computers – AgileOps

Are you Secure when you browse the web ?

Ibrahim Quraishi — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 01:26:51 +0000

Eventually someone else started using their network; they only realized this after they felt that their connection became slow. This could have been worst as people can capture all the packets and get the critical information like online banking information, CC numbers etc. The truth is even if your using secure Wi-Fi connection, wireless technology can still be very easy to compromised, how ? Check out for yourself Googleit – how to crack Wi-Fi network and you will get the answer. However we can avoid this just by making sure we do not use simple name or dictionary words as a passphrase. Always use complex passphrase /WEP/WPA2 keys and make sure you have a key which is at least 10 to 12 characters long. Now let’s get to the point How to secure Your wireless network ? Change Your network name and Your router login information Simple job just login to the router using the details from Manufacture. Usually found at the back on the router long and change the Name of the network and login information or at least the password. Secure Your Wi-Fi network: If you do not secure your network it will be open for anyone who can get your wireless signal. WEP (Wire Enabled Protection) this should only be used if you have old laptop that does not support the advanced encryption. If you are using this make sure you use 128 bit encryption. WPA 2 encryption is the best so far, However I suggest you keep a long passphrase and complex at the same time. Hide Your network name (SSID) Although most people don’t do this, but I strongly suggest you to hide the SSID. Simple logic if they can’t find your Wi-Fi signal you will be less vulnerable to get hacked. Enable Software and Hardware Firewall: Let me explain Software firewall is the firewall built into the Operating System i.e., Windows Vista or Windows 7 just enable it. Hardware firewall ah might be new to some of us, but most of the routers built today even the cheapest one has a firewall program built into them. So all you got to do is login to the router using your admin login and enable it. Hope you find this post useful feel free to comment if you ever used open / un-secure Wi=Fi.]]>

Memory Support in Windows – Kernal v User Virtual Addressing

Ibrahim Quraishi — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 22:02:43 +0000

example: [boot loader] timeout=30 default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT [operating systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT=”*****” /3GB Note: “*****” Can be any of the following operating system versions: Windows XP Professional Windows Server 2003 Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition Windows Server 2003, Datacenter Edition Windows 2000 Advanced Server Windows 2000 Datacenter Server Windows NT Server 4.0, Enterprise Edition So if you think you need more memory you can give it a short. However if your Kernal is already struggling then,I would not suggest you to try this. you can try some other options like increasing the virtual memory. reference: https://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/pae/paemem.mspx]]>

How to Virtualize Your Computer

Ibrahim Quraishi — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 14:08:36 +0000

Last Friday I have virtualized my Windows XP Laptop, before I start telling you guys, how its done I think its worth mentioning why I need to do it?

We normal Virtualize the physical server that are very old and start getting faults very often or they are too big for us to keep in our data centres. I have dual booted my laptop with Windows 7 ’64 bit’ edition, Which works brilliant. However Win7 is as this is 64 bit version of Windows I had to work around quite a few applications which I use on daily basis to get them work on Win7. However the most important software which I need to work from home is the vpn client provided by CISCO. The VPN client is yet to be rewritten for Win ’64 bit’ CPU. As a result I could not use Win7 to work from home, as I was unable to install VPN client to deil. Now you can guess why I virtualized my Windows XP OS. For P2V (Physical to virtual Conversion) all you need is VM ware Vcenter which is the software that does this beautiful job of converting the Physical machine in my case Laptop to a VM ware Virtual machine more specifically it rebuilds it to a .VMDK file (a specific file format for VMware virtual machines). This is how you do it:

1. Open VCenter and select Convert Mechine

: VCenter

2. Specify Source: On the new screen you we will need to select source which will be the system you want to virtulize.

• From the dropdown select Power-on machine. • Make sure you select this local machine.

: Specify Source

3. Specify Destination: On this screen you will need to specify the destination and destination type i.e. if you want the virtual machine to be a workstation or a vmware Infrastructure guest machine.

• Select the destination type as Vmware Workstation or Other VMware or virtual machine • Select a VMware product VMware Worksation 6.5.x • On the virtual machine details section You will need to give the name of the system (what ever you want it to be known as) • Specify the destination to store the vm ( you will find the .vmdx file eg. TechnoMechine.vmdx)

: Specify Destination

4. Specify Destination View and Edit Options: On this screen you can edit all Virtual machine and select the requirement you need for your virtual machine.

• We can give the storage size by default VCenter will like to give the same size of the source drive where your Operating system is installed. • I have my XP installed on 30 GB partition and I have now extended it to 50 GB as I was struggling for disk space. • You can click on the Advanced to view more option.

: View and Edit VMware

View and Edit VMware 5. Devices : This section is to setup the number of CPU you want your VM to use and the Memory you want to give to the VM.

6.Networks: this section is to choose how you want the vm to connect to the network.

We have 3 options: •Bridge that allows you to connect directly to the physical network. •NAT (Network Address Translation) Used to share the host IP address. (recommended) •Host-only that setup a private network share with the host machine.

7.Services: always make sure you disable all the services which are specific to the hardware as you will not need them once the system is virtualized. an example is Apple Mobile device for iPhone.

8. Ready to Complete: Summery of all the selections you have made just go through it to be sure that you have selection is correct. If you wish to change something you can still hit on the back button and get it changed.

Once you confident that you have everything correct on this page click Finish and sit back and relax. Once you confident that you have everything correct on this page click Finish.

: Physical to Virtual Conversion by VmWare Vcenter

After the P2V is completed, I used the VM ware Player to open the .vmdk file this understands that it’s a virtual machine and starts the system. Just by chose the option that says open an existing VM machine. And browse to the .vmdx file, you should be ready to play the vm.

We can also Save/Restore the VM to save time which is similar to hibernation After opening XP vm I am connecting to the VPN to make sure the RSA still work after vitalizing. If anyone wants to do this and need any help just let me know I will update this post with step by step instructions for doing the P2V conversion. Advantages of virtualization: • Save hardware replacement cost on event of hardware failure. best for old servers that are running crappy hardware and keeps braking every other week. • Save maintenance cost. • Save energy as your not powering it on its running on another Server • You will eventually save money on cooling too. • Most importantly if you think that the Virtual machine needs more memory all you would need to do is shut down and increase memory. • The same applies to disk space all you will need to do is add a new Virtual disk image and map it to the VM it will start looking at the new data store in My Computer. If anyone has any questions please feel free to comment .]]>

Where in the World is Ibrahim Quraishi?

Ibrahim Quraishi — Sat, 14 Feb 2009 02:18:37 +0000

I haven’t had a chance to write a new post in a while because I’ve been busy working at Orange. I am mostly involved in managing and maintaining Microsoft Windows 2k and 2k3, however we still have some of the legacy WinNT 4.0 nightmares every now and then. I have been working on HP Open View Operations version 8 involving some auditing on our servers.

I have finally become Expert in configuration of iLo Management Boards for the HP Bladservers also have had training by HP for HP BladeSystem Administrator

I am also quite keen on learning to use the magic of BladeLogic, ( running jobs for package deployments)

Apart from that I’ve been playing with VM Ware ESX server and also the VM Ware Infrastructure 2.0 managing quite a lot Virtual Machines, should admit Virtualization is really good fun. I am looking forward for training on VM Ware which will give me an insight how this technology mingles with the physical hardware.

In my spare time I have started working on Linux Administration, I have recently build a CentOS Server which is the exact binary of the Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Not to forget that this is a free distribution unlike RHEL, the good thing about this Linux version is this is quite robust unlike Fedora family.

My next experiment on another famous brand of Unix system called FreeBSD, Although it took me considerable amount of time to figure out the terminology of the Operation system itself.

Yes how can I forget to mention! just creating a simple user is also a nightmare on this Unix flavor. Thus I have decided that I will be loyal to Mr Red Hat. J

In addition to this, I have few trainings lined up which I am looking forward for.

Microsoft Windows 2003, February 23 -27, London, UK

Microsoft Windows Server 2008, March 17- 20, Bristol, UK

Virtualization VM Ware, April, Reading, UK

Finally before I my end my blog today some updates on my personal, I recently got engaged on 26 Jan, yeh that’s right India’s Republic day.

More update on my wedding which is not too far will be coming soon. …

If you wish to contact me or have any comments feel free.

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Get more done by working Smarter!

Ibrahim Quraishi — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 00:04:47 +0000

Working as a System Analyst is very exiting job, but if your not smart enough! It can become a little boring. let me give you a simple example, I was doing some of the housekeeping of the Servers that we support, which involved me to do a series of task on each Server, you might be thinking that’s not a big deal ! well reconsider it once more if you have to do that task 300 times, the same steeps on all the Servers (if you have 300 Servers) or if you have to do a task several time a day on few Servers, Now that can get very tedious job, and off course can become boring too. the only solution around this problem is scripting or Coding or Programming. Ok hang on are you one of the guy who likes to keep away form programming like me ? Well in all honesty, I use to say that programming is not my peace of cake as I am a system Admin, but let me give you another example. As you’re the Administrator you are been told to create a user account for a new starter, well if he just needs the domain access your job is very easy as you just need to create one user at the Active directory dome controller. But if you need to give him logon locally access you have to create a local account on each of the Server, if you have 300 Servers, then its not wise to logon each server and careate a user. Ok now you will need a method or a script to do that job for you, You do not need to be an expert to do it, you should just know, want to be done. Dint get it ? I know scripting sounds scary isn’t it, don’t worry you do not need to learn every thing, Scripting is very simple, its a set of commands which you want to do. If your very lucky you can find a ready to use code on the internet, all you got to do now is download it and edit it according to your need then please do not forget to test before you implement. once your convinced that the script is doing the exact job as you wanted. Wala Believe me it does make our life a lot easy so if your need to do a task more then once which can take 10 minutes each time you do it. Try to write a Script. if you have to do a series of admin tasks on several computers Try to write a script If you want to run a particular task at a time when you wont be in the office or it simply does not need any monitoring. Again try to write a script. just write a simple script and keep it. so wheen you need to do it again you can just execute that code and it will do it for you Magic isn’t it J Ok this is how you can work smatter rather then harder I have gathered some useful links which is worth watching.

Special thanks to my friend Nathan who has not only given me this idea but helped me by going through some of the scripts which he wrote earlier, now I have managed to do the same task with in a matter of minutes just by working smarter.

Hear are some of the links you can find useful other wise just use Google

You will find a lot of new scripting tools like windows Power Shell, and other useful software and technical articles for making the Admin task easy by scripting

Microsoft TechNet :

https://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/default.mspx

Scripting: Your First Steps

https://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/topics/beginner/firststeps.mspx

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