One of the coolest features of Office 2007 is SmartArt.  It makes it incredibly easy to create great looking diagrams to show a process, cycle, hierarchy, or relationship.

During some business planning recently, however, I had the need to actually COMBINE two different diagrams to show a relationship between two related processes.  However, in Word, I found that I could not combine the two.  The "Segmented Cycle" was exactly what I needed on the inside of my chart, and the "Block Cycle" was exactly what I needed on the outside.  However, when I dragged one over the other, they would NOT overlap. Both diagrams would just swap places.

It turns out that this is expected behavior. Each diagram type knows what type of shapes belong there and how the shapes related to each other, so adding other arbitrary shapes or diagrams isn’t possible. 

Fortunately, there are two possible workarounds.  The first is to use PowerPoint, where you can overlap Smart Art all day long, and group/ungroup with no problems. 

The second is to position two Smart Art objects, or a Smart Art object and other shapes, in a way that they appear together on a page (just fine for my needs)which requires both objects to be floating. To make the Smart Art floating, right click it (its border, not an individual shape) and change the Text Wrapping to something other than Inline (e.g., Square or Tight).  Once the images are “floating”, you can size them and position them over each other. 

Because why wouldn't you?

Best Practice Guide for Securing Windows Server Active Directory Installations

Best Practice Guide for Securing Active Directory Installations and Day-to-Day Operations: Part 1

Best Practice Guide for Securing Active Directory Installations and Day-to-Day Operations: Part 2

Windows Server 2003 Deployment Kit: Designing and Deploying Directory and Security Services

Windows Server 2003 Security Guide

Windows Server 2008 Security Guide

Achieving Autonomy and Isolation with Forests, Domains, and Organizational Units

Active Directory Security Technical Implementation Guide (Non-Microsoft Guide)

http://iase.disa.mil/stigs/stig/active-directory-stig-v1r1.pdf

A few years ago, at my first IT job, my manager told me that there was a server at Microsoft, and all day long it created objects in a test Active Directory Domain.  "This server has been running since Windows Server 2000 was released" he said, "and it still has not hit a limit on the number of objects AD can hold".

I'm pretty sure he was talking out of his arse at the time, but we really do test the limits of our software at Microsoft (both upper and lower).  Some limits are hardware driven (such as the limits of the 32-bit address space), some are hardcoded limits, and some are practical limits (such as how long it would take to restore in the event of a hardware failure).  As noted at Tomek's blog, the Active Directory Maximum Limits article was recently updated, so check it out if you are curious how many Group Policy Objects can be applied to a user account, or why each Active Directory domain controller can only create 2,147,483,393 objects during its lifetime (and how to work around that limitation).

Just saw the following on Trika's blog.  GREAT opportunity to share your technical/certification knowledge with others!  Signing up right now...

Check this out: MCP mentors is a cool new program some people around here are cooking up, through which our certified community helps others get started in IT. To participate in this pilot, it makes most sense if you are in eastern U.S. or Canada, so you're in the same time zone. But more on that later...

Share your stories and help build the MCP community! Become an MCP Mentor.

As an experienced MCP, you have many stories--of both successes and failures. There was the time when the new guy brought down the entire system. The time you spent an entire week troubleshooting that elusive problem. And the time you completed your task in record time. Microsoft Learning invites you to share your stories, skills, and experience to make a difference in someone's life as an MCP Mentor.

HOW IT WORKS
The MCP Mentor Program matches an experienced Microsoft Certified Professional (you) with someone new to IT and studying to pass their first Microsoft Certification exam (your mentee). Through the program, your real-world perspective, technical skills, and community connections can help others overcome the experience gap to complete a path to proven skills, new career opportunities, and confidence.

As an MCP Mentor, you will share real-world experience with your mentee about objectives that are covered by the Microsoft Certification exam, helping to build self-confidence about his or her technical skills and preparedness. You will meet regularly with your mentee by phone or e-mail. In addition, you and your mentee will have access to an online community to share best practices, tips, and study tools. The online community also helps you and your mentee connect with other IT professionals of diverse experience, perspectives, and backgrounds.

VOLUNTEER FOR THE PILOT AT WALTER REED ARMY MEDICAL CENTER, UNITED STATES
Microsoft Learning is running a pilot of this program in conjunction with the IT Academy that is associated with Walter Reed Army Medical Center. The soldiers in this IT Academy program are recovering from recent injuries and waiting to find out if they will be discharged from the military. Most of these soldiers enter the IT Academy program with little or no experience in IT.

The MCP Mentor Program is not intended to be a replacement for training, but instead to supplement training. An experienced MCT supports these soldiers in their preparation. But these soldiers would benefit greatly from the kind of 1:1 mentoring relationship that you can provide. We need volunteer mentors to help these soldiers build the skills that are validated on their target exam(s), enter the IT profession, and join the MCP community. We are specifically looking for:

- IT professionals (vs. developers) with experience on MCDST exams 70-271 and 70-272 <corrected typo immediately after pressing publish. argh>

- Commitment of 2-4 hours per month over a 3-6 month period

- Local to mid-Atlantic United States preferred <edited 4/16...SEE NOTE FROM PROG. MNGR IN COMMENTS: YOU CAN PARTICIPATE REMOTELY!!!!>

HOW TO PARTICIPATE
If you are interested in volunteering, go to http://connect.microsoft.com and enter this Invitation ID to fill out an application survey: MNTR-CGPX-QQKK. If you have questions about this program, you can contact the MCP Mentor Program administrators at mcpmntr@microsoft.com.

I am a BIG fan of Live Maps.  Since last fall, they have had a feature that Yahoo and Google are still lacking, and that is driving directions that take traffic into account.  I live to the south of Seattle/Redmond, and there are no fewer than 4 major routes I can take to get to work...  I could take I-5 to I-405, or Hwy 167 to I-405, or I-405 to SR900, or Hwy 18 to I-90.

So what to take in the morning?  405 is the most direct route, but half of the people in western Washington are sitting on 405 in the morning.  Driving a stick-shift in traffic, this can be an exercise in road rage.  My commute that is 30-45 minutes without traffic becomes easily 75-90 minutes in traffic.  Yuck.  There is nothing worse than second-guessing myself all the way to work ("I sure wish I had taken alternate route X or Y!  That would have been faster!")  So now, before I head to work, I fire up Live Maps, generate directions for myself, and check the little box that says "Choose route based on traffic".  I will then know what the fastest way to work is, and how long it will take to get there.

In the past, this has worked great on Internet Explorer and Firefox, but Safari has choked on Live Maps for some reason.  Fortunately, as of last week, Safari 3 is now a supported browser.  No matter what computer happens to be at hand, I can pull up my handy-dandy driving directions and hit the road.  Awesome!

Alright... back from a MUCH needed vacation, some crazy weather (hail in Seattle?), and I have started to recover from the black lung that my kids were nice enough to share with me.

My new Samson microphone showed up as well, so I am ready to start recording some screencasts to share will all of you.   To kick off my queue, however, I am taking requests.  What would you like me to cover?  Windows Server 2008? FSRM? DPM? Virtualization? Active Directory? Vista? Microsoft Operations Framework? Solution Accelerators? SharePoint?  Let me know in the comments below and I'll get cracking :)

...and awesome as always!  Check it out here.

Windows Administration: Active Directory Backup and Restore in Windows Server 2008

Windows Server 2008 and the new Windows Server Backup utility bring many changes and welcome enhancements to backing up. Here is an in-depth guide to backing up and restoring Active Directory in the new server OS. Gil Kirkpatrick

Windows Administration: Designing OU Structures that Work

Too many administrators underestimate the importance of having a well-designed Organizational Unit structure. Find out why having a sound OU strategy is important and determine the best OU structure for your organization. Ken St. Cyr

Windows Administration: Extending the Active Directory Schema

Many applications that rely on Active Directory define their own changes to the schema. But it's important that these changes don't impact other applications. Get an overview of extending the Active Directory through the classSchema and attributeSchema objects. Vikas Malhotra

System Center: Introducing System Center Mobile Device Manager

The new System Center Mobile Device Manager provides a complete set of tools for managing Windows Mobile devices through an MMC snap-in or via Windows PowerShell. Find out how this vital tool will allow you to manage mobile devices, increase security, and deliver mobile VPN capabilities. Matt Fontaine

System Center: What's New in System Center Essentials SP1

Service Pack 1 introduces significant enhancements for System Center Essentials 2007. Explore some of the key changes that will improve the user experience and streamline administration. Pete Zerger