Back to Basics: Using the vSphere 5.1 Web Client to create a Datacenter object

I am going to assume you already have vCenter 5.1 up and running, if you don’t read this article. Once again, this is a “Back to Basics” series, so don’t expect deepdive info here.

First point your browser to the vSphere Web Client. The vSphere Web Client can be found at: https://<IP address or DNS name of your vCenter instance>:9443/vsphere-client/. Now you will see is a question if it is okay to install the “VMware Remote Console Plugin” as shown in the following screenshot.

I recommend installing this plugin  as it greatly enhances the experience. Note that this plugin is only available for supported platforms like Windows and Linux. Currently Mac OS X is not supported. The install procedure is simple:

• Click on “click here”.
• Click “Run”.
• Close all browsers.
• Click “Next”.
• Click “I accept the terms…” if you agree and then “Next”.
• Click “Next” if you want to use the default installation location.
• Click “Install”.
• In some cases specific files can in use, the installer will ask if it is allowed to close there. We select “Close applications…”.
• Click “Finish”

Open the vSphere Web Client again in your browser and login. Now it is time to start creating our Datacenter object. In some cases the browser will now ask if it can run the “VMware Client Support Plug-in”, select “Run” for the full Web Client experience.

I am going to ignore the licensing error for now by clicking the “x” on the top right of this error message. Now we see our normal vSphere Web Client. We will start by clicking on “vCenter”.

First thing we are going to do is create a Datacenter object:

• This is easiest when you click on “Hosts and Clusters” under “Inventory Trees”.
  
• Now click “Create Datacenter” in your “Getting Started” tab.
• Pick a name for your Datacenter object, we prefer to use the name of the location in the object, and select the “vCenter System” it belongs to.
• Click “OK”.

Do note that there are multiple ways to do things in the Web Client, I prefer using the “Inventory Trees” as I like the hierarchical views. This is not per se the best way, just the way I prefer doing stuff.