VMware Communities : Thread List - Documentation Suggestions and Comments (VI3 beta, LOCKED)

commandline help

Hjorleifur — Mon, 12 Jun 2006 15:27:24 GMT

I've setup an esx server without any network configuration. And no network conectivity. Now after using the server configureation guide I could not configure the network so that I could access the service console.
Are there any plans to have more documentation on the command line tools ?
For example configure.
default gateway
set hostname
configure virtual switches
virtual nics
etc.

with regards
Hjorleifur

web page typo?

jurajfox — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 18:57:20 GMT

I noticed that on the new webage posted today:
http://www.vmware.com/products/vi/#tabfeatures

Memory ballooning is repeated twic in the following sentence:

Advanced memory management including RAM over-commitment, Transparent page sharing, Memory ballooning and Memory ballooning.

Message was edited by:
jurajfox

Courses

roartf — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 13:53:09 GMT

Hi
Was wondering if the plans for courses on ESX 3 and VC 2 are under construction and what time u think they will be available?

thanx,
roar

memory usage

biekee — Thu, 25 May 2006 00:06:33 GMT

Maybe some people have dived into the memory usage of the ESX server and the vm's.

Question 1: how will memory be divided when I have two vm's of 256 MB, SC has 272 MB and the ESX server has 1 GB of memory. In this configuration I am already in a warning state, what disappoints me. (I am running the vms for one hour now).I have the impression I cannot set minimum and maximum as easy as in 2.5.x.

Question 2: will memory be shared the same way as it was in ESX 2.5.x? And will the vmkernel swap be used the same way?

Question 3: is there something like vmkusage? or the memory tab in the MUI? The performance tab in VC is great, but it just doesn't hit the spot for memory stats, if you know what I mean.

I hope someone can shed some more light in my darkness

bk

Where can I find all the documentation for the esx3.0/beta

DjBurty — Mon, 22 May 2006 18:05:01 GMT

Hi all,
Anyone has got a link where I can download the Docs
Thanks

Usefull extra commands in new release

KidE — Mon, 22 May 2006 11:05:31 GMT

L.S.

It would be realy helpful wel the findutils package would be included in the new release. Locate and updatdb are one of the most used commands in the linux world.
We inplemented it on all are unix systems and it makes our life a lot easier.

If there are more command's or features that people would like see post them!

Gr,

E

esxcfg-*

kix1979 — Thu, 11 May 2006 18:00:15 GMT

My question is perhaps loaded... When, if ever, will more options be exposed to esxcfg? A good example is setting up virtual switches for VMs/Kernel. It's bad enough I have to reboot for changes to show up, but most things I have to configure in the GUI as there is no alternative via the command line. Yes, I can edit the esx.conf file, but that is obviously less then perfered.

Kix

Install VMware software under Virtual Machines

jgswinkels — Thu, 04 May 2006 20:11:58 GMT

Problem:
It is not possible to test new VMware stuff e.g VMware server Beta 2 under a Virtual Machine.

Request:
A solution to test new Beta software under VMware Virtual Machines

The RC docmentation

roartf — Fri, 21 Apr 2006 11:07:06 GMT

Hiiiiiiiii
Havent looked at them real close but does anyone know if there are lots of changes in documentation from Beta 2 to RC?

Thanx,
Roar

Typo in supported guest OSes

elsinore84 — Tue, 18 Apr 2006 23:36:51 GMT

On page 36 of the Installation and Upgrade Guide for VirtualCenter and ESX Server, under the heading "Experimental Support for 64-bit Guest Operating Systems", one of the OSes listed is "Slackware Enterprise Linux 9 (all SPs)". I believe this should be "SuSE Enterprise Linux 9 (all SPs)". There is no such thing as Slackware Enterprise Linux.

Regards,

-Erik.

Saving Host configurations

jheppner — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 13:42:44 GMT

In virtual center I would like the ability to save a ESX host configuration to a text file and later use this text file to rebuild that server. From a DR point of view this would make recover much easier. Since all configuration information is now done via virtual center the config must be stored somewhere in the database right?

Thanks

VM power-on option

jheppner — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 13:40:06 GMT

I would like to have the ability to group VMs for power-on. I see I can arrange the order of power-on of VMs on a host server however I would like to see this at a resource pool level. For example I might have multiple AD servers spread across multiple hosts. I what to ensure all of the AD servers are running before starting my LOB VMs.

Thanks

Auditing

jheppner — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 13:37:22 GMT

If it is not too late I would like to see advanced auditing features in virtual center. I would like to run a report showing by user ID who created, changed VMs, added or changed ESX configurations and farm settings. I have looked through the user guide and find anything like this.

Thanks

Best Practices Updates

MichaelJKnight — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 07:02:47 GMT

Folks,

I have used the following document http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vc_technical_best.pdf
to assist me in the past when creating environments.

This document has some best practices regarding....

<quote>

No more than 16 ESX Servers connected to a single VMFS volume

For added scalability, VMs should be divided into multiple VMFS
volumes, each of which can still be accessible to all ESX Servers

No more than 32 IO-intensive VMs, or 100 non-IO intensive VMs sharing
a single VMFS volume

Also recommend increasing the maximum queue depth for the Fiber
Channel adapter, and increasing the Disk.SchedNumReqOutstanding
parameter (see ESX docs).

</quote>

I would like to know with ESX 3 and VC2, if these still apply and are you VMware folks going to release an updated documented with new and additional recommendations.

I'm sure a lot of folks would welcome this

Michael.

Datastore Partitioning

USRMBMN1 — Fri, 24 Mar 2006 18:57:10 GMT

Appendix B of the Installation and Upgrade Guide is entitled Datastore Partitioning. This section gives recommendations for partition sizes. Why does these sizes differ from what you get when performing a 'clean' install and selecting the Recommended Partitioning option?

Example:

/boot

Appendix B recommends 250MB
Recommended Partitioning option creates the partition as 100MB

thanks........Bruce

Licensing Guide

JasonV — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 18:39:20 GMT

Is there going to be an official licensing guide beside the one from macrovision? It would be nice to see some straight forward information about the LMTOOLS and how to set up and configure server based licensing. Also I was looking for more info concerning VM templates and there was a reference to the "virtual machine management guide". I couldn't find that document.

Something must be done with permission management

zdeneks — Fri, 17 Mar 2006 16:31:40 GMT

Ok here we go, there are two things that I'd like to mention:

1) I think this one might be addressed by future release (or maybe I just did not find it in the menu): when you connect using virtual infrastructure client to ESX3 and add user to role, there is no delete on user. Workaround I found was to create new role, assign user to it (which removes user from existing role) and then destroy role without reassignment.

2) Oh, this one rocks - you can connect to standalone server and assign root "readonly" privileges. And you are cooked - fortunately I had ESX in VC so there was vpx user so my workaround - save password file, chang password on vpx user, create empty role, assign root and delete role to remove root settings. It is important to note here that root still stayed at the root folder permissions, but it had read only permissions on the ESX server and I did not find a way to bypass that checking by any other means. Once root is readonly on ESX, obviously that supercedes the root folder settings and I was unable to regain control by any other means. Maybe root should be locked so user cannot accidentally render system useless.

ESX 3.0 and P2V Capabilities

dtrinh4000 — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 21:41:06 GMT

After reading the Roadmap for ESX Server 3 beta 2, correct me if im wrong, but i did not see any mention of p2v support.
What are VMware's plans for supporting p2v in their upcoming release? will they be pushing for third party platespin or be releasing a new version of p2v assistant? also, would any such type of tool be included with the purchase of esx server 3?

thanks

Category announcements..

Liz — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 15:46:01 GMT

For example : http://www.vmware.com/community/ann.jspa?annID=88

was the category annouuncement that greeted me this afternoon, only if you click on it, you get some big hairy Java type error..

Is this just me?

Boot from SAN part needs revision

Sowmya Narayanan — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 19:19:32 GMT

The section "Configuring the ESX Server Host to Boot from a SAN" in Chapter 4 of the "Installation and Upgrade Guide" needs to mention that the HBA BIOS settings need to be changed along with the server's boot BIOS settings. There is a screenshot of the HBA boot BIOS but there is no mention of having to selecting the boot device in the HBA BIOS.

Package Options

lightfighter — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 14:09:40 GMT

I would definately like to see some type of options to install the packages during the intial install , its kind of a PITA to go back and install the RPMs later

Windows XP Professional SP3?

zwaagp — Sat, 18 Feb 2006 08:34:06 GMT

esx3_systems_guide.pdf, page 2:

Supported OS: Windows XP Professional SP1 and SP3

I think SP3 has to be SP2.

Installation & Upgrade Guide - Virtual Switch Question

MR-T — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 08:50:10 GMT

On page 34 it states 'Up to 32 virtual machines per virtual switch'

I thought the switch sizes had been increased with ESX 3 to allow +1000 ports.

Can someone confirm if this is simply an error in the doc.

Also, will the number of gigabit adapters be increased for the final release?

Where is the Virtual Machine Configuratin Guide???

n8_DeT — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 15:58:09 GMT

I have seen several references inside of Beta2 docs to the Virtual Machine Configuration Guide. Where is this guide? OR does it go under a different name?

Installation & Upgrade Guide CPU Question

MR-T — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 08:44:26 GMT

How many virtual cpus can the hosts cope with?

Page 34 'A total of 128 virtual processors in all virtual machines per ESX Server Host'

Page 37 'Each ESX Server machine can host up to 80 virtual CPUs in virtual machines'

Also on page 37 in the processor section it states 'one or two processors per virtual machine' Should this be 4 processors now?

Error in Introduction to Virtual Infrastructure

Bo Christiansen — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 05:54:45 GMT

Hi,

On page 7:

"Multiple Processors on one virtual machine (SNMP)" I think should be
"Multiple Processors on one virtual machine (SMP)"

Best regards

Missing documentation on 'relocate VM files' option

wally — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 13:31:58 GMT

Although I do have a clue about what will happen if I click it, there is no mention of this option in the online help/documentation.

SAN High Availability/Disaster Recovery Configuration Guide

Ronnan — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 10:50:46 GMT

The SAN configuration Guide is a very basic SAN guide, only in Appendix A is something about SAN high availability and Disaster Recovery.

Is there coming a guide with HA/DR SAN configurations and examples with EMC products and other vendors?

Examples and best practices like a two Symmetrix/DMX configuration with SRDF (Split-Site configuration) and how VC2 and ESX3 have to be configured for this kind of HA/DR SAN Configurations.

Errors in the documentation

HenrikB — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 10:11:40 GMT

Hello,

found an error in the "Resource Management Guide". The chapters "Clusters and Virtual Machines" and "Advanced Resource Management" carry the same number - 8.

C.U.,

Henrik

ESX & VC Install Guide

kimono — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 06:47:39 GMT

"Upgrade Is Not Reversible The upgrade process has only one direction. Once you upgrade part of your virtual infrastructure, that upgraded part cannot be reverted for use with older VMware software. Consider that if you migrate your personal music system entirely to CDs and DVDs, you have an environment in which you cannot listen to a phonograph record or tape cassette. In the same way, once you upgrade to ESX Server version 3, you cannot use older VMware server or virtual machine
formats."

Interesting Analogy VMWARE! But I've kept my record and cassette players, and along with all my records and tapes, and I can still play them in my new sound system!

Resumeable download.

Liz — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 11:04:22 GMT

Would it be possible to make the ISO available on a resumable download server? I must be on like try 30 or so maybe more, and I keep getting the first 400mb or so, but struggle with anything later.

Congrats!

dsiles — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 02:26:02 GMT

Glad to see this finally drop. Downloading is moving along very nice, about 30 minutes out from burning out the ISO. Looks like I am not going to get any sleep tonight

Good work VMware!

roadmap broken ?

daikyu — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 10:07:37 GMT

when i download the file http://www.vmware.com/products/beta/esx-vc/roadmap.pdf
its broken

also yours ?

peter

Welcome to the Documentation Suggestions/Comments forum!

Daryll — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 01:02:02 GMT

Hello all,

If you have a suggestion for how we can document something, or a suggestion for new documentation, please post it here. We're always looking for ways to improve our documentation!

-Daryll