VMware vCenter Lab Manager
Simplify management of the internal cloud for dev and test

Overview:

VMware vCenter™ Lab Manager, part of the VMware vCenter family of management products, provides on-demand access and automated management of the internal cloud for dev and test, enabling higher service levels for end users and eliminating repetitive provisioning tasks for IT staff.

Key Benefits

• Provide on-demand access to internal cloud resources for end users, while ensuring IT control.
• Instantly repurpose hardware in support of various teams and project needs.
• Eliminate time-consuming provisioning tasks for IT staff.
• Reduce storage footprints and contain storage growth.
• Optimize resource utilization of shared infrastructure.
• Improve processes, communication and team collaboration.

Using VMware vCenter Lab Manager, Avaya was able to decommission 200 machines and 100 monitors, decrease physical space requirements by 80 percent, and reduce power consumption by 50 percent.

How is VMware vCenter Lab Manager Used in the Enterprise?

VMware vCenter Lab Manager allows IT to provide non-IT users with on-demand access to shared virtual resources. Application owners, development and testing teams, support and training organizations can create, deploy and reconfigure multi-tier system configurations in seconds. Self-service management with policy-based access control reduces administrative burden and infrastructure management costs, and empowers businesses to deliver new or updated applications rapidly and with greater agility.

Application Development and Testing
VMware vCenter Lab Manager streamlines application development and testing by giving every engineer the equivalent of his or her own personal datacenter. In a matter of seconds, Lab Manager deploys, captures and shares any system configuration, enabling teams to prototype new applications rapidly; test software releases on a broader range of system configurations; and capture, reproduce and resolve defects more easily. The Lab Manager API and integrations with leading test and build management tools provide additional automation benefits to allow for continuous testing and integration of software applications, shortening delivery schedules and improving software quality.

Release Management
IT Operations and Application Owners responsible for production releases use Lab Manager to eliminate the risk of failed production system updates. With Lab Manager, it is easy to create faithful replicas of production systems for patch testing and seamlessly transition updated system configurations across testing, staging and production environments connected to different networks, server and storage systems. Lab Manager allows release teams to update production systems more quickly, shorten maintenance windows and avoid downtime.

Support and Helpdesk Operations
VMware vCenter Lab Manager enables your entire support organization to rapidly retrieve software releases and host platforms, recreate customer environments, and share those environments with other teams. As a result, support engineers troubleshoot problems and close tickets more quickly, increasing customer satisfaction.

Training and Education
VMware vCenter Lab Manager makes it easy to set up, tear down and re-image lab equipment to support hands-on learning with minimal effort from the IT organization. Instructors can quickly deploy virtual lab systems to their students, and create and update virtual machines shortly before each class. Students can interact with their lab systems directly through the Web browser from any computer with network access, suspend the virtual training environment and continue at a later time.

Software Demonstrations
Technical sales and demo teams rely on Lab Manager to give software product demonstrations in a reliable and repeatable manner—product demos will work every time. Users can access system configurations remotely through a secure connection to the corporate network, making demo equipment portable and available around the clock. The Lab Manager API allows tight integration with corporate websites to provide demo environments for software evaluations online. Lab Manager improves user experience, shortens sales cycles and contributes to top-line revenue growth.

How Does VMware vCenter Lab Manager Work?

VMware vCenter Lab Manager is a server application that provides an easy-to-use, Web-based portal through which users can provision, control and share virtual machines in seconds. IT staff remains in control of access rights, storage quotas and deployment policies.

Integral to Lab Manager is an image library to provide quick access, capture and sharing of virtual machine configurations. Images can be stored "in state," allowing users to recreate pointin- time configurations with the click of a mouse. By storing images in a central repository, data de-duplication techniques and role-based access control, Lab Manager reduces storage footprints and contains storage growth.

Tightly integrated with VMware vSphere™ and VMware vCenter Server, Lab Manager automates repetitive provisioning and ad-hoc management tasks for IT, avoiding resource conflict in a multi-user environment. Lab Manager optimizes utilization of shared resources by automatically reclaiming server and storage capacity no longer needed by end users.

Key Features:

Self-Service Portal
Provide on-demand access to shared infrastructure for non-IT users.

• Rapid provisioning: Create, deploy and capture any conceivable system configurations in seconds.
• End-user oriented: Capture and share virtual machine configurations easily, and restore a previous system state with a simple mouse click.
• Web-based: Control and interact with virtual machines via the Web browser from anywhere on the corporate network.

Image Library
Maintain a central repository of virtual machine images that can be easily deployed and shared with other users.

• Linked clones: Greatly reduce storage footprints by de-duplicating data in similar system images.
• Storage leases: Eliminate resource sprawl by reclaiming space from expired images.
• Gold Master configurations: Allow users to easily identify released images and other reference configurations.

Organizations
Dynamically allocate resources to multiple teams, projects and sites, and enforce policy-based access control.

• Quotas & deployment leases: Allow administrators to set policies for the number and length of concurrent virtual machine deployments for users and groups.
• "Live Link" feature: Share complete application environments as a single URL embedded in an email or bug tracking system.
• Network Fencing: Deploy virtual machine configuration clones simultaneously, and preserve the original system settings without causing network conflict.

Enterprise Scalability
Scale with the needs of the organization from local to global deployments.

• Scalable architecture: Support thousands of users simultaneously.
• Seamless VMware vSphere and VMware vCenter Server integration: Take full advantage of the VMware platform benefits.
• LDAP support: Integrate Lab Manager with Active Directory and other user authentication systems.
• Audit trail and change logs: Keep track of all user activities in the system
• SOAP API and third-party integrations: Improve task automation.

How to Buy:

VMware vCenter Lab Manager
VMware vCenter Lab Manager is licensed on a per processor basis where a processor is defined as a populated socket in a server with up to 12 physical processor cores. Lab Manager requires an adequate number of vSphere Standard, Advanced, Enterprise or Enterprise Plus licenses and one instance of vCenter Server Standard. 

VMware vCenter Server Standard
vCenter Server is licensed per instance and enables centralized management and deployment of core vSphere features such as VMware vMotion, VMware Distributed Resource Scheduler, and more.

VMware vSphere Standard, Advanced, Enterprise, and Enterprise Plus
VMware vSphere defines the features enabled for each physical host in the virtual infrastructure. The vSphere editions are licensed on a per processor basis where a processor is defined as a populated socket with one or more physical processor cores. The number of processor cores licensed by the software depends on the edition. VMware vSphere Standard and Enterprise define a processor as up to 6 cores while VMware vSphere Advanced and Enterprise Plus define a processor as up to 12 cores.

Support:

VMware Production Support & Subscription

Technical Support, 24 Hour Sev 1 Support -- 7 days a week.

Focused, 24-Hour Support For Production Environments

• Global, 24x7 support for Severity 1 issues
• Fast response times for critical issues
• Unlimited number of support requests
• Remote Support
• Online access to documentation and technical resources, knowledge base, discussion forums
• Product updates and upgrades

Overview

VMware Production Support is designed with your production environments in mind. Our global support centers are staffed around the clock to provide you access to our industry-leading expertise in virtualization and years of experience supporting virtual infrastructure products in real-world customer environments. We are committed to delivering enterprise-class, worldwide support with a single objective in mind: your success.

VMware Basic Support & Subscription Service

Technical Support, 12 Hours/Day, per published Business Hours, Mon. thru Fri.

Weekday Support for Test, Dev and Non-Critical Deployments

• Global, 12x5 access to support
• Unlimited number of support requests
• Remote Support
• Online access to documentation and technical resources, knowledge base, discussion forums
• Product updates and upgrades

Overview

VMware Basic Support is designed for non-critical applications and platforms that require support during normal business hours. Our global support centers have been strategically placed to provide you with fast and efficient access to the support center in your region. Each center is staffed with engineers that can provide industry-leading expertise in virtualization and years of experience supporting virtual infrastructure products in real-world customer environments. We are committed to delivering enterprise-class, worldwide support with a single objective in mind: your success.

Feature	Production Support	Basic Support
Hours of Operation	24 Hrs/Day 7 Days/Wk 365 Days/Yr 1	12 Hrs/Day Mon–Fri 1
Length of Service	1 or 3 Years	1 or 3 Years
Product Updates	Yes	Yes
Product Upgrades	Yes	Yes
Products Supported	All Products (excluding VMware Fusion and Player)	All Products (excluding VMware Fusion and Player)
Method of Access	Telephone/ Web	Telephone/ Web
Response Method	Telephone/ Email	Telephone/ Email
Remote Support	Yes	Yes
Access to VMware Web site	Yes	Yes
Access to VMware Discussion Forums and Knowledge Base	Yes	Yes
Max Number of Support Admins per Contract	6	4
Number of Support Requests	Unlimited	Unlimited
Target Response Times Critical (Severity 1 Major (Severity 2) Minor (Severity 3) Cosmetic (Severity 4)	30 minutes or less: 24x7 4 business hours 8 business hours 12 business hours	4 business hours 8 business hours 12 business hours 12 business hours
Business Hours North America and Latin America Alaska, Hawaii South America (NASA) Europe, Middle East, Africa (EMEA Asia, Pacific Rim, Japan (APJ) Australia/New Zealand	Monday - Friday 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. (local time zone) 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. (PST/PDT) 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. (EST/EDT) 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (GMT/GMT+1) 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. (Singapore Time) 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (Sydney AET)	Monday - Friday 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. (local time zone) 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. (PST/PDT) 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. (EST/EDT) 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (GMT/GMT+1) 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. (Singapore Time) 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (Sydney AET)

1Hours of operation for Gemstone are Monday - Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. (PST/PDT) globally.
1Hours of operation for VMware Go Pro and vCenter Protect products are 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. (CST/CDT), except holidays.
1Hours of operation for VMware IT Business Management and IT Financial Management are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. (EST/EDT/GMT) except holidays.
1Hours of operation for Socialcast are 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. (PST/PDT).

Documentation:

Download the VMware vCenter Lab Manager Datasheet (PDF).