Python script to connect to Prism Central and use the v3 APIs to create a VM with detailed specs.

Unlike the basic example also available in this repository, this sample creates a virtual machine with attached disk and network adapter.

This is not a production-grade script. Please make sure you add appropriate exception handling and error-checking before running it in production. See note re versions below, too.

Chris Rasmussen, Developer Content Architect, Nutanix (Melbourne, AU)

• 2020.02.20 - Code sample updated to deal with "missing cluster reference" case
• 2019.07.23 - Code sample created

Connect to Prism Central and use the v3 APIs to create a VM with detailed specs.

Requires create_vm_v3_detailed.json to be populated with the following information:

• pc_ip: Prism Central IP address
• username: Prism Central username
• vm_name: The name of the VM to create
• cluster_name: The name of the cluster to create the VM on
• cluster_uuid: The UUID of the cluster to create the VM on
• vcpus_per_socket: The number of vCPUs per socket to assign to the new VM
• num_sockets: The number of sockets to assign to the new VM
• memory_size_mib: The memory size in MiB to assign to the new VM
• first_disk_size_mib: The size of the first disk in MiB to assign to the new VM
• first_nic_subnet_name: The name of the VM's first NIC's network/subnet
• first_nic_subnet_uuid: The UUID of the VM's first NIC's network/subnet

Note re cluster UUID - This is required to deal with the use case where the specified Prism Central instance has multiple connected clusters (quite common in the real world).

Example API POST request to get the cluster UUID:

https://pc_ip:9440/api/nutanix/v3/clusters/list

Body to use with the request above:

{"kind":"cluster"}

Note re subnet UUID - This is required when creating attached VM NICs.

Example API POST request to get the subnet UUID:

https://pc_ip:9440/api/nutanix/v3/subnets/list

Body to use with the request above:

{"kind":"subnet"}

All the steps below assume you have a terminal session running with the current directory set to the location of the script.

• It is strongly recommended to run development scripts like this within a virtual environment. For example, if using Python 3.7 on Linux:

  python3.7 -m venv venv
  . venv/bin/activate

• Install dependencies:

  pip3 install -e .

• Edit create_vm_v3_detailed.json to match your environment

python3.7 create_vm_v3_detailed.py create_vm_v3_detailed.json --help

Generates:

usage: create_vm_v3_detailed.py [-h] json

positional arguments:
  json        JSON file containing query parameters

optional arguments:
  -h, --help  show this help message and exit

• High-level testing has been carried out on Prism Central version 5.11
• Other versions may produce unpredictable results
• The installation of specific Python versions, pip3 etc are beyond the scope of this readme

A complete command-line example is shown below:

python3.7 create_vm_v3_detailed.py create_vm_v3_detailed.json

This is what the script looks like as it is run. This screenshot is the output of the example command above.

These scripts are unofficial and are not supported or maintained by Nutanix in any way.

In addition, please also be advised that these scripts may run and operate in ways that do not follow best practices. Please check through each script to ensure it meets your requirements.

Changes will be required before these scripts can be used in production environments.