VMware vCenter Server offers centralized management of virtualized hosts and virtual machines from a single console. It provides key functionalities like VM deployment, performance monitoring, and policy-based resource allocation, among others. While the product does not specifically have “supply chain management settings”, it does have inventory and resource management capabilities which are critical to IT supply chain processes.
To configure these aspects of vCenter, there are several steps you can take.
1. Setting Up Data Centers and Clusters:
After you install vCenter Server, you need to set up your data center and clusters. The “data center” object is the highest level you can use to organize objects in vCenter Server. Underneath data centers come clusters, which are aggregations of hosts.
To add a data center:
- Go to the vSphere Client and log into the vCenter Server.
- Go to the Hosts and Clusters view.
- Right-click on vCenter listing in the inventory pane and select “New Data center”. Enter a name in the New Data Center dialog box and click OK.
To add a cluster:
- Again, go to the Hosts and Clusters view.
- Right-click on your new data center and click “New Cluster…”
- Enter a name and select available features as per your infrastructure’s need.
1. Add and Manage ESXi Hosts:
To take advantage of vCenter Server’s management capabilities, you need to add ESXi hosts. Right-click on a data-center or cluster name, select “Add Host”. Enter the host’s IP address/DNS name and root-level username and password.
1. Inventory Management:
For the management or tracking of your virtual environment supply chain elements such as VM Images, Application Templates etc. use vCenter’s inventory management functionality. You can create folders to categorize and manage VMs, hosts, networks, and data centers.
1. Resource Management:
Managing resources effectively is a crucial aspect of supply chain management. vCenter provides DRS (Distributed Resource Scheduler) to balance computing capacity in a collection of resources at the cluster level.
Sources:
1. VMware Docs, “vCenter Server and Host Management – Introduction to vCenter Server” https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/6.7/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-671-host-management-guide.pdf
2. VMware Docs, “Create a Data Center” https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/7.0/com.vmware.vsphere.vcenterhost.doc/GUID-3B5AF2B1-C534-4426-B97A-D14019A8010F.html
3. VMware Blogs, “The Basics of VMware vCenter, ESXi and vSphere” https://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2020/02/the-basics-of-vmware-vcenter-esxi-and-vsphere.html
4. VMware Docs, “DRS Cluster Settings” https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/7.0/com.vmware.vsphere.resmgmt.doc/GUID-8ACF3502-5314-4696-82C4-4B6A5592A4E6.html.
