Cloning virtual machine on vmware esx using vmware-cmd

Below are the steps:

1. List down all the virtual machines that you have

# /usr/bin/vmware-cmd -l
/vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/server-1/server-1.vmx
/vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/server-2/server-2.vmx
/vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/server-3/server-3.vmx

2. Shutdown the machine that you are going to clone. Let say the machine is server-1

# /usr/bin/vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/server-1/server-1.vmx stop

3. Use hard stop if you cannot stop it using above command

# /usr/bin/vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/server-1/server-1.vmx stop hard

4. Make sure the vm is shutdown by viewing the state

# /usr/bin/vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/server-1/server-1.vmx getstate

5. Copy the whole directory

# cp /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/server-1/ /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/newserver/

6. Once done, rename all the files to new name

# rename server-1 newserver /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/newserver/*

7. Change all occurrence of "server-1" to "newserver" in .vmx, .vmdk and .vmxf

# cd /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/newserver/
# sed -i 's/server-1/newserver/g' {newserver.vmdk,newserver.vmx,newserver.vmxf}

8. Edit newserver.vmx file and remove below lines

ethernet0.generatedAddress = "....."
ethernet0.generatedAddressOffset = "....."
uuid.location = "....."
uuid.bios = "....."

9. Add below line to newserver.vmx

uuid.action = "keep"

10. Register your newly cloned virtual machine. Please use the full path to register as below

# vmware-cmd -s register /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/newserver/newserver.vmx

11. Start your new vm after registration.

# /usr/bin/vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes/47971de9-34657d96-8ac4-001d09068c0c/newserver/newserver.vmx start