How to get VirtualMachine moid

[edmandsj]

I just started working with the MOB and learning about MOID's. I was hoping to get the VirtualMachine MOID. We have ESXi hosts with free license. Any way to get this? I just want to execute VirtualMachine.Interact.PowerOn and .Suspend.

Example:

https://balvmware1/mob/?moid=VirtualMachine

Any ideas? Or is this justs available via vcenterserver?

[William Lam]

Yes, take a look at this article for details on retrieving MoRef ID http://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2011/11/vsphere-moref-managed-object-reference.html

Regarding the suspend operation, you'll want to read this first http://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2011/06/dreaded-faultrestrictedversionsummary.html

[edmandsj]

ahh ok. so it looks like my venture will immediately come to an end based on the free version API restrictions. darn.

All I wanted to do was have bacula run "BeforeJob: {suspend VM}" and "AfterJob: {start VM}"

Virtually ghetto sounds fine and all but it seems like a lot less work to do it this way. I really just wanted to port this from vmware server to vsphere:

http://wiki.bacula.org/doku.php?id=application_specific_backups:vmwareserver

[William Lam]

You can still perform the suspend operation, but you'll need to directly SSH into the ESXi Shell and use the vim-cmd (http://www.virtuallyghetto.com/p/vmware-vimsh_9940.html)

[diflyon]

You can find moid at the address field in web browser when you select VM in vCenter WebClient. See screenshot.

[petergsk]

Real paranoia greying out half of screen.. but answer to the point :smileyhappy:

[TonicAgency]

Assuming ssh access is enabled you can ssh into your esx server from a bash terminal i.e...

ssh {ESX IP Address}

Once logged you can run the following command...

vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms

Which will produce a list of virtual machines on the server. The moid is in the first column.