Code to push Folder tags down to VMs

[ckunkel1]

I have a rather large vCenter environment that I am tasked with aligning it with our Azure tagging policy.  I have multiple tags assigned to each folder in my environment, no small feat because I did that manually through the web portal.  So now the thing is I need the tags assigned to these folders to also be assigned to the VMs inside that folder.  

I'd prefer to do this through PowerCLI, but I'm open to suggestions.

[LucD]

Basically, you would need the Get-Folder cmdlet, the Get-TagAssignment and the New-TagAssigmnet cmdets.

But you will need to provide some more info.
Are there already Tags on some VMs?
Do these need to be removed when not present in any of the Folders in the tree?
Is this to be done for all VM folders in your environment, or only a selected set of folders?
If there are nested folders, do the VMs inherit the tags from all Folders in the tree?
Are the same Tags present in multiple Categories?

[ckunkel1]

There are no tags on the VMs as of now

I'm looking to do this with all folders in the environment

There are nested folders, but the tags I need to push are assigned to the lowest folder

I have 2 tag categories that I'm trying to push down

No duplicate tags in different categories.

[kwhorn]

Something like this should get you started - this one assumes all VMs are in tagged folders but won't assign tags if there are none found from your target categories

 

#Array containing target categories
$categories = "Cat 1","Cat 2"

#Get all VMs
$vmlist = Get-VM

#Loop and assign Tags
ForEach ($vm in $vmlist){

    #get tags matching the category
    $tags = (Get-Folder -Id $vm.FolderId | Get-TagAssignment).Tag | Where {$_.Category -in $categories}

    #check if tags are present and assign tags to vm
    If ($tags) {New-TagAssignment -Entity $vm -Tag $tags}
}

 

EDIT - corrected mistake in the "If" statement

[ckunkel1]

Getting this error when I attempt to run the code

 

+ If $tags {New-TagAssignment -Entity $vm -Tag $tags}
+ ~
Missing '(' after 'If' in if statement.
At line:1 char:13
+ If $tags {New-TagAssignment -Entity $vm -Tag $tags}
+ ~
Unexpected token '{' in expression or statement.
+ CategoryInfo : ParserError: (:) [], ParentContainsErrorRecordException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : MissingOpenParenthesisInIfStatement

[kwhorn]

sorry about that - typo on my part should read:
If ($Tags){New-TagAssignment -Entity $vm -Tag $tags}

[ckunkel1]

And now it's this

Get-TagAssignment : 5/10/2022 9:46:58 AM Get-TagAssignment com.vmware.vapi.std.errors.operation_not_found {'messages': [com.vmware.vapi.std.localizable_message {'id': vapi.method.input.invalid.interface, 'default_message': Cannot find service
'com.vmware.cis.data.svc.resource_model'., 'args': [com.vmware.cis.data.svc.resource_model], 'params': , 'localized':}], 'data': , 'error_type': OPERATION_NOT_FOUND}
At line:11 char:44
+ $tags = (Get-Folder -Id $vm.FolderId | Get-TagAssignment).Tag | W ...
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [Get-TagAssignment], CisException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : VMware.VimAutomation.ViCore.Impl.V1.Service.Tagging.Cis.TaggingServiceCisImpl.GetTagAssignment.Error,VMware.VimAutomation.ViCore.Cmdlets.Commands.Tagging.GetTagAssignment

[kwhorn]

What are you vcenter, powershell and powercli versions?

[ckunkel1]

vSphere Client version 7.0.3.00300

Powershell 5.1

VMware PowerCLI 12.0.0 build 15947286

[kwhorn]

I'm suspecting possibly a problem with the PowerCLI version.

I'd run powershell as admin, then do an 

Update-Module VMware.Powercli -Force

And try again after it's been updated

[ckunkel1]

That did it!  The script is running and tagging all my VMs after the PowerCLI update.  Thank you for all your help!

[LucD]

This is a known issue with vSphere 7.0.3, upgrade your PowerCLI version.
See Re: get-tagassignment error after vcenter upgrade - VMware Technology Network VMTN