Unify Device and VirtualMachine in a single table. Differentiate between the 2 using is_virtual flag.

[slappey-ibkr]

Environment

• Python version: 3.6
• Nautobot version: 1.1.4

Proposed Functionality

Add is_virtual flag to Device model and deprecate VirtualMachine or make it a proxy model back to Device with is_virtual hardcoded to True. I know there's more to it than that but I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on this.

Use Case

The problem with having 2 tables is that we must know if a host is physical or virtual when running remote jobs. Otherwise, we have to query both tables until we find the host we’re looking for. We must also know if a host is a physical or virtual when creating relations to objects such as IPAddress. The proposed functionality would unify all devices in a single table.

Database Changes

1. Add is_virtual flag to Device
2. (not required) Update VirtualMachine model to be a proxy to Device with is_virtual hardcoded to True.
3. (not required) Create new model PhysicalMachine as a proxy to Device with is_virtual hardcoded to False.

if device.is_virtual == False:

• device is a physical machine
• validation of device.rack is enabled and rack is visible in UI
• validation of device.position is enabled and rack position is visible in UI
• device.cluster becomes the cluster this physical machine is a member of
• device.interfaces.type choices are enabled and are visible in UI

if device.is_virtual == True:

• device is a virtual machine
• validation of device.rack is disabled and is hidden in UI
• validation of device.position is disabled and is hidden in UI
• device.cluster becomes the cluster this virtual machine is running on
• device.interfaces.type choices are disabled, value defaults to virtual and is hidden in UI

Example Queries
device_count = Device.objects.filter(is_virtual=False).count()
vm_count = Device.objects.filter(is_virtual=True).count()

cluster = Cluster.objects.first()
cluster_devices = cluster.devices.filter(is_virtual=False)
cluster_vms = cluster.devices.filter(is_virtual=True)

External Dependencies

None

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Again, I know there's more to it than this but I'd love to kick off the conversation and hear everyone's thoughts.

[glennmatthews]

Thank you! As you suggested, this is probably an idea that makes sense to have a great deal more conversation about before making any design decisions. As such I'm going to move this issue to the Discussions for now.

[glennmatthews]

We're planning to move ahead with this idea in an upcoming release. As such we've moved this back to an open issue -- please refer to #1178, and please provide any comments or feedback there.