TechHead Needs YOU!!

web-image-1465f083417c240d27230058568546e7-1 A fellow VMware enthusiast and personal friend Simon Seagrave, has announced that his website http://www.techhead.co.uk has been shortlised for a Computer Weekly Blog Award. The actual award title is: Individual IT Professional Male

If you haven’t seen the TechHead website, you really should get yourself over there an have a browse. There are some great resources there, including some ‘Hot Deals‘ on IT kit which are always handy!

If you agree with me, and you think its an awesome site please, please, please spend a few minutes of your time to vote for Simon.

Here are the steps you need to follow to vote: http://www.techhead.co.uk/techhead-shortlisted-for-computer-weekly-blog-award-2009

Testing Network throughput between VMware ESX Hosts

web-image-f23fe804058174dd4b4eabfde4bedd8bHave you ever wanted to check your Network throughput between your ESX Hosts? or even between VM’s? Well I needed to do this, and I couldn’t find any straight forward how-to’s.

Having been pointed in the direction of a simple application called IPerf by Simon Gallagher I opted to use the Windows version. I’m not great with Linux, and as this is an open source application, documentation is a little hard to come by. So for me, this post is also to remind me how on IPerf works should i need to use it again.

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VMware VCP4 Beta Exam = PASSED!

vcp4pass

I awoke this morning with a long list of alert emails from the VCP4 Beta Exam thread on the VMTN Communites forum. By logging into your Pearson Vue account you could Finally!!! find out your VCP4 Beta result.

As you can see i passed. A huge sigh of relief was let out when i saw that.

Now to find a job………Anyone??

London VMware Usergroup 24th Sept 2009

You may or may not know that the next London VMware Usergroup meeting is being held next Thursday 24th Sept. I will be in attendance and i will be looking forward to putting some faces to names, and of course a few beers afterwards.

Here is the info about the Usegroup meeting for anyone who doesn’t know about it.

Our meeting will be held at the Thames Suite, London Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 33 Queen Street, London EC4R 1AP, +44 (0)20 7248 4444. The nearest tube station is Mansion House, location information is available here. Reception is from 1230 for a prompt 1pm start, to finish around 5pm.

To register your interest in attending,please send an email to alaricdavies at yahoo dot com with up to two named attendees from your organisation. If you do not receive a confirmation mail, please don’t just turn up since we will not be able to admit you to the meeting.

Here is a copy of the agenda:

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10,000 People have taken The SLOG’s VCP4 Practice Exam

Who would have thought it!! I only set it up to help me revise for the VMware VCP4 Beta Exam.

3 Months later, it now has over 60 Questions (increasing all the time). I receive emails daily thanking me for helping them prepare for their VCP4 exam.  People as far away as New Zealand are being told to use my Exam’s and Study Notes by VMware instructors.

But the most amazing part was when i checked Google Analytics to see how many people are using it:

10000

I never expected it to be soo popular. As you can see the hits per day are increasing at a steady rate, so i’m going to do my best, to keep adding more resources, to make sure you visitors have a reason to keep coming back.

My Twitter account is Suspended!!

This morning I awoke to two Emails from Twitter titled “Your account has been suspended” (Not quite sure why they felt the need to tell me twice).

Written in the Email was the following;

If you are one of my Followers you will know that earlier on this week someone/something got hold of my username/password for my Twitter account and used it to spam all of the people I follow. As soon as I found out, I changed my password and removed any Twitter apps that could have been used to gain access to my account and since then there has been no more spam.

So why have Twitter done this? I have opened up a Support Ticket with Twitter to try and find out.

Update: Just found out that Duncan over at Yellow-Bricks has also had his Twitter account Suspended.

No sooner had I opened the ticket, the ticket was showing as “Solved”. I checked my account, it was still suspended! So I have re-opened the ticket and I await to hear back.

QR Codes – Contact details with a twist

Whilst looking into making The SLOG available on mobile devices i came across something that i had seen in CSI and also in the magazines of a recent flight. Its called a QR Code (QR = Quick Response).

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SLOG on the Go!

I’ve just installed a plug-in that will now allow The SLOG to be read on mobile devices, so you can now read my Blog where ever you have WIFI or Phone Network Coverage.. You Lucky people!!
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Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL)

Whilst reading a VMware document on using SQL inside VMware Virtual Infrastructure i realised that i wasn’t 100% sure on what the Hard Abstraction Layer ( HAL) actually is, so i decided to do some reading up, here is my take on it.

What is the Hardware Abstraction Layer or HAL?

The HAL is a part of an Operation System that talks directly to the machine’s Hardware.

The Windows OS is able to support multiple hardware platforms without having to have different OS versions for each hardware platform thanks to the HAL. During the installation of an OS the HAL is chosen depending on the hardware platform, because of this you are normally unable to remove the HDD from one PC and move it to a PC which has different hardware.

A HAL tip when you are installing VMware VM’s using  Windows Server 2003

Windows 2003 Server unlike Server 2008 doesn’t have the ability to dynamically adjust the HAL to accommodate extra vCPU’s after installation. So if you’re creating a new VM which may possibly need to have an extra vCPU added to it in the future, it is best practice to install the OS on a VM with 2 vCPU’s as this will install the SMP (Symmetric Multiprocessor) HAL rather than the UP (Uniprocessor) HAL. Once your install of 2003 server is complete you can change your VM’s vCPU’s back down to one. You now have the option to add another vCPU whenever its needed.

*If i have misunderstood what the Hardware Abstraction Layer is, please message me direct or leave a comment.

GMail Forgotten Attachments – We’ve all been there, done that

Is this a familiar story?

  • You created a new Email
  • You added the Recipients
  • You added the Subject e.g. HR Spreadsheet
  • You wrote a nice passage telling them you have attached the spreadsheet they requested
  • You hit Send

2 Mins later you get this reply… “Sorry i cant seem to find the attachment.”

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