Changes

In the previous chapter entitled [[A Guided Tour of the VMM Administrator Console]] we took a high level tour of the VMM 2008 Administrator Console component. This chapter is intended to over cover the steps necessary to manage and monitor the hosts, on which the virtual machines and libraries reside using the console.

The VMM Administrator Console may also be launched by selecting the ''Start->All Programs->Microsoft System Center->Virtual Machine Manager 2008->Virtual Machine Manager Administrator Console'' menu option. Given the depths to which this tool is buried in the menu structure, a shortcut on the Start menu or desktop (if one does not already exist) is recommended.

The first time that the console is launched, a dialog will appear requesting details of the computer hosting the VMM Server to which the console is to connect, and together with the port to be used in establishing this connection. This server name entry takes the following form:

For example, to connect to a VMM Server running on a remote system named WINSERVER using port 8100, the following server information would be entered:

Having defined the location of the hosts to be added, the purpose of the ''Select Host Servers'' screen is to allow selection of the specific hosts to be added to the VMM Administrator ConsoleServer. To add hosts, enter the name of Active Directory domain of which the host is a member followed by the computer name. If in doubt as to the name of the computer to be added, the ''Search'' button may be used to search the specified domain for systems running either Virtual Server or Hyper-V technology. Once a list of servers has been generated, one or more hosts may be selected and added to the console. Alternatively, if you know the name of the host to be added, simply enter the name and click the ''Add'' button:

Once the required hosts have been added, click on the ''Next'' button to proceed to the ''Configuration Settings'' screen. This screen is used to define which group of hosts the machine is to be assigned to. By default, only the ''All Hosts'' group is pre-configured within the VMM Administrator Console. In addition, if the host is currently managed by a different VMM Server than the one to which the VMM Administrator Console is currently connected, select the option to ''Reassociate host with this Virtual Machine Manager Server''to associate the host with the currently connected VMM Server.

Clicking ''Next'' display displays the ''Host Settings'' screen where a number of paths suitable for storing virtual machine files on the host may be defined. If no paths are specified, the default location will be used for all virtual machines created on the host using the console. Note that the console will not create any paths if they do not already exist on the host. These paths must be manually created before they can be used to store virtual machines. In addition, a remote connection port may be specified to allow remote connections to the hostusing the Virtual Machine Connection tool.

Once the host settings are defined, click ''Next'', and review the information on the ''Summary'' screen. In previous chapters we have mentioned that VMM 2008 sits on top of Windows PowerShell and that any operations performed are converted into a Windows PowerShell script and executed. To prove this, click on the ''View script'' button to display the PowerShell script which will be executed to add the hostto the VMM Server.

In the previous section a host was added to the ''All Hosts'' group of the VMM Administrator ConsoleServer. In addition to the ''All Hosts'' group, other groups may be created and existing groups removed to aid in the administration of large and complex virtualization deployments.

Host groups are configured hierarchically, with the ''All Hosts'' group at the to top of the tree and other sub-groups nested beneath it. Each sub-group may, in turn, have its own sub-groups allowing multiple layers of group nesting. For example, ''All Hosts'' may have a sub-group for all hosts located in California. The California sub-group may then be configured to have sub-groups of its own for each city in which hosts are located (San Jose, Palo Alto, San Francisco etc).

To add a new host group, ensure that the VMM Administrator Console is displaying the ''Hosts'' view, right click on the ''All Hosts'' item in the ''Hosts'' pane in the top left hand corner of the window and select ''New host group'' from the menu. A new host group entry will appear with with the default name ''New host group'' highlighted. Enter a new name and press enter to complete the creation process.

To remove an existing group, right click on the group name in the Hosts pane and select ''Remove'' from the popup menu. To move a host from one group to another, select the host from the list of hosts and click on the ''Move to host group'' link in the ''Actions'' pane. Navigate through the tree of host groups to find the target group and click ''OK'' to make initiate the move. Similarly, to add an existing host to a group, select the host group from the list, click on ''Add host'' from the Actions pane and use the wizard as described above to complete the process.

''Host Reserves'' define how much of a host's resources are to reserved for the host operating system. Once these reserves a are configured, a virtual machine cannot be deployed on that host if doing so would require the use of the those reserved resources. The host resources that may be reserved are as follows:

Host reserves are specified on a host group basis. In addition, the group reserve settings may also be overridden on a per host basis. To specify the host group reserve settings , right click on the host group name in the Hosts pane, select ''Properties'' from the menu and click the ''Host Reserve Tabs'' in the ''Host Group Properties'' dialog as illustrated in the following figure:

A variety of host property categories and settings may be viewed and configured by selecting the required host from the ''Hosts'' view of the VMM Administrator Console and selected the ''Properties'' option from the Actions pane. The properties dialog presents a number of different pages of settings, each of which is accessed by clicking the corresponding tab.:

The summary page of the host properties dialog displays general system information about the host computer. This information includes the computer name and , domain information and basic information about the CPU, memory, disk space, operating system and virtualization software on the host.

* '''Overall Status''' - Provides a single point to for information on the status of the system. Statuas Status can be ''OK'', ''Needs attention'' meaning there is a problem which is reported in the following status fields or ''OK (Limited)'' - meaning the host is a VMware Server ESX Server system and additional login information is needed to gain access to the system.

* '''Connection Status''' - Indicates whether the VMM Server componenent component is able to communicate with the host. Options are ''Responding'', ''Not Responding'' and ''Access Denied''.

* '''Agent Status''' - Indicates whether the VMM Server componenent component is able to communicate with the VMM Agent on the host. Options are ''Responding'', ''Not Responding'' and ''Access Denied''.

The VMs screen of the VMM Administrator Console host properties dialog displays information about any virtual machines present on the selected host. Information such as the virtual machine name, status, current uptime and resources is provided for each VM on the host. In addition, virtual machines which are on the host but not yet registered with the VMM Server component may be registered by using the browse button to navigate to the location of the VM files on the host system:

This screen displays and provides the ability to view and change virtual network settings on the selected host. Each configured virtual network may be selected from the list in the left hand pane and the corresponding settings changed in the center pane. For example , an existing virtual network may be changed from a private network to an internal network. In addition, virtual networks may be added or removed using this screen.

The term ''Placement'' refers to the paths which are available for the storage of virtual machine files on the host. As such, this screen lists the currently configured placement locations and provides the ability to add additional paths to the list of available locationsand to remove any locations which are no longer to be made available.

This page allows the port used by the Virtual Machine Remove Connection tool to connect to the virtual machines on the host to be viewed and modified. The default is 2179 for Hyper-V based hostsand 5900 for Virtual Server.