Here's a script that will create a session, save it to a session file and keep it alive. If at any time the session is terminated, the script will create a new session and new session file.

Usage: SessionKeeper.pl --server <servername> --file <session_filename_to_be_saved>

These scripts will list all vms registered with Virtual Center or a specific Datacenter object.

Usage: listdcvms.pl --server <VC Server> --username <username> --password <password> --datacenter <DC Name>
Usage: listallvms.pl --server <VC Server> --username <username> --password <password>

I decided that I didn't like changing the firewall by executing esxcfg-firewall all the time. So I edited the appropriate XML file to include the nececssary ports for TSM and VMM (HP) agent. This is different for ESX 3.0.x and 3.5. One word of caution: In ESX 3.5 if you add a service to services.xml and it exists in another XML file. You can render your system inaccessible.

ESX 3.5
Service - TSM
Location - ibmTSM.xml

<!-- Firewall configuration information for IBM TSM -->
<ConfigRoot>
<service>
<id>TSM</id>
<rule id='0000'>
<direction>inbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>1500</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
<rule id='0001'>
<direction>outbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>1500</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
<rule id='0002'>
<direction>inbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>
<begin>1581</begin>
<end>1583</end>
</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
<rule id='0003'>
<direction>outbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>
<begin>1581</begin>
<end>1583</end>
</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
</service>
</ConfigRoot>

ESX 3.0.x
Service - TSM
Location - services.xml
<service id='0023'>
<id>TSM</id>
<rule id='0000'>
<direction>inbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>1500</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
<rule id='0001'>
<direction>outbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>1500</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
<rule id='0002'>
<direction>inbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>
<begin>1581</begin>
<end>1583</end>
</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
<rule id='0003'>
<direction>outbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>
<begin>1581</begin>
<end>1583</end>
</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
</service>

Service - VMM
Location - services.xml
Note: We discontinued use of VMM do to VM reboots.

<service id='0028'>
<id>VmmService</id>
<rule id='0000'>
<direction>inbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>
<begin>1124</begin>
<end>1126</end>
</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
<rule id='0001'>
<direction>outbound</direction>
<protocol>tcp</protocol>
<port type='dst'>
<begin>1124</begin>
<end>1126</end>
</port>
<flags>-m state --state NEW</flags>
</rule>
</service>

I like to have a mount on each of my ESX servers to allow for quick installations and centralized scripting for cron jobs.

NFS Mount visible from host and service console:
<Required to have a Service Console and VMKernel port>
This can be accessed from /vmfs/volumes/<datastore>
esxcfg-firewall -e nfsClient
esxcfg-nas -a -o nfsserver.yourdomain.com -s /vol/vm nfs01

Manual mount visible from the service console only:
1. Edit /etc/rc.d/rc.local
2. Add: mount nfsserver.yourdomain.com:/vol/vm /mnt/vm
This will allow it to mount on boot.
3. Execute: mkdir /mnt/vm
4. Execute: chkconfig portmap on
5. Execute: service portmap start
6. Execute: esxcfg-firewall -e nfsClient
7. Execute: mount nfsserver.yourdomain.com:/vol/vm /mnt/vm
This will immediately mount.

ESX Friendly Method:
Install IO:Tty -
1. Download Perl-IO-TTY from here
2. Copy to your host or execute from a shared location
3. Execute 'rpm -ivh perl-IO-Tty-1.07-1.el3.rf.i386.rpm'

Install Expect.pm -
1. Download Perl-Expect from here
2. Copy to your host or execute from a shared location
3. Execute 'rpm -ivh perl-Expect-1.21-1.el3.rf.noarch.rpm'

Pain-in-the-butt Method:
You can download these from http://sourceforge.net/projects/expectperl/

The installation itself is pretty simple. IO::Tty needs to be installed first. This installation does not add additional items to run in RAM.

Install IO:Tty -
1. Decompress file.
2. Browse to location of files.
3. Execute perl Makefile.PL
4. Execute make
5. Execute make install

Install Expect.pm -
1. Decompress file.
2. Browse to location of files.
3. Execute perl Makefile.PL
4. Execute make
5. Execute make install

I decided to dabble into custom fields. I have scripts to add, remove, rename and set custom fields. I also have a cool script to export your custom fields to a CSV file and vice versa.

Prerequisites:
VI 3.5 (VI API 2.5.0)
Latest VI Perl Toolkit (VMware VI Remote CLI will install this)
Text::CSV_XS (Perl module for CSVs)
Text::CSV::Simple (Perl module for CSVs)

Scripts:
addvifield.pl - Adds Custom Field to VI
cf2csv.pl - Exports Custom Fields to CSV File
csv2cf.pl - Imports CSV File to Custom Fields (Note: Custom Fields must already be created)
readdcfields.pl - Reads all Custom Fields from every VM in a datacenter
readvmfield.pl - Reads a single Custom Fields from a VM
readvmfields.pl - Reads all Custom Fields from a VM
removevifield.pl - Removes a Custom Fields from VI
renamevifield.pl - Renames a Custom Field in VI
setvmfield.pl - Assigns a value to a Custom Field in a VM
setdctools.pl - Reads VMWare Tools Version From Each VM In A Datacenter And Applies It To The Custom Field "Tools Version"

Do you know which servers have got a hold of your VC licenses? I had a tedious time looking through the log on VC to get an exact count. All of the check in's and out's complicated things to. So here is a script to parse the VC licensing log to see who has what.

Usage:
vclic.vbs /s:<VC License Server>

This script will list all snapshots for guests assigned to a specific host.