Since moving this site over to Hugo back in 2018, I’ve developed a workflow that seems to work pretty well. Given that I see that a lot of others are also moving over to static site generators, and I wasn’t exactly ahead of the curve on it myself, I figured I would try to write up how I work with Hugo and Visual Studio Code on my MacBook to generate content.
Some times there is a need to use custom DNS servers for some domains, in my case specifically for access to the new lab environment we are building at work (more on that later, this is one beefy lab!)
One way of doing this, is adding custom DNS servers to /etc/resolv.conf but in macOS you really shouldn’t be editing that file manually, as it often gets overwritten or otherwise edited by VPN clients and such.
Thankfully, there is a better way to create persistent and manageable custom domain specific DNS settings.
I recently got a pair of new displays for the office, a couple of lovely Dell U2719DC’s. These offer USB-C connectivity, which is really nice, and makes it easy to connect my MacBook when I’m in the office. Connected to one of the displays is a Logitech Z337 set of speakers with a sub, since there is no built-in speakers in these displays. The problem I had with that setup, is that macOS doesn’t let me easily differenciate between the two as they are named exactly the same, sometimes creating confusion as to which of them should be the sound output to the speakers.
Way back in 2017, the CA/Browser Forum voted on Ballot 193 – 825-day Certificate Lifetimes, which passed. In short, this means that CA issued certificates issued after March 1st 2018 can not have a validity period longer than 825 days. macOS Catalina implements this change, as described in Requirements for trusted certificates in iOS 13 and macOS 10.15. So it’s been a long time coming, but most of us are just now realizing how this affects us.
Warning: This also applies to Self-signed certificates, like the ones issued for VMware vSphere and related solutions, like NSX-T and others, where the default age is 10 years or so.
As I’ve covered before, I run my home network mostly on Ubiquiti UniFi hardware. Since this offers a lot of nifty possibilities, I figured I should try to isolate all my “IoT”-devices in a separate network, while still making them accessible. After all, you don’t want a security issue on some sensor/automation thing you have in your house to be able to access and encrypt your familiy photos, right? The thing that sits in the corner and controls the color of your lightbulbs, do not need to have access to the same network as your other data.
Some times you might need to create an isolated network, while still allowing that network to access the internet. Ubiquity UniFi offers the easy option of creating a guest network for this, but that limits traffic between the devices in the same network as well, which might not be desirable. My primary use case for creating an isolated network, is to provide my tenant with his own dedicated network, without exposing anything on my own home network — but I still want him to be able to connect his own devices to each other, if he wants to — or even replacing the AP with something else, should he choose to do so. Another use case might be to create a dedicated network for all of those IoT-devices that keep popping up, like Amazon Echo’s, Google Home and Chromecasts as well as Phillips Hue bridges etc.
If you want to go to VMworld US 2019 in San Francisco, and still don’t have a ticket, don’t despair. There is still time, as Veeam is giving away three full conference passes!
Back in late April I got notified that I had been accepted to attend the VMware Center for Advanced Learning Advanced Architecture Course, to be held in Paris, France July 9 - 19, 2019. Now that it is done, I find myself on a train from Paris to Nice, rocking out to Hüsker Dü contemplating just what it is that I have been a part of. First things first — this is not a class that can be taken lightly. You can not simply sign up for this, you have to be nominated and either work for VMware or a Partner to be taken into consideration to be accepted.
I’ve recently standardized on Ubiquiti equipment in the new house, and so far I am very happy with it. Wireless is working flawlessly, which is more than I could say for my old setup. A part of the new setup is a UniFi® Security Gateway (USG) that I am using as my gateway/firewall for my fiber connection, so I thought why not use that a my VPN termination as well?
Top vBlog 2018 Results: I am very happy to see that the site is still ranked in the top 25, clocking in at a very respectable 22nd place, and that also puts it into the 7th spot in the Independant Blogger category!
About
vNinja.net is the online hub of Christian Mohn and Stine Elise Larsen.
The site primarily focuses on IT architecture and data center technologies, with a strong emphasis on virtualization and related topics.While the main content revolves around these areas, you'll also find a range of other subjects covered from time to time, reflecting the interests of authors.
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