Month: September 2024

Testing VMware Cloud Foundation 4.x/5.x Depot Connections From The SDDC Manager CLI

CaptainvOPs

Blog Date: September 30, 2024

While working with a customer recently, they were having a problem testing the SDDC managers connectivity to the online VCF_DEPOT and the VXRAIL_DEPOT. This particular customer was using VCF on VXRAIL.

After doing some searching, I came across our knowledge base article entitled: Troubleshooting VCF Depot Connection Issues

SSH into the SDDC manager as VCF, and then su to root. To test connectivity to the VMware Cloud Foundation Depot, run following curl command:

curl -kv https://depot.vmware.com:443/PROD2/evo/vmw/index.v3 -u customer_connect_username

If you have a VCF deployment running on VXRAIL, there’s an additional Dell Depot that will contain the rail update packages. To test connectivity to both VXRAIL and VCF Depots, run the following command:

curl -v http://localhost/lcm/depot/statuses| json_pp

The Depots can return a couple of status from the curl command:

“Status” : “SUCCESS” (everything is working as expected)
“Status” : “NOT_INITIALIZED” (This could indicate a connection problem with the depot)
“Status” : “USER_NOT_SET” (the depot user has not been specified)

For my customer, the VCF_DEPOT had a “SUCCESS” status, but the VXRAIL_DEPOT had a status of “USER_NOT_SET”.

Basic pings to test:

ping depot.vmware.com
ping download.emc.com

Basic curl commands to test:

curl -v https://depot.vmware.com
curl -v https://download.emc.com

Broadcom also offers a public list of URLs that the SDDC manager uses. That list can be found here: Public URL list for SDDC Manager

vCenter MOB No Healthy Upstream Error in VMware Cloud Foundation 4.X

CaptainvOPs

Blog Date: September 25, 2024

One of my customers had a strange issue where the vCenter MOB wasn’t working on some of their vCenters in their VMware Cloud Foundation 4.X deployment.

The 10 vCenters are running in enhanced linked mode, and out of the 10, we only had one management vCenter where the MOB was working. All other services on the vCenter appear to be working fine.

On the vCenter, we can check and see if the vpxd-mob-pipe is listed in the following directory /var/run/vmware with the following command:

ls -la /var/run/vmware/

If we do not see vpxd-mob-pipe, then we need to look at the vpxd.cfg file. Specifically we are looking for the following parameter: <enableDebugBrowse>. If this is set to false, the MOB will not work.

vi /etc/vmware-vpx/vpxd.cfg

Once the vpxd.cfg opens, we can search the file by pressing the ‘ / ‘ key, and then enter:

/<enableDebugBrowse>

and then press enter.

This should take us to where we need to be. In my case, it was set to false as shown below:

<enableDebugBrowse>false</enableDebugBrowse>

Hit the ‘INSERT’ key, and change >false< to >true<.

<enableDebugBrowse>true</enableDebugBrowse>

Hit the ‘ESC’ key, and then hit the ‘ : ‘ key followed by entering ‘ wq! ‘ to save and exit the vpxd.cfg file. 

:wq!

Now we need to stop and start the vmware-vpxd service with the following command:

service-control --stop vmware-vpxd && service-control --start vmware-vpxd

Once the service restarts, you should now be able to access the vCenter MOB.