Les Mikesell wrote:
On Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 10:19 AM, John R Pierce pierce@hogranch.com wrote:
On 9/5/2013 3:52 AM, Scott Robbins wrote:
At one point, it would work, but not with https. 5.1 and up can have
everything managed from the web browser--they're actually dropping the client, I believe, and having you do everything from the browser. With CentOS, (as opposed to Fedora) one needed to add some keyboard trickery to get the arrow keys to work in the web console though.
but VMware ESXi 5.x is very crippled in its free configuration, with
draconian limits on how much RAM is allowed before you have to start paying for licenses.
I'd look at it the other way and say that the free version of ESXi, the
client and the conversion tool is really very nice to give away for free... In many ways it is more convenient to use than KVM and very, very stable. But, I haven't had any trouble getting KVM (or a recent virtualbox) to run the same vmdk images, so you aren't
completely tied to it.
I'd also add that the o/p said this was what they used at his job, and I find it highly unlikely that he's going to be able to convince management to move to a VM system that they're not familiar with, esp. when all of his co-workers, and presumably management, run Windows. Given that, I think the answers he needs are how to deal with VMware ESXi as it is.
And yes, I'm well aware that ESXi is a modified version of, mmm, is it still RHEL 3, or have they gone up yet?
mark
On Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 10:46 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
but VMware ESXi 5.x is very crippled in its free configuration, with
draconian limits on how much RAM is allowed before you have to start paying for licenses.
I'd look at it the other way and say that the free version of ESXi, the
client and the conversion tool is really very nice to give away for free... In many ways it is more convenient to use than KVM and very, very stable. But, I haven't had any trouble getting KVM (or a recent virtualbox) to run the same vmdk images, so you aren't
completely tied to it.
I'd also add that the o/p said this was what they used at his job, and I find it highly unlikely that he's going to be able to convince management to move to a VM system that they're not familiar with, esp. when all of his co-workers, and presumably management, run Windows. Given that, I think the answers he needs are how to deal with VMware ESXi as it is.
I wouldn't expect them to change overnight, but when they eventually buy a server with more than 32G RAM, it may be valuable to know how to continue running the VMs for free... Meanwhile, if they use exchange/outlook or other windows tools internally, that's one less battle to fight if you use the same desktop as everyone else and there is very little disadvantage to doing your real work via NX/freenx. Your desktop PC most likely already has a paid windows license anyway - if it is moderately hefty you can run vmware player there for some things and spin the images back and forth to esxi with the conversion tool.
And yes, I'm well aware that ESXi is a modified version of, mmm, is it still RHEL 3, or have they gone up yet?
The linux components were just for the shell-level interaction and I think they are mostly gone now. In any case, they don't have security updates nearly as often as RHEL/Centos pushes a new kernel which is an advantage for uptime on the guests.
On Thu, Sep 05, 2013 at 11:04:51AM -0500, Les Mikesell wrote:
On Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 10:46 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
And yes, I'm well aware that ESXi is a modified version of, mmm, is it still RHEL 3, or have they gone up yet?
The linux components were just for the shell-level interaction and I think they are mostly gone now. In any case, they don't have security updates nearly as often as RHEL/Centos pushes a new kernel which is an advantage for uptime on the guests.
If I remember correctly (but I'm no longer at that job, so don't have access to double check) around VMware 4.x or 5.x it no longer had a Linux shell. Although there are still some commands that work, I _think_ that it's now a very stripped down shell, as opposed to 3.5 which had all the commands available in a Linux shell. So, if I am correct, then Les has summed it up nicely.
On Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 11:14 AM, Scott Robbins scottro@nyc.rr.com wrote:
And yes, I'm well aware that ESXi is a modified version of, mmm, is it
still RHEL 3, or have they gone up yet?
The linux components were just for the shell-level interaction and I think they are mostly gone now. In any case, they don't have security updates nearly as often as RHEL/Centos pushes a new kernel which is an advantage for uptime on the guests.
If I remember correctly (but I'm no longer at that job, so don't have access to double check) around VMware 4.x or 5.x it no longer had a Linux shell. Although there are still some commands that work, I _think_ that it's now a very stripped down shell, as opposed to 3.5 which had all the commands available in a Linux shell. So, if I am correct, then Les has summed it up nicely.
I'm not a real expert on the ESXi command line, but I'd say that the 5.x version is more complete in terms of what you can do relating to control of VMs at the local command line or over ssh (which is now an exposed option instead of hidden away) but perhaps less linux-like (notably no perl or rsync...). I usually just start long-running VMs with the GUI client or copy them around with the converter tool and haven't tried a lot of automation over ssh, though. I do use ocsinventory-ng and there is a fusioninventory program that can pull the hardware details and VM guest list remotely and push to the inventory sever (not really supported, but the version from the remi repository seems to work). Then when you view a VM server it shows its list of guests and when you view a guest it shows the host running it - which also works with KVM and perhaps some others. Without something like that it is easy to lose track.
On 06/09/13 02:14, Scott Robbins wrote:
On Thu, Sep 05, 2013 at 11:04:51AM -0500, Les Mikesell wrote:
On Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 10:46 AM, m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
And yes, I'm well aware that ESXi is a modified version of, mmm, is it still RHEL 3, or have they gone up yet?
The linux components were just for the shell-level interaction and I think they are mostly gone now. In any case, they don't have security updates nearly as often as RHEL/Centos pushes a new kernel which is an advantage for uptime on the guests.
If I remember correctly (but I'm no longer at that job, so don't have access to double check) around VMware 4.x or 5.x it no longer had a Linux shell. Although there are still some commands that work, I _think_ that it's now a very stripped down shell, as opposed to 3.5 which had all the commands available in a Linux shell. So, if I am correct, then Les has summed it up nicely.
I believe ESXi since it's release has always been based on Busybox, ESX was based on RHEL - that's my understanding. I manage vSphere and a couple of ESXi (free) hosts and use the VMware CLI tools https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/details?downloadGroup=VSP510-VCLI-510&p... In addition I'm running a VirtualBox Windows VM to access the vSphere console.
Getting the vSphere console working in wine has not been done, and I don't even think the Crossover guys have it working either, I looked into that a while ago. So I would also just load up a virtualbox win machine to access it.
On 05/09/13 18:14, Scott Robbins wrote:
On Thu, Sep 05, 2013 at 11:04:51AM -0500, Les Mikesell wrote:
On Thu, Sep 5, 2013 at 10:46 AM,m.roth@5-cent.us wrote:
And yes, I'm well aware that ESXi is a modified version of, mmm, is it still RHEL 3, or have they gone up yet?
The linux components were just for the shell-level interaction and I think they are mostly gone now. In any case, they don't have security updates nearly as often as RHEL/Centos pushes a new kernel which is an advantage for uptime on the guests.
If I remember correctly (but I'm no longer at that job, so don't have access to double check) around VMware 4.x or 5.x it no longer had a Linux shell. Although there are still some commands that work, I _think_ that it's now a very stripped down shell, as opposed to 3.5 which had all the commands available in a Linux shell. So, if I am correct, then Les has summed it up nicely.
The Service Console was removed in the move from ESX to ESXi, so ESX 4.1 and lower has a Service Console based on RHEL (el5 for ESX 4.x, el3 for ESX 3.x). ESXi has a very limited unix userland environment which may or may not be based on RHEL. It's not really meant for general use and I have no experience with it. I prefer to use either the client or the webadministration (vCenter), alternatively I use the vSphere Manager Appliance for remote cli access using esxcli or vi-cfg, and sometimes I'll toy around with PowerCLI in a Windows VM.
-tgc
On 9/6/2013 1:49 AM, Tom G. Christensen wrote:
ESXi has a very limited unix userland environment which may or may not be based on RHEL. It's not really meant for general use and I have no experience with it.
its not. from what all I've been able to tell, its a custom shell running in a BSD like environment. there's no linux kernel in there at all.
On 06/09/13 19:33, John R Pierce wrote:
On 9/6/2013 1:49 AM, Tom G. Christensen wrote:
ESXi has a very limited unix userland environment which may or may not be based on RHEL. It's not really meant for general use and I have no experience with it.
its not. from what all I've been able to tell, its a custom shell running in a BSD like environment. there's no linux kernel in there at all.
I never said anything about a Linux kernel, I said userland based on RHEL.
I had a look at it now and while it might not be based on RHEL sources it looks like it was built on an RHEL 5 host, judging by the python banner which says it was built with [GCC version 4.1.2 20080704 (Red Hat 4.1.2-50]
Most of the standard unix commands are provided by busybox. But it seems to be using glibc and has initscripts in /etc/init.d reminiscent of RHEL, there's even a chkconfig to enable/disable services, no runlevels though. The filesystem layout is much like RHEL and it seems to definitely be a Linux userland so IMHO not very BSD like at all.
-tgc
On 10/09/13 18:52, John R Pierce wrote:
On 9/10/2013 2:15 AM, Tom G. Christensen wrote:
and has initscripts in /etc/init.d reminiscent of RHEL
/etc/init.d is from AT&T Unix System V
I'm well aware of that, but I fail to see how it is relevant in this context since I doubt that is where VMware looked for inspiration.
-tgc
-
John R Pierce -
Keith -
Les Mikesell -
m.roth＠5-cent.us -
Scott Robbins -
Tom G. Christensen