2. Features
The first-level menus in the left sidebar of ZCenter Management Platform are as follows, and this chapter describes them one by one:
| First-Level Menu | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Home | Platform overview dashboard |
| Inventory | View virtualization resources by management node |
| Content Libraries | Image / template / image storage management |
| Platform O&M | System alarms + system O&M (monitoring, reports, logs, tags) |
| Licensing | Current license and license pool |
| System Configuration | Account management / management nodes / platform settings |
2.1 Home
The Home page is the platform overview dashboard. It presents core data such as the resource overview and alarm overview in charts, helping you intuitively grasp the current running status of the platform from multiple dimensions and quickly locate items that need attention.
2.2 Inventory
The Inventory is organized by management node and centrally displays the resources in each virtualization environment.
- ZStack ZSphere: resource overview of ZSphere-type management nodes
- VMware: resource overview of VMware-type management nodes
- Dynamic entries: the platform automatically generates an entry for each connected management node
The pages support filtering virtual machines and other resources by data center, type, and other dimensions.
Creating a Virtual Machine
In the Inventory, you can start the Create Virtual Machine wizard and follow the prompts to select the target data center, specifications, image, and so on to complete the creation.
Passwordless Redirect to ZSphere
After a ZSphere environment is connected to ZCenter (as a management node), unified passwordless redirect is supported: click the entry of that ZSphere environment in the Inventory to go directly from ZCenter to the corresponding native ZSphere console, without entering the username and password again.
Conditions and notes:
- One-way redirect: only the ZCenter → ZSphere direction is supported.
- Matching condition: passwordless redirect is available to a user only when a user with the same username and the same authentication source exists on both ZCenter and ZSphere. “Same authentication source” means the accounts on both sides come from the same authentication system — for example, both are local users, or both come from the same third-party identity source. The local
adminmatches only the localadminon ZSphere, not a same-named account from a third-party source. - Unmatched users: if the current user has no corresponding account with the same username and source on ZSphere, passwordless redirect is not available, and the user needs to log in to ZSphere manually.
Prerequisite: passwordless redirect depends on Unified Deployment and the integrated user system of the ZVF solution (see 1.1 Unified Deployment).
2.3 Content Libraries
Content Libraries centrally manage images, templates, and image storage, providing a unified source of materials for creating virtual machines and other resources. It contains three second-level menus:
| Second-Level Menu | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Image Files | Manage image resources under each management node (including export records) |
| Template Files | Manage virtual machine templates |
| Image Storage | Manage image storage (image servers) |
2.3.1 Image Files
The Image Files page manages the image resources managed by the platform and contains two tabs:
- Image: displays the image list under each management node, supports filtering by management node, data center, and type, and supports uploading/creating, editing, and deleting images. When creating an image, the source is specified with a single management node field.
- Export Records: displays the history and status of image export tasks.
Images are used as the operating system source when creating virtual machines.
2.3.2 Template Files
The Template Files page manages virtual machine templates. A template solidifies a configured virtual machine (including specifications, image, disks, and so on) into a reusable template for fast, batch creation of virtual machines with the same specifications. It supports filtering by management node, and templates can be edited and deleted.
2.3.3 Image Storage
The Image Storage page manages the storage locations of images (image servers). It displays the image storage under each management node along with capacity, status, and other information, and is where image files are physically stored. It supports filtering by management node.
2.4 Platform O&M
Platform O&M covers monitoring, operations, and information display for virtual machine resources, and is divided into System Alarms and System O&M.
2.4.1 System Alarms
System Alarms is organized into three groups in the internal sidebar — Resource Monitoring, Alarm Messages, and Alarm Configuration — covering the complete closed loop of “view monitoring → define rules → receive alarms → take action”.
Resource Monitoring · VM Monitoring
Provides visual queries of virtual machine resource usage for operations. You can filter by tag, type, resource, time range, and other dimensions to view the CPU, memory, disk, and network utilization of virtual machines on the platform in real time, quickly locate high-load / low-load virtual machines in a given environment, and export the resource table. Select the filters and click Query to display the monitoring information.
Resource Monitoring · Optimization Suggestions
Set utilization thresholds for virtual machines; virtual machines exceeding the thresholds are automatically identified and listed, providing data for resource optimization and cleanup decisions. The system has three built-in rule categories: high-load virtual machines, low-load virtual machines, and idle virtual machines:
- Each rule can define its own monitoring time range;
- Optimization metrics cover CPU average/maximum utilization, memory average/maximum utilization, disk average/maximum utilization, outbound bandwidth, and inbound bandwidth, with customizable thresholds.
Operations: view the configured optimization rules on the Optimization Suggestions > Rule Settings page; click Create Rule to customize a rule and select the management node and optimization metrics; open the rule detail page to view the virtual machine data matching the metrics.
Alarm Messages · Resource Alarms
Displays the alarm records triggered/resolved by the platform’s alarm rules. The list records every triggered and resolved alarm; click a record to view the alarm notification details. Through Actions, a message can be marked as Handled, Ignored, or used to notify the relevant people.
Alarm records are generated here automatically only after rules have been configured in Alarm Rules.
Alarm Messages · Platform Alarms
Displays the alarm messages generated by each connected management node (as opposed to resource alarms triggered by ZCenter’s own rules). They are presented as a list; click a record to expand its details, and filter by resource category to quickly classify and troubleshoot by source.
Alarm Configuration · Alarm Rules
Configure alarm rules and alarm levels for monitored objects. The platform provides common built-in alarm rules, and administrators can add, modify, and delete rules as needed. Each rule can specify the virtual machines to monitor and be associated with trigger and recovery message templates to deliver the alarm content to recipients.
Monitored objects: simply select the virtual machine resources to monitor in the alarm rule. On ZCenter Management Platform, alarms are delivered to all administrators by default, so there is no need to specify notification recipients separately here.
Alarm Configuration · Message Templates
Manage the message templates used when an alarm is triggered or resolved. When an alarm occurs or recovers, the system sends notifications to recipients in the format and content of the selected template. Email and SMS notification methods are supported, ensuring that compliant alarm messages are received in time.
Email/SMS servers are configured in System Configuration → Platform Settings → Notification Settings.
2.4.2 System O&M
System O&M is organized into three groups in the internal sidebar: Report Management, Tag Management, and Message Log.
Report Management
Consolidates resource and performance data into reports for capacity planning and operations analysis. Filtering is uniformly by management node, and reports can be exported.
| Report | Description |
|---|---|
| VM Report | Inventory-style report of the virtual machines on the platform |
| VM Performance Report | Report of virtual machine CPU, memory, disk, and network performance data |
| Host Performance Report | Report of physical host performance data |
| Compute Cluster Resource Capacity Report | Report of compute cluster resource capacity and usage |
Tag Management · Tags
Manage platform tags. You can create tags and bind/unbind them to various resources to classify and label resources, making it easy to filter and group by tag in lists.
Message Log · Operation Logs
Records platform operation traces and contains two tabs:
- Platform Operation Logs: displays each operation’s login IP, result, description, resource name, start/finish time, request data, and response data, and can be exported by time.
- Background Task Logs: displays the execution records and status of background tasks.
2.5 Licensing
Licensing is used to view the platform license status and manage license pools.
2.5.1 Current License
After ZCenter Management Platform is deployed from ZSphere through Unified Deployment, it comes with a permanent ZCenter Standard Edition license — no separate installation, upload, or purchase is required, and all Standard Edition features are available for long-term use once the deployment is complete. This page is used to view the current status of this built-in license.
2.5.2 License Pool
A license pool is a shared quota pool. After an administrator uploads a consolidated license package to activate the license pool, the licensing method of ZSphere Enterprise environments can be switched from Local License to Shared License. The environments then consume quota from the pool on demand, allowing quota to be reallocated across environments.
- Local License: each environment uses its own independent license, and quotas are not shared.
- Shared License: the environment joins the license pool and consumes quota from the shared pool.
- Scope: only ZStack ZSphere (ZSV) Enterprise environments; the only supported license type is CPU Socket.
| Operation | Location | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Import a license package | Current License page → upload the license package | The pool obtains its total quota; the first upload activates the pool |
| Add environments | License Pool page → Add Environment | After validation passes, the environments switch to Shared License |
| View quota | License Pool page → Overview | View total / used / available quota and expiration |
| Remove environments | License Pool page → Remove | The environments switch back to Local License and their quota is reclaimed into the pool |
Join conditions (validated on submission; if any is not met, the join fails with a message): ① the environment is ZSphere and in a normal state; ② the main license type matches the license pool, and the pool’s available quota is greater than or equal to the environment’s used quota; ③ the license pool currently supports only environments whose local license type is CPU Socket.
The quota overview displays the total quota, platform-wide usage, shared pool remaining (0 is displayed when negative), a usage progress bar (blue below 60%, orange at 60% or above, red at 85% or above), issue date, and expiration date. A license pool consists of multiple stacked licenses; when one of them expires, its quota is frozen and the available quota decreases accordingly.
Disconnected environments: when an environment loses contact with the license server (a disconnected state caused by network interruption, shutdown, destruction, and similar situations), its quota is frozen. The page proactively indicates this in the top banner, the status column of the list, and below the overview progress bar. Administrators can force-remove a disconnected environment directly at any time (a confirmation dialog explains that the quota will be reclaimed and the environment must rejoin after recovery). After removal, the quota is reclaimed into the pool and the associated accounts can be cleaned up normally.
For complete license pool operations and boundary descriptions, see the companion document “License Pool Operation Guide”.
2.6 System Configuration
System Configuration consists of Account Management, Management Nodes, and Platform Settings.
2.6.1 Account Management
ZCenter has a complete account system that is managed by binding users to roles with different permissions. Account Management contains three third-level menus: User, Role, and AccessKey Management.
User
The User page displays the list of created users and their basic information, and supports both single creation and batch import.
Creating a user: in System Configuration > Account Management > User, click Create User, and choose Add Manually or Batch Import (for batch import, download the template, fill in the required CSV fields, and import). For manual creation, fill in: username, password (or click Auto-generate), Require Password Change, Require Periodic Password Changes, phone number, and email, then confirm the creation.
The management platform edition has no “organization” concept, so the create-user form does not contain “Organization” or “Role” options.
Role
Roles embody permissions and limit the operation scope of users. Features that are not selected cannot be viewed or used by the user.
Creating a role: in System Configuration > Account Management > Role, click Create Role, enter the role name, keep the type as Platform Role, select the feature menus available to this role in the permission tree, and confirm the creation. The permission tree is arranged in the current menu order.
AccessKey Management
Generate an AccessKey (AK/SK) for a user with one click, to be used as identity credentials for integration with other platforms or online API debugging.
2.6.2 Management Nodes
Management Nodes are used to connect and manage virtualization environments (for the adding procedure, see 1.3 Adding a Management Node).
After a ZSphere-type management node is connected, users with the same username and source on both sides can redirect without a password from the Inventory to the native ZSphere console (see 2.2 · Passwordless Redirect to ZSphere).
- Entry: System Configuration > Management Nodes, click Add Management Node.
- Form: Name / Type (VMware | ZStack ZSphere) / Access IP / Username / Password.
- The Type column in the list identifies the platform type of each environment; editing, deleting, and other operations are supported.
2.6.3 Platform Settings
Platform Settings is organized into three groups in the internal sidebar — System Settings, Feature Settings, and Account Settings — with eight third-level menus in total.
System Settings · Custom UI
Customize UI styles of ZCenter Management Platform such as the platform name, web logo, and theme color as needed, so that the portal matches your corporate brand.
System Settings · Alarm Synchronization
Alarm Synchronization periodically synchronizes monitoring alarm data from the managed environments. Currently there is only one task, “Monitoring Alarm Synchronization”; you can view its running status, start/stop it, and open its details to configure the synchronization schedule as needed.
System Settings · Global Settings
Configure platform-level policies, divided into platform policy and time policy:
- Platform Policy
- Login Verification Code: enable verification code checking on the login page.
- Concurrent Sessions per User: allow multiple people to log in and operate with the same account at the same time.
- Third-Party User Login: enable third-party login methods.
- Enable HTTPS: enable HTTPS protection for the web portal.
- Password Complexity Configuration: require passwords to match the configured complexity policy.
- Time Policy
- Recycle Bin Retention Period: how long resources are kept in the recycle bin; the number of days is customizable.
- Message Notification Retention Period: the display time range of platform messages.
- Token Timeout: the timeout duration of the login session token.
Feature Settings · Notification Settings
Manage the platform’s notification server configuration for sending alarms and other messages. Two modes are supported:
- Email Servers: configure the name, description, email type (SMTP), server address and port, username, password, and so on.
- SMS: configure the type (such as Alibaba Cloud), name, description, AccessKey ID / Secret, and so on.
The email/SMS delivery of alarm message templates (2.4.1 Message Templates) depends on the servers configured here.
Feature Settings · HTTPS Configuration
Upload a custom certificate (cert file) to enable HTTPS for the portal, and restore the default certificate when needed.
Feature Settings · Third-Party Authentication
Configure IDP (identity provider) authentication servers for unified identity authentication and single sign-on (SSO). The OIDC, OAuth2, CAS, and LDAP / AD protocols are currently supported (LDAP/AD is built in).
Operations: click Add Third-Party Authentication Server, select the protocol type, and configure the parameters. After the configuration is complete, a third-party login entry appears below the login button on the login page, and users can select the corresponding protocol to sign in to the system via SSO.
Account Settings · Account Information
View and maintain the basic information of the currently logged-in account (such as phone number and email). To make sure you receive email/SMS alarm notifications, fill in and save the correct contact information here.
Account Settings · Account Security
Security settings of the current account, including changing the login password. It is recommended to change the initial password here immediately after the first login.
2.7 User Panel
Click the avatar in the upper-right corner to expand the user panel:
| Item | Description |
|---|---|
| Account Security | Security settings such as changing the password |
| Switch Language | 中文简体 / English |
| Log Out | Safely end the current session |