Alexander’s Blog

The power management settings in Windows Vista can be centrally managed via Group Policy. However, natively the power management settings (monitor power management, system standby, and hibernate) in Windows XP Professional and Windows 2000 cannot be centrally managed through Group Policies.

Energy Star offers a free tool to network administrators that you might want to check out. It’s called EZ GPO and doesn’t have any licensing fees. EZ GPO will allow you to centrally manage your Windows XP/2000 client workstations through Group Policy.

According to the Energy Star Web site, here’s how EZ GPO works.

• - Uses an automated installer
• - Contains one binary application that runs as a service and one that runs on login under each user’s account
• - Reads the desired power management settings that are set using GPOs in integer and string value format
• - Allows changes to power management settings using Microsoft’s core Application Programming Interface
• - Intelligently selects only capable computers when activating “system standby.” (Computers generally capable of using system standby reliably run Windows 2000 or XP with Pentium 4 chip sets capable of S3 standby mode.)

You can download EZ GPO here.

Also check out EZ GPO Installation Instructions and FAQs.

In case you are wondering about Energy Star. It is a joint program of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy. It’s purpose is to save money and protect the environment through energy efficient products and practices.

Jason Hiner, the Executive Editor of TechRepublic has written an interesting article Prediction: Microsoft will leapfrog Vista, release Windows 7 early, and change its OS business in which he states that “Microsoft will ultimately try to quell the embarrassing Windows Vista debacle by making a bold move with Windows 7 to win back customer loyalty and generate positive spin for its most important product.” He goes on to say that “My prognosis is that Microsoft will use smoke and mirrors to conjure up an early release of Windows 7, the next edition of the world’s most widely-used operating system. Then they will quietly and unofficially allow IT departments to migrate straight from Windows XP to Windows 7.”

Check out his prediction and the reasoning behind why in his opinion Microsoft will leapfrog Vista and change its OS business.

As you may know, Windows Server 2008 Server Core is a minimal operating system that uses relatively little disk space (1 GB) and can improve security because there are fewer files installed and it makes the management easier because there is less fluff added to the Server Core. Server Core cannot run server applications and there is no Graphical User Interface (GUI). Yes, you heard it right. No Windows in Windows Server 2008 Server Core. I want to know who came up with this brilliant idea to come up with an operating system that should be named “Windows” that won’t have any windows?

So how do you manage services in Server Core? Obviously, you use the command shell. Sometimes I wonder if we are going back to the old DOS days. Exchange Server 2007 is a major step backwards for administrators who expect to manage servers using GUI. Server Core also doesn’t has a GUI and you must learn and use the command shell. I have been telling my students for more than a decade, if you want to become a successful network administrator you need to know MS-DOS well. In other words, you need to know the command line interface well.

You know that sooner or later someone will come up with some GUI tools that should have been part of the Exchange Server 2007 or Server Core in the first place. Well, a fellow Directory Services MVP from Israel by the name Guy Teverovsky has written a GUI tool for the Server Core. Check out his blog for all the details.

Here are some of the features of the tool.

• Product Activation
• Configuration of display resolution
• Clock and time zone configuration
• Remote Desktop configuration
• Management of local user accounts (creation, deletion, group membership,
  passwords)
• Firewall configuration
• WinRM configuration
• IP configuration
• Computer name and domain/workgroup membership
• Installation of Server Core features/roles

The tool can be downloaded from Guy’s blog here.

Windows Server 2008 has been already released and Microsoft is encouraging IT professional to get certified in Windows Server 2008. If you are a Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator (MCSA) or a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE) on Windows Server 2003, you can transfer your skills to achieve multiple Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) certifications or Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP) credentials on Windows Server 2008.

If you have MCSA on Windows Server 2003 then you need to take exam 70-648 to earn:

1. MCTS: Windows Server 2008 Active Directory, Configuration

and

2. MCTS: Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure Configuration.

If you have MCSE on Windows Server 2003 then you need to take exam 70-649 to earn:

1. MCTS: Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Configuration

and

2. MCTS: Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure Configuration

and

3. MCTS: Windows Server 2008 Applications Infrastructure Configuration

Microsoft has posted all the details on their Web site. Check out the link Transition your MCSA and MCSE on Windows Server 2003 skills to Windows Server 2008.

Have you run into a situation where your users are getting an unexpected login prompt? If your Outlook 2007 users are configured to use NTLM authentication yet they are receiving a login prompt, which they shouldn’t, you need to modify Outlook Anywhere settings for the Autodiscover service. More specifically, you need to use the Exchange Management Shell and modify a server-side setting for Outlook Anywhere. This should be done on the server that is running the Client Access server role. For the Autodiscover service, you should set the value for the Server attribute for the EXPR OutlookProvider object to $null for the Outlook Anywhere configuration settings. Here’s how.

Make sure you have the proper permissions to modify the settings on the Exchange 2007 Server. For example logon as an account that has the Exchange Organization Administrator role. Start the Exchange Management Shell and run the following command:

Set-OutlookProvider EXPR -Server $null

In order for the changes to take effect, you should either restart Internet Information Services (IIS) or recycle MSExchangeAutodiscoverAppPool on the Exchange server that’s running the Client Access server role.

Restarting IIS is simple but if you decide to recycle MSExchangeAutodiscoverAppPool, you need to go to Application Pools container in the IIS console. Right-click MSExchangeAutodiscoverAppPool and select Recycle. You will not expect any messages confirming your action but the application pool will get recycled. If you have any doubts whether the recycling of the application pool took place then you can restart IIS instead, which will also accomplish the same thing.