I'm wondering how much vMA experience is required for the VCAP5-DCA exam? Is extensive knowledge of Perl and using the vMA appliance required to get through the exam or can PowerCLI be the method of choice to complete the command line objectives? I imagine in the cases of troubleshooting issues on a host that they may not allow direct console access to it so is that where they bring vMA into it?
You should be comfortable enough with vMA.
in my person opinion, Extensive knowledge of perl not required, but you should be able to use esxcli, vicfg-*, esxtop/resxtop, vm-support etc during the exam depending upon need.
if you are very conformable doing things from powercli, as long as question is asking you to do something, mostly choice remains with you, how you do it.
you will also face couple of questions regarding powercli script in the exam.
Needless to say, try to meet all the objectives listed in Exam Blueprint before you sit for the exam.
I didnt make it 3 months back , as per VMware Blue print , it is no more listed , but you gonna find vMA on the exam , I believe you will need it somehow, I waste some time to know how to work on it while in exam , I believe I would pass if I didnt waste it.
I am going to my 2nd attempt in 2 days , I believe all what I need is:
Adding ESXi Hosts to vMA "vMware Management Assistant"
Like:
vi-admin@localhost:~> vifp addserver 192.168.35.31 --username root --password P@ssw0rd
removing a host:
vi-admin@localhost:~> vifp removeserver 192.168.35.31
switch to the required host to execute my commands:
vifptarget --set 192.168.35.31
IMHO , I don't believe I will need more , the rest I should be able to do same as I am on the ESXi host itself, below is wonderful KB about most (not all) what you can do "or will need"
PowerCLI | vMA |
| |||
Register a VM |
|
|
| ||
Unregister a VM |
|
| vim-cmd vmsvc/unregister vmid | ||
Delete a VM |
|
|
| ||
Get a listing of VMs on a host |
|
| esxcli vm process list vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms | ||
Determine if a VM has a snapshot |
|
|
| ||
Take a snapshot of a VM |
|
|
| ||
Remove a snapshot of a VM |
|
|
| ||
Get the current power state of a VM |
|
|
| ||
Get the uptime for a VM |
|
|
| ||
Power on a VM |
|
|
| ||
Shutdown a VM |
|
|
| ||
Power off a VM |
|
|
| ||
Reboot a VM |
|
|
| ||
Reset a VM | Restart-VM –vm vm_name |
|
| ||
Upgrade VMware Tools in a VM |
|
|
| ||
Display the IP address of a VM |
|
|
|
The vMA isnt on the VCAP5.5 blueprint.
I passed the 5.5 VCAP exam having had very little exposure to the vMA & no pearl knowledge, I exclusive used PowerCLI.
Hope that helps