PowerCLI – Chris

Spectre NG (CVE-2018-3639 and CVE-2018-3640)

August 3, 2018 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 1 comment

A short wrapup to the latest Intel security leaks for VMware Administrators: CVE-2018-3639 aka Speculative Store Bypass (SSB), Variant 4 CVE-2018-3640 aka Rogue System Register Read (RSRE), Variant 3a. Once again we have to patch the whole stack: Update vCenter CPU Microcode (BIOS Update) VMware ESXi Hypervisor Patch Check if the new CPU flags are mapped to a new VM All VMs – Shutdown and start (reboot is not enough!) Update Guest OS Get some hints about EVC-Mode and how…

Configure Huawei Ultrapath with PowerCli

January 24, 2018 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

The last days we got two new All-Flash Storage Systems. These systems can present LUNs in a Metro-Cluster fashion. So I got the challenge to configure the Storage Plugin UltraPath from Huawei. In the manual from Huawei is explained how to configure the settings with esxcli on the ESXi-Host. That’s fine, but not enough 😉 We want to configure this with PowerCli to easily manage more than one Host.

#get esxcli
$esxcli2 = Get-ESXCLI -VMHost (Get-VMhost MyHost-001) -V2

#show known diskarrays 
#the corresponding esxcli command is = "esxcli upadm show diskarray"
$esxcli2.upadm.show.diskarray.Invoke()

#show ulrapath configuration 
#the corresponding esxcli command is = "esxcli upadm show upconfig" 
$esxcli2.upadm.show.upconfig.Invoke()


#create arguments 
#set working mode to priority 
#and 
#set primary array to 0 or 1 
#the corresponding esxcli command is = "esxcli upadm set hypermetro workingmode -m priority -p 0" 
$arguments = $esxcli2.upadm.set.hypermetro.workingmode.CreateArgs() 
$arguments.mode = "priority" 
$arguments.primaryarrayid ="0" 
$esxcli2.upadm.set.hypermetro.workingmode.Invoke($arguments)

#get esxcli

$esxcli2 = Get-ESXCLI -VMHost (Get-VMhost MyHost-001) -V2

#show known diskarrays

#the corresponding esxcli command is = "esxcli upadm show diskarray"

$esxcli2.upadm.show.diskarray.Invoke()

#show ulrapath configuration

#the corresponding esxcli command is = "esxcli upadm show upconfig"

$esxcli2.upadm.show.upconfig.Invoke()

#create arguments

#set working mode to priority

#and

#set primary array to 0 or 1

#the corresponding esxcli command is = "esxcli upadm set hypermetro workingmode -m priority -p 0"

$arguments = $esxcli2.upadm.set.hypermetro.workingmode.CreateArgs()

$arguments.mode = "priority"

$arguments.primaryarrayid ="0"

$esxcli2.upadm.set.hypermetro.workingmode.Invoke($arguments)

Got a PSOD? Check which VMs restarted by HA!

August 16, 2017 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

We design highly redundant Datacenters, Clusters, Storage Systems and even Networks, but in the end we still have some unplaned outages :/ This week we had a defect Memory DIMM that caused a PSOD on one ESXi Host. HA restarted the VMs fine, but we want to know quickly which VMs restarted. Check out a PowerCLI one liner to find the restarted VMs!

Restore VMs via PowerShell

December 16, 2016 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

Today I had the challenge to restore once a week multiple VMs that are used for VPN Client Testing. I would like to share my script with you 😉

Save your credentials for VIServer connections

December 8, 2016 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

Don’t put your credentials into the PowerCLI scripts! There is an option to store your credentials on the Host.

PowerCLI 6.5 watchout the Modules

November 28, 2016 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

You have to look at the Modules in PowerCLI 6.5. When you wrote your Scripts with the PowerShell ISE you had to load the PSSnapins before. In 6.5 there are no longer PSSnapins! Now there are only Modules!

PowerCLI is now available on OSX and Linux too!

October 19, 2016 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

I was very happy to see Luc Dekens and Alan Renouf @VMworld Session #INF8092R. And I was even more happy to see PowerCLI is becoming available on other Platforms like OSX and Linux too. At the moment it’s “only” a Fling, but this is quite sure only the beginning. Get the Fling PowerCLI Core at https://labs.vmware.com/flings/powercli-core

Is the SSH-Service on your ESXi disabled?

October 4, 2016 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

In times like these, where daily security leaks are published, it’s time to check some basics. Run the following PowerCLI Script to see if the SSH-Service is running and disable it!

#List Hosts into Array
$arr = @()
$arr = (Get-VMHost * | Foreach {($_ | Get-VMHostService | Where { $_.Key -eq "TSM-SSH"})} | select VMHost,Label,Policy,Running | Sort VMHost)

#Filter running SSH or Enabled
$sshOn = $arr | Where-Object { ($_.Running -eq "True") -or ($_.Policy -eq "on") }

#If SSH on -> Stop and Disable SSH
if (!$sshOn) {
Write-Host -BackgroundColor DarkGreen "No SSH enabled"
}
else {
#List Hosts
foreach ($VMhost in $sshOn) {Write-Host -BackgroundColor Red $VMhost.VMHost "- has SSH enabled"}
Write-Host -BackgroundColor Red "Stopping SSH Service and disable"
#Stop SSH Service
foreach ($VMhost in $sshOn) {Get-VMHost $VMhost.VMHost | Foreach {Stop-VMHostService -HostService ($_ | Get-VMHostService | Where { $_.Key -eq "TSM-SSH"})-Confirm:$false }}
#Disable SSH Service
foreach ($VMhost in $sshOn) {Get-VMHost $VMhost.VMHost | Foreach {Set-VMHostService -HostService ($_ | Get-VMHostService | Where { $_.Key -eq "TSM-SSH"}) -Policy Off -Confirm:$false }}
}

#List Hosts into Array

$arr = @()

$arr = (Get-VMHost * | Foreach {($_ | Get-VMHostService | Where { $_.Key -eq "TSM-SSH"})} | select VMHost,Label,Policy,Running | Sort VMHost)

#Filter running SSH or Enabled

$sshOn = $arr | Where-Object { ($_.Running -eq "True") -or ($_.Policy -eq "on") }

#If SSH on -> Stop and Disable SSH

if (!$sshOn) {

Write-Host -BackgroundColor DarkGreen "No SSH enabled"

}

else {

#List Hosts

foreach ($VMhost in $sshOn) {Write-Host -BackgroundColor Red $VMhost.VMHost "- has SSH enabled"}

Write-Host -BackgroundColor Red "Stopping SSH Service and disable"

#Stop SSH Service

foreach ($VMhost in $sshOn) {Get-VMHost $VMhost.VMHost | Foreach {Stop-VMHostService -HostService ($_ | Get-VMHostService | Where { $_.Key -eq "TSM-SSH"})-Confirm:$false }}

#Disable SSH Service

foreach ($VMhost in $sshOn) {Get-VMHost $VMhost.VMHost | Foreach {Set-VMHostService -HostService ($_ | Get-VMHostService | Where { $_.Key -eq "TSM-SSH"}) -Policy Off -Confirm:$false }}

}

Enjoy 😉

Get all the VMworld 2016 Sessions

September 21, 2016 Christoph Hochsticher Comments 0 Comment

Updated: The Sessions US are no more available on this way, but the EU 😉 You want all the Sessions from VMworld 2016? First, you have to download this raw_download_urls File. In this file the URL’s are listed. Now, download the MP4-Files in PowerShell 😉

$Filelocation = "c:\myFolder\raw_download_urls.txt" #Change the Location to your Path
$SaveLocation = "c:\myFolder\" #Change the Location to your Path
$List = Import-CSV $Filelocation -Header "ID", "Link" -Delimiter "#"
If (Get-Module BitsTransfer -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue) {
    $Bits=$true
    Write-Host "Using BITS transfer for faster more reliable downloads"
}

Foreach ($Session in $List) {
    if (Test-Path "$($Savelocation)$($Session.ID).mp4") {
        Write-Host "$($Session.ID) already downloaded... Skipping"
    } Else {
        Write-Host "Downloading Session $($Session.ID)"
        If ($Bits) {
            Start-BitsTransfer -Source $Session.Link -Destination "$($Savelocation)$($Session.ID).mp4"
        } Else {
            Invoke-WebRequest -Uri $Session.Link -OutFile "$($Savelocation)$($Session.ID).mp4"
        }
    }
}

$Filelocation = "c:\myFolder\raw_download_urls.txt" #Change the Location to your Path

$SaveLocation = "c:\myFolder\" #Change the Location to your Path

$List = Import-CSV $Filelocation -Header "ID", "Link" -Delimiter "#"

If (Get-Module BitsTransfer -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue) {

$Bits=$true

Write-Host "Using BITS transfer for faster more reliable downloads"

}

Foreach ($Session in $List) {

if (Test-Path "$($Savelocation)$($Session.ID).mp4") {

Write-Host "$($Session.ID) already downloaded... Skipping"

} Else {

Write-Host "Downloading Session $($Session.ID)"

If ($Bits) {

Start-BitsTransfer -Source $Session.Link -Destination "$($Savelocation)$($Session.ID).mp4"