VMware vSphere SDKs and Tools 8.0

8.0 7.0 6.7 6.5

vSphere Web Services (VIM) API

The vSphere Web Services (VIM) API gives programmatic access to core virtualized resources that support robust, fault-tolerant virtualized applications comprising compute, networking, and storage resources. Resource types include virtual machines, ESXi hosts, clusters, datastores, networks, and system abstractions such as events, alarms, authorization, and plug-in extensions.
The VIM API is a mature and comprehensive management API. The API works against both ESXi and vCenter Server systems, providing access to a hierarchy of managed objects that you use to configure, monitor, and manage data center resources.
Developers have several ways to access the VIM API:
  • The vSphere Management SDK contains Java bindings and samples that use SOAP access to the server.
  • The pyvmomi SDK is a user-friendly Python package containing bindings and utilities for working with the APIs.
  • The govmomi SDK is a comprehensive set of bindings, utilities, examples, and a CLI for Go developers.
  • The vSphere Management SDK provides language-neutral WSDL code for the SOAP protocol, from which you can generate bindings for your choice of language.
  • The vSphere Management SDK provides a language-neutral OpenAPI specification to which you can write code that uses a REST-like JSON protocol.
The vSphere Web Services API includes these core features:
  • Data center inventory management, using a hierarchy of folders and resource objects
  • A powerful server-side data retrieval feature, the Property Collector
  • Host system configuration and management
  • Datastore configuration and management
  • Network configuration and management
  • Virtual machine configuration and management, including guest OS operations
  • Virtual machine encryption
  • Cluster and resource pool configuration and management
  • Management of events and alarms
The Web Services API uses a SOAP-XML RPC protocol. It is bundled in the vSphere Management SDK. The Management SDK provides RPC stubs for clients with Java language bindings.
The Web Services server endpoint is
https://{domain}/sdk
The VIM JSON protocol service endpoint is
http://{domain}/sdk/vim25/8.0.1.0
For more information about using the VIM API, see the following documentation:
  • vSphere Web Services SDK Developer Setup Guide
  • vSphere Web Services SDK Programming Guide

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