Enlarging vSphere Replication appliance disk and creating a partition needed for Java heap dumps after upgrade

Products

• VMware Live Recovery
• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

This article outlines the steps needed to create additional partitions for the Java heap dump after an in-place upgrade of the vSphere Replication appliance to 8.2. The partition is automatically created for vSphere Replication appliance 8.2 and above but is not in case of upgrades.

Note:

• This is an optional setup required only if you would want to provide the Java heap dump for investigation in case of major VR service failure.
• The Java heap dumps may contain sensitive data that are not usually required for investigation any issues with the product.

Environment

VMware vSphere Replication 8.x

Resolution

​​​​​​To manually create the heap dump partition, use the following steps:

1. Edit HMS VM settings (it can be done while the VM is running) - enlarge second disk with 4GB from 13 to 17 GB.
2. Open HMS VM and make sure that /dev/sdb partition is enlarged. This could not happen immediately but could take up to several minutes for the OS to detect the changes. To do so you can use /fdisk -l and look for /dev/sdb - the size should be the new one (17GB). If it is not just wait a bit and re-run the command until you see the new size.
3. Once the OS has detected the physical disk size change and enlarges the partition (verified at step 3) we have to enlarge the physical volume using the command:

pvresize /dev/sdb

4. Verify new physical volume size using the command:

pvs

You should see the new size in PSize and PFree should be the size of the extention space which is currently free on the physical volume.

5. Verify the volume group support_vg is also enlarged along with the underlying physical volume with the command:

vgs

You should see the new size in VSize and VFre should be the size of the extention space which is currently free on the volume group.

If this is not the case try re-scanning the physical volume and volume groups by running the following commands:

pvscan

vgscan

Then run the vgs command again to verify the size of support_vg volume group as explained above.

6. Create a new logical volume named heapdump with size 4GB:

lvcreate -L 4G -n heapdump support_vg

7. Verify that logical volume is created using the following command:

lvscan

Verify heapdump volume is ACTIVE and verify its size. More info about the new logical volume can be seen. If  you run the command:

lvdisplay

8. Format the newly created logical volume:

mkfs.ext3 /dev/support_vg/heapdump

9. Mount the newly created logical volume to the heapdump directory:

sudo mount /dev/support_vg/heapdump /opt/vmware/heapdump

10. Update fstab file so that mounting the new partition will be done automatically after reboot:
    • Backup file use the command: 
      cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.old

• Add the following line at the end in /etc/fstab: 
  /dev/support_vg/heapdump /opt/vmware/heapdump ext3 rw,nosuid,nodev,exec,auto,nouser,async 0 1