Tag:

vSphere 5

Move vSphere Replicated VM files from one datastore to another

by Shawn Cannon March 10, 2015

written by Shawn Cannon

Recently at my day job we had some new storage allocated at our recovery site to use for vSphere storage. I was tasked with decommissioning the old datastores. The problem is that my replicated VMs resided on the old storage. Of course I could go into my vSphere replication settings on each VM and just point it to the new datastores and be done with it. That would have taken quite some time to do since the VMs would have to fully replicate again. I wanted to find an easy way to copy the replicated VMs from the old datastores to the new datastores. So I did some Internet searches and found the following blog post: Copy Files Between Datastores – PowerCLI. Dan Hayward posted a useful PowerCLI script that he used to copy ISO files from one datastore to another. I basically adapted this script and changed it to move a VM from an old datastore to another. I could have scripted it and passed in the variables from a CSV file but I wanted to update the vSphere Replication settings one VM at a time. So here is what my script looked like:

Connect-VIServer ServerName

#Set’s Old Datastore
$oldds = get-datastore “OldDatastore”

#Set’s New Datastore
$newds = get-datastore “NewDatastore”

#Set’s VM Folder Location
$VMloc = “VMName”

#Map Drives
new-psdrive -Location $oldds -Name olddrive -PSProvider VimDatastore -Root “\”
new-psdrive -Location $newds -Name newdrive -PSProvider VimDatastore -Root “\”
#Copies Files from Old to New
copy-datastoreitem -recurse -force -item olddrive:\$VMloc\$VMloc*.vmdk newdrive:\$VMloc\

Basically the script connects you to your vCenter server, sets the old and new datastore variables, sets the VM Folder name and then does the magic to map the datastores and copy the VMDK files from the old to the new. Having the VMDK files copied over to the new datastores allowed me to use these as my replication seed for each drive when I reconfigured replication settings for the VM. I just updated this file for each VM that I needed to copy to the new datastores.

Obviously this could have been automated even more as I had to do this for over 120 VMs but I am not a scripting expert. I am just thankful for a great blog post from Dan Hayward to help me out! Thanks Dan!

March 10, 2015 2 comments

Virtualization VMware vSphere

VMware Security Advisory VMSA-2015-0001

by Shawn Cannon January 28, 2015

written by Shawn Cannon

VMware released security advisory VMSA-2015-0001 on January 27 2015. A link to the advisory can be found here. An overview of the items that this advisory addresses is shown below.

VMware ESXi, Workstation, Player, and Fusion host privilege escalation vulnerability
VMware ESXi, Workstation, Player and Fusion contain an arbitrary file write issue. Exploitation this issue may allow for privilege escalation on the host.The vulnerability does not allow for privilege escalation from the guest Operating System to the host or vice-versa. This means that host memory can not be manipulated from the Guest Operating
System.
VMware Workstation, Player, and Fusion Denial of Service vulnerability
VMware Workstation, Player, and Fusion contain an input validation issue in the Host Guest File System (HGFS). This issue may allow for a Denial of Service of the Guest Operating system.
The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the identifier CVE-2015-1043 to this issue.

VMware ESXi, Workstation, and Player Denial of Service vulnerability
VMware ESXi, Workstation, and Player contain an input validation issue in VMware Authorization process (vmware-authd). This issue may allow for a Denial of Service of the host. On VMware ESXi and on Workstation running on Linux the Denial of Service would be partial.
The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the identifier CVE-2015-1044 to this issue.
Update to VMware vCenter Server and ESXi for OpenSSL 1.0.1 and 0.9.8 package
The OpenSSL library is updated to version 1.0.1j or 0.9.8zc to resolve multiple security issues.The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the names CVE-2014-3513, CVE-2014-3567, CVE-2014-3566 (“POODLE”) and CVE-2014-3568 to these issues.
Update to ESXi libxml2 package
The libxml2 library is updated to version libxml2-2.7.6-17 to resolve a security issue.The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2014-3660 to this issue.

January 28, 2015 0 comments

Datacenter Storage Virtualization VMware vSphere

vCenter Server 5.5 Update 2d recently released

by Shawn Cannon January 28, 2015

written by Shawn Cannon

On January 27 2015 VMware released an update for vCenter Server 5.5. The release notes are located here. A brief summary of the resolved issues from the release notes are below.

vCenter Single Sign-On

VMware Directory Service consumes excessive memory

Backup and restore of vCenter Single Sign-On database might not replicate the data between primary and secondary nodes correctly
Attempts to logout through the vCloud Automation Center UI might fail

Networking

Network Interface Cards of virtual machines in disconnected state might get ejected during vMotion

vCenter Server, vSphere Client, and vSphere Web Access

Virtual machines on ESXi hosts containing NSX Endpoint virtual machines might not power on

Update to SUSE Linux Enterprise Edition Server in vCenter Server Appliance to address time zone changes
vpxd reports massive logging
Accessing the Storage View tab fails with the error

Scheduled tasks cannot be created for a different time on the same day in vSphere Web Client
The VMware VirtualCenter Server service fails intermittently
HTML console cannot be launched with custom port

Datastore browser in vSphere Web Client does not overwrite existing files
VMware VirtualCenter Server service fails

Virtual Machine Management

Cloning or deploying deploying virtual machines over the network causes performance degradation
Alert event is not triggered when one VM has multiple vNICs with same MAC address

vMotion and Storage vMotion

The default behavior of DRS has been changed to make the feature less aggressive during cluster upgrade

January 28, 2015 0 comments

Datacenter Storage Virtualization VMware vSphere

Initial Configuration of SolarWinds Virtualization Manager v6.1.1

by Shawn Cannon January 25, 2015

written by Shawn Cannon

So now that the Virtualization Manager appliance is installed and powered on we need to configure it. The vBrainstorm lab has DHCP enabled but we are using static IP addresses so we need to change the appliance to use a static IP. To do this, just right-click on the appliance in vCenter and choose to Open Console. To configure a static IP, arrow down and hit enter on Configure Network.

Enter the info as prompted.

After the IP is set just open up a browser and go to the IP via HTTPS. The default username and password is admin.

Once you are logged in you have to accept the license agreement (after you review it of course).

Next is the configuration wizard. Just click begin!

The first screen is going to ask you for your registration info. Enter that information and click Next.

The next screen is used to configure your credentials to access the server(s) you are going to access.

Click on the Add button to add the proper credentials. In our case we are connecting to a vCenter server. Enter the credentials and click Save. Click Next.

The next screen is the data sources screen. This is where you add your servers. Click the Add button.

Choose Virtual Center.

Enter your vCenter server information. Click Save. Click Next.

The next screen lets you select collection schedules. These are used to gather the data needed to populate Virtualization Manager. For this lab setup I enabled both of these tasks. You do that by highlighting the task and clicking thee Enable button. Click Next.

The next screen is where you configure your SMTP settings so that you can receive email alerts. After the info is entered click Next.

The final wizard screen is for integration with Storage Manager. In our lab we are not using Storage Manager at this time. Click Finish.

The Configuration Summary screen will appear. A configuration status bar will show in the middle of the screen under Active Data Collection Jobs.

That’s it! Virtualization Manager has been configured for the vCenter instance in our lab! The next blog post will go over the different screens in the software after data has been collected for a few days.

January 25, 2015 0 comments

Datacenter Storage Tech Field Day VMware vSphere

Pure Storage, Pure Performance.

by Roger Lund March 30, 2012

written by Roger Lund

While at Tech Field Day – Virtualization Field Day, I had a chance to sit through a Presentation by Pure Storage. Below are my thoughts.

Pure Storage is all about giving you and your VMware Server or View environment SSD performance, at a reduced cost.

Check out the message about the Products they have at the Pure Storage Web Site.

Here are a few slides from the Deck they gave us.

Below I have included some pictures provided while at Pure Storage with Tech Field Day – Virtualization Field Day http://techfieldday.com/2012/vfd2

Some Spec’s.

Here are some Video’s they provided.

Other Tech Field Day Blogger’s, Blog Posts.

Pure Storage – Pure Genius (Brandon Riley)

Pure Storage Tackles Storage Shenanigans (Chris Wahl)

Pure Storage’s Impact on VDI – Tech Field Day (Dwayne Lessner)

Tech Field Day Video on Pure Storage.

All content provided by Pure Storage, CC Pure Storage.

I hope you enjoyed this.

Roger Lund

March 30, 2012 0 comments

VMware vSphere

VMworld 2011 Hands On Labs – a inside look within the NOC–Part 2

by Roger Lund September 18, 2011

written by Roger Lund

I wanted to show the rest of the video, that I un covered this weekend. This was form inside of the NOC at VMworld. I hope you enjoy it. First we have Xangati then a Core team member talking about the NOC at VMworld.

Roger Lund

September 18, 2011 0 comments