vRealize Infrastructure Navigator was a product of VMware that provided awareness about infrastructure monitoring. It was also a part of the vRealize suite, which includes utensils for automation services, cloud management, business, and operations in various industries. Moreover, it aimed to provide applications such as business acumen, operations, and automation.
What is vRealize Infrastructure Navigator?
vRealize Infrastructure Navigator (VIN) was a tool of VMware that was especially designed to discover and map applications and services automatically within the vSphere environment. It provides immediate visibility, which helps IT developers and controllers to understand how the infrastructure and applications are connected. Moreover, VIN is a collection of tools that help administrators to manage cloud infrastructure and operations.
In a digital virtualized data center, many applications are damaged across multiple VMs. It is especially used to discover relationships between applications of virtual machines running in the VMware vSphere environment. In the vRealize Operations Manager, it works as a plugin.
Key Features of vRealize Infrastructure Navigator
Automatic application discovery
It does not need any agent inside the VMs because it is an agentless discovery. As, VIN automatically detects the software applications that are running inside the operating system.
Dependency Mapping
It identifies the network connection and inter-VM communication. VMs communicate with each other through protocol and port services. It also enables administrators to understand upstream and downstream dependencies, which are useful for impact analysis.
Integration with vCenter and vRealize Operations
It provides seamless integration with the vCenter server. VIN uses vRealize Operations to enhance the infrastructure monitoring with application-aware context.
Change tracking
With the passage of time, it tracks changes in services and also applications.
Application Grouping
It allows the creation of logical application groupings, which enables admins to manage performance, capacity, and availability.
How to install VIN?
- First, go to the VMware product download and download the VIN appliance.
2. Then deploy the OVF template.
3. Power on the VIN appliance.
4. Register VIN with vCenter server.
5. Enable the VIN plugins in vSphere Web Client.
Function of vRealize Infrastructure Navigator
VIN is a VMware product that is especially used as a management plug for aware infrastructure management. It allows managers to discover map relationships between virtual machines and the applications they support. There are some core functions of it, which are given below:
Automatically discover applications
VIN inspected and scanned the virtual machines to recognize and also identify running applications like SQL Server, Oracle, etc.
Map application
To show how VMs and their applications interact across the infrastructure, VIN also creates dependency maps that help to understand service topologies.
Application-aware operations
It integrated with vRealize operations to allow better monitoring and capacity planning. Moreover, it also integrated with VMware vCenter for impact analysis based on application awareness.
Impact analysis
Administrators could predict and reduce the risks during infrastructure changes with the help of dependency data.
Support for compliance and auditing
By visualizing app relationships, it ensures compliance and improves audit readiness.
How does vRealize Infrastructure Navigator work?
Architecture Overview
vRealize Infrastructure Navigator is a virtual device that is integrated with VMware vCenter Server through a plug-in. It works in merging with
VMware tools are installed in VMs, which are used to perform application discovery.
Key Components
vRIN appliance: Installed as an open virtual appliance.
vSphere web client plug-in: supplied the UI inside the vSphere web client.
Communication with vCenter: used vCenter APIs to gather the VM metadata and status.
Credential vault: It only stores the credential for logging.
Discovery Mechanism
- VM identification
vRIN from vCenter identifies VMs. It also checks the VMs’ tools and checks whether they are working or not.
2. Credential-based access
Administrators provide read-only credentials for different operating system types like Windows and Linux. Moreover, they are used for remote access and are stored securely.
- Fingerprinting application
vRIN uses a variety of fingerprint print applications to detect apps like SQL and Oracle. Moreover, it installed software packages for running process, service, and configuration files.
- Mapping dependency
Once the apps are installed, it starts communication between them by using network traffic monitoring and port usage and connection data. It also builds app-to-app dependency maps.
Integration with vCenter and vRealize Operations
In the vSphere web client, it adds a new application services tab for each VM and vApp. So that the admins could see how the applications are running and dependency graphs.
vRIN is integrated with vRealize Infrastructure Navigator; the app data could be used for monitoring and for health and availability dashboards. Moreover, during maintenance impact analysis.
Applications of vRealize Infrastructure Navigator
It is a technical tool used to research, discover, and manage its use in a virtualized environment. Here are some applications of vRealize Infrastructure Navigator.
Technology Stack
VIN is especially designed for awareness of infrastructure management applications. It provides clarity into applications, how they interact across virtual machines, and enables them to make smarter decisions in security, technical operations, and operations. It also detects automatically running operations like SQL servers, web servers, and databases. Moreover, it gathers a large volume of data with the help of VMware tools and network traffic analysis. VIN is also used to identify east-west traffic between maps, which provide services to communicate with each other. It discovers sensitive data in vRealize Infrastructure Management, which enables them to improve their performance based on application context.
Automate Application Discovery
It automatically identifies the software and services that are running inside virtual machines. It also uses VMware tools to collect data. No agent for installation is required. Moreover, it identifies the enterprise applications like Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle database, and WebSphere. It is mostly used to avoid manual tracking of what applications are installed on each VM. It reduces human error and saves time.
Application dependency mapping
It plots the relationship and network communication between applications and services. It recognizes which VMs are talking to each other. Moreover, it manufactures visual topology maps showing applications like app and web. VIN also helps us to understand the east-west traffic inside the data center. Before modifying a VM, inspect which services rely on it. Additionally, it reduces the risk of service disturbance and improves change management.
Change Impact Analysis
VIN estimates which applications will be affected by changes in the infrastructure, like VM restart. It shows the full store of connected applications and also identifies the upstream and downstream dependencies, which enables better planning for the maintenance of Windows. It reduces the unplanned interruption in services and ensures smooth change execution.
Disaster Recovery (DR)
Identifying critical application components and their dependencies helps in recovery from disaster. It also ensures that all the parts of the application (like frontend, middleware, and backend) are included in recovery plans. Moreover, it helps to align the vRealize operations with actual service topology. It reduces the failure rate and increases the success rate, which improves business continuity.
Security and Compliance Auditing
VIN supports enterprise compliance by identifying unexpected services that violate securities policies. It identifies all the software that is working in your environment. Moreover, it stops unauthorized services or open ports. Detect the unapproved and unauthorized FTP services. All this improves security postures and standards and helps to meet standards like PCI and SOX.
Conclusion
vRealize Infrastructure Navigator was a product of VMware that provided awareness about infrastructure monitoring. It provides immediate visibility, which helps IT developers and controllers to understand how the infrastructure and applications are connected. VIN is a collection of tools that help administrators to manage cloud infrastructure and operations.
But today the time of vRealize Infrastructure Navigator is ending because of the use of microprocessors and hybrid models.