GuestConfiguration

Name: GuestConfiguration API
Brand: Azure Guest Configuration
Availability: InStock

★ Only Publicly Available OpenAPI DocumentSecurityComplianceoauth27 EndpointsREST

For Agents

Assign in-guest configuration policies to Azure VMs and read compliance reports that show whether each VM matches its assigned baseline.

Connect the GuestConfiguration to your agent

Jentic One is a self-hosted execution layer for AI agents. It lets your agent call the GuestConfiguration, or any other public or private API you need. You set the rules, the agent never sees your credentials, and every call is logged.

Install Jentic One Beta (Self-Hosted)

Jentic One Host machine

# On the machine that will host your Jentic One instance:
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | sh

Agent machine

# On the machine where your agent runs (keep this separate from the instance):
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jentic/jentic-one/main/tools/install.sh | sh
jentic register       # connects your agent to your Jentic One instance

Jentic One is in public beta. The setup above keeps your agent separate from the instance, which is what you want before using real credentials: an agent running as the same OS user as Jentic One can read its stored keys directly. Just evaluating? A single local install is fine to start. See the secure deployment guide for the tiers.

Capabilities

What an agent can do with GuestConfiguration API.

Assign a guest configuration package to a specific Azure VM

List all guest configuration assignments on a given VM

Retrieve the current state of a single configuration assignment

Delete a guest configuration assignment to remove the baseline from a VM

GET STARTED

Start building with GuestConfiguration API

Explore with Jentic

View OpenAPI Document

Use for: I need to assign a security baseline to VM 'web01', List all guest configuration assignments on VM 'db-prod', Retrieve the latest compliance report for the 'baseline' assignment, Check whether VM 'app-server' is compliant with its assigned configuration

Not supported: Does not author configuration packages, manage Azure Policy assignments, or run runbooks — use for assigning guest configuration baselines to VMs and reading their compliance reports only.

Jentic publishes the only available OpenAPI document for GuestConfiguration, keeping it validated and agent-ready.

Jentic publishes the only available OpenAPI specification for GuestConfiguration, keeping it validated and agent-ready. The Azure Guest Configuration API assigns and audits in-guest configuration policies on Azure VMs through the Microsoft.GuestConfiguration resource provider. It lets operators apply DSC-based configuration packages, read compliance reports per VM, and enumerate the operations the resource provider supports. The API is delivered as part of Azure Resource Manager and authenticated via Azure AD OAuth2 against management.azure.com.

Use Cases

Patterns agents use GuestConfiguration API for, with concrete tasks.

★ Apply a security baseline to a VM fleet

Assign a guest configuration package such as a CIS Windows baseline to each VM via PUT on guestConfigurationAssignments. The Microsoft.GuestConfiguration extension on the VM downloads the package, applies it, and reports compliance back to Azure. Suitable for organisations with regulatory baseline requirements.

Create a guestConfigurationAssignment named 'CIS-Windows' on VM 'web01' that references the CIS Windows configuration package.

Continuous compliance reporting

Read the latest compliance report from each assignment to confirm whether VMs match their assigned baselines. The reports list endpoint returns historical reports; the get-by-ID endpoint pulls a specific report for forensic analysis. Useful for daily automated compliance dashboards.

List GuestConfigurationAssignmentReports for 'CIS-Windows' on VM 'web01' and return any report whose complianceStatus is 'NonCompliant'.

Decommission a baseline on retired hosts

Delete the guest configuration assignment when a VM is retired or moves out of scope. The DELETE endpoint removes the ARM assignment record so Azure stops requesting compliance reports from that VM. Useful at the end of a workload migration.

Delete the 'CIS-Windows' guestConfigurationAssignment from VM 'web01' as part of decommissioning the host.

AI agent-driven compliance remediation

A compliance agent uses Jentic to fetch reports for every assignment, identify NonCompliant VMs, and either re-assign the package or escalate to a human. Jentic resolves natural-language intents to the right ARM operation and injects the bearer token at execution, so the agent never holds raw Azure credentials.

Use Jentic to search for 'list azure guest configuration compliance reports', load GuestConfigurationAssignmentReports_List, and flag every VM in resource group 'web-rg' with a NonCompliant report in the last 24 hours.

Key Endpoints

7 endpoints — jentic publishes the only available openapi specification for guestconfiguration, keeping it validated and agent-ready.

METHOD

PATH

DESCRIPTION

PUT

/subscriptions/{subscriptionId}/resourceGroups/{resourceGroupName}/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/{vmName}/providers/Microsoft.GuestConfiguration/guestConfigurationAssignments/{guestConfigurationAssignmentName}

Create or update a guest configuration assignment on a VM

GET

/subscriptions/{subscriptionId}/resourceGroups/{resourceGroupName}/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/{vmName}/providers/Microsoft.GuestConfiguration/guestConfigurationAssignments

List assignments on a VM

DELETE

Delete an assignment

GET

List compliance reports for an assignment

GET

Get a specific compliance report

GET

/providers/Microsoft.GuestConfiguration/operations

List supported provider operations

PUT

Create or update a guest configuration assignment on a VM

GET

/subscriptions/{subscriptionId}/resourceGroups/{resourceGroupName}/providers/Microsoft.Compute/virtualMachines/{vmName}/providers/Microsoft.GuestConfiguration/guestConfigurationAssignments

List assignments on a VM

DELETE

Delete an assignment

GET

List compliance reports for an assignment

Why though Jentic?

Three things that make agents converge on Jentic-routed access.

Credential isolation

Azure service principal credentials sit encrypted in the Jentic vault. Agents receive a scoped Azure AD bearer token at execution time — the client secret never leaves the vault.

Intent-based discovery

Agents search Jentic for 'assign guest configuration to azure vm' or 'read compliance reports' and Jentic returns the matching guestConfigurationAssignments operation with its input schema.

Time to first call

Direct ARM integration: 2-3 days for AAD setup, ARM long-running operation handling, and report polling. Through Jentic: under 1 hour — search, load schema, execute.

Related APIs

Alternatives and complements available in the Jentic catalogue.

Complementary

Azure Policy

Defines policies that can include guest configuration baselines as compliance rules.

Use Azure Policy when the agent needs to declare a guest configuration baseline as part of a broader policy assignment across many subscriptions.

Complementary

Azure Compute Management

Manage the underlying Azure VMs that guest configuration assignments target.

Pair with Compute when the agent needs to provision VMs before assigning them a guest configuration baseline.

Alternative

Azure Automation

DSC and runbook-based configuration management as an alternative path to in-guest config.

Use Azure Automation DSC when the agent needs broader runbook orchestration rather than ARM-tracked assignment objects.

FAQs

Specific to using GuestConfiguration API through Jentic.

Why is there no official OpenAPI spec for GuestConfiguration?

Microsoft Azure does not publish a stand-alone OpenAPI specification for the Guest Configuration API. Jentic generates and maintains this spec from the Microsoft.GuestConfiguration ARM surface so that AI agents and developers can call GuestConfiguration via structured tooling. It is validated against the live API and kept up to date. Get started at https://app.jentic.com/sign-up.

What authentication does the Guest Configuration API use?

It uses Azure AD OAuth2 against management.azure.com, declared as the azure_auth security scheme. Through Jentic, your Azure service principal credentials are stored encrypted and exchanged for a scoped bearer token at execution time.

Can I read compliance reports for a VM through this API?

Yes. Use GET on /subscriptions/.../guestConfigurationAssignments/{name}/reports to list reports, or .../reports/{reportId} to fetch a specific one. Each report includes the assignment's complianceStatus and the resources it inspected.

What are the rate limits?

Azure Resource Manager applies subscription-level throttles — roughly 12,000 reads and 1,200 writes per hour per subscription. Compliance report polling should be batched per VM rather than per resource.

How do I assign a baseline to a VM through Jentic?

Run jentic.search('assign azure guest configuration to a vm'), load the GuestConfigurationAssignments_CreateOrUpdate schema, and execute it with the subscription, resource group, VM name, assignment name, and a body referencing the configuration package. Compliance status appears under the matching reports endpoint within minutes.