When VMware announced its decision to discontinue additional major releases of vCenter Lab Manager in 2013, it left organizations that are currently running it at a crossroads. And based on the myriad posts and discussions on tech blogs over the past year, it’s clear that many users aren’t necessarily convinced that vCloud Director is the de facto replacement for Lab Manager.
If you are still considering your options, be sure to read this three-part series by Nate Odell that explores various roads you might take.
From part one of the series:
vCloud Director is designed so that a number of modular components can work together to provide the required functionality. For instance, the vCenter Chargeback module provides the ability to issue chargebacks to individual departments for the infrastructure resources that they have consumed. This allows the organization to customize their private cloud, but it also means there will be a lack of standardized documentation and numerous separate components to oversee. Organizations will typically incur costs associated with developing and deploying the vCloud Director infrastructure and training their employees to manage it, even if they obtain the vCloud Director licenses for free.
Part 1: Lab Manager EOL: Weighing Your Options
Part 2: Lab Manager EOL: Transitioning to a New Product
Part 3: Lab Manager EOL: Migrate Your Lab Environments to the Cloud
You can also read our full white paper entitled: Moving Lab Management Environments to the Cloud. If you have questions about moving your lab to the cloud, be sure to get in touch with one of our cloud specialists.
