Step 1
Once you had your drives installed, SSH to your ESXi box (now even easier in vSphere 4.1) and go to the /dev/disks directory. There, if you perform a ls -l, you’ll see your drives listed:

TODO [img]

Ignore the instances of your drives which show them as VM stores (vm1.*****). We want to look at the raw devices.

Step 2
Now move to the /vmfs/volumes folder. Here you can see your existing local datastore(s). If, like me, you had a solitary hard-drive, you’ll just see localdisk01 or whatever you chose to name the local datastore:

TODO [img]

Step 3
Now we are going to use the vmkfstools utility to create our RDM’s. Remember that a RDM is just another VMDK, but instead of the VMDK pointing to a xxx-flat.vmdk file (which is the actual virtual hard disk), the VMDK points to our physical device. Being as we still need to create this VMDK file we need to save it somewhere. Since we just have the one local datastore, we are going to create the RDM VMDK files in it’s root.

TODO [img]

The following command creates the RDM VMDK for us:

vmkfstools -z /vmfs/devices/disks//.vmdk

In my personal example below, I am creating an RDM called rdm_WD2DWCAVU0477582.vmdk and it is being stored in the location /vmfs/volumes/localdisk01/ I chose the name of the VMDK to match the name of the serial number of the physical drive (and what is shown in Step 1) to help with troubleshooting in the future when I get an inevitable drive failure). You can call your RDM’s whatever you wish.

The name of the RAW device (t10.ATA____WDC_WD10EARS2D00Z5B1__________________________WD2DCAVU0477582 in my example) you will have noted from Step 1 when you listed all local devices attached to your ESXi host. This is why the tech Gods created Copy n Paste! You will want to copy the full device name as shown in Step 1 in to the vmkfstools command.

Step 4
Once you have repeated the steps for all of your local SATA drives, you can navigate to where you created the RDM’s (in my case /vmfs/volumes/localdisk01) and perform an ls -l *.vmdk to see the new VMDK’s you have created:

TODO [img]

Don’t panic – the xxx-rdmp.vmdk files will reflect the size of the RAW devices they are mapping to, but rest assured it will be taking no more space than a few bytes on your local disk!

Step 5
You can now add your RDM’s to an existing VM. vSphere doesn’t recognise this as a true RDM (to a SAN) so you just browse the local disk datastore for the VMDK files that we created.

Edit the properties of an existing VM and click Add…

TODO [img]

Step 6
Select Use an existing virtual disk and click Next >

TODO [img]

Step 7
Click Browse. You now need to navigate your local datastore and select the VMDK’s that we created in Step 3).

Once complete you will be shown a confirmation window. Repeat Steps 5 through 7 to add additional RDM’s to your VM.

TODO [img]

Step 8
You should now see your new Hard Disk’s in your VM and vSphere will correctly identify them as Mapped Raw LUN.

TODO [img]

NOTE: One thing I forgot to show in the screen shots, is that you should create your RDM’s on a new SCSI controller! You do this by simply selecting a new SCSI ID starting with 1:x instead of 0:x. Existing VMDK’s should be on SCSI Controller 0. Your RDM’s should be on SCSI controller 1. Although my screenshot shows 0:3 this should read 1:3.

You can now save your VM configuration. Your VM will now access the RAW SATA drives and be able to use things like SMART to monitor its health.

To enable the local or remote ESXi Shell from the vSphere Client
1 Select the host, click the Configuration tab, and click Security Profile in the Software panel.
2 In the Services section, click Properties.
3 Select ESXi Shell and click Options.
4 Change the ESXi Shell options.
5 Click Start and stop with host. The change will take effect the next time you reboot the host.
5 Click OK.

To suppress informational warnings related to SSH and ESXi shell access and set the timeout:
Select the ESXi host in the Inventory.
Click the Configuration tab.
Under Software, click Advanced Settings.
Click UserVars.
Change the value of UserVars.SuppressShellWarning to 1.
Change the value of UserVars.ESXiShellTimeOut to 60
Click OK.

Allowing root ssh logins to Solaris machines:

There are currently 3 things you have to do to violate this security truism on openindiana:
1) Modify PermitRootLogin to yes in /etc/ssh/sshd_config.
2) Comment out the “CONSOLE=/dev/console” line in /etc/default/login.
3) Remove “;type=role” from the root entry in /etc/user_attr.

Setup your ZFS Server ready to use:
login as root and enter from home-directory
wget -O – www.napp-it.org/nappit | perl
reboot

Open a browser and enter http://serverip:81
If you do not know your serverip, go back to console, login and enter: ifconfig -a
If you need to manually start/ restart nappit in case of problems: /etc/init.d/napp-it restart [start,stop,restart]
Manage your server, create a datapool with menu pool, create datasets (ZFS Folder, partitions) with menu ZFS folder
and share these datasets from menu ZFS folder by klicking to the entry below SMB or NFS.

now run free:
total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 1543508 463972 1079536 0 18552 299028
Swap: 1957880 0 1957880

Located just outside Interlaken, this is a nice little project for Angela and I. We have big hopes for the place, It is divided into two places, but we plan on making it one big house, bottom floor (house1) will be the “sleeping” area, and the top floor (house2) will be the “living” area.

Specs:
Canton – Bern
Rooms – 8
Size – 360 m2

So our new playground:
Summer

Winter

Here are some pics from the estate agent:

Setting up MySQL

If you add the relevant section to advancedsettings.xml and start xbmc, it will create the relevant databases however with the default collation which is not latin1_general_ci. For some reason I kept on getting:
[cc lang='bash' ]ERROR: SQL: The table does not exist[/cc]

So, to get it all working is simple, I used mysql admin however, use phpMyAdmin as I have tested this and it works fine.

[cc lang='mysql' ]
CREATE USER ‘xbmc’ IDENTIFIED BY ‘xbmc’;
CREATE DATABASE xbmc_music CHARACTER SET latin1 COLLATE latin1_general_ci;
CREATE DATABASE xbmc_video CHARACTER SET latin1 COLLATE latin1_general_ci;
GRANT ALL ON *.* TO ‘xbmc’;
[/cc]
Things are slow with large databeses, so I suggest greating an indiex. A index is a data structure that improves the speed of operations in a table. On the xbmc_music database:
[cc lang='mysql' ]
ALTER TABLE song ADD INDEX ix_idArtist(idArtist);
ALTER TABLE song ADD INDEX ix_idGenre(idGenre);
ALTER TABLE song ADD INDEX ix_idAlbum(idAlbum);
[/cc]
This reduced my Artist Look up by ~35 seconds (before – 35.4523 : after – 0.1138 )

That’s it for SQL, move on to configure xbmc.

Setting up xbmc

First thing is to update advancedsettings to tell xbmc to use MySQL
[cc lang='bash' ]vi .xbmc/userdata/advancedsettings.xml[/cc]
And add the following:
[cc lang='xml' ]

mysql
10.0.0.10

Restart xbmc, and you good to rock and roll.

Setting up thumbnails on NFS

The reason for this is my Thumbnails is 2.3 GB and I don’t want to rebuild these on each pc, or on a reinstall. I also use dds, which is hell fast, however needs to be built from the tbn which takes time.
[cc lang='bash' ]
du -h Thumbnails/
2.3G Thumbnails/
[/cc]
You can use CIFS too, however I prefer nfs. Add your share to fstab:
[cc lang='bash' ]sudo vi /etc/fstab[/cc]
At the end add:
[cc lang='bash' ]10.0.0.10:/Thumbnails /home/xbmc/.xbmc/userdata/Thumbnails nfs soft,intr,rsize=8192,wsize=8192[/cc]
Replace 10.0.0.10 with the relevant server that you have your nfs share on.

To save a bit of time if you already have thumbnails:
[cc lang='bash' ]
cd ~/.xbmc/userdata/
mv Thumbnails Thumbnails-old
mkdir Thumbnails
sudo mount -a
mv Thumbnails-old/* Thumbnails/
rm -Rf Thumbnails-old
[/cc]
That’s it you now have xbmc using a remote MySQL database and storing yoru Thumbnails on a remote server to

Using DX1 DDS

This is simple, just add useddsfanart to advancedsettings.xml, this increases my switch times tenfold. I will never look back.

[cc lang='bash' ]vi .xbmc/userdata/advancedsettings.xml[/cc]
And add the following:
[cc lang='xml' ]
true
[/cc]

Prerequisites

Install the following qpks on the QNAP
Optware – http://resources.qnap.com/~qnap/Storage/QPKG/X86/Optware_0.99.163_x86.zip
Python – http://resources.qnap.com/~qnap/Storage/QPKG/X86/Python_2.7_x86.zip
SABnzbdplus – http://resources.qnap.com/~qnap/Storage/QPKG/X86/SABnzbdplus_0.5.3_x86.zip
Git
[cc lang='bash']
ipkg update
ipkg install git
[/cc]

Configure SABnzbdplus

connect to http://NAS_IP:8800
Set the defaults for SABnzbdplus, change the port to 8082
Once restarted go to http://NAS_IP:8082
Select Config
General








Config –> Sorting
Enable Series Sorting
Set the Sort String to:
%s.n/Season.0%s/%s.n.S%0sE%0e.%ext
This will give you a nice name for example:
Show.Name/Season.01/Show.Name.S01E05.avi

Sorting is done using replaceable values such as %sn for the show name.

Install SickBeard

[cc lang='bash']
cd /share/MD0_DATA/.qpkg
git clone git://github.com/midgetspy/Sick-Beard.git “sickbeard”
[/cc]
Run SickBeard to create initial config file:
[cc lang='bash']/usr/bin/python /share/MD0_DATA/.qpkg/sickbeard/SickBeard.py[/cc]
once fully started hit ctrl+c

Edit the config file:
[cc lang='bash']
vi sickbeard/config.ini
change web_port to 8081
web_port = 8081
[/cc]
Start up SickBeard and finnish the configuration.
[cc lang='bash']/usr/bin/python /share/MD0_DATA/.qpkg/sickbeard/SickBeard.py[/cc]
Then go to ttp://NAS_IP:8081
Select the Config Tab
General | Episode Downloads | Search Providers | Notifications






Let SABnzbdplus startup script start SickBeard
[cc lang='bash']vi SABnzbdplus/sabnzbd.sh[/cc]
after:
[cc lang='bash']
# starting sabnzbd…
echo ” Daemonizing… ”
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=”${QPKG_DIR}/lib/sabnzbd”
${SABNZBD} ${OPTIONS}
RETVAL=$?
/bin/sleep 5
[/cc]
add:
[cc lang='bash']
echo “staring SickBeard”
/usr/bin/python /share/MD0_DATA/.qpkg/sickbeard/SickBeard.py &
/bin/sleep 5
[/cc]
before:
[cc lang='bash']
echo “Shutting down ${QPKG_NAME}… ”
/bin/kill -9 `ps -ef | grep [S]ABnzbd | awk ‘{ print $1 }’` > /dev/null 2>&1
RETVAL=$?
/bin/sleep 3
[/cc]
add:
[cc lang='bash']
echo “Shutting down SickBeard”
/usr/bin/wget “http://10.0.0.10:8081/home/shutdown/” -O /dev/null
/bin/sleep 2
[/cc]
Now stop and start SABnzbdplus via the qnap qui
Home –> Applications –> QPKG Plugins –> SABnzbdplus
Disable then Enable Again

Test to see if SABnzbdplus and SickBeard started up
SickBeard – 8081
SABnzbdplus – 8082

Actually, I can say nothing else but good things about it. The Android OS feels just like…. natural. You realize quickly, that Google has put in a lot of efforts into this system. Actually, they put in a lot of efforts in their latest products (Chrome, Picasa, etc.). In any case, I could get everything running in short time.

If you have a Google (or Google Apps) account then synching and setting up the phone is a breeze. All you have to do is to enter your eMail address and password and your phone pulls all the eMail, Calendar and Contacts from Google. Nothing else to do there. I actually had a funny thing with Contact synching. Exchnage webdav support is also nice. Quicker and easier to setup than the iPhone.

You can feel that Android was build for working with Google Apps. eMails come in almost as instantly as on any desktop app. GTalk is integrated also and you get notification going all over the place. One thing that Android has definitely gotten right, are the notification in general. They don’t only work for some applications, but work for about everything. This is especially useful if you are on Twitter (who isn’t? btw: follow me at @thenitai) and someone mentions you or is sending you a message. This works with Seesmic or Hootsuite and any other app. Very nice.

Another thing is the geo location functionality. Google Maps with direction just blows aways about everything you have seen before. Did you ever try to use Directions on the iPhone? The last time in London, I ended up in a total different place. Anyhow, all I’m saying is that Android is really a good system and if they continue like this, they will give everyone a run for their money (yes, Apple I mean you).

Not being a “game” guy, I did not play one game on it yet, but can imagine that the Galaxy screen just screams for it Talking about the screen. WOW. This Super Alomed screen is just marvelous. The phone itself is bigger then the iPhone (3g and 4G) but just a little. Since it is lighter then the iPhone 4G you actually don’t feel a difference at all. Actually, you won’t even notice a big difference between the iPhone and the Samsung, until you start working with it and realize that Android is not just a “Linux” and “Geek” system, but a grown up operating system for the phone. And a fun one as well. Turn on “Live Wallpaper” and you know what I mean…

At the end, I recommend the phone wholeheartedly to everyone who is thinking of switching from the iPhone.

Setup GPRS and MMS for Swisscom network

If you, like me, have not bought the phone from Swisscom directly you have to setup the phone manually to be able to connect to any Internet service on 3G. Swisscom offers a “setup your device” website which will send you a SMS and will automatically configure the phone, but unfortunately the Samsung Galaxy can not be configured this way. Thus we have to do some hand work here.

Go to “Settings”, click on “Wireless and network” and then on “Mobile networks”. Within click on “Access Point Names”. You will probably see a black screen. Thus we will have to add a APN now. Click on the menu key and “New APN” (do it once for GPRS and one time for MMS). Then simply enter all the required paramaters according to the list below:

For GPRS:
Name: Swisscom GPRS
APN: gprs.swisscom.ch
Proxy:
Port:
User name: gprs
Password: gprs
Server:
MMSC:
MMS-Proxy:
MMS-Port:
MCC: 228
MNC: 01
Authentication type:
APN-Typ: Internet + MMS

For GPRS:
Name: Swisscom MMS
APN: event.swisscom.ch
Proxy:
Port:
User name:
Password:
Server:
MMSC: http://mms.natel.ch:8079
MMS-Proxy: 192.168.210.2
MMS-Port: 8080
MCC: 228
MNC: 01
Authentication type:
APN-Typ: MMS

That’s it. Now you should be able to see the “3G” sign in the upper menu bar and will be able to connect to Twitter et all on your mobile network.

Java? Java!

You will need Java, the standard OpenJDK implementation will work just fine:

[cc lang='bash']sudo apt-get install openjdk-6-jdk[/cc]
Once that’s installed, you might want to verify that it seems to work:

[cc lang='bash']java -version
java version “1.6.0_18″
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (IcedTea6 1.8) (6b18-1.8-4ubuntu3)
OpenJDK 64-Bit Server VM (build 16.0-b13, mixed mode)[/cc]

Downloading the Android SDK

Grab the latest Android SDK tarball from here, and install it somewhere under your home directory. Once you do that, you should add the newly-installed tools/ subdirectory to your search path, since you’re going to want to be running the android and emulator executables real soon now. Once you do that, naturally, log out and log back in to make sure you have the updated search path.
[cc lang='bash']
wget http://dl.google.com/android/android-sdk_r06-linux_86.tgz
gzip -dc android-sdk_r06-linux_86.tgz | tar -xvf -[/cc]

And now, the real downloading starts.

Adding the SDK components

At this point, you need to download and install the SDK components for whatever versions of Android you want to support. Initially, you can tell that you have no SDK versions downloaded:

[cc lang='bash']android list
Available Android targets:
Available Android Virtual Devices:
[/cc]
So what you need to do is run the following, and select whatever versions of the SDK you’re going to need. Unless you’re being frugal, just select everything since you never know if you’ll need to support older versions:

[cc lang='bash']android update sdk[/cc]
Depending on your download speed, take a break. Once the entire download is done, you can verify that it’s all there with:

[cc lang='bash']android list
Available Android targets:
id: 1 or “android-2″
Name: Android 1.1
Type: Platform
API level: 2
Revision: 1
Skins: HVGA-P, QVGA-P, HVGA (default), QVGA-L, HVGA-L
id: 2 or “android-3″
Name: Android 1.5
Type: Platform
API level: 3
Revision: 4
Skins: HVGA-P, QVGA-P, HVGA (default), QVGA-L, HVGA-L
id: 3 or “android-4″
Name: Android 1.6
Type: Platform
API level: 4
Revision: 3
Skins: HVGA (default), WVGA854, WVGA800, QVGA
id: 4 or “android-5″
Name: Android 2.0
Type: Platform
API level: 5
Revision: 1
Skins: HVGA (default), WVGA854, WVGA800, WQVGA400, WQVGA432, QVGA
id: 5 or “android-6″
Name: Android 2.0.1
Type: Platform
API level: 6
Revision: 1
Skins: HVGA (default), WVGA854, WVGA800, WQVGA400, WQVGA432, QVGA
id: 6 or “android-7″
Name: Android 2.1-update1
Type: Platform
API level: 7
Revision: 2
Skins: HVGA (default), WVGA854, WVGA800, WQVGA400, WQVGA432, QVGA
id: 7 or “android-8″
Name: Android 2.2
Type: Platform
API level: 8
Revision: 2
Skins: HVGA (default), WVGA854, WVGA800, WQVGA400, WQVGA432, QVGA
Available Android Virtual Devices:
[/cc]
So that tells us that we have support for various versions of Android, but no virtual devices yet. No problem. Time to create some virtual devices.

Creating a virtual device or two

A fairly simple procedure:

[cc lang='bash']android[/cc]
Select “New,” give your new Android Virtual Device (AVD) a name and so on, but there’s one caution — apparently, there’s still a bug (reported by your humble author) that you can’t select an SD card image of size 2G or larger so just pick something smaller. Once that appears to be done, close the window and verify you have a new AVD (given some values I pulled out of thin air):

[cc lang='bash']android list avds
Available Android Virtual Devices:
Name: avd2.2
Path: /home/rpjday/.android/avd/avd2.2.avd
Target: Android 2.2 (API level
Skin: HVGA
Sdcard: 1024M
[/cc]

Run the EMU!

[cc lang='bash']emulator @avd2.2[/cc]
Note that, the first time you run the emulator on a new AVD, it might take a while so be patient. And now, the fun part — installing a new app.

Installing a new app on your emulator

A detailed explanation of how to install a new Android app can be found here, but let’s keep it short. Assuming you have your new app in .apk file format, simply make sure your emulator is running:

[cc lang='bash']adb devices
List of devices attached
emulator-5554 device
[/cc]
at which point, install the app with:

[cc lang='bash']adb install [.apk filename here][/cc]
whereupon the icon for your new app should show up in the emulator.