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VMware View 5.1 upgrade path – Steps

20 June 2012 Andrea Mauro

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In the previous post we have talk about the pre-upgrade phase during a VMware View 5.1 upgrade path. Now let’s the the steps to perform the upgrade.

As written in the Upgrade Guide (VMware View Upgrade Overview) the steps are:

Upgrade View Connection Server on the existing host or migrate to a new machine. See Upgrade View Connection Servers in a Replicated Group.
If you use View Security Servers, upgrade to 5.1, see Upgrade View Security Server.
Upgrade View Composer on an existing Windows Server 2008 host or, if you are running View Composer 2.6 on Windows Server 2003, migrate to a new machine. See Upgrade View Composer.
If you are also upgrading vSphere components, upgrade vCenter Server. See Upgrade vCenter Server.
For the View Client with Local Mode component, upgrade or install and configure one or more View Transfer Server instances. See Upgrade View Transfer Server.
If you are also upgrading vSphere, upgrade the ESXi hosts and virtual machines. See Upgrade ESX/ESXi 4.0.x, 4.1.x, or 5.0.x Hosts and Their Virtual Machines. Remember that now virtual hardware 8 could be used also with local mode so consider to upgrade to it.
Upgrade the VMware View Agents that runs on the physical or virtual machines that are used as desktop sources, as full-clone desktops in a pool, and as individual desktops in a manual pool. See Upgrade View Agent.
Use the newly upgraded virtual desktop sources to create upgraded pools of View desktops. See Upgrade View Composer Desktop Pools.
Upgrade the VMware View Clients that runs on end users’ client devices. See Upgrade View Clients and Upgrade View Local Mode Clients.

Of course you have to make a backup of your configurations before start the process!

Strange that the document suggest to upgrade the Composer after the Connection Server, because from the compatibility matrix, the new one could be compatible with old Connection Servers (and note that new Connections Servers are not compatible with old Composer).

Is not clear if this version of View will be compatible with the next version of vSphere (probably also 5.1) or if the new version of vSphere will be no more compatibile with View 5.0… But probably is the right moment to plan you upgrade!

VMware Outdated, VDI

VMware View 5.1 upgrade path – Check-list

19 June 2012 Andrea Mauro

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As written, VMware has announced and released the new VMware View 5.1 version with several improvements.

One difference is that in this version the upgrade path is a little more complicated compared to previous upgrade procedures (see VMware View 5.0.1 upgrade path and Upgrade path to vSphere 5 – The View 5 part) due to some changes and a limited compatibility matrix!

As you can notice, new VMware Connection Servers can “talk” with old (5.0 and 4.6) Connection Servers, Agents, but only during the upgrade phase. Also new Connection Servers could not work with old Composer or Tranfer Servers.

This means that during an upgrade to View 5.1, View does not support View Composer provisioning and maintenance operations, local mode operations, or View Transfer Server publish operations. Operations such as provisioning and recomposing linked-clone desktops, checking out or checking in desktops, and publishing View Composer base images are not supported during the transitional period when any View servers are still running the earlier version. You can successfully perform these operations only when all instances of View Connection Server, View Composer, and View Transfer Server have been upgraded to View 5.1.

The entire procedure is well explained in the Upgrade Guide (VMware View Upgrade Overview) and will be described in the next post. But you must consider some important aspects before begin this operation.

Hardware requirements

They are quite the same of 5.0 version. So probably are already satisfied.

Secure Server upgrade

For the secure servers, starting from version 5.1, before begin the upgrade you must remove the current IPsec rules that govern communication between the security server and its paired View Connection Server instance. If you do not take this step, the upgrade or reinstallation fails (for more information see: Prepare to Upgrade or Reinstall a Security Server). If you remove the IPsec rules for an active security server, all communication with the security server is lost until you upgrade or reinstall the security server.

This will probably affect future upgrade paths.

Note that Before View 5.1, you could remove security server in View Administrator or with the vdmadmin -S command. In View 5.1 and later releases, you can only use vdmadmin -S.

Composer upgrade

If your current version of View Composer is installed on a computer with a Windows Server 2003 operating system, see the procedure called “Manually Migrate View Composer to the New Machine” in the VMware View 4.6 Upgrade Guide. After you migrate View Composer 2.6 to a system with a Windows Server 2008 R2 operating system, you can perform an in-place upgrade to View Composer 3.0.

To migrate View Composer 3.0 to a different physical or virtual machine, see Migrate View Composer to Another Computer. Consider also that it can be deployed on a different machined than the vCenter Server (but of course not on a Domain Controller or a View Connection Server).

Certificates validity

Starting from this version certificates are used for mandatory SSL connections also between the Connection Servers and vCenter Server and Composer. Although you may still use self-signed certificates (not sure if in the future will be still supported), you may plan to adopt valid certificates.

Certificates for vCenter Server, View Composer, and View servers must include certificate revocation lists (CRLs). For more information, see “Configuring Certificate Revocation Checking on Server Certificates” in the VMware View Installation Guide.

Note also that is still possible disable the certificate control on the client side (see VMware View 5 – Disable the certificate warning).

vDesign, VMware Outdated, VDI

Copy/Paste in a VMware View session

18 June 2012 Andrea Mauro

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Probably you have already notice that copy & paste operation in a VMware View session are limited for security reasons and is discussed in the View admin guide:

Configure clipboard redirection

Determines the direction in which clipboard redirection is allowed. You can select one of these values:

Enabled client to server only (That is, allow copy and paste only from the client system to the View desktop.)
Disabled in both directions
Enabled in both directions
Enabled server to client only (That is, allow copy and paste only from the View desktop to the client system.)

Clipboard redirection is implemented as a virtual channel. If virtual channels are disabled, clipboard redirection does not function. When this setting is disabled or not configured, the default value is “Enabled client to server on”.

General VDI

Virtual Appliances: angels o demons?

14 June 2012 Andrea Mauro

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When I explain the advantages of a virtual infrastructure, I usually add the virtual appliances (VA) as a good example of a plus that you can get. Similar to usual appliances, they can save your time in installation and configuration tasks… and in a virtual environment they can also same time in deployment (and sometime also money). There are several other pros described on What are the Benefits of Deploying Virtual Appliances?

But they may have also some possible disadvantages…

vDesign VA

New VMware Certification: VCP5-IaaS

13 June 2012 Andrea Mauro

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VMware is working a new certification specific for the “cloud”: VMware Certified Professional 5 – Infrastructure as a Service (VCP5-IaaS).

Some individuals are about to be invited to paticipate in the beta phase. The rumor goes that the public exam should be live late July.

The exam will probably measure the skills and abilities installing, configuring and administering a vCloud environment.

Sign up here to know as soon as it’s publicly available.

My experience with VCAP5-DCD exam

11 June 2012 Andrea Mauro

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Last week I’ve taken the official VCAP5-DCD, to remediate the failure of the VCAP5-DCD beta and try to gain this certification.

The exam is really huge: The VDCD510 exam contains 100 questions (in the beta 131). The total time for this exam is 225 minutes (same of the beta). Candidates who take the VDCD510 exam in a country where English is not a primary language will have an additional 30 minutes added to the exam time. This time extension is automatic, no additional action is required from the candidate.

There were jsut a few questions with a single answers (from 4-5 options), and the options were quite similar (so also those questions were not too easy). Bust most of the questions were a mixture of multiple-choice (with more answers) and drag-and-drop items. The “visio” questions (design items using an in-exam design tool) were more than one (in my case I think to remember 5) and require several time, to read the text and also to use the tool (I still hope an improvement at least in the connectors stencil to have a sticky function or keep selected).

vCertification, vDesign Outdated, VCAP

Storage for VDI: local or shared?

5 June 2012 Andrea Mauro

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In my interview with Sakthi Chandra (NexentaVSA for View Director), during the last Open Storage Summit EMEA, we have talk about the Nexenta approach of the storage for a VDI environment. Their product has been developed from a collaboration with VMware and some aspects sound familiar: for example the overview of the VSA deployment and design seems similar to the VMware VSA, except the scalability limit (that is limited to max 3 host for the VMware solution). But I don’t want talk about the product, yet (I prefer dedicate it a post, when I will be able to make some test), but about the approach: using local storage instead of shared storage.

vStorage VDI

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VMware View 5.1 upgrade path – Steps