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.

The VCF Automation Provider Networking Guide states:

“Before you can configure Provider Networking, an active Tier-0 (T0) Gateway must be created in NSX Manager and associated with the Provider region.”

This gateway provides external routing and forms the foundation for VPC and tenant networking. Creating a T0 at the Organization level (A) is not correct—organizations consume Provider networking but do not create T0s. vDS in Provider Management (C) or vCenter (D) is unrelated to NSX-based provider networking.

Thus, the required prerequisite is: Create a T0 Gateway in NSX Manager.

Memory tiering in modern vSphere environments allows hosts to utilize different memory technologies (e.g., DRAM and persistent memory tiers) to optimize cost and performance.

The vSphere documentation explains:

“Memory tiering enables efficient placement of memory pages across different memory types, optimizing performance and capacity for memory-intensive workloads.”

The primary use case is for:

Large in-memory databases

Analytics workloads

Memory-intensive applications

Incorrect options:

It does not primarily reduce swap for small VMs (A).

It does not directly boost CPU throughput (B).

It does not address host availability during hardware failure (C).

Thus, memory tiering is best suited for optimizing memory usage for large, memory-intensive workloads.

When using Fibre Channel (FC) as the principal storage type for a workload domain in VMware Cloud Foundation, storage must already be provisioned and visible to all participating ESXi hosts.

The VCF documentation specifies that for VMFS on FC deployments:

Storage LUNs must be created on the SAN.

The LUNs must be zoned and presented to all ESXi hosts.

Hosts must be able to detect the presented LUNs before domain creation.

Incorrect options:

SSD disks (A) are required for vSAN, not Fibre Channel.

Port binding (B) is required for iSCSI, not FC.

A VMkernel interface for storage (D) is required for IP-based storage (NFS/iSCSI), not Fibre Channel.

Therefore, the key prerequisite is ensuring LUNs are presented to all ESXi hosts.

To enable the visibility of audit events within the VCF Operations interface, the environment must satisfy specific deployment and configuration prerequisites. Without these steps, audit event information will not be populated.

According to the documentation:

Install VCF Operations for Logs (E): If you have not configured VCF Operations, you will not see any information related to audit events. Therefore, you must install VCF Operations for Logs first.

Configure vCenter Server instances in VCF Operations for Logs (D): You must register the vCenter Server instances in VCF Operations for Logs to ensure the management components are sending the necessary log data to the ingestion engine.

Configure VCF Operations for Logs Integration in VCF Operations (F): After you install VCF Operations for Logs, you must configure the VCF Operations for Logs management pack from the Administration > Integrations page in VCF Operations. This includes configuring the VCF Operations for Logs instances which forward logs to the specific VCF Operations for Logs instance that is integrated with VCF Operations.

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.

According to the VCF 9.0 Operations and vSAN Integration Guide, performance metrics in the vSAN Cluster Performance widget are only available when the vSAN Performance Service is enabled. The documentation states:

“The vSAN Performance Service must be enabled in vCenter Server for each vSAN cluster to collect and visualize performance statistics in VCF Operations. Without this service, performance dashboards and widgets will not display data.”

Option A (Support Insight) relates to telemetry with VMware, not performance widgets.

Option B (Cloud proxy as Collector) is required for general collection but not specific to vSAN widget visibility.

Option C (SMART data collection) provides disk health analytics, not cluster-level performance stats.

Option D is correct, because enabling the vSAN Performance Service ensures that VCF Operations receives and displays data in the vSAN Performance dashboards.

Therefore, the administrator must enable the vSAN Performance Service for all vSAN clusters in vCenter.

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.

The VCF 9.0 Architecture Guide outlines valid principal storage options for the management domain. It states: “The management domain must be deployed using vSAN, NFS, or Fibre Channel (FC). Supported protocols include NFSv3 and VMFS on FC.” vSAN (including OSA) is the default recommended option, but NFSv3 and VMFS on FC are also supported for environments where external storage arrays are required.

NVMe/TCP and vVols are not supported for the initial management domain’s principal storage. vVols may be used in workload domains after deployment, but they are not a supported foundation for the management domain. Therefore, the three correct storage solutions for the first management workload domain are: VMFS on FC, NFSv3, and vSAN OSA.

In VCF 9.x, air-gapped bring-up requires staging the required binaries in the VCF Installer. The documented list explicitly includes NSX and VCF Operations among the components to upload. The product guide states: “VMware Cloud Foundation required binaries include… NSX … VMware Cloud Foundation Operations … vCenter … SDDC Manager…” (exact list excerpt). This list does not call for ESX images or the legacy “Lifecycle Manager.”

Therefore, from the given options the two binaries that must be uploaded are NSX and VCF Operations. ESX is pre-imaged on hosts per preparation guidance and is not a required VCF Installer binary; “Lifecycle Manager” is not used in VCF 9.0 bring-up.

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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.

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.

According to the VCF 9.0 Operations and Monitoring Guide:

Fleet Management: “VCF Operations Fleet Management enables cross-instance monitoring, unifying health and metrics across multiple VCF instances.”

Operations for Networks: “Provides application and network visibility, dependency mapping, and traffic analytics. Required to complete full-stack monitoring.”

Core VCF Operations is already deployed as part of the management stack and does not need to be added separately. Operations for Logs is optional for log aggregation, not mandatory for full-stack observability. The Management Pack Builder (C) is an add-on tool for custom packs, not a required component. Therefore, the correct two to add for full-stack monitoring are VCF Operations Fleet Management (A) and VCF Operations for Networks (E).

The vSphere 9.0 Resource Management Guide describes Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (EVC) as the mechanism that masks CPU instruction set differences across ESXi hosts, presenting a consistent baseline to VMs.

The documentation states:

“EVC ensures vMotion compatibility across hosts with different CPU generations by exposing a uniform set of CPU features to all virtual machines in the cluster.”

vSphere Fault Tolerance (A): Provides continuous availability for individual VMs but does not address CPU instruction compatibility.

vSphere Availability (B): Refers to HA (High Availability) which handles VM failover, not CPU feature alignment.

Host Affinity Rules (C): Control placement of VMs but cannot solve compatibility between mixed CPU generations.

Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (D): Specifically addresses the requirement for vMotion and DRS across mixed CPU generations, making it the correct answer.

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 VCF 9.0 Convergence and Migration Guide outlines prerequisites and unsupported configurations when moving from a standalone vSphere deployment into VCF-managed workload domains.

Enhanced Linked Mode (ELM) must be removed:VCF does not support multiple vCenters joined in Enhanced Linked Mode. Each workload domain has its own dedicated vCenter instance, managed by SDDC Manager. The documentation states:“Before convergence, Enhanced Linked Mode must be deactivated. VCF requires independent vCenters for each workload domain.”

Lifecycle Manager must use Images only:VCF lifecycle operations are exclusively image-based. Baselines are not supported.“All clusters managed by VCF must be converted to vSphere Lifecycle Manager image-based lifecycle management prior to convergence.”

Other options are not required:

25 Gbps uplinks (A) are recommended for high throughput but not mandatory; 10 Gbps uplinks are supported.

An additional vMotion VMkernel (C) is not required by default, as standard vMotion networking is included in convergence designs.

vSphere Standard Switches (D) are not supported; VCF requires Distributed Switches, and existing vDS configurations can be adapted.

Therefore, the two configurations that must change are: Deactivate Enhanced Linked Mode (B) and switch Lifecycle Manager to Images only (E).

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.

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.

VCF 9.0 replaces legacy bring-up tooling with the VCF Installer, which provides a deployment wizard that validates configuration before bring-up. The guide describes: “The deployment wizard validates your inputs… and displays errors and warnings if any.” and that administrators “Download and complete the planning and preparation workbook and have the information ready for validating inputs in the deployment wizard.”

While the workbook is used to collect information, the validation of those inputs is performed by the VCF Installer wizard prior to deployment. SDDC Manager is used after bring-up for lifecycle operations, and Cloud Builder is not used in VCF 9.0 deployments. Therefore, VCF Installer is the correct tool for collecting (via wizard prompts) and validating initial deployment inputs.

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The VCF 9.0 Automation and Orchestration Guide explains how Orchestrator integrates with VCF Automation to provide workflow-driven services such as Active Directory management.

Orchestrator Integration (B):The tenant must be connected to the dedicated Orchestrator instance rather than the embedded one. Documentation notes: “Each tenant can integrate with its own Orchestrator endpoint for workflow execution.”

AD Plugin Configuration (E):The Orchestrator Active Directory plugin must be configured against the development AD only, ensuring that the development team does not impact the production directory.

Publish Workflow (C):The AD user creation workflow must be published to the VCF Automation catalog using the Content Hub. Actions alone are insufficient; workflows are the full automation logic exposed to end users.

Custom Resource Object (F):To enable developers to create and destroy AD accounts, a Custom Resource object must be created in VCF Automation and mapped to the Orchestrator workflows. This provides lifecycle capabilities (create/destroy) in the self-service catalog.

Options A and D are incorrect because publishing only the “action” is not sufficient (workflows are required), and the plugin must not point to production AD. Option G is incorrect because the dedicated Orchestrator has already been deployed, so the embedded Orchestrator is not used.

In VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0, the introduction of the Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) model within VCF Automation (formerly Aria Automation) simplifies multi-tenancy. When an administrator creates an organization and configures regional networking, the system automates the deployment of several high-level NSX objects to provide isolated networking for that organization's applications.

According to the VCF 9.0 Automation and Networking Guide:

A Provider Tier-0 Gateway (C): This is the top-level logical router in the VCF environment. During the regional networking setup, the system identifies or configures the Provider T0 to act as the primary exit point for North-South traffic for the organization.

A Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) connectivity profile (F): This profile defines the networking "flavor" (such as IP blocks, DNS, and security settings) that will be applied to the organization's VPCs. It acts as the template for how the VPC interacts with the provider's physical and logical infrastructure.

A Default Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) (B): Upon completing the organization setup, VCF Automation provisions a default VPC for that organization. This VPC serves as the logical container for the tenant's subnets, security groups, and routing.

An outbound Source Network Address Translation (SNAT) rule (A): To allow virtual machines within the newly created VPC to access external resources (the internet or corporate network) while using private IP space, the system automatically creates an outbound SNAT rule on the gateway associated with the VPC or the Provider T0.

Why other options are incorrect:

A Virtual Distributed Switch (VDS) (D): The VDS is a foundational component of the VCF VI Workload Domain created during Day 1 operations. It is not "automatically configured" during the high-level regional networking step of a VCF Automation organization; it must already exist.

An NSX Transit Gateway (E): While NSX uses Tier-0 and Tier-1 gateways for transit, "Transit Gateway" is a specific term often associated with public cloud (AWS) integrations. In the context of VCF 9.0 regional networking for a VPC, the core constructs are the T0/T1 and VPC profiles.

An outbound Destination Network Address Translation (DNAT) rule (G): DNAT is typically used for inbound traffic (mapping a public IP to a private internal IP). Outbound traffic uses SNAT to mask the internal IP as it leaves the organization.

The VCF 9.0 Deployment Guide states:

“Each new VCF instance requires its own management domain consisting of vCenter Server, NSX Manager cluster, and SDDC Manager.”

vCenter (A) is required to manage ESXi hosts and clusters.

NSX Manager (D) provides software-defined networking for the instance.

SDDC Manager (E) is the lifecycle and management component central to each VCF instance.

Supervisor (B) is optional and only enabled if Kubernetes workloads are required. VCF Automation (C) is a separate solution, not part of the core instance bring-up. VCF Installer (F) is the deployment tool, not a persistent component. Thus, the correct components to deploy are vCenter, NSX Manager, and SDDC Manager.

VCF 9.0 describes the VKS architecture and explicitly notes: “The Cluster API provides declarative, Kubernetes-style APIs for cluster creation, configuration, and management.” Inputs include resources describing the cluster, VMs, and add-ons. Provisioning flows also present ClusterClass/Cluster API as the supported “cluster type” when creating a Kubernetes cluster via self-service. These extracts confirm that Cluster API is the foundational component used by VMware Kubernetes Service (VKS) on vSphere Supervisor to bootstrap and manage Kubernetes workload clusters in VCF 9.0.

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The VCF Operations for Networks (formerly vRNI) enables Application Discovery and Network Visibility. According to VCF 9.0: “Operations for Networks provides flow-based application discovery, dependency mapping, and security planning. This allows administrators to visualize application topology and relationships across the VCF fleet.” By contrast, VCF Operations for Logs provides log aggregation, while the Collector provides integration for metrics, not discovery. The vSphere Supervisor enables Kubernetes workloads, not application discovery. Therefore, to achieve Service and Application Discovery, administrators must deploy VCF Operations for Networks.

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).

In VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0, the VCF Fleet Disaster Recovery Design Model explicitly requires deployment of VMware Live Recovery (VLR) to provide:

Cross-instance disaster recovery

Site pairing between regions

Protection of management and workload domains

Orchestrated failover and failback

From the VCF 9.0 Fleet Architecture documentation:

“To implement a Fleet-level disaster recovery model across multiple VCF instances in different regions, deploy VMware Live Recovery to provide orchestration, replication, and recovery operations between paired VCF instances.”

The Fleet DR design requires:

A primary VCF instance (Region A)

A secondary VCF instance (Region B)

VMware Live Recovery to manage DR workflows across instances

Other options are incorrect:

DSM – Provides database-as-a-service capabilities, not DR orchestration.

VCF Operations HCX – Used for workload mobility, not DR orchestration.

VCF Operations – Provides monitoring and observability, not DR functionality.

Document reference (VCF 9.0):

VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 → VCF Fleet Architecture → Disaster Recovery Design Model

VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 → VMware Live Recovery Integration with VCF

In VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0, the strategy for monitoring diverse application types (internal, commercial, and open-source) in a consolidated manner relies heavily on the ingestion and analysis of log data.

According to the VCF 9.0 Operations and Monitoring Guide:

VCF Operations for Logs (D): This is the core platform (formerly VMware Aria Operations for Logs) used for real-time log management. It provides a centralized location to collect logs from any source—be it a custom-coded internal app, a commercial database, or an open-source web server. This satisfy the "consolidated manner" requirement by aggregating disparate data streams into a single searchable interface.

VCF Operations for Logs Content Packs (E): To provide "simple" monitoring for commercial and open-source applications without manual configuration, VCF utilizes Content Packs. These packs contain pre-defined dashboards, extracted fields, and alerts tailored for specific applications (e.g., Apache, Microsoft SQL Server, Linux, etc.). By using Content Packs, an administrator can immediately gain deep visibility into the health and performance of diverse applications without building custom monitoring logic.

Why other options are incorrect:

VCF Operations Service/Application Discovery (A & C): These features are used to map relationships between virtual machines and services to understand dependencies. While they help identify what is running, they do not provide the deep "monitoring" (log analysis and alerting) requested for a mix of internal and open-source apps.

VCF Operations for Applications (B): This usually refers to high-frequency metrics and trace analysis (formerly Tanzu Observability/Wavefront). While powerful, it is often more complex to implement across a standard VCF fleet compared to the "simple, consolidated" log-based approach provided by VCF Operations for Logs and its associated Content Packs.