Common Installment Requirements
Installing using the VERDEOS method or the RPM method have the same requirements for the majority of use cases for VERDE VDI Hosting. Difference, if any, will be described in the relevant Installation steps outlined in later sections of this document.
VERDE Hosting
VERDE VDI can be installed either on premise or in a hosted cloud environment assuming the cloud hosting is capable of provisioning a dedicated a physical server. We currently host our own VERDE installation in the IBM Cloud where provisioning of physical servers offers this as an option. While you can and normally would run all of the VERDE services on physical servers, it is only a requirement for the VDI desktop delivery services. When running dedicated VERDE services for desktop delivery we refer to those types of servers as VDI servers.
In some installations of VERDE, it may be advantageous to also run a VERDE Cloud Branch installation in a remote office. This provides for high speed LAN-based virtual desktop access when a WAN connection from the remote location is not a viable option. In these cases, the same rules apply to the use of bare metal servers for the designated VDI servers.
The elements of VERDE that can be run in a virtual server are:
- Network attached storage required for managing in a VERDE cluster.
- The VERDE Cluster master and potentially the VERDE Cluster Master failover candidates used for high availability.
- The VERDE Gateway for workload and IP distribution.
- Optionally, any LDAP server used for account authorization and roaming user profiles.
- Optionally, any Third-Party Backup and recovery application management software used for business continuity.
Clustering Requirements
VERDE VDI can consist of a single server installation or can run in a cluster of VERDE servers. There is no predefined limit as to the number of servers that can be supported in a single cluster but shared network bandwidth and shared storage limitations need to be accounted for when evaluating your end user desktop needs.
Once a single server is configured to use shared storage (NAS or SAN), adding additional servers to build a cluster consists of installing VERDE VDI on a new server and configuring the type of services this server will provide. If the server is to be used as a failover Cluster Master it must, at a minimum, be designated as a Cluster Master server.
In a clustered environment, all VERDE servers must be running the same version of VERDE and all servers must be time-synced to the same NTP service.
All of the servers in a cluster must be installed using the same method of installation, either using VERDEOS or RPM based installation. This is also true regarding a Branch server. If a Branch is added, it needs to be the same install method as the CM.