Lifecycle Management

Introduction “Air-gapped” gets treated as a single scenario in most VCF conversations, you either have internet access or you don’t. VCF 9.1’s software depot architecture disagrees: it defines three distinct connection modes, and the two that cover no-internet environments, Offline Depot and Disconnected, are genuinely different operational models, not two names for the same workaround. Picking the wrong one, or assuming they’re interchangeable, is a common source of confused prechecks during upgrade planning. ...

Introduction Managing the lifecycle of a VMware Cloud Foundation environment has historically required coordinated upgrades across multiple products, ESX, vCenter, NSX, and vSAN, with complex compatibility matrices and manual orchestration. VCF 9 changes this experience by moving lifecycle management into VCF Operations: the SDDC Manager UI is deprecated, and its LCM workflows now live in VCF Operations Fleet Management, giving you a single place to plan and orchestrate upgrades across every domain. ...