Introduction

In the first two chapters of this book, you created a base platform that will allow you to run virtual machines. In this chapter, you begin to work with actual workloads. This chapter will cover provisioning the first VM, deploying virtual machines in bulk, and managing the virtual machines.

There are actually several ways to create a virtual machine. The first is to build it like you would build a normal physical server. For this, you need to install an operating system onto a blank disk from the installation media (CD, DVD, a USB flash drive, or an ISO image). This process is very manual and repetitive for administrators.

vSphere improves this process through the ability to clone a VM once it's built. Cloning makes an identical copy of your VM so that it can be deployed multiple times. Cloning is also important for other tasks such as creating test labs and replicating problems.

In addition to cloning, vSphere can also mark a built VM as a template, signifying that it is prepared with the intent to build other VMs. Templates cannot be powered on or changed. This limits a prepared VM from accidentally being used for another purpose. Cloning and deploying a VM from a template are very similar.

The fourth way to deploy a VM is to deploy a virtual appliance. Based on a very similar technology, deploying a virtual appliance is a workflow that imports a specially formatted file. A virtual appliance often comes in an Open Virtual Appliance (OVA) or Open Virtualization Format (OVF). vSphere has a workflow to import OVA and OVF in order to create machines.

However, getting a VM started is only the beginning, because all administrators know that maintaining computers takes much more time and energy than simply deploying them. You will cover several additional recipes to help with the administration and upkeep of your virtual machines once you deploy them.