VMware vSphere SDKs and Tools 8.0

8.0 7.0 6.7 6.5

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
REST
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
Remediation policies override depending on the effective global and cluster- and host-specific policies that you define.
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, use the
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/defaults/clusters/policies/apply
 or
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/defaults/hosts/policies/apply
 request. You receive a
Apply.ConfiguredPolicySpec
 data structure that contains the settings of the global remediation policy. To edit a global remediation policy, use the
PUT https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/defaults/clusters/policies/apply
 or
PUT https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/defaults/hosts/policies/apply
 request and submit the respective
Apply.ConfiguredPolicySpec
 data structure to define new values to the global policy settings. To view the effective global remediation policy settings for a cluster and host, use the
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/defaults/clusters/policies/apply/effective
 or
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/defaults/hosts/policies/apply/effective
 request. You receive the respective
Effective.EffectivePolicySpec
 JSON object 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, use the
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/clusters/
<cluster_id>
/policies/apply
 or
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/hosts/
<host_id>
/policies/apply
 request. You receive an
Apply.ConfiguredPolicySpec
 JSON object that contain the cluster- and host-specific policies to be applied during remediation. To change the cluster- and host-specific policy, use the
PUT https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/clusters/
<cluster_id>
/policies/apply
 or
PUT https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/hosts/
<host_id>
/policies/apply
 request and submit an
Apply.ConfiguredPolicySpec
 data structure to describe the cluster- and host-specific remediation policies. To view the effective cluster- and host-specific policies, use the
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/clusters/
<cluster_id>
/policies/apply/effective
 or
GET https://
<vcenter_ip_address_or_fqdn>
/api/esx/settings/hosts/
<host_id>
/policies/apply/effective
 request. You receive the respective
Effective.EffectivePolicySpec
 data structure 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 respective cluster
Apply.ConfiguredPolicySpec
 data structure
. For the vSphere 8.0 release, VMware provides the following methods to configure a global or cluster-specific policy.
Property
Description
disable_dpm
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,
set
true
 to the
disable_dpm
 property
. By default, the
vSphere Lifecycle Manager
 temporarily deactivates DPM and turns on the hosts to complete the remediation. DPM is enabled again when the cluster remediation finishes.
disable_hac
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,
set
true
 to the
disable_hac
 property
. 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.
evacuate_offline_vms
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,
set
true
 to the
evacuate_offline_vms
 property
. By default, this setting is deactivated in the global remediation policy.
failure_action
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,
set the properties of the
Apply.FailureAction
 data structure
. You can set the number of times that
vSphere 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.
enforce_hcl_validation
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 leave the
enforce_hcl_validation
 property unset
, detected hardware issues are reported as warnings and do not prevent the remediation of the vSAN cluster.
parallel_remediation_action
Enable simultaneous remediation of all hosts that are in maintenance mode with in the cluster.
Submit the
Apply.ParallelRemediationAction
 data structure
 to indicate the maximum number of hosts that can be remediated in parallel.
If 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.
pre_remediation_power_action
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,
submit the
Apply.ConfiguredPolicySpec.PreRemediationPowerAction
 enumerated type and set
one of the following values:
  • DO_NOT_CHANGE_VMS_POWER_STATE
    . Indicates that the power state of the virtual machines must not be changes.
  • POWER_OFF_VMS
    . Indicates that the virtual machines must be powered off before the hosts enter maintenance mode.
  • SUSPEND_VMS
    . Indicates that the virtual machines must be suspended before the hosts enter maintenance mode.
  • SUSPEND_VMS_TO_MEMORY
    . Indicates that the virtual machines must be suspended before the hosts enter maintenance mode.
By default, the Coordinator must leave the power state of the virtual machines unchanged.
enable_quick_boot
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,
set
true
 to the
enable_quick_boot
 property
. By default, this policy is deactivated.

Remediation Policy Options for Standalone Hosts

To describe a global or cluster-specific remediation policy, use the
respective host
Apply.ConfiguredPolicySpec
 data structure
. For the vSphere 8.0 release, VMware provides the following methods to configure a global or host-specific policy.
Property
Description
enable_quick_boot
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.
pre_remediation_power_action
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:
  • DO_NOT_CHANGE_VMS_POWER_STATE
    . Indicates that the power state of the virtual machines must not be changed.
  • POWER_OFF_VMS
    . Indicates that the virtual machines must be powered off before the standalone host enters maintenance mode.
  • SUSPEND_VMS
    . Indicates that the virtual machines must be suspended before the standalone host enters maintenance mode.
  • SUSPEND_VMS_TO_MEMORY
    . Indicates that the virtual machines must be suspended before the standalone host enters maintenance mode.
failure_action
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.

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