With the release of VMware vSphere 5.0 a new version of the VMFS datastores was released also: VMFS-5. This new VMFS-5 version has a lot of advantages over the old VMFS-3 version (see for information about the new features Cormac Hogan’s post vSphere 5.0 Storage Features Part 1 – VMFS-5). You can upgrade your VMFS-3 datastores to VMFS-5 while VM’s on the datastores keep running. In this post I will show you the vSphere PowerCLI Upgrade-VmfsDatastore function that will do the upgrade for you.

The Upgrade-VmfsDatastore function

The Upgrade-VmfsDatastore function is a PowerShell advanced function that will accept input from the pipeline. You can specify the datastores that you want to upgrade as input. If you use the -WhatIf parameter, it will only show what the function would do, but it will not do it. This is a great way to see in advance which datastore can be upgraded if you use the output of the Get-Datastore cmdlet as input.

function Upgrade-Vmfsdatastore {
<#
  .SYNOPSIS
    Upgrades a VMFS datastore.

  .DESCRIPTION
    Upgrades a VMFS datastore from VMFS 3 to VMFS 5. 

  .PARAMETER  Datastore
    Specifies the datastores you want to upgrade.
    
  .PARAMETER  WhatIf
    Shows what would happen if the function runs. The function is not run.

  .EXAMPLE
    PS C:\&gt; Upgrade-VmfsDatastore -Datastore (Get-Datastore -Name Datastore1,Datastore2)
    Upgrades VMFS datastores Datastore1 and Datastore2 to VMFS 5.

  .EXAMPLE
    PS C:\&gt; Get-Datastore | Upgrade-VmfsDatastore
    Upgrades all VMFS datastores to VMFS5.

  .INPUTS
    VmfsDatastoreImpl

  .OUTPUTS
    VmfsDatastoreImpl

  .NOTES
    Author:  Robert van den Nieuwendijk
    Date:    11-10-2016
    Version: 1.1
 
  .LINK
    https://rvdnieuwendijk.com/
    Tweets by rvdnieuwendijk
#>

  [CmdletBinding()]
  [OutputType([VMware.VimAutomation.ViCore.Impl.V1.DatastoreManagement.VmfsDatastoreImpl])]
  param(
    [parameter(Mandatory = $true,
               ValueFromPipeline = $true,
               ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName = $true)]
    [VMware.VimAutomation.ViCore.Impl.V1.DatastoreManagement.VmfsDatastoreImpl[]] $Datastore,
    [Switch] $WhatIf
  )

  process {
    foreach ($CurrentDatastore in $Datastore |
      Where-Object {
        $_.GetType().Name -eq 'VmfsDatastoreImpl' -and $_.FileSystemVersion -lt 5
      }
    )
    {
      # If -WhatIf is used, only show what the function would do and don't do it
      if ($WhatIf)
      {
        Write-Output "What if: Performing operation Upgrade-VmfsDatastore on Target $($CurrentDatastore.Name)."
      }
      else
      {
        # Get the HostStorageSystem of the first host that the datastore is connected to
        # The UpgradeVmfs() method of this object is used to upgrade the datastore
        $HostStorageSystem = $CurrentDatastore |
          Get-VMHost | Select-Object -First 1 |
          Get-VMHostStorage | Get-View

        # Construct the path to the volume to upgrade
        # For example: /vmfs/volumes/4e97fa06-7fa61558-937e-984be163eb88
        $Volume = '/' + $CurrentDatastore.ExtensionData.Info.Url.TrimStart('ds:/').TrimEnd('/')
        
        # Upgrade the datastore
        $HostStorageSystem.UpgradeVmfs($Volume)
        
        # Return the datastore that has been upgraded
        $CurrentDatastore
      }
    }
  }
}

Listing 1. The Upgrade-VmfsDatastore function

There are some examples in the Upgrade-VmfsDatastore function’s comment-based help. Here are some more:

PowerCLI C:\> Get-Datastore -Name Datastore1 | Upgrade-VmfsDatastore -WhatIf What if: Performing operation Upgrade-VmfsDatastore on Target Datastore1. PowerCLI C:\> Get-Datastore -Name Datastore1 | Upgrade-VmfsDatastore

Name FreeSpaceGB CapacityGB

—- ———– ———-

Datastore1 103,861 499,750

I would love to hear it when you use the Upgrade-VmfsDatastore function to upgrade your datastores.

Enjoy!