Tanzu VM Service refusing VM deploy with "GuestOS not supported"

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:
If the Cluster or Datacenter "Default VM Compatibility" level is set to versions lower than ESXi 7.0 and later releases, the following symptoms will be experienced:

• The Tanzu VM Service refuses a VM deploy.
• User will see messages similar to:

GuestOS not supported.

 

• The VirtualMachineImage resource will have a condition "VirtualMachineImageOSTypeSupported" with reason "VirtualMachineImageOSTypeNotSupported". This can be viewed by doing "kubectl describe virtualmachineimage <nameofvmimage>"

Example describe output:
 

Status:
  Conditions:
    Last Transition Time:  2021-05-13T14:45:29Z
    Message:               VirtualMachineImage image type vmwarePhoton64Guest is not supported by VM Svc
    Reason:                VirtualMachineImageOSTypeNotSupported
    Severity:              Error
    Status:                False
    Type:                  VirtualMachineImageOSTypeSupported
    Last Transition Time:  2021-05-13T14:45:29Z
    Status:                True
    Type:                  VirtualMachineImageV1Alpha1Compatible
  Image Supported:         false

  

• When invoking `kubectl apply` with a vm specification, you see errors being emitted similar to:

failed to create or update VirtualMachine: admission webhook "default.validating.virtualmachine.vmoperator.vmware.com" denied the request: GuestOS not supported for osType vmwarePhoton64Guest on image ob-17419070-photon-3-k8s-v1.18.10---vmware.1-tkg.1.3a6cd48 or VMImage is not compatible with v1alpha1 or is not a TKG Image

• Logs from the vmware-system-vmop pods will show:

deploy VM preCheck failed for image "ob-20953521-tkgs-ova-photon-3-v1.23.8---vmware.3-tkg.1": image osType 'vmwarePhoton64Guest' is not supported by VMService

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 7.0.x

Cause

This issue occurs due to the VM Service referencing an incorrectly configured Cluster or Datacenter "Default VM Compatibility" level to validate which VirtualMachine Hardware compatibility versions are permitted for deployment.

Resolution

This is a known issue affecting VMware vCenter Server 7.0 Update 2a.

Currently, there is no resolution available at this time. Please reference the below workaround to correct the condition.

Workaround:
To work around this issue, change the "Default VM Compatibility" (This can be found at the vSphere CLUSTER or the DATACENTER level) to "Use datacenter setting and host version".

Alternatively, use something equal or higher than "ESXi 7.0 and later". You can do this by right clicking on the vSphere Cluster or Datacenter and selecting "Edit Default VM Compatibility".