vSAN Witness node mistakenly assigned VCF license

Products

• VMware vSAN 7.x
• VMware vSAN 8.x

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• The vSAN Witness Node shows that it is using a puchased VCF license as seen in vCenter:   Choose Wtiness Host -> Configure Tab -> Licensing 

Environment

• VMware vSAN 7.x
• VMware vSAN 8.x

 

Cause

• A system administrator mistakenly assigned the a non-embedded license to the vSAN witness node
• It is possible to assign an ordinary VCF license to the vSAN witness appliance after it has has been deployed, even though the witness appliance comes with its own embedded license.
• This is not a problem, but it does use licensing that can be use for other hosts.
•  

Resolution

• Once the vSAN witness has been assigned a non-embedded license, it will be necessary to redeploy the witness to regain access to the embedded license. 

Additional Information

• For more information on redeploying the vSAN witness, please see KB: vSAN Stretch Clusters - How to Replace the Witness Appliance/Host
• NOTE: If the cluster was being managed by vSphere Lifecycle Manager (vLCM), you will need to reconfigure vLCM to manage the updates of the witness again: vSAN Health Service - Stretched cluster - Witness node is managed by vLCM