Orphaned Template

[kellino]

Not sure how this happened, but all our Virtual Center templates are now "orphaned". The only thing I can think of is that our hosts were removed from a cluster and then added back in. All the VM's are fine, but we just lost the templates which are on the same datastores.

In any case, it seems that there is no solution for orphaned objects and that they must be removed from the inventory. I can do this, but then how do I import then back in?

Thanks!

[KC_Brent]

I had the same problem after upgrading from 2.5x to 3.x. After adding them back it happened again a few days later. It hasn't happened since though.

[PaulL]

Also having this problem. I re-register and a couple of days later they become orphaned again. Have logged a call with VMware.

[Scott_Westberg]

I had this happen today. It looks like when we shutdown all of our ESX servers for Airconditioner maintenance, one of the servers (the one the templates were actually built from) hung during startup. Our VC server was up and running before this server was restarted. We noticed all of our templates were orphaned. A reboot of the VC server cleared this (we are still in testing for our VM environment) and all templates were available. Odd, but true...

[CWedge]

One of mine decided to leave today ahhhhhhgain....

I'm tiring of this.

[TalesFromDogRiv]

The workaround is to run

service mgmt-vmware restart

on every ESX server.

[juchestyle]

Just an FYI - This command restarts the Service Console.

The workaround is to run

service mgmt-vmware restart

n every ESX server.

Respectfully,

[CWedge]

That's no fun in a 16 Node cluster

[kgouldsk]

I'm repeatedly having this problem as well. There seem to be a lot of people dealing with this annoying issue, which is unpredictable and can come at the most inopportune times. Any chance we can see some kind of statement from VMware on whether this is being looked at? Someone reading this must be able to find out. I think everyone would like some kind of response.

[bbourdua]

A power outage took my VC server down and when it restarted the templates were not orphaned anymore, making me think it might be a VC issue more than an ESX one.

Next time it happens I'll definitely be looking at VC. Maybe restarting the VC service would do the trick.

I had VMware support look at this and didn't get anything helpful out of them. They blamed my storage unit (ya right!) and gave me the workaround way of removing the templates from the inventory and adding them again. Pretty disappointing.

[ksinclair]

I was just about to call Tech Support concerning this issue but decided to browse the forum first. We noticed our templates in (orphaned mode) yesterday. Our problem is a bit unique though in that our templates are hosted on our 2.5x ESX Server. I cannot say for sure when the templates went into orphaned mode but we are currently in the process of migrating servers from the 2.5x Servers to a newly built cluster running 3.01. The fix with removing the template from inventory and in short putting it back does not work because I don't have the configuration tab available to me form the 2.5x host where the templates reside. We did have a power outage 3 days ago so my guess is that they're related. Any ideas how I can restore my templates?

Thanks Kerwin

[avarcher]

Not exactly, it restarts the host agent daemon on the service console, not the entire beast.

I found I got orphaned templates when restarting a blade enclosure where the ESX server blades started before the SAN switch had completed it's startup, the VMs came back OK after a subsequent SAN rescan but restarting the host agent daemon (service mgmt-vmware restart) had to be done to fix the templates.

[DaveInFC]

We're also seeing this issue. (ESX 3.0.1-32039 with patches ESX-1006511 ESX-1410076 ESX-2158032)

Seems to happen for no apparent reason.

[kgouldsk]

I haven't seen this happen since I put the latest build of Virtualcenter in several weeks ago. I'm guessing the agent gets upgraded and fixes the issue. Have you upgraded yet?

[bbourdua]

Well this one is confirmed. Restarting the VirtualCenter service brings the templates back online. At least on build 32042.

[ColBaby]

Same here. I had just two of my templates go orphaned. Restarting the Virtual Center Server service on the VC box, then restarting my VC client has brought my templates back to life. (VC Version 2.0.1 build 32042)

[CWedge]

Just a post here on my experience.

After Patching to 2.0.1 I didn't have the problem anymore.

I now have all the patches for ESX 3.0.1 and all is well.

So fear not all...Your fix is a Patch away!

[brightg]

Hi there I just came across this post for the first time, thanks all for your help. Restarting the vc service does fix this issue for me but sadly for me at least the bug is still there in 2.0.1 40644.

As a note they don't all get orphanded at the same time they will slow go one by one

TIA

Gary

[CWedge]

Try atleast up to the March patches for ESX.

[GVM]

yep, we scored this issue as well. VC 2.0.1 40644. only just upgraded to it a week ago. have never seen this behaviour before upgrade. funny that

edit : restarted the VC service and they came back.

can anyone say patch 3 vmware?

Message was edited by: GVM

GVM

[Mork]

I have had this issue many many times and have never found a reason for it.

It doesn't seem to matter if a host goes offline or if nothing changes...

Unfortunately, restarting the VC service adhoc is not really an option for me as I have some critical systems that need to have their remote console available via the VC web service for operational reasons.

My VC is on build 40644 (patch 2).

My Production ESX hosts are only on build 35804 but my Test hosts are on build 39823 and this happens for both my Production and Test templates.

Sure would be nice to know a proper fix!