What's wrong with VMware ? Are you shutting down ?

[Stream2back]

Sorry for being so hostile right of the bat and i'm not really sure if this is even the right place for this, but i could not find anywhere else to post it.

I have used Vmware since 2005 when i started of with two virtual domain controllers, a file server and exchange ... Since then our company has grown and today i have 653 virtual servers on 30 hosts.

I have always liked VMware, being one of the most stable and easy systems we have and it always worked no matter what. Easy to update and run ....

This stopped when you decided to do alot of .. frankly stupid things. It began with the license changes that you sort of corrected, but then it really started to come apart with SSO and finally today when i discovered after upgrading alot of servers to new hardware version that i can't administer those machines through the vSphere client ....

What are you thinking of ? It seems that every version becomes less stable and harder to upgrade and even if there are great new functionality it actually becomes harder to administer.

We are two IT guys that administer everything in the whole company which have 20 departements, one datacenter and one disaster site. I don't have time to use 48 hours straight to get the vmware infrastructure working again every time i update to a new version ....

So the two main things a really can't understand is:

Why is SSO not an optional install ? I had AD integration before SSO .. I don't need it and i don't want it ....

Why are you moving to a web client only strategy ? That is essentially what you are doing when i can't administers upgrade machines via the client. No web client is EVER as good as a thick client ....

So where does this leave me ? After working around the clock again to regain access to my machines yet again i'm frustrated and really pissed off .... And i'm doing something a never even thought about doing and that is to begin testing HyperV .... Even writing this makes me sad, really sad but i have had enough ....

I have been there from the start and you have made possible for us as a relative small company to do things that we could never have done otherwise and made possible for us to grow into a market leader in our region, but his is maybe goodbye if you don't change for the better soon ... Get well, please !!!

Regards

Lars Skjønberg

Systems Manager

Norstat AS

[abhilashhb]

Hey Lars,

I hear you. And i totally understand why you feel so frustrated with VMware. I think VMware understood the problems with licensing and now licensing is no more an issue  Its not been easy since release of 5.1 as there were a lot of changes made on the vCenter end. One thing i always tell is, the easier a technology gets for the end users, the harder it is for the administrators to implement and administer it.

Let me answer your questions.

Why is SSO not an optional install ? I had AD integration before SSO .. I don't need it and i don't want it ....

You say your company is growing and you have reached up to 30 Hosts now. You would have realized how much manual work is required to maintain these servers, So you will want to automate a lot of things, VMware gives you an orchestrator which can help you with this. Imagine logging in into vCO every single time to run workflows. Being an administrator wouldn't you be happy if you can right click and run all the workflows related to your VM in one single pane where you will always login(in a web client)?. this is one of the example. SSO can integrate a lot of vSphere products into a single management pane and authenticates all the products with one credential. You of all people would require it more as you say you are just two guys who take care of the whole environment. Now you might think its just for AD authentication and i used to do that before with normal vCenter setup too. but what if you grow and add more products? Imagine your level of frustration then if you have to login into every page every single time to do something on them.

Why are you moving to a web client only strategy ? That is essentially what you are doing when i can't administers upgrade machines via the client. No web client is EVER as good as a thick client ....

Yes thick client is very good. I personally prefer thick client over web client any given day. But you will also understand that there's  a lot of dependency on Microsoft right now. And if you go according to best practice you will have to dedicate a windows VM for management of your vSphere environment. So you are paying for a license there and also resource to create that machine. Yes you might say you will create a small machine with 1GB RAM and 1 vCPU. But that's still some resource right? What if you can get rid of the dependency? What if you can load it with a browser without any dependency on resource? And imagine if you will have multi-sites and you have to access vCenter remotely. Won'tvSphere client eat up lot of resource? That way web client uses less amount of resources to get the inventory for you. And i'm sure there are lot of other advantages. I'm just telling what i can think of right now.

I'm not trying to convince you here to stick with VMware. Its left to you to explore whatever you feel is right for your organization. But all these changes that are happening  for good. And i understand a new release takes some time to get stable with all the fixes and workarounds. What i do is i wait for a while and watch on community for all the fixes to come and then upgrade my environment. You could do that and avoid unnecessary issues.

[Rubeck]

Your post is spot on, Lars...!

(Kunne sq ikke have beskrevet det bedre selv)

/Rubeck

[Jayden56]

Hi

Welcome to the communities.

I am agree with abhilash and its not only for VMWARE case we will get even Microsoft too as I am working in both environment .

From customer point of view I will suggest test everything before deploying production.

"The most incredible things happen in life when you decide to achieve them"

[TedH256]

I agree with Abhilash, though on SSO I am kind of equivocal:

SSO - it would be nice if this were "optional" in a way, or at least if it had been better imagined from the start. It cracks me up that, in order to re-do the SSO piece, I would have to uninstall vcenter. WHAT? Gees - make it a piece that you can plug in and unplug if and when you want. Having said that - I have not found it to be much of a bother, really. It slightly complicates the install (much less with 5.5 than 5.1) but after that, I really don't care much as I don't have to think about it or muck with it.

WebClient - well really, the logic of using a webclient is very clear. It works really quite well (takes some getting used to, I'll admit) and the advantages of not having to have a thick client installed in order to do management are just really really nice. I kind of wish there was no dependency on flash, but .... oh well. This one is a "get over it" deal I think - and if you find yourself wanting to contemplate HyperV because of the web client, I would be inclined to think "troll" moreso than actual serious customer need. JMO

[TedH256]

pps - 5.1 is rock solid stable, and a performance beast. 5.5 is no different, just even more of a perfomance beast. And yes, you can still manage hosts with the fat client if you must ... just some new features will require the web client.

Lars I'd say maybe you jumped into the upgrade with insufficient due diligence. A little bit more planning and patience and you would have had no problems continuing to manage your environment. Sorry your experience was not as smooth as you wanted, but I think you own some of the responsibility for it ....

[proden20]

A worthy thread, I believe.

Evaluating vSphere 5.5, I am very pleased with what I am seeing.  I can say, for what its worth, that a few things since the 3.x/4.x days have disrupted my once enamored view toward VMWare as a company:

- The dual personality of a thick client / web client. I feel the web client could have been much further fleshed out before going GA.  5.5 feels and looks stellar, but I can't say the same for 5.0/5.1.

- SSO.  Again, a much better feel in 5.5.  This felt forced and a solid explanation could have been communicated.  If open authentication system integration was the goal, that is admirable.  However, this personally felt like a push to vCloud since its 5.1 mandate.  As the poster mentioned, we are not accustomed to disruptive upgrades/installations.

- vCloud  - the install routines were cryptic (they still may be, I haven't evaluated since,) and the need to find dependable installation instructions via third-party blogs was not something I was accustomed to coming from VMWare.

I am 100% for relinquishing dependency on Microsoft systems in my VMWare infrastructure.  I also understand VMWare's need to grow, innovate, and compete in a market with multiple hypervisor options.  It is the dependability of yesteryear and a plea to not become the competition that I seek as a customer.

[Gortee]

Morning,

I have to say I understand the frustration SSO was a total pain in the butt.  I breaks all the time and is a pain still.  It does seem a lot better in 5.5 so far.  SSO was poorly handled from day one and not fully baked.   If you think about it this is normal for VMware with new products we are just not normally forced to install them as part of the core product (vCloud directory 1.0 was a mess, vShield 1 was a mess too... I have hopes for NSX 1.0 but I know it will be a mess)

->Why are you moving to a web client only strategy ? That is essentially what you are doing when i can't administers upgrade machines via the client. No web client is EVER as good as a thick client ....

This is all about accessibility VMware understand that people want to be able to manage vm's from all kinds of devices not just Windows computers.  First it's MAC's in 5.5 and expect to see new clients for IOS and android.  They want to make it work anywhere from any type of client to support the changing work force.  It's also about getting away from MS which has put some major limits on vCenter development. 

I asked the CTO this year at VMworld 2013 what his company plans on doing about aggressive (so called free) marketing from Microsoft around Hyper-V.  He said innovate them out of business (essentially he gave a longer answer)  I think this is the heart of the issue.  There is a reason that there is a new iPhone every 18 months... so fan boys and business users will generate more cash for Apple.   In the software world once you get market share like Vmware all you have is support which does not pay for massive new features.   Without massive new features you go out of business so you create new products and in VMwares case make it more complex.  This complexity drives out small business and pushes them to the generic players (Hyper-V Xen... not all the feature but good enough features).   It's a hard line VMware has to play as a software vendor.  I am sure some days they wish they were a hardware vendor like Apple just add some features to the core product and make them buy a new one every 3 - 5 years.  This is why Vmware pushes EUC and now NSX so hard they need to sell a new iphone. 

Just my two cents.  But at the end of the day VMware still has the best product on the market with the most market share, they frustrate me from time to time but their support is still far better than most companies I deal with in IT.   Their mean time to repair is far better than anyone out there in my experience.   Also the pain from upgrades seems to be a once every six months for me which is not bad. 

I will say I would avoid upgrading to 5.5 until Jan or Feb wait for that U1 I always do in production and it allows other to feel the pain and blog on it

Just my two cents,

J