31 mars 2009
Update: VMware Health Check Report 0.94
William Lam posted an update of his Health Check script on the VMTN Communities. I’ve been using this script extensively at several customer sites together with VIMA. Here are the release notes:
03-24-2009 - v0.9.4
Fixes:
-There was a bug reported by Duncan Epping and others regarding hosts that were appearing in the wrong cluster with respect to the portgroup listings, this should be fixed.
Enhancements:
-Detail Hardware Health sensor readings provided by CIM
-CDP Summary (individual cdp.pl available)
http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2009/03/27/update-vmware-health-check-report-094/
VMware ESX(i) 3.5 U4 released!
VMware has just released ESX Update 4. You can find the release notes here. I’ve picked a couple of bullets which I think are important, please read the release notes for the other improvements and known issues!
Be sure to also read the compatability matrix, ESX(i) 3.5 U4 requires vCenter 2.5 U2 or higher, and be sure to check if your Hardware Management Agent is still supported.
Newly supported features:
- PXE booting VMware ESX Server 3i version 3.5 Update 4 Installable is an experimental feature and is supported as such! (http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1008971 , http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1009034)
- LUN Queue depth throttling for 3PAR Arrays (http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1008113)
- Increasing the VMklinux module heap size:
esxcfg-advcfg -k <mbs> vmklinuxHeapMaxSizeMB
Newly supported Guest Operating Systems:
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 (32-bit and 64-bit).
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 11 (32-bit and 64-bit).
- Ubuntu 8.10 Desktop Edition and Server Edition (32-bit and 64-bit).
- Windows Preinstallation Environment 2.0 (32-bit and 64-bit).
Newly supported SAS/SATA controllers:
- PMC 8011 (for SAS and SATA drives)
- Intel ICH9
- Intel ICH10
- CERC 6/I SATA/SAS Integrated RAID Controller (for SAS and SATA drivers)
- HP Smart Array P700m Controller
Newly supported Storage Arrays:
- Sun StorageTek 2530 SAS Array
- Sun Storage 6580 Array
- Sun Storage 6780 Array
Expanded support for the Enhanced VMXNET driver :
- Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition (32-bit)
- Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition (64-bit)
- Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Web Edition
- Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003
- Microsoft Windows XP Professional (32-bit)
http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2009/03/31/vmware-esxi-35-u4-released/
La KB “détail” pour PRA Active Directory
Dans le cas d’un PRA Active Directory, si on positionne des contrôleurs “normalement” des contrôleurs de domaine sur le site de secours, on s’attend à ce que les systèmes d’exploitation Windows XP/2003 les utilisent lors du passage en “secours”. Et bien, c’est un peu plus compliqué que cela, …
Sous Windows XP/2003, le système d’exploitation va identifier une liste des contrôleurs de domaine potentiels lors du démarrage. De cette liste, il ne va en retenir qu’un seul (et il va garder sa tête celui-là). En plus, cette information ne sera mis à jour que dans deux cas :
Le système d’exploitation est redémarré
Que le contrôleur de domaine en cache ne réponde plus (Quickening)
S’il faut redémarrer un Datacenter pour que nos systèmes d’exploitation Windows 2003 puissent utiliser de nouveau un contrôleur de domaine, le temps de reprise va en être considérablement allongé. On peut aussi attendre qu’il le découvrent par lui même.
Pour le nombre de contrôleur de domaine mis en cache, c’est la faute à la fonction “DsGetDcName”. Avec un peu de recherches, on découvre qu’il est possible de forcer manuellement l’actualisation de ce cache avec la commande suivante :
nltest /dsgetdc:Nom du domaine DNS /force
Heureusement, cette problématique est maintenant résolue avec la KB939252. Elle s’applique aussi-bien à Windows XP que Windows Server 2003. Elle permet d’introduire une actualisation automatique du cache cache toutes les douze heures. Il est même possible de choisir sa propre périodicité d’actualisation avec la clé de registre DWORD suivante:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services
\Netlogon\Parameters\ForceRediscoveryInterval
Note : La valeur est exprimée en secondes.
Windows 2008 : N’oubliez pas la sauvegarde! (et ces paroles)
S’il y a bien un composant de Windows Server 2008 qui dans un sens a régressé, c’est bien l’outil de sauvegarde :
- Il n’est pas installé par défaut
- On ne peut plus sauvegarder sur bandes
- On ne peut pas réaliser de sauvegarde individuelle
- le VHD obtenu n’est pas bootable dans une machine virtuelle (j’ai essayé, désolé, …)
- Pas possible de restaurer nativement des sauvegarde Windows 2003 (un workaround existe cependant)
Le fait qu’il ne soit pas installé par défaut fait qu’on l’oublie toujours. Et là, c’est le drame. On tente une improvisation rapide avec une sauvegarde du système sur le disque système et d’amorce (généralement notre C:\ sauf cas de multiboot) et là, l’outil de sauvegarde nous explique qu’il refuse de sauvegarder sur cette partition car elle est critique.
La suite sur le blog :
Le quorum et le cluster
Cours magistral de Microsoft :
Le rôle du quorum au sein d’un cluster est souvent mal compris et peut mener à la mise en place d’une configuration éronée, surtout avec Windows Server 2008 où un nouveau modèle est disponible.
Tout d’abord, la définition du quorum dans son sens commun (Définition d’un quorum) :
“ En droit, le quorum est le nombre minimum de membres d'un corps délibératif nécessaire à la validité d'une décision. C'est souvent la moitié des membres, mais beaucoup d'entités ont un prérequis plus bas ou plus haut.
Lorsque le quorum n'est pas atteint, le corps délibératif ne peut pas tenir de vote et ne peut pas changer le statu quo. Ainsi, les votants en faveur du statu quo peuvent bloquer une décision en ne se présentant pas au vote. Le vote sera alors automatiquement rejeté et le statu quo conservé.
Dans un corps législatif, le quorum est habituellement la majorité des membres de l'entité y compris les postes vacants. Bien des corps ne prennent pas en compte le quorum à moins qu'une question ait été soumise à l'ordre du jour (par exemple un amendement). “
Il faut donc retenir les notions de “votants” et de “majorité” pour bien comprendre le rôle du quorum au sein du cluster.
Qu’est-ce que le quorum et a quoi sert-il ?
La suite sur : http://blogs.technet.com/windowsinternals/archive/2009/03/30/le-quorum-et-le-cluster.aspx
Mise à jour des composants d'intégration Hyper-V pour Linux
Fournie dans le cadre de notre coopération avec Citrix / XenSource, cette mise à jour des IC apporte un support amélioré de la souris via un pilote nomé InputVSC.
Lle pilote ainsi que les instructions d'installation sont disponibles directement sur le site de Xen.
27 mars 2009
Resizing your VMFS the right way, exploring the next version of ESX/vCenter
Un petit aperçu de la future version d'ESX/vCenter...
Aujourd'hui: comment agrandir un VMFS sans Extent!
I’ve been playing around with my vSphere/Next gen ESX lab. I was replaying the VMworld lab and one of the assignments was to resize a VMFS volume. Yes that’s correct, resize not extent. Extents have been discussed by many and the general consensus is avoid them if/when possible. But when running out of diskspace you don’t always have the option to avoid them. Some can’t afford the downtime that comes with a “cold migration”, and most aren’t willing to take the risk of using storage vmotion when running out of diskspace. (Snapshot is placed on source VMFS volume) This has all been solved in the next version of ESX/vCenter. You can resize your VMFS volume without resorting to extents, and you can do this with the vCenter client.
26 mars 2009
Quick Fixed VHD Creation Tool
A while ago I talked about why it takes so long to create a virtual hard disk, and a lot of people came back and said that in controlled environments they were willing to take the security risks / implications involved in order to have quick creation of fixed size virtual hard disks.
In response to this we have made a tool available that does just this:
http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/vhdtool
This tool allows you to create fixed size virtual hard disks very rapidly. You should be aware that the technique used means that it is possible to access data that was previously deleted off of the physical hard disk by running data recovery tools inside the virtual machine. As such you should only use this tool when you can trust all users of the virtual machine.
Announcing the release of Exchange Server Remote Connectivity Analyzer
Have you ever installed an Exchange server and wanted to verify your Internet facing services were setup and configured properly? Things like Exchange ActiveSync, AutoDiscover, Outlook Anywhere (RPC/HTTP), and inbound email. Sure there are cmdlets included in Exchange 2007 like test-ActivesyncConnectivity and test-OWAConnectivity, but these tests can only be run inside your network and effectively only test your internal network connectivity. Or what if you get a call or an escalation regarding one of these services not working? How do you verify if just this user or everyone has a problem? And if there is a problem, where do you start troubleshooting? Is it a DNS problem? Is it a certificate problem? Is a port not open on the firewall?
Believe it or not, these client connectivity and inbound email scenarios make up a significant portion of the support calls we see at Microsoft. And I'm sure this is the same for our partners and customers. One of my responsibilities is to analyze the top support scenarios in Exchange and to work with the Product Group to develop solutions that mitigate these issues. Instead of looking at these issues individually, I took a step back and thought of a way to address all of these scenarios with a single tool. A couple of years ago, I shared this tool idea with several product group folks, but ultimately they didn't have the time or resources to make my idea a reality. Last year, I asked Brad Hughes (an Escalation Engineer in North Carolina) if he could build a prototype of my idea. Not only did he build a prototype... he built the tool I'm sharing with you today.
I'd like to introduce you to the Exchange Remote Connectivity Analyzer (ExRCA) tool which can be accessed at https://www.TestExchangeConnectivity.com.
In this version, the tool will allow you to remotely test the following client types and services:
Exchange ActiveSync
- Windows Mobile 5, 3rd party devices
- Windows Mobile 6.1+ with AutoDiscover
Outlook Anywhere (aka RPC/HTTP)
- Outlook 2003
- Outlook 2007 with AutoDiscover
Inbound SMTP
The tool will simulate the protocol logic used by the specific client and not only tell you if the scenario was successful, but if it fails, it will tell you exactly where in the process it failed as well as try to guide you to the problem resolution.
Here is a screenshot of the tool after it completes a successful Exchange ActiveSync connection:
There are a lot of technical details captured in each one of these steps and you can see this detail by expanding the "Additional Details" node.
The following screenshot shows a failed inbound SMTP test. In this scenario, an MX record is not found for the domain.
Notice in the screenshot above the "Tell me more about this issue and how to resolve it" link. For many of the failure points, we have links to troubleshooting tips on resolving the issues. This content portion of the tool is a work in progress and is being built by a few Support Engineers. Within these articles, you'll notice a "Community Content" section. (This is the area at the bottom of every topic where you can post a response) Please use this area to suggest other helpful tips for troubleshooting specific failure points. Assistance requests should be posted to the TechNet forums instead.
A few additional notes about the tool:
- Our UI is a work in progress. Neither one of us are UI design experts... but we think you'll be able to navigate around.
- A couple of the tests allow you to "Ignore trusts for SSL". Checking this option only tells the tool to not fail if the certificate you are using is not in the list of Trusted Root Certificates... for example if you were using a certificate from your own Windows CA. This option does not allow the test to be completed over a non-SSL connection. That is, if you do not have a certificate and want to test whether Exchange ActiveSync works over port 80 - this tool cannot perform this validation. (Note: We will not be able to add this feature in the future).
Note: Due to limitations in the RPC API, we are currently unable to ignore the trust requirement for SSL for the RPC over HTTP / Outlook Anywhere tests. We are looking into alternatives for future releases. - We know that the CAPTCHA is often (overly) difficult to read. (CAPTCHA is the challenge/response test in the "Verification" section) We have plans to implement a different flavor in the coming months. We don't think the replacement will be perfect either, but it will be black & white and will also have an audio option.
- We know there are currently navigation issues with the wizard when using the forward and back buttons in the browser; we hope to address these in an upcoming release. For now, avoid using the browser's forward and back buttons while using the tool. If you receive an error when navigating the pages, simply browsing to the URL again https://www.testexchangeconnectivity.com, should reset your session and allow you to continue using the tool.
We're not finished yet. We have plans to add additional tests. For example:
- Outlook Web Access
- IMAP
- POP
- Exchange Web Services
These will hopefully be available in the next few months.
We would love your feedback on this tool. Feel free to leave a comment here or send an email to Brad and me via the "Feedback" link located on the footer of every page of the web site. Also, please send us your 'success stories' after using this tool... we'd love to hear about them.
By the way, you can follow ExRCA on Twitter and also join our ExRCA Facebook group.
Here is a short 6 minute video that describes the Exchange Server Remote Connectivity Analyzer web site with visual images and also gives you a demo of how it works:
http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2009/03/25/450908.aspx
Physical to Virtual Conversion of Linux Servers with VMware Converter BootCD
Although we have a number of Linux servers running on our ESX servers until recently the need had never arisen to convert an existing physical Linux server to virtual. However recently I've been doing a lot of work on using virtualization to improve Disaster Recovery options for SME clients (typically 2-25 servers), where cost is always important. Nowadays its not unusual to find networks of this size running one or two Linux boxes amongst their Windows servers but often the in-house IT only have minimal Linux admin skills.
VMware have now released Converter 4 which has support for P2V conversion of Linux systems, but only live conversion using a helper VM which has a number of drawbacks - for a start it only supports Red Hat, Suse and Ubuntu currently. My Linux guru said he wouldn't bother using any virtualization utilities but instead would backup all the config files and other data, then install the OS from scratch on a new Virtual Machine and restore the configs. I'm sure that would work but I wouldn't have a clue where to start doing that in Linux so instead I worked out a simple step-by-step process that any Windows IT person should be able to easily follow. Another important advantage of this "cold cloning" method is that no changes are made to the source Linux server as it remains offline throughout the process, so there is no risk of accidentally corrupting it.
Step One: Obtain the Required Tools
First of all this guide assumes you will be using VMware ESX3 as your virtual environment, although there is no reason you can't import your virtualized server into a VMware Server system instead. You will need an ESX server with enough free storage capacity to hold the whole capacity of your Linux server's hard disks, including free space. So if your Linux server has a 120GB RAID5 disk with 30GB of data on it you will still need to have 120GB of free space on your ESX datastore. After conversion you will be able to shrink the virtual disks to reclaim some of that space if necessary.
The conversion tool we will use is the VMware Converter 3 Enterprise BootCD, if you already have a VMware Infrastructure license or support agreement then you are entitled to download this from here. However if you are still only evaluating virtualization you can still get it - I discovered that if you register for the 60 day Infrastructure trial it enables the other downloads for you as well! Make sure you download the Zip file version of "VMware VCenter Converter 3.0.3 (Standalone Enterprise Edition)" as this also includes the BootCD image, the standard installer download does not. Once you have downloaded it just extract the ISO file, burn it to a CD and you are ready to go.
La suite sur : http://www.petri.co.il/physical-to-virtual-conversion-of-linux-servers-with-vmware-converter-bootcd.htm