Goals of VMWare CLI

Do basic operations with virtual machines running into an ESX / ESXi host
- Start, stop, shutdown guest, reboot guest
- List virtual machines and get some configuration informations
Do VM Cloning using a VMWare Converter server
- Cloning on a single host
- Cloning from an host to antother

Why anoher VMWare CLI ?

You can find the original VMWare CLI here. This CLI does not allow VMWare Converter operation and is based on vmx filename instead of virtual machine names.

Using VMWare CLI

Configure

Edit config.properties and add a section describing a new esx server : esx.my_server.hostname = hostname.toto.com esx.my_server.username = root esx.my_server.password = root_password

Basic commands

Launch interpreter : ./vmware-cli.sh VMWare-Cli>_

Example of available commands :

List virtual machines on an esx server : list my_server
Power on virtual machine on an esx server : power_on my_server vm_name
Power off virtual machine on an esx server : power_off my_server vm_name
Get details about a virtual machine on an esx server : show my_server vm_name
Move a vm into another resource pool : move_into_resource_pool my_server:vm_name resource_pool_name
Configure autostart of virtual machines : autostart_show my_server
Get full command list : help


	Available commands : 
	- help                                                              : this help
	Esx commands : 
	- list esx_name                                                     : list virtual machiness of an esx server
	- show esx_name:vm_name                                             : show details about a virtual machine
	- power_off esx_name:vm_name                                        : power off a virtual machine on an esx server
	- power_on esx_name:vm_name                                         : power on a virtual machine on an esx server
	- shutdown_guest esx_name:vm_name                                   : try to shutdown a virtual machine on an esx server
	- reboot_guest esx_name:vm_name                                     : try to reboot a virtual machine on an esx server
	- reset esx_name:vm_name                                            : reset a virutal machine on an esx server
	- mount_tools esx_name:vm_name                                      : mounts the vmware tools cd into virtual machine
	- unmount_tools esx_name:vm_name                                    : mounts the vmware tools cd into virtual machine
	- move_into_resource_pool esx_name:vm_name resource_pool_name       : move virtual machine into resource pool
	- list_resource_pool esx_name                                       : list resources pool of an esx
	- autostart_show esx_name                                           : show auto start config for an esx server
	- autostart_enable esx_name:vm_name                                 : configure virtual machine for auto start
	- autostart_disable esx_name:vm_name                                : configure virtual machine for auto start
	- delete_from_disk esx_name:vm_name                                 : delete a virtual machone from an esx host
	Converter commands : 
	- list_tasks                                                        : lists all tasks of the converter
	- cancel_task task_id                                               : cancel a converter task
	- copy_vm esx_source_name:vm_source_name esx_target_name:vm_target_name : copy virtual machine
	- clear_finished_task                                               : clear all finished tasks

You have completion on commands with Tab.

Remark : you can launch all commands without interpreter : ./vmware_cli.sh list my_server

Installation

Requirements

Java 1.6
Maven 2.x or higher

Compilation

To compile vmware-cli : git clone git://github.com/bpaquet/vmware-cli.git cd vmware-cli mvn clean install

Download a precompiled version

You can also download the latest version on continuous integration server.

Installation

You have two solution :

use vmware-cli from compilation directory : nothing to do !
install vmware-cli in another directory :
- copy the file target\vmware-cli-1.0-SNAPSHOT-jar-with-dependencies.jar into the target directory
- copy the file vmware-cli.sh into the target directory, and adapt paths into the file