Hello all,
Something interesting to share today. This has been ongoing for a while. I went to add a co-worker to a new View pool so I could work with her in my lab. But it did not work. When I checked the Machines view in View I saw the VM was in customizing mode – forever it seemed. This is my story on fixing this issue.
I let a VM process the customization spec as long as it wanted. It took overnight for it to say error – timeout. So to make this more simple I used the customization spec and the template outside of view. So I could see a little better.
It turns out that the deployment worked. However the customization did not – the VM was named like the template and not part of the domain.
The first thing I checked was the domain add info in the spec.
While this had worked previously, it was considered – according to the Internet as not quite right. So I changed it.
Still I could not successfully deploy a virtual machine from the template. Meaning have it join the domain and be named properly.
I used the vSphere Client (C# version) to re-enter the credential passwords just in case that bug was still around.
I had a number of virtual machines now that were not what I wanted and they were in fact licensed. So I was worried about using up my MSDN license count. I found this article that showed me how to undo activations and supposedly return the license to me. Not sure if it works but I hope it releases the license and it is added back to my MSDN world.
I next made sure that the network was connected to the VM, that virtual hardware and tools were current and they were. I manually added the VM to the domain and that worked fine.
I next checked the credentials I specified in the custom spec were good. I used them to RDP to a domain controller, and I used them to join a VM to the domain. All worked fine.
So I deployed another one and it behaved the same – no new name or domain. So I checked the c:\windows\temp folder for the vmware-imc folder and looked at the two log files within. No errors or any indications things were astray.
I now remembered an old issue where if your VM was on the domain before it was turned into a template you could have an issue. Nope, that was not an issue here.
I had the View agent installed, and anti – malware (Trend) but could they be an issue?
I created a new custom spec – same info but new custom spec and the same results occur.
So I tried again and used a new set of credentials to join the domain. Still no joy. I tried joining a workgroup rather then domain. Still no good results.
So now I got all my vC / ESXi / vSphere Web client logs, screenshots, and vmware-imc log files and created a support call. Need the help of the professionals.
Since I have only basic support as part of the TAP Elite program I did not get any help until Monday. But on Sunday when I did my newsletter I mentioned my issue and I was very lucky. Frank Buchsel is a reader and also a VMware Escalation Support Engineer. He suggested I needed to submit the sysprep log files. Didn’t know about them. This helped me find them. I did find the logs in all of the locations that the article suggested and I uploaded all of them to VMware. If I had checked the sysprep logs I would have found what Frank did.
Could not load DLL c:\Program Files\Microsoft Security Client\MSESysprep.dll
This error message is the same as a supposedly different issue. Frank suggested I try that solution. I had installed Trend a while back and it uninstalled Microsoft Security Essentials so I thought maybe it did that poorly and caused or contributed to this issue.
So I try the solution and it works. But then I find a really exciting issue.
Turns out that this error occurs on physical machines and no solution. So what do I do now? It will occur each log in. Mind you I was excited that the VM had the right name and was on the domain. But this error had to go.
I find a different Windows 7 template, and use the same custom spec and it works great. That Win7 template still had Microsoft Security Essentials on it. So I figure I need to make this Win7 template like my last one. But I need to do it in a few steps.
So first I manually remove MSE. It turns out that it still leaves behind the crap.
See it in the last line of the list in the screenshot. So again I remove it.
I test doing a deploy again and it works. Yahoo.
Now I have to upgrade that Win7 template – meaning all the normal updates like Adobe, FireFox, Chrome, Autoruns, BGInfo, VMware Tools, etc. So I test again again – and it works.
Now I add Trend and test again. It works – yahoo a little bit more.
Now I add the View agent and test again. It works – yahoo even more!
I can now add the template back to View and things should work much better now. Of course, I will test that before I tell anyone!
BTW, I want to thank VMware Support for their help but particularly thank Frank for the help and knowledge!
Just in case you are curious – yes, View worked! I hope that this might help someone else avoid the hassle I had!
And remember comments or questions are always welcome!
Michael
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