$newtemp = New-VM -Name $template -VMHost $esxhost -Datastore $datastore -MemoryMB 4096 -NumCpu 2 -GuestId winLonghorn64Guest -cd -Description (Get-Date)
$newtemp|Get-CDDrive |Set-CDDrive -Connected $true -IsoPath $isopath -StartConnected $true -Confirm:$false |Out-Null
New-HardDisk -vm $newtemp -CapacityKB (60*1024*1024) -ThinProvisioned |Out-Null
New-HardDisk -vm $newtemp -CapacityKB (20*1024*1024) -ThinProvisioned |Out-Null
$vmview=$newtemp|get-view
$vmview.MarkAsTemplate()

$MemOverheadCol = @{ Name = "MemoryOverhead"; Expr = { $_.Runtime.MemoryOverhead / 1MB } }
Get-VM | Get-View | Select-Object Name, $MemOverheadCol | Export-Csv file.csv -noType

I’ve also been searching around trying to find a script to export the memory overhead figures now displayed in the VI client out to CSV for our capacity management database.
I’ll stick a post in the communities, but given the knowledge here i thought i’d start here.
Any thoughts appreciated..

# list all templates in a single folder
get-folder “Templates” | get-template

Datastores are not associated with clusters, they are attached to host servers, so we have to do this:
# list datastores avail to cluster member host server
(get-cluster “DRS cluster Foo” | get-vmhost)[0] | get-datastore

The (blah)[0] stuff grabs only the first host server in the cluster. You could pipe get-vmhost to get-datastore, but you’d get duplicate results.

When I did try with a known good customization tempate and the following command line command line,
get-template w2k3stdR2-template | new-vm -vmhost mytestesx01.internal.dev.org -name ScriptVM01 -OSCustomizationSpec PCK_W2k3_32BIT_STD

the process runs to about 95% then fails with this error:
8/28/2008 3:48:01 PM New-VM BB572FA5-355A-4225-BBEF-8A035305A24E The operation for the entity vm-2663 failed with the following message: “Customization failed.”
At line 3, position 99
get-template w2k3stdR2-template | new-vm -vmhost mytestesx01.internal.dev.org -name ScriptVM01 -OSCustomizationSpec PCK_W2k3_32BIT_STD

Thoughts?

Template is a VM that is marked as a template. It’s identical underneath the covers. But you can do more stuff with a template with regards to VM deployment.

I’d like to maintain a machine as a live template – sitting idle on my network , picking up security updates / build tweaks and AV data.

Untill “hot cloning to template” is available ( not gone to update 2 yet ) I’m looking for a script that I can run as a scheduled task to shut a specified guest down , and clone to a template ( overwriting the last template ), then boot it back up.

I’m a complete powershell virgin but have seen the light at a recent usergroup meeting