Technical Note
VMware, Inc.
1
Extending Virtual Machine Deletion
with Scripts
View Manager 4.x
When
you
delete
a
virtual
machine
from
the
VMware
®
View™
environment,
you
might
want
to
run
your
own
scripts
to
remove
Active
Directory
or
database
entries
that
reference
the
deleted
machine.
This
technical
note
describes
how
to
configure
View
Manager
to
run
such
deletion
scripts
automatically
when
you
delete
a
virtual
machine.
To
enable
a
deletion
script,
you
add
an
entry
for
the
script
to
the
Windows
Registry,
configure
the
account
of
the
user
who
has
the
appropriate
privileges
to
run
the
script,
and
enable
the
VMware
View
Script
Host
service.
You
must
configure
all
View
Connection
Server
hosts
that
need
to
run
deletion
scripts.
There
is
no
mechanism
to
propagate
registry
changes,
VMware
View
Script
Host
service
configuration
changes,
and
deletion
scripts
between
View
Connection
Server
hosts.
Environment Variables
Deletion
scripts
cannot
run
interactively.
A
deletion
script
runs
in
an
environment
created
by
View
Manager,
and
the
script
must
obtain
its
input
data
from
this
environment.
Table 1
shows
the
environment
variables
that
you
can
use.
You
should
ensure
that
a
deletion
script
validates
the
existence
of
any
environment
variable
that
it
uses.
The
following
Visual
Basic
code
fragment
shows
how
to
access
the
environment
variable
for
the
MAC
address
of
the
first
network
interface
of
a
virtual
machine
that
is
being
deleted.
Dim shell
set shell = WScript.CreateObject( "WScript.Shell" )
macAddr0 = shell.ExpandEnvironmentStrings("%VDM_DeleteVm_VmMac.0%")
Table 1.
Environment Variables for Deletion Scripts
Environment Variable
Description
VDM_DeleteVm_VmName
Name
of
the
virtual
machine
being
deleted.
VDM_DeleteVm_VmDnsName
DNS
name
of
the
virtual
machine
being
deleted.
VDM_DeleteVm_VmDn
Distinguished
name
of
the
virtual
machine
being
deleted.
VDM_DeleteVm_VmPath
Path
in
the
VMware
vCenter™
server
that
manages
the
virtual
machine
being
deleted.
VDM_DeleteVm_PoolDn
Distinguished
name
of
the
pool
that
contains
the
virtual
machine
being
deleted.
VDM_DeleteVm_VcDn
Distinguished
name
of
the
vCenter
server
that
manages
the
virtual
machine
being
deleted.
VDM_DeleteVm_VmMac.<N>
MAC
address
for
the
network
interface
number
of
the
virtual
machine
being
deleted.
VDM_DeleteVm_Error
String
that
describes
a
problem
that
occurred
while
deleting
the
virtual
machine.
