supports the following parameters: vm_id, vm_name, discovered_name, tenant_id, tenant_name, subnet_id, subnet_name, network_id, network_name, vport_name, ip_address, ip_address_octet1 or 1, ip_address_octet2 or 2, ip_address_octet3 or 3, ip_address_octet4 or 4. Note that it does not support IPv6 addresses.

       For example, when you enter ${vm_name}.corpxyz.com and the discovered vm_name = XYZ, the DNS name for this IP becomes XYZ.corpxyz.com . When you enter ${discover_name} here and the discovered name for the IP is ip-172-31-1-64.us-west-1.compute.internal, the DNS name for this IP is ip-172-31-1-64.us-west-1.compute.internal.

   • Under Select the DNS view to which the DNS records are being added, select one or both of the following:

     • Use this DNS view for public IPs: Select this checkbox to add DNS records to a specific DNS view for public IPs. Select a DNS view from the drop-down list. If you do not select a DNS view, the DNS records are added to the default DNS view.

     • Use this DNS view for private IPs: Select this checkbox to add DNS records to a specific DNS view for private IPs. Select a DNS view from the drop-down list. If you do not select a DNS view, the DNS records are added to the default DNS view.
       If you are changing the DNS view, ensure that the Merge the discovered data with existing data checkbox is not selected.
       Note that the Use this DNS view for public IPs and Use this DNS view for private IPs fields will be disabled, if you select The tenant’s network view (if it does not exist, create a new one) option when you define the network views to which discovered data belongs for both public and private IP addresses, as described in the Defining Network Views section.

     • Under When discovered data is linked to managed data, select any combination of the following.
       Note that tenants and VMs are managed objects when they have NIOS objects, such as host records or fixed addresses, associated with them. Otherwise, they are unmanaged objects. The appliance always updates properties for all unmanaged objects.

   • Auto-consolidate on managed Tenant's properties: When you select this checkbox, the appliance updates properties with discovered data for managed tenants, as well as unmanaged tenants (NIOS always update unmanaged tenants). When you clear this checkbox, the appliance does not update discovered data for managed tenants. This checkbox is selected by default.

   • Auto-consolidate on managed Tenant's properties: When you select this checkbox, the appliance updates properties with discovered data for managed tenants, as well as unmanaged tenants (NIOS always update unmanaged tenants). When you clear this checkbox, the appliance does not update discovered data for managed tenants. This checkbox is selected by default.

   • Auto-consolidate managed VM's properties: When you select this checkbox, the appliance updates properties and extensible attributes with discovered data for managed VMs, as well as unmanaged tenants (NIOS always update unmanaged tenants). When you clear this checkbox, the appliance does not update discovered data for managed VMs. This checkbox is selected by default.

   • Auto-consolidate Cloud EAs on managed data: When you select this checkbox, NIOS updates discovered extensible attribute values for managed objects that contain cloud extensible attributes, only if a cloud license is installed in the Grid. This includes the update of the extensible attribute VM ID (which links the NIOS object to the VM) whenever a VM is added, updated or removed depending on the information collected. As a result, when a VM instance reuses an IP address or when a VM instance is deleted in the Cloud, the DNS Records or fixed address tied to that IP address are also updated, reflecting the new value of the VM instance ID. To update cloud extensible attributes for unmanaged objects, convert the objects to managed objects in NIOS. For more information, see Managing Unmanaged Data.
     Note that the extensible attribute VM ID is not updated if you do not enable the Auto-consolidate Cloud EAs on managed data checkbox, which leads to a conflict on that IP address. The NIOS object does not link to the same VM as the newly discovered IP. In such cases, you can use the Resolve Conflicts option to update either your NIOS objects or your discovered data. For information about resolving conflicts, see Resolving Conflicting Addresses.

3. Click Next to schedule this vDiscovery job and specify when the job should start, as described in the Scheduling vDiscovery Jobs section.

Creating DNS Records for Newly Discovered VMs

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Scheduling vDiscovery Jobs

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1. For a new vDiscovery job: From the Data Management tab, select the IPAM tab, then select vDiscovery -> New from the Toolbar; or from the Cloud tab, select vDiscovery -> New from the Toolbar.
   or
   To modify an existing job: From the Data Management tab, select the IPAM tab and click vDiscovery -> Discovery Manager from the Toolbar, or from the Cloud tab, select vDiscovery -> Discovery Manager from the Toolbar. In the vDiscovery Job Manager editor, click the Action icon next to a selected job and select Edit from the menu.

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2. In step five of the vDiscovery Job wizard, or in the Schedule tab of the vDiscovery Job Properties editor, complete the following:

   • Enable: To ensure that the scheduled vDiscovery job takes place, select this checkbox. When you upgrade from a previous version of NIOS, you must select this checkbox after the upgrade to ensure that the previously configured discovery tasks are being executed at the scheduled time.
     If you select Once, complete the following:

   • Choose a Start Date using the date picker.

   • Time Zone: Select the time zone for the scheduled time from the drop-down list.
     If you select Hourly, complete the following

     • Schedule every hour(s) at: Enter the number of hours between each update instance. You can enter a value from 1 to 24.

     • Minutes past the hour: Enter the number of minutes past the hour. For example, enter 5 if you want to schedule the rule update five minutes after the hour.

     • Time Zone: Select the time zone for the scheduled time from the drop-down list.

   If you select Daily, you can select either Every day or Every Weekday and then complete the following:

   • Time: Enter a time in hh:mm:ss AM/PM (hours:minutes:seconds AM or PM) format. You can also select a time from the drop-down list by clicking the time icon.

   • TimeZone: Select the time zone for the scheduled time from the drop-down list. If you select Weekly, complete the following:

   • Scheduleeveryweekon: Select any day of the week.

   • Time: Enter a time in hh:mm:ss AM/PM (hours:minutes:seconds AM or PM) format. You can also select a time from the drop-down list by clicking the time icon.

   • TimeZone: Select the time zone for the scheduled time from the drop-down list. If you select Monthly, complete the following:

   • Schedulethedayofthemonth: Enter the day of the month and the monthly interval. For example, to schedule the rule update on the first day after every 2 months, you can enter Day 1 every 2 month(s).

   • Time: Enter a time in hh:mm:ss AM/PM (hours:minutes:seconds AM or PM) format. You can also select a time from the drop-down list by clicking the time icon.

   • TimeZone: Select the time zone for the scheduled time from the drop-down list.

3. Save the vDiscovery job. The appliance lists all vDiscovery jobs in the vDiscovery Job Manager, from which you can manage jobs that have not been executed, including modifying selected jobs or deleting some. For more information about how to manage vDiscovery jobs, see the ManagingvDiscoveryJobs section.

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