Yellow Bricks

by Duncan Epping

ha

VMware vSphere 4.1 HA and DRS Technical deepdive for only $17.96 on amazon.com

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Not sure where this discount is coming from but I figured I would share it with you. You can pick up the vSphere 4.1 HA and DRS Tech Deepdive for $ 17.96 on Amazon.com. That is about as cheap as it can ever get in my opinion. Pick it up.

By the way, Frank and I are working on a major Update of the book. If you spotted any glitches or have any comments drop ’em here so we can incorporate them. Before you ask, yes we will be reconsidering an ebook version!

E-Book version of the HA/DRS Deepdive?

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I’ve had this question too many times over the last couple of weeks and instead of answering all of them separately I figured I would dedicate a blog article to it so that I can reference to that. Here we go:

Q) Will the e-book version of the HA/DRS deepdive be available soon?

A) No. We have decided that we will not release an e-book (including pdf, ibook, kindle) version of the book. It required a full reformatting of the book which is simple not feasible at this point in time. As it is a “self published” book we are responsible for not only the content but also the formatting etc. Sorry about that, for “Volume 2” however we will reconsider this.

 

I hope this answers your question(s). Thanks and again our apologies, the only option is the paper version.

UPDATE: http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2011/04/05/what-an-ebook-is-this-a-late-april-fools-joke/

What have you’ve been up to?

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I got a couple of questions around what I have been up to lately as some noticed there was a slight decrease in volume from a blogging perspective on yellow-bricks. (from 4 articles per week to 2-3 article per week) Well I have been reading up on my new role but on top of that also started blogging for the ESXi Chronicles blog (add it to your RSS reader) and created a VMware Storage centric twitter account. (Follow me if you want to keep up to date on VMware storage initiatives!) The things that I’ve worked on the last couple of weeks:

  • VMware ESXi: Planning, implementation and security
    The week before VMware Partner Exchange I decided that it was time to start brushing up my ESXi knowledge. I usually dig up all the manuals and presentations I can find and start from there. This time I took a different approach however, I bought a book. The book is titled “VMware ESXi: Planning, Implementation, and Security” and is authored by a true VMTN Community hero, Dave Mishchenko.
  • Scripted install with ESXi
    Now you can kick off the automated install of your ESXi server. But wait, you probably want to see what script I used? That is what I figured, here is the script I wrote to automatically install and configure the ESXi host, it is just a simple script that I used and tested in my lab with the main purpose of showing what is possible with ESXi today. The configuration of the server will run after the first boot. I have added several “comment lines” to explain what I am doing and why.
  • Adopting ESXi, now is the time!
    Within the virtualization community we have been seeing more and more people adopting ESXi. Not only adopting it but also actively evangelizing the use of ESXi over ESX classic. The main argument being of course the reduction in operational effort involved with maintaining the platform. Last week two excellent articles were published. The first article was by Bob Plankers of LoneSysAdmin.net fame. Bob wrote an excellent article countering all often heard complaints about ESXi.

I also wrote my first KB article which discusses the impact of CPU/Memory limits with help from someone from the the GSS team. You would expect that a KB article describing the impact already existed but surprisingly enough it did not. Hence the reason I felt an official statement could prevent some of the issues we see in the field on a daily basis.

Of course that’s not it, I am working on multiple other projects which I cannot discuss yet unfortunately and participated in the VCDX Defenses at PEX. One of the things I can reveal though is that Frank and I are make plans for a volume 2 of the HA/DRS Tech Deepdive and that the sales is still going strong, thanks everyone for your help/support! (No, there will not be an e-book unfortunately, the amount of time/reformatting required did not fit our current schedule.) Keep those reviews and pictures coming though.

Want a free HA/DRS Technical Deepdive Book?

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Want a free HA/DRS Technical Deepdive Book? Watch vChat 15!

In Episode 15 of our vChat series, we have a couple of special guests with us whom I’m sure you would have heard of or if not met before, Frank Denneman and Duncan Epping. These guys embody almost all things deep-dive when it comes to vSphere and with the recent release of their new book VMware HA/DRS Deepdive and we take the opportunity to ask about the background behind the book, whether an electronic version is in the pipeline along with their plans for any future publications. We discuss VMware Partner Exchange (PEX) 2011. Other topics, as you’d imagine, cover the VMware iPad app (and the potential security issues) and their home vSphere labs.

Watch it here!

HA role promotion…

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I received a very valid question this week from someone who bought our book. The question was as follows:

On Page 35 it is mentioned that a Secondary Node is not automatically elected as a Primary if a Primary fails. It then goes on to state the conditions under which this does occur, one of these is if the primary node becomes disconnected from the Cluster. When an ESX host fails doesn’t it always end up in the “disconnected” status, if so why isn’t the role transferred?

This one had me thinking for a couple of minutes as it was 6 months ago that I wrote that section, but I knew I tested this back then. When a host fails it will not receive the status “disconnected” but it will receive the status “not responding”. You can disconnect a host by right clicking it and selected “disconnect from cluster”, that would transfer the role to another node… in the case of “not responding” this doesn’t happen as vCenter is unaware of what happened to the host.