It is the last day of 2004 and while others are
looking forward, Techlog would like to look back at the past year. We can conclude that it has been a turbulent year for Microsoft. Techlog has collected per-month Microsoft news highlights, click the link below to see the overview.
The Team from Techlog would also like to thank you for your support. It has only been ~8 months since we started and we are already getting 15.000+ visitors per month. Lets make 2005 an even better year!
Techlog: Highlights of 2004, an overview (more)
Computers running Microsoft Windows XP can be infected by a
new Trojan horse, program remotely controlled in a victim's system, even after it is patched with Microsoft's latest Service Pack 2, IT security company Symantec warned Wednesday.
The program -- dubbed "Phel", an anagram of "Help" -- infects visitors to a malicious website through Internet Explorer's Help controls, Symantec warned in an advisory.
ISA has some great tools for controlling Internet access. Schedules let you decide when users can access the Internet. Destination Sets let you control where users can go on the Internet. Site and Content Rules are where you set the rules that apply to the destination sets that you’ve configured. A good Internet Access Policy will often use all three elements.
In my consulting practice I’ve been asked to setup this scenario several times. Boss: "I don’t like people visiting eBay during work hours. No more eBay!" Employees: "What about lunch hour?" Boss: "Fine, I don’t care what you do during lunch." Boss to IT: "Make sure no one can access eBay during work hours."
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Bruce Cowper has posted an interesting
article discussing Passwords and Passphrases following Bill's keynote @ ITForum last month. Clearly we'd all like to see the back of passwords as they are unfriendly to users. In time technology may make it feasible for devices such as smartcards and federated authentication services to enable us to take the pain away. In the meantime there are so many systems that require users to enter static passwords that we need to consider how to get the maximum level of security from this basic form of authentication.
As Bruce points out in his
article there are some discussion papers located on TechNet which discuss the use of PassPhrases rather than Passwords. The concept is pretty straight forward, advise users to enter whole sentences in the password field rather than individual words or cryptic combinations of characters. It's not realistic to expect users to remember long strings of random characters for their passwords let alone expect them to change them frequently without writing them down.
When I right clicked on IE 6 to save a JPG file, Save Picture dialog box only shows BMP as the only output format. It only reproes on some computers. After some digging, I found out that Internet cache is full on the dubious computer. For more info, please check
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q260650.
Auction site eBay announced to members on its Web site Wednesday afternoon that it will drop support for Microsoft's Passport and .NET Alerts by late January. Users were told that "once this takes place, the Microsoft Passport button that is currently displayed on Sign In pages will be replaced with links to a page with more information."
The announcement came with practically no warning, however in recent months, it had become much more difficult to sign up for alerts through Microsoft's .NET services as the pages to do so were buried on eBay's site.
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Friday's demise of general support for Microsoft's Windows NT 4.0 may give alternate operating systems, such as Linux,
a temporary opportunity.
Although Microsoft extended Windows NT 4.0 support an additional year to, as the Redmond, Wash.-based developer says on its NT support site, "assist customers upgrading from Windows NT Server 4.0 to the Windows 2000 Server and Windows Server 2003 families," the 12 months of grace haven't paid off, according to Forrester Research analyst Joe Wilcox.
Microsoft, is a bit red-faced these days; not only will PC users have to wait longer for the already long-awaited Longhorn, it now seems that finding files and folders fast with a new and promised file system, WinFS, won't find its way to users for a few more years yet.
A CNet News article reported that a Microsoft exec has pretty much
killed any hopes of seeing a new file system from Microsoft anytime soon. More specifically, the article quoted Windows Server Chief Bob Muglia as having said "WinFS in not in the Longhorn client. It is also not in Longhorn Server."
The
Windows Marketplace Discussion Groups provide a public forum where you can ask questions, share your experiences, and state your opinions about products related to Windows. This is the place to learn what other users are saying about the technologies you are considering for personal and professional computing. If you need technical support with Windows-related technology, the Community Center links to support discussion groups for consumers, IT professionals, software developers, and the small business community.
California companies and consumers who purchased Microsoft PC software may be leaving more than
$1 billion on the table as a deadline for filing in a California class action approaches.
The Settlement Recovery Center (SRC), which assists businesses and non-profits making claims in class actions, said less than one million claims out of a potential 14 million claims have been filed as of Monday in the California case. The deadline for filing is Jan. 8.
Steven Bink, a Windows MVP, is predicting what Microsoft has in store for 2005. He writes: "This growing list in no particular order (yet), is based on facts and assumptions". Among other items, these are on his list:
Windows 2003 Server R2
Windows Server 2003 SP1
Monthly IMF updates for Exchange 2003
ISA 2004 Enterprise Edition
SQL Server 2005
You can read the full list on his
site.
New Year's revelers will have one more way to watch the ball drop this New Year's Eve thanks to MSN. The online service has struck an exclusive deal with New York City to become the "official" online provider for the event. Although it was announced Tuesday morning, MSN had already begun to advertise the countdown to 2005 through its video service during commercial breaks this past holiday weekend.
The webcast marks the first time in history that the ball drop will be broadcast over the Internet. Starting at 6pm EST on New Year's Eve, MSN will turn on three cameras, each promising a different angle of the festivities. In addition, MSN hired a local New York radio personality, "Romeo," to emcee the webcast.
(webcast) (more)
Microsoft Corp. on Monday chided a private research outfit for releasing proof-of-concept code for three potentially serious flaws in the Windows operating system, warning that irresponsible disclosure was not in the best interest of consumers. The software giant's rebuke comes five days after a Chinese community group called Xfocus Team said it discovered several
high-risk vulnerabilities affecting multiple versions of Windows.
A spokeswoman for Microsoft said the company is actively investigating the Xfocus Team's findings, which were re-released by anti-virus vendor Symantec Corp. but attributed to a different researcher. "Microsoft is disappointed that Xfocus took actions that could put computer users at risk by not following the commonly accepted industry practice of privately reporting security vulnerabilities to software vendors," the spokeswoman said.
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Evan Dodd is running series of blog posts on Exchange Special Mailboxes. He writes: "Every now and then, people ask about one (or all) of the system-related mailboxes on Exchange 2003 servers."
"There are actually three in particular that people frequently notice and confuse: SystemMailbox{guid}, System Attendant Mailbox, and SMTP (servername-{guid}) Mailbox. There are a bunch of common questions, which I will try to address in the next few posts".
Part 1 - System Mailbox
Part 2 - System Attendant mailbox
Part 3 - SMTP mailbox
On the Microsoft Global Development and Computing Portal you can find a handy utility which lets you view different
Windows keyboard layouts. Simply select the desired layout and a pop-up will show you how the keyboard layout looks like.
"Microsoft® Exchange
Intelligent Message Filter (IMF) is an extension of the Exchange 2003 product, to help companies reduce the amount of unsolicited commercial e-mail (UCE), also known as spam, delivered to the users inbox. IMF puts suspected messages away in an archive subdirectory of the Exchange mailroot folder structure. With large numbers of messages filtered by IMF (Microsoft® Exchange 2003 Intelligent Message Filter), administrators have to decide what to do with the contents of the archive.
IMF Companion allows administrators to view, delete or unblock filtered messages. The unblock function returns message to the pickup directory in order to allow Exchange to deliver the message to the user inbox."
The Wall Street Journal has published some 27 letters from
people who Switched to the Mac because of their iPod, people who Switched because of Windows problems, people who want to Switch but have reservations, and some people who are happy in their Windows world. The letters were published in the column Real Time by Tim Hanrahan and Jason Fry, in response to a column they wrote last week about the iPod Halo Effect.
On the blog of the Virtual PC Guy there are some interesting articles about migrating a physical computer to a virtual machine.
The articles are subdivided into four parts, and give a good overview of which problems can arise when you decide to migratie your physical machine to a virtual machine.
1.
Tips for migrating a physical computer to a virtual machine (part 1)
2.
Tips for migrating a physical computer to a virtual machine (part 2)
3.
Tips for migrating a physical computer to a virtual machine (part 3)
4.
Tips for migrating a physical computer to a virtual machine (part 4)
Users should stay away from untrusted Web sites and e-mails from unfamiliar sources to avoid becoming victims of an attack aided by three serious security
holes in Windows, security firms warned over the weekend.
An attacker could exploit the unpatched vulnerabilities to cause a denial of service and launch spyware or other malicious code, according to Symantec Security Response and Danish security firm Secunia, which called the problems "highly critical."
Neowin reports:
After removing all references to the 64-bit (IA64) Windows XP here, we've spoken to sources close to the company who have confirmed Microsoft's intensions to axe XP IA64. The company wants to focus on Windows Server 2003 editions of Itanium-based systems.
It is important to emphasize that Microsoft will continue to promote and offer Windows Server 2003 Enterprise and Datacenter Editions for Itanium-based systems, intended for customers who require the highest levels of scalability. For the mainstream server and workstation markets, however, we believe we can best serve our customers needs with Windows Server 2003 Standard x64 Edition, and Windows XP Professional x64 Edition, respectively. (continue at source)
The Security Configuration Wizard reduces the attack surface of Microsoft Windows servers by asking the user a series of questions designed to determine the functional requirements of a server. Functionality that is not required, by the roles being performed by the server, is then disabled. In addition to being a fundamental security best practice, attack surface reduction increases the diversity of your Windows landscape and reduces the number of systems that need to be immediately updated when a vulnerability is exposed.
Security Configuration Wizard will be introduced with Windows Server™ 2003 Service Pack 1.
(more)
In this
article the Virtual PC Guy gives an example of customizing the Virtual Server website. In his example he uses a
christmas theme by modifying the VSStyles.css style sheet which can be found in the path '..\Microsoft Virtual Server\WebSite\VirtualServer\scripts\'.
You can also modify the VSStyles.css style sheet to reflect the layout of the rest of your corporate administration tools.
This article discusses the Configuration of the ISA Firewall as an outbound Filtering SMTP Relay, it discusses procedures you can use to make the ISA firewall (ISA Server 2004) an outbound filtering SMTP relay to help offload some processing from your dedicated spam filtering solution.
The ISA firewall’s built-in SMTP Message Screener, while not a complete anti-spam and e-mail anti-virus solution, can go a long way at improving the performance of your current e-mail hygiene solution by performing basic keyword and attachment filtering duties. It will build on the configuration established in an earlier article, '
Configuring ISA for Inbound Filtering SMTP' and shows how to configure the ISA firewall as an outbound filtering SMTP relay.(continue at source)
This Article reviews two of the new features of Windows Server 2003 Active Directory 1.1: raising domain functional levels and using saved queries to simplify administrative tasks.
How does a Windows Server 2003 domain keep track of all these objects as well as their permissions and attributes? With the Active Directory (AD). Think of an object as any physical or virtual resource on your network that collectively has its properties stored in AD. In AD, even the domain itself is an object, so you can have or manage multiple domain resources by using AD. Now, think of AD as a database that stores these objects on your network in a centralized manner, and that can be managed by an administrator from one location, and you've got the whole concept....(continue at source)
I caught this in an
article on Microsoft's antitrust issues in Europe. While Microsoft does provide source for some of their networking protocols (through the MCPP), the AD replication protocol, which is proprietary, is deemed "too valuable to expose". This is unfortunate because it means that other directory vendors will never be able to plug a non-MS directory server into an Active Directory environment and have it act as a "domain controller".
This most notably affects SAMBA, but I'm sure other vendors would be interested too. I can understand there are some serious security issues to deal with by opening the replication protocols, but this could be an opportunity for MS to create a de factor standard for LDAP multi-master replication, which is lacking in the current LDAP specs (and is the biggest cause of lack of interop between directory servers today).
After you apply Exchange 2003 SP1, the behavior of badmail message generation changes. There are some registry settings which can be used to influence this but unfortunately most features of the "BadMailAdmin" script are not built-in.
The Exchange 2000 and 2003 "badmail" folder is the location where mail is stored which caused an error during processing by the Exchange SMTP virtual server. For instance, a message sent to a non-existent recipient in your Exchange organization which has no valid reply address will end up in the badmail folder. The most common messages which can be found in the badmail folder are spam messages because spam is in most cases sent by using a non-existent reply address. There are other factors which cause messages being sent to the badmail folder however.(continue at source)
The Solution Accelerator for Domain Server Consolidation and Migration is a collection of documentation that presents a prescriptive, tested, and supported approach to planning, designing, deploying, and verifying a domain migration project. In the development of such a solution, the accelerator documentation addresses issues that are not typically discussed in the product documentation, such as capacity planning and scenario implementation.
This solution accelerator adds value and uses existing documentation by outlining options available, based on best practices, for the design and considerations of a migration effort from Windows NT 4.0 domains to Windows Server 2003 Active Directory service. In addition, it addresses the key planning and implementation considerations for the migration of supporting network services. A representative enterprise scenario is also defined and the guidance provides the prescriptive application of best practices to meet the business needs of a fictitious large organization.
The whole crew of Techlog wishes you a merry christmas. For Techlog it is the first christmas, and therefore a special one. Our sponsor, Jefka, has made an original drawing about this year's christmas, which is displayed on the right side of the article. Click to see a high resolution version of the drawing. Visit his site for more great pictures.
On December 31 Techlog will look back at this year and write an article about the highlights of 2004. Stay tuned! Season greetings, the Techlog crew.
Windows guru Paul Thurrott has thrown up an amazing interview on his site, dealing with the creation of Windows XP SP2. Thurrott sat down with several of the project leads of SP2, and ended up painting a great picture of how this important security-focused update came to life. The interview also outlined that SP3 is currently not scheduled to add additional features to XP.
SP3 for Windows XP is slated to be a service pack the way we've always done service packs, and not to be a major upgrade. It will focus specifically on QFEs and fixes [to bugs] that are reported by customers. It should not contain new features... SP3 will be a regular customer fix, and also anything that we might find that's security related as part of our regular investigations. (more)
The Dutch government has abandoned its negotiations with Microsoft over an ambitious plan to upgrade more than 260,000 workstations and servers.
Despite a unanimous vote by the Dutch parliament in 2002 to adopt open standards and open source software, Microsoft recently opened exclusive negotiations with the Dutch government regarding a major software upgrade. After Dutch IT weekly newspaper Automatisering Gids leaked details about the €157m ($210m) deal, Dutch MPs
demanded an explanation as to why there hadn't been a mandatory public bid.
In an open letter to the government, several Dutch public organisations and open source lobbyists, including Novell and Bits of Freedom, criticised the government for its secrecy. Even Linspire chief executive Michael Robertson joined in on the heated debate, saying that his Linux software would cost €150m ($201m)
less than the MS bid.
Bob Roudebush writes:
If you’re a Sharepoint geek, you’ll appreciate this. If you aren’t, then you won’t. I was actually more impressed by the quality of the templates that are available rather than the fact that there were templates at all. Usually those “canned” templates are pretty corny and not very pleasing to the eye. A few of these are actually rather good. Here’s a sample of what I’m talking about - the template for “Project Management”:
Ian has enumerated a series of Site Templates
here. RoudyBob has a link to SharePoint Customization that has sites up based on some of those templates like above. Continue at source.
Earlier this year, Microsoft announced Exchange Edge Services, a set of technologies designed for e-mail protection, enhanced security and management of junk email for Exchange customers. To ease planning, testing and deployment for customers, the company has decided to ship most Edge Services components, including the new messaging policy functionality, as part of the next version of Exchange Server.
Microsoft will release some elements of Edge Services with Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2 (SP2), scheduled for release in the second half of 2005. Exchange Server 2003 SP2 will include the SenderID framework, an e-mail-authentication technology that helps address the problem of spoofing and phishing by verifying the domain name from which the mail is sent.
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VMware just released the brand new product
Assured Computing Environment (ACE) for Enterprises:
What Is VMware ACE?
VMware ACE is an enterprise solution for IT desktop managers who want to provision secure, standardized PC environments throughout the extended enterprise. VMware ACE installs easily and improves the manageability, security and cost-effectiveness of any industry standard PC. VMware ACE enables IT desktop managers to apply enterprise IT policies to a virtual machine containing an operating system, enterprise applications, and data to create an isolated PC environment known as an "assured computing environment". Through Virtual Rights Management technology, VMware ACE enables IT desktop managers to control assured computing environment expiration, secure enterprise information on PCs, and ensure compliance with IT policies.(continue at source)
In a previous
article on techlog the VMWare 5 beta was announced, but then it was only released to a small group of testers. But now the time has come for VMWare to go public with a beta version of the upcoming upgrade. New features are:
Enhanced multi-tier configuration support
Multiple snapshot and snapshot management capabilities
New cloning functionality
Movie record and playback
Improved performance
New and improved Linux user interface
New guest OS, host OS, and 32- and 64-bit hardware support
Support for a new class of USB devices
Command line interface
Workstation 5 beta participants can also download and use the new VMware V2V Assistant tool, which lets users convert Microsoft virtual machines into VMware virtual machines. Download
here
Microsoft is to start shipping a cut-down version of Windows in Europe from January, following the failure of its appeal to the European Court of First Instance over penalties imposed by the Commission earlier this year. Microsoft hasn't run out of appeal routes, but the Court ordered the company to begin carrying out the Commission's decision immediately.
This, according to Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith, means OEMs will get the version of Windows without Media Player next month, with it being available to other customers from February. It's not yet clear precisely what Microsoft's implementation of the decision will entail, but the notion of Windows Media Player being illegal music software in Europe is one to conjure with. Microsoft hasn't been massively concerned about the Commission's fine of €497 million, but it sees - understandably - the Commission's attempt to limit what it can and cannot put into Windows as a direct threat to its business model. As the Commission's intent is to do something about the operation of that business model, that too is understandable.
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Here's a handy tip for those of you using Outlook 2003: if you hold down the control key and then right-click the Outlook icon in your status tray, you'll get an extra option called "Connection Status". Choosing this option reveals which Exchange server and Global Catalog server Outlook is using, together with extremely useful information such as the failure rate of RPCs, and the average response times of communication. Very useful when troubleshooting connectivity issues.
Update: There's even a knowledge base
article about troubleshooting, which reveals the trick.
Microsoft Corp. has quietly released a "critical" Windows XP Service Pack 2 update to fix a serious flaw in the Windows Firewall utility. "After you set up Microsoft Windows Firewall in Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), you may discover that your computer can be accessed by anyone on the Internet when you use a dial-up connection to connect to the Internet," the company said in a
knowledge base article.
The update was not included—or mentioned—in the
five "important" advisories Microsoft released earlier this week. Two of those bulletins applied to XP SP2, but the severity rating was reduced to "moderate" for those customers. Gary Schare, director of Windows product management at Microsoft, said it was "an unfortunate oversight" that the SP2 update was shipped without notice.
(more)
A popular configuration for the ISA firewall is to use it as an inbound SMTP filtering relay. You can setup the ISA firewall as an inbound SMTP relay and leverage the built-in SMTP filter and SMTP Message Screener to offload some of the spam and attachment filtering duties from your dedicated spam whacking device or Exchange Server located on an ISA firewall Protected Network. While the ISA firewall's SMTP Message Screener isn't a full-fledged spam whacking and e-mail anti-virus solution, it can perform some initial processing on incoming messages, which takes some heat off your dedicated e-mail scrubbing devices.
This article shows you how to make it happen.
Microsoft employee Peter Torr has started a
flame war in his own blog today. Torr claims that the distribution and code signing of Firefox isn't up to scratch. Torr provides screenshots of the latest XPSP2 protection IE but fails to mention the poor protection in IE 6 SP1 which many more users are still using. Nevertheless if you enjoy battling it out about Firefox vs IE this is a read for you. Here's a snip
"But the thing that makes me really not trust the browser is that it doesn't matter how secure the original code is if the typical usage pattern of the browser requires users to perform insecure actions."
I saw this tip about how to find out when a public folder was last accessed in Exchange which may be useful if you're trying to rationalise your folders during an upgrade or migration. There is a WMI class called Exchange_PublicFolder which has a property called LastAccessTime which you can use. The only challenge would be if you have an anti Virus solution which scanned the Public folder, as you would not be able to tall if the folder was accessed by a user, or by an automated anti-virus scan engine.
Check
here for the WMI reference documentation.
The Microsoft® Operations Manager 2005 Operations Guide includes guidance and recommended best practices for backing up and restoring, maintaining, optimizing and monitoring Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 (MOM) in an existing IT infrastructure. This guidance is based on the supported MOM deployment architectures described in the Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 Supported Configurations Guide. Additional instructions are provided for managing agents across multiple domains, across firewalls, across slow links, and in workgroups. Detailed instructions are provided for each of the MOM components: the MOM Database, the Management Server, agents, consoles and the MOM Reporting Database. Detailed information about MOM security-related features and processes are provided in the Microsoft Operations Manager 2005 Security Guide.
Description of how Microsoft IT regularly uses the Diskpart.exe utility to dynamically increase disk volume capacity on servers running Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and Microsoft Windows 2000 Server. The Diskpart.exe utility extends disk volumes without downtime or application interruption, thereby increasing availability and decreasing costs.
Download
here
MSN's Hotmail service, which has almost 200 million users worldwide, has dumped McAfee as its antivirus partner in favor of rival Trend Micro. According to Microsoft, e-mails and attachments sent or received by any of Hotmail's 187 million Web mail customers will be scanned in real time by Trend Micro's antivirus software beginning Monday.
Hotmail's antivirus service was previously provided by McAfee and the reason for the change is unclear. However, Martin Hoffman, chief executive of Ninemsn, which operates Hotmail in Australia and is half owned by Microsoft, said in a statement that Hotmail will be able to provide a "safer online experience" using Trend Micro's products because they provide "deeper antivirus protection."
Welcome to the Visual Studio Hosted Experience! The Visual Studio Hosted Experience allows you to either quickly evaluate Visual Studio .NET 2003, or learn how to build great applications for Windows and the Web with the MSDN Virtual Labs – a series of guided, hands-on labs which can be completed in under an hour.
Building on Microsoft Windows Server System and the Microsoft .NET Framework, BizTalk Server delivers an integrated, interoperable, modularized, extensible, and security-enhanced e-business solution that enables companies to connect information, systems, people, and processes. It's simple - no complex setup or installation is required to try out Biztalk running in the full-featured MSDN Virtual Lab. As part of the MSDN Virtual Lab, you will have full access to Biztalk through the following modules:
Microsoft BizTalk Server 2004 - Creating Transactions (link)
Microsoft BizTalk Server 2004 - Creating a Schema Map (link)
Microsoft BizTalk Server 2004 - Creating Schemas (link)
Thomas Lee is running a story on Coverity, a company that makes a tool for Linux source code and defect analysis. On the basis of their report,
Wired is claiming that "Linux has Fewer Bugs than Rivals". Thomas points out that similar research has not been done on those rivals, so the article is inaccurate to say the least.
Meanwhile, Microsoft points out that its Research group has doing this sort of analysis since the late 90s, gradually moving its research into shipping products. Tools like PREfix and
PREfast are widely deployed inside Microsoft, and account for some 15% of all bugs found in Server 2003.
This solution accelerator provides detailed guidance for planning and executing upgrades, migrations, and consolidations to Exchange Server 2003 from legacy Exchange environments. It provides relevant information to help organizations migrate and consolidate their environments to Exchange Server 2003 using the tools provided with Exchange Server 2003 SP1.
The Solution Accelerator for Exchange Consolidation and Migration is the latest release in a suite of Windows NT 4.0 migration guidance previously developed by the MSIM team. The complement of these solution accelerators provides customers with the complete picture for migrating from Windows NT 4.0 to Windows Server 2003. The other consolidation/migration offerings are:
Solution Accelerator for Domain Server Consolidation and Migration: NT 4.0 to Windows 2003 (link)
Solution Accelerator for Consolidating and Migrating File and Print Servers from NT 4.0 (link)
Solution Accelerator for Consolidating and Migrating LOB Applications (link)
We've just posted a new episode of The .NET Show. This one is on "Active Directory Federation Services" (ADFS, formerly known as "Trustbridge"). This is an authorization system that will allow secure cross-domain authorization and access to data, and since it uses the existing Authorization Manager (AzMan for short) methodology, it means that existing applications will easily be able to take advantage of it with little, if any, additional work.
So check it out, and be sure to submit a rating of this episode (found on the bottom of the page) to let us know what you think about it. And then come back here and post any additional comments you might have about it. Clik
here to see the show in streaming Windows Media format.
Microsoft has got several top Microsoft Active Directory Experts online today to help answer your questions about AD in Windows Server 2000 and Windows Server 2003. The experts experience ranges from Product Support (troubleshooting) to Program Managers (product direction) to technology specialists (best practices).
Two LIVE chats will available today, Friday, Dec. 17th, from 18:30-19:30 (GMT+1) and tomorrow, Saturday, Dec. 18th, from 11:30-12:30 (GMT+1). To join, simply follow
this link during either of the times listed above. You may need to log in to your .Net Passport.
Techlog note: chat times have been edited to display the correct time for Dutch readers.
Swiss company Swatch and Microsoft have jointly designed a new computer wristwatch called
Paparazzi. The miniature computer tells you what the weather will be like tomorrow, which movies are showing in local cinemas, the sports results and even current stock-exchange prices.
The new watch is developed exclusively for Microsoft's MSN Direct Service, which offers a wireless connection to the internet. Currently the service is delivered across the US and Canada over an extensive network that is based on FM radio broadcast signals.
(more)
The Exchange server 5.5 post-SP4 rollup package (
KB841765) containing the DS/IS Hotfix required for Exchange 2003 SP1 Site Consolidation, has been updated as of December 16, 2004. If you've been looking for it, you can now download the updated version
here.
The original version of this update rollup was released in May, 2004. Because of a regression, you may experience the following issue if you have the May 2004 version of this update rollup installed, and if you are using version 2658.04 of Store.exe: The Information Store may crash when Exchange Server 5.5 computers receive malformed spam messages. The Store may crash during local delivery, while the Store is performing duplicate message detection. This problem may occur if the following conditions are all true:
A message has a NULL sender address.
The Internet message ID exceeds 255 characters.
The first 255 characters of the incoming message ID match the first 255 characters of the incoming message ID for another message that is already in the user's mailbox.
On forevergeek an interesting article was posted which gives you more resources on finding Microsoft Visio templates, stencils and icons.
Turns out there are lots of free Visio stencils out there, including official ones from Dell and Cisco, which made my diagram far, far easier to understand for everyone involved. So I thought I'd share.(continue)
Microsoft provides a few tools for stressing an Exchange server so you can check beforehand if your server can handle the projected load.
The main tool is Exchange Load Simulator (LoadSim) 2003, now updated to handle new Exchange 2003 features. This tool is intended for testing Exchange servers which mainly serve Outlook MAPI calls including RPC Over HTTP clients.
The article deals with testing a brand new Exchange server hardware in a lab environment by simulating Outlook activity.(continue at source)
In the
first article of this series "Planning for High Availability", WindowsNetworking.com covered Windows 2003 Clustering & Load Balancing for high availability (HA), as well as general planning information. They expand on the plan for high availability by looking at a full blown disaster and why it’s important to have a plan. This article addresses those issues.(continue at source)
Microsoft Corp. has bought into the anti-spyware business. Just two months after Chairman Bill Gates dropped a strong hint that Microsoft planned to do something about the spyware scourge, the Redmond, Wash., company announced the acquisition of Giant Company Software, a New York-based startup with a highly rated anti-spyware application. Financial terms of the purchase were not released.
Within the next month, Microsoft plans to roll out an anti-spyware protection beta for Windows customers. The company said the spyware detection and removal application will work alongside the security technologies in Windows XP Service Pack 2. It will be launched as a free tool for Windows 2000 and later versions only. The beta will offer a scanning tool to locate and remove spyware and other deceptive software threats. It will also be configurable to block known spyware and other unwanted software, Microsoft said.
(more)
System integrators close to the OEM action tell the INQ that Microsoft is shipping its Windows software with Computer Associates Antivirus included.
As well as being bundled with OEM Windows, the integrators say that it's likely to be coming as an update pack as well. See
here, for example.
If these reports are correct - and we're waiting to hear from Microsoft - this, we'd suggest, is not going to make antivirus companies like Symantec very happy.
(continue)
If you live in The Netherlands, be sure to attend the Technet International Expert Conference on the 20th of January. Microsoft is organizing a one-day level 300/400 session about "Stretching Directory Boundaries" presented by John Craddock and Sally Storey. In Bussum, John and Sally are going to talk about Microsoft Identity Integration Server (MIIS), Microsoft Active Directory Application Mode (ADAM) and Federated Identity Management.
I will be attending, so drop me a line if you wanna meet.
See the full invitation . Or go
here to register and attend the event.
Technology innovation is a marathon for companies the size and scale of Microsoft. By consistently investing in their products and technologies, these companies and their customers are rewarded with incremental yet significant product advances over time, along with the "legs" to sometimes make sprints forward.
Microsoft's measured-race plan produced both types of innovation in 2004. The company's annual investment in research and development -- US$6.8 billion in FY2004 -- produced significant incremental advances in a broad range of the company's products and services over the past year -- from innovative new digital entertainment offerings to security enhancements for its flagship software products. It also spurred a few giant leaps forward, including the groundbreaking new Xbox game, Halo 2.
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Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates answers the questions he is asked most frequently, including the secret to his success.
Q. In the history of Microsoft, what was your happiest moment?
A. If I had to pick one it was the launch of the IBM PC in 1981. Either that or back in 1976 when our version of BASIC first ran on the Altair, the very first personal computer. But I don't much celebrate milestones such as these because I view my job as a job only partly done. Computers aren't on every desk in every home yet, and they're not as easy to use as they should be. When we achieve these goals, I'll have something to really be happy about. Like everybody, I hope that my very happiest moments are ahead of me.
Read the full questions and answers list
here.
Today Microsoft released the following security update bulletins. For more information please visit:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/ms04-dec.mspx
Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer (889293) (critical)
Vulnerability in WordPad Could Allow Code Execution (885836) (important)
Vulnerability in DHCP Could Allow Remote Code Execution and Denial of Service (885249) (important)
Vulnerability in HyperTerminal Could Allow Code Execution (873339) (important)
Vulnerabilities in Windows Kernel and LSASS Could Allow Elevation of Privilege (885835) (important)
Vulnerability in WINS Could Allow Remote Code Execution (870763) (important)
In this article a quick hack to the Windows XP Registry will be covered. As changes are made to your system from installing applications and other software, the Window File Protection (WFP) system works to keep XP running and not introduce anything that may cause the system to become unstable, a curse of older Windows based operating systems. Windows File Protection is an important tool, with it; you can run an executable (sfc.exe) that will start a process to analyze your system but other times, you will want to disable it.
WFP is part of the System File Checker, a tool used to try to keep the system stable by helping stop common problems that cause DLL inconsistencies. WFP when used may try to block the installation of software that you do want to install, but can't. Because you may run into this issue, you should know how to disable it. With Windows XP SP2, the ability to disable WFP has been removed. This article shows how to reverse this process.(continue at source)
On
Brandon Paddock's Blog there is some useful info about adding deskbar shortcuts to the MSN Search Toolbar. From the deskbar you can search RSS feeds, NNTP groups, etc. The shortcuts are stored in MsnDeskbarShortcuts.ini which is located in \Documents and Settings\[YourName]\Application Data.
For Example:
gg=http://www.google.com/search?q=$w
ggr=http://groups.google.com/search?q=$w
rss=http://www.feedster.com/search.php?q=$w
kb=http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;$w
cmd==cmd
rl=http://411.com/search/Reverse_Phone?phone=$w
Microsoft has taken the next step in making its end-to-end security architecture a reality. On Monday, several companies announced they will be working with the software giant's Network Access Protection, or NAP, security architecture. Eighteen companies have signed on since July, when 25 agreed to participate as Microsoft first announced NAP.
Microsoft developed NAP to help corporate customers keep viruses and worms off their networks by making sure users' devices are checked before they gain access to the network. It combines virus-scanning technology with policy-based networking to deny connections to machines that don't conform with security policies. From the beginning, Microsoft said it would continue to add new partners as it works on an open, standards-based security architecture. Many of the new companies that have recently joined the initiative make virtual private networking, or VPN, products, including Check Point Software, Nortel Networks, F5 Networks and Aventail.
Newssource:
news.com via
MSFN
The MSN Toolbar Suite combines several great programs that speed up your search tasks and help you surf the Web. To see what there is, and to check out what's new, read the highlights in the following list. There's now an MSN Toolbar for Microsoft Office Outlook, the MSN Deskbar in the Windows taskbar, and an MSN Toolbar that works in both Windows Explorer and Internet Explorer. With Toolbars in these three places, you can start your search and find your pages more quickly than ever before.
Ever gotten frustrated trying to find something on your computer? MSN Deskbar includes the Desktop Search feature, which lets you search your computer as easily as you search the Web. A single keyword search will find anything on your computer—even within e-mail messages and their attachments. And Desktop Search is so fast that it makes organizing your documents, messages, and other items into folders practically unnecessary.
(download)
Newssource:
Steven Bink
One of the most common Server Publishing Rule scenarios is for SMTP servers. SMTP Server Publishing Rules allow you to publish SMTP servers on an ISA firewall Protect Network. The SMTP server can be a dedicated SMTP relay, or it can be the endpoint of the inbound e-mail messages, such as you Exchange Server. The SMTP Server Publishing Rule allows inbound connections to TCP port 25 through the ISA firewall to the SMTP server on the ISA firewall Protected Network. SA firewall SMTP server publishing is popular, but along with its popularity comes a lot of troubleshooting issues. In this article we’ll take a look at one approach to troubleshooting SMTP Server Publishing Rules.
(more)
Ever wondered how Microsoft secures its own infrastructure? The
ITShowCase website provides IT Professionals with the low down on how we develop, deploy and manage their enterprise technology solutions. The site contains both business decision maker suitable content and highly technical implementation detail.
As you'd image, their environment includes secure remote access, secure wireless, distributed offices and large user populations. Technologies such as 802.1X, VPN, PKI and network quarantine control are discussed in their business context. Here you will find technical case studies, white papers, presentations and more, direct from Microsoft IT, that highlight Microsoft’s key business applications, deployment strategies, early adopter experiences, best practices, and initiatives.
Coming from Adi Oltean's WebLog:
Starting with XP and Windows Server 2003 we have a new shadow copy functionality feature built-in the operating system. In my previous posts, I already mentioned some of of the high-level scenarios that are enabled by this feature. One example is backup, and the ability to avoid the "open files" problem. Another example is the Shadow Copies for Shared Folders feature, also known as "Previous Versions". But I haven't mentioned how shadow copies are actually implemented.
First I would like to point out that the VSS (Volume Shadow copy Service) infrastructure allows third-party shadow copy implementations to be installed in the OS, and make them accessible through a common API. We won't describe here this general infrastructure. For now, we note that, in general, the built-in shadow copy implementation will be used if no other implementations are present in the system.(continue at source)
Something new is coming from Microsoft! Microsoft MOOL! In other words, Microsoft Office Outlook Live. A new add-on for Outlook 2003 or XP.
According to
a flash presentation, Microsoft would start giving a service out called, Microsoft Outlook Service. The Outlook Service allows you to manage your MSN Hotmail account, MSN account or your MSN Personal account all under one program, Microsoft Outlook 2003 or XP. This will enable notes, calendar dates, contacts and tasks to be transferred to your Microsoft Outlook program.
A source close to Microsoft, stated that a beta would be available tomorrow, Monday 12th December (continue at source)
In Exchange 2000 SP1 and higher it is now possible to restrict legacy MAPI clients to connect to the information store. Add the following key on your Exchange 200x machine(s) Key:
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\ MSExchangeIS\ParametersSystem
Name: Disable MAPI Clients
Type: REG_SZ
Value: Enter a comma-separated or semicolon-separated list of MAPI client versions
For example: 9.0.0-9.9.9; 12.0.0-12.1.5; 1.1.1-2.2.2
If you want to restrict all MAPI clients use the value 0.0.0-
Don't forget to restart the Information store fore the new setting to take effect. For a complete description of the value and how to determine the MAPI client version read the newssource of this article.
This Article gives an overview of how Microsoft IT used a variety of solutions with Exchange Server 2003, including new server and storage technologies, aggressive service level agreements with weekly performance review meetings, and personnel management, to help achieve 99.99 percent user mailbox availability.
Microsoft's long-awaited new Windows file system is still a work in progress.
Although Microsoft hopes to ship a test version of WinFS in late 2006, it could be several more years before the revamped storage mechanism finds its way into Windows Server.
The software maker has already decided that WinFS will ship separately from Longhorn, the new desktop version of Windows that is due in 2006. On Friday, Windows Server Chief Bob Muglia said that WinFS will also not be a part of the server version of Longhorn that ships in 2007.
"WinFS in not in the Longhorn client," he said in an interview. "It is also not in Longhorn Server." (continue at source)
Microsoft will let customers configure the next major release of Windows Server for specific server tasks, rather than selling a host of different Windows Server Longhorn editions tailored to those tasks, a company executive said Friday.
The release, code-named Windows Server Longhorn and set to ship in 2007, will support much more granular role-based installation than does the current Windows Server 2003. This will include the option to install only the software code needed to support a certain role, such as terminal server or file server.
Quoting from the official
announcement:
The ProLiant Essentials Virtual Machine Management Pack (VMM) provides central management and control of virtual machines from Microsoft and VMware. Integrated with HP Systems Insight Manager, VMM provides unified management of virtual machines and supporting HP ProLiant host server resources. This integrated approach provides the ability to manage both physical and virtual resources from a single management console.
VMM simplifies day-to-day management and operation of virtual machines by providing host to VM association and remote access to VM control functions (including start, stop, suspend and reset). VMM also provides at a glance view of VM and host server resource consumption. Using VMM, IT administrators can easily identify VMs or host servers reaching high CPU, memory or disk utilization levels. VMM provides the ability to easily move VMs between host server resources to balance the workload across host servers and better optimize use of datacenter resources. In the future, VMM will also provide the foundation for automating Physical to Virtual (P2V) migrations.
When Microsoft began installing its campuswide wireless network five years ago, it was something of a pioneer. Microsofties scooped up the Net capabilities and soon everyone was surfing the Web during meetings. Five years later, though, the network is due for an overhaul. "The equipment is nearing end-of-life," said Sunjeev Pandey, a senior director in Microsoft's IT unit. Newer technologies are faster and better, he said, as well as more secure and manageable.
The software maker has been taking bids for the new network and expects to pick a winner by the end of the year, according to Chief Information Officer Ron Markezich. By early next year, the company expects to be doing pilot projects with the new gear. The wireless deployment comes at the same time Microsoft is shifting much of its telephone infrastructure from traditional systems to those that rout calls over the Internet, so-called voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, technologies.
Microsoft's monthly patch day for December will produce security updates for five vulnerabilities affecting Windows users, the company said Thursday. In an
advance notice, the software giant said the maximum severity rating for the five updates is "important." Some of the security updates may require a restart. The prerelease of basic information ahead of the scheduled patch day is a new policy adopted by Redmond's security division to help customers plan for the deployment of updates.
The next batch of patches is due Tuesday, Dec. 14. While the company isn't releasing specifics on which products will be patched, several well-known flaws have already been publicly reported. Late last month, Microsoft Corp. confirmed the existence of a code execution bug in the WINS (Windows Internet Name Service) that is used to determine the IP address associated with a particular network computer. The WINS flaw affects Microsoft Windows NT 4.0 Server, Microsoft Windows NT Server 4.0 Terminal Server Edition, Windows 2000 Server and Windows Server 2003.
(more)
Outlook Web Access, Outlook Mobile Access and Exchange ActiveSync all use HTTP methods to access Exchange 2003. This article describes the mechanisms behind these features and explains why the features can sometimes be so awkward to configure.
Part 1 of this article looks at how HTTP clients can access and manipulate the Exchange ‘Web Store’.
Part 2 of this article looks at how Outlook Web Access (OWA), Outlook Mobile Access (OMA) or Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) uses these mechanisms to provide remote users with Exchange messaging and collaboration services.
Logon scripts can be useful tools for configuring desktop environments for users. Some of the things such scripts can be used for include mapping network drives, connecting to shared printers, gathering system information, synchronizing system clocks, and so on. In fact, just about anything you can do from the command-line can be done using a logon script.
This article looks at the differences in implementing logon scripts in pure and mixed Active Directory environments, including how to use Group Policy to assign scripts and how to run Windows Script Host (WSH) scripts from batch files.(
continue at source)
Attack and penetration testing is a set of techniques and methodologies to test compliance to security policies, and to detect previously unknown vulnerabilities. The overall goal is to limit the points of exposure and to restrict the ability of unknown attackers to gain entry. However, developing an effective attack and penetration testing team presents unique management challenges. This discussion gives some best practice advice and lessons learned from the Microsoft IT experience building and operating an internal attack and penetration testing team.
(continue)
The Do-It-Yourself Script Center Kit includes all the materials you need to create your own version of the TechNet Script Center, either as stand-alone Web pages, stand-alone .vbs files, or as a .chm Help file. Included in the Kit are a database of all the scripts found in the TechNet Script Center Script Repository, as well helper scripts for creating Web pages, .vbs files, and .chm files. The Kit also includes instructions for using these helper scripts.
(continue)
Something which you often see Microsoft people do in their demonstrations is have the Operating System description and build number displayed on their desktop. While sysinternals do a fabulous job with their
Background Info (bginfo) tool (in fact I use this myself), there is a built in facility right out the box in Windows. In the registry, navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER, Control Panel, Desktop, change the value of PaintDesktopVersion from 0 to 1. Logoff and back on again. Very useful when you're working with lots of virtual and test machines. This works for Windows 2000, Windows 2003 and Windows XP, but I haven't tested NT, 9x or Me. There's also a
knowledge base article available. Of course, the usual precautions about updating the registry etc., etc.
Nowadays, I get a lot of questions about the error message "The Network Load Balancing service failed to start due to the following error: The service cannot be started, either because it is disabled or because it has no enabled devices associated with it", when people boot up their Windows Server 2003. Most of the time this happens when the Network Load Balancing service is referenced as a component in the startup group of a third-party service. In
KB833375 Microsoft explains which steps to take to prevent the problem from occuring. Hope this helps!
If you've managed an ISA 2000 firewall, the networking model used in the new ISA firewall (ISA Server 2004) will likely send you for a loop. That's expected, as the new ISA firewall's networking model is completely new and improved. No longer do you have to deal with the LAT, and all connections made through the ISA firewall are exposed to the ISA firewall's stateful packet inspection (SPI) and stateful application layer inspection engines. Check out this article for details on getting started right. (
continue at source)
Microsoft last week sketched out the future direction for its Tablet PC platform, and how it intends to address some of the perceived shortcomings of the technology. The next full version of Tablet PC will ship with the forthcoming Longhorn release of the Windows client in 2006, according to Microsoft's UK head of Windows, Cynthia Crossley. However, the software vendor will continue to add new functionality to Tablet PC with service pack updates in the interim, she added.
"Tablets and laptops are going to be fundamental to mobile computing," said Crossley. "But some things still need to be addressed, such as network roaming and how do we improve handwriting recognition. These are the pieces we need to put into place." (more)
Windows Server 2003 “R2” is an interim release of Windows Server, scheduled to be released in October 2005. The core of this release is built on the Windows Server 2003 SP1 platform and adds optionally installable components that our customers have been asking for; Active Directory Federation Services, Branch Office Replication Services, Branch Office Print Management Console and more.
This site allows you to nominate yourself for the program. Please note: submission of a nomination does not guarantee admittance into the program. If you are selected, you will receive more information around the first week of December.
Guest ID:
wInr2nOm.
Install Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) Release Candidate (RC) to help secure your server and to better defend against hackers. Windows Server 2003 SP1 RC enhances security infrastructure by providing new security tools such as Security Configuration Wizard, which helps secure your server for role-based operations, improves defense-in-depth with Data Execution Protection, and provides a safe and secure first-boot scenario with Post-setup Security Update Wizard. Windows Server 2003 SP1 RC assists IT professionals in securing their server infrastructure and provides enhanced manageability and control for Windows Server 2003 users.
(continue) (screenshots)
A common strategy for increasing the cost of would-be mail abuse uses a technique called tarpitting. Mail servers that tarpit wait a specified period of time before issuing SMTP responses to the client, thus increasing the time investment needed to successfully send a large amount of mail or a constant stream of (usually invalid) SMTP commands. To minimize the impact on the performance of well-meaning senders, servers can tarpit responses only for SMTP errors and allow authenticated clients to bypass the tarpit time. (continue at source)
Coming from WhiningDog.NET:
This article is part of our ongoing Build It series here at WhiningDog and this time – our focus is on building a Microsoft Windows Media Center 2005 system. This article will provide an overview of constructing an MCE system and an overview of the Media Center Edition 2005 OS. If you're interested in creating a Windows Media Center PC and don't feel like buying a ready made system from third party hardware vendors, then come on in as we explore just how to do it. (continue at source)
This white paper describes boot from SAN technology in a Windows environment, the advantages and complexities of the technology, and a number of key SAN boot deployment scenarios. Boot from SAN technologies are supported on Microsoft® Windows Server™ 2003 and Microsoft® Windows® 2000 Server platforms.
(more)
Eileen Brown writes about how to give users outside access to Live Communications Server 2003. The
document shows you how to configure ISA Server so that people working from home (like me, now), can access presence information without using VPN. Users can connect using TLS through ISA Server. This is possible by using a Live Communications Server Proxy in the DMZ.
According to people close to the negotiations, I.B.M. is in serious discussions to sell its PC business to Lenovo, the largest maker of PC's in China - a rapidly expanding market that Hewlett-Packard and Dell covet. I.B.M. is in talks with at least one other potential buyer. Industry experts note that a sale to Lenovo may create a powerful new rival with operations based in China.
Newssource:
The Globe and Mail
Exchange Server 2003 and Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 support RPC over HTTP in Microsoft Windows Server 2003. RPC over HTTP provides access to your Exchange mailbox. You can use RPC over HTTP to remove the requirement for a remote user to connect to an Exchange computer by using a virtual private network (VPN) connection. Instead, a user who runs Outlook 2003 can connect directly to an Exchange computer over the Internet. RPC over HTTP permits an RPC client to establish a connection over the Internet. Outlook 2003 is an example of an RPC client. The RPC client establishes the Internet connection by tunneling the RPC traffic through the HTTP protocol.
(continue)
Newssource:
Eileen Brown (more)
Graham Tyler is running a story on customizing Windows Messenger 5.0 to provide corporate links or content. He quotes:
"Whilst the 'banner ad' and the help menu entry are useful, they get boring pretty quickly. But there's lots of potential with Messenger tabs for developing some cool features! If you have used the consumer-focused MSN Messenger, you're probably familiar with the concept; each tab is actually linked to a web page. So you can deliver whatever content you choose, so long as you take account of the form factor of the Messenger client and design the content appropriately." Continue at source.
Newssource:
Graham Tyler
We are proud to announce that Techlog is now Pocket PC compatible. While it is still in early development, people using pocket Internet Explorer can read Techlog using a Pocket PC optimized layout. Go to www.techlog.org on a Pocket PC device and you are automatically redirected to the correct pages. Please note that the functionality is still in a beta stage. Please help us improve by giving feedback!
Newssource:
In-House
Microsoft is developing a new consumer-oriented subscription service called Microsoft Office Outlook Live (MOOL) that is built on top of MSN Platform technologies.
According to several sources close to Microsoft who requested anonymity, MOOL leverages and extends existing MSN back-end platform infrastructure; services that are available in MSN Premium, such as MSN Outlook Connector; as well as MSN Hotmail integration.
Continue at source
Newssource:
BetaNews
Summary: Michael Howard discusses how you can run as an administrator and access Internet data safely by dropping unnecessary administrative privileges when using any tool to access the Internet.
Michael Howard:
I've said this many times, but I'll say it again, "Running with an administrative account is dangerous to the health of your computer and your data." So, whenever someone says they must operate their computers as administrators, I always try to persuade them it's not the correct thing to do from a security perspective. That said, every once in a while I meet someone who has a valid reason. For example, I use one of the computers in my office to install the latest daily build of Windows, and I need to be an administrator to install the OS. However, and this is a big point, I do not read e-mail, browse the Web, or access the Internet in any form when running as an administrator on that machine. And I do not do so because the Web is the source of most of the nasty attacks today. (continue)
Newssource:
Dirk Primb
The Session Directory is nothing more than a database that keeps track of which users are running which sessions on which servers. This information is used when a user wants to disconnect from a session and then reconnect back to it in multi-server environments. Without the Session Directory, the system would not know that the user had a disconnected session on a server and might route her to a different server where she would start a new session. In addition to being annoying for the user, this is a waste of resources. A single user could leave many orphan sessions throughout the environment. Continue at source.
Newssource:
Brian Madden
This guide provides best practices for deploying and managing offline address books with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 and Microsoft Office Outlook 2003. A brief technical overview discusses how Exchange Server generates offline address books. Recommendations include how to optimize offline address book usage in a variety of scenarios. In addition, this guide provides troubleshooting guidance for common issues that you may encounter when using offline address books.
Download the
Offline Address Book Best Practices guide from the Microsoft Download Center for convenient reading and printing, or study individual chapters online by exploring the Table of Contents on this page.
Newssource:
Microsoft Technet
From Scott Densmore's Weblog:
I found myself today needing to scroll through my console window after running some unit tests that had failed. Now my first thought would be page up / page down... nope didn't work. Confused, I started google'n around to find the answer. I was not successful in finding an answer so I walked over to Peter's office and begged for help (google really likes Peter). After two tries the answer appeared.
Alt - Space - e - l - Now what this does is take you to the system menu then to edit and scroll (not that I think that scrolling has anything to do with edit). Works like a charm. To get back to regular editing use the - esc - button.
Newssource:
Scott Densmore
Microsoft has issued a patch, out of its normal security patch cycle, for a critical bug in Internet Explorer versions from 6.0 up to but not including Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2). According to the
advisory issued by Microsoft, the bug could allow remote code execution on an affected system. The bug was
publicly reported in early November. Patches may be obtained from links on the advisory page.
The advisory also states that this patch, MS04-040, supercedes and replaces an earlier cumulative update,
MS04-038. But it may not contain hotfixes that were issued since the release of MS04-038, so users who have received hotfixes from Microsoft or another support provider should instead follow separate instructions in Knowledge Base article
889669. The vulnerability is a buffer overflow in the handling of IFRAME and EMBED tags. By providing oversized source fields for those tags, an attacker could potentially execute arbitrary code on the user's system.
(more)
Outlook Web Access (OWA) supports forms-based authentication technology. Also known as cookie authentication, this feature circumvents the risks associated with the common human frailty of either forgetting to log off or not logging off correctly and the inherent problems with browsers caching user credentials. In this article, we shall look at how you can make some visual changes to the MS Exchange 2003 Forms-based Authentication (FBA) logon screen. Continue at source.
Newssource:
msexchange.org
Detroit Free Press columnist Mike Wendland
reports that Steve Ballmer yesterday had some very enthusiastic things to say about blogging. Not surprisingly, these remarks preceded the official launch of
MSN Spaces, which rolled out last night. For more on Spaces, check out the videos
Robert Scoble shot for
Channel 9.
Here's what Steve Ballmer told Mike Wendland:
"Blogging is huge," he said. "It brings together the three biggest Internet trends: communicating, sharing and socializing. It started with e-mail and instant messaging and music sharing, and it's getting bigger each day."
Newssource:
Micro Persuasion
The MSN® network of Internet services today introduced updates to its free communication services to make e-mail, instant messaging and online sharing easier and more personal for consumers. The updates include a beta version of MSN Spaces, a new Web logging (blogging) service that enables consumers to create their own personal place on the Web, as well as a beta version of MSN Messenger 7.0, updates to MSN Hotmail®, and deeper integration between the services to enable more compelling communications experiences for consumers. Continue at source.
Newssource:
Microsoft
From Aaron Stebner's WebLog:
I wanted to take a minute to spotlight one of the big new embedded enabling features that is new to Windows XP Embedded SP2. It is called hibernate once, resume many. We have taken to abbreviating this to HORM internally, so if you see this new acronym floating around in documents or newsgroups about XP Embedded that is likely what it means.
HORM provides the ability to resume an EWF-protected system (EWF provides a means for protecting a volume from writes, red) from a hibernation file (hiberfil.sys) each time a machine is restarted instead of performing a full OS boot. This greatly improves the cold-boot startup time of machines. Continue at source.
Newssource:
Aaron Stebner
Chip firm Intel has given its customers more details about the 6XX range of Pentium 4 processors, 6XX range of processors will have 2MB of level two cache, will have bus speeds of 800MHz, and will also support the firm's EM64T technology. So far, Intel has only incorporated the 64-bit features of EM64T in its Xeons and in processors designed for workstations.
Newssource:
winbeta.org (more)
Microsoft® Windows® XP Embedded is a componentized version of the Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional operating system that brings the rich feature set of Windows XP Professional to embedded devices. However, there are some differences between Windows XP Professional and Windows XP Embedded. The major difference is that Windows XP Embedded is engineered specifically to support embedded devices and their manufacturers. This white paper describes Windows XP Embedded solutions for common embedded scenarios, and describes Windows XP Professional features that Windows XP Embedded does not include. Continue at source.
Newssource:
Microsoft MSDN
This paper explains how to package Microsoft® Windows® Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE), a System Deployment Image (SDI) file, and SDI tools, to create a recovery CD. With this recovery CD, you can boot the device with Windows PE, and then restore the image on your device by installing an image from an SDI file.
With a few modifications to the process outlined in this paper, you can use Windows PE and SDI to deploy Windows XP Embedded to a device, or upgrade an existing device in the field.
Windows PE is also useful for many Windows Embedded development tasks, including bringing up devices that have no hard drive, hardware detection, and fine-tuning an image on your device. For more information, see
Using Windows PE in Windows XP Embedded Development (more)
The Exchange Server 2003 Operations Checklists provide guidelines for disaster recovery tasks, and for daily, weekly, and monthly maintenance tasks. The Exchange Server 2003 Operations Checklists provide guidelines for IT professionals to do disaster recovery tasks, and to perform the daily, weekly, and monthly maintenance tasks required to keep your Exchange server performing optimally. Use these checklists as is, or adapt them to suit your company's specific needs.
(download)
Quoting from official
announcement:
"I have finally decided that since I do not have an immediate need for additional objects, I'll go ahead and release my current Visio Stencil set that I have been working from. While there are only six objects initially, I will be continuously adding more as I find the need for them. I will also watch for requests in the forums and attempt to meet specific requests that I can find useful.Please head over to the downloads section and check them out. Your feedback is welcome."
The company I work for, C2ICT, is looking for a senior consultant with project leading capabilities. Among other things, we specialize in doing big complex Windows & Active Directory infrastructure migrations. All consultants are Microsoft certified engineers with much experience on Windows infrastructures. If you qualify for the requirements, live in The Netherlands and want to join our efforts in supplying great Microsoft solutions to our customers, please send us an
email and we will be glad to hear your ambitions. For full details, please read this dutch
Word file on the job offering. Hope to hear from you soon!
Joe Davies reports that the following white papers and articles have been updated for changes and new features provided in the upcoming Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) (now in Beta testing):
1. Windows Server 2003 SP1 updates the Wireless Network (IEEE 802.11) Policies Group Policy extension to support WPA encryption and authentication options:
Configuring Wireless Settings Using Windows Server 2003 Group Policy
Enterprise Deployment of Secure 802.11 Networks Using Microsoft Windows
Updates to Deploying Secure 802.11 Wireless Netoworks with Microsoft Windows (more)
| 06 Dec '04 - 21:59 | kenneth van surksum | 
no comments | news source ~ Microsoft Exchange Team Blog 
