# GCP Satellite Overview

The CMDB-360 GCP Satellite provides visibility into the resources managed within a Google Cloud Platform (GCP) environment. Google Cloud organizes resources into projects, within which Compute Engine virtual machine instances, disks and networks are provisioned. The GCP Satellite discovers the projects available to it and the Compute Engine resources within them, and supports discovery across one or many Google Cloud projects.

No proprietary asset information is stored on the CMDB-360 Base Station database…only simple rosters of discovered Google Cloud resources are recorded. CMDB-360 users (with proper permissions) may obtain additional details about a discovered resource via the CMDB-360 portal that is streamed from the Satellite to the Base Station and viewed on-demand.

The GCP Satellite only requires read-only permissions to Google Cloud to gather all required CMDB details within the environment.

# Main Functions

The GCP Satellite performs two core functions:

• Discovers Google Cloud projects and their Compute Engine resources, and regularly sends non-sensitive resource details to the CMDB-360 Base Station for asset management.
• Provides the CMDB-360 Base Station on-demand access to asset information without storing sensitive information outside the Google Cloud environment.

# Managed Resources

The following Google Cloud resources are accessed:

• Projects
• Compute Engine Instances
• Disks (attached to instances)
• Network Interfaces (of instances)

For each discovered project, the Satellite captures:

• Name, display name and unique ID
• Project type and lifecycle state
• Position in the resource hierarchy — its parent and whether it is a top-level project
• Created and last-updated timestamps

For each discovered Compute Engine instance, the Satellite captures:

• Name, unique ID, description and resource URL
• Machine type and CPU platform
• Status and status message
• Zone
• Hostname and source image
• Created, last-started and last-stopped timestamps
• The project to which the instance belongs
• Its attached disks and network interfaces (described below)

For each attached disk, the Satellite captures:

• Device name, size (in GB), type and interface
• Boot, auto-delete and access-mode flags
• Architecture, attachment index and any associated licenses

For each network interface, the Satellite captures:

• Name, the associated network and subnetwork, and any network attachment
• Internal (network) IP and IPv6 address
• NIC type and IP stack type

# Deployment / Installation

The GCP Satellite may be installed or deployed in a number of different ways:

# 1) By Installing a Docker Image from Dockerhub

If you have a compute instance with Docker installed, you may install the GCP Satellite using a container image from Dockerhub. Pull the GCP Satellite Docker image and run the image as a container according to the instructions provided.

All updates to the GCP Satellite will be delivered using the internal satellite update mechanism (used by all satellites), but you may also use Docker to pull the latest version (in which case you will have to re-configure it).

To learn more about installing the GCP Satellite (or any Satellite) on a Docker host, see https://www.cmdb360.com/docs/?uri=Docker/Satellites/Install.html

# 2) By Using Universal Installer On Any Linux VM

You may provision any Linux compute instance running Oracle Linux 8+, Oracle Linux 9, Ubuntu 20.04, or Ubuntu 22.04 on ARM or x86_64 architecture and install the GCP Satellite software using the Installer graphical utility or the AutoInstaller non-interactive utility (for scripts). The provisioned compute instance must have at least 1 OCPU and 4GB RAM along with at least 10GB Disk.

You may obtain a link to the current Installer or AutoInstaller utilities (and documentation) from your CMDB-360 portal under the deployed GCP Satellite details screen.

# Additional Notes On Deployment

CMDB-360 recommends that the GCP Satellite be deployed within the customer’s Google Cloud project so that credentials and discovered data remain within the customer’s environment. Because it uses the public Google Cloud APIs, you may however install the GCP Satellite in any other location with outbound internet access.

# Configuration

The GCP Satellite has a 2-step configuration process. First, as with any satellite, you must configure the GCP Satellite to communicate with the CMDB-360 Base Station deployed for your company. Second, you must configure the GCP Satellite to access the Google Cloud APIs of your environment.

# 1) Connection To Base Station

All satellites are connected to their respective CMDB-360 Base Station by the URL and Token values defined in the encrypted config.yml configuration file found in the base config directory of the satellite (/opt/satellite/etc by default). This configuration file is managed by the AdminTool utility which is found in the base of the satellite install directory (/opt/satellite by default).

Please see https://www.cmdb360.com/docs/?uri=OCI-satellite/OciSatelliteSetup/OciSatelliteSetup.html for instructions about setting up the GCP Satellite to its respective Base Station.

# 2) Configure Connection To Google Cloud

The GCP Satellite accesses the Google Cloud APIs using a service account that has been granted read-only access to the projects and resources you wish to discover.

Create a service account and grant it a read-only role — for example, the basic Viewer role, or more granular roles such as Compute Viewer and Browser — at the organization, folder or project scope. Generate a service account key for the account.

Enter the details of your Google Cloud service account using the ConfigTool utility:

cd /opt/satellite/bin

./ConfigTool

Provide your service account key (JSON) and, if desired, the organization, folder or project to scope discovery:

Click Save to save the changes. The GCP Satellite will now automatically begin the discovery process and connect to your CMDB Base Station.