Virtualisation @ CIT
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Virtualisation @ CIT HEAnet National Networking Conference 2009 Aidan McDonald
description
Virtualisation @ CIT. HEAnet National Networking Conference 2009 Aidan McDonald. Programme. 1. Introduction. 2. VMWare ESX. 3. SAN and ESX. 4. Today and Future. 5. Pitfalls. 6. Additional work in CIT. 1. Introduction. Introduction. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
Transcript of Virtualisation @ CIT
Virtualisation @ CIT
HEAnet National Networking Conference 2009
Aidan McDonald
Programme
1. Introduction 1. Introduction
2. VMWare ESX 2. VMWare ESX
3. SAN and ESX 3. SAN and ESX
4. Today and Future 4. Today and Future
5. Pitfalls 5. Pitfalls
6. Additional work in CIT6. Additional work in CIT
1. Introduction
Introduction
Instead of CIT planning a Virtualisation project, CIT’s Infrastructure evolved from various small IT initiatives in the college.
Now, it represents a sizeable virtualised infrastructure and our reliance and dependency on it has grown enormously.
Administration, student services, IT services, academic departments all now depend on this infrastructure.
In the beginning ….
Cisco Academy’s Netlab System - introduced support for virtual PCs in the pods using VMWare GSX, capable of supporting 8 virtual PCs per server.
VM Workstation used in network labs, to allow students experience installing OS’s and configuring administration settings without effecting underlying lab PC.
Approached VMWare to customise ESX for Netlab – introduced to our neighbours in Ovens, MD ex-CIT graduate
VMware ESX
Initially, installed ESX for research, had no interest in large scale virtualisation agenda.
CIT became a VMware university allowing academic licensing to be used for creating ESX servers.
Research includes virtualising an existing server – i.e. our TACACS server, as well as creating some new servers for NM (e.g. Nagios, Squid, DNS);
PowerEdge2950
ESX SERVER 1
CIT’s Cloud
Computer Dept. SAN
Initial ESX server was running out of local disk space.
School of Computing invested in a SAN.
EMC Clarion CX300 Initially used in
computing as storage
PowerEdge2950
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5
3
41
2
0
PowerEdge 2950
EMC2
EMC2
VM ESX CLUSTER
Virtual Infrastructure Center ServerESX Management Server
SAN
ESX SERVER 1
DISK STORE 2
DISK STORE 1
CIT’s Cloud
Fiber channel switch
A colleague in Finance managed an internal WWW server which crashed.
Convinced him to buy fibre channel switch instead of new server, if we hosted finance.cit.ie – 1st Production server
An upgrade to phone management server required new server – we took this server as our 2nd ESX server and virtualised.
Provided high speed link to SAN for storage and retrieval of data from VMware servers.
6
7
5
3
41
2
0
PowerEdge 2950
EMC2
EMC2
VM ESX CLUSTER
Virtual Infrastructure Center ServerESX Management Server
SAN
ESX SERVER 1
DISK STORE 2
DISK STORE 1
1 2 3 4 5 6 11 128 107 8 13 14 15 16 17 18 23 2421 2219 20
C I S C O
STATUS
P/S
FAN
CONSOLE MGMT 10/100
MDS 9124 MULTILAYER FABRIC SWITCH
DS-C9124-K9RESET
1 2 3 4 5 6 11 128 107 8 13 14 15 16 17 18 23 2421 2219 20
C I S C O
STATUS
P/S
FAN
CONSOLE MGMT 10/100
MDS 9124 MULTILAYER FABRIC SWITCH
DS-C9124-K9RESET
PowerEdge2950
ESX SERVER 2
PowerEdge2950
CIT’s Cloud
Value of VM – AD Project
College undertook to centralise AD – 13 different departmental ADs to two central ones – Staff and Student
Impossible to build new, parallel infrastructure while old existed
Virtualised the whole old AD estate, all 13 ADs, and in this test environment, mocked up the AD migration
Implemented VMMotion
6
7
5
3
41
2
0
PowerEdge 2950
EMC2
EMC2
VM ESX CLUSTER
Virtual Infrastructure Center ServerESX Management Server
SAN
ESX SERVER 1
DISK STORE 2
DISK STORE 1
1 2 3 4 5 6 11 128 107 8 13 14 15 16 17 18 23 2421 2219 20
C I S C O
STATUS
P/S
FAN
CONSOLE MGMT 10/100
MDS 9124 MULTILAYER FABRIC SWITCH
DS-C9124-K9RESET
1 2 3 4 5 6 11 128 107 8 13 14 15 16 17 18 23 2421 2219 20
C I S C O
STATUS
P/S
FAN
CONSOLE MGMT 10/100
MDS 9124 MULTILAYER FABRIC SWITCH
DS-C9124-K9RESET
PowerEdge2950
ESX SERVER 2
PowerEdge2950
CIT’s Cloud
PowerEdgeR900
ESX SERVER 3
CIT Today
Server consolidation – ban on new physical servers SAN upgrade, CX400 – i-SCSI, mirroring 4 ESX Servers, 63 VMs, 15Tb Disk, in two centers
Pitfalls – Server for server sake
VM Servers/machines have an undoubted value and can be created instantaneously
However, there is a danger in creating VMs for the sake of it
This can lead to unstructured and unmanageable growth of virtualisation infrastructure
Network admin looses visibility of “the port” which servers attached – vSwitch
Future
VSphere CIT plans to upgrade its Virtualisation Infrastructure to VSphere
4.0 in 2010 VDI
CIT plans to investigate VDI as a means of rapid desktop deployment
It will be also used to deploy individual desktops to Staff and Students
Most likely pioneered in Dept of Computing and IT Services Project Students and CIT’s Open Access facility for Students
could benefit. EMC/VMWare/CIT Academy
CIT over the years has enjoyed good relations with EMC and VMware
Recently CIT have created a VMware Academy Built a VMware Training Infrastructure to support delivery of
VMware courses Plans to offer a number of courses including the VCP in 2010
Questions
Aidan McDonald – IT Network Manager([email protected])
Aaron Krawczyk – Virtualisation Administrator([email protected])
Pat McCarthy – VMWare Academy Coordinator([email protected])
Thank You
