VM Super Genius

A Flipboard Primer

For those of you lucky enough to have an iPad, there is a fantastic new free app called Flipboard. Dubbed as “stuff you care about all in one place,” it displays articles, pictures, videos and tweets from your social networks (currently only Twitter and Facebook) in a really easy to read magazine format. You even “turn pages” like a book, so almost no interface familiarization is needed.

On its initial release, the demand was so overwhelming that their authentication servers could not link your Facebook or Twitter accounts. I was still able to read Flipboard’s own picks and curated feeds. After about a week, I got an invite to add my Twitter/Facebook accounts and the fun began. It will unfurl many (not all) URL shorteners like bit.ly, ping.fm and even youtu.be (by just embedding the video as the article). It will also expand common article sites like Wikipedia. All this while displaying the original source site as the “byline.”

It will show your entire Twitter feed, but those of us that have an eclectic collection of Twitter friends will not get a lot out of that feed on Flipboard. You can, however, specify specific users and lists (finally a use for lists!), which brings us to the point of this article:

Using Flipboard for Virtualization!

I actually searched and searched, achieving almost Eric Siebert levels of searching and was not able to find a single list that met my needs for a list that has a good mix (one primarily of articles and media with a bit of commentary peppered in). The best one I could find was a single user: Planet V12n at @planetv12n. This is the Twitter feed for VMware’s list of virtualization-related articles by the community, including non-VMware employee blogs. From a content perspective it is the most complete, plus it is curated by someone else, so very little tweaking is necessary. There are some small drawbacks, though. All articles are shown as being shared by planetv12n, which kind of detracts from the social aspect of Flipboard. Most people RT and share directly from the source, so this is an excellent resource for the classic newspaper scenario, albeit customized.

Given that, I started gathering users from the Twitterverse for one single Twitter list to subscribe to. I created v12n-for-flipboard and added that. Because it is new, you need to add it exactly, as opposed to a search, so in the Add Section box, type in: @vmsupergenius/v12-for-flipboard, at least until their servers update more often.

v12n-for-flipboard is an aggregated list of virtualization Twitterers. They were culled from these Twitter lists:

• Duncan Epping’s VCDX list
• Maish’s VMware vExpert 2010 list (and Arnim’s vExpert post)
• Eric Siebert’s Top 25 Bloggers list
• Eric Siebert’s Top 100 VMware People list

The great part about this style of list is not only are they originally sourced, thereby allowing you to engage in a real social conversation, but you can use Flipboard to hide individual users. But be warned: hiding a user in one section hides them in all sections. So if you feel a user is too chatty in re: v12n, hiding them will also mask them from your All Friends list and any other section you might have. They can always be unhidden.

Wrap Up and Caveats

Being a very popular 1.0 (if that) product, Flipboard has a few issues. First off, there is a lot of duplication of articles and some of the short URL expansion is not perfect. They have a very active section on Get Satisfaction and are working to resolve these, so it is merely a matter of time before those get fixed (more and more URL shorteners have been added since I started using it, for instance). Also, some of the article-embedded picture cropping  is odd, leading to many people “peeking” over the edge of the articles.

Otherwise, this is a great tool for perusing articles as well as getting your long-form reading list ready with a tool like Instapaper or Read It Later.

Please continue this conversation below, either with some Flipboard tips and tricks or Twitter users that you think I should add to v12n-for-flipboard.

Cruising through the KB RSS feed (http://feeds.vmware.com/p/subscribe if you haven’t already) and came across a few KB articles that help you out if your VM won’t start. This only covers the hosted products (Workstation, Server, etc.) but each one links to some good troubleshooting articles that even apply to ESX/vSphere.

Cannot power on a hosted virtual machine after a migration
Cannot power on a hosted virtual machine after it fails
Cannot power on a hosted virtual machine after changing something
and finally
Cannot power on a hosted virtual machine when nothing changed

You may have seen some maps before about what ports need to be opened for a fully functioning VMware virtual infrastructure. A co-worker of mine, Aaron Sweemer has posted the work of one of our non-blogging counterparts, Dudley Smith. Dudley has created not only a diagram (PDF here), but a dynamic mapping list to help cull out the chaff you might not need for your specific deployment:

Connections & Ports in ESX & ESXi

You can filter by vCenter, ESX only, and many other options.

Print the PDF and use it for your office/cube’s wallpaper. I know I sure will.

I have updated the completely unofficial list of parties going on at VMworld 2009 on VMware’s VMworld community site:

Unofficial VMworld 2009 Party List

Let me know if you know of anything else.

A common hurdle I have to overcome in my day-to-day job is trying to get those who haven’t tried the advanced features of vSphere to try them, due almost exclusively to lack of access to the shared storage (Fiber Channel, iSCSI or NAS) that enables them. Understandable, since enterprise level shared storage can start in the 5 figures. Even partners have a hard time justifying the cost of something like that, thus the creation of this list. For almost everyone, it is a lot easier to get a hold of x86 servers than it is to get an array in-house.

Linkbait title aside, the purpose of this list is to get as many options out to VMware customers and partners to allow for set up of evals, proofs of concept and  demo labs while minimizing cost of entry.

This list was culled from casual discussions, both internal and on Twitter. I am trying to keep the criteria as objective as possible. Let me know if there is anything criteria or appliance-wise that you think needs adding.

You can find the consistently updated list at Free Storage for Your Lab.

As I figure out the format and content of this blog, the format and theme may change until I settle down. Which may be never.

Comments appreciated.

I know I already have a HUGE following, so you may have to stand in line if you want to touch my clothing.

I will be on the lab staff for LAB02, which is being run by Michael White (creator of the highly informative SRM FAQ). From the catalog:

VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager – Advanced Operations
You already have SRM installed! What do you need to know now? This lab will cover off troubleshooting, advanced networking for testing, DNS management, log reading and more. Attendees will walk away with knowledge about troubleshooting and using some of the advanced features of SRM.
Technical Level: Advanced (even though it is more Intermediate)

It focuses primarily on troubleshooting an SRM install using logs and other cues, as well as some of the less-documented features (like Bulk IP upload).

We have multiple sessions scheduled, so find them all at the VMworld Schedule Builder.