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alhamad
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

vCenter H/W and Service Status Plug-ins Errors

Just finished upgrading my vCenter to v4 from v2.5U4. All is OK except that two plug-ins are not starting:

vCenter Hardware Status, error: The following error occured while downloading the script plugin from : Unable to connect to the remote server

vCenter Service Status: error: The following error occured while downloading the script plugin from : Unable to connect to the remote server

Upon investigating, I found that port 8085 required by VMware VirtualCenter Management Webservices (tomcat) is in use by vCenter service (vpxd.exe):

TCP myserver:8085 rdp.alsalam.com.bh:0 LISTENING 18040 http://vpxd.exe

LifecycleException: service.getName(): "Catalina"; Protocol handler start failed: java.net.BindException: Address already in use: JVM_Bind:8085

Any thougts

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18 Replies
RParker
Immortal
Immortal

Yeah all I can say is welcome to the club. I did a vSphere installation like 10 times trying to fix this, every time it's a different problem.

Ironically this worked PERFECT installing vSphere in a VM. . . . . . But we don't want to do that, but I might if it proves to be the same performance.

Upon investigating, I found that port 8085 required by VMware VirtualCenter Management Webservices

You just gave me an idea, you can reconfigure these ports during install of vSphere, so you can change the port it's looking for...

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cclk
Contributor
Contributor

I am getting the same errors after upgrading my vCenter server to 4.0. Has anyone found the fix to this? Frustrating...

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alhamad
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

I actually esclated the issue to vmware support and working with them to find a solution which I will post once it is supplied.

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lamw
Community Manager
Community Manager

The fix is actually pretty simple and it has to do with DNS resolution of your vCenter server. From what I've seen in our small test lab, the guestOS hostname or netbios name is longer than what's supported and it's actually truncated, so when you try to load up the statistic your local system will try to do some resolution on the hostname which from what I've seen is in that error message. In your case, it's 'myserver' or whatever it is, I've seen our hostname truncated, so it's not matching what the system was setup.

Take a look at this VMware KB for the resolution: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1010641

I'm surprise VMware Support hasn't directed you to this fix, one you fix the IP Address in each of the extension plugins, then everything should start working and you'll be able to enable the plugins.

=========================================================================

William Lam

VMware vExpert 2009

VMware ESX/ESXi scripts and resources at:

VMware Code Central - Scripts/Sample code for Developers and Administrators

If you find this information useful, please award points for "correct" or "helpful".

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alhamad
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

They actually did, and it was not the cause of the issue.

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cclk
Contributor
Contributor

lamw,

I tried your suggestion as well and it did not fix the issue. I'm not getting an error that it can't resolve the name. The error is "unable to connect to the remote server". I think the problem is that port 8443 is not listening. When I do a netstat on the server that is running vCenter, I don not see port 8443 at all. Does anyone know how I can make it listen?

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alhamad
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

VMware support has reached the same conclusion, 8443 is not listening for some reason.

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cclk
Contributor
Contributor

do you have Altiris (HP RDP) installed by any chance on the server that you have vCenter server installed?

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alhamad
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Yes I do. I actually suspect this s/w when I first encountered the issue so I disabled all altiris services and restarted the server, however, still the same result.

Any suggestions?

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RParker
Immortal
Immortal

Any suggestions?

None so far, we still have the problem, and glad you identified the root cause, there is no listener. so it would be nice to figure how to start the listener, because ALL the services seem to be running....

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RParker
Immortal
Immortal

The fix is actually pretty simple and it has to do with DNS resolution of your vCenter server

The problem is with the service NOT the fact that the Status Tab is unavailable, 2 different problems.

"This issue is commonly noticed when one logs in to the remote client and finds that the vCenter Service Status icon in the Home page and the Hardware Status tab in the host view are not available."

Plus I installed the client ON Virtual Center Server. It STILL won't run, so this obviously isn't a DNS issue if I am using localhost, that resolves fine, as does the FQN and Netbios NAME. So if the client is local to the server, that rules out DNS.

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RParker
Immortal
Immortal

https://:8443/vws/Query/Health

What happens when you run that on a web browser to point to your ESX vCenter server?

I am getting:

"This request requires HTTP authentication (Not authorized to access this service.)."

Which means there is a permissions problem, that seems to be the crux of the issue.

It's in the tomcat/webapps/vws folder....

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cclk
Contributor
Contributor

I thought it was the altiris software as well. But i disabled also and it did not fix the issue. I suspect its the Tomcat service not allowing port 8443 to listen. I also have a support call in and the first thing they had me try was the DNS name not resolving issue. I already tried that and it obviously did not fix this since its not a DNS issue. So I am still waiting for another response from support.

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cclk
Contributor
Contributor

I went and disabled all the Altiris services on the server and rebooted. Once the server came up I checked the plug in manager and the error disappeared. So it seems to have something to do with Altiris blocking the post somehow. I am going to research if I can find out where in Altiris this is happening. I will post if I found out what it is.

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RParker
Immortal
Immortal

I will post if I found out what it is.

OK, do that. But run this command on your vCenter server (change the server name obviously) and see if you get the same error, HTTP us unauthorized, I think there are permissions problems also..

https://:8443/vws/Query/Health

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cclk
Contributor
Contributor

I do not get the unauthorized error. I get that internet explorer cannot display the webpage.

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alhamad
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

The issue is finally resolved, after the upgrade port 8085 was used by web services http where as it should use port 8080. The same port is required by the vCenter. To resolve support asked to uninstall and reinstall without intializing the DB.

Anyways, the server was also inline for the next OS upgrade which for this instance is a fresh insall.

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jreininger
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Just a note re: the vSphere4 Hardware and Service Status Plug-Ins. If this is still plaguing you....

Make sure you start the "VMware VirtualCenter Managment Webservices" service on your VC server.

Once I did the IE secuirty fix and started this services all my hardware sensors & vCenter Service Statup tabs poped up and worked after restarting the VIC client.

  • I am running on a Dell T100. I was able to ping my VC box w/ short name (vc01) and long-name (vc01.xxxx.org) so I knew it was not a DNS problem.

Thanks

Jonathan Reininger

VMware VCP 3.5 VMware VCP 4.0 VMware VCP 5.0
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