Getting Started with Microsoft Hyper-V

Translink is about to start a new virtualization project. They decided to use Microsoft Hyper-V as the hypervisor. The virtualization cluster, which is built on HP servers consists of 4 nodes which each have 2 6-core Intel Xeon processors and 96 GB of memory.

The first thing to do was to mount the servers in the rack which was done by my colleague John and me.

John cabling the power supply units

After approximately 90 minutes of work and 2 papercuts from the damn HP packaging (I have never got injuries from Dell packaging) the job was done:

the 4 virtualization nodes

A funny week is gone… A more funnier weekend is coming…

Hey guys, a very funny and interesting working week is gone… I have got a lot of more experience in developing with Kevin & Co., so I was inspired by Kevin R. and the projects what I have at Volunteer Now to do an own developing project in my community and I have asked Kevin to join this project, too. Well, I think it was a really nice idea, because I can get the chance to do developing on both sides with Kevin. It’s just to develop a frontend as website for administrate a file server which run on a linux server and use a MySQL-DB-Backend as accountingbase. It will be programmed in VBA.NET and telerik on a Apache-Server with the Mono-Mod. Maybe, it will be a really nice experience to work with Kevin on a OpenSource project. My project works very fine at my workplace, it’s just some fine tunings and some customizes of the Microsoft Dynamics Website which will be simple programmed with JavaScript and VBA.NET. Well, I have mentioned that asked Kevin to do something together on this weekend, it’s done and I have enjoyed it to fullest, but I will tell you more on the next blog entry. And now, please enjoy!

VBA.NET, SQL & Co.

Since the begin of this week, i working on my second project at VolunteerNow. Well, it’s based on VBA.NET & SQL as backend of the Microsoft Dynamics CRM and my new developing environment is euiped with Visual Studio 2010 and with new extensions like Silverlight and Telerik classes, that’s very amazing. On Monday evening, i and my roommates wanted to go the cinema as every week, but the film “ The dictator“ was only for VIP’s, so we was very frustrated and looked for another film and this one was funny, i would to recommend it, but you should not to be shy of blood-curdling scenes, because it was very bloody and this film doesn’t know anything about expurgation and hasn’t any limits. So, he was so bad that he was already well! Ok, i should go back to topic, the new task what i have is very interesting, of course i can learn more and more about programming Visual Studio within an important project such this one. It’s a nice chance to get more skills of developing in the languages VBA.NET and Silverlight, i hope that’s this wasn’t the last one and i can get more skills and knowledge in other programming languages like VBA and Silverlight. It’s a new experience to get another contacts in other countries too and can use this to improve my community with new features, skills and new contacts like Kevin R. and it was great to tell more about experience, so it’s coming more as soon as possible…

New Tasks, New Toys (Follow-Up)

As you can read in an earlier post, I had to set up a testing environment for Cisco Smart Install, which is now up and running.

The Smart Install director (the device which manages iOS and configuration deployment to the Smart Install clients) acts as a DHCP server and configures new switches coming factory settings with an IP address, default gateway and a TFTP server address (DHCP option 150). Right now the director deploys images and configuration files only to devices with specific MAC addresses, as I only want to configure my test client at the moment. It is also possible to filter deployment based on device model and type or IP address (if already configured).

Cisco Smart Install console output on client
Cisco Smart Install console output on client

After being upgraded and/or reconfigured by Cisco Smart install the switch is ready to be used in the corporate network without the need to be configured manually. This feature is also called zero-touch deployment. The Smart Install director console output shows the successful image and config upgrade process:

Cisco Smart Install Director console output
Cisco Smart Install Director console output

Saturday.. Road trip to the Gaints Causeway…

Well, we have an amazing travel by a bus tour to the Gaints Causeway… It was pretty nice to see a lot of landscapes in nothern irland, so we are started at 9.00 am and began the travel with a booked bus tour to a very nice castle with a little harbour near the ocean… I doesn’t how it’s called, i forgot the name… Well, while we traveled to our destination the Gaints Causeway and some little and very beautiful stops, we have saw a lot of great landscapes and my roommates take a lot of nice pictures, but i will show only some of my top 4 ranked pictures and post a link to the completely list of the gallery. The weather was sometimes very changeable with some sunshine times and with little showers, but we wasn’t to be licked, so we used the chance the variety of the landscapes and i have got the chance to meet a very crazy frenchman. By the way, on the stop at a nice scene of a bridge over the ocean, we met a man from Germany and asked him to take a pricture of us and the coast behind us… That was crazy to see a human from Germany. Well, we have continued our trip to our destination and saw the Gaints Causeway, but we was amazed that this was little bit smaler than our imagination about the Gaints Causeway… But i must say that this travel was very funny and a very nice chance to see more about nothern irland… Yeah!!! Now, i will you show my four pictures and here the link to the full list (uploading is in process): pics.xvlancom09.de

Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...
Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...

Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...
Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...
Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...
Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...

Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...
Just a road trip to the Gaints Causeway...

Network Documentation

As most of you employed in IT may know, there are always some projects you do „by the way“ (e. g. Oliver, René and Mateusz should know what I mean). 😉

I also got (another) „by the way“ project: document the whole Translink corporate network from core to access layer and from OSI layer 1 to 3. This includes all networking devices as well as every cable that connects two devices.

I think I will use a top down approach and start with the network core and WAN links between the sites and then care about the inhouse network site after site. Probably I will also have to develop a hostname scheme as not all devices in the network have unique hostnames yet.

I’ll tell you what I make out of it in later posts.

Have a nice weekend!

The third week will ending…

Hey guys, every week will ending and this one, too. It was really nice the last working days of this week, we have a little meeting about the fine tuning of the design and layout of the new Sharepoint and which kind of features we have to added. But until this time, it was just like a drag and drop and some CSS coding, so i hope and will be better with the next steps to customize the current design and getting a new layout with some user-friendly features. The second project which i working on and which running parallel by my supervisor is a little bit more hard coding and it will be coding via Visual Basic and C#, so this one will be more amazing to working on, i hope…. But it’s very amazing atmosphere in my work placement and i have asked Kevin to do something together on the next weekend and learn more about him, but he hasn’t answered until yet. Well, i hope, i can hold this contact, because he is a very nice guy… I have him to thank for crossing the line with my community and going international, maybe he want to join this one, he really liking our background and our projects… Just take a look of our blog: click here (ready to use, style & layout are in process…)

New Tasks, New Toys

After having heard that every new switch is configured manually and that there is no default configuration template, I suggested to use Cisco Smart Install to install and configure switches automatically. Bad idea! Now the shit hit the fan. My new task is to set up a testing environment for Cisco Smart Install. To do this I got a Cisco Catalyst 3750G L3 switch as well as a Cisco Catalyst 2960:

my new toys
my new toys

After searching for the documentation and CLI commands I plugged in the 3750G’s power supply and was totally euphoric … and then bitterly disappointed. There is no iOS image on the switch. 🙁 So I have to transfer an image via console cable which takes about 4 hours. It is not easy to stay calm when you want to start your work and recognize that you have to wait for the XMODEM console transfer at approximately 873 bytes per second. 😛 As I am writing this post I am still waiting for the XMODEM transfer to finish, so I think I won’t start configuring Cisco Smart Install today. 🙁

TGIF

I’m really looking forward to enjoying the weekend, so I think this picture best illustrates what I feel like. 😉

T.G.I. Friday's
Thank God it's Friday!

Yesterday I was given the task to document the MAC addresses of the devices that are connected to ten of Translink’s Cisco Catalyst 2950 access layer switches at Milewater Road. It took me about an hour with some e-mailing and surfing in between. Not a very interesting task, but at least some work on consoles of Cisco devices. 🙂

Now I’m keeping myself busy with documenting Mateusz’s business intelligence application again and waiting for the end of the work day at 2 o’clock …

The last days of this week…

It’s just few days ago, were i prepared my virtual machine on a HyperV-Server and wiki system for my developing of a new sharepoint website, now i worked with my own designed theme for this website and did some fine tuning of the stylesheets. On wednesday mornings, i and my supervisor visited the headquarter of Volunteer Now in the center of Belfast and i took some pictures of the office and some ones of the server room, where we did some support services. Well, you will see that this isn’t as structured as a profit oriented company, but it’s very amazing to see how this kind of non-profit organisation growth so large and has so many powerful infrastructure. Well, here are some pictures of this headquarter…

The server room at my work... Volunteer Now...

The server room in the headquarter... Volunteer Now... (1)
The server room in the headquarter... Volunteer Now...(2)

The office room in the headquarter... Volunteer Now...