In case you would like to import existing machines into vCAC you have the option to import them via ‘Discovery’ from within the GUI. But if you wanted to import more than a few machines at a time this might become a little more than tedious. Of course you can always revert back to AutoIT or something similar to do the clicking for you, but you might be tempted to approach this in a more sophisticated way. Luckily there is an API that help you tackle that problem in a more feasible manner.

You can actually use the VMPS SOAP interface and use the ‘RegisterExistingVirtualMachine()’ method. In PowerShell this could be implemented similar to this:

# We start with a Management Context (REPO connection)
PS > $m.GetType().FullName;
DynamicOps.ManagementModel.ManagementModelEntities
PS > $m.BaseUri;
AbsolutePath   : /Repository/Data/ManagementModelEntities.svc
AbsoluteUri    : https://vcac52.sharedop.org/Repository/Data/ManagementModelEntities.svc
LocalPath      : /Repository/Data/ManagementModelEntities.svc
Authority      : vcac52.sharedop.org
HostNameType   : Dns
IsDefaultPort  : True
IsFile         : False
IsLoopback     : False
PathAndQuery   : /Repository/Data/ManagementModelEntities.svc
Segments       : {/, Repository/, Data/, ManagementModelEntities.svc}
IsUnc          : False
Host           : vcac52.sharedop.org
Port           : 443
Query          :
Fragment       :
Scheme         : https
OriginalString : https://vcac52.sharedop.org/Repository/Data/ManagementModelEntities.svc
DnsSafeHost    : vcac52.sharedop.org
IsAbsoluteUri  : True
UserEscaped    : False
UserInfo       :

# Then we instantiate our web service ...
PS > $Service = 'VMPS';
PS > [Uri] $UriVMPS = '{0}://{1}:{2}/{3}' -f 
  $m.BaseUri.Scheme, $m.BaseUri.Host, $m.BaseUri.Port, $Service;
PS > $VMPS = New-WebServiceProxy $UriVMPS -Class $Service -Namespace $Service;

# ... and get the definition for the RegisterExistingVirtualMachine method
PS > $vmps.RegisterExistingVirtualMachine;
OverloadDefinitions
-------------------
void RegisterExistingVirtualMachine(
  VMPS.IdentityToken securityToken, 
  string virtualMachineID, 
  string hostReservationID, 
  string hostStorageReservationID, 
  string virtualMachineTemplateID, 
  string owner
  )

# Pick a machine to import/register
PS > $Machine = $m.VirtualMachines |? VirtualMachineName -eq 'ExistingServer1';
PS > $Machine | select VirtualMachineName, VirtualMachineID, VMCPUs, 
  VMTotalMemoryMB, VMTotalStorageGB;
VirtualMachineName : ExistingServer1
VirtualMachineID   : c4ef69ab-e4fb-4f56-9e28-02a6f2b82cde
VMCPUs             : 1
VMTotalMemoryMB    : 0
VMTotalStorageGB   : 2

# Let's use current user for token and owner
PS > $IdTkn = New-Object VMPS.IdentityToken;
PS > $Username = '{0}\{1}' -f $ENV:USERDOMAIN, $ENV:USERNAME;
PS > $OwnerName = $Username;
PS > $IdTkn.User = $Username;

# Then we choose our target resources where to import ...
# 1. Blueprint
PS > $m.VirtualMachineTemplates | select 
  VirtualMachineTemplateName, VirtualMachineTemplateID;
VirtualMachineTemplateName VirtualMachineTemplateID
-------------------------- ------------------------
BP03YAST                   e3011d25-f23e-4f79-a9a2-3bbbb6706cfc
WebServer                  b6dc1746-31b1-49bd-ab77-9d760c420a4d
BP02                       a4a38b9a-c874-462c-8f88-e3b70e72da3b
BP01                       b9fe831b-26fd-4ef0-b5c2-ee8f258f1727
PS > $bp = $m.VirtualMachineTemplates |? VirtualMachineTemplateName -eq 'BP01';

# 2. HostReservation
PS > $m.HostReservations | select HostReservationID, HostReservationName
HostReservationID                    HostReservationName
-----------------                    -------------------
93d0987d-1a3e-4ebf-8564-164a6bf985f4 GOLD01
072e376f-d56f-483b-ae1a-2d3c26ee2c2c BRONZE01
74ddaaed-7685-4848-9cea-4e82b29ca8e5 SILVER01
8dfd1c82-f9b6-4c43-8aaa-c76b95418525 GOLD02
PS > $hr = $m.HostReservations |? HostReservationName -eq 'GOLD';

# 3. StorageReservation
PS > $ahrts = $m.LoadProperty($hr, 'HostReservationToStorages') | 
  Select HostReservationToStorageID, Enabled, ReservationPriority |? 
  Enabled -eq $True;
PS > $ahrts
HostReservationToStorageID           Enabled ReservationPriority
--------------------------           ------- -------------------
8f81e3c5-13b6-41b0-ba2b-4d1b8f0552ee True                      2
17de5a1c-98b3-4832-97fc-6787861a19da True                      0
8536128e-3e08-4564-9405-ea191a3c5bbe True                      8
PS > $srid = $ahrts | sort -Property ReservationPriority | 
  Select HostReservationToStorageID -First 1;

# Submit our request to register the existing machine
PS > $VMPS.RegisterExistingVirtualMachine($IdTkn, $Machine.VirtualMachineID, 
  $hr.HostReservationID, $srid.HostReservationToStorageID, 
  $bp.VirtualMachineTemplateID, $OwnerName);

The corresponding SOAP payload will then look similar to this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<soap:Envelope xmlns:soap="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/" 
  xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" 
  xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
  <soap:Body>
    <RegisterExistingVirtualMachine xmlns="http://dynamicops.com/VMPS">
      <securityToken>
        <ImpersonatingUser xsi:nil="true" xmlns="http://DynamicOps.VMPS.Model" />
        <User xmlns="http://DynamicOps.VMPS.Model">SHAREDOP.ORG\vcacservice</User>
      </securityToken>
      <virtualMachineID>c4ef69ab-e4fb-4f56-9e28-02a6f2b82cde</virtualMachineID>
      <hostReservationID>93d0987d-1a3e-4ebf-8564-164a6bf985f4</hostReservationID>
      <hostStorageReservationID>17de5a1c-98b3-4832-97fc-6787861a19da</hostStorageReservationID>
      <virtualMachineTemplateID>b9fe831b-26fd-4ef0-b5c2-ee8f258f1727</virtualMachineTemplateID>
      <owner>SHAREDOP.ORG\vcacservice</owner>
    </RegisterExistingVirtualMachine>
  </soap:Body>
</soap:Envelope>