Problem with dnsServerList when cloning

[BigBlueMike]

Hello,

I have a problem and hope one of you could help me with this.

I am basically using the workflow "Clone, Windows with multiple NICs and credentia"l but have made some modification so it supports VMXnet3 and distributed switches.

I am cloning a Windows 2008R2 Datacenter VM with zero NICs and attach two new NICs.

Everything works fine but when the VM is cloned and the sysprep is done the DNS Servers are configured to the wrong NIC.

The 1st NIC is configures fine but DNS servers are missing.

The 2nd NIC is configured also fine but instead of having no DNS servers it has the two configured that should actually be attached to the first one.

If I now configure DNS for both NICs the sysprep fails into a reboot loop complaining that a parameter has been used twice.

For me it looks like the sysprep file or unattended xml file is not build right

The command "nicSettingMaps.push(adapterMapping);" is pushing the different IP settings of the different NIC into one array.  Can it be possible there is something wrong?

The getCustomizationSpec action which apparently builds the sysprep spec looks fine to me too.

I don't even know where is should start looking.

Help is much appreciated.

vCenter 4.1

vCO 4.1.1

[msatya]

unattended xml file is not build right

dont try above  one,please follow sysprep method and log

-------------------------
please award points if you see fit.Thanks

[tschoergez]

Hi!

I'm quite sure the problem is not vCO related: The dns settings are part of the GlobalIPSettings, and not part of the NIC settings map in the vSphere API data model.

So, to rule out vCO: Can you try to use another "client" for the vSphere API with the same example (via PowerCLI or vijavatoolkit or ...)?

(I expect to see the same result)

Do you know how to specify the stuff you want manually in a sysprep-answer file? Then you could try to use this as a workaround.

And of course: This might also be an issue related to sysprep itself, so you should try to research in this direction as well....

Do you see something in the sysprep-logfiles inside the new guest?

( usually C:\Windows\TEMP\vmware-imc\guestcust.log )

some references:

http://communities.vmware.com/thread/311899?tstart=0

http://www.vcoportal.de/2011/04/customize-a-virtual-machine/

Regards,

Joerg

[BigBlueMike]

Thx guys.

I found a solution or workaround if you will.

If I enter DnsDomain string for each of the NICs the DnsServerList is attached correctly to each of the NICs.  And DnsServerList can also be empty so it can be only attached to one NIC.  But I still find it strange that it chokes on the empty DnsDomain string.  It should be an optional parameter.

[thechaos]

Ich bin ab Mittwoch den 28.11.2011 wieder zu erreichen. E-Mails werden nicht weitergeleitet.

[tschoergez]

ok, thanks for sharing this!

Indeed the complete guest customization seems sometimes a bit "overengineered", and too less documented to catch all the possible combinations.

And it does not always match to the sysprep internals one-to-one, as we saw here.

At all: Not an Orchestrator problem, but it should go to the vSphere API team.... (maybe you can open a Support Request?)

Regards,

Joerg