Create services

This topic describes how to define an offering that BMC My Cloud Services Console users can choose in a service catalog when they are provisioning virtual machines (VMs).

• A service describes a function or capability that a cloud administrator makes available to users in the cloud. Application stacks, single servers, and adding a new account to a Microsoft Exchange server are all examples of services. For more general information about services, see Services overview.

• A service blueprint enables you to design, manage, and build all of the underlying components, operations, and resource sets that define a service. A service blueprint is required to create a requestable service. For overview information about service blueprints, see Service blueprints overview.

This topic contains the following sections:

To create system objects in BMC Server Automation

BMC Cloud Lifecycle Management uses BMC Server Automation for provisioning. You must perform the following configuration tasks in BMC Server Automation so that BMC Cloud Lifecycle Management can provision VMs and bare metal machines, and perform unattended installations of operating systems on servers:

1. Create virtual guest packages (VGPs) as objects and store them in the Depot.

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   VGPs can be used to deploy:

   • • A new VMware virtual machine (VM) on a VMware vCenter server. See Creating a VGP in BMC Server Automation for a vCenter environment.
     • A new VM on a Citrix XenServer. See Creating the VGP in BMC Server Automation for Citrix XenServer.
     • A new LPAR on an IBM frame. See Creating the VGP in BMC Server Automation for IBM LPAR.
     • A new VM on a Microsoft Hyper-V. See Creating the VGP in BMC Server Automation for Hyper-V.

2. Create system packages as objects and store them in the Depot.

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   System packages are used by BMC Cloud Lifecycle Management to perform unattended installations of operating systems onto new machines (bare metal machines) or to reprovision existing machines. System packages are a consistent, logical way to represent the values passed to the operating system installer. Optionally, a system package can also run a job to further configure the server. You should set up a different system package for each type of server you plan to provision. For details, see Creating a system package in BMC Server Automation.

3. Set up all the functional components of the BMC Server Automation provisioning system.

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   BMC Server Automation uses Pre-boot Execution Environment (PXE) for provisioning Windows, Linux, ESX, and ESXi servers. For details, see Configuring BMC Server Automation for unattended server installations.

4. Run the Publish Product Catalog Job in BMC Server Automation to retrieve the list of component templates, virtual guest packages (VGP), and system packages that you have created and publish them to the Product Catalog. See Publishing the Product Catalog.

To build service blueprints

Service blueprints define the software, hardware, and deployment options for a service in the Service Catalog. A service blueprint is required before you can create a service. For service blueprint overview information, see Service blueprints overview.

After creating a service blueprint, you can use the blueprint when creating a service.

To create new services for the Service Catalog

A service is the utility that an organization provides and is defined by its service offerings, requestable offerings, and service level targets. For example, the Calbro IT organization offers an email service, which includes gold and silver service offerings that have service level targets based on response times.

In the Service Catalog, a service must have at least one service offering and can have one or more requestable offerings.

To create a service offering

A service offering defines a level of service for a price; it combines the service (utility) and a service level target (warranty) to bring value to the customer. When you create a service level target in the Service Catalog, it does not create a record in or retrieve data from BMC Service Level Management.

To create a requestable offering

To create a post-deployment action

Using a post-deploy action (also known as a Transaction Requestable Offering or TRO) you can specify which options that end-users can change on Day 2 of a deployment (to existing services). For example, you configure the service offering so that end-users can only add memory to their Apache Server after the system is provisioned.

With a post-deploy action, your options are somewhat limited. There are eight options you can select, such as Software Packages or Parameters on Day 2 of a deployment (for example, after the VM is provisioned). You create the post-deploy action with the Service Request Designer.

Where to go next

Configure tenants and tenant users