Is the server a VM

Issue: Have you ever worked at a large company and get someone telling you their server is a VM but you can’t locate it?

What might have happened:

1. the servers name was changed at on the VM or OS and someone has the new or old name and it no longer synced correctly
2. out of date inventory/cmdb
3. it could be physical
4. DNS alias

A workaround:

Here are some commands that will help track down the system, you can twink a few of these commands to get additional data. You will need access to the server OS that you are trying to track down for these commands to work.

Linux:
dmidecode -t system | grep ‘Manufacture\|Product\|Version\|Serial Number\|UUID’
dmesg | grep -i hypervisor (maybe)
ifconfig
hostname

Windows:
wmic computersystem get model,name,manufacturer,systemtype
ipconfig /all
hostname

Solaris:
prtdiag -v | head -3
/usr/sbin/ifconfig -a
arp -a
/usr/bin/netstat -pn | grep SP
ipadm show-addr (solaris 11+)
hostname
uname -n

How to change SRM DB password

The issue:

You need to change or already did change your database password that site recovery manager is using. In my case someone change the password and didn’t update it in SRM so the service wouldn’t start anymore.

The Fix:

1. open cmd
2. navigate to your SRM install directory and then the bin folder
3. installcreds.exe -key db:databasename -u databaseuserid
4. enter your new password

 

 

TSM error ANS2310E

Issue:

TSM for VE will sometimes give error ANS2310E The create snapshot task is disabled on the virtual machine ‘*’. As a result, the virtual machine cannot be backed up.

Cause:

If the VM is getting vmotioned or storage vmotioned, snapshot tasks will fail and this error will be created.

Solution:

Retry the backup job at a later time after the vmotion is complete.

File copy error

The Error: Error 0x80090006: Invalid Signature

The Problem: We have had a few vmware VMs with some file copy problems. And they have produced some very odd messages.

The Workaround: Is to vmotion them to a new host. Seems to be an issue with the hosts physical network cards and network corruption.

OVF Tool error converting a OVA hardware version 4 VM

Trying to convert a OVA file that created a vmware hardware version 4 vm was giving the error below with OVF Tool 2.0.1

Error:

– Virtual machine has 8,194 megabytes of memory, which is outside the range of 4 to 3,600 megabytes supported on the host.  This may be a general limitation of the host software, or specific to the guest OS selected for the virtual machine.

The Fix

Locate the correct hardware version xml file default location is “C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware OVF Tool\env\ovftool-hw4-config-option.xml” in the xml file you will find two memmax values (you can do a search for 3600 to locate them, just increase them to the number that the error is stating your VM has to get it to work.

How to roll up a vmware snapshot that is to large

Problem:

A very old and large snapshot was removed from snapshot manager it said it completed, a month later the datastore was full that the VM was in. Looking in to the files for that VM it was found that the snapshot disks where still in the VM’s folder directory. But nothing was in the snapshot manager. Migrate/svmotion was also failing to move the disks out to a different datastore with space.

 

The Fix:

1. Get a temp datastore created for size of all the drives on that system that have snapshot disks (hostname-000001.vmdk)
2. clone the disks via command line, pointing the source vmdk to clone the snapshot disk and point the destination as the new datastore
3. after the clone are done and all your vmdk files have been cloned and all data rolled up you can delete your old data from the old data store
4. then copy the vmdk files from your temp datastore to your old datastore
5. remove temp datastore

Note: To commit a snapshot you need twice the space of the snapshot to commit it, if you don’t it will fail.

How to change the keyboard for VMWare ESX

Problem:

Someone installed ESX in a different country and picked there language. Now you have to fix a problem on the console or via ssh and can’t type your commands

The Fix:

1. loadkeys xx from the command line (the xx for US is us) Note: this will only be a temp change until the next reboot

To fix it for good:

NOTE: make a backup of your files before making changes to them

1. edit “/etc/sysconfig/keyboard”
2. change KEYTABLE=”xx” to KEYTABLE=”us” for us keyboard

VMWare update manager errors

The Problem:

1. Getting errors: “There are errors during the scan operation” and “There are errors during the remediation operation”
2. Detailed error for both: “Patch metadata for xxx.xxx.com missing. Please download updates metadata first.”

The Fix:

1. Find a vmware form on it, that linked to a KB about the problem.

The Second Problem:

1. The vci-integrity.xml was set the way it needed to be from the vmware KB
2. The system was only using one NIC

The Second Fix:

1. Run the update manager scheduled task in vCenter
2. Once finished with out errors, Restart the Update Manager Service

Increase ESX heartbeat to vCenter

How to increase your heartbeat timeout for your ESX hosts to vCenter. Normally every ESX host sends a heartbeat every 10 sec and the virtual center (vCenter) waits 20sec for that heartbeat. This should not be a problem if you have a good network or good links for remote sites. But if you have a slow link to a remote site that can mean that your hosts might show up as not responding when they are.

 

The fix:

Note! do a back up of your vpxd.cfg file first

locate the vpxd.cfg file at C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\VMware\VMware VirtualCenter\ and add in the <vpxd> </vpxd>

 

     <heartbeat>
       <notRespondingTimeout>60</notRespondingTimeout>
     </heartbeat>

Then restart the virtualcenter server service

Netapp Virtual Storage Console for VMware vSphere

Netapp has released a new plugin for VMware vSphere called Virtual Storage Console (VSC) that works with the VMware ESX Host Utilities and your Netapp filers to give you a more detailed view of your storage. You can view some screenshots from http://blogs.netapp.com/storage_nuts_n_bolts/2009/06/virtual-storage-console.html

and you can download the plugin from the netapp now site under the download section. This is a free plugin for netapp customers.