Without going into too many details... here is my dilemma -
I have 2 templates - 1 for Server 2008 R2 and 1 for Server 2012. Both templates have one NIC that is attached to the "Server VLAN". Recently, this server VLAN was split up and configured as "Server VLAN - Dev" and "Server VLAN - prod". It seems as though I have two options:
1. Create prod and dev templates for both 2008 R2 and 2012. The Devs would be attached to "Server VLAN - Dev" and prod to prod. Thus I would end up with 4 templates to manage instead of 2.
2. Stay with two templates, assign the NIC to the Dev network and add a step to our deploy document that has you select "Edit Virtual Hardware (Experimental)" on the final page during deployment. As long as we chose to deploy to our prod cluster we can easily modify the NIC to use the prod network.
*I should mention that I am using custom specs which is why it is important to have the correct network assigned when deploying so it can complete the setup.
Now I obviously have concerns with both options...
1. I don't want to have to manage twice as many templates (if we add more templates I will have to have 2 versions of each)
2. This seems more of a workaround and the checkbox being used says "experimental" which concerns me.
Why can't the deploy VM from template option include choosing a network for the VM? With multiple clusters and networks it becomes difficult to manage templates. Once you select your cluster (Prod/QA/Dev/etc) it could then populate the valid networks and voila!
Am I missing something or not thinking further outside the box? Please help!
Thanks,
-Adam