Add a VDC to a federation

You can add a VDC to an existing VDC (for example, VDC1) to create a federation. It is important when you perform this procedure that you DO NOT create a VDC on the rack you want to add. Retrieve only the VDC Access Key from it, and then proceed from the existing VDC (VDC1).

Prerequisites

Obtain the ECS Portal credentials for the root user, or for a user with System Administrator credentials, to log in to both VDCs.

In an ECS geo-federated system with multiple VDCs, the IP addresses for the replication and management networks are used for connectivity of replication and management traffic between VDC endpoints. If the VDC you are adding to the federation is configured with:

  • Replication or management traffic running on the public network (default), you need the public network IP address that is used by each node.
  • Separate networks for replication or management traffic, you need the IP addresses of the separated network for each node.

If a load balancer is configured to distribute the load between the replication IP addresses of the nodes, you need the IP address that is configured on the load balancer.

Ensure that the VDC you are adding has a valid ECS license that is uploaded and has at least one storage pool in the Ready state.

Steps

  1. On the VDC you want to add (for example, VDC2):
    1. Log in to the ECS Portal.
    2. In the ECS Portal, select Manage > Virtual Data Center.
    3. On the Virtual Data Center Management page, click Get VDC Access Key.
    4. Select the key, and press Ctrl-c to copy it. Important: You are only obtaining and copying the key of the VDC you want to add, you are not creating a VDC on the site you are logged in to.
    5. Log out of the ECS Portal on the site you are adding.
  2. On the existing VDC (for example, VDC1):
    1. Log in to the ECS Portal.
    2. Select Manage > Virtual Data Center.
    3. On the Virtual Data Center Management page, click New Virtual Data Center.
    4. On the New Virtual Data Center page, in the Name field, type the name of the new VDC you are adding.
    5. Click in the Key field, and then press Ctrl-v to paste the access key you copied from the VDC you are adding (from step 1d).
  3. In the Replication Endpoints field, enter the replication IP address of each node in the storage pools that are assigned to the site you are adding (for example, VDC2). Use the:
    • Public IP addresses for the network if the replication network has not been separated.
    • IP address configured for replication traffic, if you have separated the replication network.
    • If a load balancer is configured to distribute the load between the replication IP addresses of the nodes, the replication endpoint is the IP address that is configured on the load balancer.

    Use a comma to separate IP addresses within the text box.

  4. In the Management Endpoints fields, enter the management IP address of each node in the storage pools that are assigned to the site you are adding (for example, VDC2). Use the:
    • Public IP addresses for the network if the management network has not been separated.
    • IP address configured for management traffic, if you have separated the management network.

    Use a comma to separate IP addresses within the text box.

  5. Click Save.

Results

The new VDC is added to the existing federation. The ECS system is now a geo-federated system. When you add the VDC to the federation, ECS automatically sets the type of the VDC to either On-Premise or Hosted.

Next steps

NOTE: If External Key Manager (EKM) feature is activated for the federation, and then you have to add the necessary VDC to EKM mapping for the newly added VDC in the key management section.

To complete the configuration of the geo-federated system, you must create a replication group that spans multiple VDCs so that data can be replicated between the VDCs. To do this, you must ensure that:

  • You have created storage pools in the VDCs that will be in the replication group (see Create a storage pool).
  • You create the replication group, selecting the VDCs that provide the storage pools for the replication group (see Create a replication group).
  • After you create the replication group, you can monitor the copying of user data and metadata to the new VDC that you added to the replication group on the Monitor > Geo Replication > Geo Bootstrap Processing tab. When all the user data and metadata are successfully replicated to the new VDC, the Bootstrap State is Done and the Bootstrap Progress (%) is 100 on all the VDCs.
NOTE: All the existing data are copied to a new VDC when it is added to an existing replication group. Retention is maintained. And this occurs without the requirement to implement additional data copy or migration tooling.