vSphere SDK for Perl Programming Guide - Documentation - VMware

Chapter 1 Getting Started with vSphere SDK for Perl
Using a configuration file is useful for repeatedly entering connection details. If you have multiple
vCenter Server or ESX/ESXi systems and you administer each system individually, you can create multiple
configuration files with different names. When you want to run a command or a set of commands on a server,
you pass in the --config option with the appropriate filename at the command line.
Using Microsoft Windows Security Support Provider Interface (SSPI)
You can use the --passthroughauth command‐line argument to log in to a vCenter Server system (vCenter
Server version 2.5 Update 2 or later). Using --passthroughauth passes the credentials of the executing user
to the server. If the executing user is known by both the machine from which you access the vCenter Server
system and the machine running the vCenter Server system, no additional authentication is required.
NOTE Using SSPI is supported only when you run commands from Windows, and use a vCenter Server
system as the target server.
If SDK commands and the vCenter Server system run on the same machine, a local account for the executing
user works. If they run on different machines, then the executing user must have an account in a domain
trusted by both machines.
SSPI supports a number of protocols. By default, it selects the Negotiate protocol, which indicates that client
and server attempt to find a mutually supported protocol. Alternatively, you can use
--passthroughauthpackage to specify another protocol supported by SSPI. Kerberos, the Windows
standard for domain‐level authentication, is commonly chosen.
If the vCenter Server system is configured to accept only a specific protocol, specifying the protocol to vSphere
SDK for Perl commands with --passthroughauthpackage might be required for successful authentication
to the server. If you use --passthroughauth, you do not have to specify authentication information in any
other way. For example, to run connect.pl on the server, you can use the following command at the
command line.
--passthroughauth
See the Microsoft Web site for a detailed discussion of SSPI.
The following example connects to a server that has been set up to use SSPI. When you run the command, the
system calls vminfo.pl with the --vmname option. The system does not prompt for a user name and password
because the current user is known to the server.
vminfo.pl --server --passthroughauth --passthroughauthpackage “Kerberos”
--vihost my_esx --vmname
Common Options Reference
Table 1‐3 lists options that are available for all vSphere SDK for Perl scripts. Use the parameter on the
command line and the variable or the parameter in configuration files.
Table 1-3. Options Available for all vSphere SDK for Perl Scripts
Parameter and Environment
Variable Description
--config
VI_CONFIG=
--credstore
VI_CREDSTORE
--encoding
VI_ENCODING=
Uses the vSphere SDK for Perl configuration file at the specified location.
Important: You must specify a path that is readable from the current directory.
Name of a credential store file. Defaults to
/.vmware/credstore/vicredentials.xml on Linux and
/VMware/credstore/vicredentials.xml on Windows. Commands
for setting up the credential store are included in the vSphere SDK for Perl, which
is installed with the vSphere CLI. The vSphere SDK for Perl Programming Guide
explains how to use the credential store.
Specifies the encoding to be used. One of cp936 (Simplified Chinese), ISO-8859-1
(German), or Shift_JIS (Japanese).
You can use --encoding to specify the encoding vSphere SDK for Perl should map
to when it is run on a foreign language system.
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