My climb to the VCDX

Deathmage

Essendon,

how's the progress coming along? - it's been quiet the past few weeks.

Essendon

No progress since then. Too much work on my hands leaves no time for this. Good thing is I may have 2 new designs to choose from. We'll see!

QHalo

dave330i wrote: »

Cloud track is still vCD, not vCAC. I would have to pass another VCAP to qualify for VCDX-Cloud. They only accept real design for the cloud track.

you should be able to submit for either. pretty sure colloti said you could

Essendon

Thrown in the towel for the next round of defenses. I'll have an interesting design 6.0 next year, will use that instead. Till then focusing on learning as much Hyper-V/SCVMM/Azure as possible, since I have a big design + deployment coming up..

How are the others coming along? azjag? Architect192? Dave?

kj0

Some really cool things for 6.0 designs. Multiple vCenters are going to make it into my design (Kinda need to with Work) I've had to put my design at work aside for the moment due to other projects, but this has given heaps of time to go through all the VCAP stuff getting ready for VCIX.

Essendon

Really cool = greater potential to trip you up too! Security in 6.0 with the new cert mechanism + PSC and/or LB = another attack front for the panel! Not shying away from the challenge, just saying mate.

kj0

There's certainly a lot of new things in 6.0, but these are allowing more flexibility, so you just need to know your reasoning behind it and defend your decision.

Seeing as I am doing this for work with the intention to use it for VCDX, I think I'm going to have a harder time defending it at work than the Panel :P

You've got this one down, especially after seeing how well laid out your recent posts have been. Maybe Virtual Design Master?

Lets wait and see how VCIX goes (once I find out about VCP...)

Essendon

Yeah totally agree, whatever decision is in there must be defensible. No wrong/right decision, whatever suited at the time. That's the gist of it.

When will you be deploying 6.0? How big, curious.

Haven't had the energy for anything apart from work mate, there's a whole heap on the go. Did sign up for VDM, then chickened out.

You'll kick butt on the VCIXs mate, for sure.

kj0

Didn't have time for VDM this year, I think you should do it though. (You'll have VCDX paid for )

I'm behind the schedule I wanted for having a design together for it. It may not be deployed until This time next year. It will be two Datacenters (2 vCenters), 20 - 30 hosts per DC, Couple of thousand VMs, vShield, maybe some NSX (that is a bit down the track before considering it). It is an Upgrade design which Josh was really keen to see. So might do that.

Essendon

Yeah the VCDX will be paid for, no worries there. A colleague will likely defend this October, will pick his brains too.

That design will do nicely. Lap it up mate!

kj0

haha... I meant by winning VDM :P
There are certainly a lot of people starting to go for it now.

I'm hesitant about NSX as it opens up another topic for them to pull apart and grill you on, especially if that isn't the Silo you opted for. I guess it would depend on what part of NSX you use.

Essendon

Oh, didnt catch that mate

If you are going to put NSX in there mate, you better be prepared!

Deathmage

Awww I thought this post refresh was Manny admitting he was slacking again on his VCDX.

Essendon

Well I have a real design that I can use for my VCDX, so time to dust this thread off, get off my backside and put my plans into motion.

I did an end to end design for a voice deployment project recently, fits into the VCDX blueprint fairly nicely and satisfies most of the requirements. I'll need to embellish it a little bit here and there, but for the most part it makes the cut.

If I slack off again, remind me Trev!

kj0

How we doing Ess? Did you end up going with your voice design that you thought fitted well?

Essendon

Haven't had the energy to work on this mate, 2 x 3 month old bubs are too important than a certification (for now, at least )

jibbajabba

I might have a chance to create a nice vRA7 design so will be using that for the VCDX-CMA

Essendon

Plugged away at this in little bits and pieces here and there, using a different design now. There are now 2 deadlines left for submitting a vSphere 5 based design. Dec 2 and March 10. Highly unlikely I'll make Dec 2, but I'll try as hard as I can. March 10, definitely. If I dont pass the panel defense in these 2 available opportunities, I'll edit the design to be based on vSphere 6 instead (and pass the VCAP6:Design too)

Back to hammering away at the design doc.

slinuxuzer

Or you could always join me in the VCDX-NV pursuit I am also targeting the May Defenses, I suppose you'll be in the APAC defense region though Good luck mate!

tbgree00

My goal is March 10 as well. I've got a design I'm working on right now for work that I'm also adding to for the VCDX. Four application environments with 3 datacenters, SRM protection, RPO 0 storage replication to DR site with sub 5 ms latency. The number of hosts per DC aren't really too impressive and only a total of 60 or so VMs but I'm able to hit PARMS with it. There doesn't seem to be a requirement for massive scale as long as I know how it scales for my defense.

jibbajabba

Main requirement is 'Mission Critical' ... Doesn't really have to be massive.

Essendon

I'm about 70% done and feeling good about my design document. Going to send it out for reviews to multiple people (their time permitting!) to get more input. Good thing is I have the supporting documentation almost ready too.

Some days I feel burnt out, keep reminding myself - it's a marathon, not a sprint and it's worth it. The learning has never been greater.

Other thing is the deadline's March 10 next year. While it's the last date to ever be able to submit a vSphere 5 design for the DCV, there are 3 chances to defend the same design. So if needed, I'll have May, August and October to defend or re-defend.

kj0

Great work. Good to hear you are still chipping away at it.

Essendon

About 80% done. Got VM design and DB services design and some vCenter bits to go. Hit up a number of people asking them for their time to review my doc, luckily most of them have offered to critique it. So glad the vCommunity is very helpful.

If anyone's wondering how many hours I have put into this, I don't know as I don't keep track of the time spent, just the progress I've been making.

As of today, there are 67 days to go.

kj0

Great work bud. You'll get it first submission easy.

bertieb

Great read fella, glad to see you're progressing and progressing well with it by all accounts

Essendon

Thanks gents.

I finished my design document a few days ago and sent it to over 2 dozen people (most of them current VCDXs, some double-VCDX) for review. Two people have come back to me already, great feedback! Working on incorporating it into the document.

Meanwhile - working on the supporting documents. Things are getting feverishly busy.

kj0

Great work bud! Your dedication is inspirational. Not long too go!

Essendon

Thanks guys.

19 days to go. Installation guide's also done. Working on the SOPs and test cases. I think I'm on track.

Essendon

Mad dash to the finish line. 10 days to go. It's going to be incredibly tight.

Analyzing and throwing feedback into the design and other documents as needed.