© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved

Transitioning to ESXi with vSphere 4.1

Mark Monce – Sr. Systems Engineer

We Are Converging on the ESXi Architecture

• Brand History 2007 – ESX 3i

2008 – ESXi 3.x (Free, Std, Adv, Ent)

2009 – vSphere ESX (Std, Adv, Ent, E+), ESXi (Free, Std, Adv, Ent, E+)

2010 – “VMware Hypervisor” (Free); vSphere ESX/ESXi (all paid editions)

• VMware will converge on the ESXi architecture in mid 2011. End-of-Sale ≠ End of Support: ESX 4.0 (with Service Console) will be supported at least through May 2014

according to the VMware vSphere Support Life Cycle (HW enablement is limited to first 2 years):

987654321

General Extended

General Extended

General Availability

1st Minor Rel.

Years After Release

Please Look up the Details on vmware.com

Agenda

3 Confidential

Overview of ESXi

Hardware Monitoring and Systems Management

Infrastructure Services

Command Line Interfaces

Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

New and Improved Paradigm for ESX Management

Commands forconfiguration and

diagnostics

Commands forconfiguration and

diagnostics

Management Agents

Hardware Agents

Service Console (COS)

VMware ESXi

CIM API

Agentless vAPI-based

“Classic” VMware ESX

Agentless CIM-based

vCLI, PowerCLI

vSphere APIInfrastructure

Integration Agents Native Agents:NTP, Syslog, SNMP

Local Support Console

Agenda

5 Confidential

Overview of ESXi

Hardware Monitoring and Systems Management

Infrastructure Services

Command Line Interfaces

Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

Next Steps

WS

-MA

N

Hardware Monitoring with CIM

Common Information Model (CIM)• Agent-less, standards based

monitoring of hardware resources• Output readable by 3rd party

management tools via standard APIs• VMware and Partner CIM

providers for specific hardware devices

Management Server

ManagementClient

Hardware

VMkernel

HardwarePlatformCPU Network StorageMemory

CIM Broker

VMware Providers

Partner Providers

Monitor and Manage Health of Server Hardware with vCenter

New CIM Interface• Detailed hardware health

monitoring• Physical and virtual visibility

on server health• vCenter alarms alert when

hardware failures occur Host hardware fan status Host hardware power status Host hardware system board

status Host hardware temperature

status

New vCenter

Alarms for Hardware

Third Party Hardware Monitoring

• OEMs HW Monitoring through their Management Consoles

• view server and storage asset data• view server and storage health information• view alert and command logs• configure hardware (e.g. storage, BIOS)

Dell Open Manager Server Administrator 6.1HP SIM 5.3.2+

ESXi (VMware Hypervisor) OEM Versions

• VMware, Dell, IBM, HP versions available at www.vmware.com/go/get-free-esxi (requires registration)

New Feature: Update Manager to deploy 3rd party code

Behavior of VMware Update Manager in vSphere 4.0

• Can only deploy updates if obtained from online depot

• CANNOT deploy downloaded packages (“offline bundles”) Drivers CIM providers Other modules

• Can only do on ESXi via ‘vihostupdate’ CLI tool Operates only host-by-host Not tracked centrally

Behavior with VMware Update Manager in vSphere 4.1

• Can import offline bundles into repository

• Deployed and managed just like all other updates

BPM for Virtual Servers BPA for Virtual Servers Capacity Mgmt Essentials Atrium Orchestrator Bladelogic Operations

Manager ProactiveNet v7.7 * Client Automation Atrium Discovery &

Dependency Mapping v7.4 *

CA Virtual Performance Manager (VPM)

Spectrum Automation Management

Spectrum eHealth Cohesion ARCserve

Smarts ESM v1.1 ADM v6.2 ControlCenter Avamar Networker

ITM for Virtual Servers v6.1.2 *

TPM ITUAM ITLCM Tivoli Storage

Manager

Operations Orchestration

VI SPI Client Automation DDM Operations Agent UCMDB SiteScope Performance Agent DataProtector HP Operations

Majority of Systems Management and Back Up Vendors Support ESXi

New Feature: Additional Deployment Option

Boot From SAN

• Fully supported in ESXi 4.1

• Was only experimentally supported in ESXi 4.0

• Initially only FC-SAN support; iSCSI supported; FCOE supported, other being considered

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New Feature: Additional Deployment Option

Scripted Installation

• Numerous choices for installation Installer booted from

CD-ROM (default)

Preboot Execution Environment (PXE)

ESXi Installation image on

CD-ROM (default), HTTP / HTTPS, FTP, NFS

Script can be stored and accessed

Within the ESXi Installer ramdisk (default)

On the installation CD-ROM

HTTP / HTTPS, FTP, NFS

Configuration script (“ks.cfg”) can include other scripts

Preinstall

Postinstall

First boot

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Agenda

14 Confidential

Overview of ESXi

Hardware Monitoring and Systems Management

Infrastructure Services

Command Line Interfaces

Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

Next Steps

Infrastructure Services for Production Environments

Function Provided by

Time synchronization Built-in NTP service

Centralized log collection Built-in Syslog service

SNMP monitoring Built-in SNMP service

Persistent Logging Log to files on datastore

Local access authentication Built-in Active Directory service

New Feature: Built-in Active Directory Service

Active Directory Service

Provides authentication for all local services

• vSphere Client

• Other access based on vSphere API

• DCUI

• Tech Support Mode (local and remote)

Has nominal Active Directory groups functionality

• Members of “ESX Admins” AD group have Administrative privilege

• Administrative privilege includes: Full Administrative role in vSphere Client and vSphere API clients DCUI access Tech Support Mode access (local and remote)

Agenda

18 Confidential

Overview of ESXi

Hardware Monitoring and Systems Management

Infrastructure Services

Command Line Interfaces

Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

Next Steps

vCLI and PowerCLI: primary scripting interfaces

vCLI and PowerCLI built on same API as vSphere Client

• Same authentication (e.g. Active Directory), roles and privileges, event logging

• API is secure, optimized for remote environments, firewall-friendly, standards-based

vSphere Web Service API

vSphere SDK

Otherlanguages

vCLI Other utility

scripts

vSphere Client

vSpherePowerCLI

New Feature: Additional vCLI configuration commands

Storage

• esxcli swiscis session: Manage iSCSI sessions

• esxcli swiscsi nic: Manage iSCSI NICs

• esxcli swiscsi vmknic: List VMkernel NICs available for binding to particular iSCSI adapter

• esxcli swiscsi vmnic: List available uplink adapters for use with a specified iSCSI adapter

• esxcli vaii device: Display information about devices claimed by the VMware VAAI (vStorage APIs for Array Integration) Filter Plugin.

• esxcli corestorage device: List devices or plugins. Used in conjunction with hardware acceleration.

• Full esxcli reference guide: http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vsphere4/r40/vsp_40_vcli.pdf

Agenda

21 Confidential

Overview of ESXi

Hardware Monitoring and Systems Management

Infrastructure Services

Command Line Interfaces

Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

Next Steps

Diagnostic Commands for ESXi: vCLI

Familiar set of ‘esxcfg-*’ commands available in vCLI

• Names mapped to ‘vicfg-*’

• Also includes vmkfstools vmware-cmd resxtop

Additional commands not available in COS

• vifs: transfer of log, config, and VM files to/from host/datastores

• vicfg-volume (VMFS volume management)

• esxcli (multi-pathing module management)

New Feature: Additional vCLI troubleshooting commands

Network

• esxcli network: List active connections or list active ARP table entries.

Storage

• NFS statistics available in resxtop

Virtual Machine

• esxcli vms: Forcibly stop virtual machines that do not respond to normal stop operations, by using kill commands.

• NOTE: designed to kill VMs in a reliable way (not dependent upon well-behaving system)

Restart/Reset of Agents

Menu item to restart all management agents, including

Hostd

vpxa

Menu item to reset all configuration settings

Fix a misconfigured vNetwork Distributed Switch

Reset all configurations

Browser-based access of config files

https://boise.eng.vmware.com/host

Browser-based access of log files

https://boise.eng.vmware.com/host/messages

Browser-based access of datastore files

https://boise.eng.vmware.com/folder

Disk Descriptor

New Feature: Full Support of Tech Support Mode

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New Feature: Full Support of Tech Support Mode

Can enable in vCenter or DCUI

New Feature: Full Support of Tech Support Mode

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Big Scary Warningwill be removed…

…but admin will benotified when active

New Feature: Full Support of Tech Support Mode

• Timeout automatically disables Tech Support Mode (local and remote)

• Running sessions are not terminated• All commands issued in Tech Support Mode are sent to syslog

New Feature: Additional commands in Tech Support Mode

Additional commands for troubleshooting

• vscsiStats

• nc (netcat)

• tcpdump-uw

TSM: Advanced troubleshooting

DCUI: misconfigs / restart mgmt agents

ESXi Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

ESXiRemote Access

vCenter vCLI

vSphere APIs

• During normal operations: • If things go wrong:

Local/Remote Access

New Feature: Total Lockdown

Ability to totally control local access via vCenter Server

• DCUI

• Lockdown Mode (all access based on vSphere API)

• Tech Support Mode (local and remote)

• If all configured, then no local activity possible (except pull the plugs)

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Summary of new features in ESXi 4.0

Deployment Options• Boot from SAN• Scripted Installation (a la “Kickstart”)

Centralized updating of 3rd party code• VMware Update Manager can deploy drivers, CIM providers, other modules

Improved Local Authentication• Built-in Active Directory Service• DCUI and Tech Support Mode access by any authorized user (not just root)

Easier CLI options for troubleshooting• Full support of Tech Support Mode – both local and remote (via SSH)• Additional commands in Tech Support Mode: vscsiStats, nc, tcpdump-uw, etc.• Additional management options in vCLI: SCSI, VAAI, Network, VM

Better control over local activity• DCUI and Tech Support Mode is configurable in vCenter Server• Total host lockdown possible• Activity in Tech Support Mode is sent to syslog

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Agenda

36 Confidential

Overview of ESXi

Hardware Monitoring and Systems Management

Infrastructure Services

Command Line Interfaces

Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

Next Steps

VMware Management Assistant (VMA)

- Virtual Appliance Downloadable from VMware Appliance Market Place

- CentOS Operating Systems

- VMware Tools

- VMware Remote CLI

- Perl SDK

- CIM-S

• CIM Profiles compatible with SMI-S Standards

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© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved

Thank You

Mark Monce

mmonce@vmware.com