A few weeks back, Global Knowledge announced a new service called VMware Xtra. VMware Xtra is the brainchild of awarding winning Instructor Scott Vessey. Having already met Scott and regularly chatting with him I had a feeling that this will be good.
VMware Xtra is a selection of online resources to help you get the most from your VMware training courses. The online repository allows users access to support tools such as technical papers, industry experts and video tutorials.
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Just lately I've been doing a lot of work in a Lab environment. Some of the work I'm doing is quite important to me so I decided to workout a way I can backup my VM's onto a backup device. To my surprise this was pretty simple to do.
Here is how I decided the script should function:
- Send myself an email telling me that the backup process has started
- Import the name of the VM to be backed up and the destination datastore from a CSV file
- Create a Snapshot of the VM I want to backup
- Create a Clone'd VM from the Snapshot
- Place the backup onto my Backup Datastore
- Name the backup <master VM name>-<date stamp>
- Thin provision the backup
- Remove the Snapshot from the master VM
- Send myself an email telling me that the backup process has completed
So that's what I wanted to do, this is what I ended up with.
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If you're a virtualisation enthusiast like myself, you'll understand that we don't only need to know about virtualisation. We also need to know about all of the other IT areas that are incorporated into our virtual environment. Storage is a massive part of this. Whether your using iSCSI, FC SAN, NFS or even local storage, it's crucial to make sure you have your storage set up correctly to get the best performance, reliability and availability for your data. Storage isn't one of my strengths. Even though I know the basics, I feel, and have also been told that this can hold me back in becoming a better virtualisation specialist.
Fortunately whilst visiting EMC at the GestalIT TechFieldDay earlier in April, each of the delegates, including myself were given a copy of EMC's book; Information, Storage And Management.
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As you probably all know, at the start of the month I was invited over to Boston to take part in the 2nd ever GestaltIT TechFieldDay. For those of you who didn’t know, or who aren’t sure what the TechFieldDays are about, first read my earlier blog and then read below to find out how I got on.
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Definition of vBeers
vBeers is an informal get together of virtualisation enthusiasts and professionals to meet and discuss all things IT. It's a great opportunity to network, learn and meet like minded people.
When? Where?
So now you know what it is, it’s time for me to let you know the when and the where.The first vBeers evening will be held on:
May 6th – 6pm till late at The Pavillion End, Watling Street – MAP
This is straight after the London VMUG. For those of you who regularly attend the VMUG, vBeers will be help at the same pub as the usual after-VMUG beers.
The next vBeers evening
June 3rd – 6pm till late at The Cittie Of Yorke, Holborn – MAP
Please feel free to copy this post and post it on your own Blogs, The more places it's posted, the more people will know about it.
The Steering Committee are pleased to announce the next UK London VMware User Group meeting, kindly sponsored by RES Software, to be held on Thursday 6th May 2010. We hope to see you at the meeting, and afterwards for a drink or two, courtesy of VMware.
Our meeting will be held at the Thames Suite, London Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 33 Queen Street, London EC4R 1AP, +44 (0)20 7248 4444. The nearest tube station is Mansion House, location information is available here. Reception is from 1230 for a prompt 1pm start, to finish around 5pm. Our agenda is not final at the moment, but looks something like this:
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You may or many not have read my Post back in January about the VMware vSphere 4.0 Security Hardening Guide Draft. Well the guide has now been released fully for you to download and review against your Virtual Infrastructure
Overall, there are more than 100 guidelines, with the following major sections:
- Introduction
- Virtual Machines
- Host (both ESXi and ESX)
- vNetwork
- vCenter
- Console OS (for ESX only)
The Guide can be downloaded here: http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-12306
Source
During GestalIT TechFieldDay, myself and the other bloggers were introduced to the new Data Robotic’s product called the Drobo FS.
About the Drobo FS
The revolutionary Drobo FS was designed with one purpose in mind: to deliver the best file sharing experience ever. From the moment you plug it in and see it instantly appear on your desktop, you’ll know there’s nothing like it. The all-in-one Drobo FS is perfect any connected home, home office, or small office environment needing a simple, safe device for sharing and backing up files over the network.
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I came across this free eBook today on the Hitachi website. If you're like me and work with Virtualization products but would like to learn more about Storage Virtualization then is a great freebie to download.
Just click on the following link and fill out the form to get your copy. HDS: eBook – Storage Virtualization for Dummies by Hitachi Data Systems
Problem
When trying to Power On an old VM I was greeted with this message:
I checked the Datastore and everything seemed to be present and correct. I tried to migrate the VM to a different Host, but again I was shown this error. A quick Google didn't show up anything useful so I decided to check the logs.
running the command tail /var/log/vmware/hostd.log -f whist trying to Power On the VM flagged these error messages:
- [2010-03-24 12:11:10.547 'BaseLibs' 129907632 info] readlink /var/run/vmware/7f0f49adb5092b09694cdf456a488d6c: No such file or directory
- [2010-03-24 12:11:10.547 'BaseLibs' 129907632 info] readlink /var/run/vmware/%2fvmfs%2fvolumes%2f4ad45c8d%2ddb2eadd5%2d411f%2d00237d3c8b86%2fTEST%2dVWB01%2fTEST%2dVWB01%2evmx: No such file or directory
Solution
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