[ale] [OT] VMWare learning environment?

Discussion:

leam hall via Ale

2018-04-20 16:31:50 UTC

Well, long ago VMWare was based in Red Hat. Not so sure anymore.

I'm trying to provide mgmt a few bullets on resources needed for
someone to learn VMWare. There's the free on-line classes but I don't
know that any of them give you an actual copy of VMWare to run
locally or on the VMWare cloud.

The Premium learning subscription is USD 1025 per year. Are there
alternatives when you need to learn VMWare, not just run VMs?
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Beddingfield, Allen via Ale

2018-04-20 16:34:14 UTC

Permalink

Just download a copy of all the vSphere components. They have a 60 day evaluation license that you could use for learning.
Allen B.
--
Allen Beddingfield
Systems Engineer
Office of Information Technology
The University of Alabama
Office 205-348-2251
***@ua.edu

On 4/20/18, 11:31 AM, "Ale on behalf of leam hall via Ale" <ale-***@ale.org on behalf of ***@ale.org> wrote:

Well, long ago VMWare was based in Red Hat. Not so sure anymore.

I'm trying to provide mgmt a few bullets on resources needed for
someone to learn VMWare. There's the free on-line classes but I don't
know that any of them give you an actual copy of VMWare to run
locally or on the VMWare cloud.

The Premium learning subscription is USD 1025 per year. Are there
alternatives when you need to learn VMWare, not just run VMs?
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Matty via Ale

2018-04-20 18:42:54 UTC

Permalink

The VMware hands on labs are awesome (and free):

https://labs.hol.vmware.com/HOL/catalogs/catalog/681

Great way to try/break/fix/test new VMware features.

- Ryan
https://prefetch.net

Post by leam hall via Ale
Well, long ago VMWare was based in Red Hat. Not so sure anymore.
I'm trying to provide mgmt a few bullets on resources needed for
someone to learn VMWare. There's the free on-line classes but I don't
know that any of them give you an actual copy of VMWare to run
locally or on the VMWare cloud.
The Premium learning subscription is USD 1025 per year. Are there
alternatives when you need to learn VMWare, not just run VMs?
_______________________________________________
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DJ-Pfulio via Ale

2018-04-20 20:27:37 UTC

Permalink

Which VMware product line? They make a bunch of stuff and last time I
checked there were 6 different virtualization products.

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Leam Hall via Ale

2018-04-21 00:38:03 UTC

Permalink

Hmm...we use VCenter and VMWare hypervisor. Sounds like I'm behind the
power curve.

Post by DJ-Pfulio via Ale
Which VMware product line? They make a bunch of stuff and last time I
checked there were 6 different virtualization products.

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Leam Hall via Ale

2018-04-25 09:39:27 UTC

Permalink

So far I see ESXi, VSphere, and VCenter. The direction I've been given
is "go learn VMWare".

I've used VSphere clients but never administered an installation.
Looking at the ESXi system requirements I'm not sure SATA is supported
for the guests, so I may need to do their lab stuff remotely until I can
figure out a host to use.

Post by DJ-Pfulio via Ale
Which VMware product line? They make a bunch of stuff and last time I
checked there were 6 different virtualization products.

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DJ-Pfulio via Ale

2018-04-25 11:27:34 UTC

Permalink

So far I see ESXi, VSphere, and VCenter. The direction I've been given is "go
learn VMWare".
I've used VSphere clients but never administered an installation. Looking at the
ESXi system requirements I'm not sure SATA is supported for the guests, so I may
need to do their lab stuff remotely until I can figure out a host to use.

SATA controllers are supported, but not all of them. ESXi is picky about
hardware. Back when I ran it, only 1 of my 5 machines had a disk controller
that was supported by it. It is also picky about NICs and other HW.

This is good and bad. Flakey HW doesn't get supported, so when it is on "the
list" you know it should work. They choose very popular, server-type, hardware
for their support. Usually not the cheapest stuff.

Catch me at a meeting on Sunday and I'll happily share some apparently forgotten
history with VMware (management) and why I'll avoid all their products for the
rest of my life.

If you mainly run Windows, ESXi should be considered. If you mainly run Linux,
I wouldn't ... and don't.
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Jim Kinney via Ale

2018-04-25 12:08:00 UTC

Permalink

Ovirt for the win!

Sadly, vmware is the dominant player. Ovirt is pretty amazing and fully open source. Perfect? Nope. But what large pile of software is?

KVM is rock solid in my experience. Ovirt adds a scale up and out management layer on top. The hardware it supports is anything that will run Linux. It's pretty RedHat centric (major funder) but also has packages and community (developer actually) support for use in any distro.

Will ovirt expertise help job development? Only if it can be spun the same way that Samba expertise makes better windows admins.

Oh. Automatic migration of encrypted drive VMs is non-working thing. Got bit. Ouch. During a demo. Double ouch. New host starts new instance, pauses, overlays old instance memory, pauses old and unpauses new. Can't start new with a locked drive to start process. Process continues anyway on shutting down old instance. Demo goes down. Ouch.

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
So far I see ESXi, VSphere, and VCenter. The direction I've been

given is "go

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
learn VMWare".
I've used VSphere clients but never administered an installation.

Looking at the

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
ESXi system requirements I'm not sure SATA is supported for the

guests, so I may

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
need to do their lab stuff remotely until I can figure out a host to

use.
SATA controllers are supported, but not all of them. ESXi is picky about
hardware. Back when I ran it, only 1 of my 5 machines had a disk controller
that was supported by it. It is also picky about NICs and other HW.
This is good and bad. Flakey HW doesn't get supported, so when it is on "the
list" you know it should work. They choose very popular, server-type, hardware
for their support. Usually not the cheapest stuff.
Catch me at a meeting on Sunday and I'll happily share some apparently forgotten
history with VMware (management) and why I'll avoid all their products for the
rest of my life.
If you mainly run Windows, ESXi should be considered. If you mainly run Linux,
I wouldn't ... and don't.
_______________________________________________
Ale mailing list
https://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo/ale
See JOBS, ANNOUNCE and SCHOOLS lists at
http://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo

--
Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. All tyopes are thumb related and reflect authenticity.

Tory Deron via Ale

2018-04-25 12:13:13 UTC

Permalink

We are experimenting with Nutanix AHV, which is based on Linux KVM, but commercially supported. From what Iâve seen so far, I expect our relationship with VMware to diminish over the next couple of years as we start to move work loads to AHV.

As far as I can tell, AHV is just an overlay over standard KVM. I can even connect and manage VMs with Virt-Manager, and other KVM tools.

Tory

Post by Jim Kinney via Ale
Ovirt for the win!
Sadly, vmware is the dominant player. Ovirt is pretty amazing and fully open source. Perfect? Nope. But what large pile of software is?
KVM is rock solid in my experience. Ovirt adds a scale up and out management layer on top. The hardware it supports is anything that will run Linux. It's pretty RedHat centric (major funder) but also has packages and community (developer actually) support for use in any distro.
Will ovirt expertise help job development? Only if it can be spun the same way that Samba expertise makes better windows admins.
Oh. Automatic migration of encrypted drive VMs is non-working thing. Got bit. Ouch. During a demo. Double ouch. New host starts new instance, pauses, overlays old instance memory, pauses old and unpauses new. Can't start new with a locked drive to start process. Process continues anyway on shutting down old instance. Demo goes down. Ouch.
So far I see ESXi, VSphere, and VCenter. The direction I've been given is "go
learn VMWare".
I've used VSphere clients but never administered an installation. Looking at the
ESXi system requirements I'm not sure SATA is supported for the guests, so I may
need to do their lab stuff remotely until I can figure out a host to use.
SATA controllers are supported, but not all of them. ESXi is picky about
hardware. Back when I ran it, only 1 of my 5 machines had a disk controller
that was supported by it. It is also picky about NICs and other HW.
This is good and bad. Flakey HW doesn't get supported, so when it is on "the
list" you know it should work. They choose very popular, server-type, hardware
for their support. Usually not the cheapest stuff.
Catch me at a meeting on Sunday and I'll happily share some apparently forgotten
history with VMware (management) and why I'll avoid all their products for the
rest of my life.
If you mainly run Windows, ESXi should be considered. If you mainly run Linux,
I wouldn't ... and don't.
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See JOBS, ANNOUNCE and SCHOOLS lists at
http://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo <http://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo>
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leam hall via Ale

2018-04-25 12:23:40 UTC

Permalink

In this case it's "Work uses VMWare, learn that". I use CentOS 6 and
libvirt at home.

Started poking through the free VMWare stuff, need to figure out their
course organization. They claim a lot of free stuff but it seems to be
minutely focused on newer technology niches. Will see what else I can
find.

My really good hardware (Thanks Alan!) seems to have died at the BIOS
level during the cold. Even the comp.sys.sun.hardware folks haven't
been able to help.
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James Taylor via Ale

2018-04-25 14:29:07 UTC

Permalink

I finally have a working ovirt system after many false starts.
I like it well enough to take the leap, and feel pretty confident I can now successfully install and manage a cluster.
Not hard , but many gotchas that are not immediately obvious.
A ton of documentation that didn't have answers for, or even mention, the issues that hung me up.
Initial problems were mostly self-inflicted.
Currently have two production workloads running. Now I need to see if migrating from citrix will work instead of having to recreate.
-jt

James Taylor
678-697-9420
Ovirt for the win!

Sadly, vmware is the dominant player. Ovirt is pretty amazing and fully open source. Perfect? Nope. But what large pile of software is?

KVM is rock solid in my experience. Ovirt adds a scale up and out management layer on top. The hardware it supports is anything that will run Linux. It's pretty RedHat centric (major funder) but also has packages and community (developer actually) support for use in any distro.

Will ovirt expertise help job development? Only if it can be spun the same way that Samba expertise makes better windows admins.

Oh. Automatic migration of encrypted drive VMs is non-working thing. Got bit. Ouch. During a demo. Double ouch. New host starts new instance, pauses, overlays old instance memory, pauses old and unpauses new. Can't start new with a locked drive to start process. Process continues anyway on shutting down old instance. Demo goes down. Ouch.

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
So far I see ESXi, VSphere, and VCenter. The direction I've been

given is "go

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
learn VMWare".
I've used VSphere clients but never administered an installation.

Looking at the

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
ESXi system requirements I'm not sure SATA is supported for the

guests, so I may

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
need to do their lab stuff remotely until I can figure out a host to

--
Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. All tyopes are thumb related and reflect authenticity.

_______________________________________________
Ale mailing list
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Jim Kinney via Ale

2018-04-25 15:29:42 UTC

Permalink

There's some export capabilities that I can't recall the name of right
now (it'll wake me at 2am).
AH! virt-v2v!
I used that some time back to capture VMs off a vmware esx setup and
pull them over to ovirt. It requires the VM be powered down. Easier way
is to make a snapshot, convert to a new VM and pull that, then rsync
from old to new. For some reason people think uptime matters and I'm
supposed to care about it (on systems that have not been rebooted in
300+ days - security warts and all - can't "afford" the downtime -
<sigh>).

Post by James Taylor via Ale
I finally have a working ovirt system after many false starts.
I like it well enough to take the leap, and feel pretty confident I
can now successfully install and manage a cluster.
Not hard , but many gotchas that are not immediately obvious.
A ton of documentation that didn't have answers for, or even mention,
the issues that hung me up.
Initial problems were mostly self-inflicted.
Currently have two production workloads running. Now I need to see if
migrating from citrix will work instead of having to recreate.
-jt
James Taylor
678-697-9420
Ovirt for the win!
Sadly, vmware is the dominant player. Ovirt is pretty amazing and
fully open source. Perfect? Nope. But what large pile of software is?
KVM is rock solid in my experience. Ovirt adds a scale up and out
management layer on top. The hardware it supports is anything that
will run Linux. It's pretty RedHat centric (major funder) but also
has packages and community (developer actually) support for use in
any distro.
Will ovirt expertise help job development? Only if it can be spun the
same way that Samba expertise makes better windows admins.
Oh. Automatic migration of encrypted drive VMs is non-working thing.
Got bit. Ouch. During a demo. Double ouch. New host starts new
instance, pauses, overlays old instance memory, pauses old and
unpauses new. Can't start new with a locked drive to start process.
Process continues anyway on shutting down old instance. Demo goes
down. Ouch.

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
So far I see ESXi, VSphere, and VCenter. The direction I've been

given is "go

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
learn VMWare".
I've used VSphere clients but never administered an installation.

Looking at the

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
ESXi system requirements I'm not sure SATA is supported for the

guests, so I may

Post by Leam Hall via Ale
need to do their lab stuff remotely until I can figure out a host to

use.
SATA controllers are supported, but not all of them. ESXi is picky about
hardware. Back when I ran it, only 1 of my 5 machines had a disk controller
that was supported by it. It is also picky about NICs and other HW.
This is good and bad. Flakey HW doesn't get supported, so when it
is
on "the
list" you know it should work. They choose very popular, server-
type,
hardware
for their support. Usually not the cheapest stuff.
Catch me at a meeting on Sunday and I'll happily share some
apparently
forgotten
history with VMware (management) and why I'll avoid all their
products
for the
rest of my life.
If you mainly run Windows, ESXi should be considered. If you
mainly
run Linux,
I wouldn't ... and don't.
_______________________________________________
Ale mailing list
https://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo/ale
See JOBS, ANNOUNCE and SCHOOLS lists at
http://mail.ale.org/mailman/listinfo

--
James P. Kinney III

Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you
gain at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his
own tail. It won't fatten the dog.
- Speech 11/23/1900 Mark Twain

http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/

Tory Deron via Ale

2018-04-25 12:08:19 UTC

Permalink

One thing you can do to set up a test environment that removes any compatibility issues, is to built it nested inside VMWare Workstation, which you can also download for a trial period. You will need a Linux or Windows machine running VMWare Workstation, and you can install ESXi, vCenter, and the lot inside virtual machines. This configuration is actually supported by VMWare specifically for setting up a learning environment.

You will need enough RAM on the workstation to handle the environment, (16GB is what I have in mine, and it works fine).

There are numerous blogs with guides about setting this up. Just google "VMware Nested Environment".

Tory

So far I see ESXi, VSphere, and VCenter. The direction I've been given is "go learn VMWare".
I've used VSphere clients but never administered an installation. Looking at the ESXi system requirements I'm not sure SATA is supported for the guests, so I may need to do their lab stuff remotely until I can figure out a host to use.

Post by DJ-Pfulio via Ale
Which VMware product line? They make a bunch of stuff and last time I
checked there were 6 different virtualization products.

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