Virtualization, Cloud, Infrastructure and all that stuff in-between
My ramblings on the stuff that holds it all together
Peer to Peer VCDX Defense Workshop at UK VMUG
Posted by on September 1, 2011
I have an idea for a side-workshop/session at the upcoming UK VMUG in November for people that are actively following the VCDX4/5 track thus I am polling for interest via this post…
The format would be that participants get a 15-20min slot to present their design defence to a “panel” comprising of other VMUG members. including some of whom have taken (and failed) the actual defense process with a view to providing feedback and some questioning.
We don’t have any VCDX secret-sauce to share or special VMware info that you can’t find on the web, but the goal is to allow you to dry-run your presentation in-front of a friendly audience of like-minded community members before you brave it for real.
You would need to commit to come prepared with a Powerpoint version of your defence presentation, the panel won’t have seen your full design documents, and won’t be reviewing them.
I have created a poll, so if you’re interesting in participating, and will be attending the UK VMUG in November (details here) then please let me know via the poll below so I can estimate interest and seek panel members from the community.
Because we will need to arrange logistics I would ask that you only express an interest if you are planning to attend the UK VMUG and will have something to present, a significant number of no-shows will make it difficult to justify putting this on.
Please vote below (Poll is open until the end of September)
Cannot login to WordPress and password reset mail not working
Posted by on August 30, 2011
I have had a problem recently which has prevented me from accessing the admin pages on this blog, or indeed posting anything – which is a shame as it’s VMworld week and I’m “sure” you all want to know what I think 
.
This blog is hosted on wordpress.com – the free online service, it works for me as I generally don’t have time manage the WordPress patches etc. so it’s all handled “in the cloud” for me (see, that VMworld effect!)
I was recently asked to reset my WordPress password due to a possible security compromise (see this link) which I duly did, however I was then unable to login again, so I figured maybe I had fat-fingered the password – no problem I can just reset the password and click a link in an email in the usual manner.
Umm, nope.
No matter how many times I tried this wouldn’t work – I didn’t receive any email allowing me to change my password which meant I was locked out.
I spent ages messing with my mail account to see if it was a spam issue – it wasn’t ; I had another WordPress.com blog – I could reset the password on that perfectly which eventually ruled out a mail problem.
I logged a support ticket with WordPress, after a while they came back to me but couldn’t find the email address that should be associated with my blog.
The root cause? I had used an alias for my email account when I created my blog, rather than my normal e-mail account simon@mydomain.com rather than firstname.surname@mydomain.com which I normally use as my email address.
I recently moved mail service and it seems the simon@ alias was dropped in the process, thus the password reset emails were lost in the process – it was easy enough to re-add the mail aliases on my mail provider’s systems and I could then receive the password reset emails.
So, moral of the story – be consistent in the email address you use when setting up online services (or at least keep a record, and keep them working forever) – not entirely sure why I chose to use a non-standard alias, but I did.
Duh!
Normal service has now been resumed.
Exchange Outlook Feature Request: Where’s Waldo?
Posted by on August 18, 2011
There was recently some discussion at a customer about the use of Outlook/Exchange’s calendaring functionality, this is a commonly deployed solution in businesses yet few people seem to “get” how useful the calendaring functionality can be or how to use it properly.
I almost see it as a democratic process for keeping control of your own schedule and agenda, I often get requests for “access to my calendar” – for most people you don’t need this; your Exchange server publishes free/busy data for your calendar, so people who request a meeting can see if you have a gap in your schedule and request to fill it, they don’t need to see the detail of what is in your calendar and you retain control of your schedule, choosing what you are able to participate in – you can either choose to accept it, reject it or propose another time.
In my experience this is a much abused feature – too many people decline because they can’t make a proposed date/time/location – but they should only really decline if they have no interest in meeting with you (maybe I’m just really unpopular 
) otherwise they should suggest a new time.
However, if you work in a modern business where you are often working from a different site, or even different continent there is a gap in this functionality – you have no real way of showing people which office you are planning to be in on a particular day so they can schedule the meeting intelligently – I think there should be a where’s Waldo feature that works as follows…
It would be handy if you had a way to mark in your Outlook calendar in advance with which location you are planning to be in on a particular date – some kind of drop-down property for a day/week/period like Working from Home (online only, Office Y, office X, etc.) and likewise have an option for vacation in this which auto declines meeting requests and suggests an alternative (depending on a preference you set).
This would require your Exchange server to have a concept of location, a list of your company offices, campuses, buildings from which you would select where you are planning to be, likewise other online or virtual locations like WebEx sessions, conference bridges could be specified.
When a user requests a meeting they could select a meeting room or general location like a campus (if it’s face to face) – your server can use this to query against the invitees expected location (assuming Exchange is told which campus/building a meeting room is in) – given appropriate mapping data it could also calculate the most appropriate location with availability and facilities (projector yes/no, conference phone yes/no) for the number of invitees, take this a step further and it could feasibly provide walking/travelling time from the previous session/location to the chosen venue and add travelling time into the request (as well as insert directions into the invite).
Take this a step further and the basic presence information now finding its way into mobile devices and web services/IM could be used to integrate further – give advance warning that an attendee is likely to be late as they are stuck in traffic 50 miles away for a meeting that starts in 5mins and suggest a dial-in if available, or if all the attendees are still in another meeting and are unlikely to be able to travel to the next meeting in-time it could notify the onward requestor and provide dial-in details or suggest a re-schedule.
Anyways, just a quick idea – Outlook hasn’t had that many major innovations (except cloured calendar entries) for a while and this calendaring functionality hasn’t had any major innovations since Outlook was 1st released – this would be amazing, get in quick before someone else like Google does it, Microsoft – all the building blocks are there.
Apologies for the radio silence
Posted by on August 12, 2011
Apologies to my regular readers for the lack of content recently, this is going to be one of those “I’ve been really busy so not had time to blog” type of posts I’m afraid.
Since leaving VMware’s cloud practice earlier this year my freelance career has taken off nicely and I’m currently engaged with a large service provider on some large-scale transformation projects so that’s currently taking a lot of my time.
But, not to fear… there will be plenty coming in a few months
- vTARDIS.next – more technical details following on from the initial post once I get GA code
- Hopefully vTARDIS.next and the iTARDIS will be making an appearance at an upcoming UK VMUG
- Secret Project No.2 – suffice to say it’s very cloudy and is taking a lot of my blogging time at the moment – expect more detailed news about this towards the end of 2011 as it’s a slow, but full-on process!
- I will be at VMworld 2011 in Las Vegas, I’ll try to blog as much as I can whilst I’m there
Register for VMworld sessions ASAP or miss out
Posted by on July 20, 2011
This year VMware are enforcing session registration for VMworld, my understanding is that if you don’t register and a session is full, you wont get in!!
this is a good thing IMHO, in previous years there have been long queues (although I hope they have better badge-scanners than in the past, otherwise there are mad queues!) and this has led to missed sessions, but the downside is that you’ll need to book, pay for and plan out your schedule early on.
So, to avoid missing out logon to the portal at http://www.vmworld.com and choose schedule builder – it’s pretty quick to do.
I have completed my registrations this evening but I’ve also seen a couple of sessions that are “sold-out” already, so get in quick!
OS X Lion can’t connect to Iomega IX4 NAS workaround
Posted by on July 20, 2011
Today a received my new Mac Book Pro, it shipped with OS X Snow Leopard but by coincidence it arrived on the day Lion was released in the App Store so being an early adopter (read gadget freak) I upgraded it immediately to Lion – which took ~15mins on my Mac which has an SSD nice 
However once completed I couldn’t connect to my Iomega IX4-200d NAS, which was kind of a problem as it’s my time-machine server as well as storing all my useful data, finder just reports an error.
“There was a problem connecting to the server”
The version of the server you are trying to connect to is not supported (…)
It turns out this is a common problem; Lion implements a more secure AFP authentication method and most Linux based NASes don’t yet support the more advanced version.
However, I found the following blog post which shows a work-around enabling you to use the less-secure authentication method, use at your risk whilst we all wait to see if the NAS vendors implement an updated firmware to address this issue.
It’s pretty straightforward, some command line and 2 reboots required, but I can verify it works fine on my Mac.
http://www.alexanderwilde.com/2011/04/os-x-lion-connection-error-with-afp-and-workaround/
Early adopters beware.
Other than that, liking Lion so far – Mission Control with hot-corners and full-screen apps is very nice, new scrolling method is nice but a bit confusing as older apps seem to need specific support to work with it, Google Chrome works with the new full screen but seems to have some issues, I can’t find a way in the UI to take the window out of full-screen mode and the tab drop down obscures the search entry box if you have a Google window open.
VMworld US is still better value than VMworld EMEA
Posted by on July 5, 2011
I’m in the middle of planning my VMworld trip(s) this year, now I’m no longer working for a vendor or a consultancy I have to fund my trip myself, I’m happy to do this as I view it as an excellent training & networking opportunity.
I already have a good foundation in infrastructure and virtualization technologies so I find normal training courses a bit slow, and very narrowly focused – VMworld gives you the flexibility to pick and choose your own agenda and allows you to go much deeper if you choose.
Based on a previous presentation I did for the London VMware, I still maintain that even for us Europeans, VMworld US is better value, this post represents my logic
If you want to get the lowest cost, you should
- Book early and take advantage of early-bird discounts
- Book a cheap, non-official conference hotel – often I also find the cheapest hotels have free WiFi –it might be a short walk
- You don’t need to stay in the best hotel in town, there are so many after-hours events and parties you can take advantage of you’ll just be sleeping there.
- Don’t bother booking a rate with breakfast, you can usually get it at the conference
My pricing is all in GBP where I have only been able to obtain USD$ pricing (as I live in the UK) I have converted to GBP at the current exchange rate, pricing has been taken from the Expedia.co.uk website, which is quite useful for this sort of what-if work.
VMworld Admission Price(early bird-discount)
VMworld US £990 ($1595 (early bird pricing has now expired))
There are 124 Breakout Sessions, 8 Panel Sessions & 24 Hands-on Labs.
VMworld EMEA £683 ($1100 early bird pricing still available)
There are 116 Breakout Sessions, 3 Panel Sessions & 23 Hands-on Labs.
The US conference is 1 day longer.
Hotel & Airfare
I usually try to fly out the day before the conference as it gives you a full day to get over jetlag and have a bit of time to have a look around and do some quick tourist stuff.
I then try to fly back the day after the conference has finished, this avoids the last-day rush and means you can hang around until the end and wind-down properly.
The other main reason I do this is that I had a nightmare journey once returning from Microsoft Tech-Ed in Amsterdam on the final day of the conference – 10,000+ geeks with laptops + questionable souvenirs to scan all descending on the nearest airport isn’t a fun experience.
Travelling a day before/after also means you can usually take advantage of cheaper flights – even if it costs you an extra night of hotel.
Book a Saturday in most places and you’ll find your flights and hotel are significantly cheaper.
VMworld US
It’s not a direct flight, you can get a direct flight for approx £300 more on this package – but we’re doing this on a budget – when flying UK to west-coast US sometimes it’s also better to do a 2-leg journey so you can get off a plane for a bit
This hotel looks to be a 30min walk (or short, cheap cab-ride) from the Venetian where the conference is being held
VMworld EMEA
I’ve not stayed at this hotel, but looks pretty close, and Copenhagen has an excellent metro system, cheapest I found for flight + hotel was about £200 but it included the word hostel
Total Costs
I based my expenses on previous years in SF and CPH, as you’ll see there is obviously a difference, it’s about 30% more expensive to go to Las Vegas, this doesn’t factor in lost revenue/time from not being able to be at work, but the VMworld US trip involves travel over a weekend/Friday to compensate.
If you consider that VMworld US is a 4-day event compared to a 3-day event for VMworld EMEA the gap gets even closer.
Food, drink and taxis are significantly more expensive in Copenhagen than in the US
| Event | Admission | Airfare/Hotel | Spending Food/Drink/Taxis | Total Cost |
| US | £990.00 | £791.00 | £150.00 | £1,931.00 |
| EMEA | £683.00 | £336.00 | £280.00 | £1,299.00 |
| Difference | £632.00 |
July London VMware User Group Meeting
Posted by on June 15, 2011
Quick heads-up it’s not long now until the next London VMware User Group (VMUG) meeting on 14th July, I’m also pleased to announce that I have joined the steering committee and will be helping out with finding useful and content. We are always open to suggestions and VMUG is all about the User so don’t be shy, particularly if you have ideas for hands-on labs or topics you would like to see covered – leave a comment with an idea, or drop me a mail (details on my about page) – you don’t have to be running the largest infrastructure in the world or have a brain the size of a planet, bring your ideas, your woes, your experiences and share them with the community.
If you’ve never been before – now is the time to make time.
London VMUG Meeting
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Meeting: 10:00 a.m. – 17:00 p.m.
Networking Reception: 17:00 p.m.
London Chamber of Commerce and Industry
33 Queen Street
London, EC4R 1AP
Click here for directions
Networking Reception
Pavilion End
23 Watling Street, EC4M 9BR
The London VMUG Steering Committee are delighted to invite you to our next event. Following on from the success of the new format unveiled at the May 12th VMUG, we will continue with multiple tracks and a vCOPS focused lab, along with a Genius Bar from VMware GSS to answer any burning issues you might have. Details are below and we are grateful to our sponsors – Arista Networks, Embotics and Vision Solutions.
Please Note: If you wish to participate in the lab, you MUST bring your own laptop/client device please! You will need View 4.6 client installed (or admin rights to install it).
Agenda
Plenary sessions in Capital
10:00 a.m. – 10:15 a.m. – Welcome, Alaric Davies, Chairman
10:15 a.m. – 11:00 a.m. – Cloudvision for the Virtualised Environment, John Peach, Arista Networks, Sention System Architect
11:00 a.m. – 11:45 a.m. – Private Cloud Management Made Simple, Martin Sajkowski, Embotics, EMEA Operations & Colin Jacks Senior Solutions Specialist
11:45 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. – Break in Sponsor Expo
12:15 p.m. – 13:00 p.m.– Double-Take by Vision Solutions – Christian Willis, Technical Director: Meeting the Availability Challenges of physical, Virtual and Geographically Dispersed Systems
13:00 p.m. – 14:00 p.m.– Lunch in Sponsor Expo
Track 1
14:00 p.m. – 14:50 p.m. – vCOPS Advanced, Mark Stockham, VMware
15:00 p.m. – 15:50 p.m. – SRM Futures, Mike Laverick
16:00 p.m. – 16:50 p.m.- Cloud: Can You Compete? Mark Craddock
Track 2
14:00 p.m. – 14:50 p.m. – Thinking, Building & Scripting Globally, Julian Wood
15:00 p.m. – 15:50 p.m. – Managing IT as We Evolve to Cloud Computing, Colin Fernandez, VMware
16:00 p.m. – 16:50 p.m. - How to Save your Time With PowerCLI, Jonathan Medd
17:00 p.m. – Close
17:00 p.m. – Onward Drinks at Pavilion End
Please note the agenda is subject to change
Thank you to our meeting sponsor:
Register Today to join us for this free informative event.
Please note: You will need to log into the VMUG web site to register for this meeting. If you have not already obtained your VMUG login credentials, please visit the Username and/or Password Help page to request your username and password.
vTARDIS.next runs on vSphere 5.0
Posted by on May 27, 2011
I have been working furiously on an updated version of the vTARDIS based around vSphere 5, and now it’s in the open (I was on the heavily NDA’d beta programme) the goal is the same: lowest cost possible physical hardware, but the ability to build complex production like ESX environments and run large amounts of virtual ESX hypervisors and guests.
This time round, and due to some VERY cool [UNSUPPORTED] features of ESX 5 you can run more than just clusters of nested ESX virtual machines as I did in the original vTARDIS, but you can also run all the following on a SINGLE physical server running vSphere 5 – this is seriously cool IMHO
- Run 64-bit guests inside an ESX virtual machine (you couldn’t do this previously as it didn’t pass through the x64 extensions)
- Run HyperV under ESX as a virtual machine,
and allow it to run nested guests*and even build clusters of Hyper V servers - Run XenServers under ESX as a virtual machine
and allow it to run nested guests –to be tested - Fully stateless deployment of ESX guests using my former colleague’s amazing PXE Manager so no need to configure lots of hosts
- Run large vSphere clusters
- Multiple Virtual Storage Appliances
*I have had problems with the guests inside virtual Hyper-V nodes, more on this soon as I think it was just a config problem
Hardware
In the past I used the HP ML1xx range of PC-servers, they’re great bits of kit but I was starting to run into challenges with the 8Gb RAM limit, so I have branched out a bit and gone for an HP DL380 G5 – yes it’s not quiet enough to put under your bed 
but they are reasonably cheap 2nd hand on eBay and more importantly they take up to 32Gb of RAM. and in day to day use it’s not too noisy
Total acquisition cost of this server as follows (all from eBay and out of my own pocket)
| HP DL380 G5, 2 x dual core Xeon 2.0GHz, 8Gb RAM, 2 x 72Gb SAS disks, P400 array controller, redundant PSU, iLo advanced license. | £550 (Refurbished) |
| 6 x 72Gb 10k RPM SAS HP Disks | £270 (Refurbished) |
| 32Gb RAM | £520 (!) ouch new. |
| Sold supplied 8Gb RAM kit from server | -£150 |
| Total Cost | £1,190 |
This box has a good pedigree as you’ll see because it’s former owners didn’t erase the iLo settings before they decommissioned it (oops).
Whilst it’s noisy as hell, it seems surprisingly frugal when it comes to power consumption with approx 50% CPU load on the physical host
Storage
Local DAS array of 8 x 72Gb SFF hot-plug HP drives, I’m also backing them up to my Iomega NAS using Veeam Backup and Replication 5.
Hypervisor
I did this work with the beta and Release Candidate (RC) builds of ESX and vCenter, I used the Windows vCenter installation rather than the appliance.
Next… The iTARDIS* more soon!
*Don’t try this at home.. you won’t be able to make it work (yet), there are some firmware issues that stop it working on a Mac Mini – but I had access to some internal resources whilst working at VMware to get around it
Stay tuned for step-by-step instructions
vPastures New
Posted by on May 25, 2011
I’ve had a great time working at VMware since last year and have worked with some of the greatest minds in the industry on some interesting projects. But, after a lot of deliberation I have taken the decision to leave the relative comfort of a “permanent” position at a vendor to work on a freelance basis as an Infrastructure Architect – specialising in virtualization and cloud solutions.
My reasons for this move are varied and personal, but suffice to say that I have a number of outside ventures that are coming to fruition and I need the flexibility to work on them independently.
VMware have some great stuff in the pipeline and I’m going to enjoy working with it albeit back on the customer/partner side of the equation rather than inside, it’s also gratifying to see the cloud concepts I was working on in 2008 becoming very much mainstream – so maybe I wasn’t mad after all
VMware have some challenges and growing pains in scaling out the business and avoiding Microsoft syndrome (too much, too wide, too thin). They need to make sure that they don’t loose sight of the requirement for end-end integrated customer solutions with services and support to match. Particularly where there are so many technology acquisitions involved. That said, VMware have the best senior exec’s in the technology industry steering the ship – I can say that as I’ve met most of them over the last couple of years and they’ve been there & done it.
I will still be heavily involved in the community and need to set aside some time for vTARDIS.next and my recently neglected blog – many cool mind-bending, physics defying hypervisor inside a hypervisor posts to come!
I have some interesting professional engagements lined up and I’m looking forward to a new challenge.
Cheers
