Configuring Remediation Settings
You can control the behavior of the
ESXi
hosts and virtual machines during the remediation process. You can create a global
remediation policy that applies to all clusters and standalone hosts in a vCenter
Server
instance. You can also set a remediation
policy to a specific cluster and a standalone host. When you run cluster and standalone host
compliance checks, the Coordinator module runs a series of checks on each host to
determine their state and whether some additional actions must be taken to ensure the
success of the remediation operation. In case one or more hosts in the cluster and any
of the standalone hosts are evaluated as non-compliant, additional checks are run on
those hosts to evaluate whether they must be rebooted or put into maintenance mode.
Currently, VMware provides a set of behavior controls (remediation policies) regarding
the virtual machines and the hosts in a cluster or a standalone host. This set of
remediation policies might change with the next vSphere release.
How Remediation Policies
Overrides Work
The
vSphere Lifecycle Manager
provides a
default global policy configuration that must be applied on each cluster and
standalone host during remediation. Through the vSphere
Automation
API, you can change the global policies
and create some cluster-and host-specific policies. Before remediating a cluster and
standalone host, you can use the API to determine the effective global and
cluster-and host-specific remediation policies. The following graphic describes how
the mechanism of the policy overrides works.How Remediation Policies
Work

All clusters and standalone hosts in a
vCenter
Server
instance inherit the
default or the overridden global policy settings unless the global policy is
explicitly overridden on a cluster and host level.Editing Global or Cluster- and
Host-Specific Remediation Policies
To view
the currently set global remediation policy, call the
get(cluster_ID)
or get(host_id)
method of
the com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.clusters.policies.Apply
or
com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.hosts.policies.Apply
interface. You receive a default ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
instance that contains the configuration settings of the global remediation policy.
To edit a global remediation policy, call the set(policy_spec)
method of the respective
com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.clusters.policies.Apply
or
com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.hosts.policies.Apply
interface.
Pass as an argument an ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
instance
and define new values to the global policy settings. To view the effective global
remediation policy settings for a cluster and host, call the
get()
method of the respective
com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.clusters.policies.apply.Effective
or
com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.hosts.policies.apply.Effective
interface. The method returns an EffectivePolicySpec
instance
that contains the effective global policies applicable for all clusters and hosts in
your vCenter
Server
environment. To view
the cluster- and host-specific remediation policies, call the
get(cluster_ID)
or get(host_id)
method of
the respective com.vmware.esx.settings.clusters.policies.Apply
or
com.vmware.esx.settings.hosts.policies.Apply
interface. The
method returns an instance of the
com.vmware.esx.settings.clusters.policies.ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
or
com.vmware.esx.settings.hosts.policies.ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
class which contain the cluster- and host-specific policies to be applied during
remediation. To change the cluster- and host-specific policy, call the
set(cluster_ID,policy_spec)
or
set(host_ID,policy_spec)
method of the respective
Apply
interface. Pass as argument an
ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
instance and describe the
cluster- and host-specific remediation policies. To view the effective cluster- and
host-specific policies, call the get(cluster_ID)
or
get(host_id)
method of the
com.vmware.esx.settings.clusters.policies.apply.Effective
or
com.vmware.esx.settings.hosts.policies.apply.Effective
interface. The method returns an EffectivePolicySpec
instance
that describes the effective cluster- and host-specific policies. Remediation Policy Options for
Clusters
To describe a global or cluster-specific
remediation policy, use
the
. For the
vSphere 8.0 release, VMware provides the following methods to configure a global or
cluster-specific policy.
com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.clusters.policies.ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
and
com.vmware.esx.settings.clusters.policies.ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
classesMethod | Description |
---|---|
setDisableDpm(disableDpm) | Deactivate the VMware Distributed Power Management (DPM) feature
for all clusters or for a specific cluster. DPM monitors the resource
consumption of the virtual machines in a cluster. If the total available
resource capacity of the hosts in a cluster is exceeded, DPM powers off
(or recommends powering off) one or more hosts after migrating their
virtual machines. When resources are considered underutilized and
capacity is needed, DPM powers on (or recommends powering on) hosts.
Virtual machines are migrated back to these hosts. During the cluster
remediation, the vSphere Lifecycle Manager cannot wake up and remediate
hosts that are automatically put into a stand-by mode by DPM. These
hosts stay non-compliant when DPM turns them on. The vSphere
Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS) is unable to migrate virtual
machines to the hosts which are not remediated with the desired
state for the cluster. To deactivate DPM during
the cluster remediation, call the
. By default,
the setDisableDpm(disableDpm) method of the
ConfiguredPolicySpec instance and pass as
argument true vSphere Lifecycle Manager temporarily deactivates DPM and turns on
the hosts to complete the remediation. DPM is enabled again when the
cluster remediation finishes. |
setDisableHac(disableHac) | Deactivate the vSphere HA admission control. vSphere HA uses
admission control to ensure that a cluster has sufficient resources to
guarantee the virtual machines recovery when a host fails. If vSphere HA
admission control is enabled during remediation, putting a cluster into
maintenance mode fails because vMotion cannot migrate virtual machines
within the cluster for capacity reasons. To allow the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager to temporary deactivate vSphere HA
admission control, call the
. By default,
the vSphere HA admission control is enabled because DRS should be
able to detect issues with the admission control and deactivate it
to allow the remediation to complete. setDisableHac(disableHac) method of the
ConfiguredPolicySpec instance and pass as
argument true |
setEvacuateOfflineVms(evacuateOfflineVms) | Migrate the suspended and powered off virtual machines from the
hosts that must enter maintenance mode to other hosts in the cluster. To
enable this remediation policy, call
the . By
default, this setting is deactivated in the global remediation policy.
setEvacuateOfflineVms(evacuateOfflineVms)
method of the ConfiguredPolicySpec instance and
pass as argument true |
setFailureAction(failureAction) | Specify what actions vSphere Lifecycle Manager must take if a host fails
to enter maintenance mode during the remediation. To configure this
policy on a global or cluster-specific level, call the
.
You can set the number of times that setFailureAction(failureAction) method of the
ConfiguredPolicySpec instance. Pass as
argument an ApplyTypes.FailureAction
instancevSphere Lifecycle Manager
tries to put a host into maintenance mode and the delay between the
tries. When the threshold is reached and the host failed to enter
maintenance mode, the cluster remediation fails. By default,
vSphere Lifecycle Manager tries to put a host into maintenance mode
three times with a five minute delay between each try before the cluster
remediation fails. |
setEnforceHclValidation(enforceHclValidation) | Prevents the remediation of vSAN clusters if vSphere Lifecycle Manager
reports hardware compatibility issues during the hardware compatibility
check performed as part of the remediation pre-check or the remediation
tasks of the cluster. If you pass
,
detected hardware issues are reported as warnings and do not prevent the
remediation of the vSAN cluster. null as a parameter |
setParallelRemediationAction(parallelRemediationAction) | Enable simultaneous remediation of all hosts that are in
maintenance mode with in the cluster. Pass an instance of the
to indicate the maximum number of hosts that can be
remediated in parallel. com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.clusters.policies.ApplyTypes.ParallelRemediationAction
classIf the hosts have
NSX virtual
distributed switches that are ready to be migrated to vSphere
Distributed Switches, you must manually set the maximum number of
parallel remediations to no more than 4. In cases when host switch
migration is needed, if more than 4 hosts are remediated in
parallel, the remediation might fail, because the host switch
migration takes more time than the time vSphere Lifecycle Manager needs to complete the parallel
remediation. |
setPreRemediationPowerAction
(preRemediationPowerAction) | Specify how the power state of the virtual machines must change
before the host enters maintenance mode. If DRS is not enabled on a
cluster or the automation level of a DRS cluster is not set to fully
automated, the Coordinator module fails to remediate the cluster if the
remediation requires a reboot or maintenance mode. You can set a policy
that powers off or suspends the virtual machines on hosts that must be
rebooted or must enter maintenance mode during remediation. The DRS
takes care of changing the power state of the virtual machines when the
host enters and exits maintenance mode. To set a policy for the
power state of the virtual machines during the remediation, call the
one of the following values: setPreRemediationPowerAction(preRemediationPowerAction)
method of the ConfiguredPolicySpec instance.
Pass as a parameter an instance of the
PreRemediationPowerAction enumeration
class and specify
|
setEnableQuickBoot(enableQuickBoot) | Reduce the reboot time of an ESXi host by skipping all the hardware initialization
processes and restarting only the hypervisor. This policy is applicable
only if the host platform supports the Quick Boot feature. To enable the Quick Boot
feature on the hosts during the remediation, call the
. By
default, this policy is deactivated.setEnableQuickBoot(enableQuickBoot)
method of the ConfiguredPolicySpec instance
and pass as argument true |
Remediation Policy Options for Standalone Hosts
To describe a global or cluster-specific remediation policy, use the . For the
vSphere 8.0 release, VMware provides the following methods to configure a global or
host-specific policy.
com.vmware.esx.settings.defaults.hosts.policies.ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
and
com.vmware.esx.settings.hosts.policies.ApplyTypes.ConfiguredPolicySpec
classesMethod | Description |
---|---|
setEnableQuickBoot(enableQuickBoot) | Optimize the host patching and upgrade operations by reducing the
reboot time of an ESXi host.
Since the patching and upgrading operations do not affect the hardware
of the host, the hardware initialization processes can be skipped. This
policy is applicable only if the host platform supports the Quick Boot
feature. For more information about which hosts are Quick Boot
compatible, see the following KB article https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/52477. |
setPreRemediationPowerAction
(preRemediationPowerAction) | Specify how the power state of the virtual machines must change
before the standalone host enters maintenance mode. You can choose
between the following power actions:
|
setFailureAction(failureAction) | Specify what actions vSphere Lifecycle Manager must take if a standalone
host fails to enter maintenance mode during the remediation. You can set
the number of times that vSphere Lifecycle Manager tries to put a standalone
host into maintenance mode and the delay between the tries. When the
threshold is reached and the standalone host failed to enter maintenance
mode, the host remediation fails. |