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VMware's ESX Server 4.0 lost in the clouds?

Virtualization juggernaut VMware kicks off the VMworld Europe trade show in Cannes today, and the opening salvo of the company's own announcements are rather muted because ESX Server 4.0 (or whatever the future hypervisor will ultimately be called) is not being launched. At least not on the first day of the event, as far as we …

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robin penny
Happy

A client Hypervisor - whoopee at last!!!

This is an announcement I have been hoping for - to overcome the Windows, Use, Slowdown, Rebuild, Use, slowdown, rebuild..... cycle.

Currently I have several task based VMs I run on top of Windows to try & help with this. One with all my Digital Photography software on, another with development type tools & so on, but a Hypervisor approach is so much better. It will also allow me to run a home web server (to provide an intuitive interface for the rest of the family to find all that useful stuff on the PC (Instructions for various appliances, Recipies etc) without the overhead of a 2nd PC.

I will even be able to run a dedicated PC for surfing that can be trashed & replaced if it gets any malware. Yes I know I can do that with a VM appliance, but the perceived coplexity & overhead of booting it up means that solution won't wash with the rest of the family.

The only thing that worries me is that the hardware support might be limited to business PCs. Oh well at least I don't have to go out and buy a server now as I would for ESX or Hyper-V.

TheDude

View 3 can already work without a network connection

Wrong, View 3 can do this already. You can "check out" a VM from the server and sync changes back as and when you have a network link.

"Moreover, the approach to desktop virtualization currently sold by VMware as a product set called View, which is an example of what is called virtual desktop infrastructure, or VDI, has its limits. Like you need a network connection to do anything - no network, no PC. VMware View stores virtual PC images on a server back in the data center running ESX Server and runs them there, streaming video and audio down to thin clients and PCs at the end of a network connection. A bare metal hypervisor running on the PC will allow software to be streamed down to one or more virtual machines - perhaps one for work and one for play - and then run applications even if there is no network connection."

Anonymous Coward
Thumb Down

Yawn...

What a disappointment today was. I got out of bed to listen to Paul Maritz and he said NOTHING I hadn't heard at yesterdays partner day.

That and Mauricio Carli being one of the most boring speakers I've ever listened to made today a washout for me.

"I'm a notta gonna tella you a whatta teama supporta butta it a Italian and it a redda..."

Will I get out of bed for tomorrows keynote? Tomorrow can't be any worse right?

Anonymous Coward
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Common misconception re ESX and Linux.

The fifth paragraph in your article states "only has only a Linux kernel that allows the hypervisor (and the system management interface in the ESX Server rather than the ESXi embedded variant) to be initially loaded." This is a common misconception - ESX 3 does not require any form of Linux and the hypervisor is not a Linux kernel.

What you are seeing on ESX is the service console booting (which is essentially a special virtual machine with hooks into the underlying hypervisor) and is not the hypervisor itself. You may see VMs actually up and running before the service console completes booting up. ESX 3i doesn't have a service console.

Steve

ESX is NOT Linux

The ESX Kernel is not Linux. It's by VMWare and VMWare alone. The command line shell is based on Red Hat 6 I believe - however the Kernel is not.

Anyone have more details about this vShield thing? The write up sounds pretty much like what I'm already doing - which is having a DMZ VLAN with a firewall doing the routing between other networks and the DMZ, and any server that sits inside the VLAN is within ESX. Each ESX server has 2 LACP'd NIC's that are tied to a seperate vSwitch....

What's new about that in 4.0?

Anonymous Coward
Pirate

Lies lies lies...

"The ESX Kernel is not Linux. It's by VMWare and VMWare alone. The command line shell is based on Red Hat 6 I believe - however the Kernel is not."

Isn't it 7.2?

This misconception (not about the Red Hat version) is typical M$ fud. I sat in a presentation from M$ about Hyped-up-v and they said the same rubbish: "ESX is just Linux".

When I challenged them on it, they went red and stuttered and stumbled all over the shop...

When I challenged them further about the "parent partition" being a SPOF and inherent security risk they went back to the default "but ESX needs Linux" line. Once I'd finished banging their heads into the table, I left with a wikipedia link to what a hypervisor is burned into their foreheads...

mwhahahahaha!

(not really but I wanted to)

Russell Cassidy

Re: ESX is NOT Linux

In ESX3.5 Update 3 the service console runs RHEL 3 Update 9.

Michael Corkery

good article overall

One correction, you state that if vCenter/Virtual Center crashes, you cannot manage or change VMs.

Thsi is not true, vCenter is a centralised management tool for ESX hosts, and without vCenter, cluster based management is not possible, but the VI client has been able to connect directly to each ESX host since at leats as early as ESX 3.0 (not sure about ESX 2.x, before my time! :)

So you can manage VMs without vCenter, but not cluster based things (like HA/DRS), and of course as it's a single host connection, you can't vMotion either. But within a single host, you can still work with VMs.

this is how people who run vCenter as a VM restart it if it crashes!

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