This is the second of [?] posts, participating in Blogtober in the virtualization community.

So, maybe you’ve heard how cool vCheck is, but you’re just not sure where to get started. If you aren’t sure what it is, check out this post by its creator, Alan Renauf.

Now that I have you at least semi-interested, let’s get started.

Install PowerCLI

Grab PowerCLI – you can grab it as a Powershell module now. It also auto-loads pieces as it needs, which is really convenient.

1. Uninstall existing all PowerCLI versions
2. Fire up Powershell
   1. Make sure you can access the Powershell Gallery
   2. Installs the modules as the current user (or run PS as admin, skip the “-Scope CurrentUser” option to install for all users)

Find-Module -Name VMware.PowerCLI
Install-Module -Name VMware.PowerCLI –Scope CurrentUser

For a more detailed look, check this blog post.

Downloading vCheck

Grab the latest version from the GitHub Repo: https://github.com/alanrenouf/vCheck-vSphere/releases

At the time of this writing, we’re grabbing the 6.24 release (August 24, 2017).

Unzip it to your favorite place for stuff like this. In this example, C:\Utilities\vCheck.

Configuration

In your Powershell window, navigate to where you unzipped vCheck.

You have to load some custom functions, you’ll need to “dot source” the utility file, which loads some functions for you to launch later if you want (export and import settings, for example).

PS C:\Utilities\vCheck\> . .\vCheckUtils.ps1

Now that you’ve got the functions loaded, you can do things like import/export your settings, add/remove plugins. For the initial config, there’s a nifty gui configuration you can use, just fire it up like this:

PS C:\Utilities\vCheck\> .\vCheck.ps1 -GUIConfig

You can list plugins, remove plugins you won’t use:

PS C:\Utilities\vCheck\> Get-vCheckPlugin --Installed
PS C:\Utilities\vCheck\> Remove-vCheckPlugin "Name Here"

Following, setup the scheduler (probably want to do this on a server) you loaded from the vCheckUtils.ps1 functions.

PS C:\Utilities\vCheck\> Schedule-vCheck

Give it a shot and see what it’s like:

PS C:\Utilities\vCheck\> .\vCheck.ps1

Rob Nelson has a more in-depth post if you’re looking for more.