Aria operation displays placeholder VMs as 'Duplicate Not found'

Products

• VMware Live Recovery

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• From Aria Operation, the Placeholder VM appears as "Duplicate Not Found".
  
  
• The Placeholder VM appearing '"Duplicate Not Found" in Aria Operation, has status set 'unset' in MOB of vCenter server hosting the Placeholder VMs.
  
  
  This Indicates the placeholder VM is stale and lost connection to Site Recovery manager.
  
  
• Placeholder VMs which is running good and not appears with "Duplicate Not Found" in Aria operation as below,
  
  
  
  The parameter "ManagedBy" as per screenshot will appears with link.
  
  This Shows the placeholder VM is still has connection with Site Recovery manager and valid placeholder VM.
  
  
• The above two screenshots shows difference in placeholder VM configuration, Active/Valid Placeholder appears as below,
  
  
  
  The affected or stale placeholder appears as below, appears with Missing extension (placeholder).
  
  

Environment

VMware Live Recovery 9.x

Site Recovery manager 8.x

Cause

If Recovery Site vCenter MOB(Managed Object) displays "managedByInfo" property for Placeholder VM as unset, it indicates that the placeholder VM is not properly configured to connect to the vCenter Server and is not being managed by Site Recovery Manager. This is typically a problem with the SRM's connection to vCenter caused due to Manual/unfinished changes.

Resolution

Perform below steps to recreate placeholder VMs,

1. Manually removed the placeholder VM from Recovery site vCenter server Inventory (OR) Using SRM UI, select the Protection Group with affected VM. Select the VM and use "remove protection" to delete placeholder.
   
   
2. Select 'Virtual machine' option in SRM, Site Recovery -> Protection Group, recreate the Placeholder VM using "Configure VM". 
   
   Note: If the VM was removed from Protection Group, Select Edit option in protection group and Add the VM again, Add or Remove Virtual Machines to or from a Protection Group
   
   
3. Once the placeholder VM is successfully created, check vCenter Server MOB for 'managedByInfo' value.
   
   
4. Perform the same steps for all affected VMs.
   
   Note: For Reference only - Remove Protection from a Virtual Machine
   
   
5. Once The placeholder VMs are recreated check the property 'managedByInfo' using Recovery Site vCenter MOB.