VMware vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 Release Notes

vRealize Orchestrator Appliance 8.0.1 | 19 December 2019 | Build 15296158 Check frequently for additions and updates to these release notes.

What's in the Release Notes

The release notes cover the following topics:

• What's New in vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1
• Deploying the VMware vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 Appliance
• Upgrading and Migrating to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1
• Root Password Expiry Extension
• Plug-ins Installed with vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1
• Internationalization Support
• How to Provide Feedback
• Prior Releases of vRealize Orchestrator
• Resolved Issues
• Known Issues

What's New in vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1

vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 introduces critical bug fixes for the vRealize Orchestrator Client.

For more information on feature and support updates introduced in vRealize Orchestrator 8.0, see the VMware vRealize Orchestrator 8.0 Release Notes.

Deploying the VMware vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 Appliance

The vRealize Orchestrator Appliance is VMware PhotonOS-based appliance distributed as an OVA file. It is prebuilt and preconfigured with a internal PostgreSQL database, and and it can be deployed with vCenter Server 6.0 or later.

The vRealize Orchestrator Appliance is a fast, easy to use, and more affordable way to integrate the VMware cloud stack, including vRealize Automation and vCenter Server, with your IT processes and environment.

For instructions about deploying the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance, see Download and Deploy the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance. 

For information about configuring the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance server, see Configuring a Standalone vRealize Orchestrator Server.

Upgrading and Migrating to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1

You can upgrade a standalone or clustered vRealize Orchestrator 8.0 deployment to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 by using a mounted ISO image.

For more information about upgrading the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance, see Upgrading a Standalone or Clustered vRealize Orchestrator 8.0 Deployment to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1.

You can migrate a standalone vRealize Orchestrator 7.3-7.6 instance authenticated with vSphere to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1. The migration of clustered vRealize Orchestrator 7.x deployments or deployments authenticated with vRealize Automation is not supported.

For more information about migrating the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance, see Migrating vRealize Orchestrator.

Root Password Expiry Extension

Important: For security reasons, the password expiry of the root account of the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance is set to 365 days. To increase the expiry time for an account, log in to the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance as root, and run the following command:

passwd -x number_of_days name_of_account

To make your vRealize Orchestrator Appliance root password last forever, run the following command:

passwd -x 99999 root

Plug-Ins Installed with vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 

The following plug-ins are installed by default with vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1:

• vRealize Orchestrator vCenter Server Plug-In 6.5.0
• vRealize Orchestrator Mail Plug-In 7.0.1
• vRealize Orchestrator SQL Plug-In 1.1.4
• vRealize Orchestrator SSH Plug-In 7.1.1
• vRealize Orchestrator SOAP Plug-In 2.0.0
• vRealize Orchestrator HTTP-REST Plug-In 2.3.4
• vRealize Orchestrator Plug-In for Microsoft Active Directory 3.0.9
• vRealize Orchestrator AMQP Plug-In 1.0.4
• vRealize Orchestrator SNMP Plug-In 1.0.3
• vRealize Orchestrator PowerShell Plug-In 1.0.13
• vRealize Orchestrator Multi-Node Plug-In 8.0.1
• vRealize Orchestrator Dynamic Types 1.3.4
• vRealize Orchestrator vCloud Suite API (vAPI) Plug-In 7.5.0

Internationalization Support

vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 provides multi-language support for the vRealize Orchestrator Control Center and the vRealize Orchestrator Client.

How to Provide Feedback

Your active feedback is appreciated. Provide your feedback by using one of the following methods:

• Support Requests (SRs)
• The vRealize Orchestrator Community Forum

Support Requests

File all issues that you find as Support Requests (SRs), even if you report them to VMware by other means.

For more information on VMware Support and instructions on how to file SRs, please visit the official VMware Support Offerings page.

Include log files in your SRs.

To generate your vRealize Orchestrator logs:

1. Log in to the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance command line as root.

2. Run the vracli log-bundle command.

Result: The log bundle is generated in the root folder of the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance.

Earlier Releases of vRealize Orchestrator

Features and issues from earlier releases of vRealize Orchestrator are described in the release notes for each release. To review release notes for earlier releases of vRealize Orchestrator, click one of the following links:

• vRealize Orchestrator 8.0
• vRealize Orchestrator 7.6.0
• vRealize Orchestrator 7.5.0
• vRealize Orchestrator 7.4.0

Resolved Issues

• Recieving a 406 error when editing a VC:SdkConnection variable.

  When you have a workflow or a configuration element with a variable of the VC:SdkConnection type and you have set its value to a vCenter instance that has an ID which ends with .com or some other domain, you receive a 406 error when you try to edit the variable. The 406 error can also appear when you click the caret to expand the details of the variable when its value was just set.

• Critical issue when pushing resource elements to a Git repository.

  When pushing a resource element to the integrated Git repository, the user must push both the resource.binary and resource.binary.properties elements. Failure to follow this requirement can cause a critical issue for the vRealize Orchestrator Git integration.

• Error when displaying dynamic type workflows.

  Dynamic types selector for the workflow folder displays all folders under the same name.

• Some package content items are imported after package import fails.

  If the package import fails, some of the package items are nevertheless imported.

   

• Exported package content does not follow the assigned restrictions​.

  Setting "View Content" and "Add to package" export options does not have the desired effect over the exported package.

• Logging out of an external vRealize Orchestrator Client authenticated with vRealize Automation can redirect you to the vRealize Automation login page.

  Logging out of an external vRealize Orchestrator Client authenticated with vRealize Automation can redirect you to the vRealize Automation login page. Any following login operations continue to be redirected to vRealize Automation.

   

• Removing the debug breakpoints does not work.

  Removing the debug breakpoints does not work. The workflow debugger saves the breakpoints of the previous run when you exit the workflow editor.

• The Embedded vRealize Orchestrator does not update its authentication configuration.

  The Embedded vRealize Orchestrator does not update its authentication configuration if the virtual appliance host name is changed.

   

• Group search works only for groups with small letters.

  If your group includes uppercase letters, you cannot use the vRealize Orchestrator Client search functionality to find this group.

   

• vRealize Orchestrator Client responds with a 403 forbidden error because of a missing x-xsrf-token when the authentication provider is changed.

  When configuring vRealize Orchestrator for the first time, or changing the authentication provider, it is possible to see the 403 forbidden error in the vRealize Orchestrator Client because of a missing or wrong x-xsrf-token. This issue occurs only if the user has previously opened the client in the browser and afterwards changes the authentication provider using the Control Center. The browser session keeps the first token loaded before the change in the authentication provider. The token used in the current session of the client is not updated and becomes invalid which causes the error.

   

• If a workflow run is exported while still running and then imported it will appear as running.

  The workflow cannot be canceled in the vRealize Orchestrator Client. Consequently, the workflow cannot be deleted as it still appears as running.

• You cannot access the Java documentation of the Plug-in SDK from Develop plug-in page.

  When you navigate from the vRealize Orchestrator Welcome page > Development and Resources > Plug-in Documentation and try to access the EXPLORE THE PLUG-IN SDK page, you are directed to a 404 error page.

• Cannot register vRealize Orchestrator as a vSphere extension.

  The workflow Register vCenter Orchestrator as a vCenter Server extension fails with the error: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: cert parameter is required (Workflow:Register vCenter Orchestrator as a vCenter Server extension / Register extension (item1)#10198).

• An invalid resource element is created if you attempt to upload a file with a size greater than 16 MB.

  When attempting to upload a file with a size greater than 16 MB, a error message appears, but the resource element is still created.

   

• Failure to switch to an integrated external vRealize Orchestrator node from the embedded vRealize Orchestrator Client.

  When switching to an integrated external vRealize Orchestrator node from the embedded vRealize Orchestrator Client, the following message appears: Can not switch to host \{{hostname}}. It is not properly configured or unreachable. The browser logs contain messages indicating a certificate chain error. For Google Chrome, such a certificate chain error is: 2. net::err_cert_authority_invalid.

• Migration to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0 fails for vRealize Orchestrator 7.3 deployments that use an Oracle database.

  The migration fails because the source vRealize Orchestrator 7.3 instance uses an Oracle database.

Known Issues

The known issues are grouped as follows.

• Configuration Issues
• Migration/Upgrade issues
• Web client
• Miscellaneous Issues
• Previously known issues

Configuration Issues

• Recieving a 401 Unautherized Error after joining a single node to a vRealize Orchestrator High Availability (HA) environment.

  After joining a node to a vRealize Orchestrator HA environment, you recieve a 401 error when trying to access the vRealize Orchestrator Client. This error only appears if the vRealize Orchestrator node is authenticated with vRealize Automation.

  Workaround: Reconfigure your authentication provider settings in the Control Center. Unregister the vRealize Automation authentication provider and register it again.

• Increasing the size of vRealize Orchestrator Appliance disks is not reflected on the Operating System (OS) level

  After increasing the size of any of the discs of a vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1 Appliance, the changes are not reflected in the OS. New disc space is not accessible even after auto resize is triggered manually with the vracli disk-mgr resize command

  Workaround:

    1. Log in to the vRealize Orchestrator Appliance over SSH.
    2. Navigate to the /etc/cron.d directory.
    3. Create a file named "disk-management" with this content:

    * * * * * root /opt/scripts/monitor_disk_usage.sh >> /var/log/disk_usage.log 2>&1

    * * * * * root sleep 10 && /opt/scripts/manage_disk_resize.sh >> /var/log/disk_resize.log 2>&1.

    NOTE: Make sure there is a trailing newline at the end of the file.
    4. Modify the file with read permissions for standard users and write permissions for the owner (chmod 644 disk-management).
    5. If one or more disks have been externally resized, perform the following steps to trigger automatic resize on the OS level:
       a. Navigate to the /var/vmware/prelude/disk-management directory.
       b. Open the "disk_stats" file and modify its content to:
       /dev/sda: 1
       /dev/sdb: 1
       /dev/sdc: 1
       /dev/sdd: 1
       c. Run the vracli disk-mgr resize command.

• Deploying or upgrading a High Availabiity environment with vRealize Suite Lifecycle Manager might fail on boot, because of constraint violations when initializing vRealize Automation.

  After deploying or upgrading, you see the following error messege in the vco-control-center container log:
  <log_date><log_time>[localhost-startStop-1] ERROR {} [DbConfigurationInitializator] Failed to create the initial configuration data. Reason: query did not return a unique result: 2;

  Workaround:

  1. Scale the vco-app replicas to 0.

      kubectl -n prelude scale deployment vco-app --replicas=0

  2. By running the vracli dev command, verify that there are more than one record in vmo_contentversioncontrol where repositorytype = 'INTERNAL'.

      vracli dev psql

      \c vco-db

      select count(*) from vmo_contentversioncontrol where repositorytype = 'INTERNAL' group by location;

      select * from vmo_contentversioncontrol where repositorytype = 'INTERNAL';

  3. Delete any additional records and leave only one record in vmo_contentversioncontrol performing the following sql query where {extra_record_id} has to be replaced with the id of the record that has to be deleted.

      delete from vmo_contentversioncontrol where id='{extra_record_id}';

  4. Exit the psql interactive terminal.

  5. Scale the vco-app replicas to 1

      kubectl -n prelude scale deployment vco-app --replicas=1

  6. Wait for the vro pod to be ready and to have 3/3 ready containers for the pod and then scale vco-app replicas to 3. Two more pods have to be deployed.

      kubectl -n prelude scale deployment vco-app --replicas=3

Migration/Upgrade issues

• After migrating vRealize Orchestrator 7.x to 8.0.1, Active Directory takes a long time to show all plug-in folders in the inventory.

  This issue is not consistently observed, but in rare cases after migration the Active Directory inventory does not appear immediately in the vRealize Orchestrator Client.

  No workaround. Wait for the problem to resolve itself.

• Failed to log in after upgrade to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1.

  After upgrading to vRealize Orchestrator 8.0.1, log in attempts fail with the following error message:  _400 BAD_REQUEST \"Required String parameter 'client_id' is not present\"_*. This issue only appears in vRealize Orchestrator deployments authenticated with vRealize Automation.

  Workaround: Reconfigure your authentication provider settings in the Control Center. Unregister the vRealize Automation authentication provider and register it again.

Web client

• Unable to validate an SSH address when configuring a GitLab integration.

  Adding an SSH address and clicking on the validation button causes the following error: Error: org.bouncycastle.util.io.pem.PemGenerationException: unknown object passed - can't encode.

  Workaround: When you add an SSH address, you must first click on the Save button to generate a public key. Paste your public key and add it in GitLab, so you can connect to your repository.

• In the vRealize Orchestrator Client, you see tags containing underscore characters in the name.

  The vRealize Orchestrator Client doesn't support tag names with less than three characters or names containing white-space characters. All tags auto-generated from objects with shorter names will be suffixed with "underscore". All white-space characters will also be replaced with "underscore".

  Example: The workflow located in "/Library/project A/app/DR/backup" in the Orchestrator Legacy Client,  will have the following auto-generated tags in the vRealize Orchestrator Client: "Library", "project_A", "app", "DR_"

  Workaround: Follow the presented tagging conventions when creating new content in the vRealize Orchestrator Client.

• Workflow Designers cannot run policies created by them in the vRealize Orchestrator Client.

  After creating a policy, the Workflow Designer clicks Run. Navigating to the Policy Runs page shows that the policy run initiated by the Workflow Designer is in the Stopped state.

  Workaround: Have a user with administrator rights run the policy created by the Workflow Designer.

• Scheduled workflow runs are triggered at a different than the expected time with the time offset to UTC time.

  When you schedule workflow runs through scripting by using the *workflow.scheduleRecurrently()* function, scheduled workflows are always triggered in UTC time. There is a discrepancy between the vRealize Orchestrator Client UI and the function behavior, because the UI adds the time zone of your browser to the recurrence pattern. However, the time zone is not included in the recurrence pattern when using the function and the calculations of the time to the trigger the workflow runs are done on the server side in UTC time.

  Workaround: When you schedule workflow runs in scripting, use time values in UTC time.

• Duplicated workflows created in Orchestrator Legacy Client might display a constant instead of an external action in their value options.

  When editing the input parameters of a workflow that is designed in the Orchestrator Legacy Client, and duplicated in the vRealize Orchestrator Client, the value options might be set as a constant instead of an external action.

  Workaround: Navigate to the Input Form tab and edit the input parameter presentation to include the required external action.

• Unable to select an action as an external source in input forms because of a return type issue.

  In the vRealize Orchestrator Client Input Form tab, you are unable to select an action that has a return type of either Any or Array/Any for a default value or value option.

  Workaround:

  1. Log in to the vRealize Orchestrator Client.
  2. Select your workflow and navigate to the Input Form tab.
  3. Set the action with the return type expected from the widget default value or value option and save the changes.
  4. Select the default value or value option action, save the workflow, and revert the action to previous version or change the return type back to the Any type.

Miscellaneous Issues

• The vCenter Server plug-in does not support policies.
  The vCenter Server plug-in for vRealize Orchestrator does not support using policies to monitor for events that are issued by the managed vCenter Server instance.
• Importing a package created in a newer vRealize Orchestrator version into an older version of vRealize Orchestrator can cause an error.

  Compatability issues between vRealize Orchestrator versions lead to the inability to import packages created in newer product versions into older vRealize Orchestrator deployments.

Previously known issues

To view a list of previous known issues, click here.

This section contains previously known issues (Issues remaining from previous releases and still exist in the product).

• During the installation of a plug-in in Control Center, an error message appears.
  When you install a plug-in from the Manage Plug-Ins page in Control Center, the error message Plug-in 'name_of_the_plug-in' (plug-in_file_name) is not compatible with the current platform version. Supported platform versions are ''. Clicking on the 'Install' button will install it anyway appears. You can safely ignore this error and proceed with the installation of the plug-in.

• The Orchestrator authentication configuration might become invalid, if the authentication provider certificate changes or regenerates.
  When the SSL certificate of the vRealize Automation or vSphere instance that is configured as the authentication provider in Control Center is changed or regenerated, the Orchestrator authentication configuration becomes invalid and the Orchestrator server cannot start.

  Workaround: Import the new authentication provider certificate:

  1. Log in to Control Center as root.
  2. Click Certificates.
  3. Click the Import on the Trusted Certificates tab.
  4. Load the SSL certificate from a URL or a file.
  5. Click Import.

   

• The SOAP plug-in cannot connect through an authenticated proxy server.
  When you run the Add a SOAP host workflow, use a proxy server that does not require authentication.

• If you experience issues connecting to a SOAP or a REST host, or importing a certificate, you might have to explicitly enable certain versions of SSL or TLS.
  For information about this issue, see https://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/technotes/guides/security/jsse/JSSERefGuide.html.

  Workaround: For information about explicitly enabling SSLv3 and TLSv1 for outgoing HTTPS connections, see Enable TLSv1 for outgoing HTTPS connections in vRealize Orchestrator 6.0.4 and 7.0.x manually (KB 2144318).

• vCenter Server objects are not accessible in the vSphere Web Client (Flex)

  Orchestrator cannot access vCenter Server objects in the vSphere Web Client (Flex), if the vCenter Server instance that you are attempting to access is registered in Orchestrator by IP address.

  Workaround: Register the vCenter Server instance by host name.

• The SSH plug-in cannot connect to a Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) firewall.
  The SSH plug-in for vRealize Orchestrator 7.1 does not support connectivity to a Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) firewall.
• Problems handling non-ASCII characters in certain contexts.
  Using non-ASCII characters in input parameters results in incorrect behavior in the following situations:
  • If you run the SCP put or SCP get workflows from the SSH folder on a file with a name that contains non-ASCII characters, the workflow runs, but name of the resulting file on the destination machine is unreadable.
  • If you try to insert non-ASCII characters into attribute names, the characters do not appear. This issue occurs for workflow attributes and action attributes.
• The Storage VSAN workflows of the vCenter Server plug-in do not support adding Solid-State Drive (SSD) disks to an ESXi host.
  The Add disks to disk group and Remove disks from disk groups workflows do not support adding SSD disks as capacity disks to ESXi hosts.

• Compiling a custom model-driven plug-in fails if you use an extension method that contains lambda expressions.
  When you use model-driven to create plug-ins and you add extension methods to a certain extension, the plug-in does not compile if the extension method contains lambda expressions. The plug-in compilation fails with an error message, similar to the following: Caused by: java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException: 52789.

  Workaround: Do not use lambda expressions in the body of the extension methods.

• The RESTOperation ID does not initialize properly if the REST host instance is created by using a Swagger spec.
  In the HTTP-REST plug-in, when the REST host instance is created by a Swagger spec, the RESTOperation ID does not initialize properly and the getOperation of the RESTHost object does not work.

• The Convert disks to thin provisioning workflow does not handle virtual machines with snapshots correctly and does not convert the thick-provisioned disks.
  On completion, the Convert disks to thin provisioning workflow reports that the thick-provisioned disks of virtual machines with snapshots are successfully converted to thin-provisioned, but they are not.

  Workaround: Do not include virtual machines with snapshots in the workflow.

• Adding values to vCenter Server data object properties of the Array type is not possible.
  When Orchestrator runs scripts, the vCenter Server plug-in converts JavaScript arrays to Java arrays of a fixed size. As a result, you cannot add new values to vCenter Server data objects that take arrays as property values. You can create an object that takes an array as a property if you instantiate that object by passing it a pre-filled array. However, after you instantiate the object, you cannot add values to the array.

  For example, the following code does not work:

  var spec = new VcVirtualMachineConfigSpec();
spec.deviceChange = [];
spec.deviceChange[0] = new VcVirtualDeviceConfigSpec();
System.log(spec.deviceChange[0]);

  In the above code, Orchestrator converts the empty spec.deviceChange JavaScript array into the fixed-size Java array VirtualDeviceConfigSpec[] before it calls setDeviceChange(). When calling spec.deviceChange[0] = new VcVirtualDeviceConfigSpec(), Orchestrator calls getDeviceChange() and the array remains a fixed, empty Java array. Calling spec.deviceChange.add() results in the same behavior.

  Workaround: Declare the array as a local variable:

  var spec = new VcVirtualMachineConfigSpec();
var deviceSpec = [];
deviceSpec[0] = new VcVirtualDeviceConfigSpec();
spec.deviceChange = deviceSpec;
System.log(spec.deviceChange[0]);

• Passing a VcSnapshotInfo object as an attribute of type Any between two workflow elements causes an exception during serialization

  In the vCenter Server plug-in, passing a VcSnapshotInfo object or an array of VcSnapshotInfo objects as an attribute of type Any between two workflow elements triggers a serialization that fails with a Can not set long field com.codahale.metrics. error message.

  Workaround: Change the workflow to omit passing a VcSnapshotInfo object or an array of VcSnapshotInfo objects between the workflow elements.

To collapse the list of previous known issues, click here.