How to reset HP iLO Password (DL 585 G2)

Today, I got into trouble with a HP Server. I need to hold remote console of the HP DL 585 G2 server. When I tried to access the console, prompted me to enter "Administrator" credential...Oops... no idea what is the password. I have not been known about this while KT from previous administrator. Now, I have to find a way to reset this password and access the server remotely. While searching, I ended up with 3 different ways to reset the password. All the 3 ways given below, you choose which one good for you:

Resetting using SmartStart CD

1.        Boot the server using HP SmartStart CD

2.       Press F8 to goto iLO Configuration console

3.       Select the HP iLO setting

4.      Goto User setting

5.       Select the “Administrator” and change the password or Create new user with administrator privileges

Resetting using Security Override Switch

1.        Look system board diagram server top bonnet

2.       Look for the system management switch (mostly no:11 on DL 585 G2 servers)

3.       Turn off the iLO Security switch (SW5)

Position	Default	Function	Description	Settings
1	Off	iLO security override	The override allows the administrator full access to the iLO processor.	Open (off) = Normal Closed (on) = Override
2	Off	Redundant bootblock select	Forces booting from the redundant bootblock	Open (off) = Normal Closed (on) = Redundant bootblock (ROM)

(Ref: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=115&prodSeriesId=463637&prodTypeId=12169&objectID=c00305177)

Resetting the Password using HPONCFG command:

                Using the command needs some prerequisites. You can use this command on the same server where you need to reset the password. The server can be loaded with either Windows or Linux OS. You have to run the SmartUpdate CD again to choose and install the HP iLO configuration utility.

1.        Install the SNMP (pre-requisite, if you already have installed this, ignore)

2.       Install  the HP Insight Management

3.       Install the HP iLO configuration utility/driver as highlight above picture

4.      Create a XML file as follow and save it as “Administrator_reset_pw.xml”

(Unable to publish XML codes here, thatswhat, screeshot)

(Most of the sample scripts can be found here: http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareDescription.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&mode=3&taskId=135&swItem=MTX-UNITY-I20110 )

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareDescription.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodTypeId=18964&prodSeriesId=1146658&swItem=MTX-84d9a19b43b84516ac2d26d01f&prodNameId=1135772&swEnvOID=1005&swLang=8&ta

5.       Save this file where the iLO Configuration utility. The common location of the utility is “C:\Program Files\HP\HPONCFG”

6.      Then, run the following command in RUN command

                                                               i.      HPONCFG.exe /f Administrator_reset_pw.xml /l log.txt >output.txt

7.       Open the iLO page in IE or Firefox. You should able to login using “Administrator”

Office 365 - Microsoft offers MS-Office on Cloud

Finally, Microsoft put their Ms-Office suite on the cloud and started as cloud service (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/online-software.aspx ).They hosted important application such as Email (Outlook) and Calendar. Office 365 offers 25GB mailbox for each user and they can send email messages upto 25 MB.  Other important MS-Office application like MS-Word, Excel, Powerpoint and OneNote are also available under Office365. Users can view,edit and simultaneously access and edit the same document with other users. The same feature available in Google docs and referred as “Real-time Collaboration”( http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/business/collaboration.html ).  I generally use the Google docs in home computer for documentation work. I noticed that Google docs automatically saves the document and maintain version. Microsoft offers the office365 as Beta version only. I have not yet used office365 and unable to conclude the feature comparison between Office 365 and Google docs.

Amazon Cloud Drive

Amazon offers free 5GB cloud drive at free of cost https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/learnmore . You can save your documents, music and video files. Addition to this, you can directly play your music files without downloading. This feature is currently available only for US customer. Amazon may start this service for world wide.  If you are willing to use more than 5 GB, Amazon will charge you as per storage choice. I remember few years back I used to keep my documents in www.xdrive.com.  What is difference between them and Amazon? Just few features, more memory, cloud (music) player and you can directly purchase the music albums from Amazon store and copy them to cloud drive.  Some old wine in new sexy bottle. That’s all!

Google Chrome OS as VM on VMware Workstation

During this weekend, got sometime to play with Google Chrome OS. I downloaded the OS image (around 650 MB) and installed with VMware Workstation as a VM. I chosen the "Other Linux Kernel 2.6.x" as the type of the VM. However, the Google Chrome OS using Linux as their base kernel. It looks like that noone going to leave this  Linux kernel, a evergreen OS kernel.

I am facing some issues with Chrome OS as a VM, unable to change the screen resolution/size, though I managed to get this sound device, but, poor audibility. I am not seeing any console (Terminal Windows) like other Linux based systems. Therefore, unable to install the VMware tools for better enhancement of the VM.

Anyway, using the Google Chrome browser/OS for this post :)

Its still long way to go for full exploration of capability of this OS. I applied for Pilot user program for Chrome OS and keep my finger cross to get the notebook and experience the feel  of lightweight OS.

Uninstalling vShield Service from ESX using Command line

Today, I got into big trouble with vShield Zones where I need to remove them from ESX host. Generally, it would be done by using vCenter. In my case, I don’t have enough resources in another ESX host where I need to bring the ESX1 for maintenance mode in order to remove the vShield Service. Finally, I end up with using service console command to remove vShield service from ESX host.

# esxupdate query

-------------Bulletin ID------------- -----Installed----- -----------------Summary------------------


ESX400-Update01 2010-01-29T11:28:45 VMware ESX 4.0 Complete Update 1


VSZ200_vshield-dvfilter-module_285928 2010-10-04T09:49:17 Dvfilter fastpath module for vShield Zones

 # esxupdate remove -b VSZ200_vshield-dvfilter-module_285928


Removing vshield-dvfilter-module #################################################################### [100%]

Running [/usr/sbin/vmkmod-install.sh]...


ok.


# esxupdate query

To verify the vShieldZone is presented or not.

Then, reboot the ESX host.

VMware Certified Advanced Professional 4 - Datacenter Administration - Exam Registration Open

The long waiting for the VCAP-DA exam is now over and ready for registration. VMware offers 50% discount in VCAP-DA exam if you are attending the following recommended courses between now and November 30, 2010:

VMware vSphere: Troubleshooting [V4]

VMware vSphere: Manage for Performance [V4]
VMware vSphere: Manage and Design for Security
VMware vSphere: Automation with vSphere PowerCLI

To register the VCAP-DA

Blueprint for VCAP-DA

All the Best Guys!!!

When ESX host reclaim memory?

This is really interesting and important question for the VMware professional. Who and when will host reclaim the memory, the answers follows:

VMKernel is responsible for the reclaiming the memory. VMKernel decides to reclaim the host memory based on their four states. ESX maintains the four memory states:

High @ 6% - No Action
Soft @ 4% - Ballooning
Hard @2% - Swapping + Ballooning
Low @1% - Swapping

ESX effectively supports 3 memory reclaim techniques such as:

1. Transparent Share Paging (TPS)
2. Ballooning
3. Host Swapping

Now, the ESX will decide which memory reclaims technique to be used at when. However, TPS is enabled by default and continuously running in the ESX host, it is not considered.

Let’s see the how memory state is calculated:

Memory State % = Physical Memory – Service Console Memory

When the memory state equals to high state (6%) or virtual machines use less than 94% of host memory, there won’t be any reclaim process invoked. When the memory state start to fall down, it will start to use the Ballooning mechanism to reclaim the memory. Ballooning will be started to use at soft state or 4% and if memory state is still further falls down to Hard state (2%), swapping will be used with addition of ballooning. Even the memory state drastically drops down to Low state (1%), swapping will be used as last resort and additionally blocks the execution of VMs that consume more memory than their target allocation.

Some situation, the ballooning will be kicked when memory state between hard and soft. Because, the balloon driver will take some time to identify the free pages and allocate them back to required state. This would help us to avoid the situation of soft or worse.

In certain scenarios, host memory reclaims can happen. Such as, if the VM has limit, the VMKernel tries to use host reclaim the memory using either ballooning or swapping even though the host memory has plenty of memory left to free.

How to check the memory state of the host:
 
Either remote SSH or Direct console to your ESX host and type “esxtop” then press “m” memory status:
 

 
 
 
 
 
Free state value can be configured by host attributes in ESX3.5. I am not seeing this attribute in ESX4.0 and later editions. I don’t know whether VMware hidden those attributes and replaced with different name. Anyway, the following screenshot taken from ESX3.5 host advanced configuration:

VMware vCloud Director – Enabling your Cloud

Finally, the long wait is over. VMware officially launched their cloud enabler/management product called vCloud Director. This product help the organization to build their own secured private cloud. vCloud Director coupled with VMware vSphere for hypervisors and vCenter, VMware vShield for Security and vCenter Chargeback for accountability and granular level user’s usage.

Using vShield technologies offers network solution like as DMZ, Port-level firewall, NAT and DHCP services. vShield Edge offers site-site VPN solution, web load balancing and other significant network features.
vCloud Director cells can scale up to 25 vCenter and 10,000 managed VMs.

vCloud Director will be licensed for 25 managed VMs at cost of US$ 3750. Also, they have promotion pack for vCloud Director with vCenter Chargeback at cost of US$ 2500 for 25 managed VMs. Apart from this, there would be additional cost for vSphere ESX4.1/Hypervisor and vCenter4.1 if you don’t have them already. VSphere4.1 Enterprise Plus and vCenter Standard are required by vCloud Director. It sums up to altogether would burn your IT budget. But, it is highly worthy to have them.

To know more about this product, please visit VMware website

TCO and ROI Calculation:

TCO Calculation:

Sum of money invested for the entire project

Payback Period:

Divide the initial investment (cost) by amount of yearly savings
Let’s assume, you have initial investment is $3 million and yearly saving is $2 million.
$3 million / $ 2 million = 1.5
Now, your payback period is 1.5 years

ROI (Return on Investment)

Divide the net cost saving per year by project cost.
Let’s assume the your project cost was $4 million and yearly saving were $1 million
$1 million / $ 4 million = $ 0.25 million

Overall Savings:

Annual Savings x No. of years = Total Saving
$1 million x 5 = $5 Millions

Without Initial Investment:

(Overall Savings – initial Investment)/initial investment = ROI
($5 million – $2 million)/$2 million = 1.5 OR 150%

Creating EC2 AMI from VMware VMDK

With continuation previous post, I did some google search to convert a VMware based Virtual Machine into Amazon EC2 AMI format. This conversion can be achieved by using QEMU tool.

QEMU helps to conver the VMware VMDK into RAW disk format. The next thing is that bundle this RAW disk to an AMI using "eu2-bundle-image" command.

For more information, please follow this link: VMDK into AMI Format

Converting Amazon EC2 AMI to VMware Workstation/vSphere Virtual Machine

Today, I had chat with one of my friend who is keep doing some research on Amazon EC2 platform, but he is new to VMware products. While in our chat, he had asked that is there any solution that I can convert my Amazon EC2 instances into VMware vSphere. I done quick search on Google found this KB article from VMware converting Amazon EC2 instance to VMware Virtual Machine. This article uses Windows instance. If someone already tried or ready to try for linux, please share the steps that involved in.

Here is the KB: Converting Amazon EC2 Windows Instances to VMware Workstation or VMware vSphere Virtual Machines

VMware Certified Advanced Professional - Certification Announcement by VMware

Finally, VMware offically announced and published the new certification names, one step prior to VCDX certification. New certifications are named VMware Certified Advanced Professional on vSphere 4 - Datacenter Administration (VCAP4-DCA) and VMware Certified Advanced Professional on vSphere 4 – Datacenter Design (VCAP4-DCD)

The exams are opened on 12th July,2010 for Datacenter Administration and sometime in August 2010 for Datacenter Design.

You can signup on the VMware site to received further updates regarding those certifications and more details about the certification path and requirements.

Troubleshooting Guide: VMware VM's Snapshot

When I was seeing my linkedin updates, I came across a update about VMware Snapshot troubleshooting guide which is written by VMware employee named as "Ruben Garcia, TSE". Ruben also creator of a utility called SnapVMX utility.

This troubleshooting guide describes the basic concepts of VM's snapshot and different troubleshooting methods. This guide is designed for ESX3.5 and extra consideration to be taken care of whilst VMware ESX3i/4i/ESX4.0

Ruben's personal blog: http://vmutils.blogspot.com/

EMC VPLEX Product @ EMC 2010

EMC unveiled their product called EMC VPLEX Family which offers a distributed federation. It has two products in this family:

1. VPLEX Local
2. VPLEX Metro

VPLEX Local provides the transparent co-operation and mobility within the data center.

VPLEX Metro offers the distributed federation across two diffrent data centers at synchronous distances. VPLEX Metro will get additional features soon (planned for 2011) for asynchoronous distances by VPLEX Geo and VPLEX Global (more than 2 sites). VPLEX Metro support two clusters upto 100KMs. You can do VMotion between two diffrent data centers.

VPLEX virtualizes the EMC and Non-EMC storage arrays. VPLEX products offers

1. VPLEX Hardware - Engine based on EMC's highly available storage controllers, dual high availability redirectors, hot-swap serviceability and intergrated battery back-up.

2. VPLEX Software - EMC GeoSynchrony is operating system for VPLEX products.

For more information and updates, visit EMC website

Eucalyptus Beginner’s Guide – UEC edition

I came across wonderful installation guide for Eucalyptus to setup your own private cloud. Many Thanks to Authors who made it to available thru internet. It is pretty simple and straightward than compare to Eucalyptus Guide.

Eucalyptus Beginners Guide for UEC Edition.

The original Administrator guide from Eucalyptus

Changing Thin to Thick disk and vice-versa

You can change the existing Virtual Hard disks (VMware based) from Thick to thin and vice-versa. This can be achieved by either using VMotion/SVMotion or command line tool called "vmkfstools". Using VMotion/SVMotion is required a valid license. Select “Migrate” and choose “Change Datastore” and select the Disk format.

If you don’t have a VMotion/SVMotion license, use the following command to achieve the same.

From Thick to Thin:

vmkfstools –i "Thickdisk.vmdk" -d thin "Thindisk.vmdk"

It will start to clone to virtual hard disk in Thin Provision method. After completed, you can attach this disk with VM and power it on. If all looks good, you can delete the original thick disk from the data store.

Use the following command to see real-time usage of thin disk:

du –h "Thindisk.vmdk"

You can notice the big difference of disk usage between of Thin and Thick format disks.

From Thin to Thick:

vmkfstools –i "Thindisk.vmdk" -d zeroedthick "Thindisk.vmdk"

It will start to clone the virtual disk in Thick method.

In both disk conversion, should have enough disk space to achieve it since it clones and converts.

New VMware Certification soon!!!

There has been talk for awhile now that VMware planned to launch some new certification. Scott Vessy confirmed the name of certification and VMware will be announcing them in next few weeks. In order to become VCDX3, you have to pass two exams:

1. Enterprise Admin Exam

2. Design Exam

We are expecting the new certification going to break them, we need to go all the way to gain VCDX by writing two difficult exams. But, How VMware going to address the VCDX4, Lets wait and watch. New Certification may look like this:

1. Enterprise Administrator Certification (final name may differ)

2. Design Administrator Certification (final name may differ)

3. VMware Design Expert Certification 4 (VCDX4)

Lets wait for official confirmation VMware!

Cloud Computing (IaaS)

“Cloud Computing” is a new magical word and every IT people raves this one for quite some time. There is a debate and confusion as whether it is a “technology” or a “service model”. Unfortunately, many of my colleagues believe it is a Technology. Maybe, it is bonded with latest virtualization technology. But, it is a kind of service model, a new way to offering service for a customer.

Cloud computing offers 3 kind of major services:
1. PaaS (Platform as a Service)
2. SaaS (Software as a Service)
3. IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service)

Also, there are other services such as “Storage as a Service” and “Desktop as a Service”

But, I am going to talk about IaaS model in this post.

IaaS is one very commonly required service model for any organizations for short-term development, Testing and educational purpose. In IaaS, users can manage their respective system. What exactly IaaS offer is, a Virtual Machine (VM). It could be self provisioned and manageable by the end user. A combination of an infrastructure stack and management stack provides an IaaS model. Please see the diagram:


The Infrastructure Stack consists of your storage, networking, hardware (x86), hypervisor (VMware/KVM/XEN) and VM images.
The management stack consists of dynamic resource management, automatic provisioning and workflow of approvals, chargeback to the customer, monitoring the underlying hardware and virtual machines and Backup/DR plans.
The management stack also provides a web interface to the end-user for manage their VMs such as Powering ON/OFF, reset and console redirection.

The web interface will have 3-tier workflow control for approvals:
1. Cloud Administrator
2. Cloud Manager
3. Cloud User

Cloud Administrator is who the one is going to manage the cloud environment such as creating golden images, provisioning them to approved cloud user, managing the cloud users and monitoring the cloud environment.

Cloud Manager is responsible for approving/rejecting the cloud user requests and chargeback to the cloud user.

Cloud user will be using the requested VMs and manage themselves. They can choose the any OS image and application that I can install on the VMs.

I have been in the long discussions with many vendors for build private cloud for my organization. In recent talks with IBM, seems to be attractive. They are offering pre integrated solution for IaaS model, eventually; I am not convinced with that. I would like to have a solution where my existing infrastructure resources (Hardware/Hypervisor/Storage) can be used to build a cloud. IBM is smart again. They have suite of tools to do this. But, I am seeing a problem with these IBM products as a vendor locking. They are supporting VMware ESX hypervisors only. But, they promised that XEN hypervisor will be supported in next quarter. Hyper-V is out of their roadmap for 2010. Eventually, the main aspect of Cloud Computing called "Elasticity" is missing all those products.

Since IBM supports only VMware now, I can definitely go with VMware vCloud APIs and build my own cloud interfaces. vCloud API can be downloaded and customized. Thinking of why should I go with IBM and spend some thousand dollars with them. A positive side of using the vCloud APIs, I can cut down the software cost, the negative side of this, time line that would take us to build the application. There are some pros and cons with both approaches. However, There are other player in Cloud Computing (IaaS) model such as BMC, EMC IONIX and Enomaly. There are some useful Open Source, they are good PoCs.

Desktop on Cloud

Today, I came across some articles and found a useful about offering a desktop on cloud with 3GB storage at free of cost! cool..huh... The desktop can be accessible thru your browser over the internet. The service is powered by Xcerion's XIOS technology including its XML virtual machine.

Xcerion's(http://xcerion.com/internet-os/) XIOS/3 (Xcerion Internet Operating System)is a zero-footprint XML based OS. Since the OS and application runs in the browser, it also works in offline. There is no more update hazzle, they will update themself.

You can upload your pictures/documents/movies/music thru a simple click "Upload Button" from your system. I felt that it took long time to see those files in the VM. Might be a bandwidth of my internet connection.

Please visit and sign up for your cloud desktop http://www.icloud.com/en
Cloud is keep passing!!!

vCenter Reinstallation after 60-Days trial expires without losing Database Contents

Many of us still evaluating the vSphere and vCenter in our test environments. Sometimes, it takes more than 60 days to evaluate where trial edition expires.

We can't extend the trial edition in ESX host, either we have to reinstall it or license it. vCenter also have to follow the same way as ESX does. But, here we can keep old database contents as it is when you reinstall the vCenter software.

This document using vCenter 4.0 and SQLEXPRESS 2005 (built in) database. At the time of installation of vCenter 4.0, it installs SQLEXPRESS 2005 by default unless any other Database specified. Mostly, we are using built-in database is SQLEXPRESS 2005 for testing environment.

When you install vCenter 4.0, it installs SQLEXPRESS 2005 and creates a database called "SQLEXP_VIM". You can view this thru SQL Server Configuration Manager console.

Start à All Programs à Microsoft SQL Server 2005 à Configuration Tools à SQL Server Configuration Manager

Creating DSN

Create a System DSN for this database using ODBC (Administrative Tools à Data Sources (ODBC) either before/after expiry of your vCenter trial period.

Open the ODBC Database Administrator Source, Select "System DSN" and Click "Add" Button and Select "SQL Native Client"

Provide the Datasource name (recommened to use as "SQLEXP_VIM")

Select, the server and database name (mostly local host, since it is installed on the same server where we installed vCenter earlier)

Leave the Authentication as default. It is important to change the default database to

VIM_VCDB as shown in the picture: (Select in the list)

Press Next and leave them to default settings and Test Connectivity.

Use the Add/Remove Programs to uninstall the vCenter 4.0 after trail period is over.

Reinstalling the vCenter

When you reinstall the vCenter on same server, select the "Use an existing supported database" on database section. Then, enter "sqlexp_vim" as the DSN and press "Next" and leave blank for UN/PW

Select "Do not overwrite, leave my existing database in place" and press "Next", leave it default

 

After complete database selection, continue with your installation as usual.

Once the vCenter installation completed, open it thru vSphere Client, you can see your old settings such as Datacenter, Cluster and other configuration. Again, your evalution periods starts with 60-days again.

How do you find your processor is 32/64 Bit in ESX?

Login to console and type

[root@localhost root]# cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep lm
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm nx lmIf you see “lm” under flags, it is 64Bit supported process
Another way to find out:
[root@localhost root]# cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 23
model name : Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5405 @ 2.00GHz
stepping : 6
cpu MHz : 1995.067
cache size : 6144 KB
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm nx lm
bogomips : 3984.58

Enter “Model Name” and “Stepping” in Google search to make sure your processor 64-Bit supported processor.

Adding Tape Drive with ESX3.5/3i Host

We can add a SCSI controller based Tape Drive with ESX 3.5/3i hosts to connect it with any particular VM to run as Backup Server. According to the HCL, It must be a separate SCSI Adaptor for the Tape drive. After, added the tape drive/SCSI controller, you will see the drive as SCSI device under STORAGE configuration in the VI Client Console. Few LSI will work as well, they must be pure SCSI, not RAID Controllers. Preferable SCSI controller card is Adaptec, However, you can check it on the VMware HCL website before you procure them.
Now, you have to configure this tape drive as a SCSI Device on the particular VM. We add this ESX 3.5 is still using SCSI-2 commands:
Therefore, we need to change the controller Type from LSI Logic to BUS Logic.
1) Shut down the VM and editing its settings.
2) Select to add a new HD - the size of it won't matter as you'll remove it before you save your change
3) On the Advanced Options screen for the Add Hardware wizard, select Virtual Device Node = SCSI(1:0) (or SCSI(2:0) if the VM already have 2 SCSI controllers.
4) Finish the wizard, but don't click OK on the Edit VM settings window. you should see New Hard Disk (adding) and New SCSI Controller (adding).
5) Select the New Hard Disk and click Remove
6) Select the New SCSI Controller and then click Change Type and select Buslogic.
7) Save the change to the VM. You can then edit it again and add the a Generic SCSI device to the buslogic controller (i.e. you'll add it as SCSI(1:x)).
The Device (Target) ID must be identical on the HOST and Virtual Machine. Example: Mine was 2:6:0, I created a SCSI adapter as 1:0:0, and set the tape drive to 1:6:0 (setting device id is important for pass through)
Windows 2008 x64
This version is having problem with Symantec BackupExec, since the Backup application is sending a “scsi split” command to the tape drive on SCSI Passthru, hence ESX causing PSOD error. This has been fixed by this patch: http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1010135:
Reference:
http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi35_backup_guide.pdf
http://communities.vmware.com/thread/156068?start=0&tstart=0
http://vikashkumarroy.blogspot.com/2009/04/virtual-machine-as-backup-server.html
http://communities.vmware.com/message/1339072#1339072

Killing a VM

Sometimes the Virtual Center won’t do the job. You virtual machine has hung and you need to kill it. Here are 2 examples of how you can kill the vm from within the service console:

The ‘VMWARE-CMD’ command
Log on to the service console and issue the following command
vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes///.vmx stop’ you must not use the friendly datastore name. If you need to know the location of all vm’s type ‘VMWARE-CMD -l’ that will list on vm’s and the location for the corresponding vmx file.
If that fails, then try it with the hard option,
‘vmware-cmd /vmfs/volumes///.vmx stop hard’ this command will just try and kill it without shutting it down.

2. Kill it using the PID command
Run the following command: ps auxfww | grep to locate the correct PID of the virtual machine, the first number to appear in the output is your vm’s PID. Use the PID number to terminate the process by issuing
kill -9 PID NO

Remote Console for SingleVM thru vCenter 4.0

This is one of another feature that vCenter4.0 (although it existing in VirtualCenter 2.5) provides that we can give remote console access thru RemoteConsole Plug-in and also can be accessed by web browsers.
Browse the vCenter web console thru Internet Explorer® or FireFox.
Select the desired VM and navigate to “Console” button.
Then, Install the Remote Console Plug in in your desktop


After the installation of the plug-in, navigate back to “Summary” tab.
Click “ Generate Virtual Machine”


Then pops up a window with URL of the VM



Copy and paste URL in the browser or double click the “Remote Console Plug-in” shortcut in your desktop.

vSphere is Available to Download Now!!!

Finally, time has come!!!, Time to download and evaluate the vSphere. Download it from here

Also, download the documents bundle here

VCB with NTBackup

VCB (VMWare Consolidate Backup) Framework is backup proxy. VCB is NOT Backup software. It acts as a relay agent between the Virtual Machine and backup software. Generally, VCB would be installed as part of vCenter OR it can be installed on any standalone system as well.

VCB comprehensive software of Backup, Snapshot and mounting the virtual disk.



Download the VCB Framework from www.vmware.com download portal. Install it on a Windows XP system.

It install under the following path:

C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Consolidated Backup Framework

Before take backup of the VMs, its virtual disk has to be mounted with our local system.

Enter following command in Command prompt to mount the Virtual Disk:


vcbmounter -h 172.17.42.55 -u -p -a name: -t file -r C:\VCC001 -m nbd

where as

-h can either ESX Host OR vCenter Server

-u Username

-p Password

-a VM parameters (name: enter VM name as per the inventory)

-t Fileflavor

-r Mount point

-m mode

After run this command, you will folder called VCC001 on C Drive of local disk, open the VCC001 folder, you will see “C” drive of the VM as shown in the picture:





To UNMOUNT
It is necessary to unmount the mounted Virtual disk after backup done.
vcbmounter -h virtualcenter.domain.com -u username -p password -U c:\mnt\nameofthevm

Although NTBackup is unsupported for use with VCB, because it has no pre- and post-scripts, you can however use a batch file to mount the VMs, start NTBackup and Unmount those VMs.

@ECHO OFF
SET VCBFW="C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Consolidated Backup Framework"
%VCBFW%\vcbmounter -h virtualcenter.domain.com -u username -p password -a name:%1 -t file -r c:\mnt\%1 -m nbd
ntbackup backup c:\mnt\%1\letters\c /j "%1 C-disk" /f "c:\ntbackup\%1.bkf" /snap:off /m normal
%VCBFW%\vcbmounter -h virtualcenter.domain.com -u username -p password -U c:\mnt\%1

Use Task Scheduler to schedule the backup using this batch file.

VCB with NTBackup is simple and costless solution for small enterprises and non-mission critical systems.

Some Pros and Cons:

1. NTBackup thru Windows XP NOT allow us to select any specified folder to be backedup

2. NTBackup thru Windows 2003 allows us to take backup of any specified folder

3. The mounted Virtual Disk is READBLE ONLY

4. We need to manually schedule the backup jobs thru “Scheduled Tasks”

5. It can be security breach, if someone knows the username and password, they can easily use the VCB to mount the Virtual Disk and steal the data

6. We can’t do incremental and differential backup as the mounted virtual disk is read-only and NTBackup can’t set the archive bit.

7. VCB using Port 443

8. After unmount the virtual disk thru command, sometimes, its not removing the snapshots and delta disks from the particular Virtual Machine. Therefore, it not allows us to mount the same Virtual Disk again. Therefore, we used the following commands to remove the snapshots:

# vmware-cmd /vmfs// hassnapshot

If it return as 1, snapshot existing

# vmware-cmd /vmfs// removesnapshots

It should return null.

WARNING: Using this method to remove the snapshots may remove the other snapshots which are needed critically.

Migrating a Physical Server to Virtual Environment

The following points to pondered before migrate a Physical Server into Virtual Environment:

1. Avoid hot cloning of AD DC (Active Directory Domain Controller) to virtual environment. Best to build a new VM and make it DC (“dcpromo” on the fresh VM)
2. If any SQL Server, better to build a VM and restore the databases.
3. If any MS-Exchange server, better to do perform cold migration
4. If any SAN LUN presented in the physical server, unpresent them. Present the LUN back to VM and configure as RDM (Raw Device Mapping)
5. Keep the same no of CPUs.
6. You can increase the Disk size.
7. Keep in mind that USB is not supported VI3, if any USB tongle needed for any license purpose, better to stay back as physical OR try USBNetwork solution before migrate them

NOTE: Install the VMWare Tools on those migrated servers without fail.

vSphere - Launch In India

I have been invited for vSphere event in Mumbai, India on 14/May. It was 4 hrs program and VMWare presented the highlights of vSphere. Along with VMWare, CISCO and EMC also presented their products which can be intergrated with vSphere.
I would prefer to highlight the networking advancement on the vSphere rather than its own features.

CISCO NEXUS 1000v software switch attracted many audience. This product address previous network issues with VI3 products. NEXUS 1000v provides policy based VM connectivity. It is able to define the network policy, called as Port Profile. Also, Port Profile can consists QoS, Access-Control List. The highlighted feature of the NEXUS 1000v is portability. Those configured Port Profile can be migrated along with VM to another Host by VMotion.CISCO NEXUS 1000v can be managed by vCenter 4.0

To know more about NEXUS 1000v, please refer the CISCO website. Also, software is free to try. The Estimated price would be around less than USD.1000.

vSphere Launched!!!

Finally, most waiting Cloud Computing Operating System has been launched by VMWare today!!!. vSphere will have lot of new features and licensing system. I will post all the details shortly. Until, you can read for more information

http://www.vmware.com/products/vsphere/

Also you can read new features of vSphere here

http://www.rtfm-ed.co.uk

Collection of VMWareESX Useful Links

iSCSI
=====
http://virtualgeek.typepad.com/virtual_geek/2009/01/a-multivendor-post-to-help-our-mutual-iscsi-customers-using-vmware.html

Hardware Functioning Correctly or not:
======================================
http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1004019

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1003690


Interpretting ESXTOP Statistics:
===============================
http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-9279

http://www.virtu-al.net/

Enabling/Disabling HyperThreading (HT) on DELL PE2950:
======================================================
http://www.experts-exchange.com/Hardware/Servers/Q_23238837.html

Advanced Resource Management on ESX:
====================================
http://pubs.vmware.com/vi301/resmgmt/wwhelp/wwhimpl/js/html/wwhelp.htm?href=vc_advanced_mgmt.11.10.html

Cloud Computing:
================
http://communication.howstuffworks.com/cloud-computing.htm

VMWARE-CMD thru RCLI:
=====================
http://communities.vmware.com/thread/161168

http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_35/esx_3/r35u2/vi3_35_25_u2_rcli.pdf

Paravirtualization (Setting MMU):
================================
http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/VMware_paravirtualization.pdf

Ports to be opened for VCC/VI client to ESX host:
================================================
http://communities.vmware.com/message/624990

Book about ESX Security:
========================
http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/VMWare_ESX_Server_in_the_Enterprise

Visio Stencils:
==============
http://viops.vmware.com/home/docs/DOC-1346

VMWare Exam Study Guides:
=========================
http://www.virtualtroll.com/?p=132

http://jasondlangdon.wordpress.com

Adding TELNET RPM on ESX Host
============================
http://communities.vmware.com/message/628839#628839

http://communities.vmware.com/message/620519

www.theVirtualBlackHole.com

www.VMadmin.co.uk

Networking on ESX
=================
http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/24158

http://communities.vmware.com/thread/25485

Time Keeping Documents (NTP)
============================
http://blogs.vmware.com/kb/2009/02/new-timekeeping-articles.html

Difference Between ESX and ESXi
==============================
http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/msbrowse.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&externalId=1006543&sliceId=1&docTypeID=DT_KB_1_1

VMotion CPU Compatiablity
=========================
http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/msbrowse.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&externalId=1993&sliceId=1&docTypeID=DT_KB_1_1

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/msbrowse.do?cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&externalId=1991&sliceId=1&docTypeID=DT_KB_1_1"

Virtualized DMZ Network
=======================
http://www.vmware.com/resources/techresources/1052

http://vmwire.blogspot.com/2009/02/configuring-vswitch0-for-service.html

DELL OPTIPLEX 755
=================
http://communities.vmware.com/thread/110817

64Bit Check
===========
http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1901

http://communities.netapp.com/message/5582;jsessionid=0981B5F509852D5772F5E88DA41597D9"

http://communities.vmware.com//thread/200101?tstart=0

http://www.petri.co.il/virtual_vmware_snapshot.htm

http://www.malaysiavm.com

http://blog.vadmin.ru


VCB Guide
=========
http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_35/esx_3/r35u2/vi3_35_25_u2_vm_backup.pdf

http://viops.vmware.com/home/docs/DOC-1392

HOW TO BACKUP the ESX Server
============================
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1000761

http://viops.vmware.com/home/docs/DOC-1133

Linked Clones Scripts
=====================
http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-9020

http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-9061

http://engineering.ucsb.edu/~duonglt/vmware/

ESX Datastore sizing and allocation
===================================
http://www.dailyhypervisor.com/2009/03/26/esx-datastore-sizing-and-allocation/

DELL PE 2950 BIOS Settings Screenshots
======================================
http://www.mohca.gov.bt/~susumu/other/dell/2950/data/pe2950/doc/en/hom_E/syssetup.htm

http://communities.vmware.com/thread/12342?tstart=510

http://communities.vmware.com//thread/202046?tstart=0

http://vmware-land.com/Vmware_Tips.html

VMWareMount Utility
===================
http://download3.vmware.com/software/wkst/VMware-mount-5.5.0-18463.exe

http://communities.vmware.com/thread/43285

http://www.wallpaperama.com/forums/how-to-change-ip-address-static-dynamic-linux-fedora-core-red-hat-t1692.html

VMWare Network Topology
=======================
http://www.astroarch.com/wiki/index.php/Blog_Roll#Cisco_Subnet_-_Blue_Gears_-_Virtual_Networking

http://blog.scottlowe.org/2006/04/17/vlans-and-port-groups/

http://b2v.co.uk/b2vguide2vmware3.htm


http://vmetc.com/2008/05/31/configure-portgroup-settings-across-all-esx-hosts-simultaneously/

Purble Screen of Death(PSOD)
============================
http://www.vi-toolkit.com/wiki/index.php/Vmkerrcode

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1004250

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1010195

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1006794

What will be Future Technologies?

The following technologies can be future technologies, just a prediction:

1. Virtualization
2. Cloud Computing
3. GIS

Virtualization:
Considering current economic turmoil, many of organization no more willing to invest money for their IT infrastructure. CTO/CIOs would consider more ROI than TCOs of their IT infrastructure. By virtualizing their IT environment, they can make more ROI.Currently, IT companies are doing research projects and grooming up their human resources to compete in the post-recession periods.Therefore, they would prefer to virtualize their systems to cut down cost for Desktops/servers. When a research project needs around 40 systemsfor the entire organization, they can simply go ahead with one higher class server such as DELL PE 2950/R905 and load the VMWare/XenServerfree Hypervisor and have 40 systems. Now, the ratio became 1:40. They really going to cutdown additional 39 physical servers and HVAC costs.

Cloud Computing:
Cloud computing is Internet ("cloud") based development and use of computer technology ("computing"). It is a style of computing in which dynamically scalable and often virtualised resources are provided as a service over the Internet. Users need not have knowledge of, expertise in, or control over the technology infrastructure "in the cloud" that supports themThe concept incorporates infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS) and software as a service (SaaS) as well as Web 2.0 and other recent technology trends which have the common theme of reliance on the Internet for satisfying the computing needs of the users. Examples of SaaS vendors include Salesforce.com and Google Apps which provide common business applications online that are accessed from a web browser, while the software and data are stored on the servers.

GIS:
Any developing nation needs GIS related projects soon. Govt. of India, having some million dollar worth of projects for GIS.One question remains that who is going to wake up the government for those GIS related projects. State goverment can manage their land/facility management using some GIS software. Any nation's Border force also can have GIS to survilleance their Border, restricted zones such as Atomic Center/Power Station. Also, there are lot of opensource GIS products which can facilate the requirment. In India, stree level map is not that much accruate/sublevels. Some areas of GIS such as LandParcelling,GeoIntelligence and Image processing will have tremendous growth in near future.

Interpretting ESXTOP Statistics

This web document from VMWare Portal explains the "esxtop" command and its parameters in details

http://communities.vmware.com/docs/DOC-9279

Understanding: iSCSI Fundamentals (Especially on ESX)

This is one of the Best Link I got it for iSCSI on ESX environment. Author explained it such a lovely way...

http://virtualgeek.typepad.com/virtual_geek/2009/01/a-multivendor-post-to-help-our-mutual-iscsi-customers-using-vmware.html

VMWare Technology Day, Mumbai, India

I had an chance to attend recent VMWare Technology Day, Mumbai, India.
During the session, VMWare Declared the following features will be added in future version. The future version will be named as "vSphere".

1. 256 GB RAM for Guest Systems
2. 8 CPU Support
3. Hot CPU and PCI Devices Support
4. 512 GB RAM for Host Systems
5. 128 Core CPU Support (Current 32 Cores and 64 Cores experimentally Supported)
6. vStorage Thin Provisioning
7. vStorage Linked Clones
8. vCenter AppSpeed (http://www.vmware.com/products/vcenter-appspeed/)
9. vcenter Orchestrator (http://virtualfuture.info/2008/09/vmworld-2008-tech-preview-vcenter-orchestrator/)
10. vCenter Capacity IQ (http://www.vmware.com/products/vcenter-capacityiq/)
11. vCenter Chargeback (http://www.vmware.com/products/vcenter-chargeback/)

Monitor your ESX at free of cost

We can monitor the ESX host and its VM from your desktop without any additional investment. SolarWinds offers free monitor tool. Sadly, they are allowing us to monitor only one host. If need more than that, please pay to them :).

Here is the link for downloading the Tool: http://www.solarwinds.com/products/freetools/vm_monitor.aspx

Download this tool, install on your desktop (mine is Windows XP SP2). In the configuration setting, please enter your ESX host IP address and select the SNMP Version. It selecte SNMPV2 by default and enter the community string if SNMP related NMS configured. Otherwise, leave it to "public"

The following steps only for if SNMP not enabled in the host.

Connect the ESX thru SSH or service console.

SNMP configuration file is: /etc/snmp/snmpd.conf

To start the service: /etc/rc.d/init.d/snmpd start (OR) service snmpd start

Use following command to start the SNMP service after every reboot

chkconfig snmpd on

Now, dont forget to do this....

esxcfg-firewall -q snmpd (To check the SNMP is enabled or not, by default it is disabled)

esxcfg-firewall -e snmpd (Enabling the SNMP service in the ESX firewall)

Now, you can connect the ESX server and view its VMs status.

There you go!!!!

FreeNAS Server

FreeNAS is a free NAS (Network-Attached Storage) server, supporting: CIFS (samba), FTP, NFS, AFP, RSYNC, iSCSI protocols, S.M.A.R.T., local user authentication, Software RAID (0,1,5) with a Full WEB configuration interface. FreeNAS takes less than 32MB once installed on Compact Flash, hard drive or USB key.

FreeNAS supports SCSI, PATA (IDE), SATA, CF and USB Drives.

This Software runs on FreeBSD.

Please visit http://www.freenas.org/ for more information, documentation and downloads.

Accessing ESX 3.5 thru Web Console

You can manage your ESX 3.5 server (only Guest systems) thru a web console. To access,

http://servername/ui

ex: http://myesx/ui

I tried same with ESX 3i, no luck. Still digging more, if you have answer, please let me know :)

VI Ports

Virtual Infrastructure TCP Ports (VI 3.5)

Disabling Hibernation in Windows 2008

By default, the hibernation in Windows 2008 enabled. As well, the Hibernate file (C:\Hiberfil.sys, hidden OS file) takes around more than 1GB. Most of us., not going to do hibernate a server. So, I feel that it is not required. We can save some disk space as well. I checked with Power Settings on Control Panel to disable the hibernate and delete the file. Unfortunately, Hibernate is disabled state in all power settings (Windows 2008 having 3 diffrent power options). Still, I was unable to delete. Found a way to delete it. Enter into command prompt by using RUN. Then type the following command to disable the hibernate.

POWERCFG -H OFF

Now, the hiberfil.sys is deleted. If you change your mind turn on the hibernate back:

POWERCFG -H ON