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vExpert 2023 – Subprogram Nominations

VMware annually grants the vExpert award to individuals who have made a special contribution to the VMware community. This can be either through publications, presentations, blogs, or work in the VMware User Group (VMUG). I am pleased to be part of the vExpert community for the seventh year in a row in 2023.

In addition to the common vExpert, there are subprograms for specialized application branches.

I applied for the three sub-programs vExpertPro, Application-Modernization and Multi-Cloud and was accepted in all three categories.

vExpertPro

The mission of the vExpert PRO program is to create a global network of vExperts willing to find new vExperts in their local communities, support them, and mentor them on their way to becoming vExperts.

For this purpose, vExpertPro exist in many regions of the world. I have been a member of this group since 2021 myself and have been confirmed for another year.

vExpert Multi-Cloud

The multi-cloud area covers large parts of the VMware Compute portfolio. The term cloud includes not only the public cloud, but also local data centers (private cloud) and combinations of both approaches (hybrid cloud). This includes numerous products such as vSphere, vSAN, VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF), Aria, VMware Cloud on AWS, Site Recovery Manager (SRM) or vCloud Director (VCD).

I submitted my first application for this relatively new vExpert path in 2023 and was accepted. Many thanks to the business unit for the decision.

vExpert Application Modernization

Application Modernization is all about Tanzu and Kubernetes, as well as the ecosystem around these technologies. The background was described in great detail by Keith Lee in his article “Announcing the VMware Application Modernization vExpert Program 2023“.

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Update Tanzu Workload Management

This is a brief guide on how to upgrade Tanzu Workload Management within the vSphere cluster.

Kubernetes Release and Patch Cycles

Kubernetes versions are specified as x.y.z following Semantic Versioning terminology, where x is the major version, y is the minor version, and z is the patch version. For example, v1.22.6 denotes a minor version 22 with patch level 6. Minor versions are released approximately every 3-4 months. In the meantime, there are several patches within the minor version.

The Kubernetes project maintains release branches for the last three minor versions (1.24, 1.23, 1.22). Since Kubernetes 1.19, newer versions receive patch support for about a year. So keeping the Kubernetes versions in Tanzu up to date is highly recommended.

Step 1 – Update vCenter

This step is not mandatory, but recommended. Updates on vCenter are often accompanied by a new Kubernetes versions. You can see notifications about updates in the vSphere Client.

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Upgrade of a K3s Lightweight Kubernetes Cluster

K3s is a lightweight, highly available open source Kubernetes cluster platform designed for easy and resource-efficient installation. K3s is provided in a package of less than 60 MB. The package is optimized for ARM platforms and can therefore also be run on hardware such as a Raspberry Pi, or as a guest VM on ESXi-on-ARM.

Prerequisites and collection of information

K3s is a cluster solution. That is why the order in which the nodes are updated is important. The update starts on the master node. So first we need to find out which node has this role. The easiest way to do this is with a kubectl command:

kubectl get node
NAME STATUS ROLES AGE VERSION
k3node1.lab.local Ready master 2y43d v1.19.3+k3s3
k3node2.lab.local Ready none 2y42d v1.19.3+k3s3
k3node3.lab.local Ready none 2y42d v1.19.3+k3s3

From the output above we see my three K3s nodes with FQDN, status, role, age and version. So here k3node1 has the master role.

As an alternative, you can also execute the command in verbose mode:

kubectl get node -o wide
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Heads-up: Linux Start- and Reboot-Issues with Maxtang NX6412 solved

Cohesity vExpert gift

I recently became the owner of a Maxtang NX6412-B11 Mini PC. Cohesity gave away these barebones to vExperts at the VMware Explore EMEA in Barcelona. Once again a big thank you to Cohesity for their support of the community!

The fanless MiniPC with Elkhart Lake chipset is well-equipped. It has 2x 1 Gbit LAN, 1x USB-C (front), 2x USB 3.2 (front), 2x USB 2.0, 2x HDMI 2.0, and an audio jack.

Featured ports on the rear side.

The MiniPC will be a great addition to my homelab. I had intended to install the Tanzu community edition for it. Unfortunately, the project has since been discontinued by VMware and the removal of the packages from GitHub has been announced. 🙁

Hardware finish

The barebone still had to be provided with RAM and a flash disk. I installed a Samsung SSD 860 EVO Series 1TB M.2 SATA and two SO-DIMM DDR4 3200 16 GB from Crucial.

Reboot Issues with Linux

With the SATA SSD and the RAM, the machine was ready to boot. Ubuntu 22.04 LTS was used as operating system. After installation, a usual reboot was requested. However, the PC did not shut down completely and remained in the “Reached target shutdown” state. The PC had to be powered off hard. The reboot also took several minutes, which is very unusual for Ubuntu. To rule out the possibility that the problem is specific to Ubuntu, I tried an installation with Fedora. The result was exactly the same here too.

The solution

After a lengthy search, I found a clue that was specific to the EHL hardware platform. The fix is to disable a kernel module for the Intel Elkhart Lake SoC chipset. This can be done by adding it to the blacklist.conf file.

sudo vi /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

The line below must be added to blacklist.conf:

blacklist pinctrl_elkhartlake

Quit the vi editor with [ESC] [:] wq! (save and exit)

update-initramfs –u

The next shutdown was still delayed, but after a cold boot the OS came up within a few seconds.

I hope this hint helps someone – especially my vExpert colleagues who received the Cohesity gift too. Sharing is caring. 🙂