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We are delighted to share the exciting news that VMware Cloud Director 10.5 is now Generally Available, starting from July 18th, 2023.

This highly anticipated yearly major release brings a multitude of thrilling new features and enhancements that will propel your cloud-based services to new heights. With a strong emphasis on networking advancements, we have introduced new capabilities and enhanced existing ones, empowering you with greater flexibility and control. Additionally, we have streamlined core management features and implemented updates to optimize storage efficiency.

In line with our dedication to ongoing improvement, we have further enhanced the features related to the interoperability of our solutions. This ensures seamless integration with advanced features and updates, allowing for a more streamlined and efficient experience. This milestone release signifies a significant step forward in the evolution of VMware Cloud Director.

NSX Federation with VDC Groups

VMware Cloud Director now offers support for NSX Federation, enabling you to register an NSX Global Manager instance that effectively coordinates security policies across local NSX Manager instances within your VMware Cloud Director environment. With the capability to include up to 4 NSX Manager instances in a single VDC Group, you gain enhanced flexibility. It’s important to note that the utilization of NSX Federation with VMware Cloud Director is specifically limited to Stretched Tier 0 and Tier 1 Gateways. In practical terms, this means that the provider gateway, associated with both your global NSX Manager instance and a data center group, establishes the boundaries of that data center group. By leveraging NSX Federation, you are empowered with greater options in establishing networking availability zones, as you can now distribute NSX Manager instances across different regional data centers, allowing for increased flexibility and scalability.

IP Spaces Migration UI Wizard

Experience the power of seamless migration with the remarkable IP Spaces Migration UI wizard! This extraordinary tool empowers you to effortlessly migrate any provider gateway in your environment from outdated legacy IP blocks to cutting-edge IP spaces. The IP Spaces Migration UI wizard is your key to unlocking a smoother transition and unlocking the full potential of your network infrastructure.

NSX Advanced Load Balancer HTTP Policies

VMware Cloud Director 10.5 introduces a tenant self-service UI for configuring NSX Advanced Load Balancer HTTP policies. This includes HTTP requests, responses, and security policies. With HTTP request policies, you can modify requests before forwarding them, enabling content switching or discarding. HTTP response policies allow the evaluation and modification of virtual application responses and attributes. Additionally, HTTP security policies offer control over request allowances, TCP connection closure, HTTPS redirection, rate limiting, and static page responses during outages. Elevate your virtual services with enhanced configuration capabilities in VMware Cloud Director 10.5

vApp Network (routed) Enhancements

vApp Network NAT rules can now be configured at the VDC level by the provider to be created using Reflexive NAT and Standby Network Relocation.

BGP Enhancements

The new BGP enhancements include the addition of a “Community List” and “Route Maps” tabs. Customers now have the ability to define extra configurations for route redistribution through the newly introduced BGP route maps tab. These route maps are exclusively accessible to provider gateways employing IP spaces. By utilizing the other BGP tabs, users can establish route maps containing IP prefixes and community lists, which are defined on the provider gateway.

Firewall Rule Management

Experience an enhanced user interface in VMware Cloud Director 10.5 for firewall rule expressions. Enjoy the convenience of creating and positioning individual firewall rules within the list without the need to edit the entire rule set. Seamlessly reordered specific firewall rules for improved management. Additionally, easily add IP ranges and individual addresses directly into the Source and Destination text boxes. Gain greater visibility with the new ‘loggingId’ element that aligns firewall rules with NSX ‘rule_ids’. Elevate your firewall rule management with VMware Cloud Director 10.5’s enhanced user experience.

IP Space – Network Topology Config

Autoconfigured Default NAT and Firewall Rules

When utilizing IP spaces, you have the ability to generate and apply automatically configured default SNAT, NO SNAT, and firewall rules on edge gateways and provider gateways within your environment. VMware Cloud Director handles the automatic configuration of SNAT, DNAT, and firewall rules based on the topology of the corresponding IP spaces, as well as their external and internal scopes.

Example for Edge Gateway

Content Hub – Enhanced Catalog and Content Management

Content Hub is the new all-in-one management solution that empowers you to effortlessly create and oversee Catalogs and Application Images. Seamlessly access and retrieve content from multiple sources, including the VMware Marketplace, Helm chart repositories, locally uploaded OVF files, and even import from vCenter or other published catalogs within VCD. Experience the ultimate efficiency and versatility with Content Hub, revolutionizing your content management experience in VMware Cloud Director.

Provider View Tenant view

Support Shortcuts

Starting with VMware Cloud Director 10.5, you can use the following shortcuts for troubleshooting the VMware Cloud Director appliance, VMware Cloud Director on Linux and Bash environment variables to simplify frequently used directory paths.

Upgrade Solution Add-Ons and to Publish Solution Add-Ons to Tenants

With the introduction of VMware Cloud Director 10.5, you now have the capability to upgrade your solution add-on instances whenever a new version is released. Additionally, you have the flexibility to publish solution add-ons to selected or all of your tenants, giving you greater control and customization options. Enjoy the enhanced capabilities of VMware Cloud Director 10.5 in managing and upgrading solution add-ons within your environment.

VM Discovery Configuration (API Only)

From VCD 10.5 onwards, VM discovery has the capability to be disabled globally while still being selectively enabled at both the Organization and Organization VDC levels. It is important to prioritize the most specific setting over the global configuration.

Previously, VM discovery in VCD could be set up globally, at the organization level, and at the OVDC level. However, priority was given in the following order: global level, organization level, and then OVDC level. If VM discovery was disabled at the global level, it couldn’t be changed at the organization or OVDC level. Similarly, if it was disabled at the organization level, it couldn’t be modified at the OVDC level.

From this release onwards, here is the updated combination of capabilities that will be effective.

API to enable new behaviour

https://Toggle AllowOverrideOfVmDiscoveryByOrgAndOVDC to true to enable and false to disable