Command Line ESX

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B2V Command Line Guide to VMware ESX Server 3Last Updated 5th May 2009 by Alistair Sutherland

This guide has been compiled by the consultants & trainers at Taupo Consulting and isbased upon their personal experiences with the VMware ESX Server 3 product and is

updated frequently. For more information about Taupo Consulting, please click here. Theinformation in this guide is not verified or sanctioned by VMware Inc. and we encourage our

website visitors to use www.vmware.com/vmtn as their primary source of VMware productinformation. We are of course delighted if you find our shared experience documented in

this guide of use in your environment and always appreciate being linked to.

ESX Server 3 is the core component of VMware Virtual Infrastructure 3 and is generallyavailable. The latest version is ESX 3.5 Update 2 on 25th July 2008.

There is lots of new content coming to the command line guide, so please forgive the

occasional gap as we work on updating the content!

If you are using ESX server 2.x, you can click here for the command line guide to ESX 2.x

The esxcfg- Commands

esxcfg-

There are a new set of command line tools in ESX 3.x which all start with "esxcfg-".These tools are used to configure each part of the ESX 3.x configuration. For example,

esxcfg-firewall is used to manage the service console firewall while the esxcfg-nic isused to manage the physical Ethernet adapters present in the server.

Watch out for vicfg- commands also. If you are using the RCLI tools for managing ESX

3i, then the esxcfg- tools are now prefixed with vicfg- although the esxcfg- prefix still

works.

esxcfg-advcfg

The esxcfg-advcfg command is interesting as there is not a huge amount of help about

this command. However, we can figure out that it is meant to do advanced configurationand we can figure out some settings that can be made. The -g switch is used to "get"

settings; the -s switch is used to "set" settings.

Here are a few examples of some VMkernel parameters which can be interrogated.
http://www.taupoconsulting.co.uk/http://www.vmware.com/vmtnhttp://b2v.co.uk/b2vguide2vmware.htmhttp://www.taupoconsulting.co.uk/http://www.vmware.com/vmtnhttp://b2v.co.uk/b2vguide2vmware.htm


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[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg -g /Misc/BlueScreenTimeoutValue of BlueScreenTimeout is 0

[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg -g /Misc/HostNameValue of HostName is esx1.vmlab.net

The question is, how much is configurable? To figure out what is configurable, we

recommend that you look in the directory /proc/vmware/config which you will find in

the service console command line and then you will see the following directories

BufferCacheCpuDiskFileSystemIrqLVMMemMigrateMiscNetNFSNumaScsiUserVMFS3

From these directories and the files within, you can work out the paths to be supplied to

the esxcfg-advcfg command as parameters. Alternatively, you could also use the

command

esxcfg-info o

to list the advanced options.

We often see this tool used to make configuration changes relating to storage. Forexample, below, you can see we are checking to see if we are creating virtual disks in

"eager zero" format by default, whether we will discover non-contiguous numberedLUNs, the maximum LUN number addressed,the SCSI conflict retry count and finally the

logical volume manager (LVM) setting for resignaturing VMFS volumes.

[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg -g /VMFS3/ZeroedThickVirtualDisksValue of ZeroedThickVirtualDisks is 1

[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg g /Disk/SupportSparseLUNValue of SupportSparseLUN is 1

[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg g /Disk/MaxLUNValue of MaxLUN is 255

[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg g /Scsi/ConflictRetries


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Value of ConflictRetries is

[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg g /LVM/EnableResignatureValue of EnableResignature is

In this last example, we are again setting a parameter related to storage. This

parameter limits the number of outstanding disk request for each VM. This is intended toequalise the disk access between virtual machines.

[root@esx1host vmware]# esxcfg-advcfg -s 16 /Disk/SchedNumReqOutstanding

When using the esxcfg-advcfg command, remember case sensitivity!

Usage: esxcfg-advcfg []-g|--get Get the value of the config option-s|--set Set the value of the config option

-d|--default Reset Config option to default-q|--quiet Suppress output-k|--set-kernel Set a VMkernel load time option value.-j|--get-kernel Get a VMkernel load time option value.-h|--help Show this message.-r|--restore Restore all advanced options from the configurationfile. (FOR INTERNAL USE ONLY).

esxcfg-firewall

The service console in ESX 3.x has a firewall enabled by default. The network packetfiltering found in Red Hat Linux is called iptables. As the management ofiptables is

not entirely straightforward, the esxcfg-firewall command makes things a loadeasier. The firewall rules are stored in /etc/vmware/esx.conf, but we don't go editing

this file, we use this command to ensure it is locked while we make our edits. If you arevery interested in the iptables commands used behind the scenes, then you can inspect

the log file /var/log/vmware/esxcfg-firewall.log

We use the esxcfg-firewall command to view and configure the firewall rules. The most

popular switch will be the -q switch to query the firewall for its current settings.

[root@esxhost1 root]# esxcfg-firewall -q

The -s switch will allow you to enable or disable network services that may traverse the

firewall successfully. The list of known services are shown below - very casesensitive!....

nfsClientftpServerntpClientdellom


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nisClientvncServertmpLicenseClientswISCSIClientCIMHttpsServer

sshClientsnmpdtmpAAMClientvpxHeartbeatssmbClienthpimtmpHostVmdbServertmpHostdSOAPServerftpClientsshServeribmdirectorCIMHttpServertelnetClient

The -l switch loads the firewall and enables the IP tables.

The -u switch unloads the firewall and disables the IP tables.

We use the -e switch to enable a particular known service, so if we wanted to enable

ssh outbound connections from the service console we would simply enter

[root@esxhost1 root]# esxcfg-firewall -e sshClient

We use the -d switch to disable a service. In the following example, we prevent

outbound connections

[root@esxhost1 root]# esxcfg-firewall -d smbClient

If we need to open a TCP or UDP port that is not described by a defined friendly name

like "sshClient", then we can explicitly open that port with the -o switch. The serviceconsole firewall is bidirectional and so when opening a port you must also specify

direction of incoming or outgoing. Equally, we can close an explicit port with the -cswitch.

[root@esxhost1 root]# esxcfg-firewall -o port,protocol,direction,name

In the following example, we are opening a unique port which we are calling

"MySQLclient". If we wanted to close a port that we had already opened, we would usethe -c switch.

[root@esxhost1 root]# esxcfg-firewall -o 3306,tcp,out,MySQLclient

The service names such as sshClient and smbClient are defined in the file

/etc/vmware/firewall/services.xml. It is strongly suggested that this file is not

manually edited as changes are unlikely to survive host patch updates. A much better

approach for defining services is to add a new XML file, for example the guys over at


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Veeam very helpfully have already created one for you so you can enable their FastSCPtool - http://www.veeam.com/download/fastscp/FastSCP.xml. See more under the guide entry

for services.xml.

esxcfg-module

This command is used to view and set options for start-up on the VMkernel modules(drivers). When this command is used with the list option, it produces an output similar

to vmkload_mod -list

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-module -l

Module Type Enabled Loadedvmkapimod vmkapimod true truevmklinux linux true truecciss.o scsi true falsetg3.o nic true falseqla2300_7xx.o fc true false

This command is often used when we want to modify a VMkernel module behaviour, forexample, if we wanted to change the queue depth of our fibre-channel host bus adapter.

In the following example, we are setting the queue depth for our QLogic HBA to 64; upfrom it's default value of 32.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-module -s ql2xmaxdepth64 qla2300_707_vmw

To do the same with an Emulex HBA, we would use something like

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-module -s "lpfc0_lun_queue_depth=64"lpfcdd_7xx

esxcfg-rescan

This command is used to perform a rescan of a host bus adapter (HBA). Specifically it

scans a named vmkernel hba device, i.e. a vmhba. This command does a similar job to

vmkfstools -rescan.

In this example the esxcfg-rescan command is being used to rescan the VMkernel

iSCSI software initiator vmhba.

[root@esx1host]# esxcfg-rescan vmhba32

esxcfg-upgrade

esxcfg-upgrade -h --help
http://www.veeam.com/download/fastscp/FastSCP.xmlhttp://www.veeam.com/download/fastscp/FastSCP.xml


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-g --convert-grub-f --convert-fstab-r --upgrade-pre-vmkernel-o --upgrade-post-vmkernel

The -g option may only be used with the -r option.

esxcfg-vswitch

This command is one of the most useful commands in the service console. Thiscommand allows you to list, add, modify or delete virtual Ethernet switches on an ESX

host. The simplest option with this command is the -l option to list the virtual switchesand portgroups defined on the host.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -l

If you are having problems with your ESX server after an in-place upgrade, this tool isinvaluable in resolving the problems with service console networking. The output of this

command is initially a little intimidating. It is best to keep in mind the network topology:

Service Console IP Interface (vswif0) ---- connected to ----> Service Console Port onvSwitch ----- up-linked to ----> vmnic

Where a vmnic is a physical Ethernet adapter.

In following screenshot taken from the VI Client, we can see this ESX host has 2

connections to vSwitch0, the service console connection a VMkernel port connection.

If we wish to view the same information at the service console command line, we woulduse the esxcfg-vswitch command with the "-l" switch to listthe defined virtual

switches.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -l

Switch Name Num Ports Used Ports Configured Ports Uplinks


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vSwitch0 32 4 32 vmnic0

PortGroup Name Internal ID VLAN ID Used Ports UplinksService Console portgroup0 0 1 vmnic0NFS access portgroup1 0 1 vmnic0

If we wanted to add another virtual Ethernet switch, we would use esxcfg-vswitch

command with the "-a" switch. Note that the -a is specified in lowercase. Take care toensure you have specified lowercase because uppercase "A" performs a different

function with this command. So, lets add a new virtual switch to our ESX host calledvSwitch1 and then list the switches to check our command has worked ok.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -a vSwitch1[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -l

Switch Name Num Ports Used Ports Configured Ports UplinksvSwitch0 32 4 32 vmnic0

PortGroup Name Internal ID VLAN ID Used Ports UplinksService Console portgroup0 0 1 vmnic0NFS access portgroup1 0 1 vmnic0

Switch Name Num Ports Used Ports Configured Ports UplinksvSwitch1 64 0 64

PortGroup Name Internal ID VLAN ID Used Ports Uplinks

Notice that the number of ports on the virtual switch is 64 on the newly created switch.The original virtual switch has only 32. This difference arises between creating the

switch in the VI Client or the command line. Notice also that the used port count doesn'timmediately make sense. Each VM consumes a port, each vmnic consumes a port and

the uplink itself consumes a port. Anyway, if you are like me and you can neverremember which case of the letter "a" to use when adding a virtual switch, then use the

esxcfg-vswitch command with the --add switch when creating a new switch like this:

esxcfg-vswitch --add vSwitch2

which I think is a little clearer to understand.

Now if we want to add a portgroup to the new virtual switch we have created, we can

use the esxcfg-vswitch -A command. It does not matter whether you are creating aservice console port, a VM port group or a VMkernel port when creating a port group;

the way we create the connection to the virtual switch always starts out the same in thecommand line. Only after creating the port group do we then specify if it is to be

anything other than a VM port group. In the following commands, we add a new

portgroup called "Production" on the virtual switch vSwitch1.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -A "Production" vSwitch1[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -l


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Switch Name Num Ports Used Ports Configured Ports UplinksvSwitch0 32 4 32 vmnic0

PortGroup Name Internal ID VLAN ID Used Ports UplinksService Console portgroup0 0 1 vmnic0

NFS access portgroup1 0 1 vmnic0

Switch Name Num Ports Used Ports Configured Ports UplinksvSwitch1 64 0 64

PortGroup Name Internal ID VLAN ID Used Ports UplinksProduction portgroup2 0 0

Alternatively you could use the following command to add a port group to a virtual

switch.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch --add-pg="Production" vSwitch1

This alternative switch of using --ad-pg I think is clearer for understanding what the

command is doing. The --add-pg option can clearly be seen to add a portgroup to a virtual

switch, and again is simpler to understand than just -A. The portgroup name in our example

is called Production, but it can be what you want. We recommend adoption of a standardacross all your virtual infrastructure. I have seen some clients align their portgroup names with

the IP subnets, so you could have a portgroup called something like 192.168.1.0 subnet.

Although we have now created a new virtual switch and have created a VM port group on it,

the virtual switch itself does not have any uplinks. Remember that when we bind a physicalnetwork adapter to a virtual switch we are uplinking a vmnic to the switch and the switch then

"owns" that adapter, i.e. it is not available to be used by any other virtual switches. We performthe uplink by using the esxcfg-vswitch command with the -L switch forlink.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -L vmnic1 vSwitch1

So in one simple command we have linked the physical network adapter vmnic1 to our new

virtual Ethernet switch vSwitch1. If we then realised we had used the wrong physical adapter,

we can just as easily unlink with -U. In the next example, we swap the uplinked vmnic1 for analternative adapter vmnic2

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -U vmnic1 vSwitch1

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -L vmnic2 vSwitch1

This changing of vmnic bound to a virtual switch is often required post-installation, as

we may select the wrong physical adapter to use for the service console during theinstall and need to correct our configuration before we can connect to our host with VI

client!


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VLANs with esxcfg-vswitch

If we wish to do VLAN tagging in the virtual switch (VST), then we can assign a VLAN ID

to a port group using the -v switch to this command. All traffic passing through thisportgroup will now be tagged (IEEE 802.1q) with the VLAN ID specified as a numeric

parameter after the -v switch. This must match the VLAN ID of the network defined inthe physical switch topology in the range 1 through 4094. The physical switch port that

the traffic uplinks through from ESX will also need to be configured to accept q-taggedtraffic for that VLAN. In Cisco terminology this is a trunk port, in HP ProCurve

terminology this is a tagged port.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -v 3223 VMPortGroup1 vSwitch1

If you wanted to do VLAN tagging in the guest operating system itself - called Virtual

Guest Tagging (VGT), then you can set the VLAN ID of the port group to 4095, which

allows tagged traffic from the guest to pass through the portgroup.

Cisco Discovery Protocol with esxcfg-vswitch

As of ESX 3.5, VMware added Cisco Discovery Protocol (CDP) support for virtual

switches. We can view CDP information of the current neighbour of the physical NIC. In

the VI Client, we can see this by clicking on the icon to the right side of the vmnic inthe network view of the ESX host.


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To display the CDP configuration setting for a virtual switch, we use the lowercase b

switch, where we will find which of the four CDP modes it is in: disable, listen, advertiseor both.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -b vSwitch0listen

We can change the CDP mode with the -B (uppercase) option. Here we are changingvirtual switch called vSwitch0 to support both advertise and listen.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -B both vSwitch0

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -b vSwitch0both

esxcfg-auth

Configures the service console user authentication options including NIS, LDAP,Kerberos and Active Directory. In the following command, we are configuring


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authentication for the Active Directory domain called taupoconsulting.com

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-auth --enablead--addomain=taupoconsulting.com --adddc=dc1.taupoconsulting.com

You can also use this tool to set a password policy for service console user accounts.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-auth --maxpassdays=90 --minpassdays=30--passwarnage=75

In the above example, your service console user account password would expire after 90

days, you would get a warning message after 75 and once changed, you would have tokeep that password for a minimum period of 30 days.

esxcfg-info

Produces an enormous amount of information about the state ESX host, often this tool is

the one tool that can tell you what is really going on and not what is in someconfiguration file. If you run this command with no parameters, then you really need to

pipe this to a file for closer examination! Over time as newer releases of ESX server are

released, less information will be available in the proc nodes (the /proc/vmware

directory structure), so the sooner we can get used to examining the current running

configuration of ESX using this command, the better off we will be.

In this first example, we will run the command with no switches and pipe the result intoa file esxinfo-28-07-2008.txt (we like putting in the date of operation into the

filenames of dumped files so we don't lose track!) and we are then viewing the contents

with the less command, allowing us to scroll up and down through the file.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-info >/tmp/esxinfo-28-07-2008.txt[root@esx1host root]# less /tmp/esxinfo-28-07-2008.txt

If you know the area you are looking at, e.g. storage, then we can launch the tool with

the appropriate switch. Here are the six switch options:

w hardwarer resources storagen networky systemo advanced options

If we combine the filtering of the output using the above switches along with a grepfilter we can really zoom in on the area we are interested in. An excellent VMware

communities post gives an example of using the storage switch whilst looking forPending reservations on LUNs. We are piping the result of the storage output ofesxcfg-

info into the input for grep.

[root@esx1host]# esxcfg-info -s | grep Pending


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Check out the post at http://communities.vmware.com/thread/156778?tstart=0

esxcfg-mpath

Manages storage multi-pathing just as the vmkmultipath utility did in previous versions

of ESX Server. In the example below we are using the -l switch to list the storage andpaths.

[root@esx1host tools-isoimages]# esxcfg-mpath -l

Disk vmhba0:0:0 /dev/cciss/c0d0 (69459MB) has 1 paths and policy of FixedLocal 2:1.0 vmhba0:0:0 On active preferred

Disk vmhba1:0:0 (0MB) has 1 paths and policy of Most Recently UsedFC 10:1.0 210000e08b846a725006016930221397 vmhba1:0:0 On activepreferred

Disk vmhba1:0:6 /dev/sda (9216MB) has 1 paths and policy of Most Recently

UsedFC 10:1.0 210000e08b846a725006016930221397 vmhba1:0:6 On activepreferred

Disk vmhba1:0:21 /dev/sdb (10240MB) has 1 paths and policy of MostRecently UsedFC 10:1.0 210000e08b846a725006016930221397 vmhba1:0:21 On activepreferred

esxcfg-resgrp

Used to manage the new ESX feature called resource groups. This command can add,

remove or modify existing resource groups.

esxcfg-hbadevs

The esxcfg-vmhbadevs command is used to list the equivalent Linux device names for

the visible disk devices that the VMkernel references using vmhba notation.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vmhbadevsvmhba0:0:0 /dev/sdavmhba0:0:1 /dev/sdbvmhba0:0:2 /dev/sdcvmhba0:0:3 /dev/sdd

vmhba2:0:0 /dev/sdevmhba2:1:0 /dev/sdf

If we use this command with the m switch, then we only list the LUNs which containVMFS partitions. Alongside the Linux device name, a long unique hexadecimal value is

listed. This is the VMFS volume signature assigned by the new logical volume manager(LVM).

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vmhbadevs -m
http://communities.vmware.com/thread/156778?tstart=0http://communities.vmware.com/thread/156778?tstart=0


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vmhba0:0:0:1 /dev/sda1 45407607-fbc43ced-94cb-00145e231ce3vmhba0:0:2:1 /dev/sdc1 455b08a8-8af7fee3-daa9-00145e231e35vmhba2:0:0:3 /dev/sde3 4559c75f-831d8f3e-bc81-00145e231e35

You can view these volumes in the directory /vmfs/volumes/

esxcfg-boot

Used to configure the GRUB options presented at boot time. One thing to note is thatthe new esxcfg commands will not run if you boot just into Linux. If you just want to

query the boot settings, you can use the -q switch but this must be qualified with the

keyword boot or vmkmod.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-boot -q boot272 2:;7:;10:; UUID=847199e4-d3c7-11da-8ef8-930e3d734c03 /vmlinuz-2.4.21-37.0.2.ELvmnix /initrd-2.4.21-37.0.2.ELvmnix.img

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-boot -q vmkmodvmkapimod vmkapimodvmklinux linuxcciss.o scsitg3.o nicqla2300_7xx.o fc

This is also used if you making modifications to VMkernel device drivers defaults. For

example, if you were modifying the queue depth for a fibre HBA, you would likely beusing esxcfg-module. Then to rebuild the boot image you would enter

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-boot -m

After which, you would do a reboot the host to test that the update to the boot imagehad worked.

esxcfg-init

Should not be run manually!

esxcfg-nas

The esxcfg-nas command is used to list, mount and dismount NFS exports for the

VMkernel. In the first example we list the NFS datastores which the VMkernel has mounted.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-nas -lNFS01 is /NFS from 100.100.100.253 mounted

In the next example, we add a new VMkernel mount to a remote NFS server. This time we are

connecting to the NFS server at IP address 100.100.100.253 and the name of the exported

directory on the NFS server is /Test. We are labelling (from the ESX host perspective) this


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NFS mount as NFS02. This will appear as the datastore name on the ESX host.

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-nas -a -o 100.100.100.253 -s /Test NFS02Connecting to NAS volume: NFS02NFS02 created and connected.

Remember that to create a connection to an NFS datastore, the VMkernel needs to havean IP address, as it is the NFS client. We give the VMkernel an IP address by creating a

VMkernel port on a virtual Ethernet switch. We can do this at the command line usingthe command esxcfg-vmknic

The command line options for esxcfg-nas are:

esxcfg-nas []-a|--add Add a new NAS filesystem to /vmfs volumes.Requires --host and --share options.-o|--host Set the host name or ip address for a NAS mount.

-s|--share Set the name of the NAS share on the remotesystem.-d|--delete Unmount and delete a filesystem.-l|--list List the currently mounted NAS file systems.-r|--restore Restore all NAS mounts from the configurationfile. (FOR INTERNAL USE ONLY).-h|--help Show this message.

esxcfg-route

If we add an IP address to the VMkernel by adding a VMkernel port, then we can fullyconfigure that IP stack by also assigning a default gateway. We can view (no

parameters) and set (1st parameter) the VMkernel IP default gateway with the esxcfg-route command as shown here. In the following example, we view the current VMkernel

gateway (.254) and then change it to a new one (.1)

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-routeVMkernel default gateway is 100.100.100.254

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-route 100.100.100.1VMkernel default gateway set to 100.100.100.1

As of ESX 3.5, we have the -a switch which is used to add additional routes to the

VMkernel routing table. We also have the -l switch to list the VMkernel routing table. In

the following example, we list the routing table, then add a new static route for the192.168.90.0/24 network and check it has added to the VMkernel routing tablecorrectly.

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-route -l

VMkernel Routes:Network Netmask Gateway100.100.100.0 255.255.255.0 Local Subnet


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default 0.0.0.0 100.100.100.1

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-route -a 192.168.90.0/24 100.100.100.165Adding static route 192.168.90.0/24 to VMkernel[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-route -l

VMkernel Routes:Network Netmask Gateway100.100.100.0 255.255.255.0 Local Subnet192.168.90.0 255.255.255.0 100.100.100.165default 0.0.0.0 100.100.100.1

If we want to remove an entry from the VMkernel routing we use the -d switch. So inthe following example, we are removing the newly added route.

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-route -d 192.168.90.0/24 100.100.100.165Deleting static route 192.168.90.0/24 from VMkernel

esxcfg-vmknic

Used to view and set configure the VMkernel ports on virtual Ethernet switches. A

VMkernel port is a special type of port group on a virtual Ethernet switch which is usedto assign an IP address to the VMkernel. The VMkernel only needs an IP address for

VMotion, software-initiated iSCSI or NFS access.

If you need to create a VMkernel port at the command line, then you need to create a portgroup first and then enable it as a VMkernel port. This tool does not allow you to enable the

VMkernel port for VMotion, you must either use vimsh or the VI client for that.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vswitch -A VMotion vSwitch0[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vmknic -a -i 100.100.100.121 -n 255.255.255.0VMotion

The above commands would result in an additional connection to the virtual Ethernet

switch, specifically a VMkernel port. The esxcfg-vmknic command has assigned the

VMkernel an IP address & the portgroup called VMotion is now explicitly VMkernel port.

Lets now add another VMkernel port, this time for NFS access to our NAS device.

[root@esx1host root]# esxcfg-vmknic -a -i 100.100.100.21 -n 255.255.255.0"NFS Access"

The following screenshot displays the new VMkernel port connections on vSwitch0.


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In the following example, we list the VMkernel ports, then use esxcfg-vmknic to delete

one of them and then list them again.

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-vmknic -l

Interface Port Group IP Address NetmaskBroadcast MAC Address MTU Enabledvmk0 VMotion 100.100.100.121 255.255.255.0100.100.100.255 00:50:56:6d:7c:7d 1514 truevmk1 NFS access 100.100.100.21 255.255.255.0100.100.100.255 00:50:56:62:ca:f6 1514 true

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-vmknic -d VMotion

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-vmknic -l

Interface Port Group IP Address NetmaskBroadcast MAC Address MTU Enabledvmk1 NFS access 100.100.100.21 255.255.255.0100.100.100.255 00:50:56:62:ca:f6 1514 true

As of ESX 3.5, we can set the MTU for VMkernel initiated traffic. We should be awarehowever that currently Jumbo frames is only technically supported for VMotion and not

iSCSI or NAS, even though it does work. Anyway, if you decide you want to enableJumbo Frames for an existing VMkernel port, you are going to have to delete and

recreate that VMkernel port. The MTU size for a VMkernel port can only be set atcreation time. So, continuing our above example, if we wanted to enable an MTU of

9000 on the port group "NFS Access" we would need to do the following:

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-vmknic -d "NFS Access"[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-vmknic -a -i 100.100.100.21 -n 255.255.255.0-m 9000 "NFS Access"[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-vmknic -l

Interface Port Group IP Address NetmaskBroadcast MAC Address MTU Enabled


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vmk2 NFS access 100.100.100.21 255.255.255.0100.100.100.255 00:50:56:62:ca:f6 9000 true

Notice that as each VMkernel interface is created, an interface name is created of the

form vmkx where x is just an incremental value. So you can see as we recreated the

"NFS Access" VMkernel interface, the interface was named a vmk2, where as previously

it was vmk1. This shouldn't cause you any problems as this seems to just be an internal

reference to the interface. The only time we've needed this number is when using the

scary, yet powerful vimsh tool to enable VMotion on a VMkernel port from the command

line - something we only tend to do in scripted installs of ESX.

One final note on this utility is about the disable function. If you disable the VMkernelport, you cannot delete it while in this state. If you want to delete a VMkernel port, it

must be enabled or the call to delete it is ignored.

The command line options for esxcfg-vmknic are:

esxcfg-vmknic [[]]-a|--add Add a VMkernel NIC to the system, requires IPparameters and portgroup name.-d|--del Delete VMkernel NIC on given portgroup.-e|--enable Enable the given NIC if disabled.-D|--disable Disable the given NIC if enabled.-l|--list List VMkernel NICs.-i|--ip The IP address for this VMkernel NIC. Setting anIP address requires that the

--netmask option be given in same command.-n|--netmask The IP netmask for this VMkernel NIC. Settingthe IP netmask requires that the --ip

option be given in the same command.

-r|--restore Restore VMkernel TCP/IP interfaces fromConfiguration file (FOR INTERNAL USE ONLY).-h|--help Show this message.

esxcfg-dumppart

Used to configure the VMkernel crash dump partition. The old ESX 2.x utility for this

function (vmkdump) is still present on an ESX 3 server, but appears just to be for

extracting dump files.

So far, we have only used this utility to interrogate ESX hosts to determine where the

dump partition has been created. Here is an example of viewing the dump partition.

# esxcfg-dumppart -l

VM Kernel Name Console Name Is Active Is Configuredvmhba0:0:0:7 /dev/cciss/c0d0p7 yes yes

Remember that the dump partition does not show up when you run the vdf utility.


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However it is visible if you run fdisk. In the following example, we are running fdisk to

view the partitions. We can see the dump partition as c0d0p7, i.e. partition #7. Noticethe Id of that partition is "fc", the custom partition type for VMkernel dump partitions.

# fdisk /dev/cciss/c0d0

Disk /dev/cciss/c0d0: 36.3 GB, 36385505280 bytes64 heads, 32 sectors/track, 34699 cylindersUnits = cylinders of 2048 * 512 = 1048576 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System/dev/cciss/c0d0p1 * 1 100 102384 83 Linux/dev/cciss/c0d0p2 101 5100 5120000 83 Linux/dev/cciss/c0d0p3 5101 7100 2048000 83 Linux/dev/cciss/c0d0p4 7101 34699 28261376 f Win95 Ext'd(LBA)/dev/cciss/c0d0p5 7101 7644 557040 82 Linux swap/dev/cciss/c0d0p6 7645 34599 27601904 fb Unknown

/dev/cciss/c0d0p7 34600 34699 102384 fc Unknown

The command line options for esxcfg-dumppart are:

esxcfg-dumppart []-l|--list List the partitions available for Dump Partitions.WARNING: This will scan all LUNs on the system.-t|--get-active Get the active Dump Partition for this system,returns the internal name of the partition

vmhbaX:X:X:X) or 'none'.-c|--get-config Get the configured Dump Partition for this system,returns the internal name of the partition

vmhbaX:X:X:X) or 'none'.

-s|--set Set the Dump Partition for this system and activateit, either vmhbaX:X:X:X or 'none' to

deactivate the active dump partition.-f|--find Find usable Dump partitions and list in order ofpreference.-S|--smart-activate Activate the configured dump partition or find thefirst appropriate partition and use it(same

order as -f).-a|--activate Activate the configured dump partition.-d|--deactivate Deactivate the active dump partition.-h|--help Show this message.

esxcfg-linuxnet

There is not normally a command that a virtual infrastructure administrator should need.

The tool is automatically used when you start an ESX server in troubleshooting mode;

i.e. when you start only the service console Linux kernel and don't start the VMkernel.

When you are working in the service console while the VMkernel is loaded, the service

console's network interface is not called eth0, but is called vswif0 instead. This is


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because the service console network interface is provided via a service consoleportgroup on a virtual Ethernet switch. If you restart your ESX server without the

VMkernel, then standard Linux drivers and network card management is used. Therefore

the network interface used in troubleshooting mode is called eth0 - just like any otherregular Linux box. This tool is called by starting troubleshooting mode to replicate the IP

parameters assigned to vswif0 to eth0.

Should you want to investigate this command, the options are:

esxcfg-linuxnet --setup--remove-h --help

The --setup option cannot be combined with the --remove option.

esxcfg-nics

This tool can be used to view and configure the speed and duplex settings of thephysical network cards in the ESX Server. This tool can replace the mii-tool and

modules.conf for network card management.

In the following example, we run the list option to view all physical NICs and theirproperties.

[root@esx1host etc]# esxcfg-nics -l

Name PCI Driver Link Speed Duplex Descriptionvmnic2 01:01.00 tg3 Up 1000Mbps Full Broadcom Corporation NetXtremeBCM5703 Gigabit Ethernet

vmnic0 01:02.00 tg3 Up 100Mbps Full Broadcom Corporation NC7781Gigabit Server Adapter (PCI-X, 10,100,1000-T)vmnic1 04:02.00 tg3 Up 1000Mbps Full Broadcom Corporation NC7781Gigabit Server Adapter (PCI-X, 10,100,1000-T)

This command has the following optional parameters:

esxcfg-nics [nic]-s|--speed Set the speed of this NIC to one of 10/100/1000/10000.Requires a NIC parameter.-d|--duplex Set the duplex of this NIC to one of 'full' or'half'. Requires a NIC parameter.-a|--auto Set speed and duplexity automatically. Requires a NIC parameter.

-l|--list Print the list of NICs and their settings.-r|--restore Restore the nics configured speed/duplex settings (INTERNALONLY)-h|--help Display this message.

esxcfg-swiscsi

ESX server 3 supports both hardware and software initiated iSCSI. For hardware iSCSI,we can use host bus adapters which perform the TCP offload and so the VMkernel can


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just pass SCSI commands to them as normal. The iSCSI hba can then wrap the SCSI

command in IP transport and forward them to the iSCSI target.

In VI-3, one of the supported iSCSI hardware HBAs is the QLogic 4052. More

information about this particular family of adapters can be found athttp://support.qlogic.com/support/product_resources.asp?id=964

In software iSCSI initiator, the wrapping of SCSI commands in IP is performed by theVMkernel and a regular physical network card is used to communicate with the iSCSI

target. The software iSCSI configuration is exposed in the VI Client as a host busadapter called vmhba40 in ESX 3.0.x and is called vmhba32 in ESX 3.5. We can use this

command line tool esxcfg-swiscsi to configure the software iSCSI initiator. The

software iSCSI initiator in the VMkernel has a dependency upon the service console,

therefore both the service console and VMkernel must have an IP route to the iSCSItarget. The esxcfg-swiscsi command is not used in isolation, we use it in a sequence

of commands to fully configure iSCSI from the service console command line.

1. Add a VMkernel port to a vSwitch that has an uplink and route to iSCSI target

2. Ensure service console IP interface has a route to the same iSCSI target3. Using either the VI Client security profile or the esxcfg-firewall, open a port in the

service console firewall for iSCSI (TCP:3260)4. In the command line, enable iSCSI with the command esxcfg-swiscsi -e

5. Enable a discovery address with the command vmkiscsi-tool -D -a 10.0.0.99vmhba32

6. List the targets that were discovered with vmkiscsi-tool -T -l vmhba32

7. Perform a rescan with esxcfg-rescan vmhba32

8. List the iSCSI LUNs with vmkiscsi-tool -L -l vmhba32

If you want to ensure the VI client reflects the changes made at command line, it is best

to restart the vmware management service with the command service mgmt-vmware

restart

The full list of command line options for this command are:

-e, --enable Enable sw iscsi-d, --disable Disable sw iscsi-q, --query Check if sw iscsi is on/off-s, --scan Scan for disk available through sw iscsi interface-k, --kill Try to forcibly remove iscsi sw stack-r, --restore Restore sw iscsi configuration from file (FOR INTERNAL USEONLY)-h, --help Show this message

esxcfg-vswif

This tool can manage the Ethernet interfaces of the service console. In a big changefrom previous versions of ESX, the Ethernet interface of the service console is named

with the "vswif" prefix and not "eth" prefix as you may be used to in Linux.

During installation of ESX server, your service console Ethernet connection should have

been created. However, maybe a mistake was made, or we want to add another service
http://support.qlogic.com/support/product_resources.asp?id=964http://support.qlogic.com/support/product_resources.asp?id=964


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console port for redundancy.

In VI Client we can view the network configuration of our ESX host. Here is an exampleof a typical network configuration.

If we use the esxcfg-vswif tool, we are examining, creating or modifying a service

console port. So in the first example here, we are simply listing what ports have beencreated.

# esxcfg-vswif -l

Name Port Group IP Address Netmask BroadcastEnabled DHCPvswif0 Service Console 192.168.31.31 255.255.255.0192.168.31.255 true false

So the output is showing the same as the graphical output in VI client.

If we wanted to add a 2nd service console port, we could use this command. However,

all this command will do is turn a regular portgroup into a service console port and bindan IP address to Linux. So in the following command line example, we create a

portgroup first, and then we turn it into a service console port with esxcfg-vswif.

# esxcfg-vswitch --add-pg="Service Console Backup" vSwitch1# esxcfg-vswif -a -i 10.10.1.31 -n 255.255.0.0 -p "Service Console Backup"vswif1

[2007-11-21 11:29:18 'Vnic' warning] Generated New MAC address,

00:50:56:4d:da:97 for vswif1Nothing to flush.

So now if we run esxcfg-vswif to list the service console ports, we will be able to see

the original service console port as well as our new one we just created. We've shown

you the graphical representation as well from the VI client so you can compare.

# esxcfg-vswif -l


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Name Port Group IP Address NetmaskBroadcast Enabled DHCPvswif0 Service Console 192.168.31.31 255.255.255.0192.168.31.255 true falsevswif1 Service Console Backup 10.10.1.31 255.255.0.0

10.10.255.255 true false

A new function was added to esxcfg-vswitch when ESX 3.5 was released at the end of

2007. This version of ESX server was the first to support Ethernet Jumbo Frames. This is

where the MTU size is increased beyond the default 1500 bytes. In the followingexample, we are changing the maximum MTU for vSwitch1.

# esxcfg-vswitch -m 9000 vSwitch1

Configuration Files

/etc/vmware/esx.conf

An all new configuration file for ESX Server 3.x. This file replaces the functionality of thefollowing configuration files found in earlier versions of ESX.

/etc/vmware/hwconfig

/etc/vmware/devnames.conf/etc/vmware/vmkmodule.conf/etc/vmware/netmap.conf/etc/vmware/vmkconfig

This file should not be copied from one ESX host to another in order to duplicate

configuration, it is unique to the host. The file groups similar settings by using a notationsimilar to directories and subdirectories; for example, here is a section ofesx.conf


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/etc/nsswitch.conf

This is the name service switch configuration file. If you need to modify the order of hownames in the service console are resolved, this is the place to make the change. You can

view and edit this conf file as usual. There will be a number of lines to this file, but theone you are likely to be interested in will start "hosts:" as shown:

hosts: files nisplus dns

In the above example, the name service will use the /etc/hosts file, then NIS+ and

then the DNS name server specified in the /etc/resolv.conf file. If the application that

is trying to use a hostname is using the libc resolver library (by using the

gethostbyname function call) the nsswitch.conf file is used.

However, an application could use its own resolver library. An example of this is the dig

utility for testing DNS lookups - this tool ignores the /etc/nsswitch.conf file.

/usr/bin/vmware-watchdog

This process watches over the hostd process and restarts it if it crashes.

hostd

This is the daemon that replaces vmware-serverd that was found in the ESX 2.x

products. This is the host management agent and is responsible for a number of keymanagement functions on an ESX host. If you are having any "host not responding" typeproblems, before you even think of an ESX host restart, consider just a restart of the

management agent; it's amazing how often a quick restart of hostd gets things going

again.

We can restart the host management agent with the command

service mgmt-vmware restart

/var/log/vmware/hostd.log

The log file for the host management agent.

/etc/vmware/firewall/services.xml

This file contains the definitions for the TCP ports and service names used by the service

console firewall. When we use the esxcfg-firewall command to open ports based on

friendly service names such as sshServer, that name is a definition in this XML file. A

typical service definition in this file looks like


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sshServerinboundtcp22-m state --state NEW

You could modify this XML file to include your own definitions but this is not

recommended by VMware. The VMware management agent (hostd) will load everythingin this file, whether it is valid or not. Also, we have not tested if such a change would

persist through a patching/upgrade, but we suspect not. Duncan Epping over at YellowBricks has done some great testing and documentation in this space and at the following

link demonstrates how to add your own custom.xml file to the /etc/vmware/firewall

directory (using same format as services.xml) to provide custom port definitions. You

can read all about it at http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2007/12/31/howto-adding-a-firewall-service-on-esx/. Just make sure you use ids in the file that are different than the

ones in services.xml.

vpxa

This is the name of the VirtualCenter server agent that runs in the service console of

ESX 3.x servers (which was called vmware-ccagent in ESX 2.x). This can be stopped,

started or restarted with the service command

service vmware-vpxa restart

/etc/vmware/vpxa.cfg

This is the XML configuration file for the VirtualCenter Server Agent in the service

console. Here is a typical vpxa.cfg file.

[root@esx1host vmware]# cat vpxa.cfgfalse

error

false10

root100.100.100.11
http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2007/12/31/howto-adding-a-firewall-service-on-esx/http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2007/12/31/howto-adding-a-firewall-service-on-esx/http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2007/12/31/howto-adding-a-firewall-service-on-esx/http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2007/12/31/howto-adding-a-firewall-service-on-esx/


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30100.100.100.172902

/var/log/vmware/vpx

Notice the tag. If you are trying to troubleshoot an issue, then increasing

the logging level is a good idea. We have used the level "verbose", there could be a

higher debug level of logging, but we've not tested that. We have also found the

logleveltrivia, info, warning and error.

/var/log/vmware/vpx/vpxa.log

The log file for VirtualCenter agent in the service console.

VMware Command Line Tools

vmkfstools

Used to manipulate VMFS and virtual disks at the service console command line. InESX2.x we used it most often for import and export operations, where a virtual disk is

converted from monolithic format to sparse format (previously called COW format). Nowwe tend to use it in ESX scripted install scripts to automate VMFS configuration.

VMFS Manipulation with vmkfstools

We can use vmkfstools to create VMFS file system, if we have a partition of type fb

already created on it. In the following example, we are creating a VMFS3 datastore on

partition 1 on LUN25 accessible via host bus adapter vmhba1. We are specifying a VMFSblock size of 2MB and setting a volume label (datastore name) of "fc-lun25-tier1". Welike embedding useful information in the datastore name to assist the operator in

selecting the appropriate storage when provisioning VMs.

vmkfstools -C vmfs3 -b 2m -S fc-lun25-tier1 vmhba1:0:25:1

VMFS volumes can be spanned across LUNs. We are not big fans of this as it tends to

indicate storage wasn't planned in the first place and now things have reached crisis!

However, they can be useful in certain circumstance and vmkfstools steps up again.

Virtual Disk Manipulation with vmkfstools

The -X (case-sensitive) switch is used to extend the size of a virtual disk; e.g. if you hada 10GB virtual disk and wanted to extend it to 20GB, you could use this command. The

VM would need to be powered off for this to work.


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vmkfstools -X 20GB /vmfs/volumes/storage1/vm.vmdk

Note that the -X switch specifies the NEW SIZE of the virtual disk and NOT how muchyou are extending it by.

If you have used the -X switch before in an older version of ESX server (earlier than 3.0)it was possible to specify a small disk size; thereby making the virtual disk smaller. This

was dangerous but useful if your partition within the disk did not consume 100% of thedisk size. However, this is not possible with vmkfstools command found in ESX Server

version 3.x.

From ESX 3.5, the size of a virtual disk can now be increased in the VI Client! VMware

are implementing more and more in the user interface, less time needed in the serviceconsole command line...

Previously, the main use ofvmkfstools command was to import or export virtual disks.

This would be required if you were deploying templates by hand instead of using

VirtualCenter. It was also the primary method for moving VMs between the ESX serverproduct and the hosted VMware products such as VMware Workstation or Server. The

reason we say "previously" is that moving VMs between servers or between VMwareproducts has become much simpler and cleaner by using the VMware Converter utility.

This tool is task oriented and treats the VM as a whole object, not just the virtual diskfiles as vmkfstools.

If you do want to import virtual hard disks that are in 2GB sparse format into monolithicformat by hand, then we can use vmkfstools command with the -i switch.

vmkfstools -i /importfiles/vm.vmdk /vmfs/volumes/storage1/vm/vm.vmdk

Notice that the import option requires two parameters, source and destination. This

would not create a VM, but would create the monolithic virtual disk for a VM. You couldthen create a custom VM in the VI Client and select the option to "use an existing disk".

If you want to export a virtual disk you no longer use the -d switch, but just use

the same -i switch and specify the virtual disk type at the destination of the import. So if

you were exporting a virtual disk from VMFS to a ext3 directory path you could use:

vmkfstools -i /vmfs/volumes/storage1/vm/vm.vmdk -d 2gbsparse/exportvm/vm.vmdk

Fragmentation of Virtual Disks

All being well, our storage is well planned out, disks are thick provisioned at creation

and we get no surprises. However, things are not as straightforward as we always want.The business want changes to the virtual disk sizes, they want to save money on

storage provisioning etc! So, it is possible that a virtual disk could be fragmented. The

vmkfstools command can help us again here. The undocumented -t switch will show ushow many contiguous sections a virtual disk has. If it only has 1 section, then it's not


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fragmented.

vmkfstools -t /vmfs/volumes/storage1/vm/vm.vmdk

vmware-cmd

This command has been in ESX for a number of versions and it's functionality has been

extended with each major release. We tend to find that the most frequent use of thiscommand is to register or power on VMs from the console command line

# vmware-cmd -s register /vmfs/volumes/SharedVMs/vm1/vm1.vmx# vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/SharedVMs/vm1/vm1.vmx start

If you have a VM that you can't tell if it is powered on or off, you can use the getstateoption

# vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/SharedVMs/vm1/vm1.vmx getstatevm1 is powered on

If you need to force the VM to power off, the stop hard function will normally do thetrick. This is not very graceful, but can save you time if things are not responding.

# vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/SharedVMs/vm1/vm1.vmx stop hard

If there is limited space in your VMFS volumes, then you will likely want to know if anyof your VMs are running in snapshot (where the disk writes are going into a disk delta

and not the regular parent virtual disk). It is a nice idea to have a short script to

enumerate the VMs on your host and loop through them to check each of them to see if

they have a snapshot. The vmware-cmd command again helps us out with this.

vm-support

A great built-in tool which collects all configuration files on an ESX host and builds a tararchive that can be sent to VMware support so they can have a complete picture of your

system to assist in the troubleshooting effort.

A useful function of this tool is to list running VMs using the -x switch.

[root@esx1 root]# vm-support -x

[root@esx1 root]#

Watch out for the creation of empty subdirectories of the name "vm-support." in the directory where you run this tool with the -x switch. It is safe to delete

these directories. You can't run this command if your current directory is /proc.


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A less well-known option ofvm-support is the ability to capture host performance data

which can be replayed later using esxtop. To invoke the performance capture, we need

to specify how frequently a performance "snapshot" is taken and over what period of

time. For example, if we wished to capture host performance every 30 seconds for 10minutes, then we would invoke vm-support with the following options

[root@esx1 root]# vm-support -S -i 30 -d 600

The performance snapshots are archived automatically into a tgz file (a tgz file just like

a WinZIP (R) archive). The tgz archive file name produced is unique to each time it'srun, as the name includes date, time and process id ofvm-support. Before we can

actually replay the snapshot performance data in esxtop, we need to extract the tgz

archive. The tar command is used to "unzip" tgz archive files.

[root@esx1 root]# tar -zxvf archive.tgz

To replay the data in esxtop, use the "-R" switch to specify replay mode and supply thepath to the performance capture file produced by vm-support.

esxupdate

This utility is what we use to patch our ESX hosts with updates from VMware. You canuse this tool interactively to install individual patches, or use it to scan your ESX host to

see which patches are required as well as to do a "what-if" install of a host patch toidentify if there will be any problems.

The power of the esxupdate command is realised when you use it with a patch

repository. A patch repository can be exposed to a host via HTTP, FTP or NFS.

esxupdate -d ftp://taupopatchserver/esx35/0710-03 scan

- Bundle Name - AppFlags --- Summary ---iFlagsESX350-200710049-BG -------v Bugs fixed in some vmkernel. rm-ESX350-200710050-SG i------v Security bugs fixed in vmkernel module.. rm-ESX350-200710052-BG i------v Several bugs fixed in vmx module... -m-ESX350-200710053-BG -------- Provided new PBM for SUSE 11 U2. ---ESX350-200710054-BG -------v COS fix for Ooops. rm-ESX350-200710055-BG -------- More fixes in scsi drivers. r--ESX350-200710058-RG -------v This is a roll-up bundle. rm-ESX350-200710059-RG -------v This is a roll-up security bundle. rm-

If you choose to use the new VirtualCenter Server 2.5 feature called VMware Update

Manager (VUM), then when you perform host scans and remediation, you are in fact justremotely invoking this utility, it's just you don't see it!

You can use the --explain switch when scanning to provide a greater level of detail to


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your host patch scan operation. If for example, the AppFlags for a patch indicated "c" forconflict, you would probably want to know what exactly the patch was in conflict with.

/var/log/vmware/esxupdate.log

The log file for the esxupdate host patch utility.

contents.xml

Every ESX patch contains a file called contents.xml. This file describes the directorystructure of the patch bundle contents.

contents.xml.sig

This is a detached PGP signature of the contents.xml file in a ESX patch.

vimsh

This is a superb utility that we use on occasion, particularly when we are creating

scripted builds for ESX. The industry-recognised experts in the functions of this tool arethe folks over at www.xtravirt.com. Where we have found this tool of unique use is in

the enabling of a VMkernel port for VMotion.

If you are using ESX versions prior to 3.5 then use

vimsh -n -e "hostsvc/vmotion/vnic_set portgroupname

However, if you are using ESX version 3.5 then we need to use a slightly differentsyntax for specifying the portgroup to enable. We now need to specify using a vmkxnotation. Trouble is, we don't know which portgroup corresponds to which vmkx

number. So to first identify the mapping of portgroup name to vmk number, we enterthe command

vimsh

and then enter hostsvc/vmotion/netconfig_get and we'll get a whole pile of output,

but buried in there will be the device names in vmkxformat that we can then use to

enable VMotion on that portgroup with the following:

vimsh -n -e "hostsvc/vmotion/vnic_set vmk0

Using the vimsh command for enabling VMotion is just 1% of the functionality of this

tool. It's not for the faint hearted and there really is no better source of informationabout it than the PDF documents that the xtravirt guys have written. Find their article

here http://knowledge.xtravirt.com/white-papers/scripting.html .Thanks also to MikeLaverick of RTFM Education (www.rtfm-ed.co.uk) for documenting the changes in vimsh

in version 3.5.
http://www.xtravirt.com/http://knowledge.xtravirt.com/white-papers/scripting.htmlhttp://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk/http://www.xtravirt.com/http://knowledge.xtravirt.com/white-papers/scripting.htmlhttp://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk/


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vmware-vim-cmd

This command is a variation on the vimsh command that allows faster execution as we

can invoke this command using the same options we use with vimsh, however this time

we don't end up inside the vimsh shell after execution. If you use vimsh, after executionyou are in a weird shell with a prompt like the following:

[/] $

that you need to type exit to escape from.

Using vmware-vim-cmd is straightforward as you just run the command and you are

returned to the regular bash shell in the service console. For example

vmware-vim-cmd /hostsvc/hostsummary

RPM Utilities

rpm

As ESX service console is based on modified Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3, we can use the

RPM package installation method to add applications to it. However, we should alsopoint out that it's maybe not the best idea to add software to the service console. It is

best to treat the service console as a dedicated console and not add applications to it.

If you are unfamiliar with RPMs in Linux, think of them like MSI packages in Windows.

The rpm command can be used to list and to install RPM-based applications. In the

following example, we are using the command switch (-qa) to list the rpms installed inthe service console.

# rpm -qalibgcc-3.2.3-53setup-2.5.27-1basesystem-8.0-2tzdata-2005m-1.EL3glibc-2.3.2-95.37bzip2-libs-1.0.2-11.EL3.4

etc!.....

If we are only interested in the VMware rpms, then we can just pipe the output ofrpm

-qa command into the grep search tool.

rpm -qa |grep VMware


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which should yield an output something like

VMware-webCenter-esx-2.0.1-32041VMware-esx-apps-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-iscsi-3.0.1-32039

VMware-esx-uwlibs-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-vmkernel-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-drivers-block-DAC960-2.4.11-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-bcm5700-7.3.5-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-e100-2.3.40-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-pcnet32-1.30c-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-tg3-3.43b.1vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-adp94xx-0.0.5-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-aic7xxx-6.3.9-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-lpfcdd-v732-7.3.2.1vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-megaraid_sas-0.0.2-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-qla2200-v7.07-7.7.4.1vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-qla4010-3.24-32039

VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-vmkiscsi-3.4.2-32039VMware-hostd-esx-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-lnxcfg-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-perftools-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-docs-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-tools-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-vmkctl-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-drivers-block-cciss-2.4.54-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-3c90x-1.0.2-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-bnx2-1.3.22-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-e1000-7.0.33.2vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-net-s2io-1.7.6-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-aacraid_esx30-1.1.5.1vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-aic79xx-6.3.9-32039

VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-ips-7.10.17.1vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-megaraid2-2.10.7-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-mptscsi_2xx-2.6.34.1vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-qla2300-v7.07-7.7.4.1vmw-32039VMware-esx-drivers-scsi-qla4022-3.24-32039VMware-esx-vmx-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-srvrmgmt-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-backuptools-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-scripts-3.0.1-32039VMware-esx-3.0.1-32039VMware-cim-esx-3.0.1-32039VMware-vpxa-2.0.1-32042

If we then want to find out more information on an individual RPM package, we can use

the rpm -qi option to query a package which reports the file version, vendor, license anddescription.

# rpm -qi VMware-hostd-esx-3.0.1-32039

Name : VMware-hostd-esx Relocations: (not relocatable)Version : 3.0.1 Vendor: VMware, Inc.


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Release : 32039 Build Date: Tue 26 Sep 200601:30:42 AM PDTInstall Date: Tue 06 Nov 2007 03:07:02 PM PST Build Host: pa-build43.eng.vmware.comGroup : Applications/Emulators Source RPM: VMware-hostd-esx-

3.0.1-32039.src.rpmSize : 269864433 License: commercialSignature : (none)Summary : VMware Host Agent package.Description :

If we then want to know what files are included in the rpm package, we can use query

with the list option to see the files inside. For example, to see the files

# rpm -ql VMware-hostd-esx-3.0.1-32039

/etc/vmware/hostd/config.xml/etc/vmware/hostd/env/0.xml

/etc/vmware/hostd/env/1.xml/etc/vmware/hostd/env/vmconfigoption-esx-2.5.0.xml/etc/vmware/hostd/env/vmconfigoption-esx-3.0.0.xml/etc/vmware/hostd/environments.xml/etc/vmware/hostd/esxinfo.vha.....

If you want to install an RPM, run

rpm -ivfh?XXX

rpm2cpio

If you are wanting to extract a single file from a RPM package but you don't want to

install the RPM, then this is the tool for you. Probably best if you copy the RPM to a tempdirectory so when you extract the RPM you can then navigate the directory structure

created in that temp directory to find the file or files you need.

Once you have copied out the file you were after, you can safely delete the contents of

that temp directory. In other words, we have used rpm2cpio to extract the RPM archive.

Here is an example using the RPM we've used in the previous examples.

# rpm2cpio VMware-hostd-esx-3.0.1-32039 | cpio -idmv

i = Restore archive

d = Create landing directoriesm = Create previous file modification times


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v = verbose

Linux Utilities

/etc/ssh/sshd_config

The configuration of SSH client is stored in the text file /etc/ssh/ssh_config

The configuration of the SSH server daemon is stored in the text file/etc/ssh/sshd_config. An important setting in this file is PermitRootLogin=No. This is

the default setting in ESX 3.x and it is recommended that you keep the setting at "No".This way you have an audit trail and see exactly who is logging in, rather than just

"root". You can quickly what the setting is by using a grep operation on the file as

shown:

# grep Permit /etc/ssh/sshd_config

If you do edit the file to change this setting to Yes, then make sure you restart the

daemon for the changes to take effect using the command:

# service sshd restart

It is also possible to explicitly allow or deny specific users to the SSH daemon. Theheadings in the ssh_config file are DenyUsers and AllowUsers.

su

This command is the switch user utility. Think of it as the command line equivalent ofWindows Fast User Switching!

When it used without parameters, we are specifying to switch to the user root. However,we can use the su command to switch shell to any user account that we know the

password of. In the first example, we are logged in as the user kevin and we are

switching to user ali.

[kevin@esx1host kevin]$ su aliPassword:

[ali@esx1host kevin]

In this second example, we are switching from being logged on as a user called sara to

being logged on as root. Notice to switch to root, we don't need to specify a username.

[sara@esx1host sara]$ su -Password:[root@esx1host root]#


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If we restrict the built-in user account root from logging in over the SSH protocol, then

we are forcing remote users to authenticate as themselves and then su to run privileged

commands if need be, thus leaving a decent audit trail. The downside being that those

users would still know the root account password.

If you would like to restrict the use of the su command, then we can limit it to the

members of a specific group called wheel. This group is defined in the /etc/group file

by default and it's membership can be modified by root. In order to limit su to the

wheel group members we need to modify a configuration file called /etc/pam.d/su

There is a single line in this file that needs to be uncommented to limit the use ofsu.

The line is shown below as it appears it that file, all that is required is the removal of the# symbol at the start of the line.

#auth required /lib/security/$ISA/pam_wheel.so user_uid

The attempts to switch to the root account are logged in /var/log/messages.

sudo

The downside of the su command is that the operators who elevate their privilege to

root are now root. They have full privilege, they know the root password, there is no

granularity of delegation of privilege.

Allows delegation of administration in terms of certain commands that normally only a

particular user can execute (usually root). So if the user ali had been given the

authority to run vmkfstools, then sudo would be used like:

[ali@esx1 ali]$ sudo vmkfstools

The vmkfstools command would then run under the security context of the root user.

The superb feature of this tool is that the user ali does not need to know or supply the

root password to be able to run the delegated command. Further, we keep an audit trail

of when sudo was invoked in /var/log/secure.

The sudo tool uses the lookup file /etc/sudoers to determine which users can perform

which commands. We do not edit this file with a regular text editor like vi or nano,instead we use the tool visudo.

visudo

This is the vi text editor with extras. When launched, it automatically opens and locks

for exclusive edit, the /etc/sudoers file. The point ofvisudo is to ensure we always

edit the right file as the location of the sudoers file differs between nix distributions, but

this command is constant and will utilise the right sudoers file for the distribution being

used.

A great benefit of using visudo over regular vi, is that it performs some basic syntax


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checking for us!

/etc/sudoers

The text file that contains the sudo users and the rules that apply to them. The first"ALL" relates to all machines (useful if this is a network wide file). Otherwise, this could

be the hostname of the one machine we are trying to run the command on. In thefollowing example we are allowing the user "alistair" to run the kill command, all of the

commands in the directory /usr/bin and any commands in the directory/usr/sbin/alistair

alistair ALL= /bin/kill, /usr/bin/, /usr/sbin/alistair/

In the following line added to the /etc/sudoers file, we are allowing the user sara to

run the esxcfg-firewall and esxcfg-vswitch command.

sara ESX1= /usr/sbin/esxcfg-firewall, esxcfg-vswitch

You can use aliases within this file to group together users, hosts and commands.

User_Alias ESXHOSTADMINS-PROD = john, grant, julieUser_Alias ESXHOSTADMINS-TEST = peterHost_Alias PRODESXHOSTS = esxprodsrv01, esxprodsrv02Host_Alias TESTESXHOSTS = esxtest01, esxtest01Cmnd_Alias SECURITYCOMMANDS =Cmnd_Alias VMCOMMANDS =Cmnd_Alias NETCOMMANDS = /usr/sbin/esxcfg-vswitch, /usr/sbin/esxcfg-nics, /usr/sbin/esxcfg-vmknic

Now we can combine these to create rules such as;

ESXHOSTADMINS = PRODESXHOSTS NETCOMMANDS

Although, rather than maintaining a static configuration file on each ESX host, it would

be better to customize the sudoers file during host deployment and include Linux

groups. For example, if we wanted to delegate a set of commands to those Linux users

who belong to a Linux group, for example, wheel, then we can use the % operator to

leverage those group definitions, thus avoiding static user aliases.

%wheel = PRODESXHOSTS SECURITYCOMMANDS

The best source we've found so far on detailed use and background of sudo can be

found at http://aplawrence.com/Basics/sudo.html

w

Great for viewing logged on console users.[root@esx1host firewall]# w
http://aplawrence.com/Basics/sudo.htmlhttp://aplawrence.com/Basics/sudo.html


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12:07:45 up 4 days, 2:16, 3 users, load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00USER TTY FROM LOGIN@ IDLE JCPU PCPU WHATroot tty1 - Fri10am 4days 0.02s 0.02s -bashroot tty2 - Fri 9am 4days 0.06s 0.06s -bashroot pts/0 remote7.lab.vmwa 9:29am 0.00s 0.06s 0.00s w

who

This command allows use to view who is logged onto the service console eitherinteractively at the console or via an SSH session. The who command without

parameters gives us the basics.[root@esx1host firewall]# whoroot tty1 Jul 25 10:30root tty2 Jul 25 09:56root pts/0 Jul 29 09:29 (remote7.lab.b2v.net)

If we want to see all the details of users we can use the -a switch to show all data. We

tend to combine -a with -H (i.e. -aH) to display column headers making it easier to read

and interpret.

[root@esx1host firewall]# who -aHNAME LINE TIME IDLE PID COMMENT EXIT

Jul 25 09:51 743 id=si term=0exit=0

system boot Jul 25 09:51run-level 3 Jul 25 09:51 last=S

Jul 25 09:52 1205 id=l3 term=0exit=0root + tty1 Jul 25 10:30 old 2056root + tty2 Jul 25 09:56 old 2057LOGIN tty3 Jul 25 09:52 2058 id=3

LOGIN tty4 Jul 25 09:52 2059 id=4LOGIN tty5 Jul 25 09:52 2060 id=5LOGIN tty6 Jul 25 09:52 2061 id=6root + pts/0 Jul 29 09:29 . 18092(remote7.lab.b2v.net)

vmkload_mod

This command will load and unload VMkernel modules on the fly. The results of thisload/unload will happen as you type it and will only be valid for the current booted

session. So this command is superb for troubleshooting as we can load and unloadmodules, e.g. network drivers.

In the following example, we are examining the options for the Intel network driver(e1000) with the -s (show parameters) switch and then unloading it using -u (thereby

interrupting network operations on that physical interface temporarily) and then loadingit again with a new option. Notice to load a VMkernel parameter, we just supply the

module name to the vmkload_mod command as a parameter listing any module-specificoptions as further parameters.

[root@esx1host]# vmkload_mod -s e1000


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Using /usr/lib/vmware/vmkmod/e1000.oheap_initial int, description "Initial heap size allocated for thedriver."heap_max int, description "Maximum attainable heap size for the driver."reset_wait_ms int array (min = 1, max = 32)

[root@esx1host]# vmkload_mod -u e1000[root@esx1host firewall]# vmkload_mod e1000 RxIntDelay=32Using /usr/lib/vmware/vmkmod/e1000.oModule load of e1000 succeeded.

If you were experimenting with a driver setting to determine the right setting for theenvironment, then you may be loading and unloading a module a number of times. Once

we were happy we had found the correct setting, it is likely we would want to make thischange persistent, i.e. we would want it to take effect for each time the kernel module is

loaded at server boot time. For that, we should use esxcfg-module command.

minicom

This is a great utility for talking to serial attached devices; we think of it as

HyperTerminal for Linux. Where we have found this particularly useful is for commandline administration of your storage array. For example, if you had an HP MSA1000

attached to you ESX host and attached the serial cable to the unit and your host, thenyou could manage LUN presentation from the service console command line.

Minicom uses a configuration file to determine bit rates etc. This configuration file isplaced in the /etc directory. We normally create the file with a meaningful name e.g.

minirc.com1, so to launch the tool we enter

# ./minicom com1

The contents of the minirc.com1 file would typically be:

pr port /dev/ttyS0pu baudrate 19200pu bits 8pu parity Npu stopbits 1pu rtscts No

Much more detail on minicom can be found at

http://www.cisl.ucar.edu/nets/intro/staff/siemsen/tools/minicom.html

vi

We can't talk about the command line without talking about vi. This is the simple but

powerful text editor in Linux and UNIX. People tend to love it or hate it. Either way, it's

nearly always there in any *nix implementation and just by memorising a fewcommands you can be up and running with it. If you can use Windows Notepad, you can
http://www.cisl.ucar.edu/nets/intro/staff/siemsen/tools/minicom.htmlhttp://www.cisl.ucar.edu/nets/intro/staff/siemsen/tools/minicom.html


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use vi!

vi filename

The first thing that throws you is that to enter text into your file, you need to press "i"

for Insert mode. You can then enter your text just as any other text editor. When youare done with text entering, just press the Escape (Esc) key to come out of insert mode.

If you are happy with your file, then we need to Write & Quit (wq). To enter commandsin this command line editor, rather than having menus, we have a command prompt in

the application. To reach the vi command prompt, simply enter ":" - the colon characterwhich will automatically place your cursor at the bottom of the session. Here you can

enter the "wq" command to write and quit the editor. That's it!

Here is a summary of the vi commands

i Changes to insert mode where you can edit the text

:wq Write the file and quit the editor

:q! Quit the editor without saving changes

SHIFT ZZ Quit the editor and save any changes made - just a fast way of doing":wq"

Esc key Exits the current mode, e.g. out of insert mode back to view mode.

These commands are just extra if you have the inclination to learn!

/ search - if you entered /failed then the cursor would move to the first

instance of "failed in the text

$ jumps to the end of the opened file

yy copy - it's y for yank!

dd delete a line (cut) if you precede this with a number e.g. 8dd, then it

would delete 8 lines

p paste

%s/old/new/g substitute any occurrences of the world "old" with the world "new"

There are some great web sites which document the features of vi in superb depth, one

of them is the staff site at University of Washington which helped me. Their site is athttp://staff.washington.edu/rells/R110/

nano

Another text editor, more friendly than vi but you should use w to avoid word wrap.

/etc/ntp.conf

[root@esx7 firewall]# cat /etc/ntp.conf# Prohibit general access to this service.restrict default ignore

# Permit all access over the loopback interface. This could# be tightened as well, but to do so would effect some of
http://staff.washington.edu/rells/R110/http://staff.washington.edu/rells/R110/


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# the administrative functions.restrict 127.0.0.1

# -- CLIENT NETWORK -------# Permit systems on this network to synchronize with this

# time service. Do not permit those systems to modify the# configuration of this service. Also, do not use those# systems as peers for synchronization.# restrict 192.168.1.0 mask 255.255.255.0 notrust nomodify notrap

# --- OUR TIMESERVERS -----# or remove the default restrict line# Permit time synchronization with our time source, but do not# permit the source to query or modify the service on this system.

# restrict mytrustedtimeserverip mask 255.255.255.255 nomodify notrapnoquery# server mytrustedtimeserverip

# --- NTP MULTICASTCLIENT ---#multicastclient # listen on default 224.0.1.1# restrict 224.0.1.1 mask 255.255.255.255 notrust nomodify notrap# restrict 192.168.1.0 mask 255.255.255.0 notrust nomodify notrap

# --- GENERAL CONFIGURATION ---## Undisciplined Local Clock. This is a fake driver intended for backup

# and when no outside source of synchronized time is available. The# default stratum is usually 3, but in this case we elect to use stratum# 0. Since the server line does not have the prefer keyword, this driver# is never used for synchronization, unless no other other# synchronization source is available. In case the local host is# controlled by some external source, such as an external oscillator or# another protocol, the prefer keyword would cause the local host to# disregard all other synchronization sources, unless the kernel# modifications are in use and declare an unsynchronized condition.#server 127.127.1.0 # local clockserver 0.vmware.pool.ntp.orgserver 1.vmware.pool.ntp.orgserver 2.vmware.pool.ntp.org

fudge 127.127.1.0 stratum 10

## Drift file. Put this in a directory which the daemon can write to.# No symbolic links allowed, either, since the daemon updates the file# by creating a temporary in the same directory and then rename()'ing# it to the file.#


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driftfile /var/lib/ntp/driftbroadcastdelay 0.008

## Authentication delay. If you use, or plan to use someday, the# authentication facility you should make the programs in the auth_stuff

# directory and figure out what this number should be on your machine.#authenticate yes

## Keys file. If you want to diddle your server at run time, make a# keys file (mode 600 for sure) and define the key number to be# used for making requests.## PLEASE DO NOT USE THE DEFAULT VALUES HERE. Pick your own, or remote# systems might be able to reset your clock at will. Note also that# ntpd is started with a -A flag, disabling authentication, that# will have to be removed as well.#

keys /etc/ntp/keys

/etc/ntp/step-tickers

If you have a single time source configured for your service console, then this file will

have just 1 line, similar to the following:

server 192.168.1.100

ntpdate

If you want to synchronise your service console clock with the defined time server, youcan use this command with the -u switch.

ntpdate -u timeserver.local

ntpq

This queries the state of the ntp service. Watch for the back ticks used in the

parameters, they are not single quotes!

date

If we are checking the time and date of our ESX Service Console, then the date

command is very useful. Just entering the "date" command returns what the serviceconsole thinks the current date is.

If the date is incorrect and you wish to reset it you would enter the command with the -s


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switch and specify date in mm/dd/yyyy format.

# date -s "12/29/2007 23:48"

Once you have set the date, you will want to ensure that the hardware clock matchesyour newly entered date. We can do this with the hwclock command described below.

hwclock

We can use this command to synchronise the server hardware clock with the date we set

in the service console. If you enter the command with no parameters then the value of

the hardware clock is displayed.

# hwclock

If we want to synchronise the hardware clock with the service console date and time, we

use the following:

# hwclock --systohc

cal

Display calendar for current month or set of months. The following command displays 3months, current month and the month before and after.

# cal -3March 2006 April 2006 May 2006

Su Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa Su Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa Su Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa1 2 3 4 1 1 2 3 4 5 6

5 6 7 8 9 10 11 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 7 8 9 10 11 12 1312 13 14 15 16 17 18 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 14 15 16 17 18 19 2019 20 21 22 23 24 25 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 21 22 23 24 25 26 2726 27 28 29 30 31 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 28 29 30 31

30

Surprisingly useful!

passwd

Used to change the password of the currently logged on user (use the command with noparameters) or for changing the password of a named user account (supply the user

name as a parameter).

passwd

Remember that passwords are not stored in the /etc/passwd file (that's where users

are defined) but are actucally stored in the file /etc/shadow

If you are ever needing to reset an unknown root account password, then it is this


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utility you would run after booting into Linux single user mode.

VMware HA

AAM

AAM is the Automated Availability Manager that runs in the service console when you

create a VMware High Availability (VMware HA) cluster. The VMware HA feature waspreviously known as DAS (Distributed Availability Services) but we don't mention that

anymore.

This software maintains an in-memory database on active nodes in the cluster and uses

heartbeats to co-ordinate the active and passive nodes. It is suggested that youconfigure service console with 2 Ethernet interfaces to remove any single point of

failure.

This is a piece of licensed Legato software which itself has been renamed to EMCAutoStart.

This component has a very high dependency upon fully functional host name resolution.

So before you enable VMware HA, check the following files

/etc/hosts/etc/FT_HOSTS/etc/resolv.conf/etc/vmware/esx.conf

to ensure accuracy. One thing you can do to check the name resolution functionalitybefore enabling HA is run

hostname -s

to return the short name of the service console. If this fails, then the HA configurationWILLfail.

The log file for VMware HA in ESX 3.0.x can be found in the service console in the

directory

/opt/LGTOaam512/

and for ESX 3.5 can be found in

/opt/VMware/

To avoid split brain scenarios, an ESX server can determine if it has become isolated

from other servers and we can configure that servers' isolation response. If the AAMcomponent loses contact with the other nodes in the HA cluster, it attempts to contact

the configured default gateway for service console using ICMP echo request (PING). If


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this fails, then the ESX host is isolated. If your default gateway suppresses ICMP echorequests, then we can configure an alternate IP address called the

das.isolationaddress. From ESX 3.5, you can configure multiple isolation addresses

so that you can configure a host with more that one address to attempt contact withbefore declaring itself isolated.

/opt/LGTOaam512/bin/ftcli

This utility allows you to view the active nodes in an HA cluster and the managed IPaddresses. This utility will help you determine whether the HA agent is in a running state

and which IP addresses are visible between those managed hosts.

/etc/FT_HOSTS

This file is created when HA is enabled and is a copy of/etc/hosts. If you have

problems with name resolution and configuring HA, you can safely delete this file and

reconfigure that cluster node for HA again. FT_HOSTS will be re-created.

Networking

hostname

This utility displays the service console hostname. There are some useful switches to

this command

hostname -i displays the IP address

and

hostname -s displays the short hostname, i.e. without domain name

ifconfig

Used to determine what IP address you have, the equivalent of the ipconfig command

in Windows. You can use the command without parameters to view all interfaces, or you

can be interface specific, e.g.

[root@esx1host] # ifconfig vswif0vswif0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:50:56:49:96:03

inet addr:192.168.1.7 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1RX packets:4867312 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0TX packets:1980227 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000


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RX bytes:1632239875 (1556.6 Mb) TX bytes:138260324 (131.8 Mb)

Notice this is a quick way of viewing your COS virtual MAC address alongside the IPaddress. Also note, you don't see the additional optional IP parameters like gateway and

DNS servers.

The ifconfig command manages the addr part of the more powerful ip command.

ping

Our favourite IP connectivity tool; I love the name Packet InterNetwork Groper! This tool

uses ICMP to send an "echo request" and looks for an ICMP e"cho reply" . There are acouple of very useful switches we can use with ping, the most common one we use is -c

to specify count. The Linux ping command keeps pinging continually by default

(Windows needs -t to do that). So if we only want 4 pings, we specify -c4.[root@esx1host root]# ping 192.168.93.200 -c 4

PING 192.168.93.200 (192.168.93.200) 56(84) bytes of data.64 bytes from 192.168.93.200: icmp_seq=0 ttl=63 time=0.507 ms64 bytes from 192.168.93.200: icmp_seq=1 ttl=63 time=0.458 ms64 bytes from 192.168.93.200: icmp_seq=2 ttl=63 time=0.448 ms64 bytes from 192.168.93.200: icmp_seq=3 ttl=63 time=0.538 ms

--- 192.168.93.200 ping statistics ---4 packets transmitted, 4 received, 0% packet loss, time 3016msrtt min/avg/max/mdev = 0.448/0.487/0.538/0.045 ms, pipe 2

Remember that often firewalls block ICMP echo requests, so not getting a reply doesn't

mean your host is down!

This tool relies on correct ARP functionality. So again, what looks like a ping failure,

may in fact be a local ARP issue and unrelated to the destination address of the ping

operation performed. If you are testing MTU sizes, you can force ping not to fragmentwith the -f switch.

XXX

We can set the ttl with this - poor mans traceroute!

vmkping

This ping makes use of IP stack of the VMkernel rather than the Linux network stack inthe service console. So if you are trying to troubleshoot VMotion, iSCSI or NAS issues

where the VMkernel is directly using its own IP (a VMkernel port). We supply the IPaddress of the destination as a parameter, just as we do with regular ping.[root@esx1host root]# vmkping 192.168.93.20064 bytes from 192.168.93.200: icmp_seq=0 ttl=63 time=0.871 ms64 bytes from 192.168.93.200: icmp_seq=1 ttl=63 time=5.079 ms64 bytes from 192.168.93.200: icmp_seq=2 ttl=63 time=22.754 ms

--- 192.168.93.200 ping statistics ---


45/59

3 packets transmitted, 3 packets received, 0% packet lossround-trip min/avg/max = 0.871/9.568/22.754 ms

Be aware this tool makes use of the service console DNS, so if there are problems there,

try vmkping using the IP address of the destination rather than hostname to ensure that

any errors you see are unrelated to name resolution problems in the service console.

If you use -D it will ping all important stations (own interface, iSCSI and defaultgateway).

/sbin/arping

This is a similar utility to ping, but uses Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) and so the

result will only be for loc

Documents

Command Line ESX