vCenter custom attributes

[GabesVirtualWorld]

Hi
In previous versions we always used a vCenter custom attribute field in which Veeam published the backup results. I'm now trying to switch to tags and categories. I build a v7R2 setup in my test lab but stupid enough I can't find the setting anymore. I thought in 6.x I could set this in the backup job, but I must be looking in the wrong place.... help !!!

Another question, how can I start using tags instead of custom attributes because these custom attributes don't show anymore in the vSphere Web Client.

Gabrie

[GabesVirtualWorld]

Oh never mind... I was looking at a Copy job, no wonder I couldn't find it.

[GabesVirtualWorld]

Question on how to switch to tags remains however.....

[Gostev]

Hi Gabrie, this is not currently possible. But at least recently this became possible in theory, as VMware has finally added some APIs for programmatic tag management in vSphere 5.5. So we can potentially add this down the road, if there is enough requests. Thanks!

[GabesVirtualWorld]

Hi Gabrie, this is not currently possible. But at least now this possible it became possible in theory, as VMware has finally added some APIs for programmatic tag management in vSphere 5.5. So we can potentially add this down the road, if there will be enough feature requests. Thanks!

Just released a blog post on it this morning http://www.gabesvirtualworld.com/time-t ... s-to-tags/.

Please do see this as a request from me, since I'm trying to push customers to start using just the vSphere Web Client. We need to prepare them for the worst if the Windows Client really isn't working anymore with the next vSphere version to come

[tsightler]

Hi Gabe, I'm curious about your ideas using tags. I've worked on some scripts to use tags for things like tagging the job a VM is in, or a backup policy (used by a script to place the VM in the proper job) and even a simple tag for whether the VM is currently meeting it's policy, they seem pretty great for holding relatively static descriptive data for an object. However, it seems like they aren't very suited for use with dynamic data, such as the most recent backup status for a VM, where, as far as I can tell, you'd now need a unique tag for every VM, instead of previously with attributes where you'd have a common attribute that simply held different values for each VM. Am I missing something here?

[GabesVirtualWorld]

Well I have been struggling with that too. A tag is not really a field you can fill with changing data daily. I think there are two options:
- Keep using the Notes field, because that is still available, and hope no other product runs into the same issue
- Create a new tag daily for each VM in which the tag is the result of the backup.

Option 1 is simple and doesn't need more explaining.

The way to implement option 2 would be like this (I think):
- create a category VeeamBackup that allows multiple entries.
- after the backup has finished, create a new tag in that category and name it: "Veeam Backup: Job name: [MineCraft] Time [1/14/2014 3:00:28 AM], Backup host [VEEAM7], Backup file [[This server] E:\Backups\MineCraft\MineCraft2014-01-14T030020.vib]"
- add the tag to the VM.

Not sure if the create time of a tag can be retrieved later on, because then you could remove tags easily after xx days. Something like: "Get all tags from category veeambackup older than xx days and delete them". If that is not possible, maybe the contents for the tag should be changed and start with a date. Then you can sort the tags based on that and delete them.

Currently I think you'll be needing a script that is triggered when the backup has finished and converts the attribute field that Veeam fills, into tags. Working on a blogpost that shows how to do this.

[zebduin]

I would like to be able to create and assign tags in vCenter through vCO and vCAC. vCO has built-in workflows to create custom attributes, but I have not been able to find anything to automate the creation and assignment of tags.

[GabesVirtualWorld]

There are powershell commands for it. And in the categories you can select vCO objects to assign tags to. One would assume vCO would be able to create tags, but never worked with vCO unfortunately.

[tsightler]

- Create a new tag daily for each VM in which the tag is the result of the backup.

Yep, that's pretty much what I was thinking, you'd basically have to create a new tag everyday and apply it to the VMs. It would work, but just feels a little kludgy. Guess I wasn't missing anything after all. Still, I think it could be workable.