VMware DEM – Upgrade Manager to v. 2303

Release date: April 9th 2023

Welcome to my VMware Dynamic Environment Manager series. In this session I will describe how I upgraded the VMware DEM Management Console to v. 2303. According to VMware’s official documentation, this should be done as step 12 in the supported update sequence.

I start out by downloading the installation media from VMware Customer Connect

Before I start the upgrade, I verify the installed version and build

Previously I’ve done this manually, but this time I will be doing an unattended remote upgrade from my management server, using the PowerShell script below. The workflow of the script is as follows:

Prerequisites:

• PowerShell Administrative access to the server running the DEM Management Console
• Run script in Administrative Powershell session

I first created the following credentials to be used in the script:

Horizon admin-user:

$credential = Get-Credential
$credential | Export-CliXml -Path '<path>hz_admin.xml'

Now that I had the credentials created, I was good to go. (PS: I know I’m no programmer and a lot of this script have the potential for improvement, but, it gets the job done, and that’s good enough for me).

dem-console-silent-upgr.ps1

# Dynamic Environment Manager Console Upgrade script

# --- Configure PSSession ---
$credential = Import-CliXml -Path "<path to horizon admin>hz_admin_${env:USERNAME}_${env:COMPUTERNAME}.xml"
$DEMSrv = "fqdn"

$session = New-PSSession -ComputerName $DEMSrv -Credential $credential -Authentication CredSSP

# --- Define, Copy and Run Installer ---
Invoke-Command -Session $session -ScriptBlock {
    
    $installDir = "C:Install"
    New-Item -Path $installDir -type directory -Force

    $demZip = "<network-path>VMware-DEM-Enterprise*.zip"
    Expand-Archive -Path $demZip -DestinationPath $installDir
    $msi = Get-Item $installDir*x64*.*
    
    $Vendor = "VMware"
    $Product = "VMware Dynamic Environment Manager Enterprise"
    $UnattendedArgs = '/qn ADDLOCAL="FlexManagementConsole" /l* C:InstallUpgradeDEM.log'
    
    Write-Verbose "Starting upgrading $Vendor $Product Console" -Verbose
    (Start-Process $msi -ArgumentList $UnattendedArgs -Wait -Passthru).ExitCode

    Remove-Item –path $installDir –Recurse -Force

}

# --- Disconnect PSSession ---
Remove-PSSession $session

Once the script has upgraded the DEM Console, I verify the installed version

This concludes my session about upgrading the VMware DEM Manager to v. 2303. I can now proceed with upgrading the GPO-bundles, posted here: VMware DEM – Upgrade GPO Templates to v. 2303

VMware DEM – Upgrades

My VMware DEM LAB Set Up

Official VMware Dynamic Environment Manager Documentation

Disclaimer: Every tips/tricks/posting I have published here, is tried and tested in different it-solutions. It is not guaranteed to work everywhere, but is meant as a tip for other users out there. Remember, Google is your friend and don’t be afraid to steal with pride! Feel free to comment below as needed.