Configure VMware Virtual Infrastructure Alarms

Network Administration - VMware Virtual Infrastructure Alarms function to perform an action when a VMware event occurs.

Alarm (notification) can be configured at various levels, such as VMware server, Virtual Machine (virtual machine), Datacenter (data center), and Cluster. We can only use the Alarm feature when using the VMware VirtualCenter and Virtual Infrastructure Suite. If you're managing a separate ESXi or ESX server, we won't be able to enable this feature.

Typically, when creating an Alarm means that we want the VirtualCenter to display a notification whenever an event occurs in a virtual data center, in a resource or Cluster area, on an ESX server or on a machine. Virtual VMware certain.

Alarms of VMware Virtual Center are configured in the Alarms tab of VMware Virtual Infrastructure workstation (VI) connected to a VirtualCenter server. In this tab, we will see two views, including Triggered Alarms and Definitions (this is where the Alarm is defined).

What level of Alarm should we create at Virtual Infrastructure?

As mentioned above, we can configure VMware Alarm at many levels of VI, we can create Alarms at:

1. Datacenter (Data center)
2. Folder (Folder)
3. Resource Pool
4. ESX Host (ESX Server)
5. VM Guest (Guest virtual machine)

However, what level do we need to configure them? This depends on what we want it to do. Usually Alarms are configured with levels from the server or client, and we can also configure them for all servers or clients in a Folder , Datacenter , or Resource Pool .

Once you have selected the appropriate level, we will proceed to define Alarm.

Definition VMware Virtual Infrastructure Alarm first

Before creating a new Alarm, in VMware Virtual Infrastructure, there are a number of default alarms available. Figure 2 shows the list of these default alarms.



As we can see from the Name and Descriptions column of these default alarms, they are configured to manage both the server and the workstation. The default three alarms for the server will notify in case ESX loses master connections, when the OSX server uses multiple CPUs, and when the OSX server uses more memory. Two default alarms for Virtual Machine will display a notification when the virtual machine uses a lot of CPU and memory.

These default alarms can be adjusted to the desired level. In Figure 2, the default Alarms are defined as Lad Datacenters in the Defined In area. If you click on Datacenters, you will see the level of Datacenters sseer that can correct these alarms. Notice the message we receive when editing an Alarm at the level that it was not created there.



Now, by default, default alarms will not perform any actions other than creating an entry in the Triggered Alarms window as shown in Figure 4.



So to create an Alarm can perform some actions, instead of just creating an item in Triggered Alarm Log, we can edit the existing default Alarm to perform higher tasks, or create one. New alarm to perform a specific action.

Suppose we want to create a new Alarm definition. First, we will have to access the Alarms tab at the desired level, then click on the Definitions View then right-click on an empty area and select New Alarm as shown in Figure 5.



Then we will see the Alarm Settings window appear. On the General tab, we need to enter information for the Alarm Name and Alarm Description fields, select the type (Type) and select the Enable alarm checkbox. On the Reporting tab, we will set the Tolerance Range. And in the last tab, Actions , we'll define the action for Alarm.

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Suppose to create an alarm for a guest virtual machine that will send a notification to the user if the CPU processes more than 80%. To perform this process, first access the guest virtual machine (VM Guest) in the VI client, click on the Alarms tab, in Alarm Definitions, right click on New Alarm . Suppose the name for this Alarm is Alert when Vista 1 is down (notify when the Vista 1 is off) and enter the message in the Alarm Description field, then select the Enable this Alarm checkbox to activate.



Then switch to the Triggers tab, on this tab click the Add button to add an Alarm Trigger for Alarm when the virtual machine's CPU handles over 80%.



Next, we will switch to the Actions tab to create an action to send mail to a certain mail address. Note that in Figure 8 we have many options including: email, SMTP Trap, run a script, and turn on / off / hang a guest virtual machine. In addition, it should be noted that the notification method will appear when the trigger changes color.



Done, click OK .

We need to note that for SNMP and Email Alarm to work, the settings of SNMP server and Mail must be configured to support these types of alarms. We can perform configuration for these two servers in the VirtualCenter Management Server Configuration (Figure 9).



Then we can see that the Alarm is successfully launched in the Triggered Alarm panel of the VI client.



Conclude

In this article we learned how to configure VMware Alarms. These Alarms have the function of telling us what is happening on the VMware Virtual Infrastructure system.