The VMguy

I have to tell you what a crazy week it has been.  In the first 48 hours since the vSphere announcements I have presented vSphere 5 times!  (1 customer, 2 partners, 2 events)  The conversation and interest is awesome.  I’m constantly taking a poll on what pieces of functionality gain the most approval or applause from the room.  This is the winner so far:  In vSphere 4.0, VMware has changed their licensing method for activation.  In previous generations (3.5 and before) you had to do the following steps (get some Advil, some of you may have flashbacks from this):

1. Receive activation code in email
2. Go to license portal
3. Generate a new license file
4. Choose server or host based file
5. Select license quantities to activate
6. Download or email license file
7. Install license server if needed
8. Upload license file to license server
9. Re-read license file to server
10. Configure licensing in VC/ESX UI
11. Product activated.

The great news is that this has been drastically simplified in vSphere 4.0.  Licenses are now delivered as 25-character keys.  The procedure now looks like this:

1. Receive license keys in email
2. Enter license key into vSphere Client GUI
3. Assign licenses to ESX hosts
4. Product activated.

Here’s a shot of what the new licensing config looks like in the new vSphere client:

This definitely got the biggest "Thank You" from the audience.  The license server will still be available in vSphere 4.0 so that you have backward compatibility.  For instance, if you wanted to run some ESX 3.5 and some 4.0 together.  vCenter 4.0 will be required to manage both versions of ESX together (vCenter 2.5 cannot manage ESX 4.0 hosts however vCenter 4.0 is backward compatible).

Not a ground-breaking feature by any means, but one solving some pain that customers have felt for a long time.  Enjoy, reports about more of the new features coming soon.  Next up: vCenter Linked Mode