Introduction
VMware Infrastructure is a new way of delivering IT, and it also brings together many different and sometimes new technologies. It is essential to do a short evaluation and testing phase, a Proof of Concept (PoC), to verify that the technology meets its early specification before any serious investment in design and implementation is performed.
A PoC also offers a valuable window to bring different subject matter experts together, including operational and management staff (not just technical), to see and feel the technology in one's own organization - vMotion is often not believed until seen!
It's critical to have a predefined measure of success for the Proof of Concept. A successful PoC should be a key precursor to progressing with the Virtualization project.
The PoC can provide valuable information and data into subsequent phases such as Plan and Design.
Intended Audience
VMware Certified Professionals (VCP) and VMware Architects (VCDX), and the management and finance teams who will support and fund the virtualization project.
Outline
Planning your Proof of Concept
Running your Proof of Concept
Reviewing your Proof of Concept
VI3 Proof of Concept (PoC)
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More than just supplying you with the example steps of building a PoC, the goal of this document is to provide more value to the PoC experience by connecting it into the VI3.Blueprint approach and linking the PoC activity with those around it, like the Business Case and future Workshops.
Planning is critical, as always, but of course you have to strike a balance between time spent planning and getting on with the PoC. The key takeaway in planning is to involve those who are going to be impacted by virtualization in future - get them on board now, and involve them with virtualization - they'll be your biggest advocates in future.
Running the PoC is where most of the action is and we have decided to lean on existing high quality material like the VI3 Evaluator Guide (attached). We will provide the outline checklist of what to do, but the detail of "how?" will be in that document. The key here is running a methodical and objective PoC, whether you are doing it yourself or have a partner doing it for you.
Reviewing is the exit point of the PoC where you take a step back and a deep breath and focus one eye on what you've achieved, and the other eye on what's next. The key here is making sure you have the support of your sponsors and the teams you need to work with - did you answer everyone's questions in the PoC, and can you prove it?
1. Planning your Proof of Concept |
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As you plan your PoC, check that you've covered these points. The second column shows the sample entries for this VI3.Blueprint's PoC.
Point | Covered? |
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1. Did you plan for the PoC in your VI3.Blueprint Business Case? | The business case expects the PoC to be delivered on existing, spare hardware, with a small budget of $5000 for any purchases. Evaluation licenses will be used, and we will be running the PoC on our own. |
2. Who are your sponsors, who needs to sign off, and what are the requirements to be met? | Head of IT is providing the resources and asks that we prove the technology works as advertised, as well as being able to run our simple workloads that we can consolidate from physical. End users are represented by Head of Apps who wants to see web servers run for a start. A RACI diagram of who needs is Responsible/Accountable and who should be Consulted/Informed is in the PoC Document. |
3. What is the goal of your PoC - just prove that VMWare features work, and integrate with your tools, and meet specific performance criteria, and develop operational procedures? | The goal is to (a) prove VI3 works here, (b) consolidate one or two workloads, (c) run a web server test. |
4. Who is going to run your PoC - will you do it your own basic/comprehensive, or will you get help in the form of a Jumpstart or have a partner do the whole thing? | We are going to run this PoC on our own, but we recognize that we could get partner help to speed things up. |
5. Who needs to be involved in the PoC - other technical teams, operational teams and end users. | IT Ops, Server/OS team, Network, Storage, PMO, Web Team, NT4 team |
6. Balancing money, time, quality: How much money do you have, how much time have you got, what do you want to prove? | We have $5k, one full-time employee, existing kit - two weeks to run the PoC with a week to review/act, and our criteria is quite simple. |
7. What documents will you use to track progress? | There will be a PoC Document that captures our specifications, requirements, design, tests, observations and findings; plus we will issue a PoC Report at the close. |
8. How will you measure success of the PoC? | (a) The technology works to our specification, (b) we can run our consolidation workloads in VMs, (c) we can run our webservers in VMs, (d) we deliver this in two weeks, within budget, (e) we get the support of our peer teams, (f) our sponsors sign off and we get the green light for the next stage, design. |
One of the key decisions in the table above is - do it yourself, or use a partner? Some guidance to help you decide:
If you do it yourself, don't immediately assume that will be the fastest, cheapest method. If you are new to virtualization, this is likely to be the longest method because you will be learning as you go: decide if you want to use the PoC as an educational activity, and if that is true then you need to double/increase the time taken and along the way you will probably re-write your PoC targets as you learn more.
If you want to use a partner there are a couple of options: first, get someone in to do a Jumpstart which is a fast way of getting a system up and running according with best practices AND getting knowledge transfer from the expert who is onsite. Or, outsource the whole thing to a partner and just provide the governance.
If you are deciding to do it yourself, then make sure you have researched and understood the following:
Understand fundamental virtualization concepts
Understand VMware Infrastructure components, including: ESX/ESXi hosts, VirtualCenter Server, VI Client, VI Web Access, and VirtualCenter Extensions (Update Manager, Converter Enterprise)
Understand license server requirements and unavailability implications
Understand ESX vs. ESXi differences
Understand virtual networking concepts, features and requirements
Understand virtual storage options and requirements
Understand VirtualCenter objects, including: datacenters, clusters, hosts, Gain awareness of VMware.com Support resources, including technical product documentation, release notes, and compatibility guides
Understand VMware Infrastructure installation steps
Understand general VMware architectural and operational best practices
If you are going down the partner route, then it's important to involve them now before you start anything. Their early involvement can speed things up considerably because they are likely to have run many PoCs before.
Check out the VI3 Jumpstart which gets a Proof of Concept up and running on your site in a couple of days.
2. Running your Proof of Concept |
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This section assumes you are going to "do it yourself" instead of using a partner. However, you could still use the content in here to work with your partner as a guide to work through, even though they will have prior PoC experience.
The detailed content for this section is in the VI3 Comprehensive Evaluators Guide (attached). Rather than duplicate the excellent and detailed information in that guide, we instead outline the steps covered by that guide and how that should map to your planning and the next review step.
VI3 Evaluator Guide
Please download the attached guide, and inside it you will find:
1 Getting Started
2 Evaluation Planning and Environment Setup
3 VMware Infrastructure Evaluation Setup
3.1 Install the VirtualCenter Server and the VI Client
3.2 Install VMware ESX Server 3
3.3 Configure an ESX Server 3i server
4 Building the Virtual Datacenter
4.1 Starting the VI Client and Logging On
4.2 Creating a Datacenter
4.3 Bringing Hosts Under VirtualCenter Management
5 Creating Virtual Machines
5.1 Creating Virtual Machines by Importing Virtual Appliances (Import)
5.2 Creating Virtual Machines from Scratch (Create New)
5.3 Creating Virtual Machines from Existing Physical Servers
5.4 Creating Virtual Machines from Existing Virtual Machines (Clone)
5.5 Creating Templates and Deploying Virtual Machines from Templates
6 Managing Virtual Machines
6.1 Managing Virtual Machines States
6.2 Edit Virtual Machine Settings and Add Virtual Machine Hardware Devices
6.3 Configure Network Connections
6.4 Configure Resource Pools on a Standalone Host
6.5 Schedule Tasks, View Events and Set Alarms
6.6 Monitor the Virtual Infrastructure
7 Evaluate Application Workloads within a VMware Virtual Machine
8 VMware Infrastructure Setup with Shared Storage
8.1 Add a Second ESX Server Host to VirtualCenter
8.2 Configure access to Shared Storage
8.3 Migrate Virtual Machine Files to the Shared Datastore
8.4 Configure ESX Server Hosts to enable VMotion Migration
9 Migrate Virtual Machines across Hosts with VMotion
10 Create a DRS / HA Cluster and Add ESX Server Hosts
11 VMware Distributed Resource Scheduling
11.1 VMware DRS provides Dynamic Load Balancing
11.2 Create Resource Pools on the Cluster to Manage Access to Resources
11.3 DRS demonstrated
12 VMware High Availability
13 VMware Storage VMotion (Optional)
14 Next Steps
15 About VMware
16 Appendix
3. Reviewing your Proof of Concept |
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Your final review checklist is below. Each question should be ticked off for a successful Proof of Concept:
Check | Completed? |
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1. Have you documented your Proof of Concept lessons-learned, to improve future PoC efforts? | |
2. Have you sufficiently documented your Proof of Concept so it can be scrutinized by others who might question your results? | |
3. Have you written a concise and easy-to-read report for your PoC, with an Executive Summary, data results, with observations and findings? | |
4. Have you identified and started acting upon any findings, like "testing has shown that the host needs 32GB of RAM, not 16GB". | |
5. Did you meet the objectives set in the Planning stage? | |
6. Did you secure the "green tick" sign-off from your sponsors? | |
7. Have you updated the other teams, like network and storage, with the results - face to face, with discussion? | |
8. Have you identified what was out-of-scope/missed from the PoC, and should be done next, like monitoring integration? | |
9. Have you got enough information to provide input to the next Design and Architecture stages? | |
10. Have you posted your method and findings to VIOPS, for the benefit of the global community? |
Resources
AuthorsWilliam Bishop, Administrator, Huntsville Hospital Rodos, vExpert Steve Chambers, Senior Architect at VMware
VMware (NYSE: VMW) is the global leader in virtualization solutions from the desktop to the datacenter. Customers of all sizes rely on VMware to reduce capital and operating expenses, ensure business continuity, strengthen security and go green. With 2008 revenues of $1.9 billion, more than 130,000 customers and more than 22,000 partners, VMware is one of the fastest-growing public software companies. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, VMware is majority-owned by EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC). For more information, visit www.vmware.com.
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Document StatusThis document is currently under development by members of the VIOPS community. |
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