Error when browsing or selecting a datastore

Problem

When you select and browse a datastore in 5.1 and higher you get the following error message:

com.vmware.sps.fault.QsConnectionException

If you are not familiar with all the vCenter plug-ins you can login to https://IP-or-FQDN-of-vCenter/mob with administrator credentials and browse to content – ExtensionManager and search in the extensionlist for com.vmware.sps or similar entry. As a result you will get the name of the service or plug-in. In our case it’s the VMware vSphere Profile-driven Storage Service.

Cause

This issue may occur due to the following reasons:
VMware Inventory Service is not running
VMware Profile Driven Storage Service is not running

Resolution

Check if one or both services are not running and start them. If both services are not running start the Inventory service first and the Profile Driven Storage second.
Windows vCenter
Open Start – Run and start the services.msc. Under der service list select the required services and start them.
vCenter Server Appliance
Login to your VCSA with Putty or any other ssh client and check with chkconfig –list which services are available.
vmware-inventoryservice
vmware-logbrowser
vmware-netdumper
vmware-rbd-watchdog
vmware-sps
vmware-sso
vmware-tools-services
vmware-vpostgres
vmware-vpxd
The required services are vmware-inventoryservice and vmware-sps.
You can also check if one or both services are running with the following command:
service –status-all |grep Profile

VMware vSphere Profile-Driven Storage Service is running (PID:14048, Wrapper:STARTED, Java:STARTED)

service –status-all |grep Inventory

VMware Inventory Service is running (PID:3390, Wrapper:STARTED, Java:STARTED)

To restart or start the service invoke the following command:
service vmware-sps restart or service vmware-sps start
service vmware-inventoryservice restart or vmware-inventoryservice start