Getting Started

This document provides steps to get started with your Private Cloud Director setup.

If you haven't yet, make sure to follow the Pre-requisites to get ready for install.

Step 1 - Setup your Private Cloud Director Instance

The commercial version of Private Cloud Director offers two deployment options: SaaS or Self Hosted. Or you can use the free community edition of Private Cloud Director for your home lab / test setup.

1. SaaS Hosted

With SaaS Hosted model, we setup and host Private Cloud Director in the cloud for you and you consume it as a SaaS service. Your infrastructure still remains in your data center. The SaaS hosted version of Private Cloud Director communicates remotely with your infrastructure to get your private cloud setup and running. This is generally the best option for organizations that prefer the ease of use of SaaS and don't want to manage the technical complexity of hosting the product themselves.

2. Self Hosted

With Self Hosted model, you can host Private Cloud Director on your on hardware in your data center or a co-location hosted data center. This is generally the best option for organizations with extra compliance and security requirements where SaaS hosting is not a viable option.

Follow Install for steps to install the self hosted management plane.

3. Community Edition

Private Cloud Director also offers a community edition that is completely free to download and use.

Follow Community Edition guide for steps to install Private Cloud Director Community Edition.

Step 2 - Create Cluster Blueprint & Virtualized Cluster

Once you have a Private Cloud Director instance setup, next step is to start onboarding your hypervisors. Follow the steps below to create a Cluster Blueprint and start onboarding hypervisors.

1. Create a virtualized cluster blueprint. Follow Cluster Blueprint article for more information on what cluster blueprints are and how to create one.

2. Once the cluster blueprint is created, you are now ready to create one or more virtualized clusters.

3. Follow Create a Virtualized Cluster for steps to create a cluster.

4. Your first virtualized cluster is now created.

Step 3 - Add Hosts to Cluster

1. The next step is to start onboarding your physical servers or hosts and adding them to the cluster.

   1. For SaaS hosted management plane - follow Add a Host (SaaS Deployment)

   2. For Self Hosted or Community Edition - follow Add a Host (Self-Hosted & Community Edition Deployment)

2. Now you will have a number of hosts showing up as unauthorized in your Private Cloud Director UI.

3. Follow Authorize Host And Assign Roles to authorize one or more roles for the hosts and assign them to the cluster.

Step 4 - Create Images and Networks

1. Follow Image Library & Images to create your first image in your image library.

2. Create at least one Virtual Network or Physical Network.

Step 5 - Create Virtual Machines

1. Read Virtual Machines for steps to provision your first virtual machine on your cluster.

Step 6 - Create Kubernetes Cluster

1. Read Getting Started with Kubernetes to create your first Kubernetes cluster using Private Cloud Director.