1.0 Getting Started with Novell Cluster Services in an ESXi Virtualized Environment

Novell Cluster Services (NCS) for Novell Open Enterprise Server (OES) 11 Support Pack (SP) 3 supports clustering virtual machines, physical machines, and a mixture of virtual and physical machines in the same cluster. Among other benefits, clustering virtual machines can help reduce the hardware costs of traditional clusters.

The ESXi 5.1 hypervisor, the latest virtualization software developed by VMware, allows multiple virtual machines on a single host. ESXi supports the latest processors from Intel and Advanced Micro Devices. The hypervisor abstracts the underlying bare-metal hardware, which allows you to define virtual machines with the virtual hardware needed by a guest operating system.

This guide describes how to get the most from Novell Cluster Services within an ESXi virtualized environment.