vCenter Server Appliance 6.0 password aging information

A small article to help you set password aging information for vCenter Server Appliance 6.0

The default expiry of vCenter Server Appliance root account password is 365 days. It can be set to desired value. Procedure is explained below.

Invoke vCenter Server Appliance 6.0 console

Press Alt+F3 –  To get into command line

‘chage‘ is a general linux command to set aging information

Alt+F2 to switch back to console

You can use the ‘chage’ command on other VMware products as well which are available in form of linux appliances.

VMware PSC (Platform Services Controller) 6.0 FAQs

As we know, VMware has come up with PSC(Platform Services Controller) for vSphere 6.0 release.

PSC is an infrastructure services node and the critical components/services of which are detailed in my previous blog article>> vSphere 6.0 – vCenter Server (Components, Deployment Model)

There were lot of questions haunting around PSC and to address some of the frequently asked questions, VMware has released an excellent Knowledge Base article. Pls check it out for details.

VMware Platform Services Controller 6.0 FAQs (2113115)

Backup and Restore of vCenter Server Appliance 6.0 through VDP 6.0

Tried to explain this as a conversation between 2 characters                                 (Mr Green, Mr Blue)

One of the names is inspired by HULK character. The smashing HULK 🙂

Mr Green

My vCenter 6.0 crashed. Unable to connect and is inaccessible.

Mr Blue

vCenter being a centralized management layer, is a single point of failure. In an event of failure it prevents consumption of all the products registered to it

Mr Green

You are right. I have all vCloud Suite 6.0 products (SRM, VR, BDE, VDP, vROPS, vRA, vRAS, vRB, VCM, VIN, VCO, Hyperic) registered to the vCenter and unable to consume them now.

Mr Blue

vCenter is a primary product that should be backed up on regular basis. Scheduled backups can help to restore the vCenter in case of failure/crash

Mr Green

You know, I have successful daily backups of vCenter through VDP. But my vCenter is down so how do I access VDP and restore my backup

Mr Blue

Emergency Restore is a feature in VDP which allows to restore from existing backup even in case vCenter is not accessible

Check this link for steps on how to perform an Emergency Restore

Emergency Restore – VDP 5.5 (Case Study)

Mr Green

That’s Perfect !

I am able to successfully recover my vCenter from backup through Emergency Restore

With the recovered vCenter, all my products are intact now and fully operational.

Thanks a lot Mr Blue ! 🙂

Important points to note

• vCenter referred in this context is a vCSA (vCenter Server Appliance 6.0) with embedded PostgreSQL Database
• This is not a backup/restore of entire environment but only the centralized management layer which is vCenter
• The results holds good for both vCSA with embedded & external Platform Services Controller
• With external PSC both VC & PSC nodes need to be backed up/restored at the same time
• Backup/Restore of vCenter(Windows) with external DB is yet to be tested in my lab

VMware References on Backing up and Restoring vCenter Server

http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-60/index.jsp#com.vmware.vsphere.install.doc/GUID-78933728-7F02-43AF-ABD8-0BDCE10418A6.html

vSphere 6.0 – vCenter Server (Components, Deployment Model)

vCenter Server Components and Services

This is a brief overview of vCenter Server Components and Services. It applies to both vCenter Server(Windows) and vCenter Server Appliance

vCenter Platform Services Controller

• vCenter Single Sign-On : SSO provides secure authentication services to vSphere components. Through SSO, vSphere components communicate with each other through a secure token based mechanism, instead of each component/solution user reaching out to an external directory service like Active Directory for authentication. All components/solutions while install or upgrade process gets registered with SSO constructed security domain (vSphere.local). From then SSO can authenticate users from its default Identity Source(vSphere.local) or an explicitly added external Identity Source like Active Directory. Authenticated users can then be assigned registered solution-based permissions or roles within vSphere environment. (vSphere.local can be a custom name now)
• vSphere License Service : Provides license inventory and management capabilities to all vCenter instances connected to a Platform Services Controller
• VMware Certificate Authority : VMware Certificate Authority (VMCA) provides each ESXi host with a signed certificate with VMCA as root certificate authority. Certificate provisioning occurs when an ESXi host is added to vCenter explicitly or it can be part of ESXi host installation process. All ESXi certificates are stored locally on the host

vCenter Server

• vCenter Inventory Service : Stores vCenter configuration and inventory data. It enables to search and access inventory objects across vCenter Server instances
• vSphere Web Client : Allows to connect to vCenter Server instances through a Web browser for managing vSphere Infrastructure
• PostgreSQL : VMware distribution of PostgreSQL database for vSphere (Embedded database with vCenter)
• vSphere ESXi Dump Collector : Allows you to configure ESXi to save VMKernel memory to a network server, rather than to a disk, when a PSOD is encountered.
• vSphere Syslog Collector : The vCenter Server on Windows support tool that enables network logging and combining of logs from multiple hosts. You can use the Syslog Collector to direct ESXi system logs to a server on the network, rather than to a local disk. The recommended maximum number of supported hosts to collect logs from is 30
• vSphere Syslog Service : The vCenter Server Appliance support tool that provides a unified architecture for system logging, network logging and collecting logs from hosts. You can use the vSphere Syslog Service to direct ESXi system logs to a server on the network, rather than to a local disk. The recommended maximum number of supported hosts to collect logs from is 30
• vSphere Auto Deploy : The vCenter Server support tool that can provision hundreds of physical hosts with ESXi software. You can specify the image to deploy and the hosts to provision with the image.

vCenter Server Deployment Models

For VMware recommended deployment topologies, you can refer

• http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2108548