vsphere C# client

Quick Tip - Using the CLI to upgrade to a specific VM virtual hardware version in vSphere 5.5

10.30.2013 by William Lam // 4 Comments

For those of you who usually use the "legacy" vSphere C# Client to perform virtual machine virtual hardware upgrade (also known as Virtual Machine Compatibility) should know that the default behavior is to automatically upgrade to the latest supported version. This is usually not an issue, however with vSphere 5.5 if you do perform this upgrade, one caveat to be aware of that you will NOT be able to edit the virtual machine configurations using the vSphere C# Client afterwards. A confirmation dialog is even presented to warn the user before performing this operation and that the virtual machine can only be manage through the vSphere Web Client.

Note: Even though the virtual machine settings can not be managed/configured using the vSphere C# Client, you can still use the various vSphere API/CLIs to manage the virtual machine and those are fully supported.

I had noticed a couple of comments on Twitter the other day and even at VMworld Barcelona that this was not ideal that the vSphere C# Client automatically upgraded to the latest version. I know there are some folks that would have liked to upgrade to a specific version of virtual hardware. Luckily, you can easily do so by using the vSphere API/CLI such as PowerCLI for example if you have paid vSphere license.

You can use the Set-VM cmdlet and specify the -Version property, here is the syntax for the command:

Set-Vm -VM (Get-VM -Name [VM-NAME]) -Version v[HW-VERSION]

Here is a screenshot of upgrading a VM called "Duncan" from vHW8 to vHW9:

Now this is great for customers who have a vSphere license that allows for both read/write access to the APIs which PowerCLI and other CLIs leverage. For customers using Free ESXi or just want a quick and simple way of upgrading to a specific virtual hardware version, you can leverage vim-cmd utility which is found in the ESXi Shell.

You can use the following command to upgrade to a specific virtual hardware version (you will need to specify the VM-ID by using vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms):

vim-cmd vmsvc/upgrade [VM-ID] vmx-[HW-VERSION]

Here is a screenshot of upgrading a VM called "Cormac" from vHW7 to vHW9:

You no longer can install vSphere C# Client on Windows Domain Controller in vSphere 5.5

09.25.2013 by William Lam // 2 Comments

In the last couple of days I have noticed several folks comment on a new check that has been put in place in vSphere 5.5 which prevents a user from installing the vSphere C# Client onto a Windows Domain Controller system. If you try to install the vSphere C# Client on a Domain Controller system, you will get the following error message:

It is generally not recommended to install additional software on a Windows Domain Controller and I suspect this check was put in place to deter users from installing additional software, including VMware software onto a Domain Controller system. However, for a development environment or home lab, you may want to consolidate multiple applications onto a single system and help reduce the number of Windows systems that you may need to deploy. Luckily there is a way to by-pass this check and I am actually glad one exists as this is something I will need while building out some of internal labs.

Disclaimer: This is not officially supported by VMware, please use at your own risk.

To by-pass the check, you will need to launch the vSphere C# Client install from the command-line and pass in the following arguments:

VMware-viclient.exe /v "SKIP_OS_CHECKS=1"

Now the installer should allow you to proceed with the vSphere C# Client installation.

Handy Keyboard Shortcuts for the vSphere Web Client

07.30.2013 by William Lam // 7 Comments

After publishing an article about the vSphere Web Client Recent History Feature, I received question from a reader asking about the keyboard shortcuts that were available as part of the legacy vSphere C# Client. The reader really enjoyed these shortcuts as a way to quickly navigate between the various inventories and was wondering if similar keyboard shortcuts existed for the new vSphere Web Client? I was not able to find anything in our documentation and decided to reach out to our UE (User Experience) folks to see if they could assist.

Though we do not have every single keyboard shortcut that was available from the legacy vSphere C# Client, we actually do have quite a few and this somehow must have gotten missed during documentation (I have filed documentation bug on this). In talking to our UE folks, some of the challenges in adding the keyboard shortcuts was to find shortcuts that have not already been taken by either a web browser (vSphere Web Client is a browser application) or the Operating System used to connect to the vSphere Web Client. It was also very important if new shortcuts were added, that it would be easy to understand. As you can see this was not a trivial task at all.

The screenshot below provides a quick overview of the available keyboard shortcuts for the vSphere Web Client. Take a look at the table below for a more detailed break down of each keyboard shortcut.

Keyboard Shortcuts

Keyboard Combination	Action
Ctrl+Alt+s	Quick Search
Ctrl+Alt+Home OR Ctrl+Alt+1	Home Screen
Ctrl+Alt+2	Virtual Infrastructure Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+3	Hosts and Clusters Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+4	VMs and Templates Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+5	Datastores and Datastore Clusters Inventory
Ctrl+Alt+6	Networking Inventory

I was able to verify these shortcuts on both a Mac OS X system as well as a on Windows. This is something I definitely will be bookmark as a useful reference. If there are other keyboard shortcuts that you have grown to rely on in the legacy vSphere C# Client and would like to see in the new vSphere Web Client, feel free to leave a comment and I will make sure it gets to our UE folks.