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Locating logs - Linux appliance

The SRA's logs are located in:

/var/log/vmware/srm/SRAs/sha256{characterSpamHere}

This directory should have the logs referenced below.

The SRM's logs are located in:

/var/log/vmware/srm/

Locating logs - Windows appliance

The SRA 's logs are located in:

%PROGRAMDATA%\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\Logs\SRAs\purestorage

Each invocation of the SRA produces one log file. Sort by Date Modified to see the commands executed in chronological order.

The SRM 's logs are located in :

%PROGRAMDATA%VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\Logs

Look for vmware-dr-##.log files. The file with the largest ## is the most recent. The SRM logs are useful for diagnosing problems when (a) The SRA responded correctly, but SRM still failed an operation, and (b) The SRA crashed on launch before being able to log anything. Before collecting SRM logs, be sure to quit SRM and wait a few seconds for all the logs to be flushed to disk.

The SRA installer's logs are located in:

%PROGRAMDATA%\PureStorage\PureSRAInstaller.log

Verifying Installation

To verify that the SRA has been installed correctly, do the following:

1. Confirm that the SRA is listed in Programs and Features.
2. Find where SRM is installed by looking at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\VMware, Inc.\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\InstallPath in the Registry. It is usually C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\bin .
3. In the SRM folder, navigate to the " storage/sra/purestorage" folder.
4. Confirm that the following files are present (filename case may vary):

   command.pl
   PureSRA.exe
   PureSRA.pdb
   PureSRA.exe.config
   PureStorage.Rest.dll
   PureStorage.Rest.pdb
   Newtonsoft.Json

5. Right click on PureSRA.exe and select Properties. Verify that it's the version you expect, and that the binary is signed by Pure Storage.
6. Confirm that .NET 3.5 is installed by checking the presence of:

   %windir%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5

Confirming Environment

The SRA log starts by logging the SRA version and the info about the environment it runs in. The SRA expects to run as an admin, and as a 64-bit process. It will not work correctly otherwise. Look for something like to confirm this is the case:

[02/12/2015 11:03:30,Logging session for discoverArrays,V] Process is 64-Bit.
[02/12/2015 11:03:30,Logging session for discoverArrays,V] Running as the administrator.

Confirming Array Pair

The SRA logs the input from SRM. Look for "Received input:" followed by an XML string near the top of the log file. In the XML string, there are usually two Connection nodes, with the id "localArray" and and "peerArray". They are the pair of array the operation is being applied on. These info are entered by the user when configuring the SRA from inside SRM. Make sure they are actually the arrays you are using for SRM. Example:

<Connection id="localArray">
    <Addresses>
        <Address id="spA">vss-purity-vm1.dev.purestorage.com</Address>
    </Addresses>
    ...
</Connection>

<Connection id="peerArray">
    <Addresses>
        <Address id="spA">vss-purity-vm2.dev.purestorage.com</Address>
    </Addresses>
    ...
</Connection>

Locating Errors

Each entry in the SRA log is associated with a verbosity level. Search for ", E ]" and ", W ]" in the log file to see the logged E rrors and W arnings, respectively. They are usually indicative of what went wrong. For example, the entries below indicate that the SRA could not connect to an array:

[02/11/2015 09:40:56,SRMCommandHandlerBase.cs:ConnectToInputAr<wbr/>rays,W] Connection failed to FlashArray at 10.66.50.90 using connection localArray
[02/11/2015 09:40:56,SRMCommandHandlerBase.cs:ConnectToInputAr<wbr/>rays,E] "PureRestException: HttpStatusCode = 'BadRequest', RestErrorCode = 'InvalidVersion', Details = '', InnerException = ''"

If the entire operation failed, the SRA will output an error. Look for "Setting output:" followed by some XML string. You should see an Error node with an error ID, such as:

<Error code="1004">
    <purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>...</purestorage<wbr/>:PureExceptionMessage>
    <purestorage:LogFile>...</purestorage:LogFile>
</Error>

The meaning of the error codes are listed below. For example, 1004 stands for "array unreachable".

WarningSyncInProgress = 500, // Defined by VMware
ErrorUnhandledException = 1001,
ErrorUnknownCommand = 1002,
ErrorPureException = 1003,
ErrorArrayUnreachable = 1004,
ErrorArrayUnauthorized = 1005,
ErrorArrayIdNotAvailable = 1006,
ErrorArrayIDMissing = 1007,
ErrorBadArrayPair = 1008,
ErrorVolumeNotInPGroup = 1009,
ErrorCannotFindSyncStatus = 1010,
ErrorCannotFindSnapshot = 1011,
ErrorCannotFindVolume = 1012,
ErrorTestFailoverStartInProgress = 1013,
ErrorVolumeConnectionFailed = 1014,
WarningCannotFindPgroup = 1015,
ErrorCannotCreatePgroup = 1016,
WarningDeviceAlreadyFailedOver = 1017,
WarningPrepareFailoverInProgress = 1018,
ErrorArrayInsufficientPermissions = 1019,
WarningHostConnectionFailed = 1020,
ErrorCannotCreateVolume = 1021,
ErrorCannotDisconnectVolume = 1022,
ErrorCannotRenameVolume = 1023,
ErrorVolumeNotDisconnected = 1024,
ErrorCannotDeleteVolume = 1025,
ErrorCannotSnapshotPGroup = 1026,
ErrorEmptyOrMissingDeviceID = 1027,
WarningAlreadyPerformedPrepareRestoreReplication = 1028,
WarningAlreadyPerformedRestoreReplication = 1029,
WarningAlreadyPerformedPrepareReverseReplication = 1030

The "PureExceptionMessage" portion of the error will contain more specific information about why the operation failed. Examples are under the subheadings for specific errors below.

Additionally, the SRA logs the HTTP requests (URL only) and their response codes. Look for "Rest Library transcript:" in the log. In the HTTP transcript that follows, look for "PureStorage.Rest Error:". Note that many HTTP errors are benign and expected (e.g. we test for the existence of a volume by asking the array about it; if the array responds with a does-not-exist error, we know it doesn't exist), so view errors in the HTTP transcript in the context of other clues in the log.

[01/04/2018 11:54:01,DiscoverArrays.cs:ProcessCommand,V] Exiting
Setting output: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Response xmlns="http://www.vmware.com/srm/sra/v2" xmlns:purestorage="http://www.purestorage.com/sra">
  <Error code="1004">
    <purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>The remote server returned an error: (400) Bad Request.
Message from Purity='ctx:,msg:invalid credentials'</purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>
    <purestorage:LogFile>C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\Logs\SRAs\purestorage\discoverArrays_2018-01-04-11-53-58-443789-6607c4a5-ed27-4f4a-8d3b-46c8db303e85.log</purestorage:LogFile>
  </Error>
</Response>

Error 1004 (ErrorArrayUnreachable)

[01/04/2018 11:54:01,DiscoverArrays.cs:ProcessCommand,V] Exiting
Setting output: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Response xmlns="http://www.vmware.com/srm/sra/v2" xmlns:purestorage="http://www.purestorage.com/sra">
  <Error code="1004">
    <purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>The remote server returned an error: (400) Bad Request.
Message from Purity='ctx:,msg:invalid credentials'</purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>
    <purestorage:LogFile>C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\Logs\SRAs\purestorage\discoverArrays_2018-01-04-11-53-58-443789-6607c4a5-ed27-4f4a-8d3b-46c8db303e85.log</purestorage:LogFile>
  </Error>
</Response>

Common Problems

[01/04/2018 11:54:01,DiscoverArrays.cs:ProcessCommand,V] Exiting
Setting output: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Response xmlns="http://www.vmware.com/srm/sra/v2" xmlns:purestorage="http://www.purestorage.com/sra">
  <Error code="1004">
    <purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>The remote server returned an error: (400) Bad Request.
Message from Purity='ctx:,msg:invalid credentials'</purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>
    <purestorage:LogFile>C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\Logs\SRAs\purestorage\discoverArrays_2018-01-04-11-53-58-443789-6607c4a5-ed27-4f4a-8d3b-46c8db303e85.log</purestorage:LogFile>
  </Error>
</Response>

"invalid credentials"

Example error:

[01/04/2018 11:54:01,DiscoverArrays.cs:ProcessCommand,V] Exiting
Setting output: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Response xmlns="http://www.vmware.com/srm/sra/v2" xmlns:purestorage="http://www.purestorage.com/sra">
  <Error code="1004">
    <purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>The remote server returned an error: (400) Bad Request.
Message from Purity='ctx:,msg:invalid credentials'</purestorage:PureExceptionMessage>
    <purestorage:LogFile>C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager\Logs\SRAs\purestorage\discoverArrays_2018-01-04-11-53-58-443789-6607c4a5-ed27-4f4a-8d3b-46c8db303e85.log</purestorage:LogFile>
  </Error>
</Response>

This usually means the array managers are configured incorrectly. If it is a "one to many" or "many to one" configuration, ensure that the Pure FlashArray username and password are the same for each array.

Tunable: HTTP Timeout

If the SRA does not hear a response from the array with 60 seconds for a REST call, it times out (indicated by verbiage about "timed out" in the logs).

To change the HTTP timeout value from the default value of 60 seconds, do the following (on all machines where the SRA is installed):

• Launch the Registry Editor.
• Create the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\PureStorage\SRA (or navigate to it if it already exists).
• Create a DWORD Value named "HTTPTimeoutInSeconds", if it doesn't exist already.
• Change the value to the desired HTTP timeout value (e.g. 120 seconds, in decimal), and press OK.

The change will take effect the next time the SRA is invoked.

Tunable: Host Connection on SRM Failover

By default, the SRA prioritizes host group connections when asked by SRM to connect to hosts (e.g. if a hostgroup HG contains a host H, the SRA will connect to HG when asked to connect to H). Most users should use this behavior.

However, if the user wishes to disable this behavior ( i.e. only connect to hosts on failover) , the can add a DWORD Value (named "DisableHostGroupConnectionOnFailover") under the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\PureStorage\SRA , and set its value to 1.

Miscellaneous

One useful tool of debugging problems is to use Fiddler. You will need to follow Decrypting HTTPS-protected traffic to set up debugging for HTTPS traffic. Repeat the failed SRM operation with Fiddler running to see the HTTP traffic. You can save Fiddler trace to file and give to the dev team for further debugging.

Another noteworthy reminder is that the user needs to rescan for the SRA after upgrading it (it's covered in the manual accompanying the SRA), or they may see errors.

Additionally, it might be useful to enable a higher level of logging if what you have is not providing sufficient information. Please note that greater detail in logging can fill up whatever the logs are writing to, so you need to be really careful when enabling this and should only enable it for short periods of time while the customer is reproducing an issue and then disable it immediately after. More details can be found in this VMware KB.

Problem

When you are using the vCenter Pure plug-in you are able to view and manage the GUI within the vSphere Web Client.  Each browser has a different way to handle the SSL Certificate authentication.  We have a known issue with mismatched addresses that we plan to fix in the long term, in the meantime you can find the workarounds below.

Solution

Internet Explorer

When logging into the vCenter Web GUI on IE you may see the following:

In order to use the vSphere Plug-In you will need to perform the following:

Step 1: Disable the Option for "Warn about certificate address mismatch*" (IE11+ Only)

Step 2: Add the array's URL to the trusted sites

Step 3: Navigate to the PureStorage FlashArray's GUI URL

Do not log in, click on "Certificate Error > View Certificates"

Step 4: Install the Certificate

Once the certificate is installed, you should be able to see the Pure GUI in the vCenter Plug-in.

Google Chrome

When you log into the vSphere GUI you will see the following:

To fix this you will need to log into the array directly first & by pass the certificate warning:

Once you do this, you will be able to reload the vSphere GUI and see the Pure GUI in the plug-in.

Firefox

When logging into the vCenter Web GUI you will get the following error:

To fix this, log directly into the Pure GUI and add it as an exception:

Once you've done this you're all set as this will add it as a permanent exception.

Confirming the SCSI-2 Reservations are Happening

If VMware is not configured as per best practice expectations (ATS Enabled) then we may see SCSI-2 Reservations in our logs.   This is how you can check to see if that's happening:

1. Run this command tgrep -c 'vol.pr_cache inserting registration' core* on Penguin Fuse on the date directory in question for the array, this will give you the number of SCSI-2 reservations created every hour:

   quelyn@i-9000a448:/logs/del-valle.k12.tx.us/dvisd-pure01-ct1/2015_10_27$ tgrep -c 'vol.pr_cache inserting registration' core*
   core.log-2015102700.gz:1875
   core.log-2015102701.gz:1798
   core.log-2015102702.gz:1827
   core.log-2015102703.gz:1817
   core.log-2015102704.gz:1860
   core.log-2015102705.gz:1812
   core.log-2015102706.gz:1818
   core.log-2015102707.gz:2577
   core.log-2015102708.gz:8181
   core.log-2015102709.gz:15131
   core.log-2015102710.gz:21826
   core.log-2015102711.gz:19140
   core.log-2015102712.gz:12044
   core.log-2015102713.gz:13451
   core.log-2015102714.gz:22995
   core.log-2015102715.gz:33136
   core.log-2015102716.gz:18587
   core.log-2015102717.gz:5900
   core.log-2015102718.gz:7324
   core.log-2015102719.gz:2541
   core.log-2015102720.gz:2213
   core.log-2015102721.gz:1850
   core.log-2015102722.gz:1807
   core.log-2015102723.gz:1851

2. Running this command without the '-c' will allow you to see which LUNs are being locked, seen below bolded.  This can yield many lines of output, so you may want to do this per log file:

   quelyn@i-9000a448:/logs/del-valle.k12.tx.us/dvisd-pure01-ct1/2015_10_27$ tgrep 'vol.pr_cache inserting registration' core*
   core.log-2015102700.gz:Oct 26 23:18:51.394 7FB1ACCF3700 I     vol.pr_cache inserting registration, seq 3097137672 vol 69674 i_t 20000025B5AA000E-spc2-0 res_type 15
   core.log-2015102700.gz:Oct 26 23:18:51.431 7FB1AD5F5700 I     vol.pr_cache inserting registration, seq 3097137673 vol 69673 i_t 20000025B5BB000E-spc2-0 res_type 15
   core.log-2015102700.gz:Oct 26 23:18:51.457 7FB1AE378700 I     vol.pr_cache inserting registration, seq 3097137674 vol 69662 i_t 20000025B5AA000E-spc2-0 res_type 15
   core.log-2015102700.gz:Oct 26 23:18:51.483 7FB1AE378700 I     vol.pr_cache inserting registration, seq 3097137675 vol 69661 i_t 20000025B5AA000E-spc2-0 res_type 15
   core.log-2015102700.gz:Oct 26 23:18:51.503 7FB1A73FC700 I     vol.pr_cache inserting registration, seq 3097137676 vol 69676 i_t 20000025B5AA000E-spc2-0 res_type 15
   core.log-2015102700.gz:Oct 26 23:18:51.522 7FB1AF7FD700 I     vol.pr_cache inserting registration, seq 3097137677 vol 69667 i_t 20000025B5BB000E-spc2-0 res_type 15

3. You can then run the pslun command to determine the volume name:

   quelyn@i-9000a448:/logs/del-valle.k12.tx.us/dvisd-pure01-ct1/2015_10_27$ pslun
   
   Volume Name                              pslun Name
   --------------------------------         ----------
   PURE-STR-LUN01                           pslun69648
   PURE-STR-LUN02                           pslun69660
   PURE-STR-LUN03                           pslun69661
   PURE-STR-LUN04                           pslun69662
   PURE-STR-LUN05                           pslun69664
   PURE-STR-LUN06                           pslun69665
   PURE-STR-LUN07                           pslun69666
   PURE-STR-LUN08                           pslun69667
   PURE-STR-LUN09                           pslun69668
   PUR-STR-LUN10                            pslun69669
   PUR-STR-LUN11                            pslun69670
   PURE-STR-LUN12                           pslun69671
   PURE-STR-LUN13                           pslun69672
   PURE-STR-LUN14                           pslun69673
   PURE-STR-LUN15                           pslun69674
   PURE-STR-LUN16                           pslun69675
   PURE-STR-LUN17                           pslun69676
   PURE-STR-LUN18                           pslun69677
   PURE-STR-LUN19                           pslun69678

4. To determine which hosts are creating the SCSI-2 Reservations, we will need a VMware bundle.  The customer can send this to us via FTP.
5. Once the bundle is uploaded, please prepare for analysis as per  KB: Retrieving Customer Logs from the FTP
6. Run the vm script that jhop created against the bundles to check the global configuration of VAAI ATS Wiki: VMware vSphere Ovreview and Troubleshooting

   /home/jhop/python/Mr_VMware.py

7. After we have confirmed that VAAI ATS is enabled globally if we are still seeing SCSI-2 reservations we will want to check each volume individually.  Please proceed to the next section:

Identifying datastore ATS Configuration on VMware ESXi

grep "naa.624a937" esxcfg-scsidevs_-m.txt | awk '{print $3}' > Pure-LUNs.txt;while read f;do cat vmkfs*$f.txt |grep -e "Mode:" -e "naa.624a937";echo;done < Pure-LUNs.txt

Step 1:

Since we only care about datastores (not Raw Device Maps (RDMs)) on Pure Storage we will find our applicable LUNs in the "esxcfg-scsidevs -m.txt" file under the "commands" folder in a VMware Support Bundle. Below is an example of what a line from there will look like:

There are several things that we want to identify from this output; the first is the "NAA Identifier". This is important because anything starting with "naa.624a937" is a Pure Storage LUN. Once we have a Pure Storage LUN we then want to take note of the "VMFS UUID" number (i.e. 53c80075-7ddcc5ba-7d03-0025b5000080 ). The reason why we focus on this instead of the "User-Friendly Name" is because the customers can choose any name they want in that option. If we choose the VMFS UUID then we are guaranteed to know we are referring to a Pure Storage LUN since that is a uniquely generated ID that the vCenter Server assigns to individual LUNs.

Step 2:

Once we have this information the next step is to search for the "vmkfstools" text file that contains the File System information on this device; this will also be found in the "commands" folder you already reside in. An example of what the text file will look like is as follows:

vmkfstools_-P--v-10-vmfsvolumes 53c80075-7ddcc5ba-7d03-0025b5000080 .txt

Notice above our "VMFS UUID" is contained in the file name (in red). We can now search this file for the "Mode" it is running in. An example of what this line will look like, if configured properly, is as follows:

Mode: public ATS-only

If the datastore is not configured properly it will look as follows:

Mode: public

If the datastore is showing a "public" mode then we know that this datastore is misconfigured and we'll be receiving an excessive amount of SCSI-2 Reservations from the ESXi Hosts. This means that locking tasks are not being offloaded to the FlashArray.

Obviously if the customer has a lot of LUNs this process above can take a while, so it is best to script this. I have listed below a simple one liner that will do this for you if you would like to use this instead of going through each LUN one-by-one:

grep "naa.624a937" esxcfg-scsidevs_-m.txt | awk '{print $3}' > Pure-LUNs.txt;while read f;do cat vmkfs*$f.txt |grep -e "Mode:" -e "naa.624a937";echo;done < Pure-LUNs.txt

NOTE: This command is able to be copied & pasted then used on any ESXi Host that is 5.0 and higher, as long as you are in the "commands" folder of the ESXi Host you want to verify.

Resolution

Once we have the misconfigured LUNs identified the customer can use the VMware KB listed below to resolve the issue:

Link to VMware KB: http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1033665

Follow the steps outlined in the "Changing an ATS-only volume to public". Simply change the "0" they are setting to a "1" in the listed command they provide to turn ATS-only back on. It is important that the customer read all of the steps before continuing forward and reading the notes & caveats.

Alternatively, and also much less of a headache, the customer can simply create a new LUN from the FlashArray and mount it to the applicable ESXi Host(s). Once the new VMFS datastore is created they can verify that ATS is properly configured. Once confirmed the new datastore has ATS enabled can then migrate the Virtual Machines from the misconfigured datastore to the newly configured datastore. After everything has been moved from the old datastore and they have confirmed all is working well, they can simply destroy the old LUN. This is much easier to do and is typically what should be recommended as the first step.

If there are any questions please reach out to a fellow colleague or Support Escalations team member for assistance.