VMware finally listened....

The Web Client is faster is 5.5 Update 3, it's about time. It was so painfully slow I just used the normal client even if it had some things missing....However as soon as I upgrade the home-cluster to 6.0 it was blazing fast, glad they backtracked it...

https://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2015/11/significant-performance-improvements-come-to-the-vsphere-web-client-5-5-update-3.html

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markulous

Yeah this was a huge problem. I like the web client's gui, but the response times were just awful.

Deathmage

markulous wrote: »

Yeah this was a huge problem. I like the web client's gui, but the response times were just awful.

I thought it was always just me....

Dakinggamer87

Finally hallelujah that web client was sooo slow!!

gorebrush

Pardon my ignorance, but what do I need to install the Web Client - do I need a full blown VCSA or vSphere server?

markulous

gorebrush wrote: »

Pardon my ignorance, but what do I need to install the Web Client - do I need a full blown VCSA or vSphere server?

You need basically vCenter, SSO, etc. There really isn't anything that's called a "vSphere server". vSphere is just basically the software that manages your hosts, VMs, storage, etc.

I support View more than ESXi or vSphere, but let me know if I need to clarify more or if you have any questions.

See it here: VMware KB: Installing the vSphere Web Client

scaredoftests

I like to run both..

greg9891

Great news!

cs8400

Good news! The web interface has been painful to use w/5.5. I'll have to give it a try.

Deathmage

running VUM tonight to upgrade to 5.5 U3.

Dakinggamer87

@Deathmage: I will check it out at work tomorrow hoping it will be much more improved. Thanks for posting the update

techfiend

I have no experience with 5.5's web client but 6 is pretty sluggish at times, even in chrome. Why did they choose flash instead of html5?

vCenter, while it's pretty powerful seems very heavy for what it is, 7 GB of RAM and dozens of processes just to run it. I think a lot of optimizing is due.

jibbajabba

7GB? Try the appliance, that runs on 16 by default. But I agree, even the 6 client is far from perfect which is actually worse when you rely on RDP (think jump box). Flash and RDP don't go well and in fact, since a recent update the browser turns black on me occasionally when using the web client. Fixed easy enough by minimising and maximising but annoying still.

techfiend

I have vSphere nested in wmware workstation. With 16 GB total I could only afford 10 for the appliance, started with the minimum 8 gb. It took about 15 minutes to boot the vm. After trying to connect for 90 minutes with the web client loading and black screen I gave up and went back to windows. Historically linux is a smaller footprint and postgres has shown to run more effeciently in linux. What gives? Java?

Ditto on the rdp issue, the desktop client console is glitchy too. If it wasn't for the longer history and some useful additional features I don't see how it could compete with hyper-v. I get that esxi is the least emulated hypervisor but my experience has been hyper-v, even nested in a full desktop, is more responsive and throughput is about the same. Granted they aren't under heavy loads. Hopefully they learn from each other.

markulous

@techfiend

The web client page itself is black or it's black when you try to launch the VM from the web console? Before or after the login screen? Flash is required for the web client also, so make sure you've got that updated.

elTorito

Thank the gods!

If you're going to push customers into using something new (by making certain features inaccessible in the vSphere Client), better make sure the new application isn't a piece of S**T.

Also, it's high time that all tech providers STOP developing management GUIs that rely on Flash and Java (Java more so than Flash). Each and every time a critical update comes around, it's another crapshoot whether I can still use all my tools. I'm entirely OK with using the CLI as an alternative, but not all software/hardware comes with one.

techfiend

markulous: I tried again and it worked this time after about 40 minutes. I was mistaken on the black screen, the dcui was black like it should be. The web client showed 'web server initializing'. I changed the CPU's from 2 sockets x 1 vCPU to, 1 socket x 8 vCPU on an FX8320. That may have made the difference. The windows server only takes about 10 minutes to start up, is the appliance usually this much slower to boot?

Deathmage

@Techfiend - your not alone my friend, even in production vCenter takes what seems like forever to load into memory before you can even use vCenter correctly and if you use vROps it's even slower. I've given my vCenter and vROps 20 GB's of RAM and 4 vCPU's with high shares and it still makes no difference, it just take a long ass time to load into memory....

I ponder what vCenter would be like if it sat on SSD's instead of a 15k RAID 10 array or if this is merely a application issue and not hardware.

Dakinggamer87 wrote: »

@Deathmage: I will check it out at work tomorrow hoping it will be much more improved. Thanks for posting the update

Works better but still could be better. I may consider putting vCenter management traffic on it's own vLAN entirely and see if this makes a different for management with RDC and the Web Client.

gorebrush wrote: »

Pardon my ignorance, but what do I need to install the Web Client - do I need a full blown VCSA or vSphere server?

It's all good I'm sure we have ignorance when it comes in CCIE level knowledge, we all have our trades at the moment.

As for the Web Client, basically if you have ESXi installed and you use the vSphere Client to manage your ESXi hosts or vCenter you manage it in the same manner but instead you just type the address of the server or the DNS name into a web browser with the assigned socket/port and access the ESXi hosts or vCenter from a web browser. As this post has shown it is slower than the classical Client and isn't very fluid at all. After you use it you'll see what we mean when we say "our brains move faster than the web client can"...

This is a bit of a dramatization but this trailer of a sloth is a perfect example of vSphere Web Client, anyone that uses it will get a laugh out of it.... it relates so well to it...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3A_pzCUwRA

Usually the URL link, with default settings would be the following: [URL]https://[/URL][IP address or DNS name of vCenter Server]:9443/vsphere-client/

Rick9

Good news, but the real deal is switching to HTML5. Can't wait for it!

techfiend

My virtualized vCenter sits on SSD so it probably doesn't help much. I'm going to point the finger at java. Every java management gui I've used has taken an abnormally long time to start but not minutes like this.

I really think getting introduced to vCenter through VCP6 studying is giving me a negative outlook on VMWare. The desktop client, which is heavily used so far in the VCP5.5 study guides, acts normal and things are in places that make some logical sense. The web client, which is almost exclusive in VCP6, is another story. One big criticism I had during 70-412 studying was having to go through a lot of hoops to implement most of the AD security features, seems vmware has the same issue to a lesser extent. Outside of certain VMware employees does anyone think the web client is good enough to be the defacto standard gui for vSphere? I'm personally frustrated they made this choice. I get that they want it to be accessible without installing a client, still have to install plugins, but the more I work with web clients, the more I despise them.

Deathmage

techfiend wrote: »

My virtualized vCenter sits on SSD so it probably doesn't help much. I'm going to point the finger at java. Every java management gui I've used has taken an abnormally long time to start but not minutes like this.

I really think getting introduced to vCenter through VCP6 studying is giving me a negative outlook on VMWare. The desktop client, which is heavily used so far in the VCP5.5 study guides, acts normal and things are in places that make some logical sense. The web client, which is almost exclusive in VCP6, is another story. One big criticism I had during 70-412 studying was having to go through a lot of hoops to implement most of the AD security features, seems vmware has the same issue to a lesser extent. Outside of certain VMware employees does anyone think the web client is good enough to be the defacto standard gui for vSphere? I'm personally frustrated they made this choice. I get that they want it to be accessible without installing a client, still have to install plugins, but the more I work with web clients, the more I despise them.

I only use the web client for what is needed. Everything else is in the normal client.

Dakinggamer87

techfiend wrote: »

My virtualized vCenter sits on SSD so it probably doesn't help much. I'm going to point the finger at java. Every java management gui I've used has taken an abnormally long time to start but not minutes like this.

I really think getting introduced to vCenter through VCP6 studying is giving me a negative outlook on VMWare. The desktop client, which is heavily used so far in the VCP5.5 study guides, acts normal and things are in places that make some logical sense. The web client, which is almost exclusive in VCP6, is another story. One big criticism I had during 70-412 studying was having to go through a lot of hoops to implement most of the AD security features, seems vmware has the same issue to a lesser extent. Outside of certain VMware employees does anyone think the web client is good enough to be the defacto standard gui for vSphere? I'm personally frustrated they made this choice. I get that they want it to be accessible without installing a client, still have to install plugins, but the more I work with web clients, the more I despise them.

Personally, as a VMware employee I prefer the old school C# desktop client much snappier and efficient. I do my tasks and am in and out similar to what I do in AD. The web client has been improved but I still have times where it lags when doing simple tasks such as adding rules or browsing to some objects it can get hung up.

Dakinggamer87

Deathmage wrote: »

I only use the web client for what is needed. Everything else is in the normal client.

I couldn't agree more!!