VmBix configuration - daemon Java Exceptions, SDK

[monman]

Hi all, I am trying to verify the configuration of my new VmBix 1.2.2 installation and run the daemon.
I have been following the guide on VmBix Wiki page, all was OK till and including the "Check that VmBix runs on your system" section.
When trying to "Configure daemon" I keep getting Java Exceptions every second:
RemoteException: java.rmi.RemoteException: VI SDK invoke exception:java.rmi.RemoteException: VI SDK invoke exceptionrg.dom4j.DocumentException: null Nested exception: null

The vSphere is on the same subnet and I used this command:

$ /usr/local/sbin/vmbix -P 12050 -u <my-user> -p <my-passwd> -s http://172.30.x.x:9443

I suspect we might not have the required SDK installed (I tried various /sdk suffixes, with the port and without it etc.), I am rather new to all this, if it is this major and basic problem, please be patient with me and give a clue, just to get the right direction. Which SDK is required? I presume not the Perl one as it is mentioned as suboptimal on the Wiki and I found a number of SDKs on the VMWare site.

Many thanks and sorry for the utter noobness.
M.

[gavind]

Hi Monman, I got nothing on top of my head for this. But have you found a work around so far?

[tatapoum]

Hi,
If you use the zip archive and install the JAR, you don't need to install any SDK on your server.
Are you sure about the vCenter URL ? Isn't it https ? Can you test it with a browser ?

[monman]

Hi Monman, I got nothing on top of my head for this. But have you found a work around so far?

Hi gavind, thanks for your time! I am still struggling to get it to work but I will have to manage till tomorrow. Good motivation

Hi,
If you use the zip archive and install the JAR, you don't need to install any SDK on your server.
Are you sure about the vCenter URL ? Isn't it https ? Can you test it with a browser ?

Hi tatapoum, thanks for this point. As I said I am new to this and was just brainstorming what could have gone wrong based on the Java Exceptions I was getting. I installed vmbix as explained on https://code.google.com/p/vmbix/wiki/VmBix, all was OK until I tried to test the connection with "vmbix -P" prior to updating /etc/vmbix/vmbix.conf.

As for HTTP/HTTPS, that was a typo. I forgot to update the post after I tried several variants. The connection is HTTPS with a problematic/local certificate, which the browser screams about.

Bottomline, apart from Java RE and the correctly extracted VmBix zip, there is no special requirement to install anything into vSphere?
I am confused about the /sdk in every VmBix configuration example. In other words, no "vSphere Web Client SDK", "VMware vSphere Web Services SDK", "VI SDK" or other is needed?

This is my Java RE:

java version "1.8.0_31"
Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.8.0_31-b13)
Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM (build 25.31-b07, mixed mode)

Many thanks!

[monman]

Hi all, I was finally able to connect VmBix to vSphere.

The problem was not Java or similar but a malformed URL and my original vSphere user account type (was only able to log in with "Use Windows session authentication" ticked).

I further struggled with starting the daemon using the config file. I was getting a syntax error from the daemon utility (line with username=my-valid-user), so I am using daemontools instead:

root@vmbix:/home/vmbix# service vmbixd start
$Starting vmbixd: daemon: fatal: syntax error in /etc/vmbix/vmbix.conf, line 12:
username=my-valid-user

Nevertheles, after I set up daemontools and started the daemon, I added a new Host as instructed, linked it with the template and VmBix started discovering vSphere nodes as expected. I am not using the loadable module as installation of agents on the maschines is not an option. All hosts have an IP of 127.0.0.1. I was able to use zabbix_get:

root@vmbix:/home/vmbix# zabbix_get -s 127.0.0.1 -p 12050 -k about[*]
VMware vCenter Server 5.5.0 build-2001466

My mission is to obtain CPU usage info from a subset of the discovered VMs. Here I beg for help again, what is the correct form of the hostname when issuing the respective zabbix_get command? I tried to use the exact name as presented in the Zabiix "Host" field, got a timeout. I tried to strip the "ourdomain.local" suffic and got an empty result.

root@vmbix:/home/vmbix# zabbix_get -s 127.0.0.1 -p 12050 -k vm.cpu.load[hostname.ourdomain.local,used]
zabbix_get [8770]: Timeout while executing operation

root@vmbix:/home/vmbix# zabbix_get -s 127.0.0.1 -p 12050 -k vm.cpu.load[hostname,used]

root@vmbix:/home/vmbix#

Any clue please? Is this even possible?
Thank you!

[tatapoum]

Can you try this ?

zabbix_get -s 127.0.0.1 -p 12050 -k "vm.cpu.load[hostname.ourdomain.local,used]"

You must use the display name of the VM.

[monman]

Hi all, just FYI this project has been suspended and the thread is thus obsolete. OPs can delete.
Cheers to everyone who tried to help!