Shellshock Vulnerability

So last week it was reported that a serious vulnerability was discovered in Bash (Bourne-Again SHell) which is pretty much core to a lot of Linux/Unix OSes - including Apple's MacOS. The bug, dubbed Shellshock, is supposed to be more serious than the previous OpenSSL Heartbleed vulnerability that was discovered earlier this year. It allows … Continue reading Shellshock Vulnerability

Upgrading to SRM 5.8 and vSphere Replication Appliance 5.8

There were new versions released earlier this month for a number of VMware products, and one of the things I like to do is keep my demo environment up to date! =) Upon upgrading SRM from 5.5 to 5.8 and vRA from 5.5 to 5.8 (I'm using vSphere replication with SRM in my demo environment), I noticed … Continue reading Upgrading to SRM 5.8 and vSphere Replication Appliance 5.8

vSphere and vCenter Server 5.5 update 2 released

.... so instead of giving us all vSphere/vCenter Server 6.0, we're treated to another update of 5.5...... =( https://www.vmware.com/support/vsphere5/doc/vsphere-vcenter-server-55u2-release-notes.html https://www.vmware.com/support/vsphere5/doc/vsphere-esxi-55u2-release-notes.html Anyways, the new update now supports hosts with up to 6TB of RAM.... yes, that's 6 terabytes!!! (I'll be interested to find out if any of my clients will take advantage of this!!) vCenter Server … Continue reading vSphere and vCenter Server 5.5 update 2 released

vCenter Operations Manager – SSL Certificate issues

So during a recent deployment of vCenter Operations Manager (5.8.2) at a customer site I encountered the following error whilst trying to pair the vCOPs vApp to their vCenter Server."Unable to get vCenter Server certificate chain"This was the first time I had encountered this issue deploying vCOPs, fortunately given how much exposure I got to … Continue reading vCenter Operations Manager – SSL Certificate issues

Project MARVIN morphs into VMware EVO: RAIL – VMworld updates

EVO: RAIL?? Really…. Ok, someone really needs to fire the marketing guys!! =PVMware EVO: RAIL announced.In a nutshell, VMware and ‘a-n-other’ partner to produce a hyper-converged infrastructure appliance.As I previously mentioned VMware are NOT going to start manufacturing and shifting tin!So far the partners listed are Dell, EMC, Fujitsu, Inspur, Net One and Supermicro – these … Continue reading Project MARVIN morphs into VMware EVO: RAIL – VMworld updates

VMworld 2014 – what I’d like to see…….

So with VMworld 2014 kicking off in the US this weekend, I thought it fitting to blog about what I would love to hear coming out of San Francisco.VMware have always been tight-lipped regarding what they will be announcing! However, there’s always just enough that can be found online to allow you to make an educated … Continue reading VMworld 2014 – what I’d like to see…….

What Next for Virtualisation in Midmarket Companies

So I was asked a while back to write a short article for my company's blog page and the newspaper that they send out to customers (MTI Times)..... Point your browsers to: http://www.mtibytes.com/post/What-next-for-Virtualisation-in-midmarket-companies

Upgrading vCenter Server

Just a quick post today as I've had numerous clients call me recently regarding the same issue with upgrading their vCenter Server.....If you're upgrading from vCenter Server 5.5 to a later addition (like 5.5 update 1c), then if you mount the ISO and try to update vCenter using the "Simple Install", the installer will probably display … Continue reading Upgrading vCenter Server

Has your root password for your vCenter Server Appliance expired? No problems, check out this KB!!

So it slipped my mind that the root/admin passwords for the vCenter Server Appliance expires after 90 days by default..... and when I tried to access the admin webpage today in my demo environment so that I could update the appliance, I couldn't log in...... dammit.....!Surprisingly this must be a really common issue with customers … Continue reading Has your root password for your vCenter Server Appliance expired? No problems, check out this KB!!

VM displays to two port groups after migrating to a distributed vSwitch

Do you ever encounter the same issue over and over again and forget how you solved it the first time, or what caused it to happen in the first place?!? It happened to me today on a customer site..... we were migrating a couple hundred VMs off a standard vSwitch onto a newly created Cisco Nexus … Continue reading VM displays to two port groups after migrating to a distributed vSwitch