© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved vSphere Autodeploy Cian O’Mahony Technical Support Engineer – VMware Global Support Services – Cork, Ireland

2 Agenda  Overview  Components  Image Creation  Architecture and Scalability  Initial Setup  Design for Resiliency  Troubleshooting  Upcoming Features

3 A Quick Comparison

© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved Components

5 Auto Deploy Components

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7 Overview  What is it?  New host deployment method introduced in vSphere 5.0  Based on PXE Boot  Works with Image Builder, vCenter Server, and Host Profiles  How it works:  PXE boot the server  ESXi image profile loaded into host memory via Auto Deploy Server  Configuration applied using Answer File / Host Profile  Host placed/connected in vCenter

© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved Image Creation

9 Vendor, VMware Offline Bundles Base ESXi Image Profile Copy VIBs Create Image Profile Emit ISO Custom Image Image Creation

10 Vendor, VMware Offline Bundles ESXi Host ESXi Image Profile Local Online Depot (set up by Autodeploy) Autodeploy Server Copy VIBs Create Image Profile Boot Request Fetch & Cache VIBs Deploy VIBs Image Creation

© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved Architecture and Scalability

12 Boot Sequence

13 Host DHCP TFTP Architecture and Scalability

14 TFTP DHCP PXE AutoDeploy Architecture and Scalability

15 TFTP DHCP PXE AutodeployWeb Proxy Architecture and Scalability Reference:

16 Edit the configuration file (/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf) making the following changes: Set the "Listen" and ServerName" options: Listen 80 ServerName.. :80 Uncommented the "ProxyRequests" entry: ProxyRequests on Architecture and Scalability

17 Added the following lines to the end of the file: # This section defines the location where the web proxy will cache the content CacheRoot /var/cache/AutoDeploy/ CacheEnable disk / CacheDirLevels 5 CacheDirLength 3 CacheDefaultExpire 3600 CacheMaxFileSize # this section defines the directories on the Auto Deploy server that the web proxy will cache SSLProxyEngine on ProxyPass /vmw/cache ProxyPassReverse /vmw/cache ProxyPass /vmw/rbd ProxyPassReverse /vmw/rbd Architecture and Scalability

18 Save the changes to the /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf file, and verify the apache configuration by running: # /usr/sbin/httpd -t -f /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf (command returns "Syntax OK" if the configuration is good) Finally, start the web server: # service httpd start # service httpd status Architecture and Scalability

19 Autodeploy WebProxy Cache ESXi Image Profile Architecture and Scalability

20 DHCP TFTP 1 TFTP 2 TFTP 3 Autodeploy Webproxy Option 66 Cache Architecture and Scalabilty

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© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved Initial Setup

23 Use vCenter Server Appliance as a Syslog Server to capture ESXi host logs directly to vCenter Server Use vCenter Server Appliance to receive ESXi core dumps from failed ESXi hosts using NetDump (ESXi Dump Collector Service) Initial Setup

24 Initial Setup

25 Initial Setup

26 Initial Setup Just boot an ESXi host???

27 Get-ExecutionPolicy It should return the following If it does not return “Unrestricted” then we can set the execution policy to be “Unrestricted” with the following command. Let now check what PowerShell Snap-ins are loaded. We do this with the Get-PSSnapin cmdlet ( command ) At the command prompt type the following: Get-PSSnapin Initial Setup

28 The last 3 PSSnap-ins are of interest to us. VMware.VimAutomation.License - This Windows Powershell snap-in contains cmdlets for managing License components. VMware.DeployAutomation - Cmdlets for Rule-Based-Deployment VMware.ImageBuilder - This Windows PowerShell snap-in contains VMware ESXi Image Builder cmdlets used to generate custom images. Initial Setup

29 Initial Setup

30 We will now define a rule in which ESXi 5.0 hosts will be assigned to an Image Profile. New-DeployRule -Name “ForAllHosts” -Item $ip[1] -AllHosts You will see this list continue as it uploads the remaining drivers to the Auto Deploy cache. Initial Setup

31 We can see the rule name “ForAllHosts” and the Image Profile that was used. To see what rules have been created, we can use the following command: Get-DeployRule We now need to add the rule to a working ruleSet. We use the following command. Add-DeployRule -deployRule ForAllHosts To list the rules in a ruleset Get-DeployRuleSet Initial Setup

32 Using an Answer File, administrators can configure host-specific settings to be used in conjunction with the common settings in the Host Profile, avoiding the need to type in any host-specific parameters. This feature enables the use of Host Profiles to fully configure a host during an automated deployment. Host Profiles now has support for a greatly expanded set of configurations, including: Network Settings iSCSI FCoE Native Multipathing Initial Setup

33 Initial Setup

© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved Design for Resiliency

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36 vSphere High Availability vSphere Fault Tolerance

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© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved Troubleshooting

39 Troubleshooting Auto Deploy – Services  The Auto Deploy Service Service needs to be set to Automatic and Started  Auto Deploy also needs to have an available DHCP server, configured to your environments specification.  A TFTP server also needs to be installed and configured to enable PXE boot. TFTP server needs to hold the Boot file

40 TFTP service stopped? Firewall? Check TFTP port is open (default 69) Troubleshooting - TFTP

41 Server NIC connected? DHCP service stopped? Incorrect scope / reservations? Firewall? Check rules / disable Troubleshooting - DHCP

42 Documentation: "Troubleshooting Auto Deploy": B E-4FB3-BAC2-0EA46CFBD7EE.html KB: "Understanding vSphere Auto Deploy": KB: "Troubleshooting Auto Deploy" (includes ports & log locations): Troubleshooting Guides

© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved Upcoming Features

44 System Image Caching – Introduction  New Features in vSphere 5.1 Stateless Caching – host boots from Auto Deploy, but will fall back to the cached image in event DHCP/TFTP/Auto Deploy server is not available Stateful Install – Host does initial boot from Auto Deploy Server which installs an ESXi image on the local disk. All subsequent boot are from the ESXi image saved on local disk  Support for Local, Remote and USB Disks  Auto Deploy behaviour configured through Host Profile

45 Auto Deploy - Stateless Caching  Enable Stateless Caching through Host Profile

46 Auto Deploy - Stateless Caching  Examples of setting Stateless Caching in Host Profile Stateless Caching to a USB Stateless Caching on the Host

47 Auto Deploy - Stateful Installs  Review – Stateful Installs Create Host Profile Specify disk type ( local, remote, USB) Specify to preserve or overwrite VMFS One time boot using Auto Deploy Image cached to disk when Host Profile applied Reboot host from disk image created during Auto Deploy Once provisioned, host is managed as a standard ESXi host

© 2009 VMware Inc. All rights reserved VMware Vision

49 Products Service Manager ITBM (Digital Fuell) Chargeback VMware Vision

50 VMware Cloud Infrastructure Suite vCloud Director vShield Security The First Comprehensive Cloud Infrastructure Suite vSphere 5 vCenter Site Recovery Manager vCenter Operations High Performance Resource Control, Pooling and Scheduling Virtualized Security and Edge Functions Policy, Reporting, Self-Service Monitoring and Management Business Continuity

51 Apps Enterprise Hybrid Cloud Computing Cloud Infrastructure Apps Cloud Infrastructure Management Security VMware vCloud Services Common platform Common management Common security vCloud Service Provider Private Cloud

52 Indianapolis Newark Beltsville United Kingdom Japan Singapore vCloud Datacenter – Global Consistent Service Plano Dallas Brazil San Jose Hong Kong Denmark Malaysia Australia Chantilly Chicago Netherlands Luxembourg Florence, KY Germany China

53 Questions?

54 Introduction  vSphere 5.1 introduces the following new features for Auto Deploy Stateless Caching Stateful Install  IPv6 Support  Switch from gPXE to iPXE as the network bootloader  VLAN Tagging  vSphere 5.1 has also enhanced the Host Profiles feature to include Managing the Stateless Caching and Stateful Installs Configure an alternate datastore for the locker (scratch and default log directory) Support for highly customized security settings ( /etc/security/login.map and /etc/passwd ) Support for environments without full DNS ( /etc/hosts ) Configure PCI devices for direct use by VM’s (PCI Passthrough )