what did you learn today? (part 2)

[ZPrime]

Big Wooly Mammoth[/url]":2vafsi16]

M. Jones[/url]":2vafsi16]

PaveHawk-[/url]":2vafsi16]
Previous guys who did this VMware deployment set all VMs (inc the DC) to sync time to the host.

Yes, that is a GREAT idea.

In fairness, it was VMware's recommendation to sync time to host through VMware tools until a couple of years ago. I only noticed they entirely reversed their recommendation when it was pointed out to me. It explained a lot because the old way was terrible, and caused much pain.

This is also the default with HyperV R2; I am working on clearing up this mess in our environment as well.

For non-DCs, why does it matter? The time should be the same on the host or the guest (assuming the host is also joined to the same domain the guests are on), no?

I agree that if you have virtualized DCs, they shouldn't sync to anything but NTP... but I hate virtualized DCs too.

 

[jshiplett]

I can't speak for HV, but with ESXi, each host is configured for NTP individually. There are ways to mitigate configuration drift, but if a single ESXi host loses its NTP config and ends up out of sync with AD, you're boned.

And why would you hate virtualized DCs? I've successfully virtualized a number of domain controllers without issue.

 

[Scotttheking]

Some people, when wrong, will double and triple down rather than admit they are wrong. Ahh, vendors.

 

[hawkbox]

euri[/url]":2do5ws0m]I can't speak for HV, but with ESXi, each host is configured for NTP individually. There are ways to mitigate configuration drift, but if a single ESXi host loses its NTP config and ends up out of sync with AD, you're boned.

And why would you hate virtualized DCs? I've successfully virtualized a number of domain controllers without issue.

I use the shit out of virtualized DCs. I also got burned with the VMware time sync thing and I should probably email my old job and let them know that it's not longer the recommended way.

 

[HellDiver]

The new Poweredge R515 I just fired up is really quiet once the fans settle down. Compared to the 2950-II it's replacing, anything is quiet, I guess.

The RAID BIOS on the H700 still sucks - same old crap since PERC5/i days.

With dual 2.7GHz Opterons and 32GB RAM, it'll make a damned fine DC for 40 machines....

 

[Black_Obsidian]

HellDiver[/url]":3dq02rhw]
With dual 2.7GHz Opterons and 32GB RAM, it'll make a damned fine DC for 40 machines....

Are you also using it for something else, or perhaps using DC to mean something other than domain controller? Because I'm reasonably sure that a modern smartphone has sufficient horsepower to be a DC for a measly 40 machines

(If you could somehow get it to run Windows Server, anyway)

 

[Barmaglot]

What do Atom smartphones use for booting? BIOS/UEFI, or something else entirely?

 

[HellDiver]

Black_Obsidian[/url]":2ynlo0i3]

HellDiver[/url]":2ynlo0i3]
With dual 2.7GHz Opterons and 32GB RAM, it'll make a damned fine DC for 40 machines....

Are you also using it for something else, or perhaps using DC to mean something other than domain controller? Because I'm reasonably sure that a modern smartphone has sufficient horsepower to be a DC for a measly 40 machines

DC=Domain Controller.

Though it does do SQL, WSUS, DNS, DHCP, file sharing, etc, too. Yes, it's overkill at the moment, but we got 6+ years out of our last "overkill" server (the aforementioned 2950-II).

 

[Rick25]

I'd suggest throwing on ESXi (even the free version) and then standing up those servers as VMs. You'll get better segregation between the different roles. DC, DNS, DHCP on one VM, WSUS, SQL and the file server on their own separate ones.

 

[HellDiver]

Yeah, I was planning on doing something with VMs.

I'm just back after a month off, so I'm still trying to fix the backlog of cockups before I decide what to do with 32GB of RAM and 12 cores.

 

[Heresiarch]

From version 8.1+ (not sure of specific version) of the IP Office 500 v2 firmware, Avaya decided to tie the license to the SD card and the chassis. Previously it was just the SD card.

...and they didn't mention this to anyone.

 

[dlp]

Avaya's licensing is batty. I have a few small setups of single IP Office modules that are licensed by a dying PC. If the PC dies, I need an XP replacement or I need to upgrade something to use Windows 7. If I want to license without the PC, I have to upgrade something. Meanwhile, if I lose the PC the place effectively loses its ability to operate.

WHY AM I THE ONLY ONE WHO CARES. (specifically how it'll affect the users)

 

[jshiplett]

...and here's my "keeping myself honest" post

Taking VCAP5-DCD on August 26
Taking VCP5-DT on August 27

Still need to schedule VCAP5-DCA for around 2-3 weeks before that, I just want to make sure I'm ready.

 

[Danger Mouse]

euri[/url]":35gd722o]...and here's my "keeping myself honest" post

Taking VCAP5-DCD on August 26
Taking VCP5-DT on August 27

Still need to schedule VCAP5-DCA for around 2-3 weeks before that, I just want to make sure I'm ready.

VERY nice.

Plz to provide your blog, so you too can join the vExpert ranks

I'm trying to schedule my ccna before the end of August. I'm done with most of my data center move.

All that's left is my giant cluster(fsck) of bladepcs.

 

[hawkbox]

euri[/url]":39161sbg]...and here's my "keeping myself honest" post

Taking VCAP5-DCD on August 26
Taking VCP5-DT on August 27

Still need to schedule VCAP5-DCA for around 2-3 weeks before that, I just want to make sure I'm ready.

70-410 on Aug 1 for me. Taking an 8 hour MVA online course today that hopefully should help get me on the right track.

 

[hernias]

Questions about fsck seem to be standard screening for Bay Area big names. This is concerning.

[if you have to resort to fsck you're probably boned anyway]

 

[kperrier]

Eh, they will get their data back Tueday, Wednesday at the latest.....

 

[CanSpice]

hernias[/url]":jjd3jto6]Questions about fsck seem to be standard screening for Bay Area big names. This is concerning.

[if you have to resort to fsck you're probably boned anyway]

If you have to fsck you're probably fscked.

 

[Arbelac]

hawkbox[/url]":1puu9a03]

euri[/url]":1puu9a03]...and here's my "keeping myself honest" post

Taking VCAP5-DCD on August 26
Taking VCP5-DT on August 27

Still need to schedule VCAP5-DCA for around 2-3 weeks before that, I just want to make sure I'm ready.

70-410 on Aug 1 for me. Taking an 8 hour MVA online course today that hopefully should help get me on the right track.

I should schedule my CCNP SWITCH exam... I've been putting it off.

 

[jshiplett]

Danger Mouse[/url]":2a4ur0ke]

Plz to provide your blog, so you too can join the vExpert ranks

...but I already am one of those (as well as at least a couple of other Arsians).

If you meant VCDX, that's a long way down the road. :/

 

[jshiplett]

Arbelac[/url]":2kzve41y]I should schedule my CCNP SWITCH exam... I've been putting it off.

I dropped my CCNP quest for this year. I'm supposed to be doing more Cisco R&S later this year, so that should spur it on. As it stands, my CCNA knowledge is slowly leaking out my left ear due to neglect.

 

[daldrich]

That after 3 months of working with a remote site it came down to the wrong cable. Our label printers apparently do not use a standard Serial cable and apparently that is what they were using. Why can't manufactures put in big, bold print that it uses a non-standard cable, especially when the newer models don't use the same as the older ones.


Something else. While trying to remotely fix a machine with RDP that had lost the trust relationship I tried logging in using \\172.16.1.1\administrator and got the trust relationship failure message. When I used the machine name: \\tuk-temp01\administrator it worked fine.

 

[ImRaptor]

daldrich[/url]":34sya5s3]
Something else. While trying to remotely fix a machine with RDP that had lost the trust relationship I tried logging in using \\172.16.1.1\administrator and got the trust relationship failure message. When I used the machine name: \\tuk-temp01\administrator it worked fine.

That, to me, sounds like a DNS problem. Maybe a stale record to the client system from a dynamic DNS entry or worse a bad entry in the msdcs entries.

 

[hawkbox]

I don't know how some people can get so many certs and stuff. I don't know if I have nerd ADD or some kind of learning disability but I have a terrible time memorizing all the little inane shit needed to write tests and pass them. I think I need some adderall or something.

 

[Arbelac]

hawkbox[/url]":57t5e7w9]I don't know how some people can get so many certs and stuff. I don't know if I have nerd ADD or some kind of learning disability but I have a terrible time memorizing all the little inane shit needed to write tests and pass them. I think I need some adderall or something.

I test -terribly-. For some reason, under pressure in a real life environment, I can dredge up the most inane shit that fixes the problem, but when it's a test environment, I have some extreme difficulty remembering basics.

I've dropped keeping my MS Server certifications up to speed, and have been focusing on getting my CCNP. I'd like to get the VCP as well, since I've got enough experience (at least with 4... I should upgrade to 5 in my home lab) but haven't been able to scrounge up the 3k+ for the class. My new department does have some VMWare credits though...

 

[hawkbox]

Arbelac[/url]":bp62fnkj]

hawkbox[/url]":bp62fnkj]I don't know how some people can get so many certs and stuff. I don't know if I have nerd ADD or some kind of learning disability but I have a terrible time memorizing all the little inane shit needed to write tests and pass them. I think I need some adderall or something.

I test -terribly-. For some reason, under pressure in a real life environment, I can dredge up the most inane shit that fixes the problem, but when it's a test environment, I have some extreme difficulty remembering basics.

I've dropped keeping my MS Server certifications up to speed, and have been focusing on getting my CCNP. I'd like to get the VCP as well, since I've got enough experience (at least with 4... I should upgrade to 5 in my home lab) but haven't been able to scrounge up the 3k+ for the class. My new department does have some VMWare credits though...

I have a lot of experience in 5.1 and when I went to write the test it felt like it was written in another language and translated with google docs. Now I'm working in a 4.1 environment so I can't even use it to practice. It's driving me nuts because I want to prove I know this shit, but I seem to know a fraction of what gets tested.

 

[Danger Mouse]

euri[/url]":36wnowov]

Danger Mouse[/url]":36wnowov]

Plz to provide your blog, so you too can join the vExpert ranks

...but I already am one of those (as well as at least a couple of other Arsians).

If you meant VCDX, that's a long way down the road. :/

I meant that thing that various VMWare bloggers blog about being honored by being selected as such.

I'm sure you'll get the VCDX before I round out my list of desired certs.

 

[ronelson]

TIL that MVA Jumpstart sessions are awesome, even if they're on PST time and go till 8pm for me. However, people that call curly braces are not

I don't know how some people can get so many certs and stuff. I don't know if I have nerd ADD or some kind of learning disability but I have a terrible time memorizing all the little inane shit needed to write tests and pass them. I think I need some adderall or something.

What always gets me is when you find that question that describes the problem you had last week and their "correct" solution is the first one you had to rule out

 

[hawkbox]

ronelson[/url]":1uqm916h]TIL that MVA Jumpstart sessions are awesome, even if they're on PST time and go till 8pm for me. However, people that call curly braces are not

I don't know how some people can get so many certs and stuff. I don't know if I have nerd ADD or some kind of learning disability but I have a terrible time memorizing all the little inane shit needed to write tests and pass them. I think I need some adderall or something.

What always gets me is when you find that question that describes the problem you had last week and their "correct" solution is the first one you had to rule out

You've spent all day watching the Powershell video too?

 

[ronelson]

You've spent all day watching the Powershell video too?

I lost it at "prayer based parsing"

 

[hawkbox]

ronelson[/url]":2ralv6aj]

You've spent all day watching the Powershell video too?

I lost it at "prayer based parsing"

That was great yes. I have to admit I feel completely out of my depth with Powershell. It's scary.

 

[jshiplett]

Danger Mouse[/url]":232u0m4f]

euri[/url]":232u0m4f]

Danger Mouse[/url]":232u0m4f]

Plz to provide your blog, so you too can join the vExpert ranks

...but I already am one of those (as well as at least a couple of other Arsians).

If you meant VCDX, that's a long way down the road. :/

I meant that thing that various VMWare bloggers blog about being honored by being selected as such.

That's vExpert. I decided I did enough self-flagellation last year, and decided to forego it this year.

hawkbox[/url]":232u0m4f]I don't know how some people can get so many certs and stuff. I don't know if I have nerd ADD or some kind of learning disability but I have a terrible time memorizing all the little inane shit needed to write tests and pass them. I think I need some adderall or something.

All I do is VMware consulting (with a bit of Cisco UCS implementation). If I couldn't pass these exams, I don't know what I'd do with myself.

 

[PaveHawk-]

I'm across a ton of technology, and I am constantly doing a whole lot of solution architecture encompassing the whole range of technologies. Thats how I stay current - I'm constantly deploying all of these things to learn how to deploy it so I can design it.

Its also how I pass my exams, wealth of experience and all that.

TIL, trying to design infrastructure for MongoDB, Hadoop/Impala and other technologies is challenging.

It appears I want to do 2 VMs per host with a ton of RAM so that I can get the most performance out of a server. So many considerations, not enough time before I have to hand this in to the client.

 

[afidel]

PaveHawk-[/url]":1q75pe2j]I'm across a ton of technology, and I am constantly doing a whole lot of solution architecture encompassing the whole range of technologies. Thats how I stay current - I'm constantly deploying all of these things to learn how to deploy it so I can design it.

Its also how I pass my exams, wealth of experience and all that.

TIL, trying to design infrastructure for MongoDB, Hadoop/Impala and other technologies is challenging.

It appears I want to do 2 VMs per host with a ton of RAM so that I can get the most performance out of a server. So many considerations, not enough time before I have to hand this in to the client.

At 2 VM's per host I'd be very serious about looking at something non-VMWare (probably KVM due to poor experience with Xen based offerings and knowing that HV isn't the best for Linux performance), unless the training overhead would overcome the high expense of licensing. VMWare standard might also be a thought if you don't want to introduce mixed hypervisors, it's unlikely you'd want to move those type of workloads, just shut down the node on the host you need to work on and let the clustering software handle it.

 

[bkraus]

Today I learned that sometimes just because you tested an 8Gb mezz card and you can see it in SIM that doesn't mean that VMware will give a damn. Swapped the Mezz cards and it works.

 

[PaveHawk-]

afidel[/url]":14eqm97t]At 2 VM's per host I'd be very serious about looking at something non-VMWare (probably KVM due to poor experience with Xen based offerings and knowing that HV isn't the best for Linux performance), unless the training overhead would overcome the high expense of licensing. VMWare standard might also be a thought if you don't want to introduce mixed hypervisors, it's unlikely you'd want to move those type of workloads, just shut down the node on the host you need to work on and let the clustering software handle it.

Client only has experience with VMware, so am trying to prefer that. Also, they're asking for hosting it on IaaS with very specific requirements. Because of that, VMware is the likely candidate in that scenario - the VMs themselves will be pinned to specific CPUs, since we're talking 2 VMs/host on a dual socket system, with 8 instances. Thankfully VMware licensing is the least of my issues - the MongoDB and Impala/Hadoop stuff will be on their own clusters so I dont need to use DRS/HA, where the other Windows based aspect of the solution will be on an Ent+ cluster for that specific reason.

Yay for N+1 redundancy etc.

 

[LordFrith]

hernias[/url]":2wtg3o5u]Questions about fsck seem to be standard screening for Bay Area big names. This is concerning.

[if you have to resort to fsck you're probably boned anyway]

Questions about fsck aren't for seeing if you know what the tool is, but rather if you understand the lower-level structure of file systems, which in turn shows that you don't consider higher-level tools as magic boxes.

 

[Mike Bridge]

Danger Mouse[/url]":1kulf2x8]

Mike Bridge[/url]":1kulf2x8]

Danger Mouse[/url]":1kulf2x8]

I'm not counting on it. I'm putting out my resumes. I should be doing the ICND1 test next week. The MCITP EA shortly thereafter. ICND2 before the end of summer. I've got to space out the testing a little due to cost

After that, on to the MCSE track, then maybe hit CISSP along the way to CCNP by the end of the year, hopefully.

MCITP:EA gets retired at the end of july.

Better do it soon, then, hHAHAHAHA, I can put it right there with my Novell CNA class cert (missed the damn cert by 1 question)

(necro)

misread. MCITP:SA retires end of this month. MCITP:EA retires end of january 2014.

 

[ImRaptor]

hawkbox[/url]":2x9f8e7l]

Arbelac[/url]":2x9f8e7l]

hawkbox[/url]":2x9f8e7l]I don't know how some people can get so many certs and stuff. I don't know if I have nerd ADD or some kind of learning disability but I have a terrible time memorizing all the little inane shit needed to write tests and pass them. I think I need some adderall or something.

I test -terribly-. For some reason, under pressure in a real life environment, I can dredge up the most inane shit that fixes the problem, but when it's a test environment, I have some extreme difficulty remembering basics.

I've dropped keeping my MS Server certifications up to speed, and have been focusing on getting my CCNP. I'd like to get the VCP as well, since I've got enough experience (at least with 4... I should upgrade to 5 in my home lab) but haven't been able to scrounge up the 3k+ for the class. My new department does have some VMWare credits though...

I have a lot of experience in 5.1 and when I went to write the test it felt like it was written in another language and translated with google docs. Now I'm working in a 4.1 environment so I can't even use it to practice. It's driving me nuts because I want to prove I know this shit, but I seem to know a fraction of what gets tested.

VMWare's tests kind of bug me, much the same way as Cisco ones do, in that the questions seem to really have a lot of edge scenario involved knowledge. I completely understand the reasoning behind it as predominantly contractors are the ones getting the certification and those are the guys you want to have that edge case knowledge, so the exams make sense in their structure. Doesn't mean I like it though.
Now RedHat exams I do like the way they are setup, at least the lower level ones. Not sure how their more specialized ones are, but the starting cert. exams are purely objective based. They don't care how you get it done, just get it done in the time given. Hate GUI and want to go pure CLI? Go for it. Don't know the CLI, use the GUI. In the end as long as it works and gives them what they want the means don't matter. And I didn't find anything to an obscure task in the exam, very much typical real world usage.

 

[dotorg]

The Dell Outlet people are rather generous when there is a problem.

I appreciate the free upgrades.