Caution: Articles written for technical not grammatical accuracy, If poor grammar offends you proceed with caution ;-)

Routed Network Profiles have a very specific function. Routed Network Profiles are used in conjunction with NSX and Multi-Machine vCAC blueprints. Routed Network Profiles are used to define the networks that will be used by the Multi-Machine component machines. These networks will sit behind a deployed NSX Edge Gateway that is deployed as part of the Multi-Machine deployment.

While creating a Routed Network profile you will need to select an External Network Profile for the Routed Network profile to use. The External Network Profile is used to assign the IP address to the Uplink Interface of the NSX Edge Gateway that is deployed as part of a Multi-Machine Request. Routed Network Profiles also consists of IP Network Ranges, not IP address ranges.

IP Network Ranges are used to allocate a Range of IP’s to be used for a specific component Machine. An example would be if you have a web server component in a Multi-Machine blueprint and you want to deploy two of them. If the range was a /30 network range you would have two IP addresses available for your two web servers

Below is a diagram representing the Architecture of NSX when using Routed Network Profiles in vCAC. The External Network Profile that is defined in a Routed Network Profile if depicted as the Purple network in the diagram. As you can see in the diagram this is the Logical Network that connects the vCAC deployed routers to the pre-existing NSX Edge. The Green, Orange, and Blue networks represent the Routed Networks that are assigned from the Routed Network Profile.

To achieve the above architecture we will need to create three Routed Network Profiles. One for Web, App, & DB. Because we are connecting each to one Perimeter NSX Edge we can reference the same External Network Profile for each. In the above diagram I have three Multi-Machine apps that deployed. For each app a separate network range from the pool within the Routed Network Profile is assigned from each network.

Created a Routed Network Profile

Navigate to Infrastructure –> Reservations –> Network Profiles and hover over New Network Profile and select Routed. Next provide a Name for the Routed Network Profile, then select the External Network Profile to be used for the Edge Gateway deployments.(You will notice when you assign the External Network Profile that the DNS/WINS information is automatically populated.) Next you need to specify the Subnet Mask that is associated with the External Network Profile that you selected. The next two fields are used to define the Network Ranges that will be used for the Routed Network. You will need to specify a Range Subnet Mask that will be used to subnet the range into smaller units. I went with a /29 so I could put up to six hosts on each network. Then specify the Network Base IP address. Since I am subnetting a class C network my network address is 192.168.60.0. Once you can input all the info click the IP Ranges tab at the top. On the IP Ranges tab select Generate Ranges to have vCAC generate the pool of IP Ranges to be used by the Routed Networks. Click OK when finished.

You have successfully created a Routed Network Profile. Create one for each Routed Network that you will need for your deployment. In my examples we will be using three as in the network diagram above.