For anyone who lives in the North East of England, David Owen (@vMackem) is organising a vBeers on 18th August in Sunderland. This is quite central for everyone from Newcastle to Thirsk. Read more about it at vBeers.org I will be attending.
Top 5 Blog Articles first half of 2011
I was looking through my stats last week, and thought I would share with you the top 5 articles that people read regularly on my site. The top four are not really a surprise, as they are all hot topics for the community at the moment. HowTo: Configure PXE Manager for stateless ESXi deployments HowTo: Install PXE Manager for vCenter VMworld 2011 – Session #1264 – Private vCloud Architecture Deep Dive VMware vCloud Connector Plugin: How it fits together HowTo: Enable SSH and Remote Tech Support mode on ESXi 4.1
HowTo: Configure PXE Manager for Stateless ESXi deployments
This is the second of two part articles on Max Daneri’s PXE Manager. The first article can be found by clicking here. In this article I will explain how to configure PXE Manager to boot stateless ESXi hosts. This is a very simple process, but saves lots of time and effort when deploying hosts that have no local storage. Step1: Login to vCenter and open the PXE Manager plug-in Step2: Accept the certificate warning if prompted Step3: Select Repository and Stateless build Step4: Right click and select Add Build Step5: Select the build zip file containing the ESXi build Note: This is not an .ISO. This is the depot.zip file that contains all the latest build and patches. This can be downloaded from VMware.com Step6: Once the file is located click Next The files are extracted from the Zip file Step7: Confirm the details are correct and click next Step8: […]
VMware vCloud Connector Plugin: How it fits together
I have had a few questions recently on how VMware vCloud Connector fits in relation to vSphere and vCD installs. I thought this diagram might help answer some of the questions. Listed below is how vCC is installed and configured Step 1: vCC is installed as a Virtual Appliance within a vSphere environment. Step 2: vCC is registered to a vCenter and installs a plug-in Step 3: Administrators access the plug-in through vSphere Client connected to a vCenter that has the plugin installed Step 4: The plug-in is configured with credentials for connections to vCenter servers and VMware vCloud Director cells Step 5: Administrators can then select VMs from vCenter and move to a vCloud Director environment. (Note: All VMs have to be powered off to be migrated to and from vCenter and vCD) Step 6: Migrated VM is powered on at the destination The screen shot below shows the […]
HowTo: Install PXE Manager for vCenter
One of my colleagues in the cloud team has written a “VMware Fling” called PXE Manager for vCenter which can be found by clicking here This is one of the best plug-ins to accompany vCenter for a long time (IMHO). This blog article is part 1 of a two part series to explain how to install and configure PXE Manager. In part 2 I will explain how to deploy stateless ESXi (4.1 Update) hosts. Note: Before beginning the installation please make sure you have read all the pre-requisites required for this application Step1: Run vgpxe-x64.exe to begin the application installation Step2: You will be prompted to run the application Step3: If you havent already you will be prompted to install .NET Framework version 3.5 Step4: Once all pre-reqs are in place, click Next to start the installation Step5: Click Next Step6: Confirm the license agreement and click Next Step7: Select […]