Introducing the VI 2.5 Client Plugin - SVMotion

[akutz]

SVMotion is a VI 2.5 client plugin (the FIRST released, third-party plugin in fact) that extends the client's functionality by providing an integrated, graphical tool that can be used to invoke storage VMotion (SVMotion) operations. This plugin is not supported by VMware. In fact, the plugin is not anywhere close to supported by VMware because it is the result of a two-week dive into the inner-workings of the VI client libraries with popular reflection tools (reverse-engineering). l o s t c r e a t i o n s is working on a white paper that describes how to build VI plugins.

Read more about SVMotion and download it here http://www.lostcreations.com/code/wiki/vmware/viplugins/svmotion.

[akutz]

Thank you to everyone helping out people with the plug-in. I'm so busy

with the next version of the plug-in and the book that I have not had

time to frequent the forums lately...

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-a

"condensing fact from the vapor of nuance"

[John_Bergin]

Maybe this is a silly question but this software works like a champ for all VMs residing on SAN storage but it won't help me migrate from Local LUNs to SAN LUNs. Is that working as designed?

[rick-vanover]

I believe the official answer is that SVMotion is not supported for local storage.

But the real answer is that it works.

[akutz]

I don't want it to break VMotion...

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-a

"condensing fact from the vapor of nuance"

[John_Bergin]

It is grayed out for me when I choose VMs on local storage. I had hoped to use this plug-in to get everything off local storage and then mothball that for backups or other secondary uses.

[rick-vanover]

Yeah, SVMotion as delivered from VMware will allow it through the svmotion remote CLI and right-click. But Andrew is not wanting to allow you to do something that may put you in a bad situation. Here here for akutz!

[John_Bergin]

I don't want it to break VMotion either. DRS has been a huge boon since I got that configured and finally getting the last images off of local storage (+/- 30) would be a big help. It is funny how no one is ever really willing to power off a system for even 20 minutes.

So Akutz this is working as designed then by being grayed out when selecting local storage?

[John_Bergin]

Darn, I guess I will have to do it the old fashioned way. This does still work great for everything else.

[ccastaneda]

For some of my VMs I get the "Migrate Storage" option, while for most ot them it's greyed out. The majority of my VMs are thin-provisioned. Does this tool not support thin-provisioned VMDK files even though my ESX hosts are patched for the svmotion bug?

Thanks,

[dougm]

I used this plugin in to migrate to and from local storage several times at one of the last clients I was at. However, the last time I tried it, it was grayed out? ??? It is a VERY nice plugin!

[John_Bergin]

So with an older version this worked? I would be willing to take the risk at this point.

[akutz]

In an older version it worked. I am working on a massive overhaul of

the plug-in right now, removing all of VMware's internal library

references. Once that is complete the new version will have a switch

that lets you turn this feature back on.

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-a

"condensing fact from the vapor of nuance"

[John_Bergin]

I am very impressed! Thanks for all the hard work!

[ccastaneda]

akutz,

For my situation, I am NOT attempting to move from local storage to shared storage, but rather shared to shared. I am using the latest ESX build, 3.5 Update 1 (82663) along with your latest build of 0.4.4.0 and I get the grayed out "Migrate Storage" for what I believe to be the VMs with thin-provisioned VMDKs. We have about 80% thin-p'd VMs and 20% regular VMs, so there not esily distinguihable from within VC, other than the fact that I get the greyed out option for the majority of them.

Just wanted to know if you haven't built in support for the thin-provisioned VMDKs even though the ESX servers are corrected for the bug OR maybe I'm not doing something right?

Thanks in advance.

[dougm]

That sounds like a very nice feature. Complete with a little popup telling of the risks? :smileygrin: Thanks again for this plugin. Just let us know when the new version is posted.

Thanks againI I know you have made this task a LOT easier for a lot of us.

[akutz]

Version 1.0 of the SVMotion has been released at http://vip-svmotion.sourceforge.net/. New features include:

- No longer protects against migrating VMs that have thin-provisioned disks.

- No longer counts RDM files against datastore size, fixing the bug that plagued the last version.

- SVMotion operations against templates are not supported since VMware does not support them.

- Added tool tips that explain why a relocation cannot take place

- All SVMotion events write out a log, enabling better understanding of what went wrong in case of an error.

- Aside from the library that loads the plug-in, all of VMware's internal code has been replaced with the VI Toolkit for .NET.

- The project is now supported by almost 20 unit tests, helping to ensure fewer bugs and greater stability.

- The unit tests can be expanded to include testing for a system-resource supported number of servers since they use mock testing designed to work with the VI Toolkit for .NET.

- The project is now built using NAnt, which allows nightly builds of the source, creates distributions, and builds the MSI installer.

[Cory_S]

akutz,

I just downloaded the 1.0 plugin and installed using the MSI. Installed and enabled no problems, and I've already migrated a VM from one SAN to another with no problems. I'm going to be using this quite often now, I can tell already!! Thanks for all your work on this, is a great interface and a very useful plug-in.

[jose_maria_gonz]

Hi akutz,

This is a great tool. much appreciated

I am just getting an error when it was at 9% which I have attached below

Thanking you in advance and sorry for the inconvenience

rgds,

J.

[akutz]

If the SVmotion operation starts at all my code is out of the way.

However, post the dataset that is written to the temp dir (read the

SVmotion website for this info) and I will take a look at what you

were trying to do.

--

-a

"condensing fact from the vapor of nuance"

[jose_maria_gonz]

Hi akutz,

You are right. I am getting the same error using VMware VI Remote CLI with svmotion.pl --interactive.

See attached below.

Thanks anyway.

rgds,

J.