VMware released vCloud Director Client for iPad today.
And in the grand tradition of VMware releasing version 1.0 applications we come away with something that has potential but leaving me wanting.
Wanting an application that can do something.
Perhaps they should have left this in the oven to bake a little longer. I think the vSphere Client for iPad had some of the same issues upon first release.
My suggestion: wait until it receives updates before installing on your iPad.
Key features touted are in bold, my comments (which are not positive) are indented.
Ability to create new vApps
- Does not support any uploaded media in private catalogs
- Does not support anything from a public catalog
- Only works with templates in private catalogs
Through the use of a third party app, you can access the VMs within your vApp via RDP, VNC, or SSH
- None of the 4 RDP iOS applications I have was offered for RDP access
- None of the 5 VNC iOS applications I have was offered for VNC access
- Something called ‘Remoter’ and iSSH were compatible for for SSH, and I have iSSH installed and still don’t know what Remoter is. And message if I tried to remote in, verbatim: RDP, VNC, or SSH is not enabled or accessible on this VM – I don’t know what that means.
Provides the ability to perform common tasks, such as powering on a VM
- power on
- power off
- suspend
- reset
- I have other tasks that need to be done but they aren’t common I guess
Settings can be visualized and modified
- Yes you can see your VM settings, but I could not figure out how to change anything
For your vCloud Portal you do need to enter your vCloud Portal organization URL, like:
https://portal.vmforge.com/cloud/org/miketest
because it won’t work otherwise.
Items missing may take time. Updating your firewall rules within vShield Edge or changing a virtual machines’ resource allocation will come later I bet.
Same thing with the ability to create a vApp with multiple virtual machines or creating a new vApp from a public catalog.
VMware’s new vCloud Director Client for iPad carries on the version 1.0 tradition of VMware software releases with missing or non-operational features, but it is VMware and they will update this into a stellar application. At least it hasn’t crashed in my last 90 minutes of futzing with it.
(I haven’t used the View app yet but I have heard good things about it)