Signup for itopia and Google Cloud here.

Make sure you have signed up for for Google Cloud. Then, create a new deployment or finish an existing deployment.

1. Login to itopia and if you already created a deployment, select it from the "Deployments" menu on the top left. You will get the option to continue the deployment in the Dashboard. The system will resume your deployment at the same step where you left off.

Click the "Continue" button

Or create a new deployment. Click All deployments from the main menu and click the green + sign

Just type the Name of the deployment and hit Next.
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Click the "Authenticate" button. The system will ask you for your Google email address and password. Make sure to use the same one you used to sign up for Google Cloud.

Note: This email account can be different from the email you used to sign up to the itopia platform.

The email account you selected will appear in the screen and you can create a Google Project that will be associated with your deployment. Put the Project Name and click "Create" button.

If you already created a project in Google platform, click "Already have one" and it will appear in the drop-down list below so you can select it. 

"Project" is Google's way of separating different deployments.

3. Enable APIs

Before the system allows you to continue, you will need to enable all the API's for the project. They allow itopia software to integrate and communicate with your Google infrastructure.

Click on the links one by one and the system will open a new tab in Google Cloud Platform. In Google tab, click Enable located in the top of the screen. 

Once enabled, the button will change to "Disable"

The last confirmation is the IP quota restriction. The system will check if your Google account is upgraded. Without upgrading the GCP account you would only have access to 1 static IP which is not enough for a basic deployment in itopia.
In https://console.cloud.google.com/ click on the UPGRADE button in the top right corner to upgrade your account. If you don't see such button in the IP quota tab, it means that you account was already upgraded.

After you enable the APIs in Google, you can click on the refresh buttons next to each API. 

APIs will turn green to confirm they were enabled so you can continue and click Next.

You will be redirected to specify the Windows Infrastructure settings for your environment.

Windows Infrastructure explained:

Suffix: is the username login identifier (username ending) that will be used by end users when logging in to Cloud workspace. (i.e. username@sufix)

Internal DNS Name: it's a name for your Active Directory Domain, it cannot resolve to an existing domain (i.e. name.local)

External DNS Name: A real domain or subdomain you own is needed here since you will input DNS entries with your registrar later.
We require the DNS name because servers are not yet configured and therefore we don't know their IPs. To make the configuration of the RDP file easier, once the Deployement is launched to Cloud, you will create a DNS record with your server IP in your domain and the RDP file will be configured automatically.

Operating System: if you select 2012, users will get Windows 8 experience, with 2016 you'll get Windows 10 user experience

Dedicated File Server: dedicated file server will be created. No end users sessions will be hosted in the server, it will host only data. A separate server will be created for end user sessions.
If the option is not selected, files will be hosted in session host server.

RD Gateway: provides you higher security for your Cloud connection. If enabled, you will get a task to input RD Gateway certificate (SSL) in .pfx format and a password after the provisioning. Make sure you request wildcard SSL cert or check with the support for the correct hostname for your certificate in case you are requesting a different SSL certificate type.

Dedicated RD Broker: Broker role will be configured in a dedicated server. If the option is not selected, the broker will be combined with the session host server

Redundant Gateway: Another server with the gateway role will be deployed and the system will configure Google Load Balancer

Secondary Domain Controller: Enabling the option will create Backup Domain Controller server with the default setting to only turn on for 1 hour a day to synchronize the database with primary domain controller.

User Profile Disk: If enabled, user profile configuration will take advantage of user profile disk technology. If you prefer other configuration for user profiles, you can disable User Profile Disk and manually setup different configuration of your choice for user profiles.

Estimated No. of users: put the number of users that are expected to be created for this deployment so we can give you more accurate Google cost estimate in the last step

On the top you get the option to select a Region for your deployment. Companies with multiple sites located in different states, countries or continents can now be deployed under single domain with their environment created close to their physical location.
Select the site and add it with the green + sign:
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In case you selected multiple regions make sure you choose the Primary region:
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Then look below where you get the Instance type specifics for your selected servers. You have the option to change the default instance types for your servers as well as change the storage type from Standard storage to SSD for any of the disks.
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​Note: You can also select the type of storage every time you create new app server or add a new disk.
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There are slight pricing differences between Standard and SSD storage options. You can learn more in Google Cloud support document.

Zone: select your nearest data center. US locations are composed of 3 Main US regions, every region has several zones ( -a, -b, -c, -d letters in the end)

West US – Oregon (Dalles) - US-WEST1, 

Central US - Iowa (Council Bluffs) - US-CENTRAL1

Eastern US - South Carolina (Berkeley County) - US-EAST1
                      Northern Virginia - US-EAST4

Under the settings summary and just above the disclaimer message, you will see Google infrastructure cost estimate to give you an idea of the approximate Google cost for your selected settings after you spend your free credits. The estimate shows two scenarios, one if you leave your servers on 24/7 or just 14 hours from Monday to Friday. 

After the provision is saved, you can see Provisioning Status in itopia after clicking on your deployment dashboard and watch how Google servers are being automatically deployed and configured.

After the automatic server configuration is complete, you will receive an email with server admin credentials to be able to connect to your servers. 

You can now go to itopia - Tasks section where you will see 2 provision tasks to be completed manually. After both tasks are marked complete, you will receive a link to download RDP file so users can connect to their cloud desktop. 

IMPORTANT: Don't turn off your servers before the provisioning process has fully completed.

If you deploy your servers directly in Google, you will not be able to manage them from itopia.
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Next steps: 

We’d love to hear from you! Feel free to contact us with any questions or feedback.