NCP-MCA Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA v6.5) Exam Questions and Answers

To automate the task of growing vDisks on multiple classes of VMs using Nutanix Playbooks, the administrator should follow these steps:

Create a custom Alert Policy:

Create an alert policy that triggers when the server's disk usage reaches 85% or above. This ensures the playbook is triggered based on the specified threshold.

Select Alert as the trigger:

Set the alert created in step 1 as the trigger for the playbook. This ties the alert condition to the execution of the playbook.

Select Email Action with custom message:

Add an action to send an email notification. This email should be sent prior to any work being started, to inform relevant stakeholders about the impending vDisk growth operation.

Add Action to Grow vDisks:

Add the action to grow the vDisks on the VMs. This step should include the necessary script or task that performs the vDisk growth operation on the specified VMs.

Based on the requirements and steps, the playbook should be structured as follows:

Step 1: Create a custom Alert Policy

Define the alert policy with the condition that disk usage on the VMs reaches 85% or higher.

Step 2: Select Alert as the trigger

Use the alert policy created in Step 1 as the trigger for the playbook.

Step 3: Select Email Action with custom message

Add an email action to notify relevant stakeholders before the vDisk growth task is initiated.

Step 4: Add Action to Grow vDisks

Include the necessary action to grow the vDisks on the VMs as required.

This structure ensures that the playbook is dynamically responsive to changes in server usage, sends notifications prior to execution, and performs the required vDisk growth operation automatically.

Protection Domains are a Nutanix feature that allows you to replicate data across clusters or to a remote site. You can use Protection Domains to replicate images from one cluster to another, and then use them for workload automation. This is one of the methods documented in the Nutanix Solutions Portal for Citrix MCS on Nutanix AHV1. Alternatively, you can also use Prism Central to manage multiple clusters and use Protection Policies to replicate images across clusters2. However, this option is not listed in the question, so the best answer is A. References:

1: Multi Cluster Image Replication for Citrix MCS on Nutanix

2: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide

The error message “Authentication by failed” typically indicates an issue with the authentication credentials being used. Since the administrator is using SSH key-based credential to authenticate, it’s essential to ensure that the private key associated with this credential is correct and accessible. If there’s an issue with the private key, such as it being incorrect or inaccessible, authentication will fail. Increasing the retries or modifying the timeout will not help if the credential is invalid. Changing to password authentication credential may work, but it’s not the best option as it may compromise security and require additional configuration. References:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) v6.5, Section 3 - Validate Blueprints, Runbooks, Playbooks, and Automation Settings, page 2

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), Module 5 - X-Play, Lesson 5.2 - Credential Management, page 7

Nutanix Calm User Guide, Credential Management, SSH Key-Based Authentication

Autopilot is a feature of Nutanix Calm that allows the administrator to automate the execution of playbooks based on predefined conditions or triggers. Autopilot can optimize the performance, availability, and cost of applications by applying the appropriate actions in response to events or metrics. Before configuring autopilot, the administrator must be aware of the following limitations12:

Autopilot never waits for approvals. This means that the administrator must ensure that the playbooks are tested and verified before enabling autopilot. Autopilot will execute the playbooks without any human intervention or confirmation.

Autopilot feature only applies to metric-based alerts as triggers. This means that the administrator can only use metrics from the Nutanix Prism Central or the Nutanix Karbon clusters as the conditions for triggering the playbooks. Autopilot does not support other types of triggers such as schedules, webhooks, or manual triggers. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 10; Nutanix Calm SaaS User Guide, section 4.3.

After upgrading Self-Service (formerly Calm) from version 3.3 to 3.6, the administrator noticed that Policy Engine scheduled jobs were failing and an alert was being presented in Prism Central. This issue is likely due to a version mismatch between the upgraded components. The recommended solution is to use Lifecycle Manager (LCM) to upgrade the Policy Engine to ensure compatibility with the new version of Self-Service.

References:

Nutanix documentation on Upgrading Components with LCM.

Nutanix Best Practices for Managing Upgrades.

A Category in Nutanix is a grouping of entities (such as VMs, hosts, clusters, etc.) into a key-value pair. Categories are used to organize and manage resources more effectively by tagging them with meaningful identifiers.

References:

Nutanix documentation on Categories.

Nutanix Best Practices for Using Categories.

When a VM managed by Self-Service (formerly Calm) is deleted manually from Prism Central, the associated application in Self-Service cannot be deleted using the standard delete action because the substrate is no longer present. In this scenario, the administrator should use the "Soft Delete" action in Self-Service, which will remove the application from management without requiring the substrate to be present.

References:

Nutanix documentation on Soft Delete.

Nutanix Best Practices for Managing Self-Service Applications.

The archived application logs within Prism Central can be found under Services > Calm > Settings. Calm automatically archives run logs of the deleted applications and custom actions that are older than three months. The administrator can download the archives within 7 days from the time of archive creation. For a running application, data is not archived for the system-generated Create actions. References: Nutanix Support & Insights

Showback is a feature in Calm that allows administrators to track and report the costs of running applications and projects on different cloud platforms. Showback can be enabled in the Setting menu of Calm, under the Showback tab. There, the administrator can configure the cost models, cloud accounts, and currency for Showback. Showback can also be accessed from the Dashboard menu, where the administrator can view the cost reports and charts for different applications and projects. References: 

https://www.nutanix.com/support-services/training-certification/certifications/certification-details-nutanix-certified-professional-multicloud-automation-v6-5\

https://www.nutanix.com/content/dam/nutanix/resources/support/ebg-ncp-mca-6.pdf

To create a Category via automation in Nutanix, the required items are:

Name: The identifier for the category.

Value: The specific value assigned to the category.

Categories help in organizing and managing resources by tagging them with meaningful identifiers.

References:

Nutanix documentation on Creating Categories.

Nutanix Best Practices for Category Management.

The best way to automate the scale-out of the application layer using a third-party tool is to create a Playbook with a webhook as a trigger and a REST API call as an action. A webhook is a mechanism that allows a third-party service to send a notification to a Calm server when a certain event occurs, such as a code commit or a build completion. A REST API call is a way to interact with the Calm server programmatically, such as launching a blueprint or scaling out a service. By creating a Playbook that combines these two elements, the administrator can enable the third-party tool to trigger the scale-out action on the Calm server with a single command. The other options are either not feasible, not efficient, or not relevant for this task. References: Nutanix Calm: Playbooks - Read the Docs and Nutanix Calm: REST API - Read the Docs.

When launching Calm blueprints, there are two view options available: Developer and Consumer. The Developer view allows you to create, edit, and manage blueprints, as well as access advanced features such as macros, actions, and scripts. The Consumer view allows you to launch and manage applications from the Marketplace, as well as access basic features such as variables, tasks, and alerts. The view option is determined by the role assigned to the user in the project. Users with the Project Admin or Project Auditor role can switch between the Developer and Consumer views, while users with the Project User role can only access the Consumer view. References:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) v6.5, Section 1 - Describe and Differentiate Automation Concepts and Principles, page 3

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), Module 2 - Nutanix Calm, Lesson 2.1 - Nutanix Calm Overview, page 9

Nutanix Calm User Guide, Introduction to Nutanix Calm, Nutanix Calm User Interface

When a Blueprint is launched via Marketplace, it uses the credential that is configured in the Project Environment. If the credential is invalid, the Blueprint deployment will fail with a check login error. To fix this issue, the developer needs to verify and update the credential in the Project Environment and ensure that it has the required permissions to access the target infrastructure and applications. References: Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), page 29-30; [Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide] (https://www.nutanix.com/content/dam/nutanix/resources/support/ncp-mca-ebg.pdf), section 3.1.

Scaling VM replica settings allow you to specify the minimum, maximum, and default number of VMs that can be created from a blueprint service. The minimum and default values must be equal to or greater than the number of VMs needed at any time and at time of deployment, which is 2 in this case. The maximum value must be equal to or less than the project quota divided by the VM resources, which is 100/12 = 8 for vCPUs and 300/24 = 12 for memory. The lowest of these two values is the limit for the maximum value, which is 8. Therefore, the only option that meets all the requirements is B. MIN: 2, MAX: 7, Default: 2.

References:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 10, Objective 3.1: Given a scenario, create a blueprint to deploy infrastructure and applications using Self-Service

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), Module 5: Self-Service, Lesson 5.2: Blueprint Design, slide 23: Scaling VM Replica Settings

Nutanix Certified Professional Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) 6 Exam, page 10, Objective 3.1: Given a scenario, create a blueprint to deploy infrastructure and applications using Self-Service

The error message "A specified logon session does not exist. It may already have been terminated" is often caused by the lack of CredSSP (Credential Security Support Provider) being enabled on the Windows Operating System. CredSSP is necessary for certain remote operations, including executing PowerShell scripts remotely.

References:

Microsoft documentation on Enabling CredSSP.

Nutanix documentation on Troubleshooting PowerShell Scripts.

When configuring Playbooks to automate the scaling of CPU and memory resources for VMs, the administrator should consider the following prerequisites:

CPU can be added to a powered on VM if the guest OS supports it. This is also known as hot-plug CPU. The administrator should check the compatibility of the guest OS and the hypervisor before enabling this feature. For example, Windows Server 2019 supports hot-plug CPU on AHV, ESXi, and Hyper-V, but not on XenServer1.

Memory can be removed from a powered on VM if the guest OS supports it. This is also known as hot-unplug memory. The administrator should check the compatibility of the guest OS and the hypervisor before enabling this feature. For example, Linux supports hot-unplug memory on AHV, ESXi, and XenServer, but not on Hyper-V2.

VM must be powered off to add CPU if the guest OS does not support hot-plug CPU. This is also known as cold-plug CPU. The administrator should plan for the downtime required to power off and power on the VM after adding CPU.

VM must be powered off to reduce memory if the guest OS does not support hot-unplug memory. This is also known as cold-unplug memory. The administrator should plan for the downtime required to power off and power on the VM after reducing memory. References: Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), page 10; Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA), section 3; Nutanix Support Portal - Guest OS Compatibility Matrix

The error message indicates that the project for the blueprint does not have any associated Nutanix account. This typically means that the new account added in Self-Service (formerly Calm) has not been verified. Account verification is required to ensure the account is properly configured and has the necessary permissions to be used within a Self-Service project.

References:

Nutanix Calm documentation on Account Management.

Nutanix Best Practices for Verifying Accounts.

The error message indicates that customization of the guest operating system is not supported. This issue often arises because open-vm-tools is not installed or not running on the Redhat Enterprise Linux VM. open-vm-tools is necessary for vSphere to perform guest customization tasks, such as setting the hostname, IP configuration, and other initialization tasks.

References:

Nutanix documentation on Guest Customization Requirements.

VMware documentation on Installing Open VM Tools.

 The easiest way to satisfy the request is to add an Email action to the end of the existing playbook and use the {{action[index] .stdout}} parameter in the Message field. This way, the administrator does not need to modify the script or create a file to store the output. The {{action[index] .stdout}} parameter will capture the standard output of the previous action, which is the VM SSH action that executes the script. The Email action will then send the output as the message body to the specified recipients. References: You can find more information about this topic in the following sources:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, Section 3 - Validate Blueprints, Runbooks, Playbooks, and Automation Settings, page 10

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), Module 4 - X-Play, Lesson 2 - Playbooks, page 4-11

Calm can be deployed as a VM on ESXi or AHV hypervisors and leverage calm functionality without the Nutanix infrastructure. Calm can also be enabled inside of Prism Central, which is a VM that can run on any Nutanix supported hypervisor, including ESXi and AHV. However, Calm cannot be enabled inside of Prism Element, which is the management interface for each Nutanix cluster. Calm also cannot be deployed as a VM on Hyper-V, as this is not a supported hypervisor for Calm. References: Nutanix Calm Configuration and Training, Calm on ESXi Deployment | Nutanix Community, Nutanix Support & Insights

A category is a key-value pair that can be assigned to an entity in Prism Central to simplify daily operations and management. Categories can be used to filter, search, and group entities based on common attributes. Categories can also be used to define policies and permissions for different entities. A category can be assigned to a cluster, a VM, an image, a network, a blueprint, an application, or a project. A category cannot be assigned to a hypervisor, a protection domain, or a storage container, as these are not entities in Prism Central. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 12; Nutanix Prism Central Guide, section 4.1.

To manage and optimize the performance of virtual machines (VMs) within a playbook, administrators often need to adjust the resources allocated to VMs. Here are the appropriate actions:

VM Add Memory Action: This action allows the administrator to increase the memory allocation to a VM, which can be essential for applications requiring more RAM.

VM Add CPU Action with limits: Adding CPUs with defined limits ensures that the VM receives the necessary CPU resources without exceeding the cluster's capacity.

These actions enable the dynamic scaling of resources, improving VM performance and ensuring resource availability.

References:

Nutanix documentation on Playbook Actions.

Nutanix Best Practices for Resource Allocation.

Playbooks are a feature of X-Play that allow you to automate tasks based on events or alerts. You can use the actions gallery to select from a variety of actions that can be executed by a playbook. These actions are categorized into three types: VM, alert, and communication1. VM actions allow you to perform operations on virtual machines, such as power on, power off, snapshot, clone, etc. Alert actions allow you to create, update, or close alerts in Prism Central. Communication actions allow you to send messages to various channels, such as email, Slack, or Microsoft Teams2. Therefore, the correct answer is B. References:

1: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide

2: Playbooks – Nutanix.dev

 The styx.log file contains the logs related to blueprint packaging and deployment. It can be accessed by SSHing to Prism Central and navigating to the /home/calm/log directory. The other options are not relevant for blueprint package failures, as they show the application status, audit events, or service logs. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) 6.5 Exam Blueprint Guide, page 9; Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA), section 3; NCP-MCA Exam Dumps - Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud …, question 63.

To create a custom alert policy, the administrator needs to specify the entity type, the impact, the severity, the condition, and the notification method. In this case, the entity type is VM, the impact is performance, the severity is warning, the condition is CPU usage > 70%, and the notification method is email. Additionally, the administrator can use categories to filter the entities that are affected by the alert policy. By selecting the category Env:Production, the administrator can limit the alert policy to only apply to the production VMs.

References:

Nutanix

https://www.bing.com/th?id=OSK.rK3sz-kbZCnJ9cwhAmYELm3vDpqzAZFHBIZFgLsHbGQ &pid=cdx&w=128&h=128&c=7

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) v6.5, Section 2 - Deploy and Configure Self-service and Related Components, Objective 2.5 - Identify required configuration settings for a Self-Service deployment

How to create custom alert policies | Prism central | Nutanix Community

The correct macro syntax in Nutanix Calm is @@{and}@@. This syntax is used to reference variables and parameters within blueprints and tasks, allowing for dynamic substitution of values during execution.

References:

Nutanix Calm documentation on Macro Syntax.

Nutanix Best Practices for Using Macros.

In Nutanix Calm, there are two types of blueprints: Single VM and Multi VM. Single VM blueprints are used to define and manage the deployment of individual virtual machines, while Multi VM blueprints are used to manage the deployment of applications that span multiple VMs with defined dependencies and configurations.

References:

Nutanix Calm documentation on Blueprint Types.

Nutanix Best Practices for Blueprint Creation.

To enable Calm, the administrator needs to log on to Prism Central with a local ADMIN account and click Services -> Calm -> Enable. This will install the Calm service on Prism Central and allow the administrator to access the Calm UI and features. The other options are incorrect because they either refer to Prism Element, which is not the correct platform for Calm, or they involve unnecessary or incorrect steps. References: [Enabling and Accessing Calm | Nutanix Community] (https://next.nutanix.com/installation-configuration-23/enabling-and-accessing-calm-40191); [Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide] (https://www.nutanix.com/content/dam/nutanix/resources/support/ds-ncp-mca.pdf), section 2.1.

The administrator should assign the VMs to an Inactive:VM category as an action and trigger a playbook on alert with the Inactive VM alert policy. By doing this, they can create a custom category to group and identify the inactive VMs and use a custom alert policy to trigger a playbook that can perform automated actions on them, such as powering them off, deleting them, or sending notifications. This is based on the general practices in managing VMs in a multicloud environment, as well as the specific features and requirements of Nutanix X-Play and Nutanix Calm. References:

How to create custom categories | Prism central | Nutanix Community

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) v6.5 Exam Blueprint Guide, Section 1: Describe and Differentiate Automation Concepts and Principles, Objective 1.4: List how to implement categories for the appropriate use cases

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA) course, Module 3: Nutanix X-Play, Lesson 2: Nutanix X-Play Playbooks

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA) course, Module 4: Nutanix Calm Governance, Lesson 2: Nutanix Calm Alerts

In Approval Policies within Nutanix Calm, "Conditions" are used to set the criteria for an approval to be triggered. Conditions define the specific circumstances under which an approval process should be initiated, such as specific actions or threshold limits.

References:

Nutanix Calm documentation on Approval Policies.

Nutanix Best Practices for Defining Conditions.

Scaling VM replica settings allow you to specify the minimum, maximum, and default number of VMs that can be created from a blueprint service. The minimum and default values must be equal to or greater than the number of VMs needed at any time and at time of deployment, which is 2 in this case. The maximum value must be equal to or less than the project quota divided by the VM resources, which is 100/12 = 8 for vCPUs and 300/24 = 12 for memory. The lowest of these two values is the limit for the maximum value, which is 8. Therefore, the only option that meets all the requirements is B. MIN: 2, MAX: 7, Default: 2.

References:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 10, Objective 3.1: Given a scenario, create a blueprint to deploy infrastructure and applications using Self-Service

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), Module 5: Self-Service, Lesson 5.2: Blueprint Design, slide 23: Scaling VM Replica Settings

Nutanix Certified Professional Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) 6 Exam, page 10, Objective 3.1: Given a scenario, create a blueprint to deploy infrastructure and applications using Self-Service

The port 5986 is used for PowerShell Remoting over HTTPS, which is a secure way of executing PowerShell commands on a remote Windows VM. Calm uses PowerShell Remoting to run scripts on Windows VMs as part of the blueprint actions. Therefore, the port 5986 needs to be opened on the VM firewall to allow the communication between Calm and the VM. The other ports are not related to PowerShell Remoting, as they are used for SQL Server (1433), Remote Desktop Protocol (3389), and PowerShell Remoting over HTTP (5985). References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) 6.5 Exam Blueprint Guide, page 10; Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA), section 3; Nutanix Calm User Guide, page 93.

A Self-Service (formerly Calm) developer can find detailed and downloadable logs for analyzing a Blueprint deployment failure in the specific Application Audit tab. This tab provides insights and logs related to the deployment, helping to diagnose and resolve issues.

References:

Nutanix Calm documentation on Application Audit.

Nutanix Best Practices for Troubleshooting Deployments.

The Audit tab of the Calm application shows the history of actions performed on the application, such as create, update, delete, launch, stop, etc. It also shows the status of the synchronization between Prism Central and Calm, which indicates if the changes made to the VMs on the AHV cluster are reflected in the Calm application. The administrator can check the Audit tab to verify the changes and troubleshoot any issues with the synchronization. References:

Nutanix NCP-MCA Certification Exam Sample Questions, Question 15

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation, Page 17

Nutanix Calm User Guide

An X-Play Trigger is a condition that initiates a Playbook. There are four types of X-Play Triggers: Alert, Audit, Event, and Time1. An Alert Trigger is based on a Prism alert, such as a VM power state change or a disk failure. An Audit Trigger is based on a Prism audit entry, such as a user login or a cluster operation. An Event Trigger is based on a Prism event, such as a VM creation or deletion. A Time Trigger is based on a schedule, such as daily, weekly, or monthly2. In this scenario, the administrator needs to create a Playbook to be notified when VMs are deleted. Therefore, the appropriate X-Play Trigger would be an Event Trigger, since VM deletion is a Prism event. References: 1: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 42: Getting Started with Nutanix X-Play – Nutanix.dev

To deploy blueprints to Calm SaaS and execute them, the administrator must first configure a site-to-site VPN tunnel and a tunnel entity in the environment where the blueprint will be deployed. A site-to-site VPN tunnel is a secure connection between two networks over the internet that allows Calm SaaS to communicate with the on-premises or cloud environment. A tunnel entity is a logical representation of the VPN tunnel in Calm SaaS that contains the tunnel configuration and credentials. The administrator must also register the environment and the provider accounts in Calm SaaS before deploying the blueprints. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 9; Nutanix Calm SaaS User Guide, section 3.1.1 and 3.1.2.

The Calm SaaS API key consists of two components: name and token. The name component is analogous to the ID or username you provide when you configure your Calm tunnel client VM to establish the tunnel connection. The token component is analogous to the password portion of the HTTP basic authentication. The Calm SaaS API key is used along with the Calm APIs and Calm DSL to access Calm. The API key file that you download will have the name and token components in the JSON format. References: Nutanix Support & Insights

An administrator can look to view a list of executed playbooks in two locations: Executions and Plays. The Executions page shows the status and details of all the playbooks that have been executed across all the projects. The Plays page shows the status and details of all the playbooks that have been executed within a specific project. The Lists page shows the predefined and custom lists that can be used as inputs for playbooks. The Dashboard page shows the overview and statistics of the X-Play service. References:

Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) v6.5, Section 3 - Validate Blueprints, Runbooks, Playbooks, and Automation Settings, page 4

Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), Module 5 - X-Play, Lesson 5.3 - Playbook Management, page 2

Nutanix Calm User Guide, X-Play, Executions

A service dependency is a feature of Nutanix Calm that allows you to define the order of execution and the conditions for starting and stopping services in a blueprint. By creating a service dependency between the application and the database, you can ensure that the application will not start until the database is fully installed and ready. This avoids the need for manual intervention or inefficient workarounds like loops or sleep statements. References: Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), page 41; Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA), section 2.

The Prism Viewer role in Nutanix Prism Central is a read-only role. Users with this role can view and analyze various elements within Prism Central, including playbooks and the action gallery, but they cannot perform any modifications or operational tasks such as stopping or resuming a playbook, cloning, or updating templates.

References:

Nutanix documentation on RBAC Roles.

Nutanix Best Practices for Role-Based Access Control.

To reduce the manual effort for the NOC personnel, the administrators can create a new Action that contains the custom Python script as an Execute task with a script type of EScript. This will allow the NOC personnel to run the script on any VM from the Calm UI or API without logging into each VM. To ensure the process is repeatable across all applications, the administrators can create a new Runbook that contains the same Action and assign it to the relevant Projects. This will enable the NOC personnel to run the script on multiple VMs across different applications in a single workflow. To provide audit history for management of the actions, the administrators can view the Execution History tab under the Runbook page for audit purposes. This will show the details of each Runbook execution, such as the status, duration, user, and logs. Alternatively, the administrators can also view the Audit tab under the Application view for audit purposes. This will show the history of all actions performed on the application, such as launch, update, delete, and run actions. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 18, section 4.2.1. 

A provider is a configuration that allows Nutanix Calm to interact with a public cloud platform, such as AWS, Azure, or GCP. A provider contains the credentials, settings, and policies required to deploy and manage VMs on the public cloud. Before creating a blueprint for a new public cloud environment, the administrator should create a new provider for AWS and specify the region, access key, secret key, and other parameters. This will enable the administrator to select the AWS provider as the deployment location for the blueprint and configure the VM attributes accordingly. References: Nutanix Multicloud Automation Administration (NMCAA), page 15; Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA), section 2.

To run a blueprint deployment and tasks in a different Prism Central instance than the one running Self-Service (formerly Calm), the administrator should add the remote Prism Central instance as an account. This configuration allows Self-Service to interact with multiple Prism Central instances, enabling the management and deployment of blueprints across different environments.

References:

Nutanix documentation on Managing Accounts in Calm.

Nutanix Best Practices for Multi-Cluster Management.

A Branch Condition is a type of action in X-Play that allows you to create conditional logic based on the output of a previous action or a custom expression. A Branch Condition can have multiple branches, each with a different condition and a different set of actions to execute if the condition is met. The minimum number of actions required in a Branch Condition is two: one for the condition itself, and one for the action to perform if the condition is true. If the condition is false, the Branch Condition will skip to the next action in the Playbook. You can add more branches to a Branch Condition, but you cannot have less than two. References: Nutanix Calm: Playbooks - Read the Docs and Nutanix Calm: Branch Condition - Read the Docs.

In Nutanix Self-Service (formerly known as Calm), substrates refer to the combination of the underlying cloud infrastructure and the virtual machine instances. Substrates define the environment where applications will be deployed and managed, encompassing cloud providers, virtualization platforms, and the associated VM configurations.

References:

Nutanix Calm documentation on Substrates.

Nutanix Best Practices for Application Deployment.

To make a Blueprint visible to a specific Project, it needs to be approved and published with that Project. This ensures that only authorized Blueprints are available for consumption by the Project members. Applying a Category or a version number to the Blueprint does not affect its visibility to the Project. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 14, section 3.1.2

When configuring Calm to use Kubernetes as a provider, the administrator can choose between two Kubernetes types: Karbon and Vanilla. Karbon is Nutanix’s own Kubernetes distribution that is integrated with Prism and AHV. Vanilla is any other Kubernetes distribution that is not Karbon, such as OpenShift, Rancher, or EKS. The administrator needs to provide the Kubernetes API endpoint and credentials for the Vanilla type, while the Karbon type is automatically discovered by Calm. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 14; Nutanix NCP-MCA Questions, question 102.

The administrator needs to add AWS as a provider in Calm. A provider is a cloud platform or infrastructure that hosts the application VMs or services. Calm supports various providers such as Nutanix, AWS, Azure, GCP, VMware, and Kubernetes. To add a provider, the administrator needs to go to the Providers page in the Calm UI and click on the +Create Provider button. Then, the administrator needs to select the AWS provider type and enter the required information such as name, access key, secret key, and regions. References: Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Automation (NCP-MCA) Exam Blueprint Guide, page 11; Nutanix Calm User Guide, section 3.1.

From the exhibit, it is clear that Prism Central needs to communicate with Calm managed target Linux VMs via SSH and with Calm managed target Windows VMs via PowerShell or Shell scripts. The appropriate ports to open for these communications are:

TCP 22: This port is used for SSH, which is necessary for managing Linux VMs.

TCP 5985 and 5986: These ports are used for PowerShell remoting, which is essential for managing Windows VMs.

References:

Nutanix Calm documentation on Network Ports.

Best practices for Nutanix Network Configuration.