VMware Tools for Nested ESXi

Wow. You can install VMware Tools for Nested ESXi now. The VIB package provides a VMware Tools service (vmtoolsd) for running inside a nested ESXi virtual machine. The following capabilities are exposed through VMware Tools:

  • Provides guest OS information of the nested ESXi Hypervisor (eg. IP address, configured hostname, etc.).
  • Allows the nested ESXi VM to be cleanly shut down or restarted when performing power operations with the vSphere Web/C# Client or vSphere APIs.
  • Executes scripts that help automate ESXi guest OS operations when the guest’s power state changes.
  • Supports the Guest Operations API (formally known as the VIX API).

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Patch standalone esxi host to 6.0

With every new vmware esxi build you need to update your servers. It is very easy with Update Manager, but how to do it when there is standalone version of ESXi or one managed by vCenter server? It  can be patched very easy way via CLI and using SSH. Today we will try such process with  upgrade ESXi 5.5 to ESXi 6.0 in my home lab. In the future posts I will tell you about my home lab, but now lets start to upgrade standalone esxi server which is managed by vCenter living on this server. We need ESXi Offline Bundle (VMware-ESXi-6.0.0-2494585-depot.zip file) for that. 

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