Adding hosts to a vCenter server

To add a host to a vCenter server using the PowerCLI cmdlet, we need to use the Add-VMHost cmdlet. But, for this cmdlet to run successfully, we need to first connect to a vCenter server. We can connect to a vCenter server using the Connect-VIServer cmdlet. So, let's start:

PS C:\> Connect-VIServer vcenter.lab.com –User [e-mail] –Password Vmware1!

Note that I have provided all the parameter values in the command line itself; if you omit them, then it will display a popup asking for the user ID and password.

There's a better way of providing passwords to a connection: using the –Credential option and with PSCredential. Hal Rottenberg has written very good functions to incorporate these. The functions are as follows:

The first Export-PSCredential function exports the provided credential to a credentials.enc.xml file in XML format:

function Export-PSCredential {
        param ( $Credential = (Get-Credential), $Path = "credentials.enc.xml" )

        #...