SS AdoptionGuide

VMware Solution Adoption Guide
for
<Customer>
Prepared by
<Consultant>
VMware Professional Services

<consultant>@vmware.com
Version History
Date Version Author Description Reviewers
Consultant Note: Amend all text highlighted in yellow as needed and address the consultant notes. After completion,
the comments and yellow highlighting can be removed. This text provides either sample guidance information,
configuration recommendations for specific services, or customer specific configurations.
© 2020 VMware, Inc. All rights reserved. This product is protected by U.S. and international copyright and intellectual
property laws. This product is covered by one or more patents listed at
http://www.vmware.com/download/patents.html.
VMware is a registered trademark or trademark of VMware, Inc. in the United States and/or other jurisdictions. All
other marks and names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respective companies.
If you have comments about this documentation, submit your feedback to:
pseassistance@vmware.com
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3401 Hillview Ave.
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www.vmware.com
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Contents
Document Overview...........................................................................................................................4
Solution Adoption Overview..............................................................................................................5
Solution Set Objectives................................................................................................................................5
Technology Operational Processes.............................................................................................................5
Solution Activities...............................................................................................................................7
Appendix A: Process Routine Mapping............................................................................................8
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vSphere Adoption Content
Document Overview
This adoption guide document is created by VMware Professional Services to support the subsequent operations of the
VMware solution.
This document is accompanied by other documents that focus on implementation and operation subjects, such as
installation, configuration and fundamental technology.
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Solution Adoption Overview
Adoption of any solution involves the incorporation of the technology into existing business processes. The creation,
training and verification of adopted processes is required to ensure that the original business aims are achieved post
implementation of the solution.
VMware has created a simple methodology to assist with this, the diagram below illustrates this.
Solution Set Objectives

During the scoping of the solution, VMware identified the following business objectives:
Table 1. Desired IT Outcomes of Solution

Table 2. Desired IT Capabilities to Develop
Technology Operational Processes

The following table illustrates the list of processes included in this document and how they relate to the IT Outcomes and
IT Capabilities shown in Table 1 and Table 2.
PS Consultant: Review the Consumption processes that have been inserted into section 3.2 below. Based upon the process
description map each process to one or more IT Outcomes and IT Capabilities listed in section 2.1 above. The aim is to
create the linkage between the processes provided with this engagement to the pre-sales discussion that determined the
Capabilities and IT Outcomes the customer wanted to develop.
Process Name Related IT Outcomes Related IT Capabilities
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Solution Activities
The following sections provide details of the operational use cases that contribute towards the development of the IT
Outcomes and IT Capabilities that the technology is intended to support.
Maintenance Activities
This section contains standard maintenance procedures for the capabilities being deployed as a part of the service.
This chapter includes the following topics:
 ESXi Host Procedures
 vCenter Server Infrastructure Procedures
 vSphere Network Infrastructure Procedures
 vSphere Storage Infrastructure Procedures
 High Availability Procedures
 Continuous Availability Procedures
 Dynamic Resourcing Procedures
 Virtual Machine Procedures
ESXi Host Procedures

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This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining ESXi hosts.
Using the VMware Host Client
The embedded VMware Host Client is an HTML5-based client that is only used to manage single ESXi hosts. You
can use the VMware Host Client to conduct an emergency management when vCenter Server is temporarily
unavailable.
Start the VMware Host Client and Log In
You can use the VMware Host Client to manage single ESXi hosts and perform various administrative and
troubleshooting tasks on your virtual machines.
Note The VMware Host Client only works for administrative users.
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Procedure
1 In a Web browser enter the target host name or IP address using the form
http://host-name/ui or http://host-IP-address/ui.
A log in screen appears.
2 Enter your user name and your password.
3 Click Login to continue.
4 Review the VMware Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP) page and choose whether you
want to join the program.
To learn about the program and how to configure it at any time, see Configuring the Customer
Experience Improvement Program.
5 Click OK.
Results
You are now logged in to your target ESXi host.
Log Out of the VMware Host Client
When you no longer need to view or manage your target ESXi host, log out of the VMware Host Client.
Note Closing a VMware Host Client session does not stop the host.
Procedure
 To log out of the ESXi host, click the user name at the top of the VMware Host Client window and select Log
out from the drop-down menu.
You are now logged out of the VMware Host Client. Your target ESXi host continues to run all its normal
activities.
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Using Active Directory to Manage ESXi Users
You can configure ESXi to use a directory service such as Active Directory to manage users.
Creating local user accounts on each host presents challenges with having to synchronize account names and
passwords across multiple hosts. Join ESXi hosts to an Active Directory domain to eliminate the need to create
and maintain local user accounts. Using Active Directory for user authentication simplifies the ESXi host
configuration and reduces the risk for configuration issues that could lead to unauthorized access.
When you use Active Directory, users supply their Active Directory credentials and the domain name of the
Active Directory server when adding a host to a domain.
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Configure a Host to Use Active Directory
You can configure a host to use a directory service such as Active Directory to manage users and groups.
When you add an ESXi host to Active Directory, the DOMAIN group ESX Admins is assigned full administrative
access to the host if it exists. If you do not want to make full administrative access available, see VMware
Knowledge Base article 1025569 for a workaround.
If a host is provisioned with Auto Deploy, Active Directory credentials cannot be stored on the hosts. You can
use the vSphere Authentication Proxy to join the host to an Active Directory domain. Because a trust chain
exists between the vSphere Authentication Proxy and the host, the Authentication Proxy can join the host to the
Active Directory domain. See Using vSphere Authentication Proxy.
Note When you define user account settings in Active Directory, you can limit the computers that a user can log in
to by the computer name. By default, no equivalent restrictions are set on a user account. If you set this limitation,
LDAP Bind requests for the user account fail with the message LDAP binding not successful, even if the
request is from a listed computer. You can avoid this issue by adding the netBIOS name for the Active Directory
server to the list of computers that the user account can log in to.
Prerequisites
 Verify that you have an Active Directory domain. See your directory server documentation.
 Verify that the host name of ESXi is fully qualified with the domain name of the Active Directory
forest.
fully qualified domain name = host_name.domain_name
Procedure
1 Synchronize the time between ESXi and the directory service system using NTP.
See Synchronize ESX and ESXi Clocks with a Network Time Server or the VMware Knowledge Base for
information about how to synchronize ESXi time with a Microsoft Domain Controller.
2 Ensure that the DNS servers that you configured for the host can resolve the host names for the Active
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Directory controllers.
a Browse to the host in the vSphere Client inventory. b
Click Configure.
c Under Networking, click TCP/IP configuration.
d Under TCP/IP Stack: Default, click DNS and verify that the host name and DNS server information
for the host are correct.
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What to do next
Join the host to a directory service domain. See Add a Host to a Directory Service Domain. For hosts that are
provisioned with Auto Deploy, set up the vSphere Authentication Proxy. See Using vSphere Authentication Proxy.
You can configure permissions so that users and groups from the joined Active Directory domain can access the
vCenter Server components. For information about managing permissions, see Add a Permission to an Inventory
Object .
Add a Host to a Directory Service Domain
To have your host use a directory service, you must join the host to the directory service domain. You can enter the
domain name in one of two ways:
 name.tld (for example, domain.com): The account is created under the default container.
 name.tld/container/path (for example, domain.com/OU1/OU2): The account is created under

a particular organizational unit (OU).
To use the vSphere Authentication Proxy service, see Using vSphere Authentication Proxy.
Procedure
1 Browse to a host in the vSphere Client inventory.
2 Click Configure.
3 Under System, select Authentication Services.
4 Click Join Domain.
5 Enter a domain.
Use the form name.tld or name.tld/container/path.
6 Enter the user name and password of a directory service user who has permissions to join the host to the
domain, and click OK.
7 (Optional) If you intend to use an authentication proxy, enter the proxy server IP address.
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8 Click OK to close the Directory Services Configuration dialog box.
What to do next
You can configure permissions so that users and groups from the joined Active Directory domain can access the
vCenter Server components. For information about managing permissions, see Add a Permission to an Inventory
Object .
View Directory Service Settings
You can view the type of directory server, if any, the host uses to authenticate users and the directory server
settings.
Procedure
1 Select a host in the vSphere Client inventory, and click the Configuration tab.
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2 Under Software, select Authentication Services.
The Authentication Services Settings page displays the directory service and domain settings.
Monitoring Host Health Status
You can use the vSphere Client to monitor the state of host hardware components, such as CPU processors,
memory, fans, and other components.
The host health monitoring tool allows you to monitor the health of a variety of host hardware components
including:
 CPU processors
 Memory
 Fans
 Temperature
 Voltage
 Power
 Network
 Battery
 Storage
 Cable/Interconnect
 Software components
 Watchdog
 PCI devices
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 Other
The host health monitoring tool presents data gathered using Systems Management Architecture for Server
Hardware (SMASH) profiles. The information displayed depends on the sensors available on your server hardware.
SMASH is an industry standard specification providing protocols for managing a variety of systems in the data
center. For more information, see http:// www.dmtf.org/standards/smash.
You can monitor host health status by connecting the vSphere Clientto a vCenter Server system. You can also set
alarms to trigger when the host health status changes.
Note The interpretation of hardware monitoring information is specific for each hardware vendor. Your hardware
vendor can help you understand the results of the host hardware components monitoring.
Monitor Hardware Health Status in the vSphere Client
You can monitor the health status of host hardware in the vSphere Client
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Procedure
1 Select a host in the vSphere Client .
2 Click the Monitor tab, and click Hardware Health.
3 Select the type of information to view.
Option Description
Sensors Displays all sensors arranged in a tree view. If the status is blank, the health monitoring
service cannot determine the status of the component.
Storage Sensors Displays the storage sensors.
Alerts and Warnings Displays alerts and warnings.
System Event Log Displays the system event log.
Reset Health Status Sensors in the vSphere Client
Some host hardware sensors display data that is cumulative over time. You can reset these sensors to clear
the data in them and begin collecting new data.
If you need to preserve sensor data for troubleshooting or other purposes, take a screenshot, export the data, or
download a support bundle before resetting sensors.
Prerequisites
Verify that the vCenter Hardware Status plug-in is enabled.
Procedure
1 Select a host in the vSphere Client
2 Click the Monitor tab, and click Hardware Health
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3 Click Reset sensors.
Monitoring Inventory Objects with Performance Charts
The vSphere statistics subsystem collects data on the resource usage of inventory objects. Data on a wide range of
metrics is collected at frequent intervals, processed, and archived in the vCenter Server database. You can access
statistical information through command-line monitoring utilities or by viewing performance charts in the vSphere
Client.
Counters and Metric Groups
vCenter Server systems and hosts use data counters to query for statistics. A data counter is a unit of information
relevant to a given inventory object or device. Each counter collects data for a different statistic in a metric group.
For example, the disk metric group includes separate data counters to collect data for disk read rate, disk write rate,
and disk usage. Statistics for each counter are rolled up after a specified collection interval. Each data counter
consists of several attributes that are used to determine the statistical value collected.
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For a complete list and description of performance metrics, see the vSphere API Reference.
Note Counters that are introduced in later versions might not contain data from hosts of earlier versions. For
details, see the VMware Knowledge Base.
Collection Levels and Collection Intervals
Collection levels determine the number of counters for which data is gathered during each collection interval.
Collection intervals determine the time period during which statistics are aggregated, calculated, rolled up, and
archived in the vCenter Server database. Together, the collection interval and collection level determine how much
statistical data is collected and stored in your vCenter Server database.
Data Availability
Real-time data appears in the performance charts only for hosts and virtual machines that are powered on. Historical
data appears for all supported inventory objects, but might be unavailable during certain circumstances.
Performance Chart Types
Performance metrics are displayed in different types of charts, depending on the metric type and object.
Table 1-1. Performance Chart Types
Chart Type Description
Line chart Displays metrics for a single inventory object. The data for each performance counter is plotted on a separate line in the
chart. For example, a network chart for a host can contain two lines: one showing the number of packets received, and
one showing the number of packets transmitted.
Bar chart Displays storage metrics for datastores in a selected data center. Each datastore is represented as a bar in the chart. Each
bar displays metrics based on the file type: virtual disks, snapshots, swap files, and other files.
Pie chart Displays storage metrics for a single object, based on the file types, or virtual machines. For example, a pie chart for a
datastore can display the amount of storage space occupied by the virtual machines taking up the largest space.
Stacked chart Displays metrics for the child objects that have the highest statistical values. All other objects are aggregated, and the
sum value is displayed with the term Other. For example, a host's stacked CPU usage chart displays CPU usage
metrics for the 10 virtual machines on the host that are consuming the most CPU. The Other amount contains the total
CPU usage of the remaining virtual machines.
The metrics for the host itself are displayed in separate line charts.
Stacked charts are useful in comparing the resource allocation and usage across multiple hosts or virtual machines. By
default, the 10 child objects with the highest data counter values are displayed.
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Data Counters
Each data counter includes several attributes that are used to determine the statistical value collected. See the
vSphere API Reference for a complete list and description of supported counters.
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Table 1-2. Data Counter Attributes
Attribute Description
Unit of Standard in which the statistic quantity is measured.

Measurement
 Kilobytes (KB) – 1024 bytes
Note Technically, 1 Kilobytes (KB) = 1000 bytes and 1 Kibibyte (KiB) = 1024 bytes. However, based on the
context, kilobyte is also used for 1024 bytes in the computer science literature interchangeably.
 Kilobytes per second (KBps) – 1024 bytes per second

 Kilobits (kb) – 1000 bits
 Kilobits per second (kbps) – 1000 bits per second
 Megabytes (MB)
 Megabytes per second (MBps)
 Megabits (Mb), megabits per second (Mbps)
 Megahertz (MHz)
 Microseconds (µs)
 Milliseconds (ms)
 Number (#)
 Percent (%)
 Seconds (s)
 Watts (watt)
 Joules (joule)
 Terabytes (teraBytes)
 Temperature in celsius (celsius)
Description Text description of the data counter.
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Table 1-2. Data Counter Attributes (continued)

Attribut Descriptio
Statistics Type Measurement used during the statistics interval. Related to the unit of measurement.
 Rate – Value over the current statistics interval. For example:
CPU Usage: Amount of CPU actively used by the host, resource pool, or virtual machine in the cluster.
Counter: usagemhz
Stats Type: Rate
Unit: MegaHertz (MHz)
 Delta – Change from previous statistics interval. For example:
CPU System Time for vCPU (%): Amount of time spent on system processes on each virtual CPU in the
virtual machine.
Note This is the host view of the CPU usage, not the guest operating system view. Counter: system
Stats Type: Delta
Unit: Percentage (%)
 Absolute – Absolute value (independent of the statistics interval). For example:
Memory: Amount of host machine memory used by all powered on virtual machines in the cluster. A cluster's
consumed memory consists of virtual machine consumed memory and overhead memory. It does not include
host-specific overhead memory, such as memory used by the service console or VMkernel.
Counter: consumed Stats
Type: Absolute Unit:
MegaBytes (MB)
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Attribut Descriptio
Rollup Type Calculation method used during the statistics interval to aggregate data. Determines the type of statistical values
that are returned for the counter.
 Average – Data collected during the interval is aggregated and averaged. For example:
Virtual Disk Read Requests: Number of virtual disk read commands completed on each virtual disk on the
virtual machine. The aggregate number of all virtual disk read commands is also displayed in the chart.
Counter: numberRead
Stats Type: Absolute
Unit: Number
Rollup Type: Average
 Minimum – The minimum value is rolled up.

 Maximum – The maximum value is rolled up.
The Minimum and Maximum values are collected and displayed only in statistics level 4. Minimum and
maximum rollup types are used to capture peaks in data during the interval. For real-time data, the value is the
current minimum or current maximum. For historical data, the value is the maximum or minimum of the
aggregated values.
For example, the following information for the CPU usage chart shows that the average is collected at statistics
level 1. The minimum and maximum values are collected at statistics level 4.
 Counter: usage
 Unit: Percentage (%)
 Rollup Type: Average (Minimum/Maximum)
 Collection Level: 1 (4)
 Summation – Data collected is summed. The measurement displayed in the chart represents the sum of data
collected during the interval. For example:
Network Packets Received: Number of network packets received across the top ten physical NIC instances on
the host. The chart also displays the aggregated value for all NICs.
Counter: packetRx Stats
Type: Absolute Unit:
Number
Rollup Type: Summation
 Latest – Data collected during the interval is a set value. The value displayed in the performance
charts represents the current value. For example:
Space in GB (Allocated): Total amount of logical datastore space provisioned by an administrator for the virtual
machine. It is the storage size up to which the virtual machine files on datastores can grow. This includes log
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Attribut Descriptio
files, VMX files, and other miscellaneous files.
Allocated space is not always in use.
Counter: provisioned
Stats Type: Absolute
Unit: Gigabytes (GB)
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Attribut Descriptio
Rollup Type: Latest
Collection level A collection level determines the number of data counters used to collect statistics data. Collection levels are also
referred as statistics levels. These collection levels vary from 1 to 4, with Level 4 having the most counters.
 Level 1 is the least detailed statistics level and only includes the most critical statistics, such as
aggregate CPU, memory, and network usage.
 Level 2 introduces a number of additional statistics

 Level 3 incorporates per instance statistics, for example CPU usage of a host on a per-CPU basis.
 Level 4 is the most detailed and is inclusive of all the other levels For more
information on collection levels, see Data Collection Levels .
Note Be careful when you set a higher collection level, as the process requires significant increase of resource
usage.
Metric Groups in vSphere
The performance data collection subsystem for vSphere collects performance data on various inventory items
and their devices. Data counters define individual performance metrics.
Performance metrics are organized into logical groups based on the object or object device. Statistics for one
or more metrics can be displayed in a chart.
Table 1-3. Metric Groups
Metric group Description
Cluster Performance statistics for clusters configured by using vSphere Distributed Resource Scheduler, vSphere High
Services Availability, or both.
CPU CPU utilization per host, virtual machine, resource pool, or compute resource.
Datastore Statistics for datastore utilization.
Note From VC 4.1 onwards, NFS statistics are collected under datastore statistics. For more information, see
 https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1019105
 https://communities.vmware.com/message/1729358#1729358
Disk Disk utilization per host, virtual machine, or datastore. Disk metrics include I/O performance, such as latency and
read/write speeds, and utilization metrics for storage as a finite resource.
Memory Memory utilization per host, virtual machine, resource pool, or compute resource. The value obtained is one of the
following:
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Attribut Descriptio
 For virtual machines, memory refers to the guest physical memory. Guest physical memory is the amount of
physical memory presented as a virtual-hardware component to the virtual machine, at creation time, and made
available when the virtual machine is running.
 For hosts, memory refers to the machine memory. Machine memory is the RAM that is installed on
the hardware that comprises the host.
Network Network utilization for both physical and virtual network interface controllers (NICs) and other network devices. The
virtual switches that support connectivity among all components, such as hosts, virtual machines, VMkernel.
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Table 1-3. Metric Groups (continued)
Metric groupDescription
Power Energy usage statistics per host.
Storage Data traffic statistics per host bus adapter (HBA).

Adapter
Storage Path Data traffic statistics per path.
System Overall system availability, such as the system heartbeat and uptime. These counters are available directly from hosts
and from vCenter Server.
Virtual Disk Disk utilization and disk performance metrics for virtual machines.
Virtual Flash Virtual flash counters.
Virtual Machine Virtual machine power and provisioning operations in a cluster or data center.
Operations
vSphere Statistics for the virtual machine replication performed by VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager.
Replication
Data Collection Intervals
Collection intervals determine the duration for which statistics are aggregated, calculated, rolled up, and archived.
Together, the collection interval and collection level determine how much statistical data is gathered and stored in
your vCenter Server database.
Table 1-4. Collection Intervals
Collection Interval/ Collection

Archive Length Frequency
Default Behavior
1 Day 5 Minutes Real-time (20s) statistics are rolled up to create one data point every 5 minutes. The
result is 12 data points every hour and 288 data points every day. After 30 minutes, the
six data points collected are aggregated and rolled up as a data point for the 1-Week
time range.
You can change the interval duration and archive length of the 1-Day
collection interval by configuring the statistics settings.
1 Week 30 Minutes 1-Day statistics are rolled up to create one data point every 30 minutes. The result is 48
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data points every day and 336 data points every week. Every 2 hours, the 12 data points
collected are aggregated and rolled up as a data point for the 1-Month time range.
You cannot change the default settings of the 1-Week collection interval.
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Table 1-4. Collection Intervals (continued)
Collection Interval/ Collection

Archive Length Frequency Default Behavior
1 Month 2 Hours 1-Week statistics are rolled up to create one data point every 2 hours. The result is 12 data
points every day and 360 data points every month (assuming a 30-day month). After 24
hours, the 12 data points collected are aggregated and rolled up as a data point for the 1-
Year time range.
You cannot change the default settings of the 1-Month collection interval.
1 Year 1 Day 1-Month statistics are rolled up to create one data point every day. The result is 365
data points each year.
You can change the archive length of the 1-Year collection interval by configuring
the statistics settings.
Note If you change the duration of data collection intervals you might need to allocate more storage resources.
Data Collection Levels
Each collection interval has a default collection level that determines the amount of data gathered and which
counters are available for display in the charts. Collection levels are also referred to as statistics levels.
Table 1-5. Statistics Levels
Level Metrics Best Practice
Level 1  Cluster Services (VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler) – all Use for long-term performance monitoring
metrics when device statistics are not required.
 CPU – cpuentitlement, totalmhz, usage (average), usagemhz
Level 1 is the default Collection Level for
 Disk – capacity, maxTotalLatency, provisioned, unshared, usage
all Collection Intervals.
(average), used
 Memory – consumed, mementitlement, overhead, swapinRate,
swapoutRate, swapused, totalmb, usage (average), vmmemctl
(balloon)
 Network – usage (average), IPv6
 System – heartbeat, uptime
 Virtual Machine Operations – numChangeDS,
numChangeHost, numChangeHostDS
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Level 2  Level 1 metrics Use for long-term performance monitoring
 CPU – idle, reservedCapacity when device statistics are not required but
 Disk – All metrics, excluding numberRead and numberWrite. you want to monitor more than the basic
statistics.
 Memory – All metrics, excluding memUsed and maximum and minimum
rollup values.
 Virtual Machine Operations – All metrics
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Table 1-5. Statistics Levels (continued)
LevelMetricsBest Practice
Level 3  Level 1 and Level 2 metrics Use for short-term performance monitoring
 Metrics for all counters, excluding minimum and maximum rollup after encountering problems or when device
values. statistics are required.
 Device metrics
Level 4 All metrics supported by the vCenter Server, including minimum and Use for short-term performance monitoring
maximum rollup values. after encountering problems or when device
statistics are required.
Note When the statistics levels, level 3 or level 4 are used beyond the default value, it may cause one particular
process, vpxd, to sustain memory growth, if it cannot save the statistics information to the database as quickly as
required. If the usage limit of these statistics levels is not monitored closely, it may cause vpxd to grow out of
memory and eventually crash.
So, in case the administrator decides to elevate any of these levels, it is necessary for the administrator to
monitor the size of the vpxd process to make sure that is not growing boundlessly after the change.
View Performance Charts
The vCenter Server statistics settings, the type of object selected, and the features that are enabled on the selected
object determine the amount of information displayed in charts. Charts are organized into views. You can select a
view to see related data together on one screen. You can also specify the time range, or data collection interval.
The duration extends from the selected time range to the present time.
Overview charts display multiple data sets in one panel to evaluate different resource statistics, display thumbnail
charts for child objects. It also displays charts for a parent and a child object. Advanced charts display more
information than overview charts, are configurable, and can be printed or exported. You can export data in the
PNG, JPEG, or CSV formats. See View Advanced Performance Charts.
Procedure
1 Select a valid inventory object in the vSphere Client.
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Overview and advanced performance charts are available for datacenter, cluster, host, resource pool, vApp,
and virtual machine objects. Overview charts are also available for datastores and datastore clusters.
Performance charts are not available for network objects.
2 Click the Monitor tab, and click Performance.
3 Select a view.
Available views depend on the type of object. For views that might contain many charts in a large
environment, the vSphere Client displays the charts distributed on multiple pages. You can use the arrow
buttons to navigate between pages.
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4 Select a predefined or custom time range.
View Advanced Performance Charts
Advanced charts support data counters that are not supported in other performance charts.
Procedure
1 Navigate to an inventory object in the vSphere Web Client.
2 Click the Monitor tab, and click Performance.
3 Click Advanced.
4 (Optional) To view a different chart, select an option from the View list.
The amount of historical data displayed in a chart depends on the collection interval and statistics level
set for vCenter Server.
Performance Charts Options Available Under the View Menu
The performance chart options that you can access under the View menu vary depending on the type of inventory
object you select.
For example, the Virtual Machines view is available when you view host performance charts only if there are
virtual machines on the selected host. Likewise, the Fault Tolerance view for virtual machine performance charts is
available only when that feature is enabled for the selected virtual machine.
Table 1-6. Performance Chart Views by Inventory Object
Object View List Items
Data center  Storage - space utilization charts for datastores in the data center, including space by file type and storage space used
by each datastore in the data center.
 Clusters - thumbnail CPU and memory charts for each cluster, and stacked charts for total CPU and
memory usage in the data center. This view is the default.
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Datastore and  Space - space utilization charts for the datastore:
datastore cluster  space utilization by file type
 space utilization by virtual machine
 space usage
 Performance - performance charts for the datastore or datastore cluster and for virtual machine disks on the
resource.
Note The Performance view for datastores is only available when all hosts that are connected to the datastores are
ESX/ESXi 4.1 or greater. The Performance view for datastore clusters is only available when the Storage DRS is enabled.
Cluster  Home - CPU and memory charts for the cluster.

 Resource Pools & Virtual Machines - thumbnail charts for resource pools and virtual machines, and stacked charts
for total CPU and memory usage in the cluster.
 Hosts - thumbnail charts for each host in the cluster, and stacked charts for total CPU, memory, disk
usage, and network usage.
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Table 1-6. Performance Chart Views by Inventory Object (continued)
ObjectView List Items
Host  Home - CPU, memory, disk, and network charts for the host.
 Virtual Machines - thumbnail charts for virtual machines, and stacked charts for total CPU usage and total
memory usage on the host.
Resource Pool  Home - CPU and memory charts for the resource pool.
and vApps  Resource Pools & Virtual Machines - thumbnail charts for resource pools, and virtual machines and stacked charts
for CPU and memory usage in the resource pool or vApp.
Virtual Machine  Storage - space utilization charts for the virtual machine: space by file type, space by datastore, and total
gigabytes.
 Fault Tolerance - CPU and memory charts that display comparative metrics for the fault-tolerant primary and
secondary virtual machines.
 Home - CPU, memory, network, host (thumbnail charts), and disk usage charts for the virtual machine.
vCenter Server Infrastructure Procedures
This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining vCenter Server infrastructure.
Managing Updates with vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Updating vSphere is critical to the performance and security of the environment.
This section discusses the new vSphere Lifecycle Manager service that is included with vSphere
7.0 and the common procedures for an environment.
About vSphere Lifecycle Manager
®
VMware vSphere vSphere Lifecycle Manager enables centralized and simplified lifecycle management
for VMware ESXi hosts through the use of images and baselines.
What Is Lifecycle Management?
Lifecycle management refers to the process of installing software, maintaining it through updates and upgrades, and
decommissioning it.
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In the context of maintaining a vSphere environment, your clusers and hosts in particular, lifecycle
management refers to tasks such as installing ESXi and firmware on new hosts, and updating or upgrading the
ESXi version and firmware when required.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager General Overview
vSphere Lifecycle Manager is a service that runs in vCenter Server and uses the embedded vCenter Server
PostgreSQL database. No additional installation is required to start using that feature. Upon deploying the
vCenter Server appliance, the vSphere Lifecycle Manager user interface becomes automatically enabled in the
HTML5-based vSphere Client.
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vSphere Lifecycle Manager encompasses the functionality that Update Manager provides in earlier vSphere
releases and enhances it by adding new features and options for ESXi lifecycle management at a cluster level.
In vSphere releases earlier than 7.0, Update Manager provides you with the ability to use baselines and baseline
groups for host patching and host upgrade operations. Starting with vSphere 7.0, vSphere Lifecycle Manager
introduces the option of using vSphere Lifecycle Manager images as an alternative way to manage the lifecycle
of the hosts and clusters in your environment. You can also use vSphere Lifecycle Manager to upgrade the virtual
machine hardware and VMware Tools versions of the virtual machines in your environment.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager can work in an environment that has access to the Internet, directly or through a proxy
server. It can also work in a secured network without access to the Internet. In such cases, you use the Update
Manager Download Service (UMDS) to download updates to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot, or you import
them manually.
The vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot
Several components make up vSphere Lifecycle Manager and work together to deliver the vSphere Lifecycle
Manager functionality and coordinate the major lifecycle management operations that it provides for. The vSphere
Lifecycle Manager depot is an important component in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager architecture, because it
contains all software updates that you use to create vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines and images. You can use
vSphere Lifecycle Manager only if the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot is populated with components, add-ons,
base imаges, and legacy bulletins and patches.
For more information about software updates, see Vibs, Bulletins, Components.
For more information about the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot, see Working with the vSphere Lifecycle
Manager Depot.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager Scalability
For information about the scalability that vSphere Lifecycle Manager supports, visit the VMware Configuration
Maximums Matrix at https://configmax.vmware.com/.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Images
vSphere Lifecycle Manager enables you to manage ESXi hosts and clusters with images or baselines.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines and vSphere Lifecycle Manager images are different in their essence,
the way they work, and the features they support.
You use vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines and baseline groups to perform the following tasks.
 Upgrade and patch ESXi hosts.
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 Install and update third-party software on ESXi hosts.
You use vSphere Lifecycle Manager images to perform the following tasks.
 Install a desired ESXi version on all hosts in a cluster.
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 Install and update third-party software on all ESXi hosts in a cluster.
 Update and upgrade the ESXi version on all hosts in a cluster.
 Update the firmware of all ESXi hosts in a cluster.
 Generate recommendations and use a recommended image for your cluster.
 Check the hardware compatibility of hosts and clusters against the VMware Compatibility Guideand the
vSAN Hardware Compatibility List.
To start managing a cluster with a single image, you have two options.
 Set up an image for the cluster during the creation of the cluster
For more information about creating a cluster that uses a single image, see the vCenter Server and Host
Management documentation.
 Skip setting up an image for the cluster and switch from using baselines to using images at a later time.
Note If you switch to using images, you cannot revert to using baselines for that cluster. You can only move the
hosts to a cluster that uses baselines.
To start managing a cluster with baselines and baseline groups, you must skip setting up an image during the
creation of the cluster. For more information about managing hosts and clusters with baselines and baseline groups,
see Using Baselines and Basline Groups To Update ESXi Hosts.
Table 1-7. Comparison Between vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Images
Criterion Baselines Images
Software packaging A vSphere Lifecycle Manager baseline is A vSphere Lifecycle Manager image is a
a collection of bulletins. collection of components.
Consumable formats vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines are vSphere Lifecycle Manager images are
distributed through online depots, as offline distributed through online depots, as offline
bundles, or as ISO images. bundles, or as JSON files.
Remediation result vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines list the vSphere Lifecycle Manager images define the
updates to be applied to hosts, but the ESXi precise image to be applied to the hosts after
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image on the hosts might change after remediation. No deviation from the defined
remediation. image is possible after remediation. vSphere
Lifecycle Manager does not allow solutions to
push VIBs to the hosts.
Software recommendations Limited support. Supported.
Software recommendations are only Based on the hardware of the hosts in the
available for vSAN clusters in the form of cluster, you get recommendations about
recommendation baselines. available and applicable ESXi updates or
upgrades.
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Table 1-7. Comparison Between vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Images (continued)
Criterion Baselines Images
Portability You can create a custom baseline and attach You can export an image and use it to
it to different objects in the same vCenter manage other clusters in the same or in a
Server instance. You cannot export baselines different vCenter Server instance. Images are
and distribute them across vCenter Server portable across vCenter Server instances.
instances.
Remote Office/Branch Office (ROBO) Not provided. Provided.

support
Although no specific optimization exists With vSphere Lifecycle Manager images,
for ROBO deployments, you can still use you can set up a local depot and use it in
baselines and baseline groups with ROBO environments.
ROBO clusters.
REST APIs Not available. Available.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Baseline Groups
You use baselines and baseline groups to update and upgrade the ESXi hosts in your environment.
Baselines
A baseline is a grouping of multiple bulletins. You can attach a baseline to an ESXi host and check the compliance
of the host against the associated baseline.
Baselines can be classified according to different criteria.
 Depending on the type of content, baselines are patch baselines, extension baselines, and upgrade baselines.
Patch and extension baselines contain bulletins of the respective kind. Upgrade baselines contain ESXi
images.
 Depending on how the update content is selected, baselines are fixed and dynamic.
 Depending on how they are created and managed, baselines are predefined,
recommendation, or custom baselines.
Baseline Groups
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A baseline group is a collection of non-conflicting baselines. You can attach the entire baseline group to an
inventory object to check the compliance status of the object against all the baselines in the group as a whole.
You can combine custom baselines with any of the predefined baselines to create baseline groups.
Host baseline groups can contain a single upgrade baseline, and various patch and extension baselines.
To update or upgrade ESXi hosts by using baselines or baseline groups, you must first attach the baselines or
baselines group to an inventory object.
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Although you can attach baselines and baseline groups to individual objects, a more efficient method is to attach
them to container objects, such as folders, vApps, clusters, and data centers. Individual vSphere objects inherit
baselines attached to the parent container object. Removing an object from a container removes the inherited
baselines from the object.
For more information about creating and managing baselines and baseline groups, see Creating and Working with
Baselines and Baseline Groups.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager Images
You can use a single vSphere Lifecycle Manager image to manage all ESXi hosts in a cluster. You use vSphere
Lifecycle Manager images to apply software and firmware updates to the ESXi hosts.
Today, you can use various methods and tools to deploy ESXi hosts and maintain their software lifecycle. For
®
example, you can upgrade hosts by using VMware vSphere ESXi™ Image Builder CLI, esxcli, vSphere Auto
Deploy. The different deployment and upgrade choices involve different workflows and require you to use
different ESXi image formats.
When you use vSphere Lifecycle Manager images, you follow one workflow and use the same ESXi image format
for all software lifecycle-related operations: install, upgrade, update, and patching, which significantly simplifies
the lifecycle management process.
What Is an Image?
A vSphere Lifecycle Manager image represents a desired software specification to be applied to all hosts in a
cluster. When you set up a vSphere Lifecycle Manager image, you define the full software stack that you want to run
on the hosts in a cluster: the ESXi version, additional VMware software, vendor and third-party software, for
example firmware and drivers. Using a single image to manage all hosts in a cluster ensures cluster-wide host image
homogeneity.
The Desired State Model
The concept of images that vSphere Lifecycle Manager introduces is based on the Desired State model for
managing ESXi hosts and clusters.
The desired state of an ESXi host represents both the target software and target configuration for the host as
opposed to the software and configuration that it currently runs. The Desired State model is the idea of managing
hosts and clusters by defining and applying a desired state instead of listing and following steps to change the
current state.
What Is in an Image?
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A vSphere Lifecycle Manager image can contain four elements.
 ESXi base image
The base image is an ESXi image that VMware provides with every release of ESXi. The base image contains
an image of VMware ESXi Server and additional components, such as drivers and adapters that are necessary
to boot a server. Base images have a user-readable name and a unique version that is updated with every major
or minor release of ESXi.
 Vendor add-on
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The vendor add-on is a collection of software components that OEMs create and distribute. The vendor add-
on can contain drivers, patches, and solutions.
 Firmware and drivers add-on
The firmware and drivers add-on is a special type of vendor add-on designed to assist in the firmware update
process. The firmware and drivers add-on contains firmware for a specific server type and corresponding
drivers. To add a firmware and drivers add-on to your image, you must install the hardware support manager
plug-in provided by the hardware vendor for the hosts in the respective cluster.
 Independent components
The component is the smallest discrete unit in an image. The independent components that you add to an
image contain third-party software, for example drivers or adapters.
The ESXi base image is a mandatory element. You cannot set up a vSphere Lifecycle Manager image without
selecting a base image. All other elements are optional.
What Is in an Image?
A vSphere Lifecycle Manager image can consist of up to four elements: an ESXi version, a vendor add-on, a
firmware and drivers add-on, and additional components.
When you set up and edit an image for a cluster, you specify and combine each of those elements. Spcifying an
ESXi version is always mandatory. Adding the other elements to an image is optional.
ESXi Base Image
The base image is an ESXi image that VMware provides with every release of ESXi. The base image contains
an image of VMware ESXi Server and additional components, such as drivers and adapters that are necessary
to boot a server. Base images have a user-readable name and a unique version that is updated with every major
or minor release of ESXi.
Vendor Add-On
A vendor add-on is a collection of software components for the ESXi hosts that OEMs create and distribute.
This vendor add-on can contain drivers, patches, and solutions.
Firmware and Drivers Add-On
The firmware and drivers add-on is a special type of vendor add-on designed to assist in the firmware update
process. The firmware and drivers add-on contains firmware for a specific server type and corresponding
drivers. To add a firmware and drivers add-on to your image, you must install the hardware support manager
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plug-in provided by the hardware vendor for the hosts in the respective cluster.
Component
A component is the smallest discrete unit in an image. VMware and OEMs do not publish components.
VMware packages components into base images. OEMs package components into vendor add-ons. However,
third-party software vendors can create and publish
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components, for example drivers or adapters, independently. You can add such independent components to
your image.
When you set up vSphere Lifecycle Manager image during the creation of a cluster, you can only specify an ESXi
base image and, optionally, a vendor add-on. You can later Edit Image Specs to add a firmware add-on or
indepednent components to it.
When you Switching from Baselines to Images, you can immediately select and include any of the four elements in
the image that you set up for the cluster.
Distribution Formats for vSphere Lifecycle Manager Images
You can use vSphere Lifecycle Manager to customize an ESXi base image by adding vendor add- ons and
additional components. Depending on your goal, a vSphere Lifecycle Manager image can be distributed and
consumed in three different formats.
ISO Image
Distributing an image created with vSphere Lifecycle Manager in an ISO format is useful when you need the
image to perform clean installs of ESXi and for bootstrapping purposes, for example the kickstart workflow.
You cannot use an image exported as an ISO file with another cluster that uses vSphere Lifecycle Manager images.
You can import the ISO image into the local depot of the target vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance, but you can
only use the ISO file to create upgrade baselines. You cannot use ISO files with vSphere Lifecycle Manager
images.
ZIP File
Distributing an image created with vSphere Lifecycle Manager as an offline bundle is useful when you want to
import the components that the image contains into the depot of the target vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance.
Unlike the ISO image, you cannot use a ZIP file to create upgrade baselines. JSON File
Distributing an image created with vSphere Lifecycle Manager as a JSON file is useful when you want to reuse
the same image for other clusters that use images for host management.
When you distribute the JSON file to clusters in a different vCenter Server instance, you must make sure that
the depot of the target vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance contains all components that the JSON file contains.
The JSON file contains only metadata and not the actual software payloads.
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What is the Difference Between vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Images?
You can use vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines and images to manage the lifecycle of the ESXi hosts in your
environment. Those two management methods are different in their essence, the way they work, and the features
they support.
Baselines were already available in previous vSphere releases.
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Images are a new concept in vSphere 7.0. Applying software updates by using vSphere Lifecycle Manager images
is a simple and straightforward process with a predictable result. Using images allows you to enforce and maintain
host homogeneity at cluster level.
Before you switch to using images, learn the differences between vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines and
vSphere Lifecycle Manager images.
Baselines Images
Software packaging Bulletins. Components.
Consumable formats Online depot, offline bundle, ISO Online depot, offline depot, JSON files.
images.
Software recommendations Limited support. Software Supported.

recommendations are only available for
Based on the hardware of the hosts in the
vSAN clusters in the form of
cluster, you get recommendations about
recommendation baselines.
available and applicable ESXi updates or
upgrades.
Portability You can create a custom baseline and attach You can export an image and use it to
it to different objects in the same vCenter manage other clusters in the same or in a
Server instance. You cannot export baselines different vCenter Server instance. Images are
and distribute them across vCenter Server portable across vCenter Server instances.
instances.
ROBO support Not provided. Provided.
Although no specific optimization exists for With vSphere Lifecycle Manager images,
Remote Office/Branch Office (ROBO) you can set up a local depot and use it in
deployments, you can still use baselines and ROBO environments.
baseline groups with ROBO clusters.
REST APIs Not available. Available.
Working with the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot
The vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot is the source of software updates for vSphere Lifecycle Manager.
Conceptually, the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot represents all software available for consumption to
vSphere Lifecycle Manager.
The vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot is a local depot on the vCenter Server machine. It contains all the content
from the online and offline depots that you use with vSphere Lifecycle Manager.
You can work with vSphere Lifecycle Manager only if the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot contains software
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packages. For example, ESXi base images, vendor add-ons, third-party components, and legacy patches and
updates. For more information about ESXi base images, vendor add-ons, components, and patches, see Software
Updates and Related Terminology.
You control how the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot gets populated with software. You can configure vSphere
Lifecycle Manager to download updates from online depots, or a UMDS- created shared repository. Alternatively,
you can use offline depots to import updates into the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. For more information
about the different types of depots that vSphere Lifecycle Manager can use, see vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Download Sources.
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Synchronization is the process through which the contents of the online depots that you configure vSphere
Lifecycle Manager to use get into the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. During synchronization, only the software
metadata is downloaded. The actual payloads are downloaded when they are needed, for example during staging or
remediation. When you deploy vCenter Server, vSphere Lifecycle Manager synchronizes with the official VMware
online depot automatically. After the initial synchronization, you can schedule a download task to run at regular
intervals or you can initiate a download task manually.
Import is the operation through which the contents of an offline bundle get into the vSphere Lifecycle Manager
depot. During an import operation, both the software metadata and the actual payloads are downloaded into the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
By default, vSphere Lifecycle Manager is configured to use the official VMware online depot as a download source
for software updates. The official VMware online depot contains ESXi images, OEM add-ons, drivers, and async
VMware Tools releases. You can configure ESXi to use additional online depots for components. You can also
change the default download source and use a UMDS-created shared repository.
All software updates hosted in the official VMware online depot are also available as offline bundles, which
you can download from my.vmware.com and import manually to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager Download Sources
You can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to download software from the Internet or, in air- gap scenarios,
from a UMDS-created shared repository.
Download Updates from the Internet
If you configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to use the Internet, then the download sources are practically all online
depots that you use for downloading software.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager is preconfigured to use the official VMware online depot. In the vSphere Client, you
can list additional online depots for vSphere Lifecycle Manager to download additional third-party components
from, for example CIM modules.
When vSphere Lifecycle Manager synchronizes to online depots, it downloads only the metadata of the updates.
The actual payload is downloaded during staging or remediation.
Download Updates from a UMDS Depot
In vCenter Server deployments without access to the Internet, instead of synchronizing to online depots, you can
configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to download updates from an UMDS- created shared repository. When you
configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to use a UMDS repository, synchronization of the updates metadata is not
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triggered immediately. The metadata is downloaded according to the configured download schedule or when you
initiate the download. When the default download source for vSphere Lifecycle Manager is a UMDS repository,
only the metadata is stored and displayed in the vSphere Client. The actual payload is downloaded during staging or
remediation.
Depot Overrides
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In ROBO scenarios, you can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to use a local depot with updates for a
particular cluster instead of the depots that all clusters in that vCenter Server instance use by default.
For more information, see Manage Depot Overrides for a Cluster.
Browsing the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot
You can use the vSphere Client to view and browse the contents of the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
You can view the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view. The contents of
the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot are displayed on three different tabs: Image Depot, Updates, and Imported
ISOs.
Image Depot
On the Image Depot tab, you can view all VMware base images, vendor add-ons, and components
that are available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
You can use the ESXi Versions, Vendor Addons, and Component links at the top of the pane for easier
navigation through the lists.
The ESXi Versions list contains all base images available in the depot together with information about the version,
release date, and category for each image. When you select an image from the list, an information panel appears on
the right. The panel displays a list of all components that the base image applies to a host upon remediation.
The Vendor Addons list contains all vendor addons available in the depot together with information about the
version, release date, and category for each addon. When you select an add-on from the list, an information panel
appears on the right. The panel displays information about the components that the add-on applies to the host and
the components that the add-on removes from a host upon remediation.
The Component list contains all components that are available in the depot together with information about the
version, release date, and category for each component. When you select a component from the list, an information
panel appears on the right. The panel displays information about the VIBs that the component contains.
You can filter the Component list so that it displays only independent components or all components available
in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. Independent components are components that are not part of a vendor
add-on.
You use the ESXi images, vendor add-ons, and components visible on the Image Depot tab to set up images
that you can use to manage hosts in clusters collectively.
Updates
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On the Updates tab, you can see all components available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot as bulletins.
You can use the Filter by Baseline drop-down menu to view only the bulletins that are part of a particular baseline.
When you select a bulletin from the list, additional information appears below the bulletins list. In the bottom pane,
you see information about the baselines that include the selected bulletin.
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You use the bulletins visible on the Updates tab to create baselines and baseline groups.
Because in vSphere 7.0 the official VMware depot hosts certified partner content in addition to VMware content,
the Updates tab displays a broader set of OEM bulletins, for example vendor add-ons and VMware-certified device
drivers. Some of these bulletins might have dependencies that must be pulled into the baselines that you create, so
that the remediation against those baselines is successful. As a best practice, always consult the KB article for an
individual bulletin to find information about its deployment specfics and reqired dependencies before including the
bulletin in your baselines. For more information about the official VMware depot and other types of depots, see
vSphere Lifecycle Manager Download Sources.
Starting with vSphere 7.0, some changes are also introduced in the way VMware content is packaged. As a result,
you might see additional bulletins on the Updates tab at patch and update releases. Those bulletins are usually of the
Enhancement or BugFix category. When you include those bulletins in a baseline, you might need to also include a
base ESXi bulletins in that baseline. As a best practice, to ensure successful application of patches and updates,
always include the appropriate rollup bulletin into your baselines. You can use the Show only rollup updates
toggle switch that is on the Updates tab to filter the list of bulletins.
Imported ISOs
On the Imported ISOs tab, you can see the ISO images that you import and make available to vSphere
Lifecycle Manager.
You use the ISO images visible on the Imported ISOs tab to create upgrade baselines. You cannot use an
ISO image for clusters configured to use a single vSphere Lifecycle Manager image.
Note ISO images are not distributed through any online or offline depot, they are a separate software distribution
format. As a result, they cannot become available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot through synchronization
or the regular import operation that you perform to import offline bundles (ZIP files) to the depot. To make an ISO
image available to vSphere Lifecycle Manager, you must trigger the Import ISO operation. For more information,
see Import an ISO Image to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot
Import Updates to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot
You can use an offline bundle in ZIP format and import updates to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot manually.
When you import offline bundles, you add both the update metadata and actual payload to the vSphere Lifecycle
Manager depot.
You use the import option to populate the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot with updates from an offline bundle.
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If you want to use vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines, you can import offline bundles that contain patches and
extensions for hosts that run ESXi 6.5 and later. In that case, you can use the contents of the offline bundle only for
host patching operations. If you import an OEM offline bundle that contains an ESXi image of a version earlier than
7.0, you cannot use the image for upgrade operations. To create upgrade baselines, you need an ISO image. For
more information, see Import an ISO Image to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot.
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If you want to use vSphere Lifecycle Manager images, you can import offline bundles that contain software for hosts
that run ESXi 7.0 and later. In that case, you can use the contents of the offline bundle to set up vSphere Lifecycle
Manager images, which you can use to upgrade ESXi hosts collectively.
As in previous releases, offline bundles can contain patches and extensions. Starting with vSphere 7.0, an offline
bundle can also contain an ESXi base image, a vendor add-on, or third- party software, for example, asynchronous
drivers specific to the OEM hardware requirements. For more information about base images, vendor add-ons, and
components, see Vibs, Bulletins, Components.
Prerequisites
 Verify that the updates that you import are in ZIP format.
 Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Upload File.Upload File.
Procedure
1 Navigate to the Update Manager home view.
a In the vSphere Client, select Menu > Lifecycle Manager.
b Select a vCenter Server system from the Update Manager drop-down menu.
The drop-down menu is available only when multiple vCenter Server systems are connected by a
common vCenter Single Sign-On domain. By selecting a vCenter Server system, you specify which
Update Manager instance you want to administer.
2 Select Actions > Import Updates at the top of the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
The Import Updates dialog box opens.
3 Enter a URL or browse to an offline bundle in ZIP format on your local machine.
If the upload fails, check whether the structure of the ZIP file is correct and whether the vSphere
Lifecycle Manager network settings are set up correctly.
4 Click Import.
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The Import updates task appears in the Recent Tasks pane.
Results
You imported updates to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
You can view the imported patches and extension on the Updates tab in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home
view.
You can view the imported ESXi images, vendor add-ons, and additional components on the
Image Depot tab in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
Synchronize the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot
Instead of waiting for the predefined download task to run as scheduled, you can update your local vSphere
Lifecycle Manager depot immediately.
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At regular configurable intervals, vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads updates from the configured download
sources. The download sources can be online depots or a UMDS-created shared repository.
Regardless of the download schedule, you can initiate synchronization between the vSphere Lifecycle Manager
depot and the configured download sources. Similar to scheduled synchronization, when you initiate
synchronization manually, vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads software from all online depots that you
configured it to use. For more information about configuring the vSphere Lifecycle Manager download sources,
see Configuring the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Download Sources.
During synchronization, vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads only the update metadata, the actual payloads
are downloaded during staging or remediation.
Procedure
2 Select Actions > Sync Updates at the top of the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
The Sync updates task appears in the Recent Tasks pane.
Results
You downloaded updates to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
You can view the downloaded patches and extension on the Updates tab in the vSphere Lifecycle
Manager home view.
You can view the downloaded ESXi images, vendor add-ons, and components on the Image Depot tab in the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
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Configuring the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Download Sources
You can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to download software updates for ESXi hosts either from the
Internet or from a shared repository of UMDS data.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads only the metadata and not the actual binary payload of the updates.
Downloading the metadata saves disk space and network bandwidth. The availability of regularly updated
metadata in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot lets you perform compliance checks on hosts at any time.
Whatever the download source, vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads the following types of information:
 Metadata about all ESXi 6.x updates regardless of whether you have hosts of such versions in your
environment.
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 Metadata about all ESXi 7.x updates regardless of whether you have hosts of such versions in your
environment.
 Patch recalls for ESXi 6.x hosts.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager supports the recall of patches for hosts that are running ESXi 6.5 or later. A patch is
recalled when it has problems or potential issues. After you scan the hosts in your environment, vSphere
Lifecycle Manager alerts you if the recalled patch has been installed on any host. Recalled patches cannot be
installed on hosts with vSphere Lifecycle Manager. vSphere Lifecycle Manager deletes all the recalled patches
from the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. After a patch that fixes the problem is released, vSphere Lifecycle
Manager downloads the new patch to its depot. If you have already installed the problematic patch, vSphere
Lifecycle Manager notifies you that a fix is available and prompts you to apply the new patch.
Downloading host patches from the VMware website is a secure process.
 Patches are cryptographically signed with the VMware private keys. Before you try to install a patch on a
host, the host verifies the signature. This signature enforces the end-to-end protection of the patch itself and
can also address any concerns about downloading the patch.
 vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads the patch metadata and patch binaries over SSL connections. vSphere
Lifecycle Manager verifies both the validity of the SSL certificates and the common name in the certificates.
The common name in the certificates must match the names of the servers from which vSphere Lifecycle
Manager downloads the patches. vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads the patch metadata and binaries only
after successful verification of the SSL certificates.
Download Sources
If your deployment system is connected to the Internet, you can use the default settings and links for downloading
updates to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. You can also add URL addresses to download third-party software,
for example drivers.
If your deployment system is not connected to the Internet, you can use a shared repository after downloading the
upgrades, patches, and extensions by using Update Manager Download Service (UMDS).
For more information about UMDS, see Installing Setting Up and Using Update Manager Download
Service.
The default configuration is for the vSphere Lifecycle Manager to download information directly from the
Internet. However, you can change the download source at any time. Changing the download source from a shared
repository to the Internet and the reverse is a change in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager configuration. The two
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options are mutually exclusive. You cannot download updates from the Internet and a shared repository at the
same time.
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By default, vSphere Lifecycle Manager is configured to use the official VMware online depot as a download
source. When you deploy vCenter Server, synchronization to the official VMware depot is triggered automatically.
When you change the default download source, synchronization to the new download source is not triggered
automatically. The synchronization task runs as per its schedule. To download new data, you must run the VMware
vSphere
Update Manager Download task or trigger synchronization manually.
The VMware vSphere Update Manager Download task is a scheduled task that runs at regular intervals. You
can change the schedule, and you can also trigger the VMware vSphere Update Manager Download task
independently of its schedule.
If the VMware vSphere Update Manager Download task is running when you apply the new configuration settings,
the task continues to use the old settings until it finishes. The next time the download task starts, vSphere Lifecycle
Manager uses the new settings.
Using a Proxy Server
Starting with vSphere 7.0, you cannot configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to use a proxy server on its own.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager uses the proxy settings of thevCenter Server instance where it runs.
In vSphere 6.7 and earlier, you can configure the proxy settings for Update Manager and use a proxy server to
download updates metadata from the Internet.
Configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to Use a Shared Repository as a Download Source You can
configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to use a shared repository as a source for downloading ESXi
images, vendor add-ons, and additional components.
You cannot use folders on a network drive as a shared repository. vSphere Lifecycle Manager does not download
updates from folders on a network share in the Microsoft Windows Uniform Naming Convention form (such as
\\Computer_Name_or_Computer_IP\Shared), or on a mapped network drive (for example, Z:\).
The downloading of updates takes place at configurable regular intervals. To initiate downloading of updates
regardless of the download schedule, see Synchronize the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot .
Prerequisites
 Create a shared repository by using UMDS and host the repository on a Web server or a local disk. For
detailed information about exporting the upgrades, update binaries, and update metadata in Export the
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Downloaded Patches and Notifications.
 Verify that UMDS is of version compatible with the version of vSphere Lifecycle Manager that you are using.
For more information about compatibility, see Compatibility Between UMDS and the Update Manager Server.
 Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Configure.
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Procedure
2 On the Settings tab, select Administration > Patch Setup.
3 Click the Change Download Source button.
The Change Download Source Type dialog box opens.
4 Select the Download patches from a UMDS shared repository option and enter a path or URL address to
the shared repository.
For example, C:\repository_path\, https://repository_path/ or http://
repository_path/.
In these examples, repository_path is the path to the folder with the exported downloaded upgrades, patches,
extensions, and notifications. In an environment where vSphere Lifecycle Manager does not have direct access
to the Internet, but is connected to a physical machine that has access to the Internet, the folder can be on a
Web server.
You can specify an HTTP or HTTPS address, or a location on the disk where vSphere Lifecycle
Manager runs. HTTPS addresses are supported without any authentication.
5 Click Save.
vCenter Server validates the URL. You can use the path to the shared repository only when the validation is
successful. If the validation fails, vSphere Lifecycle Manager reports a reason for the failure.
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Important If the updates in the folder that you specify are downloaded with a UMDS version that is not
compatible with the vCenter Server version that you use, the validation fails and you receive an error message.
Results
The shared repository is used as the main source for downloading software updates. Downloading
from the repository is enabled by default.
Example: Using a Folder or a Web Server as a Shared Repository
You can use a folder or a Web server as a shared repository.
 When you use a folder as a shared repository, repository_path is the path to the top-level directory that
stores the patches and notifications exported from UMDS.
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For example, use UMDS to export the patches and notifications to the F:\ drive, which is a drive mapped to
a plugged-in USB device on the physical machine where UMDS is installed. Then, plug in the USB device to
the physical machine where vSphere Lifecycle Manager runs. The device is mapped as E:\ and the folder to
configure as a shared repository for vSphere Lifecycle Manager is E:\.
 When you use a Web server as a shared repository, repository_path is the path to the top- level directory on
the Web server that stores the patches exported from UMDS.
For example, export the patches and notifications from UMDS to C:\docroot\exportdata. If the folder
is configured on a Web server and is accessible from other physical machines at the URL
https://umds_host_name/exportdata, the URL to configure as a shared repository in vSphere
Lifecycle Manager is https://umds_host_name/exportdata.
Configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to Use the Internet as a Download Source
If your deployment system is connected to the Internet, you can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to
directly download ESXi images, vendor add-ons, and other components from the configured online depots to
the local vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
The Internet is the default download source for vSphere Lifecycle Manager. Downloading takes place at
configurable regular intervals. To initiate downloading of updates regardless of the download schedule, see
Synchronize the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot .
Prerequisites
Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Configure
Procedure
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3 Click the Change Download Source button.
The Change Download Source Type dialog box opens.
4 Select the Download patches directly from the Internet option and click Save.
Add a New Download Source
If you use the Internet as a download source for updates, you can add URL addresses to third- party online depots.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager downloads software updates from all the online depots that you configured it to use.
Update metadata are downloaded from the online depots to the local vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
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The default download source for vSphere Lifecycle Manager is the official VMware depot.
Starting with vSphere 7.0, the official VMware online depot also hosts vendor add-ons and VMware-certified
device drivers. Unlike previous releases, all software that you need to install, update, or customize the ESXi
version of your hosts is available in the official VMware online depot.
Downloading updates takes place at configurable regular intervals. To initiate the downloading of updates regardless of
the download schedule, see Synchronize the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot .
Prerequisites
Procedure
3 In the Patches downloaded from the Internet pane, click New.
The New Download Source dialog box opens.
4 Enter a URL address to a new download source.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager supports both HTTP and HTTPS URL addresses. Use HTTPS URL addresses to
download data securely. The URL addresses that you add must be complete and contain an index.xml
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file, which lists the vendor and the vendor index.
Note The proxy settings that vSphere Lifecycle Manager uses are also applicable to third- party URL
addresses.
5 (Optional) Enter a short description for the download source.
6 Click Save.
Results
The new location is added to the list of download sources and downloading from it is enabled by default.
Modify a Download Source
You can enable, disable, edit, or delete a download source from the list of vSphere Lifecycle Manager
download sources.
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Prerequisites
Procedure
3 In the Patches downloaded from the Internet pane, select a URL address from the list of download
sources and select your task.
 Click Edit to edit the source URL or the description for the selected download source.
 Click Enable or Disable to enable or disable downloading from the selected download source.
 Click Delete to delete the selected download source.
Note You cannot edit or delete the default VMware download source for ESXi updates. You can only enable
or disable downloading update metadata from it.
Configuring the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Remediation Settings
Whether you manage the ESXi hosts in your environment with baselines or with images, you can configure the
behavior of vSphere Lifecycle Manager during host update and upgrade operations.
You can configure and modify the vSphere Lifecycle Manager settings only if you have the privileges to configure
the vSphere Lifecycle Manager settings and service. The permission must be assigned to the vCenter Server where
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vSphere Lifecycle Manager runs. For more information about managing users, groups, roles, and permissions, see
the vSphere Security documentation. For a list of the vSphere Lifecycle Manager privileges and their descriptions,
see vLCM Privileges.
If your vCenter Server system is connected to other vCenter Server systems by a common vCenter Single Sign-On
domain, you can configure the settings for each vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance. The configuration properties
that you modify are applied only to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance that you specify, and are not
propagated to the other instances in the domain.
You can change any of the vSphere Lifecycle Manager settings on the Settings tab in the vSphere
Lifecycle Manager home view.
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Host Remediation Settings
You can use baselines or images to remediate individual hosts or all hosts in a cluster collectively. Some
remediation settings are applicable regardless of whether you use baselines or images to initiate host remediation.
For example, you can configure virtual machine migration settings, maintenance mode settings, and quick boot for
hosts that are managed by either cluster images or baselines.
Other settings are applicable only to hosts that you manage by using baselines and baselines groups. Such
settings are allowing the installation of software on PXE booted hosts and the removal of media devices before
maintenance mode.
For information about how to configure host remediation settings, see Configure Remediation Settings for
vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Configure Remediation Settings for vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Images .
You can also configure certain cluster settings to ensure successful remediation. For more information about the
cluster settings that affect host remediation, see Cluster Settings and Host Remediation.
Quick Boot
Quick Boot is a setting that you can use with clusters that you manage with vSphere Lifecycle Manager images and
vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines. Using Quick Boot optimizes the host patching and upgrade operations. Quick
Boot lets vSphere Lifecycle Manager reduce the remediation time for hosts that undergo patch and upgrade
operations. Patch and upgrade operations do not affect the hardware of a host. If the Quick Boot feature is enabled,
vSphere Lifecycle Manager skips the hardware reboot (the BIOS or UEFI firmware reboot). As a result, the time an
ESXi host spends in maintenance mode is reduced and the risk of failures during remediation is minimized.
Quick Boot is supported on a limited set of hardware platforms and drivers. Quick Boot is not supported on
ESXi hosts that use TPM or passthrough devices. For more information about a host's compatibility with the
Quick Boot setting, see the following KB article: https:// kb.vmware.com/s/article/52477.
Cluster Settings and Host Remediation
When you remediate ESXi hosts that are in a cluster, certain cluster settings might cause remediation failure. You
must configure the cluster settings in such a way as to ensure successful remediation.
When you update the ESXi hosts in a cluster that has vSphere Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS), vSphere
High Availability (HA), and vSphere Fault Tolerance (FT) enabled, you can temporarily disable vSphere
Distributed Power Management (DPM), HA admission control, and FT for the entire cluster. When the update
finishes, vSphere Lifecycle Manager restarts these features.
DRS
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Updates might require a host to enter maintenance mode during remediation. Virtual machines cannot run when a
host is in maintenance mode. To ensure availability, you can enable DRS for the cluster and you can configure it for
vSphere vMotion. In this case, before the host is put in maintenance mode, vCenter Server migrates the virtual
machines to another ESXi host within the cluster.
To help ensure vSphere vMotion compatibility between the hosts in the cluster, you can enable Enhanced vMotion
Compatibility (EVC). EVC ensures that all hosts in the cluster present the same CPU feature set to virtual machines,
even if the actual CPUs on the hosts differ. EVC prevents migration failures due to incompatible CPUs. You can
enable EVC only in a cluster where the host CPUs meet the compatibility requirements. For more information about
EVC and the requirements that the hosts in an EVC cluster must meet, see the vCenter Server and Host
Management documentation.
DPM
If a host has no running virtual machines, DPM might put the host in standby mode, which might interrupt a
vSphere Lifecycle Manager operation. So, to make sure that all vSphere Lifecycle Manager operations finish
successfully, you can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to disable DPM during these operations. For
successful remediation, you must have vSphere Lifecycle Manager disable DPM. After the remediation task
finishes, vSphere Lifecycle Manager restores DPM.
If DPM has already put a host in standby mode, vSphere Lifecycle Manager powers on the host before compliance
checks and remediation. Additionally, for clusters that you manage with baselines, vSphere Lifecycle Manager
powers on the host before staging, too. After the respective task finishes, vSphere Lifecycle Manager turns on
DPM and HA admission control and lets DPM put the host into standby mode, if needed. vSphere Lifecycle
Manager does not remediate powered off hosts.
If a host is put in standby mode and DPM is manually disabled for a reason, vSphere Lifecycle Manager does
not remediate or power on the host.
HA Admission Control
Within a cluster, you must disable HA admission control temporarily to let vSphere vMotion proceed. This action
prevents downtime for the machines on the hosts that you remediate. You can configure vSphere Lifecycle
Manager to disable HA admission control during remediation. After the remediation of the entire cluster is
complete, vSphere Lifecycle Manager restores the HA admission control settings. vSphere Lifecycle Manager
disables HA admission control before remediation, but not before compliance checks. Additionally, for clusters
that you manage with baselines, vSphere Lifecycle Manager disables HA admission control before staging.
Fault Tolerance
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If FT is turned on for any of the virtual machines on a host within a cluster, you must temporarily turn off FT
before performing any vSphere Lifecycle Manager operation on the cluster. If FT is turned on for any of the virtual
machines on a host, vSphere Lifecycle Manager does not remediate that host. You must remediate all hosts in a
cluster with the same updates, so that FT can be reenabled after remediation. A primary virtual machine and a
secondary virtual machine cannot reside on hosts of different ESXi versions and patch levels.
Configure Remediation Settings for vSphere Lifecycle Manager Images
You can configure how ESXi hosts and VMs behave before and during the remedition of a cluster that you managed
with a single image.
When you edit images remediation settings, you set the global remediation setting for all clusters that you manage
with images. However, you can override the global remedation settings and use specific remediation settings for a
cluster. For more information, see Use Custom Remediation Settings for a Cluster Managed by an Image.
Hosts that are in a vSAN cluster can enter maintenance mode only one at a time. This behavior is a peculiarity of
the vSAN cluster. For more information about the vSphere Lifecycle Manager behavior during the remediation of
hosts in a vSAN cluster, see Remediation Hosts That are Part of a Virtual SAN Cluster (1).
For information about automatically triggered hardware compatibility checks, which is a functionality that is also
applicable only to vSAN clusters, see Automatically Triggered Hardware Compatibility Checks for Clusters.
Prerequisites
Verify that you have the proper privileges. See Images Privileges.
Procedure
2 On the Settings tab, select Host Remediation > Images.
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3 Click the Edit button.
The Edit Cluster Settings dialog box opens.
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4 Configure the images remediation settings and click Save.
Option Description
Quick Boot Quick Boot reduces the host reboot time during remediation. Before you enable Quick
Boot, you must make sure that the ESXi host is compatible with the feature.
VM power state The VM power stateoption lets you control the behavior of the virtual machines that run
on the ESXi host. You can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to power off or suspend
all running virtual machines before host remediation. Alternatively, you can choose not to
change the power state of the virtual machines.
VM migration You can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to migrate the suspended and powered
off virtual machines from the hosts that must enter maintenance mode to other hosts in
the cluster.
Maintenance mode failures You can configure how vSphere Lifecycle Manager behaves if a host fails to enter
maintenance mode before remediation. You can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to
wait for a specified retry delay period and to retry to put the host into maintenance mode
as many times as you indicate in the Number of retries text box.
HA admission control Admission control is a policy that vSphere HA uses to ensure failover capacity within a
cluster. If vSphere HA admission control is enabled during remediation, vMotion might be
unable to migrate the virtual machines within the cluster.
Disabling admission control allows a virtual machine to be powered on even if it causes

insufficient failover capacity. When this happens, no warnings are presented, and the
cluster does not turn red. If a cluster has insufficient failover capacity, vSphere HA can still
perform failovers, and uses the VM Restart Priority setting to determine which virtual
machines to power on first.
You can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to disable HA admission control. In that
case, vSphere Lifecycle Manager remediates the cluster and re-enables HA admission
control after remediation is complete.
If you do not disable HA admission control, vSphere Lifecycle Manager skips the clusters
on which HA admission control is enabled.
DPM VMware Distributed Power Management (DPM) monitors the resources consumed by the
running virtual machines in the cluster. If sufficient excess capacity exists, VMware DPM
recommends moving virtual machines to other hosts in the cluster and placing the original
host into standby mode to conserve power. If the capacity is insufficient, VMware DPM
might recommend returning standby hosts to a powered-on state.
If you select to disable DPM on the cluster, vSphere Lifecycle Manager remediates the
hosts in the cluster and re-enables DPM after remediation is complete. If you choose not
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to disable DPM, vSphere Lifecycle Manager
skips the clusters on which VMware DPM is enabled.
Results
These settings become the default failure response settings with vSphere Lifecycle Manager images. You can
specify different settings when you configure individual remediation tasks.
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Configure Remediation Settings for vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines
You can configure how vSphere Lifecycle Manager behaves before and during remediation against a
baseline or a baseline group. The remediation settings help ensure that vSphere Lifecycle Manager puts
ESXi hosts in maintenance mode before remediation.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager might behave differently during remediation against an image and against a
baseline.
You cannot use vMotion to migrate virtual machines that run on individual hosts. If vCenter Server cannot migrate
the virtual machines to another host, you can configure how vSphere Lifecycle Manager responds. You can also
configure how vSphere Lifecycle Manager responds when a host fails to enter maintenance mode.
Hosts that are in a vSAN cluster can enter maintenance mode only one at a time. This behavior is a peculiarity of
the vSAN cluster. For more information about the vSphere Lifecycle Manager behavior during the remediation of
hosts in a vSAN cluster, see vSAN and vLCM.
When you use vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines, you can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to let other
software initiate the remediation of PXE booted ESXi hosts. The remediation installs software modules on the hosts,
but typically those host updates are lost after a reboot.
To retain updates on stateless hosts after a reboot, use a PXE boot image that contains the updates. You can
update the PXE boot image before applying the updates with vSphere Lifecycle Manager, so that the updates are
not lost because of a reboot. vSphere Lifecycle Manager itself does not reboot the hosts, because it does not install
updates requiring a reboot on PXE booted ESXi hosts.
Prerequisites
Procedure
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2 On the Settings tab, select Host Remediation > Baselines.
3 Click the Edit button.
The Edit Settings for Host Remediation dialog box opens.
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4 Configure the baselines remediation settings and click Save.
Option Description
VM power State You can determine the behavior of the virtual machines that run on the host. You can
configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to power off or suspend all running virtual machines
before host remediation. Alternatively, you can choose not to change the power state of the
virtual machines.
Maintenance mode failures If a host fails to enter maintenance mode before remediation, vSphere Lifecycle
Manager waits for the specified retry delay period and retries putting the host into
maintenance mode as many times as you indicate in the Number of retries text box.
PXE booted hosts You can allow the installation of software for solutions on the PXE booted ESXi hosts in
the vSphere inventory that you manage withvSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines.
VM migration vSphere Lifecycle Manager migrates the suspended and powered off virtual machines
from the hosts that must enter maintenance mode to other hosts in the cluster.
Removable media devices vSphere Lifecycle Manager does not remediate hosts on which virtual machines have
connected CD/DVD or floppy drives. All removable media drives that are connected to the
virtual machines on a host might prevent the host from entering maintenance mode and
interrupt remediation. So, you can disconnect all removable media devices to ensure that
the respective host enters maintenance mode successfully. After remediation, vSphere
Lifecycle Manager reconnects the removable media devices if they are still available.
Quick Boot Quick Boot reduces the host reboot time during remediation. Before you enable Quick
Boot, you must make sure that the ESXi host is compatible with the feature. For more
information, see Quick Boot.
Results
These settings become the default failure response settings with vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines. You can
specify different settings when you configure individual remediation tasks.
Cluster Operations and vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Whether you manage the hosts and clusters in your environment with vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines
or vSphere Lifecycle Manager images has an impact on the basic cluster operations.
All cluster-related operations are described in full detail in the vCenter Server and Host Management
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documentation.
For information about using Auto Deploy to deploy and provision ESXi hosts, see VMware ESXi Installation and
Setup.
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Creating a Cluster
When you create a new cluster, you can specify an image to be applied to all hosts in the cluster. If you do not
specify an image during the creation of the cluster, you must use baselines for host patching and upgrade operations.
You can switch from using baselines to using images at a later time. For more information about switching from
baselines to images, see Switching from Baselines to Images.
Before you create a cluster that uses a single image or switch to using images, verify that the cluster meets all
requirements for using images. See vSphere 7.0, requirements and Limitations.
Extending a Cluster
You can extend a cluster by adding hosts to the cluster.
You can add hosts of any version to a cluster that you manage with baselines.
You can add hosts to a cluster that you manage with a single image only if the hosts are of ESXi version 7.0 and
meet all other requirements. See vSphere 7.0, requirements and Limitations. The image that the cluster uses is
applied to the newly added host upon remediation.
Note When you add a host to a vSAN cluster that you manage with a single image, vSphere Lifecycle Manager
invalidates the results from the last hardware compatibility check for the cluster. To obtain valid hardware
compatibility information about the cluster, re-run a hardware compatibility check. For instructions how to check
the hardware compatibility for a cluster, see Check Cluster Compliance Against vSAN HCL.
Removing Hosts from a Cluster
Removing a host from a cluster is a straightforward procedure. If you remove a host from a cluster that uses a
single image, the host retains the software and firmware installed during the last remediation against the image
for the cluster.
Note When you remove a host from a vSAN cluster that you manage with a single image, vSphere Lifecycle
Manager invalidates the results from the last hardware compatibility check for the cluster. To obtain valid
hardware compatibility information about the cluster, re-run a hardware compatibility check. For instructions how
to check the hardware compatibility for a cluster, see Check Cluster Compliance Against vSAN HCL.
Creating and Working with Baselines and Baseline Groups
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You use baselines and baseline groups to update the ESXi hosts in your vSphere inventory. The vSphere Lifecycle
Manager baselines are three types: predefined baselines, recommendation baselines, or custom baselines, which
you create. Depending on their content, baselines can be patch, extension, or upgrade baselines.
When you initiate a compliance check for an ESXi host, you evaluate it against baselines and baseline groups
to determine its level of compliance to those baselines or baseline groups.
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If your vCenter Server system is connected to other vCenter Server systems by a common vCenter Single Sign-
On domain, the baselines and baseline groups that you create and manage are applicable only to the inventory
objects managed by the vCenter Server system where the selected vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance runs.
In the vSphere Client, the baselines and baseline groups are displayed on the Baselines tab of the vSphere Lifecycle
Manager home view.
Predefined, Recommendation, and Custom Baselines
Predefined baselines
Predefined baselines cannot be edited or deleted, you can only attach or detach them to inventory objects.
On the Baselines tab in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view, you can see the following predefined
baselines.
 Host Security Patches
The Host Security Patches baseline checks ESXi hosts for compliance with all security patches.
 Critical Host Patches
The Critical Host Patches baseline checks ESXi hosts for compliance with all critical patches.
 Non-Critical Host Patches
The Non-Critical Host Patches baseline checks ESXi hosts for compliance with all optional patches.
The Host Security Patches, and Critical Host Patches predefined baselines are attached by default to the
vCenter Server instance where vSphere Lifecycle Manager runs.
Recommendation Baselines
Recommendation baselines are predefined baselines that vSAN generates.
You use recommendation baselines to update your vSAN clusters with recommended critical patches, drivers,
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updates, or the latest supported ESXi host version for vSAN.
These baselines appear by default when you use vSAN clusters with ESXi hosts of version 6.0 Update 2 and
later in your vSphere inventory. If your vSphere environment does not contain any vSAN clusters, no
recommendation baselines are created.
Recommendation baselines update their content periodically, which requires vSphere Lifecycle
Manager to have constant access to the Internet. The vSAN recommendation baselines are typically
refreshed every 24 hours.
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Recommendation baselines cannot be edited or deleted. You do not attach recommendation baselines to
inventory objects in your vSphere environment. You can create a baseline group by combining multiple
recommendation baselines, but you cannot add any other type of baseline to that group. Similarly, you cannot
add a recommendation baseline to a baseline group that contains upgrade, patch, and extension baselines.
Custom Baselines
Custom baselines are the baselines that you create. You can create custom patch, extension, and upgrade
baselines to meet the needs of your specific deployment.
Baseline Groups
You create a baseline group by assembling existing and non-conflicting baselines. Baseline groups allow you
to scan and remediate objects against multiple baselines at the same time.
The following are valid combinations of baselines that can make up a baseline group:
 Multiple host patch and extension baselines.
 One upgrade baseline, multiple patch, and extension baselines.
To create, edit, or delete baselines and baseline groups, you must have the Manage Baseline privilege. To attach
baselines and baseline groups to target inventory objects, you must have the Attach Baseline privilege. The
privileges must be assigned on the vCenter Server system where vSphere Lifecycle Manager runs.
For more information about managing users, groups, roles, and permissions, see the vSphere SecurityvSphere
Security documentation.
For a list of all vSphere Lifecycle Manager privileges and their descriptions, see vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Privileges (1).
Creating Baselines in vSphere 7.0
Because in vSphere 7.0 the official VMware online depot hosts certified partner content in addition to VMware
content, a broader set of OEM bulletins are available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. As a result, in the
Create Baseline and Edit Baseline wizards, you also see a broader set of OEM bulletins. Some of these bulletins
might have dependencies that must be pulled into the baselines that you create, so that the remediation against those
baselines is successful. As a best practice, always consult the KB article for an individual bulletin before you
include it in a baseline. The KB article contains information about the bulletin deployment specifics and required
dependencies.
Starting with vSphere 7.0, some changes are also introduced in the way VMware content is packaged. As a result, at
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patch and update releases, you might see additional bulletins on the patch selection page of the Create Baseline and
Edit Baseline wizards. Those bulletins are usually of the Enhancement or BugFix category. When you include those
bulletins in a baseline, you might need to also include a base ESXi bulletins in that baseline. As a best practice, to
ensure successful application of VMware patches and updates, always include the appropriate rollup bulletin into
your baselines.
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Creating and Editing Baselines and Baseline Groups
You can create custom patch, extension, and upgrade baselines to meet the needs of your specific deployment.
Also, you can create baseline groups to perform orchestrated updates and upgrades of hosts. You create and
manage baselines and baseline groups from the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
domain, and you have more than one vSphere Lifecycle Manager instances, the baselines that you create are not
applicable to the inventory objects managed by the other vCenter Server systems. Baselines are specific to the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance that you specify in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
Patch baselines can be dynamic or fixed.
Dynamic patch baselines contain a set of patches, which updates automatically according to patch availability and
the criteria that you specify. Fixed baselines contain only patches that you select, regardless of new patch
downloads.
Extension baselines contain additional software modules for ESXi hosts. This additional software might be
VMware software or third-party software. You can install additional modules by using extension baselines, and
update the installed modules by using patch baselines.
Upgrade baselines contain an ESXi image and you use upgrade baselines to upgrade hosts that are running ESXi
6.5 or ESXi 6.7 to ESXi 7.0. Host upgrades to ESXi 5.x, ESXi 6.5, or ESXi 6.7 are not supported.
A baseline group consists of a set of non-conflicting baselines. Baseline groups allow you to scan and remediate
objects against multiple baselines at the same time.
The baseline groups that you create are displayed on the Baselines tab of the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home
view.
Creating and Editing Patch or Extension Baselines
You can remediate hosts against baselines that contain patches or extensions. Depending on the patch criteria you
select, patch baselines can be either dynamic or fixed.
Dynamic patch baselines contain a set of patches, which updates automatically according to patch availability and
the criteria that you specify. Fixed baselines contain only patches that you select, regardless of new patch
downloads.
Extension baselines contain additional software modules for ESXi hosts. This additional software might be
VMware software or third-party software. You can install additional modules by using extension baselines, and
update the installed modules by using patch baselines.
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domain, and you have more than one vSphere Lifecycle Manager instances, the baselines that you create are not
applicable to the inventory objects managed by the other vCenter Server systems. Baselines are specific for the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager instance that you specify in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
Create a Fixed Patch Baseline
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A fixed baseline is a set of patches that does not change as patch availability in the depot changes.
Prerequisites
Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Manage Baselines
Procedure
2 On the Baselines tab, select New > Baseline.
The Create Baseline wizard opens.
3 On the Name and Description page, enter information about the baseline and click Next. a Enter
a name and, optionally, a description for the baseline.
b Select the Patch radio button.
c (Optional) From the ESXi version drop-down menu, select an ESXi version for the baseline.
4 On the Select Patches Automatically page, disable the automatic updates by deselecting the respective check
box and click Next.
5 On the Select Patches Manually page, select the patches that you want to include in the baseline and
click Next.
 To view only the rollup bulletins in the list, turn on the Show only rollup updates toggle swtich.
 To filter the patches that are available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot and find specific patches to
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include in the baseline, use the filter icon next to each column header. If you use several criteria to filter the
patches, the relationship between those filter criteria is defined by the Boolean operator AND.
6 On the Summary page, review your selections and click Finish.
Results
The new baseline appears in the baselines list on the Baselines tab.You can attach the baseline to a data center, a
cluster, or a host.
Create a Dynamic Patch Baseline
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A dynamic baseline is a set of patches that meet certain criteria. The content of a dynamic baseline changes as
the available patches change. You can manually exclude or add specific patches to the baseline.
Prerequisites
Procedure
b Select the Patch radio button.
c (Optional) From the ESXi version drop-down menu, select an ESXi version for the baseline.
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4 On the Select Patches Automatically page, set the criteria for adding patches to the baseline.
a Enable the automatic update of the baseline by selecting the respective check box.
b On the Criteria tab, specify the criteria that a patch must meet to be added to the baseline and
click Next.
Option Description
Patch Vendor Specifies which patch vendor to use.
Note In vSphere 7.0, the vendor name of VMware for inbox components has changed
from VMware, Inc to VMware. As a result, if you use the filter to see only components
by VMware, the filtered list contains both VMware, Inc for 6.x patches and VMware
for 7.0 patches.
Product Restricts the set of patches to the selected products or operating systems.
The asterisk at the end of a product name is a wildcard character for any
version number.
Severity Specifies the severity of patches to include.
Category Specifies the category of patches to include.
Release Date Specifies the range for the release dates of the patches.
The relationship between these fields is defined by the Boolean operator AND.
For example, when you select a product and severity option, the patches are restricted to the ones that are
applicable for the selected product and are of the specified severity level.
c (Optional) On the Matched tab, deselect patches from the ones that matched your criteria to
exclude them permanently from the baseline.
d (Optional) On the Excluded and Selected tabs, view the patches that are are excluded from the baseline
and the ones that are included in the baseline.
You can use the filter icon next to each column header on the Matched, Excluded, and Selected tabs to filter
the patches that are available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. This way, you can easily find specific
patches to exclude from or include in the baseline. If you use several criteria to filter the patches, the
relationship between those filter criteria is defined by the Boolean operator AND.
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5 On the Select Patches Manually page, select individual patches to include in the baseline and click Next.
The patches that are displayed on this page are patches that do not meet the criteria you set on the Select
Patches Automatically page. You can use the filter icon next to each column header to filter the patches that
are available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot and find specific patches to include in the baseline. If you
use several criteria to filter the patches, the relationship between those filter criteria is defined by the Boolean
operator AND.
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The patches that you add manually to the dynamic baseline stay in the baseline regardless of the automatically
downloaded patches.
Results
cluster, or a host.
Create a Host Extension Baseline
Extension baselines contain additional software for ESXi hosts. This additional software might be VMware
software or third-party software.
Extensions deliver additional host features, updated drivers for hardware, Common Information Model (CIM)
providers for managing third-party modules on the host, improvements to the performance or usability of the
existing host features, and so on.
The host extension baselines that you create are always fixed. You must carefully select the appropriate
extensions for the ESXi hosts in your environment.
You use extension baselines to install extensions on the ESXi hosts in your environment. After an extension is
installed on a host, you can update the extension module through either patch, or extension baselines.
Note When you use extension baselines, you must be aware of the functional implications that the installation of
new modules on the host might have. Extension modules might alter the behavior of ESXihosts. During the
installation of extensions, vSphere Lifecycle Manager only performs the checks and verifications expressed at the
package level.
Prerequisites
Procedure
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b Select the Extension radio button.
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4 On the Select Extensions page, select individual extensions to include in the baseline and click Next.
You can use the filter icon next to each column header to filter the extensions that are available in the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot and find specific extensions to include in the baseline. If you use several
criteria to filter the patches, the relationship between those filter criteria is defined by the Boolean operator
AND.
5 On the Select Extensions page, select individual extensions to include in the baseline and click Next.
Results
cluster, or a host.
Creating and Editing Host Upgrade Baselines
You can upgrade the hosts in your environment to ESXi 7.0 by using host upgrade baselines. To create a host upgrade
baseline, you must first upload at least one ESXi 7.0 .iso image to the Update Manager repository. Alternatively,
you can use an URL to an .iso image.
With vSphere Lifecycle Manager 7.0, you can upgrade hosts that are running ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 to ESXi 7.0.
Host upgrades to ESXi 5.x, ESXi 6.5, or ESXi 6.7 are not supported.
You upload and manage ESXi images from the Baseline Images tab in the Update Manager
home view.
Before uploading ESXi images to the Update Manager repository, you must obtain the image files from the
VMware website or another source. You can create custom ESXi images that contain third-party VIBs by using
vSphere ESXi Image Builder. For more information, see "Customizing Installations with vSphere ESXi Image
Builder" in the VMware ESXi Installation and Setup documentation.
You can include the ESXi images that are in the Update Manager repository in host upgrade baselines. To delete
an ESXi image from the Update Manager repository, first you must delete the upgrade baseline that contains it.
After you delete the baseline, you can delete the image from the Baseline Images tab.
domain, and you have more than one Update Manager instances, the host upgrade files that you upload and the
baselines that you create are not applicable to the hosts managed by other vCenter Server systems. Upgrade files
and baselines are specific for the Update Manager instance that you specify in the Update Manager home view .
Import an ISO Image to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot

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You import ESXi images in ISO format to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager local depot, so that you can create
upgrade baselines, which you use for host upgrade operations.
You can use ESXi .iso images to upgrade ESXi 6.5.x hosts and ESXi 6.7.x hosts to ESXi 7.0.
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ISO images can only be used with vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines. You cannot use an ISO image to
upgrade the hosts in a cluster that uses a single image.
To upgrade hosts, use the ESXi installer image distributed by VMware with the name format VMware-
VMvisor-Installer-7.0.0-build_number.x86_64.iso or a custom image created by using
vSphere ESXi Image Builder. You can also use ISO images created and distributed by OEMs.
Prerequisites
Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Upload File
Procedure
2 On the Imported ISOs tab, click Import ISO
3 In the Import ISO dialog box, select an image.
 Click the Browse button to import an ESXi image from your local system.
 Enter an URL address to import an ESXi image that is not on your local system.
Local images are imported immediately, whereas importing images from a URL takes some time.
4 Click Import.
Results
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The ISO image that you uploaded appears in the list of images. You can view information about the ESXi image,
such as product, version, and build details, vendor, acceptance level, and creation date.
What to do next
Create a host upgrade baseline. Create
a Host Upgrade Baseline
You can create upgrade baselines for ESXi hosts with ESXi 7.0 images, which you must first import to the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot.
You can use ESXi .iso images to upgrade ESXi 6.5.x hosts and ESXi 6.7.x hosts to ESXi 7.0.
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To upgrade hosts, use the ESXi installer image distributed by VMware with the name format VMware-
VMvisor-Installer-7.0.0-build_number.x86_64.iso or a custom image created by using
vSphere ESXi Image Builder. You can also use ISO images created and distributed by OEMs.
Note In case of an unsuccessful upgrade from ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 to ESXi 7.0, you cannot roll back to your
previous ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 instance.
Prerequisites
 Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Manage Baselines.
 Verify that you have an ESXi7.0 image available in inventory. For more information, see Import an ISO
Image to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager Depot.
Procedure
2 Start the Create Baseline wizard.
 On the Imported ISOs tab, select an ESXi image from the list and click New Baseline.
 On the Baselines tab, select New > Baseline.
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b Select the Upgrade radio button.
4 On the Select ISO page, select an ESXi image from the list and click Next.
Results
cluster, or a host.
Creating and Managing Baseline Groups
A baseline group consists of a set of non-conflicting baselines. Baseline groups allow you to scan and remediate
objects against multiple baselines at the same time.
You can create a host baseline group to perform an orchestrated update or upgrade of hosts. A baseline group
might contain a single host upgrade baseline and multiple patch or extension baselines, or a combination of host
patch and host extension baselines.
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The baseline groups that you create are displayed on the Baselines tab of the Update Manager home view.
If your vCenter Server system is connected to other vCenter Server systems by a common vCenter Single Sign-
On domain, and you have more than one Update Manager instance, the baseline groups that you create are not
applicable to the inventory objects managed by other vCenter Server systems in the group. Baseline groups are
specific for the Update Manager instance that you specify in the Update Manager home view.
Create a Host Baseline Group
You can combine multiple baselines of different types into a baseline group. For example, you can combine one
host upgrade baseline with multiple patch or extension baselines, or you can combine multiple patch and
extension baselines.
A baseline group might contain a single host upgrade baseline and multiple patch or extension baselines, or a
combination of host patch and host extension baselines.
You can create a baseline group and add baselines to it later.
Prerequisites
Procedure
2 On the Baselines tab, select New > Baseline Group.
The Create Baseline Group wizard opens.
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3 On the Name and Description page, enter a unique name and, optionally, a description for the baseline
group, and click Next.
4 (Optional) On the Upgrade Baseline page, select an upgrade baseline to include in the baseline group
and click Next .
a Select the Add the following Upgrade Baseline to the Group check box. b Select an
upgrade baseline from the list.
5 (Optional) On the Patch Baselines page, select patch baselines to include in the baseline group and click
Next.
6 (Optional) On the Extension Baselines page, select extension baselines to include in the baseline group
and click Next.
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Results
The new host baseline group appears in the baselines list on the Baselines tab. You can attach the baseline group
to a data center, a cluster, or a host.
Attach Baselines and Baseline Groups to Objects
To check the compliance status of the objects in your inventory against selected baselines and baseline groups,
you must first attach the respective baselines and baseline groups to the objects.
You attach baselines and baseline groups to individual hosts or objects that contain hosts, such as clusters, data
centers, and vCenter Server instances. In the vSphere infrastructure hierarchy, the baseline and baseline groups
that you attach to container objects are also attached to the child objects. For example, if you attach a baseline or
baseline group to a folder, the baseline or the baseline groups is inherited by all the objects in the folder, including
subfolders.
You cannot use vSphere Lifecycle Manager to update the hosts in a cluster that uses a single vSphere Lifecycle
Manager image. For more information about using vSphere Lifecycle Manager images to manage hosts in clusters
collectively, see Using Images to Install and Update ESXi Hosts and Clusters.
Prerequisites
 If you want to attach a baseline or a baseline group to a cluster, verify that the cluster is not configured to use
a single image.
 Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Manage Baselines.Attach Baseline.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, navigate to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager compliance view for an individual host
or a container object.
a Navigate to a host, cluster, or a container object. bClick
the Updates tab.
2 Select Hosts > Baselines.
3 In the Attached Baselines pane, click Attach > Attach Baseline or Baseline Group.
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The Attach dialog box opens.
4 Select one or more baselines or baseline groups and click Attach.
If you select a baseline group, all the baselines in it are attached to the object.
The selected baselines or baseline groups are attached to the object. They appear on the list in the Attached
Baselines pane. If the selected object is a container object, the selected baselines or baseline groups are
attached to all the child objects.
What to do next
Scan the selected object against the attached baselines.
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Checking Compliance Against vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Baseline Groups
Before you update or upgrade an ESXi host or a container object with vSphere Lifecycle Manager
baselines, you must first check its compliance status.
You use vSphere Lifecycle Manager to check the compliance status of ESXi hosts against the baselines and baseline
groups that you attach to the hosts or to a parent container object. You do a compliance check on hosts to determine
whether they have the latest patches or extensions. During the compliance check, attributes of the host are evaluated
against all patches, extensions, and upgrades from an attached baseline or baseline group.
You can check the compliance status of a single ESXi host or a valid container object. Supported groups of ESXi
hosts include virtual infrastructure container objects such as folders, clusters, and data centers. When you initiate a
compliance check for a container object, vSphere Lifecycle Manager scans all the ESXi hosts in that container
object.
Note If you initiate a compliance check for an inventory object, for example data center, that contains clusters that
use vSphere Lifecycle Manager images, the compliance check is not performed for those clusters. Operations
To generate compliance information, you can initiate compliance checks manually or you can schedule the
compliance checks to run at regular periods. Schedule compliance checks at a data center or vCenter Server system
level to make sure that the objects in your inventory are up-to- date.
You check the compliance status of vSphere objects from the vSphere Lifecycle Manager
compliance view.
To initiate or schedule compliance checks, you must have the Scan for Applicable Patches, Extensions,
and Upgrades privilege.
For more information about managing users, groups, roles, and permissions, see the vSphere Security
documentation.
Privileges (1).
Initiate a Compliance Check for ESXi Hosts Manually
Before remediation, you must check the compliance of the vSphere objects against the attached baselines and
baseline groups. To check the compliance status of hosts in the vSphere inventory immediately, initiate a
compliance check manually.
Prerequisites
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If you want to check the compliance status of a cluster, verify that the cluster is not configured to use a single
image.
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Procedure
the Updates tab.
The Baselines pane shows three panels. In those panels, you obtain host information about the selected
object, host compliance information, and remediation information.
3 In the compliance information panel, click Check Compliance.
Results
The selected inventory object and all child objects are scanned against all attached patch, extension, and upgrade
baselines. The larger the virtual infrastructure and the higher up in the object hierarchy that you initiate the scan,
the longer the scan takes.
Schedule Regular Compliance Checks for ESXi Hosts
You can configure vSphere Lifecycle Manager to check the compliance status of ESXi hosts at specific times or
at intervals that are convenient for you.
Prerequisites
If you want to check the compliance status of a cluster, verify that the cluster is not configured to use a single image.
Procedure
the Updates tab.
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The Baselines pane shows three panels. In those panels, you obtain host information about the selected
object, host compliance information, and remediation information.
3 In the compliance information panel, click Schedule.
The Automatic compliance check dialog box opens.
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4 Configure the compliance check schedule.
a Set the frequency and the starting point of the compliance check.
b Enter a unique name, and optionally, a description for the scan task.
c (Optional) Specify one or more email addresses to receive notification after the scan task is complete.
You must configure mail settings for the vCenter Server system to enable this option.
5 Click Save to exit the Automatic compliance check dialog box.
Compliance Statuses of ESXi Hosts, Baselines, and Baseline Groups
Compliance statuses are computed after you initiate a compliance check for an inventory object against the attached
baselines or baseline groups. The compliance statuses that baselines and baseline groups might have depend on the
applicability of the patches, extensions, and upgrades contained in the baseline or baseline group attached to an
object. The compliance status of a single host depends on the compliance statuses of all baselines and baseline
groups attached to the host.
Compliant
The compliant status indicates that a vSphere object is compliant with all baselines in an attached baseline group or
with all patches, extensions, and upgrades in an attached baseline. The compliant state requires no further action. If
a baseline contains patches or upgrades that are not relevant to the target object, the individual updates, and
baselines or baseline groups that contain them, are treated as not applicable, and represented as compliant.
Compliant are also hosts with attached patch baselines containing extensions or patches with the obsoleted by host
status.
The compliant status occurs under the following conditions:
 Target objects are compliant with the baselines and baseline groups when all updates in the baseline or
baseline group are either installed on the target object, obsoleted by host, or are not applicable to the target
object.
 The updates in a baseline are compliant when they are installed on the target object, or are not applicable to
the object.
Non-Compliant
The non-compliant status indicates that one or more baselines in a baseline group, or one or more patches,
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extensions, or upgrades in a baseline are applicable to the target object, but are not installed (missing) on the
target. You must remediate the target object to make it compliant.
When a baseline contains a non-compliant update, the overall status of the baseline is non- compliant. When a
baseline group contains a non-compliant baseline, the overall status of the baseline group is non-compliant. The
non-compliant status takes precedence over the incompatible, unknown, and compliant states.
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Unknown
When you attach a baseline or a baseline group to a vSphere object and you do not initiate a compliance check for
the object, the status of the vSphere object against the baseline or baseline group is unknown. This status indicates
that a compliance check is required, that the compliance check has failed, or that you initiated a compliance check
on an unsupported platform.
When a baseline contains updates in the compliant and unknown states, the overall status of the baseline is
unknown. When a baseline group contains unknown baselines and compliant baselines, the overall status of the
baseline group is unknown. The unknown compliance status takes precedence over the compliant status.
Incompatible
The incompatible status requires attention and further action. You must determine the reason for incompatibility by
probing further. You can remediate the objects that have this status, but the operation might not be successful. In
most cases,vSphere Lifecycle Manager provides sufficient details for the incompatibility.
When a baseline contains updates in the incompatible, compliant, and unknown states, the overall status of the
baseline is incompatible. When a baseline group contains incompatible, unknown, and compliant baselines, the
overall status of the baseline group is incompatible. The incompatible compliance status takes precedence over the
compliant and unknown compliance statuses.
View Compliance Information About ESXi Hosts
You can check how the ESXi hosts in your environment comply with the baselines and baseline groups that you
attach to those hosts. You can check and view the compliance status of an individual host or a container object.
Compliance checks provide information about the degree of compliance of an object with the attached baselines
and baseline groups.
In the compliance view for an object, you can view information about the compliance of the object with the
attached baselines and baselines groups. You can also view the individual compliance statuses of the attached
baselines and baseline groups. The compliance view changes dynamically and depends on the object that you
want to view compliance information about. For a full description of the compliance information that you can
obtain about an object, seeCompliance View.
For information about the different compliance statuses that an object might have, see Compliance
Statuses of ESXi Hosts, Baselines, and Baseline Groups .
Prerequisites
 Verify that the host for which you want to view compliance information uses baselines and is not managed
with a single vSphere Lifecycle Manager image.
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 Review the Compliance View topic.
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Procedure
the Updates tab.
2 Select Hosts > Baselines and review the compliance information in the compliance view.
Results
You see complete compliance information about the selected object.
Remediating ESXi Hosts Against vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Baseline Groups
Remediation is the process during which vSphere Lifecycle Manager applies patches, extensions, and upgrades to
ESXi hosts. Remediation makes the selected vSphere objects compliant with the attached baselines and baseline
groups.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager supports the remediation of ESXi hosts against patch, extension, and upgrade
baselines.
You can initiate remediation manually or schedule a regular remediation task to run at a time that is convenient for
you.
You can remediate a single ESXi host or a container object. You can initiate remediation at a folder, a cluster,
or a data center level.
Note If you initiate remediation for an object that contains clusters that use a single vSphere Lifecycle
Manager image, remediation is not performed on those clusters.
If a vCenter Server instance is connected to other vCenter Server systems by a common vCenter Single Sign-On
domain, you can remediate only the inventory objects managed by the vCenter Server system where the vSphere
Lifecycle Manager instance that you use runs.
Orchestrated Upgrades of ESXi Hosts

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You can use baseline groups to perform an orchestrated upgrade of the ESXi hosts in your environment. The
baseline group might contain a single host upgrade baseline and multiple patch or extension baselines, or multiple
patch and extension baselines. vSphere Lifecycle Manager first upgrades the hosts and then applies the patch or
extension baselines. Because the upgrade runs first and patches are applicable to a specific host version, the
orchestrated workflow ensures that no patches are lost during the upgrade.
Orchestrated upgrades can be performed at a host, cluster, folder, or a data center level.
Starting with vCenter Server 6.7 Update 2, you can select and work with multiple baselines instead of
grouping them into a baseline group first.
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Maintenance Mode
If the update requires it, hosts are put into maintenance mode before remediation. Virtual machines cannot run
when a host is in maintenance mode. To ensure a consistent user experience, vCenter Server migrates the virtual
machines to other hosts within the cluster before the host is put in maintenance mode. vCenter Server can migrate
the virtual machines if the cluster is configured for vMotion and if VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS)
and VMware Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (EVC) are enabled. However, EVC is not a prerequisite for
vMotion. EVC guarantees that the CPUs of the hosts are compatible. For container objects or individual hosts that
are not in a cluster, migration with vMotion cannot be performed.
To remediate vSphere objects, you must have the Remediate to Apply Patches, Extensions, and Upgrades
privilege. For more information about managing users, groups, roles, and permissions, see the vSphere Security
documentation.
Privileges (1).
Remediation Pre-Check
Before you remediate an object, you can perform a remediation pre-check on the object. During that check,
vSphere Lifecycle Manager identifies possible issues that might prevent successful remediation and suggests
actions to fix the issues.
For more information about the possible issues that might prevent successful remediation, see Remediation Pre-
Check Report.
Remediation of PXE Booted ESXi Hosts
vSphere Lifecycle Manager lets you remediate PXE booted ESXi hosts. vSphere Lifecycle Manager does
not apply the patches that require a reboot to PXE booted ESXi hosts.
If there is any additional software installed on the PXE booted ESXi host, the software might be lost if the host
restarts. Update your image profile with the additional software so that it will be present after the reboot.
To patch PXE booted ESXi hosts, you must enable the respective setting in the Edit Settings for Host
Remediation dialog box, which you open from the Settings tab in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view.
Understanding the Remediation Operation
For ESXi hosts, updates are all-inclusive. The most recent update contains the patches from all previous
releases.
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The ESXi image on the host maintains two copies. The first copy is in the active boot and the second one is in the
standby boot. When you patch an ESXi host, vSphere Lifecycle Manager creates an image based on the content of
the active boot and the content of the patch. The new ESXi image is then located in the standby boot and vSphere
Lifecycle Manager designates the active boot as the standby boot and reboots the host. When the ESXi host reboots,
the active boot contains the patched image and the standby boot contains the previous version of the ESXi host
image.
When you upgrade an ESXi host, vSphere Lifecycle Manager replaces the backup image of the host with the new
image and replaces the active boot and the standby boot. During the upgrade, the layout of the disk that hosts the
boots changes. The total disk space for an ESXi host remains 1GB, but the disk partition layout within that 1GB
disk space changes to accommodate the new size of the boots where the ESXi 7.0 image is stored.
For rollback purposes, the term update refers to all ESXi patches, updates, and upgrades. Each time you update an
ESXi host, a copy of the previous ESXi build is saved on your host.
If an update fails and the ESXi 7.0 host cannot boot from the new build, the host reverts to booting from the
original boot build. ESXi permits only one level of rollback. Only one previous build can be saved at a time. In
effect, each ESXi 7.0 host stores up to two builds, one boot build and one standby build.
The remediation of ESXi 6.5 and 6.7 hosts to their respective ESXi update releases is a patching process, while the
remediation of ESXi hosts from version 6.5 or 6.7 to 7.0 is an upgrade process.
From the vSphere Lifecycle Manager settings, you can configure the host remediation process to skip a host reboot
during host patch and host upgrade operations. This configuration setting is called Quick Boot. For more
information about configuring the vSphere Lifecycle Manager remediation settings, see Configuring the vSphere
Lifecycle Manager Remediation Settings.
Types of Host Remediation
Host remediation runs in different ways depending on the types of baselines that you attach to an object and
whether the remediated host is in a cluster or not.
Host Upgrade Remediation
When you upgrade an ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 host to ESXi 7.0, all supported custom VIBs remain intact on the
host after the upgrade, regardless of whether the VIBs are included in the installer ISO.
You can upgrade hosts by using custom ESXi images that contain third-party modules for ESXi
7.0. In such a case, third-party modules that are compatible with ESXi 7.0 stay available on the upgraded host.
Host upgrade in a high-latency network in which vSphere Lifecycle Manager and the hosts are at different locations
might take a few hours because the upgrade file is copied from the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot to the host
before the upgrade. During this time, the host stays in maintenance mode.
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vSphere Lifecycle Manager 7.0 supports upgrade from ESXi 6.5 and ESXi 6.7 to ESXi 7.0.
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Upgrading to ESXi 7.0 requires a boot device that is a minimum of 4 GB. When booting from a local disk, SAN or
iSCSI LUN, up to 128 GB of disk space is used to create ESXi system partitions. You can create a VMFS
datastore on a boot disk larger than 128 GB.
Note After you upgrade your host to ESXi 7.0, you cannot roll back to the previous ESXi versions, ESXi 6.5, ESXi
6.7. So, back up your host configuration before performing an upgrade. If the upgrade fails, you can reinstall the
ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 software that you upgraded from and restore your host configuration. For more information
about backing up and restoring your ESXi configuration, see the VMware ESXi Upgrade documentation. To
upgrade ESXi hosts, you must first import ESXi ISO images to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. You then
create baselines and baseline groups to manage the upgrades for the ESXi hosts.
Host Patch Remediation
Patching is the process of remediating ESXi hosts against patch baselines.
The remediation of ESXi 6.5 and 6.7 hosts to their respective ESXi update releases is a patching process, while the
remediation of ESXi hosts from version 6.5 or 6.7 to 7.0 is an upgrade process.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager handles host patches in the following ways:
 If a patch in a patch baseline requires the installation of another patch, vSphere Lifecycle Manager detects the
prerequisite in thedepot and installs it together with the selected patch.
 If a patch is in a conflict with other patches that are installed on the host, the conflicting patch might not be
staged or installed. However, if another patch in the baseline resolves the conflicts, the conflicting patch is
installed. For example, consider a baseline that contains patch A and patch C, and patch A conflicts with patch
B, which is already installed on the host. If patch C obsoletes patch B, and patch C is not in a conflict with
patch A, the remediation process installs patches A and C.
 If a patch is in a conflict with the patches in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot and is not in a conflict with
the host, after a compliance check, vSphere Lifecycle Manager reports this patch as a conflicting one. You can
stage and apply the patch to the host.
 When multiple versions of the same patch are selected, vSphere Lifecycle Manager installs the latest version
and skips installing the earlier versions.
During patch remediation, vSphere Lifecycle Manager automatically installs the prerequisites of the patches.
With vSphere Lifecycle Manager 7.0, you can remediate hosts of version ESXi 6.5 and ESXi 6.7 against patches
from offline bundles, which you import to the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot manually.
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You can stage patches before remediation to reduce host downtime.
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Host Extension Remediation
During extension remediation, vSphere Lifecycle Manager does not automatically install the prerequisites of the
extension. Missing extension prerequisites cause some remediation operations to fail. If the missing prerequisite
is a patch, you can add it to a patch baseline. If the missing prerequisite is an extension, you can add it to the same
or another extension baseline. You can then remediate the host against the baseline or baselines that contain the
prerequisite and the original extension baseline.
Remediating ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 Hosts Against an ESXi 7.0 Image
When you upgrade an ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 host to ESXi 7.0, all supported custom VIBs remain intact on the
host after the upgrade, regardless of whether the VIBs are included in the installer ISO.
When you perform a compliance check, the target host is scanned against a set of VIBs from the upgrade image. If
you check the compliance of a host against an upgrade baseline that contains an ISO image of the same version as
the target host, vSphere Lifecycle Manager displays Compliant or Non-compliant compliance status. If the upgrade
image is the basic one distributed by VMware, or is a custom ISO image that contains the same set of VIBs as the
ones already installed on the target host, the scan result is Compliant. If the upgrade ISO contains VIBs that are of
different kind or version than the VIBs that are already on the target host, the scan result is Non-compliant.
The remediation process of an ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 host against an ESXi 7.0 image is an upgrade process.
Note Upgrading to ESXi 7.0 requires a boot device that is a minimum of 4 GB. When booting from a local disk,
SAN or iSCSI LUN, up to 128 GB of disk space is used to create ESXi system partitions. You can create a VMFS
datastore on a boot disk larger than 128 GB.
You can use an ISO 7.0 image in an upgrade operation of an ESXi 7.0 host. The remediation process of ESXi 7.0
host by using ESXi 7.0 image with additional VIBs is equivalent to a patching process. Because the upgrade image
is of the same version as the target host, upon completing the upgrade operation, the additional VIBs are added to
the target host.
Table 1-8. Scan and Remediation Situations for ESXi 6.5 and ESXi 6.7 Hosts Against ESXi 7.0 Images
Action Description
Compliance check and remediation of ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 hosts vSphere Lifecycle Manager displays a Non-Compliant compliance
against an ESXi 7.0 image that contains additional non-conflicting status for the host. Remediation succeeds. All VIBs on the target host
before remediation remain on the host. All VIBs from the upgrade
and non-obsoleting VIBs with the target host.
image that are not present on the target host before remediation are
added to the host.
Compliance check and remediation of ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 hosts vSphere Lifecycle Manager displays a Non-Compliant compliance
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against an ESXi 7.0 image that contains VIBs of a version later than status for the host. Remediation succeeds. VIBs on the target host are
the version of the same VIBs on the target host. updated to the later version.
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Table 1-8. Scan and Remediation Situations for ESXi 6.5 and ESXi 6.7 Hosts Against ESXi 7.0 Images
(continued)
ActionDescription
Compliance check and remediation of ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 hosts vSphere Lifecycle Manager displays an Incompatible compliance
against an ESXi 7.0 image that contains conflicting VIBs with the status for the host. Remediation fails. The host remains intact.
target host.
Scan and remediation of ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 hosts against an ESXi  If the vendor-tagged VIBs do not match the host hardware,
7.0 image that contains vendor-tagged VIBs. vSphere Lifecycle Manager displays an Incompatible
compliance status for the host. Remediation fails.
 If the vendor-tagged VIBs match the host hardware, vSphere
Lifecycle Manager displays a Non-Compliant compliance
status for the host and remediation succeeds.
Scan and remediation of ESXi 6.5 or ESXi 6.7 hosts against an ESXi Remediation succeeds. All VIBs that have been installed on the target
7.0 image that contains VIBs that obsolete the VIBs installed on the host before remediation are replaced by the newer VIBs from the
host. ESXi image.
Remediation Pre-Check Report
The remediation pre-check report shows the results of a check that is performed on a cluster or a host before
remediation. During that check, vSphere Lifecycle Manager identifies possible issues that might prevent successful
remediation. Depending on the type of issue, vSphere Lifecycle Manager suggests actions that you must take to fix
the issue or resolves the issue automatically.
You can generate a pre-check remediation report in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager compliance view for an
object.
Table 1-9. Cluster Issues
Current Configuration/
Issue
Recommended Action Details
DRS is disabled on the Enable DRS on the cluster. DRS enables vCenter Server to place and migrate virtual machines
cluster. automatically on hosts to attain the best use of cluster resources.
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vSAN health check fails Navigate to the vSAN Health page The vSAN health check performs a series of tests on the hosts in the
during the pre-check. and address any health issues vSAN cluster. The vSAN health check must succeed to ensure the hosts
are successfully remediated. If you start a remediation task in a vSAN
before proceeding with
cluster that failed the vSAN health check during the remediation pre-
remediation.
check, the hosts enter maintenance mode, get upgraded, but might fail
to exit maintenance mode. The remediation eventually fails.
Insufficient licenses for Ensure that you have multiple Starting with vSphere 7.0, one CPU license covers up to 32 physical
one or multiple ESXi hosts licenses for the ESXi hosts that cores. If a CPU has more than 32 cores, you must assign additional
in the cluster. have more than 32 cores per CPU. CPU licenses to the respective ESXi host. For more information, see
https://www.vmware.com/ company/news/updates/cpu-pricing-
model-update-
feb-2020.html.
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Table 1-9. Cluster Issues (continued)
Current Configuration/
IssueRecommended Action Details
DPM is enabled on the None. If a host has no running virtual machines, DPM might put the host in
cluster. standby mode before or during remediation and vSphere Lifecycle
vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Manager cannot remediate them.
disables DPM automatically.
HA admission control is None. HA admission control prevents the migration of virtual machines with
enabled on the cluster. vSphere vMotion and the hosts cannot enter maintenance mode.
vSphere Lifecycle Manager
disables HA admission control
automatically.
Table 1-10. Host Issues
Current Configuration/Issue Recommended Action Details
A CD/DVD drive is attached to a Disconnect the CD/DVD Any CD/DVD drives or removable devices connected to the virtual
virtual machine on the ESXi host. drive. machines on a host might prevent the host from entering maintenance
mode. When you start a remediation operation, the hosts with virtual
machines to which removable devices are connected are not
remediated.
A floppy drive is attached to a Disconnect the floppy Any floppy drives or removable devices connected to the virtual
virtual machine on the ESXi host. drive. machines on a host might prevent the host from entering
maintenance mode. When you start a remediation operation, the
hosts with virtual machines to which removable devices are
connected are not remediated.
Fault Tolerance (FT) is enabled for a Disable FT for the virtual If FT is enabled for any of the virtual machines on a host, vSphere
virtual machine on the ESXi host. machine. Lifecycle Manager cannot remediate that host.
A powered on virtual machine is "Disable Virtual Flash Starting with vSphere 7.0, Virtual Flash Read Cache is not
configured to use Virtual Flash Read Read Cache before supported. During an upgrade operation, vSphere Lifecycle Manager
Cache. proceeding with the removes Virtual Flash Read Cache for all virtual machines on the
upgrade. host. Before remediation, consult
https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/2057840.
VMware vCenter Server is installed Enable DRS on the cluster One of the virtual machines in the cluster runs the vCenter Server
on a virtual machine on the ESXi host and ensure that virtual instance that you currently use. If you enable DRS on the cluster,
machines can be migrated vSphere vMotion can migrate the virtual machine where vCenter
and DRS is disabled on the cluster.
with vSphere vMotion. Server runs to ensure that the remediation of the hosts is successful.
An ESXi host in the cluster has a CPU Assign as many licenses as Starting with vSphere 7.0, one CPU license covers up to 32 physical
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wih more than 32 cores and requires the host needs. cores. If a CPU has more than 32 cores, you must obtain additional
multiple licenses. CPU licenses. For more information, see
https://www.vmware.com/company/news/updates/cpu- pricing-
model-update-feb-2020.html.
Generate a Pre-Remediation Check Report
When you generate a pre-remediation check report, vSphere Lifecycle Manager generates a list with actions that
you must perform to ensure successful remediation of the hosts in your cluster.
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The remediation pre-check report contains information about issues at the cluster, host, and VM level that might
prevent the completion of remediation.
For information about the possible issues that might prevent successful remediation, see Remediation Pre-
Check Report.
Procedure
the Updates tab.
2 Select Host > Baselines.
3 In the Baselines pane, click Pre-Check Remediation.
The Remediation Pre-check dialog box opens.
4 Review the results from the pre-check and click Done.
In the bottom pane of the Remediation Pre-check dialog box, you see a list of issues at the host and virtual
machine level.
Results
The Remediation Pre-check dialog box lists the issues with cluster, hosts, and virtual machines that might
prevent successful remediation of the selected object.
In the upper pane of the Remediation Pre-check dialog box, you see a list of issues at a cluster level.
In the bottom pane of the Remediation Pre-check dialog box, you see a list of issues at the host and virtual
machine level.
What to do next
Fix all issues that vSphere Lifecycle Manager identifies during the pre-remediation check and remediate the
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selected object.
Remediate ESXi Hosts Against a Single Baseline or Multiple Baselines
You can remediate hosts against attached patch, upgrade, and extension baselines or baseline groups.
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You can remediate a host against a single baseline, multiple baselines of the same type, or against a baseline
group. To remediate against baselines of different types, you must create a baseline group. Baseline groups
might contain multiple patch and extension baselines, or an upgrade baseline combined with multiple patch and
extension baselines.
Note Because in vSphere 7.0 the official VMware online depot hosts certified partner content in addition to
VMware content, a broader set of OEM bulletins are available in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager depot. As a result,
a broader set of OEM bulletins are included in the vSphere Lifecycle Manager predefined bulletins. During
remediation, always inspect the contents of those baselines to exclude the bulletins that you do not need in the
baseline. For the bulletins that you do need, consult the corresponding KB articles for information about deployment
specifics and dependencies. Verify that dependent bulletins are also included in the baselines that you use for
remediation.
You can remediate ESXi hosts against a single attached upgrade baseline at a time. You can upgrade all hosts in
your vSphere inventory by using a single upgrade baseline that contains an ESXi 7.0 image.
You can remediate a single ESXi host or a group of ESXi hosts in a container object, such as a folder, a cluster,
or a data center. You can also initiate remediation at a vCenter Server level.
Note If a vCenter HA failover is initiated during the remediation of a cluster, the remediation task is canceled. After
the failover finishes, you must restart the remediation task on the new node.
Prerequisites
 Required privileges: VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager.Manage Patches and

Upgrades.Remediate to Apply Patches, Extensions, and Upgrades.
 Attach a patch, upgrade, or extension baseline or a baseline group containing patches, upgrades, and
extensions to the host.
 Resolve any issues that occur during Remediation Pre-check.
 In upgrade scenarios, verify that the ESXi hosts to upgrade have a boot disk of at least 4 GB. When booting
from a local disk, SAN or iSCSI LUN, up to 128 GB of disk space is used to create ESXi system partitions.
You can create a VMFS datastore on a boot disk larger than 128 GB.
Procedure
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the Updates tab.
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3 In the Attached Baselines and Baseline Groups pane, select the baselines and baseline groups to use
for remediation.
You can select a single baseline or baseline group. You can also select multiple baselines and baseline groups.
Your selection of baselines and baseline groups must contain only one upgrade baseline.
4 Click Remediate.
If the selected baselines and baseline groups do not contain an upgrade image, the
Remediate dialog box opens.
If the selected baselines and baseline groups contain an upgrade image, the End User License
Agreement dialog box opens.
5 If the selection of baselines and baseline groups contains an upgrade baseline, accept the terms and the
license agreement in the End User License Agreement dialog box.
After you accept the agreement and click OK to close the dialog box, the Remediate dialog box opens.
6 In the Remediate dialog box, review the remediation settings and make any necessary changes.
a Review the list of actions that vSphere Lifecycle Manager must perform to ensure successful
remediation.
b (Optional) To generate a full pre-remediation check report, click Show Full Remediation Pre-Check
Report.
If you select this option, the Remediate dialog box closes and vSphere Lifecycle Manager does not
proceed with the remediation process. Instead, the Remediation Pre-Check dialog box opens. After you
review the results from the pre-remediation check, you must initiate remediation again.
c Review the list of hosts to be remediated and deselect any host that you do not want to remediate.
The list contains all the hosts to which the selected baselines and baseline groups are attached. Even if you
navigated to a single host before initiating remediation, the list might display multiple hosts to be
remediated. All hosts in the list are selected by default. Deselecting hosts from the list changes the overall
number of hosts to be remediated.
7 (Optional) To view information about the updates that will be installed during the remediation, expand the
Install list.
If the selection of baselines and baseline groups contains an upgrade baseline, information about the ESXi
image is also displayed.
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8 (Optional) To schedule the remediation task for a later time, expand Scheduling Options and configure the
scheduled task.
By default, the remediation task starts immediately after closing the Remediate dialog box.
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9 Expand Remediation settings and review the remediation settings.
 To disable Quick Boot, deselect the respective check box in the table.
 To disable health checks after remediation, disable the respective check box in the table.
 To ignore warnings about unsupported hardware devices, select the respective check box in the table.
 To change any other of the remediation settings, click the Close Dialog And Go To Settings link
above the table.
If you select this option, the Remediate dialog box closes and vSphere Lifecycle Manager does not
proceed with the remediation process. Instead, you are redirected to the Baselines Remediation Settings
pane on the Settings tab of the vSphere Lifecycle Manager home view. To change any of the remediation
settings, click the Edit button.
Remediation does not resume automatically. After you make the desired changes, you must initiate
remediation again.
10 Click Remediate.
Results
Depending on the remediation schedule, the remediation task starts immediately or runs later.
Upgrade the VM Hardware Compatibility of Virtual Machines
You can upgrade the hardware of virtual machines to the latest hardware version that the host supports. You can
upgrade immediately or schedule an upgrade at a time that is convenient for you.
With vSphere Lifecycle Manager, you can upgrade the hardware compatibility version of a single virtual machine
or multiple virtual machines simultaneously. Supported container objects for virtual machines in the vSphere
inventory are folders, vApps, data centers.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, navigate to a single virtual machine or a container object.
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You can also initiate upgrade at the level of any inventory object where virtual machines run. For example,
you can start the upgrade operation at a host or cluster level.
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2 Open the Upgrade VM Hardware to Match Host dialog box.
Inventory Object Steps
Virtual Machine a Click the Updates tab.

b In the VM Hardware Compatibility panel, click Upgrade to Match Host.
Container Object, Host, Cluster, a Click the Updates tab.

Data Center, or vCenter Server b Select Hosts > VM Hardware.
Instance c If the selected inventory object is a data center or a vCenter Server instance,
select a cluster from the list.
A list of all virtual machines in the cluster appears in the bottom pane. d Select the
virtual machines to upgrade.
e Click Upgrade to Match Host.
A list of the virtual machines selected for upgrading is visible in the Upgrade VM Hardware to Match Host
dialog box.
3 (Optional) To change the selection of the virtual machines to upgrade, select or deselect virtual machines
from the list.
4 (Optional) To schedule the upgrade for a specific date and time, expand Scheduling Options
and configure the scheduled task.
a Enter a name and, optionally, a description for the scheduled upgrade task.
b Use the Powered On VMs, Powered Off VMs, and Suspended VMs drop-down menus to configure the
upgrade to run immediately or at a specific date and time.
5 (Optional) Expand Rollback Options.
a To enable or disable taking of snapshots of virtual machines before remediating them, select or
deselect the Take snapshot of VMs check box.
The option to take snapshots is selected by default. b
Configure snapshots.
 Keep snapshots indefinitely.
 Keep snapshots for a fixed period. c
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Enter a new snapshot name.
Additional details about the snapshot can be entered in the Snapshot Description text box.
d Select the Include the virtual machine memory in the snapshot check box.
6 Review your selections and click the Upgrade to Match Host button.
Results
The hardware versions of the selected virtual machines are upgraded and the virtual machine status changes to
Up to Date.
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Upgrade the VMware Tools Version of Virtual Machines
You can upgrade the VMware Tools version of virtual machines to the latest version that the host supports. You can
upgrade immediately or schedule an upgrade at a time that is convenient for you.
With vSphere Lifecycle Manager, you can upgrade the VMware Tools version of a single virtual machine or
multiple virtual machines simultaneously. Supported container objects for virtual machines in the vSphere
inventory are folders, vApps, data centers.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, navigate to a single virtual machine or a container object.
You can initiate the upgrade at the level of any inventory object where virtual machines run. For example,
you can start the upgrade operation at a host or cluster level.
2 Open the Upgrade VMware Tools to Match Host dialog box.
Inventory Object Steps
Virtual Machine a Click the Updates tab.

b In the VMware Tools panel, click Upgrade to Match Host.
Container Object, Host, Cluster, a Click the Updates tab.

Data Center, or vCenter Server b Select Hosts > VMware Tools.
Instance c If the selected inventory object is a data center or a vCenter Server instance,
select a cluster from the list.
A list of all virtual machines in the cluster appears in the bottom pane. d In the
VMs in Cluster pane, select the virtual machines to upgrade.
e Click Upgrade to Match Host.
A list of the virtual machines selected for upgrading is visible in the Upgrade VMware Tools to Match
Host dialog box.
3 (Optional) To change the selection of the virtual machines to upgrade, select or deselect virtual machines
from the list.
4 (Optional) To schedule the upgrade for a specific date and time, expand Scheduling Options
and configure the scheduled task.
a Enter a name and, optionally, a description for the scheduled upgrade task.
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b Use the Powered On VMs, Powered Off VMs, and Suspended VMs drop-down menus to configure the
upgrade to run immediately or at a specific date and time.
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5 (Optional) Expand Rollback Options.
a To enable or disable taking of snapshots of virtual machines before remediating them, select or
deselect the Take snapshot of VMs check box.
The option to take snapshots is selected by default. b
Configure snapshots.
 Keep snapshots indefinitely.
 Keep snapshots for a fixed period. c
Enter a new snapshot name.
Additional details about the snapshot can be entered in the Snapshot Description text box.
d Select the Include the virtual machine memory in the snapshot check box.
6 Review your selections and click the Upgrade to Match Host button.
Results
The VMware Tools version that runs on the selected virtual machines is upgraded and the VMware Tools
status changes to Up to Date.
Switching from Baselines to Images
In vSphere 7.0, you can manage a cluster with either baselines or images. You cannot use both at the same time for a
single cluster. Even if you did not set up an image for the cluster during the cluster creation, you can at any time
switch from using baselines to switching images for the cluster.
To switch to vSphere Lifecycle Manager images, you must set up a new image or import an existing one. Before you
proceed with setting up or importing an image, vCenter Server checks and reports if the cluster is eligible for using
images. For more information about cluster eligibility, see Cluster Eligibility for vLCM images.
With standalone hosts, you can only use baselines. For more information about the difference between baselines
and images, see vSphere Lifecycle Manager Baselines and Images.
Requirements
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To switch to using images, the cluster must meet multiple requirements.
 All ESXi hosts must be of version 7.0 and later.
 All ESXi hosts must be stateful. A stateful install is one in which the the host boots from a disk.
 No host in the cluster can contain any unknown components.
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If a host is of version earlier than 7.0, you must first use an upgrade baseline to upgrade the host and then you can
successfully switch to using images. For more information about using baselines for host patching and upgrade
operations, see Using Baselines and Basline Groups To Update ESXi Hosts.
For more information about converting a stateless host into a stateful host, find information about Auto
Deploy in the VMware ESXi Installation and Setup documentation.
Specifics
Several behavioral specifics exist when you switch to using vSphere Lifecycle Manager images.
 If you switch to using images, you cannot revert to using baselines for the cluster. You can move the hosts to a
cluster that uses baselines, but you cannot change a cluster that already uses a single image for management
purposes.
 When you set up and save an image for a cluster, the image is not applied to the hosts in the cluster unless you
remediate the hosts. The mere action of changing the management method does not alter the hosts in the
cluster.
 After you set up an image for the cluster and remediate the hosts in the cluster against the image, standalone
VIBs are deleted from the hosts.
 After you set up an image for the cluster and remediate the hosts in the cluster against the image, non-
integrated solution agents are deleted from the hosts.
Before you switch to using vSphere Lifecycle Manager images, learn what the new functionality lets you do and
what the differences between using baselines and using images are.
Using Baselines Using Images
Validation Not supported. Supported.
You do not validate a baseline before You can validate a vSphere Lifecycle
applying the updates to the hosts. Manager image to check if it is applicable
to all hosts in the cluster. You can also
You can only perform a remediation pre- perform a remediation pre-check.
check.
Compliance checks With baselines, you can check the With vSphere Lifecycle Manager images, you
compliance of an object against a single can check the compliance of the hosts against
or against multiple baselines. a single image. To check the compliance
against another image, you must first set up
the new image.
Staging You can stage updates to the hosts before Not supported.
actually installing them.
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Using Baselines Using Images
Remediation With vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines, With vSphere Lifecycle Manager images, you
you can remediate an object against a can add, remove, or modify the components in
single baseline or against multiple the image that you use for a cluster. When you
baselines. So, with a single operation, you remediate the hosts against the new image, all
can patch and upgrade a host. modified components are applied to the host.
So, you can upgrade and patch a host with a
single remediation operation.
Firmware updates Not supported. With vSphere Lifecycle Manager images,

firmware updates are carried out through
firmware and drivers add- ons, which you add
to the image that you use to manage a cluster.
Updating firmware with images requires an
OEM- provided hardware support manager
plug-in, which integrates with vSphere
Lifecycle Manager.
Hardware compatibility checks Not supported. You can check the hardware compatibility
of the hosts in a cluster against the VMware
Compatibility Guide (VCG).
You can also check the compatibility of all

hosts in a vSAN-enabled cluster against the
vSAN Hardware Compatibility List (vSAN
HCL).
Software recommendations Not supported. Supported.
Based on the hardware of the hosts in the

cluster, you get recommendations about
available and applicable ESXi updates or
upgrades.
vCenter Server /Datacenter-level With vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines, With vSphere Lifecycle Manager images,
operations you can trigger any of the main operations you cannot operate at a vSphere Lifecycle
at the vCenter Server or data center level. Manager or data center level.
Virtual machine management You can upgrade the VMware Tools and You can upgrade the VMware Tools and
virtual hardware versions of the virtual virtual hardware versions of the virtual
machines in a cluster that you manage with machines in a cluster that you manage with
vSphere Lifecycle Manager baselines. vSphere Lifecycle Manager images.
Update Manager Download Service Supported. Supported.
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(UMDS)
Monitoring Events, Alarms, and Automated Actions
vSphere includes a user-configurable events and alarms subsystem. This subsystem tracks events happening
throughout vSphere and stores the data in log files and the vCenter Server database. This subsystem also
enables you to specify the conditions under which alarms are
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triggered. Alarms can change state from mild warnings to more serious alerts as system conditions change, and can
trigger automated alarm actions. This functionality is useful when you want to be informed, or take immediate
action, when certain events or conditions occur for a specific inventory object, or group of objects.
Events
Events are records of user actions or system actions that occur on objects in vCenter Server or on a host. Actions
that might be recorded as events include, but are not limited to, the following examples:
 A license key expires
 A virtual machine is powered on
 A user logs in to a virtual machine
 A host connection is lost
Event data includes details about the event such as who generated it, when it occurred, and what type of event it is.
The types of events are:
Table 1-11. Event Types

Event TypeDescription
Error Indicates that a fatal problem has occurred in the system and
terminates the process or operation.
Warning Indicates that there is a potential risk to the system which needs to be
fixed. This event does not terminate the process or operation.
Information Describes that the user or system operation is completed

successfully.
Audit Provides important audit log data which is crucial for the security
framework. The audit log data includes information about what is the
action, who did it, when it occurred, and the IP address of the user.
You can learn more about this in the vSphere Security
guide.
Alarms
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Alarms are notifications that are activated in response to an event, a set of conditions, or the state of an inventory
object. An alarm definition consists of the following elements in the vSphere Client:
 Name and description - Provides an identifying label and description.
 Targets - Defines the type of object that is monitored.
 Alarm Rules - Defines the event, condition, or state that triggers the alarm and defines the notification
severity. It also defines operations that occur in response to triggered alarms.
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 Last modified - The last modified date and time of the defined alarm.
Alarms have the following severity levels:
 Normal – green
 Warning – yellow
 Alert – red
Alarm definitions are associated with the object selected in the inventory. An alarm monitors the type of inventory
objects specified in its definition.
For example, you might want to monitor the CPU usage of all virtual machines in a specific host cluster. You can
select the cluster in the inventory, and add a virtual machine alarm to it. When enabled, that alarm monitors all
virtual machines running in the cluster and triggers when any one of them meets the criteria defined in the alarm. To
monitor a specific virtual machine in the cluster, but not others, select that virtual machine in the inventory and add
an alarm to it. To apply the same alarms to a group of objects, place those objects in a folder and define the alarm on
the folder.
Note You can enable, disable, and modify alarms only from the object in which the alarm is defined. For
example, if you defined an alarm in a cluster to monitor virtual machines, you can only enable, disable, or
modify that alarm through the cluster. You cannot change the alarm at the individual virtual machine level.
Alarm Actions
Alarm actions are operations that occur in response to the trigger. For example, you can have an email notification
sent to one or more administrators when an alarm is triggered.
Note Default alarms are not preconfigured with actions. You must manually set what action occurs when the
triggering event, condition, or state occurs.
Create or Edit Alarms
To monitor your environment, you can create alarm definitions in the vSphere Client . You can access alarm
definitions in the Configure tab.
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Create alarms in the Configure tab.
Prerequisites
Required Privilege: Alarms.Create alarm or Alarms.Modify alarm
Procedure
1 Select an inventory object, click the Configure tab, and click More.
2 Click Alarm Definitions.
3 Click Add to add an alarm.
4 Select an alarm, click Enable to enable an alarm.
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5 Select an alarm, click Disable to disable an alarm.
6 Select an alarm, click Delete to delete an alarm.
7 Click Edit to edit an alarm.
8 You can also edit an alarm definition by selecting Monitor > Triggered Alarms
a Select an alarm listed under Alarm Name. b
Click Edit Alarm Definition to edit an alarm.
Specify Alarm Name, Description, and Target
Settings of an alarm definition include alarm name, description, and target.
Prerequisites
 Required Privilege: Alarms.Create alarm or Alarms.Modify alarm
 In the Alarms Definitions page, click Add. See Create an Alarm
Procedure
1 Type a name and description.
2 Select the type of inventory object that this alarm monitors from the Target type drop-down menu
Depending on the type of target that you choose to monitor, the summary that follows the
Target, change.
3 Click Next.
Note Depending on the type of activity that you choose to monitor, the options on the Alarm Rule page,
change.
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Results
Set alarm rule.
Specify Alarm Rules
You can select and configure the events, states, or conditions that trigger the alarm from the
Alarm Rule page in the New Alarm Definition wizard.
An alarm definition must contain at least one trigger before you can save it.
Prerequisites
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Procedure
1 Select a trigger from the drop-down menu.
The combined event triggers are displayed. You can set the rule for a single event only. You must create
multiple rules for multiple events.
2 Click Add Argument to select an argument from the drop-down menu.
It supports ALL based expression, option to select ANY is not available. You must create a separate alarm
definition for each trigger. The OR operator is not supported in the vSphere Client. However, you can
combine more than one condition trigger with AND operator.
3 Select an operator from the drop-down menu.
4 Select an option from the drop-down menu to set the threshold for triggering an alarm
5 Select severity of the alarm from the drop-down menu.
You can set the condition to either Show as Warning or Show as Critical, but not for both. You must create a
separate alarm definition for warning and critical status. Keep the target's current state option can be enabled
only for an event based alarm condition. For example, if Cannot power off the VM and Keep the target's
current state is selected for an alarm rule, then it cannot be combined with any other alarm rule with different
severities like Warning or Critical. These alarms will not have reset rules as the alarm rule does not change
the state of the target object.
6 Send email notifications
a To send email notifications when alarms are triggered, enable Send email notifications. b In the
Email to, enter recipient addresses. Use commas to separate multiple addresses.
7 To send traps when alarms are triggered on a vCenter Server instance, enable Send SNMP traps.
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8 Run scripts
a To run scripts when alarms are triggered, enable Run script.
b In Run this script column, type script or command information:
For this type of command... Enter this...
EXE executable files Full pathname of the command. For example, to run the cmd.exe
command in the C:\tools directory, type:
c:\tools\cmd.exe.
BAT batch file Full pathname of the command as an argument to the c:\windows
\system32\cmd.exe command. For example, to run the cmd.bat
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c c:\tools\cmd.bat.
Note The command and its parameters must be formatted into one string.
If your script does not make use of the alarm environment variables, include any necessary parameters in
the configuration field. Enclose parameters in curly brackets. For example:
The script can run on any platform. You must provide the path to the script and argument keys. For
example:
c:\tools\cmd.exe {alarmName} {targetName}
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c c:\tools\cmd.bat {alarmName} {targetName}

/var/myscripts/myAlarmActionScript {alarmName} {targetName}
9 (Optional) Configure alarm transitions and frequency.
10 Select an advanced action from the drop-down menu.
You can define the advanced actions for virtual machine and hosts. These advanced actions are applicable
only for virtual machines and hosts. There are different sets of advanced actions based on target types of
virtual machines and hosts.
You can add multiple advanced actions for an alarm.
11 (Optional) Configure frequency for advanced actions.
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12 Click Add Another Rule to add an additional rule for an alarm.
13 Click Duplicate Rule to create an identical rule for an alarm.
14 Click Remove Rule to remove an existing rule set for an alarm.
What to do next
Click Next to set the Reset Rule.
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Specify Alarm Reset Rules
You can select and configure the events, states, or conditions that trigger the alarm from the
Reset Rule page in the New Alarm Definition wizard. You
can set the Alarm Reset Rule
Prerequisites
Procedure
1 Enable the Reset the alarm to green option.
2 Select a trigger from the drop-down menu.
The combined event triggers are displayed. You can set the rule for a single event only. You must create
multiple rules for multiple events.
3 Click Add Argument to select an argument from the drop-down menu.
It supports ALL based expression, option to select ANY is not available. You must create a separate alarm
definition for each trigger. The OR operator is not supported in the vSphere Client. However, you can
combine more than one condition trigger with AND operator.
4 Select an operator from the drop-down menu.
5 Send email notifications
a To send email notifications when alarms are triggered, enable Send email notifications. b In the
Email to, enter recipient addresses. Use commas to separate multiple addresses.
6 To send traps when alarms are triggered on a vCenter Server instance, enable Send SNMP traps.
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7 Run scripts
a To run scripts when alarms are triggered, enable Run script.
b In Run this script column, type script or command information:
For this type of command... Enter this...
EXE executable files Full pathname of the command. For example, to run the cmd.exe
c:\tools\cmd.exe.
BAT batch file Full pathname of the command as an argument to the c:\windows
\system32\cmd.exe command. For example, to run the cmd.bat
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c c:\tools\cmd.bat.
Note The command and its parameters must be formatted into one string.
If your script does not make use of the alarm environment variables, include any necessary parameters in
the configuration field. Enclose parameters in curly brackets. For example:
The script can run on any platform. You must provide the path to the script and argument keys. For
example:
c:\tools\cmd.exe {alarmName} {targetName}
c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe /c c:\tools\cmd.bat {alarmName} {targetName}

/var/myscripts/myAlarmActionScript {alarmName} {targetName}
9 Select an advanced action from the Add Advanced Actions drop-down menu.
You can add multiple advanced actions for an alarm reset rule. You can define the advanced actions for virtual
machines and hosts. These advanced actions are applicable only for virtual machines and hosts. There are
different sets of advanced actions based on target types of virtual machines and hosts.
You can add multiple advanced actions for an alarm.
10 (Optional) Configure frequency for advanced actions.
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11 Click Add Another Rule to add an additional reset rule for an alarm.
12 Click Duplicate Rule to create an identical reset rule for an alarm.
13 Click Remove Rule to remove an existing reset rule set for an alarm.
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Example
Click Next to review the alarm definition.
Review and Enable Alarm
You can review and enable the alarm in the vSphere Client
After setting the alarm rule, review the alarm before enabling the alarm.
Prerequisites
Procedure
1 Review the Alarm Name, Description, Targets, and Alarm Rule.
3 Select Enable this alarm to enable the alarm.
Results
The alarm is enabled.
Using Roles to Assign Privileges
A role is a predefined set of privileges. Privileges define rights to perform actions and read properties. For example,
the Virtual Machine Administrator role allows a user to read and change virtual machine attributes.
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When you assign permissions, you pair a user or group with a role and associate that pairing with an inventory
object. A single user or group can have different roles for different objects in the inventory.
For example, assume that you have two resource pools in your inventory, Pool A and Pool B. You can assign group
Sales the Virtual Machine User role on Pool A, and the Read Only role on Pool
B. With these assignments, the users in group Sales can turn on virtual machines in Pool A, but can only view
virtual machines in Pool B.
vCenter Server provides system roles and sample roles by default.
System roles
System roles are permanent. You cannot edit the privileges associated with these roles.
Sample roles
VMware provides sample roles for certain frequently performed combination of tasks. You can clone,
modify, or remove these roles.
Note To avoid losing the predefined settings in a sample role, clone the role first and make modifications to the
clone. You cannot reset the sample to its default settings.
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Users can schedule tasks only if they have a role that includes privileges to perform that task at the time the task is
created.
Note Changes to roles and privileges take effect immediately, even if the users involved are logged in. The
exception is searches, where changes take effect after the user has logged out and logged back in.
Custom Roles in vCenter Server and ESXi
You can create custom roles for vCenter Server and all objects that it manages, or for individual hosts.
vCenter Server Custom Roles (Recommended)
Create custom roles by using the role-editing facilities in the vSphere Client to create privilege sets that match
your needs.
ESXi Custom Roles
You can create custom roles for individual hosts by using a CLI or the VMware Host Client. See the vSphere
Single Host Management - VMware Host Client documentation. Custom host roles are not accessible from
vCenter Server.
If you manage ESXi hosts through vCenter Server, do not maintain custom roles in both the host and vCenter
Server. Define roles at the vCenter Server level.
When you manage a host using vCenter Server, the permissions associated with that host are created through
vCenter Server and stored on vCenter Server. If you connect directly to a host, only the roles that are created
directly on the host are available.
Note When you add a custom role and do not assign any privileges to it, the role is created as a Read Only role with
three system-defined privileges: System.Anonymous, System.View, and System.Read.
Create a Custom Role
You can create vCenter Server custom roles to suit the access control needs of your environment.
You can create a role or clone an existing role.
You can create or edit a role on a vCenter Server system that is part of the same vCenter Single Sign-On domain
as other vCenter Server systems. The VMware Directory Service (vmdir) propagates the role changes that you
make to all other vCenter Server systems in the group.
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Assignments of roles to specific users and objects are not shared across vCenter Server systems.
Prerequisites
Verify that you are logged in as a user with Administrator privileges.
Procedure
1 Log in to the vCenter Server by using the vSphere Client.
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2 Select Administration and click Roles in the Access Control area.
3 Create the role:
Option Description
To create a role Click the Create role action icon.
To create the role by cloning Select a role, and click the Clone role action icon.
See vCenter Server System Roles for more information.
4 Select and deselect privileges for the role.
See Defined Privileges for more information.
Note When creating a cloned role, you cannot change privileges. To change privileges, select the cloned role
after it is created and click the Edit role action icon.
5 Enter a name for the new role.
6 Click Finish.
What to do next
You can now create permissions by selecting an object and assigning the role to a user or group for that object.
Managing Permissions for vCenter Components
A permission is set on an object in the vCenter object hierarchy. Each permission associates the object with a group
or user and the group's or user's access roles. For example, you can select a virtual machine object, add one
permission that gives the ReadOnly role to Group 1, and add a second permission that gives the Administrator role
to User 2.
By assigning a different role to a group of users on different objects, you control the tasks that those users can
perform in your vSphere environment. For example, to allow a group to configure memory for the host, select
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that host and add a permission that grants a role to that group that includes the Host.Configuration.Memory
Configuration privilege.
To manage permissions from the vSphere Client, you need to understand the following concepts:
Permissions
Each object in the vCenter Server object hierarchy has associated permissions. Each permission specifies
for one group or user which privileges that group or user has on the object.
Users and Groups
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On vCenter Server systems, you can assign privileges only to authenticated users or groups of authenticated
users. Users are authenticated through vCenter Single Sign-On. Users and groups must be defined in the
identity source that vCenter Single Sign-On uses to authenticate. Define users and groups using the tools in
your identity source, for example, Active Directory.
Privileges
Privileges are fine-grained access controls. You can group those privileges into roles, which you can then
map to users or groups.
Roles
Roles are sets of privileges. Roles allow you to assign permissions on an object based on a typical set of tasks
that users perform. Default roles, such as Administrator, are predefined on vCenter Server and cannot be
changed. Other roles, such as Resource Pool Administrator, are predefined sample roles. You can create custom
roles either from scratch or by cloning and modifying sample roles. See Create a Custom Role.
You can assign permissions to objects at different levels of the hierarchy, for example, you can assign permissions
to a host object or to a folder object that includes all host objects. See Hierarchical Inheritance of Permissions. You
can also assign permissions to a global root object to apply the permissions to all object in all solutions. See Global
Permissions.
Add a Permission to an Inventory Object
After you create users and groups and define roles, you must assign the users and groups and their roles to the
relevant inventory objects. You can assign the same permissions to multiple objects simultaneously by moving
the objects into a folder and setting the permissions on the folder.
When you assign permissions, user and group names must match Active Directory precisely, including case. If you
upgraded from earlier versions of vSphere, check for case inconsistencies if you experience problems with groups.
Prerequisites
On the object whose permissions you want to modify, you must have a role that includes the
Permissions.Modify permission privilege.
Procedure
1 Browse to the object for which you want to assign permissions in the vSphere Client object navigator.
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2 Click the Permissions tab.
3 Click the Add Permission icon.
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4 Select the user or group that will have the privileges defined by the selected role. a From
the User drop-down menu, select the domain for the user or group.
b Type a name in the Search box.
The system searches user names and group names. c
Select the user or group.
5 Select a role from the Role drop-down menu.
6 (Optional) To propagate the permissions, select the Propagate to children check box.
The role is applied to the selected object and propagates to the child objects.
7 Click OK to add the permission.
License Management
vSphere provides a centralized license management system that you can use to manage licenses for ESXi hosts,
vCenter Server systems, vSAN clusters, Supervisor Clusters, and solutions.
Solutions are products that integrate with vSphere such as VMware Site Recovery Manager, vCloud
Networking and Security, vRealize Operations Manager, and others.
Managing Licenses
To license an asset in vSphere, you must assign it a license that holds an appropriate product license key. You
can use the license management functionality in the vSphere Client to license multiple assets at a time from a
central place. Assets are vCenter Server systems, hosts, vSAN clusters, Supervisor Clusters, and solutions.
In vSphere, you can assign one license to multiple assets of the same type if the license has enough capacity. You
can assign a suite license to all components that belong to the suite product edition. For example, you can assign
one vSphere license to multiple ESXi hosts, but you cannot assign two licenses to one host. If you have a vCloud
Suite license, you can assign the license to ESXi hosts, vCloud Networking and Security, vCenter Site Recovery
Manager, and so on.
Managing Licenses in the vSphere Client

(http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid2296383276001?
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bctid=ref:video_vsphere67_licenses)
Create New Licenses
When you purchase, divide, or combine license keys in My VMware, you must use the new keys to license assets
in your vSphere environment. You must go to the vSphere Client and create a license object for every license key.
A license is a container for a license key of a VMware product. After you create the new licenses, you can assign
them to assets.
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Prerequisites
 To view and manage licenses in the vSphere environment, you must have the
Global.Licenses privilege on the vCenter Server system, where the vSphere Client runs.
Procedure
1 Click Menu > Administration.
2 Expand Licensing and click Licenses.
3 On the Licenses tab, click Add New Licenses.
4 On the Enter licenses keys page, enter one license key per line, and click Next.
The license key is a 25-symbol string of letters and digits in the format
XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX. You can enter a list of keys in one operation. A new license
will be created for every license key that you enter.
5 On the Edit license names page, rename the new licenses as appropriate and click Next .
6 On the Ready to complete page, review the new licenses and click Finish.
Results
A new license is created for every license key that you entered.
What to do next
Assign the new licenses to hosts, vCenter Server systems, or other products that you use with vSphere. You must
not keep unassigned licenses in the inventory.
Assign a License to Multiple Assets

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To continue using product functionality, you must assign appropriate licenses to assets in evaluation mode, or assets
with expiring licenses. When you upgrade a license edition, combine, or split licenses in My VMware, you must
assign the new licenses to assets. You can assign licenses that are already available, or create licenses and assign
them to the assets in a single workflow. Assets are vCenter Server systems, ESXi hosts, vSAN clusters, Supervisor
Clusters, and other products that integrate with vSphere.
Prerequisites
 To view and manage licenses in the vSphere environment, you must have the
Global.Licenses privilege on the vCenter Server system, where the vSphere Client runs.
Procedure
1 Click Menu > Administration.
2 Expand Licensing and click Licenses.
3 Select the Assets tab.
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4 On the Assets tab, click the vCenter Server systems, Hosts, vSAN Clusters, Supervisor Clusters, or
Solutions tab.
5 Select the assets to license.
Note Use Shift+click to select multiple assets.
6 Click Assign License.
7 In the Assign License dialog box, select the task that you want to perform.
 In the vSphere Client, select an existing license or select a newly created license.
Task Steps
Select an existing license Select an existing license from the list and click OK.
Select a newly created license a Click the New License tab.

b In the Assign License dialog box, type or copy and paste a license key and click
OK.
c Enter a name for the new license and click OK.
Details about the product, product features, capacity, and expiration period appear
on the page.
d Click OK.
e In the Assign License dialog box, select the newly created license, and click OK.
Results
The license is assigned to the assets. Capacity from the license is allocated according to the license use of the
assets. For example, if you assign the license to 3 hosts with 4 CPUs each, the consumed license capacity is 12
CPUs.
Manage the vCenter HA Configuration
After you configure your vCenter HA cluster, you can perform management tasks. These tasks include certificate
replacement, replacement of SSH keys, and SNMP setup. You can also edit the cluster configuration to disable or
enable vCenter HA, enter maintenance mode, and remove the cluster configuration.
Edit the vCenter HA Cluster Configuration
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When you edit the vCenter HA cluster configuration, you can disable or enable the cluster, place the cluster in
maintenance mode, or remove the cluster.
The operating mode of a vCenter Server controls the failover capabilities and state replication in a vCenter HA
cluster.
A vCenter HA cluster can operate in one of the following modes.
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Table 1-12. vCenter HA Cluster Modes of Operation
Manual
Mode Automatic Failover Failover Replication
Enabled Yes Yes Yes This default mode of operation protects

the vCenter Server from hardware and
software failures by performing
automatic failover.
Maintenance No Yes Yes Used for some maintenance tasks. For

other tasks, you have to disable vCenter
HA.
Disabled No No No If the Passive or Witness nodes are lost or

recovering from a failure, a vCenter HA
configuration can be disabled. The Active
node continues as a standalone vCenter
Server.
Note If the cluster is operating in either Maintenance or Disabled mode, an Active node can continue serving
client requests even if the Passive and Witness nodes are lost or unreachable.
Prerequisites
Verify that the vCenter HA cluster is deployed and contains the Active, Passive, and Witness nodes.
Procedure
1 Log in to the Active node vCenter Server with the vSphere Client and click Configure.
2 Under Settings select vCenter HA and click Edit.
3 Select one of the options.
Option Result
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Enable vCenter HA Enables replication between the Active and Passive nodes. If the cluster is in a healthy state, your
Active node is protected by automatic failover from the Passive node.
Maintenance Mode In maintenance mode, replication still occurs between the Active and Passive nodes. However,
automatic failover is disabled.
Disable vCenter HA Disables replication and failover. Keeps the configuration of the cluster. You can later enable vCenter
HA again.
Remove vCenter HA Removes the cluster. Replication and failover no longer are provided. The Active node continues to
cluster operate as a standalone vCenter Server. See Remove a vCenter HA Configuration for details.
4 Click OK.
Initiate a vCenter HA Failover
You can manually initiate a failover and have the Passive node become the Active node.
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A vCenter HA cluster supports two types of failover.
Automatic failover
The Passive node attempts to take over the active role in case of an Active node failure.
Manual failover
The user can force a Passive node to take over the active role by using the Initiate Failover action.
Initiate a manual failover for troubleshooting and testing.
Procedure
1 Log in to the Active node vCenter Server with the vSphere Client and click Configure for the vCenter Server
where you need to initiate failover.
2 Under Settings select vCenter HA and click Initiate Failover.
3 Click Yes to start the failover.
A dialog offers you the option to force a failover without synchronization. In most cases, performing
synchronization first is best.
4 After the failover, you can verify that the Passive node has the role of the Active node in the vSphere Client.
vSphere Network Infrastructure Procedures
This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining the vSphere Network infrastructure.
Monitoring Network Connection and Traffic
Monitor network connection and packets that pass through the ports of a vSphere Standard Switch or a vSphere
Distributed Switch to analyze the traffic between virtual machines and hosts.
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vSphere Distributed Switch Health Check
The health check support helps you identify and troubleshoot configuration errors in a vSphere Distributed
Switch.
Use vSphere Distributed Switch health check to examine certain settings on the distributed and physical switches to
identify common errors in your environment's networking configuration. The default interval between two health
checks is 1 minute.
Important Use health check to troubleshoot network problems, and then disable it after you identify and resolve
the problem. After you disable vSphere Distributed Switch health check, the generated MAC addresses age out of
your physical network environment according to your network policy. For more information, see Knowledge Base
article KB 2034795.
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Required Configuration on
Configuration Error Health Check the Distributed Switch
The VLAN trunk ranges configured on the Checks whether the VLAN settings on the distributed At least two active physical
distributed switch do not match the trunk switch match the trunk port configuration on the NICs
connected physical switch ports.
ranges on the physical switch.
The MTU settings on the physical network Checks whether the physical access switch port MTU At least two active physical
adapters, distributed switch, and physical jumbo frame setting based on per VLAN matches the NICs
vSphere distributed switch MTU setting.
switch ports do not match.
The teaming policy configured on the port Checks whether the connected access ports of the At least two active physical
groups does not match the policy on the physical switch that participate in an EtherChannel are NICs and two hosts
paired with distributed ports whose teaming policy is set
physical switch port-channel.
to IP hash.
Health check is limited to only the access switch port to which the distributed switch uplink connects.
Enable or Disable vSphere Distributed Switch Health Check
Health check monitors for changes in vSphere Distributed Switch configurations. You must enable vSphere
Distributed Switch health check to perform checks on distributed switch configurations.
Procedure
1 On the vSphere Client Home page, click Networking and navigate to the distributed switch.
2 Select the Configure tab and expand Setting.
3 Select Health Check and click the Edit button.
4 Use the drop-down menus to enable or disable health check options.
Option Description
VLAN and MTU Reports the status of distributed uplink ports and VLAN ranges.
Teaming and Failover Checks for any configuration mismatch between theESXi host and the physical
switch used in the teaming policy.
5 Click OK.
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What to do next
When you change the configuration of a vSphere Distributed Switch, you can view information about the change
in the Monitor tab in the vSphere Client. See View vSphere Distributed Switch Health Status.
View vSphere Distributed Switch Health Status
Once you have enabled health check on a vSphere Distributed Switch, you can view the network health status of the
hosts connected in the vSphere Client .
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Prerequisites
Verify that health check for VLAN and MTU, and for teaming policy is enabled on the vSphere Distributed
Switch. See Enable or Disable vSphere Distributed Switch Health Check.
Procedure
2 On the Monitor tab, click Health.
3 In the Host member health status section, examine the overall, VLAN, MTU and teaming health of the
hosts connected to the switch.
Switch Discovery Protocol
Switch discovery protocols help vSphere administrators to determine which port of the physical switch is
connected to a vSphere standard switch or vSphere distributed switch.
vSphere 5.0 and later supports Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) and Link Layer Discovery Protocol (LLDP). CDP
is available for vSphere standard switches and vSphere distributed switches connected to Cisco physical switches.
LLDP is available for vSphere distributed switches version 5.0.0 and later.
When CDP or LLDP is enabled for a particular vSphere distributed switch or vSphere standard switch, you can
view properties of the peer physical switch such as device ID, software version, and timeout from the vSphere
Client.
Enable Cisco Discovery Protocol on a vSphere Distributed Switch
Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) enables vSphere administrators to determine which port of a physical Cisco
switch connects to a vSphere Standard Switch or vSphere Distributed Switch. When CDP is enabled for a vSphere
Distributed Switch, you can view the properties of the Cisco switch such as device ID, software version, and
timeout.
Procedure
2 From the Actions menu, select Settings > Edit Settings.
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3 In the Edit Settings dialog box, click Advanced.
4 In the Discovery Protocol section, select Cisco Discovery Protocol from the Type drop-down menu.
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5 From the Operation drop-down menu, select the operational mode of the ESXi hosts connected to
the switch.
Option Description
Listen ESXi detects and displays information about the associated Cisco switch port, but
information about the vSphere Distributed Switch is not available to the Cisco switch
administrator.
Advertise ESXi makes information about the vSphere Distributed Switch available to the Cisco
switch administrator, but does not detect and display information about the Cisco switch.
Both ESXi detects and displays information about the associated Cisco switch and
makes information about the vSphere Distributed Switch available to the Cisco switch
administrator.
6 Click OK.
Enable Link Layer Discovery Protocol on a vSphere Distributed Switch
With Link Layer Discovery Protocol (LLDP), vSphere administrators can determine which physical switch port
connects to a given vSphere Distributed Switch. When LLDP is enabled for a particular distributed switch, you can
view properties of the physical switch (such as chassis ID, system name and description, and device capabilities)
from the .
Procedure
2 From the Actions menu, select Settings > Edit Settings.
3 In the Edit Settings dialog box, click Advanced.
4 In the Discovery Protocol section, select Link Layer Discovery Protocol from the Type drop- down menu.
5 From the Operation drop-down menu, select the operational mode of the ESXi hosts connected to
the switch.
Operation Description
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Listen ESXi detects and displays information about the associated physical switch port, but
information about the vSphere Distributed Switch is not available to the switch
administrator.
Advertise ESXi makes information about the vSphere Distributed Switch available to the switch
administrator, but does not detect and display information about the physical switch.
Both ESXi detects and displays information about the associated physical switch
and makes information about the vSphere Distributed Switch available to the switch
administrator.
6 Click OK.
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View Switch Information
When Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) or Link Layer Discovery Protocol (LLDP) is enabled on the distributed
switch and the hosts connected to the switch are in Listen or Both operational mode, you can view physical switch
information from the vSphere Client.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, navigate to the host.
2 On the Configure tab, expand Networking and click Physical adapters.
3 Select a physical adapter from the list to view its detailed information.
Results
According to the enabled switch discovery protocol, the properties of the switch appear under the CDP or LLDP
tab. If the information is available in the network, under Peer device capability you can examine the system
capabilities of the switch.
Capture Network Packets by Using the PacketCapture Utility
Use the PacketCapture utility to diagnose networking problems such as slow connection, lost packets, and
connectivity problems
PacketCapture is a lightweight tcpdump utility that captures and stores only the minimum amount of data that is
needed to diagnose the network problem. PacketCapture is integrated in the rhttpproxy service of ESXi and
vCenter Server. You start and stop PacketCapture by editing the rhttpproxy service XML configuration file.
Procedure
1 Start capturing packets.
a Open an SSH connection and log in to the ESXi host or vCenter Server. b Open
the config.xml file for editing.
vSphere Component File Location
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ESXi /etc/vmware/rhttpproxy/config.xml
vCenter Server /etc/vmware-rhttpproxy/config.xml
c Make the following changes.
<config>
<packetCapture>
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d (Optional) Configure PacketCapture options.
Option and Default ValueDescription
<validity>72</validity> On startup delete all pcap and pcap.gz files that were last modified
before the specified period of hours and are not part of the current process.
<directory>/directory_path</directoTrhye> directory in which pcap and pcap.gz files are stored. The directory
must exist and be accessible.
<maxDataInPcapFile>52428800</maxDatTahIenPacmapoFuinlteo>f captured data in bytes that each pcap and pcap.gz file
can store before rolling over to the next file. The minimum size is 5 MB on vCenter
Server and 2.5MB on ESXi.
Note Storing 50 MB of captured data in a pcap file requires a pcap file of about
67.5 MB.
<maxPcapFilesCount>5</maxPcapFilesCTohuentn>umber of pcap or pcap.gz files to rotate. The minimum number is 2.
e Save and close the config.xml file.
f Reload the config.xml file by running the following command.
kill -SIGHUP `pidof rhttpproxy`
2 Stop capturing packets.
a Open an SSH connection and log in to the ESXi host or vCenter Server. b Open
the config.xml file for editing.
c Make the following changes.
d <config>
Save and close the config.xml file.
<packetCapture>
e Reload the config.xml file by running the following command.
kill -SIGHUP `pidof rhttpproxy`
3 Collect the captured data.
The pcap or pcap.gz files are stored in the following default directories.
vSphere Component File Location
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ESXi /var/run/log
vCenter Server /var/log/vmware/rhttpproxy
What to do next
Copy the pcap and pcap.gz files to a system that runs a network analyzer tool, such as Wireshark,
and examine the packet details.
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Before you analyze the pcap and pcap.gz captured from an ESXi host, use the TraceWrangler utility to fix the
frame size metadata. For more information, see https://kb.vmware.com/kb/52843
Capturing and Tracing Network Packets by Using the pktcap-uw Utility
Monitor the traffic that flows through physical network adapters, VMkernel adapters, and virtual machines
adapters, and analyze packet information by using the graphical user interface of network analysis tools such as
Wireshark.
In vSphere you can monitor packets on a host by using the pktcap-uw console utility. You can use the utility
without additional installation on an ESXi host. pktcap-uw provides many points in the host network stack at
which you can monitor traffic.
For detailed analysis of captured packets, you can save packet content from the pktcap-uw utility to files in
PCAP or PCAPNG format and open them in Wireshark. You can also troubleshoot dropped packets and trace a
packet's path in the network stack.
Note The pktcap-uw utility is not fully supported for backward compatibility across vSphere releases. The options
of the utility might change in the future.
pktcap-uw Command Syntax for Capturing Packets
Use the pktcap-uw utility to inspect the contents of packets while they traverse the network stack on an
ESXi host.
pktcap-uw Syntax for Capturing Packets
The pktcap-uw command has the following syntax for capturing packets at a certain place in the network stack:
Note Certain options of the pktcap-uw utility are designed for VMware internal use only and you should use
them only under the supervision of VMware Technical Support. These options are not described in the vSphere
Networking guide.
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Table 1-13. pktcap-uw Arguments for Capturing Packets
Argument Group Argument Description
switch_port_arguments --uplink vmnicX Capture packets that are related to a

physical adapter.
You can combine the --uplink and

--capture options for monitoring
packets at a certain place in the path

between the physical adapter and the
virtual switch.
See Capture Packets That Arrive at a

Physical Adapter.
--vmk vmkX Capture packets that are related to a

VMKernel adapter.
You can combine the vmk and
--capture options for monitoring

between the VMkernel adapter and the
virtual switch.
See Capture Packets for a
VMkernel Adapter.
--switchport {vmxnet3_port_ID | Capture packets that are related to a
vmkernel_adapter_port_ID} VMXNET3 virtual machine adapter or

to a VMkernel adapter that is
connected to a particular virtual switch
port. You can view the ID of the port in
the network panel of the esxtop
utility.
You can combine the switchport and

capture options for monitoring

between the VMXNET3 adapter or
VMkernel adapter and the virtual
switch.
See Capture Packets for a

VMXNET3 Virtual Machine
Adapter.
--lifID lif_ID Capture packets that are related to the
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logical interface of a distributed router.
See the VMware NSX documentation.
capture_point_options --capture capture_point Capture packets at a particular place

in the network stack. For example,
you can monitor packets right after
they arrive from a physical adapter.
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Table 1-13. pktcap-uw Arguments for Capturing Packets (continued)
Argument GroupArgumentDescription
--dir {0|1|2} Capture packets according to the

direction of the flow with regard to the
virtual switch.
0 stands for incoming traffic, 1 for

outgoing traffic, and 2 for bidirectional
traffic.
By default, the pktcap-uw utility

captures ingress traffic.
Use the --dir option together with the

--uplink, --vmk, or
--switchport option.
--stage {0|1} Capture the packet closer to its source

or to its destination. Use this option to
examine how a package changes while
it traverses the points in the stack.
0 stands for traffic closer to source

and 1 for traffic closer to destination.
Use the --stage option together with

the --uplink, --vmk ,
--switchport, or --dvfilter
option.
--dvfilter filter_name --capture Pre DVFilter| Capture packets before or after a

PostDVFilter vSphere Network Appliance
(DVFilter) intercepts them. See
Capture Packets at DVFilter Level.
-A | --availpoints View all capture points that the
pktcap-uw utility supports.
For details about the capture points of the pktcap-uw utility, see Capture Points of the pktcap-
uw Tool.
filter_options Filter captured packets according to source or destination address, VLAN ID, VXLAN ID,
Layer 3 protocol, and TCP port. See pktcap-uw Options for Filtering Packets.
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output_control_options Save the contents of a packet to a file, capture only a number of packets, and capture a number of
bytes at the beginning of packets, and so on. See pktcap-uw Options for Output Control.
The vertical bars | represent alternative values, and the curly brackets {} used with vertical bars specify a list of choices
for an argument or option.
pktcap-uw Command Syntax for Tracing Packets
Use the pktcap-uw utility to view the path of a packet in the network stack on an ESXi host for latency
analysis.
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pktcap-uw Syntax for Tracing Packets
The command of the pktcap-uw utility has the following syntax for tracing packets in the network
stack:
Options to the pktcap-uw Utility for Tracing Packets

pktcap-uw --trace filter_options output_control_options
The pktcap-uw utility supports the following options when you use it to trace packets:
Table 1-14. pktcap-uw Options for Tracing Packets
Argument Description
filter_options Filter traced packets according to source or destination address,

VLAN ID, VXLAN ID, Layer 3 protocol, and TCP port. See
pktcap-uw Options for Filtering Packets.
output_control_options Save the contents of a packet to a file and trace only a number of
packets. See pktcap-uw Options for Output Control.
pktcap-uw Options for Output Control
Use the options for output control of the pktcap-uw utility to save packet contents to a file, capture up to a
certain number of bytes from each packet, and limit the number of captured packets.
pktcap-uw Options for Output Control
The options of the pktcap-uw utility for output control are valid when you capture and trace packets. For
information about the command syntax of the pktcap-uw utility, see pktcap-uw Command Syntax for
Capturing Packets and pktcap-uw Command Syntax for Tracing Packets.
Table 1-15. Options for Output Control That Are Supported by the pktcap-uw Utility
Option Description
{-o | --outfile} pcap_file Save captured or traced packets to a file in packet capture (PCAP)
format. Use this option to examine packets in a visual analyzer tool
such as Wireshark.
-P | --ng Save packet content in the PCAPNG file format. Use this option
together with the -o or --outfile option.
--console Print packet details and content to the console output. By default, the
pktcap-uw utility shows packet information in the console
output.
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{-c | --count} number_of_packets Capture the first number_of_packets packets.
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Table 1-15. Options for Output Control That Are Supported by the pktcap-uw Utility (continued)
OptionDescription
{-s | --snaplen} snapshot_length Capture only the first snapshot_length bytes from each packet. If
traffic on the host is intensive, use this option to reduce the load on
the CPU and storage.
To limit the size of captured contents, set a value greater than 24.
To capture the complete packet, set this option to 0.
-h View help about the pktcap-uw utility.
The vertical bars | represent alternative values, and the curly brackets {} used with vertical bars specify a list of
choices for an argument or option.
pktcap-uw Options for Filtering Packets
Narrow the range of packets that you monitor by using the pktcap-uw utility to apply filtering options for
source and destination address, VLAN, VXLAN, and next level protocol consuming the packet payload.
Filter Options
The filter options for pktcap-uw are valid when you capture and trace packets. For information about the
command syntax of the pktcap-uw utility, see pktcap-uw Command Syntax for Capturing Packets and pktcap-
uw Command Syntax for Tracing Packets.
Table 1-16. Filter Options of the pktcap-uw Utility
Option Description
--srcmac mac_address Capture or trace packets that have a specific source MAC address.
Use colons to separate the octets in it.
--dstmac mac_address Capture or trace packets that have a specific destination MAC
address. Use colons to separate the octets in it.
--mac mac_address Capture or trace packets that have a specific source or destination
MAC address. Use colons to separate the octets in it.
--ethtype 0xEthertype Capture or trace packets at Layer 2 according to the next level
protocol that consumes the packet payload.
EtherType corresponds to the EtherType field in Ethernet frames. It

represents the type of next level protocol that consumes the payload
of the frame.
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For example, to monitor traffic for the Link Layer Discovery
Protocol (LLDP) protocol, type --ethtype 0x88CC.
--vlan VLAN_ID Capture or trace packets that belong to a VLAN.
--srcip IP_addess|IP_address/subnet_range Capture or trace packets that have a specific source IPv4 address or
subnet.
--dstip IP_addess|IP_address/subnet_range Capture or trace packets that have a specific destination IPv4
address or subnet.
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Table 1-16. Filter Options of the pktcap-uw Utility (continued)
OptionDescription
--ip IP_addess Capture or trace packets that have a specific source or destination
IPv4 address.
--proto 0xIP_protocol_number Capture or trace packets at Layer 3 according to the next level
protocol that consumes the payload.
For example, to monitor traffic for the UDP protocol, type
--proto 0x11.
--srcport source_port Capture or trace packets according to their source TCP port.
--dstport destination_port Capture or trace packets according to their destination TCP port.
--tcpport TCP_port Capture or trace packets according to their source or destination

TCP port.
--vxlan VXLAN_ID Capture or trace packets that belong to a VXLAN.
--rcf pcap_filter_expression Capture or trace packets using the rich common filter
expression.
For example, to capture all ingress and egress packets whose IP

content length is larger than 1000 bytes, use the filter expression --
rcf "ip[2:2]>1000".
To select a specific source host address and port number, use the
filter expression
--rcf "src host 12.0.0.1 and port 5000". This

example filters traffic for the host address 12.0.0.1 using port
5000.
To learn more about filtering network traffic with the --rcf option,
refer to the documentation for pcap filter expressions using command-
line packet analyzers such as tcpdump. See pcap-filter - packet filter
syntax.
Note When using the --rcf option, obey the following limitations.
 Do not filter VLAN packets using the --rcf option. To trace

VLAN or VXLAN use the pktcap-uw --vlan or
--vxlan options.
 Do not filter an IP broadcast address.

 Do not use --rcf on ENS ports.
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--rcf-tcp-data tcp_packet_data_filter Capture or trace TCP data packets using the rich common filter
expression.
For example, to capture all HTTP/1.0 response packets with 200 OK,
use the filter expression
--rcf-tcp-data "HTTP/1.0 200 OK".
To filter on HTTP GET requests returning an index.html file, use the

filter expression
--rcf-tcp-data "GET /index.html".
The vertical bars | represent alternative values.
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Capturing Packets by Using the pktcap-uw Utility
Capture packets through the pktcap-uw utility in the path between a virtual switch and the
physical adapters, VMkernel adapters and virtual machine adapters to troubleshoot data transfer in the network
stack on an ESXi host.
Capture Packets That Arrive at a Physical Adapter
Monitor host traffic related to the external network by capturing packets at certain points in the path between a
vSphere Standard Switch or vSphere Distributed Switch and a physical adapter.
You can specify a certain capture point in the data path between a virtual switch and a physical adapter, or determine
a capture point by traffic direction with regard to the switch and proximity to the packet source or destination. For
information about supported capture points, see Capture Points of the pktcap-uw Tool.
Procedure
1 (Optional) Find the name of the physical adapter that you want to monitor in the host adapter list.
 In the vSphere Client, on the Configure tab for the host, expand Networking and select
Physical adapters.
 In the ESXi Shell to the host, to view a list of the physical adapters and examine their state, run the
following ESXCLI command:
Each physical
esxcli adapter
networkis represented
nic list as vmnicX. X is the number that ESXi assigned to the physical adapter
port.
2 In the ESXi Shell to the host, run the pktcap-uw command with the --uplink vmnicX argument and
with options to monitor packets at a particular point, filter captured packets and save the result to a file.
where the square brackets [] enclose the options of the pktcap-uw--uplink vmnicX command and the vertical
bars | represent alternative values.
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If you run the pktcap-uw--uplink vmnicX command without options, you obtain the content of packets that are
incoming to the standard or distributed switch in the console output at the point where they are switched.
a Use the --capture option to check packets at another capture point or the --dir option at another
traffic direction.
pktcap-uw Command Option Goal
--capture UplinkSnd Monitor packets immediately before they enter the physical adapter device.
--capture UplinkRcv Monitor packets immediately after they are received in the network stack from the
physical adapter.
--dir 1 Monitor packets that leave the virtual switch.
--dir 0 Monitor packets that enter the virtual switch.
b Use a filter_options to filter packets according to source and destination address, VLAN ID, VXLAN ID,
Layer 3 protocol, and TCP port.
For example, to monitor packets from a source system that has IP address 192.168.25.113, use the --
srcip 192.168.25.113 filter option.
c Use options to save the contents of each packet or the contents of a limited number of packets to a
.pcap or .pcapng file.
 To save packets to a .pcap file, use the --outfile option.
 To save packets to a .pcapng file, use the --ng and --outfile options.
You can open the file in a network analyzer tool such as Wireshark.
By default, the pktcap-uw utility saves the packet files to the root folder of the ESXi file system.
d Use the--count option to monitor only a number of packets.
3 If you have not limited the number of packets by using the --count option, press Ctrl+C to stop capturing
or tracing packets.
Example: Capture Packets That Are Received at vmnic0 from an IP Address 192.168.25.113
To capture the first 60 packets from a source system that is assigned the IP address 192.168.25.113 at
vmnic0 and save them to a file called vmnic0_rcv_srcip.pcap, run the following pktcap-uw
command:
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pktcap-uw --uplink vmnic0 --capture UplinkRcv --srcip 192.168.25.113 --outfile
What to do next
If the contents of the packet are saved to a file, copy the file from the ESXi host to the system that runs a graphical
analyzer tool, such as Wireshark, and open it in the tool to examine the packet details.
Capture Packets for a VMXNET3 Virtual Machine Adapter
Monitor traffic that flows between a virtual switch and a VMXNET3 virtual machine adapter by using the
pktcap-uw utility.
You can specify a certain capture point in the data path between a virtual switch and a virtual machine adapter.
You can also determine a capture point by traffic direction with regard to the switch and proximity to the packet
source or destination. For information about supported capture points, see Capture Points of the pktcap-uw Tool.
Prerequisites
Verify that the virtual machine adapter is of type VMXNET3.
Procedure
1 On the host, learn the port ID of the virtual machine adapter by using the esxtop utility. a In
the ESXi Shell to the host, to start the utility, run esxtop.
b To switch to the network panel of the utility, press N.
c In the USED-BY column, locate the virtual machine adapter, and write down the PORT-ID value for it.
The USED-BY field contains the name of the virtual machine and the port to which the virtual
machine adapter is connected.
d Press Q to exit esxtop.
2 In the ESXi Shell, run pktcap-uw--switchportport_ID.
port_ID is the ID that the esxtop utility displays for the virtual machine adapter in the PORT- ID column.
3 In the ESXi Shell, run the pktcap-uw command with the --switchport port_ID argument and with
options to monitor packets at a particular point, filter captured packets and save the result to a file.
where the square brackets [] enclose the options of the pktcap-uw--switchportport_ID

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command and the vertical bars | represent alternative values.
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If you run the pktcap-uw--switchportport_ID command without options, you obtain the content of
packets that are incoming to the standard or distributed switch in the console output at the point when
they are switched.
a To check packets at another capture point or direction in the path between the guest operating system and
the virtual switch, use the --capture option or combine the values of the --dir and --stage
options.
pktcap-uw Command Options Goal
--capture Vmxnet3Tx Monitor packets when they pass from the virtual machine to the switch.
--capture Vmxnet3Rx Monitor packets when they arrive to the virtual machine.
--dir 1 --stage 0 Monitor packets immediately after they leave the virtual switch.
--dir 1 Monitor packets immediately before they enter the virtual machine.
--dir 0 --stage 1 Monitor packets immediately after they enter the virtual switch.
or tracing packets.
Example: Capture Packets That Are Received at a Virtual Machine from an IP Address
192.168.25.113
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To capture the first 60 packets from a source that is assigned the IP address 192.168.25.113 when they arrive at a virtual
machine adapter with port ID 33554481 and save them to a file called vmxnet3_rcv_srcip.pcap, run the
following pktcap-uw command:
pktcap-uw --switchport 33554481 --capture Vmxnet3Rx --srcip 192.168.25.113 --outfile

vmxnet3_rcv_srcip.pcap --count 60
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What to do next
Capture Packets for a VMkernel Adapter
Monitor packets that are exchanged between a VMkernel adapter and a virtual switch by using the pktcap-uw
utility.
You can capture packets at a certain capture point in the flow between a virtual switch and a VMkernel adapter.
You can also determine a capture point by traffic direction with regard to the switch and proximity to the packet
source or destination. For information about supported capture points, see Capture Points of the pktcap-uw Tool.
Procedure
1 (Optional) Find the name of the VMkernel adapter that you want to monitor in the VMkernel adapter list.
 In the , expand Networking on the Configure tab for the host and select VMkernel adapters.
 In the ESXi Shell to the host, to view a list of the physical adapters, run the following console
command:
Each VMkernel adapter isiprepresented

esxcli network interfaceaslist
vmkX, where X is the sequence number that ESXi assigned to the
adapter.
2 In the ESXi Shell to the host, run the pktcap-uw command with the --vmk vmkX argument and with
options to monitor packets at a particular point, filter captured packets and save the result to a file.
where the square brackets [] enclose the options of the pktcap-uw--vmk vmkX command and the vertical
bars | represent alternative values.
You can replace the --vmk vmkX option with --switchportvmkernel_adapter_port_ID, where
vmkernel_adapter_port_ID is the PORT-ID value that the network panel of the esxtop utility displays for
the adapter.
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If you run the pktcap-uw--vmk vmkX command without options, you obtain the content of packets that are
leaving the VMkernel adapter.
a To check transmitted or received packets at a specific place and direction, use the
--capture option, or combine the values of the --dir and --stage options.
pktcap-uw Command Options Goal
--dir 1 --stage 0 Monitor packets immediately after they leave the virtual switch.
--dir 1 Monitor packets immediately before they enter the VMkernel adapter.
--dir 0 --stage 1 Monitor packets immediately before they enter the virtual switch.
or tracing packets.
What to do next
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Capture Dropped Packets
Troubleshoot lost connectivity by capturing dropped packets through the pktcap-uw utility.
A packet might be dropped at a point in the network stream for many reasons, for example, a firewall rule,
filtering in an IOChain and DVfilter, VLAN mismatch, physical adapter malfunction, checksum failure, and so
on. You can use the pktcap-uw utility to examine where packets are dropped and the reason for the drop.
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Procedure
1 In the ESXi Shell to the host, run the pktcap-uw --capture Drop command with options to monitor
packets at a particular point, filter captured packets and save the result to a file.
where the square

pktcap-uw brackets []
--capture enclose
Drop the options of the
[filter_options] pktcap-uwpcap_file_path
[--outfile --capture Drop command
[--ng]] and the
[--count
vertical bars | represent alternative values.
number_of_packets]
a Use a filter_options to filter packets according to source and destination address, VLAN ID, VXLAN ID,
b Use options to save the contents of each packet or the contents of a limited number of packets to a
Note You can see the reason and the place where a packet is dropped only when you capture packets to
the console output. The pktcap-uw utility saves only the content of packets to a .pcap or
.pcapng file.
c Use the--count option to monitor only a number of packets.
or tracing packets.
Results
Besides the contents of dropped packets, the output of the pktcap-uw utility displays the reason for the drop and
the function in the network stack that handled the packet last.
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What to do next
Trace Packets by Using the pktcap-uw Utility
Use the pktcap-uw utility to trace the path that packets traverse in the network stack for latency analysis and for
locating the point where a packet is corrupted or dropped.
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The pktcap-uw utility shows the path of packets together with timestamps that note the time when a packet is
handled by a networking function on ESXi. The utility reports the path of a packet immediately before it is
released from the stack.
To view the full path information for a packet, you must print the result from the pktcap-uw
utility in the console output or save it to a PCAPNG file.
Procedure
1 In the ESXi Shell to the host, run the pktcap-uw --trace command with options to filter traced
packets, save the result to a file and limit the number of traced packets.
where the square

pktcap-uw brackets
--trace [] enclose optional
[filter_options] items of the
[--outfile pktcap-uw [--trace
pcap_file_path command and the
--ng]] [--count
vertical bars | represent alternative values.

number_of_packets]
a Use a filter_options to filter packets according to source and destination address, VLAN ID, VXLAN ID,
b Use options to save the contents of each packet or the contents of a limited number of packets to a
Note A .pcap file contains only the contents of traced packets. To collect packet paths besides packet
content, save the output to a .pcapng file.
c Use the--count option to monitor only a number of packets.
or tracing packets.
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What to do next
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vSphere Storage Infrastructure Procedures
This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining the vSphere Storage infrastructure.
Managing Storage Devices
Manage local and networked storage device that your ESXi host has access to.
Storage Device Characteristics
When your ESXi host connects to block-based storage systems, LUNs or storage devices that support ESXi
become available to the host.
After the devices get registered with your host, you can display all available local and networked devices and
review their information. If you use third-party multipathing plug-ins, the storage devices available through the
plug-ins also appear on the list.
Note If an array supports implicit asymmetric logical unit access (ALUA) and has only standby paths, the
registration of the device fails. The device can register with the host after the target activates a standby path and
the host detects it as active. The advanced system /Disk/ FailDiskRegistration parameter controls this
behavior of the host.
For each storage adapter, you can display a separate list of storage devices available for this adapter.
Generally, when you review storage devices, you see the following information.
Table 1-17. Storage Device Information
Storage Device Information Description
Name Also called Display Name. It is a name that the ESXi host assigns to the device based on the storage type
and manufacturer. Generally, you can change this name to a name of your choice. See Rename Storage
Device.
Identifier A universally unique identifier that is intrinsic to the device. See Understanding Storage Device
Naming.
Operational State Indicates whether the device is attached or detached. See Detach Storage Devices.
LUN Logical Unit Number (LUN) within the SCSI target. The LUN number is provided by the storage
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system. If a target has only one LUN, the LUN number is always zero (0).
Type Type of device, for example, disk or CD-ROM.
Drive Type Information about whether the device is a flash drive or a regular HDD drive. For information
about flash drives and NVMe devices, see Working with Flash Devices.
Transport Transportation protocol your host uses to access the device. The protocol depends on the type of storage
being used. See Types of Physical Storage.
Capacity Total capacity of the storage device.
Owner The plug-in, such as the NMP or a third-party plug-in, that the host uses to manage paths to the
storage device. See Pluggable Storage Architecture and Path Management.
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Table 1-17. Storage Device Information (continued)
Storage Device InformationDescription
Hardware Acceleration Information about whether the storage device assists the host with virtual machine management
operations. The status can be Supported, Not Supported, or Unknown. See Storage Hardware
Acceleration.
Sector Format Indicates whether the device uses a traditional, 512n, or advanced sector format, such as 512e or 4Kn.
See Device Sector Formats.
Location A path to the storage device in the /vmfs/devices/ directory.
Partition Format A partition scheme used by the storage device. It can be of a master boot record (MBR) or GUID
partition table (GPT) format. The GPT devices can support datastores greater than 2 TB. See Device
Sector Formats.
Partitions Primary and logical partitions, including a VMFS datastore, if configured.
Multipathing Policies Path Selection Policy and Storage Array Type Policy the host uses to manage paths to storage. See
Understanding Multipathing and Failover.
Paths Paths used to access storage and their status. See Disable Paths.
Display Storage Devices for an ESXi Host
Display all storage devices available to a ESXi host. If you use any third-party multipathing plug- ins, the storage
devices available through the plug-ins also appear on the list.
The Storage Devices view allows you to list the hosts' storage devices, analyze their information, and modify
properties.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, navigate to the ESXi host.
2 Click the Configure tab.
3 Under Storage, click Storage Devices.
All storage devices available to the host are listed in the Storage Devices table.
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4 To view details for a specific device, select the device from the list.
5 Use the icons to perform basic storage management tasks.
Availability of specific icons depends on the device type and configuration.
Icon Description
Refresh Refresh information about storage adapters, topology, and file systems.
Detach Detach the selected device from the host.
Attach Attach the selected device to the host.
Rename Change the display name of the selected device.
Turn On LED Turn on the locator LED for the selected devices.
Turn Off LED Turn off the locator LED for the selected devices.
Mark as Flash Disk Mark the selected devices as flash disks.
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IconDescription
Mark as HDD Disk Mark the selected devices as HDD disks.
Mark as Local Mark the selected devices as local for the host.
Mark as Remote Mark the selected devices as remote for the host.
Erase Partitions Erase partitions on the selected devices.
Mark as Perennially Reserved Mark the selected device as perennially reserved.
Unmark as Perennially Reserved Clear the perennial reservation from the selected device.
6 Use the following tabs to access additional information and modify properties for the selected device.
Tab Description
Properties View device properties and characteristics. View and modify multipathing policies for
the device.
Paths Display paths available for the device. Disable or enable a selected path.
Partition Details Displays information about partitions and their formats.
Display Storage Devices for an Adapter
Display a list of storage devices accessible through a specific storage adapter on an ESXi host.
Procedure
3 Under Storage, click Storage Adapters.
All storage adapters installed on the host are listed in the Storage Adapters table.
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4 Select the adapter from the list and click the Devices tab.
Storage devices that the host can access through the adapter are displayed.
5 Use the icons to perform basic storage management tasks.
Availability of specific icons depends on the device type and configuration.
Icon Description
Refresh Refresh information about storage adapters, topology, and file systems.
Detach Detach the selected device from the host.
Attach Attach the selected device to the host.
Rename Change the display name of the selected device.
Storage Rescan Operations
When you perform storage management tasks or make changes in the SAN configuration, you might need to
rescan your storage.
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When you perform VMFS datastore management operations, such as creating a VMFS datastore or RDM, adding
an extent, and increasing or deleting a VMFS datastore, your host or the vCenter Server automatically rescans and
updates your storage. You can disable the automatic rescan feature by turning off the Host Rescan Filter. See Turn
off Storage Filters.
In certain cases, you need to perform a manual rescan. You can rescan all storage available to your host or to all
hosts in a folder, cluster, and data center.
If the changes you make are isolated to storage connected through a specific adapter, perform a rescan for this
adapter.
Perform the manual rescan each time you make one of the following changes.
 Zone a new disk array on a SAN.
 Create new LUNs on a SAN.
 Change the path masking on a host.
 Reconnect a cable.
 Change CHAP settings (iSCSI only).
 Add or remove discovery or static addresses (iSCSI only).
 Add a single host to the vCenter Server after you have edited or removed from the vCenter Server a datastore
shared by the vCenter Server hosts and the single host.
Important If you rescan when a path is unavailable, the host removes the path from the list of paths to the device.
The path reappears on the list as soon as it becomes available and starts working again.
Perform Storage Rescan
When you make changes in your SAN configuration, you might need to rescan storage. You can rescan all storage
available to your ESXi host, cluster, or data center. If the changes you make are isolated to storage accessed
through a specific host, perform the rescan for only this host.
Procedure
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1 In the vSphere Client object navigator, browse to a host, a cluster, a data center, or a folder that contains
hosts.
2 From the right-click menu, select Storage > Rescan Storage.
3 Specify extent of rescan.
Option Description
Scan for New Storage Devices Rescan all adapters to discover new storage devices. If new devices are discovered,
they appear in the device list.
Scan for New VMFS Volumes Rescan all storage devices to discover new datastores that have been added since the last
scan. Any new datastores appear in the datastore list.
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Perform Adapter Rescan
When you make changes in your SAN configuration and these changes are isolated to storage accessed through a
specific adapter on ESXi host, perform rescan for only this adapter.
Procedure
3 Under Storage, click Storage Adapters, and select the adapter to rescan from the list.
4 Click the Rescan Adapter icon.
Enable or Disable Locator LED on ESXi Storage Devices
Use the locator LED to identify specific storage devices, so that you can locate them among other devices.
You can turn the locator LED on or off.
Procedure
4 From the list of storage devices, select one or more disks and enable or disable the locator LED indicator.
Option Description
Enable Click the Turn On LED icon.
Disable Click the Turn Off LED icon.
Erase Storage Devices
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Certain functionalities, such as vSAN or virtual flash resource, require that your ESXi host uses clean storage
devices. You can erase an HHD or flash device and remove all existing data.
Prerequisites
 Make sure that the host is in the connected state.
 Verify that the devices you plan to erase are not in use.
 Required privilege: Host.Config.Storage
Procedure
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4 Select one or more devices and click the Erase Partitions icon.
5 Verify that the partition information you are erasing is not critical.
6 Click OK to confirm your change.
Identifying Device Connectivity Problems
When your ESXi host experiences a problem while connecting to a storage device, the host treats the
problem as permanent or temporary depending on certain factors.
Storage connectivity problems are caused by a variety of reasons. Although ESXi cannot always determine the
reason for a storage device or its paths being unavailable, the host differentiates between a permanent device loss
(PDL) state of the device and a transient all paths down (APD) state of storage.
Permanent Device Loss (PDL)
A condition that occurs when a storage device permanently fails or is administratively removed or
excluded. It is not expected to become available. When the device becomes permanently unavailable,
ESXi receives appropriate sense codes or a login rejection from storage arrays, and is able to recognize
that the device is permanently lost.
All Paths Down (APD)
A condition that occurs when a storage device becomes inaccessible to the host and no paths to the device are
available. ESXi treats this as a transient condition because typically the problems with the device are
temporary and the device is expected to become available again.
Connectivity Problems and vSphere High Availability
When the device enters the PDL or APD state, vSphere High Availability (HA) can detect connectivity problems
and provide automated recovery for affected virtual machines on the ESXi host. vSphere HA uses VM Component
Protection (VMCP) to protect virtual machines running on the host in the vSphere HA cluster against accessibility
failures. For more information about VMCP and how to configure responses for datastores and virtual machines
when the APD or PDL condition occurs, see the vSphere Availability documentation.
Detecting PDL Conditions
A storage device is considered to be in the permanent device loss (PDL) state when it becomes permanently
unavailable to your ESXi host.
Typically, the PDL condition occurs when a device is unintentionally removed, or its unique ID changes, or
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when the device experiences an unrecoverable hardware error.
When the storage array determines that the device is permanently unavailable, it sends SCSI sense codes to the
ESXi host. After receiving the sense codes, your host recognizes the device as failed and registers the state of the
device as PDL. For the device to be considered permanently lost, the sense codes must be received on all its
paths.
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After registering the PDL state of the device, the host stops attempts to reestablish connectivity or to send
commands to the device.
The vSphere Client displays the following information for the device:
 The operational state of the device changes to Lost Communication.
 All paths are shown as Dead.
 Datastores on the device are not available.
If no open connections to the device exist, or after the last connection closes, the host removes the PDL device and
all paths to the device. You can disable the automatic removal of paths by setting the advanced host parameter
Disk.AutoremoveOnPDL to 0.
If the device returns from the PDL condition, the host can discover it, but treats it as a new device. Data
consistency for virtual machines on the recovered device is not guaranteed.
Note When a device fails without sending appropriate SCSI sense codes or an iSCSI login rejection, the host
cannot detect PDL conditions. In this case, the host continues to treat the device connectivity problems as
APD even when the device fails permanently.
Permanent Device Loss and SCSI Sense Codes
The following VMkernel log example of a SCSI sense code indicates that the device is in the PDL state.
Permanent Device Loss and iSCSI

H:0x0 D:0x2 P:0x0 Valid sense data: 0x5 0x25 0x0 or Logical Unit Not Supported
On iSCSI arrays with a single LUN per target, PDL is detected through iSCSI login failure. An iSCSI storage array
rejects your host's attempts to start an iSCSI session with a reason Target Unavailable. As with the sense
codes, this response must be received on all paths for the device to be considered permanently lost.
Permanent Device Loss and Virtual Machines
After registering the PDL state of the device, the host closes all I/O from virtual machines. vSphere HA
can detect PDL and restart failed virtual machines.
Performing Planned Storage Device Removal
When a storage device is malfunctioning, you can avoid permanent device loss (PDL) conditions or all paths down
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(APD) conditions. Perform a planned removal and reconnection of a storage device.
Planned device removal is an intentional disconnection of a storage device. You might also plan to remove a
device for such reasons as upgrading your hardware or reconfiguring your storage devices. When you perform an
orderly removal and reconnection of a storage device, you complete a number of tasks.
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Task Description
Migrate virtual machines from the device you plan to detach. vCenter Server and Host Management
Unmount the datastore deployed on the device. See Unmount Datastores.
Detach the storage device. See Detach Storage Devices.
For an iSCSI device with a single LUN per target, delete the static target entry from See Remove Dynamic or Static iSCSI
each iSCSI HBA that has a path to the storage device. Targets.
Perform any necessary reconfiguration of the storage device by using the array console. See your vendor documentation.
Reattach the storage device. See Attach Storage Devices.
Mount the datastore and restart the virtual machines. See Mount Datastores.
Detach Storage Devices
Safely detach a storage device from your ESXi host.
You might need to detach the device to make it inaccessible to your host, when, for example, you perform a
hardware upgrade on the storage side.
Prerequisites
 The device does not contain any datastores.
 No virtual machines use the device as an RDM disk.
 The device does not contain a diagnostic partition or a scratch partition.
Procedure
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4 Select the device to detach and click the Detach icon.
Results
The device becomes inaccessible. The operational state of the device changes to Unmounted.
What to do next
If multiple hosts share the device, detach the device from each host.
Attach Storage Devices
Reattach a storage device that you previously detached from the ESXi host.
Procedure
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4 Select the detached storage device and click the Attach icon.
Results
The device becomes accessible.
Recovering from PDL Conditions
An unplanned permanent device loss (PDL) condition occurs when a storage device becomes permanently
unavailable without being properly detached from the ESXi host.
The following items in the vSphere Client indicate that the device is in the PDL state:
 The datastore deployed on the device is unavailable.
 Operational state of the device changes to Lost Communication.
 A warning about the device being permanently inaccessible appears in the VMkernel log file.
To recover from the unplanned PDL condition and remove the unavailable device from the host, perform the
following tasks.
Task Description
Power off and unregister all virtual machines that are running on the datastore affected by the PDL See vSphere Virtual
condition. Machine Administration.
Unmount the datastore. See Unmount Datastores.
Rescan all ESXi hosts that had access to the device. See Perform Storage
Rescan.
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Note If the rescan is not successful and the host continues to list the device, some pending I/O or active
references to the device might still exist. Check for any items that might still have an active reference to
the device or datastore. The items include virtual machines, templates, ISO images, raw device
mappings, and so on.
Handling Transient APD Conditions
A storage device is considered to be in the all paths down (APD) state when it becomes unavailable to
your ESXi host for an unspecified time period.
The reasons for an APD state can be, for example, a failed switch or a disconnected storage cable.
In contrast with the permanent device loss (PDL) state, the host treats the APD state as transient and expects the
device to be available again.
The host continues to retry issued commands in an attempt to reestablish connectivity with the device. If the host's
commands fail the retries for a prolonged period, the host might be at risk of having performance problems.
Potentially, the host and its virtual machines might become unresponsive.
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To avoid these problems, your host uses a default APD handling feature. When a device enters the APD state, the
host turns on a timer. With the timer on, the host continues to retry non-virtual machine commands for a limited time
period only.
By default, the APD timeout is set to 140 seconds. This value is typically longer than most devices require to recover
from a connection loss. If the device becomes available within this time, the host and its virtual machine continue to
run without experiencing any problems.
If the device does not recover and the timeout ends, the host stops its attempts at retries and stops any non-virtual
machine I/O. Virtual machine I/O continues retrying. The vSphere Client displays the following information for
the device with the expired APD timeout:
 The operational state of the device changes to Dead or Error.
 Datastores on the device are dimmed.
Even though the device and datastores are unavailable, virtual machines remain responsive. You can power off the
virtual machines or migrate them to a different datastore or host.
If later the device paths become operational, the host can resume I/O to the device and end the special APD
treatment.
Disable Storage APD Handling
The storage all paths down (APD) handling on your ESXi host is enabled by default. When it is enabled, the host
continues to retry nonvirtual machine I/O commands to a storage device in the APD state for a limited time period.
When the time period expires, the host stops its retry attempts and terminates any nonvirtual machine I/O. You can
disable the APD handling feature on your host.
If you disable the APD handling, the host will indefinitely continue to retry issued commands in an attempt to
reconnect to the APD device. This behavior might cause virtual machines on the host to exceed their internal I/O
timeout and become unresponsive or fail. The host might become disconnected from vCenter Server.
Procedure
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3 Under System, click Advanced System Settings.
4 In the Advanced System Settings table, select the Misc.APDHandlingEnable parameter and click the Edit
icon.
5 Change the value to 0.
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Results
If you disabled the APD handling, you can reenable it and set its value to 1 when a device enters the APD state.
The internal APD handling feature turns on immediately and the timer starts with the current timeout value for
each device in APD.
Change Timeout Limits for Storage APD
The timeout parameter controls how many seconds the ESXi host must retry the I/O commands to a storage device
in an all paths down (APD) state. You can change the default timeout value.
The timeout period begins immediately after the device enters the APD state. After the timeout ends, the host marks
the APD device as unreachable. The host stops its attempts to retry any I/O that is not coming from virtual
machines. The host continues to retry virtual machine I/O.
By default, the timeout parameter on your host is set to 140 seconds. You can increase the value of the timeout if,
for example, storage devices connected to your ESXi host take longer than 140 seconds to recover from a
connection loss.
Note If you change the timeout parameter after the device becomes unavailable, the change does not take effect
for that particular APD incident.
Procedure
3 Under System, click Advanced System Settings.
4 In the Advanced System Settings table, select the Misc.APDTimeout parameter and click the
Edit icon.
5 Change the default value.
You can enter a value between 20 and 99999 seconds.

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Verify the Connection Status of a Storage Device on ESXi Host
Use the esxcli command to verify the connection status of a particular storage device.
Prerequisites
Install ESXCLI. See Getting Started with ESXCLI. For troubleshooting, run esxcli commands in the ESXi
Shell.
Procedure
1 Run the esxcli storage core device list -d=device_ID command.
2 Review the connection status in the Status: area.
 on - Device is connected.
 dead - Device has entered the APD state. The APD timer starts.
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 dead timeout - The APD timeout has expired.
 not connected - Device is in the PDL state.
Administrative Operations for Datastores
After creating datastores, you can perform several administrative operations on the datastores. Certain operations,
such as renaming a datastore, are available for all types of datastores. Others apply to specific types of datastores.
Change Datastore Name
Use the vSphere Client to change the name of an existing datastore. You can rename the datastore that has
virtual machines running on it without any negative impact.
Note If the host is managed by vCenter Server, you cannot rename the datastore by directly accessing the host
from the VMware Host Client. You must rename the datastore from vCenter Server.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, navigate to the datastore.
2 Right-click the datastore to rename, and select Rename.
3 Enter a new datastore name.
The system enforces a 42 character limit for the datastore name.
Results
The new name appears on all hosts that have access to the datastore.
Unmount Datastores
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When you unmount a datastore, it remains intact, but can no longer be seen from the hosts that you specify. The
datastore continues to appear on other hosts, where it remains mounted.
Do not perform any configuration operations that might result in I/O to the datastore while the unmounting is in
progress.
Note Make sure that the datastore is not used by vSphere HA Heartbeating. vSphere HA Heartbeating does not
prevent you from unmounting the datastore. However, if the datastore is used for heartbeating, unmounting it
might cause the host to fail and restart any active virtual machine.
Prerequisites
When appropriate, before unmounting datastores, make sure that the following prerequisites are met:
 No virtual machines reside on the datastore.
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 Storage DRS does not manage the datastore.
 Storage I/O Control is disabled for this datastore.
Procedure
2 Right-click the datastore and select Unmount Datastore.
3 If the datastore is shared, select the hosts from which to unmount the datastore.
4 Confirm that you want to unmount the datastore.
Results
After you unmount a VMFS datastore from all hosts, the datastore is marked as inactive. If you unmount an NFS or
a vVols datastore from all hosts, the datastore disappears from the inventory. You can mount the unmounted VMFS
datastore. To mount the NFS or vVols datastore that has been removed from the inventory, use the New Datastore
wizard.
What to do next
If you unmounted the VMFS datastore as a part of a storage removal procedure, you can now detach the storage
device that is backing the datastore. See Detach Storage Devices.
Mount Datastores
You can mount a datastore you previously unmounted. You can also mount a datastore on additional hosts,
so that it becomes a shared datastore.
A VMFS datastore that has been unmounted from all hosts remains in inventory, but is marked as inaccessible. You
can use this task to mount the VMFS datastore to a specified host or multiple hosts.
If you have unmounted an NFS or a vVols datastore from all hosts, the datastore disappears from the inventory. To
mount the NFS or vVols datastore that has been removed from the inventory, use the New Datastore wizard.
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A datastore of any type that is unmounted from some hosts while being mounted on others, is shown as active in
the inventory.
Procedure
2 Right-click the datastore to mount and select one of the following options:
 Mount Datastore
 Mount Datastore on Additional Hosts

Whether you see one or another option depends on the type of datastore you use.
3 Select the hosts that should access the datastore and click OK.
4 To list all hosts that share the datastore, navigate to the datastore, and click the Hosts tab.
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Remove Dynamic or Static iSCSI Targets
Remove iSCSI servers connected to your ESXi host.
Procedure
3 Under Storage, click Storage Adapters, and select the iSCSI adapter to modify from the list.
4 Switch between Dynamic Discovery and Static Discovery.
5 Select an iSCSI server to remove and click Remove.
6 Rescan the iSCSI adapter.
If you are removing the static target that was dynamically discovered, you need to remove it from the storage
system before performing the rescan. Otherwise, your host will automatically discover and add the target to the
list of static targets when you rescan the adapter.
High Availability Procedures
This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining vSphere High Availability.
(Operational Enablement Activity) Testing Failover of a Host Virtual Machines

There are number of different ways to test if vSphere is working correctly. By the far the most effective and
realistic is to induce a failure of a physical vSphere host by powering it off. This can be done physically with the
power button or by using the BMC/DRAC/ILO card.
Note This test requires powered on VMs. Powering off an vSphere host does not register immediately in the
vCenter/Web Client UI as the management systems has number of retries to connect to the vSphere host in the
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event of temporary network outage. So for tests you may wish to carry out a ping -t of the vSphere host that
will be brought down and number of the VMs that currently located on the host.
To test vSphere HA follow these steps:
Procedure
1 Login to the vSphere Client and navigate to Hosts and Clusters.
2 Select the Cluster, click Configure > vSphere Availability. From this page verify that vSphere HA is turned
on.
3 Select the Host you will test with, and select the VMs tab to make sure that there are Virtual Machines
Powered on, on the Host.
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4 Power down the host. This can be done via ILO or by pressing the power button on it.
The host will go into a not responding state, and vSphere HA will kick in, restarting the VMs on other hosts
in the cluster.
5 Verify that the VMs are restarted properly on other hosts in the cluster.
6 Restart the host.
The host will join back to the cluster once it has restarted.
Configuring vSphere Availability Settings
When you create a vSphere HA cluster or configure an existing cluster, you must configure settings that
determine how the feature works.
In the vSphere Client, you can configure following the vSphere HA settings:
Failures and responses
Provide settings here for host failure responses, host isolation, VM monitoring, and VM Component
Protection.
Admission Control
Enable or disable admission control for the vSphere HA cluster and choose a policy for how it is enforced.
Heartbeat Datastores
Specify preferences for the datastores that vSphere HA uses for datastore heartbeating.
Advanced Options
Customize vSphere HA behavior by setting advanced options.
Configuring Responses to Failures
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The Failure and Responses pane of the vSphere HA settings allows you to configure how your cluster should
function when problems are encountered.
In this part of the vSphere Client, you can determine the specific responses the vSphere HA cluster has for host
failures and isolation. You can also configure VM Component Protection (VMCP) actions when Permanent
Device Loss (PDL) and All Paths Down (APD) situations occur and you can enable VM monitoring.
The following tasks are available:
Respond to Host Failure
You can set specific responses to host failures that occur in your vSphere HA cluster. This page is
editable only if you have enabled vSphere HA.
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Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, browse to the vSphere HA cluster.
3 Select vSphere Availability and click Edit.
4 Click Failures and Responses and then expand Host Failure Response.
5 Select from the following configuration options.
Option Description
Failure Response If you select Disabled, this setting turns off host monitoring and VMs are not restarted
when host failures occur. If Restart VMs is selected, VMs are failed over based on their
restart priority when a host fails.
Default VM Restart Priority The restart priority determines the order in which virtual machines are restarted when the
host fails. Higher priority virtual machines are started first. If multiple hosts fail, all virtual
machines are migrated from the first host in order of priority, then all virtual machines from
the second host in order of priority, and so on.
VM Restart Priority Condition A specific condition must be selected as well as a delay after that condition has been met,
before vSphere HA is allowed to continue to the next VM restart priority.
6 Click OK.
Results
Your settings for the host failure response take effect.
Respond to Host Isolation
You can set specific responses to host isolation that occurs in your vSphere HA cluster. This page is
editable only if you have enabled vSphere HA.
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Procedure
4 Click Failures and Responses and expand Response for Host Isolation.
5 To configure the host isolation response, select Disabled, Shut down and restart VMs, or
Power off and restart VMs.
6 Click OK.
Results
Your setting for the host isolation response takes effect.
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Configure VMCP Responses
Configure the response that VM Component Protection (VMCP) makes when a datastore encounters a
PDL or APD failure.
This page is editable only if you have enabled vSphere HA.
Procedure
4 Click Failures and Responses, and expand either Datastore with PDL or Datastore with APD .
5 If you clicked Datastore with PDL, you can set the VMCP failure response for this type of issue, either
Disabled, Issue Events, or Power off and restart VMs.
6 If you clicked Datastore with APD, you can set the VMCP failure response for this type of issue, either
Disabled, Issue Events, Power off and restart VMs--Conservative restart policy, or Power off and restart
VMs--Aggressive restart policy. You can also set Response recovery, which is the number of minutes that
VMCP waits before taking action.
7 Click OK.
Results
Your settings for the VMCP failure response take effect.
Enable VM Monitoring
You can turn on VM and Application Monitoring and also set the monitoring sensitivity for your vSphere HA
cluster.
This page is editable only if you have enabled vSphere HA.
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Procedure
4 Click Failures and Responses and expand VM Monitoring.
5 Select VM Monitoring and Application Monitoring.
These settings turn on VMware Tools heartbeats and application heartbeats, respectively.
6 To set the heartbeat monitoring sensitivity, move the slider between Low and High or select
Custom to provide custom settings.
7 Click OK.
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Results
Your monitoring settings take effect.
Configure Proactive HA
You can configure how Proactive HA responds when a provider has notified its health degradation to
vCenter, indicating a partial failure of that host.
This page is editable only if you have enabled vSphere DRS.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, browse to the Proactive HA cluster.
4 Select Turn on Proactive HA.
5 Click Proactive HA Failures and Responses.
6 Select from the following configuration options.
Option Description
Automation Level Determine whether host quarantine or maintenance mode and VM migrations
are recommendations or automatic.
 Manual. vCenter Server suggests migration recommendations for virtual machines.

 Automated. Virtual machines are migrated to healthy hosts and degraded
hosts are entered into quarantine or maintenance mode
depending on the configured Proactive HA automation level.
Remediation Determine what happens to partially degraded hosts.
 Quarantine mode for all failures. Balances performance and availability,
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by avoiding the usage of partially degraded hosts provided that virtual machine
performance is unaffected.
 Quarantine mode for moderate and Maintenance mode for severe failure
(Mixed). Balances performance and availability, by avoiding the usage of
moderately degraded hosts provided that virtual machine performance is unaffected.
Ensures that virtual machines do not run on severely failed hosts.
 Maintenance mode for all failures. Ensures that virtual machines do not run on
partially failed hosts.
Host.Config.Quarantine and Host.Config.Maintenance privileges are
required to put hosts in Quarantine mode and Maintenance mode, respectively.
To enable Proactive HA providers for this cluster, select the check boxes. Providers appear when their
corresponding vSphere Client plugin has been installed and the providers monitor every host in the cluster. To
view or edit the failure conditions supported by the provider, click the edit link.
7 Click OK.
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Configure Admission Control
After you create a cluster, you can configure admission control to specify whether virtual machines can be started
if they violate availability constraints. The cluster reserves resources so that failover can occur for all running
virtual machines on the specified number of hosts.
The Admission Control page appears only if you enabled vSphere HA.
Procedure
4 Click Admission Control to display the configuration options.
5 Select a number for the Host failures cluster tolerates. This is the maximum number of host failures that the
cluster can recover from or guarantees failover for.
6 Select an option for Define host failover capacity by.
Option Description
Cluster resource percentage Specify a percentage of the cluster’s CPU and memory resources to reserve as spare
capacity to support failovers.
Slot Policy (powered-on VMs) Select a slot size policy that covers all powered on VMs or is a fixed size. You can
also calculate how many VMs require multiple slots.
Dedicated failover hosts Select hosts to use for failover actions. Failovers can still occur on other hosts in the
cluster if a default failover host does not have enough resources.
Disabled Select this option to disable admission control and allow virtual machine power ons
that violate availability constraints.
7 Set the percentage for the Performance degradation VMs tolerate.
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This setting determines what percentage of performance degradation the VMs in the cluster are allowed to
tolerate during a failure.
8 Click OK.
Results
Your admission control settings take effect.
Configure Heartbeat Datastores
vSphere HA uses datastore heartbeating to distinguish between hosts that have failed and hosts that reside on a
network partition. With datastore heartbeating, vSphere HA can monitor hosts when a management network
partition occurs and continue to respond to failures.
You can specify the datastores that you want to be used for datastore heartbeating.
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Procedure
4 Click Heartbeat Datastores to display the configuration options for datastore heartbeating.
5 To instruct vSphere HA about how to select the datastores and how to treat your preferences,
select from the following options.
Table 1-18.
Datastore Heartbeating Options
Automatically select datastores accessible from the host
Use datastores only from the specified list
Use datastores from the specified list and complement automatically if needed
6 In the Available heartbeat datastores pane, select the datastores that you want to use for heartbeating.
The listed datastores are shared by more than one host in the vSphere HA cluster. When a datastore is selected,
the lower pane displays all the hosts in the vSphere HA cluster that can access it.
7 Click OK.
Continuous Availability Procedures
This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining vSphere Fault Tolerance.
Turn Off Fault Tolerance
Turning off vSphere Fault Tolerance deletes the secondary virtual machine, its configuration, and all history.
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Use the Turn Off Fault Tolerance option if you do not plan to reenable the feature. Otherwise, use the
Suspend Fault Tolerance option.
Note If the Secondary VM resides on a host that is in maintenance mode, disconnected, or not responding, you
cannot use the Turn Off Fault Tolerance option. In this case, you should suspend and resume Fault Tolerance
instead.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, browse to the virtual machine for which you want to turn off Fault Tolerance.
2 Right-click the virtual machine and select Fault Tolerance > Turn Off Fault Tolerance.
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3 Click Yes.
Results
Fault Tolerance is turned off for the selected virtual machine. The history and the secondary virtual machine
for the selected virtual machine are deleted.
Note Fault Tolerance cannot be turned off when the secondary VM is in the process of being started. Since this
involves syncing up the primary VM's full state to the secondary VM, this process may take longer than expected.
Suspend Fault Tolerance
Suspending vSphere Fault Tolerance for a virtual machine suspends its Fault Tolerance protection, but preserves
the Secondary VM, its configuration, and all history. Use this option to resume Fault Tolerance protection in the
future.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, browse to the virtual machine for which you want to suspend Fault Tolerance.
2 Right-click the virtual machine and select Fault Tolerance > Suspend Fault Tolerance.
3 Click Yes.
Results
Fault Tolerance is suspended for the selected virtual machine. Any history and the Secondary VM for the selected
virtual machine are preserved and will be used if the feature is resumed.
What to do next
After you suspend Fault Tolerance, to resume the feature select Resume Fault Tolerance.
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Migrate Secondary
After vSphere Fault Tolerance is turned on for a Primary VM, you can migrate its associated Secondary VM.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, browse to the Primary VM for which you want to migrate its Secondary VM.
2 Right-click the virtual machine and select Fault Tolerance > Migrate Secondary.
3 Complete the options in the Migrate dialog box and confirm the changes that you made.
4 Click Finish to apply the changes.
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Results
The Secondary VM associated with the selected fault tolerant virtual machine is migrated to the specified host.
Test Failover
You can induce a failover situation for a selected Primary VM to test your Fault Tolerance protection.
This option is unavailable (dimmed) if the virtual machine is powered off.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, browse to the Primary VM for which you want to test failover.
2 Right-click the virtual machine and select Fault Tolerance > Test Failover.
3 View details about the failover in the Task Console.
Results
This task induces failure of the Primary VM to ensure that the Secondary VM replaces it. A new Secondary VM
is also started placing the Primary VM back in a Protected state.
Test Restart Secondary
You can induce the failure of a Secondary VM to test the Fault Tolerance protection provided for a selected
Primary VM.
This option is unavailable (dimmed) if the virtual machine is powered off.
Procedure
1 In the vSphere Client, browse to the Primary VM for which you want to conduct the test.
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2 Right-click the virtual machine and select Fault Tolerance > Test Restart Secondary.
3 View details about the test in the Task Console.
Results
This task results in the termination of the Secondary VM that provided Fault Tolerance protection for the selected
Primary VM. A new Secondary VM is started, placing the Primary VM back in a Protected state.
Upgrade Hosts Used for Fault Tolerance
Use the following procedure to upgrade hosts used for Fault Tolerance.
Prerequisites
Verify that you have cluster administrator privileges.
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Verify that you have sets of four or more ESXi hosts that are hosting fault tolerant virtual machines that
are powered on. If the virtual machines are powered off, the Primary and Secondary VMs can be relocated
to hosts with different builds.
Note This upgrade procedure is for a minimum four-node cluster. The same instructions can be followed for a
smaller cluster, though the unprotected interval will be slightly longer.
Procedure
1 Using vMotion, migrate the fault tolerant virtual machines off of two hosts.
2 Upgrade the two evacuated hosts to the same ESXi build.
3 Suspend Fault Tolerance on the Primary VM.
4 Using vMotion, move the Primary VM for which Fault Tolerance has been suspended to one of the upgraded
hosts.
5 Resume Fault Tolerance on the Primary VM that was moved.
6 Repeat Step 1 to Step 5 for as many fault tolerant virtual machine pairs as can be accommodated
on the upgraded hosts.
7 Using vMotion, redistribute the fault tolerant virtual machines.
Results
All ESXi hosts in a cluster are upgraded.
Dynamic Resourcing Procedures
This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining Dynamic Resourcing features of vSphere.
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Migrating Virtual Machines
You can move virtual machines from one compute resource or storage location to another by using cold or hot
migration. For example, with vSphere vMotion you can move powered on virtual machines away from a host to
perform maintenance, to balance loads, to collocate virtual machines that communicate with each other, to move
virtual machines apart to minimize fault domain, to migrate to new server hardware, and so on.
Moving a virtual machine from one inventory folder to another folder or resource pool in the same data center is
not a form of migration. Unlike migration, cloning a virtual machine or copying its virtual disks and configuration
file are procedures that create a new virtual machine. Cloning and copying a virtual machine are also not forms of
migration.
By using migration, you can change the compute resource that the virtual machine runs on. For example, you can
move a virtual machine from one host to another host or cluster.
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To migrate virtual machines with disks larger than 2 TB, the source and destination ESXi hosts must be version
6.0 and later.
Depending on the power state of the virtual machine that you migrate, migration can be cold or hot.
Cold Migration
Moving a powered off or suspended virtual machine to a new host. Optionally, you can relocate configuration
and disk files for powered off or suspended virtual machines to new storage locations. You can also use cold
migration to move virtual machines from one virtual switch to another, and from one data center to another.
You can perform cold migration manually or you can schedule a task.
Hot Migration
Moving a powered on virtual machine to a new host. Optionally, you can also move the virtual machine disks or
folder to a different datastore. Hot migration is also called live migration or vMotion. With vMotion, you
migrate the virtual machine without any interruption in its availability.
Depending on the virtual machine resource type, you can perform three types of migration.
Change compute resource only
Moving a virtual machine, but not its storage, to another compute resource, such as a host, cluster, resource
pool, or vApp. You can move the virtual machine to another compute resource by using cold or hot
migration. If you change the compute resource of a powered on virtual machine, you use vMotion.
Change storage only
Moving a virtual machine and its storage, including virtual disks, configuration files, or a combination of these,
to a new datastore on the same host. You can change the datastore of a virtual machine by using cold or hot
migration. If you move a powered on virtual machine and its storage to a new datastore, you use Storage
vMotion.
Change both compute resource and storage
Moving a virtual machine to another host and at the same time moving its disk or virtual machine folder to
another datastore. You can change the host and datastore simultaneously by using cold or hot migration.
In vSphere 6.0 and later, you can move virtual machines between vSphere sites by using migration
between the following types of objects.
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Migrate to another virtual switch
Moving the network of a virtual machine to a virtual switch of a different type. You can migrate virtual
machines without reconfiguring the physical and virtual network. By using cold or hot migration, you can move
the virtual machine from a standard to a standard or distributed switch, and from a distributed switch to another
distributed switch. When you
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move a virtual machine network between distributed switches, the network configuration and policies that are
associated with the network adapters of the virtual machine are transferred to the target switch.
Migrate to another data center
Moving a virtual machine to a different data center. You can change the data center of a virtual machine by
using cold or hot migration. For networking in the target data center, you can select a dedicated port group on
a distributed switch.
Migrate to another vCenter Server system
Moving a virtual machine to a vCenter Server instance that is connected to the source vCenter Server
instance through vCenter Enhanced Linked Mode.
You can also move virtual machines between vCenter Server instances that are located across a long
distance from each other.
For information about the requirements about vMotion across vCenter Server instances, see
Requirements for Migration Across vCenter Servers.
Migrate a Powered Off or Suspended Virtual Machine
You can use cold migration to move a virtual machine and its associated disks from one datastore to
another. The virtual machines are not required to be on shared storage.
Prerequisites
 Make sure that you are familiar with the requirements for cold migration. See Cold Migration.
 Required privilege: Resource.Migrate powered off virtual machine
Procedure
1 Power off or suspend the virtual machine.
2 Right-click the virtual machine and select Migrate.
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a To locate a virtual machine, select a data center, folder, cluster, resource pool, host, or vApp.
b Click the Virtual Machines tab.
3 Select the migration type and click Next.
Option Description
Change compute resource only Move the virtual machine to another host.
Change storage only Move the virtual machine’s configuration file and virtual disks.
Change both compute resource and Move the virtual machine to another host and move its configuration file and virtual disks.
storage
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4 If you change the compute resource of the virtual machine, select the destination compute resource for this
virtual machine migration and click Next.
Any compatibility problem appears in the Compatibility panel. Fix the problem, or select another host or
cluster.
Possible targets include hosts and DRS clusters with any level of automation. If a cluster has no DRS
enabled, select a specific host in the cluster rather than selecting the cluster.
Important If the virtual machine that you migrate has an NVDIMM device and virtual PMem hard disks, the
destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource. Otherwise, the compatibility check fails and
you cannot proceed further with the migration.
If the virtual machine that you migrate does not have an NVDIMM device, but it has virtual PMem hard disks,
the destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource, so that all PMem hard disks remain stored
on a PMem datastore. Otherwise, all the hard disks will use the storage policy and datastore selected for the
configuration files of the virtual machine.
Important Migrating a virtual machine that has an NVDIMM device or a vPMem disk to a host that does not
have the proper license fails and leaves the virtual machine in an unmanageable state for 90 seconds. You can
afterwards retry the migration and choose a destination host that is licensed to use PMem devices.
5 On the Select storage page, select the storage type for the virtual machine configuration files and all the hard
disks.
 If you select the Standard mode, all virtual disks are stored on a standard datastore.
 If you select the PMem mode, all virtual disks are stored on the host-local PMem datastore.
Configuration files cannot be stored on a PMem datastore and you must additionally select a regular
datastore for the configuration files of the virtual machine.
 If you select the Hybrid mode, all PMem virtual disks remain stored on a PMem datastore. Non-PMem
disks are affected by your choice of a VM storage policy and datastore or datastore cluster.
6 Select the format for the virtual machine's disks.
Option Action
Same format as source Use the same format as the source virtual machine.
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Thick Provision Lazy Zeroed Create a virtual disk in a default thick format. Space required for the virtual disk is
allocated during creation. Any data remaining on the physical device is not erased during
creation. Instead, it is zeroed out on demand on first write from the virtual machine.
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OptionAction
Thick Provision Eager Zeroed Create a thick disk that supports clustering features such as Fault Tolerance. Space required
for the virtual disk is allocated at creation time. In contrast to the thick provision lazy
zeroed format, the data remaining on the physical device is zeroed out during creation. It
might take longer to create disks in
this format than to create other types of disks.
Thin Provision Use the thin provisioned format. At first, a thin provisioned disk uses only as much
datastore space as the disk initially needs. If the thin disk needs more space later, it can
expand to the maximum capacity allocated to it.
7 Select a virtual machine storage policy from the VM Storage Policy drop-down menu.
Storage policies specify storage requirements for applications that run on the virtual machine. You can also
select the default policy for vSAN or Virtual Volumes datastores.
Important If the virtual machine hard disks use different storage policies, the new policy that you select only
applies to non-PMem hard disks. PMem hard disks are migrated to the host- local PMem datastore of the
destination host.
8 Select the datastore location where you want to store the virtual machine files.
Option Action
Store all virtual machine files in the Select a datastore and click Next.
same location on a datastore.
Store all virtual machine files in the a Select a Storage DRS cluster.
same Storage DRS cluster. b (Optional) To disable Storage DRS with this virtual machine, select Disable
Storage DRS for this virtual machine and select a datastore within the Storage
DRS cluster.
c Click Next.
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Store virtual machine configuration files a Click Configure per disk.
and disks in separate locations.
Note You can use the Configure per disk option to dowgrade from or upgrade to
PMem storage.
b For the virtual machine configuration file and for each virtual disk, select
Browse, and select a datastore or Storage DRS cluster.
Note Configuration files cannot be stored on a PMem datastore.
c (Optional) If you selected a Storage DRS cluster and do not want to use Storage DRS
with this virtual machine, select Disable Storage DRS for this virtual machine and
select a datastore within the Storage DRS cluster.
d Click Next.
9 Select a destination network for all VM network adapters connected to a valid source network and
click Next.
You can click Advanced to select a new destination network for each VM network adapter connected to a
valid source network.
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You can migrate a virtual machine network to another distributed switch in the same or to another data
center or vCenter Server.
10 On the Ready to complete page, review the details and click Finish.
Results
vCenter Server moves the virtual machine to the new host or storage location.
Event messages appear in the Events tab. The data displayed on the Summary tab shows the status and state
throughout the migration. If errors occur during migration, the virtual machines revert to their original states and
locations.
Migrate a Virtual Machine to a New Compute Resource
You can use the Migration wizard to migrate a powered-on virtual machine from one compute resource to
another by using vMotion. To relocate only the disks of a powered-on virtual machine, migrate the virtual
machine to a new datastore by using Storage vMotion.
Prerequisites
Verify that your hosts and virtual machines meet the requirements for migration with vMotion with shared
storage.
 Verify that your hosts and virtual machines meet the requirements for migration with vMotion. See Host
Configuration for vMotion and Virtual Machine Conditions and Limitation for vMotion.
 Verify that the storage that contains the virtual machine disks is shared between the source and target hosts.
See vMotion Shared Storage Requirements.
 For migration across vCenter Server instances, verify whether your system meets additional requirements.
See Requirements for Migration Across vCenter Servers
 For migration of a virtual machine with NVIDIA vGPU, verify that the target ESXi host has a free vGPU slot.
Also, verify that the vgpu.hotmigrate.enabled advanced setting is set to true. For more information
about configuring vCenter Server advanced settings, see "Configure Advanced Settings" in vCenter Server
Configuration.
 Required privilege: Resource.Migrate powered on virtual machine
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Procedure
2 Click Change compute resource only and click Next.
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3 Select a host, cluster, resource pool, or vApp to run the virtual machine, and click Next.
Any compatibility problem appears in the Compatibility panel. Fix the problem, or select another host or
cluster.
Possible targets include hosts and fully automated DRS clusters in the same or another vCenter Server system.
If your target is a non-automated cluster, select a host within the non- automated cluster.
destination host or cluster must have available PMem resources. Otherwise, the compatibility check fails and
the destination host or cluster must have available PMem resources, so that all PMem hard disks remain stored
on a PMem datastore. Otherwise, all the hard disks use the storage policy and datastore selected for the
afterwards retry the migration and select a destination host that is licensed to use PMem devices.
click Next.
5 Select the migration priority level and click Next.
Option Description
Schedule vMotion with high priority vCenter Server attempts to reserve resources on both the source and destination hosts
to be shared among all concurrent migrations with vMotion. vCenter Server grants a
larger share of host CPU resources. If sufficient CPU resources are not immediately
available, vMotion is not initiated.
Schedule regular vMotion vCenter Server reserves resources on both the source and destination hosts to be shared
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among all concurrent migration with vMotion. vCenter Server grants a smaller share of
host CPU resources. If there is a lack of CPU resources, the duration of vMotion can be
extended.
6 Review the page and click Finish.
Results
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locations.
Migrate a Virtual Machine to New Storage
Migrate a virtual machine with Storage vMotion to relocate the configuration file and virtual disks while the virtual
machine is powered on.
You can change the virtual machine host during a migration with Storage vMotion.
Prerequisites
 Verify that your system satisfies the requirements for Storage vMotion. See Storage vMotion Requirements
and Limitations.
 For migration of a virtual machine with NVIDIA vGPU, verify that the ESXi host on which the virtual
machine runs has a free vGPU slot. Also, verify that the vgpu.hotmigrate.enabled advanced setting is
set to true. For more information about configuring vCenter Server advanced settings, see Configure
Advanced Settings in the vSphere Client.
Procedure
2 Click Change storage only and click Next.
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Option Action
might take longer to create disks in this format than to create other types of disks.
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destination host.
Option Action
DRS cluster.
c Click Next.
PMem storage.
d Click Next.
Results
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vCenter Server moves the virtual machine to the new storage location. Names of migrated virtual machine files on
the destination datastore match the inventory name of the virtual machine.
locations.
Migrate a Virtual Machine to a New Compute Resource and Storage
You can move a virtual machine to another compute resource and move its disks or virtual machine folder to
another datastore. With vMotion, you can migrate a virtual machine and its disks and files while the virtual
machine is powered on.
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Simultaneous migration to a new compute resource and datastore provides greater mobility for virtual machines by
eliminating the vCenter Server boundary. Virtual machine disks or content of the virtual machine folder are
transferred over the vMotion network to reach the destination host and datastores.
To make disk format changes and preserve them, you must select a different datastore for the virtual machine
files and disks. You cannot preserve disk format changes if you select the same datastore on which the virtual
machine currently resides.
Prerequisites
 Verify that your hosts and virtual machines meet the requirements for live migration. See
Cross-Host Storage vMotion Requirements and Limitations.
 For migration across vCenter Server instances, verify whether your system meets additional requirements.
See Requirements for Migration Across vCenter Servers
 For migration of a virtual machine with NVIDIA vGPU, verify that the target ESXi host has a free vGPU slot.
Also, verify that the vgpu.hotmigrate.enabled advanced setting is set to true. For more information
about configuring vCenter Server advanced settings, see Configure Advanced Settings in the vSphere Client.
Procedure
2 Select Change both compute resource and storage and click Next.
3 Select a destination resource for the virtual machine, and click Next.
Any compatibility problems appear in the Compatibility panel. Fix the problem, or select another host or
cluster.
Possible targets include hosts and fully automated DRS clusters. If your target is a non- automated
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cluster, select a host within the non-automated cluster.
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If your environment has more than one vCenter Server instances, you can move virtual machines from
one vCenter Server inventory to another.
destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource. Otherwise, the compatibility check fails and
the destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource, so that all PMem hard disks remain stored
on a PMem datastore. Otherwise, all the hard disks will use the storage policy and datastore selected for the
afterwards retry the migration and choose a destination host that is licensed to use PMem devices.
4 On the Select storage page, select the storage type for the virtual machine configuration files and all the hard
disks.
 If you select the Standard mode, all virtual disks are stored on a standard datastore.
 If you select the PMem mode, all virtual disks are stored on the host-local PMem datastore.
Configuration files cannot be stored on a PMem datastore and you must additionally select a regular
datastore for the configuration files of the virtual machine.
 If you select the Hybrid mode, all PMem virtual disks remain stored on a PMem datastore. Non-PMem
disks are affected by your choice of a VM storage policy and datastore or datastore cluster.
Option Action
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destination host.
Option Action
DRS cluster.
c Click Next.
PMem storage individual hard disks.
d Click Next.
click Next.
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Option Description
extended.
Results
locations.
Common Task Steps for Virtual Machine Migration
Common task steps for virtual machine migration.
Note vMotion network traffic is not encrypted. You should provision secure private networks for use by vMotion
only.
By using a separate TCP/IP stack, you can handle vMotion and cold migration traffic according to the topology of
the network and as required for your organization:
 Route the traffic for migration of powered on or powered off virtual machines by using a default gateway.
The gateway must be different from the gateway assigned to the default stack on the host.
By using a separate default gateway, you can use DHCP for IP address assignment to the VMkernel
adapters for migration in a flexible way.
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 Assign a separate set of buffers and sockets.
 Avoid routing table conflicts that might otherwise appear when many features are using a common TCP/IP
stack.
 Isolate traffic to improve security.
Prerequisites
Verify that the host is running ESXi 6.0 or later
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Procedure
1 Select the virtual machine that you want to migrate in the inventory.
2 Right-click on the virtual machine and select Migrate from the pop-up menu.
5 Select the migration type and click Next.
Option Description
Change compute resource only Move the virtual machine to another host.
Change storage only Move the virtual machine’s configuration file and virtual disks.
Change both compute resource and Move the virtual machine to another host and move its configuration file and virtual disks.
storage
6 Select Change host and click Next.
7 Select the destination resource for the virtual machine migration.
Option Action
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click Next.
11 If you chose to move the configuration file and virtual disks of the virtual machine, select a disk format.
Option Description
Same as Source Use the format of the original virtual disk.
Thin provisioned Use the thin format to save storage space. The thin virtual disk uses just as much storage
space as it needs for its initial operations. When the virtual disk requires more space, it
can expand up to its maximum allocated capacity.
Thick Allocate a fixed amount of hard disk space to the virtual disk. The virtual disk in the thick
format does not change its size and from the beginning occupies the entire datastore space
provisioned to it.
Disks are converted from thin to thick format or thick to thin format only when they are copied from one
datastore to another. If you leave a disk in its original location, the disk format is not converted,
regardless of the selection made here.
Option Action
DRS cluster.
c Click Next.
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Store virtual machine configuration files a Click Advanced.
and disks in separate locations. b For the virtual machine configuration file and for each virtual disk, select
d Click Next.
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Option Action
same Storage DRS cluster. b (Optional) To not use Storage DRS with this virtual machine, select Disable
DRS cluster.
c Click Next.
Store virtual machine configuration files a Click Advanced.
and disks in separate locations. b For the virtual machine configuration file and for each virtual disk, click the
datastore name, select Browse, and select a datastore or Storage DRS cluster.
d Click Next.
Option Description
High Priority On hosts running ESX/ESXi version 4.1 or later, vCenter Server attempts to reserve
resources on both the source and destination hosts to be shared among all concurrent
migrations with vMotion. vCenter Server grants a larger share of host CPU resources to
high priority migrations than to standard priority migrations. Migrations always proceed
regardless of the resources that have been reserved.
On hosts running ESX/ESXi version 4.0 or earlier, vCenter Server attempts to reserve a
fixed amount of resources on both the source and destination hosts for each migration. If
resources are unavailable, high priority
migrations do not proceed.
Standard Priority On hosts running ESX/ESXi version 4.1 or later, vCenter Server reserves resources on
both the source and destination hosts to be shared among all concurrent migration with
vMotion. vCenter Server grants a smaller share of host CPU resources to standard priority
migrations than it grants to high priority migrations. Migrations always proceed regardless
of the resources that have been reserved.
On hosts running ESX/ESXi version 4.0 or earlier, vCenter Server attempts to reserve a
fixed amount of resources on the source and destination hosts for each migration. Standard
priority migrations always proceed. If sufficient resources are not available, the migration
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might proceed more slowly or fail to complete.
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Option Description
extended.
16 Review the information on the Review Selections page and click Finish.
17 Review the page and click Finish.
18 On the Select target device page, select the switch for the VMkernel adapter, and click Next.
Option Description
Select an existing network Use the physical adapter configuration of an existing distributed port group to send data
from the VMkernel adapter to the external network.
Select an existing standard switch Use the physical adapter configuration for the VMkernel adapter of an existing
standard switch.
New vSphere standard switch Assign a new physical adapter configuration for the VMkernel adapter on a new standard
switch.
Results
locations.
Creating a DRS Cluster

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A cluster is a collection of ESXi hosts and associated virtual machines with shared resources and a shared
management interface. Before you can obtain the benefits of cluster-level resource management you must create a
cluster and enable DRS.
Depending on whether or not Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (EVC) is enabled, DRS behaves differently when
you use vSphere Fault Tolerance (vSphere FT) virtual machines in your cluster.
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Table 1-19. DRS Behavior with vSphere FT Virtual Machines and EVC
EVC DRS (Load Balancing) DRS (Initial Placement)
Enabled Enabled (Primary and Secondary VMs) Enabled (Primary and Secondary VMs)
Disabled Disabled (Primary and Secondary VMs) Disabled (Primary VMs)
Fully Automated (Secondary VMs)
Edit Cluster Settings
When you add a host to a DRS cluster, the host’s resources become part of the cluster’s resources. In
addition to this aggregation of resources, with a DRS cluster you can support cluster-wide resource pools
and enforce cluster-level resource allocation policies.
The following cluster-level resource management capabilities are also available.
Load Balancing
The distribution and usage of CPU and memory resources for all hosts and virtual machines in the cluster are
continuously monitored. DRS compares these metrics to an ideal resource usage given the attributes of the
cluster’s resource pools and virtual machines, the current demand, and the imbalance target. DRS then provides
recommendations or performs virtual machine migrations accordingly. See Virtual Machine Migration. When
you power on a virtual machine in the cluster, DRS attempts to maintain proper load balancing by either placing
the virtual machine on an appropriate host or making a recommendation. See Admission Control and Initial
Placement.
Power management
When the vSphere Distributed Power Management (DPM) feature is enabled, DRS compares cluster and host-
level capacity to the demands of the cluster’s virtual machines, including recent historical demand. DRS then
recommends you place hosts in standby, or places hosts in standby power mode when sufficient excess
capacity is found. DRS powers-on hosts if capacity is needed. Depending on the resulting host power state
recommendations, virtual machines might need to be migrated to and from the hosts as well. See Managing
Power Resources.
Affinity Rules
You can control the placement of virtual machines on hosts within a cluster, by assigning affinity rules.
See Using DRS Affinity Rules (RMG).
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Prerequisites
You can create a cluster without a special license, but you must have a license to enable a cluster for vSphere DRS
or vSphere HA.
Note vSphere DRS is a critical feature of vSphere which is required to maintain the health of the workloads
running inside vSphere Cluster. Starting with vSphere 7.0 Update 1, DRS depends on the availability of vCLS
VMs. See vSphere Cluster Services (vCLS) for more information.
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Procedure
1 Browse to a cluster in the vSphere Client.
2 Click the Configure tab and click Services.
3 Under vSphere DRS click Edit.
4 Under DRS Automation, select a default automation level for DRS.
Automation Level Action
Manual  Initial placement: Recommended host is displayed.

 Migration: Recommendation is displayed.
Partially Automated  Initial placement: Automatic.

 Migration: Recommendation is displayed.
Fully Automated  Initial placement: Automatic.

 Migration: Recommendation is run automatically.
5 Set the Migration Threshold for DRS.
6 Select the Predictive DRS check box. In addition to real-time metrics, DRS responds to forecasted
metrics provided by vRealize Operations server. You must also configure Predictive DRS in a version
of vRealize Operations that supports this feature.
7 Select Virtual Machine Automation check box to enable individual virtual machine automation
levels.
Override for individual virtual machines can be set from the VM Overrides page.
8 Under Additional Options, select a check box to enforce one of the default policies.
Option Description
VM Distribution For availability, distribute a more even number of virtual machines across hosts. This is
secondary to DRS load balancing.
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Memory Metric for Load Balancing Load balance based on consumed memory of virtual machines rather than active
memory. This setting is only recommended for clusters where host memory is not over-
committed.
Note This setting is no longer supported and will not be displayed in vCenter 7.0.
CPU Over-Commitment Control CPU over-commitment in the cluster.
Scalable Shares Enable scalable shares for the resource pools on this cluster.
9 Under Power Management, select Automation Level.
10 If DPM is enabled, set the DPM Threshold.
11 Click OK.
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What to do next
Note Under the Cluster Summary page, you can see Cluster Services which displays vSphere Cluster Services
health status.
You can view memory utilization for DRS in the vSphere Client. To find out more, see: Viewing
Distributed Resource Scheduler Memory Utilization
(http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid2296383276001?
bctid=ref:video_vsphere67_drs)
Virtual Machine Procedures
This section contains procedures for operating and maintaining vSphere virtual machines.
Create a Virtual Machine with the New Virtual Machine Wizard
If no virtual machines in your environment meet your needs, you can create a single virtual machine, for
example of a particular operating system or hardware configuration. When you create a virtual machine without
a template or clone, you can configure the virtual hardware, including processors, hard disks, and memory. You
open the New Virtual Machine wizard from any object in the inventory that is a valid parent object of a virtual
machine.
During the creation process, a default disk is configured for the virtual machine. You can remove this disk and add
a new hard disk, select an existing disk, or add an RDM disk on the Virtual Hardware page of the wizard.
Prerequisites
Verify that you have the following privileges:
 Virtual machine.Inventory.Create new on the destination folder or data center.
 Virtual machine.Configuration.Add new disk on the destination folder or data center, if you are adding a
new disk.
 Virtual machine.Configuration.Add existing disk on the destination folder or data center, if you are adding
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an existing disk.
 Virtual machine.Configuration.Configure Raw device on the destination folder or data center, if you
are using an RDM or SCSI pass-through device.
 Virtual machine.Configuration.Configure Host USB device on the destination folder or data center, if you
are attaching a virtual USB device backed by a host USB device.
 Virtual machine.Configuration.Advanced configuration on the destination folder or data center, if you

are configuring advanced virtual machine settings.
 Virtual machine.Configuration.Change Swapfile placement on the destination folder or data center, if you
are configuring swap file placement.
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 Virtual machine.Configuration.Toggle disk change tracking on the destination folder or data center, if you
are enabling change tracking on the virtual machine's disks.
 Resource.Assign virtual machine to resource pool on the destination host, cluster, or resource pool.
 Datastore.Allocate space on the destination datastore or datastore folder.
 Network.Assign network on the network that the virtual machine will be assigned to.
To verify the privileges assigned to your role, click Menu > Administration > Roles and select the role.
If you want to create a virtual machine that uses persistent memory, choose a host or a cluster with an available
PMem resource.
Procedure
1 Right-click any inventory object that is a valid parent object of a virtual machine, such as a data center,
folder, cluster, resource pool, or host, and select New Virtual Machine.
2 On the Select a creation type page, select Create a new virtual machine and click Next.
3 On the Select a name and folder page, enter a unique name for the virtual machine and select a
deployment location.
4 Click Next.
5 On the Select a compute resource page, select the host, cluster, resource pool, or vApp where the virtual
machine will run and click Next.
If creating the virtual machine at the selected location causes compatibility problems, an alarm appears in
the Compatibility pane.
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6 On the Select storage page, choose the storage type, the storage policy, and a datastore or datastore cluster
where to store the virtual machine files.
Option Description
Create a virtual machine on a host that a Choose the type of storage by selecting the Standard or the PMem
has PMem resource radio button.
With the PMem storage option, every virtual machine disk file is stored on the host-
local PMem datastore by default. You can change the datastore at a later time. The
virtual machine home location must be on a non-PMem datastore.
For more information about persistent memory and PMem storage, see the vSphere
Resource Management guide.
b (Optional) From the VM Storage Policy drop-down menu, select a virtual machine
storage policy or leave the default one.
c (Optional) To encrypt the virtual machine, select the Encrypt this virtual machine
check box.
d Select a datastore or a datastore cluster.
e If you do not want to use storage DRS with the virtual machine, select the Disable
Storage DRS for this virtual machine check box.
Create a virtual machine on a host that a Select a VM storage policy or leave the default one.
does not have PMem resource b (Optional) To encrypt the virtual machine, select the Encrypt this virtual machine
check box.
c Select a datastore or a datastore cluster.
For information about creating an encrypted virtual machine, see vSphere Security.
7 On the Select compatibility page, select the virtual machine compatibility with ESXi host versions and
click Next.
To have access to the latest hardware features, select the latest ESXi host version.
8 On the Select a guest OS page, select the guest OS family and version and click Next.
When you select a guest operating system, BIOS or Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) is selected by default,
depending on the firmware supported by the operating system. Mac OS X Server guest operating systems
support only EFI. If the operating system supports BIOS and EFI, you can change the default by editing the
virtual machine after you create it and before you install the guest operating system. If you select EFI, you
cannot boot an operating system that supports only BIOS, and the reverse.
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Important Do not change the firmware after the guest operating system is installed. The guest operating
system installer partitions the disk in a particular format, depending on which firmware the installer was booted
from. If you change the firmware, you will not be able to boot the guest.
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9 (Optional) Enable Windows Virtualization Based Security.
When you enable this option, hardware virtualization, IOMMU, EFI, and secure boot become available to the
guest operating system. You must also enable Virtualization Based Security within the guest operating
system of this virtual machine.
The Enable Windows Virtualization Based Security option is available only for the latest Windows OS
versions, for example Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016. For more information about VBS, see the
vSphere Security documentation.
10 Click Next.
11 On the Customize hardware page, configure the virtual machine hardware and options and click Next.
You can leave the defaults and configure the virtual machine hardware and options later. For more information,
see Configuring Virtual Machine Hardware and Configuring Virtual Machine Options.
Important If you chose to use PMem storage for the virtual machine, its default hard disk, the new hard disks
that you configure, and the NVDIMM devices that you add to the virtual machine all share the same PMem
resources. So, you must adjust the size of the newly added devices in accordance with the amount of the PMem
available to the host. If any part of the configuration requires attention, the wizard alerts you.
Results
The virtual machine appears in the vSphere Client inventory.
Installing a Guest Operating System
A virtual machine is not complete until you install the guest operating system and VMware Tools. Installing a guest
operating system in your virtual machine is essentially the same as installing it in a physical computer.
The basic steps for a typical operating system are described in this section. See the Guest Operating System
Installation Guide at http://partnerweb.vmware.com/GOSIG/home.html.
Install a Guest Operating System from Media
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You can install a guest operating system from a CD-ROM or from an ISO image. Installing from an ISO image is
typically faster and more convenient than a CD-ROM installation.
If the virtual machine’s boot sequence progresses too quickly for you to open a console to the virtual machine
and enter BIOS or EFI setup, you might need to delay the boot order. See the vSphere Virtual Machine
Administration documentation.
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Prerequisites
 Verify that the installation ISO image is present on a VMFS datastore or network file system (NFS) volume
accessible to the ESXi host.
Alternatively, verify that an ISO image is present in a content library.
 Verify that you have the installation instructions that the operating system vendor provides.
Procedure
1 Log in to the vCenter Server system or host on which the virtual machine resides.
2 Select an installation method.
Option Action
CD-ROM Insert the installation CD-ROM for your guest operating system into the CD- ROM drive
of your ESXi host.
ISO image a Right-click the virtual machine and select Edit Settings. The virtual machine Edit
Settings dialog box opens. If the Virtual Hardware tab is not preselected, select it.
b Select Datastore ISO File from the CD/DVD drop-down menu, and
browse for the ISO image for your guest operating system.
ISO image from a Content Library a Right-click the virtual machine and select Edit Settings. The virtual machine Edit
Settings dialog box opens. If the Virtual Hardware tab is not preselected, select it.
b Select Content Library ISO File from the CD/DVD drop-down menu, and
select an ISO image from the content library items.
3 Right-click the virtual machine and select Power On.
A green right arrow appears next to the virtual machine icon in the inventory list.
4 Follow the installation instructions that the operating system vendor provides.
What to do next
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Install VMware Tools. VMware highly recommends running the latest version of VMware Tools on your guest
operating systems. Although the guest operating system can run without VMware Tools, you lose important
functionality and convenience without them. See Upgrading Virtual Machines for instructions on installing and
upgrading VMware Tools.
Clone a Virtual Machine to a Template
After you create a virtual machine, you can clone it to a template. Templates are primary copies of virtual
machines that let you create ready-for-use virtual machines. You can make changes to the template, such as
installing additional software in the guest operating system, while preserving the original virtual machine.
You cannot modify templates after you create them. To alter an existing template, you must convert it to a virtual
machine, make the required changes, and convert the virtual machine back to a template. To preserve the original
state of a template, clone the template to a template.
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Prerequisites
If a load generator is running in the virtual machine, stop it before you perform the clone operation.
Verify that you have the following privileges:
 Virtual machine.Provisioning.Create template from virtual machine on the source virtual machine.
 Virtual machine.Inventory.Create from existing on virtual machine folder where the template is created.
 Datastore.Allocate space on all datastores where the template is created.
Procedure
1 Start the Clone Virtual Machine To Template wizard.
Option Description
From a valid parent object of a a Right-click any inventory object that is a valid parent object of a virtual machine,
virtual machine such as a data center, folder, cluster, resource pool, or host, and select New Virtual
Machine.
b On the Select a creation type page, select Clone virtual machine to template
and click Next.
c On the Select a virtual machine page, select the virtual machine that you
want to clone.
From a virtual machine Right-click the virtual machine and select Clone > Clone to Template.
2 On the Select a name and folder page, enter a name for the template and select a data center or a folder
in which to deploy it.
The template name determines the name of the files and folder on the disk. For example, if you name the
template win8tmp, the template files are named win8tmp.vmdk, win8tmp.nvram, and so on. If you change
the template name, the names of the files on the datastore do not change.
Folders provide a way to store virtual machines and templates for different groups in an organization and you
can set permissions on them. If you prefer a flatter hierarchy, you can put all virtual machines and templates
in a datacenter and organize them a different way.
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3 On the Select a compute resource, select a host or a cluster resource for the template.
The Compatibility pane shows the result from the compatibility checks.
Important If the virtual machine that you clone has an NVDIMM device and virtual PMem hard disks, the
destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource. Otherwise, you cannot proceed with the
task.
If the virtual machine that you clone does not have an NVDIMM device, but it has virtual PMem hard
disks, the destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource.
Otherwise, all the hard disks of the template will use the storage policy and datastore selected for the
configuration files of the source virtual machine.
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4 On the Select storage page, select the datastore or datastore cluster in which to store the template
configuration files and all of the virtual disks. Click Next.
Option Description
Clone a virtual machine that has a Choose the type of storage for the template by selecting the Standard, the PMem, or
vPMem hard disks the Hybrid radio button.
If you select the Standard mode, all virtual disks are stored on a standard
datastore.
If you select the PMem mode, all virtual disks are stored on the host- local PMem
datastore. Configuration files cannot be stored on a PMem datastore and you must
additionally select a regular datastore for the configuration files of the virtual
machine.
If you select the Hybrid mode, all PMem virtual disks remain stored on a PMem
datastore. Non-PMem disks are affected by your choice of a VM storage policy and
datastore or datastore cluster.
b From the Select virtual disk format drop-down menu, select a new virtual disk
format for the template or keep the same format as the source virtual machine.
c (Optional) From the VM Storage Policy drop-down menu, select a virtual machine
e Select the Disable Storage DRS for this virtual machine check box if you do not
want to use storage DRS with the virtual machine.
f (Optional) Turn on the Configure per disk option to select a separate datastore or a
datastor cluster for the template configuration file and for each virtual disk.
Note You can use the Configure per disk option to convert a PMem hard disk to
a regular one, but that change might cause performance problems. You can also
convert a standard hard disk to a PMem hard disk.
Clone a virtual machine that does not a Select the disk format for the virtual machine virtual disks.
have vPMem hard disks
Same format as source uses the same disk format as the source virtual machine.
The Thick Provision Lazy Zeroed format creates a virtual disk in a default thick
format. Space required for the virtual disk is allocated when the virtual disk is created.
Data remaining on the physical device is not erased during creation, but is zeroed out
later, on demand, on first write from the virtual machine.
Thick Provision Eager Zeroed is a type of thick virtual disk that supports clustering
features such as Fault tolerance. Space required for the virtual disk is allocated at
creation time. In contrast to the flat format, the data remaining on the physical device
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is zeroed out when the virtual disk is created. It might take much longer to create disks
in this format than to create other types o disks.
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OptionDescription
The Thin Provision format saves storage space. At first, a thin provisioned disk
uses only as much datastore space as the disk initially needs. If the thin disk needs
more space later, it can grow to the maximum capacity allocated to it.
b (Optional) Select a VM storage policy or leave the default one. c
Select a datastore or a datastore cluster.
d (Optional) Turn on the Configure per disk option to select a separate datastore or a
datastore cluster for the template configuration file and for each virtual disk.
Important You cannot change the storage policy if you clone an encrypted virtual machine. For information
about cloning an encrypted virtual machine, see vSphere Security.
5 On the Ready to complete page, review the template settings and click Finish.
The progress of the clone task appears in the Recent Tasks pane. When the task completes, the template
appears in the inventory.
Deploy a Virtual Machine from a Template
Deploying a virtual machine from a template creates a virtual machine that is a copy of the template. The
new virtual machine has the virtual hardware, installed software, and other properties that are configured for
the template.
Prerequisites
You must have the following privileges to deploy a virtual machine from a template:
 Virtual machine.Inventory.Create from existing on the data center or virtual machine folder.
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 Virtual machine.Configuration.Add new disk on the data center or virtual machine folder. Required only
if you customize the original hardware by adding a new virtual disk.
 Virtual machine.Provisioning.Deploy template on the source template.
 Datastore.Allocate space on the destination datastore.
 Network.Assign network on the network to which the virtual machine is assigned. Required only if you
customize the original hardware by adding a new network card.
 Virtual machine.Provisioning.Customize on the template or template folder if you are customizing

the guest operating system.
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 Virtual machine.Provisioning.Read customization specifications on the root vCenter Server if you are
customizing the guest operating system.
Procedure
1 Start the Deploy From Template wizard.
Option Description
From a valid parent object of a a Right-click any inventory object that is a valid parent object of a virtual machine,
virtual machine such as a data center, folder, cluster, resource pool, or host, and select New Virtual
Machine.
b On the Select a creation type page, select Deploy from template and click Next.
c On the Select a template page, select the template that you want to use.
From a template Right-click a template and select New VM from This Template.
2 On the Select a name and folder page, enter a unique name for the virtual machine and select a deployment
location.
3 On the Select a compute resource page, select the host, cluster, resource pool, or vApp where the virtual
machine will run and click Next.
The virtual machine will have access to the resources of the selected object.
Important If the template that you deploy has an has an NVDIMM device and virtual PMem hard disks, the
destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource. Otherwise, you cannot proceed with the task.
If the template that you deploy does not have an NVDIMM device, but it has virtual PMem hard disks, the
destination host or cluster must have available PMem resource. Otherwise, all the hard disks of the virtual
machine will use the storage policy and datastore selected for the configuration files of the source template.
If creating the virtual machine at the selected location causes compatibility problems, an alarm appears in the
Compatibility pane.
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4 On the Select storage page, select the datastore or datastore cluster in which to store the virtual machine
configuration files and all of the virtual disks. Click Next.
Option Description
Deploy a virtual machine from a template a Choose the type of storage for the template by selecting the Standard, the PMem, or
that has vPMem hard disks the Hybrid radio button.
If you select the Standard mode, all virtual disks will be stored on a standard
datastore.
If you select the PMem mode, all virtual disks will be stored on the host- local PMem
datastore. Configuration files cannot be stored on a PMem datastore and you must
additionally select a regular datastore for the configuration files of the virtual
machine.
If you select the Hybrid mode, all PMem virtual disks will remain stored on a PMem
datastore. Non-PMem disks are affected by your choice of a VM storage policy and
datastore or datastore cluster.
b (Optional) From the Select virtual disk format drop-down menu, select a new virtual
disk format for the template or keep the same format as the source virtual machine.
c (Optional) From the VM Storage Policy drop-down menu, select a virtual machine
e Select the Disable Storage DRS for this virtual machine check box if you do not
want to use storage DRS with the virtual machine.
f (Optional) Turn on the Configure per disk option to select a separate datastore or a
Deploy a virtual machine from a template a Select the disk format for the virtual machine virtual disks.
that does not have vPMem hard disks
Same format as source uses the same disk format as the source virtual machine.
The Thick Provision Lazy Zeroed format creates a virtual disk in a default thick
format. Space required for the virtual disk is allocated when the virtual disk is created.
Data remaining on the physical device is not erased during creation, but is zeroed out
later, on demand, on first write from the virtual machine.
Thick Provision Eager Zeroed is a type of thick virtual disk that supports clustering
features such as Fault tolerance. Space required for the virtual disk is allocated at
creation time. In contrast to the flat format, the data remaining on the physical device
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is zeroed out when the virtual disk is created. It might take much longer to create disks
in this format than to create other types o disks.
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OptionDescription
The Thin Provision format saves storage space. At first, a thin provisioned disk
uses only as much datastore space as the disk initially needs. If the thin disk needs
more space later, it can grow to the maximum capacity allocated to it.
b (Optional) Select a VM storage policy or leave the default one. c
Select a datastore or a datastore cluster.
d (Optional) Turn on the Configure per disk option to select a separate datastore or a
5 On the Select clone options, select additional customization options for the new virtual machine.
You can choose to customize the guest operating system or the virtual machine hardware. You can also
choose to power on the virtual machine after its creation.
6 (Optional) On the Customize guest OS page, apply a customization specification to the virtual machine.
Customizing the guest OS prevents from conflicts that might occur if you deploy virtual machines with
identical settings, such as duplicate computer names.
Note To access customization options for Windows guest operating systems, Microsoft Sysprep tools must be
installed on the vCenter Server system. The Sysprep Tool is built into the Windows Vista and Windows 2008
and later operating systems. For details about this and other customization requirements, see Guest Operating
System Customization Requirements.
Option Description
Select an existing specification Select a customization specification from the list.
Create a specification Click the Create a new specification icon, and complete the steps in the wizard.
Create a specification from an a Select a customization specification from the list.

existing specification b Click the Create a spec from an existing spec icon, and complete the steps in the
wizard.
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7 (Optional) On the Customize hardware page, configure the virtual machine hardware and options and
click Next.
You can leave the defaults and configure the virtual machine hardware and options later. For more information,
see Configuring Virtual Machine Hardware and Configuring Virtual Machine Options.
Important If you chose to use PMem storage for the virtual machine, its default hard disk, the new hard disks
that you configure, and the NVDIMM devices that you add to the virtual machine all share the same PMem
resources. So, you must adjust the size of the newly added devices in accordance with the amount of the PMem
available to the host. If any part of the configuration requires attention, the wizard alerts you.
8 On the Ready to complete page, review the information and click Finish.
Deploy an OVF or OVA Template
You can deploy an OVF or OVA template from a local file system or from a URL.
Some of the pages in the Deploy OVF Template wizard only appear if the OVF template that you deploy requires
additional customization, contains deployment options or has one or multiple vService dependencies
Procedure
1 Right-click any inventory object that is a valid parent object of a virtual machine, such as a data center,
folder, cluster, resource pool, or host, and select Deploy OVF Template.
The Deploy OVF Template wizard opens.
2 On the Select an OVF template page, specify the location of the source OVF or OVA template and
click Next.
Option Action
URL Type a URL to an OVF or OVA template located on the Internet. Supported URL sources
are HTTP and HTTPS.
Example: http://vmware.com/VMTN/appliance.ovf.
Local file Click Browse and select all the files associated with an OVF template or OVA file. This
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includes files such as .ovf, .vmdk, etc. If you do not select all the required files, a
warning message displays.
3 On the Select a name and folder page, enter a unique name for the virtual machine or vApp, select a
deployment location, and click Next.
The default name for the virtual machine is the same as the name of the selected OVF or OVA template.
If you change the default name, choose a name that is unique within each vCenter Server virtual machine
folder.
The default deployment location for the virtual machine is the inventory object where you started the
wizard.
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4 On the Select a compute resource page, select a resource where to run the deployed VM template, and
click Next.
5 On the Review details page, verify the OVF or OVA template details and click Next.
Option Description
Publisher Publisher of the OVF or OVA template, if a certificate included in the OVF or OVA
template file specifies a publisher.
Download size Size of the OVF or OVA file.
Size on disk Size on disk after you deploy the OVF or OVA template.
6 (Optional) On the Configuration page, select a deployment configuration and click Next.
7 On the Select storage page, define where and how to store the files for the deployed OVF or OVA template.
a Select the disk format for the virtual machine virtual disks.
Format Description
Thick Provision Lazy Zeroed Creates a virtual disk in a default thick format. Space required for the virtual disk is
allocated when the virtual disk is created. Data remaining on the physical device is not
erased during creation, but is zeroed out later, on demand, on first write from the virtual
machine.
Thick Provision Eager Zeroed A type of thick virtual disk that supports clustering features such as Fault tolerance.
Space required for the virtual disk is allocated at creation time. In contrast to the flat
format, the data remaining on the physical device is zeroed out when the virtual disk is
created. It might take much longer to create disks in this format than to create other
types of disks.
Thin Provision Use this format to save storage space. For the thin disk, you provision as much
datastore space as the disk requires based on the value that you enter for the disk size.
However, the thin disk starts small and at first, uses only as much datastore space as
the disk needs for its initial operations.
b Select a VM Storage Policy.
This option is available only if storage policies are enabled on the destination resource.
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c (Optional) Enable the Show datastores from Storage DRS clusters check box to choose
individual datastores from Storage DRS clusters for the initial placement of the virtual
machine.
d Select a datastore to store the deployed OVF or OVA template.
The configuration file and virtual disk files are stored on the datastore. Select a datastore large
enough to accommodate the virtual machine or vApp and all associated virtual disk files.
Note If you want to use the API calls to deploy an OVF template that contains vPMem hard disks
and that has been exported from a content library, consult https://kb.vmware.com/kb/ 52370.
8 On the Select networks page, select a source network and map it to a destination network. Click
Next.
The Source Network column lists all networks that are defined in the OVF or OVA template.
9 (Optional) On the Customize template page, customize the deployment properties of the OVF
template and click Next.
10 (Optional) On the vService bindings page, select a binding service provider and click Next.
11 On the Ready to complete page, review the page and click Finish.
Results
A new task for creating the virtual machine appears in the Recent Tasks pane. After the task is
complete, the new virtual machine is created on the selected resource.
VMware, Inc.
3
Appendix A: Process Routine Mapping
The following table provides the full mapping of process routines for all IT Outcomes related to the VMware
solution.
The following table provides the full mapping of all IT Capabilities linked to the VMware solution and the
process routines that contribute to the delivery of the IT Capability.
VMware, Inc.
3

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VMware Solution Adoption Guide

VMware Professional Services

Date Version Author Description Reviewers

3401 Hillview Ave.

Solution Adoption Overview..............................................................................................................5

Solution Set Objectives................................................................................................................................5

Technology Operational Processes.............................................................................................................5

Appendix A: Process Routine Mapping............................................................................................8

Solution Adoption Overview

Solution Set Objectives

Table 1. Desired IT Outcomes of Solution

Technology Operational Processes

Process Name Related IT Outcomes Related IT Capabilities

This chapter includes the following topics:

 ESXi Host Procedures

 vCenter Server Infrastructure Procedures

 vSphere Network Infrastructure Procedures

 vSphere Storage Infrastructure Procedures

 High Availability Procedures

 Continuous Availability Procedures

 Dynamic Resourcing Procedures

 Virtual Machine Procedures

ESXi Host Procedures

Using the VMware Host Client

Start the VMware Host Client and Log In

A log in screen appears.

2 Enter your user name and your password.

3 Click Login to continue.

You are now logged in to your target ESXi host.

Log Out of the VMware Host Client

Using Active Directory to Manage ESXi Users

Configure a Host to Use Active Directory

fully qualified domain name = host_name.domain_name

a Browse to the host in the vSphere Client inventory. b

c Under Networking, click TCP/IP configuration.

Add a Host to a Directory Service Domain

domain name in one of two ways:

 name.tld/container/path (for example, domain.com/OU1/OU2): The account is created under

1 Browse to a host in the vSphere Client inventory.

3 Under System, select Authentication Services.

4 Click Join Domain.

Use the form name.tld or name.tld/container/path.

8 Click OK to close the Directory Services Configuration dialog box.

View Directory Service Settings

2 Under Software, select Authentication Services.

Monitoring Host Health Status

Monitor Hardware Health Status in the vSphere Client

1 Select a host in the vSphere Client .

2 Click the Monitor tab, and click Hardware Health.

3 Select the type of information to view.

Storage Sensors Displays the storage sensors.

Alerts and Warnings Displays alerts and warnings.

System Event Log Displays the system event log.

Reset Health Status Sensors in the vSphere Client

Verify that the vCenter Hardware Status plug-in is enabled.

1 Select a host in the vSphere Client

2 Click the Monitor tab, and click Hardware Health

Monitoring Inventory Objects with Performance Charts

Counters and Metric Groups

Collection Levels and Collection Intervals

Performance Chart Types

Table 1-1. Performance Chart Types

Chart Type Description