I saw the same issue in Fusion 4 too and was at first suspicious at a subversion integration called Tortoise with Explorer, but could never pin it down on that. Even an uninstall of the tortoise to no avail.

Installing a brand new version of Windows 8 and sharing the same folder… had the same issues! Really a brand new windows VM and locking up for a minute or more while navigating a Fusion Shared Folder. That’s nuts!

Last week the guy who started this thread: Dr Gary mentioned that he had seen Windows Defender pop up in his task manager running at 100%.

Wait a second.. It’s always Windows Explorer that I see chewing up all the CPU, but YES, Windows Defender does integrate with Windows Explorer in a way that it might hide the real problem.

So I started Processmonitor from Sysinternals (Microsoft) and had it monitor all my file access while bringing Windows Explorer to its knees on a Shared Folder. I got to see this (but repeated many times and a lot of other zip files in there as well)

The clue there is that it tries to open and read zip files. Many of them and over and over again. Wait a second!

Before Windows 8 the Windows Defender tool is a malware scanner. My antivirus is allowed to look into zip files, I’m not sure if it is such a good idea for Windows Defender AND my antivirus to look into these files at the same time.

So I went to the settings of Windows Defender to stop scanning zip files and can’t believe the problem is fixed. Wow.. that’s 2 years of annoying lockups that could simply have been prevented.

Update:

Disabling the zip background scanning by Windows Defender did remove most of the high CPU for me.

However while using Outlook and trying to save an attachment in the shared folder I noticed high CPU again…

As the zip integration in Windows now was my direct suspect I decided to completely remove the integrated zip handling by windows explorer.

For me acceptable as I strongly dislike windows explorer’s behavior to treat zip files as a folder. Already used 7zip for opening/creating zip files, so nothing is lost by doing this for me.

So I used the steps as laid out here:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/13619-zip-folders-enable-disable-windows-explorer-view.html

Restarted my VM to apply that change.

…and that indeed now also seems to fix the high CPU in the “save as” dialog.

Of course not having to take any of these workaround steps would be nicer, but I personally am at least happy to have a responsive VM.

Will let you all know if the problem does come back again (hopefully not)

Update 2013/04/27:

1. According to Steve Goddard -the developer from VMware who knows EVERYTHING about this feature- the zip folder integration with Windows is unrelated and should only affect local disks, not VMware Shared folders.

2. As you can see in the linked forum thread above, another user reported this problem and his symptoms apparently had to do with the provider order in the network stack.

In the registry check the following setting:

Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\NetworkProvider\Order

Value Name: ProviderOder

Type: REG_SZ

It will say something like:

"RDPNP,LanmanWorkstation,webclient,vmhgfs"

The vmhgfs setting should be the first in the list, so in this example it should be changed into:

"vmhgfs,RDPNP,LanmanWorkstation,webclient"

This article was originally posted at planetvm.net and written by Wil van Antwerpen

The release notes have the following details on resolved issues:

• Added support for Boot Camp partitions on 3TB disk drives.
• Improved the cursor performance for select applications, especially when in Unity mode.
• Resolved an issue that could result in blurry graphics under certain circumstances.
• Resolved an issue that resulted in horizontal scrolling being reversed in Unity mode.
• Resolved an issue with displaying Office 2013 applications on some recent Macs.
• Improvements to vSockets.

If you already have Fusion installed, then get it via the VMware Fusion Menu -> Check for Updates. Alternatively get it via the VMware Fusion Download page.

This article was originally posted at planetvm.net and written by Wil van Antwerpen

Seems that I was queueing in the wrong line

It was apple who needed to address this as the OS X 10.8.3 update -which is available for everyone- addresses this issue.
For more info, see this thread on the forum Re: Volunteers needed: 2012 Mac users affected by 10.8.2 update issue

This article was originally posted at planetvm.net and written by Wil van Antwerpen

Apparently he has been able to strike a deal with the people from BareMetalCloud.com that the first 100 people using his discount voucher get a $100,- discount. Please read the details at Mike’s Bare Metal Cloud for your Autolab article.

These are some of the things that I will be blogging on over the next couple of months.

• P2V – a 101 and how to move it to an industrial scale.
• View 5.2 a 101 and then an advanced series

Further and contrary to popular belief, the world does not know what Cloud is,  there are still a lot of gaps in peoples understanding.  I will therefore be doing a series on what is cloud and what are the differing aaS’s out there ( and no that is not a naughty statement – it stands for As A Service )

Somehow just moving the shares to a new network segment on another VLAN broke things. I was puzzled and should have asked Tom I suppose.. but as a good IT guy I had to dig until I find out why by myself.So what do you do when you have NFS problems? Right.. you follow the steps of basic troubleshooting.

Both my lab hosts (vSphere 4.1 -ESX- and vSphere 5.1 -ESXi-) behaved the same and would not let me connect.

Trying to connect to any NFS share would -after a while- result in the following error:

"Call "HostDatastoreSystem.CreateNasDatastore" for object "ha-datastoresystem" on ESX "192.168.0.7" failed.
Operation failed, diagnostics report: Unable to complete Sysinfo operation.  Please see the VMkernel log file for more details.

The vmkernel.log had the following helpful tidbit:

2012-12-09T14:25:05.746Z cpu2:198983)NFS: 157: Command: (mount) Server: (192.168.0.9) IP: (192.168.0.9) Path: (/nfs/MyShare) Label: (MyShare) Options: (ro)
2012-12-09T14:25:05.746Z cpu2:198983)StorageApdHandler: 692: APD Handle 271460f7-918a5edb Created with lock[StorageApd0x410016]
2012-12-09T14:25:35.979Z cpu4:198983)StorageApdHandler: 739: Freeing APD Handle [271460f7-918a5edb]
2012-12-09T14:25:35.979Z cpu4:198983)StorageApdHandler: 802: APD Handle freed!
2012-12-09T14:25:35.979Z cpu4:198983)NFS: 168: NFS mount 192.168.0.9:/nfs/MyShare failed: Unable to connect to NFS server.

Connecting to these exact same shares via an ubuntu guest on the same host was no problem at all, just connect the guest to the NFS vSwitch and boom, gotcha,  it works.

Connecting from the vSphere 5.1 host to the iSCSI target the NAS device also exposes worked beautifully too. Click click.. done… easy.

So then one scratches behind the ear and starts to follow all the standard steps from the knowledge base:

Cannot connect to NFS network share

Troubleshooting connectivity issues to an NFS datastore on ESX / ESXi hosts

also followed my own troubleshooting steps from here:

ESX NFS storage on linux

Everything looked just fine. No firewall problems, all services worked fine. No root squash problem as I used these same shares before, albeit with different IP’s and not via the same vmkernel interface.

Wondered about things like a gateway being set incorrectly, but as they are all in the same isolated subnet – with no connection to the outside world – there is no gateway required.

Now just before I was considering pulling out some hair, I came accross this post on vmtn: ESXi 4.1 can not add NFS Datastore on a Netgear READYnas 1100 ( Please Help)

Down there it mentioned that your DNS server has to be set correctly so that both host and NFS server can be found…

But I am connecting via IP, the vSphere hosts are not accessing the NFS shares via DNS resolution! Well.. that might be the case, but …

.. sure enough.. I simply added the IP’s of both vSphere servers to the /etc/hosts file on the NFS device and the first time I tried it worked. Immediately!

Happy that it works now, but a bit frustrated that there’s no better error description to be found anywhere.

Synopsis:	VMware security updates for vSphere API and ESX Service Console
Issue date:	2012-11-15
Updated on:	2012-11-15 (initial advisory)
CVE numbers:	— vSphere API — CVE-2012-5703 — bind (service console) — CVE-2012-1033, CVE-2012-1667, CVE-2012-3817 — python (service console) — CVE-2011-4940, CVE-2011-4944, CVE-2012-1150 — expat (service console) — CVE-2012-0876, CVE-2012-1148 — nspr and nss (service console) — CVE-2012-0441

1. Summary

VMware has updated the vSphere API to address a denial of service vulnerability in ESX and ESXi.  VMware has also updated the ESX Service Console to include several open source security updates.

2. Relevant releases

VMware ESXi 4.1 without patch ESXi410-201211401-SG

VMware ESX 4.1 without patches ESX410-201211401-SG, ESX410-201211402-SG, ESX410-201211405-SG, and  ESX410-201211407-SG

3. Problem Description

a. VMware vSphere API denial of service vulnerability

The VMware vSphere API contains a denial of service vulnerability.  This issue allows an unauthenticated user to send a maliciously crafted API request and disable the host daemon. Exploitation of the issue would prevent management activities on the host but any virtual machines running on the host would be unaffected.

VMware would like to thank Sebastian Tello of Core Security Technologies for reporting this issue to us.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-5703 to this issue.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

b. Update to ESX service console bind packages

The ESX service console bind packages are updated to the following versions:

• bind-libs-9.3.6-20.P1.el5_8.2
• bind-utils-9.3.6-20.P1.el5_8.2

These updates fix multiple security issues. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the names CVE-2012-1033, CVE-2012-1667, and CVE-2012-3817 to these issues.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

c. Update to ESX service console python packages

The ESX service console Python packages are updated to the following versions:

• python-2.4.3-46.el5_8.2.x86_64
• python-libs-2.4.3-46.el5_8.2.x86_64

These updates fix multiple security issues. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the names CVE-2011-4940, CVE-2011-4944, and CVE-2012-1150 to these issues.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

d. Update to ESX service console expat package

The ESX service console expat package is updated to expat-1.95.8-11.el5_8.

This update fixes multiple security issues. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the names CVE-2012-0876 and CVE-2012-1148 to these issues.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

e. Update to ESX service console nspr and nss packages

This patch updates the ESX service console Netscape Portable Runtime and Network Security Services RPMs to versions nspr-4.9.1.4.el5_8 and nss-3.13.5.4.9834, respectively, to resolve multiple security issues.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-0441 to this issue. This patch also resolves a certificate trust issue caused by a fraudulent DigiNotar root certificate.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

4. Solution

Please review the patch/release notes for your product and version and verify the checksum of your downloaded file.

ESXi and ESX
http://downloads.vmware.com/go/selfsupport-download

ESXi 4.1
Filename: ESXi410-201211001.zip
Build:    874690
md5sum:   f7da5cd52d3c314abc31fe7aef4e50d3
sha1sum:  a4d2232723717d896ff3b0879b0bdb3db823c0a1
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2036257
ESXi410-201211001 contains ESXi410-201211401-SG

ESX 4.1
Filename: ESX410-201211001.zip
Build:    874690
md5sum:   c167bccc388661e329fc494df13855c3
sha1sum:  a8766b2eff68813a262d21a6a6ebeaae62e58c98
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/2036254
ESX410-201211001 contains ESX410-201211401-SG, ESX410-201211402-SG,
ESX410-201211405-SG, and ESX410-201211407-SG

5. References

  — vSphere API —
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-5703

  — bind (service console) —
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-1033
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-1667
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-3817

  — python (service console) —
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2011-4940
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2011-4944
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-1150

  — expat (service console) —
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-0876
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-1148

  — nspr and nss (service console) —
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-0441

6. Change log

2012-11-15 VMSA-2012-0016
Initial security advisory in conjunction with the release of ESX 4.1 P06 on 2012-11-15.

7. Contact

E-mail list for product security notifications and announcements:
http://lists.vmware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/security-announce

This Security Advisory is posted to the following lists:

• security-announce at lists.vmware.com
• bugtraq at securityfocus.com
• full-disclosure at lists.grok.org.uk

E-mail: security at vmware.com
PGP key at: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1055

VMware Security Advisories
http://www.vmware.com/security/advisories

VMware security response policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/security_response.html

General support life cycle policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/eos.html

VMware Infrastructure support life cycle policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/eos_vi.html

Copyright 2012 VMware Inc. All rights reserved.

Synopsis:	VMware Hosted Products and OVF Tool address security issues
Issue date:	2012-11-08
Updated on:	2012-11-08 (initial advisory)
CVE number:	CVE-2012-5458, CVE-2012-5459 and CVE-2012-3569

1. Summary

VMware Hosted products and OVFTool patches address several security issues.

2. Relevant releases

• OVF Tool 2.1
• Workstation 8.0.4
• Player 4.0.4

3. Problem Description

a. VMware Workstation and Player Weak permissions on process threads vulnerability.

Certain processes when created have weak security permissions assigned. It is possible to commandeer these process threads, which could result in Elevation of Privilege in the context of the host.

VMware would like to thank Derek Soeder of Cylance, Inc. for reporting this issue to us.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-5458 to this issue.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

b. VMware Workstation and Player DLL binary planting vulnerability.

Workstation and Player have a binary planting vulnerability. An attacker who can write their malicious executable to a system folder on the host, may be able to run code under certain circumstances.

VMware would like to thank Derek Soeder of Cylance, Inc. for reporting this issue to us.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-5459 to this issue.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

c. VMware OVF Tool format string vulnerability.

The OVFTool has a format string vulnerability. Exploitation of this issue may lead to code execution. In order to exploit the issue, the attacker would need to trick the user into loading their malicious OVF file.

It is recommended that only OVF files from trusted sources should be used.

VMware would like to thank Jeremy Brown of Microsoft for reporting this issue to us.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-3569 to this issue.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

Note: Workstation, Player and the vSphere Web Client (part of vCenter Server) use the OVF Tool to load OVF files. Other products, including vCenter Server (except vSPhere Web Client), ESX, and vCloud Director do not use the OVF Tool to parse OVF files.

4. Solution

Please review the patch/release notes for your product and version and verify the checksum of your downloaded file.

OVF Tool 3.0.1
https://www.vmware.com/support/developer/ovf/

VMware Workstation 8.0.5
https://www.vmware.com/go/downloadworkstation

Release notes:

https://www.vmware.com/support/ws80/doc/releasenotes_workstation_805.html

Player 4.0.5
http://www.vmware.com/go/downloadplayer

Release notes:

https://www.vmware.com/support/player40/doc/releasenotes_player405.html

5. References

http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-5458
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-5459
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-3569

6. Change log

2012-11-08 VMSA-2012-0015
Initial security advisory in conjunction with the release of  Workstation 8.0.5 and Player 4.0.5 on 2012-11-06.

7. Contact

E-mail list for product security notifications and announcements:
http://lists.vmware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/security-announce

This Security Advisory is posted to the following lists:

• security-announce at lists.vmware.com
• bugtraq at securityfocus.com
• full-disclosure at lists.grok.org.uk

E-mail:  security at vmware.com
PGP key at: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1055

VMware Security Advisories
http://www.vmware.com/security/advisories

VMware security response policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/security_response.html

General support life cycle policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/eos.html

VMware Infrastructure support life cycle policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/eos_vi.html

Copyright 2012 VMware Inc.  All rights reserved.

Synopsis	VMware vCenter Operations, CapacityIQ, and Movie Decoder security updates
Issue date	2012-10-04
Updated on	2012-10-04 (initial advisory)
CVE numbers:	CVE-2012-4897, CVE-2012-5050, CVE-2012-5051

1. Summary

VMware has provided an upgrade path for vCenter Operations and CapacityIQ and an update for Movie Decoder.  These updates address multiple security vulnerabilities.

2. Relevant releases

• vCenter Operations prior to 5.0.x
• vCenter CapacityIQ 1.5.x
• Movie Decoder prior to 9.0

3. Problem Description

a. VMware Movie Decoder Installer binary planting vulnerability

The installer of the VMware Movie Decoder has a binary planting vulnerability. An attacker who can write their malicious executable to the same folder as where the installer of the Movie Decoder is located may be able to run their code when the installation is started.

VMware would like to thank Mitja Kolsek of ACROS Security for reporting this issue to us.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-4897 to this issue.

b. vCenter Operations cross-site scripting vulnerability

The vCenter Operations server contains a cross-site scripting vulnerability that allows an attacker to steal an administrator’s session cookie.  To exploit this vulnerability, the attacker must convince the administrator to click on a malicious link.

VMware would like to thank Alexander Minozhenko of ERPScan for reporting this issue to us.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-5050 to this issue.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

c. vCenter CapacityIQ path traversal vulnerability

vCenter CapacityIQ contains a path traversal vulnerability that allows unauthenticated attackers to download arbitrary files.

VMware would like to thank Alexander Minozhenko of ERPScan for reporting this issue to us.

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CVE-2012-5051 to this issue.

Column 4 of the following table lists the action required to remediate the vulnerability in each release, if a solution is available.

4. Solution

Please review the patch/release notes for your product and version and verify the checksum of your downloaded file.

vCenter Operations 5.0.x

Download link
https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/info/slug/infrastructure_operations_management/vmware_vcenter_operations/5_0

Release Notes
https://www.vmware.com/support/pubs/vcops-pubs.html

Movie Decoder 9.0

Download link
https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/info/slug/desktop_end_user_computing/vmware_workstation/9_0#drivers_tools

5. References
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-4897
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-5050
http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2012-5051

6. Change log

  2012-10-04 VMSA-2012-0014
  Initial security advisory in conjunction with the release of Movie
  Decoder 9.0 on 2012-10-04.

7. Contact

E-mail list for product security notifications and announcements:
http://lists.vmware.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/security-announce

This Security Advisory is posted to the following lists:

• security-announce at lists.vmware.com
• bugtraq at securityfocus.com
• full-disclosure at lists.grok.org.uk

E-mail: security at vmware.com
PGP key at: http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1055

VMware Security Advisories
http://www.vmware.com/security/advisories

VMware security response policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/security_response.html

General support life cycle policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/eos.html

VMware Infrastructure support life cycle policy
http://www.vmware.com/support/policies/eos_vi.html

Copyright 2012 VMware Inc. All rights reserved.

Well she has decided that it is time to leave home and set up her own house for blogging.  you can now find her at www.rimmergram.com.

We at PlanetVM.Net wish her all the best in her new home, and you will be sadly missed here.