[dba-SQLServer] Syncing Virtual Machines

jwcolby jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com
Tue Oct 25 11:33:58 CDT 2011


I don't quite understand the question, but everything is working fine.  As long as the virtual disks 
themselves still exist it is somewhat trivial to get a vm back working, but it is absolutely silly 
that I have to "rebuild" every VM, attaching the existing virtual disk for the VM(s) when an XML 
file is sitting right there to use.

I have been doing this for years and for the small guy, the process is just pure frigging magic 
shall we say.  Smoke and mirrors and who the heck knows why we have to jump through these hoops. 
For a fortune 500 company with a million dollar IT payroll this may all make sense.

I'm telling you, you guys should try and exist in this IT world when you are a sole proprietor 
trying to maintain all this stuff and make a living as well.  It pretty much sucks!

Just understanding networks is a full time career.  Then add virtual machines (and their servers), 
and SQL Server (and their servers), and then maintain the workstations, and finally... learn C# and 
Access, source control (and the server), 16 different variants of remote access into the client's 
machines.  FTP crap to get and put files.  Have I left anything out?  Oh yea, in my "spare time" I 
have to maintain all of the family computers.

And my wife wonders why I spend 12 hours a day in my office.

My JOB is writing C# and Access database software.  My JOB actually consumes about 25% of my total 
time.  Maaaaybe 50% on a good day.

So when I spend 2 hours dicking around trying to figure out (for the third or fourth time) how to 
get my VMs to cleanly back up - AND FAIL!!! (for the third or fourth time!!!) - I get slightly annoyed.

It shouldn't be this hard!  The technology of all of this stuff is cool, the implementation is crap, 
and that is being kind.

John W. Colby
Colby Consulting

Reality is what refuses to go away
when you do not believe in it

On 10/25/2011 11:53 AM, Francisco Tapia wrote:
> So in what state is the logical disk that housed your vm?
>
> Sent from my mobile
>
> On Oct 25, 2011, at 6:40 AM, jwcolby<jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com>  wrote:
>
>> No, not at all.  I did not back up before the change of the motherboard.
>>
>> John W. Colby
>> Colby Consulting
>>
>> Reality is what refuses to go away
>> when you do not believe in it
>>
>> On 10/25/2011 8:51 AM, Francisco Tapia wrote:
>>> Did you mean you did not backup. Ever?
>>>
>>> Sent from my mobile
>>>
>>> On Oct 25, 2011, at 4:14 AM, Arthur Fuller<fuller.artful at gmail.com>   wrote:
>>>
>>>> Maybe I'm missing something, but can't you just copy the physical VM file
>>>> from one server to another, say daily? I have successfully done that with
>>>> Sun VirtualBox.
>>>>
>>>> A.
>>>>
>>>> On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 7:07 AM, jwcolby<jwcolby at colbyconsulting.com>wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> I have a virtual machine server (Colby-VM) and last weekend I rebuilt that
>>>>> machine - new motherboard / memory in preparation for a faster CPU etc.  I
>>>>> store all my stuff on a RAID array on a dedicated controller, and which
>>>>> survives nicely across upgrades so I got lazy and did not backup.  (almost)
>>>>> Everything that could go wrong did and by the end of the experience I was
>>>>> sweating bullets about whether I was going to find one of my critical VMs.
>>>>>
>>>>>
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