Runecast has launched on 19th of November a new version of their product. In this Runecast Analyzer v4.7.4 for NSX-T Kubernetes and vCloud Director review, I will go through all the new features and how Runecast can work and protect your NSX-T, Kubernetes infrastructures, and also vCloud Director (still in a kind of beta version).

• How to add your Kubernetes to Runecast Analyzer

For this section, I would like to test some of our Kubernetes implementations that we have in production but could not have teams create the user create in time to use it in this blog post. So I decide to use the Runecast Demo to provide the proper information and show the type of issues that we can scan with Runecast Analyzer.

If, meanwhile, I get access to our production Kubernetes, I will update this post with real examples.

To add your Kubernetes to Runecast Analyzer, you need to go to Settings and in the Connections tab, scroll down to the Kubernetes section, and click Add Kubernetes.

Note: To add Kubernetes to Runecast Analyzer, you need to add Kubernetes cluster API address, port, and service account token.

• • How to create user and Token in Kubernetes?

Use the following commands to create a service account and output the account token.

1 – Set the namespace where the service account will be created

2 – Create the service account

3 – Create clusterrole

4 – Bind the clusterrole

5 – Output the service account token

After you create your user account and token, add to Runecast Analyzer.

Then you have Kubernetes connected(the next example is from the Online Runecaste Demo).

This is the Kubernetes Main Dashboard.

Note: If you want to view only the Kubernetes or other products (like NSX-T or vCD), always select in the product list.

As we can check in the example, a lot of Best Practices need to be fixed. You will have the list of the Best Practices to be fixed, but you will also know the Best Practices for Kubernetes just with one Runecast Analyzer scan.

Note: Again, this is from Online Runecast Demo.

Again, we can click on a Best Practices issue and get the details for that fail issue.

• How to add your vCloud Director to Runecast Analyzer

vCloud Director(vCD) Runecast Analyzer support is still in Early Access. Meaning that it is still in development and is the first version. Runecast Analyzer for vCD is only supported for vCD v10 and above.

If you try to add a vCD v9.x, you will get some errors and cannot add the vCD. I don’t know if Runecast is planing to add earlier versions in the next versions, but since those use Flash and v10.x uses HTML5, I don’t this it will be supported.

Unfortunately, in production, I only have vCD 9.x (upgrade is already planned for Q1 2021), so I cannot test this new feature in a real production environment. So I will use some examples from my lab vCD and some from the Online Runecast Analyzer Demo.

To connect your Runecast Analyzer to vCD, it needs a minimum user role with View only permissions privileges on the vCD provider.

As we have seen in the other connections, to add vCD, you need to go to Settings and in the Connections tab, scroll down to the vCD section, and click Add VMware Cloud Director.

Again, after adding the Product to your Runecast Analyzer, scan and let Runecast Analyzer search for any Best Practices and Issues in your vCD.

Here we can see an example of my lab vCD v10.1 with some Best Practices not implemented.

Click in one example of Certificates Best Practices that are not implemented.

Some examples of the Online Runecaste Analyzer Demo from Runecast.

In this example, we notice more properly configured issues, but also that patches are available and are not installed.

Clicking in the patches issues to get the details and seeing the patches’ information are missed.

Note: When I upgrade my production vCD, I will update this post with real examples.

Resuming:

I have said this many times when it comes to saying something about Runecast Analyzer, which is the best and unique tool that I know that has all these features and supported VMware Products to scan for Best Practices, Issues, and Hardware incompatibilities or any security miss configurations that we may have in our implementations.

Runecast now adds these three new products, NSX-T, Kubernetes, and vCD, which is again a huge improvement on the tool, and also Runecast team is on top of the new and most important VMware Products (and not forget Pure Storage) because those are the ones that customers use on their daily work.

As an example of the great work and how useful this tool is, we receive last month a new Pure Storage system, so after everything is in place, I run the Runecast on it to check if everything was configured properly and that Best Practices were all implemented when used with VMware (vCenter, ESXi hosts and VMs).

As we can notice, some changes need to be done to the ESXi hosts iSCSI adapters. It is also very important to change the VMs virtual controller to Paravirtual to have better performance.

I think this is a tool that all IT departments/companies should have and use to help them to have a safe Virtual Infrastructure with all the Security Compliance. like VMware Guidelines, ISA STIG, PCI DSS, HIPAA, BSI IT-Grundschutz, CIS, NIST,  GDPR, ISO 27001.

Have an infrastructure fully configured with the Best Practices for the different VMware products, but also have the proper compatible Hardware that VMware recommends in their HCL List.

I hope this blog post, Runecast Analyzer v4.7.4 for NSX-T Kubernetes and vCloud Director review, helped show the new features in this new Runecast Anaylzyer v4.7.4 and the type of issues that we can discover in these new supported VMware products.

Useful links:

You can try Runecast Analyzer with Analyzer-online-demo.

Runecast is scheduling many VMUGs online meetings and Webinars HERE, check them out.

Download and register for Runecast Analyzer v4.7.4 trial HERE.

Here you can check most of the information I have shown in this blog post. Particular the user configuration and permissions needed, Runecast User Guide