Category: Tech Notes
-
NSX 9 Distributed Firewall Fundamentals: Categories, Applied-To and Zero Trust (NSX Series, Part 12)
The Distributed Firewall puts stateful enforcement at every vNIC. Rule categories and order, the anatomy of a rule, why Applied-To matters most, and the zero-trust pivot.
-
NSX 9 NAT, DHCP and DNS Forwarder: The Gateway Services That Need the Edge (NSX Series, Part 11)
NAT, DHCP and the DNS forwarder are the first services that require a service router on the Edge. NAT types and the active-active trap, DHCP modes, and DNS forwarding.
-
NSX 9 Tier-1 Gateways and East-West Routing: DR, SR and the Hairpin Trap (NSX Series, Part 10)
The Tier-1 is half distributed router, half service router, and knowing the difference decides whether east-west traffic stays local or hairpins to the Edge.
-
NSX 9 Tier-0 Gateways and North-South Routing: BGP, ECMP and VRF (NSX Series, Part 9)
The Tier-0 is where NSX peers with your physical fabric. BGP design, ECMP and the URPF trap, route redistribution, and VRF-Lite for multi-tenant routing.
-
NSX 9 Host Transport Node Prep: VDS, EDP and Verifying It Worked (NSX Series, Part 6)
Preparing an ESXi host as an NSX 9 transport node: what it installs, how the Transport Node Profile applies VDS and EDP across the cluster, and how to verify it.
-
NSX 9 Manager Deployment and Cluster Bring-Up in VCF 9 (NSX Series, Part 5)
In VCF 9 you do not install NSX Manager, VCF does. Here is what the workflow deploys, the prerequisites that decide success, shared vs dedicated, and how to verify.
-
NSX 9 Design and Planning: Transport Zones, MTU, TEP Pools and EDP (NSX Series, Part 4)
The NSX 9 design decisions that decide whether your overlay works: the single overlay transport zone, GENEVE MTU, TEP IP pools and VLANs, and EDP mode.
-
NSX 9 Licensing and Editions: VCF vs Standalone and the vDefend Trap (NSX Series, Part 3)
How NSX 9 is licensed in VCF 9: what the base bundle includes, why security needs a vDefend add-on at full core count, and when standalone NSX makes sense.
-
NSX 9 Architecture: Management, Control and Data Planes (NSX Series, Part 2)
How NSX 9 splits into management, control and data planes, what the converged NSX Manager cluster does, the CLI to check it, how to size it, and what breaks when each plane fails.
Architect’s Toolkit
PJ’s Tools
VMware Cloud Foundation
- VCF Documentation
- VCF 9 Planning & Preparation Workbook
- VCF Bill of Materials (BoM)
- VMware Compatibility Guide
- VMware Interoperability Matrix
- VMware Configuration Maximums
- VMware Ports & Protocols
- VMware Hands-on Labs
- RVTools Download
Nutanix
AI & Cloud-Native Platform
- NVIDIA Build (Model Catalog)
- NVIDIA AI Enterprise Reference Architecture
- NVIDIA NIM Performance Benchmarking
- NVIDIA NGC Catalog
- NeMo Microservices Helm Chart
- Helm Charts Repository
- Hugging Face Models
Architecture & Design
About the Author
Dr Pranay Jha
Dr. Pranay Jha is a Cloud and AI Consultant with 18+ years of experience in hybrid cloud, virtualization, and enterprise infrastructure transformation. He specializes in VMware technologies, multi-cloud strategy, and Generative AI solutions. He holds a PhD in Computer Applications with research focused on Cloud and AI, has published multiple research papers, and has been a VMware vExpert since 2016 and a VMUG Community Leader.
You May Have Missed
DrJha