Author: Wouter

The VMware Labs flings monthly for March 2021 – New Website

  By , , , , , ,

A day late but never late than never, this is your monthly overview with all the latest and greatest VMware flings. The flings site received a new fresh look head out to https://flings.vmware.com to have a look yourself. I am not sure if the (are they new?) tags for updated or new flings are okay yet as one has been marked updated but it seems to be new while one new one I could find a blog post for from last month but I missed it for my overview, not sure what happened there. Overall I see four new flings and ten received an update.

New Releases

Configuration Wizard for Nuance PowerMic

vRealize Automation Code Stream CLI

Hillview: Distributed Data Visualization

SDDC Import/Export for VMware Cloud on AWS

Updates

Workspace ONE Mobileconfig Importer

Workspace One UEM Workload Migration Tool

vSAN Hardware Compatibility List Checker

Vmss2core

vRealize Build Tools

Horizon Cloud Pod Architecture Tools

Workspace ONE App Analyzer for macOS

App Volumes Packaging Utility

DoD Security Technical Implementation Guide(STIG) ESXi VIB

VMware OS Optimization Tool

New Releases

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Configuration Wizard for Nuance PowerMic

Nuance PowerMics are the leading dictation device used in Healthcare today.
This handy standalone Fling will assist in determining the optimal PowerMic configuration for a specific customer environment.

To determine the configuration that works best for you, we need to know a few details about the customer environment:

  • Endpoint type
  • Endpoint vendor
  • Endpoint operating system
  • Single/nested mode
  • Horizon protocol

The PowerMic Configuration Wizard will then provide the specific settings for optimal PowerMic performance and accuracy in the customers environment.

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vRealize Automation Code Stream CLI

vRealize Automation Code Stream CLI is a command line tool written in Go to interact with the vRealize Automation Code Stream APIs. This Fling is written to help automate Code Stream and provide a simple way to migrate content between Code Stream instances and projects.

  • Import and Export Code Stream artefacts such as Pipelines, Variables, Endpoints
  • Perform CRUD operations on Code Stream artefacts such as Pipelines, Variables, Endpoints
  • Trigger Executions of Pipelines

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Hillview: Distributed Data Visualization

Hillview is a simple cloud-based spreadsheet program for browsing large data collections. The data manipulated is read-only. Users can sort, find, filter, transform, query, zoom-in/out, and chart data. Operations are performed using direct manipulation in the GUI. Hillview is designed to work on very large data sets (billions of rows). Hillview can import data from a variety of sources: CSV files, ORC files, Parquet files, databases, parallel databases; new connectors can be added with relatively little effort. Hillview takes advantage of all the cores of the worker machines for fast visualizations.

Hillview is a distributed system, composed of two pieces:

  • A distributed set of one or many workers, which should be installed close to the data (e.g., on the machines that host the data).
  • A front-end service that runs a web server and aggregates data from all workers.

The source code of Hillview is available as an open-source project with an Apache-2 license from Hillview’s github repository. For any questions, feature requests or bug reports please file an issue on github.

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SDDC Import/Export for VMware Cloud on AWS

The SDDC Import/Export for VMware Cloud on AWS tool enables you to save and restore your VMware Cloud on AWS (VMC) Software-Defined Data Center (SDDC) networking and security configuration.

There are many situations when customers want to migrate from an existing SDDC to a different one. While HCX addresses the data migration challenge, this tool offers customers the ability to copy the configuration from a source to a destination SDDC.

A few example migration scenarios are:

  • SDDC to SDDC migration from bare-metal (i3) to a different bare-metal type (i3en)
  • SDDC to SDDC migration from VMware-based org to an AWS-based org
  • SDDC to SDDC migration from region (i.e. London) to a different region (i.e. Dublin).

Other use cases are:

  • Backups – save the entire SDDC configuration
  • Lab purposes – customers or partners might want to deploy SDDCs with a pre-populated configuration.
  • DR purposes – deploy a pre-populated configuration in conjunction with VMware Site Recovery or VMware Cloud Disaster Recovery

Detailed instructions can be found on the Instructions tab, in the README.md included in the Zip file or on Patrick’s blog (http://www.patrickkremer.com/sddc-import-export/).

Details about the use cases and origins of the project can be found on Nico’s blog (https://nicovibert.com/2021/02/08/fling-sddc-import-export-for-vmware-cloud-on-aws/).

Updates

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Workspace ONE Mobileconfig Importer

The Workspace ONE mobileconfig Importer gives you the ability to import existing mobileconfig files directly into a Workspace ONE UEM environment as a Custom Settings profile, import app preference plist files in order to created managed preference profiles, and to create new Custom Settings profiles from scratch. When importing existing configuration profiles, the tool will attempt to separate each PayloadContent dictionary into a separate payload for the Workspace ONE profile.

Changelog

Version 1.1

  • Support for Big Sur
  • Updated icon

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Workspace One UEM Workload Migration Tool

Quite a few updates for this fling already!

The Workspace One UEM Workload Migration Tool allows a seamless migration of Applications and Device configurations between different Workspace One UEM environments. With the push of a button, workloads move from UAT to Production, instead of having to manually enter the information or upload files manually. Therefore, decreasing the time to move data between Dev/UAT environments to Production.

Changelog

Version 2.1.0

  • Fixed app upload issues for Workspace One UEM 1910+
  • Fixed profile search issue for Workspace One UEM 1910+
  • Added profile update support
  • Added template folder structure creation
  • Updated Mac app to support notarization for Catalina

Version 2.0.1

  • Fixed Baseline Migration issue
  • Fixed Profile Errors not displaying in the UI

Version 2.0.0

  • Baseline Migration Support
  • MacOS application
  • UI refactoring to make bulk migrations easier
  • Added support for script detection with Win32 applications

Version 1.0.1

  • Fixed issue with expired credentials.

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vSAN Hardware Compatibility List Checker

The vSAN Hardware Compatibility List Checker is a tool that verifies all installed storage adapters against the vSAN supported storage controller list. The tool will verify if the model, driver and firmware version of the storage adapter are supported.

Changelog

Version 2.2

  • Support multi-platforms for Windows, Linux and MacOS
  • Bug fixed

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Vmss2core

Vmss2core is a tool to convert VMware checkpoint state files into formats that third party debugger tools understand. It can handle both suspend (.vmss) and snapshot (.vmsn) checkpoint state files (hereafter referred to as a ‘vmss file’) as well as both monolithic and non-monolithic (separate .vmem file) encapsulation of checkpoint state data.

Changelog

Version 1.0.1

  • Fixed running out of memory issues
  • Added support for more versions of Windows 10/Windows 2016

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vRealize Build Tools

vRealize Build Tools provides tools to development and release teams implementing solutions based on vRealize Automation (vRA) and vRealize Orchestrator (vRO). The solution targets Virtual Infrastructure Administrators and Solution Developers working in parallel on multiple vRealize-based projects who want to use standard DevOps practices.

Changelog

Version 2.12.5 Update

  • [vRBT] Package installer – Add support for installation on a standalone vRO (not embedded) version 8.x with basic authentication
  • [vRA] Added catalog entitlements and examples to the vra-ng archetype
  • [vRO] Support / in Workflow name or path, by substituting it with dash (-) character.
  • [vRBT] Added http / socket timeouts support in the installer
  • [ABX] Support for ABX actions
  • [vRO] Support of placeholders in workflow description
  • [vRA] Import vRA8 custom resources before blueprints
  • [vROPS] Fixed policy import / export problem with vROPs 8.2, maintaining backward compatibility
  • [MVN] Fixed ussue with installer timeouts
  • [TS] vRO pkg – Adds support for slash in workflow path or name
  • [vRBT] Package installer – updated documentation, added checking of workflow input, writing of workflow error message to file, setting of installer exit code when executing of a workflow
  • [TS] Allow additional trigger events for policies trigered by the vcd mqtt plugin
  • [MVN] Fix Missing vRA Tenant After Successful package import
  • [MVN] Fix vROPS import fails on certain assets

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Horizon Cloud Pod Architecture Tools

The Horizon Cloud Pod Architecture Tools mainly acts as a wrapper around the lmvutil for Horizon Cloud Pod Archtitecture.

Changelog

Version 1.1

Based on the customer requests, have added few more command line options for CSV reports generation and AD LDS data cleanup.

What’s New:

Adds support to cleanup stale global local entitlement assignments from ADAM DB.

  • Global AD LDS Command:
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –resolve-localpool-ga
  • Scans the cloud pod database and resolves the stale entries of local pool global assignments.
    Note: This resolves deleted local pool conflicts of current pod only. If dashboard session data load error or session search fails in a different pod, a scan and resolve has to be executed in that pod.
  • List of new commands added to Local AD LDS:
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –export-machine
  • All machine data exported as CSV file. Compatibility: Horizon 7.10 and above, 8.x
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –export-machine -pool=”DesktopPool1,DesktopPool2″
  • All machine data exported as CSV file. Use -pool= to filter machines by desktop pool name. Compatibility: Horizon 7.10 and above, 8.x
  • Spaces are not allowed in -pool= optional argument.
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –export-session
  • All local sessions data exported as CSV file. Compatibility: Horizon 7.10 and above, 8.x
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –export-session -pool=”PoolName1,PoolName2″ -farm=”FarmName1,FarmName2″
  • All local session data exported as CSV file. Use -pool= to filter sessions by desktop pool name. -farm= filter sessions by RDS farm name. Compatibility: Horizon 7.10 and above, 8.x
  • Spaces are not allowed in -pool= and -farm= optional argument.
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –check-apps-integrity
  • Scans and lists the stale application icons in local ADLDS instance.
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –check-apps-integrity -input=”AbsoluteFilePath1″,”AbsoluteFilePath2″
  • Reads the list of adam LDIF files in “-input=” for parsing and exports the stale application icons data to a file.
    adlds-analyzer.cmd –export-named-lic-users
  • Exports the utilized and un-utilized named license users list information.

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Workspace ONE App Analyzer for macOS

The Workspace ONE macOS App Analyzer will determine any Privacy Permissions, Kernel Extensions, or System Extensions needed by an installed macOS application, and can be used to automatically create profiles in Workspace ONE UEM to whitelist those same settings when deploying apps to managed devices.

Changelog

Version 1.2.1

  • Fixed bug that caused crash with certain System Extension configurations

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App Volumes Packaging Utility

This App Volumes Packaging Utility helps to package applications. With this fling, packagers can add the necessary metadata to MSIX app attach VHDs so they can be used alongside existing AV format packages. The MSIX format VHDs will require App Volumes 4, version 2006 or later and Windows 10, version 2004 or later.

Changelog

Version 1.2 Update

  • Fixed bugs found in internal testing.

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DoD Security Technical Implementation Guide(STIG) ESXi VIB

The DoD Security Technical Implementation Guide (‘STIG’) ESXi VIB is a Fling that provides a custom VMware-signed ESXi vSphere Installation Bundle (‘VIB’) to assist in remediating Defense Information Systems Agency STIG controls for ESXi. This VIB has been developed to help customers rapidly implement the more challenging aspects of the vSphere STIG. These include the fact that installation is time consuming and must be done manually on the ESXi hosts. In certain cases, it may require complex scripting, or even development of an in-house VIB that would not be officially digitally signed by VMware (and therefore would not be deployed as a normal patch would). The need for a VMware-signed VIB is due to the system level files that are to be replaced. These files cannot be modified at a community supported acceptance level. The use of the VMware-signed STIG VIB provides customers the following benefits:

  • The ability to use vSphere Update Manager (‘VUM’) to quickly deploy the VIB to ESXi hosts (you cannot do this with a customer created VIB)
  • The ability to use VUM to quickly check if all ESXi hosts have the STIG VIB installed and therefore are also in compliance
  • No need to manually replace and copy files directly on each ESXi host in your environment
  • No need to create complex shell scripts that run each time ESXi boots to re-apply settings

Changelog

Update March 2021

  • New ESXi 7.0 STIG VIB release
  • Updated sshd_config file to meet the ESXi 7.0 Draft STIG which is also now the default config in 7.0 U2 with the exception of permitting root user logins.
  • Removed /etc/vmware/welcome file from VIB since it can be configured via the UI or PowerCLI now with issue.
  • Draft ESXi content can be found here: https://github.com/vmware/dod-compliance-and-automation/tree/master/vsphere/7.0/docs
  • See the updated Overview and Installation guide included in the download.

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VMware OS Optimization Tool

No comments needed, just use the OS Optimization Tool when creating your golden images!

Changelog

March 2021, b2002

  • Fixed issue where the theme file was being updated by a Generalize task and the previously selected optimizations including wallpaper color were being lost.
  • The administrator username used during Generalize was not getting passed through properly to the unattend answer file. This resulted in a mismatch when using some languages versions of Windows.
  • Removed legacy code GPO Policy corruption
  • Removed CMD.exe box that displayed at logon.
  • Windows Store Apps were not being removed properly on Windows 10 version 20H2. Fixed the optimizations to cope with the differences introduced in this version.

Optimizations

Changed step Block all consumer Microsoft account user authentication to be unselected by default. When disabled this was causing failures to login to Edge and Windows store.

Changed the step Turn off Thumbnail Previews in File Explorer to be unselected by default. This was causing no thumbnails to show for store apps in search results.

Windows Update

On Non-Enterprise editions of Windows 10, KB4023057 installs a new application called Microsoft Update Health Tools: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/kb4023057-update-for-windows-10-update-service-components-fccad0ca-dc10-2e46-9ed1-7e392450fb3a. Added logic to ensure that the Windows Update Medic Service is disabled including after re-enabling and disabling Windows Updates using the Update tab.

Templates

Windows 8 and 8.1 templates have been removed from the list of built-in templates. To optimize these versions of Windows, use the separate download for version b1130.

Removed old Windows 10 templates from the Public Templates repository:

  • Windows 10 1809-2004-Server 2019
  • Windows 10 1507-1803-Server 2016

January 2021, b2001 Bug Fixes

  • All optimization entries have been added back into the main user template. This allows manual tuning and selection of all optimizations.
  • Fixed two hardware acceleration selections were not previously controlled by the Common Option for Visual Effect to disable hardware acceleration.

Optimize

  • During an Optimize, the optimization selections are automatically exported to a default json file (%ProgramData%\VMware\OSOT\OptimizedTemplateData.json).

Analyze

  • When an Analyze is run, if the default json file exists (meaning that this image has already been optimized), this is imported and used to select the optimizations and the Common Options selections with the previous choices.
  • If the default selections are required, on subsequent runs of the OS Optimization Tool, delete the default json file, relaunch the tool and run Analyze.

Command Line

  • The OptimizedTemplateData.json file can also be used from the command line with the -applyoptimization parameter.

Optimizations

  • Changed entries for Hyper-V services to not be selected by default. These services are required for VMs deployed onto Azure. Windows installation sets these to manual (trigger) so these so not cause any overhead on vSphere, when left with the default setting.

Powercli script to assign a dedicated Horizon machine to multiple users

  By , , , , ,

Yesterday Robin Stolpe again reached out that he was having issues assigning multiple accounts to the same dedicated machine. He couldn’t get this running with the vmware.hv.helper and looking that with how it is implemented now it will probably never work. I decided to put together some of the functions I have used for ControlUp script based actions and some of my other work to put together the following script (that can be found on Github here.)

[CmdletBinding()]
Param
(
    [Parameter(Mandatory=$False,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Enter a username' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $Username,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Domain i.e. loft.lab' )]
    [string] $Domain,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Password in plain text' )]
    [string] $Password,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$true,  HelpMessage='FQDN of the connectionserver' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $ConnectionServerFQDN,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="credsfile",
    HelpMessage='Path to credentials xml file' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $Credentialfile,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,  HelpMessage='username of the user to logoff (domain\user i.e. loft.lab\user1')]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string[]] $TargetUsers,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false, HelpMessage='Name of the desktop pool the machine belongs to')]
  [string] $TargetPool,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false, HelpMessage='dns name of the machine the user is on i.d. lp-002.loft.lab')]
  [string] $TargetMachine,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false, HelpMessage='domain for the target users')]
  [string] $TargetDomain
)

if($Credentialfile -and ((test-path $Credentialfile) -eq $true)){
    try{
        write-host "Using credentialsfile"
        $credentials=Import-Clixml $Credentialfile
        $username=($credentials.username).split("\")[1]
        $domain=($credentials.username).split("\")[0]
        $secpw=$credentials.password
        $BSTR = [System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal]::SecureStringToBSTR($secpw)
        $password = [System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal]::PtrToStringAuto($BSTR)
    }
    catch{
        write-error -Message "Error importing credentials"
        break
    }
}
elseif($Credentials -and ((test-path $credentials) -eq $false)){
    write-error "Invalid Path to credentials file"
    break
}
elseif($username -and $Domain -and $Password){
    write-host "Using separate credentials"
}


function Get-HVDesktopPool {
    param (
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "Displayname of the Desktop Pool.")]
        [string]$HVPoolName,
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "The Horizon View Connection server object.")]
        [VMware.VimAutomation.HorizonView.Impl.V1.ViewObjectImpl]$HVConnectionServer
    )
    # Try to get the Desktop pools in this pod
    try {
        # create the service object first
        [VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService]$queryService = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService
        # Create the object with the definiton of what to query
        [VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition]$defn = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition
        # entity type to query
        $defn.queryEntityType = 'DesktopSummaryView'
        # Filter on the correct displayname
        $defn.Filter = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals -property @{'memberName'='desktopSummaryData.displayName'; 'value' = "$HVPoolname"}
        # Perform the actual query
        [array]$queryResults= ($queryService.queryService_create($HVConnectionServer.extensionData, $defn)).results
        # Remove the query
        $queryService.QueryService_DeleteAll($HVConnectionServer.extensionData)
        # Return the results
        if (!$queryResults){
            write-host "Can't find $HVPoolName, exiting."
            exit
        }
        else {
            return $queryResults
        }
    }
    catch {
        write-host 'There was a problem retreiving the Horizon View Desktop Pool.'
    }
}

function Get-HVDesktopMachine {
    param (
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "ID of the Desktop Pool.")]
        [VMware.Hv.DesktopId]$HVPoolID,
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "Name of the Desktop machine.")]
        [string]$HVMachineName,
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "The Horizon View Connection server object.")]
        [VMware.VimAutomation.HorizonView.Impl.V1.ViewObjectImpl]$HVConnectionServer
    )

    try {
        # create the service object first
        [VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService]$queryService = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService
        # Create the object with the definiton of what to query
        [VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition]$defn = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition
        # entity type to query
        $defn.queryEntityType = 'MachineDetailsView'
        # Filter so we get the correct machine in the correct pool
        $poolfilter = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals -property @{'memberName'='desktopData.id'; 'value' = $HVPoolID}
        $machinefilter = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals -property @{'memberName'='data.name'; 'value' = "$HVMachineName"}
        $filterlist = @()
        $filterlist += $poolfilter
        $filterlist += $machinefilter
        $filterAnd = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterAnd
        $filterAnd.Filters = $filterlist
        $defn.Filter = $filterAnd
        # Perform the actual query
        [array]$queryResults= ($queryService.queryService_create($HVConnectionServer.extensionData, $defn)).results
        # Remove the query
        $queryService.QueryService_DeleteAll($HVConnectionServer.extensionData)
        # Return the results
        if (!$queryResults){
            write-host "Can't find $HVPoolName, exiting."
            exit
        }
        else{
            return $queryResults
        }
    }
    catch {
        write-host 'There was a problem retreiving the Horizon View Desktop Pool.'
    }
}

function Get-HVUser {
    param (
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "User loginname..")]
        [string]$HVUserLoginName,
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "Name of the Domain.")]
        [string]$HVDomain,
        [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
        HelpMessage = "The Horizon View Connection server object.")]
        [VMware.VimAutomation.HorizonView.Impl.V1.ViewObjectImpl]$HVConnectionServer
    )

    try {
        # create the service object first
        [VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService]$queryService = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService
        # Create the object with the definiton of what to query
        [VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition]$defn = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition
        # entity type to query
        $defn.queryEntityType = 'ADUserOrGroupSummaryView'
        # Filter to get the correct user
        $userloginnamefilter = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals -property @{'memberName'='base.loginName'; 'value' = $HVUserLoginName}
        $domainfilter = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals -property @{'memberName'='base.domain'; 'value' = "$HVDomain"}
        $filterlist = @()
        $filterlist += $userloginnamefilter
        $filterlist += $domainfilter
        $filterAnd = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterAnd
        $filterAnd.Filters = $filterlist
        $defn.Filter = $filterAnd
        # Perform the actual query
        [array]$queryResults= ($queryService.queryService_create($HVConnectionServer.extensionData, $defn)).results
        # Remove the query
        $queryService.QueryService_DeleteAll($HVConnectionServer.extensionData)
        # Return the results
        if (!$queryResults){
            write-host "Can't find user $HVUserLoginName in domain $HVDomain, exiting."
            exit
        }
        else {
            return $queryResults
        }
    }
    catch {
        write-host 'There was a problem retreiving the user.'
    }
}

$hvserver1=connect-hvserver $ConnectionServerFQDN -user $username -domain $domain -password $password
$Services1= $hvServer1.ExtensionData

$desktop_pool=Get-HVDesktopPool -hvpoolname $TargetPool -HVConnectionServer $hvserver1

$poolid=$desktop_pool.id

$machine = get-hvdesktopmachine -HVConnectionServer $hvserver1 -HVMachineName $TargetMachine -HVPoolID $poolid
$machineid = $machine.id
$useridlist=@()

foreach ($targetuser in $TargetUsers){
    $user = Get-HVUser -HVConnectionServer $hvserver1 -hvdomain $TargetDomain -HVUserLoginName $targetUser
    $useridlist+=$user.id
}

$Services1.Machine.Machine_assignUsers($machineid, $useridlist)

So first I have 3 functions to get the Pool, the machine and users. With a foreach on the $Targetusers list I create a list of the userid’s that is required to use for the Machine_assignUsers function of the machine service.

Powercli script to (forcefully) log off Horizon users

  By , , , , , ,

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away I wrote this blog post to log a user off from their vdi session. Today I got an inquiry from Robin Stolpe that he was trying to make it a script with arguments instead if the menu’s but was having some issues with that. This gave me the chance to make it a bit nicer of a script with the option to user username/domain/password as credentials but also a credentialfile , optional forcefully logging off the users and with Robin’s requirements of being able to provide the exact username and the machine that user is working on.

The script can be ran like this:

D:\GIT\Scripts\logoff_user.ps1 -Credentialfile "D:\homelab\creds.xml" -TargetUser "loft.lab\m_wouter" -TargetMachine "lp-001.loft.lab" -ConnectionServerFQDN loftcbr01.loft.lab

or with credentials and the -force parameter

D:\GIT\Scripts\logoff_user.ps1 -TargetUser "loft.lab\m_wouter" -TargetMachine "lp-001.loft.lab" -ConnectionServerFQDN loftcbr01.loft.lab -Username m_wouter -domain loft.lab -password "HAHAHAHA" -force

Now let’s have a look how the script is build.

So I started with the parameters and for that I included 2 parameter sets so you can either choose to have the separate credentials or to use a credentials file.

[CmdletBinding()]
Param
(
    [Parameter(Mandatory=$False,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Enter a username' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $Username,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Domain i.e. loft.lab' )]
    [string] $Domain,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Password in plain text' )]
    [string] $Password,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$true,  HelpMessage='FQDN of the connectionserver' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $ConnectionServerFQDN,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="credsfile",
    HelpMessage='Path to credentials xml file' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $Credentialfile,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false, HelpMessage='Synchronise the local site only' )]
    [switch] $Force,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,  HelpMessage='username of the user to logoff (domain\user i.e. loft.lab\user1')]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $TargetUser,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false, HelpMessage='dns name of the machine the user is on i.d. lp-002.loft.lab')]
  [string] $TargetMachine
)

Than I check if a credential file was supplied and if I can actually import it

if($Credentialfile -and ((test-path $Credentialfile) -eq $true)){
    try{
        write-host "Using credentialsfile"
        $credentials=Import-Clixml $Credentialfile
        $username=($credentials.username).split("\")[1]
        $domain=($credentials.username).split("\")[0]
        $secpw=$credentials.password
        $BSTR = [System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal]::SecureStringToBSTR($secpw)
        $password = [System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal]::PtrToStringAuto($BSTR)
    }
    catch{
        write-error -Message "Error importing credentials"
        break
    }
}
elseif($Credentials -and ((test-path $credentials) -eq $false)){
    write-error "Invalid Path to credentials file"
}
elseif($username -and $Domain -and $Password){
    write-host "Using separate credentials"
}

The file doesn’t exist:

Or an error importing the xml (duh, what do you think what happoens when you use a json instead of xml, fool!)

Then it’s a matter of logging in, performing a query and checking if there’s really a session for this user. As you can see I am using machineOrRDSServerDNS so it should also work for RDS sessions.

$hvserver1=connect-hvserver $ConnectionServerFQDN -user $username -domain $domain -password $password
$Services1= $hvServer1.ExtensionData

$queryService = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService
$sessionfilterspec = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition
$sessionfilterspec.queryEntityType = 'SessionLocalSummaryView'
$sessionfilter1= New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals
$sessionfilter1.membername='namesData.userName'
$sessionfilter1.value=$TargetUser
$sessionfilter2= New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals
$sessionfilter2.membername='namesData.machineOrRDSServerDNS'
$sessionfilter2.value=$TargetMachine
$sessionfilter=new-object vmware.hv.QueryFilterAnd
$sessionfilter.filters=@($sessionfilter1, $sessionfilter2)
$sessionfilterspec.filter=$sessionfilter
$session=($queryService.QueryService_Create($Services1, $sessionfilterspec)).results
$queryService.QueryService_DeleteAll($services1)
if($session.count -eq 0){
    write-host "No session found for $targetuser on $targetmachine"
    break
}

And last but not least logging the user of with or without the -force option

if($Force){
    write-host "Forcefully logging off $targetUser from $targetmachine"
    $Services1.Session.Session_Logoffforced($session.id)
}
else{
    write-host "Logging off $targetUser from $targetmachine"
    try{
        $Services1.Session.Session_Logoff($session.id)
    }
    catch{
        write-error "error logging the user off, maybe the sessions was locked. Try with -force"
    }
}

This session was locked

So let’s force that thing

And here’s the entire script but you can also find it on my github.

[CmdletBinding()]
Param
(
    [Parameter(Mandatory=$False,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Enter a username' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $Username,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Domain i.e. loft.lab' )]
    [string] $Domain,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="separatecredentials",
    HelpMessage='Password in plain text' )]
    [string] $Password,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$true,  HelpMessage='FQDN of the connectionserver' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $ConnectionServerFQDN,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,
    ParameterSetName="credsfile",
    HelpMessage='Path to credentials xml file' )]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $Credentialfile,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false, HelpMessage='Synchronise the local site only' )]
    [switch] $Force,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false,  HelpMessage='username of the user to logoff (domain\user i.e. loft.lab\user1')]
    [ValidateNotNullOrEmpty()]
    [string] $TargetUser,

    [Parameter(Mandatory=$false, HelpMessage='dns name of the machine the user is on i.d. lp-002.loft.lab')]
  [string] $TargetMachine
)

if($Credentialfile -and ((test-path $Credentialfile) -eq $true)){
    try{
        write-host "Using credentialsfile"
        $credentials=Import-Clixml $Credentialfile
        $username=($credentials.username).split("\")[1]
        $domain=($credentials.username).split("\")[0]
        $secpw=$credentials.password
        $BSTR = [System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal]::SecureStringToBSTR($secpw)
        $password = [System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal]::PtrToStringAuto($BSTR)
    }
    catch{
        write-error -Message "Error importing credentials"
        break
    }
}
elseif($Credentials -and ((test-path $credentials) -eq $false)){
    write-error "Invalid Path to credentials file"
    break
}
elseif($username -and $Domain -and $Password){
    write-host "Using separate credentials"
}


$hvserver1=connect-hvserver $ConnectionServerFQDN -user $username -domain $domain -password $password
$Services1= $hvServer1.ExtensionData

$queryService = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryServiceService
$sessionfilterspec = New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryDefinition
$sessionfilterspec.queryEntityType = 'SessionLocalSummaryView'
$sessionfilter1= New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals
$sessionfilter1.membername='namesData.userName'
$sessionfilter1.value=$TargetUser
$sessionfilter2= New-Object VMware.Hv.QueryFilterEquals
$sessionfilter2.membername='namesData.machineOrRDSServerDNS'
$sessionfilter2.value=$TargetMachine
$sessionfilter=new-object vmware.hv.QueryFilterAnd
$sessionfilter.filters=@($sessionfilter1, $sessionfilter2)
$sessionfilterspec.filter=$sessionfilter
$session=($queryService.QueryService_Create($Services1, $sessionfilterspec)).results
$queryService.QueryService_DeleteAll($services1)
if($session.count -eq 0){
    write-host "No session found for $targetuser on $targetmachine"
    break
}

if($Force){
    write-host "Forcefully logging off $targetUser from $targetmachine"
    $Services1.Session.Session_Logoffforced($session.id)
}
else{
    write-host "Logging off $targetUser from $targetmachine"
    try{
        $Services1.Session.Session_Logoff($session.id)
    }
    catch{
        write-error "error logging the user off, maybe the sessions was locked. Try with -force"
    }
}

Pushing a new image using the VMware Horizon Python Module

  By , , , , , , ,

One of the REST api calls that where added for Horizon 8 2012 was the ability to push images to Desktop Pools (sadly not for farms yet). This week I added that functionality to the VMware Horizon Python Module. Looking at the swagger UI these are the needed arguments:

So the source can be either the streams from Horizon Cloud or a regular vm/snapshot combo. For the time you will need to use some moment in epoch. The optional items for adding the virtual tpm, stop on error I have set the default for what they are listed. As logoff policy I have chosen to set a default in WAIT_FOR_LOGOFF.

For this blog posts I have to go with the vm/snapshot combo as I don’t have streams setup at the moment. First I need to connect:

import requests, getpass, urllib, json, operator, numpy, time
import vmware_horizon


requests.packages.urllib3.disable_warnings()
url="https://pod2cbr1.loft.lab"
username = input("Username\n")
domain = input("Domain\n")
pw = getpass.getpass()

hvconnectionobj = vmware_horizon.Connection(username = username,domain = domain,password = pw,url = url)
hvconnectionobj.hv_connect()
print("connected")

Than I open the ports for the classes I will be using

monitor = obj=vmware_horizon.Monitor(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)
external=vmware_horizon.External(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)
inventory=vmware_horizon.Inventory(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)

Now let’s look at what the desktop_pool_push_image method needs

First I will grab the correct desktop pool, I will use Pod02-Pool02 this time. There are several ways to get the correct pool but I have chosen to use this one.

desktop_pools=inventory.get_desktop_pools()
desktop_pool = next(item for item in desktop_pools if item["name"] == "Pod02-Pool02")
poolid=desktop_pool["id"]

To get the VM and Snapshots I first need to get the vCenter and datacenter id’s

vcenters = monitor.virtual_centers()
vcid = vcenters[0]["id"]
dcs = external.get_datacenters(vcenter_id=vcid)
dcid = dcs[0]["id"]

I created a new golden image last Friday and it has this name: W10-L-2021-03-19-17-27 so I need to get the compatible base vm’s and get the id for this one

base_vms = external.get_base_vms(vcenter_id=vcid,datacenter_id=dcid,filter_incompatible_vms=True)
base_vm = next(item for item in base_vms if item["name"] == "W10-L-2021-03-19-17-27")
basevmid=base_vm["id"]

I had Packer create a snapshot and I can get that in a similar way

base_snapshots = external.get_base_snapshots(vcenter_id=vcid, base_vm_id=base_vm["id"])
base_snapshot = next(item for item in base_snapshots if item["name"] == "Created by Packer")
snapid=base_snapshot["id"]

I get the current time in epoch using the time module (google is your best friend to define a moment in the future in epoch)

current_time = time.time()

For this example I add all the arguments but if you don’t change fromt he defaults that’s not needed

inventory.desktop_pool_push_image(desktop_pool_id=poolid,parent_vm_id=basevmid,snapshot_id=snapid, start_time=current_time, add_virtual_tpm=False, stop_on_first_error=False, logoff_policy="FORCE_LOGOFF")

And closing the connection

end=hvconnectionobj.hv_disconnect()
print(end)

and when I now look at my desktop pool it’s pushing the new image

I have created a new folder on Github for examples and the script to deploy new images is the first example. I did move a couple of the names to variables so make ie better usable. You can find it here. Or see the code below this.

import requests, getpass, urllib, time
import vmware_horizon

requests.packages.urllib3.disable_warnings()

url                     = "https://pod2cbr1.loft.lab"
desktop_pool_name       = "Pod02-Pool01"
base_vm_name            = "W10-L-2021-03-19-17-27"
snapshot_name           = "Snap_2"

username = input("Username\n")
domain = input("Domain\n")
pw = getpass.getpass()

hvconnectionobj = vmware_horizon.Connection(username = username,domain = domain,password = pw,url = url)
hvconnectionobj.hv_connect()
print("connected")
monitor = obj=vmware_horizon.Monitor(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)
external=vmware_horizon.External(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)
inventory=vmware_horizon.Inventory(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)

desktop_pools=inventory.get_desktop_pools()
desktop_pool = next(item for item in desktop_pools if item["name"] == desktop_pool_name)
poolid=desktop_pool["id"]

vcenters = monitor.virtual_centers()
vcid = vcenters[0]["id"]
dcs = external.get_datacenters(vcenter_id=vcid)
dcid = dcs[0]["id"]

base_vms = external.get_base_vms(vcenter_id=vcid,datacenter_id=dcid,filter_incompatible_vms=True)
base_vm = next(item for item in base_vms if item["name"] == base_vm_name)
basevmid=base_vm["id"]

base_snapshots = external.get_base_snapshots(vcenter_id=vcid, base_vm_id=base_vm["id"])
base_snapshot = next(item for item in base_snapshots if item["name"] == snapshot_name)
snapid=base_snapshot["id"]

current_time = time.time()
inventory.desktop_pool_push_image(desktop_pool_id=poolid,parent_vm_id=basevmid,snapshot_id=snapid, start_time=current_time)

end=hvconnectionobj.hv_disconnect()
print(end)

 

 

Quickly grabbing all available REST api url’s for your Horizon version

  By , , , , , , , ,

One of the challenges with the Horizon REST API’s is that they are not feature complete yet and if you ain’t on the latest version you need to scroll trough the api explorer or Swagger UI to find if the URL you need is available. I have created a short script for both python and powershell that will show all the available urls.

If you’ve taken a good look at the Swagger page you’ll see there’s a link to the api docs almost at the top

If you open this you get something that looks like a json but it’s not readable (yet!)

Let’s grab the url’s with powershell first

$data = Invoke-WebRequest https://pod2cbr1.loft.lab/rest/v1/api-docs?group=Default
$json = $data |ConvertFrom-Json
$json.paths

this will give you all the available url’s from the docs and the methods they support

Now if you want to drill down deeper you can do a select -expandproperty on the url’s and with a get-member you get the available calls

$json.paths | select -expandproperty "/inventory/v1/rds-servers/{id}" | Get-Member

and with another select -expandproperty you see all the details

$json.paths | select -expandproperty "/inventory/v1/rds-servers/{id}" | select -ExpandProperty get

With Python you can start with something similar

import json,requests,urllib 
requests.packages.urllib3.disable_warnings() 
response = requests.get("https://pod2cbr1.loft.lab/rest/v1/api-docs?group=Default" , verify=False) 
data = response.json() 
for i in data["paths"]: 
    print(i)

but this will just give the url’s

To be able to drill down I decided to bring the url, method and the description into a list and print that if needed. This example is just with the method and url but you can add the description as well. The list is to make it easier to filter on.

import json,requests,urllib
requests.packages.urllib3.disable_warnings()
response = requests.get("https://pod2cbr1.loft.lab/rest/v1/api-docs?group=Default" , verify=False)

data = response.json()

list=[]
paths=data["paths"]

for i in paths:
    for method in paths[i]:
        obj = {}
        obj["method"] = method
        obj["url"] = i
        obj["description"] = paths[i][method]
        list.append(obj)

for i in list:
    print(i["method"], i["url"])

The VMware Labs flings monthly for February 2021 – Reach alert!

  By , , , , , , ,

It’s been a busy month on the flings front, no less than 17(!!) new releases and updated flings. This is how my browser tabs look:

If I have therm all correct there are 6 new releases and 10 updates (2 1 of which update without a changelog so a boo for that!) so this post is going to be a long one!

New Releases

Community NVMe Driver for ESXi

VMware Cloud Foundation Powernova

Workspace ONE Access Migration Tool

Sample Data Platform Deployment on Virtualized Cloud Infrastructure

Community Networking Driver for ESXi

Code Stream Concourse Integrator

Updates

ESXi Compatibility Checker

VMware Machine Learning Platform

Virtualized High Performance Computing Toolkit

Horizon Peripherals Intelligence

Workspace ONE App Analyzer for macOS

VMware OS Optimization Tool

Horizon Helpdesk Utility

HCIBench

Horizon Reach

Workspace ONE Discovery

App Volumes Migration Utility

New Releases

[sta_anchor id=”cndfe” /]

Community NVMe Driver for ESXi

This Fling is a collection of ESXi Native Drivers which enables ESXi to recognize and consume various NVMe-based storage devices. These devices are not officially on the VMware HCL and have been developed to enable and support the VMware Community.

Currently, this Fling provides an emulated NVMe driver for the Apple 2018 Intel Mac Mini 8,1 and the Apple 2019 Intel Mac Pro 7,1 allowing customers to use the local NVMe SSD with ESXi. This driver is packaged up as an Offline Bundle and is only activated when it detects ESXi has been installed on either an Apple Mac Mini or Apple Mac Pro.

[sta_anchor id=”vcfp” /]

VMware Cloud Foundation Powernova

VMware Cloud Foundation Powernova is a Fling built on top of VCF that provides the users the ability to perform Power Operations (Power ON, Power OFF) seamlessly across the entire inventory. It has a sleek UI to visualize the entire VCF inventory (which is the first of its kind for VCF) across the domains of VCF.

The UI is easy to use and elucidates the current Health and Power State of each node in the VCF inventory. Powernova lets the user work on the Power Operations on the components with domain specific inter dependencies automatically resolved.

Powernova also performs valid health checks on all nodes in the VCF inventory to ensure Power Operations are performed only on healthy nodes. Powernova takes minimal input (4 user defined inputs on their VCF system) and does all the magic for the users behind the scenes.

If any infrastructure maintenance activity, VCF migration activity, or power operations need to be performed only on specific domains in VCF, then Powernova is the one stop solution for all VCF users.

[sta_anchor id=”wsoamt” /]

Workspace ONE Access Migration Tool

Workspace ONE Access Migration Tool helps ease migration of Apps from one WS1 Access tenant to another (on-premises to SaaS or SaaS to SaaS) and use cases that require mirroring one tenant to another (for setting up UAT from PROD or vice versa) by providing capabilities listed below

Features
  • Copying of App Categories
  • Migrating Weblinks (3rd party IDP), icons as is
  • Creating a link to federated apps and copying the icons (to maintain the same user experience)
  • Copying App Assignment to a Category mapping

[sta_anchor id=”sdpdovci” /]

Sample Data Platform Deployment on Virtualized Cloud Infrastructure

Data is king and your users need a sample data platform quickly.

With this Fling, you will leverage your VMware Cloud Foundation 4.0 with vRealize Automation deployment and stand a sample data platform based on vSphere Virtual Machines in less than 20-minutes comprising of Kafka, Spark, Solr, and ELK.

You can also choose whether to deploy a wavefront proxy and configure the components to send data to the wavefront proxy or use your own.

[sta_anchor id=”cndfe” /]

Community Networking Driver for ESXi

This Fling is a collection of ESXi Native Drivers which enables ESXi to recognize and consume various PCIe-based network adapters (See Requirements for details). These devices are not officially on the VMware HCL and have been developed to enable and support the VMware Community.

[sta_anchor id=”csci” /]

Code Stream Concourse Integrator

The Code Stream Concourse Integrator (CSCI) Fling provides integration between a vRealize Automation Code Stream and Concourse CI tools with which users can trigger Concourse CI pipelines from Code Stream pipelines without any additional tooling/scripting. This enables users to use the features from both the tools flexibly and seamlessly as per their needs. This solution is built using Code Stream’s extensibility feature named Custom Integration.

Updates

[sta_anchor id=”ecc” /]

ESXi Compatibility Checker

The ESXi Compatibility Checker helps the vSphere admin out in checking if their environment will work with later versions of ESXi. [non-sponsored advertisement]Also check Runecast, they can run a simulation for you as well.[/non-sponsored advertisement]

Changelog

Build 20210219

  • Fix for ESX / VC 7.0 U1 Versioning issues
  • A new logo 😉

[sta_anchor id=”vmlp” /]

VMware Machine Learning Platform

Our goal is to provide an end-to-end ML platform for Data Scientists to perform their job more effectively by running ML workloads on top of VMware infrastructure.

Using vMLP allows to:

Save the costs by enabling efficient use of shared GPUs for ML workfloads
Reduce the risks of broken Data Science workflows by leveraging well-tested and ready-to-use demos and project templates
Faster “go-to-market” for ML models by utilizing end-to-end oriented tooling including fast and easy model deployment and serving via standardized REST API

Changelog

Version 0.4.1

  • Jupyter: R Kernel
  • Jupyter: BitFusion 2.5.0 Demo
  • Jupyter: MADlib/RTS4MADlib on Greenplum Demo
  • Multiple bug fixes

[sta_anchor id=”vhpct” /]

Virtualized High Performance Computing Toolkit

This toolkit is intended to facilitate managing the lifecycle of these special configurations by leveraging vSphere APIs. It also includes features that help vSphere administrators perform some common vSphere tasks that are related to creating such high-performing environments, such as VM cloning, setting Latency Sensitivity, and sizing vCPUs, memory, etc.

Changelog

Nope 🙁

[sta_anchor id=”hpi” /]

Horizon Peripherals Intelligence

Horizon Peripherals Intelligence is an online self-serviced diagnosis service that can help increase the satisfaction when using peripheral devices with Horizon product by both the end users and the admin user. Currently, we support diagnosis for the following device categories – USB storage devices, USB printers, USB scanners, Cameras. We will continue to cover more device categories in the future

Changelog

Version 1.0

  • Add support for USB Audios, Speechmics, Signaturepads, Barcode scanners
  • Add support for L10n of web pages in simplified Chinese, traditional Chinese and English
  • Add support for window 7 and windows 2012R2
  • Add support for 32 bits OS
  • Add support for cmdline installation

[sta_anchor id=”woaafm” /]

Workspace ONE App Analyzer for macOS

The Workspace ONE macOS App Analyzer will determine any Privacy Permissions, Kernel Extensions, or System Extensions needed by an installed macOS application, and can be used to automatically create profiles in Workspace ONE UEM to whitelist those same settings when deploying apps to managed devices.

Changelog

Version 1.2 

  • Added support for Big Sur
  • Updated icon

[sta_anchor id=”osot” /]

VMware OS Optimization Tool

Image optimize you must with osot!

Changelog

  • nope 🙁

Update: OSOT didn’t receive an update, someone only edited the page according to Hilko.

[sta_anchor id=”hhu” /]

Horizon Helpdesk Utility

Besides ControlUp the helpdesk fling  is the best tool to help your users.

Changelog

Version 1.5.0.24

  • Added support for Horizon 8.1

[sta_anchor id=”hcibench” /]

HCIBench

HCIBench stands for “Hyper-converged Infrastructure Benchmark”. It’s essentially an automation wrapper around the popular and proven open source benchmark tools: Vdbench and Fio that make it easier to automate testing across a HCI cluster. HCIBench aims to simplify and accelerate customer POC performance testing in a consistent and controlled way. The tool fully automates the end-to-end process of deploying test VMs, coordinating workload runs, aggregating test results, performance analysis and collecting necessary data for troubleshooting purposes.

Changelog

Version 2.5.3

  • Fixed graphite permission issue which blocked vdbench/fio grafana display
  • Updated drop cache script to make it compatible with upcoming vSphere
  • md5sum: 622625cc7a551bd7bf07ff4f19a57a17 HCIBench_2.5.3.ova

[sta_anchor id=”reach” /]

Horizon Reach

Again if you’re not a ControlUp customer Reach is the next best thing to manage you’re Horizon environment.

Changelog

Version 1.3.1.2

  • Added support for Horizon 8.1
  • Bugfixes

[sta_anchor id=”wsod” /]

Workspace ONE Discovery

VMware Workspace ONE UEM is used to manage Windows 10 endpoints, whether it be Certificate Management, Application Deployment or Profile Management. The Discovery Fling enables you to view these from the device point of view and review the Workspace ONE related services, which applications have been successfully deployed, use the granular view to see exactly what has been configured with Profiles, view User & Machine certificates and see which Microsoft Windows Updates have been applied.

Changelog

February, 16, 2021 – Version 1.2

  • Replaced icon
  • New logo 🙂

[sta_anchor id=”avmu” /]

App Volumes Migration Utility

App Volumes Migration Utility allows admins to migrate AppStacks managed by VMware App Volumes 2.18, to the new application package format of App Volumes 4. The format of these packages in App Volumes 4 have evolved to improve performance and help simplify application management.

Changelog

Version 1.0.7 Update

  • Migration fails if their are blacklisted registry entries containing embedded NULL chars.
  • File system migration fails if their are directories having a trailing DOT name ( ex- Microsoft. ).

Managing application pools using the VMware Horizon Python Module

  By , , , , , ,

Earlier this week I added several methods to the VMware Horizon Python Module that are centered about application pools and I promised a blog post so here it is 🙂 In the module we have the following methods in the Inventory about Application Pools:

Preparation

In order to use the methods I am using this as standard configuration in my script

import requests, getpass, urllib, json, operator
import vmware_horizon
requests.packages.urllib3.disable_warnings()

url="https://loftcbr01.loft.lab"
username = "m_wouter"
domain = "loft.lab"
pw = getpass.getpass()


hvconnectionobj = vmware_horizon.Connection(username = username,domain = domain,password = pw,url = url)
hvconnectionobj.hv_connect()
print("connected")
monitor = obj=vmware_horizon.Monitor(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)
external=vmware_horizon.External(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)
inventory=vmware_horizon.Inventory(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)
entitlements=vmware_horizon.Entitlements(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)

All of the connects at the bottom is so I don’t need to think to do those if I need them when testing.

I end with

end=hvconnectionobj.hv_disconnect()
print(end)

Both the connected and end prints aren’t required at all but give me feedback about the status of the connection.

[sta_anchor id=”get_application_pools” /]

get_application_pools

This is the easiest method to use as it doesn’t require anything. It does allow for setting page sizes and filtering if needed. See this article if you want to know more about filtering: https://www.retouw.nl/2021/02/14/filtering-searching-and-pagination-with-the-python-module-for-vmware-horizon/ The method will return a list of dicts, for the first example I will show only the names of the items.

ap = inventory.get_application_pools(maxpagesize=100)
for i in ap:
    print(i["name"])

Or just with the entire list returned

ap = inventory.get_application_pools(maxpagesize=100)
print(ap)

[sta_anchor id=”get_application_pool” /]

get_application_pool

To get a single application pool you can use get_application_pool and it requires an application_pool_id, I will use the first one of the list of application to show it.

ap = inventory.get_application_pools(maxpagesize=100)
firstap=ap[0]
print(inventory.get_application_pool(application_pool_id=firstap["id"]))

[sta_anchor id=”delete_application_pool” /]

delete_application_pool

To delete an application pool we again only need the application_pool_id I will combine both the get methods to show all application pools before and after the deletion. (with some prints not relevant for the code so I won’t show them below)

ap = inventory.get_application_pools(maxpagesize=100)
for i in ap:
    print(i["name"])
firstap=ap[0]

print(inventory.get_application_pool(application_pool_id=firstap["id"]))

inventory.delete_application_pool(application_pool_id=firstap["id"])

ap = inventory.get_application_pools(maxpagesize=100)
for i in ap:
    print(i["name"])

[sta_anchor id=”new_application_pool” /]

new_application_pool

Since I just deleted my firefox pool I will need to recreate it. The new_application_pool method requires a dict with quite a lof of values. This is the standard list that the swagger-ui gives you

{
  "anti_affinity_data": {
    "anti_affinity_count": 10,
    "anti_affinity_patterns": [
      "*pad.exe",
      "*notepad.???"
    ]
  },
  "category_folder_name": "dir1\\dir2\\dir3\\dir4",
  "cs_restriction_tags": [
    "Internal",
    "External"
  ],
  "description": "string",
  "desktop_pool_id": "0103796c-102b-4ed3-953f-3dfe3d23e0fe",
  "display_name": "Firefox",
  "enable_client_restrictions": false,
  "enable_pre_launch": false,
  "enabled": true,
  "executable_path": "C:\\ProgramData\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Firefox.lnk",
  "farm_id": "855ea6c5-720a-41e1-96f4-958c90e6e424",
  "max_multi_sessions": 5,
  "multi_session_mode": "DISABLED",
  "name": "Firefox",
  "parameters": "-p myprofile",
  "publisher": "Mozilla Corporation",
  "shortcut_locations": [
    "START_MENU"
  ],
  "start_folder": "string",
  "supported_file_types_data": {
    "enable_auto_update_file_types": true,
    "enable_auto_update_other_file_types": true,
    "file_types": [
      {
        "description": "Firefox Document",
        "type": ".html"
      }
    ],
    "other_file_types": [
      {
        "description": "Firefox URL",
        "name": "https",
        "type": "URL"
      }
    ]
  },
  "version": "72.0.2"
}

This does not say that all of these are required, what I have found to be an easy way to find what the minimums are is to  create an application pool with a single key value pair. display_name is always required so I will use that one. Experience has learned that this might require several tries so let’s go.

new_app_pool = {}
new_app_pool["display_name"] = "Firefox"

inventory.new_application_pool(application_pool_data=new_app_pool)

So the first hard requirements are display_name, executable_path and name, let’s add these and see what happens

new_app_pool = {}
new_app_pool["display_name"] = "Firefox"
new_app_pool["name"] = "Firefox"
new_app_pool["executable_path"] = "C:\\ProgramData\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Firefox.lnk"

inventory.new_application_pool(application_pool_data=new_app_pool)

It looks like we actually need some more: at least desktop_pool_id or farm_id since I am doing this against a connection server with no farms I’ll use a desktop pool.

desktop_pools = inventory.get_desktop_pools()
firstpool = desktop_pools[0]

new_app_pool = {}
new_app_pool["display_name"] = "Firefox"
new_app_pool["name"] = "Firefox"
new_app_pool["executable_path"] = "C:\\ProgramData\\Microsoft\\Windows\\Start Menu\\Programs\\Firefox.lnk"
new_app_pool["desktop_pool_id"] = firstpool["id"]

inventory.new_application_pool(application_pool_data=new_app_pool)

No errors and a peak in the admin console shows me that I again have a firefox application

[sta_anchor id=”update_application_pool” /]

update_application_pool

To update the pools we need the application_pool_id and again a dict, this time the dict needs things we want to update. Experience again learned me there are a few required key value pairs while the example in the swagger-ui shows lots, so let’s find those. I am going to use my new firefox app as the source for this. What I actually am going to try to change is the display_name so I will use that as the first key value pair.

filter = {}
filter["type"] = "And"
filter["filters"] = []
filter1={}

filter1["type"] = "Equals"
filter1["name"] = "name"
filter1["value"] = "Firefox"
filter["filters"].append(filter1)
ap = (inventory.get_application_pools(filter=filter))[0]
appid = ap["id"]
update_app = {}
update_app["display_name"] = "FF2"
inventory.update_application_pool(application_pool_id=appid, application_pool_data=update_app)

So here different key value pairs are required than when creating a new application pool, strange but there is nothing I can do about it! I will add these from the ap object I retrieve earlier in the script.

aps = inventory.get_application_pools(maxpagesize=100)
for i in aps:
    print(i["display_name"])
filter = {}
filter["type"] = "And"
filter["filters"] = []
filter1={}

filter1["type"] = "Equals"
filter1["name"] = "name"
filter1["value"] = "Firefox"
filter["filters"].append(filter1)
ap = (inventory.get_application_pools(filter=filter))[0]
appid = ap["id"]
update_app = {}
update_app["display_name"] = "FF2"
update_app["executable_path"] = ap["executable_path"]
update_app["multi_session_mode"] = ap["multi_session_mode"]
update_app["enable_pre_launch"] = ap["enable_pre_launch"]

inventory.update_application_pool(application_pool_id=appid, application_pool_data=update_app)

aps = inventory.get_application_pools(maxpagesize=100)
for i in aps:
    print(i["display_name"])

So with that you have the basics to retrieve, create, update and delete application pools using python

Filtering/Searching and pagination with the Python module for VMware Horizon

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Yesterday I added the first method to the VMware Horizon Python module that makes use of filtering while the day before that I added pagination. VMware{Code} has a document describing available options for both but let me give some explanation.

Pagination

Pagination is where you perform a query but only get an x amount of objects returned by default. The rest of the objects are available on the next page or pages. This is exactly what I ran into with the vmware.hv.helper Powershell module a long time ago. With the REST api’s this is rather easy to add since if there are more pages/objects left the headers will contain a key named HAS_MORE_RECORDS. For all the methods that I add where pagination is supported you don’t need to handle this though as I have added it to the method itself. What I did add was the option the change the maximum page size. I default to 100 and the maximum is 1000, if you supply an interrupt higher than 1000 this will be corrected to 1000.

Filtering

Filtering needs some more work from the user of the module to be able to use it.

What options are there for filtering?

For the type we have: And, Or and Not

For the filters themselves there are: Equals, NotEquals, Contains, StartsWith and Between.

The formula is you pick one from the first row and combine that with one or more from the second row.

To apply these the document describes the base schema like this:

{
    “type”: ”And”,
    “filter”: <filter object>
}

and a filter object looks like this:

{
    "type":"Equals",
    "name":"domain",
    "value":"ad-example0"
}

or this for a range:

{
    "type":"Between",
    "name":"assignedUsers",
    "fromValue":"10",
    "toValue":"20"
}

Combining both into a single object looks like this:

{
    "type":"Not",
    "filter": {
        "type":"Equals",
        "name":"domain",
        "value":"ad-example0"
    }
}

This all looks like a dictionary with a nested dictionary when translating it to Python but when you have multiple filters it suddenly looks like this:

{
    "type":"And",
  "filters": [
        {
            "type":"Equals", 
            "name":"domain",
            "value":"ad-example0"
        },
        {
            "type":"StartsWith", 
            "name":"name",
            "value":"test"
        }
    ]
}

otherwise know as a dictionary with a list of dictionaries in it and since the latter also works with a single dict inside the list I have taken that route. The document also describes encoding and minifying the code to it works for a REST api call but I have done all of that for you so no need to worry about it, just build the dictionary and you are good!

Now let’s actually perform a search

First I create my base object with the type AND and a list for the filters key

filter_dict = {}
filter_dict["type"] = "And"
filter_dict["filters"] = []

Next I create the filters object where the type is contains and I filter on the field name with the value LP-00

filter1={}
filter1["type"] = "Contains"
filter1["name"] = "name"
filter1["value"] = "LP-00"

And now I add the filters1 object to the filter_dict filters list

filter["filters"].append(filter1)

and I get the machines with a pagesize of 1 to show the pagination (the pool with these machines only has 2 😉 )

machines = obj.get_machines(maxpagesize=1, filter = filter_dict)

And this would be the entire python script

import requests, getpass, urllib, json
import vmware_horizon

requests.packages.urllib3.disable_warnings()

url="https://loftcbr01.loft.lab"
username = "m_wouter"
domain = "loft.lab"
pw = getpass.getpass()

hvconnectionobj = vmware_horizon.Connection(username = username,domain = domain,password = pw,url = url)
hvconnectionobj.hv_connect()

obj = vmware_horizon.Inventory(url=hvconnectionobj.url, access_token=hvconnectionobj.access_token)

filter_dict = {}
filter_dict["type"] = "And"
filter_dict["filters"] = []
filter1={}
filter1["type"] = "Contains"
filter1["name"] = "name"
filter1["value"] = "LP-00"

filter["filters"].append(filter1)

machines = obj.get_machines(maxpagesize=1, filter = filter_dict)

for i in machines:
    print(i["name"])

hvconnectionobj.hv_disconnect()

And it shows this in python:

My #100DaysOfCode #Python Challenge == VMware_Horizon Module

  By , , , , , , , ,

So after 5 weeks of following the #Python training for my 100DaysOfCode challenge I have decided that my main goal for the challenge itself will be to work on the Horizon Python Module. With the course some things I find really boring and I need a real target to really learn things instead of just repeating someone else is doing as well.

I will still do some of the fun parts of it in time like databases and such when I need it but for now I will focus on the module. This weekend I added handling of the Instant Clone domain accounts to the module and also added documentation both in the module and the github repository. I know I will still learn heaps because almost all of it is still rather new and repetition works best for me.

Added Methods to the module

  • External Class
    • get_ad_domains
  • Settings class
    • get_ic_domain_accounts
    • get_ic_domain_account
    • new_ic_domain_account
    • update_ic_domain_account
    • delete_ic_domain_account

The VMware Labs flings monthly for January 2021 – it’s OSOT time again!

  By , , , , , ,

January was a good month for me as I started the Python 100DaysOfCode challenge but the VMware engineers also did plenty of work. Seven flingss received an update and it looks like we have a single new release.

New Release

Desktop Container Tools

Updates

Demo Appliance for Tanzu Kubernetes Grid

Power vRA Cloud

DRS Dump Insight

vSphere Software Asset Management Tool

VMware OS Optimization Tool

Workspace ONE Discovery

Python Client for VMC on AWS

New Releases

[sta_anchor id=”dct” /]

Desktop Container Tools

Desktop Container Tools is a free tool that allows you to do basic management of vctl (a CLI tool shipped with VMware Fusion) container engine on macOS for running containers and Kubernetes clusters.

Features

  • Easy&Access

Handy management of vctl container engine through the user interface and Touch Bar. Configure your virtual machines for containers and Kubernetes cluster without CLI.

  • Multi-language Support

Currently support English & Simplified Chinese. More languages are underway.

  • Light & Free

It’s light and it’s free.

Updated Flings

[sta_anchor id=”daftkg” /]

Demo Appliance for Tanzu Kubernetes Grid

The Demo Appliance for Tanzu Kubernetes Grid is a sample appliance to help customers to learn and deploy Tanzu Kubernetes Grid.

Changelog

Jan 05, 2021 – v1.2.1

  • Support for latest TKG 1.2.1 release
  • Support for TKG Workload Cluster upgrade workflow from K8s 1.18.10 to 1.19.3
  • Updated embedded Harbor to use self-sign TLS certificate (new feature of TKG 1.2.1)
  • Updated to latest version of Harbor (2.1.2)

Known Issue:

DNS resolution issue when installing TKG Extensions. Workaround is to add the following snippet to kapp-controller.yaml

volumeMounts:
- mountPath: /etc/hosts
name: etc
subPath: hosts
volumes:
- name: etc
hostPath:
path: /etc

[sta_anchor id=”pvrac” /]

Power vRA Cloud

PowervRA Cloud is a PowerShell module that abstracts the VMware vRealize Automation Cloud APIs to a set of easily used PowerShell functions. This tool provides a comprehensive command line environment for managing your VMware vRealize Automation Cloud environment.

Changelog

Version 1.3

  • 4 x New Cmdlets for VMC
  • 5 x New Cmdlets for AWS
  • Powershell 7 on Windows Support
  • Bugfixes

[sta_anchor id=”drsdi” /]

DRS Dump Insight

DRS Dump Insight is a portal that vSPhere administrators can use to analyze why DRS performed actions.

Changelog

Version 2.0

  • Added support for 7.0 and 7.0U1 dumps.
  • Toggle added for selective analysis of all full dumps.
  • Bug fixes and backend improvements

[sta_anchor id=”vsamt” /]

vSphere Software Asset Management Tool

The vSphere Software Asset Management (vSAM) is a tool that collects and summarizes vSphere product deployment information. It calls on vSphere APIs for deployment data and produces a PDF report that the customer can consult as a part of their infrastructure review and planning process. This lightweight Java application runs on Windows, Linux or Mac OS.

Changelog

Version 1.3 Update

  • Show Tanzu products in the report.
  • Bug fixes.

[sta_anchor id=”osot” /]

VMware OS Optimization Tool

Building a new golden image? Use the OS Optimizer tool to let it perform better but please test test test if all your apps are working.

Changelog

January 2021, b2001 Bug Fixes

  • All optimization entries have been added back into the main user template. This allows manual tuning and selection of all optimizations.
  • Fixed two hardware acceleration selections were not previously controlled by the Common Option for Visual Effect to disable hardware acceleration.

Optimize

  • During an Optimize, the optimization selections are automatically exported to a default json file (%ProgramData%\VMware\OSOT\OptimizedTemplateData.json).

Analyze

  • When an Analyze is run, if the default json file exists (meaning that this image has already been optimized), this is imported and used to select the optimizations and the Common Options selections with the previous choices.
  • If the default selections are required, on subsequent runs of the OS Optimization Tool, delete the default json file, relaunch the tool and run Analyze.

Command Line

  • The OptimizedTemplateData.json file can also be used from the command line with the -applyoptimization parameter.

Optimizations

  • Changed entries for Hyper-V services to not be selected by default. These services are required for VMs deployed onto Azure. Windows installation sets these to manual (trigger) so these so not cause any overhead on vSphere, when left with the default setting.

[sta_anchor id=”wsoned” /]

Workspace ONE Discovery

VMware Workspace ONE UEM is used to manage Windows 10 endpoints, whether it be Certificate Management, Application Deployment or Profile Management. The Discovery Fling enables you to view these from the device point of view and review the Workspace ONE related services, which applications have been successfully deployed, use the granular view to see exactly what has been configured with Profiles, view User & Machine certificates and see which Microsoft Windows Updates have been applied.

Changelog

January 14, 2021 – Version 1.1

  • Updated application icon (ICO)
  • Monitoring the VMware Horizon Client, VMware Digital Experience Telemetry and VMware Hub Health services

[sta_anchor id=”pcfvrmcoaws” /]

Python Client for VMC on AWS

Python Client for VMware Cloud on AWS is an open-source Python-based tool. Written in Python, the tool enables VMware Cloud on AWS users to automate the consumption of their VMware Cloud on AWS SDDC.

Changelog

Version 1.2

  • Added a Dockerfile to build a Docker image to run PyVMC
  • Added Egress counters visibility
  • Added routing table visibility
  • Added L2VPN support
  • Added Nested Group support