JDPFu.com 2025

Last week, I setup and configured a special desktop for the accounting system for the company. Basically, it is a Windows7 Pro desktop running under ESXi 4 that the folks responsible for accounting remote (RDP) into after connecting via VPN to the special network for it. We’re small and only a few people even need access – never more than 1 at a time.

It was fairly painless to setup, install Accounting, load Payroll CD, then validate remote VPN access (which is never trivial), then setup daily backup jobs. Of course, AV, automatic patchs and nasty IE settings were configured too. Each daily backup set is about 250MB, which isn’t too bad, but more than I would have thought given the machine is idle most of the time and won’t be used more than 3 days a month. These backups are Microsoft VHD files using the built-in backup, which could be useful, but I’d rather have a complete VDMK, VDI, or Xen img file to restore.

Of course, it isn’t possible to connect to this VM without going through our VPN.

Next I need to perform a test restore to another machine under some virtualization tool that we use. Yeah, I know with the VHD, I can perform a restore someplace else, but with the VM-image file, I just point a hypervisor at it and go. Now that VirtualBox supports VMware, vdmk, files, this test really should be trivial. If it goes well, I’ll take my WinXP (MS-Office, Visio and other WinXP-only tools VM) and put it under a server-based VM too. It will be better to not travel with that stuff on my laptop anyway.

I’m off to the VMware event in a few minutes. It is probably more of the same. I did hear from a coworker that a 17 server VMware migration went well last night. I had nothing to do with it.

Look for me at the Georgia World Congress Center today. I’ll be wearing a dull green windbreaker if it is chilly.

If I learn something ground breaking, I’ll create a new post. Sadly, it will probably be more of the send us money and send NetApp money all-day-adware.

VMware’s Client, which is used to manage VMware Servers, doesn’t like Windows7 … yet. A friend dropped me this link with instructions to get around the prob. He said it was a 64-bit Win7 issue.

• http://serverfault.com/questions/44946/how-do-you-get-the-vmware-vsphere-client-to-work-on-windows-7-rc

I haven’t tried this, but I did try to use Microsoft’s built-in compatibility mode settings. No joy.

Host VMware ESXi 4.x – 64-bit
Client Win7 Pro 64-bit

On another front, here’s a link to instructions to upgrade ESXi 3.5 to 4.0 without migrating to a new machine. Ballsy, we all know, but sometimes, in a lab, the chance of failure doesn’t matter.

I can confirm these instructions worked for me.

Enjoy.

Last year, the owner of CodeWeavers, a commercial Windows Interface Layer for Linux called CrossOver-Office, was forced to backup his President Bush hate speak with a fairly large software giveaway. I don’t recall the exact bet he made, but something like I’ll give my products away if any of these 3 things happen. One of them was related to the price of gasoline. At least one of them did happen and he manned up and gave away his products for a few days or weeks. WINE is the free version of this product, just a few months or years behind on compatibility.

Anyone could get a copy, installed it on their Linux machine and use it with support for a year. I did this things, but only used it a little. Perhaps … er … twice. I never used them again. I don’t recall why I didn’t use them more now. Perhaps it was that if every windows program didn’t work or didn’t work perfectly under CrossOver Office, so I still needed to keep a Windows VM anyway. Regardless, it never crossed my mind to use CO.

This morning, an email arrived with a reminder that support was ending in about a week. I should renew my support, if I want the new versions that are coming out soon. I suppose I should go down load the current versions (it has been a year after all) and install them and see if the improvements help with the Windows programs that I use and would like to use under Linux. Those are:

• Quicken 2009
• Investors Toolkit
• MS-Office 2007
• MS-Visio 2007
• then I have a bunch of Windows-only computer secure tools and network scanning tools.

If you work in a structured environment with very specific tools that don’t change very often, you could and should install these tools to validate how well they work. There’s a real savings in using them across an enterprise. but note that patching may not be possible.

I’ll need a Windows VM for the other tools, so I probably won’t remember to use CO. Further, since there is no way to portable install MS-Office, it is a hassle to install it under multiple instances and it could be in violation of the license agreement. I do own an MS-Office 2003 license and work provides an MS-Office 2007 license, so being legal isn’t a problem, provided I don’t install the same version in both places. Sadly, we’ve standardized on 2007 and 2003 won’t read the new file formats. OpenOffice, which runs ever where, does a fairly good job with all the new formats, provided you aren’t collaborating and constantly going back and forth with others. It really would be easier to standardize on OpenOffice. Seriously.

A few links:

• http://www.openoffice.org/
• http://www.codeweavers.com/
• http://www.winehq.org/

If you got in on the deal a year ago, check your email for the 50% coupon code.

This guy get’s it. He wrote an article on deploying cloud computing inside your company and why the new Ubuntu Server release needs to be considered.

There are other options, but Ubuntu has the most compelling thing in my mind – APT. APT makes using and deploying applications nearly trivial.

I’ve been in RPM hell with the competition, so it really isn’t much of an option to me.

VMware has compelling solutions, if you have $4K to spend for every 2-3 servers. Uh…. no thanks.

You all know I use Ubuntu heavily. I love the application management and update scheme used – APT.
A new version of Ubuntu is scheduled for release this week – 9.10. While this isn’t an LTS – Long Term Support release, so it isn’t suitable for production servers, it does have enough new and useful things to be worth migration consideration.

I plan to migrate my main desktop to it, but I’ll really be waiting for xubuntu, the lighter weight GUI version.

As I consider the new features included and made significantly easier, I came across an article where someone compared the so-called new features in Windows7 with other OSes.

Big new features in Ubuntu 9.10, from my point of view?

• EXT4 – this will be the default file system. Testing has shown it to be faster than most other alternatives. I’ll be staying with JFS on physical hardware and ext3 on virtual hardware. IMHO, more time is needed before I’ll risk my data. I really want ZFS, but since the license isn’t working with GNU, my best hope is btrfs at some future date. Linus is running btrfs on his daily workstation, so that’s a good sign.
• Cloud Computing infrastructure with Eucalyptus. Eucalyptus was introduced in an earlier release, but I didn’t use it. Ok, so it isn’t new, but it is_ new to me._ This is both compute and storage infrastructure that is compatible with Amazon EC2 and S3. Ubuntu has decided to call this UEC going forward. Very nice.
• KVM – Ubuntu has decided to leave my beloved Xen for KVM. That means it will be easier for me to change from Xen to KVM for virtual servers with the next LTS server release. I’ll need a few months to get ready and test.
• Easy HOME directory encryption – Don’t know that I’ll use this, but I will encrypt a subdirectory. Yes, I know TrueCrypt has been available for a long time and is cross platform. Ubuntu adds an auto-mount / dis-mount as you log in and out of your account. The resulting encryption can be moved, but only with the key provided at create time.
• Bluetooth tethering with cell phones. This means you’ll be able to use a cell data connection from your laptop, fairly easily. Great if you travel much.
• New kernel – In every new kernel, there are lots of new features that don’t matter to most of us and a few new features that matter a bunch. My kernels are so old that there are many, many new to me features. Some are security and others are performance related. KVM is built-into the kernel now. That’s better than getting Xen updates that don’t get tested well enough and occasionally break.

Ubuntu is also excited about free cloud storage they will offer. Of course, there’s a storage amount that will force a payment, but ease of use will make this useful to many people. Even if all you do is share your desktop settings or back them up to the cloud, you’ll be better off.

Anyway – Look for bittorrent downloads on 10/29 and get yours running. Seed after you complete for the entire weekend to help your fellow users out, please.

Every once in a while, I need to create instructions that someone else can follow. A few screen shots would be very helpful. Windows7 includes a program called psr that captures the entire desktop and describes which mouse clicks were entered as they happen. Every mouse click captures another screen shot. Very handy for creating a step-by-step instruction document or to help recreate steps to cause a problem. When you stop recording, it packages the file(s) into a ZIP ready to share.

This can also be used to report bugs, since it captures widget clicks too and adds the description of them into a web page along with the screen captures.

I can also report that it captures virtual machine screen shots and clicks too, but not for internal to the processes. It just knows that you clicked on something inside the VM.

To run this tool,

Start —> Run —> psr

It may work in Vista and there may be a download for older systems like WinXP, but I can’t confirm that.

The other downside to this tool is that it creates MHTML (mht) files, which don’t display without coaxing except with IE. Opera Browser will display the resulting files, but Firefox 3.5.x refused to open it.

http://ninite.com/ helps make installation of commonly used applications easy. Lifehacker covered this tool nicely.

If you install test and virtual machines, this is a real time saver. A few clicks to select your apps, I selected about 10, then about 5 minutes of downloads and installs. Only once did I have to “Accept”, but that was a Windows7 UAC.

Have you seen any issues with this solution? Let us know.

For example, I did have to decrease the security so ninite could create and download the custom installation package, but that was expected. That part was expected AND necessary. After all the installations were completed, I removed it from my trusted sites. Good enough.

Some of the installed apps were not the latest and had updates available. Doing an update rather than searching for the apps, downloading, installing, is much quicker. Of course, addons for Firefox still needed to be added.

Which apps did I install?

1. Firefox
2. Thunderbird
3. OpenOffice
4. Opera
5. Skype
6. IrfanView
7. KMplayer
8. VLC
9. Java 6
10. Foxit
11. WinSCP
12. Putty
13. Notepad++

Which Firefox addons did I install?

• NoScript
• Sage (Sage Too forbids AdBlock)
• AdBlock Plus
• Scroogle
• Tree Style Tab

You don’t want too many firefox addons or it will get slow.

Today, I’ll try to explain why you probably want the 64-bit version of Windows7 regardless of your current needs.

Which processor?

To get us started, you want a 64-bit processor with “VT support.” There’s no downside to getting a 64-bit processor. You can run them with 32-bit software and they aren’t expensive any more. The upside in capabilities that 64-bit CPUs provide far outweighs the slightly higher cost. This is a no-brainer folks.

Why 64-Bit OS?

There are 2 reasons you want a 64-bit OS. Accessing more RAM and moving data around faster. Access to more RAM may not be an issue for 90% of the users out there today, but in 3 years, it is likely you’ll want to access more RAM than what the 32-bit OS can. The RAM cutoff for 32-bit happens at 3.5GB-4GB of RAM.

If you do virtual machines, you want a 64-bit OS. There are exceptions, but if you are already using VMs, you wouldn’t be reading this anyway.

Why Not 64-bit OS?

Software incompatibilities and drivers. Out of these, access to drivers is the more important since Win7 allows you to run programs in Compatibility Mode. There are 11 choices from Win95, Win98, ME, NT, XP, Vista and all the different service paks for each of these. If you can’t get a program to run in those modes, there’s always a WinXP virtual machine – free download from Microsoft. Basically, software compatibility shouldn’t be a showstopper for anyone this time around. The difficulty to configure a particular program is minor, but I don’t think I could explain it to everyone. 90% of you will figure this out easily.

Drivers are a different issue. For me, all my equipment had Win7 drivers, including a Hauppauge TV tuner. Microsoft has a tool you can run that will tell you whether all your equipment has drivers or not. For me, there were a few drivers that it could only say post-install upgrade needed.

Your CPU isn’t 64-bit, then obviously you don’t want a 64-bit OS. What were you thinking? Chances are, your computer is 4 years old or more. Time for an upgrade?

Why 32-bit OS?

1. You only run 1 program at a time and it isn’t a game, anything from Adobe, or you need some old driver that doesn’t have a new version known to be compatible with Win7. Many Vista drivers are compatible, but don’t expect WinXP drivers to work.
2. You know that you will never need more than 4GB of RAM for the entire OS and all programs.

Why Not 32-bit OS?

1. Gamer? The hottest, new games are designed for 64-bit and lots of RAM (6GB+)
2. You want to be ready for the next 8 years worth of programs.

Win7 is an OS like WinXP was. You’ll use it for many, many years and mostly be happy.

Did I forget something important for why you would want 64-bit or 32-bit?

In the beginning, people didn’t really like WinXP, if you recall. Windows7 has been reviewed very favorably and it is nice enough for a Linux guy like me to write a number of favorable articles about it. There are enough good things in Win7 that I’m a convert from both Vista and WinXP. OTOH, I didn’t pay for it and wouldn’t.

If you are happy with WinXP, I can’t recommend you upgrade at this point unless it is free or there’s a feature that you need/want. Win7 media center is nice.

Fantastic is the only word I can use. Windows7 x86 memory use is FANTASTIC (meaning low). I’ve done a little optimization using Vista System Optimizer after installing Win7 on my laptop – here are the results:

Win7 = Host OS

Ubuntu = Client VM – 1224MB allocated

The total system memory used with VirtualBox, Ubuntu and Windows Media Player playing a TV show is 1.75GB. 1.2GB of that is allocated to the client VM.

Under Vista-64, this same config would use 2.5GB.

Running another VM, WinXP, with 1GB of use, will bring the total memory used to 2.75GB.

Win7 = Host OS

Ubuntu = Client VM – 1224MB allocated

WinXP = Client VM – 1024MB allocated.

This would use almost 4GB in Vista-64.

Even with the 32-bit limitation of 3.5GB of RAM, on my system, I actually gain more usable RAM with 32-bit Win7 over 64-bit Vista and isn’t giving more RAM to client VMs the goal?