vSphere Client SDK 8.0 Update 3 Release Notes

vSphere Client SDK 8.0 Update 3 | 25 June 2024 | Build on developer.broadcom.com
For VMware Cloud Foundation and vSphere
Check back for additions and updates to these release notes, marked New.

About the vSphere Client SDK

The vSphere Client SDK provides sample plug-ins, tools, libraries, and documentation to help developers build user interfaces with vSphere Client extensions for vSphere and VMware Cloud.

Changes and New Features

The vSphere Client SDK 8.0 U3 offers the following New features:

Extend the Snapshots tab of a virtual machine.
Added a possibility for remote plug-ins to extend the "Snapshots" tab of a virtual machine in the same way as "Monitor" and "Configure" tabs. The extensibility can be achieved by specifying snapshots on a Virtual Machine object in the plugin.json file. For example:
```
   "VirtualMachine": {
     "snapshots": {
       "views": [
         {
         ...view-information
         }
       ]
     }
   }
```

Allow extensibility of Supervisor Namespace and Supervisor Cluster objects.

Added a possibility for remote plug-ins to extend the Supervisor Namespace and Supervisor Cluster inventory objects. The extensibility can be achieved by specifying a "SupervisorNamespace" or "SupervisorClusterComputeResource" object in the plugin.json file. For example:

   "objects": {
      "SupervisorNamespace": {
         "summary": {
            "view": {
               "uri": "myCard.html"
            }
         },
         "monitor": {
            "views": [
               {
                  "uri": "myMonitor.html"
               }
            ]
         },
         "configure": {
            "views": [
               {
                  "uri": "myConfigure.html"
               }
            ]
         },
         "menu": {
            "actions": [
               {
                  "id": "myAction",
                  "labelKey": "my.action.label",
                  "icon": {
                     "name": "action"
                  },
                  "trigger": {
                     "type": "modal",
                     "uri": "index.html#/my-action-modal",
                     "titleKey": "my.action.modal.title",
                     "size": {
                        "width": 600,
                        "height": 205
                     }
                  }
               }
            ]
         }
      }
   }

Define plug-in card sizes.
Added an option to choose the size of the plug-in defined summary cards. The options are "small", "medium", or "large" cards. The default (if no size is specified) is "medium". Size can be specified as in the plugin.json file below:
```
   "VirtualMachine": {
      "summary": {
         "view": {
            "id": "vmCard",
            "uri": "index.html#/vm-card",
            "size": {
               "width": "small"
            }
         }
      }
   }
```
More flexible recognition of certificate thumbprint formats.
The Extension Registration tool now supports passing thumbprints in different formats. Until now, the only supported format of thumbprints in the Extension Registration tool was the colon-separated one (XX:XX:XX). The tool now supports passing thumbprints that are space-separated (XX XX XX) or ones that have no separation at all (XXXXXX).
Integrated Solution Installer improvements.
- Inject the associated vCenter Server(s) version in the deployed solution appliance. In addition to vCenter Servers count, FQDNs, thumbprints and GUIDs, the vCenter Server version will also be injected into the deployed solution appliance (solutionInstall.targetVcenterServers.<index>.version).
- The /solutioninstall API endpoint is extended to allow passing vcenterExtensionsPerGuid in addition to vcenterExtensions. The new payload will indicate which extensions to register for a given vCenter Server GUID. Currently, vcenterExtensions only allows passing a list of extensions and the vSphere Client will register the extensions in all user-selected vCenter Servers. With the new payload vcenterExtensionsPerGuid, plug-in developers can specify a list of extensions for every vCenter Server. Either vcenterExtensions or vcenterExtensionsPerGuid can be used, but not both.
- Inject the vSphere Client version in the deployed solution appliance. Since a new payload is introduced for the /solutioninstall API, plug-in developers need to know the version of the vSphere Client that they must call. This is why, in addition to solutionInstall.postDeployData.endpoint and solutionInstall.postDeployData.thumbprint, there is a new solutionInstall.postDeployData.version property.

For new features in the previous versions, see the vSphere Client SDK 8.0.2 Release Notes and before.

Compatibility Notices

Partners should migrate all local plug-ins to remote plug-ins as soon as possible. Local plug-ins for vSphere Client remain functional in the vSphere 8.0 U3 release, but they must be upgraded for compatibility with a number of security-related changes. Local plug-ins must become FIPS-compliant and must isolate their 3rd-party libraries.

Recently Resolved Issues

The following fixes are New in the 8.0 U3 release:

Multi Manifest validation.
Fixed an issue with the Multi Manifest feature where a plug-in may be reported as "incompatible" if it uses the Multi Manifest feature along with requirements for a specific vSphere Client or vCenter Server version. Now, requirements checking is part of the plug-in manifest validation. If a given plug-in manifest does not satisfy the environment requirements, it fails on the parsing stage and the next plug-in manifest in line will be tried to be deployed.
Remote Plug-in sample.
- Addressed an issue with web sockets.
- Tomcat server has been updated to mitigate a security issue.
Integrated Solution Installer.
- All running solution install tasks are now canceled when the solution install task fails or times out.
- Solution install default properties are removed from the wizard because they are not user configurable. Users will no longer see the default (non-configurable) solution install properties.
No verification for pinned certificates.
Hostname verification when downloading plug-ins is not needed and is no longer performed for self-signed plug-in server certificates. Using plug-in server certificates was introduced in the vSphere 8.0 U2, and the vSphere Client was wrongly doing hostname verification for pinned certificates.
Localization.
Fixed localization issues when showing or hiding plug-ins from Client Plug-ins view.
Accessibility.
Improved the accessibility of modal dialogs opened through the vSphere Client SDK.
Bundled libraries discontinued.
The vSphere Client SDK no longer bundles Spring and other libraries used by local plug-ins. After the local plug-ins isolation, local plug-ins are required to bundle their own libraries.

Known Issues and Workarounds

There are no unresolved issues known at this time.

Use of /sdkTunnel Endpoint

The vSphere Client 8.0 U2 release notes contained a section about proper use of the /sdkTunnel endpoint: calling LoginExtensionByCertificate to authenticate. Because LoginExtensionByCertificate is deprecated, you should consider the /sdkTunnel deprecated as well.