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13 Replies Last post: Nov 6, 2009 8:37 AM by twd711  

ESX Host Update Error posted: Nov 4, 2009 8:51 AM

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twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009

Good afternoon,

I have been updating our ESX Hosts using Update manager and ran into an issue with one of the servers. Update Manager was stalling when applying patches to one particular host so I went ahead and tried to manually apply the patches. I am receiving the following error:

INFO: No repository URL specified, going with file:///temp/April/ESX350-200904405-BG
INFO: Configuring...
INFO: Preparing to install ...
INFO: The following RPMs are already installed on the system and will be skipped:
INFO: Downloading kernel-vmnix-350.2.4.21-57.EL.158874.i686.rpm...
INFO: Checking disk space and running test transaction...
INFO: Running yum install <1 packages>...
INFO: | Gathering header information file(s) from server(s)
INFO: | Server: Bundle ESX350-200904405-BG
INFO: | Finding updated packages
INFO: | Downloading needed headers
INFO: | Resolving dependencies
INFO: | Dependencies resolved
INFO: | I will do the following:
INFO: | update: kernel-vmnix 350.2.4.21-57.EL.158874.i686
INFO: | Downloading Packages
INFO: | Getting kernel-vmnix-350.2.4.21-57.EL.158874.i686.rpm
INFO: | Running test transaction:
INFO: | Test transaction complete, Success!
INFO: | kernel-vmnix 100 % done 1/2
INFO: | error: unpacking of archive failed on file /boot/System.map-2.4.21-57.ELvmnix;4af1aefd: cpio: open
INFO: | Updated: kernel-vmnix 350.2.4.21-57.EL.158874.i686
INFO: | Transaction(s) Complete
INFO: Yum failed to install new pkgs
INFO: --- TOTALS: 0 packages installed, 1 pending or failed, 0 removed, 0 excluded ---
ERROR: A failure occurred while installing or removing packages.
ERROR: Check /var/log/vmware/esxupdate.log for details.
ERROR: Upgrade Failed. Error class: vmware.esxupdate.errors.IncompleteUpgradeError

I then went ahead and checked the /var/log/vmware/esxupdate.log file and this is what I am seeing

09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Downloading needed headers
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Resolving dependencies
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Dependencies resolved
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | I will do the following:
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | update: kernel-vmnix 350.2.4.21-57.EL.158874.i686
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Downloading Packages
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Getting kernel-vmnix-350.2.4.21-57.EL.158874.i686.rpm
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Running test transaction:
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Test transaction complete, Success!
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | kernel-vmnix 100 % done 1/2
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | error: unpacking of archive failed on file /boot/System.map-2.4.21-57.ELvmnix;4af1aefd: cpio: open
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Updated: kernel-vmnix 350.2.4.21-57.EL.158874.i686
09Nov04-1142 INFO: yum: | Transaction(s) Complete
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: session: Checking status of 2 rpms...
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: install: Matching package name 2 and NAVR 1
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: session: install pend : kernel-vmnix.i686
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: session: -- Total 1 pending 1 installed 0
09Nov04-1142 INFO: summary: Yum failed to install new pkgs
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: states: Entering 11:42:38 11/04/09 UpgradeFailed
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: install: Install cleanup...
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: system: LogCommand(rm -f /etc/vmware/esx.conf.WRITELOCK)
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: system: LogCommand(rm -f /var/lib/rpm/__db*)
09Nov04-1142 INFO: summary: --- TOTALS: 0 packages installed, 1 pending or failed, 0 removed, 0 excluded ---
09Nov04-1142 ERROR: states: A failure occurred while installing or removing packages.
09Nov04-1142 ERROR: states: Check /var/log/vmware/esxupdate.log for details.
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: lock: Lock file /var/run/esxupdate.pid deleted
09Nov04-1142 DEBUG: root: Final state: UpgradeFailed
09Nov04-1142 ERROR: root: Upgrade Failed. Error class: vmware.esxupdate.errors.IncompleteUpgradeError

Any help would be appreciated

Re: ESX Host Update Error

1. Nov 4, 2009 9:18 AM in response to: twd711
Click to view AndreTheGiant's profile Guru
AndreTheGiant
5,897 posts since
Aug 28, 2008
Do you have enough space?
What's the output of df -h command?

Andre

Re: ESX Host Update Error

2. Nov 4, 2009 10:10 AM in response to: AndreTheGiant
Click to view twd711's profile Enthusiast
twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sda2 4.9G 2.4G 2.2G 53% /
/dev/sda1 97M 38M 55M 41% /boot
none 391M 0 391M 0% /dev/shm
/dev/sda6 2.0G 440M 1.4G 24% /var/log
/dev/cdrom 684M 684M 0 100% /mnt/cdrom

Regards,

Re: ESX Host Update Error

3. Nov 4, 2009 9:33 AM in response to: twd711
Click to view AndreTheGiant's profile Guru
AndreTheGiant
5,897 posts since
Aug 28, 2008
Seems you have enough space... but you have and error in package decompression:
error: unpacking of archive failed on file /boot/System.map-2.4.21-57.ELvmnix;4af1aefd: cpio: open

Have you tried to repeat the patch operation, maybe the packages are corrupted.

Andre

Re: ESX Host Update Error

4. Nov 4, 2009 10:14 AM in response to: AndreTheGiant
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twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009
I've tried running the patch multiple times with the same outcome. Are the packages you are referring to from the patch itself or are those packages that were already installed on the machine? Can I copy the same packages from my other hosts?

Re: ESX Host Update Error

5. Nov 4, 2009 10:14 AM in response to: AndreTheGiant
Click to view twd711's profile Enthusiast
twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009
What's interesting is that when I do an esxupdate --test update, it
comes back as being successful. Not sure if that helps with anything. I
seem to recall that I have had issues with the host in the past since
it was upgraded from an earlier version of ESX to 3.5U4 and possibly
done incorrectly whereas the other hosts (which patched fine) had clean
installs of 3.5.

Re: ESX Host Update Error

6. Nov 4, 2009 10:30 AM in response to: twd711
Click to view AndreTheGiant's profile Guru
AndreTheGiant
5,897 posts since
Aug 28, 2008
Can I copy the same packages from my other hosts?
Yes.
Also you can try to do a manually install (be sure that your ESX is in maintenance mode) with esxupdate

Andre

Re: ESX Host Update Error

7. Nov 4, 2009 10:47 AM in response to: AndreTheGiant
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twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009
I have actually tried doing the manual esxupdate and it does the same thing.

One /boot (on patched server) has the following

-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 26861 Oct 7 19:11 config-2.4.21-58.ELvmnix
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 1024 May 15 05:34 grub
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 10142691 Oct 21 15:47 initrd-2.4.21-58.ELvmnix.img
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 11430012 Oct 21 15:47 initrd-2.4.21-58.ELvmnix.img-dbg
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 137683 Oct 19 16:22 initrd-2.4.21-58.ELvmnix.img-sc
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 615 May 14 06:05 kernel.h
drwx

Re: ESX Host Update Error

8. Nov 4, 2009 10:52 AM in response to: twd711
Click to view AndreTheGiant's profile Guru
AndreTheGiant
5,897 posts since
Aug 28, 2008
Sorry... no other idea.
Just to be sure try to create a file in /boot to see if you have some errors... also check if you have I/O error with dmesg command (see last rows).

Andre

Re: ESX Host Update Error

9. Nov 4, 2009 11:05 AM in response to: AndreTheGiant
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twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009
I tried to create a new file and it tells me that /boot is a read only file system.

I ended up remounting /boot as a result and I can now write files to /boot. Just re-ran the patch and it looks like it took!

Thanks for your help

Re: ESX Host Update Error

10. Nov 4, 2009 11:23 AM in response to: twd711
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twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009

Trying to run the next patch and am running into problems yet again.

Could not move '/tmp/vmware.0.tmp' to '/boot/grub/grub.conf': Invalid cross-device link
2009-11-04 14:19:21 (2241) ERROR: Unable to create new grub.conf file. Reason Invalid cross-device link
2009-11-04 14:19:21 (2241) ERROR: Could not commit changes back to grub.conf.
2009-11-04 14:19:21 (2241) INFO : Releasing lock on file '/etc/vmware/esx.conf'.
2009-11-04 14:19:21 (2241) ERROR: /usr/sbin/esxcfg-boot failed, examine /var/log/vmware/esxcfg-boot.log for details.

Re: ESX Host Update Error

11. Nov 4, 2009 11:25 AM in response to: twd711
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twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009
I may just have to blow this host away and do a fresh install because there is obviously something very wrong with it.

Re: ESX Host Update Error

12. Nov 4, 2009 8:59 PM in response to: twd711
Click to view AndreTheGiant's profile Guru
AndreTheGiant
5,897 posts since
Aug 28, 2008
I tried to create a new file and it tells me that /boot is a read only file system.
You must umount, use fsck.ext3 /dev/XXX to fix the filesystem and then remount again.

Andre

Re: ESX Host Update Error

13. Nov 6, 2009 8:37 AM in response to: AndreTheGiant
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twd711
24 posts since
May 27, 2009

I ended up trashing the system and reloading/reconfiguring it. Was able to load it into VCenter and successfully patch it using update manager. I think the ESX configuration was incorrect for some reason due to the previous SA (who has never used VMware) having inproperly updated/patch the system from an older version of 3.5 to 3.5U4.

Thanks for all of your help.

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