Excel file size much larger than the contents

I recently had a weird problem with an Excel doc that jumped in size after making some changes and saving a new revision. It was a kit list/pricing spreadsheet I'd been working on for a while so couldn't pin down the exact action that caused it to increase in size.

In this instance I was using Excel 2007 and saving the doc as an Excel 97-2003 Workbook.

After some Googling I tried the following fixes, the last of which solved my problem:

Inspect the document
Prepare > Inspect Document > Inspect
This shows a list of hidden content including rows, columns and worksheets and if it find any, allows you to delete them.

Force everything on a sheet to be deleted
Press ctrl-a, right click anywhere in the selected worksheet and click 'Delete'
This was overkill for what I was trying to do as I needed to keep the content I could actually see, but it was really useful to go through a copy of my dodgy spreadsheet and clear every tab and once done the file was still huge, so there was still work to do...

Manually delete components in the file
Warning, this may destroy your data so make sure you have a backup of the file first!!!
Save the spreadsheet as an .xslx file. Rename the extension to .zip. Open the file in WinZIP. Look for an xl\externalLinks folder and delete any files in this. Close WinZIP and rename file back to .xlsx, open in Excel and allow Excel to repair the file.
This is great as it shows you exactly where bulky data is stored in the file. In my case WinZIP showed the xl\externalLinks folder contained some bulky data. I dropped one of the .XML files into Notepad and could immediately see that it the entire contents of a Cisco pricelist I'd pasted some content from! I would have only pasted a couple lines from this other spreadsheet so Excel must have brought the whole lot across for an unknown reason but decided not to acknowledge this anywhere. Once I delete the files in the xl\externalLinks folder and saved it as per my instructions above my file was back to a sensible size.

Changing the IP address in CUCM 7.02

Follow the steps below to change the IP address of the Cisco Unified Call Manager Publisher server.


Environment Overview


CUCM version 7.02 running as a virtual machine on VMware Server 2.0. The virtual machine was moved to a different VMware server and subnet.



1) On the new VMware host server in VMware Infrastructure Web Access, go to the settings for the CUCM guest and change the network adapter connection to vmnet1 (hostonly)



2) On the VMware host server change the IP address and subnet of the vmnet1 network adapter to an IP address in the same subnet as the existing IP address of the CUCM. You don't need to set a default gateway on the network adapter.



3) Log into the CUCM via the CLI (I used the VMware Console to access the CLI) and change the default gateway to the new default gateway you want to use using the following command:

set network gateway gateway_ipaddress

4) Log on to Cisco Unified CM Administration and under System > Server > your CUCM server, change the IP address to your new IP address and click save.

5) Back on the CLI change the IP address using the following command

set network ip eth0 ipaddress subnetmask

The CUCM should now reboot.




6) Back on the the VMware host server in WMware Infrastructure Web Access, go to the settings for the CUCM guest and change the network connection back to vmnet0 (bridged).




7) Once the CUCM has rebooted you should now be able to access it via the new IP address. You can check the IP address has change via the CLI using the following command:


show tech network hosts

My Other Lab Location

While sporadically building my home lab setup (which has been mainly for my own personal development) I've also been adding to a lab I have setup at my workplace. I've had this lab in place since around 2007 for testing LCS 2005, OCS 2007 and OCS 2007 R2 integration with Mitel, Avaya and Cisco PBXs.

Summary of what the lab has done/can do, by PBX manufacturer:


Mitel 3300

OCS 2007 and OCS 2007 R2 Remote Call Control via Mitel Live Business Gateway (Linux and Windows versions)

Exchange 2007 UM for Mitel handsets homed on the Mitel 3300


Cisco Unified Call Manager (CUCM)

CUCIMOC integration with MOC on OCS 2007 (CUCM 7.0.2)
Interesting blog entries for CUCIMOC:
http://blog.misthos.com/2009/07/cisco-cucimoc.html
http://blog.misthos.com/2009/08/cisco-cucimoc-features.html

Exchange 2007 UM for Cisco handsets homed on the Cisco CUCM (CUCM 6.1.5)
Microsoft guide to configuring CUCM for Exchange 2007 UM:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=68B43D3C-7C84-4C2F-BFD7-98754970D70E&displaylang=en&displaylang=en


Avaya Communications Manager

OCS 2007 Remote Call Control via Avaya AES server
Avaya Softphone integration with MOC on OCS 2007

OCS 2007 R2 Documentation and Setup

Since the last post I have finished off installing OCS 2007 R2 and Exchange 2007 on the home lab setup and have been working on a lab environment elsewhere (see next post).

There isn't much point in going into too much detail on the OCS install as it is relatively straightforward AS LONG AS YOU FOLLOW THE DOCUMENTATION!

I've setup a number of LCS, OCS07 and OCS07 R2 implementations in the past and the one thing that is critical is to follow the step by step docs from Microsoft if you want a functional setup. If you attempt a Next, Next, Finish approach then it will only take up more time in the future as you have to fiddle around trying to fix things.

Anyway, preaching over, click this link for the Microsoft documentation pack for Office Communications Server 2007 R2, updated Dec 2009.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=E9F86F96-AA09-4DCA-9088-F64B4F01C703&displaylang=en

Communications_Server_2007_R2_Documentation.zip contains the whole doc pack in one zip file.