vsphare 5 command line

[hud4n]

Do anyone have vsphare 5 command line tutorial? what is the different with vsphare 4.x command line?

i tried to use 4.x command line in vsphare 5, but command not found...

please share :smileyhappy:

Thanks

[William Lam]

Can you clarify on what you mean by vSphere command line? There are a few CLIs and they are generally backwards compatible but not forward compatiable.

[hud4n]

I mean, i want to power on vm, power of vm, etc from command line, not from GUI and command for troubleshoot when i can't connect to my vsphare 5 gui.

i tried to use command line that usually used in esx 4.1.. but i can't found in my esxi 5.

example: where is command vicfg-.... in esxi 5 ?

[William Lam]

First off, you should understand the differences between ESX 4.x and ESXi, note the "i" - http://www.vmware.com/products/vsphere/esxi-and-esx/compare.html

There is a remote CLI called vCLI that includes majority of the esxcfg-* commands but now made available remotely which also includes vmware-cmd and vmkfstools that you maybe famliiar with. Take a look at the documentation which provides you examples on how to use the remote CLI - http://www.vmware.com/support/developer/vcli/

One of the documents that I highly recommend is the transition of CLIs from ESX to ESXi - http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/index.jsp?topic=/com.vmware.vcli.migration.doc_50/cos_upgrade_technote.1.1.html

[hud4n]

hi Lamw, thanks for your reply.

ooo remote cli and cli in esxi/esx (no remote) is different?

[William Lam]

There are both local and remote CLIs in ESXi, but not all CLIs are available locally, especially if you are coming from ESX. I would recommend you take a look at the documentation which will provide you a list of commands that are available to use.

[hud4n]

what is powerCLI? it is same with VCLI?

[William Lam]

PowerCLI is a CLI based on Windows PowerShell and leveraging the vSphere SDK for .NET and runs only on windows as a remote CLI - http://www.vmware.com/support/developer/PowerCLI/index.html

vCLI is a CLI based on vSphere SDK for Perl, and since it's Perl, it can run on Windows, Linux or MacOSX

They both have support for remote management of your vSphere infrastructure from host management/configuration to other operations such as managing vCenter, VM, etc. Depending on the platform you use for management, you'll want to use one or the other. All capabilities are available in both CLIs, but you may need to write some custom scripts with vCLI if a certain capability is not available out of the box.

Good place to start if you're new to vSphere 5 is the documentation center - http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-pubs.html

[hud4n]

i can't found vmware cli version 5.. just only 4.1.. can i use it to manage esxi 5?

[William Lam]

Please be very specific in what CLI you're referring to, as there are several :smileywink:

vCLI 5.x - http://www.vmware.com/support/developer/vcli/

PowerCLI 5.x - http://www.vmware.com/support/developer/PowerCLI/

Download links on the page and yes they are backwards compatible with vSphere 4.x