Wu's Blog

My IT Adventure

Category: English

English version of my posts.

  • What is the time format in Bitbucket API?

    I was trying to retrieve a report in a Bitbucket instance. The return from the API contains event dates. However, the value looks strange. It is something like 1680143775227.

    The format looks like Unix Epoch Timestamp. But it was converted to a far future time in any online converters.

    The .Net action [System.DateTime]::UnixEpoch.AddSeconds() threw an error:

    MethodInvocationException: Exception calling "AddSeconds" with "1" argument(s): "Value to add was out of range. (Parameter 'value')"

    The solution is using [System.DateTime]::UnixEpoch.AddMilliSeconds() to convert the time.

    Such format calls Epoch Milliseconds or Unix Time in Milliseconds.

  • Fixing Motor Unresponsiveness on Raspberry Pi Due to Grounding

    The last time I wrote about Raspberry Pi was Connect to New Provisioned Raspberry Pi Less than $3, about six years ago. Time flies! Today, I will talk about a grounding issue.

    Background and Troubleshooting

    I recently purchased a powerful motor driver board. It supports two DC motors with encoders and other features. During the initial testing, I experienced weird behavior. As a cloud engineer, I find it interesting to learn about the physical world.

    (more…)
  • Terraform Cloud – How to List All Users

    Terraform Cloud – How to List All Users

    Terraform Cloud has a rich API. However, the API documentation does not mention how to list all users. We can leverage the organization membership API and the PowerShell command Invoke-RestMethod to get a user list.

    (more…)

  • Connect-NsxtServer shows “Unable to connect to the remote server”

    When you run Connect-NsxtServer in the PowerCLI, it may show “Unable to connect to the remote server“.

    Because the error message is a little bit confusing with other login issues. It’s not easy to troubleshoot. The actual reason is the NSX-T uses a self-signed certificate, and the PowerCLI cannot accept the certificate automatically.

    The fix is super easy. You need to set the PowerCLI to ignore the invalid certificate with the following command:

    Set-PowerCLIConfiguration -Scope User -InvalidCertificateAction:Ignore -Confirm:$false

  • Move Terraform Providers to Other Folders

    Create a new control file with the name .terraformrc or terraform.rc in your profile folder.

    Add the following lines:

    plugin_cache_dir   = "$HOME/.terraform.d/plugin-cache"

    Create the folder .terraform.d/plugin-cache in your profile folder.

    The providers will be downloaded to the cache folder when you run terraform init.

    If you don’t want to create the control file in the profile folder. Alternative is to create an environment variable.

    export TF_PLUGIN_CACHE_DIR="$HOME/.terraform.d/plugin-cache"

  • How to Use Proxy on WSL 2

    1. Install cntlm.
      sudo apt-get install cntlm
    2. Configure the permission for cntlm.conf file.
      sudo chmod 644 /etc/cntlm.conf
    3. Configure proxy settings.
      sudo vi /etc/cntlm.conf
    4. Make sure the following parameters are configured.
      Domain Domain
      Username username
      Proxy 1.2.3.4:5678
      NoProxy localhost, 127.0.0., 10.
      Listen 3128
    1. Test connectivity. (Hit enter key if it asks a password)
      cntlm -M http://www.google.com
    2. Generate hashed passwords.
      cntlm -H
    3. Paste the generated passwords to the cntlm configuration file.
    4. Configure proxy.
      export http_proxy=http://localhost:3128/
      export https_proxy=http://localhost:3128/
    5. Start cntlm
      sudo cntlm -v -c /etc/cntlm.conf

  • Setup Terraform and Ansible for Windows provisionon CentOS

    Setup Terraform and Ansible for Windows provisionon CentOS

    Provisioning Windows machines with Terraform is easy. Configuring Windows machines with Ansible is also not complex. However, it’s a little bit challenging to combine them. The following steps are some ideas about handling a Windows machine from provisioning to post configuration without modifying the winrm configuration on the guest operating system.

    1. Install required repos for yum.
    yum -y install https://repo.ius.io/ius-release-el7.rpm
yum -y install https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/epel-release-latest-7.noarch.rpm
yum -y install https://packages.endpointdev.com/rhel/7/os/x86_64/endpoint-repo.x86_64.rpm
yum -y install epel-release
yum -y install yum-utils
yum-config-manager --add-repo https://rpm.releases.hashicorp.com/RHEL/hashicorp.repo
    ShellScript
    1. Install Terraform.
    sudo yum -y install terraform
    ShellScript
    1. Install Ansible.
    sudo yum -y install ansible
    ShellScript
    1. Install Kerberos.
    yum -y install gcc python-devel krb5-devel krb5-libs krb5-workstation
    ShellScript
    1. Install pip.
    sudo yum -y install python-pip

# You probably need the following packages if you are using VPN
pip install pysocks
    ShellScript
    1. Install pywinrm[kerberos].
    pip install pywinrm[kerberos]
    ShellScript
    1. Configure /etc/krb5.conf.
      The following are the required lines. Please make sure to change the domain name to yours. And it’s case-sensitive.
    [libdefaults]
 dns_lookup_realm = true
 dns_lookup_kdc = true
 forward = true
 forwardable = true
 default_realm = ZHENGWU.ORG


[realms]
 ZHENGWU.ORG = {
  kdc = DC.ZHENGWU.ORG
  admin_server = DC.ZHENGWU.ORG
 }

[domain_realm]
 .zhengwu.org = ZHENGWU.ORG
 zhengwu.org = ZHENGWU.ORG
    ShellScript
    1. Create an Ansible inventory file.
    [win] #Group name
dc.zhengwu.org #This is the target server list
 

[win:vars]
ansible_connection=winrm 

ansible_user=administrator #It's better a domain admin account.
ansible_password=P@ssw0rd #Change this password
ansible_port=5985
ansible_winrm_transport=kerberos
ansible_winrm_server_cert_validation=ignore
    ShellScript
    1. Run Ansible win_ping test.
    ansible <group in inventory file> -m win_ping -i <inventory file>
    ShellScript

  • Cannot log in to Microsoft Account over VPN

    Abstract

    I am using a VPN (proxy) to improve the access performance to global websites. There was a minor issue that I struggled with for a long time. I could not log in to any Microsoft account when using a VPN. The solution is to add the Your account to the loopback exemption. However, I’ll explain the reason in this post.

    Explanation

    Microsoft used a different way to run applications on Windows 8 and later versions. It is called AppContainers. This change leads to some applications not working with VPN (proxy) since it blocks some data exchanges between applications. The change is for security reasons. It basically isolates each application to block the communication on the local computer level.

    But, Microsoft offers a way to exempt applications for troubleshooting purposes. Hence, adding the applications to the exemption work around the problem.

    Following are some useful commands for exemption with Windows native commands:

    # Show a list of loopback exemption
CheckNetIsolation.exe LoopbackExempt -s

# Add an application to the exemption
CheckNetIsolation.exe LoopbackExempt –a –n=<app name>

    It’s not easy to figure out the application name or ID. You should use Process Explorer. However, you can also download the 3rd party tool “Windows 8 AppContainer Loopback Utility” to configure it.

    AppContainer Loopback Exemption Utility
    Utility interface

    Reference

    How to enable loopback and troubleshoot network isolation (Windows Runtime apps) – Windows app development | Microsoft Docs

    AppContainers for Windows 8: What Are They and How Can You Create Them? | by Apriorit | Apriorit — Specialized Software Development Company | Medium

    AppContainer Isolation – Win32 apps | Microsoft Docs

    Allow an Application to bind and listen on a port to honor requests from outside the app (microsoft.com)

  • vSphere Web Client stuck on the loading screen

    vSphere Web Client stuck on the loading screen

    It’s been a while since my last post. I got an exciting issue a few days ago. I was trying to log in to a vCenter Server in Chrome. I can see the login screen and enter the credential. However, I was not able to get into the main page. vSphere Web Client was stuck on the “loading.”

    The reason is the Chrome version was 50. It’s incompatible with the vSphere Web Client version.

    Here are the vSphere Client requirements for your convenience.

  • Hackintosh on x86 platform – Part II Install macOS

    Hackintosh on x86 platform – Part II Install macOS

    I introduced the Hackintosh hardware tips in the first article. However, some software is required to configure, install, and run macOS on the Hackintosh. I used OpenCore. The other option is Clever.

    The high-level configure procedure

    1. Prepare macOS image.
    2. Create bootable USB disk with macOS image.
    3. Edit EFI configuration on the USB disk.
    4. Install macOS on the hardware.
    5. Tuning.

    However, you need to follow OpenCore official guidelines to prepare and install macOS. I only share my experience on Dell Inspiron 15-7569.

    Helper Machine for the Hackintosh

    OpenCore guidelines provide the tools on Windows, Linux, and macOS. I think the tools under macOS are most straightforward. So I suggest you have another computer to prepare the macOS image. Suppose you don’t have an Apple computer. You can create a macOS virtual machine on Windows 10. Following is what I used:

    1. Prepare a Windows 10 computer.
    2. Install VMware Workstation or VMware Player. The evaluation version is enough.
    3. Run unlocker 3.0.3 to enable macOS support on the VMware products above.
    4. Create a macOS VM.
    5. Download macOS image and install on the VM. (This article offers some images that can be used directly on VMware Workstation. I didn’t test it. But the guide is also helpful.)

    I recommend downloading the Catalina or older macOS version for the virtual machine since it is more stable. And another trick is you need to install VMware Tools on the virtual machine twice after install macOS.

    Tools

    Once the virtual machine is ready, you need to download and upload the following tools to it:

    • MountEFI. It’s a tool to mount the EFI partition.
    • OpenCore. It’s the core part to boot up macOS on non-Apple platform. It simulates the Apple hardware environment.
    • ProperTree. It’s used to edit the configure.plist file.
    • GenSMBIOS. It generates fake Apple serial number, board id…etc.
    • IORegistryExplorer. It’s useful to list graphic card on macOS for troubleshooting purpose.
    • installmacos.py. It downloads the official images to macOS.

    Configuration

    Now you have enough tools to start the actual works. I would suggest you follow the OpenCore official guidelines. Since it contains the detailed steps, I mentioned below. Following is the high-level procedure I used:

    You should complete the following steps on the helper macOS virtual machine.

    1. Download macOS image. I used to see some newer versions of Big Sur that could not complete the installation progress. If it’s the case, please choose a lower version.
    2. Format a USB disk to the Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format.
    3. Create the USB bootable installer with the downloaded image.
    4. Mount EFI partition of the USB disk.
    5. Create a folder called EFI in the empty EFI partition you mounted.
    6. Copy OperCore files over to the EFI folder.
    7. Add, remove, and modify the files in the EFI folder according to the OpenCore official guidelines.
    8. Edit the “config.plist” file in the EFI folder according to the OpenCore official guide.

    Installation

    Now you should be able to install macOS on the Hackintosh with the USB disk.

    Please make sure the partition is APFS when you format the local disk. Otherwise, macOS installation may be in problem.

    Please leave some space to install Windows 10 if you can. It will be beneficial for macOS issues in the future.

    You may want to use an external keyboard and mic if it’s a laptop. The reason is the laptop keyboard and touchpad may require additional tuning. You can do that later after installed the macOS.

    If everything goes smoothly, you should be able to see the login screen after several reboots.

    Post Installation Tuning

    The installation is not the end of the Hackintosh game. You still need to tune the macOS as much as possible to works as an actual Mac. Even it’s a Hackintosh. 🙂 Following is my experience:

    Apple’s unique features

    1. Play DRM content. Such as Apply TV+, High quality lossless music in Apply Music, Netflix or Amazon in Safari…etc. It doesn’t work if your computer only has embedded GPU (iGPU). And it only works well on AMD Dedicate GPU (dGPU, the secondary GPU on your computer). You may need to follow the commands I mentioned in the part I to enable it.
    2. AirDrops, SideCar, and Apple Bluetooth features (Such as AirPod Pro). You need a compatible wireless card to enable these features. The card with different part number (PN) may not work on some computers. For example, my laptop is Dell Inspiron 15-7569. I bought an DW1820A. The bluetooth worked but wireless never worked. According to the community, the only work version is DW1820A with PN: CN-08PKF4. Then I returned the first card and bought another one with the correct PN, it worked just fine. People says that driver is not required for compatible wireless card. This is inaccurate. You actually need to follow OpeCore guidelines to install 3rd party driver.

    Common features

    1. Sound Card. You may see no sound card in the macOS settings. Therefore, you need to follow the guide to find out your sound card’s ALC and try the layout id one by one in the boot arg section in configure.plist file. It spent me a lot of time to identify ALC of my sound card. Following is my experience:
      • Find your sound card’s vendor id (VEN), device id (DEV), and subsys id (SUBSYS) in device manager -> Properties of your sound card -> Detials -> Device instance path on Windows 10.
      • Search the combination of VEN and DEV. For example: Dell Inspiron 15-7569’s sound card is customized. It’s hard to find the actual Codec. I found the VEN 10EC, DEV 0225, SUBSYS 1028073 in the devce manager on Windows 10. I searched 10EC0225 in this file. And then try to match the SUBSYS in results. And found out the codec is ALC3234.
      • Found the codec in the AppleALC list.
      • You should see there are few or a lot of layout ids for your codec.
      • Now you need to test each id by following “Testing your layout section” in OpenCore.
      • Be patient! I tried a lot of ids for my codec, and one time I was about to gave up. But suddenly one ID was working!
    2. TouchPad and Mic on laptop. The OpenCore official guidelines have enough information for this. However, The trick is you need to decide are your TouchPad and Mic a PS2, USB, I2C or something else. It really confused me. My workaround to identiy it is to go to BIOS setting to check. My laptop has a keyword “PS2” in the TouchPad setting.

    That’s all I have at this moment. I didn’t provide detailed procedures since everyone’s hardware is different. However, the high-level processes may bring you some ideas about the whole picture of Hackintosh. Good luck and have fun!!!