Creating a DNS/LDAP server in vCenter

[dauphin77]

Hola!

Does anyone have any expereince with creating a DNS/LDAP server in vCenter? I had a request come in that requires a DNS/LDAP server on it's own subnet to oversee multiple resource pools.

Query if anyone has any experience doing this in vCenter 5. Is it possible? What OS would work best for a setup like this....Windows Server/Linux?

Any guidance would be apprecaited!

[weinstein5]

I would create a seperate VM and have it provife those services and let vCenter just be vCenter -

[will373794]

There are lots of ways doing that. Depends on many factors, e.g. windows/linux preference and skills, budget, resource available, size of your organization, what vc (windows/vcsa). AD/AD LDS and openldap are supported

Both windows and linux have solutions for this. Windows would be AD or AD LDS + DNS . Linux would be openladp+bind/power dns.

Vmware seems to favour windows, AD generally works quite well and it is tired in with DNS. Ease management for users, name resolving and so on. Linux can work quite well especially you are low on budget but require some skills if you come from windows background.

You also need to consider redundancy for them and what sort of impact can it have on your operation when some or all services are unavailable.

I would probably choose windows.

[3CV]

Yup - I agree.  Only need be a small VM running Linux, stripped of all unnecessary services, on a separate sub-net.  You could run something like Webmin to administer it and get rid of the GUI. It would be pretty fast.  I have a similar setup in mind for here.

[dauphin77]

What flavor of Linux would you reccomend?

[ainterne]

I have always used a RedHat Server for speed, and then to really optimize things, create a ram drive in Red Hat and then put the DNS zone files in the ram drive.

That way you loose the limitation of log files and dynamic updates being written out due to disk write speed. As said above, disable or remove all other services and

minimize the footprint.   I have built many bootable images for VM that are R/O DNS/DHCP servers that use Ram...... They are extremely reliable in this form.

I also have used WebMin and that is also a cool way to go......depends on the method of managing DNS....e.g. is it a large infrastructure that's dynamic or pretty static.