Heartbeat messages in an ESX /var/log/vmksummary log file

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

Each hour, VMware ESX logs host heartbeat information to the /var/log/vmksummary log. The heartbeat lines are logged one minute after the hour by /etc/cron.hourly/vmkheartbeat. In addition, startup, shutdown, and reboot events are logged.

This article provides information about these messages.

Environment

VMware ESX 4.1.x
VMware ESX Server 3.5.x
VMware ESX Server 3.0.x
VMware ESX 4.0.x

Resolution

Here is an example of the heartbeat message:

Feb 25 15:01:01 myhost logger: (1235592061) hb: vmk loaded, 5166530.82, 5166517.348, 20, 110268, 110268, 265330688, vmware-h-61456, vpxa-16504, webAcces-14548

This table provides information about each message component:

Message component	Description
Feb 25 15:01:01	This is the date and time of the entry.
myhost	This is the hostname.
logger	This is standard text that appears in every message.
(1235592061)	This is the date and time of the entry in Unix Time.
hb: vmk loaded	This indicates that it is a heartbeat entry and that the VMkernel is loaded.
5166530.82	This is the uptime of the Console OS as per /proc/uptime.
5166517.348	This is the uptime of the VMkernel as per /proc/vmware/uptime.
20	This is the number of currently running virtual machines as per the number of running console OS Processes (ps -auxw | grep -c [v]mware-vmx).
110268	This is the build of the currently running VMkernel.
110268	This is the build of the currently running VMM.
265330688	This is the amount of Console OS swap used, as per /proc/meminfo. This is measured in bytes.
vmware-h-1456 vpxa-16504 WebAcces-4548	These three fields are the top three processes in the Console OS for memory consumed. The numeric value is measured in kilobytes. These processes are identified with the command: memHogs=`ps -A --no-headers --format fname,rss --sort=-rss | head -3 | sed -r 's/\s+/-/g' | column | sed -r 's/\s+/, /g'`

The message may also contain these parts:

Message component	Description
Starting system... Halting system... Rebooting system...	These messages occurs upon system startup, shutdown, and reboot, respectively. Logged from /etc/init.d/vmkhalt.
loaded VMKernel unloaded VMkernel	This message component occurs on VMkernel load/unload. Logged from /etc/init.d/vmware.
VMKernel Error	This is logged when there is a core file found during bootup. Logged from /etc/init.d/vmware.