Virt-who service on Red Hat Satellite 6 fails with exception: error: bad character range.

Solution Verified - Updated -

Environment

  • Red Hat Satellite 6

Issue

  • Virt-who service on Red Hat Satellite 6 server fails with below error:

    error: bad character range

  • How to use filter_regex parameter in virt-who configuration file for using regular expressions?

Resolution

  • Use the below parameters in the affected virt-who configuration file.

    filter_hosts=servername0([0-1],|[0-1][0-2]).example.com
filter_type=regex

  • After making the above changes in virt-who configuration file, run below commands on Satellite server.

    # systemctl stop virt-who.service
# virt-who -c < virt-who configuration file name> -d -o
# systemctl start virt-who.service

    Note: Do not run virt-who deployment commands, as this will remove the manual changes by overwriting virt-who configuration file.

Root Cause

  • The error occurred because filter_type=regex parameter was missing from virt-who configuration file. This parameter is required for using regular expressions to filter hosts.

Diagnostic Steps

  • Check virt-who service status on Satellite server.

    # systemctl status virt-who.service -l
● virt-who.service - Daemon for reporting virtual guest IDs to 
subscription-manager
Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/virt-who.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
Active: active (running) since Tue 2021-09-21 11:48:41 IST; 2s ago
Main PID: 21625 (virt-who)
Tasks: 8
CGroup: /system.slice/virt-who.service
       └─21625 /usr/bin/python /usr/bin/virt-who
[virtwho.destination_-6954900173952236195 INFO] 
MainProcess(21625):Thread-6 @subscriptionmanager.p...6073d49f284
Sep 21 11:48:43 satellite.example.com /usr/bin/virt- 
who[21625]: 2021-09-21 11:48:43,435 
[virtwho.destination_-5456464160048940608 ERROR] 
MainProcess(21625):Thread-5 @virt.py:run:421 - Th... exception:
error: bad character range

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