Archive
Allowing Veeam to backup to non-Domain shares via PowerShell
Getting Veeam to backup via a PowerShell script to a share on a server that was not part of a domain proved to be less than easy. I kept getting numerous errors about Veeam not being able to create folders. This solution took me ages to find, so I thought I’d post it here – so it’s easy for me to find, plus helpful for others!
You’ll need to change the Logon properties of the Veeam Data Mover service to an account that can access the share. You’ll also need to enter the password for the relevant account and then restart the Veeam Data Mover service. Do this by firing up services.msc, then finding the Veeam Data Mover service. Right-click, choose Properties, then click the Log On tab. Enter the relevant account information and hit Apply, then OK. Then right-click on the service and choose Restart.
Redirecting folders in OS X to a network drive
I’ve recently managed to get OS X 10.7.1 running on my Core i7 box. My setup at home is such that I have a Dell Dimension E521 AMD x2 box stuffed with a couple of 1TB drives in a mirrored RAID-1 array acting as a file server amongst other things.
I wanted to be able to redirect folders such as Music and Documents in the /users/neil folder on my Mac to point to those on my server.
Having added a connection to my server via the Finder by using Go – Connect to Server… and adding it – in my case, it’s a Windows 2008 R2 box, so uses SMB for file sharing. Having put in smb://dellserv/storage (storage being the name of the share) and authenticating with my username and password, I was good to go.
For good measure, I also went to System Preferences – Users, then selected my username and added the share under Login Items to ensure that it is mounted when my Core i7 box boots up.
The next step was to actually create the symbolic links – these allow us to set up the redirect and are a very useful feature in any Unix/Linux/BSD-based system (OS X is based on BSD). I’ve worked with them previously when using Macs in the past plus when dabbling with Linux.
The aim is to redirect Documents, Music, Pictures, Movies and Downloads to their relevant locations on the Dell box.
First, we need to bring up a Terminal window (from Applications – Utilities).
Using Music as our first example, we need to first delete the existing Music directory on the Mac. As the folder is treated as a system folder, we need elevated permissions, hence the use of the sudo command:
corei7:volumes neil$ sudo rm -rf /users/neil/Music
Password: (enter your password here)
Next, we need to set up the symbolic link, which creates the redirect to the Dell box. Remember that the SMB (Windows) share is mounted on the Mac in /volumes/sharename. The command is as follows:
corei7:volumes neil$ ln -s /Volumes/storage/Neil/Music/ /users/neil/Music
ln -s creates the symbolic link (i.e. the redirect), /Volumes/storage indicates the Windows share plus the path to the music folder on the Dell server and /users/Neil/Music is the path to the Music folder on the Mac.
Repeat for your other folders – I’ve pasted the output for the others that I used below:
corei7:volumes neil$ sudo rm -rf /users/neil/Downloads/
corei7:volumes neil$ ln -s /Volumes/storage/Neil/Downloads/ /users/neil/Downloads
corei7:volumes neil$ sudo rm -rf /users/neil/Pictures/
corei7:volumes neil$ ln -s /Volumes/storage/Neil/Photos/ /users/neil/Pictures
corei7:volumes neil$ sudo rm -rf /users/neil/Movies
corei7:volumes neil$ ln -s /Volumes/storage/Neil/Videos/ /users/neil/Movies
corei7:volumes neil$ sudo rm -rf /users/neil/Documents
corei7:volumes neil$ ln -s /Volumes/storage/Neil/Documents/ /users/neil/Documents
Don’t forget to change the first part in the ln -s commands to point to the correct location on your network drive! The above is an example using the network paths on my network.
Job done – hopefully if you go into your home folder in Finder and click on Music or Documents etc. then you’ll be redirected to the relevant location on your network.
Hope you’ll find this of use! Comments/feedback appreciated!
Ubuntu 11,10 – first impressions
This week saw the release of Ubuntu 11.10, which could also be considered a tribute to the late Dr. Dennis Ritchie, who was heavily involved in the development of Unix and the C programming language. Both of these technologies are essential building blocks in the Linux arena, owing to the fact Linux was developed as a Unix clone and coded in C.
Last night, I pulled down the ISO image for the 64-bit desktop release of 11.10 and installed it into a VMWare virtual machine. Installation was easy – no change from the previous 11.04 version and it’s a very straightforward routine. The usual choosing of disk partition, language and time zone etc.
You can also boot Ubuntu from other media – a bootable CD (by burning the ISO image to one) or create a bootable USB key. It can be an extremely useful tool for salvaging data off non-booting Windows systems or those that are infected with a virus or malware, as the infected will not be active when Ubuntu is booted, making it a safe platform to back data up from the infected PC.
After the VM booted for the first time, I was presented with a login screen not dissimilar to the Windows XP one. After clicking on my username and entering my password, I was presented with the Unity desktop. The Unity desktop was first introduced in the 10.10 Netbook release and became a core part of the Desktop release in version 11.04, but there was also an option within Ubuntu to switch back to the standard Gnome ‘Classic’ desktop. If you want Gnome ‘Classic’, you’ll now need to install the Gnome Desktop package.
Gone are familiar menus at the top of the screen, although the icons that make up the equivalent of the Windows System Tray are still present in the top right-hand side. Occupying the full length of the left-hand side is an applications launch bar or dock. There are some pre-defined shortcuts to apps – such as Firefox already present as part of the default install. Right-clicking on a shortcut allows you to remove it. Other applications can be launched/installed by clicking the ‘Ubuntu’ icon at the top of the launch bar. You can also drag applications to the launch bar for quick access.
Back in version 11.04, LibreOffice replaced OpenOffice. LibreOffice is a fork of Oracle’s OpenOffice and is produced by The Document Foundation. It began as a result of concerns that Oracle would either discontinue or place restrictions on OpenOffice. I’ve not personally used LibreOffice yet, but a quick look shows that it is extremely similar to OpenOffice, which makes sense, given that it originates from the same code base.
In summary, Ubuntu 11.10 looks to be a useful update to the operating system. It’s easy to install, offers a range of applications that would give you a useful, working platform with a fully featured office suite. LibreOffice is compatible with Microsoft Office, although glitches can and do occur with document conversion from time to time.
Importing .m3u playlists into iTunes 10.4.x on Windows
When Apple released the 10.4.x versions of iTunes. support for importing playlists in .m3u format seemed to have become broken. Having spent considerable time today creating some playlists on my main desktop PC, it was very frustrating to find out that they wouldn’t import properly into the iTunes library on my laptop.
The fix requires modifying your .m3u playlist file and can be easily carried out in any text editor such as Notepad. Please note that it is extremely important that you get the file paths correct or the playlists will not work!
In my case, I store music in D:\Neil\Music (I set up redirects to Music, Videos etc. to relevant folders within D:\Neil). The file structure is the same on both my laptop and desktop systems and I keep directory structures and contents synced using SyncBack, using my Buffalo LinkStation NAS box as a backup source and a sync source for the laptop.
First, you need to export the file from iTunes. To do this, right-click on the playlist of your choice and choose ‘Export’. Choose where to save the file and change the file type to .m3u.
Next, open exported .m3u file up in Notepad. You’ll find the relevant paths to the music will look similar to this:
#EXTM3U
#EXTINF:293,Can’t Fight This Feeling – REO Speedwagon
D:\Neil\Music\Compilations\Take It On The Run_ The Best Of REO Spee2 Can’t Fight This Feeling.mp3
The first step is to replace the first part of the path to the drive. We need to replace D:\ to file://localhost/D:/file://localhost/D:/, where D can be changed with the drive letter than is relevant in your case.
To do this, go to the Edit menu and select Replace. Enter the relevant item to find – e.g. D:\ and the item to replace it with – e.g. file://localhost/D:/file://localhost/D:/. Click Replace All and then Cancel.
The next step is to replace the rest of the ‘\‘ characters in the file to ‘/‘ characters. To do this, go to the Edit menu and select Replace. Enter the relevant item to find – \ and the item to replace it with – /. Click Replace All and then Cancel.
Next, save the file. Repeat if necessary with any other playlists. You can also make other changes using the above method for different paths etc.
To import the file on the target computer, open iTunes and also ensure a Windows Explorer window is open with the .m3u files present. Drag the files onto the iTunes sidebar.
You should be all done!
Non user-servicable hardware
Well it had to come sooner or later – what’s an IT blog without a good rant?
I look after a number of Asus eeeBox’s at work. These are essentially Netbook hardware in a very small form factor, with a VESA mount that allows you to fix the box to the back of a monitor. I’m not a great fan of the hardware – a pokey 1.6Ghz Atom with 2GB RAM and 160GB S-ATA hard drive. These seem to suffer from extremely slow disk I/O – I suspect with an SSD – or even a 7200RPM hard drive, they’d be a bit more sprightly. However, for general office apps and space-saving, they are a good concept.
They also occasionally suffer from the issue of not booting at all and going through the POST (Power On Self Test). When they were under warranty, I used to send them back to Asus (via the supplier). Asus had an awful turnaround of at least a month. However, a year has now passed – the length of the warranty, so that is no longer a cost-effective option. Plus, it would be good to be able to know how to fix the problem.
Some work with Google seemed to indicate that the non-POSTing issue could be fixed by disconnecting the CMOS battery for a few minutes with the system unplugged from the mains, then re-connecting the battery. Sounds simple enough.
However, Asus, in their wisdom have designed these things so as they are not user serviceable. Apart from an easy to swap-out hard drive cage, the only way to get in to these eeeBox’s is to remove two screws from the frame, gently prise off both side panels, being careful not to snap off the little lugs. You are then presented with two metal panels held together with a number of small screws. Having removed those, the next step is to remove the chassis from the plastic frame – done by removing four larger screws – which aren’t easy to get back in. Having removed a number of smaller screws to separate both panels, you can now get to said battery! Thankfully, all the connections to the PC are still accessible, so I could test before re-assembly – all was good and the machine worked again when I put it all back together.
However, would it have been so difficult for Asus to actually allowed an easier access panel that provides access to the CMOS battery – especially as this is a common problem! At the same time, they could have provided easy access to the laptop-sized SODIMM memory slots at the same time!
This would have saved much time with assembly and disassembly and would have been both easy and cheap to implement! The hard drive is user accessible, so I’m wondering what possessed their design time to come up with the idea of the battery and memory being as difficult as possible to swap out!
With organisations being more cost-conscious, the eeeBox isn’t a bad solution for some applications and actually makes sense as a ‘fleet PC’ for organisations. But please think of us techies that keep these things working – there really is no excuse in this day and age not to allow easy access to certain components!
WordPress iPhone app
Testing out the WordPress iPhone app. Seems easy enough to use and offs all the features I’ll need for blogging on the move.
Computers that I use
As you’d guess, I run several computers here at home. Here’s a rundown of what I use:
Corei7 – this was built back in April as my main workstation with a few bits added during May, June and July. Designed as a pretty much ‘best of everything’ from a hardware perspective, this is where I do most of my computing at home. I wanted something that would last ,be reliable and handle heavy-duty tasks with ease. It runs Windows 7 Ultimate x64. The spec is:
- Intel Core i7 2600 Sandy Bridge processor
- Asus P8H67-M H67 Chipset motherboard
- 4x 4GB Kingston ValueRAM PC1333 DDR3 modules – a total of 16GB system RAM
- XFX Radeon HD5770 1GB GDDR3 single-slot PCIe Graphics
- Crucial RealSSD M4 128GB Solid State Drive – boot drive
- 2x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB S-ATA Hard Drives (in a RAID-1 mirrored array) – for data
- Optiarc 20X DVD Writer
- Optiarc 12X Blu-Ray Rewriter
- Coolermaster Sileno case / 500W PSU bundle
- 3-bay Hot-Swap S-ATA backplane – this useful device fits in 2 5.25″ drive bays and allows you to install the hard drives in caddies for easy removal. On the back of the backplane are connectors for power and S-ATA.
- 22″ Samsung monitor
My next system is a late 2009 vintage Mac Mini. This was my main desktop for a while, but is now destined to become a media centre as part of the home cinema setup. It runs OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard. The spec is:
- Intel 2.53 Ghz Core2Duo processor
- 4GB DDR3 RAM
- 320GB Hard Drive
- NVidia GeForce 9400M graphics
- 8X DVD writer
Lastly, we have the laptop. Not wanting something too large or heavy to carry, but with a decent keyboard and screen, I decided a system a little larger than a netbook would fit the bill. I went for a Toshiba Satellite T110, which also offered a free USB DVD rewriter. I upped the RAM from 2GB to 4GB and replaced the stock 250GB 5400RPM S-ATA drive with a larger and faster Seagate Momentus 500GB 7200RPM drive. The smaller drive went into the PlayStation 3 to upgrade its stock 120GB drive. The system runs Wimdows Home Premium x64. The final spec is:
- Intel Celeron Core Solo 743 1.3 GHz processor
- 2x 2GB PC1066 DDR3 RAM
- Intel GMA4500M graphics
- Seagate Momentus 500GB Hard Drive
- 10/100 Ethernet
- 802.11n (Draft) WiFi
- Bluetooth
- 11.6″ 1366 x 786 display
Whilst not the fastest machine in the world, this a decent portable that isn’t heavy to carry, faster than most netbooks, whilst having a slightly larger screen. It also has an excellent battery life.
Connectivity is provided by BT Business ADSL2, which is an excellent service. Extremely reliable and I’m seeing speeds of abou 17000kbps down and 1100kbps up. The BT Business Hub is patched into a Netgear GS105 5-port Gigabit switch, which has my PC. Mac, Playstation 3 and 1TB Buffalo LinkStation Live NAS (used as a backup store).
30stechie 