OSDATA volume configured on an SSD device was reported as a VFFS volume prior to esxi version 8.0.1,it reports error "GetVffsInVFlashResource: VFFS volume […] does not exist

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

To clean Hostd.log message - "GetVffsInVFlashResource: VFFS volume [........] does not exist" which creates confusion.

Symptoms:

OSDATA volume if configured on SSD/NVME device reported as a VFFS volume. following messages noticed in hostd.log

 

2023-06-08T16:55:10.620Z Er(163) Hostd[2101862]: [Originator@6876 sub=Hostsvc.VFlashManager opID=WorkQueue-490e8664-969a-3902-f318 sid=5268ed5c user=dcui:hcid] GetVffsInVFlashResource: VFFS volume [6400dcb1-f292e685-2e26-5ced8c043068] does not exist.

2023-06-08T16:55:44.843Z Er(163) Hostd[2101872]: [Originator@6876 sub=Hostsvc.VFlashManager opID=b5eef32e] GetVffsInVFlashResource: VFFS volume [6400dcb1-f292e685-2e26-5ced8c043068] does not exist.

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 8.0

Cause

Above messages generate due to stale entry in configstore, it does not impact any functionality. This issue has been fixed esxi version 8.0.1 onwards where it is reported as a VMFSOS volume. However this stale configstore entry for the VFFS volume will still remain post upgrade to any newer release >= 8.0.1 from < 8.0.1.

Resolution

Please refer workaround to clean configstore entry.

Workaround:

Upgrade esxi version to 8.0.1 and above, please issue following command from esxi host command line.

>configstorecli config current get -c esx -g services -k hostd -p plugins/hostsvc/vflash/

Confirm that the vffs_uuid shows as 6400dcb1-f292e685-2e26-5ced8c043068.

After this run the below command.

>configstorecli config current set -c esx -g services -k hostd -p plugins/hostsvc/vflash/vffs_uuid -v 0

Check using the first command that the vffs_uuid is correctly set to 0. Hostd restart is not required. This should stop the spam messages.

Note: -p flag introduced with esxi version 8.0.1

Additional Information

https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vSphere/8.0/rn/vsphere-esxi-801-release-notes/index.html

Impact/Risks:

No Functional impact, only spam messages in hostd.log