VMware ESX

ESX Resource Pools Revisited

How many times have you gone back to your resource pools and wondered why your performance is not what you were expecting? Here is a quick tip on your configuration that may help understand your situation. For small- to medium-sized ESX implementations, have a uniform value for the shares for...

VMware ESX console commands: esxcfg-info

VMware ESX has many commands on the console that you can use to get detailed information on the status or configuration of many elements of your installation. Recently I had an opportunity to run esxcfg-info on the console (or can be run in the same fashion over SSH) and really liked...

Managing VMware Infrastructure 3 (VI3) from OS X (10.5.1 Leopard)

Up until now there has not been a way to manage VI3 from OS X clients. This stinks for those of us with our shiny PowerBooks and MacBook Pros (I just can't let my 12" go!). What to do, what to do... Then, suddenly and without warning BOMP BOMP BOMP (10 points if you know where that line is from)...

Use Virtual Infrastructure Client with Caution on Vista

The Virtual Infrastructure Client used to manage your VMWare ESX hosts may not perform all tasks correctly when running on Windows Vista. There are a handful of issues reported from users in the VMWare communities board such as "Object...

Why You Should Listen To Me

No, the title is not a typo. No, I am not that arrogant (I'm telling my wife to hush right about now.) :). I simply think that you should listen to me. Why? Because unlike a lot of other developers I know, I will gladly admit that there may be easier ways of accomplishing a task than writing new...

VMware heads 50K network user school district data center and DR plan in hurricane country

If the Collier County Public School district IT department can trust VMware to to head its disaster recovery program in hurricane-ridden Florida, then you can probably trust it with your company's IT and DR needs, too.

A SearchDataCenter.com coworker sent me

How to Install VMWare Tools Through Windows Group Policy

With all of the migration strategies available to the virtualization host administrators, it is easy to overlook the guest operating system details. When it comes to upgrading or installing VMWare Tools, the idea of touching every server interactively is not very appealing. For a Windows guest...

Revisiting the VI3 SDK? Visit this link first!

How long has it been since you have taken a look at the VMware Virtual Infrastructure 3 (VI3) SDK? A month? Two months? Six? Maybe you were originally turned off by the SDK because of its hard-to-use traversal mechanism, or maybe you could never get your application to take less than a good minute...

How to allow the root user to log in to VMware ESX Server with SSH

Let's say that you just installed a new VMware ESX server. You tried to add SSH to it and log in as root. What happened? It didn't work, did it? The firewall allows it, right? You can log in to the physical server console with the same username and password, right? But it still doesn't work,...

Why VMware ESX/VI3 will stay best in production and price, even after Viridian

Last summer I wrote about an IT manager’s virtualization platform decision on