GNS3 VM on ESXi 802.1q link to external network

Monday, 23 July 2018 / Published in Lab, Networking
This post details my experiences getting the GNS3 VM on ESXi to work with 802.1q. I’ve been using the GNS3 VM on VMware Workstation for years, so far I’ve been unable to get virtual devices on the GNS3 VM to link to external networks using 802.1q. From my research I believed the issue to be

Restore VMware ESXi Host Configuration

Friday, 01 June 2018 / Published in Automation, Lab, Networking
This is a follow up post to the last one about backing up VMware host configurations. This post details how to Restore VMware ESXi Host Configuration. Restoring a configuration requires the host to be running the same product and build version that the backup was taken from. This was harder than I thought to work out

Upgrade a VMware ESXi host that VCSA is running on

Sunday, 25 March 2018 / Published in Lab, Networking, Security
How do you upgrade a VMware ESXi host that VCSA is running on? well, you can not use VCSA VUM (vCenter Server Appliance, VMware Update Manager). In this case we have a chicken and the egg problem. This is due to maintenance mode required on the host prior to patching but maintenance mode requires VCSA

Cisco SG300 backup python script

Friday, 16 February 2018 / Published in Automation, Lab, Networking
New script published to GitHub, a Cisco SG300 backup python script used to backup my SG300’s in my home lab. The script uses Netmiko to handle the ssh connection. The configuration from each switch is saved to a TFTP server in my home lab. I’ll shortly be adding an alternative version of the script which

Somebody please get this engineer a CLI

Monday, 01 January 2018 / Published in Networking, Personal
This post is a little war story about a time I helped out a friend of mine. My favourite movie for 2017 was John Wick Chapter 2. Not quite as good as the first movie but still awesome. In one of the  scenes Laurence Fishburn shouts “Somebody, please! get this man a gun” Just prior to Christmas a

Implementing Ubiquiti Unifi into the home network

Tuesday, 28 November 2017 / Published in Lab, Networking, Security
This post details my observations and experiences Implementing Ubiquiti Unifi into the home network. If you intend to use Unifi devices exclusively then the kit will work straight out the box with little configuration required, no point in reading this post TL;DR. On the other hand if you have a fairly elaborate home network which

Disaster Recovery Plan

Wednesday, 20 September 2017 / Published in Networking
“There is a problem with the disaster recovery plan, there is no recovery and there’s a 97.6% chance of failure”

StarTech USB To RS232 Serial Adaptor

Tuesday, 27 June 2017 / Published in Networking
It can be tricky finding a reliable USB to serial adaptor. I’ve recently brought a new as I’ve replaced my laptop and my old adaptor was not compatible with Windows 10. Fortunately I found one that works on my first purchase, the StarTech USB to serial Adaptor. The Adaptor was recognised by Windows 10 with

Automating the reboot of my home cable modem

Friday, 27 January 2017 / Published in Automation, Networking
This post details my approach to automating the reboot of my home cable modem. Up until recently my ISP has been extremely reliable and in over 14 years I’ve been a customer with them I could count on my hand the number of times I’d experienced issues. For the last week the service has been

Server 2012 Domain Controller Not Authenticating Users

Thursday, 01 December 2016 / Published in Lab, Networking
I don’t usually write “this how you configure this” type blogs but for this particular problem I experienced I’ll make an exception. This post details how I resolved an issue with a Windows server 2012 domain controller not authenticating users. Up until I purchased a VM backup solution I was manually and occasionally taking backups