How to stop, start, or restart vCenter Server Appliance 5.x services

Products

VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

This article provides steps to stop, start, or restart vCenter Server Appliance services.

For troubleshooting and maintenance purposes, it may be necessary to change the status of vCenter Server Appliance services such as VMware VirtualCenter Server or VMware Infrastructure Web Access.

Environment

VMware vCenter Server Appliance 5.5.x
VMware vCenter Server Appliance 5.0.x
VMware vCenter Server Appliance 5.1.x

Resolution

Beginning in vCenter Server 6.0, it is recommended to use the vSphere Web Client or Service Control command-line tool to stop, start, or restart vCenter Server and/or Platform Services Controller services. This process is different from previous versions of vCenter Server with the Microsoft Windows Services snap-in.

For more information see, Stopping, Starting or Restarting VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.x services (2109887)

Checking the status vCenter Server Appliance services

To check the status of vCenter Server Appliance services:

Connect to the vCenter Server Appliance through SSH. For more information, see Enable or Disable SSH Administrator Login on the VMware vCenter Server Appliance section in the vCenter Server and Host Management Guide.
Log in as root.
Run this command in the SSH client:

service –-status-all
Scroll through the output to check the status of all services.

To check the status of a specific service:

Run this command to review the list of all services:

ls /etc/init.d
Scroll through the output and find the name of the service you are interested in. For a list of core vCenter Server services, see the Additional Information section of this article.
Run this command in the SSH client:

service ServiceName status

Where ServiceName corresponds to one of the services in /etc/init.d or the core list in the Additional Information section of this article. For example:

service vmware-vpxd status

If the vpxd service is running, you see output similar to:

vmware-vpxd is running
tomcat is running

Note: The tomcat service is within the vmware-vpxd service. You can check the status of tomcat by checking the status of vmware-vpxd. This service can be stopped and started outside of the vmware-vpxd service by running these commands:

vmware-vpxd tomcat-stop

vmware-vpxd tomcat-start

Stopping vCenter Server Appliance services

To stop a vCenter Server Appliance service if it has started:

Connect to the vCenter Server Appliance via SSH. For more information, see Enable or Disable SSH Administrator Login on the VMware vCenter Server Appliance section in the vCenter Server and Host Management Guide.
Log in as root.
Run this command to review the list of all services:

ls /etc/init.d
Scroll through the output and find the name of the service you are interested in. For a list of core vCenter Server services, see the Additional Information section of this article.
Run this command in the SSH client:

service ServiceName stop

Where ServiceName corresponds to one of the services in /etc/init.d.

Note: When you stop the VMware VirtualCenter Server service (vmware-vpxd), all connected users are disconnected from their session.

Starting vCenter Server Appliance services

To start a vCenter Server Appliance service if it has stopped:

Connect to the vCenter Server Appliance through SSH. For more information, see Enable or Disable SSH Administrator Login on the VMware vCenter Server Appliance section in the vCenter Server and Host Management Guide.
Log in as root.
Run this command to review the list of all services:

ls /etc/init.d
Scroll through the output and find the name of the service you are interested in. For a list of core vCenter Server services, see the Additional Information section of this article.
Run this command in the SSH client:

service ServiceName start

Where ServiceName corresponds to one of the services in /etc/init.d.

Note: If the VMware VirtualCenter Server service does not start, verify that it is able to get exclusive access to the vCenter Server repository.

Restarting vCenter Server Appliance services

To restart a vCenter Server Appliance service:

Connect to the vCenter Server Appliance through SSH. For more information, see Enable or Disable SSH Administrator Login on the VMware vCenter Server Appliance section in the vCenter Server and Host Management Guide.
Log in as root.
Run this command to review the list of all services:

ls /etc/init.d
Scroll through the output and find the name of the service you are interested in. For a list of core vCenter Server services, see the Additional Information section of this article.
Run this command in the SSH client:

service ServiceName restart

Where ServiceName corresponds to one of the services in /etc/init.d.

Note: When you restart the VMware VirtualCenter Server service, all connected users are disconnected from their vSphere/Virtual Infrastructure Client sessions.

Additional Information

vCenter Server Appliance 5.x Service Description and Service Name correlation list

Service Description	Service Name
VMware VirtualCenter Server Service	vmware-vpxd
Embedded vPostgres Database service	vmware-vpostgres
VMware Tools Service	vmware-tools-services
VMware vSphere Profile-Driven Storage Service	vmware-sps
VMware vCenter Inventory Service	vmware-inventoryservice
VMware vSphere Network Dump Collector service	vmware-netdumper
VMware vSphere Log Browser	vmware-logbrowser
VMware vSphere Auto Deploy service	vmware-rbd-watchdog
VMware vSphere Web Client	vsphere-client
[For vSphere 5.1 Only] vCenter Single Sign-On 5.1	vmware-sso

[For vSphere 5.5 Only] vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 - VMware Directory Service	vmdird
[For vSphere 5.5 Only] vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 - VMware Certificate Service	vmcad
[For vSphere 5.5 Only] vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 - VMware Secure Token Service	vmware-stsd
[For vSphere 5.5 Only] vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 - VMware Kdc Service	vmkdcd
[For vSphere 5.5 Only] vCenter Single Sign-On 5.5 - VMware Identity Management Service	vmware-sts-idmd

Stopping, starting, or restarting VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.x services