Hello everyone. I have gathered all my presentations (slideshares) and published them in one place. Link to all my speeches is here but you can also use the menu above.
One speech also including recorded session – from infraXstructure 2016 conference.
Recently I developed a tool to analyze processes CPU utilization. My tool, called pCPUvis is currently in 0.7 version and is still in develop stage.
Manual is located on tool page.
And you can download this tool right here:
If you test it and like it, please post here your opinion and share this tool with your colleges. You can also follow me on Twitter or Facebook to receive updates about this tool.
Here is short script how to list all VMs (or hosts or other objects) from VMM with Custom Properties. You can also export such table to CSV format to import it in Excel and do some calculations.
When you want to list Custom Properties you have to use this CMDlet:
Get-SCCustomProperty | select Name, Members | Sort-Object Name
Name Members
---- -------
CustApp {}
Custom1 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom10 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom2 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom3 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom4 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom5 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom6 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom7 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom8 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Custom9 {VM, Template, VMHost}
Location {VM, Template, VMHost, HostCluster...}
VMEndDate {VM, Template}
And then you can list Virtual Machines. In this script we will use PSCustomObject to collect all the ingratiation and present it in tabular style.
$vmCPs = @()
# List all Custom Properties
$CPs = Get-SCCustomProperty | Where {$_.Members -like "VM"} | Sort-Object Name
# Custom Property filtering
# $CPs = Get-SCCustomProperty | Where {($_.Members -like "VM") -and ($_.Name -like "Custom1")} | Sort-Object Name
# List all VMs
$Members = Get-VM | Sort-Object Name
# VMs filtering
# $Members = Get-VM | Where {$_.Name -like "Servers*"} | Sort-Object Name
foreach($membObj in $Members) {
"Object: $($membObj.Name)"
$custObj = [PSCustomObject] @{}
Add-Member -InputObject $custObj -MemberType NoteProperty -Name "Name" -Value $membObj.name
# You can also add some additional data to the table, ie. CPU Count and Memory
# Add-Member -InputObject $custObj -MemberType NoteProperty -Name "CPUCount" -Value $membObj.CPUCount
# Add-Member -InputObject $custObj -MemberType NoteProperty -Name "Memory" -Value $membObj.Memory
# Here you list all the Custom Properties
foreach($cp in $CPs) {
$cpValue = Get-SCCustomPropertyValue -InputObject $membObj -CustomProperty $cp
Add-Member -InputObject $custObj -MemberType NoteProperty -Name $($cp.name) -Value $($cpValue.value)
}
$vmCPs += $custObj
}
$vmCPs | Format-Table -AutoSize
# List all columns
# $vmCPs | select *
If you want to export Hosts with Custom Properties you have to change those lines:
$CPs = Get-SCCustomProperty | Where {$_.Members -like "VMHost"} | Sort-Object Name
$Members = Get-SCVMHost | Sort-Object Name
To export this report (table) to CSV you can use Export-Csv CMDlet:
$vmCPs | Export-Csv -Path "VMs_with_CP.csv" -NoTypeInformation -Encoding Default
If you have any questions or suggestions pleas write it down below in comments.
When you publish private desktops to the users they see it in StoreFront under one common name – Delivery Group name.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
It’s OK, when you publish one desktop for one user. Of course you can check machine name, when you click on the Details.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
But what to do, when you assign more then one desktop (from the same Delivery Group) to one user. By default he will see each desktop with additional number – (1), (2), (3), … It’s annoying and might be confusing for users. Of course, still you can click on Details, but sill, it’s not a good solution.
It such case we can use attribute PublishedName in Desktop Machine object. By default it’s empty, but when you fill it with name, this value will be presented in StoreFront. Here is the PowerShell script.
Add-PSSnapin Citrix.*
$machines = Get-BrokerMachine -DesktopGroupName "YourDeliveryGroupName"
# alternative
# $machines = Get-BrokerDesktop -DesktopGroupName "YourDeliveryGroupName"
foreach($d in $machines)
{
$machineName = $d.MachineName.Split("\")
$newName = $machineName[1]
Set-BrokerMachine -InputObject $d -PublishedName $newName
# alternative
# Set-BrokerPrivateDesktop -InputObject $d -PublishedName $newName
}
And here is what we achieve:
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Short description from Citrix documentation:
PublishedName – Changes the name displayed to the user for this desktop. When this setting is $null, the name displayed is determined by the PublishedName of the desktop group.
As you can see, to revert the settings just set this attribute to $null value.
Important notice. This trick can be used only for Private Desktops.
When you are deploying PVS infrastructure based on Hyper-V you can observe Blue Screen (BSOD) during VM boot. SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED (CVhdMp.sys).
Image may be NSFW.
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It’s caused by incorrect streaming NIC identifier. The same issue you can observe, when you create new VM with existing disk (and OS). This problem was described in MSDN post:
Hyper-V: Why is networking reset in my VM when I copy a VHD?
Citrix post KB: Hyper-V Synthetic Network Interface Card Reinitializes on New Target Devices
I was wondering what is the root case and why this problem does not occur on XenServer or VMware.
From John’s post we know, that each NIC has it’s own GUID. Let’s try to find it for our NICs. Here it the example for my Dell laptop:
PS C:\> Get-NetAdapter | select ifDesc, ifAlias, PnPDeviceID ifDesc ifAlias PnPDeviceID ------ ------- ----------- Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-AC 8260 Wi-Fi PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_24F3&SUBSYS_00508086&REV_3A\F48C50FFFFCC6D9D00 Intel(R) Ethernet Connection I219-LM Ethernet PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_156F&SUBSYS_06DE1028&REV_21\3&11583659&0&FE
PnPDeviceID (from MSDN): Indicates the Win32 Plug and Play device ID of the logical device.
As you can see, I have 2 Network Adapters, both on PCI. We can look for the first device:
PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_24F3&SUBSYS_00508086&REV_3A\F48C50FFFFCC6D9D00
We have: VEN_xxxx (Vendor ID: 8086), DEV_xxxx (Device ID: 24F3). Let’s decode it:
VEN_8086
Intel Corporation
DEV_24F3
Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-AC 8260
Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-N 8260
SUBSYS_00508086
Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-AC 8260
Vendor list: https://driverlookup.com/hardware-id/pci
As you can see, who ever install this adapter in computer/laptop then he will see the same GUID.
XENSERVER
Let’s do the same on XenServer Virtual Machines.
PS C:\> Get-NetAdapter | select ifDesc, ifAlias, PnPDeviceID ifDesc ifAlias PnPDeviceID ------ ------- ----------- XenServer PV Network Device #0 Ethernet XENVIF\VEN_XS0002&DEV_NET&REV_00000000\0
We can check it on other VMs:
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
All VMs have the same GUID for all NICs.
So now we can check it on VMs on Hyper-V.
PS C:\> Get-NetAdapter | select ifDesc, ifAlias, PnPDeviceID
ifDesc ifAlias PnPDeviceID
------ ------- -----------
Microsoft Hyper-V Network Adapter #2 Data VMBUS\{F8615163-DF3E-46C5-913F-F2D2F965ED0E}\{38A2857B-7740-47D9-BE64-53561AD3F981}
Microsoft Hyper-V Network Adapter Streaming VMBUS\{F8615163-DF3E-46C5-913F-F2D2F965ED0E}\{E5D7B629-A61A-4788-9304-E192F3F8B8F6}
OK, that’s strange. This ID is in complete different format then it should be. The second part of this description is generated randomly for each new Virtual Machine. And this cause the problem. When you create the image – using PVS Imagining Wizzard – GUID for streaming network adapter is stored. When we create new VM (on Hyper-V) is will get the new GUID and when we try to boot it Windows can’t find the proper NIC and just crash (BSOD).
John also pointed, that this ID is stored in VM XML file. But it’s not supported just to change it right there.
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This GUID remain when you clone the VM. So unfortunately, you have to grab the image from one VM and then you have to clone it as many times as you need Target Devices.
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Citrix also published KB: How to Manually Create Hyper-V GEN2 Provisioning Services Target Devices but I have’t test it yet.
Last year, during 6th Polish Citrix User Group Meeting in Cracow I had a presentation titled “Complete Citrix environment monitoring“.
I know, that good and complete environment monitoring (both infrastructure and application layer) is a hard to achieve.
In the past I used PowerShell scripts and RRDtool to monitor some part of the whole environment (ie. monitoring Citrix licenses). It was good, but it doesn’t cover the whole spectrum. That’s why I moved to Splunk.
And finally, after almost one year (after PLCUG meeting) I decided to share some part of the scripts and help you to achieve the same as I did.
If you want to do the same, let’s check this page: Splunk – complete Citrix environment monitoring. All scripts are stored in my GitHub repo. And here are all pages
If you want to be informed about new monitoring parts – follow me on Facebook or Twitter. And please leave a comment presented topic is interested for you and you want more Image may be NSFW.
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If you think, that such monitoring is cool and useful, but you don’t know how to do this by your own. Or you don’t have enough time to to this, please contact me. I can consult it with you.
Three examples of useful Splunk dashboards:
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Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Short photo report from Regional Open Compute Project Summit 2018. This summit took place in Amsterdam Conference Center RAI at October 1st and 2nd.
Regional Summit: https://www.opencompute.org/summit/regional-summit-2018
Agenda schedule: https://www.opencompute.org/summit/regional-summit-2018/schedule
You can also check photos from ING Bank Use Case during OCP Track.
Image may be NSFW.During OCP Summit 4 companies had a chance to share their journeys with OCP gear. One of them was ING Bank Śląski S.A. (Poland), and I was one of the speaker (the second speaker was Mikołaj Kujawa).
Those Use Case was titled: “How OCP Helps ING Bank Slaski to Reduce TCO and Improve User Experience“
As soon as OCP Fundation will post all recorded presentation on Youtube channel I will also put here this record. And till now, here are some pictures from it.
Image may be NSFW.
