Broadcom is about to release a brand-new edition of the VMware Cloud Foundation: Troubleshooting course, fully updated for VCF 9.1. I recently got a first look at the course material, and this five-day, hands-on training is shaping up to be an essential deep dive for anyone who operates and supports a VCF private cloud.
Why this course matters
VMware Cloud Foundation brings compute, storage, networking, automation, and operations together in a single platform — which is great, until something breaks. Misconfigurations and system failures can surface anywhere in the stack, from the initial bring-up to day-2 lifecycle operations. This course teaches administrators a structured approach to isolating and resolving problems across the entire VCF fleet, using the tools built into the platform itself.
What's new in the 9.1 edition
Compared to the 9.0 course, two things immediately stand out. The course now opens with a dedicated module on Monitoring and Troubleshooting with VCF Operations, including the Troubleshooting Workbench with its real-time analysis tools and log management. And at the other end of the week, there is a completely new module on Troubleshooting vSphere Kubernetes Service (VKS), covering the vSphere Supervisor architecture and troubleshooting VKS cluster deployments with logs and health checks — a welcome addition now that Kubernetes is a first-class citizen in VCF.
The upgrade module has also been reworked around real-world 9.1 scenarios, such as upgrading from vSphere 8 to VCF 9.1 and moving a VCF environment with multiple Aria components to 9.1.
Course outline
The course spans twelve modules over five days:
- Course Introduction
- Monitoring and Troubleshooting with VCF Operations
- Troubleshooting New Deployment
- Troubleshooting Upgrades
- Troubleshooting License Management
- Workload Domain Troubleshooting
- Troubleshooting VCF Compute
- Troubleshooting VCF Networking
- Troubleshooting VCF Storage
- Troubleshooting Using VCF Operations Fleet Management
- Troubleshooting VCF Automation
- Troubleshooting vSphere Kubernetes Service
Hands-on from day one
This is not a slideware-only course. Thirteen lab exercises run throughout the week, and they mirror what you actually face in production: analyzing SDDC Manager pre-check errors during a management domain upgrade, reviewing post-deployment logs, working with the VCF APIs, troubleshooting compute, networking, and vSAN issues, running vSAN health tests, fixing certificate and password management problems through Fleet Management, and diagnosing VCF Automation platform failures.
A few highlights from the content itself:
- VCF Operations as the starting point — fleet visibility monitoring, the Troubleshooting Workbench, and log analysis form the foundation for everything that follows.
- Deep networking coverage — from NSX management cluster status and Edge node validation to live traffic analysis, routing validation, and the new Virtual Network Appliance.
- Storage troubleshooting — monitoring vSAN through the UI and digging deeper with CLI tools.
- Fleet Management — certificates, passwords, identity and access management, tags, and configuration drift remediation using vCenter configuration profiles.
- VCF Automation — clustered deployment architecture and troubleshooting the automation platform, including microservice pod execution anomalies using container log architectures.
Who should attend
The course is aimed at administrators and support engineers responsible for a VCF 9.1 environment. You'll get the most out of it if you've already followed VCF: Build, Manage, Secure [v9.1] or have equivalent hands-on experience. It also aligns with the upcoming VCP-VCF 9.1 Support certification, making it a logical preparation step.
Final thoughts
Troubleshooting skills are what separate an administrator who can operate a platform from one who can keep it running when things go wrong. With the added coverage of VCF Operations, the Troubleshooting Workbench, and vSphere Kubernetes Service, the 9.1 edition reflects how troubleshooting in a modern VCF environment actually works today. Keep an eye on the course catalog — this one is worth booking as soon as it becomes available.
