Advanced Transport APIs

For managed disk, the first release of VDDK required network access ESXi host (LAN or NBDSSL transport). With VDDK 1.1 programs can access virtual disks directly on a storage device, LAN-free. Direct SAN access increases I/O performance. To select the most efficient transport method, a set of APIs is available, including:

• VixDiskLib_InitEx() – Initializes the advanced transport library. You must specify the library location. Replaces VixDiskLib_Init() in your application.
• VixDiskLib_ListTransportModes() – Lists transport modes that the virtual disk library supports.
• VixDiskLib_ConnectEx() – Establishes a connection using the best transport mode available, or one you select, to access a given machine’s virtual disk. Currently it does not check validity of transport type. Replaces VixDiskLib_Connect() in your application.