Thus Spoke Herman

I had some difficulty in getting WireShark to recognise any of the interfaces on my machine. A quick net search led to a rather longer one, but revealed that my problems were because of permissions on the devices themselves for my user. I am sorry to the person who posted this result originally, I cannot remember which site I got it off:

sudo chown <user> /dev/bpf*

This allows wireshark to see the connections. It doesn’t require a wireshark restart either.

Right then, finally got round to finishing this.

Need to set up PokerTracker running in Parallels so that it can see the Postgresql DB running on the host machine.

To allow the VM image running in Parallels access to the Mac, I initially went for the host-based networking, thinking that PokerTracker was the only thing and didn’t need an internet connection, but it checks for updates on startup, and I also use Parallels for using Sopcast, which obviously needs internet access, so I had to revert my decision and go back to Shared.

To change the network configuration, just use the Parallels Devices menu and choose the one you want for networking. I disabled the network adapter in Windows and re-enabled to ensure that the new ip address gets set properly.

I opened PokerTracker in Parallels and set up the Postgresql settings in the setting tab - Still didn’t work! I could ping the Mac from the within Parallels, so was a bit confused for a while, but then the penny dropped:

I had to change Postgresql to accept network connections as by default it doesn’t allow non-local connections!

edit postgresql.conf

make sure this line looks like this:

listen_addresses = ‘*’

so it listens on all ip addresses!

edit pg_hba.conf

host all all 10.211.55.0/24 trust

to allow all hosts on this private network to connect! Obviously make this network the one the Parallels DHCP server assigns. This was the default for mine for Shared, it was different for the Host-Based, so check by doing a ipconfig in Windows and an ifconfig on the Mac.

Restart Postgresql once you have changed these files.

I then went into the Postgresql setting in PokerTracker using the new 10.211.55.2 address, which i got from doing a simple ifconfig on my Mac. It works!

I converted a DB, and renamed and set to be the default in PokerTracker. I restarted FullTilt on mac, to see where my hand histories are being saved (~/Documents/HandHistory) and changed this in PokerTracker before taking another Parallels snapshot, so I wouldn’t have to do all this again.

It now works a treat. It was a shame Crossover didn’t work (or I just couldn’t get it working before trying Parallels), but Parallels is pretty cool, and I know now I don’t need any other computer other than this one for my personal use.

NetApp F720 and FC7 (or was it FC9?) from eBay. Another load of hardware I have picked up hugely cheaply as they are now unsupported by their own makers. A habit I just can’t kick…

Now how the hell do they work?

What do we know: the filer head runs a Data ONTAP OS. It is proprietary and I believe needs a license. I have no idea if my filer has one or not.

Got myself a now.netapp account and have access to the documentation.

Using the My Licenses, I search by serial number. Not registered to me. No shit.

I try and register: Registered. Check licenses again: nothing, nothing in my registered products. It did ask for a product number which you get from typing in a command on the filer console. I haven’t even turned it on yet . This is next…

Lets go….

Serial cable by the looks of it. Need to check if it needs anything like a null modem. Need docs… back to now.netapp…
This might be it!

NetApp® Filers
F700 Series
Hardware Guide

actually this talks about LEDs and front diagnostics, lets just power it up and see what it does.

checking sensors
testing memory
finding image
testing all sorts
startup failed
repeat....


i may need to attach the disks and deafen myself further for this.
This entails some seriously loud beeping.
it has found an image though and is loading.
starting - yippee

Initialising PCI devices.


Beeping has stopped. -

Replace NVRAM batteries!
filer 0
Fault on slot 0a


Hmm. Doesn’t look too hot. According to the docs, I need a null modem for the serial console to connect. i only have a 25pin one. wonder if it will work :). Seriously, i have the most ridiculous thing coming out the back on 1 of the servers. Both NetApp and my server are male 9 pin serials. This is the set of connectors:

NetApp M9 - F9 Cable M9 - F9 Adaptor M25 - F25 Null Modem M25 - F25 Adaptor F25 - M25 Adaptor M9 - F9 Adaptor F9 - M9 Server.

Need hyperterminal or some such on my windows server in the rack i am using, but it doesn’t have anything and has no CD Player, hmm, might have to RDC and install it that way.
Add new windows components, click through to Communications and lo and behold, hyperterminal is unchecked. Now there is a security issue with this application on Windows Server 2003 apparently, whcih is why it isn’t installed by default, but I am not that fussed at present. This is no internet facing server, and I might just remove it once done anyway.

Bloody thing won’t do it over network. Had to copy all files to desktop and copy over ones it asked for during install. done now.

Files needed from CD for interest:
HYPERTRS.HL_
HYPERTRS.DL_
HYPERTRS.EX_
HYPERTRS.CH_
HTICONS.DL_
HTRN_JIS.DL_

Serial Settings for a NetApp F720 Filer - 9600 baud, 8 data bits, no parity, 1 stop bit.

We are in. Turning a Power Supply off got me a message. We also have a prompt:

filer>

lets try the command for the registration again:

filer> sysconfig -a
NetApp Release 6.5.6: Tue Oct 4 17:40:11 PDT 2005
System ID: 0016801618 (filer)

Backplane Serial Number: 236634
slot 0: System Board (NetApp System Board V N8)
Model Name: F720
Serial Number: 236634
Firmware release: 2.3_a2
Processors: 1
Memory Size: 256 MB
slot 0: FC Host Adapter 0a (QLogic 2100 rev. 3, 64-bit, L-port, <UP>)
Firmware rev: 1.19.14
Host Loop Id: 7 FC Node Name: 2:000:00a098:039c5a
Cacheline size: 16 FC Packet size: 2048
SRAM parity: Yes External GBIC: No
Link Data Rate: 1 Gbit
0: SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13 17.0GB 512B/sect (LRJ99488000070280Z69)
1: SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13 17.0GB 512B/sect (LRG99899000070481CAM)
2: SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13 17.0GB 512B/sect (LRG781410000704745NF)
3: SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13 17.0GB 512B/sect (LR47258400007052J8K3)
4: SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13 17.0GB 512B/sect (LRG866990000704747B2)
5: SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13 17.0GB 512B/sect (LRB09491000021024LGN)
6: SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13 17.0GB 512B/sect (LRK71932000070295GYY)
Shelf 0: VEM Kernel Version : 2.5 App. Version : 3.1

I/O base 0xbf00, size 0x100
memory mapped I/O base 0x84000000, size 0x1000
slot 0: SCSI Host Adapter 0b (Qlogic ISP 1040B, <ONLINE>)
Fast/Wide, Differential
Firmware Version 4.66.00 Clock Rate 60MHz.
I/O base 0xaf00, size 0x100
memory mapped I/O base 0x84200000, size 0x1000
slot 0: Ethernet Controller e0
MAC Address: 00:a0:98:00:82:68 (auto-100tx-fd-up)
I/O base 0xae80, size 0x80
memory mapped I/O base 0x84201000, size 0x400
slot 9: NVRAM (NetApp NVRAM II)
Revision: B3
Serial Number: 24402
Memory Size: 8 MB
Battery 1 Status: 0% (0.01v)
Battery 2 Status: 100% (3.08v)
memory mapped I/O base 0x84001000, size 0x80
I/O base 0xbe80, size 0x80
memory mapped I/O base 0x80000000, size 0x4000000
filer>


much stuff. it also seems to have recognised all the 7 17G seagate disks in my FC7 array.

Battery 1 status 0%
Battery 2 status 100%

This explains the front panel messages, but why is it still knackered?

Not attached to network yet, lets see what happens when i do this.
cool, it has a bash like command history!
right, ethernet is now up, but no ip.

filer>ifconfig e0 192.168.0.13

works. now pingable.

filer>license
cifs CNDWHEM

There are a lot of options/extras and other cool looking things, but they are all unlicensed. At least cifs has a working license, otherwise this is a paperweight, as there is no way I am paying for one of those license things (if I could even get one).

Lets see what we have under cifs then:


filer> cifs shares
Name Mount Point Description
---- ----------- -----------
ETC$ /etc Remote Administration
BUILTIN\Administrators / Full Control
HOME /vol/vol0/home Default Share
everyone / Full Control
C$ / Remote Administration
BUILTIN\Administrators / Full Control
filer>


added myself as a user

filer> useradmin useradd matt
New password:
Password must contain at least 2 alphabetic characters and
at least 1 numeric or special character
New password:
Retype new password:
User <matt> added.
filer> Thu May 1 21:51:51 GMT [rc:info]: User <matt> added


Oh look, the date is wrong. I will fix if I can get everything else sorted.
Connected as that user from a different machine, whoa, we are in! We now have a working filer! It has a df command and it only shows 11G though:

filer> df -h
Filesystem total used avail capacity Mounted on
/vol/vol0/ 11GB 155MB 11GB 1% /vol/vol0/
/vol/vol0/.snapshot 3056MB 14MB 3042MB 0% /vol/vol0/.snapshot


A problem message popped up in the console, which was the “Fault on slot 0a” issue, this was rectified when I attached another power supply to the disk array. Greedy bastard wants 2. The noise suddenly reduced massively and the it even reported that the fault had now been rectified. Ho Ho Ho. Just need to work out how to replace NVRAM batteries now, and work out where all the disk space is


filer> shelfchk
Only shelves attached to channel 0a should have all LEDs ON.
Are these LEDs all ON now? yes
filer> Thu May 1 22:07:14 GMT [rc:info]: Disk Configuration - No Errors Identified

Disk array is fine. It seems I need to create a new volume. Back to docs for a bit…
Right, I need to see what disks are available for a new volume:

filer> vol status -s

Spare disks

RAID Disk Device HA SHELF BAY CHAN Used (MB/blks) Phys (MB/blks)
--------- ------ --------------- ---- -------------- --------------
Spare disks for zoned checksum volumes only
spare 0a.2 0a 0 2 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
spare 0a.3 0a 0 3 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
spare 0a.4 0a 0 4 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
spare 0a.5 0a 0 5 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
spare 0a.6 0a 0 6 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
filer>
Cool. Lets get creationist on it!

I went for 4 as I got a RAID warning about not having any spares so thought I might get add the 5th later

filer> vol create vol_main 4
Thu May 1 22:38:56 GMT [raid.vol.disk.add.done:notice]: Addition of Disk /vol_main/plex0/rg0/0a.5 Shelf 0 Bay 5 [SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13] S/N [LRB09491000021024LGN] to volume vol_main has completed successfully
Thu May 1 22:38:56 GMT [raid.vol.disk.add.done:notice]: Addition of Disk /vol_main/plex0/rg0/0a.4 Shelf 0 Bay 4 [SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13] S/N [LRG866990000704747B2] to volume vol_main has completed successfully
Thu May 1 22:38:56 GMT [raid.vol.disk.add.done:notice]: Addition of Disk /vol_main/plex0/rg0/0a.3 Shelf 0 Bay 3 [SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13] S/N [LR47258400007052J8K3] to volume vol_main has completed successfully
Thu May 1 22:38:56 GMT [raid.vol.disk.add.done:notice]: Addition of Disk /vol_main/plex0/rg0/0a.2 Shelf 0 Bay 2 [SEAGATE ST318203FC NA13] S/N [LRG781410000704745NF] to volume vol_main has completed successfully
Thu May 1 22:38:57 GMT [config_async_0:notice]: Volume vol_main has been added to the system.
Creation of a volume with 4 disks has completed.
filer> Thu May 1 22:38:57 GMT [download.update:info]: Begin bootblock update, prototype is 0a.1


But when I checked, I saw that 1 had been set as a parity one anyway:

filer> vol status vol_main -r
Volume vol_main (online, raid4) (zoned checksums)
Plex /vol_main/plex0 (online, normal, active)
RAID group /vol_main/plex0/rg0 (normal)

RAID Disk Device HA SHELF BAY CHAN Used (MB/blks) Phys (MB/blks)
--------- ------ --------------- ---- -------------- --------------
parity 0a.2 0a 0 2 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
data 0a.3 0a 0 3 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
data 0a.4 0a 0 4 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
data 0a.5 0a 0 5 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480


Rather than have a wasted disk (do I really need a spare, not at present. Maybe I will undo later and have a spare once I work out what to do with this insanely noisy thing) - I need to destroy and start again:


filer> vol offline vol_main
Thu May 1 22:41:41 GMT [config_async_0:notice]: CIFS - disabled for volume vol_main
Volume ‘vol_main’ is now offline.
filer> vol destroy vol_main
Are you sure you want to destroy this volume? yes
Thu May 1 22:41:51 GMT [raid.config.vol.destroyed:info]: Volume ‘vol_main’ destroyed.
Volume ‘vol_main’ destroyed.
filer>

filer> vol create vol_main 5

WARNING! Continuing with vol create will result in having no spare disk available for one or more raid groups.
Are you sure you want to continue with vol create? yes
Thu May 1 22:44:03 GMT [raid.rg.spares.low:warning]: /vol0/plex0/rg0
volume has been created with 1 disk added to the volume. 4 more disks need
to be zeroed before addition to the volume. The process has been initiated
and you will be notified via the system log as the remaining disks are added.
filer>
filer> Thu May 1 22:45:00 GMT [monitor.globalStatus.nonCritical:warning]: There are not enough spare disks.


Bugger


filer> vol status
Volume State Status Options
vol_main restricted raid4
initializing
vol0 online raid4 root, maxdirsize=5242
filer> vol offline vol_main
vol offline: Invalid operation on volume vol_main being created.
filer> vol destroy vol_main
vol destroy: Invalid operation on volume vol_main being created.
filer>

Have I shafted it already?

filer> vol status vol_main -r
Volume vol_main (restricted, raid4, initializing) (zoned checksums)
Plex /vol_main/plex0 (offline, empty, active)

Targeted to volume but not yet assigned to a raid group
RAID Disk Device HA SHELF BAY CHAN Used (MB/blks) Phys (MB/blks)
--------- ------ --------------- ---- -------------- --------------
pending 0a.2 0a 0 2 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480 (zeroing, 21% done)
pending 0a.3 0a 0 3 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480 (zeroing, 22% done)
pending 0a.4 0a 0 4 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480 (zeroing, 20% done)
pending 0a.5 0a 0 5 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480 (zeroing, 22% done)
pending 0a.6 0a 0 6 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480


Phew, not quite. The warning must be that I have just used all the disks.

This is taking quite some time. Once done I reckon I need to create a new cifs share and away we go! I can then do some tests on the speed of this end-of-life ebay gloriousness!

filer> vol status vol_main -r
Volume vol_main (online, raid4) (zoned checksums)
Plex /vol_main/plex0 (online, normal, active)
RAID group /vol_main/plex0/rg0 (normal)

RAID Disk Device HA SHELF BAY CHAN Used (MB/blks) Phys (MB/blks)
--------- ------ --------------- ---- -------------- --------------
parity 0a.3 0a 0 3 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
data 0a.6 0a 0 6 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
data 0a.2 0a 0 2 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
data 0a.5 0a 0 5 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480
data 0a.4 0a 0 4 FC:A 17000/34816000 17366/35566480

filer> df -h
Filesystem total used avail capacity Mounted on
/vol/vol0/ 11GB 155MB 11GB 1% /vol/vol0/
/vol/vol0/.snapshot 3056MB 14MB 3042MB 0% /vol/vol0/.snapshot
/vol/vol_main/ 47GB 1508KB 47GB 0% /vol/vol_main/
/vol/vol_main/.snapshot 11GB 0GB 11GB 0% /vol/vol_main/.snapshot
filer>


Created fine, lets get it shared via cifs:

filer> cifs shares -add data /vol/vol_main
filer> cifs shares
Name Mount Point Description
---- ----------- -----------
ETC$ /etc Remote Administration
BUILTIN\Administrators / Full Control
HOME /vol/vol0/home Default Share
everyone / Full Control
C$ / Remote Administration
BUILTIN\Administrators / Full Control
data /vol/vol_main
everyone / Full Control
filer>


And a quick test from another machine works fine. We are now ready to see how fast this goes, and this will have to be another time, as I need to get some sleep as my day tomorrow has admin all over it, and it is late already…

filer> halt -t 0.1
CIFS local server is shutting down...
CIFS local server has shut down...
Thu May 1 23:56:22 GMT [kern.shutdown:notice]: System shut down because : “halt”.
ok


I finally got a chance to do some work at the server without the pain of using Remote Desktop. I was messing around a bit, and needed a restart. Restart I did. However, after the initial Windows Server 2003 screen, I got the infamous blue screen of death:

“The registry cannot load the hive (file)”
“SystemRoot\System32\Config\SOFTWARE”

Now thats a failure! Hive file, WTF? I didn’t get a screen shot, but some other dude has had the same thing. I actually didn’t wait for the memory to dump to disk, I have no time for niceties.

Luckily my method of sorting this mess out was less tortured than his:

http://content.zdnet.com/2346-10741_22-39528.html

I tried Safe Mode. No cigar, same screen. Bugger.

I have the Windows Server 2003 CDs so I got them out. 1 issue. No CD Player in the server and I do not have a USB CD player, just IDE ones. Bugger.

Get the server out of the rack, take the hood off and connect the CD drive to the spare IDE slot and connect (just reached) to the spare molex. Was not recognised by motherboard. Bugger.

Swapped jumper on CD Drive to cable select - was on master. We are off and running. Changed the BIOS to try the CD drive first. We are into the Windows installer! When given the option, I press R for the Recovery Console. After being prompted for the admin password, I ran the following commands:

cd system32\config
ren software software.bak
copy c:\windows\repair\software

This goes to the directory where the dodgy registry software crap is, takes a copy (just in case) and then copies a repair, older version from a repair directory. Reboot time…

exit

It works!
Shutdown, remove IDE CD player, close hood. startup. It works!
Put back in rack
It works!
Wow. I can now do some work!

I got a copy of Office 2003, and installed using CrossOver again. I used the existing Microsoft Office 2003 installation rather than the custom one this time. After downloading many fonts, I just chose to install Access. This did not take very long. I could not create and save a new blank database though. PokerTracker would also still not start. Without access even running, I might have to use a VM image.

I decided to cut my losses and install Parallels and give it a go this way. I don’t want to dual boot, so Parallels seems a good option. I downloaded and installed and have 15 days to evaluate. I used Parallels Transporter to install a Windows VM from a Windows 2003 server installation I have running on a server tucked away in a dusty corner of the basement. It took a very long time. Once installed, I installed PokerTracker and took a snapshot. I also got myself a PokerTracker license, so I could use the postgres stuff already installed on the Mac. I activated PokerTracker and took another snapshot (also installed SopCast as a bonus before taking the snapshot, which also didn’t work fully in CrossOver). The issues now remaining are how to access the postgres DB running on my host Mac and how to access the directories of the FullTilt application, also running on the Mac. I want the DB on the host so I can simply use a Parallels snapshot and just restart the snapshot each time for obvious reasons. I also want the DB available outside of Parallels, as the less I have running in Windows the better.

I haven’t gotten PokerTracker talking to the Postgres DB on the host yet though. I am posting as I haven’t had time to look at this in a while and believe the longer things stay in draft mode, the less likely anything will ever happen….

conclusion of this saga can be found here