Get started Bring yourself up to speed with our introductory content.

Getting VMware terminology straight

7/10

Can you keep your cool with VMware hot add, hot plug and hot extend?

Source:  TechTarget; icons: Fotolia

With VMware, hot add, hot plug and hot extend all describe the act of adding resources to a powered-on VM. What kind of "hot," however, depends on what type of resource you're adding to the VM.

In VMware parlance, you hot-add virtual memory (RAM) and network interface cards, hot-plug virtual CPUs and hot-extend the virtual disk. To avoid sounding like a beginner, admins should know which term to use with each kind of resource -- memory, processors, networking and disk -- although frequently you will hear "hot add" used to describe boosting any of these resources.

But be aware: Not every VM operating system supports hot-adding or hot-plugging.

Read more about adding hot resources
What you can do with hot add and hot plug

When to enable hot add

View All Photo Stories
Virtual Desktop
Data Center
Cloud Computing
Close