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VMware Cloud on AWS

November 24, 2017 / David / 0 Comments

Perhaps one of VMware’s most significant announcements made in recent times is the partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS), including the ability to leverage AWS’s infrastructure to provision vSphere managed resources. What exactly does this mean and what benefits could this bring to the enterprise?

Collaboration of Two Giants

To understand and appreciate the significance of this partnership we must acknowledge the position and perspective of each.

Market leader in private cloud offerings
Deep roots and history in virtualisation
Expanding portfolio

Market leader in public cloud offerings
Broad and expanding range of services
Global scale

VMware has a significant presence in the on-premise datacentre, in contrast to AWS which focuses entirely on the public cloud space. VMware cloud on AWS sits in the middle as a true hybrid cloud solution leveraging the established, industry-leading technologies and software developed by VMware, together with the infrastructure capabilities provided by AWS.

How it Works

In a typical setup, an established vSphere private cloud already exists. Customers can then provision an AWS-backed vSphere environment using a modern HTML5 based client. The environment created by AWS leverages the following technologies:

ESXi on bare metal servers
vSphere management
vSAN
NSX

The connection between the on-premise and AWS hosted vSphere environments is facilitated by Hybrid Linked Mode. This allows customers to manage both on-premise and AWS hosted environments through a single management interface. This also allows us to, for example, migrate and manage workloads between the two.

Advantages

Existing vSphere customers may already be leveraging AWS resources in a different way, however, there are significant advantages associated with implementing VMware cloud on AWS, such as:

Delivered as a service from VMware – The entire ecosystem of this hybrid cloud solution is sold, delivered and supported by VMware. This simplifies support, management, billing amongst other activities such as patching and updates.

Consistent operational model – Existing private cloud users use the same tools, processes and technologies to manage the solution. This includes integration with other VMware products included in the vRealize product suite.

Enterprise-grade capabilities – This solution leverages the extensive AWS hardware capabilities which include the latest in low latency IO storage technology based on Solid State Drive technology and high-performance networking.

Access to native AWS resources – This solution can be further expanded to access and consume native AWS technologies pertaining to databases, AI, analytics and more.

Use Cases

VMware Cloud on AWS has several applications, including (but not limited to) the following:

Datacenter Extension

Because of how rapidly an AWS-backed software-defined datacenter can be provisioned, expanding an on-premise environment becomes a trivial task. Once completed, these additional resources can be consumed to meet various business and technical demands.

Dev / Test

Adding additional capabilities to an existing private cloud environment enables the division of duties/responsibilities. This enables organisations to separate out specific environments for the purposes of security, delegation and management.

Application Migration

VMware cloud on AWS enables us to migrate N-tier applications to an AWS backed vSphere environment without the need to re-architect or convert our virtual machine/compute and storage constructs. This is because we’re using the same software-defined data centre technologies across our entire estate (vSphere, NSX and vSAN).

Conclusion

There are a number of viable applications for VMware Cloud on AWS and it’s a very strong offering considering the pedigree of both VMware and AWS. Combining the strengths from each creates a very compelling option for anyone considering a hybrid cloud adoption strategy.

To learn more about VMware Cloud on AWS please review the following:

https://aws.amazon.com/vmware/

https://cloud.vmware.com/vmc-aws

Joining the Insight Team

November 2, 2017 / David / 0 Comments

As of this week, I started a new position at Insight as a VMware/SDDC Solutions Architect/Evangelist. Exciting times!

I’ll be fortunate to work with the likes of established community contributors and experts in the field such as vJenner and Chan.

Why Insight?

The IT landscape is constantly changing and with it, we as IT professionals must adapt accordingly. I wanted a new challenge, to expand my horizons and delve deeper into the areas I’ve already gained experience in. Insight is such a place that will allow me to do this. My new boss described it quite eloquently: “We sell everything to everyone”. This doesn’t mean that Insight will push for subpar products though – part of the philosophy here is that we’re transparent, flexible and agnostic. Leading solutions are evaluated and assessed to address a plethora of challenges presented by both existing and new customers. Multiple vendors, multiple products, private/public/hybrid cloud and everything in-between is considered as part of the product/solutions/services portfolio.

I will continue to focus primarily on VMware based solutions with a bit of AWS on top, together with complementary technologies (IE storage, networking, containers, automation, scripting)

VMware vRealize Operations 2017 Specialist Exam (2VB-602)

October 15, 2017 / David / 2 Comments

“Specialist Exams”….Wait, what?

I have a requirement to essentially get more up to speed with vRealize Operations Manager. As I was digging through some of the reading material I came across the specialist exam. The details for which can be found here.

I wasn’t actually aware up until this point VMware actually offer specialist exams. At time of writing vRealize Operations and vSAN are the only two specialist certifications you can take.

I can understand the logic behind it – vRealize is becoming a very comprehensive suite of applications and with the VCP7-CMA certification primarily focused on vRealize Automation, it makes sense to separate out certain technologies into their own curriculum.

2VB-602 (vRealize Operations)

For a couple of weeks or so I’ve been messing around with / reading up on / watching videos of vRealize Operations primarily focused on 6.6 without even knowing about the certification. The exam, however, is based on 6.0 – 6.5 and 6.6 brings some rather substantial changes. Therefore don’t expect to see 6.6 related questions in the exam.

Resources

Although I wasn’t actually focused on passing this specific test, Here’s what I’ve used so far in an attempt to get up to speed:

Pluralsight’s training course on vRealize Operations (created March 2017) – https://www.pluralsight.com/courses/vmware-vrealize-operations-manager

VMware’s documentation center – https://docs.vmware.com/en/vRealize-Operations-Manager/index.html

vApp Deployment and Configuration Guide – https://docs.vmware.com/en/vRealize-Operations-Manager/6.6/vrealize-operations-manager-66-vapp-deploy-guide.pdf

VMware training videos – http://players.brightcove.net/1534342432001/S1xUFpuYwx_default/index.html?playlistId=5446534362001

Exam Experience

The exam can be taken anywhere unlike the VCP or VCAP exams which require you to attend a training center. The questions were pretty tough, but that may have come down to my lack of experience with the product.

Overall, it was a interesting experience. I probably would have preferred vRealize Operations to have it’s own VCP level exam being proctored etc. It’s a nice-to-have, but I still have a lot to learn about vRealize Operations but it’s given me some confidence that I’ve probably understood the fundamentals.

Virtual Thoughts