I was looking for VMware ESXi Datastore Naming Rules, and this was the only really relevant post I could find:
[Wayback/Archive] Datastore Naming Rules – VMware Technology Network VMTN
Archive for the ‘VMware ESXi’ Category
Datastore Naming Rules – VMware Technology Network VMTN
Posted by jpluimers on 2023/12/29
Posted in ESXi6, ESXi6.5, ESXi6.7, Power User, Virtualization, VMware, VMware ESXi | Leave a Comment »
VMware ESXi: shell script to get uuid.bios and all Ethernet generatedAddress MAC address values for all VMs
Posted by jpluimers on 2023/12/28
This is a sort of follow-up on ESXi: listing virtual machines with their IP addresses where we ended with this:
I modified the above script to become this:
#!/bin/sh vmids=`vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms | sed -n -E -e "s/^([[:digit:]]+)s+((S.+S)?)s+([S+])s+(.+.vmx)s+(S+)s+(vmx-[[:digit:]]+)s*?((S.+)?)$/1/p"` for vmid in ${vmids} ; do # powerState values: # Powered off # Powered on # Suspended powerState=`vim-cmd vmsvc/power.getstate ${vmid} | sed '1d'` name=`vim-cmd vmsvc/get.config ${vmid} | sed -n -E -e '/(vim.vm.ConfigInfo) {/,/files = (vim.vm.FileInfo) {/ s/^ +name = "(.*)",.*?/1/p'` vmPathName=`vim-cmd vmsvc/get.config ${vmid} | sed -n -E -e '/files = (vim.vm.FileInfo) {/,/tools = (vim.vm.ToolsConfigInfo) {/ s/^ +vmPathName = "(.*)",.*?/1/p'` # For now, I choose to use only the IPv4 main address from ipAddress, which is in between (vim.vm.GuestInfo) { and net = (vim.vm.GuestInfo.NicInfo) [. ipAddress=`vim-cmd vmsvc/get.guest ${vmid} | sed -n -E -e '/(vim.vm.GuestInfo) {/,/net = (vim.vm.GuestInfo.NicInfo) [/ s/^ +ipAddress = "(.*)",.*?/1/p'` printf "VM with id %3s has power state %-11s and IPv4=%-15s (name = ${name}; vmPathName = ${vmPathName}).n" "${vmid}" "${powerState}" "${ipAddress}" done
Now the script grew even larger in to vim-cmd-list-all-VMs-with-IPv4-MAC-uuid.sh:
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Posted in *nix, *nix-tools, ash/dash, ash/dash development, Development, ESXi6, ESXi6.5, ESXi6.7, Power User, Scripting, Software Development, Virtualization, VMware, VMware ESXi | Leave a Comment »
Large (hundreds) CVE-2021-21974 ESXi VMware based ESXiArgs (Nevada?) ransomware attacks
Posted by jpluimers on 2023/02/04
Admins, hosting providers, and the French Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-FR) warn that attackers actively target VMware ESXi servers unpatched against a two-year-old remote code execution vulnerability to deploy ransomware.Tracked as CVE-2021-21974, the security flaw is caused by a heap overflow issue in the OpenSLP service that can be exploited by unauthenticated threat actors in low-complexity attacks.“As current investigations, these attack campaigns appear to be exploiting the vulnerability CVE-2021-21974, for which a patch has been available since 23 February 2021,” CERT-FR said.“The systems currently targeted would be ESXi hypervisors in version 6.x and prior to 6.7.”To block incoming attacks, admins have to disable the vulnerable Service Location Protocol (SLP) service on ESXi hypervisors that haven’t yet been updated.CERT-FR strongly recommends applying the patch as soon as possible but adds that systems left unpatched should also be scanned to look for signs of compromise.CVE-2021-21974 affects the following systems:
- ESXi versions 7.x prior to ESXi70U1c-17325551
- ESXi versions 6.7.x prior to ESXi670-202102401-SG
- ESXi versions 6.5.x prior to ESXi650-202102101-SG
[Wayback/Archive] Esxi Ransomware Help and Support Topic (ESXiArgs / .args extension) – Page 2 – Ransomware Help & Tech Support (there are now 4 pages, most victims OVH, likely many more pages to follow)
[Wayback/Archive] How to Disable/Enable the SLP Service on VMware ESXi (76372)
[Wayback/Archive] html:”We hacked your company successfully” title:”How to Restore Your Files” – Shodan Search which resulted in the above image (I tweeted it at [Wayback/Archive] Jeroen Wiert Pluimers @wiert@mastodon.social on Twitter: “@vmiss33”)
Commands used in [Wayback/Archive] Jeroen Wiert Pluimers @wiert@mastodon.social on Twitter: “@vmiss33 I did forget to disable SLP on a patched system, but doing that is easy as per kb.vmware.com/s/article/76372“:
/etc/init.d/slpd status/etc/init.d/slpd stopesxcli system slp stats getesxcli network firewall ruleset set -r CIMSLP -e 0chkconfig slpd offchkconfig --list | grep slpd
More links to follow, but I’m away from keyboard for most of the day.
–jeroen
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Posted in ESXi6, ESXi6.5, ESXi6.7, Power User, Ransomware, Security, Virtualization, VMware, VMware ESXi | Leave a Comment »
VMware ESXI: creating an eagerly zeroed thick disk
Posted by jpluimers on 2022/12/30
For my memory to create a 40 GiB (gibibytes, i.e. sizes in powers of 2 bytes):
# vmkfstools --createvirtualdisk 40G --diskformat eagerzeroedthick ./X9SRI-3F-W10P-EN-MEDIA-DATA.vmdk Creating disk './X9SRI-3F-W10P-EN-MEDIA-DATA.vmdk' and zeroing it out... Create: 100% done.
People tend to abbreviate it into what for me reads gibberish:
# vmkfstools -c 40G -d eagerzeroedthick ./X9SRI-3F-W10P-EN-MEDIA-DATA.vmdk Creating disk './X9SRI-3F-W10P-EN-MEDIA-DATA.vmdk' and zeroing it out... Create: 100% done.
It will create a descriptor file and flat data file, of which the last is exactly 40 gibibytes size (as 42949672960 / (1024 * 1024 * 1024) == 40):
# ls -l X9SRI-3F-W10P-EN-MEDIA-DATA*.vmdk
-rw------- 1 root root 42949672960 Nov 16 16:54 X9SRI-3F-W10P-EN-MEDIA-DATA-flat.vmdk
-rw------- 1 root root 471 Nov 16 16:54 X9SRI-3F-W10P-EN-MEDIA-DATA.vmdk–jeroen
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Converting an existing XP machine to a VMware ESXi Virtual Machine and having boot issues?
Posted by jpluimers on 2022/05/02
A while ago I wrote about Stop 0x0000007B after converting an existing XP machine to a Virtual Machine (ESXi, Hyper-V, or other).
After this, the machine still had boot issues (a grey or black screen after boot, unless booted via Grub from a rescue CD).
The solution in retrospect was simple, but I only figured out after the fact what the solution had done.
Of course this gave me a facepalm moment, as back in the days, this was exactly the warning I gave everyone when installing Windows XP on ESXi anyway: use a SCSI buslogic based virtual disk, not an IDE or SATA virtual disk.
The reason is that Windows XP does not like the IDE/SATA disk that VMware provides. Windows Vista and up are less of a problem.
This is indeed what my practical solution did:
- VMware Converter 4.x creates a VM with an IDE/SATA disk (as it cannot talk to the more recent ESXi versions at all because of API changes)
- VMware Converter 6.x creates a VM with a buslogic SCSI base disk (and it can create it directly on your ESXi rig, though it will use a directory in the root of your data store, even if you prefer it somewhere deeper in the directory tree)
References:
- [Wayback] P2V Windows XP – VMware Technology Network VMTN (showing VMware Converter 6.x steps)
- [Wayback] P2V Windows XP Won’t Boot – VMware Technology Network VMTN
…
did you create a IDE-based VM ?
That will not work – though it is offered as an option. Converter uses a bluff here
…
try again first – use Buslogic when asked for the controller.
If that does not work either try Converter 3.0.3 next
if that still fails post
boot.iniand a screenshot of diskmanagement of the XP-source…
SCSI was the answer.
Thanks.
…
–jeroen
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virtualization – Convert a hard-drive into a VMWare machine – Server Fault
Posted by jpluimers on 2022/04/29
Sometimes machines die without one having had the chance of doing a proper bootable file-system backup instead of a file-by-file-backup.
You can still P2V these machines (convert them from physical to virtual), but it is a lot more pain as you have to try to grab any installation keys for them and create a compatible virtual machine configuration by hand like I did in P2V of an existing XP machine to Hyper-V to have an emergency fallback when retiring old XP physical machines.
The below linked answer (with steps) uses Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery (now back in the hands of Veritas again as Backup Exec) to make part of this process towards VMware ESXi less tedious: [Wayback] virtualization – Convert a hard-drive into a VMWare machine – Server Fault (thanks [Wayback] Mark Booth and [Wayback] Dave M)
Doing this might require you to find old Windows XP media. Those are in the Internet Archive (often slower, but has the file hashes too) and The Eye (much faster from where I live in Europe); Internet Archive examples are for English, though other languages are present as well:
- Internet Archive: Windows XP Professional SP3 x86 : Microsoft : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
- Internet Archive: [MSDN] Windows XP Professional SP3 x86 (32 bit) RETAIL English : Microsoft Corporation : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
- Internet Archive: [MSDN] Windows XP Professional SP3 x86 (32 bit) VL (volume) English : Microsoft Corporation : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
- [Wayback] Index of /public/MSDN/Windows XP/
The Eye is a website dedicated towards archiving and serving publicly available information. #opendirectory #archive #digitalhistory
Got the Internet Archive tip from [Wayback/Archive.is] Where can I download an official Windows XP ISO? I have a license key if that helps? : windows, found the correct filename there, then downloaded the [Wayback] The Eye.
–jeroen
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VMware ESXi: How to Kill an Unresponsive (Stuck) Virtual Machine | Windows OS Hub
Posted by jpluimers on 2022/04/21
For my link archive: [Wayback] VMware ESXi: How to Kill an Unresponsive (Stuck) Virtual Machine | Windows OS Hub
Commands covered:
esxcli vm process listesxcli vm process kill --type=[soft,hard,force] --world-id=WorldNumberesxtoppskill
–jeroen
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ESXi: various ways to find and view the log files
Posted by jpluimers on 2022/04/20
For my link archive:
–jeroen
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Run ESXi from a USB Flash Drive: A How-To-Guide
Posted by jpluimers on 2022/04/13
Guessing the [Wayback] Run ESXi from a USB Flash Drive: A How-To-Guide by just the abstract does not show the value enough:
A USB flash drive can be used not only for installation media – you can also run ESXi from USB flash drives or SD flash cards and boot from these devices.
In fact, the article shows way more, including:
- how the partitions on USB/SD devices are built as compared to HDD devices, and how they even differ depending on USB/SD sizes
- how to backup/restore the USB/SD boot devices (so you can stock them in case of failure)
This is very important, because every now and then, these USB and SD devices fail (see for instance [Wayback] Solved: Remount boot filesystem on a running system. – VMware Technology Network VMTN), so knowing what to do then is key and helps handling errors like this one:
Lost connectivity to the device mpx.vmhba32:C0:T0:L0 backing the boot filesystem /vmfs/devices/disks/mpx.vmhba32:C0:T0:L0. As a result, host configuration changes will not be saved to persistent storage.
A every useful article for my link archive!
Related: ESXi: storing an ISO 8601 time-stamped backup tarball locally
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When some virtual machines cannot run VMware Tools: Graceful shutdown of an ESXi 5.1 host and guest VMs (free edition) using the shell/command line/scripting (UPS friendly)
Posted by jpluimers on 2022/04/12
An interesting set of scripts from [Wayback/Archive.is] No Joke IT: Graceful shutdown of an ESXi 5.1 host and guest VMs (free edition) using the shell/command line/scripting (UPS friendly).
If all ESXi virtual machines support running of VMware Tools, then the solution is a plain /sbin/shutdown.sh && /sbin/poweroff (see [Wayback/Archive.is] No Joke IT: Shut down ESXi 5.1 guest VMs and the host (free edition) via SSH – the easy way!).
Code is in the repository at [Wayback/Archive.is] sixdimensionalarray/esxidown: A shell script to shutdown VMware ESXi host servers, with these two main files:
- [Wayback/Archive.is] esxidown/async.sh at master · sixdimensionalarray/esxidown
#!/bin/sh # Runs a shell command asynchronously. if [ "$1" != "" ]; then nohup sh $1 > /dev/null 2>&1 & fi - [Wayback/Archive.is] esxidown/esxidown.sh at master · sixdimensionalarray/esxidown with this interesting code fragment right before the script finishes:
# exit maintenance mode immediately before server has a chance to shutdown/power off # NOTE: it is possible for this to fail, leaving the server in maintenance mode on reboot! echo "Exiting maintenance mode..." if [ $TEST -eq 0 ]; then esxcli system maintenanceMode set -e false -t 0 fi
Note: the No Joke IT web-site has vanished, so only the [Wayback] and [Archive.is] links of it still work. The github code was still there at the time of writing.
Via: [Wayback] Solved: Read only Files – VMware Technology Network VMTN
Related: Some notes on replacing parts of a text file with template text using sed on a Busybox system.
–jeroen
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Posted in *nix, *nix-tools, ash/dash, ash/dash development, Development, ESXi5, ESXi5.1, ESXi5.5, ESXi6, ESXi6.5, ESXi6.7, Power User, Scripting, Software Development, Virtualization, VMware, VMware ESXi | Leave a Comment »