Hersey had to take a pass on this week, so we’ll be doing something a bit different. Our occasional (well, more than occasional) host Josh Atwell, will be presenting this week. Also of note, we have some exciting VMworld announcements to make. Details: Register: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/613559281Date/Time: 7/18/2012 @ 7 PM CST
Hi, it’s Alastair again, this is the third post uncovering the automation that is in the AutoLab. If you don’t know what the AutoLab is then head to my AutoLab announcement post. If you missed the first article on AutoLab automation then you can head there now, then read the second post before returning here.
A rather important part of the AutoLab are the ESXi servers. The server basic builds are automated using a PXE server and the Weasel installer that has been part of ESXi since 4.1. Weasel doesn’t require PXE, it is perfectly happy with CDROM or USB boot, the AutoLab uses PXE to allow central management which makes scaling easier. PXE requires two services, a DHCP service and a TFTP service. In the AutoLab both are provided by the DC VM, the DHCP service is the standard Windows DHCP and the TFTP service is the Jounin TFTP server.
UPDATE! EHERMAGERD I Broke the #vBrownBags. This show has been rescheduled for next week. Sorry for the inconvenience. Wednesday, we will have Hersey Cartwright back to round out the VCAP5-DCA objective 1 material. Details Date/Time: Wednesday 7/11 @ 7P CST Register: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/613559281 The #vBrownBags are also on iTunes/RSS: iTunes: http://t.co/07DGNQsT Feedburner: http://t.co/2Fic71ZW
Always on the search for new skills and new ways to work with vSphere & Virtualization, I’ve been turned on to pSphere (Python bindings for vSphere). However, getting this up and going on my Mac was not as straight forward as I’d have thought. Note: I’m not sure what is strictly required here, these are
-> Continue reading Getting Started with pSphere on OSX
Holy links Batman! What follows below are a collection of links from the semi-regular closing of tabs to reclaim memory. Also, most of them are virtualization/VMware related! Rails apps at scale – http://www.bluebox.net/news/2012/06/managing-real-wold-rails-apps-at-massive-scale-part-i/ With the various outages last week, a DR piece – http://www.itworld.com/business/282852/disaster-recovery-1975-how-att-reconnected-170000-phone-lines The UnConference – http://vninja.net/virtualization/vmworld-session-reject-club/ More UnConference – http://www.virtualnetworkdesign.com/vbrownbags/vbrownbag-unconference/ Piston Cloud
-> Continue reading Link Dump – End of June
Earlier this week, I got to hang out some in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. While I wasn’t quite sure what an Oshkosh was, I did get to meet some new folks as well as catch up with others at the Wisconsin User Conference. Before going too much further: Thank you to the Wisconsin VMUG for having me,
-> Continue reading #WIVMUG Follow-Up
Tonight’s #vBrownBag continues our VCAP-DCA series with @bobbyfantast1c (Bobby Stampfle) covering Objective 8.2 on the vSphere Management Assistant. Details Register: https://vbrownbag.comm/brownbags/ Date/Time: 6/27/12 @ 7PM CST
Did you get an e-mail similar to this recently? Dear Cody, Thank you for your interest in speaking at VMworld 2012. We received a record number of submissions this year and were only able to accept ~12%. Unfortunately, we are not able to accept your session proposal, but we greatly appreciate and value the time
-> Continue reading #vBrownBag UnConference–Join Us!
Tonight, #vBrownBag regular Hersey Cartwright (blog | twitter) will be presenting on the VCAP5-DCA Objective 1. Hersey is a long time presenter, and his sessions are always informative. Heck, don’t take my word for it, you can find all his old sessions here. Critical Details Topic: VCAP-DCA Objective 1Date/Time: 6/20/2012 @ 7PM CSTRegister: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/613559281 About
-> Continue reading #vBrownBag – VCAP-DCA Objective 1 w/ Hersey Cartwright
Hi, it’s Alastair again, this is the second post uncovering the automation that is in the AutoLab, if you don’t know what the AutoLab is then head to my AutoLab announcement post. If you missed the first article on AutoLab automation then you can head there now, before returning here.
This article is all about how the windows servers in the AutoLab are built, there were a lot of Yaks to Shave before you can install the VMware goodness.
First, thanks to everyone who have helped make the #vBrownBags what they are… those of you who attend on a weekly basis, who have told friends about the #vBrownBags, or who download us on iTunes. Also thank you to everyone who has hosted or presented a #vBrownBag. With out you, the #vBrownBags would not be
-> Continue reading The #vBrownBags Need You!
The APAC series of BrownBags will return at the start of July. This series will focus on the What’s New of VCAP5-DCA as well as looking at a few other VMware products in real world use. The schedule ahead is maintained on my blog and you can signup for the new series here: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/885241632 Get
-> Continue reading APAC vBrownBag returning in July
This is another post from Alastair. Just a reminder that Cody is no longer alone in posting on ProfessionalVMware.com. Earlier this month the AutoLab was announced right here on ProfessionalVMware and released on LabGuides.com. We’ve had a huge number of downloads and a great response. For those who missed it the AutoLab is a package
-> Continue reading AutoLab Automation outline
This also notes the first post made from a Win7 instance running on the OCP box via VMware View! Also, I don’t have cats, but I blame my excessive amount of open tabs on them: Links VCAP-DCA Obj 9 follow-up http://www.vhersey.com/2012/05/vbrownbag-vcap5-dca-objective-9/ Big Iron hatin on Cloud Storage: http://dataontop.com/doing-their-very-best-to-stall-cloud-storage/ Razor! – Read, watch the videos… then
-> Continue reading Link Dump – 5/25/12
As with the Oxygen post, I’ve been playing with the idea and a few Cloudy storage options in the Homelab for a bit. This week, with a well known storage conference going on, I’ve been installing and testing TwinStrata’s CloudArray. As a side note, when did we stop removing spaces and capitalizing compound words? About
-> Continue reading Installing TwinStrata – iSCSI Cloud Array
This week’s #vBrownBag has Hersey Cartwright returning to present on the VCAP-DCA! Specifically he’ll be tackling Objective 9. To register: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/613559281
DPM or Distributed Power Management is the power saving function of VMware’s DRS. I’ll not go into too much on configuring it here, as that’s quite thoroughly covered elsewhere (Those are 3 different links). I will show you, however, quickly how to test it. Why? Well, there are a few times when you’d want to
-> Continue reading PowerCLI 101 – Test DPM
Edited: So, not sure why but this post was stuck in my drafts folder until the evening right before… bleh. So I’m going to be at the North Carolina User Summit (here) presenting on vCO and handing out a few copies of the vCO Book. If you are going to be in the area Tuesday,
-> Continue reading On the Road with vCO – North Carolina User Summit
Last week was entertaining, what with a laptop rebuild and knocking out some Orchestrator work in preparation for VMworld. (More on that later). Here’s the tabs I currently have open: VDDK API Reference – http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/index.jsp?topic=%2Fcom.vmware.vddk.pg.doc_50%2FvddkPreface.html Enabling CBT with PowerCLI: http://www.vmguru.com/articles/powershell/23-cbt-tracker-powershell-script-now-with-more-zombie Doing the above for a number of VMs at once: http://jpaul.me/?tag=change-block-tracking More of the same:
-> Continue reading Link Dump – 5/6/2012
As expected when the AutoLab was released people wanted to use it, then found issues. This is why I put version 0.5 on it! Erik Bussink has found that the Windows 2008R2 build automation for the Domain Controller and Virtual Center VMs is currently only compatible with the RTM release, it fails with the SP1
-> Continue reading vSphere AutoLab first Bug report