Managing zones

Grouping servers and engine hosts into zones based on their physical proximity—as well as assigning to those zones a specific remote storage—streamlines the deployment process. For more information, see Zones and Remote storage.

Before you begin

To add a zone, ensure that you already defined servers and engine hosts that you will use for the deployment. For more information, see Managing servers and Managing engines and engine hosts.
To assign a remote storage to a zone, make sure you created a remote storage, and that it is physically located within the geographical area of a zone.

To add a zone

Add a zone to group the servers and engine hosts based on their physical proximity.

1. On the Define tab, from the left menu, click Zones.
2. Click New Zone.
3. Enter the zone name into the Name field. For example, Austin.
4. Click Create.

To add servers and engine hosts to a zone

1. Under System > Zones, on the Servers tab, click Add Servers.

2. From the list of the available servers, click the servers that you want to add to a zone you are creating, and then click the Submit  icon.

   Note

   Servers and engine hosts can only be assigned to one zone at a time. If you want to assign a server to a different zone, first remove the server from the previous zone.

3. On the Engine Hosts tab, click Add Engine Host.
4. From the list of the available engine hosts, click the engine hosts that you want to add to a zone that you are creating, and then click the Submit  icon.

To add a property to a zone

1. Under System > Zones, on the Properties tab, click Add Property.
2. Specify a property name in the field that appears under the Name column and specify a corresponding property value in the field appearing under the Value column.
3. If you want to encrypt the property, click the Encrypt  icon.
4. Click the Submit  icon  to save your details (or changes) or click the Cancel   icon to exit without saving any details (or changes).

For more information about property precedence in BMC Release Package and Deployment, see Properties.

To assign remote storage to a zone

1. Under System > Zones, on the Properties tab, click Add Property.
2. Enter the name and the value for the property:
   • Name: For example,  Austin_remote_storage
   • Value: Enter the path to the physical location of the remote storage folder in the platform-specific format, and then click the Submit  icon.
     • (Windows) C:\Austin remote storage\....
     • (Linux) /opt/Austin remote storage/....
3. Under Define > Processes, click to open the process to which you want to link the remote storage, and add a new activity to it:
   • Name: Enter a name for the activity. For example, Austin remote activity.
   • Library: From the library menu, select Send Instance Content or Send Named Content.
   • Click Create. 
4. Under the Configure tab, in the Remote Storage field, enter the name of the property in the following format:
   ${property_name}
   For example:  ${Austin_remote_storage}
5. Click Save, and then click Done.

Now every time you run the deployment using this process, the specified remote storage will be used.

To remove a zone

To remove a zone, you must first remove all the servers and engine hosts associated with it.

1. On the Servers tab under System > Zones, remove the servers associated with a zone by hovering over the Actions  menu, and clicking Remove.
2. On the Engine Hosts tab under System > Zones, remove the engine hosts associated with a zone by hovering over the Actions  menu, and clicking Remove.
3. Under System > Zones, hover over the Actions  menu to the right of the zone that you want to remove, and click Remove.