vCenter lookupsvc may fail to start if /etc/hosts was modified

Products

• VMware vCenter Server 7.0

Issue/Introduction

If the /etc/hosts file was modified and the vCenter is not properly resolving the hostname/PNID the lookupsvc may fail to start causing other services fail to start.

Cause

/etc/hosts was modified where another IP address was added causing the lookupsvc to fail to start

Resolution

Remove any additional entries in /etc/hosts either above or below the "# VAMI_EDIT" comments and ensure the vCenter shortname, FQDN and localhost are added for the 127.0.0.1 IPv4 loopback and ipv6-localhost and ipv6-loopback are added for the ::1 IPv6 loopback, for example: