This document provides an overview of the vSphere Web Client, including its past, present, and future state. In the past, the Web Client was criticized for being slow, difficult to navigate, and lacking features of the desktop client. Recent improvements in vSphere 6.0 have aimed to address these issues through a redesigned user interface, 2x faster performance on summary views, and 10x faster action menus. The presentation outlines additional planned improvements like live refresh of tasks/alarms, updating manager and custom attributes UIs, and socialcast integration. Feedback is solicited on potential enhancements to further optimize navigation, reduce clicks, and promote related objects.

1. vSphere Web Client –
Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
Yavor Boychev, VMware, Inc
Dennis Lu, VMware, Inc
INF5093
#INF5093

2. • This presentation may contain product features that are currently under development.
• This overview of new technology represents no commitment from VMware to deliver these
features in any generally available product.
• Features are subject to change, and must not be included in contracts, purchase orders, or
sales agreements of any kind.
• Technical feasibility and market demand will affect final delivery.
• Pricing and packaging for any new technologies or features discussed or presented have not
been determined.
Disclaimer
CONFIDENTIAL 2

3. Agenda
CONFIDENTIAL 3
1 HTML5
2 Web Client Improvements in vSphere 6.0
3 Some Cool New Stuff Coming Soon

4. The Voice of Our Customers
• “It’s hard to find my way around”
• “It’s slooow”
• “It’s not on feature parity with the VI Client”
• “It’s Flash”

5. Introducing the HTML5 vSphere Host Client
5
• Troubleshoot individual host or VMs
• Conduct basic administrative tasks such as
the create/update/delete of host resources
• Greenfield deployment
Expected Use Cases
• Available via the browser (Windows, Linux,
Mac)
• Negligible host resource requirements
• Console access to VM through WebMKS
• Iterative development cycle and releases
• HTML5 direction for the vSphere clients
Host Client attributes
Try it out
now!
Released
Fling
CONFIDENTIAL

6. HTML5 Web Client
It’s Coming
Tech
Preview
CONFIDENTIAL 6

7. Fast Feedback: vSphere 6 Web Client
7CONFIDENTIAL

8. The Voice of Our Customers
• “It’s hard to find my way around”
• “It’s slooow”
• “It’s not on feature parity with the VI Client”
• “It’s Flash”

9. Home Menu Allows Very Fast Navigation Between Views
9
Lots of up and down navigation
Problem
Add menu for navigation across functions
Solution
CONFIDENTIAL

10. Action Menus Have Less Clicks and are More Familiar
After (6.0)Before
(5.5)
Too much mouse traversal, too many clicks
– “All vCenter Actions”
Problem
Flatter, more familiar menu
Solution
CONFIDENTIAL 11

11. Recent Tasks at the Bottom Allows Room for More Information
CONFIDENTIAL 12
Hard to troubleshoot with Recent Tasks
due to limited screen real estate
Problem
Display more information by moving the
Recent Tasks at the bottom
Solution

12. Docking UI Allows Customization of Web Client Layout
14
Don’t like the default layout. Want to move
things around.
Problem
Customizable UI. Can move panes around
(more columns/data visible). Can restore
defaults if needed
Solution
CONFIDENTIAL

13. Docking UI Allows Customization of Web Client Layout
Don’t like the default layout. Want to move
things around.
Problem
Customizable UI. Can move panes around
(more columns/data visible). Can restore
defaults if needed
Solution
CONFIDENTIAL 15

14. The Voice of Our Customers
• “It’s hard to find my way around”
• “It’s slooow”
• “It’s not on feature parity with the VI Client”
• “It’s Flash”

15. 2x Performance on Summary Views
18
Before (5.5) After (6.0)
CONFIDENTIAL

16. 10x Performance on Action Menus
20
Before (5.5) After (6.0)
CONFIDENTIAL

17. vSphere Web Client – 5 Features You May Not Know About (5.5+)
21
2. History – Right
click for more
3. Recent Objects –
Jump around quickly
1. Shift+Click – Select
multiple objects, batch
actions
4. Minimize Wizard
– Save Progress
(Across sessions!)
5. Browser Bookmark
– Save and Share
URLs using your
browser
CONFIDENTIAL

18. It’s now much more
user friendly, snappier
and responsive
• Hundreds of performance and usability fixes
• Coming Soon: Performance improvements
in vSphere 5.5 U3
• Coming Soon: More improvements in
vSphere 6.0U1

19. The Voice of Our Customers
• “It’s hard to find my way around”
• “It’s slooow”
• “It’s not on feature parity with the VI Client”
• “It’s Flash”

20. Live Refresh of Recent Tasks and Alarms
24
2016+
6.0 U1
Viewing All Users’ Tasks and Alarms
has a delay
Problem
Live Refresh of Recent Tasks and Alarms
Solution
CONFIDENTIAL

21. vSphere Update Manager UI in Web Client
CONFIDENTIAL 25
I still need to switch to the VI Client if I need
to use vSphere Update Manager
Problem
Full blown feature vSphere Update Manager
plugin for the Web Client
Solution
6.0 U1

22. Custom Attributes UI in Web Client
27
Tech
Preview
Tags are not the same, and I still need to
switch to the VI Client if I need to use
Custom Attributes
Problem
Bring Custom Attributes into the Web Client
Solution
Custom
Attributes
Portlet
CONFIDENTIAL

23. Onyx – Record PowerCLI from Web Client
29
PowerCLI is powerful, but hard to learn
Problem
Turn recorded Web Client actions into
PowerCLI scripts
Solution
Released
Fling
https://labs.vmware.com/flings/onyx-for-vsphere-web-client CONFIDENTIAL

24. PowerActions – Execute PowerCLI Directly from Web Client
30
Web Client is more convenient, but
PowerCLI is more powerful
Problem
Bring PowerCLI into the Web Client
Solution
Released
Fling
https://labs.vmware.com/flings/poweractions-for-vsphere-web-client CONFIDENTIAL

25. Auto Deploy and Image Builder UIs in Web Client
31
Auto Deploy, Image Builder lack full
featured UIs
Problem
Bring them into the Web Client
Solution
Tech
Preview
CONFIDENTIAL

26. Socialcast Integration for Enterprise Collaboration
32
Web Client lacks integration with common
communication+collaboration platforms
Problem
Integration with Socialcast also provides
easy notifications model and integration
with 3rd parties like JIRA and PagerDuty
Solution
Mobile App Available now Summary page – Socialcast portlet
Tech
Preview
CONFIDENTIAL

27. Solutions Exchange – Web Client Plug-ins all in One Place
33CONFIDENTIAL

28. POLLING
text webclient to 22333
or
Visit pollev.com/webclient

29. First Poll
35
Register
text webclient to 22333
or
Visit pollev.com/webclient
CONFIDENTIAL
Environment Web Client VI Client
vSphere 5.5
(or earlier) A B
vSphere 6
C D

30. What’s Next?
Sneak Peak – Seeking feedback

31. More Performance Improvements
37
Performance still worse than Client
for Windows
Problem
Measure performance everywhere and fix it!
Prioritize most used workflows
(Opt-In to CEIP!)
Solution
CONFIDENTIAL

32. Web Client Upgrade – Improvements without Touching vCenter
38
Register
text webclient to 22333
or
Visit pollev.com/webclient
A – Don’t care
B – Like it
C – Love it
VOTE!
CONFIDENTIAL

33. UI Enhancements – Reduce Clicks and Make Things Easier to Find
39
Recent
Objects
Pane
Action buttons
on top
CONFIDENTIAL

34. “Go to” Menu – Speed Up Navigation
40
New “Go to”
Menu – Fast
access to
object’s
subtabs
Register
text webclient to 22333
or
Visit pollev.com/webclient
A – Don’t care
B – Like it
C – Love it
VOTE!
CONFIDENTIAL

35. Promote Related Objects – Ease Discovery of Objects
41
New Object
tabs + Sub-tabs
Hosts -> Hosts, Resource Pools
VMs -> VMs, vApps
Datastores -> Datastores, Datastore Clusters
Networks -> Networks, Distributed Switches CONFIDENTIAL

36. Action Labels – Make Actions Easier to Identify
42
Action
Labels
CONFIDENTIAL

37. Hover search – Search for Settings
43
Search
Register
text webclient to 22333
or
Visit pollev.com/webclient
A – Don’t care
B – Like it
C – Love it
VOTE!
CONFIDENTIAL

38. Closing
• HTML5
• Web Client improvements in vSphere 6.0
• Some cool new stuff coming soon
CONFIDENTIAL 44

39. Q & A

40. **UNOFFICIAL** Wiki
46
• Contains many tips/tricks for using vSphere Web Client. Consider contributing!
This is a publically accessible website, so do be careful with what you add.
• Very useful tips are marked with a *
• “Learning Web Client” section highlights differences between Desktop client
and Web Client, helping you in the switchover.
Short URL:
tiny.cc/webclientwiki
https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/VSphere_Web_Client
CONFIDENTIAL

43. vSphere Web Client –
Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
Yavor Boychev, VMware, Inc
Dennis Lu, VMware, Inc
INF5093
#INF5093

44. Reference Slides
These slides show more of the features of vSphere Web Client.
For easy reference, it is a superset of the preceding stuff

45. Agenda
• Wikibook
• Features available in vSphere 5.5
• Features available in vSphere 6.0
• vSphere 6 feedback
• Glossary
51

46. vSphere Web Client Features – 5.5

47. History
Fast way to get back to previous views. Works just like a browser back
button.
The neighboring right-arrow acts as a forward button.
53

48. Recently Visited & Created Objects
Super fast way to get to objects you’ve recently worked on. This is great
for jumping between a group of objects you’re working on collectively,
while saving a lot of navigating time.
54

49. Hide All Getting Started Pages
The “Getting Started” pages are great in the beginning. But they can be
easily hidden by going to the Help menu, and clicking “Hide All Getting
Started Pages”. This becomes “Show All Getting Started Pages” if you
want to bring them back later.
55

50. Schedule Tasks
When performing an action on an object (right click, or through Action
menu), you can press “Ctrl” and schedule some actions. The ones that
can be scheduled will gain a “clock” icon. Select the action and you will
get scheduling options.
Can also be created under an objects “Manage -> Scheduled Tasks” tab
56
Right click on an
object and hold
down “Ctrl”
Or within Manage ->
Scheduled Tasks

51. Batch Actions – Shift+click to select multiple
Many Batch Actions are available in vSphere Web Client (Migrate, VM
power on/off, Host power on/off, etc).
One improvement over Desktop Client, you can select a mix of objects
(some on, some off) and apply the “Power On” action, and you will get a
dialog notifying you only the applicable subset will be acted on.
57
Select
one
Shift
+Click
Perform action
(right click, or use
Action Menu)

52. Bookmarks – saving and sharing URLs
The URL for any view in Web Client, objects, administrative views, can
be reused. You can bookmark Datacenter -> Monitor -> Issues and use
that as your homepage, for example.
This may be especially useful for support cases that span multiple calls
or people. At the end of a call, bookmark a certain view post the link into
the support ticket, which can be used for the next call or by the next
person.
58

53. Work in Progress – Save Wizards
This allows you to minimize wizards, saving your work. This is great for
long wizards (some of the networking ones), pausing in the middle of
your work to complete another task, or find some information. You can
then resume by clicking on the entry in the Work In Progress pane. This
is also saved and persists across sessions.
*You can also click and drag the title bar to move it, double click it to
maximize it, and resize using the bottom right corner
59

54. Related Objects
Related Objects – This is a new tab, and is somewhat hard to
understand and use. Related Objects collects all of the object tabs into
one parent tab.
Instead of a “VMs” tab showing the VMs on a host, or a “Hosts” tab on a
cluster, these objects (and more!) are clustered under “Related Objects”
60

55. Saved Searches
Our advanced search dialog allows you to create very complicated
searches, and then you can save them and quickly access them.
61

56. Keyboard Combination* Action
Ctrl+Alt+s Quick Search
Ctrl+Alt+Home OR Ctrl+Alt+1 Home Screen
Ctrl+Alt+2 Virtual Infrastructure Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+3 Hosts and Clusters Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+4 VMs and Templates Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+5
Datastores and Datastore Clusters
Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+6 Networking Inventory
Shortcut Keys for Navigation
*On a Mac, substitute Command for Ctrl
62

57. Hierarchy
This button allows you to view how your object sits in the various
hierarchies, including folders. This can be extra helpful when you’re in
the “List” view, where you are not navigating in the trees.
63

58. vSphere 6 Web Client

59. Quick Notes
65
• Firefox, Chrome, IE11 are all around the same performance. Performance testing on
vSphere 6 shows no browser beating others. IE11 works better with compatibility mode.
• vSphere 6 Web Client can be used to manage vSphere 5.5 vCenter(s) in a mode called
“Mixed-Version” environments.
• Many new settings are available in the webclient.properties file.

60. Summary pages
66
Before (5.5) After (6.0)
Select VC, Datacenter, Cluster, Host, VM, in order
*Time only includes draw times, no mouse movement time

61. Host Action Menu
67
Before (5.5) After (6.0)
Opening a Host’s Action Menu
*Time only includes draw times, no mouse movement time

62. Putting tasks back in their place
Problem: Hard to troubleshoot using Recent Tasks due to limited screen
real estate.
Fix: Display more information by moving Recent Tasks to the bottom of
the screen.
68
Before (5.5) After (6.0)

63. Dockable UI (customizable UI)
Problem: Workspace (or another pane) needs to be wider to display
more information, or panes need to be
Fix: Customizable UI. Every pane but the central work space can be
dragged like a window to different locations. Reset by: Click on your
Username on the top right -> Layout Settings… -> Reset to Default
69
Default 6.0
Customized for
more workspace

64. Improve Tasks Liveness (faster refresh time)
Problem: Tasks take too long to show up
Fix: Separate the refresh/polling timer for Tasks from the global refresh.
70
Change the “tasks.refresh.rate” setting in webclient.properties
vCenter Server Appliance (vSphere 6):
• /etc/vmware/vsphere-client/webclient.properties
Windows vCenter Server:
• C:ProgramDataVMwarevCenterServercfgvsphere-clientwebclient.properties

65. Making right-click work like it did before
Problem: Too slow to navigate to frequent actions.
Fix: Flatten the right-click menus, make them closer to Windows Client
71
Before (5.5) After (6.0)

66. Improving Lateral Navigation – Home menu
Problem: Lots of up and down navigation via Home.
Fix: Add menu for navigation across functions.
72

67. Object Aggregation
Problem: Aggregation of objects increases number of
clicks, and are unintuitive
Fix: Make the aggregation limit configurable (per object
type), and allow users to disable it entirely
73
Aggregates at 20
Limit configurable in webclient.properties
(Can also be disabled)
Before (5.5) After (6.0)

68. 74
Fast feedback:

69. Hands on Lab – vSphere 6 – HOL-SDC-1410
1. Go to http://labs.hol.vmware.com/, Register/Login
2. Search for “1410”, the lab number of “HOL-SDC-1410 - Virtualization 101 - vSphere with
Operations Management”, and Enroll
3. Open Firefox or Chrome, check “Use Windows session
authentication”, and click “Login”
*Recommend closing the “Manual” panel (click on the “x”), or popping it out (“More Options”
-> Split Screen -> Open….In a new Window”)
75
Try vSphere 6 without installation!

70. Challenge: vSphere Web Client for a month
76
Spend one month using Web Client as your first,
second, and third choice client
Week 1 (Day 1):
1. Read tiny.cc/webclientwiki
2. Hide or Delete your Desktop client shortcut.
When you have a problem, go search the Internet
first for how to do it in Web Client. (VUM
excepted, for now)
Week 2:
1. Uninstall Desktop client.
2. Install it each day you want to use it, and uninstall
at the end of the day.
Week 3-4:
Uninstall Desktop client permanently. Immersion time
is necessary to become accustomed to the differences
End:
Discuss pros/cons with fellow admins, contact Web
Client PM with feedback (positive or negative)

71. Glossary
Some slides showing vSphere Web Client terms

72. Naming
78
Some of the items in Web Client are well labelled (Alarms pane, Work In Progress
pane, Recent Tasks pane), or hopefully evident (username, help, search)
Some are not labelled. The main ones are shown above with their proper names
attached.
Object
Navigator
WorkspaceHome Button Username
Global
Refresh
Alarms Pane
Work in
Progress
Pane
Recent Tasks
Pane

73. Naming
79
Our Action menus appear when you right click on any object, but can also be accessed
through various locations with the “Actions” dropdown. The “Gear” icon is also used to
denote actions.
Scheduling can be done for some actions by pressing “Ctrl” while the menu is open.
Action Menu
(Right click an
object)
Also accessible here for
viewed object
And here for object(s)
selected in list

74. Object Navigator (1/2): Tree View
80
Clicking on “Hosts and Clusters” gets you to the familiar tree as in the Desktop Client
Similarly with “VMs and Templates”, “Storage”, and “Networking”.
vSphere 6 (easier to find)
vSphere 5.5

75. Object Navigator (2/2): Lists
81
Clicking on “vCenter Inventory Lists” gets you the List views where you can view
single types of objects in a flat list. This view is unique to vSphere Web Client and
is especially helpful in very large environments, or for admins working with a small
set of objects across many different Datacenters, Hosts, Folders, etc.
vSphere 6