VMware Server 2.0 First Look - My Rating: C-
I've always liked VMware's no-cost "Server" product for use as a sandbox for building and testing environments. Last night I had need to get some Server 2008 images loaded onto that environment and realized that I needed to upgrade to VMware Server 2.0 Beta in order to fully support them. I figured it also a nice opportunity to test out this new whole-number upgrade.
Well, the installation was definitely...interesting... If you decide to try out VMware Server 2.0, make absolutely sure that you thoroughly read its release notes file before starting. As a Beta product there are still some bugs to work out with its installation routines. There are a few major gotchas within that document that you must know before installing. Since the release notes require a registration to be seen, I'll include them after the jump.
As to my first impressions of the new interface -- in a word: "yuck". VMware had a slick client-based tool in the last version that looked and behaved much like VMware Workstation's interface. The new web-based interface reminds me of what I think we all disliked about ESX 2.5's web interface. The interface is exceptionally slow, has problems showing me the consoles of my running VM's, and needs to be at full screen to be useful whatsoever. I rarely put any windows in full screen, so this is doubly annoying. Most interesting of all, for Linux there is no direct upgrade from 1.0.4 to 2.0. One must first remove 1.0.4, prior to installing the 2.0 code, which is always a scary experience.
As an interesting and minor change, RAM count for each VM is now displayed in GB, which makes it difficult to read in some cases. As an example, 384M of RAM is actually .38GB. This change, though seemingly directed towards multi-GB servers doesn't help those of us who run really-small ones.
Lastly, and this is a regular (but irritating) feature of all VMware Beta products, debug mode is enabled for all machines by default -- and it cannot be disabled through the GUI interface. I've found an alternate way to disable it, which I'll post in another post later today.
So, all-in-all, I give this update to VMware Server a C-. The product still works, and still hosts machines as per its design. But its interfaces have taken a move backwards in usability.
Click past the break for the full list of gotchas from the release notes...
Known Issues
The following are known issues with VMware Server 2.0.
You must run VMware Server as an administrator user. VMware Server does not have a default username and password.
Workaround: Use existing login credentials on the host machine to log in to VI Web Access.
On Linux, log in as root. On Windows, log in as Administrator or as a user that belongs to the local group or domain Administrators group.
VI Web Access does not provide a way to enter a serial number.
Workaround: Enter a serial number when prompted by the installer.
When you run the Windows installer, the default HTTP connection port is 8222 and the default HTTPS port is 8333. If you use these defaults, or any values other than 80 (HTTP) and 443 (HTTPS), you must specify the port number when you connect to VMware Server using VI Web Access. You must also allow connection to these ports through your firewall.
An example URL to connect to VI Web Access using a non-standard port is http://server_host:8222
Workaround: If you want to use ports 80 (HTTP) and 443 (HTTPS), override the default values when you run the Windows installer.
Note: If you are running IIS or Apache web server on the default ports, specify alternate HTTP and HTTP ports when prompted by the Windows installer or vmware-config.pl. Alternatively, stop IIS's default Web site or any other Web site running on these ports. On Linux, shut down Apache or any other application using these ports and make sure they are not configured to restart automatically.
On Windows, the VMware Server desktop and Start menu shortcuts use the NetBIOS name in the connection URL. This may cause VI Web Access to fail to connect to VMware Server.
Workaround: Enter the correct host name as the External Name when prompted by the Windows installer. Or, if the URL specified in the shortcut does not work, use the correct host name, IP address, or localhost, as appropriate, in the connection URL.
Using RPM to upgrade from a released version of VMware Server 1 to a beta version of VMware Server 2 might fail. This is because the beta version number includes e.x.p. (meaning experimental), which is considered an earlier version than the currently installed released version.
Workaround: If you want to replace a released version of VMware Server 1 with the beta version of VMware Server 2, use the rpm -Uhv --oldpackage option. Note that VMware recommends installing VMware Server 2 on a separate host that is suitable for testing.
On Linux, if you run vmware-uninstall.pl when virtual machines are running, the uninstall will fail and it will not be possible to shut down the virtual machines.
Workaround:
If you installed using tar:
Run /etc/init.d/vmware-mgmt restart to restart VMware services.
If neither xinetd nor inetd is running, run /usr/sbin/vmware-authdlauncher to restart the authorization service.
Log in to VI Web Access and shut down running virtual machines.
Re-run vmware-uninstall.pl.
If you installed using rpm: Kill all vmnet-xxx and vmware-xxx processes.
Remove VMware Server files using the following commands:
rm -rf /etc/vmware
rm -rf /usr/bin/vmware
rm -f /lib/modules/`uname -r`/misc/vm*
rmmod vmnet
rmmod vmmon
If you reconfigure VMware Server using vmware-config.pl and change the HTTP port, the WebAccess.properties file is not updated and connection using VI Web Access will fail.
Workaround: Update the WebAccess.properties file manually to set login_url to use the correct port. By default, the WebAccess.properties file is in the /usr/lib/vmware/webAccess/tomcat/apache-tomcat-5.5.17/webapps/ui/jslib-1.0.63065/modules/
com.vmware.webaccess.app_1.0.0 directory.
It is not possible to add an NFS datastore if the NFS share has root squashing enabled.
Workaround: Disable root squashing.
VMware Server will not run on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 if the Xen kernel is installed.
Workaround: You must install the Red Hat Enterprise Linux kernel without Xen to use VMware Server.
The vmnet-netifup daemons do not terminate when VMware Server is stopped.
Workaround: Disable IPv6 on your host.
If a power operation fails, the power button may continue to pulse until you click a different virtual machine.
If you click Upgrade Virtual Machine and then click Cancel, all following actions will generate an error.
Workaround: Click the Web browser Refresh button.
When you remove a datastore, it still appears in the list of datastores.
Workaround: Click the Web browser Refresh button.
If you edit a CD/DVD drive and manually enter the datastore path to point to an ISO image file, you might see the error: You cannot continue until the following fields have been corrected: ISO Image Path.
Workaround: Instead use the graphical datastore browser to select ISO images.
It is possible to add the same virtual machine to the inventory more than once. However, if you do this, errors might occur.
It is not possible to add or edit USB devices using VI Web Access.
It is not possible to add or edit generic SCSI (SCSI passthrough) devices using VI Web Access.
On Windows host systems, host configuration settings for Virtual Machine Startup and Shutdown are ignored.
Recording runtime statistics information for a virtual machine (enabled in the VM Configuration Advanced tab) is not currently supported. If you enable statistics, VMware Server operations will fail.
VMware Tools automatic upgrade is not currently supported.
Workaround: Upgrade VMware Tools manually.
VMware Tools upgrade might fail in Windows Vista guests.
Workaround: Uninstall VMware Tools from the Control Panel in the guest operating system, then click Install VMware Tools in the Commands section of the virtual machine workspace in VI Web Access.
You must configure a virtual CD/DVD drive for a virtual machine before installing VMware Tools.
The virtual machine remote console might not work with the version of Firefox that comes with your Linux distribution.
Workaround: Get the latest version of Firefox from www.mozilla.org.
You might need to uninstall the browser add-in (which enables the virtual machine remote console in VI Web Access) before you can re-install or upgrade Web Access using Firefox on Windows.
Workaround: To manually uninstall the browser add-in, follow these steps:
Quit any running instances of Firefox so files can be deleted.
In the Mozilla Firefox folder (typically C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\), remove the files ssleay32.dll, msvcr71.dll, and libeay32.dll.
In the "plugins" folder, remove the files vmware-remotemks.exe, ssleay32.dll, npmks.dll, and libeay32.dll.
If you use VI Web Access in Internet Explorer, navigating to a virtual machine's Events tab and then clicking Refresh in the browser might cause the workspace to go blank. The inventory panel may also be blank.
Workaround: Close the browser window and log in again.
The virtual machine remote console might not function correctly in Linux Web browsers running inside remote X or NX Client sessions.
Workaround: If you want to use the virtual machine remote console, run your Web browser locally.
On Ubuntu, you must enable the root account by specifying a root password in order to use VMware Server.
The host Summary tab might display an incorrect, negative value for memory utilization on Windows hosts.
The executable (vmware.exe) for the Server 1 Console is installed on Windows, even though this Console is obsolete and is replaced with the VI Web Access Console functionality.
If you add or edit a hard disk or CD/DVD drive and choose a device node between 1:0 and 2:15 when device nodes 0:0 through 0:15 are not being used, if you then edit the SCSI controller to change the controller type from BusLogic to LSI Logic or vice versa, an extra controller is displayed in VI Web Access.
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Comments
hi !
thanks for your feelings about VM Server2 beta.
i have one question :
Does it provide a way to access the virtual machine using a web browser (like LogmeIn do) ?
thanks for anwser me (even by email please).
have a long life!
Posted by: Michael REMY | February 5, 2008 5:06 AM
Hi, congratulations, very good article.
Just a short question: I installed this ver. in a w2008, and created a VM, but when I power on, the physical server reboots, any idea?
Thanks in advance.
Posted by: Fernando Duran | July 21, 2008 5:58 PM
Have you attempted to run VMware Workstation on a Win2008 instance that also has the Hyper-V role installed? There are some reports out now that Hyper-V and VMware Workstation don't like each other. If Hyper-V is running a VM, and then Workstation starts, all sorts of bad thngs happen.
Posted by: Greg Shields | July 21, 2008 6:18 PM
I am using the latest release VMware Infra Web Access 2.0.0 Build 116503. On Win Server 2003 SP1 X64.
The console does not automatically install, have not found any way or info on the Web.
What a disappointment the 2.0 release ! Vmware you HAD once good products.
Posted by: Michael | September 30, 2008 12:38 AM