PowerShell V2 - New Features!!

There's a bunch of new features in PowerShell V2 - although some will change and some of the things in the CTP may even  be dropped. That's the nature of CTPs! A good place to start is to read the release notes that describe the new features and show worked examples.

Here's my list of key new stuff in PowerShell V2:

• Remoting - PowerShell now includes support for executing cmdlets and scripts on remote systems using WinRM. COOL!!!!
• Background jobs - PowerShell V2 now has the concept of background jobs that you can spawn and monitor.
• Script Cmdlets to enable you to write rich cmdlets in PowerShell. In PowerShell V1, you could write functions that sort of felt like cmdlets. With V2, you can now write fully fledged cmdlets using just script which is very cool!!!
• Stepable pipelines - a neat feature to enable you to  control the execution of the pipeline.
• Data Language - provides for better separation of scripts and data. Useful for internationalisation scenarios
• Script debugging - there are improvements to debugging. Hooray
• New operators and new internal variables - some new operators and new system variables have been added
• New Cmdlets - the range of standard cmdlets has been expanded with 24 new cmdlets, including Out-GridView, Invoke-WMIMethod and Start-PSjob.
• Additional APIs - as ever, more APIs for devs to play with.
• A very early alpha release of a more GUI like PowerShell shell. A nice concept

This is a very nice set of improvement, and goes a long way towards making PowerShell the only choice for command line admin under Windows!

Along with the rest of the PowerShell bloggers, I'll be looking at these new features in upcoming blog articles. The next year or so (the lead up to the RTM) is going to be fun!!!

Sadly, there seems no improvement to the documentation of trap and throw. :-(

Technorati tags: Powershell, Powershell version 2, Microsoft

Windows PowerShell 2.0 CTP - Available for Download

The Version 2 CTP build of PowerShell is now available for download. See: Download details: Windows PowerShell 2.0 CTP for the downloads.

There are some release notes there too - these are good reading. And while I realise most folks will not want to RTFM, this time it's pretty useful. And there's a draft SDK. The documentation is really very good!

So get downloading!!!!

Technorati tags: PowerShell Version 2, PowerShell, PowerShell CTP

Windows PowerShell V2 CTP Shipping Soon

VERY COOL -- V2 PowerShell CTP is shipping to the web very shortly. There are some incredibly neat components of V2. Some are aimed at ISVs and more advanced users. There are also some darn useful other stuff that I really am enjoying too. I have it running here and it's very stable. I'll let Kenneth and the PowerShell team spill the details, but this is a very useful update. PowerShell V2 ROCKS!!

As an aside, this CTP represents the PowerShell team's efforts, a year after V1 was released. A lot of neat technology but some unfinished work too. Of course this is to be expected, but it means that this release comes with a warning clearly spelt out on the PowerShell team's blog: CTP != BETA !. I expect many things will change  between now and RTM (whenever that happens).

One interesting aspect of the CTP and PowerShell V2, it's a replacement for PowerShell V1, and not a side-by-side install. So far as I can tell, everything I can do in V1 (in terms of demos in classes, etc) works just with the CTP. Well so far!!   This also means that .ps1 files run with PowerShell Version 2. This could get confusing. Well it could have had the team not thought ahead. As Jeffrey Snover describes in a blog entry (Versioning), you can code around this. Just begin your scripts with a #Requires directive! For example:

#REQUIRES -Version 2
"In script that requires PowerShell Version 2"

If you run this on a system which does not have V2 yet (like most of you reading this now!) will get a message:

PSH [D:\foo]: .\v2.ps1
The script 'v2.ps1' cannot be run because it contained a "#requires" statement at line 1 for Windows PowerShell version
 2.0. This does not match the currently running PowerShell Version 1.0.
At line:1 char:9
+ .\v2.ps1 <<<<

Now that shows someone really thought ahead - a very nice touch. And I so much want to say a lot more about this release!

In closing, a CTP health warning as requested:

The PowerShell V2 CTP is not for everyone. You should read this PowerShell Team blog entry ( http://blogs.msdn.com/powershell/archive/2007/11/02/ctp-watch-this-space.aspx ) to find out what it is and what it isn't and then make an informed decision before installing the CTP. 

Technorati tags: PowerShell, PowerShell Version 2, #REQUIRES

WikipediaVision (beta)

 This is an interesting mashup - basically the WikipediaVision page displays a Google map of the world and shows where updates are coming from, in near real time. A fascinating view of how Wikipedia is being updated - you quickly realise just how much global updating is going on - totally fascinating.

Technorati tags: Google, Google Maps, Wikipedia

DNS Expert and Book Author Cricket Liu To Present Designing a resilient DNS/DHCP Network

 Now this is cool - one of  my all time net-god heroes, Cricket Liu, is in town (London) to present a seminar entitled Designing a resilient DNS/DHCP Network. A chance to hear Cricket speak - you bet I'll be there.

Technorati tags: Cricket Liu, DNS, DNS God, DNS NET GOD

Learning Plans for OCS 2007

Over in my corporate blog, I jotted down some links to information that helps you learn more about OCS 2007. Take a look at my Learning Plan for OCS 2007 - and please provide comments.

 

Technorati tags: OCS 2007, OCS Training, Global Knowledge

OCS 2007 Inter-Operating with Nortel CS 1000

In researching the OCS Learning Plan I  found a neat web cast you can download from Microsoft web site.  The main starting page for this  webcast is on the MS TechNet site. This page requires you to log in with a MS Passport, which takes you to the live meting site from where you can pick up the webcast. A little long winded process wise, but a good webcast!  In addition to the 8mb WMV file, you can also download just the PowerPoint slides (14.2MB ), or just an mp3 podcast.

This is, for me most useful as it shows how to do this interop and explains many aspects of the Nortel products, including more details on the ICA solution. I am looking forward to working more with the Nortel and the ICA tools in some upcoming work.

Technorati tags: OCS, Nortel, web-cast

PowerShell Remoting through Group Policy

Special Operations software has just announced SpecOps Command: PowerShell Remoting through Group Policy. I was lucky enough to see a neat demo last week while in Stockholm - this is a neat tool. As I understand it, it'll be formally released at TechEd in Barcelona.

 Basically, SpecOps uses group policy to send out scripts, cmdlets and (I assume providers) to client systems. These scripts are then run on the target machine (one, daily, weekly, etc) and the results returned back to a central server. A very very neat solution to the lack of remoting in PowerShell V1. And even when we get V2 (a preview edition of V2 will be available in Barcelona), GP may be a better option due to permissions on the local systems.

I can't wait to get my hands on this code! Yet another aspect of the power of the PowerShell community - when there are gaps, someone or some organisation will just fill them. PowerShell rocks - and so does SpecOps Command.

Technorati tags: PowerShell, Special Operations Software, Specops Command

Communicator 2007 Hotfix Package

 Microsoft has released a hot fix for Office Communicator 2007.

As noted in the KB article (Description of the Communicator 2007 hotfix package: October 5, 2007), this hot fix package includes at least 15 separate bug fixes.

This is probably a must-add hot fix for OCS 2007 users.

Technorati tags: OCS, Office Communicaor 2007

PowerShell Training In Europe

As noted in over in my work blog, I'm starting to teach PowerShell in Europe. My first classes are this week in Stockholm and in Copenhagen. I'm delivering the two day PowerShell Fundamentals class in both cities. To say the least, I'm really excited to finally being able to run real PowerShell training for our customers.

In the background, Microsoft has engaged a vendor to create a formal MOC class on PowerShell, but we'll not see this till next June. In the mean time, if you want PowerShell training in Europe, feel free to contact me and I'll put you in touch with the local office. And wherever possible, I'm happy to come to teach these classes.

Technorati tags: PowerShell, PowerShell training, Global Knowledge

Office Communications Server 2007 Document: Technical Reference

 Microsoft has at last published the detailed technical reference to OCS 2007. This is a must read for all OCS fans!

Download details: Office Communications Server 2007 Document: Technical Reference

Technorati tags: OCS 2007, OCS Technical Reference

Vista Adoption Numbers

 One of the big questions many commentators are posing is just how much deployment is happening with Vista. Forget the MS statements around adoption - what is really happening. From where I sit, adoption is not as rosy as MS would want us to belive - and like many I'm no longer using Vista on front line systems as I've gone back to XP.  Over on the Hackers blog, Alex reports Random: Some Vista adoption numbers. These show that Vista is in use by only 10% of their web site users, and less than1% of the users of CounterSpy. These numbers feel a little bit lower than the MS VIsta Hype Machine would lead us to believe.

What is your take on adoption - what are you seeing??

Technorati tags: Vista, Vista Adoption, Microsoft

Updated Live Writer

Microsoft's Windows Live Writer blogging tool has now reached Beta 3 stage. As a free blogging too, I find it excellent - and now even better. The latest release, which you can download from Microsoft's webs site.

There are many improvements in Beta 3. These include:

• Publish XHTML-style markup

• Use Writer in 28 additional languages

• Print your posts

• Justify-align a post's text

• Better image handling (in particular fewer blurry images)

• Resolved installation issues from the last release

• Plus Many other bug fixes and enhancements

 

Get it now!

[LATER]

Unfortunately, as one reader has pointed out in a comment to this blog entry, it appears that the latest beta of Live Writer does not work on x64 systems which is a pretty significant omission. Thanks to Chris Randall for pointing this out - I missed it since I am still mainly using i386 systems.

 

Technorati tags: Live Writer, Not supported on x64

First-Gen Zune Getting All The New Features: This is How You Treat Your Customers

Gizmodo is reporting that First-Gen Zunes Are To Get All The New Zune 2 features (for free!!). The post goes on to suggest that "This is How You Treat Your Customers". I agree completely!! Having ordered the Zune two days before the announcement, it was a shock to find that whilst in transit, my purchase was not outdated. It was a delight to find the extra features will be available for free download. In effect, I've got a somewhat smaller and marginally thicker box, but for what I use it for (short-ish commutes up to town and flights inside EMEA) my 30gb model is fine.

So thanks Microsoft - this is really the way to treat your customers. The folks over in the Vista group (and MSL) could learn a thing or two from this very nice move.

Technorati tags: Zune, Microsoft, MSL

PowerGUI - A updated version is available

Those nice folks at Quest have released a new version of PowerGui - this is a free download you get  here: http://powergui.org/filedownload.jspa?attachmentID=915&filePath=/shares/powergui/sbin/downloads/PowerGUI.1.0.11.207.msi.

NB: if you have an earlier version of PowerGui, this must be removed before installing the new version.

This is a neat tool!!

Technorati tags: PowerShell, PowerGui, Quest

I Got A ZUNE!

As an Microsoft MVP, those nice folks in Redmond provide a small balance at the company store that I can spend on software, books, apparel, etc.  At least they so every year I am re-awarded. This is a very nice benefit.

Last Sunday, I realised that, as MVP renewal was on October 1 (I did get renewed !, my company store balance would be wiped out. So I logged on to see what I could spend my balance on. Frankly nothing jumped out - but on the home page, there was an advert for a Zune. As it happened, I had just enough to buy buy it, so I hit the appropriate keys and yesterday the nice FedEx man delivered it. My wife is furious - but I played with it till 3:00 in the morning. 

First impressions: I like it! Now I've not had an real iPod so maybe there are things I'm missing, but I've found the Zune pretty easy to use. The quality and volume are all well, although the build quality of the headphone jack leaves a bit to be desired (If you push too far, the headphones go mono).

The Zune host software is easy enough to use. I've managed to download several live concerts (Jerry Garcia, The Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd and Keith Jarrett). I'm listening to a great GD 69 show as I write this posting.

One thing that freaked me out was reading about the new Zune - it was announced after I'd ordered, but before I'd even got it! But as it happens, most of the features of the new box are to be made available as a firmware upgrade for existing Zunes (although I have to suffer the 30gb hard disk). But the firmware upgrades are meant to be free - I have one upgrade already that adds wireless etc.

One thing I was surprised at - by default, plugging a Zune into your PC does not automagically show the Zune hard disk on the host. As a 30GB USB hard drive that I will carry around with me, this feature is pretty desirable. Turns out there's a simple fix - a few registry hacks as described on the ZuneMods.Net site. 

However, the instructions for this mod are marginally wrong (and will be wrong for some people). The instructions suggest you modify registry values below HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\ControlSet001\Enum\USB\. Since NT boxes can have several controls ets editing a specific one is incorrect. To ensure it works, use the key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Enum\USB\ instead. Otherwise this mod works great and I've got it working on my system now! More importantly - this does NOTHING to the Zune, so it's not likely to suddenly brick the device. 

All in all, I like my Zune!

Technorati tags: Microsoft, MVP, Zune

Download details: Office Communications Server 2007 Software Update Service

 One neat aspect of the new Microsoft OCS related handset (the Tanjay phone) is that it can get updates via WUS. This download: Office Communications Server 2007 Software Update Service helps to provide the updates.

Technorati tags: Microsoft, OCS, Tanjay

Prometric: Testing and Assessment Blog

As many of you will know, Microsoft has gone single-vendor for its certification testing. MSL kept this a secret until they announced over the summer that Prometric had won the single vendor contract. Sadly, for most of people I know, VUE lost out big time. Over the years, VUE customer service was consistently better, VUE testing sites consistently better, and the VUE web site better. Overall, almost every person I know preferred VUE to Prometric - at least in my experience of 14 years of MCP testing. But that did not seem to matter. All that seemed to matter was that Prometric made a good proposal (which is also secret so).  And in a pretty cynical bit of communication, the change was announced just as everyone was headed away for a US bank holiday.

Naturally, when this change was announced there was a great outcry - which MSL seemed to be somewhat surprised about, but they promised to listen and to fix the problems.  Chris Pirie, in a recent blog entry, claims MSL really is listening. Sadly, it appears that  nothing is actually being achieved and the promises appear somewhat empty.

In early July, I had the chance to put some of my concerns to key Prometric management. I was promised big changes and in response to that I was happy to wait and see. Well, 2 months later and from everything I hear, there are still problems. MSL is doing its best to keep these quiet by insisting that any feedback come via mail - they are not addressing the issues in any public forum that I can see.

One important update that I found quite amusing - Prometric has now put up a marketing "blog": Testing and Assessment which trumpets their successes in testing and certification. The amusing bit for me is that the "blog" does not allow user comments. While this may be safer for Prometric, it means the authentic voice of the customer continues to be not heard. I deeply distrust any site that claims to be a blog but provides no way of enabling legitimate reader feedback.

I am not excited. :-(

Technorati tags: Microsoft Certification, Prometric, Vue, VUE Rocked!!

Office Communication Server 2007 Videos

 Microsoft has published two downloadable videos promoting OCS 2007. Known as the Evil Presence videos, the first shows how an organisation can use OCS, while the second looks at the roundtable.

To get the downloads, see:  Unified Communications - Office Communication Server 2007 Videos

Technorati tags: OCS, Evil Presence, Office Communications Server 2007, Microsoft

OCS 2007 TechNet Forums Are Back!

The TechNet web forums are back up. Microsoft changed the URL to address the forums to reflect that the product had achieved RTM (i.e. dropping the "beta" from the URL). It looks like this happened without changing other links to the forum. Anyway, they're back up!

The content on the OCS forums still says "beta", but the RTM is definitely on-topic. I hope that the eye-candy will be updated soon to reflect RTM. It would be nice if this content was also shared with an NNTP feed.

For OCS users wanting NNTP support, there is one newsgroup (microsoft.public.office.communicator) on MS's NNTP Server news:msnews.microsoft.com. Hopefully a richer set of newsgroups will be forthcoming. I'm sure trying!

Technorati tags: OCS 2007, TechNet, OCS TechNet Forum, OCS NNTP Support, TechNet Forum NNTP

OCS TechNet Forum Down

The TechNet OCS 2007 Beta on-line forum at: http://forums.microsoft.com/Ocs2007publicbeta/default.aspx?SiteID=57 is down. It's been down since Friday morning. The outage has been reported, but not yet fixed.

These forums were about the OCS 2007 beta product (and are, or at least were, still missing any links to NNTP). Now that OCS has hit RTM, there is a need for both forums and newsgroups that support the final RTM, product. These are coming, I'm told by folks at Microsoft, hopefully with full gating between on-line forum(s) and NNTP newsgroups.

When I get more information, or if the site suddenly comes back, I'll post more more information.

[Later - 17:45 Saturday Aug 25 - Evening]

I've seen Tata Moraes comment - sadly I have no idea when this forum will be back up. Plus it's a bank holiday weekend at least here, so everyone's away. You could try posting in the microsoft.public.office.communicator newsgroup, although strictly speaking OCS posts are probably off topic there.

[Still Later - 19:00 Monday Aug 7 - 1900]

The outage continues. This appears to be an error in the change over to RTM support and the forums should be back soon. There will be RTM forums, but don't know yet about newsgroup support.

Technorati tags: OCS Forums, OCS, TechNet, Microsoft

Going To Have To Pay For Vista SP1?

A rumour, to be sure, but are Vista users going To Have To Pay For Vista SP1?. Now this may just be a "pay P&P to get the DVD" deal in which case that's perfectly reasonable. But if MS plans to chare more than simple costs involved in shipping then I'd expect a pretty huge backlash. I'm about to buy a new Dell box for my wife, and this would make a difference to my choice of OS (fortunately Dell still provides XP which is perfectly fine for the intended use).

Technorati tags: vista, Vista SP1, Microsoft

Interview with Mike Neil on Microsoft Virtulisation

 VMblog.com has an interesting interview with Mike Neil, Microsoft's general manager for virtulisation. In the interview Neil assesses the competition, licensing and security of virtulisation. There are some interesting questions, but some of Neil's answers sadly descend in to PR-speak. He disagrees with the suggestion that Microsoft is way behind VMware claiming that virtulisation is still a developing market. He also says that the dropping of Live Migration from the Viridian platform not a big deal since it was 'just a sexy feature [that] sounds really exciting" and goes on to suggest that it's not being used much in the VMware product.  

One nice part of the interview, Neil claims that Microsoft are still developing Virtual PC and Virtual Server and that the respective teams have even grown. No indication of when better products will be available is given however. I use VPC in the classroom heavily and would love a better product - there's just too much flakieness involved with VPC. Plus VPC can't make use of multi-core systems the way VMware does. 64-bit support would also be very useful.

The final bit of bad or good news (depending on your point of view), Neil re-confirms that the hypervisor is still a year away. He cites February 2008 as the Longhorn Ship date, with the hypervisor is due to ship 6 months after that. He gives no dates on beta programs. I suspect that by the Longhorn "ship date" he means the launch date (I hope he's not implying a further slip of RTM!!). I'm hoping to see early versions coming in the next few months.

Technorati tags: Viridian, Microsoft, Hypervisor, VMware, Virtual PC, Martin Neil

Office Communications Server 2007 Resource Kit Tools

 Microsoft has posted the updated  Office Communications Server 2007 Resource Kit Tools for free download. One cool tool is Snooper.exe which can help you parse SIP and C3P protocol logs, including those generated by OCSLogger.exe.

These tools are a must have if you are using OCS!!

Technorati tags: Office Communications Server, OCS Resource Kit

404 Error Pages

Smashing  Magazine asked their readers to design 404 pages, the page a web server returns when for whatever reason the page you asked for does not exist.  The results, 404 Error Pages: Reloaded show some fantastic out of the box thinking - and are a lot more interesting than some that I can mention! My favorite is the Blue Screen of Death on the Web.

Technorati tags: 404, Smashing Magazine, fun

Quest's AD cmdlets 1.0.4 are Released

Those very nice people at Quest have released an updated version of the free AD PowerShell Cmdlets. You can read about the updates contained in the  AD cmdlets 1.0.4 release in Dmitry Sotnikov's Blog. If you use Active Directory and PowerShell, these free cmdlets are must-haves! There's also a pretty good bit of documentation (PDF).

To download the updates, go to the Quest web site (you have to register to get access at present). And did I mention that these are free?

These cmdlets really rock - thanks Quest!!

Technorati tags: Quest, AD Cmdlets, PowerShell

Windows Server 2008 Beta 3 VM Free Download

Microsoft has released a pre-configured Server 2008 B3 Virtual Machine.  You can download it from the MS web site. It's BIG - 2.8GB, and comes as five separate RAR files that you combine to create the virtual machine.

The documentation claims you have to use Virtual Server (which is also a free download). I've not tested it to see whether this is correct and if you can actually use Virtual PC.

Technorati tags: Virtual Server, Windows Server 2008, VM

Some Nice Vista (and XP) Wallpapers

 I just found this page - it contains some nice Vista Wallpaper. Of course you can use them for XP or Server too!

Technorati tags: wallpaper, vista, XP

PowerShell-users Mailing List

Marco Shaw has setup up a PowerShell-users mailing list. If you are a hard core PowerShell junkie, you might take a look.

This is a great idea, but it may duplicate (at least to some degree) the contents of the existing NNTP newsgroup microsoft.public.windows.powershell. You can access this newsgroup via NNTP at msnews.microsoft.com (or via Google and HTTP).

Technorati tags: PowerShell, Windows PowerShell, Marco Shaw

PowerShell on Windows 2000 - Forget it

 Nearly 2 years ago, I wrote a blog article entitled  Monad on Windows 2000. The article suggested that while you might be able to get Monad (as it was then known) to run on Windows 2000, it was probably a pointless exercise.

I notice from my logs that this earlier article is getting hits, so I thought I'd update the advice a bit. When I say "a bit" about the only bit is that it's PowerShell I'm talking about and not the beta (known back then as Monad).  As I reported back in 2005, while you might be able to sort of install PowerShell under Windows 2000, the installation would rely on manual effort and probably wouldn't work anyway.

Of course, you can use PowerShell from your XP/Vista box to reach out and touch Windows 2000 servers across  your network (e.g. using WMI). But as for running PowerShell on a Windows 2000 system - forget it!!

Technorati tags: Windows PowerShell, Windows 2000, PowerShell on Windows 2000

Vista Patches - Mini SP1??

As has been widely reported, Microsoft has released two important patches for Vista that improve the compatibility, performance and reliability of Windows Vista. Given the scope of these updates, you could argue this is a Mini-SP1, although that's not how Microsoft is positioning the updates. I've downloaded these patches and my Vista system seems to be working OK.

The first update is described in KB938194 and is intended to improve compatibility and contains fixes for 13 identified issues. This patch can be downloaded for both i386 and x64  platforms. The download is  just over 2mb (or 3mb for X64).

The second update is described in KB 938979 and is intended to improve performance an reliability. This patch contains fixes for 10 identified issues. Like the first patch, you can get i386 and X64 patches from Microsoft.

 These updates look useful in improving Vista's performance, compatibility and reliability.

Technorati tags: Microsoft, Vista, Vista patches

A Nice Unified Communications Blog

I just found a useful new blog: Unified Communications blog. Based in Netherlands, with some links that are Dutch orientated, but it looks good (and it's in English!).

Looks a great reference! I'm linking to it on my corporate blog too!

Technorati tags: UC, Unified Communications, Office Communications Server, blog

Hey Silicon Valley - Please Fix Your Emails

I subscribe to a number of newsletters - I find  these very useful in both keeping up to date with events in our hi-tech world, and also to learn more about various news subjects. Once daily newsletter I particularly like is First Edition, published by The Mercury News. You can read this online from the Silicon Valley web site, or via email (see the signup page to subscribe).

I love these newsletters. However recently, someone's changed their format and I find them now much harder to read. Here's what today's edition looks like in my mail client:

If you are having difficulties viewing this newsletter, please click
here.         
http://www.bayareanewsgroup.com/sites/sv/images/email/sv-header-image.gif
=0)document.write(unescape('%3C')+'\!-'+'-') //-->
http://mngisv.112.2O7.net/b/ss/mngisv/1/H.1--NS/0
http://www.siliconvalley.com/'http://extras.mnginteractive.com/live/std/clear.gif'
function refreshArticleList(theForm) { theForm.submit(); }
Updated: August 08, 2007
http://www.siliconvalley.com/mngi/tracking/track?s=573&c=5800877&t=VIEWED&n=1
del.icio.usdel.icio.usDiggDiggRedditRedditYahooMyWebYahooMyWebGoogle
GoogleThese icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can
share and discover new web pages.What's this? 
First Edition: August 8, 2007
From SiliconValley.com
Article Launched: 08/08/2007 08:20:00 AM PDT

     var requestedWidth = 0;    
    if(requestedWidth > 0){         
document.getElementById('articleViewerGroup').style.width =
requestedWidth + "px";     
document.getElementById('articleViewerGroup').style.margin = "0px 0px
10px 10px";     }   

In a stunning victory for government prosecutors, Gregory Reyes, the ...

I have tried mailing the publishers (can you find an easy way to reply?) but to no avail. I hope that, by posting this, SV might get the message and fix their mails.

Technorati tags: Silicon Valley, Mercury News, broken email lists

Office Communicator Blog opens for business

Now that  Office Communications Server 2007 has been released to manufacturing, it's time to ramp up the excitement around the product.  Microsoft has opened a new blog whose focus is Microsoft Office Communicator, the key OCS 2007 client. The content on the Microsoft  Office Communicator blog.

Technorati tags: Office Communications Server, Microsoft Office Communicator, blog, Microsoft

OneNote PowerShell Provider

 Not sure who Brian actually is, but his post on OneNote PowerShell Provider is pretty cool.  It documents another PowerShell Provider for One-Note. It allows you to see the contents of your OneNote Notebooks from PowerShell. Brian has created this cool provider which freely available under the Microsoft Community License.

The installation file is here: OneNotePowershell.msi, while the source files are here: OnPsProvider-1158.zip. When  you install the provider,several sample scripts are also installed. And for the documentation that comes with the provider and the scripts, which comes in OneNote format, see here: OneNote PowerShell Documentation.

One small note  - while the installation MSI installs this provider, you have to do some work in order to get it all installed into PowerShell. Read the documentation!

Technorati tags: PowerShell, OneNote, PowerShell Provider

SAPIEN Technologies and Global Knowledge Bring Windows PowerShell Training to European Market

I've reported this on my corporate blog, but for those who don't read it,  I  can confirm the story here: SAPIEN Technologies and Global Knowledge Bring Windows PowerShell Training to European Market. 

W\e plan to deploy PowerShell training across our EMEA subsidiaries starting in September.  The first class will be held on September 4-5 in Holland and will be run by superstar Don Jones of Sapien. We'll then be rolling out the training to our other offices around EMEA as fast as we can! Assuming that I can, I'm planning on being at the September event - I hope to see you there!

PowerShell Rocks!! And I'm really excited!!

Technorati tags: PowerShell, Global Knowledge, Don Jones, Sapien

Office Communications Server 2007 Trial Download Now Available

Wow - that was fast. Microsoft has now posted the trial versions of OCS for download. The download, which you can get at Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 Trial Download, is 374MB. You actually download an MSI then then "installs" both the Standard Edition and Enterprise Edition binaries on your system. You can run setup from there to actually install OCS.

Of course, if you are using OCS 2007, you probably also want the updated version of Communicator. The evaluation edition of Microsoft Office Communicator is also available for download here

Technorati tags: Office Communications Server 2007

. 

OCS 2007 Reaches RTM!

The long  wait for OCS 2007 is now (nearly) over. During last week, while teaching OCS to British Telecom, I saw that RTM had been achieved at last. Customers on the TAP program can now download the evaluation version of OCS (and Microsoft  Office Communicator), and the general customer base should be able to get their hands on the full version by the end of August. The formal launch is scheduled for October.

Microsoft is also working on three official training courses: 5177 (a one-day class covering IM and presence), 5178 (2 days on conferencing) and 5179 (2 days on OCS and Voice). These are meant to be available by launch (although I'm not betting on this!). As the MCT reviewer for these three courses, I'm excited about the content and scope - the courses have the potential to be very good.

You can visit the Microsoft Unified Communications web site (http://www.microsoft.com/uc).  For more details on the product and it's features, see the TechNet OCS  library Sub-Site (although the landing page does not display well using FireFox). If you are not up to speed with OCS, then a good starting point is the Technical Overview.

Technorati tags: OCS 2007, FireFox, TechNet

The architecture VMware ESX, XEN and MS Viridian Compared

 I just read a nice blog article describing the architectures of VMware  ESX, XEN and the soon to come Windows Hypervisor. The article, entitled  A brief architecture overview of VMware ESX, XEN and MS Viridian provides a good look at the differences between these three products.

Technorati tags: Virtulisation, XEN, VMware ESD, Virdian

Free PowerShell E-Book

Frank Koch of Microsoft Switzerland  has written a small book on PowerShell which you can download for free. The download is a zip of a 44-page PDF file. There are some demo files you can also download. This is a great intro to PowerShell complete with samples.

Sweet!

 

Technorati tags: PowerShell, Frank Kich, Microsoft Switzerland, free, book

Behind the Technology

Several years ago, at PDC 2003, I wrote a blog entry discussing Bill Gate's Keynote speech. In that post, I described a funny video that was shown, entitled Behind The Technology. It was quite amusing and I noted in the blog post that it would nice to have this video.

Last night, I got a comment on that blog post (which I've published) saying that the video was up on YouTube at http://youtube.com/watch?v=N1PMiFiSqU0. The video is video camera recording of the event, complete with local noise and a shaky, at times, hand on the cam.  No idea as to the legality of this, or how long it'll stay up. But it is still funny.

 

Technorati tags: Microsoft, Behind the Technology, geek humour

WMI Win32_Volume Class using PowerShell

I've been playing around this weekend with PowerShell and the Win32_Volume WMI class and have written some PowerShell scripts to exploit this class.

To get the volumes on a system is trivial:

$volumes = Get-WMIObject Win32_Volume

This returns an array of volume objects which you can iterate through and display. To display the whole collection, or to just see the first volume, you could do this:

$volumes
$volumes[0]

See here for a simple script that obtain the volumes on a system and then displays their information. Then look at this script to run a chkdsk on the system.

You can also use a method to determine how badly fragmented a volume is, and another to run a defrag pass on a volume. Look here for a script to display a defrag analysis of the C:\ and here to actually defrag the disk.

 

[Later Update]

The Win32_Volume WMI class is not available on all versions of Windows - I ran the scripts on a Longhorn B3 server.

 

Technorati tags: PowerShell, WMI, Win32_Volume

Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1 Has Shipped

According to a MS source, SP1 for VS 2005 R2 has now shipped. It's meant to be available on the Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 page, but it's not up yet. It should be there by the end of the day.

Technorati tags: Virtual Server, VS 2005 R2 SP1

NIST Security Controls Guide Published

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has published a 387-page Guide for Assessing the Security Controls in Federal Information Systems, which you can freely download as a PDF document. Technically this document is a draft (the third draft), but even so, it contains good information on the fundamentals of security controls and details on the process you undergo to develop and implement controls. This is a useful read for anyone in the IT Security business.

Technorati tags: NIST, Security, Security Controls

Office Communications Server Forums

Microsoft has setup a series of Office Communications Server 2007 Beta Forums. The forums are part of the TechNet forums and cover the entire OCS 2007 product. If you have questions about OCS, this is a place to ask them.

[LATER] The OCS forums have moved - see my later blog post at: http://tfl09.blogspot.com/2007/08/ocs-2007-technet-forums-are-back.html

Technorati tags: Office Communications Server, OCS 2007, TechNet, Microsoft

IIS7 Added to Longhorn Server Core

MS has announced that IIS7 Added to Server Core.  This sounded fantastic, at first, till I read the fine print. While IIS will be supported, there is no .NET support still, thus no PowerShell support. :-(

Live Writer Beta 2 Ships

Microsoft has just released an updated beta, dubbed Beta 2, of it's Live Writer blogging tool. I use Live Writer pretty much exclusively for this blog. The biggest feature, for me at least, is in the inline spell checking.

Get the beta and learn more over at the Writer Zone

 

Technorati tags: Windows Live Writer

PowerShell Dissassebler for the .NET Reflector

.NET fans will know all about the .NET Reflector. A great tool to understand more about .NET "under the covers".  A neat feature of the Reflector is the plug-in library - with a huge number of plug-ins available.

And I've just noticed a plug-in that dis-assembles MSIL into a PowerShell Script. Cool!!!

 

Technorati tags: powershell, .NET Reflector

Getting Microsoft Hotfixes via the Web

For many IT Pros supporting Windows systems, getting hotfixes from MS's Product Support Services (PSS) seems to be a black art. In theory, all you have to do is to call in to Microsoft, tell them the KB and you'll get an email with a URL to the patch and the password for  the zipped hotfix file. This should be easy - and judging from my last attempt it works as advertised.  However, I've heard a lot of tales from IT Pros (in newsgroups, etc) that suggest they've had a different and less pleasant experience.

Well - MS has done something cool and has put up the Hotfix Request Web Submission Form where you can ask for hot fixes. I'm told this is still in beta and does not yet handle all hot fixes, but it's worth a try.

Technorati tags: Microsoft, hot fix, PSS

How Windows Server 2008 Got It's Name

No doubt, most IT Pros are wondering how Microsoft managed to come up with the clever and innovative formal name for the server product previously known as Longhorn. It take some skill to turn a great sounding code name into such a boring and underwhelming product name. We've seen XP and Vista, but nothing so fresh and infesting in the server space. If you were wondering, well now the truth can be revealed. See the video at http://www.microsoft.com/winme/0705/30054/Windows_Server_Naming_HD_MBR.asx for all the details.

Of course, no matter WHAT it's called, or how they came up with the name, Longhorn rocks!!!

 

Technorati tags: Longhorn, Windows Server 2008, Microsoft naming

OCS 2007 Ignite -It Rocks

Last week, I was in Munich delivering the OCS Ignite workshop for a very interesting group of partners and MS employees from eastern Europe. It was a great couple of days - some great hands on lab exercises, good documentation and (thanks Microsoft!!) great hospitality. The Ignite workshops are being deployed around the works by Microsoft, assisted by Global Knowledge (i.e.me) in EMEA. 

We also discovered some very interesting issues with VMs - we hit what appears to be the bug described in KB Article 875485. I say "appears" - I now have the hot fix noted in this article but have not yet been able to test it. What is intriguing is that the problem did not exist on all machines - only 5 of the 14 were hit (copying updated VMs to these machines cured 4). This is not the first time I've seen Exchange based Virtual Machines have curious VPC/VS related issues - the Exchange UM training sometimes suffers from VM issues too.

For MCTs, this is great training to go on - and I hope to be able to run some Town Hall events later in the summer. Watch this space (or this one).

 

Technorati tags: OCS, Office Communications Server, Exchange 2007, VM, VPC, Virtual Server, Global Knowledge

Dell to Create Formal Channel Program (again)

According to the Dell to Create Formal Channel Program story reported on EWeek's Channel Insider site, Dell is about to launch a new channel partner programme. I say new - many years ago (late 1980s/early 1990s), I was one of a small number of Dell VARs here in the UK. We made a small profit in the days when PCs cost £2k or more, although we were hardly in the big leagues! It was heady times as we replaced earlier stand-alone word processing systems with networked PCs, first using Novell NetWare then using Windows NT.

Dell were great to the VARs in those days. As an example, I got a call one day from a customer whose office ceiling had collapsed reducing their main PC to debris. They desperately needed a new box, so I phoned my account rep. He organised for me to pick up a machine that afternoon from Dell's tiny factory in Bracknell. Effectively, he'd found a  system at the end of the production line that matched the spec I needed. He let me have it and had another system built to go to the person who originally ordered it. My account manager even met me at the door and helped me to load the boxes into my car. What great service - less than a day after the accident, my client was back up and running.

The phone support in those days was outstanding too. Today, sadly, much of it has been outsourced to India with a corresponding (and significant) reduction in quality. I blogged about one less than stunning episode  here. This is NOT an isolated incident sadly.

Then things began to change, and not for the better, in terms of the VAR channel. I had the opportunity to bid for a very nice PC supply contract for a firm in Yorkshire.  I checked with my then account manager to see if, for 100 systems or more, I could get a better discount. He never phoned back. A few days later I discovered a Dell employee had called on my customer offering them a discount greater than the one they were offering me! I complained and effectively got a shrugged shoulder response and that was it.  The end came when I went to order a machine and was told I was no longer a VAR. Dell had apparently eliminated the VAR channel and there'd be a letter (which I don't recall ever getting). I continue to provide machine installation  service, but had my customers order their machines direct.

Of course, this was all a very long time ago and I have no doubt that things have changed. I continue to be a Dell customer despite the untimely end to my VAR status and the continuing poor support from India.  Nevertheless, I doubt I could ever trust the firm enough to want to  become a VAR again. New channel/VAR partners need, as always, to be careful when entering in to any reseller agreements. Larger manufacturers don't always play nice.

 

Technorati tags: Dell, Dell reseller

SecureZIP - Free Download

Those nice people at PKware have a very nice freebie - a fully licensed copy of SecureZIP for you to download. This is a full version and at least at present is free. Go to the  http://www.securezip.com site, enter an email address and they send you a link to the download.

Enjoy!

 

Technorati tags: PKware, SecureZip, Free software

TechEd EMEA 2007

TechEd is Microsoft's annual technical educations show run in multiple countries around the world each year. I'm one of the very few folks that has attended, thus far, fernery European TechEd.  I've been to  Bournmouth, Hamburg, Nice, Amsterdam and Barcelona (although Microsoft did not recognise this fact and omitted me from the list last year!).

The EMEA TechEd 2007 site is now up with some initial details of what to expect. One of the big changes is that the event is now 5 days (with no Pre-Conference day).

I'm looking forward to the, particularly the Unified  Communications track!

 

Technorati tags: Microsoft, TechEd, Unified Communications

Getting the "default" registry value entry with PowerShell

Want to get to the 'default' registry value using Powershell?. If so, set-itemproperty -path 'your path' -name '(Default)' -value 'your value'  should do the trick as shown here:

PS C:\> cd KHCU:
PS HKCU:\> mkdir test

Hive: Microsoft.PowerShell.Core\Registry::HKEY_CURRENT_USER

SKC VC Name Property
--- -- ---- --------
0 0 test {}

PS HKCU:\> get-itemproperty test  # not no output - entry does not exist
PS HKCU:\> set-itemproperty -path test -name '(Default)' -value 'some value'
PS HKCU:\> get-itemproperty test
PSPath : Microsoft.PowerShell.Core\Registry::HKEY_CURRENT_USER\test
PSParentPath : Microsoft.PowerShell.Core\Registry::HKEY_CURRENT_USER
PSChildName : test
PSDrive : HKCU
PSProvider : Microsoft.PowerShell.Core\Registry (default) : some value

 

 

Technorati tags: Powershell, Registry, Windows PowerShell

Using PowerShell to Examine Vista's Firewall

Using PowerShell, you can use the firewall COM object to obtain details of the Windows Firewall.

Here's how to get the object and the Firewall profile:

PSH [D:\foo]: # create com object
PSH [D:\foo]: $profile = (new-object -com HNetCfg.FwMgr).LocalPolicy.CurrentProfile

Once you get this object created, you can examine it and determine your firewall setup as follows:

PSH [D:\foo]: # determine global open ports (NB there aren't any!)
PSH [D:\foo]: $profile.GloballyOpenPorts | ft name, port
PSH [D:\foo]: # determine authorised applications
PSH [D:\foo]: $profile.AuthorizedApplications | ? {$_.Enabled} | ft name

Name
----
localsrv
SMTPServer
Virtual PC 2007
WS_FTP 95
iTunes
Microsoft Office OneNote
Microsoft Office Groove

PSH [D:\foo]: # determine enabled services
PSH [D:\foo]: $profile.Services | ? {$_.Enabled} | ft name

Name
----
File and Printer Sharing
Network Discovery

PSH [D:\foo]: # determine enabled services (ports)
PSH [D:\foo]: $profile.Services | ? {$_.Enabled} | select -expand GloballyOpenPorts

Name : File and Printer Sharing (NB-Session-In)
IpVersion : 2
Protocol : 6
Port : 139
Scope : 1
RemoteAddresses : LocalSubnet
Enabled : True
BuiltIn : True

Name : File and Printer Sharing (SMB-In)
IpVersion : 2
Protocol : 6
Port : 445
Scope : 1
RemoteAddresses : LocalSubnet
Enabled : True
BuiltIn : True

Name : File and Printer Sharing (NB-Name-In)
IpVersion : 2
Protocol : 17
Port : 137
Scope : 1
RemoteAddresses : LocalSubnet
Enabled : True
BuiltIn : True

Name : File and Printer Sharing (NB-Datagram-In)
IpVersion : 2
Protocol : 17
Port : 138
Scope : 1
RemoteAddresses : LocalSubnet
Enabled : True
BuiltIn : True

Name : Network Discovery (SSDP-In)
IpVersion : 2
Protocol : 17
Port : 1900
Scope : 1
RemoteAddresses : LocalSubnet
Enabled : True
BuiltIn : True

Name : Network Discovery (UPnP-In)
IpVersion : 2
Protocol : 6
Port : 2869
Scope : 1
RemoteAddresses : LocalSubnet
Enabled : True
BuiltIn : True

You could of course, do some better formatting of this information. And as you might imagine, this method only works on the current machine - the New-Object command does not allow you to remote the object creation.

Thanks to Jacques Barathon for this tip!!

 

Technorati tags: PowerShell, Windows PowerShell, Vista, Vista Firewalll

Some More on Random Numbers

In a recent blog post, I wrote about random numbers and Powershell. As noted in that article, you can create a new random number object as follows:

$rand = New-Object  System.Random
$rand.next()
129641862

This approach to creating the random number object seeds the random number generator with a pseudo-random number (current time). Therefore, if you try this at home, you're not likely to see the same result to $rand.next(), i.e. 129641862.

If you wanted to create a repeatable random number sequence (which is of course not actually random!), you could add a seed number as follows:

$rand = New-Object  System.Random 1234567
$rand.next()
1673116976

If you try this code at home, you should get the same result to the call to $r4and.next (i.e. 1673116976).

 

Technorati tags: random numbers, PowerShell, Windows PowerShell

Microsoft Cuts Key Longhorn Virtualization Features

This PC World article titled "Microsoft Cuts Key Longhorn Virtualization Features" is one of many on the web that describe Microsoft's decision to cut some of the key virtulisation features of Longhorn, code named Viridian. And to make matters less good, Microsoft has not said when, or even if, these features will surface again. 

For the official work, check out a blog entry posted on Thursday, 10 May where Mike Neil dropped the bombshell that some of the key features of Viridian are being dropped. And despite dropping cool and core features, there has been no improvement on likely delivery dates - MS is still saying Viridian will hit 6 months ("180 days") after Longhorn is complete. To be fair, MS are saying publicly that Viridian will ship "within 180 days of the release to manufacturing of Windows Server Longhorn."   Thus, it might be release4d earlier but given Microsoft's track record on meeting Windows release deadlines, I'm not holding my breath. Assuming no further slips, we should the public beta in November/December of this year, with RTM some time late sprint/early summer next year (i.e around a  year from  now). Naturally I'd love to see Viridian released earlier.

The three key feature cuts that were announced are:

• The live migration feature
• Hot-adding  resources (including storage, networking, memory, processor)
• Support for  16 processor cores (e.g 4-way, quad proc is maximum to be supported)

The first two of these dropped features are a real shame. The decision to drop support for more than 16 cores may not be such a big deal.

 

Technorati tags: Windows Longhorn, Viridian, Server Virtulisation, Virtulization

Network Monitor 3.1 Beta Is Launched

Netmon has been a product I've used for many years - using it to capture packet traces for the TCP/IP books I worked on. Netmon was first issued as part of SMS, and a crippled version of Netmon was shipped with earlier versions of Windows Server. After a long silent time, the Netmon finally issued a massively updated version, Netmon 3.0, a few months ago. Just the other day, Microsoft shipped the first beta of Network Monitor 3.1. You can get it via MS's Connect site.

Netmon includes a host of new features, along with a bias towards Vista.

Key features included in this beta are:

• Wireless (802.11) capturing and monitor mode on Vista - With supported hardware, (Native WIFI), you can now trace wireless
  management packets. You can scan all channels or a subset of the ones your wireless NIC supports. You can also focus in on one specific channel. We now show the wireless metadata for normal wireless frames.
• RAS tracing support on Vista - Now you can trace your RAS connections so you can see the traffic inside your VPN tunnel. Previously this was only available with XP.
• Microsoft Update enabled - Now you will be prompted when new updates exist. 
• New look filter toolbar - MS has changed the UI related to apply and remove filters. You can now apply a filter without having to UN-apply it first. 
• New reassembly engine - The reassembly engine has been improved to handle a larger variety of protocol reassembly schemes. 
• New public parsers - These include ip1394, ipcp, ipv6cp, madcap, pppoE, soap, ssdp, winsrpl, as well as improvements in the previously shipped parsers.
• And numerous Bug Fixes -  MS has  fixed many of the confirmed bugs.

Netmon rocks!

 

 

Technorati tags: Network Monitor

VIsta Policy Based QOS

QOS - Quality Of Service - is a networking feature that provides for protection of bandwidth, e.g. to ensure you have enough bandwidth to stream a video without dropout. Vista provides policies to enable you to prioritise network traffic by configuring Policy-based Quality of Service (QoS).

See http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=59030735-8fde-47c7-aa96-d4108f779f20&DisplayLang=en for more details on how to implement QOS with Vista (and Longhorn!).

 

Technorati tags: Vista, QOS, quality of service, Windows networking

Want to Learn More about Longhorn?

Then download the Reviewer's Guide!

The Reviewer's Guide is a 276 page document provides a comprehensive look at the the new and improved features that are contained in Longhorn Server Beta 3. This is a massive document, and demonstrates just how much work has gone into the product.

Technorati tags: Longhorn, Longhorn Reviewer's Guide

Longhorn Server Core - Beta 3

One of the cooler features of Windows Longhorn Server is the Server Core role - Server core is a version of Longhorn without the GUI and all the stuff that comes along with a GUI. At first sight, it's a little scary to see a version of Windows with just a cmd.exe prompt. The tag line for server core has to be "the wow stops now!"

Andrew Mason, a superstar-Program Manager at Microsoft has setup of a Server Core blog - at http://blogs.technet.com/server%5Fcore/. The latest article in this blog is a useful description of what's new in Server Core for Beta 3.

About the biggest disappointment with Server Core is the absences of PowerShell. PowerShell is not supported since the .NET Framework is not installed on Server Core. This is more evidence that Server Core, a great idea, is still a little immature as a product. Hopefully the R2 version will support  PowerShell and close this embarrassing loss of functionality!

 

Technorati tags: Longhorn, Longhorn Server Core, PowerShell

-

Vodafone Wireless Access - Or Not

I'm in Italy today, trying to get onto the Internet. A valued client has brought a number of journalists from around Europe to see more about Longhorn - but the wireless if commercial (supplied by Vodafone).

Here's a snippet of the logs:

 

Thu, 3 May 2007 12:34:21 Collecting mail from POP3 server pop.newsguy.com
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:34:21 Timed out connecting to POP3 server pop3.demon.co.uk
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:34:21 Collecting mail from POP3 server pop.mistral.net
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:35:21 Timed out connecting to POP3 server pop.newsguy.com
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:35:21 Collecting mail from POP3 server pop.mistral.net
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:35:21 Timed out connecting to POP3 server pop.mistral.net
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:35:38 Collecting mail from POP3 server pop.mistral.net
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:35:38 Collecting mail from POP3 server pop3.demon.co.uk
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:36:38 Timed out connecting to POP3 server pop.mistral.net
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:36:38 Collecting mail from POP3 server pop.newsguy.com
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:36:39 Timed out connecting to POP3 server pop3.demon.co.uk
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:36:39 Collecting mail from POP3 server pop.mistral.net
Thu, 3 May 2007 12:36:59 Failed to connect to POP3 server pop.newsguy.com:
[translating host name to IP address]
Host IP address = 64.214.94.172
... trying to connect
Connection failed -
-- Winsock ERROR : Connection timed out

 

Etc...

How impressive - NOT!

 

Technorati tags: Vodafone, wireless