Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Bye-bye, Google Reader: Alternative RSS solutions for Mac and iOS users | Macworld [feedly]
Brief message sent from a mobile device
Monday, June 24, 2013
This Week's Reading - 20130624
Prevent a Mac from sleeping from the command line - Mac OS X Hints
How to secure files from other users on external disks | MacFixIt - CNET Reviews
Get more out of Google Earth with these tips for power users | PCWorld
Avoid triggering Hot Corners accidentally - Mac OS X Hints
Here's what an eavesdropper sees when you use an unsecured Wi-Fi hotspot | PCWorld
Sunday, June 23, 2013
In Depth: 10 technologies that really could change the world
TechRadar: All latest feedsIn Depth: 10 technologies that really could change the world
We're told that all kinds of technologies changed the world - Popular Mechanics' list includes the stapler - but today's researchers are working on ideas even more ambitious than joining several bits of paper together.
New technologies could replace fossil fuels, turn your house into a power station, save thousands of lives - and maybe even create new lifeforms.
Here are 10 technologies that have the potential to change the world all over again.
1. Phones
In developing countries the phone is more important than the PC: mobiles are used for banking, and for forecasting the weather (a critical business when a farmer has to pick the best time to sow or reap a precious crop). But phones can do even more.
For example, in Africa cell phone tower data is used to map people's movements - and that mapping can help track diseases such as malaria and identify patterns of transmission.
Phone location data might also be useful in dealing with natural disasters, improving public transport or just helping retailers make shopping malls more profitable.
2. Digital imaging
As imaging technology improves we'll see our world like never before, both outside and inside. DARPA recently showed off a 1.8 gigapixel surveillance drone that can watch 25 square kilometres at a time, while advances in medical imaging tech enable doctors to look inside patients with unprecedented levels of detail.
3. Better fibre-optic cables
Fibre-optic cabling has been around since the 19th century, but it wasn't until 1970 that the problem of attenuation - signals degrading over distance - was solved.
Since then fibre-optic has become part of the fabric of the internet, but it's a fabric that, for most people, stops long before it gets to their house.
When fibre broadband finally makes it into every home - which it will, albeit not until some of us are really, really old - it promises to revolutionise the way people use the internet all over again.
4. Mind-controlled prosthetics
DARPA calls it Targeted Muscle Re-innervation, or TMR for short. We call it astonishing: TMR makes brain-controlled prosthetic limbs almost as responsive as real ones, providing sensory feedback that enables prosthetic users to riffle through a bag or grab an object without having to look at it.
From electronic eyes to entire exoskeletons, the combination of serious technical talent and enormous piles of cash is bringing us ever closer to a cybernetic future.
YouTube : //youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=
5. 3D printing
3D-printed guns and drugs may get the headlines, but the real effect of 3D printing is likely to be less sensational and much more useful.
It's already helping to revolutionise manufacturing by slashing research and development costs, and in the longer term it might mean that instead of ordering online and waiting for couriers to deliver, we'll just print products at home - maybe even food.
That's good for the environment but could have disastrous consequences for many people's jobs.
6. Small, smart sensors
Research firm ON World reckons that in 2017, firms will ship some 515 million sensors for wearable, implantable or mobile health and fitness devices, and that's just the tip of an electronic iceberg.
Networks of small, smart sensors could change health care, finally make home automation something people actually use, help you find a parking space or look for aliens on Mars.
7. Predictive policing
The row over the Prism surveillance system rumbles on, but there's no doubt that the technology to watch people's every move exists: one version, dubbed RIOT, mines public websites such as social networks to build up a surprisingly detailed picture of individuals and their likely future behaviour.
Another, PREDPOL, uses algorithms and mapping data to predict where and when crimes are likely to occur. Put them together, add a bit of Tom Cruise and you're getting awfully close to Minority Report-style policing where the cops turn up before the crime is committed.
8. Serious solar
Solar technology has been held back by several issues: solar panels are hefty, pricey, and of course they don't provide energy when it's dark. The biggest problem, though, is efficiency: as National Geographic reports, they only capture 10 to 20 percent of the sunlight that strikes them.
The future? Nanotech that makes the panels much less reflective, much cheaper to produce and much more efficient. Other ideas include tiny antennae on devices that capture solar energy and instantly convert it to power, solar panels that can actually store energy, and nanotech paint that turns entire buildings into solar energy collectors.
9. Biohacking
There's a controversy brewing on Kickstarter: the Glowing Plant project plans to engineer glow-in-the-dark plants, and some experts are worried: they fear that this is the thin end of a very big and scary wedge.
As Nature reports, "they fear that distributing the plants could set a precedent for unsupervised releases of synthetic organisms, and might foster a negative public perception of synthetic biology - an emerging experimental discipline that involves genetically engineering organisms to do useful tasks."
Biohackers could engineer entirely new lifeforms, good or bad, and the emerging sector is almost entirely unregulated. Friends of the Earth has called for a global moratorium on the release of synthetic organisms "until the proper regulations and safety mechanisms have been put in place".
YouTube : http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6n6jJ9zhbBU
10. Genetic scanning
The MyGenome iPad app is a glimpse of the future, enabling you to analyse the full genetic makeup of someone. For now that someone is the developers' CEO, but if DNA sequencing prices continue to plummet - the cost per person has dropped from US$2.7 billion to US$5,000 in ten years - then full genome analysis could be in many of our futures.
That could have profound implications: we could discover if we're prone to particular kinds of cancer, or if we have higher than average risks of various unpleasant conditions, or if particular drugs could kill rather than cure us.
Angelina Jolie's recent preventive surgery was an example of DNA sequencing in action: Jolie has the BRCA1 gene, which means she has a high risk of developing the breast cancer that killed her mother.
As Carole Cadwalladr writes in The Guardian: "revealing our full DNA will revolutionise medicine - but it will also raise huge ethical questions about what we do with the information".
     |
http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/669/f/9809/s/2dab239c/l/0L0Stechradar0N0Cus0Cnews0Cworld0Eof0Etech0C10A0Etechnologies0Ethat0Ereally0Ecould0Echange0Ethe0Eworld0E11587150Dsrc0Frss0Gattr0Fall/story01.htm
Sent with Reeder
Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Monday, June 17, 2013
This Week's Reading - 20130617
How to move your iTunes library to an external drive | News | TechRadar
Windows 7: Manage devices and drivers | TechNet Magazine
Virtualization: What’s new with Hyper-V | TechNet Magazine
New Features in Windows Server 2012 R2 Storage Spaces - Petri
Automatically delete a huge amount of duplicate files | PCWorld
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Effective ways to cut IT costs
TechRadar: All latest feedsEffective ways to cut IT costs
Regardless of austerity and the economic outlook, small businesses need to keep an eye on the bottom line. IT is one area where, without diligence, costs can quickly spiral out of control.
So how do businesses find effective ways to decrease IT costs?
Replace old hardware
With energy prices shooting up year after year, it might be worth looking at how much energy your desktop computers, printers and servers are using. An old server may have given your organisation many years of service, but a new one is going to be so much more power-efficient.
On top of that, virtualisation can replace multiple servers by having many operating systems run on the same piece of hardware. Newer servers can handle virtualisation out of the box with special virtualised extensions to processors to carry out such tasks more effectively than older hardware.
Desktop computers with CRT monitors can also by replaced with cheaper-to-run laptops. This also gives your employees to ability to take work home or work away from the office.
Turn off equipment
Many employees rarely switch off equipment at the end of the day, and even if no application is being used, the PC still consumes energy.
Get the last person leaving the office to switch off desktop computers and monitors. You can also consider buying a device that powers down a computer if it sits idle for a length of time.
Use free software
New office software can cost a great deal of money every time you buy a new computer. So ask yourself this question – could free software do the same job?
Libre Office is an open source productivity suite to rival Microsoft Office. If it does everything you want, you can cut costs by downloading and using that instead of a paid-for productivity suite.
Use the cloud
Some firms are now ditching servers for services on the cloud. Do you need an in-house email server or would a cloud-based email server offer better value for money? Could your CRM system be ported from hardware in your organisation to the cloud via a software-as-a-service offering?
This move from capital expenditure (Capex) to operational expenditure (Opex) is sure to make your accountant happy. Google Drive offers a cloud-based alternative to Microsoft Office and for most small businesses this is completely free.
Use VoIP instead of a phone line
It's tempting to think you need multiple phone lines in your office, but sometimes it is better to use a service such as Skype to call colleagues and clients. If they use the same service, the call is usually free. Some offer videoconferencing and screen sharing, cutting travel costs.
How much internet do I need?
Many companies think they need an all-you-can-eat internet connection when in reality all they send are a few emails a day. An investigation of different ISPs can find you a cheaper deal that means you are not paying for a service you don't really need.
| |
http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/669/f/9809/s/2d52d6d8/l/0L0Stechradar0N0Cnews0Cworld0Eof0Etech0Cmanagement0Ceffective0Eways0Eto0Ecut0Eit0Ecosts0E11571750Dsrc0Frss0Gattr0Fall/story01.htm
Sent with Reeder
Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Data management broken down and explained
TechRadar: All latest feedsData management broken down and explained
Data management is one of the core elements of any modern business, large or small. It's not just the figures on costs, revenues and resources, but intelligence on research, sales, market opportunities, and the information on work processes within a company.
Even the one man (or woman) band needs to keep a firm hold on their data, and managing it effectively is one of the priorities of a successful business.
The central elements of data management are policies, practices and procedures. This covers areas such as: what data should be shared, either among key employees, around the company or with partners; how employees access, amend and pass on data; and when it is appropriate to either archive or delete it.
Compliance
Another important element is compliance, ensuring that a business maintains the records required of it by law and that these are kept secure but easily accessible.
Then comes data design, alternatively labelled data architecture, which may sound complicated to uninitiated but is basically about which data is collected and how it is stored, arranged, integrated and used in a company.
Any small business needs to think carefully about the relative value of different types of data, what needs to be quickly available, what needs to be extra-secure and how it relates to its processes, especially those that are crucial in keeping customers happy.
It has to think about the way its data is structured, which usually depends on the process it supports and the software. Sometimes the data is in a text format, sometimes numerical or binary, but it always has to be organised in a way that the software application can recognise.
Off-the-shelf or customised?
Most small businesses are likely to be using off-the-shelf software that effectively makes these decisions for them, but there may be some flexibility, and if they are in a highly specialised field it's possible that they have can have software customised or even designed from scratch. This is bound to be more expensive, and it will involve more of a risk if the business doesn't get it right first time.
Then comes data storage, for which there are plenty of options, but not all appropriate to every purpose. The hard drive on a desktop PC or laptop is the most obvious, on which it easy to amend the data, but there are also flash drives (your USB stick), optical media (CDs and DVDs), local servers and network attached storage devices.
There is also the option of storing data in the cloud – sending it to a service provider over the internet for them to store at their data centre.
The choices depend on how quickly you need to get at the data, how sensitive it is and whether it is subject to any legal regulations. For example, optical disks can be better long term preservation than hard drives but they are no good if you need quick access.
Security
The final element is data security. Data has varying degrees of sensitivity, and for a small business it's likely that anything financial or with the personal details of employees and customers will be the most sensitive. But there are some steps that most should take.
These include installing a firewall to prevent unauthorised access, encrypting personal data, backing up data, and ensuring there is a proper recovery strategy in place if the on-site systems go down.
For most businesses the implementation will be more complex than this, but the principles should be the starting point for all.
| |
http://rss.feedsportal.com/c/669/f/9809/s/2d52d6d6/l/0L0Stechradar0N0Cnews0Cworld0Eof0Etech0Cmanagement0Cdata0Emanagement0Ebroken0Edown0Eand0Eexplained0E11571820Dsrc0Frss0Gattr0Fall/story01.htm
Sent with Reeder
Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Windows 7: Manage devices and drivers
TechNet Magazine: RSS FeedWindows 7: Manage devices and drivers
Windows 7 allows for simplifief installation of external hardware devices and the drivers to support them.
Jorge Orchilles
Adapted from "Microsoft Windows 7 Administrator's Reference" (Syngress, an imprint of Elsevier)
Windows 7 gives you several tools and utilities for configuring and managing hardware devices and printers. You have several options for configuring devices and installing the necessary drivers, which is important, because without the proper drivers and the proper configuration, your devices won't function properly.
Installing hardware devices and drivers is much simpler in Windows 7 than in previous versions of Windows. You can install several different types of hardware devices on Windows 7 computers:
- Internal drives: You can install hard drives, CD drives, DVD drives, Blu-ray drives, floppy drives, zip drives and any other internal drive. These devices generally include a data cable (Integrated Drive Electronics [IDE] or SATA) that attaches to the motherboard and a power cable that attaches to the power supply.
- Internal cards: These include adapters or expansion cards plugged into the motherboard's expansion slots (PCI Express [PCIe], PCI or Accelerated Graphics Port [AGP]), such as video cards, RAIDs and SATA controllers. Laptop expansion cards are also considered internal cards. Generally, you would use these cards to connect another device through a cable.
- External devices: These include any external device that connects to the computer through available ports including USB, IEEE 1394 (FireWire), Line Printer Terminal (LPT), COM and so on. You can use these ports to connect printers, scanners, external hard drives, media devices and more through the appropriate cable.
- Additional memory: You can add memory to the computer's motherboard to expand the amount of memory to which the computer has access.
Windows 7 automatically detects any hardware recently installed and attempts to automatically install the driver. After Windows 7 setup is complete, if some drivers weren't installed by default, Windows 7 will attempt to find the device and its respective driver. The OS does this through Windows Update.
Install drivers with Windows Update
Windows 7 detects hardware that wasn't automatically installed with Windows 7 setup. Most of the time, this will happen if the Windows 7 media didn't include the driver for that piece of hardware. The built-in hardware diagnostics generally detect whether hardware installed on the computer has the proper drivers installed. The OS will attempt to identify the hardware, then use Windows Update to search for the correct driver. Windows Update will automatically download the driver, but won't install it automatically.
You can open Windows Update in any of the following ways to check for new drivers or updated drivers:
- Click Start | Control Panel | System and Security | Windows Update
- Click Start | Control Panel | Windows Update
- Type "Windows Update" on Start menu Search
- Right-click Action Center | Open Windows Update on the notification area
- After opening Windows Update, click "Check for updates" on the left pane
Essential drivers for video, sound or hard disk controllers may appear as important updates. Other device drivers will appear in the optional updates section. Click the link on the main Windows Update console titled "[X] optional updates are available."
By default, optional updates won't be selected for installation. Check the box to the left of each driver you wish to install, then click OK to download and install the update. Once the driver is installed, Windows will automatically detect and install the hardware device.
Device Manager
Device Manager is the central location from which to view, configure and manage hardware devices. It's critical to understand how Device Manager works before working on hardware devices. There are multiple ways to open Device Manager:
- In the Start menu, right-click Computer | Manage, then expand Computer Management on the console tree and select System Tools | Device Manager
- In the Start menu, right-click Computer Properties, then click Device Manager on the left pane
- Control Panel | Device Manager
- Control Panel | Hardware and Sound | Device Manager
Notice that Device Manager is a Microsoft Management Console (MMC) 3.0 console. The process for expanding the device view is similar to any other MMC 3.0 console. Simply click the arrow to the left of the device to expand the node. Devices with issues are displayed with a small symbol next to the device icon. A red X indicates the device isn't installed correctly or has been disabled. A yellow exclamation point indicates a problem with the device.
To change the view, select View on the Menu bar, then choose from the following options:
- Devices by Type: This is the default view, which displays the devices by the type of hardware. Devices are under the name of the device type.
- Devices by Connection: This displays devices by the type of connection for each device.
- Resources by Type: This displays the devices by resource type. There are four resource types: direct memory access (DMA), input/output (IO), IRQ and memory.
- Resources by Connection: This displays the devices by the type of resource to which they're connected. The four resource types (DMA, IO, IRQ and memory) let you trace resources by connection.
- Show Hidden Devices: This displays devices that have been removed, but whose drivers haven't been uninstalled. It also shows non-plug-and-play devices. To view options or actions for each device, either right-click the device or click on the device, and then click Action on the Menu bar. The options for each device are as follows:
- Update Driver Software: This initiates the Hardware Update wizard.
- Disable: This disables the selected driver.
- Enable: This enables the selected driver.
- Uninstall: This uninstalls the device and respective driver.
- Scan for Hardware Changes: This initiates a Windows 7 scan for new hardware devices or changes.
- Properties: This initiates the Properties window for the selected device.
Devices and printers
The Devices and Printers applet lets you configure devices and printers attached to your system. You can configure device properties, your default printer and many other settings. The Devices and Printers applet lets you add a device or add a printer:
- Add a device: Selecting this option will kick off the Add a Device wizard. Windows 7 will automatically attempt to detect devices added to the system. If the system can't automatically detect a device, you'll be given the option to add it manually.
- Add a printer: Selecting this option will kick off the Add Printer wizard. You can use it to install a local printer, network printer, wireless printer or Bluetooth printer.
There are two sections in the applet: "Devices" and "Printers and Faxes." You'll use the Devices section to configure devices attached to the system. The system has a biometric coprocessor and an integrated camera. There's also a device listed representing the system itself. If you select the device representing the system, you get two device options:
- Browse files: You can use this option to view files on the disk drives attached to the system. These could be hard drives, disk drives or removable media.
- Eject: You can use this object to remove hot-pluggable hardware and removable media.
The Printers and Faxes section contains all the printers connected to the system. You can configure printer properties and select your default printer. If you select one of the printers you've already configured, you get four options:
- See what's printing: This lets you view print jobs being serviced by the printer. You can view, cancel or restart print jobs.
- Manage default printers: This brings up the Default Printers window, which lets you set an overall default printer. You can also set a different default printer for each network to which your system connects.
- Print server properties: This application lets you configure system-wide print server properties. These print server properties are used by all printers configured on the system. You can configure available printer forms and configure printer ports to be used on the system. You can also add and remove printer drivers.
- Remove device: This lets you remove a printer from the system.
Again, it's a good idea to become thoroughly familiar with Device Manager. You'll need to know how to use it to add, remove and configure devices and their drivers. This is an essential part of Windows 7 management.
.jpg "Jorge Orchilles")
Jorge Orchilles began his networking career as a network administrator for the small private school he attended. He's currently a security operating center analyst, and recently completed his Master of Science degree in management information systems at Florida International University.
©2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Printed with permission from Syngress, an imprint of Elsevier. Copyright 2011. "Microsoft Windows 7 Administrator's Reference" by Jorge Orchilles. For more information on this title and other similar books, please visit elsevierdirect.com.
Related Content
http://technet.microsoft.com/magazine/76e0b456-c761-4bf6-b9da-b51e1e3923da
Sent with Reeder
Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Utility Spotlight: Install apps from ISO files
TechNet Magazine: RSS Feed Utility Spotlight: Install apps from ISO files
The Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel lets you mount an ISO file from which you can easily install that file's application.
Lance Whitney
It's always better to simplify tasks, or even skip a step when you can. Windows 8 can handle ISO disk image files natively, so you can directly install the application stored within the file. Unfortunately, Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP can't do that. These three older versions of Windows can, however, tap into that capability through the free Microsoft Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel.
This utility lets you mount any ISO file as a virtual disk drive, so you can install the associated application without having to burn the file onto a CD or DVD disc. The tool itself has been around for years, but Microsoft recently updated it to confirm compatibility with Windows 7 and other more recent versions of Windows.
The Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel does have one limitation. It only supports 32-bit versions of Windows. The older Windows driver it uses isn't compatible with a 64-bit OS.
Download the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel from its page at the Microsoft Download Center. Run the file winxpvirtualcdcontrolpanel_21.exe, which is a self-extracting executable. Choose where you want to save the extracted files. You should find the following three extracted files: VCdControlTool.exe, VCdRom.sys and readme.txt. VCdControlTool.exe launches the utility, VCdRom.sys provides the driver and the readme.txt file contains instructions on how to set up the utility.
Following the steps in the readme.txt file, copy the VCdRom.sys file to the windows\system32\drivers folder. This step will require administrative privileges. Launch the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel through the VCdControlTool.exe file using the Run as Administrator command.
Once the utility is up and running, click on the Driver Control button and then click on the Install Driver button (see Figure 1). Browse to and select VCdRom.sys in the windows\system32\drivers folder, and then click OK.
.jpg "Install the Virtual CD-ROM driver.")
Figure 1 Install the Virtual CD-ROM driver.
One note: In Windows 7, the utility was unable to access the driver if I copied it into windows\system32\drivers. Instead, I copied it to the Windows folder, and it worked fine.
Click on the Add Drive button (see Figure 2). Windows assigns an unused drive letter to create the virtual disk drive. Then click on the Mount button (see Figure 3). Select the mounted drive in the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel window. Browse to and select the ISO file you wish to mount.
.jpg "Select Add Drive to assign an unused letter to the virtual drive.")
Figure 2 Select Add Drive to assign an unused letter to the virtual drive.
.jpg "Select Mount to activate the drive.")
Figure 3 Select Mount to activate the drive.
Leave all the options unchecked in the Special Mount Options dialog box (see Figure 4). Click OK. You should now see the drive mounted with the name of the ISO file (see Figure 5). You can then leave the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel open or click OK to have it closed.
.jpg "Don't select any of the special mount options.")
Figure 4 Don't select any of the special mount options.
.jpg "Now your drive is mounted with the ISO file name.")
Figure 5 Now your drive is mounted with the ISO file name.
Your virtual drive should now appear in My Computer or Windows Explorer. Double-click on the drive to install the actual application. After you've installed the application and no longer need the drive, return to the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel. Select the mapped drive, click Eject and then click Remove Drive to remove the mapping.
Virtual testing
In my testing, the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel performed without a hitch in Windows XP. This is no surprise, as it was originally designed for Windows XP specifically. Running this utility in Windows 7 or Windows Vista does require an extra step, however.
In Windows 7 and Windows Vista, the tool sails through the various installation and setup steps, but doesn't display the mounted drive within Windows. Fortunately, you can still access the drive through a command prompt. In either OS, open a command prompt as an administrator. Type the letter of the mounted drive. You should see the list of its files (see Figure 6). Run the appropriate .exe or .msi file from the prompt to install the ISO file's application.
.jpg "You can see the list of files on a mounted drive with a command-line prompt.")
Figure 6 You can see the list of files on a mounted drive with a command-line prompt.
On the client site, the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel supports 32-bit Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP. On the server side, it's compatible with 32-bit Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008.
Even with the extra steps required if you're using Windows 7 or Windows Vista, the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel is still a handy tool that can greatly expedite application installation.
.jpg "Lance Whitney")
Lance Whitney is a writer, IT consultant and software trainer. He's spent countless hours tweaking Windows workstations and servers. Originally a journalist, he took a blind leap into the IT world in the early '90s.
Related Content
http://technet.microsoft.com/magazine/f2779b23-12e9-4c15-84b5-90a27f0ee606
Sent with Reeder
Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Virtualization: What’s new with Hyper-V
TechNet Magazine: RSS Feed Virtualization: What's new with Hyper-V
Some of the major improvements to Windows Server 2012 are focused around Hyper-V. Here's a deep look at some of the enhancements.
Paul Schnackenburg
Hyper-V is at the forefront of some of the most significant changes in Windows Server 2012. There are so many new and enhanced features that planning a successful Hyper-V implementation requires insight into the depth of these technical changes.
Many of the enhanced features support different aspects of networking. There are also improvements to scalability, security, storage and virtual machine (VM) migration. In this first of two articles, I'll focus on single root I/O virtualization (SR-IOV), network monitoring and quality of service (QoS), NIC teaming, the extensible virtual switch, network virtualization, and software-defined networking (SDN).
SR-IOV
SR-IOV is a new technology that essentially does what Intel Virtualization Technology (Intel VT) and AMD Virtualization (AMD-V) do for processor virtualization. It increases performance by moving functionality from software to dedicated hardware. SR-IOV has specific uses and some limitations that you'll need to take into account when planning new Hyper-V clusters.
With network cards that support SR-IOV, along with a server that supports SR-IOV in its BIOS, the NIC presents virtual functions (VFs) or virtual copies of itself to VMs. Because SR-IOV is fairly new, make sure you check your particular network card model. Some cards provide only four or eight VFs, whereas others offer up to 64. When you create a new external virtual switch, you can simply select to make it an SR-IOV switch (see Figure 1). You can't convert a normal vSwitch later on.
.jpg "As long as all prerequisites have been fulfilled, enabling SR-IOV is a single checkbox at switch-creation time")
Figure 1 As long as all prerequisites have been fulfilled, enabling SR-IOV is a single checkbox at switch-creation time.
SR-IOV does have certain limitations. If you configure port access control lists (ACLs), extensions or policies in the virtual switch, SR-IOV is disabled because its traffic totally bypasses the switch. You can't team two SR-IOV network cards in the host. You can, however, take two physical SR-IOV NICs in the host, create separate virtual switches and team two virtual network cards within a VM.
Live migrating a VM with SR-IOV NICs does work (unlike vMotion in vSphere 5.1), as each SR-IOV NIC is "shadowed" by an ordinary VM Bus NIC. So if you migrate a VM to a host that doesn't have SR-IOV NICs or where there are no more free VFs, the traffic simply continues over ordinary synthetic links.
Bandwidth isn't necessarily the key benefit of SR-IOV in Hyper-V. The VM Bus can saturate a 10Gb link, but that amount of traffic generates enough CPU load to occupy one core. So if low CPU utilization is a key design goal, SR-IOV is the key. If latency is a critical aspect, SR-IOV gives performance close to a physical NIC.
On a host where you expect a lot of incoming VM traffic, Dynamic Virtual Machine Queue (dVMQ) distributes the traffic into queues for each VM based on MAC address hashes. It also distributes the interrupts across CPU cores.
Metering and monitoring
Hyper-V now comes with built-in VM resource usage metering. This is primarily suitable for hosting scenarios. It's also useful in private clouds for gathering show-back or charge-back data. The metering functions track average CPU and memory usage, along with disk and network traffic. Because it's only available through Windows PowerShell, you can do more comprehensive data gathering and visualization with System Center 2012 Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) SP1.
You can also add a port ACL with the action metering to a virtual switch so you can separate Internet (default gateway) traffic from datacenter internal traffic for metering purposes. For those times when you need to capture network packets on a virtual network, you can define a monitoring port or port mirroring so you can use a network monitor.
Bandwidth management
Many cluster designs from the last few years rely on multiple 1Gb NICs, each dedicated to particular traffic—live migration, VM communication, cluster heartbeat, management and perhaps iSCSI. As 10Gb Ethernet becomes more commonplace, most servers have only a few of these NICs.
The new QoS feature lets you define both a minimum bandwidth that should always be available to a particular service, as well as a maximum level (see Figure 2). This lets you take a 10Gb link and divide its use among different services.
.jpg "You can control both minimum and maximum bandwidth used by a VM")
Figure 2 You can control both minimum and maximum bandwidth used by a VM.
In times of no congestion, each service can use up to its maximum allotted bandwidth. During heavy network traffic, each service is guaranteed a minimum proportion. The software-based QoS provides fine granularity for different types of traffic, but comes with some processing overhead.
There are also built-in filters for common types of traffic, such as live migration, Server Message Block (SMB) and iSCSI. This makes it quicker to get up and running with QoS. These bandwidth-management features will particularly appeal to hosters, as they can now clearly define and enforce service-level agreements (SLAs).
If you're using SMB Direct (new in Windows Server 2012) on Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) NICs, this will bypass software QoS. In these scenarios—or if you have non-TCP traffic you want to control—Windows Server also supports Data Center Bridging (DCB). With DCB, the bandwidth is managed by hardware on compatible NICs. This only lets you define eight traffic classes, but it comes with much less processing overhead.
Teaming network cards
Many servers today rely on network card teaming for fault tolerance and increased throughput. Each NIC vendor has its own solution, so this can be inflexible and difficult to manage. Including native NIC teaming (also known as load balancing failover) will be useful in virtualized environments.
You can team up to 32 NICs (from different vendors, if applicable). You can configure each team in either Switch Independent mode or Switch Dependent mode (see Figure 3). The first is applicable where you have unmanaged switches or where you can't change the switch configuration.
.jpg "Teaming multiple NICs is easy in Windows Server 2012, just be sure to use the best options")
Figure 3 Teaming multiple NICs is easy in Windows Server 2012, just be sure to use the best options.
This works well for redundancy. Use two NICs with one in standby mode. If the first one fails, the second one takes over. For extra protection, you can connect each NIC to a different switch.
If you'd like both NICs to be active, you can use either Address Hash or Hyper-V Port load balancing mode. The first mode works well when there's a lot of outgoing traffic, such as with media or Web servers. Incoming traffic will go through only one NIC. The latter mode works well in scenarios where you have several VMs on a host, but they each don't need more than the speed of a single NIC.
For more complex scenarios, Switch Dependent mode is better. You can set this for either static or Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP) mode. You'll need to involve the networking team to correctly set up your switches. Static only works in smaller environments that don't change often. LACP identifies teams automatically at the switch and can detect additional NICs when they're added to the team.
You can use VLANs in conjunction with teams, with multiple team interfaces for each team responding to a specific VLAN ID. You can even set up a team with only a single NIC, but multiple team interfaces for VLAN-based traffic segregation.
If you have multiple VMs on a host that you want to talk to different VLANs, use the Hyper-V switch and the virtual NICs to set up access. Don't use network teams in the host. Teaming NICs inside a VM is supported, just be sure to enable the AllowTeaming setting.
Extensible virtual switch
The new virtual switch is a huge improvement over the previous version. It adds cloud basics such as tenant isolation, traffic shaping, easier troubleshooting and protection against rogue VMs. Another new aspect to the virtual switch is that third-party vendors can add functionality, either through the Network Driver Interface Specification (NDIS 6.0) or the Windows Filtering Platform (WFP) APIs. These are both familiar environments for network software engineers.
There are several different flavors of extensions:
- A network packet inspection extension can view packets (read only) as they enter and leave the switch to identify changes. One example is sFlow by InMon Corp. You can use the free version, sFlowTrend, to visualize the traffic.
- A network packet filter extension can create, filter and modify packets in the switch. One example is Security Manager from 5nine Software. This provides an Intrusion Dectection System (IDS), firewall and anti-malware, without requiring an agent in each VM.
- Network forwarding extensions alter the switch forwarding. There can only be one of these installed in each vSwitch. The iconic example here is the Cisco Nexus 1000V.
Managing extensions is relatively straightforward (see Figure 4). VMM 2012 SP1 also supports centrally managing extensions and switch configuration, and can automatically distribute this to all hosts.
.jpg "Enabling and configuring network extensions in the new virtual switch is easy")
Figure 4 Enabling and configuring network extensions in the new virtual switch is easy.
You can have a single switch associated with several virtual NICs. You can also set port ACLs by remote or local IPv4, IPv6 or MAC addresses for controlling traffic and metering network data. Hosting environments will appreciate the Router Guard that stops VMs from acting on router advertisements, as well as the DHCP Guard that halts Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) traffic coming from a VM unless you've approved the VM as a DHCP server.
IPsec is an excellent way of protecting data traffic, but it's often overlooked because of the high processor overhead. Hyper-V now supports IPsecTO (Task Offload) for VMs running Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows Server 2012. This function delegates the calculations to a physical NIC with IPSecTO support.
SDN
SDN is a new way to manage networks and VM isolation in large datacenters and clusters. Datacenters need to be able to control networks and segregation based on central policies, and manual VLAN switch configuration just isn't flexible enough. Part of the Microsoft cloud OS vision is network virtualization (NV). Where NV and SDN really shine is when you want to move part of your infrastructure to the cloud.
You often have to change the IP addresses of your VMs. This isn't easy to do, especially as they're often tied to security and firewall policies in multiple places. It's also not very flexible; nor does it make it easy to move VMs between cloud providers.
Windows Server 2012 NV does what virtualization has done for the other fabric components such as processor, memory and disk. Each VM with NV thinks it's running on a network infrastructure that it "owns." Under the covers, it's actually isolated from other VMs through software. NV also neatly resolves moving VMs by enabling Bring Your Own IP (BYOIP). VMs can keep their addresses as they're moved up to a public cloud. This lets them seamlessly communicate with the rest of your infrastructure.
Each VM has two IP addresses—the customer address (CA) is what the VM uses and the provider address (PA) is what's actually used on the network. VMs using NV can be mixed with non-NV VMs on the same host. Broadcast traffic is never sent to "all hosts" on a segment. It always goes through NV to maintain that segregation. You can configure any VM for this, as NV is transparent to the underlying OS.
The two options for configuring NV are IP Rewrite and Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE). IP Rewrite changes each packet as it reaches or leaves a host with the appropriate CA or PA. This means network equipment needs no changes and the NIC offloads work. It also means each VM needs both a PA and a CA. This increases the address management load.
GRE encapsulates the CA packet within a PA packet with an accompanying virtual subnet ID. This results in networking hardware being able to apply per-tenant traffic policies. Each VM on a host can also share the same PA. This leads to fewer addresses to track.
The trade-off is NIC hardware offloads won't work, as they rely on correct IP headers. The solution for the future is a new standard called Network Virtualization using Generic Routing Encapsulation (NVGRE). This combines the benefits of GRE with the IP Rewrite advantage that NIC offloads work as expected.
VMM and network virtualization
VMM 2012 SP1 adds two objects for configuring NV—a logical switch and a VM network. The latter is a routing domain and can house several virtual subnets as long as they can communicate. You can set up each VM network with one of four isolation types: no isolation, VLAN, NV or external.
The first is appropriate for management networks that need to be able to reach all networks. The VLAN type is suitable where you have an existing isolation model that works. It relies on having switches (both physical and virtual) configured correctly. Each VM network is matched to a single VLAN.
The NV type uses NV in Windows Server 2012. The mapping tables that track CA to PA mapping are maintained by VMM. Each host dynamically builds mapping tables as it sends and receives network traffic. When a host needs to communicate with a host it doesn't know, it updates its mapping from VMM. This can reduce the table size in large networks.
The second object that's new in VMM is the long-awaited logical switch. This lets you centrally define vSwitch settings that are automatically replicated to all hosts. There's also a virtual switch extension manager (VSEM) that lets you centrally control extensions to virtual switches.
Extensions and their data are kept with the VMs as you live migrate them from host to host. You can also centrally define and apply bandwidth policies to VMs. Virtual networks are integrated with the VM provisioning process, providing a truly automated solution.
Hyper-V in the datacenter
With all these new network-design features and options in Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V, it's clear you may need a trip back to the drawing board. There are a couple of other network enhancements that aren't Hyper-V-specific that nevertheless may influence your design.
For large environments, Windows Server 2012 now supports Datacenter TCP (DTCP) for improved throughput and lower buffer space used in switches (as long as they support Explicit Congestion Notification-RFC 3168 [ECN]). If you're still tracking IP addresses with an Excel spreadsheet, you might want to look at IP address management (IPAM) in Windows Server 2012. This communicates with your Active Directory, DHCP and DNS servers for both IPv4 and IPv6 management. VMM 2012 SP1 has a script (Ipamintegration.ps1) that exports IP addresses assigned through VMM to IPAM. You can run this on a regular basis.
Next month, I'll cover improvements to Hyper-V storage (including being able to run VMs from file shares), VM migration and scalability enhancements.
.jpg "Paul Schnackenburg")
Paul Schnackenburg has been working in IT since the days of 286 computers. He works part-time as an IT teacher and runs his own business, Expert IT Solutions, on the Sunshine Coast of Australia. He has MCSE, MCT, MCTS and MCITP certifications and specializes in Windows Server, Hyper-V and Exchange solutions for businesses. Reach him at paul@expertitsolutions.com.au and follow his blog at TellITasITis.com.au.
Related Content
http://technet.microsoft.com/magazine/d9646018-23cf-43cf-a74a-492f01f099c8
Sent with Reeder
Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
How to manually enable NTFS read and write in OS X
Cnet How to manually enable NTFS read and write in OS X
Do you have an external hard drive formatted to NTFS that you would like to use with your Mac? You can do so without using any third-party software. [Read more]
| |
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/cnet/tcoc/~3/9Qf8ztGnvnI/
Sent with Reeder
Brief message sent from a handheld device.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)