Data Repository - Vertica vbr utility failing with "Connection closed by remote host" error

Products

• DX NetOps
• CA Performance Management - Usage and Administration

Issue/Introduction

The Vertica vbr utility (vbr.py) is returning errors when used to delete Vertica Backups instancies - for example:

~]$ /opt/vertica/bin/vbr.py --debug 0 -t remove -c /opt/vertica/share/vbr/configs/backup_restore_full_local.ini --archive 20230203_170008

Removing restore points: 20230203_170008
Regenerating backup manifest for location [xxx.xx.xx.xx]:/srv/backup_vertica

Error: Error accessing remote storage: failed accessing remote storage on xxxx.xx.xx.xx: ssh_exchange_identification: Connection closed by remote host

rsync: connection unexpectedly closed (0 bytes received so far) [Receiver]
rsync error: unexplained error (code 255) at io.c(226) [Receiver=3.1.3]
: returncode=None

Remove FAILED.

 

Environment

Release : any release

Cause

High number of concurrent SSH connections to the SSH daemon (sshd).

Resolution

As pr Vertica Team suggestions, this error could be potentially due to 'Maxstartups' values set in the sshd_config file:

Error: Error accessing remote storage: failed accessing remote storage on xxx.xx.xx.xx: ssh_exchange_identification: Connection closed by remote host

The Maxstartups value controls the maximum number of concurrent unauthenticated connections allowed to the server.
If the configuration requires backing up multiple nodes to one backup host (n:1), increase the number of concurrent SSH connections to the SSH daemon (sshd).

Try set it to higher value like 60 as below:

1. sudo vi /etc/ssh/sshd_config

2. Look for the line that starts with #MaxStartups or contains MaxStartups. If it is commented out (starts with #), remove the # to enable the setting.

3. Set the MaxStartups value to 60. e.g. 

      MaxStartups 60:30:90

4. Save and close the file.

5. Reload the SSH server to apply the changes:

sudo systemctl reload sshd