I/O Analyzer

http://labs.vmware.com/flings/io-analyzer

I/O Analyzer is a virtual appliance solution by VMware that provides a simple and standardized way of measuring storage performance in a VMware vSphere virtualized environments. I/O Analyzer automates the traditional storage performance analysis cycle and reduces the performance diagnosis time from days to hours.

Features

• Integrated framework for storage performance testing
• Readily deployable virtual appliance
• Easily configure and launch I/O tests on multiple hosts
• View integrated performance results at both guest and host levels
• Easily export performance data for off-site analysis

CPU Ready Time

vCPU waits for pCPU

Live port migration

Live port migration means a stand alone dvport can be moved to a dvportgroup and thus acquiring the all the configuration of the dvportgroup and a dvport which is a part of a dvportgroup can be moved out from a dvportgroup, the subsequent config changes to the dvportgroup does not apply to this dvport.

echo -n 'y\ny' | ./shell.sh

This echo will answer two y separated by new line, which is asked by shell.sh. This is even nice than expect

Nice trick from http://www.van-lieshout.com/2009/03/unattended-upgrade-of-hp-management-agents/

Windows on iSeries

http://as400bks.rochester.ibm.com/iseries/v5r2/ic2924/info/rzahq/rzahq.pdf

The Integrated xSeries Server for iSeries is essentially a PC on a card. It contains an Intel processor and
memory. You install it in iSeries much like a memory upgrade. Similarly, the Integrated xSeries Adapter for
iSeries is an HSL bus adapter plugged into a supported Netfinity or xSeries Server. The Netfinity or
xSeries Server appears as an HSL attached expansion unit to the iSeries system.

Virutal Windows disks are provided by iSCSI storage

IBMi ~ i5/OS ~ OS/400 or OS/400 LPAR on iSeries is required for this purpose

Unix Virtualization

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypervisor

LPAR  Logical partition:

IBM Mainframe: (Sytem Z , System i)

IBM midrange iSeries and pSeries

IBM PowerVM, Power Hypervisor: provides industrial-strength virtualization for AIX®, IBMi,and Linux environments on IBM POWER®processor-based systems.

Solaris LDOMs virtualization on SPARC: (Oracle VM Server for SPARC, now)

Sun Logical Domains or LDoms is a full virtual machine that runs an independent operating system instance and contains virtualized CPU, memory, storage, console, and cryptographic devices. This technology allows you to allocate a system resources into logical groupings and create multiple, discrete systems, each with their own operating system, resources, and identity within a single computer system.  

Supported Guest OS:

• Solaris 10 11/06 or later
• OpenSolaris 2009.06 release
• Ubuntu Linux Server Edition
• OpenBSD 4.5 or later
• Wind River Platform for Network Equipment, Linux Edition

HP vPAR at VSE (Virtual Server Environment) HPUX on HP9000 and HP Integrity 


vPars are separate operating system instances on the same nPartition or server. This offering lets you dynamically move either CPU or memory resources between partitions as the workload requirements change. They also give you the ability to run multiple copies of HP-UX on the same hardware.


nPar partitions are electrically isolated from other nPar partitions within the same chassis. Cells (a unit of processors/IO/memory) make up nPar partitions. Being electrically isolated means that if a nPar partition were to fail due to hardware failure, then the other nPar partitions would continue to work. This is contrasted with vPar partitions which exist within nPar partitions in which a failure at the hardware level for a nPar would affect all vPars within that nPar.

It's important to note that while nPartitions support HP-UX, Windows®, VMS, and Linux, they only do so on their Itanium processor, not on their HP9000 PA Risc architecture.

Openfiler 2.3 ESX VM version bug

After the openfiler is reboot, the iSCSI targets could not be reachable, and you will need to remap (unmap and map) LUN with LUN path.

This has been reported, and there was a fix for this at the wikipedia.

After rescanning path, the lost datastores might need to be re-added into ESX(i) by keeping the existing volume signature

VOIP connection to 800 number might not be able to be established

If the 800 number requires call to keyboard input the choice number when it is ringing: either the keyboard won't response or the keyboard input (touch tone) won't be recognized by receiver, so the session won't not be established at all.

Tried on Skype and Ekiga with GV

Traditional GSM network did work though.

VAAI

vStorage API for Array Integration

• File Lock & Set (disk block instead of LUN)
• LUN to LUN copy without ESX(i)
• Auto Zero-filling

AppSpeed from vmware

Assure performance of your virtualized applications and meet SLAs by continuously monitoring performance of application transactions across the virtual and cloud infrastructure.

• Proactively monitor performance by detecting deviations from auto-baselines
• Quickly isolate & troubleshoot performance problems
• Seamlessly deploy and manage using vSphere built-in instrumentation – turnkey, no agents required

Cisco LinkSys WPS54G Wireless Printer Server

Got a used one from eBay, and works well. Here is the details.

1. Download the software from Cisco website (WPS54G) . Actually version doesn't matter, since they both point to same file.
2. Setupwizard is a Windows executable, which includes two functions: setup Printer Server and Setup computer for printing to WPS54G (printer interface driver to WPS54G). Of course, the initial set up for Printer server will need wired connection to wireless router/switch, however the USB connection to physical printer is not necessary. Setupwizard should find the Printer Server with DHCP IP, if not then, you might need to reset the Printer Server by powering off and pushing the reset hole with small pin. The default password for printer server is admin with user name admin or the just leave it blank(Don't bother to change it). Later you will have option to set static IP for Printer Server.After you correctly completed Wireless settings for printer server, the process will ask you to disconnect wired connection, and re-powered printer server, Wi-Fi will take over the IP assigned to wired connection before.
3. Setupwizard could continue to setup computer for printer interface driver, while this process could be stopped by third-party firewall (such as Symantec Endpoint Protection), so you might need to disable it or add exception for Setupwizard at the firewall settings.Once the physical printer behind the Printer Server is connected via USB and detected by Setupwizard, it will ask for printer driver if you did not install it previously.
4. Process above only refers to Windows client process. If you need to print from Mac or Linux workstation, the major challenge is to find the Printer Server IP, then you could use the web interface to configure Printer Server. From Mac, Print & Fax has option for IP printer, with LPD it will finish the rest. From Linux, CUPS will do the similar job.

* The accidental power-down might cause Printer server loss its DHCP IP, so the reconfig of printer server might be required.