VMware Studio

Authoring and Management

Studio.  Enables ISVs to build customized virtual appliances, preconfiguring various services provided by VMware Infrastructure for management and maintenance of virtual appliances. Studio provides both a Web interface and a command line interface to build virtual appliances. The Web interface offers ease of use while the command line interface provides integration of existing ISV build systems for fully automated virtual appliance builds.

Web‐based Authoring Tool.  Provides a GUI to build, check build status and review build history of virtual appliances and related update repository.

StudioCLI.  Provides a Command‐line interface to build, check build status and delete builds of virtual appliances and related update repository.

Virtual Appliance Management Infrastructure (VAMI).  Provides virtual appliances built with VMware Studio an in‐guest management component based on the Common Information Model (CIM). For more information on CIM standards, see www.dmtf.org/standards/cim/. VAMI provides:

Web‐based Management Console.  Enables end users to configure, manage and monitor their virtual appliances. For example, end users can change network settings, check for and install updates, and change update settings to enable automatic installation of updates. The web interface is an AJAX application and communicates with the management agent using CIM APIs. A lightweight resource‐constrained Web server (lighttpd) is installed in the virtual appliance to host the Web interface application.

VAMICLI.  Allows end users to use a command line to configure, manage and monitor their virtual appliance.

Small Footprint CIM Broker (SFCB).  Acts as a management agent for virtual appliances. SFCB is a CIM server.

Published CIM APIs.  Integrates VMware Studio services with central management software such as Tivoli and HP Openview.

Management Services.  Supplies the following CIM providers:

• The update service simplifies the maintenance of a virtual appliance by automatically or manually applying updates from a remote repository. VMware vCenter Update Manager integrates with the update service to allow centralized management of virtual appliance updates.
• The network service allows end users to configure their network and proxy settings.
• The system service provides basic system information and allows shutdown and reboot of the virtual appliance.

OVF Support

Secure Distribution. Content verification and integrity checking based on industry-standard public key infrastructure are supported in OVF, and it provides a basic scheme for the management of software licensing.

Optimal Customer Experience. OVF supports validation of the entire package and each virtual machine or metadata component of OVF during the installation phase of the virtual machine life cycle management process.

Vendor/Platform Independence. OVF supports the full range of virtual hard disk formats used for hypervisors today and does not rely on the use of a specific host platform, virtualization platform, or guest operating system.

Extensibility. OVF is designed to be extended as the industry moves forward with virtual appliance technology. It also supports and permits encoding of vendor-specific metadata for vertical markets.

Localization Support. OVF supports user-visible descriptions in multiple locales, and it supports localization of the interactive processes during installation of an appliance. This capability allows a single packaged appliance to serve multiple market opportunities.

Components

Virtual appliances created with VMware Studio have the following components:

• JeOS.  Just Enough Operating System. Virtual appliances built using VMware Studio use the minimal required operating system packages. This ensures that the virtual appliance has a small footprint and is more secure.
• VMware Tools.  VMware Studio bundles a set of VMware tools during the build of virtual appliances. It enables better communication between VMware virtualization platforms and the virtual appliance.
• VAMI.  The in‐guest management component provides a Web console to manage the virtual appliance. VAMI provides the ability to change network settings, update the virtual appliance, and control the state of the system (shutdown/reboot). All management services provided by VAMI are implemented as Common Information Model (CIM) Providers while using Small Footprint CIM Broker (SFCB) as a CIM Manager. CIM is a standard from Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF). For more information on CIM standards, see http://www.dmtf.org/standards/cim/.
• Application  The Software Vendor or Hardware Appliance Vendor creates the application. The application performs the intended task for which the appliance is created.

The virtual appliance can be accessed with one or more of the following:

• Virtual Appliance Web console  This connection provides a Web console to perform administrative and maintenance tasks for the virtual appliance. A command line interface is also available for these tasks.
• VMware vCenter Server  This connection allows the virtual appliance to be integrated with and managed by vCenter Server.
• Third‐party management software  This connection allows any 3rd party management software to manage the virtual appliance.

Seamless VMware Infrastructure Integration

Deploying and Managing Virtual Appliances Created by VMware Studio.  VMware Ready Virtual Appliances created using VMware Studio run seamlessly on VMware products such as VMware Infrastructure, VMware ESXi, VMware Workstation, VMware Fusion and VMware Server, as well as on third-party virtualization products that support the OVF specification. In addition, virtual appliances built with VMware Studio carry an in-guest management framework that provides stand-alone management capabilities for end users to perform administrative tasks such as configuring and updating the appliance. VMware Studio built appliances can also be managed by VMware vCenter individually or in groups by VMware vCenter Update Manager, thereby enabling the update of virtual appliances in a timely, cost-effective manner.

Hypervisor Integration.  VMware Infrastructure and the VMware ESXi hypervisor both provide reliable, robust and secure platforms for running virtual appliances, and can directly import appliances that are distributed as OVF packages. Customers can also use the VMware OVF Tool to convert OVF bundles into the virtual machine format used by "hosted" virtualization software such as VMware Server, VMware Workstation, VMware Player and VMware Fusion. In addition, hypervisor integration makes VMware Ready Virtual Appliances compatible with a broad range of server, storage, networking and I/O hardware, helping appliance vendors to remove sales obstacles while minimizing the compatibility issues associated with "non-standard" hardware and operating systems.

Automated Patch and Update Management.  The VMware Studio authoring tool is tightly integrated with VMware Infrastructure and VMware vCenter, providing an end-to-end update service that simplifies the maintenance of a virtual appliance by providing an update repository where updates can be accessed over a network or the Internet, automatically, or manually. VMware vCenter Update Manager, a component of VMware Infrastructure, integrates with the update service to allow centralized management of virtual appliance updates. The service also allows for customization so that customers can configure their network settings, check for updates and install updates.

Failover, Load Balancing, and Disaster Recovery.  Along with a robust hypervisor and centralized management capabilities, VMware Infrastructure also provides virtual machines with hardware-independent failover, load balancing, and disaster recovery capabilities that help customers to ensure the highest levels of service availability for their virtual appliances without the cost and complexity of traditional Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery and clustering solutions. These features make it possible to:

• Detect OS-related failures and automatically restart virtual machines.
• Move virtual appliances to another host with no downtime in the event of hardware failure.
• Dynamically allocate hardware resources to appliances based on service level guarantees.
• Implement site-wide disaster recovery without duplicate hardware.