When is a USB Key Not a Flash Drive?

When it's a webkey.

It's a dirty little trick!  I picked up what I thought was a standard USB key from a vendor (COMMVAULT) at VMworld 2010.  I recently had a need to have a few small documents on hand and thought I would re-use this device as a flash drive to store these docs.

I inserted the USB key into the USB port and waited while the familiar "Windows is installing the driver for this device" message popped-up.  About 1 second after that, I saw the Start | Run window pop-up and it almost looked like someone was typing a URL in the text box and hit enter.  Next thing I know I'm looking at Commvault's VMworld 2010 website.

You can learn more by Googling "webkey".  This is basically a stick that when you plug it in, opens a URL.  That's it.  There's no flash memory on it.

Boo Commvault and whomever else is using these things.  I mean really?  Text or email me the URL, that will be much more handy.  The Commvault webkey that opens a 2 year-old web site now sits in the trashcan. I give webkeys a big thumbs-down!  Just a bad idea.

Occupy What?

These people are wasting their time.  Politicians in Washington already share the same ideas.  So are these demonstrations some sort of PR campaign or an effort to recruit moderates to their cause?  They should just move on, er, wait, these are probably the same people from MoveOn.org, never-mind!  (That's a joke in case you missed it.)

NGD - The StratoHog

Another Rondo deal here: http://www.rondomusic.com/sst57mhlh.html

A mahogany strat w/P90's?  Why not?  This is a nice heavy beast.  The grain of the three-piece body is beautiful and really the main reason I bought it.  It needs all of the upgrades that most SX's do: new nut, strings, saddles, block, locking tuners, pots, cap, output jack and de-goo'ing the neck.

So besides replacing the parts as mentioned above, here's the plan:
I've got 2 SD59 pickups collecting dust.  I'm not a fan of noisy P90's. New pickguard + old pickups = sweet sounding strat.

I've read that the string spacing is so different on strats that the pole pieces on traditional humbuckers don't line up with the strings so you have to use "trembucker" pickups.  I held up the SD to the strings and they seemed to match perfectly to my naked eye so I'm moving forward with it.

Here what it looks like now and then what it will sort of look like when I'm done (but left-handed):

 

I'll post pics as I make progress on the transformation.  Stay tuned!

Another VMworld in the Can

VMworld 2011 was the best conference in years.  Here's why:

Location:  The conference was held in Las Vegas this year.  What a great change of pace from San Francisco.  Better food, better entertainment.  VMware announced it will be back in San Fran for 2012.  I hope VMware is getting one helluva deal to keep making attendees return to the same city over and over again.  Hey - you get an apple with your boxed lunch every day and the mayor's face in on a sticker on the box - what a deal (what a joke)!  Please, anywhere but San Fran again!  I'd even go back to LA.

Key Notes:  I believe we are now seeing a "post-infrastructure" VMware with a consistent, rational vision for the first time.  And I mean a vision that could serve them for the next 5+ years.  I won't rehash it here - I believe everyone in IT should watch VMware CTO Dr. Steve Herrod's session, whether your a VMware fan or not.  Even if they get it 60% right, it will still have a major impact on the future of IT.  And let's face it, VMware currently has the "brain-share" with IT professionals that Novell and Microsoft once had.  Watch Dr. Herrod's session here:  Engineering the Future

Program Guide:  After registering and picking up my backpack and lanyard, I didn't understand why the no pocket used to store my printed schedule was missing.  They really shouldn't have given this as a print format option as it was unnecessary.  This year you could download a free iPhone or Android app.  This app was awesome - kudos to VMware!  My only complaint was that it was a little graphics heavy (warning you to use WiFi while running the app for best results is a good indication that something's up).

VMworld Party:  Okay, the party before the band, the Killers, was great.  The party after the band, the Killers, was great.  The band, the Killers, sucked.  Sorry but it's true.  First of all, they appeal to a limited demographic. Secondly, their music sounds like whiny Euro-trash.  I gave them a shot and watch the first half of the gig (it was all I could stand).  Third, no interaction with the audience, they just stood up there and played.  I was bored.  Worst VMworld party band yet.  Highlight of the night - my buddy spilled beer on some girl's purse and she when psycho on him - you had to be there to appreciate it, she was hilarious (poor girl, entertainment was at her expense).  Let's hope next year is better.  On a positive note, the percussionist group, food and drink were excellent.

Best of Awards:  Just a few comments here... I think it's odd that VKernel won best of virtualization management last year and they're not even a runner-up this year.  It makes me wonder if previous awards are factored into the scoring/criteria (i.e. 'let's give it to someone new this year')?  I also find it interesting that a host-based replication product won best of BCDR and best of show.  See my previous article on vSphere Replication (nice!).  I don't take these as seriously as I used to - in part due to the fact that I saw many other excellent products in the solutions exchange.  But here the list for those interested: Best of VMworld 2011 Awards

Solutions Exchange:  Very good again this year.  Seemed roomier - not sure if it is because the space was bigger of if there were fewer booths.  No real unique or useful swag this year - mostly T-shirts and miscellaneous trinkets.  Note-to-self: go to Splunk's booth for T-shirt first!  They usually have the most clever sayings and this year they went fast, like the first night.  The "crawls" (food/alcohol) were great as usual.  I highly recommend spending a lot of time there talking to vendors as part of your conference experience.

Attendance: Attendance has gone up every year and this year was no different.  19,000 were present on Monday up from 17,000 last year.  It would have been 20,000 except for hurricane Irene.  This reminds me  - it seems like something bad happens just around VMworld almost every year.  This year hurricane, last time in Vegas it was record rain storms, 2008, stock market crash, another year we (the Midwest) had a wind storm like nothing seen for over 100 years causing homes and businesses to be without power for a week or more (my wife handled it like a champ!).  If I remember correctly, there was even some weird moon/sun/earth anomaly that happened during the first VMworld in 2004.

CTO Party:  Having been selected among other vExperts at random, I was invited to this party for the first time.  I hope I get invited again next year as this was a special event.  Both CEO Paul Maritz and CTO Steve Herrod was there along with a number of top VMware engineers including the guy that invented vMotion (how cool is that!).  I got to meet several interesting guys, one of which works just north of me (small world).

Alumni Elite Event:  I am among about 45 people that have attended every VMworld conference.  Last year there were 55 so that's a drop of roughly 18%.  That means if I attend the conference for approximately the next 10 years I'l be the last Alumni Elite standing!  But I digress... To show their appreciation VMware invited us to dinner and a show.  Dinner was decent, the gift bag was just okay - an iPod Shuffle and CD soundtrack of the show we were going to attend (I'm giving the iPod to my nephew - my family will remain iDevice-free!).  I met an "interesting" gentleman that paid for the show himself "to keep his streak alive".  Hmmm... don't think I would ever do that.  The show was Le Reve.  Great show but would have been better seeing it with my wife.  I can't complain though as we got VIP seats that included champagne and some fantastic truffles.

Signage: There was lot's of interesting signage this year.  This site documents it best: 20 Memorable Examples Of VMworld 2011 Signage  I'd also like to include one of my own.  Oracle had these signs on top of just about every cab in Vegas.  They're hilarious!

LMAO... That reminds me, I learned another ancorynm - FML.   If you don't know.  I can't keep up with the kids!  At this rate texting acronyms will become their own language.

Anyway, yet another great conference.  People often ask me why I go year after year.  Well, see above.  If this stuff is boring to you, have your pulse checked.  If you have a pulse, get out of IT and do something different, life is too short!

I'm sure there are other highlights I missed but expect to see some future articles that have a tie-in to things I learned at VMworld.  I may also write a "survival guide" before the next conference.  There are several already published in the blogosphere so I'll have to see if I have anything to add.

Now go upgrade your cluster to vSphere 5.0!

vSphere Replication 1.0

With another problem comes another opportunity...

I have been working on upgrading our vSphere host hardware and migrating VMs from our old EMC Celerra NS350 to a newer HP EVA4400 (that in of itself is worthy of its own blog post).  We had purchased the EVA two years ago to host our ERP data and it has run with a single host accessing it ever since.

So we ordered additional disks and shelves for the EVAs at both primary and DR datacenters.  I installed the HBAs in the hosts, added them to the fabric, created zones, created the LUNs, masked theme off, etc, etc.  Everything was going great until...

I went to setup replication.  I setup array-based replication (ABR) for the first LUN - no problem.  Storage vMotioned a VM over to it and it replicated without issue.  Tried to setup replication for the second LUN - major obstacle time.  HP's replication mechanism for the EVA, Continuous Access (CA), is licensed based on capacity.  And of course, we had licensed 1TB but needed more like 12TB.  Great.  Meanwhile, there's grumblings and doubt by others on the IT team that CA would even be the right choice for replicating this data.

Come on HP, really? Does any vendor license replication by capacity anymore?  You don't do this with LeftHand/P4000 or 3PAR arrays.  Fustrating...

Now I'll be the first to tell you that I hate, hate, hate vendor lock-in.  Technology changes so fast that whatever you're using today, probably isn't what you'll be using 3-5-10 years from now.  Again, a good topic that deserves its own post.  This is one reason that, as a vSphere and storage engineer, I've become a fan of host-based replication (HBR).  There are third-party products that provide this capability for virtual machines today: Veeam Backup and Replication and Quest vReplicator just to name a couple.

But here comes vSphere 5 and SRM 5.  We'll be entitled to both when they're released.  As part of the upgrade we'll get the capability to replicate VMs using vSphere Replication 1.0 for free.  I've started setting up a testing environment and will post my experiences with this new feature.  One thing I'm really curious about is how the bits actually get replicated.  Different arrays handle this differently.  I will have my investigative hat on at VMworld and will ask the storage vendors all the gory details.  I'll follow-up with another article detailing how different vendors implement their replication (geesh, I've got a lot of writing to do!).

In the mean-time, I've gathered some information on vSphere Replication 1.0, all of which is publicly available.  Exciting stuff!  Here are the details:

• This feature is included with all editions of SRM 5
• VMs can be replicated from any storage to any storage, including local disk
• Replicated disks can be place on any ESXi-compatible disks/filesystem
• Breaks storage vendor lock-in
• Replication is an attribute of the VM (not the LUN or some other element)
• You can choose which VMDKs to replicate within the VM
• In some cases you may not want to replicate the system drive/VMDK, only the data drive/VMDK
• Disks are replicated in a "group consistent" manner
• Does not use CBT to track and replicate deltas.  Instead, VMware developed another technology that tracks I/O changes to VMDKs and captures them in a "PSF" or persistent state file.  It does not use VM snapshots
• I'm not sure why they didn't leverage existing CBT technology - more details to follow
• Initial "seed" copy can be made in advanced by FTP, external disk/sneaker net, etc.
• Saves bandwidth - great if you have a slower WAN connection and/or a large number of VMs to replicate
• RPO can be set on a per-VM basis
• 5 - minutes to ?
• If you need an RPO smaller than 5 minutes, you got other challenges to face!

Some limitations:

• VM must be powered-on
• My guess is that the thinking here is that if it's powered-off it must not be critical enough to recovery in a DR scenario.  I hope VMware reconsiders on this one.  I don't have any of these today, but it I can see the possibility of it in the future.
• Will not replicate swap, logs, dumps
• Will replicate VMs with snapshots.  However, snapshots will not be replicated.  Instead, the I/O from the source snapshot is written to the destination VM, effectively making the destination VM look like the source VM after collapsing the snapshot.
• No FT VMs, linked clones, templates, physical RDMs, ISOs or floppies
• Requires VM hardware version 7 or later

That wasn't too painful.  Here's what the (high-level) architecture looks like:

• vRMS - vSphere Replication Management Server
• Required at both sites
• This is a virtual appliance (VA) imported into vCenter
• vRA - vShpere Replciation agent
• Required at the protected site
• Runs on the ESXi 5 hosts
• vRS - vSphere Replication Server
• Runs on the recovery site
• This too is a VA imported into the vCenter at the recovery site

Scalability info:

• VM totals = 500 replicated (1000 total for SRM)
• If you need to protect more that 500 VMs, not only do you have a large environment, you'll need to use ABR or find an alternative HBR solution that can scale higher (if it exists).  With that size of an environment I'd recommend working with your VMware account representative and/or storage vendor.

For a storage geek like me this is pretty exciting stuff.  I think a lot of VMware customers, from the small SMB to the mid-sized and even some larger companies, are going to benefit from this new feature.

Time to kick the tires, stay tuned!

ERROR: Cannot login vi-admin00@IPADDRESS

Don't you love it when, during a standard log review of your vSphere environment, you find an error like this that zaps the next four hours of your time?  Not!  Maybe this will save you some time.

Scenario
I had the ESXi 4.1 hosts in my vSphere cluster setup to remote syslog to the VMware vMA appliance per Simon's excellent instructions:  Using vMA as Your ESXi Syslog Server
I recently upgraded our vSphere cluster hardware which included a fresh installation of ESXi.
With that in mind, after recently reviewing tasks and events in vCenter, I noticed the error message "Cannot login vi-admin00@IPADDRESS" where IPADDRESS was the IP of the vMA system.  I found this error on all of the hosts' local events and it occurred often.

Troubleshooting
Reading through the comments of the above post, I noticed someone else had the same problem, but no responses.  I did the "chown" change on the syslog directory but this did not solve the problem.

I then did ran the following command directly on the vMA appliance:
vilogger list --server SERVERNAME
Per the results, I found that the host was "enabled" but it had an "Authentication Failure".  This got me wondering about that vi-admin00 account in the original error message. The vMA has a "vi-admin" local account, but what is "vi-admin00"?   I fired up the vSphere client and logged directly in to one of the host.  Sure enough, the account didn't exist.

Solution
A little more investigation (er, Google searching), and I found the answer here:
How to Remove Stale Targets from vMA
Apparently, rebuilding/replacing the hosts wiped out the accounts vilogger creates including vi-admin00!

First step to fix this is to remove the server.  I did not need to use the "force" parameter:
sudo vifp removeserver SERVERNAME

Then add the server back in:
sudo vifp addserver SERVERNAME

Finally, re-register the host with vilogger:
vilogger enable --server SERVERNAME --numrotation 20 --maxfilesize 10 --collectionperiod 10

You'll know it worked if you get the green "Enabled" result messages.

To verify:
vilogger list --server SERVERNAME

You should see each of the three logs listed as "Enabled" and "Collecting".  I also WinSCP'ed to the system and made sure the logs were updating with new data.

Conclusion
Do this for all hosts in your cluster and you'll be back in business.  And don't forget to add this to the host rebuild/replace checklist.  It's always the little things, isn't it?

VMware vExpert!

Last Tuesday I started my day as I occasionally do - checking the spam facility for my work email account.  I found a quarantined message from one "jtroyer@vmware.com".  It turned out to be a "Welcome to the vExpert 2011 Program" email message!

I compare the vExpert program to Microsoft's MVP program (but way cooler, of course).  It's VMware's way of recognizing those that contributed to the VMware, virtualization and cloud computing communities.  Thanks VMware for the recognition!

Oh, and John's emails will no longer get stuck by my spam filter(!).

The Value of Wood

If a normal person takes a step back and looks at the electric guitar industry, they must think "what a bunch of loons!"  And, in fact, they would be right.

At the highest end there's the collector's segment.  These are typically guitars played by rock icons such as Eric Clapton or Jimi Hendrix.  They can also be "vintage" (1950s/60s), very rare models.  These are uber-expensive guitars that only the rich can afford and aren't for playing, but being displayed in a museum.  For example, Clapton's "Blackie" sold for almost 1 million dollars (that's m as in million)!

Then there's the "prosumer" tier - typically custom shop guitars ranging from $3000 up to $10,000 give or take.  These guitars are custom creations from well-respected luthiers, either independent or working for major manufacturers such as Fender and Gibson.  They are meant for playing, although many guitarist buy them and leave them locked up for fear of scratching their new, relatively expensive instrument.

Continuing down the ladder, we have the high-end "consumer" guitars.  These are typically American made and weigh-in at $1000 to $2000 give or take.  I believe these are typically the most sought after guitars.  It's funny really, as guitarists are musicians and as such, shouldn't they be trying to be creative, unique and push musical boundaries?  Yet, as a group, guitarists are about the most stubborn traditionalists I have ever seen.  Bodies and headstocks must be a certain shape and have a specific name.  If its not American-made it must be crap.  Etc, etc.  This sentiment really helps drive the sale of guitars in this segment.

Then we get to an interesting market segment, guitars in the $400 to $800 range.  Mostly imports but of good to very good quality.  From what I understand, more guitars are sold in this price range than any other.  This make sense as Fender, Gibson and many other manufacturers sell guitars in the price range made in Mexico, Canada, Indonesia,  Korea and China.  Many guitarist buy this guitar as an upgrade from their beginner model (although they really want the American model but can't afford it).

Finally, there's the entry-level, cheap beginner guitars.  These sell for $200 or less.  They are always imported (if there are any $200 American made guitars please tell me!), usually from China.  They are typically cheap pieces of junk, or are they?  Find out in a future post (hint).

Does the value match the product?  In my opinion, NO.  Guitars have the same basic components - wood bodies, wood necks, pickups, hardware (bridge/tremolo, tuners), etc.  The quality of these components vary widely.  The fit and finish of the final products also vary widely.

Here's my point - the difference in value between a $200 guitar and a $3000 guitar is not $2800.  The value of a $200 guitar can be doubled by spending some time setting it up and making it (more) playable.  Much of the difference in value can be described as perception versus reality.  As evidence, note that Gibson tried lowering the prices of their higher end guitars and found they sold fewer units which they attributed to customers' change in perception of those models(!).

American Alder is American Alder, rolled steel saddles are the same regardless if it's done by a guy in the US or some dude in China especially with today's CNC machines.  Setups can vary regardless of where the guitar is made.

Are you a headstock snob?  This will be a topic I'll revisit in future posts so stay tuned.

Error: Call "PropertyCollector.RetrieveContents"

New to me this morning is this error:
The server fault 'SystemError' had no message.  Error Stack: Call "PropertyCollector.RetrieveContents" for object "propertyCollector" on vCenter "vCenterNAME" failed.

This happened to all my templates after converting them to VMs and trying to edit settings.
Hmmm... I hadn't changed anything since upgrading to 4.1u1.  Maybe that caused the problem, maybe it was something else.

The fix: unregister and re-register the VM.  Done.

Upgrading vMA from 4.0 to 4.1

I upgraded my vSphere Management Assistant appliance this week from 4.0 to 4.1 and thought I would share the process and results.  While it's not required, I did this as a house-keeping item that's on my list before upgrading vSphere 4.0 to 4.1 - actually, it started by needing to update VMware Tools.

The tools pre-installed with the original appliance were out of date.  After some investigation, I found that the appliance upgrade does not update VMware Tools, this has to be done manually.  So first I upgraded the appliance.

The release notes for 4.1 are wrong(!).  The "vma-update" command doesn't exist until after the upgrade.  You must use "vima-update" so the command will look like this: "sudo vima-update update".  I also found that after the upgrade, both commands worked!  VMware should really make this distinction in their documentation.

This will update everything, and by everything I mean even the OS which changes from Redhat to CentOS.  If you have a lot a scripts make sure you snapshot the VM before upgrading.  If you're using the appliance as your syslog server, also check to make sure logging is still running:  /var/log/syslog/[FQDN of host].

If you'd like to setup syslogging, see Using vMA as Your ESXi Syslog Server.

Finally you'll want to update VMware Tools using the standard installation and upgrade procedure for the Linux OS.

Other relevant links:
vSphere Management Assistant Documentation
vSphere Management Assistant 4.1 Release Notes
vSphere Management Assistant 4.1 Guide

VMware Releases View Client for Apple iPad

Big deal!  VMware has come out with a client for a device that's been selling for a year?  Whoa slow the development pace down there guys you're blowing me away!

Okay, sarcasm aside, VMware doesn't seem to be overly committed to conquering the virtual desktop market.  Citrix has been the leader in this space for some time.  I have been using XenDesktop/XenServer accessed  via Wyse HDX thin client and Droid X Citrix Labs Receiver for six months now and can say it works great (even on a three inch screen).

Don't get me wrong, I'm a big VMware fan (I've been implementing/administering VMware products like ESX since 2002, I've been to every VMworld, etc, etc).  But I'm primarily a "right tool for the job" kind of guy.  XenDesktop/HDX is technically superior to View/PCoIP (at least as of this writing) and it mostly a no-brainer for existing Citrix XenApp shops.

So where's the Android version?  As of this week, Android phones are out-selling RIM and Apple/iOS. I wouldn't hold your breath.  My perception is that VMware is focusing on back-end cloud infrastructure and development products.  And their growth/size has slowed them down tremendously since 2002, but more on that in a future post.

For more information on Citrix's mobile client story, see:
http://community.citrix.com/display/ocb/2011/03/09/Today%2C+More+Than+Ever%2C+Citrix+is+the+Right+Choice+for+the+iPad%21

A Tab for a Song

One of the most popular way guitarists learn how to play songs is through the use of tablature. This is an easy to understand form of music notation that shows exactly when and where each finger should go on the fretboard.  Many guitar magazines include several songs tabbed-out which used to be a great way to build a library of song tabs to keep on hand for reference.

Until now...

I stumbled upon a web site named Songsterr:  http://www.songsterr.com

This service like an on-line version of Guitar Pro.  While not quite as robust, the basic version is free!  We're talking over 60,000 tabs from over 1500 artist.  That should be enough to keep me busy for awhile!  Don't get me wrong, I'm not dropping any magazine subscriptions - printed tab still has a place in the guitarist's learning arsenal, but this service is awesome.

Check 'em out!

(Not so) Random Thought of The Day #2

Maybe if the government had no favors to give, there would be no lobbyist or other pressure groups clamoring to recieve them.

Context: Guitars and Gear

Besides being a father and Information Technology professional, I'm also an amateur/hobbyist guitarist.. This means I'm not in a band but still practice in my living-room and occasionally write and record music.  I'm trying to learn Ableton Live enough to get a tune recorded and mixed properly.  I haven't decided if I'm going to do the drums using my Alesis DM6 kit or use one of the electronic drum kits in Live.  Oh yeah, and I can keep a decent beat on drums.  More about those efforts in a future post...

A little history...  So I have been playing guitar since I was 13 years old.  My first guitar was a 1940's acoustic "student model" f-hole guitar given to me by my grandma.  It's amazing how well those things were made back then even though much of it was made of plywood instead of a good tone wood.  Unfortunately, four years ago the top completely cracked in about five places ruining the guitar.  Someday I hope to get another f-hole that hopefully in some part captures that sound.  It looked a lot like this without the pickgaurd:

I forgot to mention, I'm a left-handed player.  Finding lefties (or righties that I can flip upside-down and re-string) can be a challenge.  Did you know less than 10% of all the people in the US (and, consequently of all guitars sold) are left-handed?  Yet, there are many great left-handed guitarist.  I picked up the guitar because of Jimi Hendrix (even though I didn't know he was left-handed at the time).  Anyway, I digress...

A friend of mine in high school gave me his beat-up old Harmony electric guitar.  It was a 70's era H802.  This thing was terrible, but at least I could play chord or two on it by then.  I plugged it into a cheap Magnavox stereo player.  No distortion or other effects but I could hear the guitar via the microphone input and the stereo at the same time.  This is when I began to play along with songs on the radio and started figuring things out.  And oh the tone! (Sarcasm in case you didn't get it.)

My first "real" guitar was a "Lynx by Yakima" my parents purchased as a gift for me on my 17th birthday.  I played that guitar only for many years after-wards.  It's a Korean made strat copy with some decent components such as Grover tuners and a full steel block.  I was told that they came out of the same factory as Kramer guitars - they wanted a low-cost line but didn't want to associate the Kramer brand with it.  I remember playing guitar with friends in the late 80's and one friend of mine bought a cheap Fender Squire Bullet.  He asked me why my guitar never went out of tune after using the tremolo.  I don't think that Bullet ever stayed in tune regardless of tremolo usage.  I didn't know it at the time but now think it has to be the tuners!  The weakest thing about this guitar are the pickups.  I may switch these out in a future project, stay tuned!

Fast-forward to present - I now have 7 or 8 guitars with my "spring project" guitar already lined-up.  Most bring unique properties to the table.  I do have three strat copies that I need to get down to one.  I'm always on the look-out for good lefty deals so the list will definitely change before long.  I'd like to pick up a cheap righty Explorer and flip it upside-down.  What a cool  body style!  And I've read good things about Korina as a tone wood so picking up a 1958 Epiphone would be sweet.  (Note: I'm thinking ZZ Top here, not metal.)

I'll be profiling my guitars in one way or another in a future post so keep checking back.  Time to go practice!

(Not so) Random Thought of The Day #1

Not too long ago, you could determine if a person was doing well if they owned a cell phone.
Now, you can determine if a person is poor if they hold a cell phone up to their ear while driving.