Test Recovery fails with error "Placeholder VM for protected VM is missing"

Products

• VMware Live Recovery

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

 

Test Recovery fails at Step-4 of Recovery Plan "Create Writable Storage Snapshot":
Error : Placeholder VM for protected VM <VM-name> is missing

In corresponding Protection Group, 'Issue' tab exhibits following error:
'Placeholder Create error'

Environment

vSphere Replication 8.x
vSphere Replication 9.x

Cause

This Error is seen as SRM fails to create Placeholder VM on Target vCenter while protecting and adding VM to Protection Group.

This in turn is caused due to missing Resource and Folder Mappings for the protected VM.

Resolution

1. Execute 'Force Cleanup' on Recovery Plan to clear-off the errored state on Recovery Plan.
(Without clearing Recovery Plan errors, editing of Protection Group would be grayed out)

2. Add the missing Resource and Folder Mappings corresponding to the VM in question.

3. Select the Protection Group (with warning alert) > Click on (...) > Click on 'Restore All Placeholder VMs'
This would create the missing Placeholder VM for the Protected virtual machine.

4. Execute the Test Recovery to test the resolution and complete.

Additional Information

Placeholder Create Error: Reprotect of the VM failed