vicfg-nics Used to report on and manage physical network adapters.
--help to display help text
--auto or -a to set the given adapter to autonegotiate the speed and duplex settings
--duplex or -d followed by [full | half ] <nic> to set the duplex value for a given NIC
--speed or -s followed by <speed><nic> to set the speed value for a given NIC
--list or -l to list the physical adapters in the system
--vihost or -h followed by <host> to direct the command to a particular ESX Server host
vicfg-vmknic Used to configure virtual network adapters.
--help to display help text
--add or -a to add a virtual network adapter to the system (an IP address and port group name must be specified)
--del or -d followed by <portgroup> to delete the virtual network adapter on the specified port group
--ip or -i followed by [<IP address>| DHCP] to set the virtual network adapter to a given IP address or to obtain an address from a DHCP server
--list or -l to list virtual network adapters on the system
--netmask or -n followed by <netmask> to set the network mask for the assigned IP address
--vihost or -h followed by <host> to direct the command to a particular ESX Server host
vicfg-vswitch Used to configure virtual switches.
--help to display help text
--add or -a followed by <vswitch_name> to add a new virtual switch
--add-pg or -A followed by <portgroup> <switch> to add a port group to the specified switch
--check or -c followed by <virtual_switch> to check for the existence of a virtual switch
--check-pg or -C followed by <portgroup> to check for the existence of a port group
--delete or -d followed by <vswitch_name> to delete the specified virtual switch (this command will not work if any of the virtual switch ports are in use)
--del-pg or -D followed by <portgroup> to delete the specified port group (this command will not work if the port group is in use)
--link or -L followed by <pnic> to add a physical adapter to a virtual switch
--list or -l to list all virtual switches and port groups
--mtu or -m to set the maximum transmission unit (MTU) of the virtual switch
--pg or -p followed by <portgroup> to provide the name of a port group when using the
--vlan option (use the ALL parameter to set VLAN IDs on all port groups of a virtual switch)
--vlan or -v to set the VLAN ID for a specific port group (using the parameter 0 disables all VLAN IDs; using --vlan requires the --pg option)
--vihost or -h followed by <host> to direct the command to a particular ESX Server host
vicfg-route Used to configure the default route for VMkernel ports.
--help to display help text
--vihost or -h followed by <host> to direct the command to a particular ESX Server host <gateway> to specify the default gateway to be used by the VMkernel
vicfg-ntp Used to configure NTP settings.
--help to display help text
--add or -a followed by <server> to add an NTP server
--delete or -d followed by <server> to delete an NTP server
--list or -l to list the configured NTP servers
--vihost or -h followed by <host> to direct the command to a particular ESX Server host
Appendix C Third-Party Virtualization Tools
The virtualization sector of information technology, led by VMware Infrastructure 3, is relatively new and despite its infancy it has quickly matured and found its way into more than 90% of the data centers among the world's largest companies. With this type of corporate penetration it is not a surprise that many software companies are beginning to build custom applications to complement VI3 deployments. This appendix aims to introduce to some of the early tools that are available in helping manage, optimize, secure, and recover the assets in your virtual environment.
Disaster-Recovery and Business-Continuity Tools
Perhaps the largest area of virtual infrastructure support with third-party virtualization tools is the disaster-recovery and business-continuity segment of the market. The virtualization tools listed here are several of the best tools available with regard to ease of use, functionality, and cost.
vRanger Pro
vRanger Pro, previously known as ESXRanger, is one of the most recognized backup solutions in virtualization environments. Developed by Vizioncore Inc., vRanger Pro is a Windows-based application that simplifies performing online backups and restoring virtual machines. The easy-to-use Windows-based graphical user interface (GUI) eliminates scripting for IT administrators, so no specialized knowledge is necessary to deploy a reliable backup strategy. vRanger Pro runs on a centralized Windows host and can run using the standard Windows scheduler, thus further eliminating the need for complex scripting. The GUI offers a Startup wizard and VirtualCenter integration for ease of operation, as well as compression options to save storage space. vRanger Pro compresses virtual machine disk files (VMDK) before sending them to the chosen destination target server, such as the local VMFS, a Linux server, or a Windows server. NAS, SAN, Novell, UNC, and mapped drives are also supported if they are accessible to the Windows host. vRanger Pro provides full-image restore to any VMware ESX Server without needing to know the prior configurations. It also reduces or eliminates the need to create manual installations and configurations to the backup image. Restores are efficiently relocated, and they run quickly because the images are compressed and all configurations are included. For Windows guests, file-level restores are available to provide an advanced file level of protection.
vRanger Pro uses the included VSS drivers to leverage Microsoft's Volume Shadow Copy Service technology to pause application writes. The VSS feature enables quiescing for supported databases to provide “transactionally consistent” backup images that can be used to recover the application as well as the image.
In an effort to reduce time and space for virtual machine backups, vRanger Pro includes a differential backups technology that captures only the changes that have occurred since the last successful full backup image. Backup administrators have the flexibility of designing retention policies to support the corporate disaster-recovery plan and the space available for the backup files.
vRanger Pro includes a P2V-DR module to provide the functionality of rapidly and frequently converting physical machines into virtual machines as part of a disaster-recovery strategy. This module functions as an agentless deployment and without the need to reboot the source computer.
The application also captures details about how long a particular backup process will take, allowing you to plan for the next backup window. In addition, users can record IP addresses, compression ratios, and the virtual machines' locations on the various LUNs. Details about backups and VMs are stored in the repository and can be accessed for reporting and analysis.
Unlike traditional backup agents, vRanger Pro runs outside the guest operating system, and can be integrated with VMware VirtualCenter for efficient backup management. The backups can be offloaded from the host leveraging integration with VMware VCB. vRanger Pro recognizes the VMotion feature and is aware when a virtual machine is migrated to a new host. This allows vRanger Pro to follow virtual machines from host to host to perform regularly scheduled backups even after the virtual machines have moved.