Transient IP Allocation Policy fails to assign IPs to virtual machines

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• Virtual machines are unable to get the IPs via DHCP even when you set the IP Allocation Policy to Transient
• Transient IP Allocation Policy fails to assign IPs to virtual machines

Transient-IP-Allocation-Policy-fails cannot-set-transient-IP

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 4.1.x
VMware vCenter Server 4.0.x

Resolution

If your virtual machine is not configured (for example, using VMware Studio) to use Transient IPs, it will not pick up an IP. As this is an OVF feature, normal Windows or Linux virtual machines will not pick up an IP if you configure them for DHCP. Transient IP Allocation does not simulate a DHCP Server and it sets the static IP addresses in the OVF space that a vApp virtual machine can query while booting.

Additional Information

For more information, see:

• The blogs Configuring OVF Properties through VMware Studio 2.0 and Self-Configuration and the OVF Environment.
• For vSphere 4.0, the Configuring IP Pools section of the vSphere Basic System Administration Guide.
• For vSphere 4.1 the Configuring IP Pools section of the vSphere Virtual Machine Administration Guide.