Passing through the weekend

One of the things I do on the weekend, is run my small data center….

Step(s) 3:

  • On new server
    • turn off hardware raid
    • install 6 new hot swap 2.5 to 3.5 to 5.25 enclosures
    • install 6 new ssds
    • boot and install xcp-ng on a raid0 array x2 ssds for boot partition
    • Build new software raid10 array for storage
    • build new storage resources, network resources and configure xcp backups
    • build guest for XenOrchestrator opensource & compile from source
  • On existing esxi server; for each vm:
    • remove open-vm-tools and disable service
    • shutdown vm
    • Use vmfkstools to convert thick provisioned disks to thin
    • Use ovftool to download and convert vmdk to ova
    • import ova into xcp, reconfigure mac address and dynamic memory settings
    • boot up vm, reconfigure primary network adapter, install xen tools

Tomorrow, I’m going to tear down the old esxi and rebuild new arrays for boot and storage and try and merge it into the xen pool and try to live transfer some guests between hosts in the pool. Wish me luck..

Then, if that all works, I’ll need to install another patch panel in the network rack, setup a new ups, and reconfigure the switch for new VLAN and trunk ports.

I will say that the pfsense on a protectli box with 6 ports, and a Unifi SDN costroller, managed switches and WAPs throughout the house had made the networking side extremely easy!

Maybe tonight I’ll find time to finish up the Azure DevOps course and get back to learning React.

Oh, and I mowed the lawn and took Bob for a ride too.

p.s. if anyone knows why mdadm isn’t activating my raid10 on reboot, please drop me a DM.. its a huge PITA.

p.p.s. Second xcp-ng server is up with 2x ssd raid1 arrays, 48GB of ram and the migrations between the two hosts completed; also created and deployed my first Azure ASE tonight. Tomorrow I relocate it to the secondary media closet.

Update a week later: media closet was still too hot so I attached a nice fan to it; dropped the CPU temp by 10 degrees!

On critical thinking

Think it's not illegal, Yet.
Think, It’s not illegal, Yet.

Found this post on my Facebook page from back in July, 2012.

What’s sad is, while I thought it was an issue then, it has gotten even worse, and is reminiscent of discussions I find myself having daily.

July 14, 2012

From my vantage point we are experiencing the unprecedented death of critical thinking in the public school systems, in corporate America, and society as a whole.

It seems we no longer teach children to think critically, rather we teach them to be “yes men” (used in a gender neutral sense). We teach them to go with the flow, to not rock the boat.

In corporate America, we want to raise leaders, but we want those leaders to do what they’re told, and not ask questions. We want them to succumb to the collective “group think” of the masses. We discourage individualism, and punish innovation.

I have been so recently fed up with the lack of critical thought process in our world and the self-destructive nature of society that I picked up the book Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand and have turned to it, to read it again, at least as another intellectual to commiserate with (I have thoroughly enjoyed some of her other books).

I thought I would leave you with a quote, and then ask you if you sit back and think about it, does this reflect your experience too?

“[you are a] brilliant child who has not seen enough of life to grasp the full measure of human stupidity. I’ve fought it all my life. I’m very tired. . . . Intelligence? It is such a rare, precarious spark that flashes for a moment somewhere among men, and vanishes. One cannot tell its nature, or its future . . . or its death. . . .”

My Phone ate it…

I remember back when I was a kid, the typical excuse for why you were late, or didn’t do your homework, or forgot about something was “The dog ate the calendar”, “The Hamster ate the homework”, etc.

Today it seems in our day and age of connected gadgets and doohickeys; we are now turning to more sophisticated excuses.

For example; the most popular one in the white collar world of the Treo and Q’s and Blackberries is “My phone ate it”…

Bad Phone! Put that Calendar entry down! J