6.7
Table Of Contents
- Platform Services Controller Administration
- Contents
- About Platform Services Controller Administration
- Getting Started with Platform Services Controller
- vCenter Server and Platform Services Controller Deployment Types
- Deployment Topologies with External Platform Services Controller Instances and High Availability
- Understanding vSphere Domains, Domain Names, and Sites
- Platform Services Controller Capabilities
- Managing Platform Services Controller Services
- Managing the Platform Services Controller Appliance
- vSphere Authentication with vCenter Single Sign-On
- Understanding vCenter Single Sign-On
- Configuring vCenter Single Sign-On Identity Sources
- Understanding vCenter Server Two-Factor Authentication
- Using vCenter Single Sign-On as the Identity Provider for Another Service Provider
- Security Token Service STS
- Managing vCenter Single Sign-On Policies
- Managing vCenter Single Sign-On Users and Groups
- Add vCenter Single Sign-On Users
- Disable and Enable vCenter Single Sign-On Users
- Delete a vCenter Single Sign-On User
- Edit a vCenter Single Sign-On User
- Add a vCenter Single Sign-On Group
- Add Members to a vCenter Single Sign-On Group
- Remove Members from a vCenter Single Sign-On Group
- Delete vCenter Single Sign-On Solution Users
- Change Your vCenter Single Sign-On Password
- vCenter Single Sign-On Security Best Practices
- vSphere Security Certificates
- Certificate Requirements for Different Solution Paths
- Certificate Management Overview
- Managing Certificates with the vSphere Client
- Managing Certificates from the vSphere Web Client
- Managing Certificates with the vSphere Certificate Manager Utility
- Certificate Manager Options and the Workflows in This Document
- Regenerate a New VMCA Root Certificate and Replace All Certificates
- Make VMCA an Intermediate Certificate Authority (Certificate Manager)
- Generate CSR with vSphere Certificate Manager and Prepare Root Certificate (Intermediate CA)
- Replace VMCA Root Certificate with Custom Signing Certificate and Replace All Certificates
- Replace Machine SSL Certificate with VMCA Certificate (Intermediate CA)
- Replace Solution User Certificates with VMCA Certificates (Intermediate CA)
- Replace All Certificates with Custom Certificate (Certificate Manager)
- Revert Last Performed Operation by Republishing Old Certificates
- Reset All Certificates
- Manual Certificate Replacement
- Managing Services and Certificates with CLI Commands
- Troubleshooting Platform Services Controller
- Determining the Cause of a Lookup Service Error
- Unable to Log In Using Active Directory Domain Authentication
- vCenter Server Login Fails Because the User Account Is Locked
- VMware Directory Service Replication Can Take a Long Time
- Export a Platform Services Controller Support Bundle
- Platform Services Controller Service Logs Reference
Table 3‑5. Certificates in vSphere 6.0 and Later (Continued)
Certificate Provisioned Comments
vCenter Single Sign-On SSL
signing certificate
Provisioned during installation. Manage this certificate from the vSphere Web Client.
Note Do not change this certificate in the filesystem
or unpredictable behavior results.
VMware Directory Service (VMDIR)
SSL certificate
Provisioned during installation. Starting with vSphere 6.5, the machine SSL certificate
is used as the vmdir certificate.
ESXi
ESXi certificates are stored locally on each host in the /etc/vmware/ssl directory. ESXi certificates are
provisioned by VMCA by default, but you can use custom certificates instead. ESXi certificates are
provisioned when the host is first added to vCenter Server and when the host reconnects.
Machine SSL Certificates
The machine SSL certificate for each node is used to create an SSL socket on the server side. SSL
clients connect to the SSL socket. The certificate is used for server verification and for secure
communication such as HTTPS or LDAPS.
Each node has its own machine SSL certificate. Nodes include vCenter Server instance,
Platform Services Controller instance, or embedded deployment instance. All services that are running on
a node use the machine SSL certificate to expose their SSL endpoints.
The following services use the machine SSL certificate.
n
The reverse proxy service on each Platform Services Controller node. SSL connections to individual
vCenter services always go to the reverse proxy. Traffic does not go to the services themselves.
n
The vCenter service (vpxd) on management nodes and embedded nodes.
n
The VMware Directory Service (vmdir) on infrastructure nodes and embedded nodes.
VMware products use standard X.509 version 3 (X.509v3) certificates to encrypt session information.
Session information is sent over SSL between components.
Solution User Certificates
A solution user encapsulates one or more vCenter Server services. Each solution user must be
authenticated to vCenter Single Sign-On. Solution users use certificates to authenticate to vCenter Single
Sign-On through SAML token exchange.
A solution user presents the certificate to vCenter Single Sign-On when it first has to authenticate, after a
reboot, and after a timeout has elapsed. The timeout (Holder-of-Key Timeout) can be set from the
vSphere Web Client and defaults to 2592000 seconds (30 days).
For example, the vpxd solution user presents its certificate to vCenter Single Sign-On when it connects to
vCenter Single Sign-On. The vpxd solution user receives a SAML token from vCenter Single Sign-On and
can then use that token to authenticate to other solution users and services.
Platform Services Controller Administration
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