TechNet Edge

Screencast: Powershell Security

Joey Snow — Tue, 13 May 2008 07:01:00 GMT

We have heard the request for more Powershell content loud and clear. The first piece of content that we are posting is a screencast from our friend Corey Hynes. In this 7 minute screencast Corey demonstrates several examples of how Powershell is a secure scripting environment.

MAP tool virtualization demo with Baldwin

David Tesar — Mon, 12 May 2008 13:36:00 GMT

In this Part 3 interview with Baldwin Ng, we cover the virtualization components of the Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) tool. In the first 5 minutes, he tells us the basics of how the tool works and how it can assist in your plan to virtualize your server and application environment using virtual server 2005 R2, Hyper-V, or Soft Grid. The tool is a compliment to the IPD virtualization guide. After this, Baldwin gives us a demo of the tool and gives us a peek at what's in store for the upcoming version 3.1 and 4.0.

See parts 1 and 2 of the interview with Baldwin.

SQL and SMS/Configuration Manager

Joey Snow — Fri, 09 May 2008 07:01:00 GMT

At MMS last week I had just a few minutes with Greg Shields before he headed off to catch an airplane. We chatted briefly about his session where he shows how SQL Server can be used as a tool to help you with Systems Center Configuration Manager and SMS.

Streaming Media with Server 2008

David Tesar — Thu, 08 May 2008 05:14:00 GMT

I’ve always been intrigued on the idea of streaming my own music collection from my home server, so I decided to write this post on technology which can make this happen. If you’re running any version of Server 2008 other than the version for Itanium-based systems, you have the capability of using Windows Media Services and/or IIS7’s Media pack to stream your audio / video (media) content. What’s the difference and which should I use?

Windows Media Services – This enables you to stream media using the “mms” prefix in your player of choice and this method is commonly referred to as a media streaming server. You have the ability to broadcast media or setup on-demand publishing. To make this work, you must install the Media server role and after this download and install media services.

Some key benefits over IIS7 Media pack

Stream content using multi-cast
Proxy/Cache the stream and other options for bigger scale streaming operations
Broadcast media in addition to on-demand playback
More efficient utilization of network bandwidth by adjusting to network conditions

File formats supported : .asf, .wma, .wmv, .mp3 (with use of the MP3 media parser plug-in & doesn’t support VBR files), .jpg, .nsc, .wsx

Media Pack for IIS7 – This enables you to stream media using a method referred to as progressive download (or using a web server), This means the media is downloaded to the client machine, playing via some type of a client such as Windows Media Player, and often beginning to play before the file is completely downloaded. This method only allows you to setup on-demand playback.

The media pack includes two components: Bit Rate Throttling and Web Playlists; both of which must be installed separately on top of IIS7.

Benefits over Windows Media Services

Additional file formats officially supported for .avi, .flv, .mov, .rm, .mp4, and .rmvb with throttling, but any file format could potentially work.
Easily push out the configuration using the shared hosting capabilities of IIS7
Granularly configure bit rates for specific files/folders
Delegate permissions for others to modify the settings for specific files/folders

File formats supported: .asf, .avi, .flv, .mov, .mp3, .mp4, .rm, .rmvb, .wma, .wmv.

Conclusion: If you have a very large amount of content you want to stream, then you’ll definitely want to use Windows Media Services due to the options available to scale and save bandwidth. However, IIS7’s media pack may be the right option for you if you’d like to stream the additional file formats and gain all of the benefits of being integrated with IIS7. For another great comparison between the two media streaming methods, see Chris Knowlton’s blog post.

Get started

IIS7 Media Pack - Bit Rate Throttling
IIS 7 Media Pack – Web Playlists
Windows Media Services Deployment Guide
Changes in Functionality from Windows Server 2003 with SP1 to Windows Server 2008 (http) (doc version)

What's coming in System Center Configuration Manager with Bryan Keller

Adam Carter — Wed, 07 May 2008 07:01:00 GMT

I caught up with Bryan after the last session at MMS, where he was kind enough to present some of the new features coming in System Center SP1 and R2 later this year. He shows some of the upcoming Asset Information service and Application Virtualization integration with CM.

Exchange Server - meet the team

Adam Carter — Tue, 06 May 2008 07:01:00 GMT

When KC Lemson from the Exchange team first sent me this video, I saw the high production value and smelled marketing all over it. Then as I watched, I realized that this piece really is a behind the scenes look in to the Exchange dev team, but they managed to get marketing to pay for the pretty production work. I have to give them props for that. You can follow the fabulous adventures of the Exchange team on their blog, including the story behind the Squeaky Lobster.

Imagine Cup Interview - Mark Aggar

Keith Combs — Fri, 02 May 2008 19:27:00 GMT

This years imagine cup has an environmental sustainability theme. The projects all focused on the environment and our impact on it. Busloads of High School kids for around the greater LA area came in to look at the projects. It was so nice and refreshing to see their take on the future of software and our technologies.

Microsoft is focused on environmental sustainability and Chris Henley was able to corner Mark Aggar (one of Microsoft's Environmental technologists) for a short interview about his participation at Imagine Cup and some of his thoughts around how software might impact the environment.

CommNet: the portable datacenter

Adam Carter — Fri, 02 May 2008 16:47:00 GMT

The communications network at conferences has become so ubiquitous that I've never really stopped to think about what goes in to putting it in place. Chris Craig is running CommNet here at MMS, and he was kind enough to take us deep into the bowels of the Venetian to show us the racks that provide the infrastructure and tell us a little about what it takes to put together the infrastructure for a show like this. These guys come in the weekend before a show, set up the the network for hundreds of machines used in a show for labs, evals, etc., make sure everything is running and tested, all in just a couple of days. Right after the show, they pull it all down and send it off to the next show's venue.

Chris gives us a breakdown of what it takes to build, and shares some war stories about running the network.

Jeremy Moskowitz: GP troubleshooting

Joey Snow — Fri, 02 May 2008 16:39:00 GMT

Jeremy is the author of "Group Policy: Management, Troubleshooting and Security." We caught up with him after his session at MMS to talk about what's new for Vista policy management, troubleshooting GP Prefs, and a little bit about Application Virtualization.

IT Pro Feature of the Week: MMS Announcements

Adam Carter — Thu, 01 May 2008 22:48:00 GMT

It’s Thursday, and that means one thing: Time for another Feature of the Week! Since I’m on location (along with Joey, who does in fact know everyone) at MMS (Microsoft Management Summit) this week, I thought I’d just give you a roundup of the announcements Microsoft made at the event

MMS Announcements Roundup

Beta availability of Virtual Machine Manager 2008 Available immediately for download, VMM 2008 provides complete management of Virtual Server, Hyper-V and VMWare virtual machines. Also includes PRO (Performance and Resource Optimization) tips that can dynamically move and provision VMs to best use the resources available across all your virtual machine hosts.

Beta availability of Cross-Platform extensions for Operations Manager Utilizes industry standards and open source technologies like WS-Man and OpenPegasus to bring SCOM management to HP-UX, Solaris, and Redhat and SUSE Linux. Partners providing Oracle, MySQL and Apache management packs.

Release of Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) 4.0 The first major MOF release in 5 years, this release moves beyond just operations to include the whole IT lifecycle. It also includes guidance that you can start implementing in just 20 minutes, and strong community engagement and interaction.

Configuration Manager SP1 Integration with Intel’s vPro technologies for deeper hardware layer integration. Asset Inventory Services – cloud based application catalog. Available in May

Configuration Manager R2 native integration of Application Virtualization distribution and streaming. SQL Reporting services and Forefront integration. RC in June.

Links

The Newly redesigned System Center home page

The MOF homepage

MMS coverage on TechNet Edge

Announcing MOF 4.0

Adam Carter — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:15:00 GMT

Yesterday evening Joey and I ran in to Jeff Newfeld, Clare Henry and friends at the end of the conference day yesterday. They were celebrating the release of Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) 4.0, and took some time to tell us about this latest release.

I've always thought of successful IT as a three-legged stool: technology is just one part of it, you also need good people and good processes. MOF provides you with those processes, and they've really put the effort into making this release something that you can read in 20 minutes and start implementing. There's also a huge community focus in this release, providing a forum for discussion of MOF and other best practices.

For more info, check out the MOF website: http://www.microsoft.com/mof

MMS Day 2 announcements overview with Larry Orecklin

Adam Carter — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:00:00 GMT

We're back with Larry to talk about today's announcements at MMS. Yesterday was all about the datacenter with Operations Manager and Virtual Machine Manager announcements, but Brad Anderson's announcements today were desktop focused. Larry tells us what's coming in Config Manager - both in the upcoming service pack and later with Configuration Manager R2. He also gives us the scoop on MDOP - the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack.

System Center overview with Larry Orecklin

Adam Carter — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Larry Orecklin is the General Manager of the System Center. In this short video, he gives a brief overview of the MMS announcements around Operations Manager and Virtual Machine Manager.

Operations Manager with Barry Shilmover

Adam Carter — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:00:00 GMT

This is one of the most exciting demo's I've seen. Barry is on the Operations Manager team - he does cross platform stuff. In this demo - the same one shown during Bob Muglia's MMS Keynote - Barry uses Ops Man to manage an application that is spread across SQL Server, Oracle, MySQL, Apache, and IIS, hosted on Windows, Solaris, Suse, and Redhat. All using open standards for management.

Robert Reynolds talks System Center and Cross Platform Management

Adam Carter — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Robert Reynolds is the Director of Product Planning for System Center. I was able to get some time with him to talk about the cross platform announcements around System Center and Virtual Machine Manager. Robert answers the question of "Why do cross platform now?"

MMS: What's in the bag?

Joey Snow — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 23:29:00 GMT

After a narrow escape from the security from in keynote room, Adam and I met JC. JC is an attendee here at MMS and guides us through everyone's favorite IT conference game: What's in the bag?

Vegas baby...VEGAS!

Joey Snow — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 19:52:00 GMT

So somebody left the backstage door open to the keynote room here at the Microsoft Management Summit in sunny Las Vegas. Adam and I could not pass up a chance to shoot some quick video of all the cool gear . Okay, it's mostly blinky lights, but who doesn't like blinky lights? Adam just saw security heading our way so we better run, but Keep checking Edge all week for all of the great stuff happening at MMS!

Installing MOSS 2007 on Windows Server 2008

Matt Hester — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 14:37:00 GMT

The other day I was building some new demo servers to showcase search capabilities with Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server 2007 (MOSS). During the process I decided to install MOSS on my brand new RTM copy of Windows 2008 Enterprise server. I had to, it was so new and shiny! :-)

As some of you may know, I was headed down a one way street to a Program Compatibility Assistant error. So imagine my surprise when the error box on the right showed up. This product has compatibility issues, say what?

So I did a live search and found some excellent blogs from Ben Curry and Martin Kearn (BTW Martin I love Guinness too!). They had ran into the same issue on RC1 as I did and both provided great step-by-step instructions to solve the error, I provided their links are at the bottom of this post. In a nut shell, Windows Server 2008 is compatible with service pack 1 of both MOSS and WSS. So all you need to do is slipstream the SP1 bits into the MOSS setup files to avoid the error.

So why this post, well I wanted to show how straight forward this process is. So I created a quick screencast,which is about 8 minutes long. During the screencast, I show installation of the pre-requisites roles (IIS and .NET) for Windows Server 2008, and the error that is created prior to slipstreaming the files for the MOSS install. I then demonstrate how to extract and slipstream the MOSS and WSS SP1 files into the MOSS installation files. With the grand finale of kicking off the installation. Enjoy and let me know what you think!

HPC in Media

Giovanni Marchetti — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 14:42:00 GMT

In my last post, I explained how HPC can be used to build UFOs. I have since learned about using HPC to make movies. I’d never have guessed, so let me share my surprise here.

Digital media production follows a complex workflows, from initial sketch to wireframe model, to rendered 3D images, to movies. HPC is typically used in rendering, encoding or transcoding.

Although Microsoft offers a solution to manage the workflow (Interactive Media Manager) and to encode (windows media encoder, expression encoder), we rely on partners for the rendering, most transcoding and non-windows media formats.

Rendering

Rendering is the process of transforming a 3-D model of an object (often displayed as a wireframe) into a 2-D image. Traditional non-interactive rendering (e.g. by ray-tracing) is a good example of an embarrassingly parallel problem. Several frames can be rendered at once, independently, one per computing node. The rendering software often also uses multi-threading on the node to compute several channels at once (e.g. diffuse light, reflected light, occlusions, refraction), then it composites those channels to generate the final image.

Partners that are active in this space are:

- Autodesk with Maya

- Softimage with XSI / Ray3

- Mental Images with Mental Ray

- Nvidia with Gelato Pro

All of those applications exist for Windows Server 2003 and are being ported to Server 2008. They offer varying levels of integration with our compute cluster scheduler. With built a simple demonstration with Softimage, for instance. We submitted a job with 25 frames to render on a small cluster with 1 head node and 3 compute nodes, each with 4 cores. The job was created as a parametric sweep with each task invoking the ray-tracing software installed on the node (Ray 3) on one of those frames. Ray 3 is multi-threaded and can render 8 channels, so we gave each task the full 4 cores per node.

Here’s what the rendered frame 1 looks like:

Here’s an example of one of the channels computed for the image above, i.e. the intensity of reflected light:

Encoding

Encoding a digital movie file (wmv, mpeg2 for instance) is the process of exploiting the redundancy in the sequence of frames making up that movie in such a way that fewer bits are necessary to represent them than in the uncompressed stream.

There are two kinds of redundancy:

- spatial, due to the correlation of neighboring pixels.

- temporal, due to the correlation of subsequent frames.

Thus, we could split a sequence of frames into a finite number of sections, then assign each section for computation to a separate node. We could further split each frame in the section into a number of tiles and distribute the tiles amongst cores within the node for encoding.

Microsoft has developed a VC-1 encoder (used for BluRay DVDs amongst others) and an SDK for it that enable parallel encoding. They are licensed on a commercial basis to ISVs and OEMs. An example of use is in Sonic’s Parallel Stream Encoder.

Another popular encoding format is MPEG2 (DVD, digital TV), for which several open source encoder implementations exist (Berkeley, Cornell).

The H264 standard is also widely supported and parallel encoder implementations are freely available for it (e.g. ELDER)

SQL Server Auditing and Compliance

Joey Snow — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 07:01:00 GMT

A hot topic for the IT Pro is compliance. Government and other regulation compliance challenges exist all over the IT infrastructure. I had a chance to sit down with JC Cannon in the SQL product group to discuss how SQL Server 2008 addresses compliance and auditing in SQL Server 2008, as well as how new tools such as Policy Based Management can help in the IT Pro's mission to achieve compliance.

Edge at MMS!

Adam Carter — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 20:29:00 GMT

hey - I just wanted to give you a heads up that Joey and I will be at MMS next week, covering the conference here on Edge. We'll have coverage starting Monday with recaps and demos of the announcements that are coming at the show.

I have to tell you, I got to see some of the stuff we'll be showing off at the conference, and I was blown away by it. Not moved to tears Scoble style, but bouncing on my feet excited about what we're doing. Keep checking back on Edge next week to see what's new, and leave us a comment here if there's something you'd like us to find out about for you while we're there.

And if you're attending the conference, and you spot a couple of overly-enthusiastic guys wearing Edge t-shirts and carrying cameras, come say hi!

4 useful technical demos in 5 min from ITEs around the world

David Tesar — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 07:01:00 GMT

Back in February of 2008 before TechReady 6, some of our IT Pro Evangelists (ITEs) came out for a pre-conference where we held a competition entitled “Edge showdown” amongst the ITEs. What you’re watching is the winning team video which was produced from start to finish in less than 45 minutes. Tony Krijnen (Netherlands) is the host while:

· Mariusz Kedziora (Poland) demos the snipping tool in Windows Vista

· Eileen Brown (UK) demos how to make sure that when someone declines a meeting request they don’t get any updates

· John Baker (US) demos WM6 mail search functionality

· Hiroshi Okunushi (Japan) demos adding additional time zones to the outlook calendar (in Japanese)

Network Access Protection Client Side Screencast

Joey Snow — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 06:59:00 GMT

In this screencast Corey Hynes walks us through Network Access Protection, but unlike normal demos we take a look from the client side. Get a look at what actually occurs on a client machine as it goes in and out of compliance on a Windows Server 2008 network protected by Network Access Protection.

Forefront Stirling – Public Beta Overview

David Tesar — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:30:00 GMT

With the launch of the 1^st public beta for Forefront Stirling on April 8^th, I thought it would be relevant to do a post this week on it. This release proves that the Stirling vision scenario in my previous blog article is becoming a reality. “Stirling” seems to be thrown around quite a bit and can be misunderstood, so let me 1^st clarify. Codename Stirling refers to the next wave of all Forefront products, scheduled to hit RTM in the 1^st half of 2009. This wave includes the “next version” of:

· Forefront Client Security (FCS)
· Forefront Security for Exchange Server (FSES),
· Forefront Security for SharePoint (FSS)
· ISA Server – new name Forefront Threat Management Gateway (TMG).

Additionally, this wave includes a server and single management console to interact with all of the above, commonly referred to as the “Stirling” server and “Stirling” management console. The console and server can be run on the same or separate machines. Down the road, we’ll have an official name to replace “Stirling” and “next version of”.

Ok, so what is some cool stuff to check out with the public beta?

Dynamic response capabilities – see how the forefront products share information and interact with each other.
Single management console and reporting for the entire technology suite except FSS - get a security state assessment for all of the connected machines & specify how you want to remediate through forefront policy.
Integration with NAP – use NAP to remediate your machines
Integrated malware and anti-virus protection – check out how it downloads & pushes out the updates
Use powershell to manage it – by default Stirling uses powershell behind the scenes, but you can do it yourself if you feel inclined.

What are some things you can NOT you do yet?

Install a topology which has more than one Stirling server
Install the Stirling server, console, or next version of FCS on Windows Server 2008
Install Terminal Services or a DC on the Stirling server
Install non-English versions

Get started

Download the Stirling beta here.
The most helpful pre-requisite page to install everything here.
Stirling homepage
TechNet technical documentation for deployment, operations, etc.
Stirling blog
Forefront team blog

Real World DBA Episode 7 – SQL Server Features - Clustering

Buck Woody — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 07:01:00 GMT

An update on SQL Server 2000 Support, Feature overview on Clustering, and securing SQL Server Accounts.

How to: Windows Troubleshooting

Adam Carter — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 07:01:00 GMT

Have you noticed the "More Information: Event Log Online Help" links at the bottom of some event log entries? Ever wonder who wrote up all those? I had an opportunity to sit down with Dan Brown (no, not that Dan Brown) to talk about Windows Troubleshooting. He's part of a team that wrote 9000 online help entries, consisting of some 3 Million words. Many of those words are things like resolve and verify and troubleshoot - and they give you info you need to find out why that event log entry got made in the first place.

Server 2008 - AD Backup and Restore PM interview

David Tesar — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 06:59:00 GMT

I met up with Stephanie Cheung, the program manager for active directory backup and recovery and we discuss:

What restartable AD is and when it is appropriate to use it
- Good for usage when you want to recover deleted objects without rebooting
- Bad for when you need to do a "bare metal" restore or have database corruption
Thoughts around when to do a "Dcpromo /forceremoval" versus restoring from backup. This includes discussion of restoring using install from media (IFM) and IFM for an RODC.
What the database mounting tool (DMT - old name "snapshot" tool) does and some ideas on what we're going to do to make recovery of deleted objects easier using DMT.
A best practice around preventing deletion of objects in AD (including the new "Protect object from accidental deletion" checkbox for objects).
Future thoughts for AD backup and restore, such as reducing forest recovery time
General disaster recovery tips

Feature of the Week - Windows System Resource Manager

Adam Carter — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 07:01:00 GMT

Virtualization is getting a ton of attention right now, and it’s a great way to compartmentalize apps so you can better control resource consumption. It’s not the only way though. You can easily control how CPU and RAM is doled out to users and apps using Windows System Resource Manager (WSRM)

Windows System Resource Manager

What is it? Some apps are well behaved and only request and use as much RAM as they really need to run, others look at what’s physically available on a server and take it all. WSRM allows you to throttle CPU and RAM resources – allowing you to limit particular apps from consuming more than say, 20% of CPU time and 256MB of RAM.

Can I manage only apps? Nope, there are a few ways you can limit resources:

· Per application (process)

· Per IIS application pool

· Per user

· Per session

The last two items are particularly appropriate for a Terminal Server environment. You can keep one user from monopolizing all the resources on your server.

What if I only want to manage resource usage at certain times of day? You can totally do that. In addition to scheduling, you customize resource management with other criteria like system events and exclusion lists. It’s all manageable by policy as well!

But I can have resource management happening all the time on my servers? Ok, there’s one minor caveat. CPU throttling doesn’t actually kick in until the server is above 70% utilization across all CPU’s. Below 70% though, means there’s not really contention for resources, so it’s no big deal.

Well, how do I get it? Well, first you install it. It’s a feature on Server 2008, so just go to Server Manager and Add Feature – Windows System Resource Manager. It’s installed as a service, so you need to start the service (and, presumably, set it to auto start) after you install it. After that, you can run the WSRM console, and start adding rules. You can also use the built in Resource Allocation Policies to do some default management (on a Terminal Server, you’d use the equal_per_session policy to make sure all users share resources equally, for example)

Ok, this is cool! I know, that’s why I wrote about it.

Get started

TechNet Library WSRM page

How to Add Rules

Fine Grained Password Policy Screencast

Joey Snow — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 07:01:00 GMT

Have you ever wanted to setup different password policies for different users in the same domain? In this screencast, Corey Hynes takes us through the setup and configuration of the new fine grained password policy in Windows Server 2008. Corey utilizes a free tool from Special Operations Software called Specops Password Policy BASIC in this demo. For more information about their tool visit http://www.specopssoft.com/products/specopspasswordpolicy/.

Windows Server 2008 Security Guide PM interview - Part 2

David Tesar — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 06:59:00 GMT

In part 2 of this interview, we cover:

Reasoning behind why the specific account lockout and password policy settings were chosen in the guide
General tips (using the appendix when you have a problem and check out the Threats and countermeasures guide)
How to the guide helps implement the granular AD auditing capabilities in WS 2008.
Demo of the security solution accelerator

For part 1, click here.
You can download the Windows Server 2008 security guide here.

SQL Server Upgrade with Joe Yong

Joey Snow — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 16:33:00 GMT

One of the biggest challenges when a new product is released is upgrades. I had a chance to sit down with SQL upgrade guru Joe Yong from Scalability Experts. We chat about upgrading from SQL Server 2000 and SQL Server 2005 to SQL Server 2008. Joe explains the differences in the Upgrade tools in SQL Server 2008 as well as providing us some guidance in setting up lab environments for upgrade testing. Visit Joe's blog at http://blog.scalabilityexperts.com/.

Jeff Woolsey on Hyper-V RC

Adam Carter — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 07:01:00 GMT

With the recent release of Hyper-V RC1, Giovanni sat down with Jeff Woolsey, Senior Program Manager in virtualization, to talk about what's new in the Release Candidate.