UCS Director: Simplify Infrastructure Automation Anywhere

The latest release of UCS Director includes new functionality to enhance orchestration and make it easier to use workflows to deliver infrastructure automation across compute, network, storage and virtualization from the data center to disaster recovery (DR), ROBO, and edge environments. It also provides an initial step for transitioning to cloud-based systems management.

Guest blogger: Anand Louis, Senior Product Manager

Simplifying Orchestration

As I explained in my recent blog, “Cisco is committed to enhancing UCS Director, our private cloud platform for Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)”. We have demonstrated our commitment with a new release of UCS Director, version 6.6. This latest update provides new enhancements that enable greater levels of simplicity and a better user experience. It includes the following new features:

• Dynamic Input Forms: Workflow designers are able to think logically and act methodically to control the end-user experience, so the inputs that match their selections, progressively reveal fields that are relevant for their current selections.
• Pre and post provision Workflows: Standard VM catalogs can now be configured to execute a pre-provisioning workflow as well as a post-provisioning workflow.
• Import/Export of Workflows: The REST API enables import and export of standard and complex workflows from GitHub and other repositories.
• Semaphore Lock: Ensures mutual exclusion of a resource via semaphore locking during workflow deployment and rollback.

This demo video shows how dynamic input forms can make it easier to design a workflow to configure a firewall.

Consistent Automation Anywhere

UCS Director includes over 2,500 out-of-the-box tasks that span Cisco and multi-vendor hardware as well as converged and hyperconverged infrastructure solutions. The automated discovery, mapping, and monitoring of infrastructure topologies allows the workflows, built leveraging UCS Director out-of-the-box tasks, to be validated in real time and update existing automated services.

Working in conjunction with the Cisco Application Policy Infrastructure Controller (APIC), Cisco UCS Director builds and manages the fabric. It enables you to extend the fabric to onboard the necessary network, compute and storage resources. UCS Director bonds with APIC and Cisco UCS service profiles to ensure that all infrastructure elements are in sync with the application’s needs. End-to-end infrastructure provisioning and management supports workloads through their complete lifecycle.

The UCS Director 6.6 release supports Cisco ACI Anywhere with ACI M-Site support. This functionality provides automation via the ACI Multi-Site Controller (MSC), allowing for policy replication across DR sites, centralized policy management, centralized tenancy, and application profiles.

Tasks and workflows are available for Cisco ACI site management, centralized tenancy, and application templates. Now you have the flexibility to move applications seamlessly to the public cloud, DR and edge environments as well as your data center without compromising high availability and creating a single fault domain.

Additional Features in the 6.6 Release

The latest release of UCS Director also includes the following new functionality:

• Hyperflex replication: Support for HX stretched cluster, discovery of stretched cluster nodes, HX replication and protection policy, and VM life cycle management with HX protection policy
• Intersight Device Connector: When UCS Director is connected to Cisco Intersight, the southbound connectors (virtualization, storage, HX, UCS compute, etc.) can automatically be updated from Intersight
• “Connected TAC” through Intersight: Provides Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC) with on-demand remote diagnostics and critical log collection to expedite problem resolution.
• Red Hat KVM support: Certified with RHKVM 4.1, and it provides additional VM life cycle management capabilities and end-user console access.

This release blog provides more details regarding the 6.6 release, and this blog provides more information regarding the Intersight device connector.

A Strategic IaaS Platform

The latest release of UCS Director is a result of our ongoing investment in this strategic platform. UCS Director delivers an open foundation for private cloud IaaS. It is a vital component of the CiscoONE Enterprise Cloud Suite – Infrastructure Automation offer.

For additional information read the UCS Director data sheet