Virtual Infrastructure Virtual Machine APIs
VirtualMachine is the managed object type for manipulating virtual machines, including templates that can be deployed (repeatedly) as new virtual machines.
This type provides methods for configuring and controlling a virtual machine.
VirtualMachine extends the ManagedEntity type because virtual machines are part of a virtual infrastructure inventory. The parent of a virtual machine must be a folder, and a virtual machine has no children.
Destroying a virtual machine disposes of all associated storage, including the virtual disks. To remove a virtual machine while retaining its virtual disk storage, a client must remove the virtual disks from the virtual machine before destroying it.