2V0-17.25 VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 Administrator Questions and Answers

Per the VCF 9.0 Automation Provider Management Guide:

Supervisor Activation: “Kubernetes-based workloads require Supervisor to be enabled in the Management Domain before deploying organizations.”

Region Configuration: “Organizations for All Applications must be deployed into a preconfigured Region, defined in the Provider Management Portal.”NSX Federation (D) is optional for multi-site deployments. Supervisor is not activated in workload domains (B) but centrally in the management domain. VMware Kubernetes Service (E) is enabled per tenant but not required before Organization creation. Thus, correct prerequisites are A and C.

VCF 9.0 states for the Simple Automation model: “Single node… Applies to Small… Can be scaled out to the high availability model by resizing the node to Medium or Large, which also forces the scale out to 3 nodes.” In addition, the Day-N procedure confirms the action is a Scale (scale-out) operation: “Scale VCF Automation… choose a larger target deployment type such as Medium or Large…” and provide “Additional VIPs” and a “Cluster Node IP Pool” (Medium requires a minimum of four IPs), then submit the scale out request. Therefore, moving from Small (Simple) to Medium necessarily transitions to the High Availability (3-node) model rather than remaining a single medium node. This aligns the form factor with the documented model behavior and the fleet management workflow.

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In VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9.0, the governance of Virtual Private Clouds (VPCs) allows for granular control over networking parameters. When a VPC is created in VCF 9.0, a VPC Connectivity Profile is automatically generated specifically for that instance if a pre-existing shared profile is not selected.

According to the VCF 9.0 Administration Guide (Networking Section):

VPC Isolation: Each NSX VPC serves as a distinct, isolated administrative and data plane boundary. While multiple VPCs can reside within a single NSX Project, their configurations—including the connectivity profiles—can be managed independently.

Profile Modification Impact: When an administrator edits the NSX Connectivity profile for a specific NSX Project and VPC, the system treats this as a targeted configuration update. Because the profile in this scenario was "generated automatically when the NSX VPC was created," it is uniquely associated with that specific VPC's lifecycle.

Scoped Changes: Modifying this specific profile does not trigger a global update across the entire VCF Automation organization, nor does it affect other VPCs within the project that may be using their own automatically generated or distinct profiles. This ensures that changes to one tenant's or application's networking environment do not cause unintended disruptions to others.

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation:

The VCF Automation Networking Guide (9.0) documents that when an Organization for All Applications is created, networking constructs are provisioned automatically to provide immediate connectivity. Specifically, “During region creation, the system automatically deploys a Default VPC, a Provider Tier-0 Gateway, a VPC connectivity profile, and default SNAT rules to enable outbound access.” .

DNAT rules are not provisioned by default (they must be configured for inbound services). Likewise, NSX Transit Gateway is a multi-region design element, not automatically deployed for a single org setup. A VDS is a vSphere construct and not part of the NSX automation performed at this stage. Therefore, the automatically created items are: Default VPC (A), Provider Tier-0 Gateway (B), SNAT rule (E), and VPC Connectivity Profile (G).

The VCF 9.0 Operations Guide – Views and Reports explains the four types of views available for custom dashboards:

Object Relationship View: Displays dependencies and hierarchy between objects (for example, VMs, hosts, datastores) but does not provide exportable tabular data.

Scoreboard View: Provides a high-level KPI visualization of a few key objects but is not intended for large tabular exports.

List View (Correct): Displays tabular data across many objects, such as CPU, memory, and disk metrics for VMs. The guide states: “List views are useful when you want to compare metrics across multiple objects and can be exported to CSV for further analysis.”

Trend View: Focuses on historical data and growth over time, but export to CSV is not its primary purpose.

Because the security team requires both tabular comparison of VM resource usage and the ability to export the data to CSV, the List View is the only option that meets both requirements.

In VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0, when deploying vSphere Supervisor (formerly part of Tanzu) specifically with VMware NSX as the networking provider, the architecture relies on the high-performance routing capabilities of the NSX fabric.

According to the VCF 9.0 Developer Ready Infrastructure Guide:

When NSX is selected as the networking stack for the Supervisor, the system utilizes Distributed Gateways (T1) to handle the routing for the supervisor's internal and external traffic.

Distributed Gateway (C): In an NSX-integrated Supervisor deployment, the East-West traffic and the localized routing for the Kubernetes Control Plane and Pod networking are handled by the Distributed Gateway. This ensures that routing occurs at the host level (kernel space) where possible, minimizing latency and "hairpinning" to a centralized edge node.

Why others are incorrect: * Avi Load Balancer (A): While Avi (NSX Advanced Load Balancer) is the preferred load balancer for VCF 9.0, the question asks for the "networking connectivity type" for the Supervisor deployment itself. Avi provides the Load Balancing service (ingress/egress), but the underlying routing connectivity type is the Distributed Gateway.

Data Network Subnet (B): This is a general networking term and not a specific "connectivity type" construct within the NSX Supervisor deployment workflow.

Centralized Gateway (D): While a Tier-0/Tier-1 gateway can have centralized services (like NAT or Statefull Firewall), the standard connectivity model for Supervisor namespaces to maintain performance and scale across the VCF hosts is the Distributed Gateway.

The VCF Operations Dashboards Guide describes the Storage Overview dashboard:

“The Storage Overview dashboard provides visibility into capacity, performance, and health across vSAN and non-vSAN datastores. Administrators can track datastore utilization, latency, throughput, and availability from a single pane of glass.”

Diagnostic Findings (B) shows troubleshooting insights, not full storage details. Data Protection & Recovery (C) covers backup/replication information. VCF Health (D) focuses on SDDC Manager, vCenter, NSX, and host health, not datastore metrics.

Therefore, the required datastore overview is accessed through the Storage Overview dashboard in VCF Operations.

The VCF 9.0 Operations Policies Guide explains how to extend and scope monitoring policies:

Create a child policy under the existing Organization Policy (C): Policies can inherit settings from parent policies. By creating a child policy under Organization Policy, administrators can apply additional metrics without overriding global policies.

Create a Custom Group (F): Custom Groups allow dynamic membership based on naming conventions or criteria. In this case, business-critical VMs can be grouped automatically by naming schema.

Assign the Custom Group to the new child policy (B): This ensures that the additional metrics only apply to the business-critical VMs in the Custom Group.

Incorrect options:

Custom Datacenters (A, D) are not required; the grouping requirement can be met with Custom Groups.

Creating the policy under Base Settings (E) would apply globally rather than inheriting from the Organization Policy.

The VCF 9.0 Design Guide highlights that for resiliency across sites with RPO = 0, the recommended approach is a vSAN Stretched Cluster. Documentation states: “Stretched clusters provide site-level resilience by mirroring data across two fault domains (sites). In the event of a full site outage, workloads remain available with no data loss (RPO = 0).” Relocating six hosts to another site creates the two fault domains required for vSAN Stretched Cluster. Options B and C provide backup or redundancy but not synchronous replication with zero RPO. Option D (fault domains) protects against host/rack failures, not entire data center loss. Therefore, the correct solution is to relocate hosts and configure a stretched cluster.

VCF provides integrated automation and orchestration for Day 0–2 operations, including networking: VCF is a “full-stack IaaS” with “automation and orchestration to simplify Day 0, Day 1, and Day 2 tasks.” VCF supports modern apps: users can provision “VMs” and “Kubernetes workloads” from self-service services, proving both VM and container support. Multi-tenancy with strong isolation is native: Organizations are “secure and isolated” boundaries; All Apps organizations run “virtual machines (VMs), Kubernetes… multiple tenants with secure infrastructure isolation.”

Incorrect choices: VCF is not limited to vSAN only (supports VMFS/NFS/CNS as documented elsewhere) and does not rely on manual scalability—automation is core. Compliance is provided within the private cloud, not only by a CSP.

In VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0, the construct of VM Applications Organizations was deprecated in favor of All Applications Organizations. The documentation highlights this change:

“Organizations for All Applications provide a unified model for managing both VM and Kubernetes workloads. They support third-party integrations such as Tanzu Salt and Active Directory, and enable deployments to Native Public Cloud endpoints.”

Since the customer upgraded from VCF 5.2, their first new Organization after the upgrade must use the All Applications model. VM Applications Organizations (Option A) are legacy and do not support the full feature set such as NPC or third-party integrations. Option C is incorrect because the Fleet Management API is for monitoring and operational insights, not for creating Organizations.

Therefore, the administrator must create the new Organization as an All Applications Organization in the VCF Automation Provider Management Portal.

The Container Storage Interface (CSI) is a Kubernetes-standard interface that allows container orchestration platforms to provision and manage storage systems.

The VMware documentation explains:

“The CSI driver enables Kubernetes clusters to dynamically provision and manage persistent volumes backed by vSphere storage.”

CSI is necessary because:

Containers are ephemeral by nature, but applications often require persistent storage for stateful workloads.

CSI enables dynamic provisioning, attach/detach, resizing, and snapshot operations for persistent volumes.

Incorrect options:

CSI does not replace all third-party interfaces (A).

CSI does not merely detect storage (B).

Ephemeral storage (C) is handled natively by container runtimes and does not require CSI.

Therefore, CSI is necessary because it provides persistent storage functionality to containers.

The Storage Overview dashboard in VCF Operations provides consolidated visibility into storage resources, including:

vSAN datastores

VMFS datastores

NFS datastores

Capacity utilization

Performance metrics

Health indicators

The VCF documentation states:

“The Storage Overview dashboard provides a unified view of storage capacity, performance, and health across vSAN and non-vSAN datastores.”

Other options are not suitable:

VCF Health (A) focuses on component health (vCenter, NSX, ESXi).

Data Protection & Recovery (B) covers backup and DR insights.

Diagnostic Findings (C) highlights detected issues but not comprehensive storage inventory.

Thus, the correct location is the Storage Overview dashboard.

Istio Service Mesh provides built-in capabilities for managing service-to-service communication within Kubernetes environments.

The Istio documentation highlights default capabilities including:

Service discovery (C): Automatic detection and routing between services.

Mutual TLS (mTLS) encryption (E): Secure communication between services by default.

Istio does not provide:

Multi-cluster backup/restore (A) — handled by tools such as Velero.

Cluster conformance validation (B).

Advanced container runtime (D) — container runtime is handled by container engines such as containerd.

Thus, the correct answers are Service discovery and Connection encryption.

In VMware Cloud Foundation, lifecycle management boundaries are defined at the workload domain level. If independent lifecycle and scaling control is required, the cluster must be deployed as a separate workload domain.

VCF 9.0 supports workload domains that either:

Use a dedicated NSX instance, or

Share an existing NSX Manager instance.

Because the requirement only states independent lifecycle and scaling (not network isolation), the correct and efficient approach is to:

Deploy the new cluster as a new workload domain with shared NSX.

Deploying within an existing workload domain (A or B) would tie lifecycle operations together.

Deploying with a new NSX instance (C) is unnecessary unless full NSX isolation is required.

Thus, the correct action is D.

The VCF 9.0 Operations Documentation identifies Operations for Networks as the key enabler for the Network Operations feature:

“VCF Operations for Networks (formerly vRNI) provides visibility into network traffic flows, NSX fabric health, application dependency mapping, and micro-segmentation planning. It integrates directly into VCF Operations dashboards under Network Operations.”

The vDefend firewall is unrelated, as it provides workload-level security. The VCF Operations Collector is required for telemetry ingestion but does not provide full Network Operations. NSX itself provides the underlying virtual networking, but it must be monitored through VCF Operations for Networks. Therefore, the correct answer is VCF Operations for Networks.

The VCF 9.0 Upgrade Documentation clearly outlines a staged upgrade sequence: “The upgrade to VCF 9.0 begins with the SDDC Manager upgrade. Only after SDDC Manager is upgraded to 9.0 are the other component bundles (vCenter, ESXi, NSX, Operations) made available for download and application.”

This design ensures SDDC Manager is compatible with the lifecycle operations required for the rest of the environment. If SDDC Manager is not upgraded first, it cannot process or display other bundles. Offline repositories (A), proxy servers (B), or ASYNC tools (C) do not affect the bundle visibility order. Therefore, the correct answer is D. SDDC Manager must be upgraded first.

The VCF 9.0 Operations Access Control Guide describes how dashboard sharing and user access is managed:

Identity Broker Authentication (D):All external users must authenticate via the VCF Identity Broker, which integrates with Active Directory, LDAP, or other identity providers. Documentation states: “Identity Broker provides single sign-on and federation, ensuring users are authenticated consistently across VCF Operations and Automation services.”

Grant Access to Dashboard (E):After authentication, the administrator must explicitly grant access to the dashboard for the specified group. This ensures that only the intended users can view or interact with the dashboard.

Set Time-Bound Access (C):VCF Operations supports time-bound access policies. The documentation specifies: “Access can be granted with an expiration period, ensuring access is automatically revoked after the configured interval (for example, 90 days).” This aligns with the 3-month requirement.

Other options are not suitable:

Reports (A) only send static data, not interactive dashboard access.

Embedded code (B, F) bypasses access control and does not provide authentication or time-limited sharing, which violates the security requirement.

Thus, the correct three steps are: Use Identity Broker (D), Grant access to dashboard (E), and Configure 3-month access expiration (C).

Velero is an open-source Kubernetes backup and restore solution integrated into VMware Cloud Foundation for Kubernetes management. The VCF 9.0 Kubernetes Services Documentation describes it as:

“Velero provides backup, recovery, and migration of Kubernetes cluster resources and persistent volumes.”

Key functionality includes:

Backup and restore of Kubernetes objects such as deployments, services, and namespaces.

Data protection for persistent volumes via storage snapshots.

Migration capabilities across clusters.

Analysis of incorrect options:

Publishing DNS records (A) is handled by CoreDNS or external DNS integrations, not Velero.

Monitoring cluster services (B) is the role of Kubernetes health checks and observability tools like Prometheus, not Velero.

Collecting logs and data (C) is done by logging stacks such as Fluent Bit or VCF Operations for Logs.

Therefore, Velero’s primary role is backup and restore of Kubernetes clusters.

The VCF 9.0 Installation Guide describes the VCF Download Tool for dark sites:

“For environments without Internet access, use the VCF Download Tool on a connected machine to download required bundles and transfer them to the air-gapped VCF environment.”

Broadcom Downloads (B) is the source but not the workflow for dark sites. The VCF Installer (C) consumes binaries but does not fetch them. SDDC Manager (D) manages bundles in connected mode but cannot download in disconnected environments.

Thus, the correct method for dark sites is A. Use the VCF Download Tool.

After configuring SSO in VCF, administrators must assign appropriate roles in the management components to grant elevated privileges.

VCF 9.0 architecture includes these primary management components:

vCenter Server (A) – Manages clusters and VMs.

NSX Manager (B) – Manages networking and security services.

VCF Operations (D) – Provides monitoring and operational visibility.

Roles must be assigned within each of these systems to allow full administrative access.

vSAN (E) and ESX (F) are managed through vCenter, not independently assigned service roles.

VCF Installer (C) is used for deployment and does not require ongoing RBAC assignments for operations.

Therefore, the correct components are vCenter, NSX Manager, and VCF Operations.

In NSX 4.x integrated with VCF 9.0, default segment security profiles block DHCP servers by default. The NSX Admin Guide states: “To allow DHCP servers on a segment, edit the applied segment security profile and set the DHCP Server Block option to NO.”

Cloning profiles (B, C) is an optional best practice but not required for functionality. The DHCP server block resides in the security profile, not the IP discovery profile, making C and D incorrect. Therefore, the required step is to edit the default segment security profile, set DHCP Server Block = NO, and apply it.

To integrate VCF Automation with an external CMDB (such as ServiceNow) for compliance and tracking of Kubernetes or VM resources, the system utilizes a specific extensibility framework. According to the VCF 9.0 documentation on "Integrating VCF Automation for ITSM with ServiceNow":

Event Subscriptions (D): These act as the trigger mechanism within the VCF Automation Event Broker Service. When a resource (such as a Kubernetes cluster or deployment) is provisioned, an event is published. An administrator creates a subscription to listen for these specific lifecycle events (e.g., Compute.PostProvision or Kubernetes-specific topics) to initiate the registration process.

VCF Operations orchestrator (B): This is the orchestration engine (formerly known as VMware Aria Automation Orchestrator or vRO). Documentation specifies that for CMDB and ITSM compliance, VCF Automation is integrated with VCF Operations orchestrator workflows. These workflows contain the complex technical logic required to:

Separate objects and feed inputs into technical integration tasks.

Handle API tokens and authentication for the external CMDB.

Execute the REST API calls to the CMDB (e.g., to the cmdb_ci_vmware_instance table).

Update custom properties (like serviceNowSysId) back into the deployment for future decommissioning lifecycle events.

Extract from VCF 9.0 Documentation:

"Enterprise users commonly integrate their Cloud Management Platform with an IT Service Management (ITSM) and Configuration Management Database (CMDB) platform for compliance. Following this example, you can integrate VCF Automation with ServiceNow for CMDB and ITSM using VCF Operations Orchestrator Client... This integration uses Event Subscriptions to trigger VCF Operations Orchestrator workflows."

The VCF 9.0 Upgrade Guide specifies required components when converting from a vSphere-only deployment to full VCF. The must-deploy services include:

VCF Operations fleet management – central monitoring of multiple instances.

VCF Operations – core operational monitoring platform.

VCF Operations Collector – required for data ingestion from vSphere, NSX, and vSAN.The Identity Broker is already embedded with VCF 9.0 SSO, while VCF Operations for Logs and Networks are optional add-ons for extended visibility. Thus, the required three are: A, D, F.

The VCF 9.0 Operations Guide – Metrics and Super Metrics explains that super metrics are used when administrators need to aggregate or compute new values from existing metrics. Super metrics can be applied across multiple objects, such as aggregating the health score of all VMs in a fleet.

The documentation states:

“A super metric is a user-defined formula that calculates a value derived from one or more existing metrics. Super metrics can be applied across objects to provide aggregate insights such as averages or totals.”

Dashboard (A): Dashboards can display metrics but cannot compute new aggregated values on their own.

Symptom (C): Used to define conditions that trigger alerts, not to compute average health values.

Alert (D): Alerts notify administrators of issues but do not calculate averages across many VMs.

Therefore, to display the average health score of all VMs across multiple clusters, the administrator must create a super metric and then visualize it in a dashboard.

The requirement is to ensure DNS records are created only when a domain name is provided.

Since the blueprint includes a custom property for domainName, the correct conditional logic in the event subscription must validate that this property is not null.

Adding the condition:

event.data.customProperties['domainName'] != null

ensures the workflow executes only when the domain name is provided.

Option B validates hostname instead of domain name.

Option A controls workflow blocking, not conditional execution.

Option C relates to cleanup, not creation condition validation.

In VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0, configuration drift detection is handled through VCF Operations Configuration Management integrated with vSphere Configuration Profiles.

According to the VCF 9.0 documentation:

vCenter Version Requirement (D):Configuration drift monitoring requires vCenter 8.0 Update 3 or later, as this introduces the enhanced configuration profile capabilities necessary for drift comparison.

Create a Configuration Template (E):VCF Operations requires a defined baseline configuration template to compare cluster states against.

Assign the Template to a Policy (F):Policies enforce and monitor configuration compliance. Assigning the template to a policy allows drift detection against the desired state.

Incorrect options:

vCenter 9.0 (A) is not required; 8.0 U3 is sufficient.

A collector (B) is not specifically required for drift detection.

Scheduling drift detection (C) is part of policy evaluation, not a standalone mandatory step.

Configuring vSphere Configuration Profiles (G) is beneficial but not mandatory for drift monitoring via VCF Operations.

Thus, the three required steps are: vCenter 8.0 U3 or later, create a configuration template, and assign it to a policy.

A VM Class predefines hardware for Supervisor-managed VMs: “The VM class… defines such parameters as the number of virtual CPUs, memory capacity, and reservation settings.”

Administration steps show these are configurable: “You can configure hardware resources such as CPU, memory, and different devices” when editing a VM class.

Additionally, the DCLI/API specification underscores CPU and Memory fields: “--cpu-count … Required.” and “--memory-mb … Required.” for a VM class.

While network adapters, PCI devices, and instance storage can also be added via advanced config, the question asks for two; CPU and Memory are canonical, always-present VM Class resources per the core definition above.

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