VMware Horizon

Creating New Storage Policies in Virtual SAN for View 5.3.1 Desktops in Horizon

By Ting Liu, End-User Computing Solution Engineer, VMware

View 5.3.1 and later provide support for VMware Virtual SAN 5.5, a component of VMware vSphere 5.5U1. Using View with Virtual SAN 5.5 reduces the total CapEx of storage by up to 50%, which is a huge plus for businesses big and small.

Note: After this blog was published, View 5.3.2 was released, which included a fix for industry-wide issues with OpenSSL. View 5.3.2 and later are now the only officially supported releases for using Virtual SAN with View.

 

In this blog post, we discuss how to configure storage policies in Virtual SAN for View 5.3.1 desktops. (View desktops in Horizon 6 operate differently.) We already know how to deploy a View pool on Virtual SAN storage. (See the Using a Virtual SAN Datastore in Horizon View section of Horizon View 5.3.1 on VMware Virtual SAN – Quick Start Guide for more.) This blog, on the other hand, shows you how to create a new virtual machine storage policy in Virtual SAN and assign it to the virtual machine template. This can help you keep part of the linked-clone pool’s replica desktop in the SSD storage, which may improve the performance of your linked-clone pool. (For more details on Virtual SAN policies, consult the About Virtual Machine Storage Policies and Working with Virtual SAN chapters in the vSphere Storage guide.)

This blog is split into two parts:

  • How to create a new virtual machine storage policy
  • How to assign this new policy to the virtual machine template

How to Create a New Virtual Machine Storage Policy

To create a new virtual machine storage policy:

1. Open the VMware vSphere Web Client. The Getting Started pane appears.

VMware-vSphere-Web-Client-Getting_started-Pane

Figure 1: VMware vSphere Web Client Getting Started Pane

2. Click Home. The Home pane appears.

Home-Pane-vSphere-Web-Client

Figure 2: Home Pane of vSphere Web Client

3. In the Home pane, under Monitoring, click VM Storage Policies. The VM Storage Policies pane appears.

Fig-3-VM-Storage-Policies-Pane

Figure 3: VM Storage Policies Pane

4. Click the Create a new VM storage policy button to create a new virtual machine storage policy. The Create New VM Storage Policy pane appears.

Create-New-VM-Storage-Policy-Pane

Figure 4: Create New VM Storage Policy Pane

5. Select your vCenter Server, type a Name and Description (optional), then click Next.

Named-VM-Storage-Policy

Figure 5: Named VM Storage Policy

The Rule-Sets pane appears.

Rule-Sets-Pane

Figure 6: Rule-Sets Pane

6. Click Next in the Rule-Sets pane. The Rule-Set 1 pane appears.

7. In the Rule-Set 1 pane, select VSAN in the Rules based on vendor-specific capabilities drop-down menu.

Rule-Set-1-Pane

Figure 7: Rule-Set 1 Pane

8. Open the <Add capability> drop-down menu. There are five kinds of capabilities. You can find descriptions of the five capabilities in the Virtual SAN and Storage Policy-Based Management section of the Working with Virtual SAN chapter in the vSphere Storage guide.

Rule-Set-1-Pane-Five-Capabilities

Figure 8: Rule-Set 1 Pane with Five Capabilities

9. I suggest you add only two capabilities: Flash read cache reservation (%) and Number of failures to tolerate. Flash read cache reservation (%) helps you keep part of the linked-clone pool’s replica desktop in the SSD storage, which may improve the performance of your linked-clone pool. Number of failures to tolerate helps you tolerate more failures, which may improve the reliability of your linked-clone pool. Select Flash read cache reservation (%), type 10, select Number of failures to tolerate, and type 1.

Rule-Set-1-Pane-Flash-Read-Cache-Reservation

Figure 9: Rule-Set 1 Pane, with Flash Read Cache Reservation (%) Capability Added

10. Click Next. The Matching resources pane appears.

Matching-Resources-Pane

Figure 10: Matching Resources Pane

11. Click Next. The Ready to complete pane appears.

Ready-to-Complete-Pane

Figure 11: Ready to Complete Pane

12. Click Finish to complete creating the new virtual machine storage policy. The VM Storage Policies pane reappears. The new policy appears in the Objects pane.

Objects-Pane

Figure 12: Objects Pane

How to Assign This Policy to the Virtual Machine Template

To assign this policy to the virtual machine template:

1. In the vSphere Web Client, select the virtual machine that will be the template of the linked-clone pool (in this case 425GolDes will be the template) and then click the Manage tab. The Settings pane appears. We want to assign the new storage policy to this virtual machine.

Settings-Pane

Figure 13: Settings Pane

2. Click VM Storage Policies. The VM Storage Policies pane appears. By default there is no VM storage policy assigned.

VM-Storage-Policies-Pane

Figure 14: VM Storage Policies Pane

3. Click the Manage VM Storage Policies button in the upper right of the VM Storage Policies pane (see Figure 14). The Manage VM Storage Policies pane appears.

Fig-15-Manage-VM-Storage-Policies-Pane

Figure 15: Manage VM Storage Policies Pane

4. For Home VM storage policy, select the new policy you just created (see Figure 15), and click the Apply to disks button. All disks are assigned the new policy.

All-Disks-Assigned-New-Policy

Figure 16: All Disks Are Assigned the New Policy

5. Click OK. The VM home is also assigned the new policy. When all the disks of a virtual machine are assigned one policy, the VM home will automatically be assigned the policy. (VM home is the virtual machine configuration files, such as .vmx, .vmsd, and .nvram.)

Fig-17-All-VM-Storage-Policies-Change-New-Policy

Figure 17: All the Virtual Machine Storage Policies Change to the New Policy

After you complete these steps, the virtual machine is ready to be the template for your linked-clone pool. When you create your linked-clone pool in the vCenter Settings pane of the Add Desktop Pool wizard, select this virtual machine as your template (see Figure 18).

Creating-Linked-Clone-Template-vCenter-Settings

Figure 18: Creating the Linked-Clone Template in vCenter Settings

Want More?

For more on View 5.3.1 and Virtual SAN 5.5, see Horizon View 5.3.1 Is Here and Supports VMware Virtual SAN and Horizon View 5.3.1 on VMware Virtual SAN – Quick Start Guide.