XenDesktop 7.5 mapped drive execute permission

By default it’s not possible to run executables (install software) from a client drive which has been mapped to a XenDesktop VM. A work around is to copy the files to a network share and run the installation from there, but it takes time and can be a fair bit of extra work.

Instead, it’s possible to enable execute permissions via a quick and simple registry modification on the VDA (the XenDesktop VM). No DDC or client PC changes are required.

  1. Start “regedit”
  2. Navigate to “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Citrix\GroupPolicy\Defaults\”
  3. Add the key “CDMSettings”
  4. Add the following DWORD value: “ExecuteFromMappedDrive”
  5. Set “ExecuteFromMappedDrive” to “1”

A restart of the VM is required for the changes to take effect.

Tested on XenServer 6.2 with XenDesktop 7.5 on a Dell R720 with NVIDIA K2 GPU card (K240Q and K260Q vGPUs assigned to the VMs).

XenDesktop75_execute_from_mapped_drive

VMware default user names / logins and passwords

Consistency in user names and passwords would be nice, but unfortunately that isn’t always the case. While setting up VMware’s vCenter, vCOPS and vShield recently I came across a few default logins / passwords worth jotting down for reference:

VMware vCenter Operations Manager: UI VM console login

Admin account: admin

Password: admin

root account: root

Password: vmware

VMware vCenter Operations Manager: Web GUI login

User: admin

Password: admin

 

VMware vCenter appliance login (same for both local console and Web GUI):

User: root

Password: vmware

 

vCenter appliance URL for initial access and configuration

https://[vCenter IP]:5480

 

vCenter appliance URL for normal web access (the web client: alternative to using the vSphere client)

https://[vCenter IP]:9443

 

vShield Manager console:

User: admin

Password: default

 

 

Configuring iSCSI and management networks on a Dell EqualLogic PS-M4110 storage array

Quick instructions on setting up an EqualLogic PS-M4110 storage array.
In this case it’s a blade model located in a Dell M1000e chassis, slot 7 and 8.
Fabric B is the iSCSI fabric and fabric A is for management
We start by configuring fabric B, then A

Since there is no IP configured, we connect via serial.
Luckily the M1000e provides serial connectivity via the CMC as per the below:

SSH to CMC IP address:
==============================

Switch to the EQL serial interface (connect to the slot ID)
==============================

Log in (default user/pass: grpadmin/grpadmin)
==============================

Note: If creating a new group, just enter the desired group name and IP
==============================

Setting up the management network:
=====================================

The array can now be accessed via the web:
==============================
http://10.6.26.227

Nagios3 – location of config and plugin directories with Crunchbang (debian squeeze)

First:
apt-get install nagios3
apt-get install freeipmi

Access from http://localhost/nagios3/

Config files:
root@cruncher01:~# ls -l /etc/nagios3/conf.d/
total 32
-rw-r–r– 1 root root 1695 Nov  1 23:11 contacts_nagios2.cfg
-rw-r–r– 1 root root  418 Nov  1 23:11 extinfo_nagios2.cfg
-rw-r–r– 1 root root 1152 Nov  1 23:11 generic-host_nagios2.cfg
-rw-r–r– 1 root root 1803 Nov  1 23:11 generic-service_nagios2.cfg
-rw-r–r– 1 root root  678 Nov  1 23:11 hostgroups_nagios2.cfg
-rw-r–r– 1 root root 2167 Nov  1 23:11 localhost_nagios2.cfg
-rw-r–r– 1 root root  657 Nov  1 23:11 services_nagios2.cfg
-rw-r–r– 1 root root 1609 Nov  1 23:11 timeperiods_nagios2.cfg
root@cruncher01:~#

Plugin directory:
root@cruncher01:~# ls -l /usr/lib/nagios/plugins/ | head
total 3588
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 108904 Jun 28  2012 check_apt
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root   7262 Jul  3  2012 check_backuppc
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root   2242 Jun 28  2012 check_breeze
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root  51984 Jun 28  2012 check_by_ssh
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root   1723 Jul  3  2012 check_cert_expire
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root      9 Jun 28  2012 check_clamd -> check_tcp
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root  35112 Jun 28  2012 check_cluster
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root  51536 Jun 28  2012 check_dhcp
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root  47568 Jun 28  2012 check_dig
root@cruncher01:~#