v1 of my PowerCLI Workshop. Download the scripts at http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-12014

1. vSphere PowerCLI The best tool for automating vSphere http://vmware.com/go/powercli

2. Introduction. About me. Product Manager – APIs and platform. twitter.com/cshanklin (@cshanklin) Did you know? Most of the world’s top virtualization experts use twitter? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

3. The Purpose of PowerCLI. PowerCLI is a tool for automating all aspects of vSphere management and administration. But PowerCLI is different because it’s purpose-built for use by administrators, not developers. “Any knowledgeable vSphere administrator can look at PowerCLI code and immediately understand what it does.” http://vmware.com/go/powercli

4. You need automation to survive the virtual world. Virtual assets are extremely easy to create. Some people call it “virtual sprawl”. But virtualization lets us do so much more – more complexity is inevitable. Tools and skill sets must be upgraded to match this rise in complexity. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

5. Financial analysis – then.

6. Financial analysis – now.

7. PowerCLI changes the nature of your work. In a lot of ways the current state of virtual management is like the accounting department from the 50s. A lot of manual labor. Complex automation used to be only accessible to dedicated development teams. But PowerCLI empowers you to do complex automation yourself. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

8. How to get the most out of PowerCLI. Remember that PowerCLI can automate anything in vSphere. Think about how these possibilities can change the nature of the things you do every day. Focus on increasing your productivity. Stop doing things manually. Start focusing on building automation tools you can use again and again. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

9. Overview / Agenda. Getting to know you. Introduction to PowerShell. Introduction to PowerCLI. Managing VMs with PowerCLI. Managing ESX with PowerCLI. Managing Storage with PowerCLI. Managing Network with PowerCLI. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

10. Overview / Agenda (cont). Other PowerCLI topics. Advanced: Intro to the API. Advanced Storage. Advanced Network. Advanced ESX. Other Advanced Topics. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

11. Getting to know you. How are you using PowerCLI today? Would you say you’re a beginner? Expert? How does PowerCLI integrate into your other management practices? What things do you wish PowerCLI could do for you? How do you manage physical + virtual? What is lacking here? What key things did you hope to learn? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

12. Getting to know you. Where are you wasting your time? Provisioning? Change management? Troubleshooting? What business pressures do you face? Supporting a wider variety of applications? Improving availability? Other things? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

13. Intro To PowerShell http://vmware.com/go/powercli

14. Top 5 things to know about PowerShell. The purpose. The cmdlets. The pipeline. The platforms. The products. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

15. PowerShell: The Purpose. IT systems are getting more complex and inter-connected. Virtualization leads to explosive growth in the number of assets (network, app, etc) to manage. Automation is becoming a valuable and needed skill for IT administrators. PowerShell allows non-programmers to automate. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

16. PowerShell: The cmdlets. PowerShell provides almost 200 commands, called cmdlets, natively. Close to 1,000 more commands are available through various “snap-ins” (e.g. PowerCLI). Within PowerShell, type “Get-Command” to see a listing of commands. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

17. PowerShell: The Pipeline. The pipeline is how you compose commands in PowerShell. Outputs of one command are automatically made inputs of the next, based on type. Example: Get-Process notepad | Stop-Process Get-VM myvm | Start-VM http://vmware.com/go/powercli

18. PowerShell: The Platforms. PowerShell runs on all versions of Windows since XP and up. Requires .NET 2.0. PowerShell is installed by default in Windows 7 and Windows 2008 R2. All future versions of Windows will pre-install it. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

19. PowerShell: The Products. PowerShell support is required for all Microsoft server applications. Exchange. Sharepoint. IIS. Many more. And, of course, VMware. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

20. The top 9 most used cmdlets.

21. The top 9 most used operators.

22. How well do you know PowerShell? Would you say you’re more novice or expert? Are you using PowerShell to manage other things such as exchange? Do you view PowerShell as a strategic direction for your IT OPS? Are the people picking up PowerShell more “Windows people” or “UNIX people”? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

23. Most Used PowerShell Cmdlets and Operators. Demo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

24. 3 Takeaways: Most used cmdlets. PowerShell provides hundreds of commands that interoperate with VMware commands. Microsoft continues to invest and expand PowerShell’s reach. PowerShell + PowerCLI makes it possible to manage everything from virtual infrastructure to guest. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

25. One bonus cmdlet you will need to automate! Import-CSV. Imports a spreadsheet. Great for doing anything at large scale. Learn this pattern and technique you won’t regret it! http://vmware.com/go/powercli

27. Export-CSV

28. Get-ContentDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

29. 3 Takeaways: Import-CSV. Get familiar with Import-CSV! Two types of automation: Make the same change to every object in a large set. Make a different change to each object in a large set. Import-CSV is an ideal choice for solving the second problem. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

30. 5 PowerShell tools you should use. VESI (Virtualization EcoShell). PowerGUI. Virtu-Al.Net vSphere PowerPack. PowerShell WMI Explorer. PowerShell Plus. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

31. Intro To PowerCLI http://vmware.com/go/powercli

32. Top 5 things to know about PowerCLI. The purpose. The cmdlets. Cmdlet Tetris. The products. The future. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

33. PowerCLI: The Purpose. You need automation. Because it’s so easy to create virtual assets. Because you need to keep up with the other guy. PowerCLI is automation for everyone. Reduce the distance between person who understands the problem and person who solves it. PowerCLI is comprehensive. Everything vCenter can do. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

34. PowerCLI: The Cmdlets. 229 cmdlets in version 4.0 U1. Built on the vSphere Web Services API. Two ways to automate: Simplified cmdlet approach. Advanced approach using Get-View (API). More coming every 6 months or so. PowerCLI release philosophy is to release twice a year and be very responsive to user feedback. Long-term goal to make Get-View unnecessary. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

35. PowerCLI: Cmdlet Tetris. PowerShell commands follow the pattern Verb-Noun or Verb-Object. For a given Object you will commonly see these four commands: New-Object, Get-Object, Set-Object, Remove-Object Look for this pattern to manage the full lifecycle of a virtual object. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

36. PowerCLI: The Products. vCenter: 2.5, 4.0 ESX / ESXi 3.0, 3.5, 4.0 VMware Update Manager (preview) http://vmware.com/go/powercli

37. PowerCLI: The Future. Continue to simplify automation until it is truly accessible to everyone. Broaden the product portfolio to other solutions such as SRM, vCloud, etc. Provide a more structured experience (i.e. not “just a bunch of scripts on some network share”) http://vmware.com/go/powercli

38. Making sense of it all.

39. Where do you feel the most pain? Configuring and maintaining ESX hosts? VMs? Reporting? Performance analysis? Troubleshooting? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

40. Use Cases and Demos http://vmware.com/go/powercli

41. PowerCLI Support Matrix (4.0 U1) (Latest) Tips Windows Vista (32 and 64 bit) Windows 2003 (32 and 64 bit) Windows XP http://vmware.com/go/powercli

42. PowerCLI Support Matrix (4.1) (Future!) Tips Windows 7 (32 and 64 bit) Windows 2008 (32 and 64 bit) Windows Vista (32 and 64 bit) Windows 2003 (32 and 64 bit) Windows XP http://vmware.com/go/powercli

43. 3 ways to connect. Tips Use your username and password. Warning: don’t do this except interactively. Use SSPI / Active Directory if you have it. Use Import-PSCredential if you don’t. See http://poshcode.org/501 http://vmware.com/go/powercli

45. Get-VMHost

46. Get-VMDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

47. 3 Takeaways: 5 minute intro. Tips PowerCLI provides more than 200 commands and it’s growing all the time. PowerCLI manages everything that vCenter manages and more. PowerCLI makes automation easy enough that anyone can do it. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

48. Get-TheMost out of “Help” Tips Help is PowerShell’s built-in help system. Everything you need to know is documented in the cmdlet itself. Supports wildcards “Help *VM*” All PowerCLI cmdlets have examples. “Help <cmdlet> -examples” “Help <cmdlet> -full” http://vmware.com/go/powercli

49. Get-TheMost out of “Get” cmdlets. Tips Learn how to string Get-Cmdlets together. Example: Get-Cluster X | Get-VMHost | Get-VM to select all VMs in a cluster. PowerCLI cmdlets are designed to navigate similar to the vSphere Client hierarchy. But PowerCLI can do things vSphere Client can’t. You can learn this from them help but easier to just try it out. Demo. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

50. PowerCLI supports multiple connections. Tips Starting in PowerCLI 4.0 U1 you can connect to multiple vCenter or ESX servers at the same time. Now you can automate across multiple vCenters or across multiple ESX even if vCenter is unavailable. Demo. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

51. The top 9 VM-related cmdlets. VMs

52. Managing VMs with PowerCLI. VMs Provisioning. Change / Update. Change its resource allocation (e.g. memory). Change its networking. Add/remove storage. VMware Tools. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

53. What challenges do you face around VMs? VMs Do you tend to provision VMs in bunches or one-at-a-time? What software do you use to provision? How do you provision lots of VMs? How often? Do you use templates or PXE-based builds? How are you increasing your VM management ratios? How do you detect wasted VM resources? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

54. 3 ways to provision your VMs. VMs Creating blank VMs and PXE booting them. Clone a template. Clone a VM while running. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

56. Get-Template

57. Get-OSCustomizationSpecDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

58. 3 Takeaways: Large-scale provisioning. VMs Whether you use templates or not, PowerCLI makes it easy to provision. Even if you use static IP addresses PowerCLI can automate it. Large-scale provisioning and Import-CSV were virtually made for each other. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

60. Set-VMDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

61. 3 Takeaways: VM Updates. VMs Large-scale updates are easy with Set-VM. Master Get-* and Where cmdlets to target exactly the VMs you want. If you’re worried about the impact, use –whatif. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

63. Remove-Snapshot

64. Where-ObjectDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

65. 3 Takeaways: Snapshots. VMs Snapshots are the “silent datastore killer”. Track their age and size with PowerCLI. Deleting lots of snapshots is a snap (sorry). http://vmware.com/go/powercli

66. The top 8 ESX-related cmdlets. ESX

67. Managing ESX with PowerCLI. ESX Provisioning (Host profiles or scripted) Change / Update. Storage. Network. Security, etc. Managing power and connection state. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

68. What challenges do you face deploying ESX? ESX What software do you use to deploy? How do you track inventory and monitor ESX? How do you manage the ESX / vCenter relationship? How do you manage storage and network to your ESX systems? How are you planning to deal with ESXi? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

69. 2 ways to provision your ESX hosts. ESX Host Profiles. Provision one server just the way you like it. “Stamp out” the configuration to other servers. Home-grown scripts (covered later). Run a custom script to do complete configuration of a server. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

71. Apply-VMHostProfile

72. Test-VMHostProfileComplianceDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

73. 3 Takeaways: Host Profiles. ESX Host Profiles simplify the process of creating identically configured ESX hosts. The purpose of profiles is avoiding cost and complexity “I don’t have to worry about a million things.” Host Profiles are a strategic direction for VMware and will continue to improve. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

74. Why we cluster. ESX Clustering is the heart of VMware’s real value. High availability. Automated resource management and balancing. PowerCLI gives complete and granular control over cluster configuration. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

76. Set-Cluster

77. Move-VMHostDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

78. 2 Takeaways: Clustering. ESX In the past all interesting VMware functionality happened at the host level. Recently this has been moving to cluster (eventually to datacenter). PowerCLI gives you the tools you need to configure, monitor and audit your clusters. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

79. You can also automate DRS rules. ESX Key cmdlets: New-DrsRule Get-DrsRule Set-DrsRule Remove-DrsRule http://vmware.com/go/powercli

80. The top 9 storage-related cmdlets. Storage

81. Managing Storage with PowerCLI. Storage Adding existing datastores or formatting new. Rescanning storage. Capacity and utilization reports. Identifying datastores that are not visible to the entire cluster. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

82. What challenges do you face around storage? Storage Do you have a dedicated storage team? How well do storage and virtualization interact? Do you have separate storage management tools? How do you identify and resolve storage bottlenecks? When users complain about slow applications, what do you do? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

83. Storage VMotion is a snap. Storage Move-VM is a versatile command. If you use –Datastore you will Storage VMotion. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

85. Get-VMHost

86. Get-DatastoreDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

87. 3 Takeaways: Storage VMotion. Storage Performing a Storage VMotion can take a really long time. Perfect reason to script it. Try to beat this simplicity: Get-VM –Datastore ds1 | Move-VM –Datastore ds2 http://vmware.com/go/powercli

88. Save money with thin provisioning. Storage Allocate space as it is used rather than all at once. Huge space savings at the cost of some performance. You can provision new VMs thin or convert existing with PowerCLI. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

90. New-Harddisk

91. Set-HarddiskDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

92. 3 Takeaways: Thin Provisioning. Storage Storage is expensive! Why pay for the parts you’re not using? With simple PowerCLI scripts you can change existing VMs to use thin provisioning. Or just build an easy report to see how much you’re using or how much you could save. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

94. 2 Takeaways: NFS Datastores. Storage Adding and auditing NFS datastores is simple with PowerCLI. Warning: NFS performance statistics are not available (coming in a future version of vSphere). http://vmware.com/go/powercli

95. The top 9 network-related cmdlets. Network

96. Managing Networking with PowerCLI. Network Adding or configuring VMKernel. Moving VMs between virtual switches. Configuring virtual switch policies. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

97. What challenges do you face around network? Network How do you manage the interaction between virtual and physical switch? Example: VLAN, CDP. How do you ensure consistent network configuration across ESX hosts? Do you use trunking for max performance? Have you encountered problems doing this? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

99. Set-NetworkAdapterDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

100. 2 Takeaways: Changing VM Networks. Network Moving VMs from one network to another is quick and easy. If a virtual switch is re-created, on purpose or by accident, your VMs will all be disconnected. You can solve that with one line of PowerCLI. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

102. Get-VirtualSwitchDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

103. 3 Takeaways: Virtual Switches. Network Creating consistent virtual switches is key for many VMware features such as DRS. Creating switches manually is insane, especially considering the simplicity of PowerCLI. You can also set policy items like failover and load balancing (covered later). http://vmware.com/go/powercli

104. The top 5 reporting cmdlets. Reports

105. Reporting with PowerCLI. Reports Three major categories of PowerCLI reports. Inventory-based reporting. Statistic-based reporting (i.e. performance) Event-based reporting. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

106. Reporting with PowerCLI. Reports What reporting tools do you use today? Do you think they are good? Do you use reports more for planning or more for reacting to problems? Where do you feel you are “in the dark”? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

107. Inventory-based reporting. Reports Relies on Get-* cmdlets as a starting point. Generally combined with Export-CSV or ConvertTo-Html. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

108. Report on your guest disk capacity. Reports Basic report. Sort by least % free space. Show all guests with <10% free space. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

110. Get-HarddiskDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

111. 3 Takeaways: Guest Disks. Reports Relies on VMware Tools! Avoid a disaster by identifying disks that are about to overflow. Also makes it easy to understand how much thin provisioning would save you. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

112. 3 ways to report on wasted resources. Reports Orphaned VMDKs. – script not working now Unused VMs. ??? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

114. ??Demo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

115. 3 Takeaways: Wasted Resources. Reports X1 X2 X3 http://vmware.com/go/powercli

116. Reporting with custom attributes. Reports Custom attributes are extremely useful for tracking things unique to your deployment. Example: VM owner, app owner, etc. Get-CustomAttribute. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

118. Get-InventoryDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

119. 3 Takeaways: Custom Attributes. Reports If you’re not using custom attributes – start! Audit your custom attributes to determine compliance (all the data is there and accurate) You should set attributes as part of your provisioning process. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

121. Get-VIRoleDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

122. 3 Takeaways: Roles and Permissions. Reports PowerCLI gives you all the tools you need to audit roles and permissions. With Quest’s ActiveRoles you can load Active Directory information for more useful reports. With PowerCLI you can easily duplicate roles and permissions between vCenter instances. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

123. Statistic-based reporting. Reports Relies on Get-Stat as a starting point. Commonly you will rank the results. This can feed into other script logic or be exported like an inventory report would be exported. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

124. Get-TheMost out of Get-Stat. Reports Get-StatType identifies available statistics. Understanding instances is critical. Note: vCenter and ESX may report different types of statistics. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

126. 3 Takeaways: Reporting with Statistics. Reports Querying statistics help you identify and solve performance problems. Stats on vCenter are determined by stat level. The higher the level the more stats you have. If you query ESX directly all stats are available but for short periods (5 mins on 3.5, 1hr on 4.0) http://vmware.com/go/powercli

127. Top 8 Most Interesting Statistics. Reports

129. 2 Takeaways: Host and VM Usage. Reports Identifying overused resources it the first step to effective rebalancing. With PowerCLI you get a complete picture all at once no matter how many hosts or VMs you have. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

130. Event-based reporting. Reports Relies on Get-VIEvent as a starting point. Most vSphere actions create events in order to generate an audit trail. This audit trail can be followed and inspected for a large number of uses. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

132. 3 Takeaways: Event-based reporting. Reports Events tell you who did what when. ESX retains a fixed number of events, vCenter retains all events since a given date. Before you report events be sure to understand your vCenter’s event retention policy. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

134. 3 Takeaways: Determining VM Poweron Date. Reports Just one of many reports you can do with events. Others: If an outage occurs you can find which modifications may have contributed to the outage using –Start and –Finish. Track who logged in and when. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

135. You can get your VM’s log file too. Reports Get to know vmstore: Use Copy-DatastoreItem to bridge the gap between local and remote. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

136. This report will make your manager love you (in a completely legal way). Reports Alan Renouf’s Daily Report. Reports: Numbers of objects in inventory (VMs, hosts, etc) Datastores running out of space. Snapshots over X days old. Disconnected hosts. Lots more! All emailed to you every morning! http://www.virtu-al.net/2009/11/04/vcheck-daily-report-v3/ http://vmware.com/go/powercli

137. Stuff Alan’s Daily Report Will Tell You. Reports Number of Hosts Number of VMs Number of Datastores Number of DRS Migrations for the last days Snapshots over x Days old Datastores with less than x% free space VMs created over the last x days VMs with No Tools VMs with CD-Roms connected VMs with CPU ready over x% Hosts in Maintenance Mode VC Error Events over the last x days VC Windows Event Log Errors for the last x days with VMware in the details VM active alerts Cluster Active Alerts vSphere check: Outdated VM Hardware (Less than V7) VMs in Inconsistent folders (the name of the folder is not the same as the name) http://vmware.com/go/powercli

138. Sample Daily Report Output. Reports

139. The top 9 other cmdlets. Tips

140. Top 5 PowerCLI FAQs (With answers!) Tips How to upgrade VMware Tools with no reboot? How to move only one disk during Storage VMotion? How to change the ESX host’s root password? How do I take lots of actions simultaneously? How to get the VM’s UUID? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

141. Top 5 PowerCLI FAQs (With answers!) Tips How to upgrade VMware Tools with no reboot? New in PowerCLI 4.0 U1, Update-Tools –NoReboot How to move only one disk during Storage VMotion? Use Set-HardDisk –Datastore. Bug: Requires the VM to be powered off. This is fixed in 4.1. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

142. Top 5 PowerCLI FAQs (With answers!) Tips How to change the ESX host’s root password? Connect directly to the ESX host. Use Get-VMHostAccount / Set-VMHostAccount. How do I take lots of actions simultaneously? Most PowerCLI commands support the –Runasync flag, which causes jobs to run in the background. Use this along with Wait-Task. Demo. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

143. Top 5 PowerCLI FAQs (With answers!) Tips How to get the VM’s UUID? Inside the view property config.uuid Get-VM | Select Name, { ($_ | Get-View).config.uuid } Or using object extensions (upcoming feature). Demo. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

144. Secure your scripts with these tips. Tips You can configure PowerShell to not run unsigned scripts. Set-ExecutionPolicyAllSigned PowerShell Plus has built-in script signing. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

145. 3 mistakes you need to avoid! Tips Careful when using New-Snapshot! Use –Memory if you want to revert to the snapshot without powering the VM off. Careful when deleting that VM! If you don’t use –DeleteFromDisk it will simply be unregistered. Don’t use Write-Host! Except as debugging, instead use Write-Output. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

146. 4 tips to make your scripts more readable Tips Use object names rather than separate cmdlet calls. Use line continuation (backticks) when necessary. Factor code into functions. Use PowerGUI, VESI, or PowerShell Plus for syntax highlighting. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

147. Tips Maximizing readability and maintainability. Demo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

148. 3 Takeaways: Readability. Tips Readable code is maintainable code. Take maximum advantage of Object-By-Name. The pipeline separates PowerShell from other languages. Use it a lot and your readability will greatly improve. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

149. Tips Speeding up your scripts. Demo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

150. 3 Takeaways: Speeding up your scripts. Tips PowerShell does not optimize scripts. Factor variables out manually. Be aware of the performance penalties OBN introduces. If you have the object handy, don’t use its name. If your scripts are slow, consider caching more objects client-side. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

151. 1 feature you absolutely need to know. Tips Object Extensions. Is your favorite object missing a property? Add it yourself! This will fundamentally change the way you script and report. “PowerCLI 2.0” Demo. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

153. (Name subject to change)Demo (Future Features) http://vmware.com/go/powercli

154. 3 Takeaways: Object Extensions. Tips Object Extensions will radically simplify your scripts and reports. If you ever wished an object had a certain property or field, find it in the API and you will soon be able to add it yourself. Coming soon in PowerCLI 4.1. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

155. Learn to write a PowerShell Advanced Function Tips PowerShell Advanced Functions function almost exactly like PowerShell cmdlets. You can write scripts that: Sit in the PowerShell pipeline. Interoperate with all PowerCLI cmdlets. Demo. “help about_functions_advanced”. See “VI Toolkit Extensions” for samples. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

156. Learn to write a PowerShell Advanced Function Tips PowerShell Advanced Functions function almost exactly like PowerShell cmdlets. You can write scripts that: Sit in the PowerShell pipeline. Interoperate with all PowerCLI cmdlets. Demo. “help about_functions_advanced”. See “VI Toolkit Extensions” for samples. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

157. Anatomy of an advanced function. Tips functionAdvanced-Function { param( [Parameter(Mandatory=$true,...] [VMware.VimAutomation.Client20.VMHostImpl] $VMHost ) Begin { ... } Process { ... } End { ... } } Initialize at the start of the pipeline (opt) Process each object in the pipeline. Called at the end of the pipeline (opt)

158. Sample advanced function: ESX Host Routes. Tips Demo. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

159. Resources http://vmware.com/go/powercli

160. 3 must-own resources: Tips Managing VMware Infrastructure with Windows PowerShell. vSphere 4.0 Quick Start Guide. VMware vSphere Pro Series Training. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

161. The “PowerCLI Bible” Tips http://vmware.com/go/powercli

162. Lots of PowerCLI Samples. Tips http://vmware.com/go/powercli

163. New training from TrainSignal! Tips

164. 6 Amazing Blogs to Follow: Tips

165. The most important resource of all: Tips The PowerCLI Community. http://vmware.com/go/powercli More than 500 scripts. Search a huge and growing knowledgebase. Ask questions and get answers. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

166. By Sheer Coincidence. Tips PowerShell Master Class [3 dagar] Instructor: Thomas Lee, PowerShell MVP Begins 2010-03-09 http://www.labcenter.se/Lab/2056 http://vmware.com/go/powercli

167. Advanced Stuff! http://vmware.com/go/powercli

168. The vSphere API Stack. API

169. Managed objects and automation objects. API PowerCLI uses two object models. Automation objects: Small objects containing only the most critical data. Returned by Get-* cmdlets (example Get-VM). View objects: Full objects with no properties missing. Not optimized for usability. You can easily transition between the two. Get-View: Automation to view object. Get-VIObjectByVIView: View to automation. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

170. Explore the vSphere API with PowerCLI. API Get-View is your gateway to the API. You can pipe most objects to Get-View. Some objects have hard-coded names and can must be loaded directly. E.g. Get-View ServiceContent http://vmware.com/go/powercli

171. You can do anything with Get-View. API When you load a view with Get-View all its properties and methods are available to you. You can see all this with PowerShell’s Get-Member cmdlet. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

173. Get-MemberDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

174. 4 Takeaways: Get-View. API Get-View opens the full power of the API to you. You can do anything vCenter can do using this API. But: you have to use the vSphere API, which can be quite challenging. Refer to the docs: http://www.vmware.com/support/developer/vc-sdk/visdk400pubs/ReferenceGuide/index.html http://vmware.com/go/powercli

175. Surviving the vSphere API Documentation. API Most useful starting points: Search within: All managed objects – OR – All methods. API has managed objects and data objects. Managed objects define methods, data objects do not. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

176. Surviving the vSphere API Documentation (cont) API When calling managed object methods you will generally need to supply some data objects. Managed objects are returned by PowerCLI’s Get-View cmdlet. Data objects are constructed by PowerShell’s New-Object cmdlet. New-Object VMware.Vim.VirtualMachineConfigSpec

177. Using “Project Onyx”. API Onyx is a code generator. Sits between vSphere Client and vCenter. Any UI click is automatically turned to code. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

178. “Project Onyx” Architecture. API ESX or vCenter

179. API Using Onyx. Demo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

180. 3 Takeaways: Onyx. API Onyx makes it simple to understand what calls vSphere Client makes and when. From this you can understand the best practices and tested code paths VMware uses. Warning: You will need to re-factor code generated by Onyx. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

181. Advanced VM management topics. VMs PowerCLI can run commands inside your guests. You can granularly control the placement of memory and snapshot files. Using View? PowerCLI gives you granular control over VM video memory. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

182. 2 ways to manage your guests. VMs With PowerShell / PowerCLI you can manage inside your guest too. Option 1: WMI over the network. Option 2: Invoke-VMScript and related cmdlets via VMware Tools. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

184. Copy-GuestFileDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

185. 3 Takeaways: Guest Management. VMs Run programs in your guest or copy files there. You could combine these to install software agents, etc. Supports Windows or Linux. Works even if your VM’s network is down or disconnected. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

186. More advanced guest management: Customizing the scripts. VMs Certain guest cmdlets can be completely re-wired by substituting their scripts. Script sources located at $env:PROGRAMFILESMwarenfrastructureSphere PowerCLIcripts http://vmware.com/go/powercli

188. 4 Takeaways: Changing swap location. VMs Take advantage of cheaper storage for less critical data. Controllable on a per-cluster, per-host, or per-vm basis. Changes location for both snapshot and virtual memory. Warning: Decreases average reliability. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

189. Advanced storage management topics. Storage All about iSCSI. Storage path reporting and management. Telling the difference between shared and unshared storage. Reporting on LUN performance. Configuring queue depth. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

190. Adding iSCSI datastores. Storage Adding iSCSI to ESX is a good deal more complex. But it offers more options and security features. PowerCLI can add the storage with or without authentication. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

192. Get-ScsiLun

193. New-DatastoreDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

194. 3 Takeaways: Using iSCSI. Storage iSCSI comes in two flavors, software and hardware. To use software iSCSI you must enable the virtual iSCSI adapter. iSCSI has richer security capabilities than NFS. This leads to higher complexity. PowerCLI has very rich support for iSCSI. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

195. Two types of storage for your VMs. Storage VMDK-based virtual hard disks. Raw devices (RDM). Warning: Think hard before using RDM! Won’t overcome size limitations! Won’t necessarily give you better performance! http://vmware.com/go/powercli

197. New-HarddiskDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

198. 3 Takeaways: Raw Devices. Storage Raw devices are necessary in some applications such as MSCS. PowerCLI makes it easy to mount, unmount and report on raw devices. Warning: If you don’t need raw devices you probably shouldn’t use them. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

200. Get-Datastore

201. Get-VMDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

202. 3 Takeaways: Unshared VMs. Storage VMs on unshared storage can’t participate in many advanced vSphere features such as DRS. If you’ve got hundreds or thousands of VMs you have to automate finding unshared VMs. PowerCLI also makes it easy to solve the problem: with Move-VM. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

204. Warning: Doesn’t work with NFS storage.Demo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

205. 3 Takeaways: LUN Performance. Storage LUN latency is a key statistic to watch. If it gets too high, workloads will be affected. There are no real standards but a pretty good suggestion is: Virtual desktops: Users will start complaining at about 20ms latency. Non-interactive, workloads: will be impacted around 40ms latency. Once you identify the problem, solve it with PowerCLI’s Move-VM. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

206. Configuring adapter queue depth. Storage By default your adapter’s queue depth is 32. This can be adjusted. Warning: adjustments require host reboots. Warning: May increasing queue depth may worsen performance depending on your storage network and storage. http://frankdenneman.wordpress.com/2009/03/04/increasing-the-queue-depth/ http://vmware.com/go/powercli

208. 3 Takeaways: Queue Depth. Storage Increasing queue depth can improve your storage performance. It can also harm it, especially on LUNs shared by lots of hosts. Be sure to read and understand all factors in play before making any changes. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

209. Advanced network management. Network Advanced switch and portgroup policies. Creating and updating your service consoles. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

211. Set-NicTeamingPolicyDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

212. 3 Takeaways: Advanced Network Management. Network Policies can be set on a per-switch or per-portgroup basis. Switch policies are inherited by portgroups unless they are explicitly overridden. The right policy is critical to effective operation and high availability of your ESX hosts. PowerCLI helps you be consistent. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

213. Advanced ESX management. ESX ESX build scripts. Setting advanced configuration parameters. Licensing. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

214. ESX build scripts you can use. ESX Lance Berc’s “How To Configure Freshly Booted ESX with PowerShell” http://communities.vmware.com/thread/161304 Stephen’s Campbell’s “Not Another ESX Provisioning Script” http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-8170 http://vmware.com/go/powercli

216. 3 Takeaways: Advanced Host Options. ESX There are hundreds of advanced host options. Some vendors (example NetApp) recommend specific settings for some options. PowerCLI ensures you can set and audit these consistently. Warning: advanced options regularly change between releases. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

218. 3 Takeaways: Licensing. ESX Applying a license is a necessary step in any ESX build script. Licensing changed a lot for vSphere. Different calls are needed depending on if you are connected to ESX or vCenter. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

219. Advanced Reporting. Reports Identifying performance bottlenecks. Searching and archiving log files. Mixing vSphere and Active Directory. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

221. 3 Takeaways: Performance Bottlenecks. Reports Bottlenecks occur when too many things compete for too few things. PowerCLI can identify resources that have too many competitors. PowerCLI can also easily move these around to balance workloads. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

223. 3 Takeaways: Archiving Log Files. Reports Retaining log files is critical for audit and compliance. Log files are rotated (a.k.a. deleted) regularly. The number of log files retained is customizable through PowerCLI. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

224. 6 Advanced FAQs (with answers!) Tips How can I reconfigure all my alarms to send SNMP traps? How to find and register missing VMs? How to report on RDM? How to change DNS servers for ESX? How do I schedule a PowerCLI script? How about a script to respond to an alarm? http://vmware.com/go/powercli

226. 2 Takeaways: vCenter Alarms. Tips If you’re deploying a lot of vCenter instances, PowerCLI will consistently reconfigure alarms just the way you want them. LucD has a great script to move alarms from one container to another. http://lucd.info/?p=1799 http://vmware.com/go/powercli

228. Get-View

229. Get-ChilditemDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

230. 2 Takeaways: Registering VMs. Tips Unregistering a VM rather than deleting it is a very common problem. This leads to wasted resources. Warning: If you have two vCenters sharing the same storage, you will get false positives! http://vmware.com/go/powercli

232. Get-ScsiLunDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

233. 1 Takeaway: RDM Reporting. Tips This simple report will help you ensure RDM is only being used by VMs that need it. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

235. Set-VMHostNetworkAdapterDemo http://vmware.com/go/powercli

236. 2 Takeaways: Changing ESX IP and DNS. Tips Setting IP and DNS is another essential component of deploying ESX. The same PowerCLI command lets you set IP and DNS attributes. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

237. How to schedule PowerCLI scripts. Tips Alan Renouf has a great writeup. http://www.virtu-al.net/2009/07/10/running-a-powercli-scheduled-task/ http://vmware.com/go/powercli

238. 3 vSphere killers to regularly check. Tips Are any VMs waiting for answers? Automatically scanning for configuration issues. DRS clusters with configuration problems. http://vmware.com/go/powercli

239. Running scripts in response to alarms. Tips Fully documented 5 step process on the PowerCLI blog. http://blogs.vmware.com/vipowershell/2009/09/how-to-run-powercli-scripts-from-vcenter-alarms.html http://vmware.com/go/powercli

240. Questions? Download today: http://vmware.com/go/powercli http://vmware.com/go/powercli