For starters one must already hold a current VMware Certified Professional (VCP) certification on VI3.  This means attending the VI3 Install and Configure Class and passing the VMware Certified Professional exam.

Beyond that one must apply for and be accepted into the VCDX program.  Once that has been accomplished two exams will be necessary to prove the candidate’s knowledge levels.  Right now these two exams are:  VMware Enterprise Administrator Exam and VMware Design Exam.

After all of the classrooms, testing, and accepting the VCDX candidate will have to submit, present, and defend a VMware Infrastructure design to a panel of VCDX colleagues

Sounds like a long journey but I think in the end the VCDX will definitely come to signify the ultimate mastery of the VMware Virtual Infrastructure.

I picked up these links from my friends over at Virtual Insanity.

First off Mike DiPetrillo has a posting on how to build a VMware ESXi server for less than $500! http://www.mikedipetrillo.com/mikedvirtualization/2008/10/building-a-500-vmware-esxi-host.html

Secondly, there is a community run site that claims to have an unofficial Hardware Compatibility List for VMware ESX and VMware ESXi.  While this may not be supported it sure will make for cheaper labs and testing environments.  Check out the unofficial HCL over at vm-help.com

I have used similar utilities before with things like Symantec Ghost (Ghost Explorer) and certainly a wide variety of ISO mounting utilities.  So I went looking for something that would allow me to read a VMware virtual disk and I came across the VMware Disk Mount Utility.

In this particular case I am only using VMware Workstation 6 virtual disks but from what I have read, this utility may work for ESX or VMware Server virtual disks as well.  One thing to note is that the download page still says VMware Workstation 5.5 but I had no problems using this tool on a VMDK that was created using VMware Workstation 6.

Download

User Guide

Just for quick reference here are the commands I used:

Mount the VMDKas drive X:
vmware-mount X: "C:\VMware\VM01\VM01.vmdk" /v:1

Unmount the VMDK:
vmware-mount X: /d

My steps below assume the usage of the nano text editor however you could certainly choose a different text editor.  For help with using nano see the nano Command Manual or this quick Introduction.

Modify the NTP config file:
nano /etc/ntp.conf

Contents of ntp.conf should look like:
restrict 127.0.0.1
restrict default kod nomodify notrap
server tick.usno.navy.mil
server tock.usno.navy.mil
driftfile /var/lib/ntp/drift

Modify the NTP Step Tickers config file:
nano /etc/ntp/step-tickers

Contents of step-tickers should look like:
tick.usno.navy.mil
tock.usno.navy.mil

Enable NTP in the firewall
esxcfg-firewall --enableService ntpClient

Restart the NTP service
service ntpd restart

Set the NTP service to start automatically at system startup
chkconfig ntpd on

After getting logged into the Service Console you will need to delete the existing vSwitch that contains the service console:

esxcfg-vswif -d vswif0

Once the vSwitch has been deleted we will then re-create the vSwitch with the new IP information.  Note this command should be entered with the forward slash and space between the words Service and Console.

esxcfg-vswif -a vswif0 -p Service\ Console -i 10.1.1.1 -n 255.255.255.0 -b 10.1.1.255

There is one final step that is often overlooked or forgotten.  If you don’t update the hosts file then the Service Console “splash” screen will display the incorrect IP address the next time your ESX server boots.  This elusive hosts file can be modified using the nano text editor.  The exact command would be:

nano /etc/hosts

Once the file has opened its really a simple matter of changing the line that lists your ESX server name and its corresponding IP address.

ChipPC Virtual Desktop Center
http://www.chippc.com/management/xcalibur-global/index.asp?p=Overview
ChipPC makes a full computer that fits into a wall socket, while that may be an interesting concept, I have doubts about their ability to work with VMware, Microsoft, and others on creating a solid connection broker product.

Citrix Desktop Broker -> Citrix Desktop Server -> Citrix XenDesktop
http://www.citrix.com/xendesktop
Citrix has what seems to be all of the pieces needed to produce a connection broker product that is head and shoulders above the competition.  They have a very efficient transport protocol (ICA), they have a solid delivery platform (Web Interface, Secure Gateway, Access Gateway), they have figured out load balancing, session management, and the list goes on and on.  However, they have not yet made their connection broker product, which has now undergone two name changes,  utilize all of their existing technologies.  It still remains to be seen what the new release of the XenDesktop product will bring, although after much hype at the recent iForum 2007, the technical preview of the XenDesktop product has been pushed back to the ambiguous “early November.”  There has also been some feuding lately between Citrix and VMware after the recent purchase of XenSource by Citrix which also rasises concerns about the future compatibility of a Citrix connection broker package with VMware or other manufacturer hypervisors.

Dunes Virtual Desktop Orchestrator (VD-O)
http://www.dunes.ch
Dunes Technologies was recently acquired by VMware, which I can only assume means that VMware wants to incorporate the Dunes VDI product suite into their own product lineup.  A quick glance around the existing Dunes website reveals that the Desktop Orchestrator (VD-O) product is missing.  Because of this I don’t know that Dunes or its once upon a time VD-Oproduct

LeoStream Virtual Desktop Connection Broker
http://www.leostream.com/productVHDC.html
Currently the LeoStream product only supports the VMware hypervisor.  While this may not be a problem for existing VMware environments it does pose a problem should an alternative hypervisor emerge as a better platform for VDI.  In terms of feature set and scalability the LeoStream product does seem to be one of the current market leaders.  IBM is also referencing the LeoStream product for their VDI architecture.

Propero workspace
http://www.propero.com
Propero was acquired by VMware in April 2007, and the Propero website now redirectes to a VMware page that doesn’t give much insight into what they plan to do with the acquired Propero technology.

Provision Networks Virtual Access Suite (VAS)
http://www.provisionnetworks.com/solutions/vas/vas.aspx
Provision Networks seems to be one of the only independent (not associated with a hypervisor technology) connection broker manufacturers that really understands what people want in a connection broker.  They support nearly every hypervisor on the market, they have a web interface, they even support the logical pooling of a mixture of virtual and physical machines.  The one thing that I did find alarming was the frequent mention of a Provision Networks VAS client.  This would mean that existing terminals, computers, and other end points that may already have RDP or even ICA clients would need yet another remote connectivity client.

Zeus Virtual Desktop Connection Broker (ZXTM VDB)
http://www.zeus.com/news/press_articles/070423-001.html
Zeus already being a player in the web server, load balancing, and traffic management markets seemed to be a good fit for entering the VDI connection brokering space.  However other than a several month old press release there is no information about the ZXTM VDB product on their website.  Have they discontinued the product?  Will the technology be incorporated into one of the other ZXTM product lines?  Until there is some more information it is hard to consider them a player in the connection broker market.

In summary if you are evaluating VDI and need a connection broker solution the only two choices available today are the ones from LeoStream and Provision.  Technically the 1.0 version of the Citrix Desktop Server is also available but it is lacking in its feature set and will likely be discontinued in favor of their new XenDesktop product.
If you can afford to wait then it will probably be worth it to see how Citrix improves upon their XenDesktop product and also what VMware decides to do with their recently acquired technologies.

From http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_installation_guide.pdf

To upgrade using esxupdate

1. Download the esxupdate tar archive bundle.
2. Extract the compressed tar archive (gtar xvzf file.tar.gz) and change to the newly created directory.
3. Type esxupdate -n update.
4. When the update command completes, reboot the ESX Server host.

• Solid State Drive (SSD) boot support  As initially discovered last month, VMware will make available a special version of ESX Server (mentioned with terms like ESX Lite and Embedded ESX) for OEM vendors, to be installed into bootable Solid State storage devices (flash drives, etc.). This option will allow creation of ESX Server hardware appliances for easy jumpstart, granting smaller form-factors and improved reliability.  Dell, IBM and possibly other vendors will offer this option at announcement time in Q3 2007.
• DMotion  Unofficially introduced with ESX Server 3.0.1, in its first version DMotion is a special VMotion operation only capable of moving running virtual machines from an ESX Server 2.5.x host to a new ESX Server 3.x., without shared SAN LUN mandatory requirement.  In ESX Server 3.1 this capability will be extended, allowing hot migration of running virtual machines between ESX 3.1 hosts through the Ethernet cable.
• Patch management system for host and virtual machines (UpdateManager)  ESX Server 3.1 will finally introduce an automated patch management system called UpdateManager. This solution will be able to update both host itself and virtual machines (both Microsoft Windows and Red Hat Enterprise Linux).  UpdateManager will feature security backup before patching and automated rollback if something goes wrong.
• VMware Consolidate Backup (VCB) and VMware Converter integration  VirtualCenter 2.1 will now allow restoring VCB images with an integrated version of VMware Converter.
• Server consolidation advisor  VirtualCenter 2.1 will expose a server consolidation assistant able to analyze which physical machines should be converted in virtual ones, and where to move existing VMs among available hosts.  (note that with this feature VMware is further extending competition with PlateSpin, covering both features with PowerRecon and PowerConvert)
• Guest OS disaster recovery capability  VirtualCenter 2.1 will be able to recognize a failure inside a virtual machine and restart it through VMware HA module.
• Power saving capability (Distributed Power Management)  VirtualCenter 2.1 will introduce a new resources utilization analysis feature, able to verify when a physical host can be powered off, VMotion-ing its virtual machines on other hosts without impacting performances.
• Support for Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP)  VirtualCenter 2.1 will be able to recognize and use CDP to discover physical and virtual network topologies.  It stays unconfirmed if ESX Server 3.1 will already expose new virtual network architecture, allowing 3rd party virtual switches, as it will be announced by Cisco CEO at VMworld 2007.
• Support for 10Gbit Ethernet network cards
• Support for TCP/IP Offload Engine (TOE) network cards
• Support for network load balancing algorithms
• Support for 200 hosts and 2000 virtual machines
• Support for 128GB RAM per host and for 64GB RAM per virtual machine
• Support for SATA storage devices
• Support for N_Port ID Virtualization (NPIV)
• Support for VCB over iSCSI SANs
• Support for IPv6 in virtual networking

• The account used by VC to access the database must be set as the owner of the database and must also have the db_owner rights to the database.
• The only supported ODBC driver is the older “SQL Server” driver, the newer “SQL Native Client” is not yet supported by VMware.

For a new installation of VirtualCenter with a SQL Server 2005 back end follow these basic steps:

1. Launch the SQL Management Studio and connect to the desired server and instance.
2. Create a new login (vclogin) for VirtualCenter to use.
3. Create a new database (VCDB) and remember to set the owner to vclogin.
   • This action should have mapped vclogin to the dbo on the VCDB database.
4. Modify the vclogin settings and change the default database to VCDB.
5. Install VirtualCenter.

• Server Consolidation: instead of dedicating an entire physical server to VirtualCenter, you can run it in a virtual machine along with others on the same ESX Server host.
• Mobility: by encapsulating the VirtualCenter server in a virtual machine, you can transfer it from one host to another, enabling maintenance and other activities.
• Snapshots: A snapshot of the VirtualCenter virtual machine can be used for backup, archiving, and other similar purposes.
• Availability: using VMware HA, you can provide high availability for the VirtualCenter server