Following are two good VMware articles outlining the correct procedure for removing datastores in a vSphere environment:

• Best Practice: How to correctly remove a LUN from an ESX host
• Detaching a datastore or storage device from multiple ESXi 5.0 hosts

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

How to properly remove vSphere datastores

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New StarWind iSCSI SAN v5.8 and Hyper Backup Plug-in are a New Level of Data Protection

Burlington, MA – January 13, 2012 – StarWind Software Inc., an innovative provider of SAN software for iSCSI storage and VM Backup technology, today announced the release of new StarWind iSCSI SAN v5.8 and Hyper-V Backup Plug-in. The iSCSI SAN software is enhanced by the powerful VM Backup technology that is included as a plug-in.

Backup plug-in is built specifically for Hyper-V-based environments to provide fast backup and restore for Hyper-V virtual machines. The backup solution delivered by StarWind performs all operations on the Hyper-V host level thus it requires no backup agents to be installed on virtual machines (Agentless Architecture).

Hyper-V Backup Plug-in makes fast backups and allows quick, reliable restore of both virtual machines and individual files. It utilizes advanced technologies for maximum disk space saving (Global Deduplication). This backup tool is integrated with StarWind Centralized Management Console that enables managing backup and storage from a single window.

Additionally, a new version of HA plug-in is presented in StarWind iSCSI SAN v5.8 that allows use of raw basic images to create HA targets. A new replication engine based on own technology instead of MS iSCSI transport creates higher performance and reliability. This new engine permits use of multiple network interfaces for synchronization and heartbeat.

To simplify the replacement of equipment and recovery of fatal failures, StarWind Software has implemented the ability to change the partner node to any other StarWind server without any downtime and on the fly. Synchronization engine is improved, and this version allows both nodes to sync automatically even in the case of a full blackout of both servers.

“With the release of StarWind iSCSI SAN v5.8 our company is happy to provide our customers with highly available storage and fast backup software developed by the same vendor,” said Artem Berman, Chief Executive Officer of StarWind Software. “Now small and medium-sized companies have an opportunity to achieve higher performance and absolute data protection.”

About StarWind Software Inc.
StarWind Software is a global leader in storage management and SAN software for small and midsize companies. StarWind’s flagship product is SAN software that turns any industry-standard Windows Server into a fault-tolerant, fail-safe iSCSI SAN. StarWind iSCSI SAN is qualified for use with VMware, Hyper-V, XenServer and Linux and Unix environments. StarWind Software focuses on providing small and midsize companies with affordable, highly availability storage technology which previously was only available in high-end storage hardware. Advanced enterprise-class features in StarWind include Automated HA Storage Node Failover and Failback (High Availability), Replication across a WAN, CDP and Snapshots, Thin Provisioning and Virtual Tape management.

Since 2003, StarWind has pioneered the iSCSI SAN software industry and is the solution of choice for over 30,000 customers worldwide in more than 100 countries and from small and midsize companies to governments and Fortune 1000 companies.

For more information on StarWind Software Inc., visit: www.starwindsoftware.com

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

StarWind Releases iSCSI SAN Software Enhanced by VM Backup Technology

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In just a few days, Dell Storage Forum 2012 kicks off at the Grange St Paul’s Hotel in London. I will be in attendance and I hope that you will have the chance to join myself and the rest of the Dell staff and of course an array of storage customers, channel partners, enthusiasts, and analysts. At DSF your appetite will be satisfied with Executive lead Keynote sessions, Breakout sessions delivered by Technical Experts, Instructor lead training, and Hands-on/Self-Paced labs covering Compellent Storage Center, Dell EqualLogic, and PowerVault storage.

This venue won’t be an exact carbon copy of past DSF events. Dell Storage will be showcasing an updated product roadmap and we’ll also see new product announcements. One of the announcements you’ll hear about is the availability of Compellent Storage Center 6.0. As a Technical Marketing Product Specialist who spends all time working on the VMware integration points, this is a release I’ve been looking forward to since starting my career at Dell Compellent in May of last year. This is a significant launch for Dell Compellent from an architectural perspective. SC 6.0 now leverages the FreeBSD 64-bit platform. The 64-bit architecture is the springboard for new features launched this week (such as multithreading opportunities and 12GB memory per Series 40 controller) and will serve as a key enabler for future scalability, integration, and feature enhancements.

If you’re a current Dell Compellent customer with vSphere 4.1 or newer in your datacenter, you know that through SC 5.5.x we supported one VAAI primitive: Zero Blocks or Write Same. Storage Center 6.0 supports additional VMware vSphere VAAI primitives:

• Copy Offload
• Hardware Assisted Locking
• Of course we still support Block Zeroing

On a side note, VMware also released a 4th VAAI primitive in vSphere 5 focusing on Thin Provisioning for block storage arrays.  However, shortly after the release, VMware pulled support on this primitive (applies to all storage vendors) to work out some kinks.  I wrote about that here.

VAAI excites me because of the performance and scalability gains it brings to the vSphere virtual datacenter in addition to vSphere bolt ons such as VMware View and vCloud Director.

Compellent SC 6.0 VAAI support:

• 41% faster block cloning operations on Eager Zeroed Thick and Lazy Zeroed Thick virtual disks
• 98% faster Eager Zeroed Thick disk creation
• Up to 100% reduction in Block Zeroing data traffic from host to storage
• Offloaded operations result in significantly reduced copy traffic between host and storage
• Offloaded operations result in reduction of ESX(i) host resource and storage fabric utilization

Find more details about VAAI at VMware KB 1021976 vStorage APIs for Array Integration FAQ.

This should be a really great week.  Personally, it will be my first Dell Compellent focused conference.  I do hope to see you there and look forward to some good discussions.  If you’re not able to attend in person, you can use these links to follow the action remotely:

Event Links:

• Dell Storage Forum London 2012
• Agenda
• Mobile Device App

Twitter/Social Media Links:

• #DellSF12 hashtag
• Dell Storage: @Dell_Storage
• Dell Storage Forum: @DellSF
• Gina Minks: @gminks
• Lance Boley: @iSCSIKing
• Jason Boche: @jasonboche
• Dell Storage Forum on Facebook

Other Links:

• Dell Tech Center
• Dell Compellent

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

Path Set for Dell Storage Forum 2012 London

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• January 18, 2012 -- How to properly remove vSphere datastores

What: New StarWind V5.8 – Storage & Hyper-V VM Backup from one vendor!

When: Tuesday, January 10, 4:00 PM GMT / 11:00 AM EST

Where: https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/562126034

Details: StarWind iSCSI SAN V5.8 introduces a new powerful backup technology designed specifically for Hyper-V-based environments to provide fast backup and restore for virtual machines.

The key to protection of your virtualization investments is one solution with a rich feature set developed to help you achieve your IT goals easily. It is ONE ultimate answer to all your storage and data managing needs.

StarWind iSCSI SAN 5.8 provides:

Register now to learn more!
Here is the link for registration:

https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/562126034

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

StarWind Webinar – Storage & Hyper-V VM Backup

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Ok, VMware Certified Associate 4 – Desktop, otherwise known as VCA4-DT.  Thursday morning, 70 questions, multiple choice, 90 minutes if I remember right. Time isn’t much of a factor on this exam as it has been in past exams I’ve sat.  Unfortunately I failed by a narrow margin. 289/500 (300 is the passing mark).  Not passing was a bummer since I’ve only failed one other exam and that was 14 years ago.  The reality was that I hadn’t had enough View Administrator seat time to recall what was being tested.  I can’t go into specifics but I will say that having a photographic memory of the View Admin console will go a long way to get by this exam.  I’ve managed a tiny View 4.6 and now 5.0 environment in my lab but I haven’t spent countless hours in the console on a day to day basis which is what I think is really required.  That makes sense – after all it is an Administrator role based exam.  My hope was that brushing up on the blueprint objectives and reading Mike Laverick’s Administrating VMware View 4.5 book cover to cover the night before the exam would have been enough to get by.  It wasn’t.  No fault to Mike of course, his was a fine book.  I planned short on the preparation, rolled the dice, and.. well you know by now what happened.  It was a humbling experience but at the same time it’s an effective method to learn more.  After I get back from Dell Storage Forum London I’ll plan on hitting the lab and ultimately finishing the exam the proper way.  After that, I’ve got my sights set on VMware Certified Professional 4 – Desktop (VCP4-DT) which I may already be better prepared for.

On to the VMware Certified Professional 5 or VPC5.  Friday morning, 85 questions, multiple choice, 90 minutes.  I reached the end of the exam with 14 minutes left to review marked questions – I had quite a few.  I don’t know why – I rarely change my answer when reviewing questions.  I mark the questions with the intent that there may be a better answer which comes to me later on in the exam but it rarely happens and I believe statistics prove that on average, first instinct is going to be the better or correct answer.  I’ll be honest, dwelling on yesterday’s fail did a number to my confidence level but I had no choice but to push forward studying the blueprint for a solid 8 hours last night into the wee hours of the morning.  Granted, the VCP5 exam should be higher on the difficulty level, but the infrastructure content maps quite a bit better to my expertise that VMware View administration does.  I had seen some comments from others that the VCP5 exam didn’t contain much along the lines of Configuration Maximums type questions.  Based on that, I didn’t spend much time in the vSphere 5 Configuration Maximums document.  I brushed up on HA, DRS, and although I have little hands on working experience with the appliance based bolt ons like the vCenter appliance, vDR, VSA, or Auto Deploy, I tried to pick up as much as I could on those areas.  On exam difficulty, the content came easier to me based on familiarity.  For most of the exam I was pretty well within my comfort zone.  As a Technical Marketing Product Specialist at Dell Compellent, the storage related questions aren’t quite the level of difficulty they once were.  There was a pretty good blend of easy/medium/difficult questions, and also a few which I felt were worded poorly enough such that I knew the correct answer either way, but interpretation of the question is going to determine a right or wrong answer.  Results on this exam were better – 406/500 (300 passing).  There were plenty of questions on the other vSphere products I talked about earlier such as the vCenter appliance, vDR, VSA, and Auto Deploy. While I feel I did answer a few of those questions correctly, the remainder is likely what accounts for the majority of the points I missed on the exam.  By the way, if you’re not using vSphere Update Manager on a regular basis to assist in upgrading your environment, you should be, and you’ll want to know that product for this exam as well.

Have a great weekend and for those attending Dell Storage Forum London next week, I hope to meet up with you.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

VCA4-DT and VCP5 Exam Reviews

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I will attest that I’ve been using Veeam Backup & Replication to protect valuable data in my home lab for a few years and I’ve had to rely on it for recovery more than once.  I also included it as a backup and disaster recovery replication solution in my VCDX design submission which I successfully defended in February 2010.

Below you’ll find two promotions for redeeming the NFR licenses.  First is the Hyper-V promotion for MVPs, MCPs, and MCTSs, followed by the VMware promotion for vEXPERTs, VCPs, VCIs, and registered VMUG members (remember, anyone can be a registered VMUG member, it’s free to sign up, so why not do it today?)

If you are a Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP), Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) or a Most Valuable Professional (MVP), you can get a FREE 2-socket NFR* license for Veeam Backup & Replication v6 for your home or work lab.

Register NOW! Get your FREE NFR license from Veeam

*An NFR (Not for Resale) license can only be used for evaluation or demonstration purposes. Read EULA for more details.

Free NFR license for
Veeam Backup & Replication v6 for vSphere
Get this holiday gift from Veeam!

If you are a VMware vExpert, VMware Certified Professional (VCP), VMware Certified Instructor (VCI) or VMware User Group (VMUG) member, you can get a FREE 2-socket NFR* license for Veeam Backup & Replication v6 for your home or work lab.

Register NOW! Get your FREE NFR license from Veeam

*An NFR (Not for Resale) license can only be used for evaluation or demonstration purposes. Read EULA for more details.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

Veeam Offers Free NFR License for Backup & Replication v6

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In this round, the vCD cell stopped working properly (single cell server environment).  I could log into the vCD provider and organization portals but the deployment of vApps would run for an abnormally long time and then fail after 20 minutes with one of the resulting failure messages being Failed to receive status for task.

Doing some digging in the environment I found a few problems.

Problem #1:  None of the cells have a vCenter proxy service running on the cell server.

Problem #2:  Performing a Reconnect on the vCenter Server object resulted in Error performing operation and Unable to find the cell running this listener.

I search the Community Forums, talked with Chris Colotti (read his blog) for a bit, and then opened an SR with VMware support.  VMware sent me a procedure along with a script to run on the Microsoft SQL Server:

1. BACKUP the entire SQL Database.
2. Stop all cells. (service vmware-vcd stop)
3. Run the attached reset_qrtz_tables_sql_database.sql
   – shutdown all cells before executing
   delete from qrtz_scheduler_state
   delete from qrtz_fired_triggers
   delete from qrtz_paused_trigger_grps
   delete from qrtz_calendars
   delete from qrtz_trigger_listeners
   delete from qrtz_blob_triggers
   delete from qrtz_cron_triggers
   delete from qrtz_simple_triggers
   delete from qrtz_triggers
   delete from qrtz_job_listeners
   delete from qrtz_job_details
   go
4. Start one cell and verify if issue is resolved. (service vmware-vcd start)
5. Start the remaining cells.

Before running the script I knew I had to make a few modifications to select the vCloud database first.

When running the script, it failed due to case sensitivity with respect to the table names.  Upon installation, vCD creates all tables with upper case names.  When the MS SQL Server database was first created by yours truly, case sensitivity, along with accent sensitivity, were enabled with COLLATE Latin1_General_CS_AS which comes straight from page 17 of the vCloud Director Installation and Configuration Guide.

After fixing the script, it looked like this:

USE [vcloud]
GO

– shutdown all cells before executing
delete from QRTZ_SCHEDULER_STATE
delete from QRTZ_FIRED_TRIGGERS
delete from QRTZ_PAUSED_TRIGGER_GRPS
delete from QRTZ_CALENDARS
delete from QRTZ_TRIGGER_LISTENERS
delete from QRTZ_BLOB_TRIGGERS
delete from QRTZ_CRON_TRIGGERS
delete from QRTZ_SIMPLE_TRIGGERS
delete from QRTZ_TRIGGERS
delete from QRTZ_JOB_LISTENERS
delete from QRTZ_JOB_DETAILS
go

The script ran successfully wiping out all rows in each of the named tables.  A little sidebar discussion here.. I talked with @sqlchicken (Jorge Segarra, read his blog here) about the delete from statements in the script. It is sometimes a best practice to use the truncate table statement instead so that the transaction logs are bypassed instead of using the delete from statement which is more resource intensive due to the row by row deletion method and the rows being recorded in the transaction logs. Thank you for that insight Jorge! More on MS SQL Delete vs Truncate here. Jorge was also kind enough to provide a link on the subject matter but credentials will be required to view the content.

I was now able to restart the vCD cell and my problems were gone. Everything was working again. All errors have vanished.  I thanked the VMware support staff and then tried to gain a little bit more information about how the problem was resolved by deleting table rows and what exactly are the qrtz tables?  I had looked at the table rows myself before they were deleted and the information in there didn’t make a lot of sense to me (but that doesn’t necessarily classify it as transient data).  This is what he had to say:

These [vCenter Proxy Service] issues are usually caused by a disconnect from the database, causing the tables to become stale. vCD constantly needs the ability to write to the database and when it cannot, the cell ends up in a state that is similar to the one that you have seen.

The qrtz tables contain information that controls the coordinator service, and lets it know when the coordinator to be dropped and restarted, for cell to cell fail over to another cell in multi cell enviroment.

When the tables are purged it forces the cell on start up to recheck its status and start the coordinator service. In your situation the cell, due to corrupt records in the table was not allowing this to happen.

So by clearing them forced the cell to recheck and to restart the coordinator.

Good information to know going forward. I’m going to keep this in my back pocket. Or on my blog as it were.  Have a great weekend!

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

vCloud Director and vCenter Proxy Service Failure

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• August 20, 2011 -- vCenter Server 5.0 and MS SQL Database Permissions
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Although VMworld is over, you still have access to the posters.

One way would be to request a Dell Compellent Executive Briefing with me. I brought a few pounds of posters back from Copenhagen and what’s mine is yours if you’re willing to listen to me talk about the great integration points Dell Compellent Storage Center has with VMware’s growing portfolio.

The other option would be to go online and grab a copy of the posters which you can view electronically or have printed at your local copier shop.  This blog post was inspired by Xtravirt email bulletin 94 – thanks for pulling together the links guys.

vSphere 5.0 CLI Reference Poster

• Landing page
• Direct link to poster

VMware Management with PowerCLI 5.0 Poster

• Landing page
• Direct link to poster

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

VMworld 2011 Hands On Lab Posters

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Press Release:

HotLink Launches Latest Version of HotLink SuperVISOR™ for VMware

Leading enterprises including McAfee and BMC Software adopt HotLink SuperVISOR to seamlessly manage mixed hypervisors inside VMware vCenter console

SUNNYVALE, Calif. – December 15, 2011 – HotLink® Corporation, the market leader in transformation solutions for heterogeneous virtualization management, today announced the newest release of its flagship product, HotLink SuperVISOR™ for VMware. HotLink SuperVISOR is the first and only solution to enable VMware vCenter users to natively manage cross-platform virtual infrastructure spanning Citrix XenServer, Microsoft Hyper-V, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (KVM). The latest release, HotLink SuperVISOR for VMware 1.2, adds new capabilities focused on enterprise robustness, scalability, configuration and management of multi-hypervisors and workloads.

With its latest release, HotLink customers benefit from an enhanced virtual integration platform that provides total control and performance visibility across all enterprise hypervisors, using the VMware vCenter management console they already have. The new features of HotLink SuperVISOR for VMware 1.2 include:

• Enhanced Networking Configuration – Users can now provision and modify virtual switches and network adapters from VMware vCenter and associate these to any enterprise hypervisor —enabling users to manage heterogeneous virtual networking from a single interface.
• Expanded Performance Monitoring – The latest release expands the heterogeneous performance statistics and alerts that are gathered and displayed inside the native VMware vCenter performance tab —allowing administrators to quickly identify issues across the mixed hypervisor environment.
• Robust Configuration of Virtual Machine Settings – Only HotLink provides the ability to modify the configuration of virtual machine settings such as virtual CPUs and memory assignments natively inside vCenter and apply across all virtual platforms —ensuring the optimum VM configuration regardless of the hypervisor.

“Enterprise IT needs are rapidly evolving as an increasing number of VMware shops are deploying heterogeneous hypervisor environments. Administrators need a single management console that provides a comprehensive view and complete control of all enterprise workloads,” said Lynn LeBlanc, CEO and founder of HotLink. “The latest enhancements to HotLink SuperVISOR extend the VMware vCenter management infrastructure to provide sophisticated and robust management capabilities to Hyper-V, XenServer and KVM – unifying the management of all virtual workloads inside VMware vCenter.”

As virtual infrastructure deployments expand and mature, heterogeneity is being fueled by a combination of economics and maturing of hypervisor alternatives. The most recent Gartner Magic Quadrant for x86 Server Virtualization Infrastructure report included, for the first time, both Citrix and Microsoft alongside VMware in the leaders quadrant. Moreover, Hyper-V grew 62 percent last year compared to ESX’s 21 percent growth and Citrix’s 25 percent, according to IDC. While the proliferation of multiple virtual platforms is accelerating, streamlined infrastructure is needed to unify management. That’s exactly what the latest release of HotLink SuperVISOR for VMware addresses.

“McAfee historically was an all VMware shop, but our business needs have changed so that we now have a mix of vSphere, Hyper-V and XenServer.  Utilizing HotLink SuperVISOR for VMware across our virtual environment enables us to increase our usage of other hypervisor platforms while unifying management. By deploying multiple hypervisors and standardizing on VMware vCenter as our primary management interface, we expect to reduce our virtualization cost by over 50 percent and admin costs by 65 percent over the next 3 years,” said Mark Tonnesen, CIO of McAfee. “The foundation of our multi-hypervisor environment is built on the HotLink SuperVISOR platform.”

With the new HotLink SuperVISOR technology, enterprises can tier their virtual infrastructure with cost-effective hypervisors and still unify the management, significantly reducing their licensing and operating costs. With HotLink SuperVISOR, customers can realize the benefits of mixed hypervisors while avoiding overly complicated management systems.

“Like many other IT shops, we are investigating the use of multiple hypervisors to cost effectively support development and test activities for our Tier 2 and Tier 3 business applications. We have been very impressed by HotLink’s SuperVISOR technology and the hypervisor interoperability that it enables.  We believe that HotLink will enable us to optimize the use of specific hypervisors for individual workloads without compromising our ability to manage our overall virtual environment,” said Mark Settle, CIO of BMC Software.

Pricing and Availability

HotLink SuperVISOR for VMware 1.2 is available now with pricing starting at $25,000. For more information, contact sales@hotlink.com or visit www.hotlink.com.

Supporting Resources

Follow HotLink on:

• Twitter
• Facebook
• LinkedIn

About HotLink Corporation

Founded in early 2010 by data center software veterans and the founders of FastScale Technology, Inc. (acquired by VMware), HotLink Corporation is on a mission to transform real-world IT with the first true heterogeneous data center system management platform for virtual, cloud and physical computing infrastructure. Early customers include enterprise IT organizations spanning technology, financial services, telecommunications and Internet search. HotLink’s advisory board includes visionary leaders from Informatica, Facebook, E*TRADE, Clorox, Citrix, BMC and Flextronics.  HotLink is a privately held, venture capital backed company based in Sunnyvale, California. For more information, visit www.hotlink.com.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

HotLink Launches Latest Version of HotLink SuperVISOR for VMware

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• August 20, 2011 -- vCenter Server 5.0 and MS SQL Database Permissions
• June 28, 2011 -- New Diskeeper White Paper: Optimization of VMware Systems

The vmware-vcd-support script collects host log information as well as these vCloud Director logs. The script is located in the following folders:

For vCloud Director 1.0, run /opt/vmware/cloud-director/bin/vmware-vcd-support

For vCloud Director 1.5, run /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/bin/vmware-vcd-support

Once executed, the script will bundle the following log files from /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/logs/ into a .tgz tarball saving it in the directory from which the script was run (providing there is enough storage available):

1. cell.log – Console output from the vCloud Director cell.
2. diagnostics.log – Cell diagnostics log. This file is empty unless diagnostics logging is enabled in the local logging configuration.
3. vcloud-container-info.log – Informational log messages from the cell. This log also shows warnings or errors encountered by the cell.
4. vcloud-container-debug.log – Debug-level log messages from the cell.
5. vcloud-vmware-watchdog.log – Informational log messages from the cell watchdog. It records when the cell crashes, is restarted, etc.

On the subject of vCD log files, also mentioned in the KB article is VMware KB 1026815 Configuring logging for VMware vCloud Director.  The information in this article is useful for specifying the quantity and size of vCD log files to be maintained on the cell server.

Once the log files have been collected, you may analyze them offline or upload them to VMware’s FTP site in association with an SR by following VMware KB 1008525 Uploading diagnostic information to VMware.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

Collecting diagnostic information for VMware vCloud Director

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Contest Rules:

1) Create and send a 1 – 3 minute video, explaining who you are and how you think the lab would help you.

2) Shipping to US addresses only.

3) Employees of prize vendors and Cody’s tight friends are ineligible.

4) Entries must be received by midnight 12/13.

5) Winner will be announced between 12/14 and 12/16.

6) The very best of luck to all contestants and may the luckiest and most deserving person win. If you sue Cody or cause trouble for him you will be the biggest loser.

Head on over there now & submit your entry!

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

BrownBag Blow Out – vSphere Lab Give Away

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For the non Twitter folks…  Seven days ago, Mostafa posted the picture shown below.  It’s the Getting Started Guide for VMware Workstation 1.0 for Linux. It comes to us from the year 1999.

Seeing this is enough to make a vEvangelist tear up.  I’d love to get my hands on this product at some point and take it for a spin.  Perhaps I’ll have a chance if the VMTN Subscription makes its return.  My VMware journey didn’t start until a year later with Workstation 2.0.2 for Windows.  Look at the file size – 5MB.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

Mostafa Khalil Makes Twitter Debut With VMware Nostalgia

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• February 28, 2011 -- Tiny Core Linux and Operational Readiness
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To provide temporary storage for uploads and downloads, an NFS or other shared storage volume must be accessible to all servers in a vCloud Director cluster. This volume must have write permission for root. Each host must mount this volume at $VCLOUD_HOME/data/transfer, typically /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/data/transfer. Uploads and downloads occupy this storage for a few hours to a day. Transferred images can be large, so allocate at least several hundred gigabytes to this volume.

This is the only VMware documentation I could find covering Transfer Server Storage.  There is a bit of extra information revealed about Transfer Server Storage upon the initial installation of the vCD cell which basically states that at that point in time you should configure Transfer Server Storage to point to shared NFS storage for all vCD cells to use, or if there is just a single cell, local cell storage may be used:

If you will be deploying a vCloud Director cluster you must mount the shared transfer server storage prior to running the configuration script.  If this is a single server deployment no shared storage is necessary.

Transfer Server Storage is used for uploading and downloading (exporting) vApps.  A vApp is one or more virtual machines with associated virtual disks.  Small vApps in .OVF format will consume maybe 1GB (or potentially less depending on its contents).  Larger vApps could be several hundred GBs or beyond.  By default, Transfer Server Storage will draw capacity from /.  Lack of adequate Transfer Server Storage capacity will result in the inability to upload or download vApps (it could also imply you’re out of space on /).  Long story short, if you skipped the brief instructions on Transfer Server Storage during your build of a RHEL 5 vCD cell, at some point you may run short on Transfer Server Storage and even worse you’d run / out of available capacity.

I ran into just such a scenario in the lab and thought I’d just add a new virtual disk with adequate capacity, create a new mount point, and then adjust the contents of /etc/profile.d/vcloud.sh (export VCLOUD_HOME=/opt/vmware/vcloud-director) to point vCD to the added capacity.  I quickly found out this procedure does not work.  The vCD portal dies and won’t start again.  I did some searching and wound up at David Hill’s vCloud Director FAQ which confirms the transfer folder cannot be moved (Chris Colotti has also done some writing on Transfer Server Storage here in addition to related content I found on the vSpecialist blog).  However, we can add capacity to that folder by creating a new mount at that folder’s location.

I was running into difficulties trying to extend / so I collaborated with Bob Plankers (a Linux and Virtualization guru who authors the blog The Lone Sysadmin) to identify the right steps, in order, to get the job done properly for vCloud Director.  Bob spent his weekend time helping me out with great detail and for that I am thankful.  You rule Bob!

Again, consider the scenario: There is not enough Transfer Server Storage capacity or Transfer Server Storage has consumed all available capacity on /.  The following steps will grow an existing vCloud Director Cell virtual disk by 200GB and then extend the Transfer Server Storage by that amount.  The majority of the steps will be run via SSH, local console or terminal:

1. Verify rsync is installed. To verify, type rsync followed by enter. All vCD supported versions of RHEL 5 (Updates 4, 5, and 6) should already have rsync installed.  If a minimalist version of RHEL 5 was deployed without rsync, execute yum install rsync to install it (RHN registration required).
2. Gracefully shut down the vCD Cell.
3. Now would be a good time to capture a backup of the vCD cell as well as the vCD database if there is just a single cell deployed in the environment.
4. Grow the vCD virtual disk by 200 GB.
5. Power the vCD cell back on and at boot time go into single user mode by interrupting GRUB (press an arrow key to move the kernel selection).  Use ‘a‘ to append boot parameters. Append the word single to the end (use a space separator) and hit enter.
6. Use # sudo fdisk /dev/sda to partition the new empty space:
1. Enter ‘n’ (for new partition)
2. Enter ‘p’ (for primary)
3. Enter a partition number.  For a default installation of RHEL 5 Update 6, 1 and 2 will be in use so this new partition will likely be 3.
4. First cylinder… it’ll offer a number, probably the first free cylinder on the disk. Hit enter, accept the default.
5. Last cylinder… hit enter. It’ll offer you the last cylinder available. Use it all!
6. Enter ‘x’ for expert mode.
7. Enter ‘b’ to adjust the beginning sector of the partition.
8. Enter the partition number (3 in this case).
9. In this step align the partition to a multiple of 128.  It’ll ask for “new beginning of data” and have a default number. Take that default number and round it up to the nearest number that is evenly divisible by 128. So if the number is 401660, I take my calculator and divide it by 128 to get the result 3137.968. I round that up to 3138 then multiply by 128 again = 401664. That’s where I want my partition to start for good I/O performance, and I enter that.
10. Now enter ‘w’ to write the changes to disk. It’ll likely complain that it cannot reread the partition table but this is safe to ignore.
7. Reboot the vCD cell using shutdown -r now
8. When the cell comes back up, we need to add that new space to the volume group.
1. pvcreate /dev/sda3 to initialize it as a LVM volume. (If you used partition #4 then it would be /dev/sda4).
2. vgextend VolGroup00 /dev/sda3 to grow the volume.
9. Now create a filesystem:
1. lvcreate –size 199G –name transfer_lv VolGroup00 to create a logical volume 199 GB in size named transfer_lv. Adjust the numbers as needed. Notice we cannot use the entire space available due to slight overhead.
2. mke2fs -j -m 0 /dev/VolGroup00/transfer_lv to create an ext3 filesystem on that logical volume.  The -j parameter indicates journaled, which is ext3.  The -m 0 parameter tells the OS to reserve 0% of the space for the superuser for emergencies. Normally it reserves 5%, which is a complete waste of 5% of your virtual disk.
10. Now we need to mount the filesystem somewhere where we can copy the contents of /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/data/transfer first.  mount /dev/VolGroup00/transfer_lv /mnt will mount it on /mnt which is a good temporary spot.
11. Stop the vCloud Director cell service to close any open files or transactions in flight with service vmware-vcd stop.
    
12. rsync -av /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/data/transfer/ /mnt to make an exact copy of what’s there. Mind the slashes, they’re important.
13. Examine the contents of /mnt to be sure everything from /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/data/transfer was copied over properly.
14. rm -rf /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/data/transfer/* to delete the file and directory contents in the old default location. If you mount over it, the data will still be there sucking up disk space but you won’t be able to see it (instead you’ll see lost+found). Make sure you have a good copy in /mnt!
15. umount /mnt to unmount the temporary location.
16. mount /dev/VolGroup00/transfer_lv /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/data/transfer (all one line) to mount it in the right spot.
17. df -h to confirm the mount point is there and vCD data (potentially along with transient transfer storage files) is consuming some portion of it.
18. To auto mount correctly on reboot:
1. nano -w /etc/fstab to edit the filesystem mount file.
2. At the very bottom add a new line (but no blank lines between) that looks like the rest, but with our new mount point. Use tab separation between the fields. It should look like this:
   /dev/VolGroup00/transfer_lv /opt/vmware/vcloud-director/data/transfer/ ext3 defaults 1 2
3. Ctrl-X to quit, ‘y’ to save modified buffer, enter to accept the filename.
19. At this time we can either start the vCD cell with service vmware-vcd start or reboot to ensure the new storage automatically mounts and the cell survives reboots. If after a reboot the vCD portal is unavailable, it’s probably due to a typo in fstab.

This procedure, albeit a bit lengthy and detailed, worked well and was the easiest solution for my particular scenario.  There are some other approaches which would work to solve this problem.  One of them would be almost identical to the above but instead of extending the virtual disk of the vCD cell, we could add a new virtual disk with the required capacity and then mount it up.  Another option would be to build a new vCloud Director server with adequate space and then decommission the first vCD server.  This wasn’t an option for me because the certificate key files for the first vCD server no longer existed.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

Expanding vCloud Director Transfer Server Storage

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The sale pricing is as follows:

US – ebook – $ 4.99

UK – ebook – £ 3.99

DE – ebook – € 3.99

FR – ebook – € 3.99

If you’re serious about vSphere 5, you need this book in your technical library.  Even if you’re already a seasoned vSphere expert, there are some major changes in the features which Duncan and Frank deepdive on.  Tis the season for giving so if you already have a copy for yourself, take advantage of these prices to pick up another copy for your favorite co-worker, employee, manager, spouse, or child.  Now is as good a time as any to get the young ones started on VMware virtualization.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

vSphere 5 Clustering Technical Deepdive Sale

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The majority of my work involved networking in which I decommissioned all legacy vSwitches in the vSphere 5 cluster and converted all remaining VMkernel port groups to the existing vNetwork Distributed Switch (vDS) where I was already running the majority of the VMs on Static binding port groups.  In the process, some critical infrastructure VMs were also moved to the vDS including the vCenter, SQL, and Active Directory domain controller servers.  Because of this, I elected to implement Ephemeral – no binding for the port binding configuration of the VM port group which all VMs were connected to, including some powered off VMs I used for cloning to new virtual machines.  This decision was made in case there was a complete outage in the lab.  Static binding presents issues where in some circumstances, VMs can’t power on when the vCenter Server (Control Plane of the vDS) is down or unavailable.  Configuring the port group for Ephemeral – no binding works around this issue by allowing VMs to power on and claim their vDS ports when the vCenter Server is down.  There’s a good blog article on this subject by Eric Gray which you can find here.

Everything was working well with the new networking configuration until the following day when I tried deploying new virtual machines by cloning powered off VMs which were bound to the Ephemeral port group.  After the cloning process completed, the VM powered on for the first time and Guest Customization was then supposed to run.  This is where the problems came up.  The VMs would essentially hang just after guest customization was invoked by the vCenter Server.  While watching the remote console of the VM, it was evident that Guest Customization wasn’t starting.  At this point, the VM can’t be powered off – an error is displayed:

Cannot power Off vm_name on host_name in datacenter_name: The attempted operation cannot be performed in the current state (Powered on).

DRS also starts producing occasional errors on the host:

Unable to apply DRS resource settings on host host_name in datacenter_name. The operation is not allowed in the current state.. This can significantly reduce the effectiveness of DRS.

VMware KB 1004667 speaks to a similar circumstance where a blocking task on a VM (in this case a VMware Tools installation) prevents any other changes to it.  This speaks to why the VM can’t be powered off until the VMware Tools installation or Guest Customization process either ends or times out.

Finally, the following error in the cluster Events is what put me on to the suspicion of Ephemeral binding as the source of the issues:

Error message on vm_name on host_name in datacenter_name: Failed to connect virtual device Ethernet0.

Error Stack:

Failed to connect virtual device Ethernet0.

Unable to get networkName or devName for ethernet0

Unable to get dvs.portId for ethernet0

I searched the entire vSphere 5 document library for issues or limitations related to the use of Ephemeral – no binding but came up empty.  This reinforced my assumption that Ephemeral binding across the board for all VMs was a supported configuration.  Perhaps it is for running virtual machines but in my case it fails when used in conjunction with cloning and guest customization.  In the interim, I’ve moved off Ephemeral binding back to Static binding.  Cloning problem solved.

Post from: boche.net - VMware Virtualization Evangelist

Copyright (c) 2010 Jason Boche. The contents of this post may not be reproduced or republished on another web page or web site without prior written permission.

Cloning VMs, Guest Customization, & vDS Ephemeral Port Binding

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