Like you need another reason to attend webcasts!

Check out this site, and list of webcasts.  If you attend one of these, and submit an evaluation at the end, you are entered in a drawing to possibly win a “full conference pass” to TechEd 2006 in Boston.

Here are the official rules.

Hey.. send me a note if you’re the winner.  We could meet up at TechEd and maybe we can share some unhealthy snacks off of a long table together!

Kevin’s Webcast Resources:

Microsoft Solutions for Windows Update Management

UPDATE: These resources are for a webcast I was scheduled to deliver today (April 28, 2006).  However, due to circumstances beyond my control, we’ve had to postpone the webcast session for another day.  I will let you know when it is re-scheduled as soon as we get that figured out.

In the meantime, please feel free to use these Windows Update Management resources.   

Kevin

Microsoft announced the new suite of products now falling under a new name – System Center – as the suite of products surrounding the area of system management.

“System Center is the Microsoft family of systems management products and solutions, focused on providing IT professionals with the tools and knowledge to help manage their IT infrastructure. It embodies the Microsoft vision for integrating systems management tools and technologies to help you ease operations, reduce troubleshooting time, and improve your planning capabilities.”

Click the graphic above for the main page, or click HERE for the overview.

“But what is it really, Kevin?”

That didn’t explain it well enough for you?  Okay… basically, “System Center” encompasses anything and everything your IT administrators use that can be followed by the word “management”:

• Operations Management
• Change Management
• Configuration management
• Release Management
• Asset Management
• Data Protection Management
• Problem Management
• Capacity Management
• Incident Management 
• Waste Management

(Okay.. so I snuck that last one in there.  But you get the idea.)

“So, like MOM and SMS and DPM?”

Right.  Data Protection Manager 2006 is a System Center product.  Current versions of SMS and MOM also fall into this category.  In fact, the next major release of SMS, currently known as "SMSv4", and MOM, currently known as "MOMv3", will take on the System Center family name.  "SMSv4" will become System Center Configuration Manager 2007 while "MOMv3" will be named System Center Operations Manager 2007. 

So… where you had SMS and MOM, you’ll now have SSCM and SCOM.

It’s official…

You could have probably guessed, I suppose.

I love this webcast!

Below I’ve pasted an edited and cleaned up copy of most of the Q&A from today’s webcast on Exchange Server 2003: Tips, Tricks, and Shortcuts. 

SUPER BIG thank you to Michael J. Murphy and Harold Wong for handling the Q&A on the back-end, and who’s work this really represents.

-Kevin

—

Questions and Answers:

“[This webcast] was advertised as Level 300...”

Hmm… Sorry about that. Some of the items will be 300 level since it involves registry entries.  However, the majority is probably more in the line of 200 level.

“Does the Best Practice Analyzer tool have any special features to fix ‘Cannot connect to port 25 of routing group master’?”

The Best Practice Analyzer does not "fix" anything. It will give recommendations based on our "Best Practices" and your current configuration.

“What do I do if my Server reports ‘Cannot connect to the routing group master over port 25?’”

See http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/Analyzer/6fa17f7e-2cce-4b87-8903-cbcce84fe9b9.mspx?mfr=true

“The most recent version is 2.6 and not 2.5”

You are correct, 2.6 was just posted April 5th.  This session was created and approved last October.  I missed that.

“How can I test connectivity to port 25?”

How about telnet? see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q153119/

“What should I try if after restoring a mailbox store from backup it is not mounting it through the Recovery Storage Group created.”

First, make sure you were successful in restoring the store to the RSG. Was the database in RSG set to allow overwriting?  Did the restore complete successfully?  Also, make sure you don't restore the log files, only the database.

“How do I enable OWAADMIN ? ( OWA is currently working though )”

You need to download the tool and install it - http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=4bbe7065-a04e-43ca-8220-859212411e10&displaylang=en.

“Is OWA Admin installed by default?”

No, you need to download the tool from the MS website: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=4bbe7065-a04e-43ca-8220-859212411e10&displaylang=en.

Sorry – I thought I mentioned that when I started demonstrating it, but I guess I wasn’t clear on that.

“How can I change the default route for the outgoing emails to my internet provider´s outgoing mail server in Exchange 2003 Server?  Thanks.”

In Exchange 200x, that would require an SMTP Connector to be configured see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/265293.  You’re welcome. 

“Do you have to have Ex 2003 sp2 installed to enable PW change?”

No, this was available in the original release as well.

“How can I find out how to enable password change in OWA?”

See http://support.microsoft.com/kb/297121

“Do you need to be using SSL Certificates to allow Domain password changes using OWA?”

Yes.  See http://support.microsoft.com/kb/297121

“If using a Dynamic IP address with your ISP, you cannot obtain a SSL Certificate for this purpose correct?”

You should be able to. The SSL Certificate is associated with a name, not an IP.

“What is full-text indexes?”

A full text index creates indices on all text, that includes message bodies and attachments, which makes searching the store very fast, but has overhead associated with it

“Is there a way to defrag/compress your Exchange DB w/o taking it off line?”

Exchange will perform an online defrag as part of its normal maintenance.  However, this only defrags within the database device.  If you want the actual file on the hard drive to be defragmented, then you will have to take it offline.

“Is ‘last Build time’ in the Full text indexing section in the ESM supposed to tell you the last time when the index got created or updated?  Otherwise how can I confirm that my index is being updated every night?”

It should be the last time it was rebuilt / updated.

“Is it Best Practices to Take if Offline and Defrag it? If so what are the tools available to do this?”

I wouldn't say it is ‘Best Practices’ to do this.  If you want to, then you would use ESEUTIL to degrag and remove the empty space.  You could then use a tool like Diskeeper  (or just the native defrag tool in Server) to defrag the drive. Or the Contig tool from Sysinternals to defragment just the store files.  Please keep in mind that this may take a considerable amount of time depending on the IO subsystem you have and the size of the database.

“Where is the step by step guide for configuring Full Text indexing?”

http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=http%3a%2f%2fwww.support.microsoft.com%2fkb%2f822932%2f

“Concerning catch-all - is this possible to have a catch all email addresses located on another container/mail server in the same organization?”

Yes

“Would adding disclaimer create an issue with digital certs ? ( is that what Kevin mentioned about S/MIME?)”

Yes. Because the email is being modified after the signature is "applied", so signing would get confused.

“I haven't installed SP2 to my Exchange 2003 Servers. I have 8 servers. Is there a preferred "Order" to install the SP? i.e. Front End, Bridge Head, other servers...”

See the step by step guide http://www.microsoft.com/technet/itsolutions/mobile/deploy/msfp_overview.mspx

“I get a lot of ‘5.5.0 smtp;554 Relay access denied’ errors on outgoing email. Any thoughts”

Take a look at http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=895853&SD=tech

“How can you check if Exchange is running a particular service pack?”

spcheck tool http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;279631

“What is the defualt time for TarpitTime?”

There isn't one.  The default is that the error messages is returned IMMEDIATELY.  You need to add the registry key and define a value.  See http://support.microsoft.com/kb/842851

“Are there any issues with OWA form based authentication enabled and Mobile ActiveSync?”

“Will all Exchange tools work also on SBS 2003?”

Everything shown today will, yes.

“Excellent Presentation and offline answers!”

Thanks!

—

Here is my blog resource page for this session again:
http://blogs.technet.com/kevinremde/archive/2006/04/26/425799.aspx

Kevin’s Webcast Resources:

Exchange Server 2003 – Tips, Tricks, and Shortcuts

Here are some resources relating to the webcast topic presented.  I hope you find them useful.

Kevin

Beta 2 of IE 7.0 is Released

Yeah, I’ve been using a pre-Beta 2 version for awhile now, and I’m loving it.  Click here (or the logo graphic) to learn more about the new features, and to download beta 2 for yourself. 

Seriously – I’m hooked on the RSS feed support, and on tabs. 

Last one.

Shot quite a few things in this just-under-4–minute video. 

Keith likes “The Mummy”, and Harold got shorter.

Rob Westover draws and then awards the XBOX winner for our “Where’s Rob?” contest.

Click HERE for Part VIII

And that concludes a very long, FUN week! 

Boston here I come!

The day was a full one.  Apparently.  Too full to take many videos.  I did manage to take a few pictures as we were walking out of Universal Studios. 

John Baker say’s hi to his mom.  And Benjamin Franklin is quoted.

Click HERE for Part VII

Crazy Fun Aussies

Apparently the launch of the XBOX 360 was big enough to warrant setting a world record for.  No, not in XBOXs sold.  (Well, maybe, but I don’t know that for a fact.)  No.. this was the record for the most water balloons thrown in one event.

“About 50,000 water balloons, the same number of Xbox 360 consoles that have been sold in the country since the launch on March 23, 2006, were thrown by participants. Gamers travelled from as far away as Asia, Europe, Latin America and the United States to take part in the event.”

Here is the PressPass article about it.

And here is the Austrailian XBOX site that has pictures of the event.

The weather is just recently warm enough here in Minnesota for water balloons.  (Those frozen ones really hurt!)

Party time!

Part 6 of my videos comes from June 8.  I took some video of Karaoke at the IT Influencer Appreciation party, and immediately following at the bar next door, as me and my team mates enjoyed some live music.

It’s a short video, so enjoy it over and over again.

Click here for Part VI

How much would you pay for all of that power?

Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 is now a free product.  Get it here!

“Isn’t this old news, Kevin?”

Yeah… If you’ve heard this already, please forgive me.  I was not blogging the week it happened, so I missed putting out the big scoop here.  But I’m still just so amazed by this bit of news and the possibilities that it has for all of you that I thought I’d better mention it here anyway, in case some of you missed it.

I recently bought a new “server” for home use, and I’m currently having a blast installing virtualized machines holding various builds of “Longhorn” Server, Windows Vista builds, Exchange “12”, and so on.  It’s a self-study training playground!  

Part 5 of the videos from TechEd 2005 included a plug for a contest that has since ended.  The SQL Server Chopper contest ended at the SQL Server 2005 Launch later in the year, when some lucky folks won some choppers built by the Orange County Chopper guys.

The video features Chris Henley (and his “Henlettes”).

Click here for Part V

SQL Server 2005 Tidbit 042

Service Pack 1 (SP1) for SQL Server 2005 is now available. 

Get it here.  (Link is finally LIVE!)

“What’s new, Kevin?”

Well, the biggest news, in my opinion, is that it now fully supports Database Mirroring.  (Can I get a big “HOORAY!” for that one?!  Yeah!)

Here’s the press release.

Other updates include the release of SQL Server Management Studio Express, “a simplified graphical management environment for SQL Server Express Edition”, and additional reporting interfaces for SSRS (SQL Server Reporting Services).

—

Got an IT question?  Give me a comment here, or contact me.

Eileen Brown interviewed on Channel 9

Eileen is a good friend of mine, who also happens to be the manager of IT Evangelists in the UK.  She’s got one of the best blogs around (in fact, she was one of the ones who first turned-me-on to blogging), and is just a super lady.

And as you’ll see in the interview, she has quite an interesting past as well.

So here she is now, featured on Channel 9’s latest “WM_IN – Women In Technology” show.

(I couldn’t find a perma-link on that Channel 9 show site page, so eventually the link above won’t go right to Eileen’s show page.  So… you can also the video directly here, or download it here.)

Part 4 of my video “Rock-U-mentary” (the sights, sounds, and smells) of TechEd 2005 was footage from Monday, June 6th.  It is the longest of the videos, and contains some introductions of several of my team mates. 

We even caught our manager, Stacey Copeland, putting up posters without permission.

And we visit the TechNet booth in the exhibit hall during the official exhibit hall reception – spinning the “Wheel of TechNet”

Click here for Part IV

Data Protection Manager 2005 vs. DFS Replication in Windows Server 2003 R2

For those of you wondering which to choose (and there are many of you), the folks that know best put some resources up on their blog (“The Filing Cabinet”). 

Part 3 in my revisit of video blogcasting from TechEd 2005 features a quick walk (fast forward video) through the exhibit hall and company store, eventually winding up at the Microsoft Across America “mobile experience” truck.

Click here for Part 3

The May 2006 TechNet Webcast Calendar is LIVE

Check out this article, which lists all the webcasts, with links for signing up. 

There are, of course, a couple that I’d especially like for you to attend:

TechNet Webcast: Tools and Techniques for Managing a Windows Vista Desktop Deployment (Level 200)

Wednesday, May 03, 2006 - 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM Pacific Time

Kevin Remde, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation

Deploying desktops in a business environment is much like running a production line. Various elements, including operating system images, application packages, and user state migrators, are constructed as discrete components and then brought together at the end of the process to make a finished product. This webcast discusses the components and production lines that form a comprehensive PC deployment solution. Learn how the production line point of view provides a project management approach to deployment readiness as a supply chain. This presentation acts as an introduction to other webcasts in the Deployment Series that focus on specific areas such as computer imaging and user state migration.

http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032294163&Culture=en-US

TechNet Webcast: Active Directory Fundamentals (Level 200)

Tuesday, May 30, 2006 - 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM Pacific Time

Kevin Remde, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation

This webcast provides an introduction to the Active Directory directory service in the Microsoft Windows Server family of operating systems. Learn what a directory service is and the benefits that Active Directory offers. We cover the logical concepts of domains, trees, and forests, as well as the physical concepts of domain controllers and sites. Gain an understanding of the relationship between Active Directory and DNS. In addition, we discuss some operational functions such as intersite and intrasite replication and the Active Directory operations masters.

http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032295119&Culture=en-US

This was just a short trip I took..

  Interface TV is on the air!

I’m very proud to share this.  My team mates Chris Henley and Matt Hester have headed up a project to deliver a TV show.  The Developers have all that great Channel 9 content, and other team mates of mine on the MSDN side of Microsoft Across America have created The Code Room.  Well.. here’s a show of our very own, for the IT Pros!

Click here to go to the official web site, and to watch Episode 1.

“What’s the first episode about?”

The first episode is a very moving one.  Matt writes in his blog entry about it:

“The show demonstrates the positive impact of IT and IT Pro’s in the community.  This episode is simply fantastic!  The show showcases how The Red Cross used technology during the relief efforts during Hurricane Katrina.  The show is simply amazing at showing the impact of the work that we do everyday!  So, sit back and enjoy!”

Indeed!

Here is video blogcast entry number two from last year’s TechEd in Orlando.

On Monday, June 6th, Chris Henley and I were working in the Server Infrastructure area of the Hands-on-Labs.  We volunteered to fix a lab that was broken (HOL163), so I thought I’d document our efforts on video. 

As you’ll see, our efforts really didn’t result in a fixed lab.  But it was a good learning experience nonetheless. 

And another comment I should make also…

I really don’t want this video to leave you with the impression that the HOLs don’t work.  They do.  And they’re awesome.  These folks who run the Hands-On-Labs are getting this process down really well.  TechEd 2005 was the first time they used a whole new engine for driving these things, and they’ve used it over and over again at other conferences since.  At our internal training conference TechReady 2 last January, for example, they ran these, and nearly all of them worked flawlessly. 

Good stuff.

“Just what is ISA Server?”

I just happened upon an excellent entry written by Security Expert Steve Lamb, where he wrestles with (and then sufficiently beats to death) the description of what ISA Server is and what it does – in terms that even your Mother would understand.

Caution: His writing is in English. 

Yes, it was a grand time last year in Orlando.  In thinking ahead to the upcoming TechEd 2005 in Boston, I re-lived some of my memories by taking a look at the blog posts I did last year during the show; and in particular, some of the bad videos I put up for your enjoyment. 

“Bad?  They weren’t bad.  Poor quality, perhaps…”

Yeah… I rendered them small so they wouldn’t take too much download bandwidth.  This year’s videos will be much better.  I promise.

Anyway, I  also noticed that my old blog entries from last year contain links to  locations that no longer exist, as far as where my video-blogcasts were being hosted.  So I thought that rather than re-find the link on the Blogcast Repository (because I know they’re still there, and it’s a great site and I think you should still visit them sometime soon), I would take this opportunity to learn how to use the resources we have here at Microsoft in the form of our company streaming media services. 

So… if you’ve seen them already, you can skip over these.  I’m going to post one every couple of days.  I don’t want you to have too much of a good thing all at once. <heh>

Here is video #1, taken June 5, 2005.

Or more appropriately, do I deserve your attention?

Question for you:
How did you get here, to this blog entry?  Do you happen upon this blog as a result of a search?  Or perhaps you regularly read another blog and they linked to me?  The best case (my opinion) is that you are one of the folks who have subscribed to an RSS feed either directly from this blog site or one of the other aggregate sites it is sent to.  But whatever the path you took, it was an action on your part that said, “I’m willing to spend some of my attention in order to gain some benefit.” 

”Huh?  I’m spending my attention?”

Yes, you are.  The new, connected world of the Internet, and the ever-expanding world conversation it allows (call it Web 2.0 if you must) is all about how attention is acquired and valued.  Attention is an interesting commodity.  The fact that you are reading this blog entry means I have gained some of yours, and in return you are expecting something of value;  Some insight, knowledge, IT Pro resources to make your work life better in some way, etc. 

“Sounds very ‘cluetrain’ to me, Kevin.”

Exactly.  For those of you who haven’t read it, and if you’re interested at all in the new world of “Attention Marketing”, I highly recommend you read “The ClueTrain Manifesto”.  At least read through and understand their “95 Theses” concerning the new world of marketing, and how companies need to wake up and smell the coffee being brewed by their customers in the form of online discourse and interaction.  Some people are taking attention gathering to the next level; even creating businesses around how attention is measured, collected, bought and sold. 

Do they place a value on your attention?  You bet. 

Any of you who regularly read Steve Gillmor, Doc Searls, and their other regular cohorts; you know that they’re all about what attention means to businesses of all types.

“What got you thinking about this, Kevin?”

Well, it was my friend and colleague Keith “King Cobra” Combs’ blog entry about “Face time” that got me thinking.  His entry was in response to other postings about how important it is for people to have face-to-face contact (and one cartoon scribble firmly opposed to that notion).  Our team, and indeed a large portion of Microsoft, is focused on presenting the technologies of Microsoft in the most efficient and effective way possible.  We have found that, yes, blogging is great for large numbers of interactions… and we’re using any-and-all ‘cast you can think of  (screencasts, broadcasts, blogcasts, podcasts, webcasts) and all the media available to get your attention.  But what is the value returned?  Are we giving you the most value for the attention you’ve spent?  Did you get the most BANG for your attention BUCK?

Our team has found that, for what we do, and in delivering the most value to you for YOUR attention, there is still no replacement for face-to-face interaction.  We’ll use our “spare” bandwidth for all the ‘casts and such, but it is our live events that are and will continue to be at the center of our efforts.

So… whether it’s at a TechNet Event, Campus Connection Event, user group, product roadshow or launch event… See you there!