Vmware products. Analytical overview of the Unitel infrastructure management software

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The leading developers in this technology were VMWare with vSphere and Microsoft with Hyper-V technologies. To select a hypervisor for the infrastructure of Avantrade LLC, it is necessary to conduct a comparative analysis of the two solutions.

VMWare Product Overview

VMware has been developing specialized products for virtualization since 1998. The entire package of the company's products, one way or another, is associated with virtualization technologies and the possibilities of their application. It should be noted that among the three main players in the commercial virtualization market (Citrix, Microsoft, VMware), only VMware is a highly specialized company in virtualization products, which allows it to go ahead of all competitors in terms of product functionality.

VMware's flagship products are VMware ESX / ESXi - hypervisors installed on bare metal. Currently, the latest version of the product is the fourth version, released in mid-2009. The hypervisor is the foundation for server virtualization, it allows you to share resources in such a way as to create separate, independent environments for multiple operating systems on a single physical server. However, the hypervisor itself has a very limited range of capabilities, but to realize all the benefits, a solution is required that includes not only virtualization tools, but also infrastructure management (vCenter) - this complex solution is called vSphere.

An analysis of the efficiency of using server equipment shows that most of the working time the load is about 5-8% of the maximum, during non-working hours the servers simply stand idle, heating the air. When using VMware vSphere, we consolidate the load from several servers on one physical server (we transfer not only applications, but also operating systems to one server). The performance of modern servers makes the previously popular concept of "one task, one server" extremely inefficient, but thanks to virtualization, you can now use the new one: "one task - one virtual machine." Thus, the problem of compatibility of various software is solved - not all applications can be run in one copy of the operating system. In addition, the infrastructure often uses old applications that are no longer compatible with the current versions of the OS, and the installation of older versions is not supported on new hardware. Virtualization solves this problem too - you can even run Windows NT 4.0 or MS-DOS in an ESX virtual machine.

Server virtualization products are used in a wide variety of infrastructures, from small businesses to large enterprises.

In small companies, the product allows you to minimize the amount of server hardware, if necessary, while retaining the ability to use various operating systems. With the help of virtualization technologies, we can place all services on one or two full-fledged servers (instead of several ordinary PCs, as is often the case) and solve both the quality of equipment and its quantity.

For midsize and large enterprises, server virtualization can improve service availability through resiliency technologies and virtual server migration between physical servers. The ability to move virtual servers from one physical server to another without stopping can significantly increase service availability and facilitate maintenance of the entire system. The time for deploying new services is significantly reduced - you no longer need to wait for the delivery of a new server, it is enough to deploy a new virtual machine and install the necessary software in a few minutes. Due to the fact that virtual machines do not require installation of specific drivers, firmware updates, etc. administration tasks are also greatly simplified.

VMware vSphere has a universal system for monitoring the state of the elements of the entire system, both at the level of physical servers and at the level of virtual servers in the enterprise. If the standard monitoring tools for some reason are not enough, then there are a number of additional third-party applications with additional capabilities.

It is possible to provide increased availability of virtual servers by restarting on the backup physical server in case of failure of the main one, as shown in Figure 2.3.

Figure 2.3 - Organization of work of the hypervisor in case of failures

Thus, due to the availability of backup servers, it is possible to quickly restore the system's performance by moving data from the main server in the event of a failure to the backup.

The term "virtualization" has recently become very fashionable. The concept of "virtual machine" has ceased to be something exotic and distant. Many organizations, one way or another related to information technology, have already learned how to use virtual machines in their daily activities to improve the efficiency of their IT infrastructure. The concept of virtualization is now used everywhere and, at times, in various contexts: virtualization of storage systems, operating systems, applications. If various aspects of virtualization of hardware resources have been known to specialists for a long time, then virtualization of operating systems has begun to gain momentum only in the last few years, but at a rapid pace.

So what are virtualization and virtual machines for operating systems? The term virtualization itself means the presentation of an object in a convenient form for the user, while all the details of the implementation are hidden, and the object itself has familiar interfaces for interacting with the external environment in relation to it. When they talk about virtualization of operating systems, first of all, they mean the creation of virtual machines - some abstractions that contain their own virtual hardware and software environment that allows you to install and run simultaneously several instances of operating systems on one physical platform. What is it for? First of all, in order to separate the operating system view from the hardware and place several working virtual servers on one physical one with the ability to quickly migrate and recover operating environments. This approach also provides maximum flexibility in server deployment, maintenance, and management.

Most CIOs of large organizations, if they do not plan to partially or completely virtualize their IT infrastructure, then at least seriously think about it. In the long term, virtualization projects seem very tempting: increasing the flexibility of the IT infrastructure, increasing the reliability and ensuring high availability of servers, saving on hardware - all these and many other factors attract the heads of IT departments of companies. However, many do not realize the effort it will take to migrate a physical infrastructure to a virtual one, because there are only a few competent specialists in this area, and the acquisition and deployment of powerful commercial virtualization platforms is costly. This article will focus on two popular server virtualization platforms - free VMware Server and commercial VMware ESX Server.

Why VMware?

VMware is one of the earliest players in the newly emerging virtualization platform market. In 1998, VMware patented its virtualization software techniques and has since released many efficient and professional virtualization products of various levels, from VMware Workstation aimed at the end user (consumer) to VMware ESX Server, designed to host virtual infrastructure for medium and large enterprises. VMware's vast portfolio of products includes many tools to improve the efficiency of the virtualization process, manage virtual servers and migrate from physical platforms to virtual platforms. In Russia, the products of VMware are especially popular, since virtualization is still gaining momentum in our country, and the platforms of other vendors, not so familiar to us, are very "raw" and have much less functionality than their counterparts from VMware. In addition, VMware virtualization almost always outperforms the competition in various performance tests. And if we talk about virtualization of Windows operating systems, then these are almost certainly VMware products. Meanwhile, among virtualization platforms, VMware has a lot to choose from:

VMware Workstation- a platform focused on Desktop users and intended for use by software developers and IT professionals,
VMware Player- a free "player" of virtual machines, designed to run ready-made templates of virtual machines, performing a specific task,
VMware Server, formerly known as VMware GSX Server, aimed at small business infrastructure to support virtual servers
VMware Ace- a product for creating virtual machines protected by security policies,
VMware ESX Server- a powerful virtualization platform for medium and large businesses, focused primarily on maintaining a holistic and scalable IT infrastructure,
VMware Virtual Center is a powerful tool for managing virtualization platforms VMware ESX Server and VMware Server, with extensive capabilities for server consolidation, configuration and management.
VMware Fusion is a desktop virtualization product for the Mac platform from Apple.

VMware's formal competitors for server virtualization are Microsoft, Virtual Iron, XenSource, and SWsoft. However, the product of the SWsoft company has a rather narrow scope of application (hosting), and the development of other vendors in comparison with the products of VMware at the moment looks much weaker.

When to implement virtual infrastructure in a company

First of all, it is necessary to clearly define the goals with which virtualization platforms will be implemented. Then, it is necessary to determine the criteria by which the effectiveness of the implementation of the virtual infrastructure will be assessed. In addition to purely financial criteria (reduced hardware costs, savings in maintenance), you also need to consider improving infrastructure reliability, scalability, flexibility, resilience, reduced deployment time, downtime, disaster recovery, centralized management, and high availability. Of course, all these criteria can be expressed in monetary terms, depending on the type and specifics of the environment to be virtualized.

7 reasons to implement server virtualization

Increased hardware utilization
According to statistics, most servers are loaded by 15-20 percent when performing daily tasks. The use of several virtual servers on one physical will increase it up to 80 percent, while providing significant savings in the purchase of hardware.
Reduced hardware replacement costs
Since virtual servers are decoupled from specific hardware, updating the fleet of physical servers does not require re-installing and configuring the software. The virtual machine can simply be copied to another server.
Increasing the flexibility of using virtual servers
In case you need to use several servers (for example, for testing and work in production) with varying load, virtual servers are the best solution, since they can be painlessly ported to other platforms when the physical server is experiencing increased loads.
Ensuring high availability
Backing up virtual machines and restoring them from backups takes significantly less time and is easier. Also, in the event of equipment failure, a backup copy of a virtual server can be immediately launched on another physical server.
Improving the manageability of the server infrastructure
There are many virtual infrastructure management products available to centrally manage virtual servers and provide load balancing and live migration.
Savings on maintenance personnel
Simplifying the management of virtual servers in the long term leads to savings on specialists who maintain the company's infrastructure. If two people using the tools to manage virtual servers can do what four did, why would you need two extra specialists earning at least $ 15,000 a year? Nevertheless, it should be borne in mind that a lot of money is also needed to train qualified personnel in the field of virtualization.
Energy savings
For small companies, this factor, of course, does not really matter, but for large data centers, where the costs of maintaining a large server park include the cost of electricity (power, cooling systems), this point is of considerable importance. Concentrating several virtual servers on one physical server will reduce these costs.

When you do not need to implement infrastructure in the company

Despite all the advantages, server virtualization also has some limitations in its use. When planning a virtual infrastructure, consider the following factors:

Servers have a continuous workload of over 60 percent
These servers are not good candidates for virtualization because when you migrate it to a virtual machine and host it with other virtual servers, it may run out of resources.
The server uses additional hardware that cannot be virtualized
Everything is clear here: in the case when the server uses hardware that is not supported by the vendors of virtualization platforms, there is no point in virtualizing such a server.
The acquisition and implementation costs of a virtualization platform are too high
In midsize and small organizations, the server infrastructure is not very large, and the hardware and maintenance costs are low. In this case, you need to be careful about the virtualization procedure, since the purchase of a commercial platform may not be justified.
Lack of qualified specialists
In many cases, the process of migrating from physical hardware to virtual machines and further deploying a virtualization platform requires good qualifications from the people conducting them. This is especially required when deploying platforms of the "Bare metal" class (bare metal). If you are not sure if your people have the knowledge to do this, do not start a virtualization project.

VMware Server is a free and powerful virtualization platform for small businesses

The free product VMware Server is a fairly powerful virtualization platform that can run on servers running Windows and Linux host operating systems. The main purpose of VMware Server is to support small and medium virtual infrastructures of small businesses. Due to the small complexity of its development and installation, VMware Server can be deployed in the shortest possible time, both on the servers of organizations and on computers of home users.

Previously, this product was distributed under a commercial license and was called VMware GSX Server 3, however, with the growth of opportunities and sales of the powerful virtualization platform VMware ESX Server, VMware did not see the prospects for sales of the VMware Server platform, eventually making the product free. It is worth noting that for this product, VMware relies heavily on the revenue from the sales of Virtual Center for VMware Server, an efficient virtual infrastructure management tool based on VMware Server that offers rich interoperability with virtual machines and virtual server consolidation.

Here are the main use cases for a VMware Server product:

support of several virtual servers on one physical one in the production of the company
support of several virtual servers for testing "in a bundle" in a virtual host network during software development and support
launching ready-to-use virtual machines (Virtual Appliances) performing a specific server function
ensuring high availability of virtual servers (virtual machines can be easily transferred between physical servers)
Creation of easy-to-restore backup copies of virtual servers by obtaining snapshots of the current state of the system ("snapshots").

VMware Server has extensive capabilities for working with virtual machines, including:

Support for any standard x86 architecture
VMware Server has no specific requirements for the physical server components — unlike VMware ESX Server, which imposes very specific restrictions on the server hardware. Multi-core processors are also supported.
Bidirectional virtual SMP (symmetric multi-processing) support
If the architecture of the physical server allows, virtual machines created in VMware Server can contain two virtual processors, which positively affects the performance of guests.
Support for a large number of host and guest operating systems, a complete list of which is always available on the VMware website
The number of host operating systems on which VMware Server can be installed is, of course, less than the number of supported guest systems. Meanwhile, almost any known operating system can be installed as a guest. Even if it is not in the list of supported, it does not mean that it cannot be installed.
Support for 64-bit host and guest operating systems
As host 64-bit systems, 64-bit operating systems of the Windows Server 2003 family can be used, as well as 64-bit versions of Linux systems: Red Hat, SUSE, Mandriva and Ubuntu. The list of supported guest operating systems is also supplemented by 64-bit versions of Windows Vista, Sun Solaris and FreeBSD.
IntelVT (Intel Virtualization Technology) support
VMware Server is experimenting with Intel's hardware virtualization technology and can be used to support virtual machines. It is worth noting that hardware virtualization, according to research by VMware engineers, is still slower than software virtualization, so it is not recommended to enable software virtualization support for better performance.

An introduction to VMware Server begins with the Virtual Machine Management Console window:

In the working area of the main window of the program, you can create a virtual machine, add an existing one, switch the console to another physical host (manage the virtual server remotely), and configure the host parameters.

Creating a virtual machine in VMware Server is a simple and intuitive process and takes just a few steps in the New Virtual Machine wizard:

select a guest system from the list, which will be installed as a guest
select the name and location of the virtual machine files
select the type of network interaction between the virtual machine, host OS, other virtual machines and an external network
enter the volume of the virtual disk and click Finish.

After that, if the distribution of the guest system to be installed is on a CD or DVD, simply insert it into the drive and press the "Power on" button on the toolbar. If you have an operating system distribution kit in the form of an ISO image, select the VM-> Settings menu item, go to the CD-ROM item, where we specify the path to the ISO image, click OK and Power On.

The process of installing a guest system in VMware Server is quite simple and does not require a separate description. However, when installing guest operating systems, be sure to consider the following points:

Allocate the planned virtual server with enough resources to perform its functions, but remember that increasing the number of allocated resources is always more difficult than decreasing.
When choosing the type of virtual server networking, consider security issues, and if the virtual server only needs interaction in the host's internal virtual network, do not install Bridged Networking.
If not only you have access to the virtual server management console, you can make your virtual machine private by checking the box in VM-> Settings-> Options-> Permissions.
Remember to install VMware Tools on your guests, as installing these add-ons will significantly increase the guest experience and performance.
Try to keep the ratio: no more than 4 virtual machines per physical processor, since more of them will significantly affect the performance of virtual servers.

When maintaining a virtual infrastructure based on VMware Server, you must carefully monitor the load on the server's hardware resources. If any virtual machine lacks resources, you need to think about moving it to another server. If you plan to manage a large number of virtual servers, you should consider purchasing VMware Virtual Center, which allows you to centrally control many hosts on which VMware Server is installed, combine them into clusters and monitor the load of hosts by virtual machines. Use the performance counters within the guests to determine the amount of resources to allocate to virtual servers. Try to use only virtual SCSI disks as virtual IDEs are slower.

If you need to access the virtual server console from an external network, you can configure a Web client for VMware Server integrated with Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS). This capability will allow you to control virtual servers over the Internet using a secure SSL (Secure Socket Layer) connection.

VMware Server Specifications

Opportunities	VMware Server 1.0
Ability to run as a service	Yes
Starting virtual machines when the host operating system starts	Yes
Local management	Fat client, command line
Multiple user access	Yes
Programming interfaces (API)	Yes (C / COM / Perl)
Remote product use	Yes (Web console)
Remote use of virtual machines	Fat client
Management of multiple installations	Not
Virtual machines / core ratio	2-4
Hardware virtualization support	Intel VT (Experimental)
Generation of virtual hardware	5
Support for virtual processors inside a virtual machine (VMware Virtual SMP technology)	2 (Experimental)
The maximum amount of RAM allocated for a virtual machine	Up to 3.4 GB
The maximum amount of RAM allocated for all virtual machines	Up to 64 GB
Virtual IDE controllers / disks per virtual machine	1/4
Virtual SCSI controllers / disks per virtual machine	4/60
Maximum virtual disk size	Up to 950 GB
Maximum number of virtual network interfaces	4
Virtual switches	9
Obtaining snapshots via a fat client	Yes
Getting snapshots via the command line	Not
Multiple snapshots	Not
Cloning virtual machines	Not
Virtual Machine Groups (Teams)	Not
Debugging virtual machines	Yes
Shared folders service	Not
Drag & Drop Support Host Virtual Machine	Not
Unsupported host OS	Windows XP Professional (32 / 64bit) Windows XP Home Windows 2000 Professional Red Hat Linux 7.0 Red Hat Linux 7.1

Only on operating systems that support extended memory or PAE enabled.
Available when using VMware Virtual Center.

There are many different commercial and free utilities available for VMware Server for virtual machine and disk management, performance monitoring, and maintenance. However, if you are going to take full advantage of the power of VMware Server, you should look at VMware Virtual Center for VMware Server.

VMware ESX Server - an enterprise-class virtualization platform and a tool for building a virtual infrastructure of the enterprise

Among the many virtualization solutions offered by VMware, VMware ESX Server stands out. As the company's flagship development, VMware ESX Server provides the foundation for building large virtual infrastructures that integrate other VMware products.

VMware ESX Server is a bare metal virtualization platform installed on a "clean" server with no operating system or other software. VMware ESX Server is built on the Linux Red Hat operating system, in which VMware engineers have made significant changes to add many features to support virtualization. This implementation of this platform maximizes the use of server hardware resources and ensures the best interaction between guests and hardware.

VMware ESX Server has many benefits and is the core of a large enterprise virtual infrastructure that requires multiple virtual servers to be maintained, consolidated, highly available, and virtualized between physical servers. ESX Server is the true concept of building an enterprise IT infrastructure using virtual machines.

In addition to the ESX server, the virtual infrastructure of the enterprise also contains components such as storage area networks (SANs), storage systems (Storages), high-speed connections (Fiber Channel) and virtual networks (VLANs). Virtual infrastructure based on VMware ESX Server allows you to centrally manage all these resources and ensure uninterrupted operation of virtual servers. The main components of the virtual infrastructure are:

ESX Server itself.
VMware File System VMFS (Virtual Machine File System) optimized for virtual machine performance and high availability.
VMware SMP (Symmetric Multi-Processing) is a technology that allows virtual machines to use all processors on a host while having multiple virtual processors.
Virtual Infrastructure Client is a powerful tool for remote administration and configuration of VMware ESX Server that runs on Windows workstations and has a user-friendly interface.
Virtual Center- a tool for centralized management of multiple ESX servers.
Virtual Infrastructure Web Access- the ability to manage virtual machines from an external network via a secure channel.
VMware VMotion- a technology that allows for "live" migration of a running virtual server to another physical server, without the need to shutdown the virtual machine and ensure its uninterrupted operation during the migration.
VMware High Availability (HA)- the ability to automatically restart the necessary mirrors of virtual machines on another server in the event of a hardware or software failure of a physical server.
VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS)- a component that allows dynamic resource allocation to virtual machines.
VMware Consolidated Backup (VCB)- a simple and powerful tool for creating backups of virtual machines.
VMware Infrastructure SDK- a package for developing applications for virtual infrastructure by third-party developers.

When to use virtual infrastructure based on VMware ESX Server

You have a clear idea of how many physical servers will be required to support the virtual server infrastructure. Keep in mind that planning the migration of physical servers should be based on no more than 4-6 virtual machines per physical processor with an average real load of the migrated physical servers of 15%.
You have selected the appropriate VMware ESX Server edition and virtual infrastructure components, calculated the costs of their deployment and maintenance, and concluded that implementation is worthwhile as the savings in hardware and maintenance cover those costs.
You have specialists who will not only competently conduct a virtualization project, but also administrators who have sufficient knowledge to maintain and develop a virtual infrastructure every day.
You are ready to purchase the hardware that VMware ESX Server requires. Be careful - the ESX server installation guide tells you what specific hardware is required to install it. At first glance, everything will seem quite expensive, but if you read the requirements carefully, it becomes clear that a fully functioning ESX Server for training purposes can be assembled for $ 900.

The installation procedure for VMware ESX Server is quite simple and does not require extensive knowledge from the user. If you followed VMware's recommendations and wisely chose the host server hardware, then the ESX server installation will take less than an hour. Once you install at least one ESX, you immediately have a lot of questions and problems - this is the price for the capabilities that VMware ESX Server provides. Here are some basic guidelines for the first steps after installing ESX:

To manage the ESX server and create your first virtual machines, use the VMware Infrastructure Client, which can be downloaded from https: //.
To transfer files to and from ESX, use either WinSCP (slow file transfer, encrypts traffic) or FastSCP (fast file transfer, but it is better not to use it from the external network, since traffic is not encrypted).
To allow the Root user to log in via SSH (Secure Shell), add the line "PermitRootLogon yes" to the "httpd.conf" file on the ESX.
Use the "vmkfs-tools" utilities to manage disks, use the "esxtop" command to monitor the performance of virtual machines, and use the "var / log / vmware / hostd.log" log to analyze error reports.
Remember, the free space on your ESX is always two types of partitions: the first for the operating system of the ESX itself, the second for vmfs partitions for hosting virtual machines. To find out how much free space is left on both partitions, use the "vdf -h" command.

After you install VMware ESX Server, you need a physical to virtual (P2V) migration tool. VMware offers to use the product VMware Converter for these purposes, but you can use solutions from other manufacturers. You will constantly have questions - do not hesitate to contact the forums of the VMware company, where its regular visitors will help you in a difficult situation. Ultimately, several virtual machines will be installed on your ESX, which is a virtual infrastructure, which is shown in the figure made using the Veeam Reporter program:

The key concepts for virtual infrastructure are: physical adapter (NIC), virtual adapter (vNIC), virtual switch (vSwitch), and virtual network (Vlan). VMware ESX Server allows you to create up to four virtual network adapters for a virtual machine, each of which can be tied to a virtual network created in turn on virtual switches.

A virtual switch is a kind of abstract multi-port device that switches channels between virtual networks and virtual network adapters of virtual machines.

A virtual network is a combination of several virtual machines into a single network environment in which they interact with each other. If the virtual switch is connected to a physical network adapter, then virtual machines through it will be able to "see" the external, in relation to ESX, network.

In fact, everything is not as complicated as it seems: the creation of elements of a virtual infrastructure takes very little time and, once configured, such an infrastructure does not require further configuration when new virtual machines are introduced into it.

A little about Virtual Center for VMware ESX Server

As with the VMware Server product, the use of multiple hosts with VMware ESX Server in an enterprise IT infrastructure creates the problem of centralized management and performance monitoring of physical hosts. To solve these problems with VMware ESX Server platforms, as well as with VMware Server, the Virtual Center solution is used. Its appearance is shown in the figure:

Virtual Center allows you to monitor multiple hosts on which VMware ESX Server is installed, cluster them and control them using "alarms" - signals about various events. It should be noted that the capabilities of Virtual Center for VMware ESX Server are much greater than those of Virtual Center for VMware Server, which is primarily due to the fact that the VMware ESX Server product itself has much wider capabilities.

Should I choose VMware Server or VMware ESX Server?

From the above, it becomes clear that both products described in the article are aimed at maintaining a virtual infrastructure of servers and perform similar functions. However, there are significant differences between the two platforms. If a virtual infrastructure based on VMware Server can be built mainly from servers that perform daily tasks in an organization that do not require high availability, speed and flexibility, then VMware ESX Server is a complete platform for supporting the vital IT infrastructure of an enterprise in conditions of uninterrupted operation of virtual servers and their support in 24 × 7 × 365 mode.

Here are some examples of when to use a VMware Server-based infrastructure:

support and maintenance of internal servers of the organization,
performing testing tasks for individual applications,
simulation of small virtual networks in order to check working server bundles,
launching ready-to-use templates of virtual machines that act as internal servers of the organization,
getting individual servers ready for quick migration.

VMware ESX Server should be used when solving the following tasks:

streaming application testing in large software development organizations,
maintaining external servers of the organization with a high degree of availability, flexibility and manageability,
modeling of large virtual networks,
reducing the cost of equipment, maintenance and electricity in large organizations and data centers.

Thus, when implementing virtual infrastructure in an organization, you need to carefully consider the definition of ultimate goals. When deploying a free VMware Server, there will be no special problems with installation and maintenance, there will also be no costs for purchasing the platform itself, but the organization can lose on performance (since virtualization is performed on top of the host operating system), reliability and availability. Implementation of VMware ESX Server will result in great technical difficulties of deployment and maintenance in the absence of qualified specialists. Plus, investing in such a platform may not pay off for small and medium-sized organizations. However, as the experience of VMware shows, for large organizations, the implementation of VMware ESX Server turns, in the long run, into significant cost savings.

Taking these points into account will allow you to competently plan the migration of physical servers of your IT infrastructure to virtual ones, while saving not only money, but also time, which, as you know, is also money.

We won't go into any technical details in this article. Instead, let's look at VMware terminology. This short overview will be useful for those who want to understand the difference between the underlying VMware products. Almost everyone knows about ESXi. What about vSphere and vCenter? People often confuse these terms, but in fact there is nothing complicated about them. Let's put everything on the shelves.

Introduced in 2001, the VMware ESX hypervisor (formerly known as VMware ESX Server) launched a virtual revolution. Today VMware is the leading developer of virtualization software products (now part of Dell). Every year and a half, the company releases new advanced software that is compatible with a wide range of hardware, including NVMe SSDs, extra-large hard drives, and the latest Intel or AMD CPUs.

VMware ESXi

ESXi is a hypervisor; a tiny piece of software that installs on a physical server and allows you to run multiple operating systems on a single host computer. These operating systems operate separately from each other, but can interact with the outside world through the network. In this case, the rest of the computers are connected to a local area network (Local Area Network, LAN). Operating systems run on virtual machines (Virtual Machine, VM), each of which has its own virtual hardware.

There are paid and free versions of VMware ESXi. You can order the installation of a free version on. The functionality of the free version is somewhat limited. It allows you to consolidate a limited number of operating systems on one computer, and it cannot be managed through a central management server - vCenter. However, Free ESXi (or VMware ESXi Hypervisor) connects to remote storages where virtual machines can be created, stored and used. That is, this remote storage can be shared between several ESXi hosts, but not between virtual machines. Virtual machines are "owned" by each host, making central management impossible.

Working with the free version of ESXi is very simple and consists of basic processes: training, testing production processes, testing disaster recovery systems, and approving architectural solutions. Using snapshots, you can check the correctness of the Windows patches. Alternatively, this can be useful if you decide to clone your production server using VMware Converter or P2V technology and want to test the Microsoft service pack before installing it.

VMware vCenter

VMware vCenter is a centralized management platform for VMware virtual infrastructure. With its help, you can manage almost all processes from just one console. VCenter Server can be installed on Windows or deployed as a pre-configured virtual machine using Photon OS, a powerful Linux-based distribution. Previously, VMware used the Suse Linux Enterprise Server (SUSE) distribution, but recently switched to Photon OS.

vCenter Server is licensed software. You can buy it in two ways:

vCenter Server Essentials as part of the vSphere Essentials package. This version of vCenter manages three hosts with two physical processors each. If you have a small company, then you will operate with about 60 VMs, and this version of vCenter will suit you. With the basic set, you get a license not only for vCenter server, but also for ESXi (up to three hosts with two CPUs each).
Standalone vCenter Server is a complete standalone vCenter server capable of managing 2,000 hosts from 25,000 virtual machines. This license is exclusively for vCenter. VCenter itself is only part of the licensing puzzle. To manage all hosts from one device, you need a license for each one. There are three types of licenses: standard, enterprise, enterprise Plus, and each applies to one processor. So, if you are planning to create a host with two physical processors, then you will need 2 licenses for just this one host.

VMware vSphere

VMware vSphere is the trade name for the entire VMware suite of products. As stated earlier, different software packages cost different amounts of money. The cheapest are the basic vSphere essentials or Essentials Plus packages. Is there a difference between them? Yes, but it consists in the number of available functions, and not in the software itself.

Depending on the type of license, you get access to a certain number of functions that can be managed through the vSphere Web client. There is also a vSphere HTML 5 client, but not yet usable. The company continues to develop it.

Essentials does not include High Availability (automatic VM restart), vMotion, backup software (VDP), and the ability to use VSAN storage.

The Essentials package is suitable for small businesses that don't need to be online all the time. On the other hand, being able to move your VMs to another host and perform maintenance or host upgrades while staying online gives you a real edge. All this can be done during the working day without interrupting the work of users.

In addition, in the event of an unexpected hardware failure, vSphere High Availability (HA) will automatically restart the virtual machines that stopped working with the problem host. These virtual machines are automatically restarted on other hosts from the VMware cluster. It takes a little time for the system to determine which computer has crashed and which hosts can temporarily take over its virtual machines. These hosts must have enough memory and CPU power to handle the additional load. As soon as the system finishes analyzing, the VMs are restarted. The whole process is automated and does not require administrator intervention.

Summarize

As you can see, VMware terminology is fairly easy to understand, as is the difference between ESXi, vSphere, and vCenter. The licensing system is also clear. The hypervisor itself is free, but its functionality is limited, as a result of which such software is not insured against data loss. Therefore ESXi is intended for use in test environments only.

VMware vSphere Hypervisor is a free, powerful and reliable hardware hypervisor for use in server and workstation virtualization. This article discusses installing and configuring the VMware Hypervisor, creating a virtual machine, installing a guest operating system.

Free vSphere Hypervisor Technical Requirements, Limitations, and Compatibility

VMware vSphere Hypervisor can be installed on a server that meets the following technical requirements:

The VMware vSphere Hypervisor distribution file is small (311 MB) and contains only the most essential drivers, mainly for branded servers. But sometimes the hypervisor cannot be installed on the servers of well-known brands. Server manufacturers often release their own hypervisor distributions with their own drivers.

You can check VMware vSphere Hypervisor compatibility with your server on the page:

List of hardware not supported in ESXi 6.7: https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/52583

Let's consider the main limitations of the free vSphere Hypervisor in comparison with the full-fledged VMWare ESXi:

Official technical support of VMWare is not provided;
One VM can be allocated no more than 8 virtual processors / cores (vCPU) (by the way, the vCPU limit for gen1 VM generation is 64);
The host cannot be connected to the vCenter;
The vStorage API is not available (it will not be possible to set up a normal backup, the same Veeam will not be able to pick up the VM from the host);
Maximum 2 physical processors (sockets) in the server (there are no restrictions on the number of cores);
All APi are available in read-only mode (i.e. you cannot change any of the server or VM parameters through the same one).

However, Sphere Hypervisor's free reaction allows unlimited use of all cores and RAM of a physical server. There is no limit to the total number of RAM, processors, cores, or the uptime of the host or VM. PCI VMDirectPath / USB redirection works.

How do I download and install the free VMware vSphere Hypervisor?

Download the current version of the VMware Hypervisor vSphere 6.7 hypervisor. To do this, you need to log into your VMWare account or create a new one.

If you create a new VMWare account, then after filling out the registration form, you need to wait for a letter to confirm your account. Follow the link in the letter, enter your password.

In the next step, you will receive a license key for the free version of the hypervisor and a link to download VMware vSphere Hypervisor. Be sure to save the key.

An iso image is downloaded, which can be written to a USB flash drive, CD / DVD disc. Now you can install the hypervisor on the server (workstation or virtual machine).

The installation is very simple. Select “ ESXi-6.7.0-2019xxx-standard installer ”.

Specify the drive where the system will be installed. In this example, one 40 GB disk is available.

Select your keyboard layout.

Enter and confirm the root password (at least 7 characters).

After installation, a warning appears that the hypervisor without a license key will work for 60 days.

Reboot your computer.

The VMware vSphere hypervisor is installed. If your server has at least one network interface connected to a network with a DHCP server, it will automatically receive an IP address that you will see in the hypervisor console (called DCUI). This IP address is used to control the hypervisor from the web interface.

Configuring VMware ESXi in the Console

To manage Hypervisor settings, from the DCUI screen, click F2, enter the username (root by default) and the password set during the installation process.

A graphical console will open for initial hypervisor configuration.

Here you can configure the following options:

The initial configuration of VMware vSphere Hypervisor is now complete. You can connect via the web interface.

VMware ESXi Web Management Interface, Free License Installation

To connect to the vSphere Hypervisor via the Web interface, enter the server IP address assigned during the initial hypervisor configuration into the browser address bar. Then login (root) and password.

Please note that a server without a license will run for 60 days.

Activate the license obtained during registration “Manage” -> “Licensing” -> “Assign License”.

If you do not activate the license, after 60 days all running VMs will continue to work, but you will not be able to turn on new VMs or reboot existing VMs.

The hypervisor has an Expires: Never license with an unlimited amount of RAM for virtual machines. You can allocate up to 8 virtual vCPUs (Up to 8-way virtual SMP) to each virtual machine.

“Manage” -> “System” -> “Time & date” -> “Edit settings”

VMWare ESXi Virtual Switch

Virtual switch(vSphere Switch or vSwitch) is a virtual appliance that transfers data between virtual machines inside a server and transfers data outside through a physical NIC. There are two types of virtual switches:

Standard Switches- a simple virtual switch that is logically located inside a physical server.
Distributed Switches- a distributed virtual switch, can be spread over several physical servers (not available in the free version of VMWare Hypervisor, and in the paid version only available in the Enterprise Plus edition ) .

After installing and running the hypervisor, there is already one virtual switch vSwitch0, which includes one physical adapter vmnic0 and two groups of ports - a service (Management Network) for managing the hypervisor and a network for data transmission (VM Network). The vmk0 hypervisor management interface (vmkernel port) is included in the Management Network group.

In most cases, on a stand-alone hypervisor, one virtual switch will suffice. Port groups need to be created if you want to isolate virtual machines from each other, use different VLAN settings for a port group.

You do not need to make changes to the Management Network or vmkernel port unless absolutely necessary, or you may lose access to your hypervisor management interface. If you lose access to the hypervisor, you can reset your network settings using the Network Restore Options menu in the DCUI console.

Creating a virtual machine in VMWare Hypervisor

In the web interface, select “Virtual Machines” -> “Create / Register VM” -> “Create a new virtual machine”.

Assign a name to the virtual machine. Select the type and version of the guest operating system. Enable the "Windows Virtualization Based Security" checkbox if you want to make hardware virtualization, IOMMU, EFI and Secure Boot available to the guest OS.

Select the datastore for the configuration files of the virtual machine and all of its virtual disks.

If the free space on the selected disk is less than its size, then you will receive a message that it is necessary to increase the size of the datastore.

At this step, all the parameters of the virtual machine are configured: the number of CPUs, the amount of RAM, the size and location of the hard disk, network adapters, CD / DVD drives, etc. To access the network in a VM, you just need to place its adapter in the VM Network port group on vSwitch0 (if you haven't reconfigured anything).

All these parameters, if necessary, can then be changed while the virtual machine is turned off.

The next screen will ask you to check all the settings of the virtual machine and confirm them.

Installing a guest OS on a virtual machine

To install a guest OS on a virtual machine, you need to download the distribution iso image with the distribution of the required OS to the local storage. From the Navigation menu, select Storage and press.

Create a directory to download distributions.

Select the created directory, click Upload in the upper left corner, select iso - the image of the bootable OS and wait until the download is complete.

Select the installed virtual machine and click "Actions" -> "Edit Settings"

Change the settings of the CD-DVD drive, as in the screenshot below. In CD / DVD Media select the downloaded iso-image of the operating system.

Then you just turn on the virtual machine, the VM tries to boot from the ISO image and the installation of the guest OS starts from the virtual CD / DVD, to which the iso image is linked.

After the installation of the guest OS is complete, you can use it as usual.

I hope this short overview article on the specifics of using the free VMWare vSphere Hypervisor will be useful to you.

The issues of creating and using virtual machines have been discussed in our magazine more than once - infrastructure software designed to solve this problem is developing very dynamically today, as well as the demand for a wide variety of solutions in this area. The reason for returning to this topic was the emergence of new versions of a number of products from VMware (a division of EMC), as well as, importantly, the expansion of the range of services related to these products, provided in Russia - this is what this article will discuss.

Virtual machines and their applications

The first part of this article is mainly addressed to those readers who are not familiar with the concept of a virtual machine and with the modern technologies available in this area.

A bit of history

The concept of a virtual machine has been around for several decades. The first virtual machines were created with operating systems running on a mainframe, and were separate workspaces that differed in individual settings and made it possible to personalize to a certain extent the working environments of multiple users who shared the same mainframe. Although the personalization of the 70s was very different from what we are used to today, it nevertheless created a certain convenience for users, saved their work time, and was generally economically justified.

In the era of personal computers, the problem of personalization of the workspace faded into the background and was forgotten for some time. However, in the late 90s, virtual machine technology actually experienced a rebirth and is now being used quite actively. Recently, virtual machine creation tools are very often used in laboratories and software testing departments, in companies specializing in application development, in research departments of development companies, in training centers, as well as as part of corporate solutions.

How virtual machines work

For modern virtual machines to function, a virtual machine management tool is required, which is either a specialized operating system with appropriate capabilities, or a Windows, Linux, or UNIX application installed on a real computer called a host. The virtual machine itself, in most cases, is an image of the file system that is formed during the installation of an OS (generally different from the one that controls the virtual machine management tool) and is stored as a file or located in a dedicated hard disk partition. Using the tool for managing virtual machines, you can load an image of the operating system of a virtual machine into the allocated address space. Such an operating system is called the guest operation system, as opposed to the original operating system, which is called the host operation system, the operating system of the host (if one exists). After that, the operating system of the virtual machine will be able to interact with the computer hardware (for example, with a video adapter, sound card, keyboard, mouse, network adapters). In this way, for example, when the Windows XP operating system is running, using the virtual machine management tool, load the Linux operating system into the address space allocated for it and switch between both operating systems without restarting the computer, and in some cases use the clipboard for clipboard data between these operating systems, or network interaction between them as if they were two different computers. You can also load more than one virtual machine at the same time - if only there is enough RAM for this (of course, there should be a lot of it - after all, there is another operating system in the RAM when the virtual machine is loaded).

Why do we need virtual machines

Where are virtual machines used? Most often, such products are used by developers of software that affects the settings of operating systems, for example, installation applications. Since any test run of the installation application can make changes to the operating system settings (registry, configuration files, environment variables, desktop icons, etc.), it is desirable that these changes be easily reversible. Testing the installation application on a virtual machine instead of a real one, at least, will not disrupt the performance of a real operating system, and a virtual machine can always be restored from a backup. In addition, it is much easier to create a "clean" version of an operating system (that is, without installed applications) for testing installation (as well as other) applications in the form of a virtual machine than in the form of a real computer.

Another typical use case for virtual machines is testing applications running on different operating systems (such as Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003 in different language versions or editions with different service packs). Such testing is usually carried out in the development of "boxed" products, as well as in projects that assume that the customer has a variety of workstations and servers purchased in different years.

In addition to these cases, we will give several more exotic examples of the use of virtual machines: operation of a product that does not work on the existing platform (for example, a DOS application written many years ago); testing the operability of the operating systems themselves or network services; documenting products intended for a platform other than that used to prepare the documentation; demonstration of products for various platforms and their interaction using one computer (the latter is often done by marketing and sales managers of software, as well as project managers for its development); preparing classrooms for classes by copying virtual machines with configured software to workstations; technical support for multi-platform products.

In recent years, special attention has also been paid to the use of virtual machines in the server parts of scalable corporate solutions. Virtual machines are often used to test server software and its various configurations and simulate multi-server configurations on one server, for hosting legacy applications, for creating solutions with increased requirements for information security, for organizing mobile offices and training centers that do not require physical server delivery, for ensuring uniform load of servers and their redundancy by placing the same set of virtual machines on several physical servers, to reduce the cost of implementing and maintaining corporate information systems by reducing the amount of hardware, installation time and setting up server and client software, to reduce software management costs. Today virtual machines in their corporate information systems are used by many large financial and telecommunications companies, trade and industrial enterprises, medical and educational institutions. Ready-made hardware and software solutions for the use of virtualization technologies are also available to developers, system integrators and their customers, such as multi-processor servers with preinstalled virtual machine management tools.

Having discussed what modern virtual machine technology is and where it is applied, we can go directly to the topic of the article - to consider the products of VMware, one of the leaders in the market for creating virtual machines.

VMware Products

VMware (www.vmware.com) was founded in 1998 and its first product was the 1999 VMware virtual machine management tool (later renamed VMware Workstation) for Windows and Linux platforms. For that time, VMware's approach to organizing computing in multi-platform environments was truly revolutionary - previously, virtual machines were talked about only in relation to mainframes. In 2001, this company released server products VMware ESX Server and VMware VirtualCenter. Two years later, VMotion technology was developed to dynamically move virtual machines with server software between physical servers, allowing you to create highly reliable server solutions using virtual machines - it was thanks to this unique technology that VMware finally confirmed its leadership in the market for virtualization tools, significantly ahead of its nearest competitor, Microsoft Corporation, for the quality, variety and reliability of the products offered.

Today, solutions based on VMware server products are used by the largest telecommunications companies, financial and government institutions, manufacturing and trade enterprises, educational institutions, including such well-known companies as Google, Lockheed Martin, Merrill Lynch, Subaru and QUALCOMM. For authors of their own solutions based on VMware products, the corresponding APIs and sets of tools and examples (Software Development Kit, SDK) are available.

Below is a brief overview of the current capabilities of VMware products.

Products for developing and testing applications and software configurations

This category of VMware products is intended primarily for application developers, testers, end users, and system administrators serving the above categories. Note that two of the three products in this category - VMware Server and VMware Player - are shipped free of charge.

VMware Workstation

Designed primarily for testing desktop and multi-tier distributed applications and their configurations, VMware Workstation 5.5 supports a wide variety of host and guest operating systems. This product can host several recent operating systems from Microsoft, Red Hat, SuSE, Ubuntu, as well as Sun Solaris (for x86 processors) and FreeBSD. As guest OS VMware Workstation 5.5 can use various, including 64-bit, versions of Windows, Linux, Novell NetWare, DOS, Sun Solaris and FreeBSD. Virtual machines can be located both in a file and on a separate hard disk or in a separate partition.

WMware Workstation supports virtual and real IDE and SCSI disks, floppy disks, CD-ROM drives, host computer DVD-ROMs, LPT, COM, USB ports, and dynamic host-attached USB devices such as scanners, printers, hard drives and flash cards, plug-in PDAs and cameras. In addition to real drives, WMware Workstation can work with ISO-format disc images, treating them like CD-ROM drives. SCSI devices such as scanners, tape drives, CD-ROM drives, DVD-ROM drives can be supported even if there are no drivers for these devices in the host operating system.

WMware Workstation supports a variety of ways to emulate network interaction, from its absence to integration into a local network in which the host is included, as well as emulation of network interaction with other virtual machines as with separate computers, NAT address translation, virtual DHCP server, networking bridging using wireless connections, a wide range of network protocols, switching between different virtual networks.

VMware Workstation allows you to create "snapshots" of a virtual machine (snapshots), storing information about its state, running applications and their data as a file of the host computer (in this case, you can take several "snapshots" of the same machine), and also supports data exchange between virtual machines and the host operating system using the clipboard and drag-and-drop operations, synchronization of the time of the guest OS and the host OS, the ability to cancel all changes made by the user in this session. Note also that this product includes memory optimizers and multi-tier application management tools designed specifically to improve the productivity of developers and users running a single workstation.

Among the innovations of the latest version of VMware Workstation, we will highlight support for assigning two virtual processors to a virtual machine (which is useful for testing dual-processor software configurations), tools for converting virtual machines created using Microsoft Virtual PC and Microsoft Virtual Server, as well as OS images created using Symantec LiveState Recovery, to VMware virtual machines, support for 64-bit Intel and AMD processors, support for wireless adapters, auto-discovery of storage devices and USB devices.

Note that at approximately the same low price in terms of operating system support, the capabilities of VMware Workstation are significantly ahead of its closest competitor Microsoft Virtual PC, which can use only desktop versions of Windows 2000 and Windows XP as a host OS, and mainly DOS as a guest OS. , all 32-bit desktop versions of Windows and some versions of the now exotic OS / 2 Warp; there is no talk about 64-bit OS support in Virtual PC either.

VMware Server

VMware Server is a free product announced earlier this year and is recommended by the manufacturer as a replacement for the paid VMware GSX Server product. VMware Server is currently available in beta with a final release expected in the second quarter of this year.

VMware Server runs 32-bit or 64-bit server versions of Windows and Linux running on computers with one or more x86-compatible processors (currently 16 processors supported). The set of operating systems supported by this product is quite impressive - among the guest operating systems there is a wide range of Linux and Windows versions, and if necessary, you can use this product to run the latest versions of Novell NetWare (Fig. 1).

This product contains tools for organizing remote administration and monitoring, based on the Web interface and running under Windows or Linux. However, unlike VMware Workstation, this product only supports one “snapshot” of a virtual machine, and its host memory optimizations are not nearly as diverse.

Among the innovations that will be available to VMWare Server users, we note support for virtual symmetric multiprocessing (Virtual SMP) and virtualization technology at the hardware level of Intel Virtualization Technology, as well as support for 64-bit guest operating systems.

Although VMware Server itself is a free product, VMware and its partners (including Russian ones) provide paid technical support to customers who need it.

Note that the technical capabilities of the free VMware Server product are similar to those of the paid Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 Enterprise Edition products and exceed the capabilities of Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 Standard Edition (for example, in terms of the number of processors supported on the host computer). At the same time, Microsoft Virtual Server runs only under the control of server versions of Windows (it is designed to use mainly various versions of Windows as guest OS), while VMware Server, in addition to Windows, supports a wide range of other OS (Linux, Solaris, FreeBSD, Novell NetWare ) as guests and Linux as the host OS.

VMware Player

VMware Player is a free product designed to run virtual machines created with VMware Workstation and VMware Server. You cannot create new virtual machines with it. However, the VMware website has a constantly updated section with configured virtual machines available for download and use, running different operating systems and installed software from different manufacturers.

Unlike VMware Server, VMware Player does not offer paid vendor and partner support.

Products for use as part of enterprise IT infrastructure

VMware ESX Server

VMware ESX Server 2.5 is a virtual machine creation tool that does not require a host operating system (in fact, it acts as an operating system itself) and runs on computers with two or more 32-bit Intel and AMD processors and two or more network adapters ... File storage must be SCSI disks, Fiber Channel-accessible drives, or an onboard RAID controller — in such storage, the product creates its own VMware File System (VMFS). This product can be installed on Blade servers or SAN (Storage Area Network - a dedicated high-performance network designed for transferring data between servers and storage devices and operates independently of the local network).

This product supports emulation of up to 80 virtual processors, and as guest OS - server versions of Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, Novell NetWare. For some versions of Windows and Linux, virtual symmetric multiprocessor configurations are supported.

Unlike VMware Server, VMware ESX Server is designed for remote administration. It does not contain tools that run locally on the server itself, apart from the installation and initial configuration tools for the ESX Server itself. Tools for organizing remote administration of ESX Server are based on the Web interface (Fig. 2).

Rice. 2. Tools for remote administration of VMware ESX Server 2.5

There is an add-on for VMware ESX Server called VMware Virtual SMP which allows one virtual machine to run on multiple physical processors. This addition makes it possible to perform additional scaling of the most resource-intensive applications running on virtual machines, as well as to test multiprocessor configurations of server software.

VMware VirtualCenter

VMware VirtualCenter 1.2 is a tool for managing virtual machines running and containing VMware ESX Server and VMware Server. This product allows you to create a configuration of operating systems, services and applications running on virtual machines, transfer them from one machine to another and quickly deploy servers with a pre-installed operating system and applications, monitor the performance and use of server resources (Fig. 3).

Rice. 3. Monitoring the use of server resources using VMware VirtualCenter

The product also includes a wizard for deploying new virtual servers from templates, which can significantly reduce the time to commission a new server compared to traditional server configuration methods.

To dynamically move virtual machines with server software between physical servers, VMware VirtualCenter includes the VMotion tool. Moving server software dynamically using VMotion does not affect the settings of workstations and occurs imperceptibly for end users, which allows you to quickly adjust the server load balance and optimize the use of computing resources.

VMware ACE

VMware ACE (from Assured Computing Environment) is a tool for network administrators to create standard virtual machines and configurations for workstations. Its main purpose is to simplify the administration of workstations by creating configurations of the same type and transferring them to workstations.

A feature of this product is a wide range of capabilities related to network security, such as support for "guest" workstations (for example, visitors' laptops), setting rules for accessing virtual machines, data encryption, or the expiration date of a particular configuration (Fig. 4 ).

A significant advantage of this product is the ability to create standard hardware-independent configurations of workstations and transfer them to computers with different hardware, which is very important today for most enterprises.

As a guest OS, VMware ACE supports various versions of DOS, Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, Novell NetWare, Sun Solaris, and as host operating systems and management tools VMware ACE Manager - all versions of Windows starting from Windows 2000.

VMware P2V Assistant

VMware P2V Assistant is a tool for creating virtual machines from real-life physical machines running different versions of Windows starting from Windows NT 4.0. This product takes a “snapshot” of the original operating system and turns it into a virtual machine, eliminating the need for administrators to install and configure the latter. Virtual machines created with it can run under VMware ESX Server, VMware Server and VMware Workstation.

A few words about costs

It makes sense to talk about the use of virtualization tools when their use can bring certain benefits to the company. Therefore, below we will name the benefits that will be received by companies that have implemented VMware products.

The use of VMware Workstation in software development companies will help save a lot of money spent on the purchase of additional workstations for testing software and creating distributions, eliminating the cost of their physical placement, software installation, configuration and maintenance. Considering that the cost of VMware Workstation does not exceed several hundred dollars, the purchase of this product is justified even for very small companies - the license for it will pay off in just a few days of use.

If a company has legacy applications that suit everyone, but are designed for a platform that is no longer supported by the manufacturer, then such a company is faced with a dilemma: whether to continue using the platform, which carries a potential threat to the security of the entire corporate network due to the termination of the release of its updates, or rewrite existing applications? The first way to solve this problem seems to be risky, the second is usually very costly. The use of VMware Player and VMware Server in such a case may well turn out to be the very option that is devoid of the disadvantages of the previous two - by operating a dangerous platform (no matter for the server or client part of a legacy application) inside a virtual machine, you can provide both an acceptable level of convenience and a sufficient security level.

If we talk about the use of virtual machines as part of the IT infrastructure of corporate solutions, then in this case there are much more opportunities to reduce the costs of infrastructure and its operation. A product such as VMware ESX Server can make it unnecessary to purchase separate hardware servers for different tasks by creating a more efficient and more cost-effective server fleet that can respond quickly to changing operating conditions and application requirements. Using VMware VirtualCenter and VMotion technology will significantly reduce the time required to deploy new servers, as well as their downtime during hardware maintenance by moving virtual machines to other physical servers. And finally, VMware ACE will enable you to implement the most stringent security rules when using virtual machines, thereby reducing the possible risks of corporate data leakage and penetration into the corporate network from the outside, which means it will help to avoid losses and often irreparable damage to the company's reputation caused by such incidents.

), Softline (www.softline.ru).

In addition, now in our country in the training center "Microinform" (www.microinform.ru) a specialized course in Russian is available "Building a virtual infrastructure using ESX Server and VMware VirtualCenter", intended for both consumers of VMware products (system administrators, users ) and for system integrators who implement solutions using VMware products at their customers.

VMware provides end customers with a license and a one-year warranty that includes service support. Currently, service support can be provided not only by the manufacturer itself, but also by Russian partners.

Conclusion

This article focuses on products from VMware, the market leader in creating and maintaining virtual machines for x86-compatible computers. In the past five years, the choice of products for such a purpose has become very extensive - if at the beginning of 2001 it was limited to a single product, interest in which was mainly shown by developers and software testing specialists, today it includes not only tools for running virtual machines on workstations and uniprocessor computers, but also a variety of tools for creating and maintaining server solutions, in terms of their functionality close to the means of supporting virtual machines for mainframes, and in some parameters even surpassing them. Today, both in the world and in Russia, many projects are underway to virtualize infrastructure, and, in our opinion, in the near future there will be an even wider use of such products as part of the infrastructure of large enterprises, as well as in companies specializing in the development and maintenance of software. ...

You will find trial versions of VMware products on the magazine's CD-ROM attachment.