vSphere 6.0 New Features – Content Library

One of the new feature of vSphere 6 is Content Library . The Content Library provides simple and effective management for VM templates, vApps, ISO images and scripts for vSphere Administrators collectively called “content”.

 

Sometimes we have ISO and other files (needed for VM creation etc) are spread across datastores as multiple administrators are managing vSphere Infrastructure. This can lead to duplication of the contents. To mitigate this issue concept of content library is introduced in vSphere 6.o which allows for a centralized place for storing your contents.

 

Advantage of Content Library

 

The Content Library can be synchronized across sites and vCenter Servers. Sharing consistent templates and files across multiple vCenter Servers in same or different locations brings out consistency, compliance, efficiency and automation in deploying workloads at scale.

 

Following are some of the features of the content library:

 

• Store and manage content - Once central location to manage all content as VM templates, vApps, ISO’s, scripts etc. This release will have a maximum on 10 libraries and 250 items per library and it is a build-in feature in the vCenter Server. Not a plug-in that you will have to install separately.
• Share content – Once the content is published on one vCenter Server, you can subscribe to the content from other vCenter Servers. This looks similar to the catalog option in the vCloud Director.
• Templates – The VM’s will be stored as OVF packages rather than templates. This will affect the template creation process. If you want to make changes to a certain OFV template in the Content Library you have to create a VM out of it first, make the changes and then export it back to an OVF template and into the library.
• Network – The port for communication for the Content Library will be 443 and there is an option to limit the sync bandwidth.
• Storage – The Content Library can be stored on datastores, NFS, CFIS, local disks etc. as long as the path to the library is accessible locally from the vCenter Server and the vCenter Server has read/write permission

 

Creating a Content Library

 

 

Selecting Storage for the Content Library

 

Deploying a Virtual Machine to a Content Library

You can clone virtual machines or virtual machine templates to templates in the content library and use them later to provision virtual machines on a virtual data center, a data center, a cluster, or a host.

 

Publishing a Content Library for External Use

 

You can publish a content library for external use and add password protection by editing the content library settings:

Users access the library through the subscription URL that is system generated.