SRM with customization

[Billho201110141]

Dear All,

I have been setting up SRM 4.0 with ip customization between my production and DR sites. I was deploying to group of machines using the dr-ip-cutomizer. It words like a magic that the most of my vms can change their ip including windows ones and linux ones. BUT, what I encountered is... all my linux machines lost their hostname. All my VMs become "localhost" vms, i could see the /etc/sysconfig/network files have been updated. Yet, from the vmware srm 4.0 admin guide, it saids dr-ip-customizer will never ever touch the hostname.

On isolating the problem, I have re-done the SVM with the manual configured customization spec. I confirmed that I have chosen deplying the hostname same as the VM name. YET, I got the same result... My linux has again lost their hostname.

Any buddy has ecountered this problem or have any inspiration? Thx

[mal_michael]

Hi,

SRM ignores all sections of custom specification file besides networking one so hostname cannot be changed by it.

I am not Linux guru, but AFAIK if you change the hostname of Linux OS by running "hostname new_name", it will work until reboot, and then the name will revert to the previous one. Make sure this is not athe case in your environment.

What Linux favors and versions do you use? Maybe they are not supported for IP customization by SRM?

Michael.

[Billho201110141]

Thanks for replying!

I am using a various of linux say

suse linux ent 10 (64 bit)

Red Hat Linux 9

RHEL 5.5 (64 bit)

RHEL 4.5 (32 bit)

RHEL 3 (32 bit)

And even some vm applicance.

Yes some OS are not supported with the customization, but for any which supporting they got their hostname disappeared after SRM.

This is indeed strange.

[mal_michael]

What is the version of SRM you have installed? 4.0.0?

[Billho201110141]

yes right. 4.0.0

[mal_michael]

Then maybe you are experiencing an issue fixed in SRM 4.0.1:

http://www.vmware.com/support/srm/readme_srm-401.html

"a problem that could prevent IP customization from updating the /etc/hosts file on a protected virtual machine running Linux"

I am not sure if this directly addresses your problem.

Have you tried to run a test of Linux VMs without ip customization? Does the hostname preserved in that case?

[Billho201110141]

I did try test SRM without customization and the hostname is preserved. Therefore, I am quite sure it's the problem of customization which vmware claimed the hostname will not be changed.

Yet, wanna ask if the 4.0.0 can directly upgrade to 4.0.1, 4.0.2 or 4.1? Or instead, this has to be done by a fresh install?

[mal_michael]

Hi,

Yes, you can perform an upgrade.

First you need to upgrade your vCenter servers.

Upgrade to 4.0.1 or 4.0.2 is very simple. Upgrade to 4.1 requires 64bit OS both for vCenter and SRM, so it may require a lot of work:

http://blogs.vmware.com/uptime/2010/07/upgrading-to-srm-41-including-upgrading-to-vsphere-virtualcen...

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=102417...

Also, check if your SRA needs to be updated.

Unless you have a complex SRM setup with a lot of customizations, RPs, etc, I would recommend a fresh install.

Michael.

[Billho201110141]

Thx!!!! dude,

The problem is solved by an upgrade.

Now the hostname maintains.

Though, when testing failover the flash copy datastore cannot renamed to correct name, still works fine except that.

[mal_michael]

You are welcome!

What do you mean by "datastore cannot be renamed to correct name"?

[Billho201110141]

um, say I have a datastore named DS_test in my protected site, during srm test, it becomes snap-xxxxxx-DS_test.

But i have solved this problem, thanks.

It's the vmware-dr.xml configuration problem. After amending the field <fixRecoveredDatastoreNames>true</fixRecoveredDatastoreNames>, the datastore is renamed to DS_test correctly. Thanks.

[mal_michael]

You don't need to edit the xml file. In SRM 4 you can change the setting via GUI. Right click on Site Recovey and choose Advanced Settings.

[Billho201110141]

genius!! Thanks a lot. really learn a lot from you dude.