vCenter upgrade from 5.1 to 5.5 and consolidation

[vinod_sikka]

I have SSO, Inventory service and vCenter installed on separate machines. I need to upgrade then from 5.1 U1 to 5.5 U1 but I like to have all three components installed on my vCenter server during upgrade.

I tried installing SSO 5.5 on my vCenter server but for obvious reasons it did not detect previous version of SSO installed on same server as it is running on a separate machine and therefore it just installed SSO on it as fresh install and same for Inventory service.

How could I achieve this upgrade and have them running on a single machine which would be vCenter server VM.

Thanks,

[pratjain]

There is no easy way to accomplish this.

For sso because 5.5 SSO does not have a database and the configuration can only be restored/backup for same versions . Same wo

Installing fresh SSO and Inventory service would not have that much impact on vCenter Functionality as vCenter Would still point to its existing database however in this case you would have to uninstall reinstall vCenter.

Also note that you before doing a fresh install of Inventory service check if you are using Storage Profiles in vCenter or any component which leverages Storage Profiles.    

[vinod_sikka]

Thanks for your reply, do we need to re-install VC, I would rather prefer to run upgrade of vCenter 5,5 over my existing vCenter 5.1. Secondly, what if take SSO DB backup, uninstall it from its dedicated virtual machine. Re-install SSO 5.1 on my vCenter pointing to backup SSO DB and then run SSO 5.5 setup so it would detect earlier version and proceed for SSO 5.5 upgrade.

BR,

[vRick31]

I think this should work...but have not tested it myself.

1. Install SSO 5.1 on the current vCenter server (which I assume is still on 5.1)
2. Back up your existing SSO DB - kb.vmware.com/kb/2034928
3. Restore the backed up SSO DB to your new instance
4. Associate vCenter with the new SSO instance  - kb.vmware.com/kb/2033620‎
5. Then go forward with your upgrade

Good luck -

Rick

[vinod_sikka]

Thanks for sharing related KBs, I will test it and share the outcome !!

[King_Robert]

vSphere 5.5 requires you to install vCenter Single Sign-On (SSO) and install or upgrade the Inventory Service. You can install SSO and upgrade the Inventory Service and vCenter Server all on a single host machine using the vCenter Server Simple Install option

Simple install and you can install the components separately. see the below URL for more detail.

VMware KB: Methods of upgrading to vCenter Server 5.5

[vinod_sikka]

I went through this KB before but it does not talk about scenario I have. I can use simple install or Custom method to install all three components but it will not detect earlier version of SSO on my vcenter server as it is installed on another VM, let me re-iterate :-

My existing VSphere 5.1 setup has SSO installed on SSOVM01, Inventory service on INVENVM01 & vCenter installed on VCVM01. I want to have all three upgraded to 5.5 U1 & installed on VCVM01. So tradition way of simple install or custom would simply install SSO & inventory service on VCVM01, they would not find any previous version.

However vCenter's earlier version would be detected as I am running the setup on VCVM01 itself. So to get all of them upgraded, this is the plan : -

I think this should work...but have not tested it myself.

1. Install SSO 5.1 on the current vCenter server (which I assume is still on 5.1)
2. Back up your existing SSO DB - kb.vmware.com/kb/2034928
3. Restore the backed up SSO DB to your new instance
4. Associate vCenter with the new SSO instance  - kb.vmware.com/kb/2033620
5. Then go forward with your upgrade

Please suggest if you think otherwise.

Thanks,

[stevied82]

What did you find the best approach in the end?

[vinod_sikka]

Hi Rick,

While following steps you suggested, I took backup of SSO, stopped SSO service on SSOVM01.

Ran autorun.exe of vcenter 5.1 for SSO installation on my vcenter server "VCVM01" as per kb.vmware.com/kb/2034928.

SSO installed successfully.

I tried installing Inventory service on my vcenter server "VCVM01" but its failing with following error in ssoreg.log file :-

C0B9-4A86-9207-E64448CBA66B}\certs -d https://VCVM01.ads.mckinsey.com:7444/lookupservice/sdk -u admin@System-Domain -p *****

[2014-09-04 08:27:09,745 main  INFO  com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Intializing registration provider...

[2014-09-04 08:27:09,746 main  INFO  com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Getting SSL certificates for https://VCVM01.ads.mckinsey.com:7444/lookupservice/sdk

[2014-09-04 08:27:10,183 main  DEBUG com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Establishing socket connection to VCVM01.ads.mckinsey.com/157.191.229.152:7444. Timeout is 60000

[2014-09-04 08:27:10,320 main  DEBUG com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Creating VMODL client for LookupService

[2014-09-04 08:27:11,155 main  DEBUG com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Getting the locations of SSO admin server and STS

[2014-09-04 08:27:11,259 main  INFO  com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Getting SSL certificates for https://SSOVM01.ads.mckinsey.com:7444/sso-adminserver/sdk

[2014-09-04 08:27:11,260 main  DEBUG com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Establishing socket connection to SSOVM01.ads.mckinsey.com/157.191.229.149:7444. Timeout is 60000

[2014-09-04 08:27:12,272 main  ERROR com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl] Unable to connect to server

[2014-09-04 08:27:12,274 main  DEBUG com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl]

java.net.ConnectException: Connection refused: connect

  at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.socketConnect(Native Method)

  at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.doConnect(PlainSocketImpl.java:351)

  at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.connectToAddress(PlainSocketImpl.java:213)

  at java.net.PlainSocketImpl.connect(PlainSocketImpl.java:200)

  at java.net.SocksSocketImpl.connect(SocksSocketImpl.java:366)

  at java.net.Socket.connect(Socket.java:529)

  at com.sun.net.ssl.internal.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.connect(SSLSocketImpl.java:564)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl.getSslCertificates(RegistrationProviderImpl.java:312)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl.initialize(RegistrationProviderImpl.java:236)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.impl.RegistrationProviderImpl.<init>(RegistrationProviderImpl.java:133)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.RegistrationProviderFactory.getRegistrationProvider(RegistrationProviderFactory.java:143)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.RegistrationProviderFactory.getRegistrationProvider(RegistrationProviderFactory.java:60)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.cli.commands.CommandArgumentsParser.createServiceProvider(CommandArgumentsParser.java:253)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.cli.commands.CommandArgumentsParser.parseCommand(CommandArgumentsParser.java:99)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.cli.commands.CommandFactory.createValidateLsCommand(CommandFactory.java:36)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.cli.RegTool.process(RegTool.java:86)

  at com.vmware.vim.install.cli.RegTool.main(RegTool.java:33)

[2014-09-04 08:27:12,277 main  ERROR com.vmware.vim.install.cli.commands.CommandArgumentsParser] Unable to connect to server

[2014-09-04 08:27:12,278 main  INFO  com.vmware.vim.install.cli.RegTool] Return code is: ServiceNotResponding

So it is still trying to look for SSL certificate from old SSO server "ssovm01" rather looking in new one "vcvm01"

Could you please help to resolve this?

[vinod_sikka]

any help on this will be highly appreciated!

[DonPr]

i believe the way to accomplish this is:

0) back everything up

1) upgrade the current distributed vCenter Single Sign-On 5.1 instance to version 5.5.

2) install a new instance of vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 to your existing vCenter Server 5.1 (virtual) machine, specifying that it is an additional instance, placing it in the already created vsphere.local security domain.

3) On the vCenter Server 5.1 machine, install the vCenter Web Client 5.5 pointed at the newly-installed local vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 instance.

3) On the vCenter Server 5.1 machine, install the vCenter Inventory Service pointed at the newly-installed local vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 instance.

4) On the vCenter Server 5.1 machine, upgrade vCenter Server to 5.5 pointed at the local vCenter Server Single Sign-On 5.5 instance.

5) Power down the original separate SSO and Inventory Service instances and verify functionality.