VMware vSphere PowerCLI 6.0 Release 1 GA

Last week VMware vSphere PowerCLI 6.0 Release 1 was announced to be General Available. This release of vSphere PowerCLI introduces a number of new capabilities and expands on the existing cmdlets introducing single console access allowing you to easily connect to vCloud Air and enabling hybrid management of both vCloud and On-premises environments from the same command line. This release also provides further management of the VMware vSphere and VMware vCloud Director products and enhancements in managing storage features.

vSphere PowerCLI 6.0 Release 1 introduces the following new features and improvements:

• Enhancements have been made to change the core distribution model of PowerCLI cmdlets. In this version some snap-ins have been converted to PowerShell modules. As part of this change, PowerCLI scripts should be adjusted, where applicable, to check for module existence instead of snap-in existence.
• PowerCLI for Tenants has now been removed as a separate downloadable installation. All cmdlets previously found in this product can be added by installing PowerCLI and selecting the vCloud Air/vCD PowerCLI optional component during the installation process.

• You can now connect to and manage vCloud Air instances with the new Connect-PIServer and Get-PIDatacenter cmdlets. Existing cmdlets for managing vCloud Director can be used to work with vCloud Air where applicable.

• You can now connect to and manage the new vCloud Suite SDK with the Connect-CISServer and Get-CISService cmdlets.
• You can now add, remove, and view details of I/O filters with the following cmdlets:
  • Get-VAIOFilter
  • New-VAIOFilter
  • Remove-VAIOFilter
• You can now manage VMware Virtual SAN and Virtual SAN disks with the following cmdlets:
  • Get-VsanDisk
  • Get-VsanDiskGroup
  • New-VsanDisk
  • New-VsanDiskGroup
  • Remove-VsanDisk
  • Remove-VsanDiskGroup
• The following cmdlets have been enhanced to enable the management of Virtual SAN in their respective areas:
  • The New-Cluster and Set-Cluster cmdlets now have a VSANEnabled parameter and a VSANDiskClaimMode parameter.
  • The New-VMHostNetworkAdapter and Set-VMHostNetworkAdapter cmdlets now have a VsanTrafficEnabled parameter.

• You can now retrieve Distributed Resource Management (DRM) dump information for each cluster from a vCenter Server system, by using the Get-DRMInfo cmdlet.
• The following cmdlets have been marked as deprecated and will be removed in a future version of PowerCLI:
  • Get-VMGuestNetworkInterface
  • Set-VMGuestNetworkInterface
  • Get-VMGuestRoute
  • New-VMGuestRoute
  • Remove-VMGuestRoute

• The Apply-VMHostProfile, Apply-DrsRecommendation, Shutdown-VMGuest cmdlets have been renamed to Invoke-VMHostProfile, Invoke-DrsRecommendation, and Stop-VMGuest respectively.

• The New-VM and Set-VM cmdlets have been adjusted to work with vSphere 6.0 and virtual hardware version 11.

PowerCLI 6.0 requires the full installation of Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5 or later. You can make use of this guide for instructions on installing and configuring PowerCLI. The guide also contains some example scripts.