Open two excel sheets and split them across two monitors

Thanks to...
http://blog.drewery.net/2006/08/29/utilising-dual-monitors-with-microsoft-excel-2003/

Folder options -> File types tab ->
Select XLS -> Advanced -> Select OPEN -> add space and "%1" at the end of the string in
'Application used to perform action' field.
UNSelect USE DDE.... ok out of everything.

The above steps should enable you to split excel files across two monitors.

WIN 7 does not have FILE Types tab..... Win 7... this was not my idea... ;-)

Cheers

VMcopy

http://www.vladan.fr/plug-in-the-external-usb-drive-to-esx-server-directly-to-backup-or-copy/

Sometimes you would like to use your external USB drive to backup (transfer) your VMDK files directly from your ESX Server external USB drive. VMDK files are files with extention *.VMDK and those files are virtual hard disks of your virtual machines. You can also mount VMDK files directly into your Windows PC.

When you plug-in external USB drive to ESX host you need to enter some commands at the console. For those of you who don’t really know linux, there is some commands to remember. But they are not many…. -:) .

First of all you should know that not all filesystems are supported. For the supported ones there are those here:

* FAT32 read/write.
* Ext3 read/write
* NTFS read only (that means that you can’t use NTFS formated USB drives to copy your VMDK files, but you should create a partition with EXT3 or FAT32)

Now how-to copy data from Service Console to a USB device:

1. Plugin the external USB drive to your ESX host.
2. Run this command to find out to which device name the kernel assigned to it:

tail /var/log/dmesg

3. Now you will have to Run the following command to create a mount point (A mount point is a directory which a device or partition is attached to):

mkdir /mnt/usb

esx-how-to-mount-usb-drive

4. Run the following command to mount the drive ( When mounting, you must tell the mount command what is the device or partition you want to mount and what is the mount point. The mount point must be a directory that already exists on your system.:

mount /dev/[device_name] /mnt/usb -t [filesystem_type]

Please Note that you must:
* Replace [device_name] with your device name found in step 2
* Replace [filesystem_type] with vfat (FAT32) or ext3

5. After your copy(backup) you can type this command to unmount the device:

umount /dev/[device_name]

You might also want to export you VMDK files. Vmkstools is VMware ESX Server file system management tool. It is a program for creating and manipulating virtual disks, file systems, logical volumes and pyhsical storage device on the VMware ESX Server. Now what you need to do to export the VMDK (virtual disk)? You will use a command ‘vmfkstools’:

vmkfstools -i /vmfs/volumes/[datastore_name]/[vm_name]/[vm_name].vmdk /mnt/usb/[vm_name].vmdk -d 2gbsparse

And how-to import the VMDK (virtual disk):

vmkfstools -i /[path_to_USB_mount]/[vm_name].vmdk /vmfs/volumes/[datastore_name]/[vm_name]/[vm_name].vmdk

You might also want to copy the configuration files for a virtual machine. Those files are files with following extentions: *.vmx *.log *.nvram *.vmxf *.vmsd (you will not only copy the configuration files, but at the same time you will make a zip file in tar.gz format:

cd /vmfs/volumes/[datastore_name]/[vm_name]
tar -czvf [vm_name].tar.gz *.vmx *.log *.nvram *.vmxf *.vmsd
cp [vm_name].tar.gz /mnt/usb

Now you will be able to extract the configuration files of a virtual machine:

tar -xzvf [vm_name].tar.gz /vmfs/volumes/[datastore_name]/[vm_name]

Services.exe using up all your memory ? and windows hangs after launch?

I have faced an issue today, where one of the servers kept showing 100% CPU usage and after investigation it turned out to be services.exe taking up most of the cpu time.

After reading few forums, followed a suggestion by someone, to delete all logs from event logs.

This is the reasoning:

Whenever Windows recognises any failure either software/Hardware it makes a entry in the system log. And when you start your machine again this system log entry will be checked and Windows will try to search for a possible solution / or try to analyse the causes of failure.How to check this..

Click ctrl + alt + del – Open your task manager and click processes. And see how much memory the process services.exe is using, If it exceeds say 10%, you can be sure you are having the diagnostic problem.In the below picture the services.exe is running normally.

I did try the above option. and it did make a difference to the performance.
However, before i deleted the logs i found lot of the below warnings under app logs.

Event Type: Warning
Event Source: EvntAgnt
Event Category: None
Event ID: 3006
Date: 5/03/2010
Time: 10:17:13 AM
User: N/A
Computer: PRDSVRMGS
Description:
Error reading log event record. Handle specified is 691944. Return code from ReadEventLog is 87.

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.


Cheers

Rahul

IIS Related issues... contact this guy....

IIS issues? Contact the guy at this website.

http://www.iis-aid.com/

Recreate vmdk files for stuffed/corrupted VMs

Below is the command to monitor any processes on the vm

ps -auxwww |grep -i .vmx ( KAD says )



________________sample vmdk file________________

FIRST VMDK FILE CREATED ->

# Disk DescriptorFile
version=1
CID=e77e6a48
parentCID=ffffffff
createType="vmfs"

# Extent description
RW 52454274 (GEt this by dividing flat vmdk size value with 512) VMFS "TST-DB01-flat.vmdk"

# The Disk Data Base
#DDB

ddb.adapterType = "buslogic"
ddb.geometry.sectors = "63"
ddb.geometry.heads = "255" (if flat file bigger then 2 gb)
ddb.geometry.cylinders = "3265" (Get this by dividing FLAT VMDK file size by 8225280
ddb.uuid = "60 00 C2 95 5b 34 57 49-ad 95 7c 96 81 c1 b0 f3"
ddb.toolsVersion = "7302"
ddb.virtualHWVersion = "4"


_______VMDK desc file of a snapshot of the vm_______________

# Disk DescriptorFile
version=1
CID=7dec0e38
parentCID=e77e6a48 (need to chain it with parent)
createType="vmfsSparse"
parentFileNameHint="PDC-TST-DB01.vmdk" (this should be the desc file not flat file)
# Extent description
RW 52454274 VMFSSPARSE "PDC-TST-DB01-000001-delta.vmdk"

# The Disk Data Base
#DDB

____________________________END OF FILE______________________________

VMX file of the above machine, Notice it has two disks mentioned below, but i havent put the vmdk for the second disk
____________________________________


#!/usr/bin/vmware
config.version = "8"
virtualHW.version = "4"
floppy0.present = "false"
nvram = "PDC-TST-DB01.nvram"
deploymentPlatform = "windows"
virtualHW.productCompatibility = "hosted"
tools.upgrade.policy = "manual"
powerType.powerOff = "default"
powerType.powerOn = "default"
powerType.suspend = "default"
powerType.reset = "default"

displayName = "PDC-TST-DB01"
extendedConfigFile = "PDC-TST-DB01.vmxf"

scsi0.present = "true"
scsi0.sharedBus = "none"
memsize = "1024"
scsi0:0.present = "true"
scsi0:0.fileName = "PDC-TST-DB01-000001.vmdk"
scsi0:0.deviceType = "scsi-hardDisk"
sched.scsi0:0.shares = "normal"
scsi0:1.present = "true"
scsi0:1.fileName = "PDC-TST-DB01_1-000001.vmdk"
scsi0:1.deviceType = "scsi-hardDisk"
sched.scsi0:1.shares = "normal"
ide0:0.present = "true"
ide0:0.fileName = "/dev/scd0"
ide0:0.deviceType = "atapi-cdrom"
ethernet0.present = "true"
ethernet0.wakeOnPcktRcv = "false"
ethernet0.networkName = "PROTECTED"
ethernet0.addressType = "vpx"
ethernet0.generatedAddress = "00:50:56:a5:39:c6"
guestOS = "winnetstandard"
uuid.bios = "50 25 c5 2f 02 02 71 ec-bf 14 72 2e f9 39 df 77"
log.fileName = "vmware.log"
snapshot.action = "keep"
sched.cpu.min = "0"
sched.cpu.units = "mhz"
sched.cpu.shares = "normal"
sched.mem.minsize = "0"
sched.mem.shares = "normal"

scsi0:0.redo = ""
scsi0:1.redo = ""
vmware.tools.requiredversion = "7302"
dMotion.enabled = "FALSE"

tools.syncTime = "FALSE"
uuid.location = "56 4d 37 d2 4d 30 08 fd-a0 18 c9 93 90 9a 28 a4"
migrate.hostlog = "./PDC-TST-DB01-07f9ca4f.hlog"
sched.mem.max = "1024"
sched.swap.derivedName = "/vmfs/volumes/488ad642-565ee789-4ece-001f2963b16a/PDC-TST-DB01/PDC-TST-DB01-07f9ca4f.vswp"
scsi0:0.DMotionParent = ""
scsi0:1.DMotionParent = ""

workingDir = "."

cpuid.1.ecx = "x----0----0--0-R-----------0-0--"
cpuid.1.ecx.amd = "x---------------------------0---"
cpuid.80000001.ecx.amd = "------------------00-00---------"
cpuid.80000001.edx = "----H---------------------------"
hostCPUID.0 = "0000000a756e65476c65746e49656e69"
guestCPUID.0 = "0000000a756e65476c65746e49656e69"
userCPUID.0 = "0000000a756e65476c65746e49656e69"
hostCPUID.1 = "0001067600040800000ce3bdbfebfbff"
guestCPUID.1 = "0001067800010800000822010febbbff"
userCPUID.1 = "0001067600040800000822010febbbff"
hostCPUID.80000001 = "00000000000000000000000120000000"
guestCPUID.80000001 = "00000000000000000000000120000000"
userCPUID.80000001 = "00000000000000000000000120000000"
evcCompatibilityMode = "FALSE"

scsi0:2.present = "false"
scsi0:2.fileName = "PDC-TST-DB01_2.vmdk"
scsi0:2.mode = "independent-persistent"
scsi0:2.deviceType = "scsi-hardDisk"

scsi0:2.redo = ""

Websense Policy server won't start

Called websense support after following everything on their support pages.

Had to take out 'WebsenseDb' account from the local admin group, bcos the websense policy database service was starting and stopping with the message that it had nothing to do.
After taking of the account from the local admin group, it remained in started mode.
Policy broker was started next,
Policy Server
Network agent,
user service
and the rest after that

Go figure...
Any explanation on how the about would make a different to the service would be great help.

Cheers
rahul

The SQL Server Agent (MSSQLSERVER) service on local computer started and then stopped

THIS worked for me.

Unable to start SQL Server Agent

We are unable to start SQL Server Agent. It was giving the following error when we were trying to start it from the services console

The SQL Server Agent (MSSQLSERVER) service on Local Computer started and then stopped. Some services stop automatically if they have no work to do, for example, the Performance Logs and Alerts service.

When we try to change the service account for SQL Server Agent we get the below error,

The process terminated unexpectedly. [0x8007042b]

Tried to start SQL Server Agent from the command prompt using:

SQLAGENT90 -C -V>C:\SQLAGENT.OUT

SQLAGENT.OUT:

Unable to rename C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\LOG\SQLAGENT.OUT to C:\ProgramFiles\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\LOG\SQLAGENT.1 (reason: The system cannot find the path specified)

2007-08-24 10:10:31 - ! [241] Startup error: Unable to initialize error reporting system (reason: The system cannot find the path specified)

2007-08-24 10:10:31 - ? [098] SQLServerAgent terminated (normally)

Resolution:

Checked the value of key ErrorLogFile in the following registry hive:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\SQLServerAgent

ErrorLogFile key had the below value:

C:\ProgramFiles\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\LOG\SQLAGENT.out

However we did not had any such directory present on the machine. Also we did not had any SQLAgent log file.

Changed the value in the ErrorLogFile key to reflect the correct location of the log folder which was on a different drive.

After making the changes we were able to start the SQL Server Agent.