by Duncan Epping
I created this quick demo last week, and I figured I would share it here. It shows vSAN 7.0 U1 File Services with SMB and NFS support. I wrote about vSAN File Services and what is new in this post here, make sure to read that as well, and of course, it also details all the other introduced changes for vSAN 7.0 U1.
As VMware has just done a major announcement (vSAN 7.0 U1 and vSphere 7.0U1), additional sessions have been added to the VMworld agenda. I already did a top 15 post not too long ago, so I figured I would create a short post that contains my 5 favorite sessions that were just added to the extensive list of available sessions at VMworld. Here we go:
Every 6-9 months VMware has been pushing out a new feature release of vSAN. After vSphere and vSAN 7.0, which introduced vSphere Lifecycle Manager and vSAN File Services, it is now time to share with you what is new for vSAN 7.0 U1. Again it is a feature-packed release, with many “smaller enhancements, but also the introduction of some bigger functionality. Let’s just list the key features that have just been announced, and then discuss each of these individually. You better sit down, as this is going to be a long post. Oh, and note, this is an announcement, not the actual availability of vSAN 7.0 U1, for that you will have to wait some time.
Over the past 9 months, I have done more “zoom” sessions / “virtual events” than I have in the past 5 years. I have seen all the complaints from regular presenters (and attendees) about virtual events, and the flood storm of Zoom requests many have been getting, but personally I seem to be part of the other side of the spectrum as I thoroughly enjoy the virtual events. First and foremost, it helped to relieve stress. To the point where my family noticed a significant change in my mental state/wellbeing, not just the mental aspect, also the physical aspect. It is much easier to have a consistent diet and training regime when you don’t need to hop on a flight to go to an event every other week.
But not only that, I just like the virtual event format. Well, the format which Cormac, Frank, and I developed for our Virtual VMUG Roadshow. Also, the format of the Virtual TAM Roundtable sessions which Cormac and I have been presenting has worked really well. Now, don’t get me wrong. I always enjoyed going to events, having dinner with (new) friends, and talking to people at/during the event… but is it sustainable when you do 20+ events per year as a presenter? And is this model sustainable for attendees when employers are expecting more with less? Not really in my opinion, hence my preference for this virtual world. But that doesn’t answer the question of why I think it has worked for us very well, while it hasn’t worked as well for some others? [Read more…] about Virtual Events, my thoughts.
Internally someone just bumped into an issue where a single host in a cluster wasn’t storing any of the created vSAN Components / Objects. It was to the point where every single host in the cluster was close to the maximum of 9000 components, but that one host had 0 components. After some quick back and forth the following message stood out in the UI:
vSAN node decommission state
What does this mean? Well basically it means that from a vSAN stance this host is in maintenance mode. For whatever reason, the host itself from a hypervisor stance was not in maintenance mode, which means that the two were not in sync. This can simply be resolved by SSH’ing into the respective host and running the following command:
localcli vsan maintenancemode cancel
One thing to consider of course is to trigger a rebalance of the cluster after taking the host out of the decommissioned state when the environment is 6.7 U2 or lower, as that would result in a more equally balanced environment. Starting with 6.7 U3 this process is initiated automatically, when configured. There is a KB that describes how to trigger, and/or configure, to be found here.