Colm Torris's Blog

Colm Torris: Moving My Blog!

colmt — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 20:23:00 GMT

This will be my last posting on this blog as I have moved my blog to http://blogs.technet.com/ieitpro/ reason for that is that we have just deployed a new server internally that allows for my blog posts to form the basis of the news on the local TechNet website.

So from now on you can stay in touch with what's happening on the TechNet Ireland front on my new blog.

Watch the very best of WinHEC on IT???s ShowTime!

colmt — Tue, 06 Jun 2006 13:43:43 GMT

Windows Vista Beta 2, Windows Server platform directions, major trends, innovative technologies and more were shown at WinHEC 2006 in Seattle. Now you can watch a selection of WinHec technical sessions as well as the 3 keynote presentations by Bill Gates, Will Poole and Bob Muglia, on IT’s ShowTime! by TechNet.

URL >> http://www.microsoft.com/emea/itsshowtime/winhec2006.aspx

Rafal Lukawiecki Presents IT Security - Belfast May 18th (Complementary Event)

colmt — Wed, 10 May 2006 13:11:00 GMT

Rafal Lukawiecki IT Security Event - Belfast May 18th

Yes we have secured Rafal Lukawiecki - a top global IT Security speaker (winner of the #1 presenter at Microsoft's European TechEd and IT Forum conferences for many year running), to present at a security event in Belfast on May 18th!

This complementary IT Security event will focus on Identity and Access Management. For more details and registration please click here

Also the event starts at 10:15 to give non-Belfast residents a chance to make it up for the event.

Rafal's Bio

In his role as Strategic Consultant and Director at Project Botticelli Ltd Rafal is responsible for analysing, planning and forecasting the changes in the field of Information Technology. Through direct association with his clients, Rafal is working closely with teams of up to 150 software developers, as well as with investors and their boards of directors. This work allows him to practice the best principles of Microsoft Solutions Framework, and Microsoft Operations Framework - the secrets behind Microsoft's and many other IT companies' success. Amongst his past experiences, Rafal was also one of the founders of Bot Inc., a Seattle software development company. In his other previous roles at Oxford Computer Group Ltd and at Aris Corporation Rafal gained extensive practical experience in consulting and professional technical speaking on a variety of subjects, which he continues to perform at Project Botticelli Ltd. His frequent conference keynotes and other speeches have been sought after by many company directors, CEOs and business leaders. These included many Microsoft and other conferences, and very prestigious addresses in a number of European countries upon their governments' invitations. Recently, Rafal has presented at prestigious Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer events. Rafal specialises in four fields: study of programming models, security and cryptography, networking with IPv6, and project and operational management of IT. His work focuses mainly on: team building, management of software development ventures, designing successful IT support and operations, current and future software design patterns, eBusiness, Microsoft .NET strategy, ITC security, service oriented design, and messaging. In his spare time, Rafal has been writing a new book on Microsoft Solutions Framework aimed at its practitioners. Amongst tens of professional Microsoft qualifications he has previously obtained the MCSE, MCSD, Internet, MCT and unique MSF Master Trainer endorsements. Rafal also holds an MSc in the Foundations of Advanced Information Technology from Imperial College, University of London.

Top Microsoft Security Event - Belfast

colmt — Mon, 08 May 2006 12:57:28 GMT

TechNet Ireland has dug deep and is bringing Rafal Lukawiecki over to present at a security event titled: Identity and Access Management for a Heterogeneous environment. We are bringing this event to Belfast as the last two TechNet events have been in Dublin. Just in case you don't know Rafal – he's one of the best speakers I know. He has won best presenter at the TechEd and IT Forum events for many years running and that says a lot. Identity lifecycle management and access management are not easy, but if done well they can increase efficiency and security and reduce the total cost of ownership, this event should show you how to achieve that in your organisation. So my advice to you is to register for the event ASAP as the places are limited and are going to be snapped up. For more information and registration you can click here.

Deep Dive Active Directory Event - Microsoft, Dublin

colmt — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 19:22:27 GMT

I’m currently sitting here in the front row of what I think has to be the most technical event TechNet Ireland has run this year. John and Sally sure have done a great job of engaging with the audience at a 300-400 technical level. Wow I think John spent most of the morning speaking in binary (at least from my non-too-technical perspective)! Luckily I kept both themselves and the audience fuelled with coffee throughout the day. On a serious note however, the audience feedback has been great especially from those lucky people who won copies of John’s book Active Directory Forestry which sure looks to be a useful resource.

Get a second shot at Microsoft exams (for free)

colmt — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 19:09:40 GMT

You can get a free second shot at any Microsoft exam by registering for the second shot offer before you take any exam. With the offer you’ll receive a promotion code that is good for one free second shot at the same exam in case you don't pass it on your first try.

There is not much time left for this offer as your initial exam must be scheduled and taken between February 15, 2006 and June 30, 2006. Your free retake exam must be scheduled and taken with the same EDP as your first exam by July 31, 2006.

An Insiders View of MMS 2006 (Microsoft's Management Summit)

colmt — Thu, 27 Apr 2006 17:27:00 GMT

My colleague Dave Northey is over in San Diego at MMS 2006 all week. He's really blogging up a storm giving us all a great insiders view of what Microsoft are doing now and planning for in the future in the Management space. You can check out his blog here.

MOM 2005 SP1 support for SQL 2005

colmt — Wed, 26 Apr 2006 16:10:00 GMT

Quite a number of people were asking me after the recent SQL event on March 1st in Dublin whether or not MOM would support SQL 2005 and if so when. Well I've just heard that a knowledge base article has just announced that there is now MOM 2005 SP1 support for SQL 2005. For all the detail check it out here. You can also find the the presentations from our March 1st event here under 'past events'.

TechNet Subscriptions - Eval vers of all MS Software, betas, phone support incidents..

colmt — Mon, 24 Apr 2006 12:58:00 GMT

I've been meaning to blog about this for some time now. A couple of weeks ago the price of TechNet subscriptions was reduced to make it accessible to more people.

From talking to people in the field I now realise that most IT professionals don't realise exactly what you get when you subscribe to TechNet Plus. Well here goes:

As a subscriber to TechNet Plus you get the full version of all Microsoft Software products (for evaluation only), access to exclusive betas, free telephone support incidents, free learning resources and more.

The Value of TechNet Plus

Stay Informed:

Try Microsoft software without time limits1. Full-version software licensed for evaluation purposes allows you to make informed decisions about new technologies and deployments at your own pace.
Betas! Be one of the first to try out Microsoft operating systems, servers, and Office applications. Keep up to date on the latest technologies.
Free learning resources help you keep your IT skills current.

Get Help When You Need It

Unlimited Managed Newsgroup Support provides reliable answers to your questions by next business day in over 100 Managed Newsgroups (English only).

Support incidents included with TechNet Plus help you address your technical roadblocks quickly:

Two complimentary professional support incidents (a €396 value)

A 20% discount on additional technical support calls

Microsoft Knowledge Base: Find comprehensive technical support information developed by Microsoft Support Professionals.

Portable CD/DVD media: Take your TechNet subscription with you wherever you go – save on download time, and take advantage of advanced search and filtering capabilities.

Save Time Searching For Information

Automatically receive updates for Microsoft products including service packs, resource kits, utilities, and product documentation to help keep your systems up to date.
Security updates, bulletins, and hot fixes delivered consistently every month.
TechNet Subscriber Welcome Kit includes a binder for organizing monthly shipments and the CDs/DVDs needed to get you started when you receive your initial shipment.

And how much does this cost I hear you ask.... well for a single user it's €530 (if you are renewing a subscription it's €430). Whereas if you want to put it on a server for all the Technical people in you organisation to be able to access it and evaluate the software you can do do €1,070 (or €800 for renewal).

All the info about TechNet Plus subscriptions is here if you want to read about it or subscribe.

Microsoft's Virtual Server is Free and Supports Linux

colmt — Wed, 05 Apr 2006 16:04:27 GMT

I’m glad to see that Microsoft is listening to its customers who have been telling us for some time now that it wasn’t “on” to only support Windows on Virtual Server. Well now (as of Monday April 3^rd), MS have announced that we will support Linux as well and that Virtual Server 2005 R2 Enterprise Edition will be available at for free.

More detail from the announcement here: This is the full Virtual Server 2005 R2 Enterprise edition available in both 32-bit and 64-bit versions that we shipped in Q4 CY2005. This is not a trial or a limited version in any way. This is a fully-supported product, not some unsupported Trojan horse designed to get you to update a multi-thousand dollar per-processor, per-server product. Virtual machines created today with Virtual Server will be able to migrate into our hypervisor based Windows virtualization. This is a risk free proposition and it’s the real deal.

Why are we doing this? We want to continue the tremendous momentum we’ve had with the Virtual Server R2 release and we’ve already stated publicly that we’re developing virtualization technology going into Longhorn Server so we want people getting used to the idea that virtualization should be free.

More detail on the Linux support (see below) and availability of our VM Additions for Linux.

Supported Linux guest operating systems within Virtual Server R2 are:

Enterprise distributions:

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.1 (update 6)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 (update 6)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4
SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 9

Standard distributions:

Red Hat Linux 7.3
Red Hat Linux 9.0
SuSE Linux 9.2
SuSE Linux 9.3
SuSE Linux 10

You can read a lot more detail on the Virtual Server website.

Configuring MOM 2005 to Manage Non-Windows Systems (by Darren Dillon)

colmt — Tue, 04 Apr 2006 18:44:45 GMT

A common misconception many people have about MOM 2005 is that it will only monitor Microsoft environments. This is not the case – and the good news is that it is really easy to configure MOM to monitor systems such as routers, firewalls, Unix servers plus any application running on a Windows server. Depending on your requirements, how much effort you want to invest, and your budget there are a number of approaches that can be taken. In this article, I give an overview of some of these approaches – this is based on a presentation I gave at the NIMTUG IT Pro inaugural event, you can download the slides from

http://nimtug.org/files/default.aspx.

A very simple method of being notified if a system is unavailable is to use some VBScript which pings the monitored device. If the ping times out, a MOM event is created. This script can be repetitively scheduled (e.g. to run once a minute) using a MOM timed event rule. Finally create a MOM alert rule to raise an alert on the MOM console (and optionally email an operator) should the MOM event be found. There are plenty of examples of this technique on the web, http://www.myitforum.com/articles/2/view.asp?id=8615 being one. This approach is useful in scenarios where you do not required detailed information on the health of a device, but do need to be made aware if it is not accessible on the network – such as an upstream router.

If you have devices that run a syslog service (which means pretty much all flavours of Unix as a minimum) then getting syslog information into MOM is easy. Configure the syslog daemon to forward messages to your MOM server (e.g. to forward all messages, add the line *.*@[IP Address of MOM server] to the syslog.conf file and restart the syslog process). Then create a new provider within MOM and select the provider type as syslog. Finally, create alert rules within MOM, using the syslog provider to raise alerts based on text within the syslog data being sent.

Another option is to use SNMP. By installing SNMP & the SNMP WMI Provider on your MOM server (do this by going into add/remove programs, then select add/remove Windows components) you have the capability to receive SNMP traps from other devices. Configure the appropriate SNMP community and trap settings on the MOM server and the SNMP clients, then create a new MOM WMI provider using the query “select * from from snmpnotification” and set the provider to use the root\snmp\localhost namespace. Once you have that in place, create alert rules to raise alerts based on text within the SNMP traps received. I’ve used this technique recently to get alerts when a datacentre UPS has reached a threshold of 20% battery life remaining – once the SNMP data flows into MOM, it is easy to review the text and build more complex rules and alerts based on specific strings within the data.

If you want to use MOM to monitor the health of an application running on a Windows server, a good approach is to create some rules which look for specific events in the eventlog. As an example, a backup application will generally log (as a minimum) if a backup has succeeded or failed. By looking at the event log and familiarising yourself with the information raised by the application, you can create an alert rule to look for events based on event ID, source, and description and then create appropriate responses if a match is found. A good walkthrough of how to do this is provided by Commvault for their QiNetix product - http://www.commvault.com/mk/get/QINETIX_INT_MOM - however the same rationale can be applied to any application which writes to the Windows event log. This approach can be augmented by monitoring the status of the application’s service. Each time the status of a service changes, MOM is notified. Using this information, you can build an alert to tell you if a specific service has been started, stopped, or had its startup type changed. More information on how to do this is available at http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/mom/mom2005/Library/837041c6-fc3c-4f8b-a425-e2fde78b142b.mspx. It’s also worthwhile checking out the Management Pack Wizard, available within the MOM Resource Kit (http://www.microsoft.com/mom/downloads/2005/reskit/default.mspx) which can be used to automate the creation of a lot of these types of rules.

If you need more monitoring capability than the above techniques provide, or if you need the benefit of inbuilt rules and product knowledge, then check out the offerings provided by our partners in this space. The management pack catalog (http://www.microsoft.com/management/mma/catalog.aspx) is an up to date list of all the available management packs for MOM. A lot of partners have developed management packs, agents and reports for a wide range of devices and applications, ranging from mainframes to firewalls to SANs and much more. Installing these packs is generally as simple as installing a Microsoft management pack, meaning you are up and running in minutes.

Feel free to drop Colm a line if you want to drill down deeper into this type of content – if there is sufficient demand we can look at covering this in more detail at a future Technet event.

Microsoft TechNet Event in Cork

colmt — Tue, 28 Mar 2006 11:27:00 GMT

I'm currently here in the Silver Springs hotel in Cork. I traveled down from Dublin yesterday to a great event hosted by IT at Cork all about RSS. Rob Burke (MS) presented just how easy it will be for the end user to use RSS feeds. One example that was when you're in IE7 you can click on a 'get feed button' (which looks just like the orange RSS button from Firefox - makes sense for everyone to stick to the same look and feel) and it automatically grabs the feed from the page you are on. The end user doesn't necessarily know about it but they have just subscribed to an RSS feed! ... the way it should be really.

John Dunne from the Central Statistics Office then presented how they are using RSS on their site to enable the distribution of many of their statistical reports to all types of data consumers.

It was great to see that both the awareness and the usage of RSS has already increased in the south east in the last 5 months or so. I remember at an IT at Cork event back in November when Robert Scoble asked the audience whether they had used RSS in any way... very few hands were raised. However, last night the vast majority of the audience was using RSS in one way or another. Fergus Burns of Nooked finished up on the night by presenting just how easy it is to publish RSS. There really is no barrier to getting up and running with RSS on your site apart from the need to update the 'feed' on a regular basis.

In just three hours to go we'll be hosting the third of our TechNet tour events here in Cork (in the Silver Springs). We've already had this 'Best Practice event on Active Directory, Microsoft Operations Manager and IP Sec' in Dublin and Belfast it is very hands on (70%+ demo based ) and it went down a treat. So if you see this post in time you are still very welcome to join us here in Cork or in Galway tomorrow.

Microsoft Active Directory Event in Dublin (speakers John Craddock and Sally Storey)

colmt — Fri, 24 Mar 2006 13:17:00 GMT

I missed St. Patrick's day in Ireland again this year (5th year running now ... previously due to me living and working in London). I spent last Thursday and Friday with my TechNet colleagues from around Europe in Munich.

Though I may have missed the festivities I'm glad to say that I secured John Craddock and Sally Storey (you can read their bio's here) to present on Active Directory -Maximizing Performance and In-Depth Replication Troubleshooting- in Dublin on April 27th. This event will be a full-day complementary technical event and will give you the chance to hear from the experts first-hand. I've spoken to the event organisers and they ensure me that the material that will be presented has been developed as a result of real-world problem solving and will provide a detailed technical drilldown on the internals of the Active Directory.

Here's the content that is going to be covered on the day:

Introduction and Just a Database?
Identifying attribute types; System and Search Flags; Linked Attributes; Operational Attributes; Phantom and Proxy Objects; Directory Partitions; Object Re-animation.

Maximizing AD Performance with 64-Bit Windows
AD Domain Controller Workloads; Event Tracing for Windows; Optimizing Performance; Search Management; Identifying Pinch Points; 64-Bit Windows; Intel Itanium vs Intel Xeon processors.

Ins and Outs of Replication
Replication Model; NTDS Settings; Site Roles; Topology Generation; Connection Objects; Knowledge Consistency Checker.

Intrasite and Intersite Replication
Notification Delays and Timings; Normal, Urgent and Immediate Replication; Intersite Topology Generation; Intersite Links and Transports; Site Link Bridges; Bridgehead Servers.

Identifying Changes and Troubleshooting
High Watermark and Up-to-dateness Vectors; Replication Conflicts and Metadata; Detecting USN Rollback; System State and Authoritative Restores; Lingering Object Removal.

If you are interested in this event I'd advise you to register ASAP as the places are filling up fast.

Location

Microsoft's European Product Development Centre (EPDC2)
Auditorium
South County Business Park
Leopardstown Dublin 18
Ireland

To register click here: TechNet Event Registration

Microsoft Patch Released for WMF Zero Day Exploit

colmt — Fri, 06 Jan 2006 13:54:00 GMT

The security centre released a security update last night to help protect our customers from exploitations of a vulnerability in the Windows Meta File (WMF) area of code in Windows.

For all the details about and downloads relating to this vulnerability you can visit the Microsoft Security Bulletin MS06-001.

Also, if you want to take part in the webcast tonight (19:00 - 20:00 GMT) where most of the time will be devoted to giving people the opportunity to ask questions about the security bulletin to our security experts, you can register here.

Free Microsoft Webcasts for IT Pros

colmt — Wed, 04 Jan 2006 20:01:00 GMT

I'm just back from a very very relaxing break. So relaxing in fact that I was really 'jet lagged' coming back into the office yesterday morning. That is after getting used to the Christmas timezone (with me that was 1pm starts and 3am finishes) it was a killer to get up a 7:30! Though I must admit I really feel refreshed after a week of being completely switched off. Now all I have to do is stick to some of those new year resolutions.

To begin the new year I thought I'd let you know about some of the cracking webcasts for IT Pros coming up in January - they're all free of course. If you're an IT Professional and would like to broaden your understanding of IT Security, SQL, MOM, SMS and more check this out.

If there are any other topics that you would like to see covered in the future - let me know colm.torris@microsoft.com

Complete list of all IT Pro webcasts

Complete list of Security webcasts

Complete list of SQL webcasts

Complete list of MOM webcasts

Complete list of SMS webcasts

A Selection of Some Choice Security Webcasts

TechNet Webcast: Identity and Access Management (Part 1 of 2): Technical Overview (Level 200)

Thursday, January 05, 2006 - 17:00 AM - 18:00 PM GMT

Chris Avis, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation

This two-part series describes how you can use identity management solutions to create and manage user account information efficiently and securely across multiple systems in an enterprise. This first webcast shows how identity information may be shared and synchronized even when distributed across several different locations. We show how access management solutions can help you to ensure that user accounts are granted the appropriate access to resources across different systems in an enterprise network

TechNet Webcast: Identity and Access Management (Part 2 of 2): Details of Intranet and Extranet Access Management (Level 200)

Friday, January 06, 2006 - 17:00 PM - 18:00 PM GMT

Chris Avis, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation

This two-part series describes how you can use identity management solutions to create and manage user account information efficiently and securely across multiple systems in an enterprise. Having described the principles and concepts of access management in the first webcast, this second webcast explains in more detail how to apply these principles and methods specifically to your organization's intranet, and also how to apply them to an external network.

TechNet Webcast: How Microsoft Information Security Protects Critical Information Assets (Level 300)

Tuesday, January 10, 2006 - 17:00 PM - 18:00 PM GMT

Igor Volovich, Microsoft Information Security, Security Engineer, Microsoft Corporation

How does the Microsoft Information Technology (IT) team secure a computing environment that has more than 300,000 network devices in 96 countries? This webcast shows how Microsoft Information Security manages security risks by adhering to the following standards: fast, reliable, protected, and secure by design. Learn how we align the Information Security organization with the security life cycle, translating risk into a coherent plan composed of key strategies and tactics. Then take a deeper dive into enhanced auditing and monitoring. We discuss two hot topics, automated vulnerability scans and network-based intrusion detection systems (NIDS). Learn our approach to protecting critical information by monitoring for vulnerabilities, complying with policy, and using NIDS.

TechNet Webcast: Defense in Depth: Sybari Antigen Solutions for E-Mail Hygiene (Level 200)

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 17:00 PM - 18:00 PM GMT

Peter Eicher, Sr. Product Manager, Enterprise Access and Security Products, Microsoft Corporation

Now that 50% of all e-mail is spam and 85% of viruses use e-mail to propagate, comprehensive e-mail protection is critical for overall network integrity. This webcast presents defense-in-depth to strengthen e-mail—and thereby overall network—security. We describe the protection that Sybari Antigen Solutions offers from viruses, worms, and spam. We also discuss content protection technologies that you can combine to eliminate single points of failure and reduce the window of vulnerability for emerging threats. We also cover perimeter defense; layered elimination of unsolicited traffic; multi-engine, server-level threat detection, and incident containment. Learn how you can apply a defense-in-depth strategy to reduce infection rates and maximize performance in e-mail environments.

TechNet Webcast: Information About Microsoft January Security Bulletins (Level 200)

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 19:00 PM - 20:00 PM GMT

Christopher Budd, CISA, CISM, CISSP, ISSMP Security Program Manager, PSS Security, Microsoft Corporation

Stephen Toulouse, Security Program Manager, Microsoft Corporation

On January 10, 2005, Microsoft releases its monthly security bulletins. Join us for a brief overview of the technical details of the January security bulletins. The intent of this webcast is to address your concerns. Therefore, most of our time is devoted to giving you the opportunity to ask questions about the bulletins and get answers from our security experts.

TechNet Webcast: How Microsoft IT Implements Exchange 2003 Anti-Spam Technologies (Level 300)

Tuesday, January 17, 2006 - 17:00 PM - 18:00 PM GMT

Konstantin Ryvkin, Microsoft IT Group Manager, Microsoft Corporation

Alexander Nikolayev, Microsoft Program Manager, Microsoft Corporation

Wouldn’t we all like to improve how we manage spam? This webcast presents how Microsoft does just that, providing an overview of anti-spam technology in Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 with Service Pack 2 (SP2) and how the Microsoft Information Technology (IT) department uses these technologies to help control spam. The webcast also provides a complete overview of the anti-spam technologies available in SP2 and explains how the department implements them. Join us to learn best practices, tips, and other useful information for getting the most from the anti-spam technologies in SP2. We conclude with a question and answer session.

TechNet Webcast: Security Considerations When Upgrading to SQL Server 2005 (Level 200)

Wednesday, January 18, 2006 - 17:00 PM - 18:30 PM GMT

Girish Chander, Program Manager, Microsoft Corporation

Microsoft SQL Server 2005 offers improved capabilities to secure the database, but there are still other things to consider when upgrading. From a security perspective, this webcast prepares you to upgrade from a previous version of Microsoft SQL Server to Microsoft SQL Server 2005. This webcast covers configuration option changes, surface area controls, and feature enhancements. Take advantage of the new capabilities in SQL Server 2005 by learning about the other steps you can take to further secure your system after the upgrade.

TechNet Webcast: Best Practices for Security Update Management with Systems Management Server 2003 (Level 200)

Wednesday, January 25, 2006 - 19:00 PM - 20:30 PM GMT

John Baker, TechNet Presenter, Microsoft Corporation

Join this webcast to learn about the best practices you should consider when you develop an update management solution using Microsoft Systems Management Server 2003. Get detailed recommendations for all parts of a software update solution, including the setup stage and the software update cycle. We provide specific guidance on updating desktop, mobile, and server computers. We also discuss using the Dell inventory tool to update Dell servers.

TechNet Webcast: Enabling Secure Remote Access to Exchange Server 2003 (Level 200)

Tuesday, January 31, 2006 - 17:00 PM - 18:30 PM GMT

Tom Bartlett, ISA Solution Specialist, Microsoft Corporation

As operations become increasingly decentralized and working practices evolve to better suit market demographics, the need for efficient remote access has become increasingly prevalent. In this webcast, we outline best practices for securing Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 to ensure that network management, policy, and security are not compromised by remote e-mail access. The discussion covers a wide range of topics, such as faster Exchange publishing, more secure remote access, e-mail hygiene considerations, efficient bandwidth management, and enhanced Microsoft Outlook Web Access security. This webcast offers the knowledge you need to provide remote users with efficient, secure, and well-managed access to Exchange.