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License Key Management for new VMWare ELA Customers

June 25, 2013 Leave a Comment

I had a recent discussion with a client regarding management of VMware Licenses after an ELA.  This is a area that I’ve been actively working on since the launch of My VMware and thought others would benefit from my high level summary; the following applies to both an Unlimited or Capped ELA.

This advice assumes a bit of license key management up front but very little compliance management over time. Over the years I have seen too many larger enterprises pay the price (literally via audits) for poor license key management from too many large enterprise software vendors, hence my invest bit now to save a lot later approach.

  • Determine the number of Entitlement Accounts (EA) that work best for your Company
    • Some companies like to keep International Departments separate
    • Other companies group everything together and align folders to corporate structure
    • Coordination of multiple EA’s between your company and your VMware Account Team is critical
    • If you have multiple EA’s today, they can be consolidated with some administrative work
  • Identify two contacts with Global Responsibility to allocate ELA Licenses (these become the Super User and Procurement User)
    • These are the Primary Contacts when internal users need licenses
    • They are responsible for Organization & Management of License Keys
    • Will have visibility and access to all License Keys across Company (Reporting)
    • Typically part of Vendor Management or Procurement Organization
    • Large ELA Key is placed in folder that only Super User / Procurement User access
    • ELA Key is split to fullfil organization requests with smaller key given to organization
      • Large ELA license key is never used or handed out, only split
      • Reconciliation of Used Licenses important at ELA Renewal time
  • Push License Key Management down to Organization “Administrators”
    • Create one folder per Organization
    • Grant one or two members of Organization Administrator priviledges to folder
    • Super User places Organization allocations of Licenses in Organization folder
    • Organization Administrator’s responsible for Managing licenses for Organization
      • Further sub dividing license keys and organizing within Organization Folder
      • Granting access to Organization folder for Administrators and Support Staff
  • My Vmware folder permissions are used to determine support entitlements by Vmware GSS

More details can be found under my other My VMware posts.

Filed Under: Instructions, VMware Tagged With: License Management, My VMware

VMworld 2012 Recap

September 6, 2012 Leave a Comment

I’m still getting a few requests for a recap of VMworld.  Below is a modified version of a private email newsletter I create for my clients and posting here for all the recap requestors…

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Last week more than 21,000 people attended VMworld 2012 in San Francisco. Nearly half of those people took one of the 11,300+ hands on labs that were delivered (over 125,000 VMs were deployed in the Hands On Labs over the four and half days of the show). Continuing the trend of past VMworlds, last week was an huge success and continued to expand on the VMworld vibe that many find unique among tech conferences.

This edition of the newsletter provides a recap of VMworld.

VMworld Replays and Recaps

  • VMworld Monday General Session – VMware CEO Paul Maritz > Pat Gelsinger; vSphere; vCloud Suite (1h 30m)
  • VMworld Tuesday General Session – VMware CTO Steve Herrod; Horizon Suite; VMware Partners (1h 17m)
  • Day 1 Recap
  • Day 2 Recap
  • Day 3 Recap
  • VMworld TV highlights, theCube, sessions, and interviews from the show
  • VMware Community TV Video Library of VMTN and vBrownBags Tech Talks from VMworld
  • Top 10 Most Popular Sessions from VMworld 2012 (available for replay now!)

Photos from VMworld

Sad to announce that the few hours I spent at the actual show I didn’t have my camera with…luckily others did:

  • Browse the VMworld photos shared on social media by attendees
  • Viktor van den Berg has posted a great set of Panorama photos he took at VMworld

VMworld Key Announcements

Bye Bye vRAM
The biggest announcement from VMworld (ranked by pure audience applause) was the changing of vSphere licensing back to CPU only.  Our customers spoke and we listened, no more vRAM!

Hello vCloud Suite
The second biggest announcement was the introduction of the vCloud Suite and new versions for a number of the Suite components.  Net Net, the vCloud Suite is an integrated solution for building and managing a complete cloud infrastructure fulfills the promise of the software-defined data center. vCloud Suite components include:

  • vSphere 5.1 (new version, release notes)
    • vSphere Replication 5.1 (release notes)
    • vCenter Update Manager 5.1 (release notes)
    • vCenter Orchestrator 5.1 (release notes)
    • vSphere Storage Appliances 5.1 (release notes)
    • vSphere Data Protection 5.1 (release notes)
  • vCloud Director 5.1 (new version, release notes)
  • vCloud Connector
  • vCloud Networking and Security 5.1 (new version, release notes)
  • vCenter Site Recovery Manager 5.1 (new version, release notes)
  • vCenter Operations Management Suite
  • vFabric Application Director

vCloud Suite is avaiable in Three Editions: Standard, Advanced, and Enterprise to provide increasing functionality based on a user’s requirements. Following in the footsteps of vSphere, the vCloud Suite Editions are licensed based on the physical CPUs upon which will be running vCloud Suite. Existing VMware customers can also upgrade from their current products to vCloud Suite under the newly announced Fair Value Conversion Program.

Here is a list of PDF Whitepapers that were released as part of the Suite announcement

  • What’s New in VMware vSphere 5.1 – Platform
  • What’s New in VMware vSphere 5.1 – Networking
  • What’s New in VMware vSphere 5.1 – Storage
  • What’s New in VMware vSphere 5.1 – Performance
  • What’s New in VMware vSphere 5.1 – VMware vCenter Server
  • What’s New in VMware vSphere Storage Appliance 5.1
  • What’s New with VMware vCloud Director 5.1
  • VMware vCloud Networking and Security Overview
  • Introduction to VMware vSphere Replication
  • Introduction to VMware vSphere Data Protection
Of course, always check out the vSphere 5.1 Documentation Center, vSphere Configuration Maximums, VMware Product Interoperability Matrix (Not all Products will work with vSphere 5.1 right away!)

vCloud Suite Components a la carte
All the components of vCloud Suite are still available individually (a la carte).  The licensing for the individual compenents has not changed, they are still licensed by VM, not by CPU.

 

Evolution of vCenter Server
As part of vSphere 5.1 release that was announced at VMworld, vCenter Server 5.1 is a major evolution. This release is the first to have a fully functional web based UI and Linux virtual appliance based service architecture.  Going forward, the single sign-on infrastructure of vCenter Server will converge with other VMware web UIs.  The classic Windows vCenter Server is also available in vSphere 5.1.

Preview of Horizon Suite
Horizon Suite is a platform to make it easier for administrators to both manage the challenges associated with mobility, cloud, and employee BYOD while also providing the most productive and enjoyable computing experience on the devices internal customers choose.  Horizon Suite brings together:

  • VMware View
  • VMware Mirage (Wanova Mirage)
  • VMware ThinApp
  • VMware Horizon Application Manager
  • VMware Horizon Mobile
  • VMware Horizon Data (Project Octopus)
  • Project AppBlast
  • Support select 3rd Party end user computing solutions

The beta version of Horizon Suite is expected to be available in Q4 2012

Additional VMworld ReCaps

I found these other blog posts to be wonderful recaps of the show:

  • Chad Sakac’s VMworld 2012: Top 5 Wrap and Summary
  • Jason Boche’s VMworld 2012 Announcements – Part 1
  • VMworld 2012: vOdgeball 2012 Recap (video of this community event to support Wounded Warrior Project)

Filed Under: Cloud Computing, Tech Industry, Virtualization, VMware, VMworld Tagged With: VMworld 2012

VMware View 5.1 & New View Clients Available

May 17, 2012 Leave a Comment

Today VMware View 5.1 is available for download.  While additional details are available in the release notes, here are highlights of the changes in 5.1:

  • Storage performance optimization & integration options leveraging vSphere
    • View Storage Accelerator:
    • View Composer API Integration(Tech Preview):
    • Customizable View Composer disposable disk driver letter
    • Support up to 32 ( increased from 8 ) host in a cluster when Network Attached Storage is in use
  • USB redirection enhancement
  • RADIUS based two-factor authentication support
  • Admin UI usability and performance enhancements
  • Support pre-created Active Directory machine accounts
  • Customer Experience Improvement Program
  • Persona Management for physical devices
  • Persona Management as a XP to Win7 migration tool
  • Support Installation of View Composer server in a standalone server separate from vCenter server
  • A set of new View Clients
  • Continue PCoIP protocol performance enhancements

A new release of the View Clients is also available on the View Client Download Center.  New features and enhancements in the View Clients include:

  •  What’s New in ALL View Clients
    • Optimized for VMware View 5.1
    • Up to 3X better video playback performance
    • Improved mouse responsiveness in virtual machine
    • RADIUS two factor authentication with VMware View 5.1
  • What’s New in ALL Mobile View Clients 1.5
    • Save password option if administrator enables new VMware View 5.1 policy
    • French, German, Spanish keyboard support with VMware View 5.1
    • Direct Korean language input support with VMware View 5.1
    • Touch in text fields brings up keyboard with VMware View 5.1
  • Windows – What’s New in View Client 5.1
    • Local mode supports hardware version 8 virtual machines with VMware View 5.1
  • Linux – What’s New in View Client 1.5
    • New ARM based Linux client for Thin Client partner integration
  • Mac – What’s New in View Client 1.5
    • Initial support for Mac OS X Mountain Lion
    • Greatly improved audio/video synchronization
    • Resolve mouse tracking problems when switching to and from View client
  • iPad –  What’s New in View Client 1.5
    • Support for the new iPad
    • Updated look and feel
    • Extended software keyboard keys no longer cover Start menu and task bar with external keyboards
  • Android – What’s New in View Client 1.5
    • Support for Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS)
    • Mouse support with hover, right click and scroll wheel on ICS
    • Updated look and feel and improvements for smaller screens
    • New Settings dialog includes security mode settings

Filed Under: Virtualization, VMware Tagged With: VDI, View, View Clients

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About latoga labs

With over 25 years of partnering leadership and direct GTM experience, Greg A. Lato provides consulting services to companies in all stages of their partnering journey to Ecosystem Led Growth.