Ramblings from another nerd on the grid
For the past couple of years I’ve been on our hosted Exchange services for my personal email. Because it was the dogfood service, it isn’t exactly the same service that you can buy at microsoft.com/online.
I decided to take the plunge and purchase a real production subscription to Exchange Online. I’m glad I did. It’s only been a few weeks, but so far it’s been a good ride. Best of all, my wife likes her new hosted mailbox. Priceless.
Why is this worthy for your consideration?
Cloud computing and services aren’t just a fad. Frankly some of the concepts have been around for several decades. Remember Ross Perot? He started a company called Electronic Data Systems (later EDS) and the whole goal of the company was to run applications and services in huge information processing centers for customers. They served many virtual markets like Healthcare, Banking, Manufacturing or Insurance. Big systems and big integration challenges. That hasn’t changed.
The Internet continues to morph and evolve. Networking to your business, home and smartphone is pervasive or soon will be. We all enjoy information discovery, sharing, email and social media. Five years ago you would not think twice about buying a server and running your email from it using Microsoft Exchange, Small Business Server, or a host of other products on the market. Publishing to the web from that server was pretty easy and allowed you to share information with partners, customers, family and friends.
But bad stuff happens. Where do you house the server? Who will support it when you are 35,000 above ground on a flight to an important business meeting? How quickly could you respond to a hardware problem if you are 1,600 miles from the server?
With cloud services, you can have someone else make sure the hardware and software is working properly and providing common or custom application services. Microsoft has packaged some of our industry leading products into online cloud based services. Microsoft Business Productivity Online Standard Suite (BPOS) and Exchange Online are two such offerings. Exchange Online is actually part of BPOS but can be purchased separately if you chose. So why build an expensive email server when there’s a low cost alternative in a state-of-the-art data center?
Getting Started
So how do you get started and how much does it cost? Getting started is really easy. There are three easy steps initially to create an account and link some services. First, head on over to the Business Productivity Online Standard Suite (BPOS) or Exchange Online product areas of microsoft.com. In each of those sections you’ll see some pricing information and the “Try It Out” button. Click the button to start a 30 day trial.
From there, it’s pretty straight forward. I actually have two accounts. I started by buying Exchange Online for my personal email. I figured $5 per person for a 25GB mailbox hosted in the data center with SPAM block and quarantine was a no brainer. The minimum number of mailboxes you can order is five and that’s exactly how many family members I knew I could put online immediately.
Like I said, this was a no brainer. Sure beats buying and running your own server. I did that when I first started using a Verizon FIOS Business plan and although it was a great learning experience, something would always go wrong with the server while I was traveling or unavailable. Besides, what does it cost you to buy and run a server? I can’t buy a server and run Exchange for $300 per year, can you?
Last week I decided it would be prudent to have a different domain for testing and demo purposes so I purchased a domain from my web hosting provider (1and1.com), then started setting up a BPOS demo environment. The BPOS product folks let me have the account at no charge for a limited period of time, so that is what we’ll use in the following screencast.
Because DNS propagation times are unpredictable, I provisioned the keithcombs.org domain prior to capturing the screencast. I could certainly have hit the pause button and waited, but that tends to stretch your day so I took the safe route. In my experience with 1and1.com and the verify steps, you can verify a domain within minutes. The sole exception I’ve seen so far was my wife’s personal domain, but that’s a long story.
So here’s the first screencast. It should give you an overview of the initial setup, some of the administrative pages, steps and tips. If you are watching via the embedded Silverlight player below, be sure to double click it for a full screen 1440x900 resolution view. The full screen button is also the far right button on the player controls.
Exchange Online Screencast Part 1 - Account Logon and Domain Setup (14:45)
Screencast File Download - if you would like to download the Windows Media Video file and watch with Media Player, by all means right mouse click Part1.wmv and save the file locally.
If you would like to start looking at the online documentation, see http://www.microsoft.com/online/help/en-us/helphowto/Exchange-Online.htm for a great starting point. The screencast above demonstrates portions of the steps in the Add a Domain to Microsoft Online Services section. The complexity of adding and using a domain with Exchange Online will depend on your domain registrar or hosting provider.
Adding Domains and DNS
I am using 1and1.com as my web hosting provider. Adding, changing and deleting DNS records via their web based control panel is pretty easy. In fact, the Exchange Online team has written some specific instructions for a variety of popular registrars and hosting providers. See the instructions for 1and1.com Domain Verification as an example. You’ll see other instructions at http://www.microsoft.com/online/help/en-us/helphowto/Exchange-Online.htm under the Setup | Domains area of the page. Click the More arrow to expand the section.
Keep in mind you don’t have to use one of your personal or business domains during the trial. When you created the account, the domain that was created is fully registered and ready. If you do a whois lookup on the domain, you’ll see it has the appropriate DNS and mail exchange (MX) records assigned. For instance, here’s the dump of the DNS records for cowboykeith.
I just decided to add another domain so that you can see it’s easy to use one or more domains in the BPOS and Exchange Online provisioning panels. I could have just used the domain above, created a mailbox, and started testing with it. It’s up to you. Speaking of which, lets see how to add a user and configure an email client to send and receive email. You won’t believe how easy we’ve made that.
Exchange Online Screencast Part 2 - Adding and Testing Users (16:33)
File Download - http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/screencasts/exchange_online/part2/Part2.wmv.
Adding Users and Importing Email
See? I told you it was easy to create a mailbox, Outlook profile, and start sending and receiving email. The Online Services Sign In application makes all of that easy on your users. Be sure to grab it from the download center at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=5c2ca866-4107-4ae5-98d5-76bf1b18ff87&displaylang=en or on the Home tab of the admin.microsoftonline.com portal.
If you need to add users in bulk, that import process is fully supported so be sure and checkout the documentation for steps on how to do that. See the file format specifications for details on the .CSV layout, examples and other steps in the online help.
After you have the initial Exchange Online user Outlook profile created and working, don’t forget it’s easy to add an existing .PST file for use in the client. If you have important email in the .PST file, I would recommend importing it into Exchange Online via the import wizards that are part of Outlook. Sure beats drag and drop unless you have a small amount of email.
Like I mentioned in the screencast, importing a bunch of data into Exchange Online is a time consuming process and your mileage will vary depending on the amount of data, and the speed of your network connection. Synchronization takes time so test and plan accordingly. And please, communicate this to your family members, customers, or business associates. The last thing you want them to do is kick off the import, then try to run catch a flight or some other urgent appointment.
In summary
This was an overview of how to get up and running fast with BPOS and Exchange Online. You don’t have to commit any of your production domains to this process for testing. You can jump into a 30 day trial for Exchange Online right now and don’t forget, the Exchange Online subscription is month-to-month so you can make a change at any time.
We obviously didn’t cover a lot of other topics like co-existence, directory synchronization, disaster recovery planning, or other mundane chores like creating contacts and distribution lists. That’s ok, we have plenty of topics to cover coming up. I hope you found this post informative.
Other Key Resources and Links
AutoDiscoverRedirect-Red001.Mail.MicrosoftOnline.com
[NOTE] The screencasts above were captured, encoded, and wrapped with Silverlight using Expression Encoder 4 Pro. No other tool was used. I used the VC-1 codec settings for Screen Capture, then set the VBR range from 1MB for average bitrate, to 3MB at the peak.
June 15, 2010 marks the beginning of a new content and publishing adventure. It’s called TechNet On: and we are bundling technical content into the topics that are top of mind for IT Professionals.
First up is Cloud Security. As with all topics, there are different layers or elements that must be considered. In this case we have combed content from a variety of credible sources like TechNet Magazine, TechNet Flash, Microsoft product group subject matter experts, and of course the Microsoft MVP community.
The Cloud Security package has a Background (Bg), Security (Sc) and a Strategies (St) focus I think you’ll find are very well done. Timely, technical and relevant.
You can expect to see a new TechNet On: package every couple of weeks. For the coming months you will see horizontal topics like Troubleshooting or Deployment as well as packages for SharePoint, Office, Windows and other technologies that are hot.
We launched TechNet On: in the US, UK, India, Australia, and Canada but we aren’t stopping there. Look for additional languages and locales as we push forward with our end-to-end content and publishing strategy.
Screencast
Here’s a short four minute screencast about TechNet On: and some of the content in this weeks package. Pay no attention to my lazy tongue when I say “egglectic”. Duh. For the full demo view, be sure to either double click the Silverlight “Black Glass” player for full screen, or hover on the bottom of the video to bring up the tool bar. The full screen button is on the far right of the tool bar. Enjoy.
I submitted a panel proposal to this years South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive Conference. The title is, “Screencasting Lessons Learned” and I’ll try to do the subject justice with the knowledge I’ve accumulated over the past four or five years.
I am getting ready to record a number of Windows 7 screencasts using both Camtasia Studio and Expression Encoder 3. I’ll be putting some of them through the ringer with adaptive streaming and Silverlight 3 so the information will be fresh and new. I may try to get my hands on the new version of Camtasia for OS X and give it a whirl on my Apple MacBook Pro, too. No promises on the later, but it would be a great comparison if I have time.
Screencasting Lessons Learned (http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/view/3477)
Your vote: Yes No Event: Interactive 2010 Level: Intermediate Type: Solo Category: Blogging, Online Video, Writing / Technical Writing Organizer: Keith Combs, Microsoft - IT Pro and Developer Evangelism Questions:
Description: Learning to publish screencasts online can be a challenge. Come learn some tips and tricks that will help you use Camtasia or Expression Encoder more effectively with your blog. I am actively recruiting other Microsoft MVPs and speakers with the goal of turning this into a panel.
NOTE: In order to vote, you need to first create an ID at http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/users/register. It’s a quick and dirty registration app. Very little hassle. Please register and vote even if you aren’t going. Thanks !!!
And don’t forget all of the other panel nominations. See http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/ideas/index/4/company:Microsoft.
I have not seen an official announcement so I have no idea if it’s real or a mock-up. But if it’s real, I want it. Especially if it works with Camtasia, Expression Encoder 3 and Vegas Movie Studio Platinum Edition 9 and above. My screencasts will never be the same and it’s looking like it’s time to buy my green screen.
[UPDATE] It's official now. See http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/digitalcommunication/ProductDetails.aspx?pid=008.
You’ve seen me do literally hundreds of Camtasia captured screencast demos. One of the screencasts I did on Windows Server 2008 was captured using the Windows Media Encoder x64 product. That product has now been depricated and the screencast below was captured with a new product called Expression Encoder Screen Capture 3. This product ships with and is designed to run with Expression Encoder 3.
This new screen capturing tool does a great job of capturing high quality work you might like to demonstrate via a blog or webpage. The screencast below was captured where the source machine was running a display resolution of 1920x1200. In the demo I also execute and run a Halo 3 720p HD video. That Halo 3 video is 30fps and the data rate for the video is right at 6MB. Try duplicating this capture with other products on the market or the internet. Let me know how successful you were. Grin.
The following demo requires the released version of Silverlight 3. Install from http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/get-started/install/default.aspx. I haven’t quite figured out the code to force that check in the blog post. So for now, there’s a little manual human intervention required. You can handle it. Smiles.
The Demo
Download Location
If you want to download the Windows Media Video file that was produced by Expression Encoder 3, right mouse click the following link and SAVE TARGET AS to a location local to your machine.
http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/screencasts/ee3/CaptureDemo/EncoderCapture.wmv
Some Notes on the Source and Output
The captured file size ended up being slightly less than 800MB. After selecting the Expression Encoder 3 VC-1 Screen profile and making some slight adjustments, I encoded to the Silverlight VC-1 format with a resulting file size of 40.5MB. That’s some serious crunching and compression folks.
The most impressive aspect is the quality of output. To truly appreciate this, run this screencast on a 24” monitor that has a native res of 1920x1200 and go full screen with the Silverlight 3 player control. The full screen button shows up if you move your mouse into the lower portion of the player and the controls pop up. The button I am referring to is bottom right. When full screen on a 24” monitor, the clarity should be nearly perfect with very little blurriness, artifacting, or other noise.
If you are using a smaller LCD panel like I am at the moment (15.4” laptop LCD at 1680x1050), you will see some blurriness but it should not be too bad. I haven’t yet decided what ot use in the future for my recordings so feedback now would be VERY welcome.
Since the data rate for this screencast is 4MB, those of you with slower internet connection may see some issues with playback buffering before the file is progressively downloaded. I am not using the adaptive bitrate streaming for this example.
Software locations
Be sure to install the released version of Silverlight 3 at http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/get-started/install/default.aspx. After that, be sure to download the trial versions of the Expression Suite 3 products at http://www.microsoft.com/expression/try-it/#PageTop when they come out (soon). Expression Blend 3 with Sketchflow is available now.
Other References
http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/seethelight/default.html
[UPDATE] Apparently they moved some stuff around after I posted some of the links. Thanks for the comments. Enjoy the new tools!!!
Executive Summary
Boot from VHD is a new technique for installing and maintaining operating system environments. Unlike virtual machines, the operating system that is running from a “boot from VHD” environment is using the actual hardware instead of emulated hardware. This means a developer could easily use WPF and the full GPU processing power of a high end graphics card. In another scenario, this technology makes it easy to setup and run Windows Server 2008 R2 with the Hyper-V role, thus supporting 64 bit virtualization workloads.
The Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) is the container for the installed operating system. Because everything is inside a single file, there are a number of benefits that can be realized for data center server environments, as well as managed desktop environments. The following article dives into the technical details of implementing two operating systems. Both are installed in a VHD file and can easily be booted by selecting the preferred environment at power on. This could easily be scripted and automated.
The Installation Foundation – Windows PE
The Windows Preinstallation Environment (WinPE) has been updated for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. One of those improvements is the ability to use a Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) file as the target for an installation of the operating system (OS).
This has some interesting implications. Booting from a .VHD file that contains an entire OS seems rather magical. I mean think about it. You go to look at a hard drive and there’s a single file but Windows Server 2008 R2 is installed inside it. This would certainly simplify the ability to boot your servers on a completely new environment with little effort. This is going to turn change management on its ear.
The same is true for the desktop OS, Windows 7. You can install Windows 7 inside a .VHD file. Again, the OS is installed inside a single file and thus makes it rather easy to move or change out and bring up a completely different version of the environment. This will make test environments for developers super easy to construct and test discrete sets of applications or components.
One thing that is not well known is how easy it is to create the initial .VHD file and install the operating system into it. The supported and documented ways are geared towards very well defined support scenarios. You can see the supported scenarios in the Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK). Most people have been reluctant to take the time to learn this because it involves the use of imagex captures and applies.
What if you could install with just the DVD?
You can. All you need is a hard drive with disk space and the DVD for Windows 7 RC or Windows Server 2008 R2 RC. In fact, when I was investigating the tools for this article I used a brand spanking new Hitachi 2.5” 320GB 7200rpm hard drive and both DVDs to create a dual boot environment. Nothing more. And it’s much simpler than I thought. The key is WinPE and DISKPART. Here is the screencast demonstration of the tools in action.
The Screencast Video – 23 minutes – Win7 and R2 Dual Boot via VHD
The Command Sequence Used in the Video
Other References and Articles
Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK) for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 RC – get it @ http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=60a07e71-0acb-453a-8035-d30ead27ef72. This is the bible for the supported methods of using “Boot from VHD”. Windows Virtualization Blog – see their VHD boot post at http://blogs.technet.com/virtualization/archive/2009/05/14/native-vhd-support-in-windows-7.aspx. Particularly interesting is the performance area of the post. Knom’s Developer Corner – another nice post at http://blogs.msdn.com/knom/archive/2009/04/07/windows-7-vhd-boot-setup-guideline.aspx.
Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK) for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 RC – get it @ http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=60a07e71-0acb-453a-8035-d30ead27ef72. This is the bible for the supported methods of using “Boot from VHD”.
Windows Virtualization Blog – see their VHD boot post at http://blogs.technet.com/virtualization/archive/2009/05/14/native-vhd-support-in-windows-7.aspx. Particularly interesting is the performance area of the post.
Knom’s Developer Corner – another nice post at http://blogs.msdn.com/knom/archive/2009/04/07/windows-7-vhd-boot-setup-guideline.aspx.
So What’s Next ???
Tomorrow I am going to backup my existing Windows 7 production hard drive. Windows 7 is installed in the traditional fashion on a 200GB drive right now. I am going to restore the backup to a larger disk then install Windows Server 2008 R2 RC into a .VHD and test mixing them. That’s a bit of a hybrid and one I think a lot of developers might be interested in. It would certainly demonstrate you can have a traditional implementation of your production OS, but flip to any other Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows 7 testbed very easily. I’ll follow-up here or another post when I get that implemented. Enjoy.
[UPDATE for 5/23/2009] As I indicated just above, I wanted to run an extension of the test I recorded. I backed up my 200GB Windows 7 RC environment then restored it to a 320GB drive. After that, I booted from the Windows Server 2008 R2 RC DVD and created a bootable VHD with R2 inside. The VHD is stored in a folder at the root of my 320GB disk. The R2 setup program fixed up the bcdstore area and I now have a dual boot hybrid. Windows 7 is installed in the traditional manner. R2 is booting from the VHD. Both are available on the selection menu at power up. Interesting stuff for sure.
[UPDATE for 5/25/2009] Since I received a couple of questions out of band on how I captured the demo, let me explain. The demo was captured using Camtasia v6.0.2. The demo was a Hyper-V virtual machine, not native hardware. I had mentioned that in some of the preliminary takes but I guess I didn't make that clear in the final take. Therefore, the booted OS in the screencast is actually using the emulated hardware of the virtual machine. Everything you see in the demo works on my native hardware, a Lenovo ThinkPad T61p.
One other thing, the VHD that is being booted from will expand to the maximum size specified at creation. It will revert to the used size when you shut it down. Keep this in mind because that buffer must exist at boot time or else.
[UPDATE for 6/14/2009] Although this article was originally written using a blank hard drive, I have received a few suggestions for adds, so here they are.
We’re a little over halfway done with the Interop Road Show I helped create. Last week Matt Hester did a simulcast of the live event from Chicago. Although he did a great job, I wanted to capture the demos with Camtasia v6.0.2 and provide some high quality audio and video of the demos, so here they are.
A Party of Protocols
There are a number of ways to invite Linux, UNIX, and OS X to the Windows Server Active Directory party. The operating systems we use today will interoperate in many ways because each includes some level of common protocol support. Support for HTTP is an obvious protocol they all share. SMB is also commonly used for access to Windows file system shares. In the UNIX world, NFS ruled the ether for years. Thankfully directory and security protocols like LDAP and Kerberos have also become common in the desktop and server operating systems.
There are pros and cons to any approach to integrating heterogeneous environments. Usually this means there will be tradeoffs on functionality. Thankfully, there is a robust market out there to lower the number of tradeoffs and attempt to provide near seamless coexistence and integration.
For those of you that get TechNet Magazine, you probably noticed the December 2008 issue devoted to this subject. You also probably noticed it isn’t necessarily trivial to do everything you might set out to accomplish. As Matt likes to say, get some sleep, get up early, and eat your Nerdflakes because you are going to need them.
I shopped the partner market. I wanted to see if there were some products you should consider that ease the pain. There are and you should by all means evaluate the products from Centrify, Quest, Likewise and others. You’ll notice I am using Centrify DirectControl.
The main reason for that is simple. Linux, OS X and UNIX and Windows include support for authentication, directories and file sharing. That capability is built into the OS. However, if you want to do desktop management, you really need help from an additional set of agents and code. You’ll see what I mean in demo number three below.
Adding SUSE Linux to Active Directory (AD)
In the video just below, we are going to add a SLED 10 SP2 virtual machine to the contoso.com domain. We’ll first check and verify the vm is able to find the domain controllers and that we have good connectivity. Then we’ll join the domain and reboot the vm. Check it out.
Security Security
Now that our workstation vm is a citizen of the contoso.com domain, we can start doing the stuff that would be a normal next step. For instance, we would want to verify user principals from AD can login on the Linux machine and use it. We would also want to check the security model and verify share and file permissions are working as expected. Checkout this next video on that subject.
Bow to Group Policy
Now that we can see networking, authentication and security is working properly, we can start to take advantage of the management infrastructure. For this demo, we are going to make a simple change to the SLED 10 SP2 GNOME settings to verify Group Policy Object (GPO) settings are flowing from Windows to Linux.
Summary
There is obviously a lot more to this subject, but as you can see, interoperability between Windows Server 2008 and a number of other server and desktop operating systems is quite good. You can do this the easy way, or you can do it the not so easy way. It’s really going to depend on your needs. If you have no need for desktop management via group policies, then you should investigate the native integration possibilities. If you have more advanced management needs to get the wild wild west tamed, then I would highly recommend looking at the partner tools.
Remember when you jumped from dial-up to DSL or a cable modem? You know what I mean. Those technology jumps that just make you smile really wide? Well, I have news for you. There’s another one coming that is going to rock your world. It’s called DirectAccess and although I am not particularly fond of the name, the name is accurate.
What is DirectAccess?
Simply put, it’s direct access to your corporate network across an automatically established tunnel. There’s a lot that has to happen in order for that to occur, but thankfully nearly everything is transparent to the user.
DirectAccess clients maintain constant connectivity with the intranet, and Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) provides the end-to-end addressing necessary to accomplish this. Since many organizations do not yet have IPv6 deployed, DirectAccess includes IPv6 transition technologies to help ensure IPv6 connectivity.
IP-HTTPS is a new protocol for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 that allows hosts behind a Web proxy server or firewall to establish connectivity by tunneling IPv6 packets inside an IPv4-based HTTPS session. HTTPS is used instead of HTTP so that Web proxy servers will not attempt to examine the data stream and terminate the connection.
The Screencast
Want to see this in action? Sure you do! And unlike a lot of the content you see us demo in virtual machines, this demo is the real thing. This is my production Windows 7 laptop. Our MSIT department is hardcore on security so I’ve already logged in using multi factor authentication via a Smartcard.
For More Information
There is a ton of information on the internet about DirectAccess already. I would highly recommend you start studying and learning about IPv6 if you haven’t already. I would also recommend you start learning about the IPv4 to IPv6 transitional technologies that will help you get there. Here are some good references.
Errata and other Stupidity
I am constantly amazed at the stupid stuff I say, but don’t pick up on it until after I’ve published something. For instance, I said “a business people’s lives” instead of “a business persons life”. Close to the end I say, “this is some technical networking” instead of “this is some complex or advanced networking”. Wow. Major idiot moments there. LOL.
And I need a chair that shocks the crap out of me when I say “got” too much. Sigh… I probably won’t re-record the darn thing because I am time boxed at the moment. Maybe I’ll record it again when the Windows 7 RC is available and do it from a VM so you can see the full login process and experience.
The other day I was complaining to myself (grumbling) about some application on my system using the wireless network nearly constantly. That sort of thing bugs me. It’s not like I was visiting one of those horrific myspace sites laden with heaven knows what. I suspected it might be one of the Silverlight player controls on my blog.
Since I had recently added the post David Tesar did on edge.technet.com, the spotlight was put on the Silverlight player in that post. Sure enough, it’s the culprit. It’s autoloading the data when the page is displayed. See for yourself at http://blogs.technet.com/keithcombs/archive/2009/01/28/internet-explorer-8-rc1-admin-kit-ieak-now-available-for-download.aspx. I reported this to the Edge team so hopefully they will change their defaults for their players. Mine don’t do that.
But how would you triage and troubleshoot the problem? My first inclination was to fire up netmon and start sniffing the wireless traffic. Netmon is a super powerful tool, but it’s probably overkill for spotting the culprit. What I should have done instead was fire up resmon.exe on Windows 7.
The new Resource Monitor in Windows 7 adds a lot of capabilities to the tool you see in the Reliability and Performance Monitor of Windows Vista. I really like those new views and displays so I thought it would be good to bring it to your attention.
See the following 7 minute screencast on Resmon. As always, you can see the video full screen by double clicking the Silverlight player, or use the full screen button on the bottom right of the player toolbar. Enjoy!
Are you the “Computer Guy” ??? You know, the Saturday Night Live character Nick Burns played by Jimmy Fallon? Well, one of the reasons computer users bring out the “Nick Burns” in many of us is the disconnect in communications and lingo between computer experts and computer users.
Thankfully the developers of Windows 7 have included a blood pressure reducing little tool called the Problem Steps Recorder (PSR). You won’t find a whole lot of information on this nifty little tool yet, but nearly everyone that sees it and uses it agrees, this baby rocks.
Psr.exe is available in both Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7. Some people may refer to it as WER PSR for the Windows Error Reporting angle. Unfortunately this application is not capturing video (a common misconception), but hey, it’s still a really nice way to alleviate the communication pain between users and a Tier 1 helpdesk, cut time and cut frustration.
Check out the following 4 minute screencast demo on this feature. Be sure to double click the player to see the large full screen view or use the full screen button on the bottom right portion of the player controls.
Lets face it, we all make mistakes. Fortunately there’s a new Windows 7 feature that might just save your bacon if you misplace a USB drive with sensitive information on it. You’ve probably heard about BitLocker. It’s the drive encryption technology that’s been around now for a little while. With Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, we took another step and now allow you to encrypt more than just the operating system drive. BitLocker To Go is an easy to use encryption technology that will allow you to encrypt the contents of a USB stick or drive and prevent prying eyes from looking at your data. Considering the number of recent horror stories about all sorts of sensitive data getting into the wrong hands, this feature is long overdue.
BitLocker To Go extends BitLocker data protection to USB storage devices, enabling them to be restricted with a passphrase. In addition to having control over passphrase length and complexity, IT administrators can set a policy that requires users to apply BitLocker protection to removable drives before being able to write to them. BitLocker To Go also allows users to more securely share data with users who have not yet deployed Windows 7. Windows 7 gives administrators more control over how data in their environment is protected. From policy configured Active Directory Domain Services integration for the escrow of recovery keys to simple and efficient hardware recovery processes, BitLocker provides an integrated management experience for IT professionals.
BitLocker To Go adds administrators control over how removable storage devices can be utilized within their environment and the strength of protection that they require. Administrators can require data protection for any removable storage device that users want to write data upon; while still allowing unprotected storage devices to be utilized in a read-only mode. Policies are also available to require appropriate passwords, smart card, or domain user credentials to utilize a protected removable storage device.
Take a look at the following 9 minute screencast to get an idea of how this works. It’s rather easy to setup and use. That’s the whole point. Make it easy for the user to use, and they’ll use it. Be sure to double click the player for a full screen view, or use the player's full screen button on the bottom far right. The player tool bar pops up if you hover on the bottom portion of the video.
For more information:
Here's the latest installment of the popular TechNet Radio program. In this audio only episode, I had the chance to catch up with friend and colleague Edwin Yuen. Edwin is a Senior Program Manager in the System Center Virtual Machine Manager development team.
Download the audio - length: 0:36:00
WMA | MP3 High | MP3 Low
Download the Evaluation
New to System Center Virtual Machine Manager? Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 provides a comprehensive, cross-platform management solution for the virtualized data center that helps enable centralized management of virtual infrastructure, increased server utilization, and dynamic resource optimization of virtual IT infrastructure. And when you download the 180-day trial software, you're automatically registered to receive valuable resources delivered at convenient intervals throughout the software evaluation period.
Other Resources
If you weren't already aware, Data Protection Manager Service Pack 1 released last week and is now available. Senior Program Manager, Jason Buffington, is cranking out the information on his blog and via the screencasts he is recording.
Jason tells me has about four of five other screencasts in the pipeline, but knowing Jason and tis the season for Xbox 360 gaming, look for those videos in January. In the meantime, checkout his latest on how to protect Hyper-V virtualization workloads with DPM SP1.
I don't know about you, but that title sounds odd to me. Why on earth would you run the LAMP stack on Windows? Well for one thing LAMP commonly refers to Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP. So running LAMP on Windows Server 2008 really means running it in a virtual machine and the only supported method for doing that at the moment is via SUSE Enterprise Server from Novell. This was discussed in the webcast Running Open Source Software (OSS) on Windows Server with IIS7 that I delivered yesterday.
In order to take one or more open source applications to the Windows platform, you might choose the prudent and safe route. First running the entire LAMP stack in a VM. Next, you might decide to remove the L and run the AMP portions on Windows Server 2008. That's where the meat of the webcast I did today really starts. You'll see in the second webcast demo we install Apache. Later we install PHP, MySQL then Drupal on top of all of that.
The purpose of the webcast is to highlight the migration and coexistence that is possible. You don't have to totally tear down everything you know and love then replace it. Windows Server 2008 will be happy to run Apache, MySQL and PHP. If you decide to replace pieces of that solution over time, you can do so pretty easily and that is demonstrated in the webcast replay.
I decided to record a higher fidelity version of some of the demos and instead of using the Drupal software used in the webcast, I used a common blogging software product called Wordpress. So here are the screencasts.
Part 1 - Installing PHP on Windows Server 2008 and IIS7 (length 8:51)
Downloading and installing PHP is pretty easy. Testing that it is installed successfully is super easy via the phpinfo() function. Learning to use PHP effectively is a little harder but the product has been around for years so there are a ton of books on using it with Linux or Windows.
Part 2 - Installing MySQL on Windows Server 2008 (length 5:39)
MySQL is a popular database product used for a variety of applications on the Internet. Just like Apache and PHP, MySQL can be installed and used on Windows Server 2008 as well. In the linked webcast replay above I spent some time creating a table, inserting some data, the executing a query against the database to confirm it works.
In this short screencast, we just go through the motions of installation, configuration, and creation of the database we'll use with the blogging software. We'll know soon enough if we made any mistakes.
Part 3 - Installing Wordpress on the Windows, IIS7, MySQL, PHP (length 5:13)
Wordpress is blogging software widely used on the Internet. I actually have a Wordpress blog but I haven't posted anything to it in six months. It's part of the hosting plan we use for my wife's websites so you'll likely run across it in your hosting adventures. One of the reasons it's so popular is because it's so easy to install and customize. Check out the screencast below. See what I mean?
There were several important points made in the webcast. You should consider downloading it and watching the entire 90 minutes when you have some spare time. I think you'll find that there are some nuggets of information there that you may now be aware of. Like:
Enjoy!!!
Right now I am installing Windows Vista Ultimate x64 on a Lenovo ThinkPad T61p. I’ll add all of the drivers, service packs and fixes, verify it works properly on my network, etc.
Then we are going to give it away on or about December 19th, 2008. Just call me Keith “Santa Claus” Combs. Matt's the Elf. Ho Ho Ho.
What’s the catch?
Well, Matt Hester and I will be announcing all of the details very soon on our blogs so stay tuned. Matt will be the keeper of the official rules, status, etc. In the meantime, you can lust over the following specs of the machine we are giving away.
It’s a Lenovo ThinkPad T61p model 6458-F55. This particular model is a Microsoft specific SKU but it includes the Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor T9300, 4GB of RAM, 160GB 7200rpm hard drive, 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050), 200 nits, 16:10 aspect ratio, 500:1 contrast ratio wide screen display, internal Ultrabay DVD burner, NVIDIA® Quadro® FX 570M, PCI Express® x16, 256MB memory video chipset, Mobile Intel PM965 Express Chipset, 9 cell extended life battery, and has three USB 2.0 ports, IEEE 1394 firewire port, a PCMCIA slot, an ExpressCard slot and fingerprint reader.
In short, one killer machine. Sorry, I’m all out of 4GB SoDIMM sticks so I won’t be giving it away loaded with 8GB of RAM.
Sound good? Oh, and that’s not all. We are also giving away a 60GB XBOX 360. Is that kewl or what? Oh, we aren’t stopping there. We’re also giving away a 120GB Zune. And a 8GB Zune. Sound good now?
And if you don’t qualify for this first round and win, I’m going to build another brand new machine and give it away early next year. And we have another XBOX and Zunes for that contest as well. Assuming of course you can pry all of these goodies from my cold dead hands. Grin.
Stay tuned for more details… coming very soon.
Matt Hester has done it again. He has produced some nice screencasts that discuss and demonstrate the improvements being made to the Internet Explorer 8 Beta. Like many of you, I am particularly interested in the new privacy technologies (InPrivate™) going into the product.
Here are the links to Matt Hester’s posts and screencasts on three major areas of interest:
Faster - http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/2008/08/27/internet-explorer-8-beta-2-screencast-faster-and-easier-browsing.aspx Secure - http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/2008/08/27/internet-explorer-8-beta-2-screencast-more-secure-and-private-browsing.aspx Reliable - http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/2008/08/27/internet-explorer-8-beta-2-screencast-more-reliable-and-interoperable-browsing.aspx
Faster - http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/2008/08/27/internet-explorer-8-beta-2-screencast-faster-and-easier-browsing.aspx
Secure - http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/2008/08/27/internet-explorer-8-beta-2-screencast-more-secure-and-private-browsing.aspx
Reliable - http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/2008/08/27/internet-explorer-8-beta-2-screencast-more-reliable-and-interoperable-browsing.aspx
If you click the pic above, it will take you to the area for downloading Internet Explorer 8, not match.com. Sorry. Grin.
It’s been a while since I brought up a great feature in Windows Vista (not present in Windows XP) called Complete PC (CPC). Available in Windows Vista Business, Ultimate, and Enterprise editions, Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore is a image-based backup tool that will help you out of a tight spot if you need to recover your entire system.
While file restore is useful in cases of file loss and data corruption, Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore is most useful for disaster recovery when your PC malfunctions. This feature helps you create complete PC backups, and then in the event of a serious system issue or data loss, Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore can restore your entire PC environment, including the operating system, installed programs, user settings, and data files.
You can restore your PC back to its original state or onto another PC. Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore can be initiated from within Windows Vista or from the Windows Vista installation CD, if the PC is not able to start up normally from the hard disk. This feature is also now integrated into Windows Server 2008 and part of the backup and recovery toolset on that platform.
Here’s a screencast on Complete PC. Don’t forget you can view this full screen by double clicking the video during playback or using the button on the far left of the player toolbar.
Checkout the FAQ from the team that developed the feature. It’ll answer some questions about security, network backups, etc. If you really must have a Powerpoint slide deck on the subject, check this out.
I’m glad to see some positive press on Windows Vista. Security is a tough business and when you’re on the desktops of millions of computers, everything is magnified to the Nth degree. A couple of recent articles and postings are getting a lot of attention. See “Vista's Despised UAC Nails Rootkits, Tests Find” by John E. Dunn. This of course got picked up on the popular site Neowin.
Since a lot of you aren’t yet running Windows Vista, here’s a quick refresh on the tech. In Windows Vista, there are two types of user accounts: standard user accounts and administrator accounts. Standard users are equivalent to the standard user account in previous versions of Windows. Standard users have limited administrative privileges and user rights—they cannot install or uninstall applications that install into %systemroot%, change system settings, or perform other administrative tasks. However, standard users can perform these tasks if they are able to provide valid administrative credentials when prompted. With UAC enabled, members of the local Administrators group run with the same access token as standard users. Only when a member of the local Administrators group gives approval can a process use the administrator’s full access token. This process is the basis of the principle of Admin Approval Mode.
See the TechNet article, “Understanding and Configuring User Account Control in Windows Vista” for a detailed review of UAC. If you want to see it in action, see the following 4 minute screencast.
Early this morning I downloaded the new WorldWide Telescope application from Microsoft Research. After exploring the galaxies, I decided this would be a cool screencast to demo the application for those of you that might not otherwise download, install and begin exploring. Your children are going to love this. Heck, you might have some fun, too!!!
The screencast is 5 minutes and was recorded at 1280x720. You should really see the application on my monitor at 1920x1200. Breathtaking is such an understatement. You’ll notice when watching the video that the panning isn’t very fluid and that is because I captured at 15 frames per second which is a low FPS for motion. You’ll also notice I am not capturing the audio of the application. That’s ok, it’ll just be an extra incentive to go check things out for yourself. So here’s a quick demo. Be sure to double click the Silverlight control to go full screen.
Media Player direct link @ http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/wwtelescope.wmv.
Here’s a partial description from the http://www.worldwidetelescope.org website:
The WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a Web 2.0 visualization software environment that enables your computer to function as a virtual telescope—bringing together imagery from the best ground and space-based telescopes in the world for a seamless exploration of the universe. Choose from a growing number of guided tours of the sky by astronomers and educators from some of the most famous observatories and planetariums in the country. Feel free at any time to pause the tour, explore on your own (with multiple information sources for objects at your fingertips), and rejoin the tour where you left off. Join Harvard Astronomer Alyssa Goodman on a journey showing how dust in the Milky Way Galaxy condenses into stars and planets. Take a tour with University of Chicago Cosmologist Mike Gladders two billion years into the past to see a gravitational lens bending the light from galaxies allowing you to see billions more years into the past. WorldWide Telescope is created with the Microsoft® high performance Visual Experience Engine™ and allows seamless panning and zooming around the night sky, planets, and image environments. View the sky from multiple wavelenghts: See the x-ray view of the sky and zoom into bright radiation clouds, and then crossfade into the visible light view and discover the cloud remnants of a supernova explosion from a thousand years ago. Switch to the Hydrogen Alpha view to see the distribution and illumination of massive primordial hydrogen cloud structures lit up by the high energy radiation coming from nearby stars in the Milky Way. These are just two of many different ways to reveal the hidden structures in the universe with the WorldWide Telescope. Seamlessly pan and zoom from aerial views of the Moon and selected planets, as well as see their precise positions in the sky from any location on Earth and any time in the past or future with the Microsoft Visual Experience Engine. Story continued at http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/whatIs/whatIsWWT.aspx.
The WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a Web 2.0 visualization software environment that enables your computer to function as a virtual telescope—bringing together imagery from the best ground and space-based telescopes in the world for a seamless exploration of the universe.
Choose from a growing number of guided tours of the sky by astronomers and educators from some of the most famous observatories and planetariums in the country. Feel free at any time to pause the tour, explore on your own (with multiple information sources for objects at your fingertips), and rejoin the tour where you left off. Join Harvard Astronomer Alyssa Goodman on a journey showing how dust in the Milky Way Galaxy condenses into stars and planets. Take a tour with University of Chicago Cosmologist Mike Gladders two billion years into the past to see a gravitational lens bending the light from galaxies allowing you to see billions more years into the past.
WorldWide Telescope is created with the Microsoft® high performance Visual Experience Engine™ and allows seamless panning and zooming around the night sky, planets, and image environments. View the sky from multiple wavelenghts: See the x-ray view of the sky and zoom into bright radiation clouds, and then crossfade into the visible light view and discover the cloud remnants of a supernova explosion from a thousand years ago. Switch to the Hydrogen Alpha view to see the distribution and illumination of massive primordial hydrogen cloud structures lit up by the high energy radiation coming from nearby stars in the Milky Way. These are just two of many different ways to reveal the hidden structures in the universe with the WorldWide Telescope. Seamlessly pan and zoom from aerial views of the Moon and selected planets, as well as see their precise positions in the sky from any location on Earth and any time in the past or future with the Microsoft Visual Experience Engine.
Story continued at http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/whatIs/whatIsWWT.aspx.
Download it @ http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/experienceIt/ExperienceIt.aspx?exp=true.
[UPDATE for 5/14/2008] A question came my way. The person wanted to know how this application differs on Windows Vista and Windows XP. Interesting question. First, this application is a prime example of the difference that Windows Presentation Foundation in Windows Vista can have on the end result of an application. The most obvious difference is the liberal use of the Glass effects in the Collection thumbnail bar (top region), and the Context thumbnail bar (bottom region). On Windows XP you do not get this transparency and you lose some of the visual appeal of the application. Another visual clue is the Finder Scope tool. This tool has transparent regions that are not transparent on Windows XP. A better visual experience on Windows Vista for sure.
The second thing I noticed when I was comparing the two was the speed at which the application pans, images render and the overall stability. Windows Vista has a more fluid feel on my machine and the pans, zooms and renders appeared quicker. I haven't run any benchmark timings so I don't have solid proof right now.
As for stability, I've been running the application since it's release on Windows Vista Ultimate x64 on two different machines and have never crashed it, even under heavy load with the Camtasia screen capturing software running. When I ran it on the same ThinkPad with Windows XP Pro x86, it faulted at one point during my testing to do a quick check of the visual differences. That was on Windows XP SP2. I am installing SP3 right now and will do a shakedown cruise again.
Matt Hester is one of the subject matter experts on my team in the Search and Sharepoint product mix. Recently Matt recorded a screencast on installing Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server (MOSS) 2007 on Windows Server 2008. Specifically, he talks about how to slipstream the service packs into the install, in order to avoid Program Compatibility Assistant errors.
Ready to watch?
Head on over to http://edge.technet.com/Media/Installing-MOSS-2007-on-Windows-Server-2008/ and check it out!!!
By now I’m sure you’ve heard about the Remote Server Administration Toolkit (RSAT) that released and your ability to run those tools on Windows Vista SP1. Around the same timeframe, we shipped Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V RC0. A week after that, we shipped the RC0 tools that allow you to manage a Hyper-V role server from a Windows Vista SP1 admin workstation.
Here’s a quick 8 minute screencast on the subject to show you where to get the tools and once installed, what it looks like from your Vista desktop.
Like I mentioned in the screencast, you have a few chores to make this work. The number of steps really depends on the infrastructure you are working with, the authentication models, etc. To run the tools, the obvious first prerequisite is Windows Vista updated to SP1. It can be either a x86 or x64 version of Windows Vista. The screencast above was recorded on Windows Vista Ultimate x64 SP1.
Next, you need to download the packages needed to update Windows Server 2008 to Hyper-V RC0, update your guest VMs, and install the management tools on Vista. Get the four packages at the following locations:
Now that you have the bits, install the update to Windows Server 2008 first. After that, you’ll probably want to update any existing VMs with the updates as well. That is rather tricky considering the RC0 update will break the integration components and networking adaptors for beta virtual machines. You have a couple of choices. You could use a Legacy Network Adaptor and access the update from a share on your network, or you could build an .ISO and mount it.
As for the permissions needed to run the remote management tools, that is also rather tricky depending on the network you have. In my case, my test environments are all in separate workgroups. For my connection to succeed, I need to use an account that is local to the Hyper-V server. I also need the appropriate WMI firewall ports to be open, DCOM permissions need to be set, etc. I had planned to document those steps in detail a couple of weeks ago, but got busy with the video stuff. Thankfully, John Howard has already done this and published it to his blog. Here are the scenarios you’ll likely need to consider and the steps to fix them up:
As you can see, there’s work involved updating to RC0 and running the tools. Don’t let that dissuade you from trying. Running the Hyper-V admin tools from Windows Vista SP1 rocks. It’s certainly going to enable all kinds of interesting virtualization scenarios.
Other References:
My good friend Chris Henley has put together a very innovative look at Bitlocker. It’s unfortunate Chris missed the disco years at the Cat’s Meow in San Marcos, Texas. He would have really enjoyed it. However, those years are recorded vinyl history so you’ll have to relive them in the following screencast.
Trust me, Chris is a master story teller and you won’t be disappointed.
How much does a 1997 Trans Am in pristine condition go for these days? A bunch I guess. Oh, and if you would like to watch the screencast with Windows Media Player or download it for offline playback, click http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/chrishenley/Bitlocker.wmv. Be sure to RIGHT CLICK the link and SAVE AS if you want to download it.
A recent Wall Street Journal article, "The New Workplace Rules: No Video-Watching" written by Bobby White highlights the fact that many people are watching videos at work. It's even more interesting that the heaviest consumption of those videos takes place during the lunch hours.
I worry about this for a couple of reasons. First, if the corporate IT departments block all incoming video streams I'll be cut off from you. No more screencasts. No interesting videos. Possibly no webcast replays.
But I worry most because we have pretty grandiose plans. Everyone on my team has a HD camera. Some of us are just figuring out how to use them. We aren't experts like Ben Waggoner so it's taken longer than planned to actually create some content.
As a creator of content I'm genuinely enthused about the tools and technologies. What's not to love? Laptops and desktops are powerful. HD video cameras are almost affordable. Software is now powerful and relatively easy to use. I look at this as a tool for my job, information delivery.
What to create?
I recently developed a test video. The Windows Server 2008 Overview video is a high definition 720p video I created from scratch. This is a dress rehearsal for the tools and techniques I'm learning and honing. This particular video uses several media elements and is just over 60 minutes in length. The beginning is an introduction shot here at my home office using the Sony HD camera I have. It also incorporates Powerpoint and demonstration captures using Camtasia 5.
My Criticisms of My Video
I'm pretty critical of my work, so let me highlight some of the stuff I dislike about the video, then I'll highlight the stuff I like. Lastly, I want to ask you a few questions that will help me in the direction I am headed. Pay no attention to the outlaw at right.
In the introduction, you'll notice I start off smiling nicely enough but the tone gets all too serious. I need to drop 20 pounds. Don't we all? I'm obviously over concentrating which becomes apparent with the smirk at the end of the intro. Have you ever tried to shoot video of yourself and deliver a salient set of remarks. It isn't easy so as I practice, I'll get better.
I'm very used to walking around on stage with 30-1000 people in the audience. Trust me, talking to 1000 people is easier than looking into a camera or recording audio. Imperfections are highlighted when recorded. The lighting in the video is a little dark. It was late in the day and the sun was already almost gone. I'm thinking of shooting my future intros poolside. It'll be more fun than the office look. You'll be especially jealous if you see a perfect top shelf margarita sitting next to me.
This is the first screencast style video where I used Powerpoint. The main reason I did it was because I wanted to see what recording widescreen 1280x720 slides would look like. If you look closely on the beginning and ending slides (video bumpers), some of the graphics are slightly stretched but the Powerpoint deck looks killer. I'll fix graphics issues better in future versions of my work.
My delivery of the material is ok, not stellar. I considered recording it again but have decided that I probably won't. I have way too many subjects to cover. So I fumble my words here and there on a few of the slides. This is also true in the demonstrations. This is primarily because I just snatched the slides and went to work pretty quickly on the test and demos. I just wanted to slam something out there that would demonstrate the possibilities. See some of my motivations in the next section.
So basically you have a 60 minute video overview. The intro video is pretty good for a rookie that is learning. The slides and demos look amazing. When you are watching the video, be sure to set Windows Media Player to fit the player on resizes. Try the video full screen or at other sizes that suite you. Be sure to try the video at 100% zoom which is 1280x720. If you are using a large square 4:3 ratio monitor, you'll see black bars on the top and bottom because this is a widescreen video. Matt Hester didn't like that much.
Feedback I would like from you
I would like to learn a lot from this test, but I need your help. My intention was to create a 60 minute high definition video that I could use to test the tools, techniques, our platform(s), your ISP connection and thoughts.
When you are watching video on a subject, what is your pain threshold? Is 60 minutes too much? Many of our webcasts are 90 minutes. Do you prefer shorter bursts of say 10-20 minutes? I've been doing 5-10 minute screencast demos but when you add powerpoint, it doubles the time easily.
Do you like or dislike Powerpoint mixed with the demos? Powerpoint is a great tool for providing references, animations and other information. Would you prefer the information via a conversational video or in text via a blog post like this? How did the slides look to you?
The demos are typical of what I've been doing the past couple of years with a couple of key differences. They were shot at 1280x720 resolution instead of 1024x768. They were shot at 30 frames per second instead of 15. The bit rate for the video is much higher than any of the work I've created in the past. This is the reason the demos and slides look killer. What do you think?
How is the streaming? I've been experimenting with the various delivery platforms and I'm nowhere near done yet. I have at least two more content delivery platforms to test. This particular test is pure streaming. I've also been testing Silverlight progressive download playback and it's promising as well. This video should stream pretty well for most of you here in the US that have a 3meg or better ISP connection. It's a variable bit rate stream with a peak of 3meg. My FIOS 15/2 connection plays the video smooth as glass.
What tools do I use?
I used a variety of tools. Camtasia 5, Expression Encoder v2 Beta, Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum Edition, and Windows Media Encoder were all actually used at various points to create the final video result. On the hardware side, my Sony HDR-HC7 video camera, and a Dell XPS 420 was used for the final encoding. I'll get into the details of capturing, editing and final production in a future blog post.
Call To Action
Be critical. Tell me what you dislike. Tell me what you like. Tell me how you learn. Tell me what subjects we aren't covering effectively.
[UPDATE] Here's the Silverlight version of the video. This Silverlight player is going to playback the exact stream from the link above. You have two viewing options with this player. The small version that is embedded below, and full screen. You can go full screen two ways. Either double click the player, or click the button on the far left of the player controls.
If you are going to run web workloads, you'd be remiss not to evaluate Windows Server 2008 and IIS7. In fact, Windows Server 2008 includes a Core installation option that is an excellent platform for a variety of computing workloads. One thing you might not have thought about is using open source software on our platform. Well think again.
In this screencast series, I'll show you how to take advantage of Internet Information Server 7 as a premier platform for some popular products including PHP, MySQL and Wordpress. Now you might be thinking I've gone off the deep end. No worries, I'm still sane (at this moment in time). If you are going to run those products, we'd rather have you run them on Windows than Linux or UNIX.
We don't really go into hosting provisioning, management and performance but you'll get an idea of how to setup and configure the products. The screencasts were recorded using Windows Server 2008 Core. I plan to record a similar screencast series in the next day or so on Windows Vista to give you an idea of how a developer workstation could be configured with open source software. I hope you enjoy both. It's always funny to listen to yourself after the fact when I record these things. Sometimes I sound like such a Texas hick from the sticks. Oh well, it's me. I'll try and work on my grammar pardner.
For this screencast series I decided to go through a brief description of each section and then I provided links to all of the videos later in the post. I have also provided links to the non-streaming versions of the videos in case you want to download them and watch them offline.
Part 1 - Installing IIS 7 Roles and Features in Windows Server 2008 (video length = 7:42)
In this section we introduce you to Windows Server 2008 and the Core installation option. Installation of the IIS7 web server roles and features are demonstrated and discussed.
InstallCGI.cmd contents:
Start /w pkgmgr /iu:IIS-WebServerRole;IIS-WebServer;IIS-CommonHttpFeatures;IIS-StaticContent;IIS-DefaultDocument;IIS-DirectoryBrowsing;IIS-HttpErrors;IIS-ApplicationDevelopment;IIS-CGI;IIS-HealthAndDiagnostics;IIS-HttpLogging;IIS-LoggingLibraries;IIS-RequestMonitor;IIS-Security;IIS-RequestFiltering;IIS-HttpCompressionStatic;IIS-WebServerManagementTools;WAS-WindowsActivationService;WAS-ProcessModel
Part 2 - Configuring PHP (video length = 7:34)
We need to configure IIS7 to use PHP as a CGI execution environment. All of the .cmd files in this section were created by me to ease the typing pain in the webcast. We'll first configure FastCGI to use PHP with the demonstrated PHP1.cmd script.
PHP1.cmd contents: appcmd set config /section:system.webServer/fastCGI /+[fullPath='C:\php\php-cgi.exe']
PHP1.cmd contents:
appcmd set config /section:system.webServer/fastCGI /+[fullPath='C:\php\php-cgi.exe']
The next thing we need to do is setup the handler and module mapping for IIS7 so that it understands the available verbs and how to call PHP for request processing. This is demonstrated in the video by executing the PHP2.cmd file in the video.
PHP2.cmd contents: appcmd set config /section:system.webServer/handlers /+[name='PHP-FastCGI',path='*.php',verb='*',modules='FastCgiModule',scriptProcessor='C:\php\php-cgi.exe',resourceType='Either']
PHP2.cmd contents:
appcmd set config /section:system.webServer/handlers /+[name='PHP-FastCGI',path='*.php',verb='*',modules='FastCgiModule',scriptProcessor='C:\php\php-cgi.exe',resourceType='Either']
And finally for the PHP configuration section, we setup IIS7 default document processing with PHP3 and PHP4.cmd
PHP3.cmd contents: appcmd set config "Default web site" /section:defaultDocument /enabled:true PHP4.cmd contents: appcmd set config "Default Web Site" /section:defaultDocument /+files.[value='index.php']
PHP3.cmd contents:
appcmd set config "Default web site" /section:defaultDocument /enabled:true
PHP4.cmd contents:
appcmd set config "Default Web Site" /section:defaultDocument /+files.[value='index.php']
You'll notice in the commands above we are using the IIS7 appcmd.exe program to modify the settings and therefore the behavior of IIS7. In the screencast we also modify the INI file that contains the PHP configuration settings so that we can turn on the needed PHP extensions. Lastly for this section we open the MySQL firewall port ahead of the actual installation and configuration of that product.
Part 3 - Installing and Configuring MySQL (video length = 5:36)
Wordpress needs a database for its operation and MySQL fits the bill nicely. In this screencast section, we install and configure MySQL by creating the wordpress database, granting permissions to the database, assigning passwords, etc.
Part 4 - Configuration of WordPress (video length - 5:37)
The last screencast is short and sweet as we create and modify the wp-config.php file which contains the userid, password and database configuration information. Then it's time to test the WordPress interfaces from another virtual machine to see if everything above actually worked. In the webcast I delivered, I left off a single ; in the MySQL configuration so the databases weren't created properly. A one character error can do that to you. Be careful and take your time.
Screencast Video Downloads - please right mouse click the links below and SAVE AS
http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/ws2008/Part1_IIS7_Install.wmv http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/ws2008/Part2_PHP_Config.wmv http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/ws2008/Part3_MySQL_Config.wmv http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/ws2008/Part4_WordPress_Config.wmv
Program Downloads and Links
Windows Server 2008 - http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/try-it.aspx PHP - http://www.php.net MySQL - http://www.mysql.com WordPress - http://www.wordpress.org
Windows Server 2008 - http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/try-it.aspx
PHP - http://www.php.net
MySQL - http://www.mysql.com
WordPress - http://www.wordpress.org
Windows Server 2008 is in the RTM process so for all practical purposes, it's shipped. Inside is a beta of Hyper-V. Hyper-V will be setting the stage for a whole new wave of technologies so with that in mind, I thought I'd give you a quick peek at the product via a screencast video I created. I actually published this in September but have re-encoded it for Silverlight streaming.
Hypervisor
I love that name. It's catchy and kewl. It sounds like a supervisor for hyper space or something. It does of course refer to the new thin layer that is installed on Windows Server 2008 also know at the virtualization parent partition. It's also a a term used industry wide so when you hear the term, it doesn't just refer to the Microsoft implementation.
Virtual Machine Additions
In order to use the new high speed VMBUS, you'll want to uninstall any previous additions from Virtual PC or Virtual Server, then install the integration components for Hyper-V. We're looking at making that transition as painless as possible, but you'll have to work through some of this manually until we get that work done.
Snapshots
You'll notice when you start looking at the CTP (and the screencast demo below), that we've added the ability to take snapshots of your virtual machines in either an online or offline state. This gives you a look into the VSS capabilities that are coming. This is going to offer much more flexibility in your high availability and disaster recovery planning.
Management Tools
We do of course ship a management console with Hyper-V which you'll see in the demos. However, our strategy is to take advantage of the System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2007 product for advanced management of the virtualization partitions, VM workloads, monitoring, reporting, resource assignments, etc. You simple won't believe what's coming and I'm not going to spill all of the beans just yet, but you can count on some deep dives later.
Take a look at the screencast and go on a tour of Hyper-V. The video is a little over ten minutes in length and I tried to hit some of the key areas so you can get a quick technical overview of the product. If you want to save this local and review it offline, please right mouse click the second link and "SAVE AS".
Save Local - http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/ws2008/WSvTour.wmv
A number of new websites have gone live in the past week or so. Here are a few of my favorites. You haven't seen anything yet. We are just getting started.
http://www.microsoft.com/scvmm http://www.microsoft.com/virtualization http://technet.microsoft.com/scvmm
http://www.microsoft.com/scvmm
http://www.microsoft.com/virtualization
http://technet.microsoft.com/scvmm
As you can see at http://edge.technet.com, we are launching a new online portal for IT Pros. Expect to see lots of content in the form of podcasts, screencasts and videos. I have some interesting stuff coming. My EDGE id is KingCobra. Head on over and register if you want a cool name, before all of the cool names are taken. I used my Live ID for the registration process and recommend you do the same.
The official launch is next week so be patient while some of the features are enabled this weekend. Have fun!
Windows Server 2008 includes an installation option we call Core. Core is a stripped down version of Windows Server 2008. It does not have a graphical shell like you've seen in Windows for years. But don't let that fool you. Core is very powerful and allows you to create a server that does what servers should do, efficiently and securely serve.
In the following eight screencasts, you'll see Core in action. We're going to start with a technical overview which will layout the premise for all of the subsequent parts.
The Technical Overview
Think of this first screencast like a fully baked chicken. All nice, golden and ready to eat. This screencast was recorded last because it's the end result of the installation and configuration of Windows Server 2008 Core. In this screencast, we set the stage for what Core is, why you should care, what not to worry about, and other issues you might be thinking about. I'll demystify a lot in a few short minutes. The screencasts that follow it take us on a journey from the beginning, to the end point which is the baked chicken.
At its "Core", the Windows Server 2008 Core installation option is a customer requested version of Windows Server. You told us you wanted to build headless servers. You told us to get rid of the fluff and just give you a server you could administer remotely or with scripts. You told us to reduce the attack surface and only run what was needed. You also told us that you wanted to create special purpose servers.
You asked, we delivered.
Windows Server 2008 Core allows you to install the Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS), Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services (AD LDS), DHCP Server, DNS Server, File Service, Print Services, Streaming Media Services and Web Server (IIS) roles. There are also a number of features you can install.
See all the details of installing and configuring Core in the Step-by-Step Guide. I would however recommend you watch each video I produced. There are a few tricks in the videos that are hard to glean from paper especially since all of the demos are performed using Windows Server 2008 virtualization. So sit back, relax, and watch the first screencast video.
Part 1 - Core Technical Overview (6:00)
Installing Core in a WSv Virtual Machine
There are a few things you need to know and learn when using the new hypervisor layer in Windows Server 2008. All of the demos in this series were accomplished using two Windows Server 2008 virtual machines. Each is the 64bit version of Enterprise Edition. One is the full graphical install and the other is of course, a Core installation. I used Camtasia 5 from Windows Vista Ultimate x64 to record each demo. This was done across RDP.
So there's the first trick. You must have networking established. You must open up the firewall. And you must turn on the remote management feature. Most of this is documented in the Core Step-by-step. See how to do some of this in the next video on WSv prerequisites.
Part 2 - Core WSv Prerequisites (7:37)
Core Networking
By default, Core network adaptors are set to use DHCP to get an ip address. While this is sufficient for most workstations, you'll likely want to make changes and set a static ip address, specify a DNS server, etc. Using the command line to make these changes is probably new for many of you. NETSH is a powerful network shell interface that can be used for configuration and diagnostics.
Part 3 - Core Networking (6:37)
Core Activation
Nearly all Microsoft products require some form of activation now. Windows Server 2008 is no exception and that includes the Core install option. Fortunately, there's a handy tool that shipped with Windows Vista, and is now in Windows Server 2008 that lets you display, add, modify or change product key information. SLMGR is a big script that will query, update and delete information related to activation and the product keys in use. See the video for more detail.
Part 4 - Core Activation (5:38)
Domain Membership
Now that we have networking and have activated the instance of Windows Server 2008 Core, we might as well join the domain and begin focusing on building out our server. Domain joins can be accomplished either manually, or via unattended operations. If you've been watching my previous Windows 2008 screencasts, you'll recall we created a Read-Only Domain Controller and joined it to the domain via an unattend script and DCPROMO. This time we are just creating a member server, so we'll use NETDOM. This video is very short but check it out.
Part 5 - Domain Join (2:37)
Core Role Installation
Roles are the working sets of the server. You can build a very specific single purpose server and have it run one role. For instance, imagine you are YouTube and have racks and racks of streaming media servers in a data center. There's no need to run any other roles since you are focused on scaling media serving heads for all of the client connections.
On the other hand, you may be a branch location. For your location, you many want several roles like Active Directory, File, and Print services. Windows Server 2008 Core is flexible in that regard. You only install the roles you need. See the video on how to do that.
Part 6 - Core Role Installation (3:46)
Core Feature Installation
Installing Core features is nearly identical to role installation. There are a few other tricks and tweaks, but for the most part there is little if any difference. Some of the features are very powerful so I'm wondering why they weren't promoted to the role designation.
Part 7 - Core Feature Installation (3:49)
Core Management
I think we went overboard in some ways. We've been so busy talking about the greatness of headless and scripting, that many of the demonstrations don't show that you can continue to use tools you already know to manage a Core server. Don't get me wrong, command line provisioning and maintenance is cool, and will save a lot of money for big services and hosting providers, but that isn't the end all be all.
So in the beginning Technical Overview, and in this section I try to bring all of that back home. If you want to do something via the command line, go for it. If you have a helpdesk that uses GUI tools, no problem. Windows Server 2008 Core can be managed either way.
Part 8 - Core Management (6:24)
You are really going to like Windows Server 2008. When you start installing it, be sure to think about the Core option and the services you are placing on your network. You have a lot of flexibility in how to deploy, maintain, monitor and manage those services. I hope this series demonstrates that effectively.
You may have noticed I didn't cover deployment in this series. That is a very broad topic I plan to cover in the near future. In the meantime, enjoy this series and let me know if you have any questions.
Anyone who has ever developed a software product knows the term. Nearly anyone who has ever been responsible for project planning understands the term. People who work with other people to define a set of requirements for a contract understand it's extremely difficult to have the magic crystal ball with pure clarity of vision at the get go.
So for those of us mere mortals, we must live with the ever changing environment to survive. Very few of us have the ability to think through problems and really visualize an end result completely. Coders tend to think about the paths that are possible. But it's really hard to pivot on all of the possibilities to understand the scope, or more accurately the amount of rope you just used to hang yourself with.
We're working on some screencasts for the Windows Server 2008 team. We're going to do at least forty of them on various dimensions of the product. I've already done a few and you've seen the Windows Server virtualization (WSv) 10 Minute Tour I did a few weeks ago.
So when Chris Henley said he needed help, I of course volunteered. He has this spreadsheet where he has outlined the "Fab 40". It's a rough outline. Heck, it's not even an outline, it's really just general topic names. So I looked down the list of topics and penned my name next to the "Core" topics. I figured I'd done this before so how hard could it possibly be? Shoot me now... I'm kidding, I actually dig Core.
The only reason it's hard is because I'm one of those people who really wants to understand a lot about all of the possible paths. It probably has something to do with the fact I was a professional developer for years before settling into the IT Pro career space. So the scope creep in this case is self induced.
I decided to take a different approach to this round of screencasts I'm recording. I still haven't completed the vision but it is starting to gel. I'm testing a few things along the way. So the scope creep is creeping in from two directions, and it's all my fault.
First, there's the technology aspect of Windows Server 2008. Setting up and running a Core server is pretty easy, but the hard part is learning all of the command line syntax, figuring out all of the new deployment methods, building a test environment, testing, writing some demos scripts, re-testing, recording, re-recording all of the takes, taking snapshots along the way, etc.
The second part is the post production work. This is Keith Combs Studios. Meaning... I do the entire enchilada. And this time I'm going to add myself to the screencasts. I'm planning three things. I'm going to show you the golden baked chicken as I pull it out of the oven. Think of this video as the Technical Overview of what we are trying to accomplish with Windows Server 2008 Core.
Then I'm going to show you each step of how we got there. The steps will be accomplished two different ways. I'll give you a whole bunch of individual demos that are short clips of about 5 minutes each. I'm also going to wire all of those demos into a full length video with slides and videos in between. Think of it as the feature film. I have no idea how long it's going to be yet, but my vision says about 40-50 minutes long.
The little clips I mentioned will have blog postings and links. That way, if you want to reference something particular like Core networking, you don't have to fast forward because you can go right to the blog post and video. I think you'll like the full feature if I do it right since I'm planning to add narrative between the demos in order to add context.
I have a significant amount of the pre-production work done. I've recorded close to half the videos and will be recording another twenty five percent or so Monday. The biggest challenge is coming. The biggest challenge is deciding how big of a scope do I take on for Core deployment. Most likely I will simply run out of time and have to cut back on this area. That's ok, we can do a whole series just on deployment. At the very least we'll check out some of the new tools and get you thinking about the possibilities.
So as you can see, we have a bunch of new content and information coming. We'll be publishing the goods through several vehicles including blogs, newsletters, microsoft.com and a some other surprises we'll announce mid November. So stay tuned. Lots of Windows Server 2008 information coming, assuming I can keep the creepy scope critter at bay until after all Hallows Eve.
Remember Windows Vista? You know, that cool operating system we shipped nearly a year ago? Well, Matt Hester is publishing some of the screencasts he created a few months ago (finally) and as always, Matt is doing a great job of demonstrating some of the features.
Check out his latest on Windows Vista Movie Maker. Anyone with a video camera should see this.
See the rest of Matt's screencasts at http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/tags/Screen+Casts/default.aspx.
One of the questions I get asked all of the time when I demo something in IE is, "Will this work in Firefox?" It's a really good question especially when using technologies like OWA, web access to admin tools, etc. Recently we shipped a new set of visualization technologies on Silverlight.
Matt Hester recently recorded a screencast on Silverlight and one of the highlighted applications is Tafiti. In his initial recording he spoke about the fact Silverlight will run on other platforms and browsers so I suggested he re-record the screencast and add a demo of Silverlight running inside Firefox. Matt did a great job on that.
Check it out at http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/archive/2007/09/15/do-you-tafiti.aspx.
Catchy title eh? We are of course talking about networking. I knew you were thinking that. So how do you control the bandwidth users are consuming on your network? Well, Chris Henley demonstrates network QoS policies in his latest Windows Server 2008 screencast on the subject.
Head on over to http://blogs.technet.com/chenley/archive/2007/09/13/windows-server-2008-quality-of-service-settings.aspx and check it out.
You'll also notice this screencast is now posted to http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsserver/2008/bb405958.aspx as well. What am I, chopped liver? Don't answer that.
Windows Server 2008 is going to ship its next public release candidate very soon. Inside that release will be a CTP of Windows Server virtualization (WSv). WSv will be setting the stage for a whole new wave of technologies so with that in mind, I thought I'd give you a quick peek at the product via a screencast video I created.
Our hypervisor, code named "Viridian", is an installable Windows Server 2008 role. After installation of this role, you can start installing one or more child partitions in which to run your virtualization workloads. Installation of those virtual machines is fairly straight forward although there are some things you need to be aware of.
In order to use the new high speed VMBUS, you'll want to uninstall any previous additions from Virtual PC or Virtual Server, then install the integration components for WSv. We're looking at making that transition as painless as possible, but you'll have to work through some of this manually until we get that work done.
We do of course ship a management console with WSv which you'll see in the demos. However, our strategy is to take advantage of the System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2007 product for advanced management of the virtualization partitions, VM workloads, monitoring, reporting, resource assignments, etc. You simple won't believe what's coming and I'm not going to spill all of the beans just yet, but you can count on some deep dives later.
Take a look at the screencast and go on a tour of Windows Server virtualization (WSv). The video is a little over ten minutes in length and I tried to hit some of the key areas so you can get a quick technical overview of the product. If you want to save this local and review it offline, please right mouse click the second link and "SAVE AS".
Michael Kleef has been doing some incredible demonstrations down in Australia and New Zealand. I'd like to watch them in person, but it's pretty far from Texas. But you and I can see him in action because like many of us, he's doing screencasts directly off his blog. He calls them blogcasts. Must be an Aussie thing. Grin.
Anyway, the one that caught my eye this evening is the one he recorded on NAP VLANs. Check it out at:
http://blogs.technet.com/mkleef/archive/2007/09/03/network-access-protection-with-cisco-switches-blogcast.aspx
I know what you're thinking... Isn't UAC just a Windows Vista thing? Nope. Get all the details at Chris Henley's blog post on the subject. Chris is on a rampage and is cranking out a bunch of Windows Server 2008 screencasts. See this one at :
http://blogs.technet.com/chenley/archive/2007/08/30/windows-server-2008-user-account-controls-video.aspx
Before too long you'll be able to get your hands on another build of Windows Server 2008. In the meantime, sit back and enjoy a screencast fellow team member Chris Henley created on password policies. Head on over to:
http://blogs.technet.com/chenley/archive/2007/08/23/granular-password-policies-video.aspx
Today Microsoft ushered in a new era of virtualization management. Want to know more? Take a 15 minute video tour with me as we take a look at System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) 2007, System Center Operation Manager (SCOM) 2007 and the Virtual Machine Management pack.
Over the past few weeks I created and tested a demonstration environment on my machines using the RTM bits of Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2, Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1, SQL Server 2005, SQL Reporting Services, PowerShell, WinRM, System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2007, System Center Operations Manager 2007, and capturing tools to record all of this. I built this from scratch and although it takes some time, you can save your time by downloading a pre-built image. Details below. But consider this, all of the products listed above are now shipping. None of it is beta. That means you can build this yourself and start learning right away.
So what's the big deal?
Have you tried to manage a bunch of virtual machines with the Virtual Server 2005 administrative website? It doesn't scale very well and there's no real collection of performance data. The new management capabilities provided by SCVMM will really help you get a grip on consolidation of underutilized servers via physical to virtual migrations, efficient management of the VM's after they are there, and excellent analysis and reporting. The tour I recorded touches on most of these subjects but obviously I can't go super deep in fifteen minutes. So lets talk about a few areas.
The VMM Console
Simple to use. I like it. It's very well thought out and has nice visualization of the servers in your org, the virtual machines executing on those servers, access to properties and settings, etc. As with many of our management tools, the actions pane is present and is context sensitive. For those of you using UNDO disk files in Virtual Server 2005, you'll notice right away this console doesn't like that. We'll talk about why in a minute and do a deep dive into that area on the next blog post and screencast this morning.
You'll find some cool new features in the console. As you'll see in the screencast, we can tag virtual machines. After tagging, we can change the view to group by tag. This will come in very handy if you want to tag VM's by customer, project, cost center, geography, etc. Partners and hosters will love this.
The VMM Console also includes nice little thumb nail views of the VM when it's selected. This will come in handy for installs or other type of activity you just want to see at a glance. If needed, double click the thumbnail to launch a VMRC session with the VM. Easy. Secure.
Got Your Library Card?
When was the last time you went down to the public library to check out a book? Or a book on tape or CD? Did they have it? Unless it was super popular most likely what you were looking for was there. SCVMM has a library. Use it to store virtual machines, hardware profiles, virtual hard disk files, etc. Think of all of the building blocks you use to build virtual machines with. When you go to start building a virtual machine, take advantage of your internal building blocks and standards stored on the Library. I think you are going to find this to be invaluable especially in a large environment with many potential virtual machines.
PowerShell is Everywhere
Much like Exchange Server 2007, nearly all of the tasks are executed via PowerShell commandlets. When you are using the VMM Console, and do something like a virtual machine migration (move from one host to another), PowerShell is doing the work behind the scenes. You can go to the jobs area in the console and see this progress. If you are a command line commando, then fire up a PowerShell console and take advantage of tons and tons of script and commandlets to do chores in the SCVMM environment. You'll see me demo moving a VM with a simple script file in the screencast. We have a commandlet reference guide that will be published today or very soon and as soon as I get the link, I'll make sure to provide it.
You'll love using PowerShell for automation of creates, moves, etc.
Checkpoints and State Management
Now that UNDO disk files aren't supported in SCVMM, what do you use? Checkpoints to the rescue. You'll quickly fall in love with the new checkpointing mechanism and forget all about UNDO before you know it. I have recorded a screencast on this topic and will be posting detailed information in another blog post in few minutes.
See http://blogs.technet.com/keithcombs/archive/2007/09/06/system-center-virtual-machine-manager-2007-screencast-checkpoints.aspx for more information on that subject.
Self Service
How do your users manage and use virtual machines? The new SCVMM Self Service Portal of course! Check out the screencast (right at the end) or get more detail from Tony Soper in his blog post at http://blogs.technet.com/tonyso/archive/2007/08/20/drive-through-vms-scvmm-self-service-portal.aspx.
Monitoring and Reporting
If you already have a bunch of virtual machines, what do you really know about them? What do you know about the host running them? Now you'll be able to answer those questions and much more. System Center Operations Manager 2007, also known as SCOM, with the combined management packs will allow for the most comprehensive VM monitoring you've ever seen. Monitor and report against the host running the workloads,the virtual machine, and the applications inside the virtual machine. End to end reporting rocks and you won't get a better solution from anyone else right now.
Take a look at the screencast and go on a tour of SCVMM and SCOM 2007. The video is a little over fifteen minutes in length and I tried to hit most of the key areas of the product mix so you can get a quick technical overview of the products. If you want to save this local and review it offline, please right mouse click the second link and "SAVE AS".
Streaming - http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/scvmm/15MinuteTour.wmv Save Local - http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/scvmm/15MinuteTour.wmv
Streaming - http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/scvmm/15MinuteTour.wmv
Save Local - http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/scvmm/15MinuteTour.wmv
A number of websites are going live through the course of today. Here are a few of my favorites. The TechNet area will have a SCVMM virtual machine you can download. This will save you the time and trouble of setting everything up from scratch (although I recommend the "from scratch" approach for training).
Outside Sources and Reviews
http://news.com.com/Microsoft+aims+at+VMwares+virtualization+lead/2100-7339_3-6206641.html http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9034818 http://weblog.infoworld.com/virtualization/archives/2007/09/here_comes_micr.html http://www.virtualization.info/2007/09/release-microsoft-system-center-virtual.html
http://news.com.com/Microsoft+aims+at+VMwares+virtualization+lead/2100-7339_3-6206641.html
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9034818
http://weblog.infoworld.com/virtualization/archives/2007/09/here_comes_micr.html
http://www.virtualization.info/2007/09/release-microsoft-system-center-virtual.html
Downloads
will go somewhat live on 9/7 with the downloadable virtual machine. This VM will allow you to test drive the product without setting it up from scratch. The SCVMM evaluation bits should be on the download center next week.
System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) has been released and one of my favorite new features is the Checkpoint management that is now possible. Spend ten minutes of your day watching the video demonstration to get an idea of what I'm talking about.
UNDO Disk Files
I'm sure many of you are used to using UNDO disk files with the virtual machines you are running on Virtual PC 2007 or Virtual Server 2005. I pretty much have to with my demos. I've always enjoyed using UNDO and was shocked to see it is not supported in SCVMM. Why might you ask? Read on.
Where are your children?
We've had a technology known as differencing disks for a long time in our virtualization products. SCVMM uses that technology to create Checkpoints. The beauty of this is that SCVMM hides all of the complexity and gives you an easy-to-use interface.
Windows Server virtualization (WSv) adds some additional capabilities I have recorded for another screencast. I'll have a ton of information on WSv when the time is right. Stay tuned for that...
In the meantime, check the video out and see for yourself. This really adds a great new dimension to your high availability, backup/recovery, and change management processes. That's really what the System Center family is all about. Allowing your org and infrastructure to improve so that it's a well oiled and managed machine. A virtual machine that is...
Take a look at the screencast and go on a tour of SCVMM Checkpoints. The video is right at 10 minutes in length. If you want to save this local and review it offline, please right mouse click the second link and "SAVE AS".
Save Local - http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/scvmm/Checkpoints.wmv
While file restore is useful in cases of file loss and data corruption, Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore is most useful for disaster recovery when your PC malfunctions. Available only to Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate Edition users, Complete PC Backup and Restore is capable of restoring your whole PC environment, including the operating system, installed programs, and user settings, as well as data files. You can restore your PC content back to its original PC if its hardware problems were fixed, or to a replacement PC if not. Complete PC Backup and Restore can be initiated from within Windows Vista as well as from the Windows Vista installation CD in the event the PC is so corrupt it cannot startup normally from the hard disk.
http://msinetpub.vo.llnwd.net/d1/keithcombs/p89CompletePC.wmv