Tuesday, September 28, 2010

SQL hell

Okay, so Microsoft sucks hard on this one:
KB968749 - SQL Server 2005 setup fails when MSXML Core Services 6.0 Service Pack 2 has already been installed

Solution: call support, pinky promise it'll be free...
Solution2: Google MSICUU2.exe. Some russian FTP mirrors still have it.

Another three hours well spent...

Monday, September 27, 2010

MSAV 2010


I recently found Microsoft Security Essentials, and gave it a try: nice, light, the first update takes forever plus one day. But after that, it's kinda cool, so I'll stick with it for a while.

Anybody remember Microsoft Antivirus? You know, msav.exe from way back in 1993. Hope this project will have a longer life...

On a related note: I just found out that you can run the Malicious Software Removal Tool anytime, called mrt.exe. Provides a nice GUI and all that jazz, although it's even slower than Spybot...

Sunday, September 26, 2010

John Wayne - Texas Funerals

(Turn me up)
I went into a bar just the other night.
Boy I got into one hell of a fight
I think I broke my jaw
The very next morning
Somebody stole my car
My wife left home about a week ago
She stole the kids and she took all my doe.
She pee’d on the carpet and she shot my horse
Now I think I’ve gone better to bad to worse.

Texas and whiskey;
Whiskey from Texas
Texas, Texas Whiskey

Well I went to Daddy’s funeral just the other day
It’s been just 3 short days since he’s passed away
Seems he died of having to much to drink
And that’s how his truck ended up in the drink

Texas and Whiskey
Funerals and Texas
Whiskey and funerals
Texas and Whiskey
Funerals; Texas Funeral

Monday, September 20, 2010

New Aleksandra Kaniak movie!

Check this out:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1067583/
On a related note, i watched Art of passion again...

ESXi, the root of all evil

ESXi in itself is a nice idea, a cool tool and everything. I really like it. Until stuff goes bad. And it goes bad.

Yesterday I had a great time, migrating an ESXi 3.5 installation from a RAID1 set on a HP DL360 G6 to a RAID5 on a HP DL360 G5. The G6 uses a P410i controller, while the G5 uses a P400, so I wasn't sure that it'll be a plug-n-play migration... But lo and behold, i tried it and it worked (after a block level full backup, of course). Migrating from RAID1 to 5 was just a cool run with dd, no sweat.

So it's done, I fire it up, ESXi boots nicely... and can't find it's own storage... After 30mins of quality Google time, this dude saved my ass:
http://cyborgworkshop.org/2008/09/14/adding-a-lun-with-an-existing-vmfs-into-an-esxi-node/

On a related note, ESXi sucks big time if you install it on the same disk as the storage. And since we don't use iSCSI or FC here, and I never succeeded in installing it on a USB drive, I had to do just that. That usually means that you can't upgrade your 3.5 to 4.0 for starters, and while I obtained 73GB free space from the RAID migration (which actually doubled my disk space), I can't partition and use it... So, guess I'll try the mentioned USB install method (just dd the little SOB to the drive and done). More info on that once it's done.

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Another portal for nothing?

I started attending the Data Center University (by APC!) more than two years ago. Since than, I usually follow the activities of the APC/Schneider group, courtesy of their active email marketing.
I even attended some courses on the Energy University site, which is a nice project to make the world a better place. No harm in that.

Some time ago, Schneider started the Collaborative Project Portal http://collaborate.schneider-electric.com. Great name, maybe I can make the world a better place too, so let's sign up.

After the usual registration procedure, you are greeted by a screen of absolutely nothing, with a nice green "Create a new Project" button. With some digging around the site, you find the usual stuff: you can blog, upload documents, create a wiki, etc.

The first hard thing to achieve is to actually find another human being, and talk to her/him. Of course you can invite anyone, create groups and all, but what to do if you signed up by your lonely self? Should you request a random facilities expert from India to be colleagues?
After looking through the group chats, there's a new post every month. Can't say it's too fast to follow...

All in all, I think it's a great idea, but the Schneider guys made a great tool with no purpose. Let's see if someone can change that.