VMware Communities : Thread List - VMware vSphere™ PowerCLI

Get-Cluster - CPU Usage 95%

harkamal — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 07:18:20 GMT

Get-Cluster appears to be an expensive query, on the VC, CPU usage goes as high as 95% (for vmxd.exe) when using get-cluster, otherwise it is fine.

Is there any workaround to avoid this, or an equivalent SDK method ?

Get-VM | %{
   Get-Cluster -vm $_.Name
}

Need a powershell script to collect esx patch info

Sureshadmin — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 00:16:45 GMT

Hi,

Iam looking for a powershell script which collects result of "esxupdate query" for all esx host version 3.5 in the Virtual center version 2.5 and exports to CSV file.

It should take input as virtual center and collect all the ESX host info, log in to esx hosts, run esxupdate query and update the csv file with results.

I got the basic code from other script. i have pasted it below. This just collects the results for esx server given and need to alter the code for requirement as given above.

$servers=”server0″,”server1″

$account=”root”
$password=”password”

$servers | % { $a=plink -pw $password $account@$_ “esxupdate query”

$server=$_}

Thanks in advance!

Historical performance using VI tool kit

Rajeev S — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:06:07 GMT

Hi,

I'm trying to generate the Mem & CPU performance of the VM's. Attached is the script, It should create a .Net datatable at the end and should be displayed as a output. The script is executed without any error, but the output is not getting displayed.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks

Question about Get-View

AGFlora — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 01:06:47 GMT

Note:
I'm using () instead of brackets because this page doesn't like brackets.

Hi

For some reason when I use the following code:

Get-VM | Get-View | % {
$_.CustomFields("Barcode")

I get a Cannot index into a null array error.

But... if I use this code:

$Vms = Get-VM
foreach($vm in $vms) {
$Vm.CustomFields("Barcode")
}
It takes longer but it works with no errors.

Does anyone know why this is? Is there a known issue with the Get-View cmdlet?

Thanks

Relating Disk partitions to vmdk files

alanrenouf — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 11:08:26 GMT

I am trying to relate disk partitions back to the VMDK file that they are stored on and ultimately the datastore the vmdk file is stored on, can anyone think of a way to relate the partition information back to the vmdk file it is stored on ? Here is what I have so far:

$AllVMs = Get-View -ViewType VirtualMachine | Where {-not $_.Config.Template}
$SortedVMs = $AllVMs | Select *, @{N="NumDisks";E={@($_.Guest.Disk.Length)}} | Sort NumDisks -Descending
$MyCol = @()
ForEach ($VM in $SortedVMs){
	$Details = New-object PSObject
	$Details | Add-Member -Name Name -Value $VM.name -Membertype NoteProperty
	$DiskNum = 0
	Foreach ($disk in $VM.Guest.Disk){
		$Details | Add-Member -Name "Disk$($DiskNum)path" -MemberType NoteProperty -Value $Disk.DiskPath
		$Details | Add-Member -Name "Disk$($DiskNum)Capacity(MB)" -MemberType NoteProperty -Value ([math]::Round($disk.Capacity/ 1MB))
		$Details | Add-Member -Name "Disk$($DiskNum)FreeSpace(MB)" -MemberType NoteProperty -Value ([math]::Round($disk.FreeSpace / 1MB))
		$DiskNum++
	}
	$MyCol += $Details
}
$MyCol

Thanks

Alan Renouf
http://virtu-al.net

extend a vmdk\windows hard drive via powershell

kwharrisit — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 03:25:43 GMT

Id like to know if its possible to write a script that will extend the vmdk to a specified size , and then extend the windows "d:" drive based off an alarm?

Id like to have a vcenter alarm for 5% disk space, then expand the windows partitiion and send the admins an email that this took place.

Help with few steps in Post configuration of esx4i server

kalex — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 21:09:55 GMT

Hello,

I'm currently in the process of finishing up my post config powershell script but i do have 2 questions/issues that i'm trying to resolve.

First one is:

Is it possible to restart the host in the middle of a configuration script and have the script wait until host is restarted? I would like to set up all my networking, restart the host to make sure everything saves correctly. then finish the rest of my script.

My second quesiton/issue is how do I run vCLI commands from powerCLI? We have HP Blades so after esx4i setup we need to install HP CIM stuff. this is fairly easy to do and we handle it via vihostupdate.pl script in vCLI. my quesiton is how can I run it and call vihostupdate.pl from powershell script?

thanks

alex

Getting Cluster Name of VM

crigano — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 18:26:04 GMT

Hello,

I've got a simple inventory query setup that pulls back all of the virtual machines in vCenter. Is there any easy way to get the cluster name that the VM resides in? I'm not finding a basic VM property that contains this information. I see there's a "parent" property, so I'm not sure if that's what I need to use or not. A code snippet below is basically what I'd like to do:

IList<EntityViewBase> vmList = client.FindEntityViews(typeof(VirtualMachine), null, null, null);

foreach (VirtualMachine vm in vmList)
{
Console.WriteLine(vm.Name);
Console.WirteLine(vm.??)
}

Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Create alarm "Lost Network Redundancy" by script?

qwert1235 — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 16:04:39 GMT

Hello:

I am trying to write a script that will create alarm to monitor Lost Network Redundancy (I know manually it’s) on host.

I know how to create alarm for “basic” event see attachment (LucD – thank you for your help) and know that for “Lost Network Redundancy” alarm I have to use “vprob.net.redundancy.lost” instead of “EnteringMaintenanceModeEvent” (like in my example); but I still have trouble to combine it together…

Can someone please help me?

Thank you,
qwert

Get-stat counter not available

houghtp — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 16:26:53 GMT

I'm trying to run following line

Get-vm TestVM | get-stat -stat mem.swapused.kilobytes

but get error

Get-Stat : 03/11/2009 16:10:49 Get-Stat The metric counter "mem.swapused.kilobytes" doesn't exist for entity "TestVM".
At line:1 char:9
+ Get-stat <<<< -entity (get-vm svr-sccm-cdc01) -stat mem.swapused.kilobytes -IntervalMins 5
+ CategoryInfo : ResourceUnavailable: (:) Get-Stat, VimException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : Client20_RuntimeDataServiceImpl_CheckUserMetrics_MetricDoesntExist,VMware.VimAutomation.Commands.GetViStats

the stats level in VC is 2 and I can see this stats through VI client. Also if i run Get-TKEperformanceCounter form the Community Extensions this stat is listed for the VM.

I can see level 1 type stats like

get-vm testvm | get-stat -stat mem.usage.average

I'm running PowerCli 4 162509

thanks.

Get-Stat script help

houghtp — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 15:41:55 GMT

Hi

I'm running the following script which used to work, but since i've upgraded to the latest version of the toolkit 1.5 142961 i get the following error:

Get-Stat : 20/03/2009 13:54:58 Get-Stat The metric counter "clusterservices.cpufairness.latest" doesn't exist for entity "svr-vm
At C:\scripts\Host-Stats.ps1:55 char:20
+ $Stats = Get-Stat <<<< -Entity $ESX -Start $Start -Finish $Finish -stat $Stat -IntervalSecs 300 -MaxSamples 1000
+ CategoryInfo : ResourceUnavailable: (:) Get-Stat, VimException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : Client20_RuntimeDataServiceImpl_CheckUserMetrics_MetricDoesntExist,VMware.VimAutomation.Commands.GetViStats

Strange thing is the script does actually run and collect data but just throws the error. the first time it tries to collect a data point from a host and only then. I think I was running a previous version of 1.5 toolkit before I upgraded don't know what build though. Here's my script..

(Following Function copied from LUCD's get-stat.ps1 script)

Function QueryPerf($entity)
{
$perfMgr = Get-View (Get-View ServiceInstance).content.perfManager

# Create performance counter hashtable
$pcTable = New-Object Hashtable
$keyTable = New-Object Hashtable
foreach($pC in $perfMgr.PerfCounter){
if($pC.Level -ne 99){
$pctable.Add(($pC.GroupInfo.Key + "." + $pC.NameInfo.Key + "." + $pC.RollupType),$pC.Key)
$keyTable.Add($pC.Key, $pC)
}
}

$metrics = $perfMgr.QueryAvailablePerfMetric($entity.MoRef,$null,$null,$numinterval)
$metricslist = @()
foreach($pmId in $metrics){
$row = "" | select Group, Name, Rollup
$pC = $keyTablehttp://$pmId.CounterId
$row.Group = $pC.GroupInfo.Key
$row.Name = $pC.NameInfo.Key
$row.Rollup = $pC.RollupType
$metricslist += $row
}
return ($metricslist | Sort-Object -unique -property Group,Name,Rollup)
}

Connect-VIServer svr-vmc-crs01

$entity = get-view -id (Get-VMHost svr-vmh-crcla01.lbcamden.net).id
$arrPerfcounters = QueryPerf($entity)

$xl = New-Object -comobject Excel.Application
$xl.Visible = $true
$xl.sheetsInNewWorkbook = $arrPerfcounters.length
$wb = $xl.Workbooks.add()

$Start = (Get-Date).adddays(-1)
$Finish = (Get-Date)

$PerfCounterWorkSheet = 1

Foreach ($PC in $arrPerfCounters){
$ws = $wb.Worksheets.Item($PerfCounterWorkSheet)
$ws.name = $PC.Group + "." + $PC.Name
$HostCount = 1
$AllESXHosts = Get-cluster cressy | Get-VMHost

foreach ($ESX in $AllESXHosts){
$StatCount = 2
$ws.Cells.Item(1,$HostCount+1) = "$ESX"
$stat = $PC.Group + "." + $PC.Name + "." + $PC.Rollup
$Stats = Get-Stat -Entity $ESX -Start $Start -Finish $Finish -stat $Stat -IntervalSecs 300 -MaxSamples 1000
foreach ($stat in $stats){
$ws.cells.item($statCount,1) = $stat.timestamp
$ws.Cells.Item($StatCount,$HostCount+1) = $stat.Value
$StatCount++
}
$HostCount++
}
$PerfCounterWorkSheet++

}

set-oscustomizationspec and IP address

LucD — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 14:12:47 GMT

In the set-oscustomizationspec cmdlet there don't seem to be options to customize network related parameters (for example the IP address).

In the "Customization Specification Manager" in the VI Client these customization parameters can be configured.

Is this correct ? Or are we missing something ?

logic in powershell script

RobMokkink — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 06:28:55 GMT

I use the clone_vm sdk way to deploy vm's.

Thanks to luc sample code, i have a way of checken the clone task, so i can log when there is an error:

#CHECK THE TASK
while ($task.info.state -eq "running" -or $task.info.state -eq "queued")
{
sleep 2
$task = Get-View $taskMoref
}

But now i am facing a problem, i wan't to clone 2 vm's at once. So i can speed up deployment. I created a counter to do that, but the while statement waits until it's loop has finished.

Is there a way to keep the while statement and have 2 clone jobs?

related bugs in set-vmhostnetwork and set-vmhostnetworkadapter

halr9000 — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 21:53:36 GMT

The Set-VMHostNetwork cmdlet has a param called DnsDhcpDevice and accordin to the help file, it should accept "a ServiceConsoleNIC object, a VMKernelNIC object in case of ESX Visor, or the NIC name as a string".

The Set-VMHostNetworkAdapter cmdlet has a param called PhysicalNic which the help says should take a "PhysicalNic[]".

In the case of both of these parameters above, no cmdlet exists which can produce an object of the required types. The Get-VMHostNetwork cmdlet has PhysicalNic and VirtualNic properties which ideally, should do the trick but the type validation does not match and you get an error if you try it.

To be consistent, there really should be a Get-VMHostNetworkAdapter cmdlet which can return the correct objects, and the code should be changed on one side (the VMHostNetworkInfoImpl object) or the other (the set-cmdlets) to match whatever object type you guys choose.

In addition, I could not get a string to work for DnsDhcpDevice.

And also, for the Set-VMHostNetworkAdapter cmdlet VirtualNic parameter, I was actually able to make this one work by using (get-vmhostnetwork).virtualnic, but that obviously is not ideal.

I think all of these parameters should accept device names as well, e.g. vmnic0.

And last but not least, is there a workaround for the pnic stuff? I may eventually be able to get this to work but I don't have the time to mess with it at the moment.

PS > $pnic = New-Object vmware.VimAutomation.Types.Host.NIC.PhysicalNic
New-Object : Constructor not found. Cannot find an appropriate constructor for type v
mware.VimAutomation.Types.Host.NIC.PhysicalNic.
At line:1 char:19
+ $pnic = New-Object  <<<< vmware.VimAutomation.Types.Host.NIC.PhysicalNic

<br>

Author of the upcoming book: Managing VMware Infrastructure with PowerShell
Co-Host, PowerScripting Podcast (http://powerscripting.net)

Datastore and Controller Report

Cabby — Fri, 01 May 2009 21:45:29 GMT

I'm having a major brain cramp. I've used two scripts I found in this forum. One is a report and another is a listing. I'd like to get the info from both scripts into 1 report.

The first script is the report with the Datastore info:

Get the VMs

$vm = get-datacenter "DATASTORE" | get-vm
$dsRegEx = regex"[(\w+)]"
$report = @()
get-vm | % {
$vm = $_
$vm.HardDisks | %{
$row = "" | Select Name,MemoryMB,NumCPU,Datastore,"Total Disk (Gb)"
$row.Name = $vm.Name
$row.MemoryMb = $vm.MemoryMb
$row.NumCpu = $vm.NumCpu
$row.Datastore = $dsRegEx.Match($_.Filename).Groups[1].Value
$row.{Total Disk (Gb)} = "{0:N}" -f ($_.CapacityKB / 1Mb)
$report += $row
}
}
$report | sort -property Name, datastore,"Total Disk" |Export-Csv "C:\temp\chargeback.csv" -noTypeInformation

I'd like to get the Controller Type of the following script into the above report.

# Get the VMs
$vm = get-datacenter "DATASTORE" | get-vm

For each of the VMs

$vm | % {
$vmview = get-view $_.id

Get all of the SCSI controller devices

$hardware = $vmview.config.hardware
$devices = $hardware | % {$_.device}
$deviceinfo = $devices | % {$_.deviceinfo}
$controller = $deviceinfo | ? {$_.label -like "SCSI Contro*"}
$controller | select-object @{name="Name"; expression={$vmview.name}}, @{name="Controller"; expression={$_.label}}, @{name="Controller Type"; expression={$_.summary}}
}

Thank you for your help. I just can't figure it out.

Cabby

Tasks Status ...

vZedification — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 12:19:53 GMT

Hello,

I would like to have the status of the tasks of virtual machines to be able to know when they are completely stopped.
After the stop of virtual machines, I'd like to start replication datastore. For this reason I must be sure that all machines are stopped.

Thanks.

Lucien.

Get a VM's IP address? (when DNS not available)

EvilEmuofDoom — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:29:23 GMT

I have a odd setup where I have a vCenter server running in a private network that doesn't have INTERNAL DNS available. I'm currently running scripts that query an IP range but takes forever to run. I can run get-vm and get all the VMs but can't do anything with them since there is no DNS and I can't find a way to grab a VM's IP address. If I could get IP addresses I could then run functions against them. If it makes a difference these VM's have two nics: Public and Private. Any ideas?

find slider bar setting in DRS fully automated mode on cluster

a2alpha — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:21:16 GMT

Hi,

Anyone know what the parameter is for knowing where your slider bar is for DRS Automation Level, the below returns that it is set for FullyAutomated but I would like to know what recommendations it will apply, (2, 3, 4 stars...) or just where the slider bar is.

$cluster = get-cluster Main
$cluster.DRSAutomationLevel

Thanks,

Dan

Enable Mount and resignature of snap luns on vSphere

tonygent — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 14:00:37 GMT

Hi all,

I've done some PS development work in the past (with all your assistance) to get my VI3.5 system to mount snaps from my NAS device and allow me to review the contents.
In the past (with VI3.5) all I had to do was use the powershell to change the LVM option value of the Esx host to "AllowSnapLun" and "EnableResignature" then rescan the esx storage. The LUN would appear (with a SNAP-xxx_lun name)
Great - all was well with the world.

Then we updated to vSphere and this has now put a spanner in the works.

Seems that vSphere no longer has the LVM option values to allow for the mounting of the LUN's. In theory, this is because vShpere allows you to mount snapped LUNs. However - the LUN appears but the datastore is invisible?? I can't find any way of allowing the powershell to mount the snapped datastores.

There seems to be some esx host Service console ESXCFG code for resiging a lun, but I can't launch that from the powershell can I, and if I could - it asks for a UUID for the storage? - how would I know what this is without manually looking each time? (not great for scripting).

Any ideas how I do this??

Also note - I'm still using the VItoolkit (NOT the NEW PowerCLI) as the PowerCLI breaks some of the code I used for mounting VMDK files on VM's. I anyone can confirm that the powerCLI is required and perhaps provide some code to prove the pointt - thats also worth a look, but I do not have time for a re-write at the mo so have shied away from the upgrade.

Any help would be much appreciated.

TG

Need to report VM path and Full path of .vmx file using friendly LUN ID

AGFlora — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 17:54:13 GMT

Hi

Came accross Luc's script to list vm path and datastore:

Get-VM | Get-View | %{
$row = "" | select Name, Datastore, Path
$row.Name = $_.Name
$row.Datastore = (Get-View $_.Datastore[0]).Summary.Name
$current = Get-View $_.Parent
$path = $_.Name
do {
$parent = $current
if($parent.Name -ne "vm"){$path = $parent.Name + "\" + $path}
$current = Get-View $current.Parent
} while ($current.Parent -ne $null)
$row.Path = $path
$report += $row
}
$report | Export-Csv $CsvFile -NoTypeInformation

I need help modifying this script to list the full path of the vmx file

Thanks

Copying VM or Templates from one datastore to another

alasdair.carnie — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 09:27:35 GMT

Hi all,

I need to be able to check for the existance of a particular VM Template on a datastore and then if it is are not there, transfer a copy of it from a secure datastore.

I started out with just trying to copy the entire content of a datastore from one to another, but have now coded myself into a corner. As my programming skills are limited I am probably missing something very simple.

Any help would be as always much appreciated. I have attached the script I have so far.

#Add VMware Powershell Cmdlets
Add-PSSnapin -Name Vmware.VimAutomation.Core

Connect to Infrastructure vCenter

Connect-VIServer -Server vc-overview.qavdc.com -User administrator -Password vmware
Write-Host “Connected to VirtualCenter ($vc)”

function CopyDirectory( $dc, $source, $dest ) {
$vmhost = Get-VMHost | Get-View
$browser = Get-View $vmhost[0].DatastoreBrowser

$spec = New-Object VMware.Vim.HostDatastoreBrowserSearchSpec
$spec.MatchPattern = "*"
$spec.Details.fileType = $true

$srcf = $browser.SearchDatastore( $source, $spec )
foreach( $srcfile in $srcf ) {
Write-Output $srcfile
}
}

$dc = Get-Datacenter "Training"

CopyDirectory( $dc, 'SharedTMPLs', 'SharedVMs' )

When I run this code I get the following error.

Property 'fileType' cannot be found on this object; make sure it exists and is settable.
At :line:14 char:15
+ $spec.Details. <<<< fileType = $true

VM disk usage and datastore report

kwharrisit — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:18:38 GMT

I am trying to figure out the best method to get the following:

Name of VM
Size of D: Drive (both preallocated and actually used)
cluster or resource pool the VM belongs to
Datastore where VM resides.

I have been messing with various storage reports that give me VM to datastore mapping, but I need something that will look at the used space within the VM and report that as well. This is all to go into an excel spreadsheet to begin a capacity planning presentation.

HELP!

SearchDatastoreSubFolders + GetVersion Question

Sirry — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 00:37:03 GMT

Hi guys,

I'm relatively new to PowerCLI and VMWare and general, and have been trying to run some example scripts. I am using PowerGUI as my editor and debugger. The problem lies in the function HostDatastoreBrowserSearchSpec; i've tried some things, but it keeps coming up with the following error:

Exception calling "SearchDatastoreSubFolders" with "2" argument(s): "Not initialized: boolean fileOwner"

I am running VSphere 4 and am not entirely sure what version of Powershell I've been running.

I think I updated Powershell to the most recent XP / Vista (two separate boxes) version (XP its the version bundled /w Windows Management Framework Core. For Vista, the KB968930 update), but whenever I debug in PowerGUI it shows that it is executing Powershell from c:\windows\system32\WindowsPowershell\v1.0\powershell.exe.

Is there any way I can check my powershell version, and if I am still doing the right thing, how do I fix the error? I cannot seem to find any resources online with a working answer; I set the fileowner attribute to true and tried multiple versions of Powershell which is what the internet suggested, and now I'm out of ideas.

background jobs with VMware.VimAutomation.Core

orend — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 07:49:16 GMT

Hi,

I am using the new winrm 2.0 on Windows XP and trying to run a background job. The command I am using is:

start-job -InitializationScript{add-pssnapin VMware.VimAutomation.Core} -ScriptBlock{connect-viserver myserver}

The job progres is set to running and no matter how long I wait, it does not change. I further tried with other scriptblocks and seems that as long as I try to load the vmware snapin, the job just stays on running.

Has anyone had better luck with this?

I am running VMware-Vim4PS-4.0.0-162509.exe.

Thanks,

Oren.

Help with vswitch active/standby vmnic configuration

kalex — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 19:40:20 GMT

hello,

I'm in the process of scripting post config of esx4i hosts. we use vswitch2 for nfs traffic and need to set one of the nics as active and one as standby. here is my script where i counfigure and set the switch:

New-VirtualSwitch -VMHost $vmhost -Name vSwitch2
$nfsvs = Get-VirtualSwitch -VMHost $vmhost -Name "vSwitch2"
New-VMHostNetworkAdapter
-VMHost $vmhost -PortGroup $NFSport -VirtualSwitch $nfsvs -IP $nfsip
-SubnetMask 255.255.255.0 -VMotionEnabled $false -EA Stop
$nfsvs = Get-VirtualSwitch -VMHost $vmHost -Name vSwitch2
Set-VirtualSwitch -VirtualSwitch $nfsvs -Nic $NFSnic1
Set-VirtualSwitch -VirtualSwitch $nfsvs -Nic $NFSnic2

This works great but after post config is done i have to manually change the standby

Problem is i can't figure out how to make $nfsnic1 active and $nfsnic2 standby in the script.

Any help is appreciated.

Alex

Stagger VM startups get-vm -Name server1 | start-vm

teddyboy — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 21:55:37 GMT

connect-viserver -server 192.168.1.1 -user root -password password

get-vm -Name server1 | start-vm
get-vm -Name server2 | start-vm
get-vm -Name w2k | start-vm

I want to be able to stagger starts up? Whats the easy way to do this please?

Copy files (vmx) , how to script it ??

ugauchr — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 09:21:13 GMT

Hi,

Quite new in VI Toolkit / Powershell but for a SRM project I need to automate so stuff.

Is there a way that a can take a copy from a vmx file and rename it. (Will be stored in the same folder / datastore but with different name)

Assume can't be so difficult but it didn't get it work yet?

Any idea, some scriptlets

Thanks

Christof

All blue folders do not show in report

AGFlora — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:09:22 GMT

Hi

For some reason or another when I run a report against one of my datacenters 2 blue folders do not show up in the report that are listed under this datacenter.

I'm attaching the code becasue this forum doesn't like brackets.

Thanks

Pro grammatically deploying a virtual machine to Data Center A from a template in Data Center B

jswager1 — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:11:18 GMT

I've seen several discussions saying that it's not possible to deploy a virtual machine to a particular data center from a template that was stored in a separate data center - even though both data centers were managed by the same Virtual Center. The error most often associated with this failure was "the input arguments had entities that did not belong to the same datacenter"

However, we've been doing this exact thing for some time using Virtual Center 2.5 and ESX 3.5 hosts using the VI Client. One data center (call it A) has our templates hosted on a SAN device. We've got a number of ESX 3.5 hosts in a separate data center (call it B). We routinely deploy from A to B using the VI Client. And it doesn't have any errors. It does have some warnings when a deployment is made concerning the networks may not be the same. We work around that by making sure that the networks under both data centers that have the same name are physically attached to the same network, so the warning can be safely ignored.

The problem occurred when we tried to automate this process using the PowerCLI (actually, the .NET interface). When we tried that for the first time, we encountered the "the input arguments had entities that did not belong to the same datacenter" error that everyone else sees. So, how does the VI Client do it? Both VI Client and the PowerCLI interface are using the same SDK at some level. Is there some extra command, some extra parameter that needs to be performed to get this to work?

Set Default CPU Masking options

nicad449 — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 17:55:18 GMT

What is the best method of resetting all the CPU Masking options back to default via the PowerCLI? I'm looking for the equivelent to choosing CPUID Mask > Advanced > Reset All to Default. I am able to easily set CPU masks (as per a number of helpful posts in this community), however finding out how to Reset them has proven more difficult.

Doug

Remove a vmnic from a VirtualSwitch

IMMatt — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:40:46 GMT

I can't seem to find a way to remove a vmnic from an existing VirtualSwitch...

The set-virtualswitch "-nic" parameter seems to add nics to a virtualswitch, not necessary set them.

For example, I have "vSwitch0" with 3 nics and "vSwitch1" with 3 nics. I want to move one of the vSwitch1 nics to the vSwitch0 switch. I can't seem to find a way to do this via PowerShell unless I delete and re-create vSwitch1. (I am reconfiguring networking on a group of about 60 systems)

Unregistering VMs

alasdair.carnie — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 12:30:07 GMT

Hi all,

I currently have a script for finding and registering VM Templates or VMs, but what I need to be able to do now is Unregister a list of VMs and then register a select number of them with my ESX Hosts. Can anyone help me with some sample use of the UnregisterVM_Task.

My current registration script has this in it

$templateHost = Get-VMHost $mgmt1 | Get-View
$folder = Get-View (Get-Datacenter -Name $datacenterName | Get-Folder -Name $templateFolder).ID
$vmtx = $templatePath + "/" + $templateName + ".vmtx"
$task = $folder.RegisterVM_Task($vmtx,$templateName,$true,$null,$templateHost.MoRef)

I've tried changing the $task setting to unregister but I get an error that the method does not exist.

Any help would be appreciated.

Best Regards,

Alasdair.......

reset sensors

RobMokkink — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:00:08 GMT

After applying patches to esx 3.5 in our lab, the hardware sensors are stuck.

I need to reset them, is there a way to do that with powershell?

help with vmkernel route scripting

kalex — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 21:57:59 GMT

Hello,

I'm trying to replicate vicfg-route.pl functionality via New-TkeVMHostRoute VI toolkit extension. Problem is i can't seem to figure out how to script it. if i open a new powerCLI window and do the following manually it works:

Connect-VIServer hostname

Get-VMHost hostname | New-TKeVMHostRoute -TableRoute -Network 10.10.10.0 -PrefixLength 24 -Gateway 10.10.10.1

That works perfectly but here is what i have in the script and this fails to run:

$vmhost = "hostname"

Connect-VIServer $vmhost

Get-VMhost $vmhost | New-TKeVMHostROute -TableRoute -Network 10.10.10.0 -PrefixLength 24 -Gateway 10.10.10.1

Any ideas of why script is failing to run but running it manually from PowerCLI window works great

Thanks

Alex

Set-NetworkAdapter

neririn — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 20:22:23 GMT

Does anyone have a suggestion on a one-liner that would connect, and conversly disconnect, the network adapter for vm's matching a certain string? That is to say, I want to disconnect all the vm's in my envoirmnet that start with DR_. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Test whether a variable has anything in it so a script can continue - if($var1 -gt 0)

a2alpha — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:58:53 GMT

Hi,

I was wondering how you perform a test to see if a variable created from a previous command has got anything in it. My script keeps failing because it is comparing it to 0 with a if greater than.

For example I have:

$var = get-vm

if i want to test whether there is anything in it how do I make the following test:

If($var -gt 0)
{
$var
}
else
{
"nothing in variable"
}

It seems sometimes it works others it throws one of those red errors.

Thanks in advance for any help,

Dan

help enhancing existing script

rg01 — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:09:54 GMT

So i initially tried getting this to loop through all the folders but couldn't figure it out so i made it so i could pass the folder as a parameter but ideally i want it to do all VMs without having to enter any parameters. Any ideas on how to best do this? I want to make csv files for each folder with all the custom attributes for each VM contained within.

##Variables
Param($Param1)
$report = @()
$folders = get-folder $Param1 # | sort name

############################################################################################

###########################

ForEach ($folder in $folders)
{
$vms = get-vm -location $folder
ForEach ($vm in $vms)
{
$ReportObj = "" | Select "Folder", "Virtual Machine", "POC", "Username", "Password",

$ReportObj."Folder" = $folder.name
$ReportObj."Virtual Machine" = $vm.name
$ReportObj."POC" = $vm.CustomFields
$ReportObj."Username" = $vm.CustomFields
$ReportObj."Password" = $vm.CustomFields
$Report += $ReportObj
$csvfile = "D:\"$folder".csv"
$report | Export-CSV $csvfile -NoTypeInformation

}
}

Script Powershell to clone a VM

dcouturier — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 16:13:53 GMT

Hi,

I would like to perform a clone of a VM with a script powershell. I can't find a way to do this easily. I wrote a script that clon a VM1 to template then template to VM2. Is there another method ?

Thanks,

NB : Tomorrow, I'll post my script (poor script :/ )

Need a powershell Script to copy a RPM into ESX server and perform a -ivh

Sureshadmin — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:36:20 GMT

Hi,

Iam looking out for a Powershell script for performing the following function,

I have one RPM file and other file and need to perform the below given function,

1. Copy the file sys.RPM to ESX server 3.5 to \vmware\pack folder (Currently the file is in the windows machine where powershell is installed)

2.Install the package on that ESX server by executing rpm -ivh

3. Copy one more file sys.zvt to \etc\opt in that ESX server (This file is alsoon the windows machine where powershell is installed)

I need to perform this on multiple ESX servers so ESX server list should be given via input file.

Thanks in advance!

Omitting VM's associated with DRS Rules

Zsoldier — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 23:06:51 GMT

I'm so freakin' close, I can smell it, but don't think my desk can handle anymore head banging.

$Cluster = Get-Cluster ClusterName

$DRS = $Cluster | get-drsrule | % {$_.VMIds}

$VMS = $Cluster | Get-VM | where {$_.Id -notmatch $DRS}

I've tried -notcontains, -inotcontains, inotmatch, etc. to no avail. Any help would be appreciated. Can't figure out how to get powershell to handle the array.

P.S. - "$VMS = $Cluster | Get-VM | where {$_.Id -notmatch $DRS[0]}" does work.

K. Chris Nakagaki (Zsoldier)
http://tech.zsoldier.com

Way to report on Orphaned .VMDK files

sp93 — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 19:11:08 GMT

I have looked in multiple locations, however aren't finding what I need. Many scripts will only report on clusters, or will also register the found VMDK files, which is what I don't want.

I would love (as I'm sure others would) to have a report in a .csv format that will scan my ESX 3.5 update 4 servers in my VC 2.5 update 4, and report any .VMDK files that aren't registered in VC.

We have iSCSI, storage as well as local storage being used on each server.

I have searched high and low for something, yet I can't seem to find anything that works.

thanks in advance.

How to Increase Video RAM

socalvm — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:07:53 GMT

I recently installed ESXi 4.0.0 (Dell PE1950 64Bit server); created a Windows 7 VM (x86 OS). The VM starts up, but I receive the following:

Message from vmhost-11.localdomain: Insufficient video RAM. The maximum resolution of the virtual machine will be limited to 1176x885 at 16 bits per pixel.
To use the configured maximum resolution of 2360x1770 at 16 bits per pixel, increase the amount of video RAM allocated to this virtual machine by setting
svga.vramSize="16708800" in the virtual machine's configuration file.

My question is how increase the video RAM in the config file? With ESXi 3.x, I had the ability to SSH to the server and access the config file. Using the vSphere PowerCL, I'm don't see a way to increase this as recommended.

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Storage vmotion all vms resident on one datastore to another datastore

jssidhu71 — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 22:04:19 GMT

I need to Storage vmotion all vms resident on one datastore to another datastore within the same cluster. All VMS have one vmdk.. has anyone a script or done something similar..

Connect-VIServer causing two sessions

abarilla — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:22:37 GMT

We are using VI Toolkit 1.5. I have powershell embedded in a Visual Studio 2005 C# project through runspaces. When calling a Connect-VIServer to a 2.5 server it causes two sessions to open only one of which I can disconnect from. This works fine against a 2.0 server. And the login works fine from the standard powershell prompt.

Any ideas?

Create alarms by script?

qwert1235 — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 16:40:13 GMT

Hello:

I am trying to create alarms by script and really would welcome any help.

Right now I am trying to write script that will create basic alarms (for example, Host memory status) that will send SNMP trap if memory reach specific parameters...

Is it possible?

If you have scripts that will create any other alarms and could share them I would be really appreciate it... (I found just a few and cannot get too much out of them).

Thanks,
qwert

PowerCLI restrictions ?

Bernd Nowak — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:07:28 GMT

Hi all,
I started to do some testing with the PowerCLI but noticed an annoying thing which is that not all commands are available in the ESXi4 free version.
Recently I played with a ESXi 4 host which was running the free 60 days version.
With this version this command works: ShutdownHost_Task

So I tried it on my own ESXi 3.5 server which has the free license code applied to and get a response like this:

Exception calling "ShutdownHost_Task" with "1" argument(s): "fault.RestrictedVersion.summary"

I then applied the free license code to my trial ESXi 4 host and wasn't surprised that after I applied the license that the command wasn't working anymore. Is there a list of available commands for the free licensed ESXi or is it trial and error ?

Why isn't it possible to do the same I can do with the vSphere Client GUI (Shutdown/Restart) from a command line utility ?

Sorry if it sounds like a rant, it shouldn't sound like one

Question about getting Size of Virtual Machine

timgerr — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:14:15 GMT

Hello all, I have a problem that I am working
on. I need to get the size of a virtual machine that was created and space on the datastore. Is that possible via Power
Shell?

Alarm Settings via Powershell GUI

Benomatic — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:35:45 GMT

Hi all,

my collegue have found a little Powershell script that allow to set Alarms via GUI. The GUI is writen with PS. He mean that is here in th Forum but I can´t founded.

thanks for help

benjo

Script for Migrating all contents from one Virtual centre to another for a particular DataCentre including folder structure within VM's & Templates view

jssidhu71 — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 21:19:38 GMT

Has anyone a script that will Migrate all contents from one Virtual centre to another for a particular DataCentre including folder structure within VMs and Templates view..?

Connect-VIServer and Single Sign-on

Flapoly — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 09:29:03 GMT

Hi all,
As part of update2 release note there is this section

Windows Single Sign-on Support
You can now automatically authenticate to VirtualCenter using your current Windows domain login credentials on the local workstation, as long as the credentials are valid on the VirtualCenter server. This capability also supports logging in to Windows using Certificates and Smartcards. It can be used with the VI Client or the VI Remote CLI to ensure that scripts written using the VI Toolkits can take advantage of the Windows credentials of your current session to automatically connect to VirtualCenter.

So I have expected to be able to use VIPowerShell (now named VIToolkit) without providing credential during the Connect-Viserver... But this does not works (I use the upd2 VC & upd2 VIPSToolkit)
Does some-one has been able use the Connect-VIServer in real sigle sign-on ?

Running VI script as a scheduled task - credential issue

roity57 — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 04:54:30 GMT

G'day!

I've writen a small scripts to extract our Datastore info and pump out to a CSV file so our Cognos Reporting system can pick it up and report on it.

Get-VC ourVCserver

$date = Get-Date -f "ddMMyyyyHHmm"

Get-Datastore | Select-Object -property "Name","FreeSpaceMB","CapacityMB" | Sort-Object Name |

Export-Csv d:\VMWareDataStores$date.csv -noTypeInformation

This works a treat, but the problem is that I want to schedule this script to run as a Windows Scheduled Task at pre-set times. I created a local user account on the VC Server for this purpose. If I do a RunAs on the VI Toolkit, when I execute Get-VC with our server name I get back..

Connect-VIServer : C:\Program Files\VMware\Infrastructure\VIToolkitForWindows\%
APPDATA%\VMware\credstore
At line:1 char:6
+ get-vc <<<<

If I run the VI Toolkit without RunAs, no worries. I can execute Get-VC and it will connect as my account but it wont work under a RunAs which leads me to suspect it wont work via a scheduled task. so the main question from all of this is how do I properly execute this script without hardcoding credentials in clear text into the script by simply using the credentials with which the VI Toolkit was run?

Cheers,

Dave

how to get a Lun number from StorageDeviceInfo property to match a DeviceName or DevicePath?

sylvain82 — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:35:40 GMT

Hello,

I'm new in powershell script and I have a basic question. I try to get a LUN Number from a disk connected to an ESX server. I want this because I want to add a rdm disk to a VM but in vsphere we have to specify the device name which is unique. So to easily identify the rdm LUN I want to match the LUN Number with the device name in the property StorageDeviceInfo.

Is anyone know a easy way to do that?

Thank you

Sylvain

PowerCLI - Datastores and LUNs.... Argh!!!

catman — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:36:18 GMT

Hello

I am new to vSphere PowerCLI (just over a month of dabbling), and I'm building up a script that we can use to perform various operations.

My current hurdle is how to find out what LUN a datastore is on. The vSphere Client shows this data with apparent ease.

I can obviously get info for a datastore:

$objDataStore = get-datastore -name "PLOEVA01_VMFS_001"

$objDataStore | Format-List

FreeSpaceMB : 467655
CapacityMB : 511744
Accessible : True
Type : VMFS
Id : Datastore-datastore-113
Name : PLOEVA01_VMFS_001

...and I can then get a .NET view, and delve a bit deeper:

$objDataStoreView = Get-View -id $objDataStore.id
$objDataStoreView

Info : VMware.Vim.VmfsDatastoreInfo
Summary : VMware.Vim.DatastoreSummary
Host : {VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference, VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference}
Vm : {VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference, VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference, VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectRe
ference, VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference}
Browser : VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference
Capability : VMware.Vim.DatastoreCapability
Parent : VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference
CustomValue : {}
OverallStatus : green
ConfigStatus : gray
ConfigIssue : {}
EffectiveRole : {-1, 5}
Permission : {}
Name : PLOEVA01_VMFS_001
DisabledMethod : {}
RecentTask : {}
DeclaredAlarmState : {alarm-9.datastore-113}
TriggeredAlarmState : {}
AlarmActionsEnabled : True
Tag : {}
Value : {}
AvailableField : {}
MoRef : VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference
Client : VMware.Vim.VimClient

...the Info and Summary properties give some additional info:

$objDataStoreView.info

Vmfs : VMware.Vim.HostVmfsVolume
Name : PLOEVA01_VMFS_001
Url : sanfs://vmfs_uuid:4a6daf9a-fde9d1f2-ee8b-001b784495e2/
FreeSpace : 490371809280
MaxFileSize : 274877906944
Timestamp : 03/11/2009 14:18:46
DynamicType :
DynamicProperty :

$objDataStoreView.summary

Datastore : VMware.Vim.ManagedObjectReference
Name : PLOEVA01_VMFS_001
Url : sanfs://vmfs_uuid:4a6daf9a-fde9d1f2-ee8b-001b784495e2/
Capacity : 536602476544
FreeSpace : 490371809280
Uncommitted : 8694775296
Accessible : True
MultipleHostAccess : True
Type : VMFS
DynamicType :
DynamicProperty :

...but I just cannot find a correlation between this and a LUN. In desperation, I knocked up a routine (below) which enumerates the fibre HBAs in a given host, enumerates the visible LUNs, then the paths, picks the active paths and reports any paths that lead to a fibre disk. The last step would be to list the datastores on this disk. But how?

Any thoughts... anyone?

Thank you

Simon Catlin

MY FUNCTION FOR ENUMERATING A HOST'S STORAGE:

EXAMPLE OUTPUT:

Setting Custom-Fields via New-VM?

chakoe — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:58:16 GMT

Hi,

in our environment we have a custom field for the VM´s which is named "Kostenstelle".

I´ve build a little script to create my VM´s. With this script I am also setting the Description of the VM. Now
I want to set the Value for the custom field "Kostenstelle".

Can anyone help?

Thx

Chakoe

scripts for Update Manager in vSphere4

olegarr — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 20:00:49 GMT

Hello:

I am trying to use some scripts that I successfully used in VI3 in my vSphere 4 environment, but have troubles...

Should I be able to do it or VMware changed something?
Should cmdlet "Get-Baseline" still work?

I am getting the term 'get-baseline' is not recognized as a cmdlet...

Thanks

Script to count VMotions per VM

rassini — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 19:34:52 GMT

Looking for a script that will report how many times a VM has migrated witing a give timeframe. -Start date to End date.

Output it to .csv file.

Main purpose is to check if the same VM9s) are constantly migrating with DRS automatic set.

Yes I could set DRS to "partially automatic" and track it manually but that won't capture the overnight activity.

Thanks.

Powershell syntax to check whether a VM exists

joeflint — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 10:12:59 GMT

I've written a Powershell script that prompts the user for a VM host name and stores the value into variable "$desktop". Following this the VM is powered on via the get-vm command i.e. (get-vm -name "$desktop") ..... However, if the hostname does not exist a powershell error is displayed and the script is aborted.

What I'd like to ask is whether there is a method to query VirtualCenter to check whether the VM hostname exists, prior to issuing get-vm command. Can anyone help with the appropriate syntax?

Thanks

Get-VM Generates Error: Unable to read data from the transport connection

the_gonzo — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 05:01:32 GMT

When I try to use WindowsPowershell or vSpher PowerCLI to excute Get-VM or Get-VM Server "mysrvname" I get the below error. Other commands work fine. I'm at wits, please help!

These work fine

Get-VMHost
Get-Template
Get-Cluster

vSphere PowerCLI D:\Program Files\VMware\Infrastructure\vSphere PowerCLI> Get-VM
Get-VM : 10/16/2009 12:35:16 AM ****Get-VM 5EA98C9E-8AEC-4EEA-9251-B214481D908B Unable to read data from the transport connection: The connection was closed.****
**At line:1 char:6**
+ Get-VM <<<<

Additional Info, that might help...

VMware vCenter Server 4.0.0 build-162856
VMware ESX 3.5.0 build-123630
VMware ESX 3.5.0 build-163429
VMware ESX 4.0.0 build-164009
VMware ESX 4.0.0 build-175625

Manage Folder in Home - Inventory - Networking

Math34 — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:07:00 GMT

Hi all,

I try to work with Network Folder and PowerCli without success

How I can script Folder creation and Move VM Port Group in target folder like below ?

Thanks in advance

FYI, When I try to select Network Folder in Datacenter Shell say "Folder with name 'Network' not found, using the specified filter(s)."

Code:

$dcName = $args[0]
$dc = Get-Datacenter -Name $dcName
$parent = Get-Folder "Network"

Disconnecting iSCSI target via script?

bobcampling — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:37:00 GMT

Anyone know a way to script (or command line) a disconnect (remove) of a iSCSI target?

Reporting through Powershell

ronmanu07 — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 04:56:33 GMT

Hi All,

I was wondering if anyone had any 'already setup' scripts that can run basic reports on ESX through VI Powershell?

Thanks to all in advance. I'm not much of a scritping person, and if anyone has anything already going that is helpful would be much appreciated.

Cheers.

change all vm's to enhanced vmxnet + ip address

RobMokkink — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 09:26:49 GMT

Hi,

I wan't to change the networkcard on all our vm's to enhancedvmxnet, for this i created a script. But one problem resided, and that is configuring the ip adres inside the vm.

Who has got a snippet for that?

Thanks.

Looping through two arrays to find a match

Matthewq — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:26:11 GMT

HI, I am working on a migration at the moment. Almost every disk has to be resized, so I started writing some script.

I am in my second month of powershell'ing so still learning. I am having trouble matching two arrays.

Basically I collect disk metrics using an SQL statement from VC database. This array has the VM path, space used, total capacity.
From this I can create the first array ($DiskNewSizes) which contains, Existing HD size, new HD size based on a target free space percentage.
The second array ($vmDisks) is simply get-harddisk from vm.

Because this is no direct link (or I cant find it) between the logical view and physical view I and trying to match the disk based on existing capacity.
I am round the hard disk capacity and looking for a match. If the is one match, use set-harddisk to resize. If 0 or more than 1 you need to do it manually.

This partly work, but with more disk has issues. I realize my issue with this syntax is that I am incrementing (+=) the array before knowing if ($DiskNewSizes) has a match but I am running myself in circles trying to figure out how to do it?

Any suggestions would be great.

.... Write-Host 'Attempting Hard disk resize'
$DiskMatch = @()
foreach ($resize in $vmDisks) {
$DiskMatch = @()
$DiskMatch += $DiskNewSizes | where {Math::round($_.CurrentCapacity /100, 0) -eq Math::round(($resize.capacitykb /1024 ) /100, 0)}

if ($DiskMatch.count -eq 1) {
$NewSizeKB = $DiskMatch.NewCapacity * 1024
Write-Host 'Match found resizing' $resize.Name $diskmatch.path 'from' $resize.CapacityKB 'KB to' $NewSizeKB 'KB'
Set-HardDisk -HardDisk $resize -CapacityKB $NewSizeKB -whatif
}
elseif ($DiskMatch.count -gt 1) {
Write-Host "Can't match disks manual resize required"
}
}

Thanks
Matt.

credentials not passed to script run as a scheduled task

allencrawford — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:48:45 GMT

I'm creating a new thread since I've not seen any action on the existing one where I posted (not sure if anyone saw it due to the age of the thread). For reference, see http://communities.vmware.com/message/1406190. But the gist of it is that running a script as a scheduled task is not properly passing the Windows service account credentials to the Connect-VIServer cmdlet. When that cmdlet is run it throws the following error:

Connect-VIServer : <SourcePath>\%APPDATA%\VMware\credstore
At <SourcePath>\scriptname.ps1:41 char:17

So anyway, rumor was that it was fixed in PowerCLI 4.0, but that does not appear to be the case as Alan Renouf (and now me) have reported. On to my original post in that thread...

My two cents to Rob, Luc, and Alan. I have had this problem with PowerCLI 4 as well. However, I think maybe it is sort of fixed. Here's my situation:

1) I have an AD service account that has the appropriate vCenter permissions.

2) I run the scheduled PShell task with this AD service account while logged into the server and it of course works fine.

3) I log out.

4) Script continues to run fine until the server is rebooted (which of course happens each month for Microsoft patches).

5) To fix it I can simply log in with my service account and just log right back out--I don't even have to interactively run the script to fix it.

So it seems to me that logging in must create the %APPDATA% environment variable and apparently logging out doesn't clear the variable properly or something.

My main question is, why is "Connect-VIServer" even trying to make a call to this path? Shouldn't it only do that when I call "Get-VICredentialStoreItem"? My script is simply doing:

[string]$strVCServer = "servername.domain"
Connect-VIServer -Server $strVCServer

I'm not trying to save any credentials as pass-through should work fine and be somewhat more secure.

Fully rehydrating a Vimclient from Vim.dll

jrackliffe — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 20:42:52 GMT

Not for Powershell, but the undelrying Vim.dll.

I wish to use this in a web environ and rather than deal with file management nightmares I want to scrape the vmware_soap_session cookie, serialize the value for it, and restore the session from the cookie on the callback rather than relogging in etc.

Well I have the cookie and the reconnect done, but after restoring the Cookie I still have a null ServiceContent. The LoadSession does not have this issue so I imagine there is something I can do to kick the VimClient so it reestablishes the underlying connection. Seems like if I call a GetView for a known entity that can help, but it seems rather brute force. Is there a more elegant way to reestablish the connection after restoring the cookie?

Also, I wish to second the need for a VimClient method for determining if a session is live after restoring. I used to just call CurrentTime on ServiceInstance in the WebServices and capture the exception. The "isSessionActive" in SessionManager needs the username and rather than having to carry that around tooit would be easier to have a bool that used the currentSession data in the cookie. In any case before kicking the VimClient SessionManager is null so its a no go anyways.

Run scheduled job with SYSTEM account

harkamal — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 11:50:10 GMT

In our environment "Administrators" group is not granted any permission in virtual center roles and permissions.

So, I am not able to run scheduled powercli scripts under SYSTEM account. It hangs forever. And as soon as I grant READ-ONLY to administrators group, my sched. So runs with SYSTEM account.

We dont want to grant administrators any rights. There is no option to add SYSTEM account in virtual center roles and permissions applet, so as to grant it READ-ONLY (instead of granting administrators read-only)

Has anyone got any clues as to how can we add SYSTEM as read-only ? or any other ideas about script scheduling.

Thanks

Set-VMHostNetworkAdapter hanging

rdiphoorn — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 01:44:27 GMT

Hi,

Quick overview of my problem:

I've got an problem with the cmdlet Set-VMHostNetworkAdapter; I am assigning an IP address and subnet mask with it, and it does this correctly.
Problem is, that after this cmdlet has done his work, my PowerShell window just "hangs"; it's waiting for an completion message I think from the ESX host.
This is not possible of course, because the host has another IP address so the active connection is actually not active anymore.

In a Powershell window this is not that much an problem, I can just close the window and restart the PowerShell session.

But, I want to use this also in a script to assign an other IP address to an ESX host, and because of the problem of the "hang", my script does not continue to run.

Do you guys have an clue how to solve this?

Regards, Richard

Clarification is a beautiful thing.

Check my site: http://www.vituality.com

% and ? - meaning in powershell

Guv — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 13:05:43 GMT

Can someone please clarify what ? and % mean in powershell cli.

I know one of them means foreach, but dont which one, and not sure what the other one means

error adding RDM LUN to VM (File is larger than the maximum size supported by datastore)

sylvain82 — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 10:21:44 GMT

Hello,

I'm trying to add a rdm LUN to a VM using the powershell cmd-let New-HardDisk

The VM is hosted in a vsphere server (IBM HS22) with latest updates. The host is managed by vcenter and is part of a cluster with 5 other servers

The exact command is:Get-VM $vm | New-HardDisk -DiskType "rawPhysical" -DeviceName "/vmfs/devices/disks/vmhba1:C0:T1:L6"

I get the following error message:

New-HardDisk : 11/5/2009 10:45:04 AM New-HardDisk 523d72ad-fda3-6c7b-a869-52f690e4c63b The operation for the entity 64 failed with the following message: "File is larger than the maximum size supported by datastore 'DATASTORE-PROD01'.
TESTVM2/TESTVM2_3.vmdk"

At D:\scripts\add-rawdisk.ps1:11 char:26
+ Get-VM $vm | New-HardDisk <<<< -DiskType "rawPhysical" -DeviceName "/vmfs/devices/disks/vmhba1:C0:T1:L6"

I've tried with another VM, Datastore and vsphere server.

I don't understand why I get this error because it is a rdm and the rdm LUN is only 20 GB very below the first limit that is 256 GB when block size is set to 1 MB

Your help would be very appreciated.

Sylvain

VpxSettings

Fisk — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 22:08:22 GMT

Does anyone know how to pull the OptionManager MOR for the VpxSettings using PowerShell?

I'm able to pull most of the other MOR's (such as FileManager) from ServiceContent Object using Get-View -ID FileManager but for some reason I can't pull the settings MOR which is supposedly mapped to the OptionManager MOR assocated with the VpxSettings. At least from what I can tell. Please correct me if I have this wrong.

Thanks for your help.

Fisk

Find a host Physical NIC IP address

KarlMitschke — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 21:27:16 GMT

I am trying to find the IP addresses for my Physical NIC's on each host.

Following http://communities.vmware.com/message/1332071 I cna get the MAC Addresses, but I cannot seem to get the IP Addresses

Karl

[vCenter] Alarm and script being triggered really slow

Cayne — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 12:10:02 GMT

Hi,

I created an alarm that trigger a powershell script.

Here is the script triggered: "C:\PowerOnSpareWeb.bat"

date /t > c:\PowerOnSpareWeb.log
time /t >> c:\PowerOnSpareWeb.log
powershell.exe -command "C:\PowerOnSpareWeb.ps1" >> c:\PowerOnSpareWeb.log
date /t >> c:\PowerOnSpareWeb.log
time /t >> c:\PowerOnSpareWeb.log

Here is the powershell script: "C:\PowerOnSpareWeb.ps1" (its purpose is to poweron VMimages in a specific ressource pool)

Add-PSSnapin VMware.VimAutomation.Core
Connect-VIServer -server localhost -User administrator -Password admin
Get-ResourcePool StandbyWebServers | Get-VM | Start-VM

The problem i have is the following:

As soon as the alarm is triggered here is what i see:

The script is properly triggered because i can see that a file called PowerOnSpareWeb.log appeared in the c: directory with the date and time
I can see in my task manager that powershell.exe is starting but then nothing is happening for 5 minutes approx.
After 5 min. I have an error message in vCenter: A general system error occured: failed to run script: Script timed out, terminated
As soon as the error message appear, my VM images are powered on as expected

What is strange is that if i run my .bat script in command line, everything is running smoothly without any problem

So it seems like vCenter is trying to do something and after it timed out it runs the script.

As anybody faced it already and has a solution ?

Any help would be really appreciated

Thanks

Get-View -ViewType VM list only VM's in a Datastore

jxstale — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:37:23 GMT

All, I seem to be stumped on something that should be easy. I imagine it stems from a lack of understanding of Get-View.

I am trying to modify the vCheck v3 script from virtu-al. In it he uses the line below to get the views of the VM's. I only want the views of the VM's in a specific datastore. I have been able to modify the rest of the code, but I'm stuck here.

$FullVM = Get-View -ViewType VirtualMachine | Where {-not $_.Config.Template}

I've tried: $FullVM = Get-Datacenter <DATACENTER> | Get-View -ViewType VirtualMachine | Where {-not $_.Config.Template} without luck. Error follows:

Get-View : The input object cannot be bound to any parameters for the command either because the command does not take
pipeline input or the input and its properties do not match any of the parameters that take pipeline input.
At line:1 char:25
+ $FullVM = $DC | Get-View <<<< -ViewType VirtualMachine | Where {-not $_.Config.Template}
+ CategoryInfo : InvalidArgument: (Server Management Denver:PSObject) Get-View, ParameterBindingExcepti
on
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : InputObjectNotBound,VMware.VimAutomation.Commands.DotNetInterop.GetVIView

Any help would be appreciated, Josh

how to make that Customfields automatic insert values?

shatztal — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 09:10:41 GMT

i want to make that every time a new ivrtual machine is created to a VM is Deployed or a Clone is be made

that some of my custom attributes are automatic insert with info , For example:

Domain attribute with but the Domain name of that machine

Os attribute with the Os Information like it is written in the summarry.

and another thing is it possible to enter value of custom attributes in the Customization specification?

VM expiration script - Automation problem

herreraj — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 22:45:30 GMT

Good day fellows,

I am seeking your assistance in troubleshooting the attached script. This what i'm trying to accomplish:

Get created time for the VM in order to see how many days the VM has been in production to-date
Send an email to the business owner if the VM has been deployed for more than a year based on information from Custom Fields. The server (s) Business Owners (BO) are contacted only if the server has been deployed over 365 days AND if they have not been contacted (see Custom Field below, with a value of either "Yes" or "No)

Information on the Custom Fields:

Application
Contacted
Decommission_date
Business_Owner
BO_email
Business_Owner2

Issue:

Unable to retrieve the value of the "Contacted' CustomField. Though i know how to query the value, i cant get it to compare against another string
Same as above except that's for the email address value

I've attached the script i've been working on for your review. Your assistance on this will greatly appreciated!!

Is It possible to run a Customscript after a Machine is Created?

shatztal — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 08:38:37 GMT

We Deploy From Templates lots of vm's . and i wrote a VI Powershell Script that is adding some Details to the VM that in the VI client we can see like "Description" "Owner" "Domain"
it is for Order Purpose only .
i want that after i Deploy a Machine it will run the script on my Guest PC so that i can input the details as it says.
is it possible ? have you any idea maybe on an other way?

Edited:

have created in vShpere CLI a script that is ps1 extended.

i want it to run after the Sysprep finishes when the user logons to the computer but just one.

in the Customization Wizard we can put in thing for "Run Once"

hwo can i put in a script like that? don't forget that is not a Powersheel script it is the VM powershell so it is more diffecult to run the script automatic.

the only ways is from direct vShpere cli Shell but i want to make it automatic withour user interupts.

How to do get-vm with parameters like (owner, Serv-description , etc)

shatztal — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 13:02:47 GMT

Hey i want to get an output of all the VMs in the Inventory but i need it to with some parameters like :

Name

Owner

Noted

Server Description

Valid Until

how do i do it ?

i know that with get-vm i can get all virtual machines but i need some parameters like -OWNER or somthing like that to get all of them.

i need the output to an Excel File.

Script for creating VM's and powering on

Guv — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:03:54 GMT

I have written few commands below on setting up a new virtual machine on a specfic vmhost and then attaching iso image to the cd drive and then powering on VM. But I wanted to find out how I can combine all these commands into a function, then run the function by giving a parameter which is the virtual machine and also maybe the iso image.

The command for creating a VM on a specific host I used was :

get-vmhost 'VMhost' | new-vm -name 'name -datastore (get-datastore 'datastore) -diskmb ( 8GB / 1MB ) -memoryMB ( 1gb / 1mb )

get-vm 'name' | new-cddrive -isopath $isopath -startconnected

Start-VM 'name'

How can you combine the above in a script by applying parameters such as name and iso path (if that is possible).

Any advise, or is there is downloadable script for creating VM's

Snapshot question

gwagchunks — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:57:13 GMT

Hello Everyone

Quick question. What is the difference between: "get-snapshot | remove snapshot " and "remove-snapshot" cmdlets? Basically I clone some VMs over to our DR site, and sometimes even thought the clone works OK, a temporary clone snapshot gets left on the original VM and I have to go in and delete it.

Thanks a lot.

New-VM powered on Script

Guv — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:30:03 GMT

I am looking for a script to setup a new VM but within the new vm have the cd connected to an iso image on a datastore and then powered on and boot from CD which will start the installation of the guest.

I can use the new-vm to setup a VM with cpu, memory parameters and what datastore, and also setup a variable for the iso destination, but within the new-vm command how can i get the cd connected and then powered on and boot from CD. Is there a script I can run.

Can anyone advise please.

Report on VM Guests

Guv — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 09:42:19 GMT

I have been practicising powershell for a while now and have given my first task now. Because of licensing I have a to produce a report on all virtual machines in our virtual centre and what operating system they are running and if they are powered on. Then have to do a count on each OS type and present this all in a report.

The script I have written so far is:

$VMGuest = @{ N = "Operating System" ; E = { (get-vmguest -VM $_).osfullname} }

get -vm | select-object name, $vmguest, powerstate | export-csv c:\scripts\guestreport.csv

My first question is this the best way to get a list of VM's and their guest OS, or is there better code or script to do this. Also regarding report format I used the export-csv instead od coverto-html, as the html report looked a bit dull. Is export-csv the best report format.

My next question is a key question and is how do you get a count of the OS and present that in the report and how would you combine this with the above script. Would you need to run a separate command to do this. I have looked at the measure-object but dont know how i would use this.

Any advise on the above questions

Does Powercli support powershell v2 on XP?

packetboy — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 09:43:25 GMT

Hey guys I noticed MS have released the PS 2.0 (Windows management framework ) http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968929 for XP. I would like to upgrade but I will hold off if Powercli does not support it...

So does powercli still work? Has anyone upgraded their desktops yet??

Cheers

Packetboy.

ComputeResource

Fisk — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:48:30 GMT

Does anyone know how to pull a ComputeResource Managed Object Reference from the API? For some reason I can't seem to pull it using Get-View.

I"m trying to map a host object to its default resourcepool. It doesn't appear that I can do this using the get-resourcepool cmdlet either.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

Clone VM using PowerCLi script

anandv — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 02:46:35 GMT

Hi All,

I am trying to develop simple script to clone VM using PowerCLi, I wrote the below script for the same. But when I execute it I get this error, I couldn't get whats wrong by looking at the error. can some one help me here?
I tried running this script with connecting to both Virtual Center 2.5.0 and ESX 3.5 but no luck.

I get this error when I tried script with ESX server.

Exception calling "CloneVM_Task" with "3" argument(s): "The operation is not su
pported on the object."
At D:\Automation\PowerShell\samp.ps1:25 char:61
+ $clntask = (Get-View (Get-VM -Name $vm2c).ID).CloneVM_Task <<<< ($targetfol
der.moref, $destcln, $VMCloneSpec)
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [], MethodInvocationException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : DotNetMethodException

And when I try with Virtual Center,

Exception calling "CloneVM_Task" with "3" argument(s): "folder"
At D:\Automation\PowerShell\samp.ps1:25 char:61
+ $clntask = (Get-View (Get-VM -Name $vm2c).ID).CloneVM_Task <<<< ($targetfol
der.moref, $destcln, $VMCloneSpec)
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [], MethodInvocationException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : DotNetMethodException

Script looks like this, I am not providing any Datastore or Resourcepool etc. I hope that should be okay.

#==============================================================
Add-PSSnapin VMware.VimAutomation.Core

$vm2c = "TESTVM002" #Name of the virtual to be cloned.
$destcln = "TESTVM002_1" #Name of the clone to be made.
$server = "x.1x.xx.xx" #Name of the host or vitrual cener server.

$foldername = "vm" #Name of the destinaion folder for the clone.
$resourcepool = "TEST-RES" #Name of the destination Resource Pool for the clone.

$serv = Connect-VIServer -Server $server -Protocol "https" -User "Administrator" -Password "pwd"

$targetfolder = Get-Folder -Server $serv -Name vm | % {Get-View $_.ID}
$VMCloneSpec = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineCloneSpec
$VMCloneSpec.Location = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineRelocateSpec
$VMCloneSpec.powerOn = $false
$VMCloneSpec.template = $false

$clntask = (Get-View (Get-VM -Name $vm2c).ID).CloneVM_Task($targetfolder.moref, $destcln, $VMCloneSpec)
#======================================================================

move only one disk per storage vmotion

ChrisRu — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 15:24:55 GMT

Hi,

we have currently the problem that we have to move only one disk with Storage Vmotion. I've found the commandlet "move-VM" for this, but I didn't find any option to move only one vmdk and not the whole VM?

Can anybody help me.

Thanks,

Christian

Filter command in powershell

Guv — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:35:38 GMT

I have quick question on the filter command. I am trying to understand how it is used.

I have seen used in the script below for the get-scsilun cmdlet, as seen below:

Filter get-scsilun { $_ | get-vmhoststorage | select-object -expandproperty filesystemvolumeinfo}

Once I run the command, I can use the get-scsilun differently now to get a name of a lun, like below:

$iscsilun = get-vmhost | get-scsilun | where-object { $_.name -eq "name of LUN"}

$iscsilun | fl

But my question how is the filter command used to change the way get-scsilun is used. Any one has any ideas and examples. Before the example the get-scsilun could not be used to get the name of the LUN.

ESX/ESXi Host CPU and Memory usage and export to CSV

kaizenwerks — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 23:39:55 GMT

Hi all,

I'm looking to get the total amount of CPU and Memory being utilized by all the ESX/ESXi hosts in our environment. The script below exports to csv the host name, CPU cores, total CPU and total Memory but I just need to know how to get the CPU and Memory utilization. Any help would be appreciated!

$vcserver="xxxxx"

*
connect-VIServer $vcserver

*

#Setting Variables

*
Write-Host "Setting Variables...Please wait"

*

$VMs = Get-VM

$VMHs = Get-VMHost

Send VM Host Information to Document #

$report = @()

ForEach ($vmh in $vmhs)

{

$hosts = Get-VMHost $vmh.Name | *%*{*Get-View* $_.ID}

$row = "" | select-Object Name, NumCpuCores, Hz, Memory

$row.Name = $hosts.Name

$row.NumCpuCores = $hosts.Hardware.CpuInfo.NumCpuCores

$row.Hz = math::round(($hosts.Hardware.CpuInfo.Hz)/10000, 0)

$row.Memory = math::round(($hosts.Hardware.MemorySize)/1024, 0)

$report += $row

}

$report | Export-Csv "c:\VMwareExport_HostReport.csv" -noTypeInformation

Disconnect session from VC #

*
disconnect-viserver -confirm:$false

*

exit

import permissions into vsphere

storagevmotion — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 17:27:40 GMT

Is there a way that i can export all permissions on VM's from vcenter 2.5 (esx 3.5) to new vSphere vcenter? since we have more than 500 VM's its difficult to configure for every Virtual machine

Iscsi multipathing

Rob Lisi — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:46:26 GMT

I'm following the VMware iSCSI SAN Configuration Guide to configure Iscsi multi-pathing and I come to a part where it says to use CLI to send this command "esxcli swiscsi nic add -n <port_name> -d <vmhba>". I have CLI setup and I'm connected to the host. When I enter the command listed above I get "The term 'esxcli' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet.........". It's frustrating because the document assumes that I'm a CLI expert but I'm really a beginner. I'd need more step by step details of how to configure this in CLI. Any help you be very appreciated. Thanks

How to Install PowerCLI on a drive other than C:

sullom — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 16:26:55 GMT

I wish to have PowerCLI on a Windows x64 server on a drive other than the system drive (C:). Space management on the server's system drive is always a problem, so our policy is to install as much on another drive, in our case F: or R: which have plenty of room. The installer does not seem to give that option. Can I do it by copying extracted files to a folder, registering some DLLs and possible setting some registry keys?

Select or select-object

Guv — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:37:33 GMT

I am trying to find out the difference in using select and select-object command in powershell commands, as I have seen it used in different commands but seem to get the same result, and want to find out when should each command be used.

Such as the below command:

Get-vm | select name

Get-vm | select-object name

Whats the difference in using each of select command. Any advise on this

scheduled tasks + credentials not passed to script

RobMokkink — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 16:51:54 GMT

I opened another thread, because if accidentaly set the other thread to solved.

I am still having issues with scheduled tasks and credentials. I created a new lab (on my laptop) to test the issue.
But still i am having issues, i keep on getting this error:

Connect-VIServer : C:\WINDOWS\system32\windowspowershell\v1.0\%APPDATA%\VMware\
credstore

When i installed the previous version everything works oke. When i hard code the username and password in the script, it works oke

Who has the answer to my problem, i can't seem to find the problem.

relocate vm's from csv file and create schedule task in VC

meistermn — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 10:13:32 GMT

What is wrong with the last line "$scheduledTaskManager.CreateScheduledTask($vmView.MoRef, $task) " ?

The ScheduledTaskManager is in the Service Instance.

$si = get-view ServiceInstance

$scheduledTaskManager = Get-View $si.Content.ScheduledTaskManager

We need to identify the VM and the host where it will be powered on.

#$vmView = Get-VM PowerOnTest | Get-View

#$esxView = Get-VMHost esx35-01.vitoolkit.local | Get-View

foreach ($f in (*import-csv* `

"D:\MigrateStorage\amsterdam-core-hp-poweron.csv"))

{

$vmView=$f

*
echo $vmView

*

}

Now we construct the task argument.

$arg = New-Object VMware.Vim.MethodActionArgument

#$arg.Value = $esxview.MoRef

$action = New-Object VMware.Vim.MethodAction

$action.Argument = $arg

$action.Name = "PowerOnVM_Task"

$scheduler = new-object VMware.Vim.OnceTaskScheduler

$scheduler.runat = (*get-date*).addminutes(5)

$task = New-Object VMware.Vim.ScheduledTaskSpec

$task.Action = $action

$task.Description = "Start a VM with a scheduled task."

$task.Enabled = $true

$task.Name = "Power On Virtual Machine"

$task.Scheduler = $scheduler

$scheduledTaskManager.CreateScheduledTask($vmView.MoRef, $task)

Find vmdk per script

meistermn — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 11:53:09 GMT

I have following situation:

after I kill a vm and unregister it, the vm is not anymore in his vm folder on the datastore.

Is it possible to search, if the vmdk'S are any else where ?

script to find the changes done in infrastrcuture for a period of time

Rajeev S — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 07:33:03 GMT

Hi,

Just curious to know, is there a way to find the changes done in the VC for a certain period of time.

No ideas on how to start. Any help would be great

list disks rdm with powershell

Josito — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 07:17:00 GMT

Hello ,

i like how lists disk rdm of a vm .Command get-hardisk give me location vmdk , capacity , but i want more informatation disks RDMs

Por example , i want to list imformation like vmhba 1:0:9:0 , SCSI (2:1) , etc for each disk .

Someone can gime some help

Thanks

Is it possible to create Alarms by using CLI?

olegarr — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 20:15:50 GMT

Hello:

I am wondering if it's possible to create Alarms (with specific settings) on VC by using commands (script) thorugh CLI. Is it possible? Is there any examples?

I know it's very easy to create alarms (with specific settings) manually, but I want to distribute the script and create the same alarms (maybe delete all existing alarms before) on all my VCs very quick.

Please let me know if you have any ideas where should I start.

Best regards,

Olegarr