Tech Field Day Extra 2014, The Day Before..

As I posted a couple of weeks ago in the VMworld 2014 US, Tech Field Day Extra enabled! post, I am  a delegate at Tech Field Day Extra, an event run by Stephen Foskett and his team. The VMworld 2014 US edition consists of three days in which a number of companies will be presenting the newest and nicest they can bring to us without getting into trouble. I’ll be attending the Day #3 sessions with EMC / XtremIO, Infinio and Nuage Networks. I am looking forward to meeting these companies, and see what they have to offer! Let’s introduce these three:

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The Vintage Hardware Stack: a new life for old hardware

Remember my Shameless call for hardware, some time ago? In that post I explained in short my idea of a pile of old hardware that could serve as an unique playground for young administrators. Well, I’ve made some big progress with that. Last june, my employer thought it was a good idea to put an interview online in which I explain the Vintage Hardware Stack initiative. Good read, if you’re good at Dutch. But if you’re not, I’ve taken the liberty to translate the Dutch post so you can all read it. A tad long, but nevertheless still quite a project. Have fun reading!

Thanks to OGD that I could translate the post and place it on my own blog. Oh, and we’re always open for donations!

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Surviving VCAC 6.0 install: Tips & tricks

When installing vCAC 6.0, please do follow This wonderful HowTo by Kendrick Coleman

But, when an install fails, it’s not nice. See it like shooting a musquito with a 17th century musket: it takes 5 minutes reloading to take a new shot after firing at a target you can not see. Some tips that helped me:

Preparing an installation:
– Make the service account member of the local administrators group. Makes life a lot easier when creating files, IIS operations etc
– Make the service account sysadmin on your SQL server, at least while creating the databases. I let the installer do that job of creating the database, btw
– Run the setup.exe file as an administrator
– Run the great powershell script provided by Kendrick as an administrator

When the install did fail however, how to reset your musket:

– Clear the c:\users\<installingaccount>\download folder of the .exe AND .XML file
– Delete the vCAC database on your SQL server
– Delete the Repository, VCAC and WAPI applications in your Default Website through IIS manager
– Delete the RepositoryAppPool, VCACAppPool and WAPIAppPool in the ApplicationPool through IIS manager
– Delete the c:\program files (x86)\vmware folder (don’t foret to close the logfile too, otherwise deletions will fail 🙂 )

And have another go!

Helpful things: Network restore with vDS / Virtual Distributed Switches

When moving a host from standard vswitching to a vDS / Distributed Switch, it usually goes well. Consider the objective you want to achieve, make a migration plan, execute and get coffee. But, there are times that you didn’t pay attention to your plan, or any errors in it. Or the environment wasn’t made according to the documentation in front of you. Then a host can get disconnected, isolated or an inconsistent vDS configuration can occur between vCenter and host. With normal vSwitching, reparing misconfigurations can be easily fixed by logging in directly at the host with the vSphere C# client, or connecting to the DCUI and change the management network settings. From there on, you can connect to your host again and fix things. But, a vDS setting can not be changed in a direct connected vSphere client or DCUI, because it’s a vCenter managed thing. Or can it ..

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VMworld 2014 US, Tech Field Day Extra enabled!

This has been an amazing year for me so far. It held fear for the unknown (moving between houses), excitement and tension (presenting at our annual meeting for many a colleague), interesting work projects (amongst others, designing and implementing one of the most challenging environments for me so far, combining Nimble Storage, vSphere and SRM into a complex dual datacenter design for a Dutch local government. VCDX worthy, but that’s for another post) and, above all, passing the VCAP-DCD exam. But the coolest thing still has to come ..

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