Difference between vapp and installable components

[q8_it]

There's any documentation or explanation of the difference between vcenter operation manager 5 enterprise deployed as a vApp or deployed on a server with the installer?

What's the best practice?

Francesco

[ysandfort]

Hi Francesco,

do you plan on using it with non virtualised servers/environments? Are you aware that the custom install version doesn't bring capacity management?

What are the target's you try to achieve?

My best practice advice would be as long as you do not have a strong use case for custom install: "Stick with the vApp deployment!", it is far less complex and works well even with thousands of VMs.

Hope this helps

Yves

[fduranti]

Hi Yves and thanks for the answer.

We actually have vcops1 standard and capacityiq installed locally on 2 different sites and we will migrate to vcops 5. Almost all of our servers are virtual we have only some db and infrastructure server physical now. I saw that the vapp is composed by 2 vm and probably it can manage the entire infrastructure without problems but I was trying to understand what's the use case for the 2 different installation. I think in the case of the custom I can install the ui in the primary site and the various collector parts locally in the 2 sites. This seems not possible with the vapp.

As you said with custom there's no capacity management but what I lose with the vapp instead of the custom?

Thanks

Francesco

[ysandfort]

Hi Francesco,

we have run tests with the appliance even across slow links in different datacenters without any issues, so I do not see the value of seperated collectors as long as you monitor a mainly virtual environment.

Adapters for external systems and collections can also be attached to the vApp (as long as you have at least an enterprise licens key plus the licenses keys for the adapters).

The custom install as far as I am aware should only be used as an exception in scenarios where the broad majority of monitored systems is non virtual. There is no functional advantage of the custom install (as I remember).

The vApp scales from my opinion fine for up to 6000 or more VMs, not sure what size you talk about?

Again my suggestion would be to go with the vApp as long as you have a virtualised environment involved. I guess this will be shortly mentioned in official best practice guides etc. But you might need to talk to Support or PSO to get more details on this.

Thanks

Yves

[fduranti]

Thanks for the really good explanation.

We're going with a total of about 500 vm between the 2 sites so we're really small compared to what vcops can manage.

We will go with vapp it seems really simple to setup at least for a standard installation/use.

The only thing that is not nice and that we cannot import data for the 2 separate vcops/capacityiq that we have but only from one of them.

Francesco

[dchrist2]

Are these difference documented anywhere?  PDF/Whitepaper?

[critical3rr0r]

Francesco-

If you can help it I would not recommend migrating the data at all. We migrated from vCops 1.0.1 and CapIQ into vCops 5 and had a lot of problems. The migration itself was simple and fast but it left a mess to clean up. We immediatly has to apply the database patch and still had issues. We then applied the build patch from tech support and still had issues. After digging through logs and working with tech support we agreed to blow away the install, start from scratch and allow vCops to rebuild its dynamic threshold baselines. I am very pleased after doing this.

Save yourself time and if you can live without the current collection start from scratch.

[fduranti]

It seems there are many patches for the vcops products..

There's some place where to check for those patches or they should only be installed after having specific problem and asking the support?

[bparlier]

Something else to keep in mind when deciding on the vApp or stand alone is upgrade paths. As far as I am aware, there is no upgrade path for stand alone from previous to current versions. And it looks like it may stay that way. I would strongly recommend the vApp (as stated in one of the earlier posts).

[critical3rr0r]

I learned of the 2 patches through this forum. These are the only 2 patches I am currently aware of. The migration Database script can be obtained through a VMware KB article. The full product patch needs to be given by VMware support. Both patches resolve specific issues but I have seen cases, by diggin through forums, where they have resolved issues outside of their scope. I would only recommend installing them though if you are encountering the issues discussed of recommended to do so by a VMware support technician.

Great thing about vSphere is that if you have the resources you can and should always snapshot before applying patches or hot fixes.

Good luck!

[delf76]

I have yet to see a clear answer on this subject. 

I understand the vapp allows for a quick installation.  But what are the limitations of the vApp vs. the installable components?  

We are trying to plan the installation of this software, and we are trying to decide to go with the vApp or the installable components.  It's really hard to make this decision when you don't know the limitations of each. 

For example, is there a maximum database size for the vApp?  Does performance start to degrade after the database reaches a certain size?  etc.. etc.. These are the kind of questions everyone is wondering.

[vcpguy]

I am not sure, there is any clear answer. It depends on your requirements and your company policy

For example -

1) The Windows installation, will ask you for seperate database and I think, for the installation they will ask to run some scripts on the SQL server. Now, that can be a big NO in some environment.

But for vAPP that is not a problem, It has its own database.

2) If your Analytics crashes due to lack of disk space, you  can jsut add a extra disk space and reboot. The Database is smart enough to use the newly added disk. The same cannot be used in Windows world.

3) For SCOM adapter, I was told you will have to use a Windows Installation and not vAPP

I hope this helps. Personally, I will go for vAPP. It is small and no License cost to pay to MS

[delf76]

I'm going to contact myTechnical rep or someone and get a clear answer on this.  We are planning on using the SCOM adapater, and nothing was mentioned to us about not being able to use the vApp.  

We are a Windows shop for the most part, and license everything under the DataCenter model, so avoiding the Windows license isn't a big deal to us.

But, I do understand for some, it may be a big deal.

VMWare needs to publish something in their documentation regarding the pros and cons of the vApp and the installable modules.

[vcpguy]

I agree, all this info is by trial and error, we never saw something like that published from VMware.

[delf76]

Based on my discussion with VMware, a document that compares the pros/cons of each installation does not exist.

I will relay what I was told.  If anyone finds out otherwise, post the update here.

I was told:

"It is our recommendation to use the vApp architecture rather than Standalone. The vApp scales to over 6000 VMs. The Standalone version does NOT include the Risk and Efficiency data. Which means you miss out on Short and Long term capacity trending."

I had also heard that the Standalone version was the only way to use some of the connectors, such as SCOM.  The reply was:

"That is not true. The vApp includes two UIs, vSphere UI and Custom UI. All third party adapters will interface with the Custom UI, not vSphere. Unless you are running more than 6000 VMs, ignore anything and everything about the Standalone installer."

So, for what it's worth, that's the answers I received.

[vcpguy]

Recently, I read this , vAPP will not support SRM but a standalone VM will suport SRM,

[vaidman]

I know this post is old, but just wanted to clarify regarding previous post on SRM / vCOps vApp implementation - this is supported via instructions in http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2031891