vCenter Server upgrade failing with Error: "Installation Failed: Exception occured in postinstallHook for lookupsvc:Patch. Please check the logs for more details. Take corrective action and then resume."

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

Updating vCenter Server fails with the error below

 

 

You will find similar errors as shown in the logs below:

 

/var/log/vmware/applmgmt/PatchRunner.log:

[YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS] ERROR starting lookupsvc rc: 4, stdout: , stderr: Start service request failed. Error: A system error occurred. Check logs for details
[YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS] Lookup Service firstboot failed
...
Exception: Lookupsvc Patching failed to execute firstboot operation

/var/log/vmware/lookupsvc/lookupsvc-prestart.log:

[YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS] ERROR Failure to register SyncaaS tables in postgressql

/var/log/vmware/lookupsvc/lookupserver-default.log:

[YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS] pool-2-thread-12 WARN com.vmware.sso.interop.ldap.LdapErrorChecker] Error received by LDAP client: com.vmware.sso.interop.ldap.OpenLdapClientLibrary, error code: -1
[YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS] pool-2-thread-12 WARN com.vmware.vim.lookup.impl.LdapStorage] Failed to connect to LDAP server, will retry; attempt:1 of 15, delay:5 sec com.vmware.sso.interop.ldap.ServerDownLdapException: Can't contact LDAP server

/var/log/vmware/rhttpproxy/rhttpproxy.log:

[YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS] error rhttpproxy[09373] [Originator@6876 sub=RhttpProxy file=vpxd-vijson-soap-proxy.json loadCfg=0] JSON parse error: Missing a name for object member. at offset 754.

 

To verify the issue access Postgres Database by running the below command:

# /opt/vmware/vpostgres/current/bin/psql -U postgres -d VCDB

Check the Role names using below command.

# \du

 We can see a user "vROuserPG" with mixed casing. 

 

Environment

VMware vCenter Server 8.x

Cause

PostgreSQL treats quoted identifiers as case-sensitive, which prevented the Lookup Service from properly registering its SyncaaS (Synchronization as a Service) tables during its prestart routine. 

Resolution

1. Access Postgres Database by running the below command

# /opt/vmware/vpostgres/current/bin/psql -U postgres -d VCDB

2. Check the Role names using below command.

# \du

3. Rename the problematic user role by running the below command.

# ALTER ROLE "vROuserPG" TO "vrouserpg";

4. Restart the update of vCenter Server.