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The Virtual Volumes (vVols) storage framework was introduced in VMware vSphere 6.0 and is based on the VASA 2.0+ protocol. Using vVols enables VM-granular data services and Storage Policy Based Management (SPBM). Configuring vVols requires the following:
In traditional storage environments, LUNs formatted with VMFS or NFS mount points are used as datastores for virtual machines. Data services are applied at the LUN or file-system level, which means that all virtual machines that reside on that particular datastore are also affected.
Using vVols enables storing VM data on individual virtual volumes, which reside on a vVol datastore, also known as a storage container. Data services, such as snapshots and clones, can be applied at a VM-level of granularity and are offloaded to the Dell Unity system. Note that data reduction is not supported on vVols. Policies and profiles can be leveraged to ensure that VMs are stored on compliant storage. Any VMs that become noncompliant result in an alert to the administrator.
The workflow for provisioning a vVol datastore differs from traditional NFS or VMFS datastore provisioning. Figure 6 shows the vVol-datastore provisioning model on Dell Unity storage.
The following is a high-level summary of the tasks that are completed by the storage administrator: