VMware Cloud Builder - Logging and Log Collection

VMware Cloud Builder is used to automate the deployment of VMware Cloud Foundation and VMware Validated Designs, during the initial bringup phase both solutions use the same components of the VMware Cloud Builder appliance:

• JsonGenerator - used to take the Excel file and generate the JSON file used by the bringup service
• PlatformAudit - used to perform both validation on the JSON file and the physical environment
• Bringup - orchestration service that carries out the installation and configuration of the VMware components

Each of these components generate log files, should you encounter issues then these log files can be used to perform your troubleshooting and can also be provided to VMware Global Support Services (GSS).

The following illustrates the key path locations:

Component	Log Name	Location
JsonGenerator	jsongenerator-[time-stamp]	/var/log/vmware/vcf/sddc-support/
PlatformAudit	platform-audit-[time-stamp]	/var/log/vmware/vcf/sddc-support/
Bringup Service	vcf-bringup.log	/opt/vmware/bringup/logs/
	vcf-bringup-debug.log	/opt/vmware/bringup/logs/
	rest-api-debug.log	/opt/vmware/bringup/logs/
Web UI	server.log	/opt/vmware/vvd/vvd-ui/server/user_data/logs/
	access.log	/opt/vmware/vvd/vvd-ui/server/user_data/logs/

In addition to reviewing the log files locally you can also generate a log bundle that can be provided to GSS, this is done using the Supportability and Serviceability Utility (SoS) from the command line of the appliance as follows:

1. Connect to the VMware Cloud Builder Appliance using an SSH utility such as Putty.
2. Login using admin and enter your password.
3. Switch to root using su and enter your password.
4. Change into the SoS Utility folder:
  cd /opt/vmware/sddc-support

5.Execute SoS to collect the logs
 ./sos --cloud-builder-logs 

VMware Cloud Builder Version Matrix

Last Updated: 26-Apr-2019
 
VMware Cloud Builder supports both VMware Cloud Foundation and VMware Validated Design deployments each of which have their own version numbers. VMware Cloud Builder also has its own version and build number and as we release new versions keeping track of which version supports which VMware Cloud Foundation and VMware Validated Design will become difficult. In attempt to keep track of this and help our customers I've created the below table:

VMware Cloud Builder	Version: 1.0.0.0 Build: 11852205	Version: 1.0.0.1 Build: 12915705	Version: 2.0.0.0 Build: 12696155
VMware Cloud Foundation	X	X	v3.7.0
VMware Cloud Foundation on VxRail
VMware Validated Design	v5.0.0	v5.0.0	v5.0.1
VMware Validated Design on VxRail	v5.0.0 (Region A Only)

VMware Cloud Builder 2.0 - What's New

Back in January VMware released VMware Cloud Builder v1.0, today March 19th VMware Cloud Builder v2.0 went GA, this is just a quick write up on the main What's New items for this relase. If you didn't see my initial blog article on VMware Cloud Builder v1.0 you can find it here https://vmland.blogspot.com/2019/01/introducing-vmware-cloud-builder.html.

What's New
1. Supports for VMware Cloud Foundation 3.7 and VMware Validated Design 5.0.1 using the same OVA. With the release of VMware Cloud Builder v2.0 the biggest change is that we now support the automated deployment of both VMware Cloud Foundation and VMware Validated Designs using the same base OVA. When you deploy the OVA you pass a SKU value of vcf for VMware Cloud Foundation, vcf-vxrail for VMware Cloud Foundation on VxRail and vvd for VMware Validated Designs, depending on the value chosen the appliance on first boot will install and configured the correct user interface.

2. Multiple software bundles. In this release we have broken down iso bundle from a single 24GB file into multiple files.

• Contained within the VMware Cloud Builder OVA itself we have the sddc-foundation-bundle.x.x.x.x-xxxxxxxx.iso file which contains the binaries for the foundation layer including ESXi, vCenter, NSX and SDDC Manager. This is used by both VMware Cloud Foundation and VMware Validated Designs
• The sddc-vrealize-bundle.x.x.x.x-xxxxxxxx.iso file is downloaded separately and contains the binaries for the vRealize Suite and is used by the VMware Validated Designs workflows.
• The sddc-dr-bundle.x.x.x.x-xxxxxxxx.iso file is also downloaded separately and contains the binaries for Site Recovery Manager and vSphere Replication.

Useful Links
VMware Cloud Foundation 3.7 Release Notes
VMware Cloud Foundation 3.7.0 Downloads
VMware Validated Design for Software-Defined Data Center 5.0.1 Release Notes 
VMware Validated Design 5.0.1 Downloads