Service activation
After the client orders and pays for the service, BILLmanager will start the activation process that includes several steps:
Creating an account in vCloud Director
The system will check a user account in vCloud Director. If it doesn't exist, BILLmanager will create a new user user(email@example.com) in vCloud Director and set permissions specified in the processing module configuration form (the default value is Organization Administrator).
Creating vApp
Virtual machines are created for every client in a separate vApp. After creating/searching a client in vCloud Director, the system will check that the newly created or found client has vApp and the number of virtual machines that it includes.
If vApp does not exist, the billing platform will create it with the name 'vapp-email@example.com_1', where 'email@example.com' is user email; '_1' is user vApp number.
If vApp exists and the number of virtual machines created in it does not exceed 128, a new vApp will be created. '_2' (3, 4, etc.) will be added to its name. Example: 'vapp-email@example.com_2'.
Creating a virtual machine
To create a virtual machine in vApp the system will complete the following steps:
- Selects a network with the largest number of available IP addresses. It will search among all the networks with the prefix specified in the processing module configuration form. Note: the integration process is performed with permissions of the organization admin. Information on allocates IP addresses can be collected only for that organization.
- Creates a virtual machine with parameters specified in the vApp template (nCPU, DISC, VM name).
- Creates a vApp network and connects it to the network found above.
- Applies the VM parameters that were specified on the service order step.
- Re-customizes the virtual machine.
- Activates the virtual machine.
- After the virtual machine is successfully created, the service is activated in BILLmanager.
Activating the service
The service status in BILLmanager changes into "Active" and the client receives a service activation email.
VPS queue
There is a queue of virtual machines to be activated. Only one vCloud Director server can be activated at a single point in time. If several virtual machines are ordered in BILLmanager at the same time, they will be created one after another.
Simultaneous creation of service is not possible due to architecture peculiarities of vCloud Director. It cannot allocate free IP addresses from external networks.
Several servers are deleted successively. It allows the processing module to define if the current virtual machine is the last one in vApp. If true, vApp will be deleted instead of VDC.
Editing parameters of virtual machines
You can edit the following parameters of an existing service in BILLmanager (if the tariff plan allows modifying them):
- Number of virtual CPU, RAM. These parameters can be either increased or decreased. The changes will be applied on the fly. A virtual machine will be rebooted to apply the new configuration.
- Hard drive size can be increased. Only block devices can be modified, the file system size can be modified manually. A virtual machine will be rebooted to apply the new configuration.
- Public IP addresses can be added/ removed on the fly. A virtual machine will be rebooted to apply the new configuration.
Logs
Detailed information on errors can be found in vCloud Director log: — '/usr/local/mgr5/var/pmvmwarevds.log'
It contains information on requests to vCloud Director and system responses.
The task information in the log is shown in XML:
<Task ... operation="Stopped Virtual Application qwe1(58b81329-ea2a-4f94-b999-1c36923a0340)" operationName="vappUndeployPowerOff" status="running">
...
</Task>operation — operation name.
status current status of the task:
- success — completed successfully;
- error — failed to complete;
- canceled — canceled by owner or admin;
- aborted — aborted by admin;
- running — running.
The XML may contain the following child nodes:
- Error — information about an error if the task cannot be completed.
- Progress — current status of the task in percent 0 to 100.