My name is Forbes Guthrie and I’m an IT Engineer/Architect who specializes in VMware, Windows/Linux Servers and Storage technologies. Based in Vancouver, I’m always on the lookout for interesting virtualization work. Please get in touch if you, or someone you know, is looking for a specialist in their datacenter.
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Nice work … thank’s
Admin from GreenCode
Folks…good thread…what exactly does last -x | grep -e showdown -e reboot do?
Hi jsd,
)
last -x searches though the /var/log/wtmp and cats out all the entries related to run-level changes. So the whole command should tell you when the server was last shutdown or reboot. (I’ve corrected the showdown typo
vSphere4 card – poster size document is not available in the link, could you please repost the same.
Thanks in advance
Hi Mohan,
Thanks for the heads up. I’ve fixed the link now.
I went for the 30% now vs. possible 100% later – I’ll let you know how it turns out in a little over a week.
P.S. BCIT Downtown is the only VUE site in Vancouver offering the exam and its schedule is packed – you might have to drive to Surrey.
Best of luck Andrew. Good tip about the testing center, I don’t want to have to go all the way to Surrey. I was wanting to book it for sometime in the next couple of weeks. Do you how long the queue is?
Thanks for the collation of resources, very handy as I’m in the midst of preparing for my VCP4, booked for sitting by the end of this month. I’ve gone for the free retake….
One comment I would make is that the VMware documentation is not infallible, so if something doesn’t seem right, validate it against other docs or in a lab (I’ve got both ESX and ESXi running in VMs on Workstation). For instance, the number of ports per vSwitch is incorrect in the official documentation (it states 1016) but ESX showed 4088. Also, the number of vSwitches per host is incorrect too. I noted that your notes are correct Forbes
.
Cheers guys and good luck!
haha
Sorry, this is quite funny, and a little sad!
I experienced this on ESX 3.5 U4 servers too! Thanks for pointing out how to disable it … now doing this on our servers!
Forbes has done it again! Thanks for the reference card. Any advice as to the best size to print? US legal size a bit small for my bad eyesight.
I don’t understand US print sizes too well, but I know you should be able to print out the regular card on A3 OK, if you scale it fit the paper. This poster version is scaled to 23.44″ x 35.26″, which I guess is pretty close to 22 x 34 poster size (ANSI D).
Thanks Forbes!
This is the one place I have been able to find that info. Any word on the official location?
I hear its in San Fran again.
This is actually a good practice in any shop with both Windows and Linux hosts. Windows IT people will press to login to a system. With screens blank and/or KVMs in use to save space, you may not be talking to the host you think you are talking to.
Exactly!
You would think this would be corrected in Update 1. Alas, I think VMware truly see it as a feature instead of a bug (where have I heard that before
).
Hi Forbes,
I would like to thank you for sharing the above with your audience. Much appreciated.
Jose Maria Gonzalez
Good post. Interesting point.
BTW Any idea where patches are staged to on host servers running embedded ESXi 4?
All of my recent installations use embedded ESXi, Am I burning up RAM by staging patches?
I’m not sure where the ESXi patches are copied too. However I think that the ESXi patches just come as complete images. There are 2 different copies on the ESXi server, the running one and the previous edition. So when you patch a server, it copies a new image over the standby image, and then changes the start-up config so you reboot into the newer one. Your current images then becomes your backup. However I don’t think these images are particularly big, and as your just replacing an old exiting image, then you shouldn’t need any additional space.
If anyone has a better incite into this then please let us know.
/tmp is usually stored in memory, not on the disk. So it’s usually a ramdisk. Inside the COS. So that 800MB RAM you allocated….
Steve, have you got any links for that? I’d like to do a bit more reading around this. So your saying it caches some of the tmp stuff in RAM then?
Thanks mate! Will come in handy as I am one of those studying as well
Wait, what’s the VCP Dec 31st deadline about???
If you are a VCP3, you need to sit your VCP4 exam by 31st Dec or you will be required to sit another qualifying class (e.g. install and configure).
From here: http://mylearn.vmware.com/portals/certification/
# If you are currently a VCP3
* Take and pass the VCP4 exam. This option will only be available until December 31, 2009. The What’s New class is strongly recommended. Beginning in 2010, VCP3s must attend the VMware vSphere 4: What’s New class in order to upgrade.
@forbes
Okay thanks for the clarification. I’m new to VMware and I took the vSphere Install and Configure class in June. I’ve taken the VCP4 exam once but failed and I plan to take it again this month. I was worried that I had to take the VCP4 exam within a certain timeframe after taking the vSphere class.
I’m assuming that I should be fine.
Matt
@Matt
Yeah, its just for existing VCPs or those who had taken a VI3 course. There shouldn’t any restriction on you. Take your time.
BTW, you might want to check out my post here:
http://www.vreference.com/2009/11/07/vmware-exam-resources/
for some pointers when you come to study again.
Best of luck,
Forbes.
Thanks for the info! I have printed off your original double-sided card. It’s very helpful!!!
Matt
One comment: In the TSO section, the adapter required for VM’s must be “Enhanced VMXnet vNIC” or “E1000″ Reference http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/vi3_performance_enhancements_wp.pdf page 4
Thanx
Marius
Hi Marius,
Thanks for the link. However that PDF is regarding version 3.5. The documentation for TSO with vSphere is says you should only use the Enhanced VMXnet driver. See here. I think there has been problems with the e1000 support, and I think they are encouraging as many people as possible to switch to the preferred driver. Let me know if you find any other evidence though.
Hi Forbes,
I actually picked up this discrepancy while doing the new VTSP 4 exams on VMware’s Partner Portal. If you don’t selct the E1000 as well the question is marked as incorrect. I think it is an issue of best practice not to use the E1000
Thanx
Marius
Thanks Forbes,
works like a charm…. -:) Great…
I just noticed that it is missing the following for ESX 4 (and maybe 4i):
“5900-5964 RFB protocol, which is used by management tools such as VNC Incoming and outgoing TCP”
See ESX Configuration Guide 4.0U1 Page 152
It would also be nice to show if the ESX ports are from the COS or VMkernel interface.
Agreed, having them listed by COS/vKernel/VMotion/FT/etc would be very helpful since they’d usually be VLAN’d apart.
I tried to find the values mentioned in the /etc/inittab but they’re not there. Is it correct that this does not apply to ESXi 4?
Yes you’re right, this only applies to ESX hosts not ESXi. Its a “feature” of the Service Console. The “unsupported” busybox implementation on ESXi is just a collection of unix tools.
Hi,
I’ve been waiting for an invite from Bluebear for a couple of months now and still nothing. If someone could spare one or know how to contact Bluebear directly I’d be very grateful.
Regards,
Greg ( email: greg5_at_klika_dot_si )
Sorry, I can’t help with an invite. However those Bluebear guys seem to have gone quiet over the last 6 months. I wonder if it’s still actively being developed or not.
A Google search brought me straight to this site because I’m having the very same problem! I placed my custom favicon in the main directory, but it still isn’t showing up in Google Reader.
… I wonder why I can’t get it to work! Bleh!
Well there are also some ports missing for Data Recovery, 902, 443 and 53 which is required by the appliance.. http://www.mingle-mangle.org/2009/08/vmware-data-recovery-and-ports/
Marcus
Hi Marcus,
I know 443 is a requirement, but can you point me to a VMware source which states it needs 902 and 53? Or is this just from personal experience?
Thanks, Forbes.
Any chance we can get the original visio? :>)
Thanks!
Hi Dustin,
I’ll ask Dudley and see if he’s willing to release it to you.
Thanks!! Looks great as usual!
Yes,
It’s great Forbes. As usual.
Vladan
Thanks guys. I always nice to know that people find them useful.
How you are not a vExpert, I have no idea.
Thanks for this great resource.
Paul
Under storage you say the maximum VMFS is 64TB minus 64K. Shouldn’t it be minus 16K? 512B x 32 extents = 16K.
Hi Derek,
Your quite right, its a typo. It should be minus 16k. I’ll make sure that gets corrected in the next release.
Thanks, Forbes.
way cool!! I think if you have the space on a wall, it is much nicer to have the poster print. it is easy to read and everything is right there.
I’m afraid the PDF version is the only one he can release.
v nice review! I had an experience to use custom vmx parameters to disable page sharing and ballooning for VMs on esx 3.x but don’t think MemTrimRate was part of those strings. It were mainly for citrix Terminal SVR VMs that weren’t performing well in shared production (even though esx didn’t show overall performance impact on other non-Citrix VMs) as opposed to the lab i.e. 100% reserved RAM and full CPU limit or one VM per one ESX (quad CPU dcore, 64GB RAM).
/Mo
Well, I definitely voted for your blog (3). One of the major things that got me through the VCP4 exam (in september, so, not as much information out there as there currently is), was your site.
Thanks Ronald, that’s very kind. I’ve not even got round to voting myself
“esxtop in the pocket”
BTW, you may change the thresholds url with the “static” one : http://www.yellow-bricks.com/esxtop/
Thanks, I’ve updated the link.
Just an FYI…
No longer available: Barry Coombs’ cue cards
Thanks for your site. It’s great!
Hi James,
I’ve updated the link. Thanks.
Check this out: http://vmind.ru/2009/12/11/whats-new-in-vsphere-41/
No idea if it’s really legit though.
Just the information I was looking for =) I wish 4.1 came out yesterday.. ahhhhh!
Any chance you know what permissions the users would need to connect with the viclient directly to ESX with AD authentication?
Hi TimC,
By default, all local users should have the default role of “No Access”, unless they are a member of the Admin Group.
You would need to log in with another account and assign them additional privileges. Even adding them “Read only” access, lets the user log in.
Forbes
seems to fill in some of the Zimbra email on VMware blanks too
Hi, is there a way, through which I can log all what is done by the kickstart file to a log file?
I am looked around and did not find much info on this.
Thanks
Hi Tom,
The regular install bit is logged to /var/log/esx_install.log
However, if you want each step of your kickstart script logged you should be able to echo each bit out to a local file. If you want to know if each command was successful or not, then that would involve a bit more work. Should be do-able but would involve a bit of investigation.