Connecting the blueprint design server to Amazon Web Services

To connect the blueprint design server to Amazon Web Services (AWS), map the AWS account information to a functional ID. Then, assign that functional ID to a team.

  • Obtain a Heat engine and an OpenStack Keystone server. The engine version must match the version of the Keystone server. In most cases for deploying to non-OpenStack clouds, install a Heat engine and Keystone server through IBM® UrbanCode® Deploy. See Installing an engine in silent mode or Installing an engine in interactive mode.
  • Create a functional user account on the Keystone server. This user account must be a member of the administrative tenant on the Keystone server. If you use the Keystone server that was supplied with the engine, you can use the default administrative tenant credentials. The Keystone server's default administrative tenant user name is admin and the default password is openstack1. Later, you associate the AWS account information with this functional ID. With this account, users can authenticate to AWS.
  • Install the blueprint design server. See Installing the blueprint design server.
  • Connect the blueprint design server to the server. See Connecting the blueprint design server to the server.
  • Configure an authentication realm for the blueprint design server. You can import users from a variety of sources, including LDAP servers, Keystone identity services, the IBM UrbanCode Deploy server, or from the internal authentication realm. See Creating authentication realms for the blueprint designer.
  • Ensure that the blueprint design server can connect to AWS. You can verify the connection path with the curl or telnet commands. For example, make sure that no firewall, proxy, or security settings prevent communication between the blueprint design server and the cloud. The blueprint design server must be able to access the AWS endpoints for the regions that you plan to use, such as ec2.ap-northeast-1.amazonaws.com and ec2.us-west-2.amazonaws.com.
The following diagram shows a typical topology for this scenario. The blueprint design server and engine connect to Amazon Web Services. For authentication information, the blueprint design server connects to the Keystone identity service and optionally to an LDAP server.
A topology that includes the blueprint design server, an engine, Amazon Web Services, a Keystone server, and an optional LDAP server
  1. Log in to the blueprint designer as a user with the following System permissions:
    • Configure Security
    • Manage Users & Groups
  2. Create a connection to the cloud:
    1. Click Settings > Clouds.
    2. Click Add New Connection.
    3. Specify a name for the cloud connection.
    4. In the Type list, select Amazon Web Services.
    5. Click Save.
  3. To create a cloud project, see Creating cloud projects for the blueprint designer.
  4. Add the cloud project to a team.
  5. Add users to the team and to one or more roles on the team.
    These users can come from any authentication realm, including LDAP servers, Keystone identity services, or from the internal authentication realm.
  6. Make sure that the team roles include the appropriate permissions for those users, such as creating and editing blueprints.
  7. Register the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) images with the cloud discovery service. See Registering Amazon EC2 images with the cloud discovery service.
Users can log in to the blueprint designer and use the cloud connection. At the top of the page, users can select the AWS cloud connection, cloud project, and region. When they edit blueprints, the palette shows resources that are available to the AWS account, and they can provision blueprints to the selected region.