VMware Communities : Unanswered Threads - 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
}

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!

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?

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?

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!

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

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

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.

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.

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

View Connection state of local connected iso image

henber — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 13:52:14 GMT

Hello, I am not sure if this is the right place to post my question but I will give it a shot.

I have created a powershell script that looks like this:

$erroractionpreference = "Continue"

$VIServer = "VC Server"

$scriptRoot = Split-Path (Resolve-Path $myInvocation.MyCommand.Path)

Start-Transcript -Path (join-path $scriptRoot Log.txt) -Append

Add-PSSnapin -Name "VMware.VimAutomation.Core"

Connect-VIServer $VIServer -User UserWithRightsOnVC -Password "PwForThatUser

Get-VM | ForEach-Object {

If ($_.CDDrives | ForEach-Object {$_.IsoPath}) {

Write-Host "Unmount cd on vm $_"

Get-CDDrive -VM $_ | Where-Object {$_.IsoPath} | Set-CDDrive -NoMedia -Confirm:$false | out-null

}

If ($_.Floppydrives | ForEach-Object {$_.FloppyImagePath}) {

Write-Host "Unmount flp on vm $_"

Get-FloppyDrive -VM $_ | Where-Object {$_.FloppyImagePath} | Set-FloppyDrive -NoMedia -Confirm:$false | out-null

}

This worked fine until we upgrade to vSphere/ESXi4. Now if someone has connected an ISO from local disk I cannot view that information with the get-vm | get-cddrive output. Where is that info displayed? I cannot see anything under remote device or host device

IsoPath :
HostDevice :
RemoteDevice :
ConnectionState : VMware.VimAutomation.Client20.ConnectInfoImpl
Id : VirtualMachine-vm-1631/3000
Name : CD/DVD Drive 1

Can someone please point me in the right direction where to find the output for local attached iso?

Henrik

SEC_E_INVALID_HANDLE error in InitializeClient() while trying to do LoginBySSPI()

vinubaby — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:20:53 GMT

I am trying to login to my VMware vSphere 4 server using the PowerCLI api.

The purpose of the project is to automatically take snapshot of the virtual machines. However the purpose is accomplished. But before moving to production, we had to change from Login() to LoginBySSPI() for enabling integrated login.

At this point, the problem arose. Whatever, I do it does not login, fromt he vmware forum i understood that the sspichallenge code should be sent again to be authenticated. When i do that it throws the SEC_E_INVALID_HANDLE error at the initializeClient() function.

code snippet is as follows

I get error in the InitializeClient() function when it is called the second time from the catch section,

in the first call to InitializeClient(), i get the clientToken of byte 55
and then when i pass it to loginbysspi i get the sspichallenge exception, from which i get the base64token and again pass to the initializeclient() so that i can get the server token and eventually pass to the LoginbySSPI(), but this time it fails at

if (ss != SEC_E_OK && ss != SEC_I_CONTINUE_NEEDED)
{
throw new Exception("InitializeSecurityContext() failed!!!");
}
with ss = -2146893055

below is the code....

VimClient VMClient;
SessionManager sm;
private void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
try
{
VMClient = new VimClient();
VMClient.Connect("vmware", CommunicationProtocol.Https, 443);

var tokenString = Convert.ToBase64String(net.sf.vitfordotnet.mo.Sessionmanager.getToken());
DoLogin(tokenString);

sm = new SessionManager(VMClient, VMClient.ServiceContent.SessionManager);
sm.LoginBySSPI(tokenString, null);
}
catch (VMware.Vim.VimException ex)
{
var mf = ex.MethodFault;
// There was a challenge (response)!
if (mf is SSPIChallenge)
{
var sc = (SSPIChallenge)mf;
var st_b64 = sc.Base64Token;
byte] st = null;
byte[ ct;
bool cc;
st = Convert.FromBase64String(st_b64);
// Complete the credentials acquisition, this time with
// the second part of the package.
var ch = new SSPIHelper();
ch.InitializeClient(out ct, st, out cc);
var ct_b64 = Convert.ToBase64String(ct);
DoLogin(ct_b64);
}
}
NameValueCollection filter = new NameValueCollection();
filter.Add("name", "^" + "CG001876" + "$");
VirtualMachine vm = (VirtualMachine)VMClient.FindEntityView(typeof(VirtualMachine), null, filter, null);
}
public void DoLogin(string tokenStr)
{
SessionManager sm = new SessionManager(VMClient, VMClient.ServiceContent.SessionManager);
UserSession us = sm.LoginBySSPI(tokenStr, null);
}

Checking VLAN's

matzoni1 — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:23:07 GMT

Hi @ll:

I need to check my ESX-Host if all physical networkcards see all connected VLAN's for QS reasons. I know how to check the portroups but don't know if the VLAN's are really connected.

Any help is appreciated.

4.0 Upgrade Automation Script Help - Virtual Machines

proden20 — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 13:58:53 GMT

OK so here's what I'd like to do:

1.) Schedule the migration of machines from a resource pool in a 3.5 cluster to a resource pool (with a different name) in a 4.0 cluster. Vmotion does work between them.

2.) Also add these machines to a specific folder in the "VM's and Templates" view

3.) Once migrated, scan & remediate the machines in the above specified folder against the VMWare Tools and Virtual Hardware upgrade baseline group I have attached to the folder

I'd like to schedule this as an overnight process. Any ideas?

switch to public nic

tkcoder — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 21:38:26 GMT

Hi, I am new to PowerCli. I need to write a script to switch VM's network from internal to public . Can anyone help me how to do this using PowerCLI cmdlet ?

Thanks.

storage Motioning

pearlyshells — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 19:08:21 GMT

I know that VMware has stated that svmotion.pl does not support migrating vDisks on a single VM to different LUN locations in VirtualCenter2.5 or ESX3.5. However, is this feature available in vSphere? I have several VMs that contain multiple vDisks and each vDisk is located on separate FC LUNs for a reason. But, when we do SAN maintenance and use svmotion to move the disks off the LUN being worked, it moves "all" the disks to the same location and will not allow me to return the disks to separate LUNs as they were originally configured.

Clone VM to different datastore using PowerCLI?

LiamCurtis — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 20:47:26 GMT

Hello All,

I am running VSphere and have a working script that clones a VM using powercli. I only see where you can specify a foldername, but not a specific datastore. Am I missing something or is it not possible to specify a new datastore uding cloneVM_Task?

I would like to clone vm's to different datastore, if possible.

If not possible using cloneVM_Task, is there another method for moving VM's? I stumbled across moveDatastoreFile_Task, but not sure this is best method and I could not find much info on this.

Thanks much!

connect-viserver times out randomly

leeplastic — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 08:11:05 GMT

Hi,

I have a script that runs each night and randomly it seems to fail to connect (I know for a fact this isn't a network issue)
So I've put a condition to check if there is a connection, if not, attempt to connect again up to a maximum of five times. However this reaches the maximum and as a result the script doesn't work.
My questions are:

Are there any blatant reasons why the script would fail to connect and is there anything obviously wrong with the reconnection attempts?
Thanks in advance.

Here a section of the code

$connect = connect-viserver $viServerName

If ($connect.IsConnected -ne $true)
{
while (($connect.IsConnected -ne $true) -and ($i -le 5))
{
sleep 15
$connect = connect-viserver $viServerName

if ($i -eq 5)
{
$failMsg = "Failed to connect to $viServerName after $i attempts"
$failMsg | out-file $logfile -append
}
$i++
}

}

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?

How do I use a list of VM's from Get-Content to get details on the VM's?

toddvoros — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 19:35:44 GMT

Can you help me out? I have a list of VM names I want to get details on from the vSphere PowerCLI. When I use get-content to read the flat-file list of VM names I am specifically interested in, how do I transform the name of the VM into a VM object so I can look up the details I want for each VM in my user-specified input list? This code does not quite work. Be gentle, I am beginner at this. Any help on this is greatly appreciated.

$MyList = Get-Content C:\Specific_List_of_VM_Names.txt

MyList | Get-VMGuest | Select VmName -ExpandProperty Disks |
Select VmName, Path, $hdCapacity, $hdSpaceUsed, $hdFreeSpace, $hdPercFree |
Export-Csv $filelocation -NoTypeInformation -Force # Export output to csv

resolveMultipleUnresolvedvmfsVolumes - Cannot Change the Host Configuration

mike lim — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 14:38:30 GMT

Hi,

I have successfully managed to resignature snapped LUNs using the HostDataStoreSystem.ResignatureUnresolvedVmfsVolume_task however this method is very slow when there are 11 volumes that need to be added and causes me timing issues.

I thought I would recode using the hostStorageSystem.resolveMultipleUnresolvedVmfsVolumes as I am assuming this may be a bit quicker and not continue executing the script until it has finished. When calling the method I get "Cannot Change the Host Configuration" after 30 seconds or so. I see that someone else had the same problem when trying to execute a similar function from the remote cli so am assuming this is a bug.

Does anyone know what the workaround might be for powercli ?

thanks

Mike

How to check if license is valid or not

harkamal — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 04:22:42 GMT

I am doing a parameterized silent install of vSphere vCenter server, and my provisioning GUI collects information and build the command line for use.

Now, I need to validate if the license entered by the user is valid or not ? vCenter server installation will then be kicked in.

Is there a way to parse / validate the license is accurate/valid ?

Thanks
H.

Using the diskpath option when cloning from a template

dmn0211 — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 14:30:33 GMT

Has anyone used the diskpath option when doing bulk deployments from a template? We would like to deploy the VMs and modify the disk paths independently. The cmdlets reference does not give an example fo the syntax.

VMDK1 goes to datastores in variable A

VMDK2 goes to datastores in variable B

We are currently using the datastore option to spread the deployment on multiple datastores, but these VMs need a second VMDK on a different set of datastores.

New-VMHostNetworkAdapter The resource vim.host.PortGroup VMotion is in use Error.

fsecchia — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 09:44:13 GMT

Hi,

playing with the following simple cmdlets and a new ESX 4i I'm getting the "The resource vim.host.PortGroup VMotion is in use" Error.
Even if I get the error, port group has been created correctly with VMotion flag enabled.

# Creates vSwitches
$vs1 = New-VirtualSwitch -Name vSwitch1 -Nic vmnic1

# Enables a vSwitch for VMotion
New-VMHostNetworkAdapter -PortGroup VMotion -VirtualSwitch $vs1 -IP 192.168.10.1 -SubnetMask 255.255.255.0 -VMotionEnabled $true

What I'm doing wrong ?

Anyone is having same problem ?

Fabio

Building VMs via CSV

jasonrobinson — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 14:36:37 GMT

Hey guys,

Trying to write a script that pulls info from a csv and builds the vm shells. For the most part I have been trying to keep it really simple and then add some error handling around it later. Right now I have ran into a snag. So of my vms will have one hard disks and others will have two. I can create the vm's with two hard disks fine, the problem I run into is when I only want to create the one hard disk. The script is looking for a value in the CSV under DiskMB2. So I need to change this script to look at the DiskMB2 column in the CSV field and if the value is blank or null skip it and move on. Below is the script I am currently using, thanks for any and all help.

foreach ($f in (Import-Csv d:\vmparm.csv)) {New-VM -name $f.vmname -VMHost $f.hostname -DiskMB $f.diskmb1,$f.diskMB2 -MemoryMB $f.memorymbv+-NumCpu $f.numcpu -GuestId $f.guestid -NetworkName $f.netname+}

Update-tools failure

jpoling — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 16:50:31 GMT

This is my first time attempting to update vmware tools using powerCLI. When i run the following:

update-tools -vm MyVM

It returns the error below:

Update-Tools : 10/1/2009 11:47:15 AM Update-Tools A20F0440-3E1B-452D-B6FE
-028CF80861E9 Operation "Update VMware Tools" failed for VM "MyVM" for
the following reason: The operation for the entity vm-13988 failed with the fol
lowing message: "The operation is not supported on the object."
At line:1 char:13
+ update-tools <<<< -vm MyVM

Has anyone experienced this before? Any thoughts on how to resolve it?

Thanks,

Jeff

Move Logfiles in multiple subdirectories on VM to remote location

kwharrisit — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 14:49:58 GMT

I have been trying to find a way to move logfiles in multiple subdirectories to a remote location where there is one directory. For exampe:

c:\appsyslogs has subdirectories for every day . Id like to move those to ~~file://fileserver/syslogs/~~

$files = ls c:\appsyslogs -recurse -Include *.log |foreach-object{copy $_ e:\syslogs}

Problem is that Id like to MOVE instead of copy, and Id like to insert a UNC path instead of a mapped drive.Also how can I create a logfile for what has been moved or not or if there is an attempted file overwrite for duplicates?

Finally , as part of this process Id also like to pull a particular registry key to a file and copy it over as well

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?

Reset alarm to green

harkamal — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 07:56:10 GMT

I created alarm for a host, and it rings as expected.

However, even after acknowledging the alarm, the red warning pointer on the host is still appearing. I have to manually click "Reset alarm to green" to make it go away.

Could not find an equivalent method in Alarm Manager to "Reset alarm to green"... can someone guide where is this API ?

Please also see the snapshot for more clarity

HostProfile [Data Object - HostConfigSpec]

harkamal — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 09:40:21 GMT

I need to create a hostProfile by hand (and not create it from a reference host) using HostConfigSpec.. but I don'e see any examples on google.

I intent to use this coded hostProfile as my provisioning system for new hosts.

Can someone point to few examples or developer guide for Hostprofiles.

Thanks.

Get-stat performance avgs for ESXi

kaizenwerks — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 23:36:28 GMT

Hi all,

I referenced a previous thread (http://communities.vmware.com/message/957517#957517) to obtain CPU averages which has worked out well for ESX hosts but I am having some trouble with obtaining the same statistics for ESXi hosts.

Two issues:

1) When I run "Get-Stat -Entity (Get-VMHost) -Stat cpu.usagemhz.average -IntervalMins 120 | Export-Csv c:\VMware_HostUsage2.csv" when connecting to a VC server, it only runs against ESX servers successfully and when it tries to run against ESXi servers it returns with:

Get-Stat : 9/21/2009 4:18:50 PM Get-Stat The metric counter "cpu.usag
emhz.average" doesn't exist for entity "server".

2) Interestingly enough when I run the same line directly to a ESXi server, it runs but with one caveat. No matter how I alter the IntervalMins it always defaults to 20 seconds and outputs only 1hr of data.

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.

Script to Update/Install vmware-tools, update VM version?

fletch00 — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:34:01 GMT

Anyone got a good script to install/update tools, bring the VM down, update the VM version (as required after a ESX 3.5 -> vSphere upgrade) and bring the vm up?

Bonus points for optionally aligning the VM while it is down (Netapp mbrscan/mbralign) - (option, since this operation can take hours depending on size of VM on disk)

thanks

VCP

adding a vmnic to vswitch0

TSWintel — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 20:17:09 GMT

i am trying to add a vmnic to vswitch0 , which is the management switch using the following

$vs = Get-virtualSwitch -Name Vswitch0 -VMHOST (Get-VMHOST 10.4.50.200)

Set-VirtualSwitch -virtualswitch vswitch0 -Nic Vmnic3

but i think the whole syntax is wrong can someone point me in the right direction

thanks

PowerCLI and SSH

teddyboy — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 09:27:40 GMT

How to copy vmdk files via ssh and powercli?

Want to copy some virtual servers files from a server to another esx server at a different site

PowerShell and View Manager 3.1.x

AUPhil — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 06:42:09 GMT

Hello,

It seems this board is mostly for vSphere users (The current release of View 3.1.x does not function with ESX 4.0) but I was wondering if anyone could comment on the use of PowerShell to schedule/automate VMware View pool enabling/disabling.

I'd like to define a few pools and simply enable them at a given time and disable them at a given time but View 3.1.x does not support scheduling. It seems like PowerShell could be use to handle the scheduling.

If anyone has some ideas, I'd be most grateful.

Thanks,
Phil

Using PowerCLi to get a snapshot list including snapshot sizes on Disk

LarsOliver — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 14:18:14 GMT

I am looking for a Script who lists the snapshots from every guest including the snapshot sizes of every guest.

I have tried some scripts found in the threads but nothing worked very exactly. Maybe the solution is simple, but i am new in powershell. Could anyone help me to get me a little bit closer to the Solution?

Deploying VMDKs from template to 2 separate datastores

sthwaites — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 10:46:03 GMT

Hello VMTN,

I'm looking into using PowerCLI to automate VM deployment from a group of templates.

Typically our templates have two VMDKs that we separate across two datastores using the 'advanced' dialogue box in the datastore section of the Deploy Template Wizard (vCenter2.5).

However, in PowerCLI it seems the New-VM -Datastore switch only accepts one argument.

Does anyone know of a way to get a template deploying its disks onto two datastores?

Thanks very much guys

Steven

Copy files from a datastore to a network location

kaizenwerks — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 21:02:40 GMT

Hi all,

I was wondering if there was a way to script the copy of files (specifically syslog files) from a datastore to a network location. If so, it would be great if someone should shed some light on how to script this. Thanks!

Strange PowerCLI Problem with Get-VM

hstagner — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 20:00:11 GMT

I am having a really strange problem with PowerCLI on a certain vCenter. Any help would be appreciated.

Background:

-On a certain vCenter when I issue the command get-vm I get the following error message:

Get-VM : Object reference not set to an instance of an object.

-Get-VM
gets all the VM objects that vCenter can see and returns an array
populated with the objects. The .NET error that I am getting is saying
that an array cannot be populated with a null object. It cannot get all
the VM's for some reason.

-This can be confirmed by issuing the following command instead:

Get-VMHost <ESX HostName> | get-vm

-This
gets all the VM's from a particular host. That works except for on one
particular host at the moment. When I run the command on the host in
question I get the following error:

Get-VM : Value cannot be null.
Parameter name: array

-So
this should point to a problem with that host. However, if I move all
of the VM's off of that host and try each host individually again, I
will eventually run into the same error:

Get-VM : Value cannot be null.
Parameter name: array

That
tells me that the problem could be following a certain VM (perhaps
permissions where a certain VM's properties cannot be read, etc.). However, If I move the VM's off of the Host one by one and keep testing the host, the problem is not resolved.

Strange, right? Does anyone have any ideas on how to move forward with troubleshooting this? Thank you.

Regards,

Harley Stagner

Report number of files in a dir (.snapshot)

fletch00 — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 17:12:09 GMT

Hi, I am about to invest some time learning powershell - gathering resources, command references, editor etc

My first goal is to customize the great dailyreport script (http://www.virtu-al.net/2009/08/18/powercli-daily-report-v2/ )

I want a section in the report simply telling me how many days retention of netapp snapshots on each NFS datastore

background (I have a linux cronjob to snapshot vm NFS volumes nightly) the cronjob script has some smarts:

check the volume usage & if > 90% delete the oldest snapshot before creating the new one.

Now I want a powershell dailyreport section that will detail how many of those daily snapshots I have - the linux listing of the snap dir looks like the example below

So if I was pseudo-coding - it'd be:

foreach ds (get-NFS-datastore-list)

echo $ds.name , `getDSlisting($ds, .snapshotdir) | grep vmsnap | wc -l `

end #foreach

The part I need help with is the getDSlisting($ds, .snapshotdir) -is there a cmd reference documenting this level of operation?

thanks!

~~root@backup-02 ~~~# ls -la /fs/vm65net2/.snapshot/
total 188
drwxrwxrwx 47 root root 4096 Sep 15 09:28 .
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 ..
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 hourly.0
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 hourly.1
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 hourly.2
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 hourly.3
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 vmsnap.irt-esx65-01.200908061753
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 vmsnap.irt-esx65-01.200908071753
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 vmsnap.irt-esx65-01.200908081753
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 vmsnap.irt-esx65-01.200908091753
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Oct 30 2008 vmsnap.irt-esx65-01.200908101753

...

VCP

Event Watcher

harkamal — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 12:41:17 GMT

Is there possibility to listen for events something like 'push' method.

For now - i can use infrastructure SDK API to pull events for some particular VM, but i am interested in some
callback functions or push methods to be notified is some type of event happens

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

Custom Scheduled Task in Virtual Center

harkamal — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 14:24:53 GMT

I am using VI SDK to create a custom scheduled task in Virtual Center. I intent to run a powershell script that connects to VC and does somethings. This appears possible while looking at API (http://pubs.vmware.com/vi-sdk/visdk250/ReferenceGuide/vim.action.RunScriptAction.html)

API says it can run "shell" scripts..DOS shell or PowerShell ? Will it allow passthrough login to VC as it is running as scheduled task ?

Can the gurus help confirm if this can achieve intented results ?

how to disconnect a SCSI device by a virtual machine before running VMotion

gchi — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 17:31:32 GMT

Hi ,

I need to know the procedure how disconnect a scsi device using the orchestrator

Thank you in advance for your help

Best regards

Gianluca

How to get a VMHBA path of each vm?

shatztal — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 07:10:31 GMT

I want to check the VMHBA Path of all RAW devices connected to my host including vmname that the raw device is connected to ,

it is very hard and i don't know if it is possible

Connect-VIServer issues in script but not in PowerCLI UI

jkyoutsey — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 21:34:36 GMT

I have a script that does:

Connect-VIServer -server $server `
	-User domain\username `
	-Password my-password

Doesn't work (with or without the ` marks). I get this:

Connect-VIServer : Login failed due to a bad username or password.
At E:\SCM_Virt_vSphereGetHostNICsXml.ps1:17 char:17
+ Connect-VIServer <<<<  $server -User domain\username -Password my-password
    + CategoryInfo          : NotSpecified: (:) [Connect-VIServer], InvalidLog
   inException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : Client20_ConnectivityServiceImpl_Reconnect_SoapE
   xception,VMware.VimAutomation.Commands.ConnectVIServer

If I comment out the -User -Password parameters so that I just have Connect-VIServer -server $server it will prompt me for credentials. And when I enter them it connects fine.
Why would it not like the User/Password hard coded in the script, but works fine if I enter the exact same credentials?
Outside of the script, on the PowerCLI Command Line I get nearly the same results. If I supply username/password then I get the error. If I don't then it just grabs my user credential and connects right away.

This is a cross domain connection. The box I am on is in one domain and the vCenter instance is in another domain. So supplying the domain\username is essential. Not sure if that matters.

CLI to Vmotion vms

sdspin — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 10:51:57 GMT

Is it possible to uses power cli to vmotion vm off from not responbile host? The host is up and vm are as well, but unable to vmotion via VI Client.

Backup Configuration - VSwitch

CapiZikus — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 08:22:08 GMT

Could someone guide me which folder is need to copy or backup for the vSwitch configuration please, or backup the whole configurations is even better.

Some article mentioned about using kickstart or tar these folders /etc/passwd /etc/shadow /etc/group /etc/grub.conf /etc/pam.d /etc/vmware /boot/ /home/.

Is this a best practise? I would prefer to do in powershell and put the scipt as schedule.

Thanks

Aligning VMFS Partition with Powershell

Rogg23 — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 09:37:31 GMT

Hi,

Is there a way to check the VMFS partition alignment with powerCLI and also to create VMFS partitions so that they align with 64KB track boundaries?

Thanks.

Tagging ESX hosts and tracking in VI Client

harkamal — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 04:08:10 GMT

We have customised ESX builds, put some additional components as part of our installation process and we wish to include our build number or tag the host. So as to be able to identify which build it is running and be able to query inventory via VI Client or toolkit and take actions.

Es. Which servers running myCustomBuild 5.1 don't have portgroup x

So we put a custom field myCustomBuild and populate the field. However, this is lost whenever host is removed from VC and added again (for tshoot purposes)

We do put myCustomBuild tag in ESX file system when we build it. Is there a way this information can be populated in VI db and visible through VI Client and be able to query through VITK.

Thanks.
H

PowerCLI Reverse Compatibility

harkamal — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 16:09:33 GMT

Release notes for PowerCLI mention that it is compatible with VC2.5, ESX3.x

Does it work well with Update Manager Powershell Snapin (VITK 1.0) ? Is that an officially supported configuration or there is a different way for managing update manager in PowerCLI or vSphere4 itself

H.

vSphere SDK for .Net deployment problem - VimService40.XmlSerializers not registered in GAC

chandcv — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 17:18:49 GMT

I don't know if this is the right place to ask this, but this is the best place I could find.

I've build a C# app that references the Vmware.VIM dll to make use of the vSphere SDK for .Net.

The app works fine on the computer where it was developed.

I packaged the app for deployment using a VS setup project. The installer runs without error, but when I attempt to run the app I get an error stating, "Unhandled Exception: System.IO.FileNotFoundException: Could not load file or assembly 'VimService40.XmlSerializers' or one of its dependencies. The system cannot find the file specified."

Indeed, when I check the GAC for this assembly on the computer with the errror, I do not see ''VimService40.XmlSerializers' in there. Further, when I check the GAC for the computer where the vSphere SDK is installed, the assembly is there.

I can work around this issue by deploying the PowerCLI to the computer where I want to run this app, but I'd much rather figure out how to get ''VimService40.XmlSerializers' into the GAC using a windows setup project.

Has anybody else encountered this/figured out what to do about it?

If you need any sample code to get started, make a request here!

navadavuluri — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 00:08:34 GMT

Need a sample code, then submit your request here: CodeCentral Sample Code Request Box

We assure you that all the requests will be processed promptly.

For more information on how this works: Learn about Sample Code Request Box and CodeCentral Feedback

Invalid configuration for device '0' when removing hard disk

Trebormint — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 15:51:19 GMT

I have a script that I've put together from various posts and very useful advice from Luc-D that we use for DR. It runs through a list of datastores and registers any .VMX files it finds. At the same time it changes the NIC configuration and removes all hard disks apart from hard disk 1. Hard disks are removed because they are invalid in the recovered .VMX file due to the path changing, they are added back using another script later on in the recovery process.

Until recently it worked just fine, but after an upgrade to ESX 3.5U4 and VirtuaCenter 2.5 (previously on ESX 3.02 & VC 2) it has stopped working. We tried removing the hard disks manually via the VI Client but that didn't work either. It was then discovered that it would work if connected directly to the ESX server rather than the VC.

A discussion with VMWare support concluded that this is a feature of newer versions of the virtualcenter whereby it is not possible to remove an invalid virtual hard disk or there abouts. This seems most odd.

The script I'm running uses the following to remove the hard disks:

function removevolumes
{
param ($vmObj)
# write $vmObj.config.hardware.device
foreach ($dev in $vmObj.config.hardware.device)
{
# Look for all volumes apart from Hard Disk 1
if ($dev.deviceinfo.label -match "Hard Disk" -and $dev.deviceinfo.label -ne "Hard Disk 1" )
{
$spec = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineConfigSpec
$spec.deviceChange = @()
$spec.DeviceChange += New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualDeviceConfigSpec
if($dev -eq $null) {return}
$spec.deviceChange[0].device += $dev
$spec.deviceChange[0].operation = "remove"
$dev.deviceinfo.label
write $vmObj.ReconfigVM_Task($spec)
#$taskMoRef = $vmObj.ReconfigVM_Task($spec)
$task = Get-View $taskMoRef
# Wait for the task to complete
while($task.info.state -eq "running" -or $task.info.state -eq "queued")
{
$task = Get-View $taskMoRef
}
}
}
}

Is there another way to remove all of the hard disks? Perhaps directly editing the .VMX and removing the invalid hards?

Thanks

PS Script to extract specific detail help please

Kevin Hamilton — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 12:18:44 GMT

Hello, I am looking to create a script that provides a number of specific parameters. I have picked up quite a few good scripts over time but struggling to put them together to get what I need. Wonder if anyone out there either has a script that does it or can help.

I want to extract into csv the name of all my VM Guests, the number and size of VMDK files associated, the partition sizes within these vmdk files then space used and available within those partitions.

I have a number of vmdk files that have multiple partitions within them and need to capture this as well. Any help appreciated.

Cheers

Ouput resource allocation vand resource pool values for VMs via CSV

kaizenwerks — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 15:37:30 GMT

Hi All,

I am new to scripting and continuing my quest to understand it. I would like to modify a script that I found on the forum. I've managed to finagle my way to get it where it is right now but I'd like work through the problem and understand what needs to be added to get the following:

Output the resource allocation (shares, reservations, limits) for each VM and resource pools and continue to output this to csv. I've attached the script I am working with (VMware_VM.ps1). In addition, I've also looked at another script with the following code but I'm not quite sure how to integrate it with the original script. In any case, it would be great to work through this. Thanks.

Send ResourcePool Information to Document

$contents = @($rp | select-object Name, MemLimitMB, CpuLimitMhz, NumCPUShares, NumMemShares | Sort-Object Name)

$columnHeaders = @('Name', 'Memory Limit MB', 'CPU Limit Mhz', 'CPU Shares', 'MEM Shares')

$columnProperties = @('Name', 'MemLimitMB', 'CpuLimitMhz', 'NumCPUShares', 'NumMemShares')

$Heading = "Resource Pool Information"

Move-VM + thin-provisioning?

justin.emerson — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 05:55:19 GMT

In vSphere, you can (via the GUI) Storage VMotion a VM and change its disk type to Thin Provisioned. Is there any way to do this through the provided Move-VM cmdlet? Or do I need to resort to using the API RelocateVM_Task and provide the VirtualMachineRelocateTransformation as sparse?

If it's the latter - might I put in a feature request?

get-cluster timing out

BenConrad — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 21:48:47 GMT

I just wrote a health check script and it ran well in the tst lab.

Now that I've ported it over to Production I'm getting lots of "The operation has timed out" messages. I never have any timeout issues with the VI client GUI running on the same desktop that the scripts runs from.

Any thoughts why I might be getting these timeout errors under powerCLI? From what I've seen, they always seem to fail when performing get-cluster or get-cluster -name $cluster_name | get-view commands.

my vCenter server CPU is not spiked and I've got physical memory left in the guest OS.

Ben

Coffee Talk Webinar: Extending PowerCLI to Enterprise Applications with Virtualization EcoShell

heyitspablo — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 23:17:52 GMT

Folks - Happy to have Scott H. present at our upcoming Coffee Talk Webinar. Wed August 5th, 2009 9:00 AM PST

-> PDF Attached
-> Web Ex Recording
https://vmware.webex.com/vmware/lsr.php?AT=pb&SP=MC&rID=34440042&rKey=467fdfafb577017e

Abstract: IT organizations are identifying increasingly more flexible ways to effectively manage their environments as Windows PowerShell gains in popularity. Through the introduction of VMware PowerCLI, power users and developers are identifying new methods to rapidly develop new features to enhance their virtualization management capabilities. Learn how Vizioncore's Virtualization EcoShell can provide a Graphical Development platform for VMware PowerCLI and the vSphere Web Services SDK that simplifies the development effort required to create PowerShell-based management solutions that extend from the Hypervisor and deep into the Datacenter. If you are an advanced administrator, beginning developer, or OEM provider trying to integrate with virtualization, be sure to check out how you can enhance your virtualization experience through the use of PowerCLI and Virtualization EcoShell.
Level Intermediate

Command execute multiple times

avarcher — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 12:58:24 GMT

We are trying to create a simple scripts to build VMs from templates, modify the CD drives and power on the VMs.

What we get is the following lines repeat many times over and give lots of errors and sometimes not the desired result.

.....

get-cddrive -VM $vcvm | set-cddrive -ISOPath $isopathdrec -StartConnected $true -Confirm:$false
New-CDDrive -VM $vcvm | set-cddrive -ISOPath $isopathesx4 -StartConnected $true -Confirm:$false
New-CDDrive -VM $vcvm | set-cddrive -ISOPath $isopathvim4 -StartConnected $true -Confirm:$false
start-vm -VM $vcvm -Confirm:$false

........

I know these lines will achieve what I want - if they would just run once!

Any help appreciated.

Thanks, Andy.

Setting Vlan on Vmotion Port Group

mealan — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 19:36:41 GMT

I know i am missing something simple, just can't seem to figure out what it is...

$vmkernelname = "VMKernel"

Set-VirtualPortGroup -VirtualPortGroup $vmkernelname -VLanId 343

gives a error of

*Set-VirtualPortGroup : Cannot bind parameter 'VirtualPortGroup'. Cannot convert

value "VMKernel" to type "VMware.VimAutomation.Types.Host.VirtualPortGroup".

**rror: "Invalid cast from 'System.String' to 'VMware.VimAutomation.Types.Host.V
**rtualPortGroup'.
<strong</p>
*+ $test = Set-VirtualPortGroup -VirtualPortGroup <<<< $vmkernelname -VLanId 34
*3

what am i doing wrong?!

Thanks!

*

How to set the annotations for an esx per cluster?

meistermn — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 20:16:43 GMT

Under the registercard configuration for an esx server in virtual center, then choosing "advanced configuration" in sofware section, there is a Option annotations with a field Annotations.WelcomeMessage.

Can this be set through powershell ?

I got this from this articel:

http://www.run-virtual.com/?p=196

Customizing the ESX 3i Main screen
Checking the advanced options list, I found one other nice option called Annotations. Here you can specify the <code>Annotations.WelcomeMessage</code>. What ever message you type here will be displayed on the ESX 3i main screen (when not logged in), so you can specify who is responsible for this server or something creative like that.

Storage vmotion to NFS datastore not working

Tigerstolly — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 12:27:00 GMT

I have a bit of a strange problem. I've done 40+ SVM's to NFS using a third party GUI plugin and thats been fine.

Now i need to move another 40 or so out of hours, so looked at doing it via powercli.

get-vm testvm | move-vm -datastore (get-datastore nfsdatastore)

Seems simple enough but it returns the following error

Move-VM : 29/06/2009 12:50:47 Move-VM 71A411CD-7200-4369-BB2F-FE186F47108
7 The operation for the entity vm-54487 failed with the following message:

" specified parameter was not correct. datastore"

At line:1 char:35
+ get-vm testvm | move-vm <<<< -datastore (get-datastore nfsdatastore)

It does work when moving to traditional LUN's and even local storage so its something to do with the NFS datastore. I have read that SVM to NFS is not officially supported, is this something that anyone else has experienced however ?

How to check the Connectionstate of the Webservice

manfred9999 — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 08:53:02 GMT

Hello

My application uses the View object vmware.vim.VirtualMachine to powerON or powerOFF the Virtual Machine. If I initiate the methode when the Virtualcenter is down, the application hangs until the timeout is received.

Is it possibe to check first if the Webservice is available?

Regards

Manfred

Get-VirtualSwitch available ports wierdness

timparkinsonSheffield — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 14:38:32 GMT

I'm running something like:

$vmhost = Get-Host "myhost.whatever.com"
$switch = $vmhost | Get-VirtualSwitch 
$switch

Which on a couple of hosts seems to display a wildly inaccurate number for Num Hosts Available. On other hosts it works fine. On the two that do not work it's always displaying 59 (of 64 ports), which is a little odd as one of the hosts has 29 guests running on it as I type this. Anyone come across this before?

Clone VM using Powershell PowerCLi

Damianini — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 19:39:36 GMT

I'm trying to clone a vm from an existing virtual machine. This VM is not setup as a template. Normally from the console we just right click and click on clone... I'd like to automate this via powershell. I'm using the script below that i found here on the forums but can't get it to work. There are two errors that I'm getting so I'm not sure if there are more cause it kills the script.

PS U:\scripts\powershell\VMWare> U:\scripts\powershell\VMWare\CloneVMnew.ps1
The term 'get-viserver' is not recognized as a cmdlet, function, operable program, or script file. Verify the term and try again.
At U:\scripts\powershell\VMWare\CloneVMnew.ps1:19 char:13
+ get-viserver <<<< -server $vcserver -user $vmuser -password $vmpassword -Protocol $vmprotocol
PS U:\scripts\powershell\VMWare> U:\scripts\powershell\VMWare\CloneVMnew.ps1
The term 'Find-EntityView' is not recognized as a cmdlet, function, operable program, or script file. Verify the term and try again.
At U:\scripts\powershell\VMWare\CloneVMnew.ps1:22 char:22
+ $HS = Find-EntityView <<<< -ViewType "HostSystem"

I changed the Get-VIServer to Connect-VIServer and now it passes that point in the script. It then gets to $HS and fails with the second error.

Also there is a command for the target directory with the variable $target. How is this possible if the folder has not been created? I tried running a different script with similar parameters and it would fail because it couldn't find the folder. What part of the script is actually creating the folder for the new clone? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

The final script wil need to incorporate specifying a customization script for sysprep and also selecting a Datastore for the VM

Thanks

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Add-PSSnapin Vmware*

#test vm clone script

$ErrorActionPreference = "Stop"

#variables
#VirtualCenter connection variables
$vcserver = "vcenter" #<vcserver>
$vmuser = "User" #<vmuser>
$vmpassword = "Password" #<vmpassword>
$vmprotocol = "HTTPS" # "HTTPS"

#Virtual Machine to be created variables
$vmpool = "ITPool"
$vmname="testxpvm" #<virtual-machine-name-to-be-created>
$vmtemplate= "WinXPSP2_Baseline" #"xp-vdisk-template"
$vmfolder = "testxpvm" #parentfolder for new virtual machines (not full path)

#connect to VirtualCenter with credentials
Connect-viserver -server $vcserver -user $vmuser -password $vmpassword -Protocol $vmprotocol

#sets up vim object
$HS = Find-EntityView -ViewType "HostSystem"

$vmrSpec = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineRelocateSpec
$vmrSpec.transform = http://VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineRelocateTransformation::sparse

#setup resource pool
$pool = get-resourcepool $vmpool
$poolview = get-view $pool.id
$vmrSpec.pool = $poolview.moref

$vmcSpec = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineCloneSpec
$vmcSpec.location = $vmrspec
$vmcSpec.powerOn = $false
$vmcSpec.template = $false

#get storage folder
$target = Get-Folder $vmfolder
$targetview = get-view $target.ID

#get template
$vmmor = Get-VM -name $vmtemplate #Get-Template -Name $vmtemplate
$vmmorview = get-view $vmmor.id #Get-View (Get-VM -name "WinXPSP2_Baseline").id

#clone
$task = $vmmorview.CloneVM_Task($targetview.MoRef,$vmname, $vmcSpec )
#wait-task $task.value

Write-Output "Finished"

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Strange cpu/mem slot on guest

dock — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 14:47:09 GMT

Hi all

I downloaded a script from http://www.peetersonline.nl/ calles get-haclustersize.ps1

The script uncoveres any reason for getting errors when configuring ha.

In my case, the result was this:

=================================
Your heaviest VM in terms of CPU usage is considered to be:

Name CPUSlot MemSlot
----

-------
XXXXXXXXXX 1024 816

Your heaviest VM in terms of Memory usage is considered to be:

Name CPUSlot MemSlot
----

-------
XXXXXXXXXX 1024 816

Your cluster has the following VMHosts:

Name CPU CPUSlots Memory MemSlots

------

esx06.afgruppen.intra 38401 37 65533 80
esx07.afgruppen.intra 38401 37 65533 80
esx08.afgruppen.intra 38401 37 65533 80
esx09.afgruppen.intra 38401 37 65533 80

If you should lose your heaviest VMHost, you would have left:
Number of CPU slots: 111
Number of memory slots: 240

Your current Failover Level is: 0 VMHosts
You should have room for another 46 vms, while maintaining a failover level of 1

Name CPUSlot MemSlot
----

XXXXXXXXXX 1024 816

Considering that my clusters total is 37*4 and 80*4 something is wrong

The guest is a Windows 2008 X64 4vCPU 12GB RAM running exchange 2007 SP1 Mailbox role

Anyone who can tell me why i'm getting this result?

Kristian

.Net Web App Problem Using PowerShell

blakef — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 14:16:58 GMT

I have several .net-based web apps running powershell code with various snapins. Currently because powershell was apparently thought of as a command-line tool, to run under a MS web app, an application pool must be configured with domain credentials of a 'service account' so that the underlying providers run under credentials. With the VMWare VI Toolkit installed and the 'service account' configured on the pool that has rights in vCenter, it will not work on a production web server (it does work on the dev server because the web browser is running on the same machine as the web server and credentials are passed through) even though credentials are being specified in the 'connect-viserver' line with -user userid -password password and the account is a local admin on the web server.

This configuration (service account that has rights in the target powershell object and is a local admin on the web server) works fine except with the VI Toolkit powershell providers.

Another oddity is that if the pool is configured with MY domain account, it will work, and if the credentials of the 'service account' are specified in the 'connect-viserver' line, the code returns only what that account has rights to see. If I specify MY credentials in the 'connect-viserver' line it returns what I have rights to see. I can run the commands fine manually from the command-prompt when logged into the web server as the service account.

There are no errors generated in the eventlog, web logs, or anywhere else on the server. The 'providers' and 'engine' all startup fine in the powershell eventlog, then stop. The code appears to not run the connect-viserver line correctly, becasue the error trapped by the web code errors on the line 'get-vm' which states: "Get-VM You are not currently connected to any servers. Please connect first using Connect-VIServer or one of its aliases"

Here is the web code:

Public Shared Sub GetVMs(ByVal Controller As String, ByRef resultObject As System.Collections.ObjectModel.Collection(Of System.Management.Automation.PSObject), ByRef errtxt As String, ByVal IDToUse As String, ByVal PasswordToUse As String)

Dim myRunSpace As Runspace

Dim rsConfig As RunspaceConfiguration = RunspaceConfiguration.Create()

Dim snapInException As New PSSnapInException

Dim info As PSSnapInInfo

info = rsConfig.AddPSSnapIn("VMware.VimAutomation.Core", snapInException)

myRunSpace = RunspaceFactory.CreateRunspace(rsConfig)

myRunSpace.Open()

Dim enumD As New StringBuilder

enumD.AppendLine("$visvr = Connect-VIServer -Server " & Controller & " -User " & IDToUse & " -Password " & PasswordToUse)

enumD.AppendLine("get-vm")

Dim pipe As Pipeline = myRunSpace.CreatePipeline()

pipe.Commands.AddScript(enumD.ToString)

Try

resultObject = pipe.Invoke()

Catch ex As Exception

errtxt = ex.InnerException.Message.ToString & "<BR>" & ex.TargetSite.ToString & "<BR>" & ex.Source.ToString

End Try

myRunSpace.Close()

End Sub

plink script + return value

RobMokkink — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 06:16:47 GMT

I have some plink scripts for stuff the vitoolkit can handle.
To get the outcome of a particular command i do the following:

invoke expression $COMMAND | out-string

But i am searching for a way to get the access denied message. The method above doesn give me an output.

Connecting to VC on port 8080 with get-viServer

zenomorph — Sun, 24 May 2009 09:42:52 GMT

I'm trying to use PowerCLI to connect to our VC but the http port on our VC is 8080 instead of 80, how can I specify another http port in the command

Get-VIServer -Server 192.168.10.10 -Protocol http -User admin -Password sck9p84

I also tried using https but get the following error;

I tried specifiying port 8080

PS C:\Program Files\VMware\Infrastructure\VIToolkitForWindows> get-vIServer -server hk-vcwn001 -port 8080 -user administrator -password XXX
Get-VIServer : Specified argument was out of the range of valid values.
At line:1 char:13
+ get-vIServer <<<< -server hk-vpcwn001 -port 8080 -user administrator -passwordxxxx

and then tried https

PS C:\Program Files\VMware\Infrastructure\VIToolkitForWindows> get-vIServer -serer hk-vcwn001 -protocol https -user administrator -password xxxx

There were one or more problems with the server certificate:

A certification chain processed correctly, but terminated in a root certificat which isn't trusted by the trust provider.

The certificate's CN name does not match the passed value.

Many thanks

how to get-vm from host and migrate one-by-one

bubunia — Fri, 22 May 2009 05:11:21 GMT

I am trying to get-vm from host (in a cluster) and move/vmotion vms from one host to other hosts, i suppose something similar to this one:

get-cluster -name blah | get-vmhost -name blah-blah | get-vm (I suppose I need to dump to a text array_list_vms etc.) then;

while (array_list_vms != NULL) {

move-vm -name (get_name from array_list_vms) -destination (get-cluster -name blah) confirm:$false

}

What makes this difficult for me is part to read from get-vm content, and moving each VM and then array_list_vms count -1 to reduce VM list etc.

Thanks in advance.

trying to get lists of VMs from Host within Cluster and dump into text and compare number of VMs per hosts

bubbzie — Thu, 21 May 2009 17:19:27 GMT

I am trying to come up with number of hosts in a cluster and VMs in these hosts, then dump into txt file and then do comparison etc.

Something like this:

$activeCluster = Get-Cluster |where {$_.DrsEnabled -like "True"}

$myHosts = $activeCluster | get-vmhost

$VMs = $myHosts|get-vm # using select name, host (but somehow I could not split/separate nicely number of VMs per host)

and then dump into txt file Out-File c:\tmp\file.txt

then get-content C:\tmp\file.txt to do some comparison and based on how many VMs per each host, to balance hosts with ~equal amount of VMs using move-vm option.

Basically, point of this would be not to allow any of the host to have way more VMs compare to other hosts etc.

Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

How to Synchronize baselines for Update Manager between two VC?

olegarr — Wed, 20 May 2009 16:20:09 GMT

How to synchronize baselines for Update Manager between two VC?

Hello:

I am wondering if someone have the script that will help me synchronize two baselines (with the same name) for VMware Update Manager on two VCs...

I know that I can delete baseline on my "destination" VC and export/import baseline from source VC, but I need to keep baseline on destination otherwise I have to attach it again to all my ESXs... That means that I have to synch my two baselines someway...

Any help will be really appreciated.

Thanks,

olegarr

Device Datastore per Host from VCDB

dloop2 — Wed, 13 May 2009 19:06:46 GMT

This may not be the right place to post this, I'm trying to rewrite some code that is in powershell using the vi-toolkit, to instead be in powershell going directly to the VCDB. In case you are wondering why, this is part of a larger script that runs too slowly. This is the last piece to convert to go to the DB directly.

The information I am after is what Virtual Center displays in the "Configuration ...Storage Panel". In particular the "IDENTIFICATION" column and the matching "DEVICE" (vmhba) column.

Here is a powershell script that gathers this information:


function FillDatastoreLookupTable () {
	Write-Host "Function: FillDatastoreLookupTable"
	foreach ($h in $HostTable.keys) {
		$hss = Get-View (Get-View (Get-VMHost -Name $h).ID).ConfigManager.StorageSystem
		foreach($mount in $hss.FileSystemVolumeInfo.MountInfo){
  			if($mount.Volume.Type -eq "VMFS"){
    			foreach($ext in $mount.Volume.Extent){
      				foreach($lun in $hss.StorageDeviceInfo.MultipathInfo.Lun){
	   		 			if($lun.Id -eq $ext.DiskName) {break}
	  				}
					
					Write-Host $h $ext.DiskName $mount.Volume.Name
				}
  			}
		}
	}
}

I've come close to duplicating this going directly to the VCDB. The only place I can find the VMHBA infromation stored with the Datastore identification is in the XML text contained with the INFO column of the VPX_Datastore table. If this cross-reference of information VMHBA to Datastore is located somewhere else that would be VERY HELPFUL to know.

Here is the code to extract it out of the INFO column:


function FillDatastoreLookupTable () {
	Write-Host "Function: FillDatastoreLookupTable"
	$SqlCmd 					= New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlCommand
	$SqlCmd.CommandText 		= "SELECT name, Info FROM dbo.VPX_DATASTORE where type = 'vmfs'"	 
	$SqlCmd.Connection 			= $SqlConnection
	$SqlAdapter 				= New-Object System.Data.SqlClient.SqlDataAdapter
	$SqlAdapter.SelectCommand 	= $SqlCmd
	$DataSet 					= New-Object System.Data.DataSet
	$SqlAdapter.Fill($DataSet)  | out-null
	$dsinfo = $DataSet.Tables[0] 
	
	foreach ($row in $dsinfo) {
		$doc = [xml] ("<root xmlns:xsi='urn:dummy'>" + $row.info + "</root>")
		($doc.root.obj.vmfs) | % {
			$_.extent | % {
				$DatastoreLookupTable.add($_.diskname, $row.name)  | Out-Null
			}
		}
	}
}

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Exception while creating customization package.

kimono — Wed, 13 May 2009 17:05:33 GMT

Hello, I am putting together a bulk clone from template script using many of the PS methods posted around here. However am currently stuck with the following problem. VM provisions from template fine, but customizaton fails with that age-old "Customization Failed" error in Virtual Center, after the VM disk has been provisioned. This is what VPXD logs tell me. I am on PS1.0 and the 1.5 toolkit. I've seen many of the other posts around here and aware of the previous issues with new-VM and templates. So 'm actually using a method similar to posted here and also building the vmclonespec manually. e.g.:

$vmclonespec.Customization.GlobalIPSettings = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationGlobalIPSettings
$vmclonespec.Customization.Options = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationWinOptions
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationSysprep
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.GuiUnattended = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationGuiUnattended
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.GuiUnattended.Password = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationPassword
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.Identification = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationIdentification
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.Identification.DomainAdminPassword = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationPassword
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.UserData = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationUserData
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.UserData.ComputerName = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationFixedName
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.LicenseFilePrintData = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationLicenseFilePrintData
$vmclonespec.Customization.Identity.LicenseFilePrintData.AutoMode = New-Object VMware.Vim.CustomizationLicenseDataMode
$vmclonespec.config = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineConfigSpec
$vmclonespec.location = New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineRelocateSpec

My script logic is all fine, I think, just something stupid going on with sysprep setup.
Who can give me the latest tip?

2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose] clone (2K3_UNIPROC_ENT_V2.2) Customizing the destination VM
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 info-- hostVersion = 3.5.0, tools version = 7300
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 info-- hostVersion = 3.5.0, tools version = 7300
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 info-- Sysprep options: -quiet -mini -reseal -reboot
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 info-- Successfully created file C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\imc2BA6.tmp
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param Unattended.OemSkipEula to value Yes
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param Unattended.InstallFilesPath to value \sysprep\i386
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param GuiUnattended.OemSkipWelcome to value 1
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param GuiUnattended.OEMSkipRegional to value 1
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param Networking.InstallDefaultComponents to value Yes
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param GuiUnattended.TimeZone to value 225
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param GuiUnattended.AutoLogon to value Yes
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param GuiUnattended.AutoLogonCount to value 1
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param GuiUnattended.AdminEncryptedPassword to value xxxxx
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param UserData.FullName to value xxxx
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param UserData.OrgName to value xxx
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param UserData.ProductKey to value xxxx
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param UserData.ComputerName to value TestVM1
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param Identification.JoinWorkgroup to value WORKGROUP
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 verbose-- Setting param LicenseFilePrintData.AutoMode to value perSeat
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 error-- Exception while creating customization package.
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 info-- Successfully deleted file/directory C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\imc2BA6.tmp
--2009-05-14 00:54:51.686 'App' 3760 error-- clone (2K3_UNIPROC_ENT_V2.2) Unexpected exception (vim.fault.CustomizationFault) during clone. Aborting.

Message was edited by: kimono --- sorry bad formatting. This editor still annoys me!

VI Toolkit 1.5 / Visual Basic 2008: Passthrough Authentication?

Abacus99 — Tue, 12 May 2009 17:18:09 GMT

Hi everybody,

I use VI Toolkit 1.5 / .NET together with Visual Basic 2008 (no PowerShell) to set up maintenance applications for our rather large ESX environment, which works quite smooth with dialog applications where the users are queried for their login credentials first which are then used to login to the VC server.

Now I need to create some batch applications - unfortunately I found no easy way so far to use some kind of passthrough authentication (use the logon credentials of the current user context and pass them on to VC to get authenticated without manually entering or hard coding credential data).

Does anybody know how to do this? Thanks very much for every hint or code sample...

VI toolkit Extensions - Get-TkeLogLastModifiedDate

houghtp — Fri, 08 May 2009 15:02:43 GMT

Hi I'm trying to run

get-vm | Get-TkeLogLastModifiedDate

but i only get one VM returned

[VI Toolkit] C:\scripts> get-vm | Get-TkeLogLastModifiedDate

Name                                                        LogLastModifiedDate
----                                                        -------------------
VSV-SQL-TAA                                                 01/01/0001 00:00:00

any ideas?

(at first this function wouldn't run I think it was trying to call a function called get-datastorefiles which doesn't exist in the latest TKE Module dated 2nd May, I did find it in an older version of the extensions so I copied it over and it now runs)

vmware Tools Update script

gboskin — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 13:44:09 GMT

Iwith Update 4 fully tested in our build environment we hope to update our systems.

need to script the vmware tool update.

I really need 2 scripts

1 ) To upgrade vmwaretool on all virtual machines resource pool by resource pool and reboot with a 5 second interval....

2) To upgrade vmwaretool on all virtual machines resource pool by resource pool with NO REBOOT

I know this has been discussed in the past but cannot seem to get it work

How do I run this script in DMZ

kevinr2008 — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 19:03:16 GMT

The vcserver is on the production network and the script work on there OK but does not get and of the server in the DMZ.
I can not run it from the DMZ as does not have access to the vcserver.
Is the only way to open a port?

#Get VMware Disk Usage

Created by Hugo Peeters
http://www.peetersonline.nl

VARIABLES

$Decimals = 1
$VCServer = “xxxxxxxx”

SCRIPT
Connect to VC

Write-Progress “Gathering Information” “Connecting to Virtual Center” -Id 0
$VC = Connect-VIServer $VCServer

Create Output Collection

$myCol = @()

List Datastores (Datastore Name)

Write-Progress “Gathering Information” “Listing Datastores” -Id 0
$Datastores = Get-Datastore | Sort Name

List vms

Write-Progress “Gathering Information” “Listing VMs and Disk Files” -Id 0
$VMSummaries = @()
ForEach ($vm in (Get-VM))
{
$VMView = $VM | Get-View
ForEach ($VirtualSCSIController in ($VMView.Config.Hardware.Device | Where {$_.DeviceInfo.Label -match “SCSI Controller”}))
{
ForEach ($VirtualDiskDevice in ($VMView.Config.Hardware.Device | Where {$_.ControllerKey -eq $VirtualSCSIController.Key}))
{
$VMSummary = “” | Select VM, HostName, PowerState, DiskFile, DiskName, DiskSize, SCSIController, SCSITarget
$VMSummary.VM = $VM.Name
$VMSummary.HostName = $VMView.Guest.HostName
$VMSummary.PowerState = $VM.PowerState
$VMSummary.DiskFile = $VirtualDiskDevice.Backing.FileName
$VMSummary.DiskName = $VirtualDiskDevice.DeviceInfo.Label
$VMSummary.DiskSize = $VirtualDiskDevice.CapacityInKB * 1KB
$VMSummary.SCSIController = $VirtualSCSIController.BusNumber
$VMSummary.SCSITarget = $VirtualDiskDevice.UnitNumber
$VMSummaries += $VMSummary
}
}
Clear-Variable VMView -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}

Loop through Datastores

ForEach ($Datastore in $Datastores)
{

List vmdk files in datastore (vmdk Name)

Write-Progress “Gathering Information” (”Processing Datastore {0}” -f $Datastore.Name) -Id 0
$DSView = $Datastore | Get-View
$fileQueryFlags = New-Object VMware.Vim.FileQueryFlags
$fileQueryFlags.FileSize = $true
$fileQueryFlags.FileType = $true
$fileQueryFlags.Modification = $true
$searchSpec = New-Object VMware.Vim.HostDatastoreBrowserSearchSpec
$searchSpec.details = $fileQueryFlags
$searchSpec.sortFoldersFirst = $true
$dsBrowser = Get-View $DSView.browser
$rootPath = ““
$searchResult = $dsBrowser.SearchDatastoreSubFolders($rootPath, $searchSpec)
ForEach ($result in $searchResult)
{
ForEach ($vmdk in ($result.File | ?{$_.Path -like “*.vmdk”} | Sort Path))
{
Write-Progress “Gathering Information” (”Processing VMDK {0}” -f $vmdk.Path) -Id 1
Write-Host “==============================================================================”

Find vm using the vmdk (VM Name)

$VMRef = ($VMSummaries | ?{$_.DiskFile -match $Datastore.Name -and $_.DiskFile -match $vmdk.Path})
“VMDK {0} belongs to VM {1}” -f $vmdk.Path, $VMRef.VM
If ($VMRef.Powerstate -eq “PoweredOn”)
{
Write-Host “VM is powered on” -ForegroundColor “yellow”
$Partitions = Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_DiskPartition -ComputerName $VMRef.HostName
If ($?)
{
$Disks = Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_DiskDrive -ComputerName $VMRef.HostName
$LogicalDisks = Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_LogicalDisk -ComputerName $VMRef.HostName
$DiskToPartition = Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_DiskDriveToDiskPartition -ComputerName $VMRef.HostName
$LogicalDiskToPartition = Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_LogicalDiskToPartition -ComputerName $VMRef.HostName
Write-Host “Read partition and disk information” -ForegroundColor “yellow”

Match disk based on SCSI ID’s

$DiskMatch = $Disks | ?{($_.SCSIPort - 1) -eq $VMRef.SCSIController -and $_.SCSITargetID -eq $VMRef.SCSITarget}
If ($DiskMatch -eq $null){Write-Warning “NO MATCHES!”}
Else
{
Write-Host “Found match:” -ForegroundColor “yellow”
$DiskMatch

Find the Partition(s) on this disk

$PartitionsOnDisk = ($DiskToPartition | ?{$_.Antecedent -eq $DiskMatch.__PATH})
If ($PartitionsOnDisk -eq $null){Write-Warning “NO PARTITIONS!”}
Else
{
ForEach ($PartitionOnDisk in $PartitionsOnDisk)
{
Write-Host “Disk contains partition” -ForegroundColor “yellow”
$PartitionOnDisk.Dependent
$PartitionMatches = $Partitions | ?{$_.__PATH -eq $PartitionOnDisk.Dependent}
ForEach ($PartitionMatch in $PartitionMatches)
{
$LogicalDiskRefs = $LogicalDiskToPartition | ?{$_.Antecedent -eq $PartitionMatch.__PATH}
If ($LogicalDiskRefs -eq $null)
{
Write-Warning “NO LOGICAL DISKS!”
}
Else
{
ForEach ($LogicalDiskRef in $LogicalDiskRefs)
{
$LogicalDiskMatches = $LogicalDisks | ?{$_.__PATH -eq $LogicalDiskRef.Dependent}
ForEach ($LogicalDiskMatch in $LogicalDiskMatches)
{
Write-Host “Matching Logical Disk:” -ForegroundColor “yellow”
$LogicalDiskMatch

Create Output Object

$myObj = “” | Select Datastore, DSSizeGB, DSFreeGB, DSPercentFree, DiskFile, VM, HardDisk, DriveLetter, DiskSizeGB, DiskFreeGB, PercFree

List datastore name

$myObj.Datastore = $Datastore.Name

Determine datastore size in GB

$myObj.DSSizeGB = Math::Round(($Datastore.CapacityMB * 1MB / 1GB),$Decimals)
$myObj.DSFreeGB = Math::Round(($Datastore.FreeSpaceMB * 1MB / 1GB),$Decimals)

Determine datastore free space (DS%Free)

$myObj.DSPercentFree = Math::Round((100*($Datastore.FreeSpaceMB/$Datastore.CapacityMB)),$Decimals)

List disk file name

$myObj.DiskFile = $vmdk.Path

List VM Name

$myObj.VM = $VMRef.VM

Determine virtual hard disk / logical drive

$myObj.HardDisk = $VMRef.DiskName

Report driveletter

$myObj.DriveLetter = $LogicalDiskMatch.DeviceID

Report Size

$myObj.DiskSizeGB = Math::Round(($LogicalDiskMatch.Size / 1GB),$Decimals)

Report Free Space

$myObj.DiskFreeGB = Math::Round(($LogicalDiskMatch.FreeSpace / 1GB),$Decimals)

Calculate Percentage free space

$myObj.PercFree = Math::Round((100 * (int($LogicalDiskMatch.FreeSpace / 1MB) / int($LogicalDiskMatch.Size / 1MB))),$Decimals)
Write-Host “RESULT:” -ForegroundColor “yellow”
$myObj

Add output object to output collection

$myCol += $myObj
}
Clear-Variable LogicalDiskMatches -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}
}
Clear-Variable LogicalDiskRefs -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}
Clear-Variable PartitionMatches -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}
}
Clear-Variable PartitionsOnDisk -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}
Clear-Variable DiskMatch -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Clear-Variable Disks -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Clear-Variable LogicalDisks -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Clear-Variable DiskToPartition -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Clear-Variable LogicalDiskToPartition -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}
Clear-Variable Partitions -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
}
Else
{
Write-Host “VM is powered off” -ForegroundColor “yellow”
}
Clear-Variable VMRef -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
Write-Progress “Gathering Information” (”Processing VMDK {0}” -f $vmdk.Path) -Id 1 -Completed
}
}
}

Disconnect from VC

Disconnect-VIServer -Confirm:$False

OUTPUT

Write-Host “===================================================”
Write-Host “===================================================”
$TotalDSFree = ($myCol | Select Datastore, DSFreeGB -Unique | Measure-Object DSFreeGB -Sum).Sum
$TotalDSSize = ($myCol | Select Datastore, DSSizeGB -Unique | Measure-Object DSSizeGB -Sum).Sum
$AverageDSFree = Math::Round(100 * ($TotalDSFree / $TotalDSSize),$Decimals)
$AverageDiskFree = Math::Round(100 * (($myCol | Measure-Object DiskFreeGB -Sum).Sum / ($myCol | Measure-Object DiskSizeGB -Sum).Sum),$Decimals)
Write-Host “Total DS Free: $TotalDSFree”
Write-Host “Total DS Size: $TotalDSSize”
Write-Host “Average DS Free Percentage: $AverageDSFree”
Write-Host “Average Disk Free Percentage: $AverageDiskFree”
$myCol | Export-Csv -NoTypeInformation ‘C:\scipts\VMwareDiskUsage.csv’

NFS storage uuid changing due to move

jsouthwell — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 18:16:53 GMT

We have to move our NFS storage to a different IP address space. This will result in the uuid changing for each volume. Anyone ideas on the best way to accomplish this?

I thought that maybe I could capture the virtualdisk backing.filename, scsicontroller.busnumber, and virtualdisk.unitnumber for each VM before the move and then remove the disks just before the change. After readding the "new" NFS mount points I could readd the disks for each VM based on the information collected above. Would this be doable or does anyone have any idea that may work? Most VM's have 2 or more disks.

Thanks for any ideas and/or code you may be willing to share.

jim

modify mac address via powershell

kwharrisit — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 15:28:56 GMT

We have a software license that locks it's use down to the mac address of the vmx file.In order to make deployments easier, a developer wrote a program that will edit the mac address in the vmx file to something taken from the host name and give us a way to track from that. The only issue is that the program works fine on a windows box (it just finds the vmx on your drive , makes the edit and closes) but the issue with that is we have 600 machines already deployed and copy the vmx files from vmfs to an ntfs drive, editing and send back would be painfull.

What I have suggested is if we could use a powershell script to run from the VC server, go through a list of machines and execute the previously written program . I just dont know how to accomplish this. any help is grealty appreciated!

Reporting HBA Status...

chayes — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 21:17:16 GMT

I'm looking for a way to spin through hosts in a farm and collect\alert on HBA status. For example, I need to know when an HBA goes down or fails within the farm. In VCenter this is typically represented by a blank Details window for a selected vmhba#.

I thought I had this kicked by searching for path status, dead or disabled, But it does not report on when cards are down. I'm actually missing the whole element that the path is not actually there when it should be (e.g. the card is down). I've thought about simply searching for a null path within my logic, but there has to be a better way to report on what VCenter sees when a card goes down. Perhaps finding the target? VCenter reports vmhba#, model, WWN and Targets...

Not sure. Hopefully someone has something!
Thx

Script to get Lun Latency

dloop2 — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 16:36:03 GMT

I've seen this script here, and have a few question I hope you can help answer for me:

1) It does return data, but why does it issue these errors in the process of returning the data?

"disk.devicereadlatency.average" doesn't exist for entity <your esx host name here>

"disk.devicewritelatency.average" doesn't exist for entity <your esx host name here>

2) In the data returned, sometimes the value for device latency is "-1". Does the the "-1" have some special meaning? See attached file.

3) Where is it documented that shows the allowed parameters to the -Stat option like "-Stat disk.deviceWriteLatency.average"?

Thanks.

Get-Stat - Need Additional Data

ehayes — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 15:21:52 GMT

Is there a way to get other historical data on the entity that I'm collecting the stat from? For Instance I'd like to know the Host that was running the VM, the Datastore, or even high level resources like the Cluster or Datacenter.

Get-Stat -Entity "VM001" -start "04/20/2009 00:00" -Finish "04/20/2009 01:00" -Stat "cpu.usage.average" -intervalmins 5 -maxsamples 1000 | where { $_.Value -ge 0 }

I plan to use a .net datatable..I would want to build output that looks like this:

Time,Entity,Metric,Value,Host,Datastore

04/20/09 00:00,VM001,cpu.usage,500,Host02,DataStore5

fault.RestrictedVersion.summary

slorkman — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 11:18:57 GMT

Hello,

I'm trying some Powershell scripting options on my ESX server, wich is the "free" ESX 3.i 3.5.0 build 153875.I'm using the VI Toolkit 1.5, wich I just downloaded. I'm currently using "automating VMware with Powershell" as a guideline

(http://blogs.vmware.com/vipowershell/files/vmworld_europe_2008_powershell_lab_7_manual.pdf)

Connecting to my server goes flawlessly, simple commands like "get-vmhost" and "get-datastore" work fine.

however, when I try to start a powered-down VM using "get-vm machinename | start-vm I get the following errormessage:

VI Toolkit C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\Infrastructure\VIToolkitForWindows> get-vm jbvlabel | start-vm
Start-VM : 4/16/2009 12:10:31 PM Start-VM 52a7b166-4fbd-2452-585b-e4077d564845 fault.RestrictedVersion.summary
At line:1 char:26
+ get-vm jbvlabel | start-vm <<<<

I tried googling, but no results. Could this be because I'm using the free version? Can it be that scripting is only possible on the non-free ESX version?

Any help is appreciated,

Kind regards,

Robert

PSSnapin and Types

fixitchris — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 00:28:42 GMT

I'm having an issue writing a VI script:

I'm forced to start the script with the provided PSC file to load the snapin:

This does not work for me:

$VMCore = Get-PSSnapin VMware.VimAutomation.Core -EA 0
if ( -not $VMCore ) { Add-PSSnapin VMware.VimAutomation.Core }; 

[void][http://Reflection.Assembly|http://Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("Microsoft.VisualBasic")
[void][http://Reflection.Assembly|http://Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("VMware.Vim")
[void][http://Reflection.Assembly|http://Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("VMware.VimAutomation")

for some reason when I try the above code I get the following when referencing types:

Unable to find type [http://VMware.VimAutomation.VIServerImpl|http://VMware.VimAutomation.VIServerImpl]: make sure that the assembly containing this type is loaded.

Then when I start the PS1 with by passing the VIM.PSC, the VMware.VimAutomation types are ok but then this happens:

Unable to find type [http://Microsoft.VisualBasic.Collection|http://Microsoft.VisualBasic.Collection]: make sure that the assembly containing this type is loaded.

I'm not sure what the proper way is to accommodate both VMWARE and MS assemblies...

Reserved Mem & CPU assigned to Guests

JindiJee — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 22:28:21 GMT

Hi, I was reading this thread - Total Consumption on Cluster per VM - which provides a great look into collecting perf data. I also want to see what the mem and cpu allocations & reservations for all VMs across clusters. This would be helpful to guage capacity. I know I must keep on eye on rources needed for my ESX Hosts, but it would be nice to know what I have committed to my VMs through reservations in case there is a run on my reservations and my VMs all grab their max allocations.

The script would collect a list of all VMs, show their current mem & cpu usage and also show the corresponding mem & cpu reservations.

HAs anyone given this a go yet?

Thanks,

Managing VMware with PowerShell book now available for pre-order

halr9000 — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 20:01:22 GMT

More details: http://halr9000.com/article/716

Ships in mid-April! I'm very excited.

Please note that if you are outside of the U.S., the feedback I'm getting is that the shipping is very steep. You may want to wait till the book hits Amazon.

vExpert, PowerShell MVP, VI Toolkit forum moderator
Author of the upcoming book: Managing VMware Infrastructure with PowerShell
Co-Host, PowerScripting Podcast (http://powerscripting.net)
Need general, non-VMware-related PowerShell Help? Try the forums at PowerShellCommunity.org

Enhanced vmxnet set-networkadapter

kjb007 — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 18:08:20 GMT

I've recently run into an issue where using set-networkadapter to change an enhanced vmxnet, modified the device type to vmxnet, as well as changing the device type whereby I receive warnings that the network adapter type is not supported. Anyone else run into or have seen this?

-KjB
VMware vExpert

graphical chart -dynamic html web site

pprovino — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 08:57:43 GMT

Hy to everyone,

in these days I m going to begin to work with get-stat statistics to obtail realtime performance on RAM CPU of my VC environment.

My problem : I d like to obtain a graphic pie chart or similar of my values obtained from get-stat result and redirect it to an intranet web site with dynamic graphic rapresentation of esx performance.

I m imagine three elements IIS ASP and (powershell with vitoolkit snapin loaded)

But I don't Know where I can start from ?

Powershell with a scheduled task to start get.stat -----------fill a db table and a query asp to rapresent my value to a chart pie ina virtual directory IIS?

thank you again for your answer in advance

Bye to everyone

Get-VMHostAdvancedConfiguration

houghtp — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 15:45:14 GMT

Is there a way to return all Advanced config except a certain value.

I know you can do

get-vmhostadvancedconfiguration -name Misc

but can't seem to find a way to return everything but Misc.CosCoreFile

i've tried Get-VMHostAdvancedConfiguration -VMHost svr-vmh-crcla01.lbcamden.net | where {$_.Name -notlike "Misc.CosCoreFile"} but doesn't work

CDRom and Floppy drive connection

tekhie — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 12:05:15 GMT

hi all, i am trying to amend the very useful Healthcheck script that i have picked up on this forum. I am trying to change it so that the connection status of CDRom and Floppy appear as True/False in the 'VM Information' table, rather than separate to the table.

As i am new to this if anyone can offer advice on how to do this that would be great.

invoke-vmscript timeout issue

halr9000 — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 04:48:19 GMT

I just tried to do invoke-vmscript against a VM and I'm not sure that the default timeout of 20 seconds is working. Possibly related is the fact that I didn't realize that the tools service was out of date until I got warned so by the cmdlet.

Yeah, it's been sitting here a couple of minutes now, I don't think it's gonna work.

vExpert, PowerShell MVP, VI Toolkit forum moderator
Author of the upcoming book: Managing VMware Infrastructure with PowerShell
Co-Host, PowerScripting Podcast (http://powerscripting.net)
Need general, non-VMware-related PowerShell Help? Try the forums at PowerShellCommunity.org

VMware network configuration compliance for Intranet and DMZ

dmn0211 — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:53:55 GMT

I stumbled accross this script this morning. Thought it might be useful for someone else.

Monitors VMware Infrastructure's network configuration for compliance to network isolation policy. Sends alert emails when a virtual machine is connected simultaneously to Intranet and DMZ. Based on VMware VI Toolkit (for Windows). The script assumes a pre-established connection to a Virtual Center server.

Thank you Andrey Anastasov!

http://poshcode.org/943

Have a Great Day!

vCenter 2.5 U4 performanace overview graphs to word VI script

gboskin — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 12:58:03 GMT

Thanks to yellow-bricks i foound a script to install the performnace pluggin which work well. The install went ok with the script and also manually ...

The results can be seen at http://www.run-virtual.com/files/perf3.gif .... I was wondering for all you VI toolkit GURUs , high priests of VMware knowledge' and ‘the cardinals of VMware' ....

It will be nice to have a scipts thats puts this data onto a word format. http:// i.e tranfersing the weekly stats in graph format to a word document.....