How to prevent duplicate of replaced systems in Hybrid Cloud Console Inventory ?

Solution Verified - Updated

Environment

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux v 6
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux v 7
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux v 8
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux v 9
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux v 10
  • Certificate Based Registration
    • Hybrid Cloud Console
    • Red Hat Customer Portal
    • Red Hat Network Portal
    • Red Hat Subscription Management)

Issue

If a RHEL system is cloned or templated after it has already been registered to Red Hat Subscription Management (RHSM) or Red Hat Insights, the cloned system inherits the existing Insights Machine-id file, stored at:

/etc/insights-client/machine-id
  • During registration:
    • Subscription-manager register generates a new system UUID
    • The inherited Insights Machine-id is not automatically regenerated
    • Multiple systems may report using the same identity values

Resolution

Before cloning or templating

Before converting a system into a template or cloning it, ensure it is not registered to RHSM or Insights.

  1. Unregister the system from RHSM
# subscription-manager unregister
# subscription-manager clean
  1. Remove the Insights Machine-id
# rm -f /etc/insights-client/machine-id

  1. Power off the system and create the template or clone the system

    • All systems created from this template will now generate a unique RHSM UUID and Insights Machine-id upon registration.

If systems are already replacing each other

  1. Remove existing subscription and identity data
# subscription-manager clean
  1. Remove the inherited Insights Machine-id
# rm -f /etc/insights-client/machine-id

  1. Ensure system uniqueness

    • Verify that the cloned system has a unique hostname

  2. Register the system to RHSM and attach a subscription

# subscription-manager register
  1. Register the system to Insights
# insights-client --register
  1. Validate in Hybrid Cloud Console
    • Log into: https://console.redhat.com/insights/inventory and confirm that the system appears as a unique entry and no longer replaces other systems.
  • Additional information
    • Re-running insights-client –register without removing /etc/insights-client/machine-id does not resolve the issue
    • Each RHEL system must have a unique Insights Machine-id to appear separately in Inventory
    • Behavior described in this article applies to supported RHEL versions where subscription-manager and insights-client are available. Extended Life Phase systems may require updated client packages.

Root Cause

Hybrid Cloud Console identifies systems using a host deduplication process that considers several identifiers, such as provider ID (for example, cloud instance ID), subscription manager UUID, and Insights Machine-ID. If multiple systems share identifiers, they may be merged or they may replace each other in inventory.

Therefore, cloning or templating a system after it has been registered can lead to duplicate or replaced hosts and is an unsupported workflow unless identity information is reset.

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