Data Center Virtualization Certification: VCP6.5-DCV Exam Guide

Book description

Deploy and configure vSphere infrastructure and learn to effectively create and administer vSphere virtual machines

Key Features

  • Implement advanced network virtualization techniques
  • Configure and administer vSphere high availability
  • Enhance your data center virtualization skills with practice questions and mock tests

Book Description

This exam guide enables you to install, configure, and manage the vSphere 6.5 infrastructure in all its components: vCenter Server, ESXi hosts, and virtual machines, while helping you to prepare for the industry standard certification.

This data center book will assist you in automating administration tasks and enhancing your environment's capabilities. You will begin with an introduction to all aspects related to security, networking, and storage in vSphere 6.5. Next, you will learn about resource management and understand how to back up and restore the vSphere 6.5 infrastructure. As you advance, you will also cover troubleshooting, deployment, availability, and virtual machine management. This is followed by two mock tests that will test your knowledge and challenge your understanding of all the topics included in the exam.

By the end of this book, you will not only have learned about virtualization and its techniques, but you'll also be prepared to pass the VCP6.5-DCV (2V0-622) exam.

What you will learn

  • Deploy and configure vSphere infrastructure
  • Create and administer vSphere virtual machines
  • Optimize, secure, and troubleshoot all vSphere components
  • Implement vSphere HA on a vSAN cluster
  • Understand how to back up and restore your vSphere 6.5 infrastructure
  • Test your understanding of key concepts required through sample questions

Who this book is for

If you are interested in achieving Data Center Virtualization certification, this is the book is for you. You will also benefit from this book if you are a system administrator or network engineer. Some prior knowledge of virtualization can assist you in understanding key concepts covered in the book.

Publisher resources

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Table of contents

  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright and Credits
    1. Data Center Virtualization Certification: VCP6.5-DCV Exam Guide
  3. Packt Upsell
    1. Why subscribe?
    2. PacktPub.com
  4. Contributors
    1. About the authors
    2. About the reviewer
    3. Packt is searching for authors like you
  5. Preface
    1. Who this book is for
    2. What this book covers
    3. To get the most out of this book
      1. Download the color images
      2. Conventions used
    4. Get in touch
      1. Reviews
  6. Configuring and Administering vSphere 6.x Security
    1. Objective 1.1 – Configure and administer role-based access control
      1. Compare and contrast propagated and explicit permission assignments
      2. View/sort/export user and group lists
      3. Add/modify/remove permissions for users and groups on vCenter Server inventory objects
      4. Determine how permissions are applied and inherited in vCenter Server
      5. Create/clone/edit vCenter Server Roles
      6. Configure VMware Identity Sources
      7. Apply a role to a user/group and to an object or group of objects
      8. Change permission validation settings
      9. Determine the appropriate set of privileges for common tasks in vCenter Server
      10. Compare and contrast default system/sample roles
      11. Determine the correct permissions needed to integrate vCenter Server with other VMware products
    2. Objective 1.2 – Secure ESXi and vCenter Server 2
      1. Configure encrypted vMotion
      2. Describe ESXi Secure Boot
      3. Harden ESXi hosts
        1. Enable/configure/disable services in the ESXi firewall
        2. Change ESXi default account access
        3. Add an ESXi Host to a directory service
        4. Apply permissions to ESXi Hosts using Host Profiles
        5. Enable Lockdown Mode
        6. Control access to hosts (DCUI/Shell/SSH/MOB)
      4. Harden vCenter Server
        1. Control datastore browser access
        2. Create/Manage vCenter Server Security Certificates
        3. Control MOB access
        4. Change vCenter default account access
        5. Restrict administrative privileges
      5. Understand the implications of securing a vSphere environment
    3. Objective 1.3 – Configure and Enable SSO and Identity Sources
      1. Describe PSC architecture and components
      2. Differentiate available authentication methods with VMware vCenter
      3. Perform a multi-site PSC installation
      4. Configure/manage identity sources
      5. Configure/manage platform services controller (PSC)
      6. Configure/manage VMware Certificate Authority (VMCA)
      7. Enable/disable SSO users
      8. Upgrade a single/complex PSC installation
      9. Configure SSO policies
      10. Add an ESXi host to an AD domain
      11. Configure and manage KMS for VM encryption
    4. Objective 1.4 – Secure vSphere Virtual Machines
      1. Enable/disable VM encryption
      2. Describe VM Secure Boot
      3. Harden virtual machine access
      4. Control VMware Tools installation
      5. Control VM data access
        1. Configure virtual machine security policies
      6. Harden a virtual machine against DoS attacks
        1. Control VM-VM communications
        2. Control VM device connections
        3. Configure network security policies
      7. Configure VM encrypted vMotion
    5. What is missing
    6. Review questions
    7. Summary
  7. Configure and Administer vSphere 6.x Networking
    1. Objective 2.1 – Configure policies/features and verify vSphere networking
      1. Creating/deleting a vSphere Distributed Switch
      2. Adding/removing ESXi hosts from a vSphere Distributed Switch
      3. Adding/configuring/removing dvPort groups
      4. Adding/removing uplink adapters to dvUplink groups
      5. Configuring vSphere Distributed Switch general and dvPort group settings
      6. Creating/configuring/removing virtual adapters
      7. Migrating virtual machines to/from a vSphere Distributed Switch
      8. Configuring LACP on vDS given design parameters
      9. Describing vDS Security policies/settings
      10. Configuring dvPort group blocking policies
      11. Configuring load balancing and failover policies
      12. Configuring VLAN/PVLAN settings for VMs given communication requirements
      13. Configuring traffic shaping policies
      14. Enabling TCP Segmentation Offload support for a virtual machine
      15. Enabling jumbo frames support on appropriate components
      16. Recognizing the behavior of vDS auto-rollback
      17. Configuring vDS across multiple vCenters to support Long Distance vMotion
      18. Comparing and contrasting vSphere Distributed Switch capabilities
      19. Configuring multiple VMkernel Default Gateways
      20. Configuring ERSPAN
      21. Creating and configure custom TCP/IP Stacks
      22. Configuring Netflow
    2. Objective 2.2 – Configuring Network I/O control (NIOC)
      1. Explaining NIOC capabilities
      2. Configuring NIOC shares/limits based on VM requirements
      3. Explaining the behavior of a given NIOC setting
      4. Determining Network I/O Control requirements
      5. Differentiating Network I/O Control capabilities
      6. Enabling/Disable Network I/O Control
      7. Monitoring Network I/O Control
    3. What is missing
    4. Review questions
    5. Summary
  8. Configure and Administer vSphere 6.x Storage
    1. Objective 3.1 – Managing vSphere integration with physical storage
      1. Performing NFS v3 and v4.1 configurations
      2. Discovering new storage LUNs
      3. Configuring FC/iSCSI/FCoE LUNs as ESXi boot devices
      4. Mounting an NFS share for use with vSphere
      5. Enabling/configuring/disabling vCenter Server storage filters
      6. Configuring/editing hardware/dependent hardware initiators
      7. Enabling/disabling software iSCSI initiator
      8. Configuring/editing software iSCSI initiator settings
      9. Configuring iSCSI port binding
      10. Enabling/configuring/disabling iSCSI CHAP
      11. Determining use cases for Fiber Channel zoning
      12. Comparing and contrasting array thin provisioning and virtual disk thin provisioning
    2. Objective 3.2 – Configure software-defined storage
      1. Creating vSAN cluster
      2. Creating disk groups
      3. Monitoring vSAN
      4. Describing vVOLs
      5. Understanding a vSAN iSCSI target
      6. Explaining vSAN and vVOL architectural components
        1. vSAN architecture
        2. vVOL architecture
      7. Determining the role of storage providers in vSAN
      8. Determining the role of storage providers in vVOLs
      9. Explaining vSAN failure domains functionality
      10. Configuring/managing VMware vSAN
      11. Creating/modifying VMware Virtual Volumes
      12. Configuring storage policies
      13. Enabling/disabling vSAN Fault Domains
      14. Creating Virtual Volumes given the workload and availability requirements
      15. Collecting vSAN Observer output
      16. Creating storage policies appropriate for given workloads and availability requirements
      17. Configuring vVOLs Protocol Endpoints
    3. Objective 3.3 – Configure vSphere Storage multipathing and failover
      1. Explaining common multi-pathing components
      2. Differentiating APD and PDL states
      3. Comparing and contrasting active optimized versus active non-optimized port group states
      4. Explaining features of Pluggable Storage Architecture (PSA)
      5. Understanding the effects of a given claim rule on multipathing and failover
      6. Explaining the function of claim rule elements
      7. Changing the path selection policy using the UI
      8. Determining required claim rule elements to change the default PSP
      9. Determining the effect of changing PSP on multipathing and failover
      10. Determining the effects of changing SATP on relevant device behavior
      11. Configuring/managing storage load balancing
      12. Differentiating available storage load balancing options
      13. Differentiating available storage multipathing policies
      14. Configuring storage policies including vSphere storage APIs for storage awareness
      15. Locating failover events in the UI
    4. Objective 3.4 – Perform VMFS and NFS configurations and upgrades
      1. Performing VMFS v5 and v6 configurations
      2. Describing VAAI primitives for block devices and NAS
      3. Differentiating VMware filesystem technologies
      4. Migrating from VMFS5 to VMFS6
      5. Differentiating physical mode RDMs and virtual mode RDMs
      6. Creating a virtual/physical mode RDM
      7. Differentiating NFS 3.x and 4.1 capabilities
      8. Comparing and contrasting VMFS and NFS datastore properties
      9. Configuring Bus Sharing
      10. Configuring multi-writer locking
      11. Connecting an NFS 4.1 datastore using Kerberos
      12. Creating/renaming/deleting/unmounting VMFS datastores
      13. Mounting/unmounting an NFS datastore
      14. Extending/expanding VMFS datastores
      15. Placing a VMFS datastore in maintenance mode
      16. Selecting the preferred path/disabling a path to a VMFS datastore
      17. Enabling/disabling vStorage API for array integration (VAAI)
      18. Determining a proper use case for multiple VMFS/NFS datastores
    5. Objective 3.5 – Set up and configure Storage I/O Control
      1. Describing the benefits of SIOC
      2. Enabling and configuring SIOC
      3. Configuring/managing SIOC
      4. Monitoring SIOC
      5. Differentiating between SIOC and dynamic queue depth throttling features
      6. Determining a proper use case for SIOC
      7. Comparing and contrasting the effects of I/O contention in environments with and without SIOC
      8. Understanding SIOC metrics for datastore clusters and Storage DRS
    6. What is missing
    7. Review questions
    8. Summary
  9. Upgrade a vSphere Deployment to 6.x
    1. Objective 4.1 – Perform ESXi Host and Virtual Machine Upgrades
      1. Updating manager
      2. Configuring download source(s)
      3. Setting up UMDS to set up download repository
      4. Importing ESXi images
      5. Creating baselines and/or baseline groups
      6. Attaching baselines to vSphere objects
      7. Scanning vSphere
      8. Staging patches and extensions
      9. Remediating an object
      10. Upgrading a vSphere Distributed Switch
      11. Upgrading VMware Tools
      12. Upgrading virtual machine hardware
      13. Upgrading an ESXI host by using vCenter Update Manager
      14. Staging multiple ESXI host upgrades
      15. Aligning appropriate baselines with target inventory objects
    2. Objective 4.2 – Perform vCenter Server Upgrades (Windows)
      1. Comparing the methods of upgrading vCenter Server
        1. Upgrading vCenter Server 5.5 on Windows
        2. Upgrading vCenter Server 6.0 on Windows
        3. Mixed platform upgrades
      2. Backup vCenter Server database, configuration and certificate datastore
        1. Backup the Windows vCenter Server
        2. Backup the vCSA
      3. Performing updates as prescribed
      4. Upgrading vCenter Server
      5. Determining the upgrade compatibility of an environment
      6. Determining correct order of steps to upgrade a vSphere implementation
    3. Objective 4.3 – Perform vCenter Server migration to VCSA
      1. Migrating to vCSA
      2. Understanding the migration paths to the vCSA
        1. Migrating from 5.5 to 6.5 with embedded PSC
        2. Migrating from 5.5 to 6.5 with external PSC
    4. Review questions
    5. Summary
  10. Administer and Manage vSphere 6.x Resources
    1. Objective 5.1 – Configure multilevel Resource Pools
      1. Determining the effect of the expandable reservation parameter on resource allocation
      2. Creating a Resource Pool hierarchical structure
      3. Configuring custom Resource Pool attributes
      4. Determining how Resource Pools apply to vApps
      5. Creating/removing a Resource Pool
      6. Adding/removing VMs from a Resource Pool
      7. Determining appropriate shares, reservations, and limits for hierarchical Resource Pools
    2. Objective 5.2 – Configure vSphere DRS and Storage DRS clusters
      1. Adding/removing Host DRS Group
      2. Adding/removing a virtual machine DRS group
      3. Managing DRS affinity/anti-affinity rules
        1. Creating a VM-VM affinity rule
        2. Creating a VM-Host affinity rule
        3. Configuring the proper DRS automation level based on a set of business requirements
        4. Backup a resource pool tree
        5. Restoring a resource pool tree
      4. Explaining how DRS affinity rules effect virtual machine placement
        1. VM-Host affinity rule
        2. VM-VM affinity rule
      5. Understanding network DRS
      6. Differentiating load balancing policies
        1. Host network saturation threshold
        2. Monitoring host network utilization
      7. Describing Predictive DRS
      8. Storage DRS Cluster
    3. Review questions
    4. Summary
  11. Backup and Recover a vSphere Deployment
    1. Objective 6.1 – Configure and Administer vCenter Appliance Backup/Restore
      1. Configuring vCSA File-based backup and restore
      2. Defining supported backup targets
    2. Objective 6.2 – Configure and administer vCenter Data Protection
      1. Deploying VDP application agents
      2. Differentiating VMware Data Protection's capabilities
      3. Explaining VMware data protection sizing guidelines
      4. Creating/deleting/consolidating virtual machine snapshots
      5. Installing and configuring VMware Data Protection
      6. Creating a backup job with VMware Data Protection
      7. Backing up/restoring a virtual machine with VMware Data Protection
    3. Objective 6.3 – Configure vSphere Replication
      1. Comparing and contrasting vSphere Replication compression methods
      2. Configuring a recovery point objective (RPO) for a protected virtual machine
      3. Managing snapshots on recovered virtual machines
      4. Installing/configuring/upgrading vSphere Replication
      5. Replication Configure VMware Certificate Authority (VMCA) integration with vSphere
      6. Configuring vSphere Replication for single/multiple VMs
      7. Recovering a VM using vSphere Replication
      8. Performing a failback operation using vSphere Replication
      9. Deploying a pair of vSphere Replication virtual appliances
    4. Review questions
    5. Summary
  12. Troubleshoot a vSphere Deployment
    1. Objective 7.1 – Troubleshoot vCenter Server and ESXi hosts
      1. Understanding the VCSA monitoring tool
      2. Monitoring status of the vCenter Server services
      3. Performing basic maintenance of a vCenter Server database
      4. Monitoring status of ESXi management agents
      5. Determining ESXi host stability issues and gather diagnostics information
      6. Monitoring ESXi system health
      7. Locating and analyze the vCenter Server and ESXi logs
      8. Determining appropriate commands for troubleshooting
      9. Troubleshooting common ESXi/vCenter issues
    2. Objective 7.2 – Troubleshoot vSphere storage and networking
      1. Identifying and isolating network and storage resource contention and latency issues
      2. Verifyinging network and storage configuration
      3. Verifying that a given virtual machine is configured with the correct network resources
      4. Monitoring/troubleshooting Storage Distributed Resource Scheduler (SDRS) issues
      5. Recognizing the impact of network and storage I/O control configurations
      6. Recognizing a connectivity issue caused by a VLAN/PVLAN
      7. Troubleshooting common storage and networking issues
    3. Objective 7.3 – Troubleshooting vSphere Upgrades and Migrations
      1. Collecting upgrade diagnostic information
      2. Recognizing common upgrade and migration issues with vCenter Server and vCenter Server Appliances
      3. Creating/locating VMware log bundles
      4. Determining alternative methods to upgrade ESXi hosts in the event of a failure
      5. Configuring vCenter Server logging options
    4. Objective 7.4 – Troubleshooting virtual machines
      1. Monitoring CPU and memory usage
      2. Identifying and isolate CPU and memory contention issues
      3. Recognizing the impact of using CPU/memory limits, reservations, and shares
      4. Describing and differentiate critical performance metrics
      5. Describing and differentiate common metrics
      6. Monitoring performance through esxtop
      7. Troubleshooting Enhanced vMotion Compatibility (EVC) issues
      8. Comparing and contrast the Overview and Advanced Charts
    5. Objective 7.5 – Troubleshoot HA and DRS configurations and Fault Tolerance
      1. Troubleshooting common HA and DRS issues
        1. HA configuration
        2. HA Admission Control
        3. HA networking
        4. DRS configuration
        5. DRS workload balancing
        6. Fault Tolerance configuration
      2. Explaining the DRS Resource Distribution Graph and Target/Current Host Load Deviation
      3. Explaining vMotion Resource Maps
    6. What is missing
    7. Review questions
    8. Summary
  13. Deploy and Customize ESXi Hosts
    1. Objective 8.1 – Configure Auto Deploy for ESXi hosts
      1. Describe the components and architecture of an Auto Deploy environment
      2. Implement Host Profiles with an Auto Deploy of an ESXi host
      3. Install and configure Auto Deploy
      4. Deploy multiple ESXi hosts using Auto Deploy
      5. Explaining the Auto Deploy deployment model needed to meet a business requirement
    2. Objective 8.2 – Create and Deploy Host Profiles
      1. Editing answer file to customize ESXi host settings
      2. Modifying and applying a storage path selection plugin (PSP) to a device using host profiles
      3. Modifying and applying switch configurations across multiple hosts using a host profile
      4. Creating/editing/removing a host profile from an ESXi host
      5. Importing/exporting a Host Profile
      6. Attaching and apply a Host Profiles to ESXi hosts in a cluster
      7. Performing compliance scanning and remediation of ESXi hosts and clusters using Host Profiles
      8. Enabling or disabling Host Profiles components
    3. Review questions
    4. Summary
  14. Configure and Administer vSphere and vCenter Availability Solutions
    1. Objective 9.1 – Configure vSphere HA cluster features
      1. Modify vSphere HA cluster settings
      2. Configure a network for use with HA heartbeats
      3. Apply an admission control policy for HA
      4. Enable/disable vSphere HA settings
      5. Configure different heartbeat datastores for a HA cluster
      6. Apply virtual machine monitoring for a cluster
      7. Configure Virtual Machine Component Protection (VMCP) settings
      8. Implement vSphere HA on a vSAN cluster
      9. Explain how vSphere HA communicates with distributed resource scheduler and distributed power management
    2. Objective 9.2 – Configure vCSA HA
      1. Enable and Configure vCSA HA
      2. Understand and describe the architecture of vCSA HA
    3. Review questions
    4. Summary
  15. Administer and Manage vSphere Virtual Machines
    1. Create and manage vSphere Virtual Machines and templates
      1. Determine how using a shared USB device impacts the environment 
      2. Configure virtual machines for vGPUs, DirectPath I/O and SR-IOV
      3. Configure virtual machines for multicore vCPUs
      4. Differentiate virtual machine configuration settings
      5. Interpret virtual machine configuration file (.vmx) settings
      6. Enable/disable advanced virtual machine settings
    2. Create and manage a content library
      1. Publish a content catalog
      2. Subscribe to a published catalog
      3. Determine which privileges are required to globally manage a content catalog
      4. Compare the functionality of automatic sync and an on-demand sync
      5. Configure content library to work across sites
      6. Configure content library authentication
      7. Set/configure content library roles
      8. Add/remove content libraries
    3. Consolidate physical workloads using VMware vCenter Converter
      1. Install vCenter Converter standalone instance
      2. Convert physical workloads using vCenter Converter
      3. Modify server resources during conversion
      4. Interpret and correct errors during conversion
      5. Deploy a physical host as a virtual machine using vCenter Converter
      6. Collect diagnostic information during the conversion operation
      7. Resize partitions during the conversion process
      8. Determine which virtual disk format to use
    4. Review questions
    5. Summary
  16. Mock Exam 1
    1. Mock exam 1
      1. Configure and administer vSphere 6.x security
      2. Configure and administer vSphere 6.x networking
      3. Configure and administer vSphere 6.x storage
      4. Upgrade a vSphere Deployment to 6.x
      5. Administer and manage vSphere 6.x Resources
      6. Backup and recover a vSphere Deployment
      7. Troubleshoot a vSphere Deployment
      8. Deploy and customize ESXi Hosts
      9. Configure and administer vSphere and vCenter Availability Solutions
      10. Administer and manage vSphere Virtual Machines
    2. Summary
  17. Mock Exam 2
    1. Mock exam 2
    2. Checking your answers
    3. Summary
  18. Understanding VMware Certification Paths
    1. Certification paths
      1. Certification levels
    2. Certification life cycle
    3. Some demographics data
    4. Most required certifications
    5. Certification versus accreditation or awards
    6. Summary
  19. VCP6.5-DCV Certification
    1. Certification paths
      1. No VCP certification
        1. Required training courses
        2. Exams to pass
      2. Holding an active VCP5-DCV or VCP6-DCV
        1. Recommended training courses
        2. Exams to pass
      3. Holding an expired VCP-DCV
        1. Required training courses
        2. Exams to pass
      4. Holding an active VCP in a different path
        1. Recommended training courses
        2. Exams to pass
      5. Order of the different steps
      6. Certification benefits
      7. What's next?
    2. Summary
  20. Before, During, and After the Exam
    1. Before the exam
      1. Attending a course
      2. Studying by yourself
        1. Books
        2. Videos
        3. Online resources
      3. Hands-on Labs
      4. Checking your exam preparation
        1. Mock exams
    2. During the exam
      1. Which exam to take
        1. Foundation exam
        2. VMware Certified Professional 6.5 - Data Center Virtualization exam
        3. VMware Certified Professional 6.5 - Data Center Virtualization Delta exam
      2. Types of questions
      3. Time management
      4. Foreign language notes
    3. After the exam
      1. Scoring in VMware exams
        1. What's next?
    4. Summary
  21. Other Books You May Enjoy
    1. Leave a review - let other readers know what you think

Product information

  • Title: Data Center Virtualization Certification: VCP6.5-DCV Exam Guide
  • Author(s): Andrea Mauro, Paolo Valsecchi
  • Release date: August 2018
  • Publisher(s): Packt Publishing
  • ISBN: 9781789340471