Use the Credential Store

Your vCLI installation includes a credential store. You can establish trust for a user with the credential store.

You can manage the credential store with the credstore-admin utility application, which is located in the /Perl/apps/general directory inside the VMware vSphere CLI directory.

Important: Updating the credential store is a two-step process. First you add the user and password for the server, and then you add the thumbprint for the server.

Procedure

1. Add the user and password for the target ESXi host to the local credential store.

   credstore_admin.pl add --server <esxi_HOSTNAME_OR_IP> --username <user> --password <pwd>

2. Add the thumbprint for the target ESXi host. This thumbprint was returned in the error when you attempted to connect to the host.

   credstore_admin.pl add --server <esxi_HOSTNAME_OR_IP> --thumbprint <thumbprint>

3. If you are using a non-default credential store file, you must pass it in with the --credstore option.
   If you do not use the --credstore option, the host becomes accessible without authentication.