VM /ETC

Posts Tagged ‘scripting’

VIRTUMANIA Episode 20 was far from scripted, but some of the best known names in virtualization scripting join us for this show. The following is the podcast summary:

VIRTUMANIA Podcast Episode 20 – Powershell is Latin to Me. Rich Brambley (@rbrambley) of VMETC and Marc Farley (@3parfarley) of StorageRap.com with special guests Scott Herold (@vmguru) of vmguru.com and Hal Rottenberg (@halr9000) of halr9000.com. This week’s discussion focuses on using Powershell in virtual environments instead of a GUI, compares learning scripting to learning the verbs and nouns of a new language such as Latin, and highlights several Powershell sites and tools that every administrator should check out. Virtumania is an Infosmack Production.

Before, between, and after the important stuff we also have some fun with using bots in first person shooter games, Mohitos, and the trial of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich.

Listen to the podcast with the embedded player or subscribe to get a weekly copy so you can listen when convenient.

Check out the VM /ETC VIRTUMANIA Page to listen to past episodes as well as episodes of Infosmack.

The following links offer more information on some of the topics mentioned in VIRTUMANIA Episode 20:

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health_check.sh script report .html

If you are looking for a free and quick method to document your ESX 3.0.X  and ESX 3.5 server configurations without installing a scripting environment then don’t forget about A. Mikkelsen’s ESX Healthcheck script. An oldie but still a goodie, this script is simply transferred to your ESX 3.5 Console and then just run manually or via a scheduled job. The end result is a .html report that is saved on your ESX host, or if you utilize the optional send_smtp.pl script the report can be mailed to you automatically.

I’m not providing any new information in this post. In fact I am way behind  as Duncan Epping has covered this script on his blog at Yellow-bricks.com. Duncan first posted about the esx healthcheck script in January 2008 and recently mentioned it again in his post about his tools he uses when conducting customer Healthcheck services. The comments thread on Duncan’s January post walk through a year’s worth of feature development and support.

Download your copy of the script at  SourceForge.net: ESX Healthcheck Script

Once downloaded, the .zip file contains several helpful text files along with the script. The rest of this post walks through the install and configure steps and then explains how to run the script when ready. Read the rest of this entry »

Like a lot of virtual infrastructure administrators already seem to be doing, I decided I better start learning about PowerShell scripting for VMware ESX and VirtualCenter. There has been a lot written on this topic in the recent months, but I have been just been speed reading through with the idea that “I’ll get around to understanding and learning this later when I have more time”. Now I am holding myself to this promise, so this post is my first steps to making myself learn. I am also looking forward to attending the Scripting VMware Infrastructure: Automating, Integrating, and Extending VI VMWorld Hands On Lab (Lab 09) already on my schedule for the conference.

Here’s what little I know about Powershell for VMware so far:

• PowerShell is actually a Microsoft application that is the base of the VMware VI Toolkit
• The best way for getting started with PowerShell is to download the Windows PowerShell 1.0 Documentation Pack
• The VMware Communities is home to the VI PowerShell Blog. They are actually running a scripting contest right now.

Here are links to several useful PowerShell scripts created by the user community: Read the rest of this entry »

VMware Communities: New Script for moving vm to another … contains a thread from this summer about cold migrating a VM from local storage of an ESX server to iSCSI storage. The post contains the code (original and updated versions) for a script to automate this process. The final version allows the migration of a VM to any ESX storage location. I have added the vm-relocate.sh script to the Files page as well.

This script is handy if you do not have Read the rest of this entry »

Even though VI 3.5 is now generally available you may not be ready to upgrade from version 3 just yet. You should, however, make sure all patches and updates are applied to your VI3 infrastructure. This post explains the upgrading and patching methods I have standardized on and provides some tips for avoiding common issues like HA agent configuration and auto applying numerous ESX patches. All scripts and files referenced are linked at the bottom of this post.

Prepare

Preparing for the upgrade and patching is critical to minimizing what can go wrong.

Upgrade Virtual Center

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