Re-evaluating my report scripts

[pamiller21]

Hey all,

Currently, I have a windows VM that runs all my scripts against the vCenter and then ftp's the reports its makes to a shared drive and finally have a linux webserver publish the directory so I can access the reports.  I really want to simplify this all, but I am not crazy proficient in linux OS (the current linux part is done by another admin). Here are some of the random thoughts/problems I have:

1) I'd like to eliminate the need for a windows license if I could maneuver around a linux OS.

2) I am currently using another windows domain user to run the scheduled task to prevent password change problems, but this seems to cause an issue when I need to work with my xml cred file.

3) Making new scripts means I have to do work in the share and the linux server on top of making it work on the windows box to start.

Open to ideas and thank you all,

Andy

[LucD]

Since PowerShell and PowerCLI can run on Linux, either native or in a container, you can run your scripts on a Linux box.

In fact my Cloud Init series shows how you deploy such boxes in an automated way, including PS and PowerCLI.

For reports I use a pipeline that deploys a temporary VM, run the scripts and removes the VM.

The existing credentials, based on Windows DPAPI methods, will of course not work on a Linux box.

There are alternatives available.

These can be native key management servers on Linux with or without a proxy function.

I did a session on the latter at the PowerShell and DevOps Summit in Seattle in 2019.

I store my scripts that I run on the temporary VM in a github repository.

That makes it easy to have access to the these scripts from whatever station.

Instead of a github repo you can of course also use a plain file share (SMB, NFS...)

[pamiller21]

I am trying to use photon OS, since you all made it and would support powershell to it first, but I am having trouble setting up nginx.  I have the default page up, but I would like to set it up so it just publishes a directory showing all my scripts reports to be viewed.  Anything I should be looking into?

[LucD]

Is that nginx in a container or native?

[pamiller21]

native

[LucD]

Can you share the details how you installed and setup nginx?
That way I'm looking at the same situation as you.