Virtuall BLOG tagged 'script'

Migrating from VBA to VSTO

hbr@pqr.nl — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 23:00:00 +0100

It was long overdue but we finally made the move away from Visual Basic for Applications (Microsoft Office scripting). We implemented Sharepoint 2010 and were still using the old fashioned VBA code that originated from Office 2003. So we got Visual Studio out and started translating the VBA code into Visual Basic dotnet.

After the code was translated and connections to CRM were setup, we bound the new standard document to the sharepoint libraries. Now if we create a new document from [...]

Scheduled monitoring of ESXi hosts

hbr@pqr.nl — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 23:00:00 +0100

In my post on sizing up the storage for block size usage, I wrote a script to get the data into a manageable form. This script runs fine from the command line but you probably want to have some sort of trend to analyze.

In that case, you want to go and schedule running the script. Now the ESX host has a scheduler called ‘cron’. In full versions you would simply add a script to /etc/cron.hourly and it would pick it up on the next run. In ESXi this is slightly different. To [...]

How to assign a dynamic computername during OSD

hho@pqr.nl — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 23:00:00 +0100

With ConfigMgr 2007 there can be put many information in the Task Sequence used for OSD. With Windows XP, Vista or 7 there will be different files created for using a unattend installation. All information set in the Task Sequence will be used for creating that specific file. Only a dynamically computername is missing here! How to assign a dynamic computername during OSD, that's the question!

In a Task Sequence used for OSD, this information can be placed in "Apply Windows S [...]

It's SAMPLE time with vscsiStats

hbr@pqr.nl — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 23:00:00 +0100

vscsiStats is a new VMware tool that helps give insight in disk IOs and latency and stuff like that. It’s a very useful tool but it dumps data in histograms. Using these in Excel is quite a pain because Excel knows histograms (with add-ins) but only one at a time. If you want a graph a whole LUN or other lower level part of the storage over time, you need to reformat the data. And luckily, ESX, like most Linux versions nowadays, comes with a python interpreter. Now I know a lot of diffe [...]

Archiving email attachments

hbr@pqr.nl — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 23:00:00 +0100

I had a discussion last week with a colleague about archiving messages in outlook. I have a 7GB mailbox on the server because I never delete mail. That may seem overdone but it has served me well a couple of times in discussions we had. Besides, I see absolutely no point in archiving mail away from the mail server to another store on some fileserver that eventually lands on the same central storage.

But a lot of the older mail contains attachments that are outdated and no longer n [...]

Import a VM into Lab Manager using Orchestrator (part 2)

hbr@pqr.nl — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 23:00:00 +0100

This is part 2 of a quick guide to importing a VM into Lab Manager using Orchestrator. In case you missed it, part 1 is available on http://virtuall.eu/blog/import-a-vm-in-lab-manager-using-orchestrator.

Lab Manager import preparation

In the previous blog we selected a VM and exported it to a fileshare. Unfortunately, for Lab Manager to understand this VM export, we need to change it a little. First, we need 2 xml files; a configuration.xml with this content:

<configu [...]

Import a VM in Lab Manager using Orchestrator

hbr@pqr.nl — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 23:00:00 +0100

There are a lot of things you can automate in a virtual infrastructure. One of the tools that can help automate the more complex workflows is Orchestrator. It’s free when you have a vCenter and it’s very powerful.

Another great tool is Lab Manager. It’s designed for Test and Dev environments but it can also help to improve uptime of your datacenter by regulating changes in your production environment.

This is a Proof of Concept combining the two tools as they overlap o [...]

Script bits (update 4)

hbr@pqr.nl — Mon, 31 May 2010 23:00:00 +0100

This post is a quick gathering of a few small scripts I wrote with my IT-life's motto: "Never do anything twice"

None of them are very special but each of them is a result of a short moment of frustration and a few minutes of gvim typing (yes, I use 'vi' on windows too).

so far this article contains:

Add wallpapers from a lot of subdirs to a Windows 7 Theme Change everybody's manager in Active Directory Execute one command on all you [...]

Scheduled View VM refresh

hbr@pqr.nl — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 23:00:00 +0100

If you use non persistent desktops with VMware View, there are two options to reset the machine to its default state. One is immediately after a user logs off, the other is manually by a View Administrator. Currently, there is no way to schedule a VM reset at, say, 2PM.

A VM reset generates a lot of IOPS. So doing this in a production environment that's strained for IOPS is a performance risk (read http://virtuall.eu/download-document/vdi-storage-deep-impact!). But having adm [...]

User pictures from the Active Directory

hbr@pqr.nl — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 23:00:00 +0100

Not many people are aware that the Microsoft Active Directory has properties for pictures. This means that it's possible to add mugshots from people to your AD.

I created a small application that lets you edit these pictures. That means you don't need a seperate fileserver directory or database to store this kind of information. I also added birthday and first working day to the schema of the AD (somehow date properties aren't available in AD??). This makes this a coo [...]