You can access the Management Console from the following link. You will see a login screen like the one listed below. Use the user name and password that was entered during the install or if you have setup LDAP/AD integration to login into the console.

http://servername/LabManager/

Now that you have logged into the console you will be greeted with the Welcome screen. This will give you some details about what you have created in VMware Lab Manager over time.

You will notice on the left side of the console there is a Menu in an explorer like structure. This will allow you to easily navigate around the console.

How to create new Virtual Machines

When creating and working with existing virtual machines you will find them located in the Workspace area of Lab Manager. A workspace is the area that hold Configurations which is a method to group virtual machines together. A configuration can have 1 virtual machine or many.

There are many reasons why using separate configurations is beneficial to keeping the environment organized. I would suggest that each application team creates a configuration for their team at minimum, this will allow them to control the settings on their virtual machines. At times you may need to create new configurations for short term projects, this will allow you to dispose of the setup once its completed.

Each separate configuration has some settings that can be applied to it that won’t affect others. You are also able to shut down and undeploy your configuration when not using it. This will then free up the computing resources for use by others.

The first step in creating a new configuration is to click the New Configuration button from the Workspace area. You can see from the image below that we are in the Workspace area from the left menu and the button for New Configuration is at the top.

Step 2 in creating the new Configuration. You will be presented with a screen like the one shown below. There are a few fields that you need to fill out and make choices on.

First is the name field at the top, this is the name of your Configuration only. So it should relate to what or who is going to be using the Virtual Machines within it. The next field is the Description this allows you to expand more with notes on what this configuration is used for.

The next couple of choices are for Deployment and Storage Lease times. These settings set how long the configuration will be around for, there are options from 1 hour to never expires. If you choose a selection other than never here the Lab Manager system will automatically dispose of your configuration when the time runs out. This is a good choice if you know that your need is short term and you do not need to hold onto the Virtual Machines once you are done, there is always the option to extend the time or manually delete them also. This will help to keep the environment clean and prevent wasting resources.

The VM Fencing Policy will be explained in a separate section as it’s an advanced feature.

The section at the bottom is where you are choosing how your virtual machine(s) will be created and what they will be named.

You can see from the image below that you are allowed to add from one to many VM (virtual machines) to your configuration. By default one will be added upon creating the New Configuration, but by click the Add VM button pointed out in the image you can add extra VM’s to the configuration.

The first field is the Source selection, this is where you will choose the operating system of the VM that you are creating. By click the down arrow on the filed you will be presented with the available Operating System templates.

The next field is the Name filed and this will be the Server Name of the VM created. This server name will be reflected in the Console and it will also be applied as the Windows server name.

The Network filed is listing the Lab Manager private network that the VM will be connected to. The IP address mode shows that the VM will be assigned a static IP address from a Pool.

The Full Clone option is not selected by default. This should remain as the default unless someone has instructed you to select it. If you opt to use a Full Clone it will consume more disk space in the Lab Manager Environment and allow for fewer VM’s to be created. Once the VM is deleted the space would be returned and be available again.

Ok at this point we have made our selections for the VM’s and assigned them the names. We now need to confirm your selections and click the OK button at the bottom to start the creation of your Configuration and virtual machines.

Now that you clicked OK you are returned back to the Workspace area and you can see that your configuration is being created. From the image below you can see the circle icon that runs while the system is doing work and the status field shows what work is in progress.

From the image below you can now see that your Configuration was created but shows and Undeployed. This means that the Virtual Machines cannot be powered on yet. So we must deploy the configuration in the next step.

In this step we will deploy the configuration and from the image below you can see that we get a menu of functions by moving the mouse over top of the Configuration name that you wish to work with. There are 2 Deploy options listed and they are explained below.

Deploy – This method will allow you to change some settings and is explained on the next page.

Deploy with defaults – This method will automatically deploy the configuration with the selections that you selected when the configuration was created. This is a sage method and can be used normally.

The screen below is showing the options available after we selected to deploy the Configuration.

Network Connectivity Section:

The option to Fence Virtual Machines is explained in a later part of this document. It allows for you to provide a firewall type Fence around your configuration to keep it from communicating with other VM’s inside of Lab Manager.

The option for select resources allows you to select a container within Lab Manager that can separate compute resources. At this time there is just once Resource Pool so the default select is OK.

You are able to change the Deployment Lease time here or leave it to match was you previously set it to be.

The section for Power on Virtual Machines gives you a couple of more options. The first one might be helpful if your creating a large configuration with several VM’s. You will be able to later set a boot order to control which VM boots up first. The other option is just choosing if you want the VM’s to be powered on after they are deployed.

Now that you are Deploying your configuration you will see a screen like the one below. It shows you that its working and the Status shows Deploying. Once it finishes you will see an image like the 2^nd on this page.

Your configuration now shows that it’s Deployed and you can see from the image below that the Thumbnail images of the VM’s are changed. This reflects that the VM’s were powered on and are booting up. Each VM will boot up and will have a customization script applied to it and will then reboot and be ready for use. The script applies the Windows name and IP address to the VM. This last step takes about 5 minutes to complete.

At this step I have waited for the VM’s to complete their reboots and they are ready and waiting at the sign on screens. You can see from the Thumbnails that they are waiting at the login screens also. The image below shows us looking at our configuration from the Workspace screen. By placing your mouse over the configuration name it gives us a list of options that you can see in the image below. Note these choices affect all VM’s in the configuration.

Open – Opens the configuration and shows more details about VM’s

History – Will show changes to the configuration over time

View Consoles – Will open up Windows consoles for all VM’s in the configuration

Suspend – Places the VM’s in a suspended mode.

Reset – Will reset VM’s (good to use if they become unresponsive)

Snapshot – Will be explained more in later documentation

Shut Down – Will gracefully shutdown the virtual machines

Power Off – This will forcibly power off the virtual machines

Undeploy Save State – Will power off and undeploy the configuration and save memory state of the virtual machines.

Undeploy Discard State – Will power off and discard anything that was running at the time. Any data on the disk remains intact.

Clone – Will make an exact copy of the configuration to use separately

Library Options – Will be explained in later documentation

Properties – Allows you to adjust or view settings about the Configuration

In the view below we have opened the Configuration that we created. This view now shows some more detail about each VM that running. We can see VM names, Status, IP address and Template which will tell you what OS it’s running.

If you place your mouse over the VM Name you will get a list of options that can be performed. These are similar to the ones from the previous section, except these will only be performed on the VM that you selected.

Since we want to begin working with our VM we will choose View Console selection. This will open up a session and allow us to work with our VM.

From the screen below you can see that we now have a console session open and can interact with our VM. By hovering over the VM name at the top as shown below we get many of the same options again, to control power and reset.

Most important there is a option for CTRL + ALT + Delete which is required to login to Windows VM’s. Once you make a selection move your mouse into the counsel area and click this will switch focus to that area and your mouse and keyboard functions will affect the VM. You can release the focus from the VM by pressing the CTRL + ALT keys and you will be back controlling the console and your computer. This is always displayed at the bottom of the window when in console screens.

In this last picture we have returned to the view of our configuration. Along the top there are tabs that show our VM’s Networks, Configuration Diagram and History. We covered the history earlier. So we are going to focus on the Configuration Diagram tab.

This shows us a view that represents each VM and its network cards and shows how they are all connected. With JukeBox we primarily just use one private network so it’s not that confusing. But if you have a need to use the Fencing that we spoke about earlier this view may help you visualize your configuration.

About Brian

Brian is a Technical Architect for a VMware partner and owner of this website. He is active in the VMware community and is helps lead the Chicago VMUG group. This blog Virtualize Tips was started to document and remember things that I come across while working with tech.

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There are of course other ways to separate virtual machines within Lab Manager. The most talked about method would be to use network Fencing that is a feature on Lab Manager Physical networks. When using fencing you can hide your configuration behind a virtual router and have the option to allow no in/out bound connection. This works great but can confuse some of your lesser experienced users.

If you don’t have the need to communicate with any servers outside of your configuration then using a Lab Manager Network Template might be easier. If setup properly the Virtual Networks within VMware Lab Manager can make your life easier and allow the IT customers to perform their work without any hand holding. By definition the Network Templates are separate Virtual Networks that can only talk with Virtual Machines within the same configuration. It does not matter if you choose the same Network Template with matching IP scheme on a different configuration the VMs will not communicate to the other workspaces. This is by design and is a good and simple way to create a Sand Box to test in.

If you choose to use IP Static – Pool selection for your Network Template you will assign a block of IP’s and Lab Manager will hand them out to the virtual machines as they are deployed. The IP pool will start over for each different configuration that you deploy so if you have 10 workspaces with 5 VMs each you don’t need 50 IP’s all you really need is 5. Since each Workspace or Configuration starts over at the first address in the pool. This is normal since they are not able to communicate with the other workspaces.

Here is a sample definition of the Lab Managers User guide to sum up Virtual Networks.

Virtual networks are configuration local networks. They exist inside configurations and do not span configurations. Virtual machines connected to a virtual network cannot communicate with virtual machines connected to a different virtual network. Each virtual network that Lab Manager creates is unique and isolated from other virtual networks, even if the networks are based on the same network template.

About Brian

Brian is a Technical Architect for a VMware partner and owner of this website. He is active in the VMware community and is helps lead the Chicago VMUG group. This blog Virtualize Tips was started to document and remember things that I come across while working with tech.

Mail | Web | Twitter | LinkedIn | More Posts (170)

Hopefully you are fairly familiar with how VMware Lab Manager works and I don’t loose you. The limit that I will cover here is when you are creating a New Configuration in a Workspace within Lab Manager when you select a VM Template to use by default the Datastore that it will be created on is locked. The Datastore that it is locked onto is the one that the VM Template is sitting on. This is done for a reason, since by default when creating these new configurations the new VMs created form the Template will be a Linked Clone of the original. For a Linked Clone to work it must reside on the same Datastore as the master VM image.

As you are probably aware that use Linked Clones will save you a lot of disk space on your Datastores so if you do not have a valid reason to not use them I would suggest to leave it this way. Now the only thing that I see is depending on the size of your VMs and your Datastore you could eventually run out of space for this Template on a particular Datastore. To solve that issue you could expand the Datastore or Clone your Template to another Datastore and start creating Linked Clones from that one. If anyone else has run into this issue and has a better idea drop something in the comments.

I have pasted a couple of screen shots below showing what the screens will look like with the default Linked Clone method. And then the option to do a Full Clone which will copy the entire template to the new VM and end up using all of the space.

Here is a note that I found in a VMware KB article to help explain this behavior also.

In vCenter Lab Manager, the configuration files will only be accessible from the same host or datastore as the base template. For example, if you have a Virtual Machine 1 on DataStore1, all the configurations you create from Virtual Machine 1 will be created on DataStore1.

Default option using Linked Clones in Lab manager

Full Clone option in Lab Manager

About Brian

Brian is a Technical Architect for a VMware partner and owner of this website. He is active in the VMware community and is helps lead the Chicago VMUG group. This blog Virtualize Tips was started to document and remember things that I come across while working with tech.

Mail | Web | Twitter | LinkedIn | More Posts (170)

So how does this work out since Lab Manager was sold as normal per socket licenses and vCloud Director is now sold on the new VMware per VM licenses. It breaks down like this for each Lab Manager license you will get 20 per VM licenses of vCloud Director. So if you purchased 6 sockets of Lab Manager that would equal 120 Per VM licenses for vCD.

I personally could not find this promotion on the Partner portal so you should inquire with your VMware rep for details.

About Brian

Brian is a Technical Architect for a VMware partner and owner of this website. He is active in the VMware community and is helps lead the Chicago VMUG group. This blog Virtualize Tips was started to document and remember things that I come across while working with tech.

Mail | Web | Twitter | LinkedIn | More Posts (170)

The setup and design challenges with Lab Manager make ESX look easy. Sure it sits on top of ESX but the possibilities are endless for the number of configurations that you can establish within the environment. You can configure physical/virtual networks, templates, pools, workspaces and countless other items. All this and the ability to offer a self service option to users with different levels of permissions to restart VM’s and deploy or destroy VM’s.

I will be writing more blog posts on Lab Manager in the weeks to come that will go into more depth on specific features.

About Brian

Brian is a Technical Architect for a VMware partner and owner of this website. He is active in the VMware community and is helps lead the Chicago VMUG group. This blog Virtualize Tips was started to document and remember things that I come across while working with tech.

Mail | Web | Twitter | LinkedIn | More Posts (170)