Yellow Bricks

by Duncan Epping

Book

Available now: Foundation for Cloud Computing with VMware vSphere 4

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Usenix/Sage has just officially publised our new book in the Short Topics series: “Foundation for Cloud Computing with VMware vSphere 4”.

Before reading the rest of this article be aware that the target audience for this book is IT Management. It’s an overview of VMware products / technology which enable Cloud Computing. It is by no means intended as a blueprint for cloud computing. If you are a techie this might not be the book for you, we are however working on a more technical book which will detail the process of designing a cloud infrastructure based on VMware products.

Book #21, Foundation for Cloud Computing with VMware vSphere 4, by John Arrasjid, Duncan Epping, and Steve Kaplan, is now online for members and available for purchase. Virtualization is recognized as a foundation for Cloud Computing. This book is an overview of the VMware technologies and how they can support the various services and management pieces required for Cloud architecture. Without diving overly deeply into specific design patterns, it provides insight into the tools to fit your design criteria. Take a look now!

Complete PDF version of the booklet can be found here (Usenix/Sage members only) or purchase the print version.

Open PDFs can be found here:

  • Covers/About the Authors PDF
  • Frontmatter/Table of Contents PDF
  • Acknowledgments PDF
  • Glossary PDF
  • Foreword by Dr. Stephen Alan Herrod PDF

I want to thank both of my co-authors for allowing me to work with them. Both Steve and John have an unseen drive and expertise. Thanks guys!

vSphere Quick Start Guide – PowerCLI and PDF

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Alan Renouf posted an article on the vSphere Quick Start Guide we recently wrote which triggered this article. First let me quote from Alan’s article:

I was responsible for adding all the PowerCLI throughout the book, basically if something is explained and there is an easy way to do it in PowerCLI, we have added a code reference, this enables you to see how much is covered by PowerCLI and also how easy it actually is.

In writing the PowerCLI areas I didn’t actually realise how many we had put in until the book was completed and I extracted them all into a nice zip file which can be downloaded and used from here: http://www.yellow-bricks.com/wp-content/uploads/quickstartguide.zip

All in all there are 67 scripts, now obviously if you want to know more information about these scripts and exactly where they fit in you will need to buy the book.

Download these scripts as they will definitely help you manage your environment better and more consistent. Secondly they will help you learn Powershell/PowerCLI faster, especially if you also own the book. Which is the second part of this post, the book… it’s available in print via Amazon and Lulu. But also available as a PDF via Lulu. You can find the links below, but keep in mind that depending on shipping costs sometimes the US one might be cheaper. Let me also be crystal clear about the PDF, it’s a separate item. If you want the PDF you will need to order it. We do however have added it to our “must haves” for the next book, we hope we will be able to offer a printed and pdf version in one package by then.

Anyway, close to 2000 copies have been sold by now. Amazon has books on stock which should make a fast delivery possible.

Amazon – US $15.99
Lulu – Europe: € 14.29
Lulu – PDF: €7.14 / $9.99

vSphere Quick Start Guide available as an electronic copy!

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Last week we decided to also make the vSphere Quick Start Guide available as an electronic book as requested by many of you. We discussed Kindle and PDF format, and decided to go with PDF as Kindle is not widely used in Europe. It’s available for only $ 9.99 or €7.14 via lulu. Pick it up.

We are currently also discussing a follow-up. I can’t say much about it though as it is in very early stages. It will not be a revision of the QSG though, it will be a complete new book and focused on the next version of vSphere! That’s about all I can say at this point in time. No release date, no ToC, no Title… stay tuned!

Book: VMware VI and vSphere SDK

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I received Steve Jin’s book VMware VI and vSphere SDK: Managing the VMware Infrastructure and vSphere two weeks ago. For those who don’t know Steve, he is the man behind the VI and vSphere Java API which can be found here. But that’s not the topic today, the topic is the book Steve recently published. The book is available via Amazon and most other large (online) bookstores.

VMware VI and vSphere SDK takes you on a tour through the SDK trenches. Knowing the SDK is essential when scripting or programming with for instance Powershell, Perl, Java and Python.

I am not a developer and always had a tough time understanding the structure and getting my head wrapped around the “managed objects” and “data objects” concepts. Steve managed to get me on the track. I’m half way through the book right now and can already highly recommend it to everyone who wants to know more about the SDK, everyone who recently started scripted and is running into limitations of provided examples, and everyone who wants to know more about the core of vSphere / VI3.

One of the Amazon reviews that stood out to me is the following by David Rousseau:

If like me you are tired of using vSphere or VI 2.5 official SDK, this book is for you.

Steve Jin has done a great job simplifying SDK access and improving performance drastically.
After using his VI Java API described in this book, you will no longer return to official VI Java SDK or other VI Toolkit.

You can code in Java but also in Python using Jython or IronPython.

We’ve choosed Jython and coupled it with some great web frameworks in python like Django. We’ve built a powerful web app exposing a RESTful API.

Add to this a real talent in popularizing VI objects in the SDK, this book saved me lots of time.