abstract your problems away
3 weeks is a long time to work on something. I think that is longer than any Celerra VSA revision, tool, or project I have worked on since EMCWorld. It is funny really. Doing this video helped me find two different bugs with the Celerra UBER VSA (see here & here) and a discover a bug with the Celerra Replicator SRA (here). The results are though are worth it.
Below you will find a video on how to build a complete UBER VSA 3.2 / SRM 4.1 lab using VMware Workstation. This tutorial will walk you through the install of the VSA’s, SRM, plug-ins, networking, storage configuration, mounting to ESXi, configuring SRM with the Celerra Replicator SRA, and finally testing and running a live failover. This includes both NFS and iSCSI configurations and the final test shows you how to setup SRM to failover both NFS and iSCSI datastores within the same configuration.
I am not kidding when I say this was a lot of work. And I have taken a different approach to making a technical tutorial video than most. My goal was to make this somewhat interesting and as short as possible given the amount of config. Hopefully I will make you crack a smile. Even with cutting out loading screens and how fast I talk, this still weighs in at a pretty long length (1 hour 13+ min.). I am pretty sure I can build this in my sleep now and as great as both products are, I am going to do something else for a while to remember why I like being a geek 
UBER SRM Video Guide from Nicholas Weaver on Vimeo.
This is a video tutorial on how to configure a lab using the EMC Celerra UBER VSA (virtual storage appliance) and VMware’s SRM (Site Recovery Manager). This will show you how to configure all aspects including networking, ESX, VCenter, SRM, replication, NFS, iSCSI, and more.
Hopefully this guide helps those that would like to setup SRM in their own labs and will show them how to use the free Celerra UBER VSA to do this easily. Great tool for the VMware SRM-curious.
This is the first effort of this type I have attempted so feedback is appreciated. I am sure I made mistakes in my play-by-play so forgiveness is cool too
Comments = possible free beers later. And I will see some of you peeps next week at VMworld Europe!
Thanks,
.nick
Both Fred Nix and I have been hinting about our *secret project* for weeks now. Well, I am excited to finally present you with the completed work.
Without further ado, vSpecialist’s Delight
This project was a ton of fun and a ton of work. I wanted to give a special thanks to Travers Nicholas, Paula Cuddy, John Avery, Ed Saipetch, Clint Kitson, Chris Birdwell, and Ryan Melton. I also want to thank Marlen and Curtis at PatchWerk Studios for helping us so much.
But, most of all I want to thank Fred Nix for making this project a reality. He took an idea I shared with him over a beer and made it not only possible but absolutely amazing. Fred jumped legal, financial, logistical, and human barriers with patience and style. The guy is a rockstar and a good friend.
*update*
Here is a video from the premier at the vGeek party:
.nick
*update*
Here are the lyrics for the song for those that asked:
I’m with Chad’s Army on the virtual patrol
Gotta make sure that my cloud is gold
Analysts say we hit it onn the nose
You from the IT department, Im tha C.I.O.
Adding Ram for your JAVA code
We be celebrating the budget had enough dough
CAP-EX, OP-EX is outa control..
Tweetin’ banana bread because Wade said so
We got beef with security, they don’t use RSA
They don’t know ‘bout no S.L.A. SO!
Tier-1 apps running on my assets
vSphere saves ‘em cash for tech refresh,
We don’t know what you take us as,
Or understand the intelligence that Sak-kac has
We are the vSpecialist crew we get the job done…[Chorus]
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done[Verse Two]
The year’s twenty-ten you’ve gots problems again.
Better journey to cloud just like John Glenn
You gots two choices, yall virtualize or
Drop some cash on some datacenter floor
Now I ain’t trying to start a backup race
Data Domain and Avamar will win that race So
I have a meeting with my database guy He says
“I don’t get it… why virtualize?”
Cause it’s fast an’ efficient and it saves me dough and it gives me much mo’
rackspace on my flo’
Should we P2V or should I guess some mo’?
“Well you was runnin’ 10000 vm’s on a vBlock and more “License of application
and step off the console”…
“Are you got a MacBook on you I know a lot of you do”
Yah, Im in Chad’s Army and I know a little bit…
Enough that you won’t login to my kit…
“We’ll see how smart you are when the competitors come”
We are the vSpecialist crew we get the job done…[Chorus]
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done
We’re number #1
vSpecialist we get the job done
What is better than UBER?
UBER version 2.
It has only been 19 days since the original release of the Celerra VSA UBER edition for the masses. The response has been overwhelming and encouraging. And out of that appreciation I am excited to present the Celerra VSA UBER V2 (version 2). It has a host of new features and now features the combined input of the vSpecialist team to put the shine on it.
If you are not familiar with the original feature list with the first UBER version, then go here first.
Here are the new features and enhancements in UBER Version 2:
Couple outstanding issues:
The new downloads are:
Please leave comments with opinions, questions, suggestions, or favorite recipes. The more comments the more inspired I will be to get the next rev out. Or maybe even something new that is not Celerra…
And while you wait for your download, watch this video showing off the new features(go full screen for more detail):
.nick
One of my favorite vExperts, David Davis, made a video walk-through the vSphere Mini Monitor. You can see it here:
