March, 2009

Hot imaging Linux servers to a virtual environment

Hi folks, I wanted to discuss hot imaging of Linux servers. Often you will run into a situation where you need to migrate an existing Linux server into a virtual environment.

The downside is that you might not want to power it down to do this and use something like VConverter or PlateSpin Migrate. These products can hot image Windows servers but can’t hot image Linux servers. So what do you end up doing? Acronis!

Acronis True Image Echo Enterprise Server can hot image a server and then you can use the program to convert the image into a VMDK file which you can then import into an existing virtual machine. Then presto, you have a virtualized Linux server without ever having to down the existing older Linux server.

The only caveat is you have to install an Acronis agent on the Linux server to accomplish this. In order for the agent to install successfully you will require the kernel source to be installed. But then you can install the agent without requiring any reboots.

Happy imaging!

-RP

China accused of spying on people with GhostNet

So you guys may have heard. Big brother is watching! Recently some researchers at the University of Toronto here in Canada have uncovered a GhostNet network of spying that reports back to China!

Apparently computers get compromised via a trojan called Ghost Rat which allows complete control of the infected PC. Apparently the attacker can even gain control of peripherals such as microphones and web cameras.

This kind of spying is absolutely horrifying and whomever did this should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Invasion of privacy at this level is absolutely shocking and whomever the people are that were guilty in perpertrating this should go to jail for a very long time! Unfortunately I highly doubt that anyone will ever catch who actually did this. I’m sure there will be tons of politics and misdirection and in the end the perpertrators will get away scott free.

-RP

New Message Indicator still displays on BlackBerry even though all are read

Hi folks, today I want to show you how to fix a common problem with BlackBerries.

One of the common things that I find happening is with your new message indicator. Whenever you receive an e-mail from someone it will cause a small icon to appear at the top of the screen indicating you have “x” amount of new messages. This is a great way to see how much new e-mail you have without actually going into the messages application.

Unfortunately sometimes people go into their application mark everything as read and it still might say you have 10 new messages. Now how can this be? I have had people tell me, “Raj, I’ve looked everywhere, and I can’t find the new messages!”. Well don’t fret, they’re easily found!

You see there is a way to save messages in the messages application and what happens is that some people save unread messages by accident. Then what happens is they dissapear into the saved messages folder and they’re still unread. So then what happens is that the new message indicator still shows that there are new messages even though you can’t see them!

In order to resolve this, go into the messages application, hit the BlackBerry button to bring up the menu and select “View Saved Messages”. This will take you to the saved messages screen where you can read all your unread saved messages and the new messages indicator will then finally dissapear!

-Cheers, RP

I think therefore I XBOX!

Hi folks, great news for all you knowledge seekers out there! ITKE is holding a contest from now until the end of April for the top 3 ITKE users that have the most knowledge points to win Xboxes!

How do you gain knowledge points you might ask? You gain knowledge points by asking and answering questions on ITKE! This is a great way to learn a lot about the tech world of IT!

You can read more about the details of the contest here: http://itknowledgeexchange.techtarget.com/itke-community-blog/new-contest-a-trio-of-xboxes-for-our-top-three-users/.

Also if you think you have more to share with the IT world, and want to do this, sign up for writing a blog on ITKE just like I do!

-RP

The BlackBerry Curve 8900 AKA The Javelin

Hi folks, you might recall how I was really wanting to get my hands on a BlackBerry Javelin. Well I just picked up a BlackBerry Curve 8900 AKA the Javelin!

After having used the BlackBerry Curve 8300 for a long time, I have to say I am suitably impressed. The Javelin is smaller, sleeker, and lighter. It fits well in your hand and the keyboard is great. The camera is 3.2 MP and the phone has WiFi and supports UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access) which allows you to automatically switch to use your data on WiFi instead of on your normal cellular network as well as make voice calls over the WiFi network you’re connected to.

I wholeheartedly recommend the Javelin and if you are thinking of buying a Curve, please pass on the 8300 and go straight for the 8900. This phone is better in every way! It even knocks the Bold off of it’s pedestal! It is also one of the lighter BlackBerry phones, with the Pearls being the lightest. I can see this phone quickly becoming the staple of the BlackBerry lineup.

-Cheers, RP

Consolidating Large Data Centers with PlateSpin Recon

Hi folks, sometimes virtualizing your servers can be a daunting task. Especially if you have tons of servers you need to wade through to get the job done. How can you make this task easier? PlateSpin Recon of course!

PlateSpin Recon is owned by Novell, and they have a great product on their hands. With PlateSpin Recon you can analyze all the servers in your environment and track them over an extended period of time. Then after you have collected the data you can go through planning stages with the program to determine what type of hardware and how much hardware you will need to virtualize to.

A product like this can save you tons of money. Novell offers a free trial of the software on their web site. I recently had a chance to use it and have to say that I love the product. It provides valuable statistical analysis data during huge consolidation projects and really takes the guesswork out of all of it.

This will allow you to make sound decisions on factual data when placing your virtual machines. You can find out more about this great product here.

-RP

Cisco UCS Announcement

Hi folks, today Cisco made their big announcement regarding their Unified Computing System. At the heart of this system is Cisco’s new UCS 5100 Blade Server Chassis. This chassis can hold up to 8 blade servers and 2 fabric extenders within a 6 RU enclosure.

UCS is being marketed as an all in one enclosure that contains many components such as the blade enclosure, the servers, fabric interconnects, a management module etc.

Cisco is going head to head with their long time partners IBM and HP by making this announcement. It remains to be seen if Cisco can make any headway in a market that they historically have not competed in during these hard economic times.

Win or lose, Cisco is sure to turn some heads. One thing is for sure, Cisco has always been one to innovate, and will most certaintly keep everyone on their toes by entering this space.

You can read more about UCS here.

-RP

Using Windows Server 2008 as a desktop OS

Hi folks, as you know I have been trying out various OS’ as of late on my laptop to see how things work. I used to use Windows XP Professional for the longest time on my laptop but finally got bored of it and wanted a change.

The next thing I tried was Suse Linux but unfortunately it couldn’t do everything I wanted it to do due to the large amount of Microsoft centric programs I needed to run in my daily work. So what I did was dual booted Suse Linux and Vista and that seemed to suffice for quite some time. The downside of this was that Vista wasn’t that much better at running my Windows world apps either. That’s pretty sad in my opinion.

You see I need 64 bit in a Windows world so I can use more memory because I’m an avid user of VMware workstation. When you’re using lots of virtual machines on your laptop you need more RAM. There really is no way around it. Of course using VMware workstation under Vista isn’t the best case scenario. Basically my laptop would become way too sluggish. Not surprising, I really didn’t expect anything less.

So then I switched to Windows 7, and as you saw in my blog, I couldn’t really get too far due to the issues I had. But for what I was able to run I was impressed with it. Frankly, I can’t wait until Windows 7 comes out, I’m looking forward to it and I hope Microsoft gets it right this time.

So what did I do next? I wiped my hard drives clean and I installed my copy of Windows Server 2008 on my laptop. Talk about a huge difference! All my hardware worked perfectly and my laptop performed way better than Windows Vista! Who would have thought that a server OS would make a great desktop OS!?!? Anyways, I disabled all the unneeded features and services and I turned on the “desktop user experience” that is included with Windows Server 2008 to “Vistaify” the OS.

I have to say I have been pretty happy with this, and I think this is what I’m going to stick too as my OS until Windows 7 comes out. Give it a try and let me know what you think!

-RP

EnergizeIT 2009

So Microsoft has a bunch of events running across Canada soon. These are the EnergizeIT 2009 events. Durings these events they will be discussing Windows 7 and Windows 2008 amongst other things.

This will be a good opportunity for you guys in the IT community to get out there and see what’s new on the horizon. After the whole Vista debacle, it’s nice to see a product like Windows 7 on the horizon. From my experiences using it (as I’ve blogged about before), I can’t wait for it to be released. As a matter of fact, it’s so popular there are petitions circling the Internet for Microsoft to release it even sooner. I think this wouldn’t be a good idea because even though we hate Vista, we don’t want Microsoft to rush Windows 7, we want them to get it right instead.

The nice thing about this EnergizeIT event is that the day before the event you can go to a local user group forum regarding the event, and then the day after the event you can go to what they’re calling an “Installfest” for Windows 7. Basically you get to install and play around with Windows 7 with techs on site to help you out and answer any questions you might have. Sounds like a great idea to me!

-RP

Client Hypervisors

Hi guys, as you all know I’m a huge proponent of virtualization. Virtualizing the server environment is a no brainer in my books. Just imagine how excited I was when the IT community started getting all pumped up about client hypervisors!

There is now talk of the ability to install a client hypervisor on a workstation pc and then use it in the same way we do server virtualization. What does this do for us? Well basically all the same things - it isolates the hardware away from the actual virtual machine, and also allows us to run multiple virtual machines on a single workstation.

In the mobile marketplace, a hypervisor was demonstrated on a mobile device allowing you to run multiple virtualized mobile operating systems on one device. Now that’s just too cool!

Anyways, I can’t wait for this technology to become mainstream. Over the next few years we are going to see the virtualization market explode!

-RP