Deploying
VMware Cloud Foundation

You begin the
VMware Cloud Foundation
deployment process by deploying the
VMware Cloud Builder appliance
. The
VMware Cloud Builder appliance
includes the
VMware Imaging Appliance service
, which you can use to image your servers with ESXi software. After imaging your servers, you download and complete the deployment parameters workbook from the
VMware Cloud Builder appliance
to define your network information, host details, and other required information. During the deployment process, this workbook is uploaded to the
VMware Cloud Builder appliance
, where a JSON file is generated to drive the bring-up process. The provided information is validated, and the automated phase of the bring-up process begins.
You must prepare your environment for deploying
VMware Cloud Foundation
. See the
Planning and Preparation Workbook
.
You can perform bring-up with certificates generated by an external CA, in which case
ESXi
certificates are not replaced with
vCenter Server
signed certificates. If you use external certificates for
ESXi
hosts in the management domain, hosts added after bring-up must also be added with external certificates. This feature is supported only through APIs. For more information, see Deploy the Management Domain Using ESXi Hosts with External Certificates.