Category: Virtualization
Rebuilding Distributed Switch on New vCenter Instance Using a Backup
As you may have seen, I recently had a vCenter fail and after working with VMware Support it was determined that the vCenter should be rebuilt from scratch. Rebuilding the vCenter and adding the hosts that were in it was fairly easy. However, restoring their networking was another story. The hosts retained their previous network configuration, but I was unable…
Rebuilding a Failed vCenter Results in More Problems
At work, I had a vCenter fail and, after working with VMware support for hours, I was told to rebuild the vCenter from scratch. I downloaded the vCenter ISO for the same version as the other vCenters that are linked (7.0.3.01700) and launched the installer. I went through the wizard and selected to join it to the existing SSO Domain.…
Upgrading VMware Tools on each ESXi Host via ESXCLI
Have you ever wanted to upgrade the version of VMware Tools on your hosts but you’re having an issue with Update Manger/Lifecycle Manager? I ran into this problem recently. I was attempting to upgrade my hosts to the latest version of VMware Tools and even though the remediation completed successfully via Lifecycle Manger finished successfully, each host still reported at…
Change default VMware Remote Console Application
Have you ever tried to open the VMware Remote Console and have it launch VMware Workstation and NOT the VMware Remote Console application? This is set via two keys in the Windows Registry. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\CLASSES\VMRC\DEFAULTICON and HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\CLASSES\VMRC\SHELL\OPEN\COMMAND. You can get these values via POWERSHELL. As you can see, my Remote Console is currently set to VMware Workstation. I prefer to use…
Deploying Vembu BDR Suite (Part 4 – Replication)
Now that I have Vembu setup and backing up to my local NAS, I thought I should try and replicate some of the data off-site. Where should I replicate to? Lets go with Amazon, as I already have an account established there. First, I created a new S3 bucket to replicate the backup data to. I decided to name it…
Running VMFS Unmap via PowerCLI
Starting in vSphere 5.5, VMware introduced a new command in the esxcli namespace that allows deleted blocks to be reclaimed on thin provisioned LUNs that support the VAAI UNMAP primitive. You can run the command without any maintenance window, and the reclaim mechanism has been enhanced: Reclaim disk space size can be specified in blocks instead of a percentage value…
Using PowerCLI to set the Global System Log Location
Are you seeing an error stating that the System Logs on your host(s) are stored on non-persistent storage. Following THIS VMware KB article, I knew I had to change the Global Logdir. What we did was create a shared datastore called ESXiScratch. On this datastore, we created folders for each host. .locker-lab01.locker-lab02etc. Next, I ran the following PowerCLI command to…
VMware Top 100 Influencers
Back in December, I was contacted by Noell Grier, with the VMware communities team, to join the VMware Influencer 100 Club Welcome and Kickoff Meeting! I was shocked to be included in this list. It’s been fun being part of this program! Thank you to Noell and VMware for the honor of being a part of this program! I’ve known…
PowerCLI Script to Change Tag Assignment
I have an environment where, using tags, unused VMs are automatically shutdown. This is done by creating a Tag Category called “Suspend Date” and when the current value is in the past, your VM gets shutdown. I don’t have many VMs that I own in this “test” environment, but the ones that I DO have there, I want to be…
Virtual VMUG Events: A Positive Side to the Pandemic
Back in March, when this all began, we were all thrown for a loop! We were forced to make big changes to our lives, including working from home! Many of us in IT were forced to adapt quickly to a fast growing remote work force, having to deploy and/or expand VDI environments, etc. Those of us that are VMUG Leaders…