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ESX Server 3.0.1, Patch ESX-1005112: Enabling Root Password Expiry; VirtualCenter 2.5 Displays an Error When a Virtual Machine is Powered on; Third Party Library libpng Updated to 1.2.29

Details

Release Date: 08/28/08
Document Last Updated: 08/28/08
 
ad645cef0f9fa18bb648ba5a37074732
Product Versions ESX Server 3.0.1
Patch Classification Security
Supersedes ESX-1004725
Virtual Machine Migration or Reboot Required No
ESX Server Host Reboot Required No
PRs Fixed 295985, 237629, 281597
Affected Hardware N/A
Affected Software libpng, VMware VirtualCenter 2.5
RPMs Included VMware-esx-hostd
Related CVE numbers CVE-2007-5269

Summary

This patch fixes the following issues:

  • Previously, the root password expiry information was not preserved across hostd restarts. A new tag called rootPasswdExpiration is added to the /etc/vmware/hostd/config.xml file. If this rootPasswdExpiration tag is set to true , then the number of days to expiry will be preserved across hostd restarts.
        After setting the rootPasswdExpiration tag in the /etc/vmware/hostd/config.xml file as True , run the following command:
     chage –M <X> root
        Here, X is the number of days till expiration.
 
          Example: chage -M <60> root indicates the root password will expire after 60 days
          Note: As the default value of rootPasswdExpiration tag is set as False , this fix will not impact customers who do not want the root password to expire.
  • VMware VirtualCenter 2.5 displays an error message when a virtual machine is powered on with a passthrough attached SCSI Tape device.
  • Several flaws were discovered in the way third party library libpng handled various PNG image chunks. An attacker could create a carefully crafted PNG image file in such a way that it causes an application linked with libpng to crash when the file is manipulated.

    The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2007-5269 to the security issue fixed in this update.  To complete the fix, install and ESX-1005112 and ESX-1005108.

Solution

Symptoms

The following symptom might occur without this patch:

  • VirtualCenter 2.5 displays a Device 'SCSI Device 1' has a backing type that is not supported. This is a general limitation of the host error message when a virtual machine is powered on with a passthrough attached SCSI Tape device. 

 
Deployment Considerations
 
To address the libpng issue, you must install ESX-1005112 and ESX-1005108 to complete the fix.

Download Instructions

Download and verify the patch bundle as follows:

  1. Download patch ESX-1005112 from http://www.vmware.com/download/vi/vi3_patches.html.

  2. Log in to the ESX Server service console as root.

  3. Create a local depot directory.

    # mkdir -p /var/updates

    Note: VMware recommends that you use the updates directory.

  4. Change your working directory to /var/updates.

    # cd /var/updates
  5. Download the tar file into the /var/updates directory.

  6. Verify the integrity of the downloaded tar file:

    # md5sum ESX-1005112.tgz

    The md5 checksum output should match the following:

    ad645cef0f9fa18bb648ba5a37074732 ESX-1005112.tgz
  7. Extract the compressed tar archive:

    # tar -xvzf ESX-1005112.tgz
  8. Change to the newly created directory, /var/updates/ESX-1005112:

    # cd ESX-1005112  

Installation Instructions

After you download and extract the archive, and if you are in the directory that you previously created, use the following command to install the update:

# esxupdate update

To run esxupdate from a different directory, you must specify the bundle path in the command:

# esxupdate -r file://<directory>/ESX-1005112 update

For example, if the host is called depot:

# esxupdate -r file:///depot/var/updates/ESX-1005112 update

During the update process, logs appear on the terminal. You can specify the verbosity of esxupdate logs by using the -v option as shown, below.

# esxupdate -v 10 file://<directory>/ESX-1005112 update

For more information on how to use esxupdate, see the Patch Management for ESX Server 3 tech note at http://www.vmware.com/pdf/esx3_esxupdate.pdf.

Keywords

esxpatch;esx301

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Actions
  • KB Article: 1005112
  • Updated: Aug 14, 2009
  • Products:
    VMware ESX
  • Product Versions:
    VMware ESX 3.0.x