VMware Clone and udev

[Guest Guest]

Now i know this is abit naughty as your not really suposed to run the free vmware server as a production server but for various reasons, mainly being cost and disaster recovery once im gone (the only *somewhat* linux savvy man in the school/area) thats whats happening, unless someone has a better idea?

 

 

Anyway the idea is I backup the VM by use of the "Advanced VB script for backup of VMs on Windows hosts", which stops the VM, copies the VM files, starts the VM, and then zips the copied files.

Disaster recovery would then be a simple case of unzipping the files and opening them in vmware.

 

Well thanks to udev its not that simple as when the VM is recreated so is the mac address on the eth, causing the network to be down.

 

Easy way to fix it is to simply edit the z25_persistent-net.rules file. Problem is thats not that simple to someone who doesnt know *nix, and hell i was cursing a fair bit at the vi edittor! I should really learn to use it properly but i tend to use an SFTP client... but since the network is down thats no good.

 

 

Can anyone think of a way to correct this without any linux knowledge?

I guess a way to do it is via a script but id prefer it to be even simpler! (Plus i wouldnt know where to start! )

 

My flavour of *nix is debian

 

:beer:

 

 

BTW apparently changing the /etc/network/interfaces file to point to the new eth# (in this case eth1) should also work, but for some reason it didnt for me.

[webman]

Does the VMWare network adapter driver (or VMWare itself) not allow you to change the MAC address?

[Guest Guest]

Not on the GUI, but you've gave me an idea, an idea i really should have before looking too far into the problem. Silly silly man

 

Simple little script, or manual edit of the vmx (VM config) file should do it as it stores the mac in there in plain text.

 

Ill post back.

[Guest Guest]

Yeah thats gunna work. When it says "Do you want to recreate UUIDs?" it just didnt occure to me it would change the mac address, but obviously it would.

So i juts make sure the recovery instructions clearly state NOT to do this

 

 

Cheers, got me there in the end!

[webman]

Good stuff

[mortstar]

Now i know this is abit naughty as your not really suposed to run the free vmware server as a production server...

 

Is this true? I thought VMWare used to sell what became VM Server as GSX. The outlay for Virtual Infrastructure or ESX is pretty steep! (When going from £0).

 

Also, don't they sell support for VMWare Server?

[plexer]

http://www.virtualization.info/2006/12/choosing-between-vmware-server-and-esx.html

 

http://communities.vmware.com/message/590461

 

Lots of people doing it.

 

Ben