And how to propely shutdown solaris/open solaris?

Answer is enter the command

init 0

Also, a really good explanation for this is here.

How to build a data storage and VM Server using comodity hardware and free software

Requisites:

1) RAID protection for data
We'll use ZFS as filesystem. RAIDZ is somewhat akin to RAID5 and should provide better performance than other types of software RAID5 with several advantages that we'll discuss later.

2) UPS power outage protection
UPSes are expensive, and we're keeping our costs down. ZFS RAIDZ works eleminates the RAID5 loophole. This won't replace an UPS for all it is needed for, but we'll greatly improve the odds of not data corruption for files directly stored on the ZFS filesystem in the event of sudden power loss.

3) Controlled costs
ZFS is available on Linux trough xxxxx or natively in Open Solaris. Both cost zilch and can be used professionaly without costs.
Because cost is a factor, storage host and VM host should be the same hardware so direct access to hard disks by VM should be supported.

4) Ease of use and management and multiple OS virtualization ability
Even if setup is not a walk in the park, usage and maintnance should be easy. Also the virtualization environment should allow for windows, linux, solaris and as many of other OSes as possbible. This means Vmware, Xen Server, or xxxxx.



At the time i bought the parts to build the computer i did not buy a motherboard + cpu combination that allowed for direct hardware access using vmware as Intel Directed I/O is needed. Alas, one must go around this. In fact going around is cheaper.

Hardware used:
- Asus P5Q3 motherboard
- Intel Quad Core Q9550 cpu
- 8gb DDR3
- 4x 1TB HDD
- 1x 80gb old HDD (original plan was to use 16gb USB pen, but was unable to create a datastore on a USB pen.)
- Power supply, silent box, fanless cpu cooler.

The plan:

1) Install VMWARE 4.0 ESXi on the bare metal.

1.1) Install VMWARE 4.0 ESXi to the 80 GB HDD

2) Install Open Solaris 2009.06

OpenSolaris is being prefered to linux zfs support because of performance. I have read everywere about how much peformance is lost so we'll stick to linux. However, on the Open Solaris side, there is no paracirtualization support in VMWARE ESXi and as far as i can tell, no support for VMNET3 virtual NIC, so i don't really know wich one is better, but have bet on Open Solaris anyway.

Moving on.

2.1) Create VM to install Open Solaris into
First create a new virtual machine. 1 GB RAM should be enough and i don't see the advantage of more than 1 cpu, performance wise. No need for a large hard drive, too, 5gb should be enough as the only job for OpenSolaris will be to run the ZFS filesystem, and to offer an ISCSI target for ESXi to connect to and eventually offer shares for access to files stored.

2.2) Installation itself
No special requirements for installing. Just next, next, next, answering the several queries should be fairly easy.

2.3) Installing VMWARE Tools on OpenSolaris 2009.06
There are no vmware tools available for Open Solaris. However the package available for Solaris 10 should do fine, with some modifications.

unzip the vmware tools:

gunzip vmware-solaris-tools.tar.gz

untar the vmware tools:

tar -xf vmware-solaris-tools.tar

now, execute the installer:

./vmware-install.pl

Just press enter on every query.

you will get an error:

Unable to copy the source file
/user/lib/vmware-tools/configurator/XOrg/7.4/vmware_drv.so to the destination
file /usr/X11/lib/modules/drivers/vmware_drv.so

what you need to do is the following:

mkdir /usr/lib/vmware-tools/configurator/XOrg/7.4
cp /usr/lib/vmware-tools/configurator/XOrg/7.1/* /usr/lib/vmware-tools/configurator/XOrg/7.4

then re-execute the installer:

./vmware-install.pl

Again, just press enter on any query.

Now, VMWARE Tools should be installed. This will add improvements to performance.

Next, restart Open Solaris.

Voilá, open solaris is now installed, with VMware Tools loaded. Nice.

How to map persistent smb shares under linux

1 - How to map a share under linux command line.

I - Everything in Linux is all about the filesystem. So, first create a folder to wich later we will map the windows share:

cd /mnt
sudo mkdir myshare

Naming the folder you create on the linux machine with the windows share name is probably a good idea as one will be redirecting to the other.

II - here is the command to mount the share. Remember, if you want to be able to write, delete, modify files and folders in the windows machine the WINDOWSUSERNAME and WINDOWSPASSWORD you are supplying must have those permissions.

sudo mount -t cifs //IPOFTHEWINDOWSBOX/myshare /mnt/myshare -o username=WINDOWSUSERNAME,password=WINDOWSPASSWORD

III - Now problem is this mapping will be forgotten on next reboot. So how to make sure the mapping is performed upon poweron?

a) First create a hidden file (with a dot on the beginning) with the windows username and apssword:

Tif and BMP....

@echo off
:start
cls
@echo OPEN TIFF WITH:
@echo.
@echo 1 - Office Image
@echo 2 - Image Fax Viewer
@echo.
set /p userinp=Choose an Option (1-2) and press ENTER:
set userinp=%userinp:~0,1%
if "%userinp%"=="1" goto 1
if "%userinp%"=="2" goto 2


echo invalid choice
goto start
:2
call c:\software\tif\sanurifv.bat
pause
goto end
:1
call c:\software\tif\menu2.bat
goto end


:end
pause>nul

CD-R drive or CD-RW drive is not recognized as a recordable device

CD-R drive or CD-RW drive is not recognized as a recordable device Article ID	:	316529
Last Review	:	October 16, 2007
Revision	:	3.0

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316529/

How to install VMWare Tools under CENTOS 5.1

1. Install software needed by VMware Tools

1.Install packages to build the kernel modules:

yum install gcc kernel-devel

2. Check the running kernel matches the kernel headers

uname -r # running kernel
rpm -q kernel-devel # installed kernel headers

3. If the two versions do not match, run

yum -y upgrade kernel kernel-devel
reboot

4. Find out where the kernel headers are (you may need this later)

ls -d /usr/src/kernels/$(uname -r)*/include


5. Install VMWARE TOOLS

5.1 # Extract VMware Tools to /tmp/

tar -C /tmp -zxvf VMwareTools-5.5.3-34685.tar.gz

5.2 Now run the installer

cd /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib
./vmware-install.pl

DONE!

Basic Unix commands

Check out this link:

http://www.ss64.com/bash/