Mastering VMware® Infrastructure3

Perhaps the largest area of virtual infrastructure support with third-party virtualization tools is the disaster-recovery and business-continuity segment of the market. The virtualization tools listed here are several of the best tools available with regard to ease of use, functionality, and cost.

vRanger Pro

vRanger Pro, previously known as ESXRanger, is one of the most recognized backup solutions in virtualization environments. Developed by Vizioncore Inc., vRanger Pro is a Windows-based application that simplifies performing online backups and restoring virtual machines. The easy-to-use Windows-based graphical user interface (GUI) eliminates scripting for IT administrators, so no specialized knowledge is necessary to deploy a reliable backup strategy. vRanger Pro runs on a centralized Windows host and can run using the standard Windows scheduler, thus further eliminating the need for complex scripting. The GUI offers a Startup wizard and VirtualCenter integration for ease of operation, as well as compression options to save storage space. vRanger Pro compresses virtual machine disk files (VMDK) before sending them to the chosen destination target server, such as the local VMFS, a Linux server, or a Windows server. NAS, SAN, Novell, UNC, and mapped drives are also supported if they are accessible to the Windows host. vRanger Pro provides full-image restore to any VMware ESX Server without needing to know the prior configurations. It also reduces or eliminates the need to create manual installations and configurations to the backup image. Restores are efficiently relocated, and they run quickly because the images are compressed and all configurations are included. For Windows guests, file-level restores are available to provide an advanced file level of protection.

vRanger Pro uses the included VSS drivers to leverage Microsoft's Volume Shadow Copy Service technology to pause application writes. The VSS feature enables quiescing for supported databases to provide “transactionally consistent” backup images that can be used to recover the application as well as the image.

In an effort to reduce time and space for virtual machine backups, vRanger Pro includes a differential backups technology that captures only the changes that have occurred since the last successful full backup image. Backup administrators have the flexibility of designing retention policies to support the corporate disaster-recovery plan and the space available for the backup files.

vRanger Pro includes a P2V-DR module to provide the functionality of rapidly and frequently converting physical machines into virtual machines as part of a disaster-recovery strategy. This module functions as an agentless deployment and without the need to reboot the source computer.

The application also captures details about how long a particular backup process will take, allowing you to plan for the next backup window. In addition, users can record IP addresses, compression ratios, and the virtual machines' locations on the various LUNs. Details about backups and VMs are stored in the repository and can be accessed for reporting and analysis.

Unlike traditional backup agents, vRanger Pro runs outside the guest operating system, and can be integrated with VMware VirtualCenter for efficient backup management. The backups can be offloaded from the host leveraging integration with VMware VCB. vRanger Pro recognizes the VMotion feature and is aware when a virtual machine is migrated to a new host. This allows vRanger Pro to follow virtual machines from host to host to perform regularly scheduled backups even after the virtual machines have moved.

vReplicator

vReplicator, previously known as esxReplicator, is a host-level image replication solution for VMware infrastructure. Also developed by Vizioncore Inc., vReplicator is a Windows-based application that enables companies to leverage virtualization technology to keep applications running day in and day out all year round by replicating entire virtual machines, including configuration settings, patches to the OS, the application and the data, and all other OS-level changes.

vReplicator selectively replicates virtual machines from many hosts to one host, as well as to dissimilar hardware platforms. In physical server environments, disaster-recovery solutions are expensive and difficult to deploy and maintain because they require redundant, overbuilt standby servers that are typically dormant and underutilized until a portion of the production environment becomes unavailable. Virtualization eliminates the expense of overbuilding by allowing higher utilization of existing servers. vReplicator offers a strategic and bandwidth-conscious approach to replication: it enables full virtual machines to be selectively and cost-effectively replicated without agents, and with full flexibility to complement the existing server environment, while reducing the financial impact of the overall solution.

vReplicator selectively replicates individual virtual machines selected by the virtual infrastructure administrator. This eliminates the maintenance, network traffic, and hardware and software expenses of replicating all the LUNs from a SAN. Because vReplicator works from a centralized server, installation components are not needed on either the source or the target virtual machines.

vReplicator operates from a centralized server and does not need to be installed on either the source or the target virtual machines, which eliminates the licensing costs, management, and maintenance involved with agent-based solutions. vReplicator provides a Setup wizard for the configuration of replication jobs. The solution can be configured for direct communication between the vReplicator server, the source, and the destination hosts, or it can be configured to leverage VirtualCenter. Replication job settings include replication intervals, the destination server, and the target datastore. Status information is available in the GUI to determine the duration of replication processes as well as to verify successful replications. Performance statistics are available to determine the workload on a host and the impact of replication on the virtualized environment. These statistics are helpful in determining the limitations of the host and the performance requirements for replication. vReplicator is integrated with VirtualCenter to provide a recognizable hierarchy of virtual machines and the respective hosts involved in replication. This integration with VirtualCenter allows the solution to be VMotion and DRS aware so replication jobs continue even after the virtual machines have moved.

The initial synchronization for vReplicator leverages proven Vizioncore technology for the initial copy of the source virtual machine. After the initial synchronization, a differential engine sends only changes to the destination host and applies them to the closed target virtual machine. The replication engine of vReplicator is a Windows service that resides on the server where vReplicator has been installed. This reduces the impact on the underlying virtualization platform implementation by offloading the work to the dedicated vReplicator server. vReplicator validates the differential information needed to perform live replication without interruption to the virtual machine. The differential engine checks for changes to VMDKs as a catalyst for performing block-level replication. To prevent problems in the replication and recovery process, vReplicator copies changed blocks to the target system before applying them. By copying the blocks before writing them into the replicated virtual machine files, vReplicator ensures that if any problems arise during the process the original blocks can be written back to the target. Ultimately this logic prevents the need to recopy the entire VMDK.

esXpress

esXpress is a virtual infrastructure backup solution created by PHD Technologies. The latest version as of this writing, esXpress v3.1, is a unique solution that involves the use of a small, low-impact virtual machine called a virtual backup appliance (VBA) that provides a sophisticated backup technology to a VMware virtual infrastructure. Although the product sits inside a dedicated virtual machine, the backup destinations include all of the following storage targets:

♦ FTP

♦ SSH

♦ CIFS/SMB (Windows file shares)

♦ iSCSI (VMFS)

♦ Fibre channel (VMFS)

esXpress installs a GUI helper virtual machine that provides for the configuration of the backup process but once configured is not required for the execution of the backups. The product is licensed and installed on a per-host basis. Uniquely it is not licensed per socket or per core, and therefore does not penalize you for having a well-stocked set of equipment for your virtual infrastructure. This also means that esXpress will scale with your hardware without any additional costs. Today your server might have two quad-core processors, but the future might see an upgrade to four quad-core processors. Such a change will not incur any additional costs for the esXpress deployment. And it gets better; PHD does not charge you for licenses for esXpress installations on ESX Server hosts that will only serve as restore targets. The licenses come in four different types: free, LE, Pro, and Enterprise. The differences in the licenses revolve around the number of simultaneous backups, bandwidth throttling, and full versus differential backup capability.

Once configured, when a backup job is instantiated esXpress will perform a consistency check across the VMX, VMSD, VirtualCenter, and datastore. Pending a successful consistency check, it will take a snapshot and create a VBA to manage the backup process. The number of simultaneous VB As a host can support is based on the number of cores in the physical server (and of course the license purchased). A server with eight processor cores can spawn eight VBA virtual machines, each responsible for the backup of an individual virtual machine. Upon completion of the backup, the VBA is deleted from disk. As backups are completed, new VBAs will be spawned to continue the process of backing up all the desired virtual machines.

The backup procedure of esXpress is completely integrated into VirtualCenter, thus eliminating the need to use any other interface or software application. However, for those times when access to VirtualCenter just isn't possible, a console session (or SSH session via putty.exe) can be used to configure, manage, and administer the backup processes. esXpress adds features like compression and encryption to provide enhanced efficiency and encryption to its product.

By default, esXpress performs full backups on the first day of the month and complements that with a differential backup every other day. The differential feature allows for the efficient use of space for storing backups.

Perhaps one of the most unsung features in esXpress is the ability to replicate backup data to alternate locations. By including a replication technology in the product, esXpress offers a true disaster-recovery solution that provides administrators with an easy off-site recovery process. Using the replication feature to send backups to another VMFS datastore in another location means that virtual machines can be powered on in the remote location when disaster occurs.

In all, esXpress offers a unique product with a great level of functionality.

Acronis True Image Echo Enterprise

Acronis True Image Echo Enterprise has long been a leading disaster-recovery tool for physical servers. Acronis now extends its reach into creating image-level backups of virtual machines. With support for both Linux and Windows 32-bit and 64-bit virtual machines, True Image Echo Enterprise covers most of the guest operating systems installed into virtual machines in VMware Infrastructure 3 (VI3) deployment. The Acronis True Image Echo Enterprise product includes many new features for simplifying the backup and restore process. Among these features are:

♦ Direct to DVD

♦ Image mounting for modifying without restoring

♦ Image verification and validation

♦ Acronis Universal Restore

After an unplanned system crash, True Image Echo Enterprise Server allows administrators to perform a full system restore, a bare-metal restore, or a simple restore of individual files and folders in a matter of minutes from a centralized management console. Complete system restoration with the Acronis Universal Restore feature can be executed to an existing virtual machine, a new virtual machine, or even a physical box with different hardware. When troubleshooting a problem requires re-creating the issue on a physical server, True Image Echo Enterprise makes this an easy task.

Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure

Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure provides virtual machine protection by offering replication services for virtual machine files. The Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure product installs on a single Windows server in the network environment and allows multiple virtual machines to be protected from a centralized management console.

Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure sits comfortably in the realm of products dedicated to easing the disaster recovery and business continuity for organizations with a VMware virtual infrastructure. Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure captures changes at defined intervals, keeping the target virtual disk up to date and ready for failover, recovery, and backup at any time.

When a production server outage occurs, the replicated virtual machine can be started on the target server with the latest replicated data. The virtual machine will be consistent as of the last successful replication procedure. Replication is supported between any type of storage supported by the VMware ESX Server, including direct attached SCSI, fibre channel or iSCSI SANs, and NAS/NFS.

The concept of whole virtual machine protection resonates from the idea that a replica of the entire virtual machine is created, including operating system, applications, and all relevant patches, as part of the copy process. Like some of the other products in this category, Double-Take has the advantage of being an agentless utility that understands the VMware VMotion feature and provides a centralized interface for managing the backups and restores.

No "agent" software is required on the ESX Server, or within any protected VM, so protection scenarios are easily managed and rapidly deployed. Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure needs to be installed only once, and multiple protection scenarios can be launched. This approach aggregates resource consumption by VM protection so it can be easily monitored and managed at the VMware enterprise level.

Setting up a VM protection scenario is easy with a directed step-by-step workflow that guides the user through the process. With just a few mouse clicks, and in less than a minute, a VM protection scenario can be created and deployed.

The Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure management interface leverages the logical groupings and hierarchies available in VMware VirtualCenter. This makes it possible for an administrator to easily navigate through configured virtual machines to select them for management and protection by Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure.

Double-Take for VMware Infrastructure provides options for compressing the replicated files, providing flexible trade-offs between host system resource consumption and network bandwidth usage. This product provides flexibility to configure the frequency of change replication based on either the amount of change or the time that has elapsed since the last replication window.

Several tools are available for monitoring and reporting a virtual infrastructure that provide great complements to the native tools in VI3. These tools work seamlessly to provide detailed data about hosts and virtual machines.

vCharter

vCharter, previously known as esxCharter, is a Windows-based application developed by Vizion-core Inc. vCharter is a data-collection engine installed on a central Windows server that connects to each ESX Server host on a user-defined interval to collect data about ESX Server hosts and virtual machines. vCharter is a comprehensive tool for monitoring real-time metrics regarding a VMware infrastructure deployment. It is capable of delivering both real-time and historical performance data. The vCharter user interface offers the performance view for an entire virtualized environment, including the ability to drill down for a more granular look at specific objects in the inventory, such as containers, hosts, or virtual machines. With all of the detailed capabilities and the “At a Glance” and “Top Five” views, vCharter provides either a deep or a shallow look at the performance of the virtual infrastructure.

Reports from vCharter can be constructed on-demand or can be delivered via e-mail on a scheduled basis. In addition to the e-mail functionality for sending custom reports, vCharter can be configured to send e-mails regarding performance thresholds.

Perhaps the most unique feature of vCharter is its ability to track resource costs associated with virtual machines in an effort to provide chargeback data. For hosting providers or IT departments that bill internal departments, the vCharter chargeback functionality provides an easy way to monitor virtual machine and host costs for accurate client billing.

Overall, vCharter takes an impressive step forward in comparison to the native monitoring tools found in the VI Client. With added functionality and enhanced detail, vCharter will provide all of the data administrators could need about the performance of their virtual infrastructure.

Veeam Monitor

Veeam Monitor is a Windows-centric utility focused on three aspects of the virtual infrastructure:

♦ Monitoring

♦ Alerting

♦ Capacity planning

Veeam Monitor is at its best in environments that include a VirtualCenter server that centrally manages the VI3 deployment. Smaller environments that do not use VirtualCenter can still use Veeam Monitor but will not experience the full functionality of the tool.

The Veeam Monitor monitoring process details the performance statistics of resource pools, clusters, or individual hosts and virtual machines. Administrators can get a high-level overview of virtual infrastructure performance, or they can dive into details to discover system bottlenecks that are causing performance issues.

All the data gathered from Veeam Monitor is consolidated into a SQL Server database, making it available for some of the other features in Veeam Monitor: trending and capacity planning. All of the historical data saved in the SQL Server database can be used to identify trends in resource utilization and plan for future growth.

The data-collection process of Veeam Monitor includes an alerting component that allows administrators to stay on top of performance at all times. Veeam Monitor also integrates with leading monitoring tools like CA Unicenter, IBM Tivoli, and HP OpenView.

When deployed correctly, Veeam Monitor arms administrators with a powerful tool for being proactive about system performance and bottleneck identification.

Veeam Reporter

Veeam Reporter is in a class of its own when it comes to VI3 reporting. Whereas Veeam Monitor is focused on performance metrics, Veeam Reporter is focused on:

♦ Discovery

♦ Documentation

♦ Analysis

The SQL stored data captured by Veeam Reporter is designed to provide easy-to-use documentation about the virtual infrastructure. The tool can be used to analyze the environment and report the information in Microsoft Visio, Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, or Adobe Acrobat (PDF) formats. This output provides one of the most sought-after yet never-accomplished feats in the world of IT management: documentation.

The content within these various file formats is just as flexible and deep. Veeam Reporter can gather information regarding:

♦ Network architecture, including virtual switches, ESX Server hosts, and virtual machines.

♦ Storage devices, including details of local and SAN-based storage and the virtual machine files stored within. In addition, Veeam Reporter provides metrics on storage capacity, limits, and utilization for the entire datastore or the virtual machines residing in the respective datastore.

♦ Resource pool configuration, including CPU and memory allocations.

♦ A full VI3 inventory for complete documentation of the virtual infrastructure.

Of all the tools, Veeam Reporter provides a level of functionality that is unparalleled by any other product in its category. It is unique in its offering and will most certainly save administrators a great deal of time and headaches in documenting and managing the growth of the virtual infrastructure.

Most of the early software products developed for a virtual infrastructure focused on supporting the backup and the restore of virtual machines for business continuity and disaster recovery. A growing number of applications focus on supporting the management of the ESX Server hosts or the virtual machines. In some cases, even some traditional Windows-based applications have become even more useful when used inside the virtual infrastructure.

Acronis Disc Director

Disc Director is an application composed of partition, boot managers, and hard disk data editing tools developed by Acronis Inc. This tool has been around for some time now, and its use in a virtual machine makes it an excellent application to have handy when managing a virtual infrastructure. Disk Director can perform online disk configuration changes in physical computers as well as in virtual machines. Some of the more useful features for virtual machines include the ability to:

♦ Resize, move, split, and merge partitions without data loss or destruction.

♦ Convert partitions to other file systems without data loss.

♦ Copy (move) partition contents.

♦ Delete partitions.

♦ Recover hard disk partitions that were accidentally deleted or damaged due to a hardware or a software error.

♦ Format, label, assign letters, hide and unhide partitions, set active partitions, and perform additional disk management operations.

♦ Boot installed operating systems from any hard disk partition.

♦ Boot installed operating systems from under Windows.

♦ Recover boot records, files and folders structure, find lost clusters, remove viruses, and so forth.

Disk Director provides an advantage when extending Windows disk drives for virtual machines because the extension of the disk can be performed without any downtime regardless of which disk partitions are being altered. Acronis Disk Director is a great tool to have in your repertoire, especially now that a VMDK can be extended right through the properties of the virtual machine.

Veeam Configurator

Throughout this book we have shown how many tasks can be completed using the VI Client GUI as well as the command line. And while the command line can be powerful and ultimately save time, a learning curve is involved that often makes administrators shy away from the command line. Veeam Configurator provides a centralized GUI for managing a portion of the ESX Server configuration settings for multiple ESX Server hosts.

Veeam Configurator is made up of modules, called Experts, that eliminate the need to know scripting. The latest version of Veeam Configurator is version 1.5 and includes the following six Experts:

RootAccess Expert Allows for enabling or disabling of root access via SSH.

TimeSync Expert Allows for NTP configuration across multiple ESX Server hosts.

AddUser Expert Facilitates creating additional Service Console user accounts on one or more hosts simultaneously.

PatchLevel Expert Provides reporting on the current patch level for all ESX Server hosts.

EsxDiag Expert Collects diagnostic data across multiple ESX Server hosts, including TCP and DNS information, Service Console configuration, NTP settings, and failed services.

CustomScript Expert Allows for executing custom scripts on multiple ESX Server hosts at the same time. This is an excellent way to allow limited scripting knowledge to have a big impact.

Veeam Configurator can be a big timesaver for the administrator responsible for multiple ESX Server hosts. Whether from three hosts to thirty hosts, Veeam Configurator allows for customizations and scripts to be executed in a centralized location.

Veeam FastSCP

Veeam FastSCP is a free tool that provides file copy and management features. Using FastSCP you can copy files from a Windows system to an ESX Server system or vice versa, as well as copy files within or between ESX Server systems. Imagine you want to copy ISO files to a SAN LUN accessible by an ESX server host, or perhaps you want to make a copy of the entire directory where a virtual machine's files are stored. Veeam FastSCP is the perfect fit. If your backup strategy involves VCB, then FastSCP might be the tool of choice for copying restored virtual machine files back into an ESX-accessible directory to perform the vcbRestore command.

With its FastSCP product, Veeam has identified and solved the major problems with providing data transfer to and from ESX Server hosts. Whereas FTP lacked security and SCP lacked efficiency, FastSCP provides efficient and secure data transfer.

The interface for FastSCP is comfortable and easy to use and with a price tag of $0 this is definitely a tool you'll want to install.

WinSCP

WinSCP (Windows Secure Copy) is an open source free Secure Shell File Transfer Protocol (SFTP) client and FTP client for Windows. WinSCP provides two program interfaces:

Norton Commander Interface The first interface is based on Norton Commander (and similar file managers). The interface displays two panels: a local folder structure in the left panel and a remote folder structure in the right panel.

Explorer-like Interface The second interface is similar to Windows Explorer in that you will only see the remote folder structure. To transfer files, perform a drag-and-drop operation between the WinSCP window and the Windows Explorer window.

WinSCP, like FastSCP, is used for file management services between and within ESX Server hosts. Unfortunately, this tool is significantly outperformed by FastSCP, but it has for a long time been a staple for ESX Server administrators.

FabulaTech USB over Network

One of the most significant features in today's IT world that has been eliminated from the virtual machines running on ESX Server 3.5 is the support for USB devices. For some administrators, access to USB devices is a critical component. The FabulaTech USB over Network product offers an excellent solution for USB access for virtual machines.

USB over Network allows USB devices to be connected to a physical computer and then mapped into virtual machines over the standard TCP/IP network. For example, suppose that a virtual machine needs access to a high-speed scanner that connects via USB. With USB over Network, the scanner can be connected to a physical computer somewhere on the network and then mapped into the virtual machine. The physical computer where the scanner is connected would use the USB over Network Server and the virtual machine would be installed with the USB over Network Client. The solution ends up presenting the high-speed scanner to the virtual machine as if it were truly a local device.

Lost Creations viplugins

On the smaller scale, but high up on the functionality scale are the products created by a company named Lost Creations. From their web site at www.lostcreations.com (or www.viplugins.com) you will find some very useful plugins for VirtualCenter. Among their available plugins you will find:

♦ SVMotion 0.4.4 — This VI plugin, perhaps the most useful of all, allows VMware administrators to invoke storage VMotion (SVMotion) events from within VirtualCenter. The first release of Storage VMotion, available at the time of writing, required a command line execution using the svmotion.pl utility.

♦ Add Port Groups 0.1.0 — This plugin facilitates managing virtual networks across multiple ESX Server hosts. It allows for the creation of multiple port groups (the vSwitch must exist) of any type on a number of ESX servers and virtual switches at once, thus eliminating the need to recreate on a host-by-host basis.

♦ RDP 1.0.1 — This tool builds Remote Desktop access directly into the Virtual Infrastructure client connection. The right-click context menu of a virtual machine includes an option to initiate an RDP session.

♦ Console 0.1.5 — This plugin adds a console tab to the details pane of an ESX Server host. Similar to the console tab natively available for virtual machine this plugin adds direct console access to an ESX Server from within the Virtual Infrastructure client.

♦ Invoke 0.1.7 — This plugin provides a high level of customization by allowing an administrator to invoke third-party applications from within the Virtual Infrastructure client connection. It can even pass the existing session cookie to the third-party application. This opens up the VI Client to a new world of integration with perl, Java, or .NET applications.