VMware App Volumes Datastore Migration – 2.18

This is a guide for migrating App Volumes app stacks, metadata, and entitlements to a new datastore. I’ll also cover the clean up steps to remove references to the old location(s). What will not be covered are writable volumes.

These instructions are intended for App Volumes 2.18 and may be applicable to other versions in the 2.x branch. The steps for metadata cleanup were obtained through collaboration with VMware Business Critical Support.

Update: These steps continue to work through at least App Volumes 4.9 (2212).

Requirements

  • Administrator role in vSphere vCenter.
  • Administrator role in App Volumes Manager.
  • Administrator privileges to the App Volumes Manager operating system.
  • Access to the App Volumes database server, SQL Server Management Studio, and at least DBO privileges on the App Volumes database.
  • A recent database backup in case a rollback is required.

Summary Steps

  • Use Storage Groups to duplicate existing app stacks and metadata to a new datastore.
  • Remove the Storage Group after duplication has occurred.
  • Remove the old datastore.
  • Metadata cleanup

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VMware Unified Access Gateway 3.3.1 Fails to Start Blast Services in FIPS Mode

A bug exists in the FIPS version of the VMware Unified Access Gateway 3.3.1 appliance that causes the local Blast services to fail to properly initialize due to a cipher suite mismatch between local services on the appliance. The issue appears to be exclusive to the 3.3.1 release, as the issue did not exist in 3.3.0 and is said to be patched in 3.4.0.

To resolve the issue, a single line needs to be edited in a configuration file on the appliance.

Open the following file in an editor:
/opt/vmware/gateway/lib/bsg/absg.properties

Locate the line for ‘localHttpsCipherSpec’ and replace it with the following:
localHttpsCipherSpec=!aNULL:kECDH+AESGCM:ECDH+AESGCM:RSA+AESGCM:kECDH+AES:ECDH+AES:RSA+AES

Save the file. Disable and enable the Blast service in the web administration UI. Restart the appliance.