You can often obtain valuable troubleshooting information by looking at the logs provided by the various services and agents that your implementation is using.

Most logs are located in /var/log/vmware/<service_name> for vCenter Server deployments.

Common Logs

The following logs are common to all vCenter Server deployments.

Table 1. Common Log Directories
Log Directory Description
../firstboot Stores first boot logs
applmgmt and applmgmt-audit Stores logs related to the VMware Appliance Management Service
cloudvm Stores logs for allotment and distribution of resources between services
rhttpproxy Stores logs for the VMware HTTP Reverse Proxy service
sca Stores logs for the VMware Service Control Agent service
vapi Stores logs for the VMware vAPI Endpoint service
vmafdd Stores logs for the VMware Authentication Framework - LDAP service
vmdird Stores logs for the VMware Directory Service - LDAP service
vmon Stores logs for the VMware Service Lifecycle Manager service

Management Node Logs

The following logs are available if a management node deployment is selected.

Table 2. Management Node Log Directories
Log Directory Service
rbd VMware vSphere Auto Deploy
content-library VMware Content Library Service
eam VMware ESX Agent Manager
netdumper VMware vSphere ESXi Dump Collector
perfcharts VMware Performance Charts Service
vmcam VMware vSphere Authentication Proxy
vmdird VMware Directory Service - LDAP
vmware-sps VMware vSphere Profile-Driven Storage Service
vpxd VMware vCenter Server
vpostgres VMware Postgres service
vcha VMware vCenter High Availability service