Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand User's Guide

Ready and usable: the virtual data center was created successfully; it is available for use, such creating and
managing virtual machines.
Busy and usable: an operation is running for the virtual data center; for example, it is being renamed. However,
users can still access it to perform tasks, such as creating and managing virtual machines.
Busy and unusable: the virtual data center is busy completing an operation and cannot be used until that
operation finishes; for example, it is being created or deleted.
Unavailable: an error has occurred affecting the virtual data center and it cannot be used.
For assistance with an unavailable virtual data center, file a support request. See Account Support in vCloud Air –
Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand Getting Started for information.
Why Create Additional Virtual Data Centers?
Because a virtual data center creates artificial limits on operational abilities, customers question why they
should create multiple virtual data centers in Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand.
Virtual data centers function as logical containers for resources that you want to create limits around or
group together. Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand is designed to allow for flexible and scalable capacity for
your public cloud. You scale capacity by deploying additional virtual machines or by increasing resources
for existing virtual machines. You do not allocate set resources to your virtual data centers. However, each
virtual data center is implemented with capacity limitations. Adding multiple virtual data centers expands
your capacity limits exponentially. See “Capacity for Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand,” on page 48 for
information.
Using multiple virtual data centers allows you to organize resources into more manageable chunks, making
them easier to find and manage. You can implement monitoring at the virtual data center level with
associated alarms; set events to trigger different responses depending on their location within your virtual
data center structure.
Creating a virtual data center creates a gateway automatically, through which you can configure security
boundaries. Using virtual data centers, you can define where your network and storage boundaries are (and
by association, host boundaries as well).
Adding virtual data centers provides the ability to group virtual machines into customer-defined network
segments. Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand leverages the organization network scheme from
vCloud Director for L2 network segmentation and network extension. The organization networks use
VxLANs as network resource pools. You can create multiple organization networks per virtual data center
to segment workloads as needed. See Network Virtualization in Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand in the
vCloud Air – Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand Networking Guide.
You can create virtual data centers to group virtual machines so that they can work together; for example,
by setting up virtual machine load balancing using the gateway services within the virtual data center. See
Load Balancer in the vCloud Air – Virtual Private Cloud OnDemand Networking Guide.
In sum, having multiple virtual data centers allows you to achieve the following goals:
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Group your resources into one or more virtual data centers depending upon your requirements; for
example, you can create one virtual data center for your entire company or you can create different
virtual data centers for different departments, project teams, or geographic sites.
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Isolate particular applications or groups of applications; for example, you can isolate your production
applications from development and testing.
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Monitor resource usage at the virtual data center level and add more resources if necessary.
Chapter 4 Managing Your Public Cloud Environment
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