VMWare ESX Server Architecture

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VMWare Infrastructure
Source: Mark Wilson

ESX server is a virtualized platform, owned by VMware. ESX has two versions of servers– ESXi server and ESX server. ESX server is a tool of an enterprise level. It uses different services that handle different virtual machines and these machines are much efficient and reliable, as compared to other Server products of VMware because it runs on bare metal. This means that the software of the ESX server can be installed directly without additional operating system.

VMkernel( a micro kernel for saving resources) controls the basic system of ESX server. This diminishes the need for running OS beneath the VM. After the setup, resources get divided into virtual hardware, for virtual machines usage.

VMkernel is responsible for running the programs smoothly including the virtual machines, agents and management applications. It can also control hardware, and manage the resources.

The processes running on VMkernel, are

  • Virtual machine monitor – This process is responsible for ensuring the providence of the execution environment of a VM. A process called VMX is also initiated by it. Each VM has its own VMX and VMM processes.
  • Direct Console User Interface (DCUI) – This is an interface for management and configuration. DCUI is accessible through the server console.DCUI is used for basic initial level configuration.
  • CIM(Common Information Model) system – The Common Information Model is an interface enabling control of the hardware management from the remote applications by APIs.
  • Agents – Agents control the VMware infrastructure from remote applications.
ESX Server VMkernel Process
VMKernel
Source: ricohids.com

ESX server has the capacity to memorize which is the best feature so far. This means that the memory of the VM can be greater than the server’s memory. This is the case of memory’s better utilization. The process is controlled by the service console.

ESX server architecture is designed to increase its reliability, management, and security. The architecture can be integrated into a virtually optimized server. It means:

  • Smooth deployment.
  • Hassle free configuration.
  • Quick installation.

We can say that ESX server can abstract the memory, networking resources, and storage of a physical server and then convert it into a number of virtual machines. These machines run parallely.

ESX server communicates by Host Agents by using API or VI API and their information can be gathered.

If you want your company to streamline the hardware and do efficient deployments and maintenance with zero downtime than you should know about the basics of VMWare. Logic Finder can help you in this. For more information check the link below:

https://www.logicfinder.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/course-8.pdf

VMWare Products And Features

Either VMWare is good for the virtualization of your company or not? You will get to know about this answer after reading the features of VMWare products in today’s post. So let’s begin.

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VMWare Products Walkthrough
Source:VMWare Guruz

VMware’s products provide packages and features, difficult for a virtualization administrator for navigation. This article will help your enterprise to choose the right VMware edition for virtualization either you want:

  • Server consolidation.
  • Reduction of hardware costs.
  • Improvement in server management.
  • reation of a virtualization infrastructure for private cloud computing.

VMware’s products are divided into two categories.

  1. Server virtualization
  2. Desktop virtualization

VMware’s basic server virtualization is ESX Server (hypervisor), and is offered as the vSphere suite with linked features (previously known as VMware Infrastructure).

  1. server virtualization

Free ESXi edition: This is a free version of VMware ESX/ESXi which allows you to consolidate servers using an enterprise-grade hypervisor

vSphere 4/ESX Server: It includes ESX and ESXi and a lot of features, depending on the vSphere suite which you choose. Some of the vSphere features are:

  • VMotion: It moves virtual machines (VMs) from one server to another.
  • Storage VMotion (SVMotion): It moves the virtual disks of a VM from one data storage to another
  • VMware High Availability (VMware HA, VMHA): It reboots VMs on another ESX server in case the ESX host goes down
  • Fault Tolerance (FT): It moves a VM from one ESX server to another if the server goes down
  • Distributed Power Management (DPM): When demand of resources is low on a virtual infrastructure, the VMs are compensated onto fewer servers, and unused ones are shut off
  • VMware Consolidated Backup (or VCB): this tool back up virtual machines using backup application
  • vShield Zones: Helps in the creation of a virtual firewall in your virtual infrastructure
  • vCenter Server: the centralized management server enabling most vSphere features
  • VMware Server: virtualization platform running in an existing Windows or Linux OS.

2. Desktop virtualization

  1. VMware View (VMware VDI): used for the consolidation of desktop PCs into the virtual infrastructure
  2. VMware Workstation: allows running of multiple OS on the desktop PC

VMware’s Certified Professional (VCP) is the most popular option of certification and Logic Finder can help you in providing even better options. So tune into Logic Finder

https://www.logicfinder.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/course-8.pdf

How Python and Network Automation are related?

Network is changing. In this new world of network automation and network programmability, you need to learn Python. Why? Because Python is one of the basic skills of a next generation network engineer. Software  controllability  is  a concept  that  is  spreading  also  in  the  area  of networking, driven by the Software defined Networks’ innovative implementations. Configuring and monitoring any device via automation, independent of vendors is a goal implementable not only on SDN devices, but also on other networking solutions. By using Python, network engineers do not need to configure by themselves each individual device, they just need to create the proper infrastructure and by implementing automation scripting the network controllability becomes easier and changes can be deployed faster, maybe even automatically, as response to the events that  take place in the network.

Organizations will benefit from an automation strategy with benefits on change control, architecture, security and operational management. Troubleshooting can be made easily and quickly when automated systems examine the network continuously.

Socket Programming in Python:

A network socket is an endpoint of an inter-process communication flow across a computer network. Sockets may communicate within a process, between processes on the same machine, or between processes on different continents. Today, most communication between computers is based on the internet protocol; therefore most network sockets are internet sockets. To create a connection between machines, Python programs import the socket module, create a socket object, and call the object’s methods to establish connections and send and receive data. Sockets are the endpoints of a bidirectional communications channel.

Socket in Python:

Python provides two levels of access to network services. At a low level, you can access the basic socket support in the underlying operating system, which allows you to implement clients and servers for both connection-oriented and connection-less protocols. Python also has libraries that provide higher level access to specific application level network protocols, such as FTP, HTTP, SMTP, and so on.

Network Automation Python Course:

The course offered by LogicFinder teaches students to learn Python skill-sets through the lens of automating networks. Topics begin with a focus on automating networks with Python; this skill set is then folded into a broadening understanding of automation. Students will have programmatic experience automating networks by the conclusion of this course.

Course Details:

Why is Python Training necessary for Network Engineers?

The heterogeneous nature and the number of devices in a network are increasing steadily. The traditional methods for configuration of network equipment are time consuming. The traditional legacy networks need to keep the pace and are required to respond to dynamic network changes. Network automation is a solution for operational expenses; it improves not only the time spent for configuring the network devices, but also the efficiency of maintenance of network through easy to follow procedures. Network programmability allows for dynamic and reliable infrastructure configurations by automating deployments, simplifying the network and reducing human generated errors. All new automation implementations are based on generic programming methods (python, java) and standard interfaces (Secure Shell SSH or even RESTful webservices). At its core, network programmability and automation has the main goal of simplifying the tasks involved in managing, configuring and operating network topologies, network equipment, network connectivity and network services.

What is Python used for:

  • Python is used to automate configuration tasks or even troubleshooting network issues
  • Interacting with API of modern platforms (VMware, Cisco APIC, F5, Arista, etc.)
  • Using power automation libraries such as NAPALM, Netmiko, Exscript

From where to learn Python Network Programming:

Just starting out with Python Programming, Network Automation or Network Programming using Python and have the desire to learn the future of Network Programmability in a practical way?Perfect. Then, this course by LogicFinder is the right one for you. You’ll boost your career with hands-on Network Programming Skills! This course will show you the best practices for developing the Python Networking Automation Scripts.

Course details:

Introduction to Python Programming for Network Engineers

Python allows you to build scripts to automate complex network configuration. It is the most widely used programming language for software-defined networking, and is a critical skill for new network engineers. The Python Language has become one of the most popular Programming Language. Today python knowledge is most sought after skills in job market and in next 5 years, almost all network engineers will be required to learn Python or some other form of automation skills using programming language. 

Nowadays, automation is the key to keep pace with ever increasing requirements and the high complexity of modern networks. Thus, today’s Network Engineers need a basic understanding of programming and corresponding tools. Python excels at offering easy GUI programming and extensive libraries. Python is a great and friendly language to use and learn. It’s fun, and can be adapted to both small and large projects. Python will cut your development time greatly and overall, it’s much faster to write Python than other languages.

Features of Python Programming Language:

Readable: Python is a easily readable language.

Easy to Learn: Learning python is easy as this is an expressive and high level programming language.

Cross platform: Python is available and can run on various operating systems such as Mac, Windows, Linux, Unix etc. This makes it a cross platform and portable language.

Open Source: Python is an open source programming language.

Advanced features: Supports generators and list comprehensions

Automatic memory management: Python supports automatic memory management which means the memory is cleared and freed automatically. You do not have to bother clearing the memory.

If you need a quick brush-up, or learning Python for the first time, you’ve come to the right place! There’s no need to fret if you haven’t coded before. By the time you finish the course Python Scripting for Network Engineers by LogicFinder, you’ll be a pro at Python! This course is here for you to get accustomed and familiar with Python and its syntax. And above all, Python is one of the easiest coding languages to learn, and there’s a lot you can do with it.

Details of the course here: https://www.logicfinder.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/course-1.pdf

Get registered for the course here: https://www.logicfinder.net/python/