During the upgrade of VMware Aria Operations, you can review and follow these guidelines.

  • Run the appropriate versioned pre-upgrade assessment tool on your current VMware Aria Operations before performing the upgrade to view the possible impact of your custom content to plan appropriate maintenance efforts for adjusting impacted custom content.

    See Using the Pre-Upgrade Assessment Tool for VMware Aria Operations 8.12 and VMware Aria Operations Upgrade Center for the latest information.

  • Verify existing functionality before upgrading

    Ensure the environment is fully functional before starting an upgrade. It is recommended to make a list of what works (or does not work) to confirm the same functionality post upgrade.

  • Backup customized content before upgrade

    Customized content must be backed up and saved for any potential overwrites or losses during upgrade.

  • Snapshot VMs with the cluster offline before upgrading

    After verifying functionality and backing up customized content, snapshot all the analytics VMs within the cluster for failsafe in event of an upgrade failure.

  • Check interoperability of management packs before upgrade

    It may be possible that some management packs will not be supported in the new product version and render the management pack inoperable. Before encountering this situation, confirm interoperability of management packs with the new product version.

    See VMware Product Interoperability Matrix and VMware Compatibility Guide for supported management pack versions.

  • Perform the upgrade outside of DT / QIC / Costing or Backup processing

    Perform the upgrade of the VMware Aria Operations cluster outside the dynamic threshold, or capacity calculations, or costing, or during backups to avoid capturing high stress states.

  • Setup restriction for maintenance to avoid false alerts

    When performing maintenance, such as an upgrade or resizing the cluster, schedule a maintenance window to account for the performed activity to avoid receiving false alerts and notifications.

  • Examine the recommendations from the validation checks before performing the upgrade

    There is a pre-check upgrade validation script that runs before performing the actual upgrade. Address any failures and warnings before continuing to upgrade or the upgrade may fail.

  • Activated the option to reset Default Content

    Select the option to reset default content and bring in new content. This will overwrite existing content to a newer version provided by the update. User modifications to DEFAULT Alert Definitions, Symptoms, Recommendations, Policy Definitions, Views, Dashboards, Widgets, and Reports will be overwritten; therefore, clone or backup the content before you proceed.

  • Upgrade the OS PAK prior to upgrading the virtual appliance (VA) PAK for VMware Aria Operations 7.5 and lower.

    To ensure a solid base OS before upgrading VMware Aria Operations, upgrade the OS of the virtual appliance first before upgrading VMware Aria Operations.

  • Use the appropriate VMware Aria Operations upgrade PAK file

    Starting with VMware Aria Operations 8.1, there are two PAK files available for upgrade:

    1. Upgrade PAK file includes the OS upgrade files from SUSE to Photon and the vApp upgrade files for upgrading from vRealize Operations Manager 7.5 and lower.

    2. Upgrade PAK file includes the OS upgrade files from Photon to Photon and the vApp upgrade files for upgrading from VMware Aria Operations 8.0.

  • Pre-distribute PAK files to minimize downtime during upgrade

    One of the longest steps of the upgrade process is the distribution of the PAK files across all the nodes. To minimize this time, pre-distribute the PAK files to all nodes before starting the upgrade.

    See How to reduce VMware Aria Operations update time by pre-copying software update PAK files.

  • Verify functionality after the upgrade

    Validate that the same functionality exists after the upgrade completed as compared to before the upgrade started.

  • Remove VM snapshots when the upgrade is completed and successfully verified

    Remove all VM snapshots post upgrade and verification of the environment as maintaining snapshots will cause performance problems.

  • Be mindful when upgrading cloud proxies

    Cloud Proxies may be located in distant locations to the VMware Aria Operations cluster so consider potential latency and performance issues before performing an upgrade. Ensure that the cloud proxies meet the latency requirements of less than 200 ms. If they do not meet latency requirements, remove those cloud proxies from the cluster one-by-one.

    To remove high latency cloud proxies, bring the cluster offline and take snapshots prior to removing the cloud proxies. Then bring the cluster back online and remove each impacted cloud proxy one-by-one using the UI. After removal of all high latency cloud proxies, follow the upgrade process. Once the upgrade is completed, install new cloud proxies with the same product version to replace previously removed cloud proxies and join the cluster.