vSphere 6.5 & 6.7 – End of General Support
Don’t forget that vSphere 6 is phasing out, and that most people should be moving to vSphere 7.
So far, vSphere 7.0.3 Update 3c seems to be very stable.
vSphere 6.5 & 6.7 End Of General Support ends October 15, 2022
This only leaves just under 7 months to get to vSphere 7.
VMware End of Support pages are here.
Don’t forget that SD cards are no longer recommended by VMware!
That means you need SSD or NVMe for boot drives now!
NIST – Patching Publications
NIST (National Institute of Standards & Technology) has always published content for the public available free of charge.
WIth so many emergency patching recommendations in the past few months, I’ve seen so many environments that have not been patched for years.
I strongly recommend folks create a Maintenance plan for the hardware & software that runs in your datacenter.
Need Guidance on creating a policy?
Try out these 2 NIST downloads yourself:
Guide to Enterprise Patch Management Planning: Preventive Maintenance
…and Improving Enterprise Patching for General IT Systems: Utilizing Existing Tools and Performing Processes in Better Ways
VMworld – now called VMware Explore
Well, a new name for the event.
Not sure why they felt the need to change the name….
Here is the new VMware Explore home page.
VMware EMPOWER Americas
Just got registered for VMware EMPOWER Americas.
May 17-19.
Looks to be another Virtual Event.
A recently certified VCDX shares his experience
Sajal Debnath recently received his VCDX #296
He also captured his thought & experiences on that journey on his blog post.
VMware PopwerCLI 12.6 released
Some new HCX, as well as some vCenter VAMI backup functionality.
Just remember to update….
# Update-Module -Name VMware.PowerCLI
VMware Blog post is here.
VMware Flings of Note
Imager – a tool to automate Windows 10 VM deployments
TIL – Intel CPUs with VMD provide RAID1
Today I learned that Intel CPUs have Intel VMD (Volume Management Device).
I started with this VMware Blog post that was reviewing how to use this when mixing vSAN disks with NVMe SSD Boot volumes on ESXi.
Started digging a bit more, and found this Intel page covering VMD.
Intel VMD-Enabled NVMe Driver for ESXi PDF.
Drivers are on the ESXi 7.0.3 (Update 3) and later media.
USB-C vs Thunderbolt – why is it so complicated?
USB-C and Thunderbolt seem to be used interchangeably…
But they are not the same.
Ever wonder why techies always ask for details?
Read this MacWorld article going over the nuances and version history (and future) of USB and Thunderbolt, and you’ll get an idea why….
Apple’s System 7 & OS 8 flashbacks
Found this on MacWorld….
Want to remember what Apple’s OS looked like back in 1990s?
This website runs System 7 in a browser.
This website runs OS 8 in a browser.
ESX 1.5 for Enterprise Server Consolidation
Wow….this is a flashback. Glad they still have it up on the VMware site!
A VMware News Release from May 2002!
QR codes – why security conscious folks avoid them
We have all seen QR codes….
Just scan this with your phone, and xyzzy something will happen
How do you know you can trust it? Well, you can’t.
1Password gives a glimpse into QR codes for a security awareness discussion.
Using 1Password for SSH & Git
I’ve been using 1Password for quite a few years as my password manager.
macOS, Windows, Linux, Android, iOS….all with one subscription per year.
Now I’m looking forward to their new version (version 8 on macOS).
This will now include the ability to create and/or import SSH keys.
…and it will use 1Password in workflows (will have to see how that works).
Nutanix Cloud Platform – the new software chart
So Nutanix is making some name changes.
You’ll see NCI (Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure, which is the old AOS) and NCM (Nutanix Cloud Manager, which is the old Prism Central).
Other names have changed as well (all listed).
Check out the software options page on the Nutanix website
Nutanix Objects – now with NFS access
Nutanix Objects provides S3 compatible storage wherever you have your Nutanix Clusters deployed. Now, accessing that storage over NFS is possible.
Just have a use case in mind before allowing this.
This 6-minute YouTube video shows how to configure, and then how to consume from an NFS client, or the Objects Web UI.
Nutanix Era Security
Nutanix Era is to DBAs, what Virtualization was to server admins since 2002.
Well, first off, Era is now DBaaS (Database as a Service).
More importantly, it does come with a security guide.
Given the amount of conversations I’ve had with this, now I’ve got the link to that here to the Nutanix Portal Era Security Guide.
Continuing Education – a list of resources that come with references
(of people who have used those sites & are happy with the results).
VeeamON – May 16 – May 19 (Las Vegas, NV & Virtual)
Nutanix Tech Summit – May 23 – May 26 (Las Vegas, NV & Virtual)
VMware Explore 2022 – August 28 – Sept 1 (San Francisco, CA)
VMware Explore 2022 Europe – November 7 – November 11
HashiCorp Learn
Kode Kloud
KubeAcademy
Nutanix University
PluralSight / A Cloud Guru (PluralSight purchased A Cloud Guru)
Udemy
vBrownBag
VeeamOn 2021 – recordings or William Lam’s Direct Links
VMware Customer Connect Learning (old VMware Learning Zone)
VMware Hands On Labs
VMworld Sessions (2021, 2020, 2019)