This chapter gives a brief overview of the features available in vCenter. We will discuss the common terminologies used in VMware and vSphere architecture and the licensing options available for vCenter.

The second half of the chapter focuses on the vCenter installation process, prerequisites, and follow-up tasks.

In this chapter, we will cover:

vCenter is a tool for the centralized management of the vSphere suite. It allows managing multiple ESX/ESXi servers and VMs through a single console application. The tool makes it easier to manage large and complex virtual environments. A single administrator can manage hundreds of workloads and be more productive in managing physical infrastructure. vCenter is required for most of the famous and important vSphere features such as vMotion, Storage vMotion, Fault Tolerance, High Availability, and Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS).

vCenter Orchestrator that comes with vCenter, gives the user the ability to easily create and manage workflows and automate tasks.

vCenter allows dynamically provisioning new services, balancing resources, and automating high availability. With its open-plugin architecture, it allows adding additional capabilities from VMware and its partners by integrating plugins that provide new features; for example, capacity management, compliance management, business continuity, and storage monitoring.

With vCenter Server APIs, it's possible to integrate third-party physical and virtual management tools.