Thursday 23 June 2011

How to export ipod notes to your PC computer for free?

There are few applications in the market offering this feature, but if you want to do it for free and easily, take note of how to do it:

1) You will need a PC computer with iTunes and Microsoft Outlook. Of course, you also need your ipod and the cable connected to the PC.
2) You must install Microsoft Outlook (not Outlook Express), and set it up as the default email client. You can do it temporarily if you want, and then change it back later to your favorite email client.
This is because itunes uses Microsoft Outlook as the default application to synchronize the Notes.
Go to iTunes, select your ipod under Devices, and from the tabs on top, select Info. In the section "Other" tick the option "Sync notes with: Outlook"
Do it, sync your ipod.
3) You will find all your notes in Outlook, that is the yellow sticky notes icon under "Tasks" on the left menu. Or just use the menu: Go to -> Notes.
You can start copying and pasting the contents of your notes, but if you have many of them, it is a better idea to export them to notepad, however, there is no such functionality in Outlook :(
Don't worry, go to the next step.
4) Open outlook, Alt+F11 to open VBA editor, put the following code in the right blank area, while on the vba editor, click the save button.

Sub exportNotes()
On Error GoTo huboerr
myfolder = "c:\notes\" 'change this to your folder path but folder path has to end with a backlash
Set myNote = Application.GetNamespace("MAPI").GetDefaultFolder(olFolderNotes)
For ibi = 1 To myNote.Items.Count
fname = myNote.Items(ibi).Subject
myNote.Items(ibi).SaveAs myfolder & fname & ".txt", 0

Next
Exit Sub
huboerr:
MsgBox fname
Resume Next

End Sub


Then all you need to do is to change the first line of code to the path of export folder
While in vba editor, when hit F5, all the notes in the notes folder will be exported to the folder you specified, the notes name will be the same as you have in your Outlook notes and in your ipod . You will probably have to edit the note names in Outlook before exporting them, as you may name them using some special characters (*, %, etc.) that are not accepted by Windows...

I hope it saved you some time re-typing the notes in your PC, and some bucks if you were thinking about buying an application for doing that.

Enjoy !

Monday 20 June 2011

How do I find discovered SAN targets and LUNs on a Linux host with Emulex HBA cards?

The sys file system (sysfs) provides details on what devices have been discovered.

Change directory to /sys/class/scsi_host. Perform an ls:

[tam@tsdownload scsi_host]$ ls
host0

Each SCSI host adapter and those that look like SCSI host adapters to Linux are assigned a host number by Linux. You may see more than one hostX (where x is a number). In the example above, only one SCSI host bus adapter is found, host0. If there are more than one, perform an ls command on each:


[tam@tsdownload scsi_host]$ ls host0
[tam@tsdownload scsi_host]$ ls host0
board_online lpfc_discovery_min_wait node_name
cmd_per_lun lpfc_discovery_wait_limit nport_evt_cnt
ctlreg lpfc_drvr_version num_discovered_ports
device lpfc_fcp_bind_method option_rom_version
disc_adisc lpfc_fcp_class outfcpio
disc_map lpfc_fdmi_on portfcid
disc_npr lpfc_hba_queue_depth port_name
disc_plogi lpfc_link_speed portnum
disc_prli lpfc_linkup_wait_limit port_type
disc_reglgn lpfc_log_verbose proc_name
disc_unmap lpfc_lun_queue_depth programtype
disc_unused lpfc_max_luns scan
events lpfc_nodev_tmo serialnum
fabric_name lpfc_scan_down sg_tablesize
fwrev lpfc_topology speed
hdw lpfc_use_adisc state
host_busy management_version unchecked_isa_dma
info mbox unique_id
issue_lip modeldesc
lpfc_ack0 modelname


Any items listed with lpfc are Emulex adapters. You can check the model, firmware version, and driver version:

[tam@tsdownload host0]$ cat info
Emulex LP10000 2Gb PCI-X Fibre Channel Adapter on PCI bus 05 device 20 irq 209

[tam@tsdownload host0]$ cat lpfc_drvr_version
Emulex LightPulse Fibre Channel SCSI driver 8.0.16.27

[tam@tsdownload host0]$ cat fwrev
1.91A5 (T2D1.91A5)

Change directory to the host directory and then the device directory:

[tam@tsdownload scsi_host]$ cd host0
{tam@tsdownload host0]$ device
[tam@tsdownload device]$ ls
detach_state power target0:0:0 target0:0:1

Each target and LUN is listed as targetX:Y:Z where:
•X is the bus number
•Y is the target number
•Z is the LUN number.
These are the devices discovered by the host bus adapter and Linux SCSI midlayer.

To determine what type of devices were found, change directory to the targetX:Y:Z directory and then the X:X:X:X directory below it. You can cat the model, vendor, and other files to learn more about the devices:
[tam@tsdownload device]$ cd 0:target0:0:0
[tam@tsdownload target0:0:0]$ cd 0:0:0:0
[tam@tsdownload 0:0:0:0]$ ls
block detach_state dump power rescan scsi_level timeout vendor
delete device_blocked model queue_depth rev state type

[tam@tsdownload 0:0:0:0]$ cat model
ST336854FC

[tam@tsdownload 0:0:0:0]$ cat vendor
SEAGATE

[tam@tsdownload 0:0:0:0]$ cat state
running

The 0:0:0:0 directory represents host bus adapter 0, bus 0, target 0, LUN 0.


Original document (official Emulex web site):
http://www.emulex.com/knowledge/search/viewArticle.jsp?docId=68

Saturday 4 June 2011

Upgrade to Vspere ESX 4.1 failed, ESX host boot stops and drops into Troubleshooting mode.

Recently, I've got this error whe upgrading an ESX host from version 4.0 to 4.1 upd 01, using the upgrade manager. I was looking to the console, after the ESX host reboot and:



ESX host boot stops at the error: VSD mount/Bin/SH:cant access TTY job control turned off

I was in panic.



Rebooting the host failed, giving me the same error.


I didn't want to re-install the host, because I had some Production Virtual Machines in the local storage, and wanted to solve it quick, as my maintenance window was almost over.




On the ESX console, you see the error:



VSD mount/bin/sh:can't access TTY; job control turned off.



The ESX host does not boot and drops into Troubleshooting (busy box) mode.



Looking into the /var/log/messages file, there was something similar to:



sysboot: Getting '/boot/cosvdmk' parameter from esx.conf


sysboot: COS VMDK Specified in esx.conf: /vmfs/volumes/4b27ec62-93ec3816-0475-00215aaf882a/esxconsole-4b27e9e3-20ee-69d7-ae11-00215aaf882a/esxconsole.vmdk


sysboot: 66.vsd-mount returned critical failure


sysboot: Executing 'chvt 1'






How to solve it:






This issue occurs if an ESX host cannot identify the esxconsole.vmdk file in which the service console resides.






1. Go to the console of the ESX host. After the error message, ESX drops into Troubleshooting (busy box) mode.


2. Find the .vmdk for the service console by running the command:






grep "/boot/cosvmdk" /etc/vmware/esx.conf






The output is similar to:






/boot/cosvmdk = "/






For example:






/boot/cosvmdk = "/vmfs/volumes/4a14d968-88bf7161-700f-00145ef48f76/esxconsole-4a14d906-2f96-7956-7284-00145ef48f74/esxconsole.vmdk"






3. Make note of the and the


4. Verify that the files exist by running the command:






ls -al /vmfs/volumes//






Where and is from the output of step 2.






The output is similar to:






total 7906560


drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 840 May 21 00:45 .


drwxr-xr-t 1 root root 2660 Oct 21 09:10 ..


-rw------- 1 root root 8095006720 Oct 26 15:37 esxconsole-flat.vmdk


-rw------- 1 root root 475 May 21 00:32 esxconsole.vmdk


drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 980 May 21 00:45 logs






5. Ensure that both the esxconsole-flat.vmdk and the esxconsole.vmdk files exist.






In my case, the esxconsole.vmdk file did not exist.






I troubleshoot using a modification to the following: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1002511






All the step in this section are important !!!






a. Identify and record the exact size of the -flat file using a command similar to:



# ls -l esxconsole-flat.vmdk


-rw------- 1 root root 4294967296 Oct 11 12:30 esxconsole-flat.vmdk


Write down this number (4294967296) it could be different in your case, it is usually 8GB !



b. Rename the file, as all the valuable data is in this file !


# mv esxconsole-flat.vmdk esxconsole-flat_ORIG.vmdk






c. Use the vmkfstools command to create a new virtual disk:



# vmkfstools -c 4294967296 -a buslogic esxconsole.vmdk



Remember to use buslogic as the bus type.



d. Rename the new blank created disk file esxconsole-flat.vmdk


# mv esxconsole-flat.vmdk esxconsole-flat_BLANK.vmdk



e. Rename the old console disk to the new file


# mv esxconsole-flat_ORIG.vmdk esxconsole-flat.vmdk






Type exit, or reboot the ESX server.






You will be able to boot the server normally.






Later, you can delete the file esxconsole-flat_BLANK.vmdk






Problem solved !










Note:


If the esxconsole-flat file does not exist in step 5, you must re-install the ESX host to recreate the service console.








Original VMware KBs:






http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1012874


http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1002511

/*.vmdk
values in the output.
/esxconsole.vmdk"