PowerWF

I’ve enjoyed a full week of vacation last week but while I was offline there was happening a lot in the virtualization world. One thing I’ve missed was the launch of PowerWF Studio version 2.0. Although the Devfarm team was kind enough to give me a heads up about their pending release,  I didn’t have enough bandwidth and time to download and test their evaluation copy. Now the suitcases are unpacked and I worked my way through a mega full inbox. It’s time to get started with the new release which marks a huge leap forward in the versatility and ease-of-use of PowerWF Studio.

• Extensive testing and user feedback ensure that this is the most versatile, stable and feature-rich version of PowerWF ever.
• Focusing on new users and real-world test cases have made learning PowerShell with PowerWF incredibly easy:
• Revised Help and Getting Started Guide ease the learning curve.
• Integrated examples allow sample workflows to be created directly from Help topics.
• Wizards have been added to simplify adding Input and Output parameters and deploying workflows to the PowerWF Agent.
• User Interface improvements have been made throughout the application.
• Major enhancements were made to several key areas:
• Parameterize workflows with step-by-step creation wizards and redesigned management dialogs.
• Create Workflows directly from PowerShell PS1 files or the embedded PowerShell editor.  Over 500 real-world PowerShell scripts have been successfully converted and tested by the Devfarm team.
• 40% improvement in overall application performance.
• Improved Plug-In Manager with support for removing PowerShell Snap-Ins and Modules from both PowerWF and the PowerShell environment.

After downloading and installing the PowerWF Ultimate Edition, the Plug-In Manager started the discovery process, all the currently installed modules, snapins and plug-ins popped up one by one.
I first opened up the PowerCLI item in the toolbox and every VMware command-let I could think of was there. The dragging and dropping begun and within a minute I produced my first workflow. It worked :-) the guys (and I’ve noticed some nice girls on their website) over at Devfarm really kept their promise, they created an awesome product which is going to rock your world. 30 day evaluation copies and pricing information are available now at PowerWF.com. Here is my little Jing movie.

Continue reading "PowerWF – Visualizing Virtualization " »

James Hofer over at PowerWF has posted his first blog article, it points out how to report the virtual machine snapshot age. He has created a step by step tutorial how to create the PowerWF workflow.

VMware provides a relatively easy way to script virtual machine management using PowerShell with PowerCLI.  Unfortunately there is still a significant learning curve for someone with minimal PowerShell experience; not realizing a connection to the virtual center or ESX host is required before executing other commands, or that failure to close that connection in a script leaves the connection open indefinitely can be very frustrating.

Fortunately PowerWF simplifies this process significantly. One problem VMware administrators face is finding old virtual machines snapshots that are wasting storage space. The following example takes advantage of both PowerShell and PowerCLI to find outdated snapshots and email the results.  To begin, create a new workflow project named, “SnapshotAge”.

Ben Vierck over at Devfarm software has put together a list of what people liked most from their PowerWF VMworld presentation. The list also contains the links to corresponding YouTube screen cast videos.

To get things started ... There were 3 features that the people at VMWorld seemed to key in on when I ran the demo. 1) The built in PowerShell/PowerCLI interpreter, 2) using PowerWF to redirect data from PowerShell scripts into Perfmon and SCOM, and 3) using PowerWF to create plugins (activity packs) for PowerWF. Below are some videos showing those 3 things.

Interpretting PowerShell/PowerCLI

1) Convert PowerShell/PowerCLI to Workflow

2) Interpreting PowerShell If/Then/ElseIf/Else into Workflow

PowerWF as an Enabler for a Monitoring

1) PowerCLI data piped to SCOM via PowerWF

2) Interpreted PowerCLI To Perfmon

Creating PowerWF Plugins with PowerWF

1) Create an activity pack for PowerWF with PowerWF

In this demo xcud takes a familiar PowerCLI one-liner scraped from a popular PowerCLI blog (http://peetersonline.nl), convert it into a workflow using PowerWF, deploy it to PowerScripter, then call it directly from the vSphere client via PowerScripter. Don’t forget to drop by at the PowerWF booth located at the VMworld New Innovators Pavilion.

PowerWF Studio can now read PowerShell and PowerCLI natively as workflow activities. This feature allows you to leverage existing PowerShell and PowerCLI scripts when building agents for SCOM, redploying back into PowerShell as Cmdlets/Snapins, or simply to make PowerShell and PowerCLI scripts more accessible as runable flowcharts.

In this demo Ben (@xcud) takes a PowerCLI script that's been transcribed into workflow activities and drop a 'ToWMI' activity at the end which causes the workflow to push the data retrieved from PowerCLI into WMI when the workflow is run. The workflow is set to run automatically every 5 seconds by being deployed as a Task in the Agent. The data is shown both on the PowerShell commandline and in a PowerGadget digital readout. Download the beta now: http://powerwf.com/

In this demo devfarm will deploy a PowerCLI script that's transcribed to a workflow using PowerWF earlier to an Agent to run automatically every 3 seconds. As a result of that script running as a workflow in the agent you'll see ESX Memory Usage in the local computer's Performance Monitor.

Organizations are increasingly looking to automate administrators' daily lives. Microsoft and VMware responded with two key technologies: Windows PowerShell, which has become the preferred scripting language for Windows administrators, and VMware’s PowerCLI which provides a Windows PowerShell interface to the vSphere API. vSphere PowerCLI includes PowerShell Cmdlets, and documentation for administering vSphere components.

PowerWF combines both technologies into a single easy-to-use product that replaces legacy batch files, scripts and custom application development, enabling you to completely automate your vSphere environment without writing a single line of code. I created a little one minute Jing demo -how to build a PowerCLI Work Flow with PowerWF.

I downloaded a copy of this workflow package and did some tests with it, these guys are awsome.
PowerWF Studio for VMware is a suite of tools for automating and administering virtual machine operations and the guests within virtual machines. Leveraging the VMware's VIX API plus several other PowerWF activities packs, PowerWF Studio for VMware offers levels of automation typically only seen in enterprise class solutions. The product supports management of VMware Server, Workstation, Player, and Virtual Infrastructure (both ESX and vCenter).

The VIX activity pack furnishes building blocks that allow you to quickly develop complex workflows that automate virtual machine operations, as well as the guests within virtual machines. PowerWF supports all the functions available within VMware's VIX API with none of complexities. PowerWF protects your existing investments by giving you myriad ways to use your workflows, including within shell scripts, an existing .NET application, or integrated with PowerShell.