Training / Certification - 16

My virtualization friend Bas Vinken pointed me to a real great vCenter Operations 5 presentation created by Iwan ‘e1’ Rahabok (virtual-red-dot.blogspot.com) who's working as a VMware staff SE, Strategic Accounts in Singapore. It's available for download in PowerPoint format and I really would like to advise you to read the slide notes (they're awesome). The presentation serves 2 purposes, first it provides in-depth training for those who are learning or evaluating vCenter Operations 5 and second it provides materials that vCenter Ops champion can use to share with internal colleagues (e.g. storage team, app team, etc).

Scripted installation is an efficient way to provision multiple ESXi host. This video explains how to use a kickstart file to install or upgrade ESXi. Both Shift-O invocation and PXE boot are supported.

VMware's Andy Cary who works as a Senior Technical Trainer in EMEA has  received a lot of e-mails recently about what the options are for people to secure their VCP5.0. The table in the diagram below shows the 4 different options for attaining your VCP 5.0 exam. Andy thinks there's confusion with the text in printed orange, this text is only valid until the 29th February. So at the 1st March all the orange options will have disappeared from the diagram.

Here's Andy's explanation regarding the four different layers for achieving a VCP5.0

Option 1 - Just Starting with VMware or VCP 2

Another way of saying this is there is no upgrade path from VCP2 to VCP5 and the student hasn’t attend any vSphere 4.0 or 5.0 classes. So in this case the student must attend a vSphere 5.0 qualifying class =  vSphere 5 Install Configure and Manage or vSphere 5 Fasttrack and take the VCP5.0 – no deadline for when they have to take the exam

Option 2 - Currently a VCP3

So now if a student is a VCP3 they can take the VCP5.0 exam if:-

1. Attend the vSphere 5.0 What’s New class and take the VCP 5.0 exam by the 29th February – they won’t be able to take the exam after 29th February if this the only training they have attended.

2. Attend vSphere 5 Install Configure and Manage or vSphere 5 Fasttrack and take the VCP5.0 exam – there is no deadline for when they have to take the VCP5.0 exam

Option 3 - Currently a VCP4.0

Go take the VCP5.0 exam by 29th February. If a student in this situation wants to become a VCP5.0 after the 29th Feb they have to attend a vSphere 5.0 What’s New class.

Option 4 - No VCP Certification but have completed one of the VCP4 qualifying classes

In this example a student has attend let’s say the vSphere 4.x ICM class but they haven’t passed any VCP exams.

1. A student will be allowed to take the VCP4.0 exam and then VCP5.0 exam to get the VCP5.0 BUT they must pass the VCP5.0 exam by the 29th February

2. A student will also be allowed to take their VCP5.0 exam (without taking VCP4.0) if they have attend the vSphere 5.0 What’s New class – again no deadline for taking the VCP5.0 exam

So if student in this situation passes their VCP4 exam today, they must pass their VCP5.0 exam by the end of February. If they don’t pass by 29th Feb they are effectively at Option 3 and they have to attend vSphere 5.0 What’s New class

The goal of this 3 day course is to equip consulting professionals with the knowledge, skills, and abilities to achieve competence in designing a VMware vSphere 5 virtual infrastructure. Given an organization’s constraints and requirements, the infrastructure should be available, scalable, manageable, and secure while meeting the organization’s business objectives. The course is based on VMware ESXi and VMware vCenter Server 5. This course discusses the benefits and risks of available design alternatives and provides information to support making sound design decisions. This course also provides an opportunity to practice your design skills by working with peers on a design project. Objectives: • Understand and apply a framework to a design. • Design a storage solution to use vSphere in an enterprise. • Design a network to use vSphere in an enterprise. • Design compute resources for an enterprise. • Design virtual machines to run applications in a virtual infrastructure. • Design a virtual datacenter for an enterprise. • Incorporate management and monitoring features in the design. • Identify design goals, requirements, constraints, and risks. • Identify useful information for making design decisions. • Recognize and analyze best-practice recommendations. • Analyze alternative design choices. Course Datasheet

This 4 days hands-on training course builds your skills in the VMware View™ suite of products: VMware View™ Manager, View Composer, and VMware ThinApp®. This course is based on the View 5.0 and ThinApp 4.6 releases. Before attending this course, you must be able to perform the following tasks:
• Create a template in VMware vCenter Server™ and deploy a virtual machine from the template. • Modify a template customization file. • Open a virtual machine console in vCenter Server and access the guest operating system. • Configure Active Directory services.
Objectives:
• Install and configure View components. • Create and manage dedicated and floating desktop pools. • Deploy and manage linked-clone virtual desktops. • Configure and manage desktops that run in local mode. • Configure user profiles with View Persona Management. • Configure secure access to desktops through a public network. • Use ThinApp to package applications.