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    • Run scripts in guest OS with vRA ABX Actions

      calendar Sep 3, 2021  · edit Sep 20, 2021 · 14 min read · vra abx powershell vmware  ·
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      Run scripts in guest OS with vRA ABX Actions

      Thus far in my vRealize Automation project, I've primarily been handing the payload over to vRealize Orchestrator to do the heavy lifting on the back end. This approach works really well for complex multi-part workflows (like when generating unique hostnames), but it may be overkill for more linear tasks (such as just …


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    • Notes on vRA HA with NSX-ALB

      calendar Aug 25, 2021 · 7 min read · nsx cluster vra availability networking  ·
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      This is going to be a pretty quick recap of the steps I recently took to convert a single-node instance of vRealize Automation 8.4.2 into a 3-node High-Availability vRA cluster behind a standalone NSX Advanced Load Balancer (without NSX being deployed in the environment). No screenshots or specific details since I ran …


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    • Free serverless URL shortener on Google Cloud Run

      calendar Aug 20, 2021  · edit Feb 3, 2022 · 4 min read · gcp cloud serverless  ·
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      Intro I've been using short.io with a custom domain to keep track of and share messy links for a few months now. That approach has worked very well, but it's also seriously overkill for my needs. I don't need (nor want) tracking metrics to know anything about when those links get clicked, and short.io doesn't provide …


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    • Creating static records in Microsoft DNS from vRealize Automation

      calendar Aug 13, 2021  · edit Jan 18, 2022 · 11 min read · vmware vra vro javascript powershell automation  ·
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      Creating static records in Microsoft DNS from vRealize Automation

      One of the requirements for my vRA deployments is the ability to automatically create a static A records for non-domain-joined systems so that users can connect without needing to know the IP address. The organization uses Microsoft DNS servers to provide resolution on the internal domain. At first glance, this …


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    • Recreating Hashnode Series (Categories) in Jekyll on GitHub Pages

      calendar Jul 24, 2021 · 9 min read · meta jekyll  ·
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      Recreating Hashnode Series (Categories) in Jekyll on GitHub Pages

      I recently migrated this site from Hashnode to GitHub Pages, and I'm really getting into the flexibility and control that managing the content through Jekyll provides. So, naturally, after finalizing the move I got to work recreating Hashnode's "Series" feature, which lets you group posts together and …


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    • Joining VMs to Active Directory in site-specific OUs with vRA8

      calendar Jul 21, 2021 · 6 min read · vmware vra abx activedirectory automation windows  ·
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      Joining VMs to Active Directory in site-specific OUs with vRA8

      Connecting a deployed Windows VM to an Active Directory domain is pretty easy; just apply an appropriately-configured customization spec and vCenter will take care of it for you. Of course, you'll likely then need to move the newly-created computer object to the correct Organizational Unit so that it gets all the right …


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    • Virtually Potato migrated to GitHub Pages!

      calendar Jul 20, 2021 · 4 min read · linux meta chromeos crostini jekyll  ·
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      Virtually Potato migrated to GitHub Pages!

      After a bit less than a year of hosting my little technical blog with Hashnode, I spent a few days migrating the content over to a new format hosted with GitHub Pages. So long, Hashnode Hashnode served me well for the most part, but it was never really a great fit for me. Hashnode's focus is on developer content, …


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    • Script to update image embed links in Markdown files

      calendar Jul 19, 2021 · 2 min read · linux shell regex jekyll meta  ·
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      I'm preparing to migrate this blog thingy from Hashnode (which has been great!) to a GitHub Pages site with Jekyll so that I can write posts locally and then just do a git push to publish them - and get some more practice using git in the process. Of course, I've written some admittedly-great content here and I don't …


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    • Federated Matrix Server (Synapse) on Oracle Cloud's Free Tier

      calendar Jun 28, 2021  · edit Sep 17, 2021 · 15 min read · docker linux cloud containers chat  ·
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      Federated Matrix Server (Synapse) on Oracle Cloud's Free Tier

      I've heard a lot lately about how generous Oracle Cloud's free tier is, particularly when compared with the free offerings from other public cloud providers. Signing up for an account was fairly straight-forward, though I did have to wait a few hours for an actual human to call me on an actual telephone to verify my …


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    • Adding VM Notes and Custom Attributes with vRA8

      calendar Jun 1, 2021 · 4 min read · vmware vra vro javascript  ·
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      Adding VM Notes and Custom Attributes with vRA8

      In past posts, I started by creating a basic deployment infrastructure in Cloud Assembly and using tags to group those resources. I then wrote an integration to let vRA8 use phpIPAM for static address assignments. I implemented a vRO workflow for generating unique VM names which fit an organization's established naming …


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    • AdGuard Home in Docker on Photon OS

      calendar May 27, 2021 · 6 min read · docker vmware containers networking security  ·
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      AdGuard Home in Docker on Photon OS

      I was recently introduced to AdGuard Home by way of its very slick Home Assistant Add-On. Compared to the relatively-complicated Pi-hole setup that I had implemented several months back, AdGuard Home was much simpler to deploy (particularly since I basically just had to click the "Install" button from the …


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    • vRA8 Automatic Deployment Naming - Another Take

      calendar May 20, 2021 · 3 min read · vmware vra vro javascript  ·
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      vRA8 Automatic Deployment Naming - Another Take

      A few days ago, I shared how I combined a Service Broker Custom Form with a vRO action to automatically generate a unique and descriptive deployment name based on user inputs. That approach works fine but while testing some other components I realized that calling that action each time a user makes a selection isn't …


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    • vRA8 Custom Provisioning: Part Four

      calendar May 18, 2021  · edit May 20, 2021 · 10 min read · vmware vra vro javascript  ·
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      vRA8 Custom Provisioning: Part Four

      My last post in this series marked the completion of the vRealize Orchestrator workflow that I use for pre-provisioning tasks, namely generating a unique sequential hostname which complies with a defined naming standard and doesn't conflict with any existing records in vSphere, Active Directory, or DNS. That takes care …


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    • Automatic unattended expansion of Linux root LVM volume to fill disk

      calendar Apr 29, 2021 · 4 min read · linux shell automation  ·
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      Automatic unattended expansion of Linux root LVM volume to fill disk

      While working on my vRealize Automation 8 project, I wanted to let users specify how large a VM's system drive should be and have vRA apply that without any further user intervention. For instance, if the template has a 60GB C: drive and the user specifies that they want it to be 80GB, vRA will embiggen the new VM's …


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    • Using PowerShell and a Scheduled Task to apply Windows Updates

      calendar Apr 29, 2021 · 3 min read · windows powershell  ·
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      In the same vein as my script to automagically resize a Linux LVM volume to use up free space on a disk, I wanted a way to automatically apply Windows updates for servers deployed by my vRealize Automation environment. I'm only really concerned with Windows Server 2019, which includes the built-in Windows Update …


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    John Bowdre

    Wrangler of imaginary computers.
    VMware vExpert
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    Featured Posts

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