Are some more digging. I have discovered the following.

If provision a vdsm node exactly the same way and add it to an old, working ovirt of mine, it works. I've reprovisioned the new ovirt again, the same exact way as before and hit the same problem. Here is what I found on the node logs:

# cat vds_installer.283838.log
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:11 DEBUG    **** Start VDS Installation ****
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:11 DEBUG    get_id_line: read line Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 6.2 (Santiago).
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:11 DEBUG    lsb_release: input line Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 6.2 (Santiago).
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:11 DEBUG    lsb_release: return: RedHatEnterpriseServer.
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:11 DEBUG    <BSTRAP component='INSTALLER' status='OK' message='Test platform succeeded'/>
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:11 DEBUG    trying to fetch deployUtil.py script cmd = '/usr/bin/curl -s -k -w %{http_code} -o /tmp/deployUtil.py http://mgmt.example.com:8080/Components/vds/deployUtil.py'
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:12 DEBUG    <BSTRAP component='INSTALLER LIB' status='OK' message='deployUtil.py download succeeded'/>
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:12 DEBUG    trying to fetch vds_bootstrap.py script cmd = '/usr/bin/curl -s -k -w %{http_code} -o /tmp/vds_bootstrap_51b8d414-a8fa-44f9-8613-f7819255d2eb.py http://mgmt.example.com:8080/Components/vds/vds_bootstrap.py'
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:12 DEBUG    <BSTRAP component='INSTALLER' status='OK' message='vds_bootstrap.py download succeeded'/>
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:14:12 DEBUG    trying to run /tmp/vds_bootstrap_51b8d414-a8fa-44f9-8613-f7819255d2eb.py script cmd = '/tmp/vds_bootstrap_51b8d414-a8fa-44f9-8613-f7819255d2eb.py -v -O salesforce.com -t 2012-04-27T03:12:27 http://mgmt.example.com:8080/Components/vds/ node.example.com 51b8d414-a8fa-44f9-8613-f7819255d2eb'


There is no output after this. vds_boostrap log is empty.

if I run the bootstrap command as specified in the log file, I get this as the only failure:

<BSTRAP component='REQ PACKAGES' status='FAIL' result='SDL.x86_64' message='Setting up Install Process No package SDL.x86_64 available. Error: Nothing to do '/>
<BSTRAP component='RHEV_INSTALL' status='FAIL'/>

After installing the package, I got this:

<BSTRAP component='SetNetworking' status='FAIL' message='addNetwork error trying to add rhevm bridge'/>
<BSTRAP component='SetSSHAccess' status='FAIL' message='Failed to retrieve server SSH key.'/>
<BSTRAP component='RHEV_INSTALL' status='FAIL'/>

Finally, I looked at the bootstrap log and found the details:

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    Bridge rhevm not found, need to create it.
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    getAddress Entry. url=script
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    getAddress return. address=script port=None
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    makeBridge begin.
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    _getMGTIface: read vdc_host_name: script
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    _getMGTIface: error trying to figure out VDC's IP
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    _getMGTIface: using vdc_host_name script strVDCIP= None
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    _getMGTIface VDC IP=None strIface=None
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    makeBridge got mgtIface None. This is a routing or resolution issue.
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 ERROR    makeBridge errored:  out=
err=None
ret=None
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    makeBridge return.
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 ERROR    addNetwork error trying to add rhevm bridge
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    <BSTRAP component='SetNetworking' status='FAIL' message='addNetwork error trying to add rhevm bridge'/>
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    getAddress Entry. url=script
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    getAddress return. address=script port=None
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    getRemoteFile start. IP = script port = None fileName = "/rhevm.ssh.key.txt"
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    /rhevm.ssh.key.txt failed in HTTPS. Retrying using HTTP.
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/tmp/deployUtil.py", line 1279, in getRemoteFile
    sock.connect((IP, nPort))
  File "<string>", line 1, in connect
gaierror: [Errno -2] Name or service not known
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 ERROR    Failed to fetch /rhevm.ssh.key.txt using http.
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/tmp/deployUtil.py", line 1295, in getRemoteFile
    conn.request("GET", fileName)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/httplib.py", line 914, in request
    self._send_request(method, url, body, headers)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/httplib.py", line 951, in _send_request
    self.endheaders()
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/httplib.py", line 908, in endheaders
    self._send_output()
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/httplib.py", line 780, in _send_output
    self.send(msg)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/httplib.py", line 739, in send
    self.connect()
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/httplib.py", line 720, in connect
    self.timeout)
  File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/socket.py", line 553, in create_connection
    for res in getaddrinfo(host, port, 0, SOCK_STREAM):
gaierror: [Errno -2] Name or service not known
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 ERROR    Failed to fetch /rhevm.ssh.key.txt status
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    getRemoteFile end.
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    <BSTRAP component='SetSSHAccess' status='FAIL' message='Failed to retrieve server SSH key.'/>
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 ERROR    setSSHAccess test failed
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    <BSTRAP component='RHEV_INSTALL' status='FAIL'/>
Fri, 27 Apr 2012 03:33:19 DEBUG    **** End VDS Validation ****

It seems that ovirt is not able to create the bridge. What could be off?; could I have missed a configuration step or param somewhere?. Note, that I used the following answers file to install ovirt:

[general]
OVERRIDE_IPTABLES=no
HTTP_PORT=8080
HTTPS_PORT=8443
MAC_RANGE=00:1A:4A:A8:7A:00-00:1A:4A:A8:7A:FF
ORG_NAME=example.com
DC_TYPE=NFS
CONFIG_NFS=no
NFS_MP=
ISO_DOMAIN_NAME=
DB_REMOTE_INSTALL=local
#DB_HOST=localhost
#DB_PORT=5432

HOST_FQDN=mgmt.example.com
AUTH_PASS=password
DB_LOCAL_PASS=password