Nagios - Switch Interface Traffic

Posted Fri, 12/09/2011 - 17:03 by MWalker

I recently wanted to start monitoring some ports on my switch stack. Specifically several uplink ports and several trunk ports. Doing a little research I found the best plugin was the "check_iftraffic3" plugin available from the Nagios Plugin Exchange. Ref: http://exchange.nagios.org/directory/Plugins/Network-Connections%2C-Stats-and-Bandwidth/check_iftraffic3/details

How To - Linux Server Performance

Posted Fri, 12/09/2011 - 09:54 by MWalker

It is important to have a basic understanding of how to check out your Linux server's performance to help diagnose / troubleshoot various issues. Below is some useful tools and reference materials I have found helpful.

Notes - Building New ESXi Host for iSCSI with Jumbo Frames

Posted Tue, 11/15/2011 - 08:53 by MWalker

My notes from setting up ESXi 4.1 and ESXi 5 for iSCSI datastores.

  1. Install OS, configure Mgmt NIC and Mgmt IP Address
  2. Test vSphere client Access
  3. Open Console Session
    TroubleShooting Options, Local ESXi Shell
    Alt-F1 to access shell
  4. Create iSCSI vSwitch
    esxcfg-vswitch -a iSCSI
  5. Enable Jumbo Frames
    esxcfg-vswitch -m 9000 iSCSI

Microsoft Office Version Numbers (XP, 2003, 2007, 2010)

Posted Fri, 09/02/2011 - 11:15 by MWalker

Recently had to verify version numbers of Microsoft Office on numerous systems. Of course I hope to automate the process, but the starting point is to find out what all the various version numbers are. I compiled this table from the various KB articles into a single page for reference.

ESXi Custom Welcome Screen Text

Posted Fri, 08/26/2011 - 09:42 by MWalker

Recently I was asked about customizing the standard ESXi splash screen with a security message. While it is easy in ESX using a standard Linux approach, not as obvious for ESXi. However a quick google search found a nice little blog post on customizing the "welcome" file in /etc/vmware on the ESXi host.

PHP - Read Data from a CSV file

Posted Thu, 08/04/2011 - 15:25 by MWalker

I found myself needing to alter a PHP program I had that queried for data to one that read from a CSV file. After a little research, seems it is really straight forward. There is the fgetcsv function which makes it all a snap. Here is the example from PHP.net's website.

<?php
$row = 1;
if (($handle = fopen("test.csv", "r")) !== FALSE) {

PHP - Input Variables from URL

Posted Thu, 08/04/2011 - 08:10 by MWalker

I wanted to be able to generate a small little bit of content based on a variable the user sets. I could have created a small form, but in this case it was easier to pass the variable in a link based on a choice the user selected. Here is a really simple example of passing a variable via URL string to my php page.

if ($_GET["id"]) {
  $programID = $_GET["id"];
} else {

Fix - WMI Error EventID 10

Posted Wed, 08/03/2011 - 07:34 by MWalker

On two new 2008R2 Servers I noticed an error similar to:

Log Name: Application
Source: Microsoft-Windows-WMI
Date: 1/18/2008 2:37:27 PM
Event ID: 10
Task Category: None
Level: Error
Keywords: Classic

Fix - EventID 4007 DNS Server Error

Posted Wed, 08/03/2011 - 07:27 by MWalker

The DNS Server Event Log was throwing the Event ID: 4007 error for "domain.com" and "_msdcs.domain.com". When I investigated it seemed to be throwing it for an old AD integrated domain that was no longer in use. I was not the original creator of the environment, but was just trying to create some good clean living.

FIX - CHECK_ESX3.PL Script

Posted Thu, 07/28/2011 - 08:48 by MWalker

In my Nagios testing I was trying to work with the CHECK_ESX3.PL script to run some scripts against the ESX hosts in the environment. I installed the required VMware vSphere Perl SDK (latest from VMware's site). I was able to run "./check_esx3.pl" without any errors. However when I tried to run an actual check against a host I received: