Announcing vSphere Configuration Profiles

In vSphere 8 we introduced a technology preview of the next generation in vSphere cluster configuration management called vSphere Configuration Profiles. With vSphere 8 Update 1, vSphere Configuration Profiles is a fully supported feature and no longer in a technology preview phase.

vSphere Configuration Profiles is a new capability in vSphere 8.0, that allows Administrators to manage the host configuration at a cluster level. This capability allows administrators to

• Set desired configuration at the cluster in form of a JSON document.
• Check that hosts are compliant with desired configuration.
• If non-compliant, remediate hosts to bring them into compliance.

What's New?

With vSphere 8 Update 1, vSphere Configuration Profiles supports vSphere Distributed Switch configuration, which was not available in the earlier technology preview. Clusters configured using vSphere Distributed Switch(es) can now transition to use vSphere Configuration Profiles in vSphere 8 Update 1. Both vCenter and ESXi need to be upgraded to version 8 Update 1.

vSphere Distributed Switch Support

vSphere Configuration Profiles supports a co-existence with vSphere Distributed Switch configurations. This means that vSphere Distributed Switch and distributed port group information is still managed by the vSphere Distributed Switch itself and is compatible with using vSphere Configuration Profiles.

For example, if you create or modify distributed port groups, you do not need to add this information to the cluster configuration document. The distributed port group is managed by the vSphere Distributed Switch independent of the cluster. However, if you attach vmkernel interfaces to distributed port groups, then the vmkernel interface configuration needs to be managed by vSphere Configuration Profiles.

vSphere Configuration Profiles will report on compliance information for vmkernel interfaces attached to distributed port groups. Configuration drift in this instance is resolved by the vSphere Distributed Switch.

Demo

Check the following demo video to see how a vSphere cluster using a vSphere Distributed Switch can be transitioned from using Host Profiles to using vSphere Configuration Profiles.

Troubleshooting

Service Health

vSphere Configuration Profiles is provided by the VMware vSphere Update Manager service. Ensure this service is started and running by inspecting the list of services from the VMware vCenter Server Management Interface (VAMI) or by using the service-control --status command line command. You can also use the command line command vmon-cli -s updatemgr to inspect the health of the service.

Log Messages

vSphere Configuration Profiles log messages are primarily written to the vmware-vum-server.log log file located at /var/log/vmware/vmware-updatemgr/vum-server/ on the vCenter Server.

Limitations

• vSphere Configuration Profiles does not currently support clusters that are managed using VMware NSX. We aim to include NSX support in a future update.
• Some ESXi services startup and runtime states are not currently managed by vSphere Configuration Profiles. For example, the SSH service startup and runtime settings are not included in a cluster configuration document.

Learn More

For everything vSphere Configuration Profiles related, see the vSphere Configuration Profiles resource page and vSphere documentation: