Day 7 - VMWare Server 1.x Monitoring with MOM 2005

Virtual Server 2005 is a solid first effort in Virtualization for Microsoft, and with System Center Virtual Machine Manager in the pipeline and the Hypervisor on the horizon, MS is clearly looking to make a dent in the dominent position of VMWare in the virtualization space. But let's face it, VMWare is here now! They have a solid platform that is clearly a few steps in the lead right now, and many of us rely on the VMWare Server 1.x platform, currently available at no charge.   So why should Virtual Server be the only kid on the block with a free management pack? To quote Rush Limbaugh, I say Equal Time! (okay, that's not exactly what he said, but you get my point)   So, on this 7th day of Christmas, here is version 1.0 of a VMWare Server 1.x Management Pack. Although  homegrown and fresh off the line, this MP includes about 140 event rules and a number of features you'd see in a standard MP.   Here's a quick rundown of features: No configuration design (Formula-driven group is auto-populated with VMWare Host Servers so you can import the MP and go back to work. VMWare Server Role in State View ("VMWare") State-aware service monitoring Several event categories, including Guest Events - notifies Virtualization Admins of changes in Guest VM state (starts, stops, suspends, resets) Hardware Issues - alerts on memory, CPU and disk faults directly affecting VM operation. Driver and resource allocation events - Alerts on driver mismatches and errors Corruption and Crash Dump event groups Alert and Event Views in the Operator Console for Guest Events Diagram View to display parent-child relationships of VMWare Host Servers and their VM Guests Virtualization Administrators Notification Group for alert recipients (as always, I recommend MOM 2005 Notification Workflow for the most flexible alert notification possible!) Disclaimer: Although I have been running this in production for a bit and it is fully functional and stable in my experience,  please always run this and all MPs new to your environment through your test environment first. Only the most critical events will raise alerts at a Critical Error or higher severity in this version (Guest Events and Service State in particular - most I left at Warning severity). I'll post an updated version in a few months if necessary after I've had some additional tuning time.   WHERE TO GET IT: Get your copy of the VMWare Server 1.x Management Pack here: http://www.momresources.org/mommps/vmwareserver.zip   FEEDBACK: I dont have a test team or a QA department, so your feedback is always apprecaited. Send feedback via e-mail from my blog or momresources.org email addresses.