You can use the vSphere Web Client SDK and the vSphere Client development kit to create HTML-based extensions.

Starting with vSphere 5.5 Update 1, an HTML Bridge infrastructure is added to the vSphere Web Client that provides support for HTML-based extensions. The vSphere Web Client SDK provides APIs, tools, and samples that can help you extend the vSphere Web Client.

Starting with vSphere 6.5, you can use the vSphere Client to connect to vCenter Server systems and manage vSphere inventory objects. The vSphere Client development kit is provided to developers that want to create HTML5-based extensions for both Web browser applications. For backward compatibility, the vSphere Client development kit contains the same APIs as the HTML Bridge.

Follow these best practices when you create your HTML-based solutions.

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Make sure that your HTML and JavaScript code is fully functional on different Web browsers and provides the same user experience.

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You must not send calls to the topmost browser window window.top or to the parent object of your current window window.parent.

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You must include in your HTML-based extensions the latest version of the web-platform.js JavaScript file provided with the vSphere Web Client SDK and added to each extension during generation. If you use an older version of this file, your HTML-based extensions might not work in the vSphere Web Client and might cause other HTML-based extensions to stop working.

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To minimize future maintenance work and prevent incompatibility problems, do not change the web-platform.js JavaScript file on your own initiative. The file depends on the vSphere Web Client version and is updated with each major release of the SDK. If the file changes between major releases, you must see whether the release notes contain any instructions for manual changes that you must apply to the file before generating your plug-in packages.

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To ensure the integrity of future versions of the vSphere Web Client running HTML-based extensions, do not modify the WEB_PLATFORM object. All HTML-based extensions use this global variable to access the vSphere Web Client platform APIs. For example, if you change this variable, other HTML-based extensions that use the WEB_PLATFORM = self.parent.document.getElementById("container_app") variable initialization might stop working.