Connect the Extension to vCenter Server

You must provide information about the vCenter Server instance to which you connect an extension. Set the details of the connection to vCenter Server in the client-side stub of the extension.

Note: If you deploy your extension using the Open Virtualization Format (OVF), you can integrate it with the vCenter Extension vService. The vCenter Extension vService automates the process of registering extension with vCenter Server, so you do not need to provide any connection parameters. See Integrating an Extension with the vCenter Extension vService.

To connect an extension to vCenter Server, provide the following information to the client-side stub of the connection.

• A username and password for a vCenter Server administrator account, if you do not use the vCenter Extension vService
• The extension key for the extension
• A reference to the SessionManager instance in the vCenter Server

The EAM Sample Solution defines the connection to vCenter Server in the VimConnection class.

The Manager class performs the following functions.

• Implements the VimConnection class to establish the connection to vCenter Server when the EAM Sample Solution starts.
• Uses the Spring framework to obtain the connection information from the eamri.properties file that you configure when you set up the EAM Sample Solution.
• Passes the connection property values to VimConnection.

Prerequisites

• Download the vSphere ESX Agent Manager SDK.

• Verify that you have set up and started the EAM Sample Solution in an application server.

• Open eam_work_folder\src\com\vmware\eam\sample\solution\util\VimConnection.java in an editor.

Procedure

1. Create an instance of the ManagedObjectReference data object to define the connection to the extension.
   The VimConnection class creates a ManagedObjectReference object of type ServiceInstance, named _siRef.

     public VimConnection(String host, int port) {
      [...]
      _siRef = new ManagedObjectReference();
      _siRef.setType("ServiceInstance");
      _siRef.setValue("ServiceInstance"); 
     }

2. Define methods to get and set the vCenter Server host, ports, username, password, connection timeout, and session cookie.
   The VimConnection constructor defines methods to obtain the host, ports, username, password, connection timeout, and session cookie from the information that you set in the eamri.properties file.
3. Connect to vCenter Server by obtaining the SessionManager managed object for the vCenter Server.
   VimConnection.java defines a method named connect(). The connect() method defines a standard connection to vCenter Server that uses WSDL. The following segment shows the calls to the SessionManager.login() and SessionManager.loginExtensionByCertificate() methods that establish the connection to vCenter Server. The _stub variable is an instance of VimPortType, _sc is a ServiceContent object, and _siRef is the ManagedObjectReference object of type ServiceInstance.

     private synchronized void connect() {
       [...]
       try {
           [...]
           VimService locator = new VimService(wsdlURL, new QName("urn:vim25Service",
                                                                  "VimService"));
   
           _stub = locator.getVimPort();
           [...]
   
           _sc = _stub.retrieveServiceContent(_siRef);
   
           ManagedObjectReference sessionManager = _sc.getSessionManager();
   
           if (_extensionKey == null) {
             _stub.login(sessionManager, _username, _password, null);
           }
           else {
             _stub.loginExtensionByCertificate(sessionManager, _extensionKey, null);
           }
       [...]
        _connectionStatus = ConnectionStatus.Connected;
       } catch (Exception e) {
           _logger.error(e, e);
       }
     }

4. Register the extension by calling the ExtensionManager.registerExtension() method.
   VimConnection defines a registerExtension() method that implements ExtensionManager.registerExtension(). Manager calls VimConnection.registerExtension() after it has set the properties for the extension.

     public void registerExtension(Extension ex) {
       try {
            Extension findExtension = _stub.findExtension(_sc.getExtensionManager(),
                                                          ex.getKey());
            if (findExtension == null) {
                _stub.registerExtension(_sc.getExtensionManager(), ex);
            } else {
                _stub.updateExtension(_sc.getExtensionManager(), ex);
            }
            _stub.setExtensionCertificate(_sc.getExtensionManager(),
                                          ex.getKey(), null);
            } catch (Exception e) { 
                _logger.error(e, e); 
            }
     }

Results

You registered an extension with vCenter Server.

What to do next

Provide an extension key with which to register the extension with vCenter Server.