Why Does Hyper-V Have Network Issues with 1 GbE NICs?

Petri IT Knowledgebase Why Does Hyper-V Have Network Issues with 1 GbE NICs?

Microsoft has urged OEMs not to enable VMQ on the standard 1 GbE NIC that's commonly found in Hype-V hosts. But despite this request and the fact that it adds nothing. VMQ is left enabled and causes performance and uptime issues. In this article, you'll learn why you should disable VMQ as a standard part of your deployment and configuration management.

A Common Cause of Networking Issues

On social media, in meetings, at community events, and even after speaking at Microsoft Ignite, I get asked a question that starts something like, "My Hyper-V hosts have a problem when <insert something to do with networking> …," and I interrupt them.

I ask if they are using Emulex 10 Gbps converged NICs, which is  the sort you find in IBM, HP, and Hitachi blade servers, or 1 Gbps Ethernet NICs in their hosts. Emulex appears to have finally sorted out the awful handling of VMQ in their firmware and drivers, and OEMs eventually dribbled out the fixes.

But most of the time, the answer is that they have 1 GbE networking from Broadcom or Intel. I usually know straight away what the fix is. I ask them if they have disabled VMQ on the physical NICs that are used for the virtual switch. "VM-what?" is sometimes the response, and other times the response is "I don't know."

If you're using 1 GbE NICs, then you probably shouldn't know or care about VMQ, because this hardware offload offers nothing to you. You're not pushing enough traffic into your hosts to take advantage of VMQ. Typically this offload makes it possible to take full advantage of 10 Gbps or faster networking.

Microsoft, aware that VMQ offers nothing, has asked OEMs not to enable the feature by default on 1 GbE NICs. However, the OEMs have not only ignored Microsoft, but they ignore VMQ-aware administrators, too. I've been told many times that those administrators that are aware of the VMQ guidance for 1 GbE NICs and disable VMQ per Microsoft's guidance, often find it re-enabled after upgrading the driver from their server manufacturer.

What makes it worse it that the drivers and firmwares for these NICs usually handle VMQ very poorly. This leads to performance issues. For example:

• Performance issues: Here's an example reported by SQL Server MVP and Ranger, Bob Duffy. He found he has slow SSAS connections with SQL installed in Hyper-V virtual machines.
• Network outages: I have heard many times how 1 GbE NICs are causing outages whenever a load is placed on them.

The cause? VMQ was enabled on these 1 GbE NICs.

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Short-Term Solution

As a short-term solution, nly enable VMQ on NICs where it is really required. Of course, the OEMs turn it on by default, so you'll need to disable it in all of your deployments if you are not making use of it. VMQ offers nothing for 1 GbE connections other than bugs, so turn it off every time on every physical 1 GbE NIC on your Hyper-V hosts.

Disable VMQ in the NIC settings > Configure > Advanced (Image Credit: Aidan Finn)

What about OEMs turning VMQ back on after you perform a driver update? The only solution here is to either waste time re-disabling it or to implement some kind of desired state configuration (DSC) management to automatically return VMQ to a disabled state on 1 GbE physical NICs.

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Long-Term Solution

For a long-term solution, I want Microsoft to do three things:

1. Turn off all hardware optimizations by default in the OS/hypervisor. We should only use these features if we know what they are and understand their effects and risks.
2. Create a super-HCL for virtualization. The current testing of hardware, drivers, and firmware is clearly insufficient. Many of the NICs I have heard are causing problems are certified by Microsoft for Windows Server 2012 R2. Obviously the testing is not checking virtualization feature stability and not checking Microsoft's guidance on feature enablement.
3. Kick offending products out of the HCL. Those vendors need Microsoft more than Microsoft needs them, and it is Windows Server and Hyper-V that get blamed when a virtual machine goes offline.

 

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10 Great Websites For Learning Programming - InformationWeek

10 Great Websites For Learning Programming - InformationWeek
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How to build an SEO strategy for your business

TechRadar: All latest feeds How to build an SEO strategy for your business

Introduction

Are you looking to learn how to optimize and rank your website through SEO (Search Engine Optimization)? Don't know where to start? This quick guide will help you get started quickly, easily, and with a long term plan that will work for any type of business or brand.

Define your goals

The first step for all marketing campaigns is defining your goals. This may sound like an easy task, but in reality, this is the most complex of all in this process. You have to clearly define, in detail, what the goals are for your SEO campaign. You need to ask yourself these questions. Are you trying to grow your online sales? Are you trying to increase your foot traffic to your store? Are you trying to get people to fill out an online sales form? These are all potential goals but there are so many more, but first defining your goals will help you be able to better assess and select search phrases and then help to measure the results.

Get out of the keyword mindset

When most people think of SEO, they think of keywords entered into a search engine. This is not necessarily true, you have to change the way that you think about SEO. Keywords isn't the best way to describe what people put into search engines when they are looking to search online. Instead, think of those words as key phrases. You don't type "store" if you are looking for a new smartphone, you are more likely to type "Los Angeles cell phone Store" or "cell phone store". Be descriptive in what you are looking for, and what phrases are used to describe your business or brand. This is imperative when selecting your key phrases.

Research, research, research

Research is the most important part of SEO. Every little thing involved in the SEO process needs to be researched. You need to come up with the search key phrases you want to rank for (e.g. "Los Angeles Pet Store"), you need to research those phrases so you can see how the competition is ranked (using tools like Google Adwords, WordTracker, or the Moz Keyword Difficulty tool), and you need to look at the current Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) for your target key phrases and assess who is linking to them which will help you with some of the steps ahead.

Get in good with Google

When it comes to SEO, Google can be your best friend. With Google being the largest search engine in the world, working directly with Google will help rank you better. Google utilizes all the data it can about your company into how it ranks your website. Because of this, it's important to embrace the Google's tools. Make sure to install Google Analytics on your website, create and maintain a Google+ profile, setup Google Webmaster Tools, and make sure your business is listed on Google Local.

Google your company

When you are getting started, you have to know where you stand. Make sure you Google yourself, so you know exactly how Google currently sees your website, brand, and additional areas of your web presence. If Google does not see your site, you'll want to check Google Webmaster Tools to figure out why and then remedy any problems.

On your website make sure you do the following:

A. Make the goal that you set in step number 1 achievable from your homepage, this will help to increase your chances for conversions.

B. Incorporate your key phrase into the title tag on your webpage (make sure the key phrase is unique for each page).

C. Place your key phrase in the Heading on each page.

D. Place your key phrase in the text in a way that makes logical sense. Don't over use your key phrase just incorporate it enough to where a real person reading your content will know that you are about the key phrase you are targeting.

E. Make your site easy to navigate - as few clicks as possible to achieve your objective.

F. On images relevant to your key phrase, incorporate the phrase in the alt tags and in filenames.

Write a compelling meta description

When you use a search engine, the description that you see in the search results is called the meta description. You are going to want to control what shows there so people looking at it know what your website is about. In turn, you need to write something that is compelling and will draw people into your site. Also, make sure that you keep wording consistent on your website. One of the worst things that you can do to visitors is have them search a key phrase, click on your key phrase and the landing page mention nothing that was in the search result or key phrase.

Add your complete address and contact info

This pertains to almost every one working in SEO but it is imperative to people trying to rank for location specific searches, make sure that you add your full address and contact info to the website. This is helps Google know where your business is located, giving your site a boost in your local SERPs.

Get links

You need to get as many relevant links to your website as possible. To get started, make sure your company is listed in the all the local directories such as Google Local, Yahoo Local, Bing Local,CitySearch, and Yelp. Also, get yourself listed in industry-specific directories. Next, take the list you created from step 3 of your competitor's links and try and start to get those websites to link to you. Lastly, embrace social sties since social share links play a huge factor in your rankings.

Measure and Adjust

SEO is a never-ending activity. This doesn't mean that you have to hammer the pavement every day, but you are going to have to check your search engine results, the way your search traffic is preforming on your website, and number of links that you have at least once a week, measure your traffic, and adjust your strategy accordingly.

Remember there is no magic trick to SEO; this list should get you started on your journey as you discover what works best for your website and your business.

• Keyon Thomas is the Marketing Director and Partner Manager at InfoStreet

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Tame your email: how to achieve Inbox Zero in Gmail and Outlook

TechRadar: All latest feeds Tame your email: how to achieve Inbox Zero in Gmail and Outlook

Introduction

Email is a blessing and a curse: while it's a boon for communication and collaboration we've all felt that sinking feeling as we've opened up an overstuffed inbox. But it doesn't have to be that way...

With a few easy tricks and a couple of top tips you can be the master or mistress of mail, eliminating annoyances and reaching the famed state of Inbox Zero. In this article, we're going to look at how to achieve this in the two most popular email services, Gmail and Outlook.

• You might also want to read: 10 tips, tricks and secrets for Gmail

Use conversations

This one's particularly important in the corporate world, where what should be fairly simple discussions can get bogged down in endless emails about nothing in particular. Both Outlook and Gmail enable you to view your emails in conversation mode, which means every message in a particular thread is collapsed underneath a single email title.

To turn on conversation view in Gmail, click on the gear icon, select Settings and scroll down to Conversation View. Toggle the switch and save your changes.

In Outlook, conversations are off by default. To enable them, click on View > Conversations > Show as Conversations. You can also change the settings here to specify how conversations should be displayed. In Outlook.com the conversation option is in Options > Group By Conversation and Pre-Load Messages.

Filter the faff and filth

No matter how good your organisation's email filters, some spam is going to get through. Thankfully both Outlook and Gmail have some tools that can help you fight the spam menace (and on the desktop you can add more via plugins).

In Gmail, the easiest way to filter unwanted messages is to use the drop-down in the message body and choose Filter Messages Like This. You can then specify what Gmail should do with messages that match the same criteria, such as email address or subject line.

In Outlook, you want Mail > Home > Delete > Junk > Junk E-Mail Options, where you can adjust the level of filtering. If you want you can restrict incoming email to known senders only, although that isn't really practical in most offices.

In Outlook.com, you can tap Actions > Create Rule to automatically delete unwanted messages.

Get to grips with the good stuff

Filters and rules aren't just for messages you don't want. They can be useful tools for organising the mail you do want, too. For example, you might create Outlook rules that colour-code messages so you can gauge their importance immediately, or you might create a rule or filter that gives certain messages a category and files them accordingly so you can worry about them later.

Such rules and filters are also a good way of keeping legitimate messages out of your spam filter, or of forwarding messages that aren't your department, and it's easy to create very complex rules – so for example you can have different outcomes based on whether incoming messages have file attachments or include certain words.

Unsubscribe from everything

Over time, there's a good chance you'll end up subscribed to all kinds of things – often without asking. That's where the superb Unroll.me website comes in. It works with Gmail and Outlook.com (as well as Hotmail, AOL Mail and iCloud), and it can do two handy things: it can roll all your subscription emails into a regular digest, keeping your inbox tidy, or it can automatically unsubscribe you from mailing lists you don't want. We used the latter option and discovered we'd been subscribed to more than 200 mailing lists we didn't want to be on. It's a fantastic tool.

Use aliases

Aliases – having multiple email addresses for the same account – are a great way to categorise incoming email, and they're handy weapons in the war against spam too. In Outlook.com you can add additional Outlook.com email addresses to your existing account, while in Gmail you can add anything after the first part of your email provided you do it with a plus sign – so for example karen.smith+notes@gmail.com would go to karen.smith@gmail.com. You can then set rules or filters to look for your aliases and process them accordingly, for example by sending them straight to your spam folder.

Set up Quick Steps

This one's Outlook-only – in addition to Rules, Outlook has Quick Steps to help you organise your inbox. The difference between Quick Steps and Rules is that the former are run manually while the latter are automatic. A Quick Step is a fast way of applying multiple actions to a message or group of messages, and Outlook comes with predefined ones such as Move to Folder or Reply & Delete. By creating a Quick Step and adding it to your Quick Access toolbar (under the lightning bolt icon) you can turn many email processing jobs into one-click efforts.

Create canned responses

You'll often find yourself essentially writing the same message again and again to multiple people, so why not automate it? Outlook's Quick Parts are a blessing here: create an email, write the bit you don't want to write ever again, then click on Insert > Quick Parts > Save Selection to Quick Part Gallery. The next time you need to send that message, put the cursor in the body of the message and click Insert > Quick Parts and then select your canned response.

The process is similar in Gmail but you need to go to Settings > Labs and look for the Canned Responses option. Click Enable to turn it on.

Use Autocorrect

Canned responses can be overkill for a lot of messages, but there's another way to speed up your email composition and replies. One massive time-saver is to use autocorrect as a form of shorthand, so for example you could replace a long email address with "eml", a postal address with "addr" or a sign-off with "regrd" so the full text magically appears when you type the correct command.

In Outlook, you can define your Autocorrect entries in File > Options > Proofing > Mail > Spelling and Autocorrect. For Gmail you'll need to do it at the operating system level using a third-party app, or via a Chrome flag: type chrome://flags in the address bar and look for Enable Automatic Spelling Correction.

Use task lists

One of the most practical ways to manage your email is to use to-do lists – flagging a message for future action is only useful if you remember to come back to it, and to-do lists are a great way of ensuring that you do. In Outlook you can flag an email message for follow-up by right-clicking the flag icon and setting a reminder time, or you can drag the message to the To-Do Bar to create a to-do item.

In Gmail, click on Gmail > Tasks to bring up the Tasks List. To add a mail message to it, click on the message's More drop-down and select Create Event. This adds the event you create to your Calendar.

Do it now

One school of thought says you should only ever read a message in your inbox once: if you just let it sit there, you aren't organising your email effectively enough. Instead, you should take immediate action – delete it if it's irrelevant, delegate it if it's someone else's job, archive if you don't need to do anything or flag it to come back to later.

The end result of that should be the much-vaunted Inbox Zero – or at least it will be until someone emails you and spoils it. The method does work, but it's best suited to infrequent raids on your inbox – if you attempt to process every email as soon as it arrives, you'll find it hard to get anything else done.

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How to set up Family Sharing on an iPhone, iPad or Mac

TechRadar: All latest feeds How to set up Family Sharing on an iPhone, iPad or Mac

In the dark days before iOS 8 introduced Family Sharing, one parent couldn't access the other's go-to playlist when the kids got cranky in the car. Now, up to six people can share purchases made in iTunes, the App Store, and iBooks, plus family photo libraries, calendars and more. Setup is simple if you avoid a couple snags - here's all you need to know.

How Family Sharing works

Everyone in the group can share the content purchased through their individual accounts, but each person retains authority over their account as an Organizer. An Organizer can grant someone a kind of second-in-command status within their account by designating them as a Parent/Guardian. A child's account is the lowest on the totem pole: it can't be directly associated with a credit card, so all purchases are made through the Organizer's account. If the Ask to Buy feature is toggled on for a child's account, then the group's Organizer and anyone designated as a Parent/Guardian will receive an alert on their own devices when a child tries to buy something, allowing those in charge to approve or disapprove the purchase before it goes through.

Getting started

Family Sharing on an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch requires iOS 8. To set up an iOS device, go to Settings > iCloud > Set Up Family Sharing. You'll get a brief overview of the feature; when you're done reading, tap Get Started. A couple of screens explain your role as Organizer, then you're asked to add a credit card to your Apple ID if you haven't done so already. If you plan to add a child to Family Sharing, a debit card won't do - since those can be given to minors, Apple requires a credit card to prove you're a grown-up. BUT! If you prefer, you can switch to a debit card after adding the child to the group.

To set up Family Sharing using a Mac, first make sure you're using OS X Yosemite, then open System Preferences and click iCloud. Next, click the Set Up Family button in the left column and follow the on-screen instructions. (Note: The Set Up Family button will change to Manage Family once you've gone through the initial process.)

Adding members

In iOS 8, the list of family members you share with can be easily managed in Settings > iCloud > Family. A new member can be added by simply tapping Add Family Member and typing in their email address. If you're adding any children, tap Create an Apple ID for a child to set up set up an iCloud email account and password for them. On a Mac, go to Settings > iCloud > Manage Family and click the + button in the lower-left corner.

And that's it!

You've now set up a group for Family Sharing. You may want to consider putting restrictions on any children's devices to prohibit them from accessing any objectionable content, such as rated-R movies or songs with explicit lyrics. (To do so, visit Settings > General > Restrictions on the child's device). It's also possible to hide purchases made through iTunes, iBooks, or the App Store so they aren't even visible to the people you share with. For more information on everything Family Sharing allows you to do, check out Apple's official page.

Have fun accessing all your family's content without having to buy anything more than once!

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