Objectives

By the end of the course, you should be able to meet the following objectives:

• Describe the software-defined Data Center
• Explain the vSphere components and their function in the infrastructure
• Deploy an ESXi host
• Deploy VMware vCenter® Server Appliance™
• Use a local content library as an ISO store and deploy a virtual machine
• Describe vCenter Server architecture
• Use vCenter Server to manage an ESXi host
• Configure and manage vSphere infrastructure with VMware Host Client™ and VMware vSphere® Web
  Client
• Describe virtual networks with vSphere standard switches
• Configure standard switch policies
• Use vCenter Server to manage various types of host storage: VMware vSphere® VMFS, NFS, iSCSI, and
  RDM
• Examine the features and functions of Fibre Channel and VMware vSAN™
• Manage virtual machines, templates, clones, and snapshots
• Create, clone, and deploy a vApp
• Describe and use the content library
• Migrate virtual machines with VMware vSphere® vMotion®
• Use VMware vSphere® Storage vMotion® to migrate virtual machine storage
• Monitor resource usage and manage resource pools
• Use esxtop to identify and solve performance issues
• Discuss the VMware vSphere® High Availability cluster architecture
• Configure vSphere HA
• Manage vSphere HA and VMware vSphere® Fault Tolerance
• Use VMware vSphere® Replication™ and VMware vSphere® Data Protection™ to replicate virtual
  machines and perform data recovery
• Use VMware vSphere® Distributed Resource Scheduler™ clusters to improve host scalability
• Use VMware vSphere® Update Manager™ to apply patches and perform basic troubleshooting of ESXi
  hosts, virtual machines, and vCenter Server operations

Outline

1. Course Introduction
   • Introductions and course logistics
   • Course objectives
   • Describe the content of this course
   • Gain a complete picture of the VMware certification system
   • Familiarize yourself with the benefits of the VMware Education Learning Zone
   • Identify additional resources
2. Introduction to vSphere and the Software-Defined Data Center
   • Describe the topology of a physical data centre
   • Explain the vSphere virtual infrastructure
   • Define the files and components of virtual machines
   • Describe the benefits of using virtual machines
   • Explain the similarities and differences between physical architectures and virtual architectures
   • Define the purpose of ESXi
   • Define the purpose of vCenter Server
   • Explain the software-defined data centre
   • Describe private, public, and hybrid clouds
3. Creating Virtual Machines
   • Introduce virtual machines, virtual machine hardware, and virtual machine files
   • Identify the files that make up a virtual machine
   • Discuss the latest virtual machine hardware and its features
   • Describe virtual machine CPU, memory, disk, and network resource usage
   • Explain the importance of VMware Tools™
   • Discuss PCI pass-through, Direct I/O, remote direct memory access, and NVMe
   • Deploy and configure virtual machines and templates
   • Identify the virtual machine disk format
4. vCenter Server
   • Introduce the vCenter Server architecture
   • Deploy and configure vCenter Server Appliance
   • Use vSphere Web Client
   • Back up and restore vCenter Server
   • Examine vCenter Server permissions and roles
   • Explain the vSphere HA architectures and features
   • Examine the new vSphere authentication proxy
   • Manage vCenter Server inventory objects and licenses
   • Access and navigate the new vSphere clients
5. Configuring and Managing Virtual Networks
   • Describe, create, and manage standard switches
   • Configure virtual switch security and load-balancing policies
   • Contrast and compare vSphere distributed switches and standard switches
   • Describe the virtual switch connection types
   • Describe the new TCP/IP stack architecture
   • Use VLANs with standard switches
6. Configuring and Managing Virtual Storage
   • Introduce storage protocols and storage device types
   • Discuss ESXi hosts using iSCSI, NFS, and Fibre Channel storage
   • Create and manage VMFS and NFS datastores
   • Describe the new features of VMFS 6.5
   • Introduce vSAN
   • Describe guest file encryption
7. Virtual Machine Management
   • Use templates and cloning to deploy new virtual machines
   • Modify and manage virtual machines
   • Clone a virtual machine
   • Upgrade virtual machine hardware to version 12
   • Remove virtual machines from the vCenter Server inventory and datastore
   • Customize a new virtual machine using customization specification files
   • Perform vSphere vMotion and vSphere Storage vMotion migrations
   • Create and manage virtual machine snapshots
   • Create, clone, and export vApps
   • Introduce the types of content libraries and how to deploy and use them
8. Resource Management and Monitoring
   • Introduce virtual CPU and memory concepts
   • Explain virtual memory reclamation techniques
   • Describe virtual machine overcommitment and resource competition
   • Configure and manage resource pools
   • Describe methods for optimizing CPU and memory usage
   • Use various tools to monitor resource usage
   • Create and use alarms to report certain conditions or events
   • Describe and deploy resource pools
   • Set reservations, limits, and shares
   • Describe expandable reservations
   • Schedule changes to resource settings
   • Create, clone, and export vApps
   • Use vCenter Server performance charts and esxtop to analyze vSphere performance
9. vSphere HA, vSphere Fault Tolerance, and Protecting Data
   • Explain the vSphere HA architecture
   • Configure and manage a vSphere HA cluster
   • Use vSphere HA advanced parameters
   • Define cluster-wide restart ordering capabilities
   • Enforce infrastructural or intra-app dependencies during failover
   • Describe vSphere HA heartbeat networks and datastore heartbeats
   • Introduce vSphere Fault Tolerance
   • Enable vSphere Fault Tolerance on virtual machines
   • Support vSphere Fault Tolerance interoperability with vSAN
   • Examine enhanced consolidation of vSphere Fault Tolerance virtual machines
   • Introduce vSphere Replication
   • Use vSphere Data Protection to back up and restore data
10. vSphere DRS
    • Describe the functions and benefits of a vSphere DRS cluster
    • Configure and manage a vSphere DRS cluster
    • Work with affinity and anti-affinity rules
    • Describe the new capabilities for what-if analysis and proactive vSphere DRS
    • Highlight the evolution of vSphere DRS using predictive data from VMware vRealize® Operations Manager™
    • Perform preemptive actions to prepare for CPU or memory changes
    • Describe the vCenter Server embedded vSphere Update Manager, VMware vSphere® ESXi™ Image Builder CLI, and VMware vSphere® Auto Deploy capabilities
    • Use vSphere HA and vSphere DRS together for business continuity
11. vSphere Update Manager
    • Describe the new vSphere Update Manager architecture, components, and capabilities
    • Use vSphere Update Manager to manage ESXi, virtual machine, and vApp patching
    • Install vSphere Update Manager and the vSphere Update Manager plug-in
    • Create patch baselines
    • Use host profiles to manage host configuration compliance
    • Scan and remediate hosts

Target Audience

• System administrators
• System engineer

Prerequisites

This course requires the following prerequisites:

• System administration experience on Microsoft Windows or Linux operating systems.