Datastores appear empty or with invalid content in vCenter Server datastore browser

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• Datastore content is not visible or appears as invalid when browsing through vSphere Client or Web Client in the vCenter Server.
• Datastore content appears when connected through an SSH session.
• Datastore content appears when browsing using the vSphere Client directly on hosts.
• Virtual Machines hosted on these datastores work.

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 5.5.x
VMware vCenter Server 5.0.x
VMware vCenter Server 6.0.x
VMware vCenter Server 5.1.x

Cause

vCenter Server relies on a specific host to determine the content of a datastore. This is the primary browser host. If that host has issues reading the datastores, vCenter Server may give wrong information to display, while the content is accessible to other hosts and virtual machines. There is a display error and operations such as power-on and power-off do not work, even though vSphere Clients are not affected.

This issue occurs due to mishandling of the presented storage on the primary browser host.

For example, when LUNs are not removed from the host, but unmasked in the storage array.

Resolution

Enable trivia logging to identify the current host acting as the primary browser host. For instructions to enable trivia logging, see Enabling trivia logging in VirtualCenter (1001584).
 

Open the most recent vpxd.log file and look for entries similar to:

trivia 'vmomi.soapStub[36]' opID=C0BF1A5F-000003B2-db] Sending soap request to [<cs p:0000000021e0f6d0, TCP:<host2>:443]:<API-Name-Related to datastore browser>

where host2 is the ESX/ESXi host that vCenter Server is using.

Note: For log location in vCenter 5.5 and earlier versions, see Location of vCenter Server log files (1021804).
For log location in vCenter Server 6.0, see Location of VMware vCenter Server 6.0 log files (2110014).
 

After the host is identified, connect to it directly using vSphere Client and access the datastore content. If the content is wrong or you are unable to access the datastore, use vMotion to move the virtual machines and reboot the host. On reboot, vCenter Server selects a new primary browser host.

Note: Placing the host in maintenance mode and then rebooting does not fix the issue. If you can access the datastore content and it is the right content, you are not facing the primary browser host issue.

Additional Information

vCenter Server データストア ブラウザでデータストアが空または無効なコンテンツがあるように見える
vCenter Server 数据存储浏览器中显示数据存储为空或包含无效内容

Impact/Risks:
Trivia logging may impact performance of vCenter Server. Revert to normal logging level after the host is identified.