KB Articles and IMP links

There are lot of KB article we use on day today basis and Its hard to remember all the KBs. Following are the list of KBs useful for daily administration

This post is dedicated to the KB article 

1. Error in the RPC receive loop => Article Number 2036350
2. Configure the MS Cluster
   http://pubs.vmware.com/vsphere-50/topic/com.vmware.ICbase/PDF/vsphere-esxi-vcenter-server-50-mscs-guide.pdf
3. Change the disk type to SSD : KB
   http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2013188
4. vCenter Performance logs - Default value : Purge  after 30 days . Following link helps to remove the default configuration http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2042009
5. ISCSI software Trouble Shooting
   http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1008083
6. VLAN Tagging
   http://www.vmwarearena.com/2012/07/vlan-tagging-vst-est-vgt-on-vmware.html

VSphere 5.1 Syslog Server

• It is used to redirect the ESXi Host logs to Vcenter server. 
• Sys log server is normally installed on a vCenter server.
• Machine that connects to the vCenter Server through the vSphere Client must have an IPv4 address for the Syslog Collector service to work.

Configuration of Sys log server is fairly simple.

Pre-requisites :

1. Install the Syslog application from vSphere installation Media .
2. Know the retention policy 
3. Check if firewall port 514  is not blocked in vCenter server

Following steps can be used to configure the sys log server

1. Enable the sys log service in all the ESX hosts in the cluster.
   
   ESX Host => configuration =>security Profile =>firewall=>Syslog (hit the check box)
   
2. Set the sys log path for each host in the cluster
   
   ESX Host =>Advanced Settings =>Syslog=>global=>syslog.global.loghost
    Set  to  tcp://vcenterip:514
   
3. Connect to ESXi Host and restart the syslog service.
   
   esxcli system syslog reload
   
4. Configured settings can be found at
   
   
   
   

Unable to login - Group policy Client

Error Msg "Group policy client service failed the logon"

Connect to the server using net Bios path \\servername\drive$\users

Rename the profile folder of the user who is not able to login to the system . 

User will be able to login after renaming the profile folder. The issue is caused due to the Corrupted profile folder.

This error is user specific not system specific.

vMotion Error - ESX 4.1 to ESXi5.1

Today I came across this error while migrating the machine from ESX 4.1 Host to ESXi 5.1 .

This is a know issue as said by VMware.  Work around would be shutdown the virtual machine and start it in the New ESXi 5.1 Host . 

Things which didnt help : 

1. Restart the Virtual Machine 
2. Power off , Un- register and Register . 

Reference :  http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=2036892

Change Memory limit of All the VMs

I had a requirement to change the limit of all the virtual guests  to Unlimited .

Limit can be an issue when we upgrade the virtual machine memory to a higher value . For OS it would look like it has the memory but host will not allow to use the memory above the limit ( previous configured value in my case).

We have a misconception above the unlimited memory . Unlimited memory means using all the allocated memory . It will never be above the configured or allocated memory.

Following power shell script can be used to change the Limit to Unlimited.



Connect-VIServer vcenterserver -User "vcenter_admin" -Password "Password"

Get-VM | Get-VMResourceConfiguration | where {$_.MemLimitMB -ne '-1'} | Set-VMResourceConfiguration -MemLimitMB $null

Disconnect-VIServer vcenterserver -Confirm:$false

View the Logs - DCUI

DCUI Refers to Direct Console user Interface. Many of us like me are from Windows background and are not familiar with the  VI commands .  This post gives the basic commands that can be used to read the logs. 

When you log into the DCUI , you will see an option to read the system logs . When you select the option you would see the list of logs available . 

When you select a system log you will view the content of the Log file . When you hit "H" , you will see the help file with description of the keys .

Usually we would always want to start the troubleshooting from end of the file . To do so you can hit "G" it will take the cursor to end of the file and hit "g" to go to start of file. 

1. To go to a particular file hit "100g"
2. To search a word use "/error"

|

Snapshot of Physical Machine

 Many of us come across a situation where we want to Migrate a Physical server which is very critical  to business and we cannot afford the physical damage . 

We came across a great Open  Source software called Clone Zilla . Its a good software with proper instructions . 

You can find the instruction from below link

http://clonezilla.org/fine-print-live-doc.php?fullmode=0&path=./clonezilla-live/doc/01_Save_disk_image/01-clonezilla-boot-menu.doc#01-clonezilla-boot-menu.doc

Disconnecting the Idle Sessions in Vsphere Server

Displaying the sessions on a vsphere server . 

Following script  can be used to display the sessions on the vsphere server


Function Get-ViSession { 
    
    $SessionMgr = Get-View $DefaultViserver.ExtensionData.Client.ServiceContent.SessionManager 
    $AllSessions = @() 
    $SessionMgr.SessionList | Foreach {    
        $Session = New-Object -TypeName PSObject -Property @{ 
            Key = $_.Key 
            UserName = $_.UserName 
            FullName = $_.FullName 
            LoginTime = ($_.LoginTime).ToLocalTime() 
            LastActiveTime = ($_.LastActiveTime).ToLocalTime() 
            
        } 
            If ($_.Key -eq $SessionMgr.CurrentSession.Key) { 
                $Session | Add-Member -MemberType NoteProperty -Name Status -Value "Current Session" 
            } Else { 
                $Session | Add-Member -MemberType NoteProperty -Name Status -Value "Idle" 
            } 
            $Session | Add-Member -MemberType NoteProperty -Name IdleMinutes -Value ([Math]::Round(((Get-Date) – ($_.LastActiveTime).ToLocalTime()).TotalMinutes)) 
    $AllSessions += $Session 
    } 
    $AllSessions 
}

Get-ViSession vsphereserver



Disconnecting the sessions which are idle for 30 min 


Connect-VIServer vsphereserver -User username -Password pwd

Function Disconnect-ViSession { 
       [CmdletBinding()] 
    Param ( 
        [Parameter(ValueFromPipeline=$true)] 
        $SessionList 
    ) 
    Process { 
        $SessionMgr = Get-View $DefaultViserver.ExtensionData.Client.ServiceContent.SessionManager 
        $SessionList | Foreach { 
            Write "Disconnecting Session for $($_.Username) which has been active since $($_.LoginTime)" 
            $SessionMgr.TerminateSession($_.Key) 
        } 
    } 
}
Get-VISession | Where { $_.IdleMinutes -gt 30 } | Disconnect-ViSession

Two Work Numbers in Lync Contact card

Today I was stuck in a strange issue , where in for a user there were two work number in lync contact card. After initial investigation I found out that in Active Directory the work Phone number is only the new number. I was wondering from where the old number is displayed . After some googling found the following ;) 

This is what happens when an attribute is changes in the Active Directory 

• Lync retrieves the Update from AD  using Update-CsUserDatabase which runs evey minute 
• This information is saved in RTcab and RTcab1
• Every day at 1:30 ( default configuration ) the addressbook files will be generated using the information stored in RTCab and RTCab2
• When the client signs in the address book is downloaded within 60 minutes.
• To force the process we can add the reg key  : reg add HKLM\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Communicator /v GalDownloadInitialDelay /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f. After adding the Reg Key close the lync client and delete the following folder %userprofile%\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Communicator\sip_<username@domain.com> and Start the client.
• Insome cases , admin makes the changes but the user is on holiday or didnt login to the lync clinet then the updates will not be reflected. To force the update we can use following command : dbimpexp /hrxmlfile:”c:\export.xml” /restype:user /user:user@domain.com ( this is export the user data) . After exporting make the relevant changes in my case replace the old number with new number and save the XML file. Now we need to export the update xml file using : dbimpexp /import /hrxmlfile:”c:\export.xml” /restype:user /user:user@domain.com. Now only new phone number will be visible in the lync contact card 

Finding KMS server

Finding KMS server  in network 

There are occasions where we want to find the KMS server in a network .You can find the KMS server details using command " slmgr.vbs /dli "

Hot Memory Add

Enable - VM Hot memory add

By default you will not be able to add Memory ( RAM) to a running virtual machine. With vSphere4.0 you can add the memory while virtual machine is running using the following power shell script. 

  
Verifying the setting changes in vSphere client after the execution of above script 

These settings will not work until the virtual machine is shutdown and started again . Please note that the restart will not enable this setting. 

After the starting the virtual machine you will see the following configuration 

Following operating systems support the Hot Memory .