Course Objectives

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

• Describe the software-defined data center (SDDC)
• Explain the vSphere components and their function in the infrastructure
• Describe the benefits and capabilities of VMware Skyline
• Install and configure ESXi hosts
• Deploy and configure VMware vCenter Server Appliance
• Use VMware vSphere Client to manage the vCenter Server inventory and the vCenter Server configuration
• Manage, monitor, back up, and protect vCenter Server Appliance
• Create virtual networks with vSphere standard switches
• Describe the storage technologies supported by vSphere
• Configure virtual storage using iSCSI and NFS storage
• Create and manage VMware vSphere VMFS datastores
• Use the vSphere Client to create virtual machines, templates, clones, and snapshots
• Create a content library and deploy virtual machines from templates in the library
• Manage virtual machine resource use
• Migrate virtual machines with VMware vSphere vMotion and VMware vSphere Storage vMotion
• Create and manage a vSphere cluster that is enabled with VMware vSphere High Availability and VMware vSphere Distributed Resource Scheduler
• Discuss solutions for managing the vSphere life cycle
• Use VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager to perform upgrades to ESXi hosts and virtual machines

Course Outline

1  Course Introduction

• Introductions and course logistics
• Course objectives

2  Introduction to vSphere and the Software-Defined Data Center

• Explain basic virtualization concepts
• Describe how vSphere fits into the software-defined data center and the cloud infrastructure
• Explain how vSphere interacts with CPUs, memory, networks, and storage
• Recognize the user interfaces for accessing the vCenter Server system and ESXi hosts
• Describe the ESXi host architecture
• Navigate the Direct Console User Interface (DCUI) to configure an ESXi host
• Recognize ESXi host user account best practices
• Install an ESXi host
• Use VMware Host Client to configure ESXi host settings
• Describe how to proactively manage your vSphere environment using VMware Skyline

3  Virtual Machines

• Create and provision a virtual machine
• Explain the importance of VMware Tools
• Install VMware Tools
• Identify the files that make up a VM
• Recognize the components of a VM
• Recognize virtual devices supported by a VM
• Describe the benefits and use cases for containers
• Identify the parts of a container system

4  vCenter Server

• Describe the vCenter Server architecture
• Discuss how ESXi hosts communicate with vCenter Server
• Deploy and configure vCenter Server Appliance
• Use vSphere Client to manage the vCenter Server inventory
• Add data center, organizational objects, and hosts to vCenter Server
• Use roles and permissions to enable users to access objects in the vCenter Server inventory
• Back up vCenter Server Appliance
• Monitor vCenter Server tasks, events, and appliance health
• Use VMware vCenter Server High Availability to protect a vCenter Server Appliance

5  Configuring and Managing Virtual Networks

• Create and manage standard switches
• Describe the virtual switch connection types
• Configure virtual switch security, traffic-shaping, and load-balancing policies
• Compare vSphere distributed switches and standard switches

6  Configuring and Managing Virtual Storage

• Identify storage protocols and storage device types
• Discuss ESXi hosts using iSCSI, NFS, and Fibre Channel storage
• Create and manage VMFS and NFS datastores
• Explain how multipathing works with iSCSI, NFS, and Fibre Channel storage
• Recognize the components of a VMware vSAN configuration

7  Virtual Machine Management

• Use templates and cloning to deploy new virtual machines
• Modify and manage virtual machines
• Create a content library and deploy virtual machines from templates in the library
• Use customization specification files to customize a new virtual machine
• Perform vSphere vMotion and vSphere Storage vMotion migrations
• Describe the Enhanced vMotion Compatibility feature
• Create and manage virtual machine snapshots
• Examine the features and functions of VMware vSphere Replication
• Describe the benefits of VMware vSphere Storage APIs – Data Protection

8  Resource Management and Monitoring

• Discuss CPU and memory concepts in a virtualized environment
• Describe what overcommitment of a resource means
• Describe methods for optimizing CPU and memory usage
• Use various tools to monitor resource use
• Create and use alarms to report certain conditions or events

9  vSphere Clusters

• Describe the functions of a vSphere DRS cluster
• Create a vSphere DRS cluster
• Monitor a vSphere cluster configuration
• Describe options for making a vSphere environment highly available
• Explain the vSphere HA architecture
• Configure and manage a vSphere HA cluster
• Examine the features and functions of VMware vSphere Fault Tolerance
• Describe the function of the vSphere Cluster Service

10  vSphere Lifecycle Management

• Recognize the importance of vCenter Server Update Planner
• Describe how VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager works
• Describe how to update ESXi hosts using baselines
• Validate ESXi host compliance using a cluster image
• Describe how to upgrade VMware Tools and VM hardware
• Describe VMware vSphere Lifecycle Manager and VMware vSAN integration

Certifications
Attending this course meets the training required to achieve the following certification:
VMware Certified Professional - Data Center Virtualization 2021 (VCP-DCV 2021)