gcc path problem with Debian 6.0.4 on VMware Fusion

I got the following error message while installing VMware Tools on Debian 6.0.4 on VMware Fusion.

The path "/usr/bin/gcc" is not valid path to the gcc binary.

I tried to fix it by installing the linux-header files…without any success.

I solved it by running:

apt-get install kernel-package

apt-get install gcc-4.3 linux-headers-`uname -r` -y

I found the solution here.

Linked: How To Upgrade VMware ESXi 3.5 To 4.1 Update 1 (Free Version)

One more great guide from the guys at TheHowToForge!

A step by step instruction on how to use the Host Update Utility from VMware.

http://www.howtoforge.com/how-to-upgrade-vmware-esxi-3.5-to-4.1-update-1-free-version

Enable Clipboard Copy and Paste in vSphere Client 4.1

First enable local or remote TSM from the vSphere Client on every ESXi host:

  1. Select the host and click the Configuration tab.
  2. Click Security profile > Properties.
  3. Click Local Tech Support or Remote Tech Support (SSH) and click Options.
  4. Choose the desired startup policy and click Start, then click OK.
  5. Verify that the daemon selected in step 3 shows as running in the Services Properties window

Next enable Clipboard Copy and Paste on every ESXi host:

Log in to the ESX/ESXi host as a root user and open the /etc/vmware/config file using a text editor.
Add these entries to the file:

isolation.tools.copy.disable="FALSE"
isolation.tools.paste.disable="FALSE"

Save and close the file. The Copy and Paste options are only enabled when the virtual machines restart or resume the next time.

Source: http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1026437

Source: http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1017910

Linked: eagerZeroedThick powershell script

I found this great Powershell script that convert virtual disk files to eagered zeroed.

Awesome script! I had to make some changes to make it work in my environment.

 function Set-EagerZeroThick{
 param($vcName, $vmName, $hdName)

# Find ESX host for VM
 $vmImpl = Get-VM $vmName
 Write-Host $vmImpl
 if($vmImpl.PowerState -ne "PoweredOff"){
 Write-Host "Guest must be powered off to use this script !" -ForegroundColor red
 return $false
 }

 $vm = $vmImpl | Get-View
 Write-Host $vm
 $esxName = (Get-View $vm.Runtime.Host).Name
 Write-Host $esxName
# Find datastore path
 $dev = $vm.Config.Hardware.Device[10] | where {$_.DeviceInfo.Label -eq $hdName}
 Write-Host $dev
 if($dev.Backing.thinProvisioned){
 return $false
 }
 $hdPath = $dev.Backing.FileName
 Write-Host $hdPath

# For Virtual Disk Manager we need to connect to the ESX server
 $esxHost = Connect-VIServer -Server $esxName -User $esxAccount -Password $esxPasswd

# Convert HD
 $vDiskMgr = Get-View -Id (Get-View ServiceInstance -Server $esxHost).Content.VirtualDiskManager
 Write-Host $vDiskMgr
 $dc = Get-Datacenter -Server $esxHost | Get-View
 Write-Host $dc
 $taskMoRef = $vDiskMgr.EagerZeroVirtualDisk_Task($hdPath, $dc.MoRef)
 Write-Host $taskMoRef
 $task = Get-View $taskMoRef
 Write-Host $task
 while("running","queued" -contains $task.Info.State){
 $task.UpdateViewData("Info")
 }

 Disconnect-VIServer -Server $esxHost -Confirm:$false

# Connect to the vCenter
 Connect-VIServer -Server $vcName
 if($task.Info.State -eq "success"){
 return $true
 }
 else{
 return $false
 }
}

$vmName = "vm1"
$vCenter = "vcenter_server"
$esxAccount = "rootuser"
$esxPasswd = "password"

Set-EagerZeroThick $vCenter $vmName "Hard disk 1"

To validate before and after running the eageredZeroed script I run the following script:

$vm = Get-VM vm1 | Get-View
$vm.config.Hardware.Device[10].backing
$vm.config.Hardware.Device[10].DeviceInfo

Source: http://www.lucd.info/2009/11/15/scripts-for-yellow-bricks-advise-thin-provisioning-alarm-eagerzeroedthick/

Linked: Move-Template

A couple of days ago I found a really great PowerCLI script that move templates i vSphere. Awesome post and script by afokkema at ict-freak.nl!

Storage vMotion is a great feature to Move your VMs to other datastores. But what if you want to move your Templates?
In the current version of vSphere there is no option within the Client

function Move-Template{
    param( [string] $template, [string] $esx, [string] $datastore)

    if($template -eq ""){Write-Host "Enter a Template name"}
    if($esx -eq ""){Write-Host "Enter an ESX hostname"}
    if($esx -ne "" -and $datastore -eq ""){$vmotion = $true}
    if($datastore -ne ""){$svmotion = $true}

    Write-Host "Converting $template to VM"
    $vm = Set-Template -Template (Get-Template $template) -ToVM 

    if($svmotion){
        Write-Host "Migrate $template to $esx and $datastore"
        Move-VM -VM (Get-VM $vm) -Destination (Get-VMHost $esx) `
        -Datastore (Get-Datastore $datastore) -Confirm:$false
        (Get-VM $vm | Get-View).MarkAsTemplate() | Out-Null
    }        

    if($vmotion){
        Write-Host "Migrate $template to $esx"
        Move-VM -VM $vm -Destination (Get-VMHost $esx) -Confirm:$false
        ($vm | Get-View).MarkAsTemplate() | Out-Null
    }
}

The function above can be used to move a single template via:

Move-Template <template> <esxhost> <datastore>

Source: http://ict-freak.nl/2010/01/21/powercli-move-template/

Linked: Remove the “host currently has no management network redundancy” warning from your whitebox HA enabled ESX cluster

I found a great post on how to remove the Host <ESXi Hostname> currently has no management network redundancy warning that you get on a typical ESXi whitebox installation. Due to the fact that most whitebox machines don’t have multiple nics..

For more info and screenshots, checkout the original post.

When you completed building your ESX cluster from so called whitebox machines, you might see a warning sign at the cluster level. It will tell you the management network has no redundancy. This is probably correct because whitebox clusters usually don’t have 2 NIC’s for the management network.

To loose this irritating warning message do the following.

  1. Go to the properties of your cluster
  2. Select HA from the left pane
  3. Click the ‘Advanced Options’ button
  4. Fill in the first column of the first row by double clicking and typing the value ‘das.ignoreRedundantNetWarning’
  5. Fill in the second column of the same row by double clicking and typing the value ‘True’
  6. Close the Advanced Options window
  7. Now deselect the option ‘Enable HA’ and press OK
  8. HA will be disabled, this will take some time
  9. Go back to the options and select ‘Enable HA’ and press OK
  10. HA will be enabled and the warning will be gone

How I manually migrated from vCenter 4.0(32-bit) to 4.1u1(64-bit)

Last week I upgraded a vCenter 4.0 installation to 4.1u1. The vCenter was installed on a 32-bit VM so I needed to migrate the installation to a new 64-bit host.

I tried to do the migration according to the vSphere 4.1 upgrade pre-installation requirements and considerations guide. But sadly I got an error during the migration process.

RESTORE FILELIST is terminating abnormally.

The error is described in this thread at vmware communities.

Also, the datamigration scripts makes the original vCenter database corrupt. So if the datamigration fails, as it did for me, the original installation is trashed. (Luckily the datamigration scripts exports a backup before trashing it. But this procedure stinks anyway.)

So how did I migrate? Well I found a workaround and did the following.:

On the old vCenter 4.0 server (32-bit)

  1. Stop the vCenter service
  2. Install Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio Express
  3. Open Management Studio and detached the vCenter database.
  4. Copy the database files.
  5. Copy the % ProgramData% \ VMware \ VMware VirtualCenter \ SSL folder.
  6. Shutdown the vCenter VM.

On the new vCenter 4.1u1 server (64-bit)

  1. Install vCenter 4.1u1 with all the default settings. (This installs SQLExpress and the vCenter database)
  2. Uninstall vCenter from add and remove programs. (This does not remove the SQLExpress installation)
  3. Restore the % ProgramData% \ VMware \ VMware VirtualCenter \ SSL
  4. Install Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio Express
  5. Detach the newly installed database and attach the one from the old vCenter server.
  6. Create a ODBC connection to the local SQLExpress server with the old vCenter database.
  7. Install vCenter 4.1u1 and choose existing ODBC connection during the installation. The installer will detect the old vCenter database and upgrade it.

I wonder why VMware don’t recommend this procedure in the first place?

Install VMware Tools on Trixbox

Recently I had to install VMware Tools on a Trixbox installation.

1. First, in the VMware console, run ‘install vmware tools’ in the menu
2. Mount the cd-rom drive in an empty folder:

cd /media
mkdir cdrom
mount /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom
cd /media/cdrom

3. Copy the .tar.gz file to somewhere such as /home & extract..

cp VMware-tools.xxxxxxxxx.tar.gz /home
tar xvfz VMware-tools.xxxxxxxxx.tar.gz
cd /home/vmware-tools-distrib

4. Run the installation:

./vmware-install.pl

Source

Fix slow/sluggish mouse in VMware Fusion

I have been experiencing that the mouse pointer in my VMware Fusion gets somewhat sluggish from time to time. It got slow for a second or two. Quite annoying.

It turns out that this is caused by VMware Fusion attempts to “optimize mouse for gaming”. Totally useless in my opinion..

Just disable this in the VMware Fusion preferences.