vSphere Lifecycle Manager Sync Updates task fails with an error 'integrity.fault.MetadataDownloadFailure: Cannot download patch definitions'

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

• The Sync updates task in vLCM fails with the below error:

  A general system error occurred: Download patch definitions task failed while syncing depots. Error: integrity.fault.MetadataDownloadFailure: Cannot download patch definitions'

• Manually uploading zip bundle to Import Updates also fails with the below error, though the UI shows 100% upload complete:
  
  A general system error occurred: Uploading offline patches task failed while creating offline depot. Error: 'integrity.fault.FileUploadInvalidPackage: Cannot upload file, because it is an invalid package. \ndownloading metadata for file vendor-index.xml: Failed to create metadata file. Error: No such file or directory'.

• Upon validating the /va/rlog/vmware/vmware-updatemgr/vmware-vum-server.log shows:
  
  YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ss.291Z info vmware-vum-server[08887] [Originator@6876 sub=Libs] FILE: Failed to create temporary file; dir "/storage/updatemgr/patch-store/hostupdate/vmw", objName "metadata-169.zip", errno 2
YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ss.291Z error vmware-vum-server[08887] [Originator@6876 sub=Default] [updateDownloaderImpl 650] Failed to create metadata file. Error: No such file or directory
YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ss.291Z error vmware-vum-server[08887] [Originator@6876sub=DownloadOfflinePatchTask.DownloadOfflinePatchTask{7}] [downloadOfflinePatchTask 2
02] Error parsing metadata files: \ndownloading metadata for file vendor-index.xml: Failed to create metadata file. Error: No such file or directory

Environment

• VMware vCenter Server 7.x
• VMware vCenter Server 8.x

Cause

• The hostupdate directory is missing from /storage/updatemgr/patch-store in the vCenter.

Resolution

• Take a snapshot of the vCenter. 
• Create the missing directories and give the appropriate permissions with the below commands:

1. 1. cd /storage/updatemgr/patch-store
   2. mkdir hostupdate
   3. mkdir eula_files
   4. chown updatemgr:updatemgr hostupdate
   5. chown updatemgr:updatemgr eula_files
   6. service-control --restart updatemgr

• Login to vCenter and check that the Sync Updates task completes successfully.