VMWare: create VMFS storage from the commandline

I just had to create a couple VMFS volumes from the command-line on a local disk. It’s pretty straight forward but I needed to document it anyway, here it is:

1. fdisk -l (check what the last partition is)
2. fdisk /dev/disks/vmhba1\:0\:0\:0
3. d (I had to delete formerly created linux partitions)
4. n (new)
5. default (start block)
6. default (end block)
7. t (partition type)
8. fb (vmfs type)
9. 1. X
   2. b
   3. 1
   4. 128 (disk alignment, check your SAN manual for the correct value, 128 is correct in most cases…)
   5. W
10. reboot if needed (I did not have to reboot on my ESXi USB VMware server)
11. ~ # vmkfstools -C vmfs3 /dev/disks/vmhba1\:0\:0\:1
    Creating vmfs3 file system on “vmhba1:0:0:1” with blockSize 1048576 and volume label “none”.
    Successfully created new volume: 49ce3608-2b378b66-c502-00123fba3df2
12. Go to VI Client, Refresh storage view and rename the newly created volume