Troubleshooting Redis for VMware Tanzu Application Service

Note: Pivotal Platform is now part of VMware Tanzu. In v2.4 and later, Redis for Pivotal Platform is named Redis for VMware Tanzu Application Service.

Page last updated:

This topic lists troubleshooting information for Redis for VMware Tanzu Application Service.

Note: Some of the troubleshooting approaches in this topic suggest potentially destructive operations. VMware recommends that you back up both your Ops Manager and deployments before attempting such operations.

For more information about backing up your setup and exporting your Ops Manager installation, see Backing Up Deployments with BBR

Useful Debugging Commands

Before debugging, gather the following information about your deployment:

• Current version of Redis for Tanzu Application Service, and, if upgrading, the previous version of Redis for Tanzu Application Service
• Current version of Ops Manager, and, if upgrading, the previous version of Ops Manager

cf CLI Commands

See the table below for Cloud Foundry Command Line Interface (cf CLI) commands commonly used while debugging:

BOSH CLI Commands

See the table below for BOSH CLI commands commonly used while debugging:

You can obtain general information after you SSH into a broker or service instance as follows:

• To see system logs, go to /var/vcap/sys/log.
• To check process health, run sudo monit summary.
• To obtain a list of all processes, run ps aux.
• To see disk usage, run df -h.
• To see memory usage, run free -m.

You can obtain information specific to the cf-redis broker as follows:

• For shared-VMs, the redis processes are co-located with the CF-Redis broker. You can check these VMs using ps aux | grep redis-server.
• Shared-VM data is stored in /var/vcap/store/cf-redis-broker/redis-data.

About the Redis CLI

The redis-cli is a command line tool used to access a Redis server. You can use the redis-cli for create, read, update, and delete (CRUD) actions, and to set configuration values. For more information about the redis-cli, see redis-cli, the Redis command line interface in the Redis documentation.

To access the redis-cli, do the following:

1. Follow the instructions in Access the Redis Service to retrieve the password and port number for the service instance.

2. SSH into the service instance.

3. Connect to the Redis server and enter the redis-cli interactive mode by running:

   /var/vcap/packages/redis/bin/redis-cli -p PORT -a PASSWORD
   

   Where:

   • PORT is the port number retrieved in step one.
   • PASSWORD is the password retrieved in step one.
   For more information about the redis-cli interactive mode, see Interactive Mode in the Redis documentation.

Troubleshoot Errors

Start here if you are responding to a specific error or error messages.

Common Services Errors

The following errors occur in multiple services:

• Failed Installation
• Cannot Create or Delete Service Instances
• Broker Request Timeouts
• Instance Does Not Exist
• Cannot Bind to or Unbind from Service Instances
• Cannot Connect to a Service Instance
• Upgrade All Service Instances Errand Fails
• Missing Logs and Metrics

Instance provisioning failed: There was a problem completing your request. Please contact your operations team providing the following information: service: redis-acceptance, service-instance-guid: ae9e232c-0bd5-4684-af27-1b08b0c70089, broker-request-id: 63da3a35-24aa-4183-aec6-db8294506bac, task-id: 442, operation: create

Server error, status code: 504, error code: 10001, message: The request to the service broker timed out: https://BROKER-URL/v2/service_instances/e34046d3-2379-40d0-a318-d54fc7a5b13f/service_bindings/aa635a3b-ef6d-41c3-a23f-55752f3f651b

Server error, status code: 502, error code: 10001, message: Service broker error: instance does not exist`

Server error, status code: 502, error code: 10001, message: Service broker error: There was a problem completing your request. Please contact your operations team providing the following information: service: example-service, service-instance-guid: 8d69de6c-88c6-4283-b8bc-1c46103714e2, broker-request-id: 15f4f87e-200a-4b1a-b76c-1c4b6597c2e1, operation: bind

Redis for Tanzu Application Service-Specific Errors

The following troubleshooting errors are specific to Redis for Tanzu Application Service:

• AOF File Corrupted, Cannot Start Redis Instance
• Saving Error
• Failed Backup
• Orphaned Instances: BOSH Director Cannot See Your Instances
• Orphaned Instances: The Deployment Cannot See Your Instances
• Failed to Set Credentials in Runtime CredHub
• Service Outage after Disabling TLS

[ErrorLog-TimeStamp] # Bad file format reading the append only file: make a backup of your AOF file, then use ./redis-check-aof --fix `filename`

Background saving error

Failed opening the RDB file dump.rdb (in server root dir /var/vcap/store/redis) for saving: No space left on device

Backup has failed. Redis must be running for a backup to run

error: failed to set credentials in credential store: The request includes an unrecognized parameter 'mode'. Please update or remove this parameter and retry your request. error for user: There was a problem completing your request. Please contact your operations team providing the following information: service: p.redis, service-instance-guid: , broker-request-id: , operation: bind

Troubleshoot Components

This section provides guidance on checking for, and fixing, issues in cf-redis and on-demand service components.

BOSH Problems

Large BOSH Queue

On-demand service brokers add tasks to the BOSH request queue, which can back up and cause delay under heavy loads. An app developer who requests a new Redis for Tanzu Application Service instance sees create in progress in the Cloud Foundry Command Line Interface (cf CLI) until BOSH processes the queued request.

Ops Manager currently deploys two BOSH workers to process its queue. Future versions of Ops Manager will let users configure the number of BOSH workers.

Configuration

Service Instances in Failing State

The VM or Disk type that you configured in the plan page of the tile in Ops Manager might not be large enough for the Redis for Tanzu Application Service service instance to start. See tile-specific guidance on resource requirements.

Authentication

UAA Changes

If you have rotated any UAA user credentials then you may see authentication issues in the service broker logs.

To resolve this, redeploy the Redis for Tanzu Application Service tile in Ops Manager. This provides the broker with the latest configuration.

Note: You must ensure that any changes to UAA credentials are reflected in the Ops Manager credentials tab of the VMware Tanzu Application Service for VMs tile.

Networking

Common issues with networking include:

Validate Service Broker Connectivity to Service Instances

To validate connectivity, do the following:

1. View the BOSH deployment name for your service broker by running:

   bosh deployments

2. SSH into the Redis for Tanzu Application Service service broker by running:

   bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME ssh

3. If no BOSH task-id appears in the error message, look in the broker log using the broker-request-id from the task.

Validate App Access to a Service Instance

Use cf ssh to access to the app container, then try connecting to the Redis for Tanzu Application Service service instance using the binding included in the VCAP_SERVICES environment variable.

Quotas

Plan Quota Issues

If developers report errors such as:

Message: Service broker error: The quota for this service plan has been exceeded.
Please contact your Operator for help.

1. Check your current plan quota.
2. Increase the plan quota.
3. Log in to Ops Manager.
4. Reconfigure the quota on the plan page.
5. Deploy the tile.
6. Find who is using the plan quota and take the appropriate action.

Global Quota Issues

If developers report errors such as:

Message: Service broker error: The quota for this service has been exceeded.
Please contact your Operator for help.

1. Check your current global quota.
2. Increase the global quota.
3. Log in to Ops Manager.
4. Reconfigure the quota on the on-demand settings page.
5. Deploy the tile.
6. Find out who is using the quota and take the appropriate action.

Failing Jobs and Unhealthy Instances

To determine whether there is an issue with the Redis for Tanzu Application Service deployment:

1. Inspect the VMs by running:

   bosh -d service-instance_GUID vms --vitals

2. For additional information, run:

   bosh -d service-instance_GUID instances --ps --vitals

If the VM is failing, follow the service-specific information. Any unadvised corrective actions (such as running BOSH restart on a VM) can cause issues in the service instance.

Techniques for Troubleshooting

This section contains instructions on:

• Interacting with the on-demand service broker
• Interacting with on-demand service instance BOSH deployments
• Performing general maintenance and housekeeping tasks

Parse a Cloud Foundry (CF) Error Message

Failed operations (create, update, bind, unbind, delete) result in an error message. You can retrieve the error message later by running the cf CLI command cf service INSTANCE-NAME.

$ cf service myservice

Service instance: myservice
Service: super-db
Bound apps:
Tags:
Plan: dedicated-vm
Description: Dedicated Instance
Documentation url:
Dashboard:

Last Operation
Status: create failed
Message: Instance provisioning failed: There was a problem completing your request.
     Please contact your operations team providing the following information:
     service: redis-acceptance,
     service-instance-guid: ae9e232c-0bd5-4684-af27-1b08b0c70089,
     broker-request-id: 63da3a35-24aa-4183-aec6-db8294506bac,
     task-id: 442,
     operation: create
Started: 2017-03-13T10:16:55Z
Updated: 2017-03-13T10:17:58Z

Use the information in the Message field to debug further. Provide this information to Support when filing a ticket.

The task-id field maps to the BOSH task ID. For more information on a failed BOSH task, use the bosh task TASK-ID.

The broker-request-guid maps to the portion of the On-Demand Broker log containing the failed step. Access the broker log through your syslog aggregator, or access BOSH logs for the broker by typing bosh logs broker 0. If you have more than one broker instance, repeat this process for each instance.

Access Broker and Instance Logs and VMs

Before following the procedures below, log in to the cf CLI and the BOSH CLI.

Access Broker Logs and VMs

You can access logs using Ops Manager by clicking on the Logs tab in the tile and downloading the broker logs.

To access logs using the BOSH CLI, do the following:

1. Identify the on-demand broker (ODB) deployment by running the following command:

   bosh deployments

2. View VMs in the deployment by running the following command:

   bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME instances

3. SSH onto the VM by running the following command:

   bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME ssh

4. Download the broker logs by running the following command:

   bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME logs

The archive generated by BOSH includes the following logs:

Access Service Instance Logs and VMs

1. To target an individual service instance deployment, retrieve the GUID of your service instance with the following cf CLI command:

   cf service MY-SERVICE --guid

2. To view VMs in the deployment, run the following command:

   bosh -d service-instance_GUID instances

3. To SSH into a VM, run the following command:

   bosh -d service-instance_GUID ssh

4. To download the instance logs, run the following command:

   bosh -d service-instance_GUID logs

Run Service Broker Errands to Manage Brokers and Instances

From the BOSH CLI, you can run service broker errands that manage the service brokers and perform mass operations on the service instances that the brokers created. These service broker errands include:

• register-broker registers a broker with the Cloud Controller and lists it in the Marketplace.

• deregister-broker deregisters a broker with the Cloud Controller and removes it from the Marketplace.

• upgrade-all-service-instances upgrades existing instances of a service to its latest installed version.

• delete-all-service-instances deletes all instances of service.

• orphan-deployments detects “orphan” instances that are running on BOSH but not registered with the Cloud Controller.

To run an errand, run the following command:

bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME run-errand ERRAND-NAME

For example:

bosh -d my-deployment run-errand deregister-broker

Register Broker

The register-broker errand does the following:

• Registers the service broker with Cloud Controller.
• Enables service access for any plans that are enabled on the tile.
• Disables service access for any plans that are disabled on the tile.
• Does nothing for any plans that are set to manual on the tile.

You should run this errand whenever the broker is re-deployed with new catalog metadata to update the Marketplace.

Plans with disabled service access are only visible to admin Cloud Foundry users. Non-admin Cloud Foundry users, including Org Managers and Space Managers, cannot see these plans.

Deregister Broker

This errand deregisters a broker from Cloud Foundry.

The errand does the following:

• Deletes the service broker from Cloud Controller
• Fails if there are any service instances, with or without bindings

Use the Delete All Service Instances errand to delete any existing service instances.

To run the errand, run the following command:

bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME run-errand deregister-broker

Upgrade All Service Instances

The upgrade-all-service-instances errand does the following:

• Collects all of the service instances that the on-demand broker has registered.
• Issues an upgrade command and deploys the a new manifest to the on-demand broker for each service instance.
• Adds to a retry list any instances that have ongoing BOSH tasks at the time of upgrade.
• Retries any instances in the retry list until all instances are upgraded.

When you make changes to the plan configuration, the errand upgrades all the Redis for Tanzu Application Service service instances to the latest version of the plan.

If any instance fails to upgrade, the errand fails immediately. This prevents systemic problems from spreading to the rest of your service instances.

Delete All Service Instances

This errand uses the Cloud Controller API to delete all instances of your broker’s service offering in every Cloud Foundry org and space. It only deletes instances the Cloud Controller knows about. It does not delete orphan BOSH deployments.

Note: Orphan BOSH deployments do not correspond to a known service instance. While rare, orphan deployments can occur. Use the orphan-deployments errand to identify them.

The delete-all-service-instances errand does the following:

1. Unbinds all apps from the service instances.
2. Deletes all service instances sequentially. Each service instance deletion includes:
   1. Running any pre-delete errands
   2. Deleting the BOSH deployment of the service instance
   3. Removing any ODB-managed secrets from BOSH CredHub
   4. Checking for instance deletion failure, which results in the errand failing immediately
3. Determines whether any instances have been created while the errand was running. If new instances are detected, the errand returns an error. In this case, VMware recommends running the errand again.

Warning: Use extreme caution when running this errand. You should only use it when you want to totally destroy all of the on-demand service instances in an environment.

To run the errand, run the following command:

bosh -d service-instance_GUID delete-deployment

Detect Orphaned Service Instances

A service instance is defined as “orphaned” when the BOSH deployment for the instance is still running, but the service is no longer registered in Cloud Foundry.

The orphan-deployments errand collates a list of service deployments that have no matching service instances in Cloud Foundry and return the list to the operator. It is then up to the operator to remove the orphaned BOSH deployments.

To run the errand, run the following command:

bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME run-errand orphan-deployments

If orphan deployments exist—The errand script does the following:

• Exit with exit code 10
• Output a list of deployment names under a [stdout] header
• Provide a detailed error message under a [stderr] header

For example:

[stdout]
[{"deployment\_name":"service-instance\_80e3c5a7-80be-49f0-8512-44840f3c4d1b"}]

[stderr]
Orphan BOSH deployments detected with no corresponding service instance in Cloud Foundry. Before deleting any deployment it is recommended to verify the service instance no longer exists in Cloud Foundry and any data is safe to delete.

Errand 'orphan-deployments' completed with error (exit code 10)

These details will also be available through the BOSH /tasks/ API endpoint for use in scripting:

$ curl 'https://bosh-user:bosh-password@bosh-url:25555/tasks/task-id/output?type=result' | jq .
{
  "exit_code": 10,
  "stdout": "[{"deployment_name":"service-instance_80e3c5a7-80be-49f0-8512-44840f3c4d1b"}]\n",
  "stderr": "Orphan BOSH deployments detected with no corresponding service instance in Cloud Foundry. Before deleting any deployment it is recommended to verify the service instance no longer exists in Cloud Foundry and any data is safe to delete.\n",
  "logs": {
    "blobstore_id": "d830c4bf-8086-4bc2-8c1d-54d3a3c6d88d"
  }
}

If no orphan deployments exist—The errand script does the following:

• Exit with exit code 0
• Stdout will be an empty list of deployments
• Stderr will be None

[stdout]
[]

[stderr]
None

Errand 'orphan-deployments' completed successfully (exit code 0)

If the errand encounters an error during running—The errand script does the following:

• Exit with exit 1
• Stdout will be empty
• Any error messages will be under stderr

To clean up orphaned instances, run the following command on each instance:

WARNING: Running this command may leave IaaS resources in an unusable state.

bosh delete-deployment service-instance_SERVICE-INSTANCE-GUID

Get Admin Credentials for a Service Instance

To retrieve the admin credentials for a service instance from BOSH CredHub:

1. Use the cf CLI to determine the GUID associated with the service instance for which you want to retrieve credentials by running:

   cf service SERVICE-INSTANCE-NAME --guid

   For example:
   

   $ cf service my-service-instance --guid
   
   12345678-90ab-cdef-1234-567890abcdef

   If you do not know the name of the service instance, you can list service instances in the space with cf services.
2. Follow the steps in Gather Credential and IP Address Information and Log In to the Ops Manager VM with SSH of Advanced Troubleshooting with the BOSH CLI to SSH into the Ops Manager VM.
3. From the Ops Manager VM, log in to your BOSH Director with the BOSH CLI. See Authenticate with the BOSH Director VM in Advanced Troubleshooting with the BOSH CLI.

4. Find the values for BOSH_CLIENT and BOSH_CLIENT_SECRET:

   1. In the Ops Manager Installation Dashboard, click the BOSH Director tile.
   2. Click the Credentials tab.
   3. In the BOSH Director section, click the link to the BOSH Commandline Credentials .
   4. Record the values for BOSH_CLIENT and BOSH_CLIENT_SECRET.
5. Set the API target of the CredHub CLI to your BOSH CredHub server by running:

   credhub api https://BOSH-DIRECTOR-IP:8844 \
         --ca-cert=/var/tempest/workspaces/default/root_ca_certificate

   Where BOSH-DIRECTOR-IP is the IP address of the BOSH Director VM.
   
   For example:

   $ credhub api https://10.0.0.5:8844 \
         --ca-cert=/var/tempest/workspaces/default/root_ca_certificate

6. Log in to CredHub by running:

   credhub login \
       --client-name=BOSH-CLIENT \
       --client-secret=BOSH-CLIENT-SECRET

   For example:

   $ credhub login \
         --client-name=credhub \
         --client-secret=abcdefghijklm123456789

7. Use the CredHub CLI to retrieve the credentials :

   • Retrieve the password for the admin user by running:

     credhub get -n /p-bosh/service-instance_GUID/admin_password

     In the output, the password appears under value. Record the password.
     For example:

     $ credhub get \
       -n /p-bosh/service-instance_70d30bb6-7f30-441a-a87c-05a5e4afff26/admin_password 
     
       id: d6e5bd10-3b60-4a1a-9e01-c76da688b847
       name: /p-bosh/service-instance_70d30bb6-7f30-441a-a87c-05a5e4afff26/admin_password
       type: password
       value: UMF2DXsqNPPlCNWMdVMcNv7RC3Wi10
       version_created_at: 2018-04-02T23:16:09Z

Reinstall a Tile

To reinstall a tile in the same environment where it was previously uninstalled:

1. Ensure that the previous tile was correctly uninstalled as follows:
   1. Log in as an admin by running:

      cf login

   2. Confirm that the Marketplace does not list Redis for Tanzu Application Service by running:

      cf m

   3. Log in to BOSH as an admin by running:

      bosh log-in

   4. Display your BOSH deployments to confirm that the output does not show the Redis for Tanzu Application Service deployment by running:

      bosh deployments

   5. Run the “delete-all-service-instances” errand to delete every instance of the service.
   6. Run the “deregister-broker” errand to delete the service broker.
   7. Delete the service broker BOSH deployment by running:

      bosh delete-deployment BROKER-DEPLOYMENT-NAME

   8. Reinstall the tile.

View Resource Saturation and Scaling

To view usage statistics for any service, do the following:

1. Run the following command:

   bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME vms --vitals

2. To view process-level information, run:

   bosh -d DEPLOYMENT-NAME instances --ps

Identify Apps using a Service Instance

To identify which apps are using a specific service instance from the name of the BOSH deployment:

1. Take the deployment name and strip the service-instance_ leaving you with the GUID.
2. Log in to CF as an admin.
3. Obtain a list of all service bindings by running the following:

   cf curl /v2/service_instances/GUID/service_bindings

4. The output from the above curl gives you a list of resources, with each item referencing a service binding, which contains the APP-URL. To find the name, org, and space for the app, run the following:
   1. cf curl APP-URL and record the app name under entity.name.
   2. cf curl SPACE-URL to obtain the space, using the entity.space_url from the above curl. Record the space name under entity.name.
   3. cf curl ORGANIZATION-URL to obtain the org, using the entity.organization_url from the above curl. Record the organization name under entity.name.

Note: When running cf curl ensure that you query all pages, because the responses are limited to a certain number of bindings per page. The default is 50. To find the next page curl the value under next_url.

Monitor the Quota Saturation and Service Instance Count

Quota saturation and total number of service instances are available through ODB metrics emitted to Loggregator. The metric names are shown below:

Note: Quota metrics are not emitted if no quota has been set.

VMware Tanzu Support Articles

The following are VMware Tanzu Support articles about Redis for Tanzu Application Service:

• Creating an Empty Services Network when using on-demand Service Tiles for Non-On-Demand Usage Only
• Full disk scaling issue
• Tile upgrade issue
• Deploy Fails to Complete
• Instance Alive after Successful De-Provisioning
• Dedicated Instance Fails to Persist to Disk
• Redis error when saving changes after a back to AWS S3: Error: Access Denied for bucket ‘pcf-redos-backup-sgp-intra-test’
• For service settings on Redis Tile, the VM options checkbox needs to be checked for GCP Environment
• Removing dedicated-vm Service Instances on CF when already deleted from BOSH
• Migrating from dedicated-vm service plans to on-demand service plans