Upgrading vCOps is relatively straightforward, but can be a lengthy process.  Since VMware recently released minor update 5.8.3, I thought this would be an ideal time to share the procedure for upgrading the vApp.  As an added treat, I’ve also included the procedure for upgrading the underlying operating system for the vApp as this latest version requires SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP3.

The release notes for the vCOps 5.8.3 vApp can be found here. (Installable version can be found here). These notes contain all necessary details regarding new features, prerequisites, upgrade procedures, and known issues.

As a warning, since upgrading to the 5.8.3 vApp requires upgrading the underlying SLES operating system, additional downtime will be required.  Plan accordingly.

Please also note, the following procedures apply to the vApp only, as in my previous posts.  Please see VMware’s documentation here for upgrading the installable version.

Upgrade the vCOps vApp

1. Take snapshots of the UI VM and Analytics VM.  These can be deleted after the successful upgrade.

2. Download the VMware-vcops-5.8.3-2076729.pak file from the VMware vCOps 5.8.3 download page.  A my.vmware.com login is required.

3. Log in to the Administration portal of the vCOps app (https: //<IP address of UI VM>/admin), using admin credentials.

4. Click on the Update tab in the Admin portal and click on the Browse button under the Update package section.  Browse to the .pak file downloaded in Step 2 and click Open.

5. Click Update to open the update dialogue window.

6. Click OK to confirm the update.

7. Wait for the file to upload.

8. Accept the terms of the EULA and click OK.

9. Click OK to confirm the update.

10.  Wait for the update to complete.  The admin page will likely refresh and kick you out.  You might get the following message:

“The web server is not yet available.  You will be re-directed when service is available.”

Once the web server is available again, the site will automatically refresh and the logon page will reappear with a warning that the update is still in progress.  Log in to monitor the progress.

11.  Monitor the update progress…<yawn>

12. This process may take a long time.  You will receive the following message when the update is complete:

“Last update completed successfully“

13. At this point, both the admin portal and the Analytics/UI VMs will show the new version:

14. You might need to reapply the vCOps license file in vCenter Server, otherwise functionality might be reduced.  In my case, functionality appeared to be unchanged and I confirmed that the license level under the Registration tab was unchanged.

15. If the license has to be reapplied, the services must be restarted.  Go to the Status tab and click on the Restart button.

16. At this point, open the vCOps UI portal and verify proper display and functionality of the upgraded vCOps environment.  Clicking on the About link in the upper right corner will also confirm the version number.

Upgrade the OS to SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) 11 SP3

VMware declares this step as necessary to run the latest version of vCOps 5.8.3 vApp.  The 5.8.2 vApp was shipped with SLES 11 SP2 so apparently Service Pack 3 is required to fully support 5.8.3.

1. Verify that vCOps 5.8.3 upgraded successfully.

2. Backup or take a snapshot of the Analytics and UI VMs.

3. Log on as root to the UI VM console.  The root password should have been created during the initial installation of the previous version.

4. Check the root password expiration date by running the following command on the UI VM:

chage -l root

Verify the password will not expire during the upgrade process.  If it does, change the password prior to the upgrade.

5. Download the SLES 11 SP3 .pak file (VMware-vcops-SP3-2069574.pak) from the VMware vCOps 5.8.3 download page and copy the file to /data drive on the UI VM.  I used WinSCP for this step.  The file is 3.2 GB so make sure you have the disk resources to copy this into the vApp.  The vApp should have been provisioned with plenty of space, but confirm the sufficient disk space on the underlying physical disk if the vApp was thin-provisioned.

6. Run the following command on the UI VM to start the upgrade process:

/usr/lib/vmware-vcops/user/conf/upgrade/va_sles11_spx_init.sh /data/VMware-vcops-SP3-2069574.pak

This will upgrade both the UI and Analytics VM.  Upgrade will start on the Analytics VM and then the UI VM.  The message, “INIT: version 2.86 reloading” will appear during the upgrade process on each VM.  The entire process can be quite lengthy.  The upgrade process is complete when the command prompt returns on the UI VM console.

7.  Restart the vCOps vApp.

8. Log back into the vCOps User Interface to verify the service is back up and running.

Upgrade is complete!