ESXi / vCenter Discovery
Change Tracker can discover ESXi hosts managed by a VMware vCenter server and automatically register them as monitored devices. Discovery runs from a Gen 7 Agent (Windows) that connects to vCenter using VMware PowerCLI and returns the list of hosts to the Hub.
Prerequisites
- A Gen 7 Agent (Windows) registered with the Hub. This agent acts as the discovery device and executes the PowerCLI commands.
- VMware PowerCLI installed on the discovery device.
- A stored credential in Change Tracker with vCenter administrator (or read-only) access. See Credentials for details on creating stored credentials.
- Network connectivity from the discovery device to the vCenter server on port 443.
Run an ESXi / vCenter discovery
Step 1 – Navigate to Settings > Device Discovery.
Step 2 – Select New Discovery Run > ESXi / vCenter Discovery.
Step 3 – Configure the discovery dialog:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Discovery Device | The Gen 7 Agent that executes the vCenter discovery. Click Select Device to choose an agent. |
| Parent Device in Hub | (Optional) An existing device to use as the parent for discovered hosts. If left blank, defaults to the discovery device. |
| Credentials | The stored credential used to authenticate to the vCenter server. |
| Device Name Prefix | The prefix applied to each discovered host name. Defaults to VM Host. Discovered devices use the format <prefix> (<hostname>), for example VM Host (esxi-host-01). Change this value to match your organization's naming conventions. If you clear the field, discovered devices use only the hostname. |
| Assign to Group | The device group that receives discovered hosts. |
| Add new VM Hosts to ChangeTracker | When selected, Change Tracker adds hosts found on vCenter that don't already exist as new devices. |
| Update existing VM Hosts in ChangeTracker | When selected, Change Tracker updates existing hosts with the latest information from vCenter. |
| Delete missing VM Hosts from ChangeTracker | When selected, Change Tracker removes hosts that no longer appear on vCenter. |
Step 4 – Click Run to start the discovery. The discovery status grid shows the progress and results of each discovery task.
Discovery results
After the discovery task completes, the results grid displays each discovered host with the following columns:
- Device Name — the name assigned to the host using the prefix and hostname.
- Operating System — the ESXi version reported by vCenter (e.g.,
ESXi 8.0). - IP Address — the management IP address of the host.
Review the results and confirm Change Tracker added the devices to the correct group. You can re-run discovery at any time to synchronize the device list with vCenter. Use the Add new, Update existing, and Delete missing options to control how Change Tracker merges changes.