Vmware Esx 5.1 Shut down Script

[djshaunvt]

Hi Guys.

I wonder if anyone could assist me.

We are having many power outages here in South Africa and I am faced with having to shut down our servers regularly.

I have got all our windows servers shutting down automatically via our UPS software (Riellio)

I have tried to download the Vmware software from our UPS support page but they say it wont work on the free version of Esx 5.1.

In turn what I have done is to create a script which runs through Plink and I am hoping to use this on another windows box as a shuhtdown script.

So when the windows box shuts down it will run the script and in turn shut down the ESX i host.

I have enabled the SSH server on the Esxi and when I run the shutdown script it shuts down the server just fine but I have been reading that the server should be in Maintenance mode when powering off.

I just want to make sure it is shutting down the Esx server gracefully.

The script is below:

Any help would be appreciated.

Script text as follows:

plink -ssh root@10.1.6.11 -pw mypassword poweroff -d 10

plink -ssh root@10.1.6.11 -pw mypassword poweroff -d 10

[JarryG]

Why do not you try "NUT" (network ups tools) software? It has client for ESXi too, and it supports many Riello-UPS models...

In my configuration, I have one linux-VM running as "NUT-master" (talking to ups). If power-outage is detected and battery is in "cirtical/low" state, it issues command to all "NUT-slaves" (other VMs, ESXi and other physical servers) to shut down. It works very well for me, and I think is more secure (does not need root-password for some script)...

[djshaunvt]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply.

Does this come in the form of an OVF template which you need to install then on the ESX through VM ware Sphere. ?

Just trying to understand how it work.

If so I will check it out.

Thanks.

[Alistar · Accepted solution]

Hi there,

while investigating the option of doing it via appliance, you can tweak your command to do the following:

plink -ssh root@10.1.6.11 -pw mypassword "esxcli system maintenanceMode set -e true;poweroff -d 10"

this way the host will first enter maintenance mode and the next command via ; will be shutdown.

[djshaunvt]

Hi Alistar...

Perfect...

Just what I am looking for in the meantime while I get the proper UPS option figured out

Much appreciated..

Shaun

[JarryG]

NUT comes as any other installation file: source-code in "tar.gz" archive-file, "vib" as binnary installation package for ESXi, and there are also native binary formats for any common linux/bsd/windows. No special template is needed, it can be installed on any VM.