vSphere 8.0 Update 2: Support for read-only VMDK and lot of cool features
Salim Reza
Lifelong Learner | Containerization | Kubernetes | Cloud Computing | Storage Infrastructure | ISO 27001 Lead Auditor | Cybersecurity & Cyber Culture Enthusiast | OpenSource | SRE | VMware | RHEL | IP Network
vSphere 8.0 Update 2 was launched last week at VMware Explore and includes numerous of fascinating new features.
While doing some testing in vSphere 8.0 Update 2 lab, came to know about a really cool feature that has been requested by customers over the years, which is the ability to configure a read-only virtual disk (VMDK). The most common use case for this feature is being able to share a single VMDK across multiple Virtual Machines and prevent any changes to the original data.
Also see this capability get leveraged by users as a way to distribute and install software where traditional application management systems are unavailable but still ensuring that workloads can not manipulate or modify the original files, definitely opens the door for some interesting capabilities.
In vSphere 8.0 Update 2, a new vSphere API feature called guestReadOnly was added to the Virtual Disc specification, which determines whether a VMDK would be presented by the ESXi Hypervisor in R/W (default) or RO mode. (Guess that they deploy PV/PVC type of feature - Will inform after done my explore)
While some guest operating systems (GOS) can provide a similiar behavior, it is not consistent across all operating systems, and it can easily be disabled from within the GOS. The benefit of this new property is that it is exposed at the virtual disk layer, so it cannot be disabled or tampered from within the GOS, which makes this a much better and scalable implementation.
The new guestReadOnly property is only configurable when using the vSphere API and it does have a few requirements:
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- vCenter and ESXi running the upcoming vSphere 8.0 Update 2 release
- VM configured with 8.0 Update 2 VM Compatibility (vHW21)
- Only SCSI-based adapters are supported (no NVME or SATA)
- VM must be powered off for reconfiguration.
Other cool Feature vSphere 8.0 Update 2:
- Enhance Operational Efficiency
- Reduced Downtime Upgrade
- Resilient vCenter Patching
- Non-disruptive Certificate Management
- Reliable Network Configuration Recovery
- vSphere Identity Federation with Azure AD
- Enhanced vSphere Lifecycle Manager vSAN Witness Support
- vSphere Configuration Profiles Draft Management --Cool feature
- Streamlined Windows Guest Customization
- Supercharge Workload Performance
- Improved Placement for GPU Workloads
- Quality of Service for GPU Workloads
- More Vroooom for your VM with Hardware Version 21
- Streamlining Supervisor Cluster Deployments
- Expanding NSX Advanced Load Balancer Support
- Windows VM support for VM Service
- Self-Service VM Image Registry