Yellow Bricks

by Duncan Epping

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Extract embedded video file from Powerpoint on OSX

I received a couple of presentations over the past weeks which had an embedded video file in it, but needless to say this article will handle all types of embedded files. I needed the source file but unfortunately the person who developed the demo video did not have it any longer. Latest versions of Powerpoint for Mac OSX don’t have the option to copy/paste the file somewhere else, there’s also no “right click save as” option unfortunately. So how do you grab this file?

Well according to the sources found on google it is simple, you rename the Powerpoint .PPTX file to zip and simply unzip it. I tried that, but my zip file then got unzipped to a zip.cpgz file. Which I then would try to unzip but again would lead to a zip file. Going around in circles. But there’s a solution for it. If simply double clicking after renaming doesn’t work, try the following procedure:

Open a terminal window:

  • Go to the folder where the file is located, in my case Desktop/test 
    cd ~/Desktop/test
  • Unzip the file (my filename is presentation.zip) 
    unzip presentation.zip

Now you should see 3 folders (docProps, _rels and ppt) and an additional file (.xml). If you go in to the folder “ppt” you will find a folder “media”. That folder will contain all media files, which includes pictures/photos/soundbites and your videos!

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Which disk controller to use for vSAN

I have many customers going through the plan and design phase for implementing a vSAN based infrastructure. Many of them have conversations with OEMs and this typically results in a set of recommendations in terms of which hardware to purchase. One thing that seems to be a recurring theme is the question which disk controller a customer should buy. The typical recommendation seems to be the most beefy disk controller on the list. I wrote about this a while ago as well, and want to re-emphasize my thinking. Before I do, I understand why these recommendations are being made. Traditionally with local storage devices selecting the high-end disk controller made sense. It provided a lot of options you needed to have a decent performance and also availability of your data. With vSAN however this is not needed, this is all provided by our software layer.

When it comes to disk controllers my recommendation is simple: go for the simplest device on the list that has a good queue depth. Just to give an example, the Dell H730 disk controller is often recommended, but if you look at the vSAN Compatibility Guide then you will also see the HBA330. The big difference between these two is the RAID functionality offered on the H730 and the cache on the controller. Again, this functionality is not needed for vSAN, by going for the HBA330 you will save money. (For HP I would recommend the H240 disk controller.)

Having said that, I would at the same time recommend customers to consider NVMe for the caching tier instead of SAS or SATA connected flash. Why, well for the caching layer it makes sense to avoid the disk controller. Place the flash as close to the CPU as you can get for low latency high throughput. In other words, invest the money you are saving on the more expensive disk controller in NVMe connected flash for the caching layer.