Windows Server 2003 Still Around? Check out some useful webcasts!

Ah, Windows Server 2003, that sturdy workhorse that just keeps going and going.  If you still have a server or two chugging along, you might find some of these upcoming webcasts of interest.

For additional information, you can also visit Microsoft Virtual Academy for some on-demand courses.

Don’t forget! MVP-led "Transform the Datacenter" Events all next week!

Just a quick reminder about some upcoming “Transform the Datacenter” events next week, led by a variety of Microsoft MVPs!  All of the events are free to attend. 

FL
Tampa
Monday, September 22
Adnan Cartwright, Telmo Sampaio, Max Trinidad (coordination w/Kevin Weilbacher)
IL
Chicago
Monday, September 22
Trevor Sullivan, Annur Sumar, Brian Desmond
WA
Bellevue
Tuesday, September 23
Brian Desmond (Coordination with Zubair Alexander)
AZ
Tempe
Wednesday, September 24
Jason Helmick, Rory Monaghan, David Lundell, Tom Ziegmann
CO
Denver
Thursday, September 25
Greg Shields
TX
Houston
Friday, September 26
Anil Desai
MI
Detroit
Saturday, September 27, 2014
Andy Syrewicze
OH
Cincinnati
Saturday, September 20, 2014
Kevin Royalty


Don’t Miss Out on Becoming an Early Expert!

In an increasingly multi-hypervisor world, more and more IT organizations are using Microsoft Hyper-V and Microsoft Azure to achieve superior performance and workload flexibility at the best possible price. With nearly two-thirds of businesses on more than one virtualization platform, adding Microsoft virtualization and cloud skills to your technical repertoire can improve your career options and prepare you to face new IT demands.

Join Early Experts! We'll help you get certified!

What is Early Experts?

Microsoft Early Experts is a free, online study group for virtualization professionals who want to extend their Microsoft Hyper-V, System Center and Microsoft Azure knowledge with official Microsoft certifications. We’ve organized our high-impact learning resources into online Knowledge Quests that include concise videos, prescriptive study materials and hands-on practice with real products. Complete the weekly quests at your own pace and enjoy the flexibility to stop and review certain topics when you need more time.

Rewards and Prizes (U.S. Only)

Complete the online Quests and receive a completion badge suitable for printing or sharing online to showcase your new skills with Microsoft virtualization! In addition, IT Pros located in the U.S. are eligible to win one of several cool prizes during monthly prize drawings in April, May and June 2014. **

Rewards, Prizes and Certification: Join Early Experts today!
If you’re located outside of the U.S., you’re certainly still welcome to join us and take advantage of the Early Experts study materials to help you prepare for certification.

The clock is ticking … Join us today!

Early Experts study groups are forming now for existing VMware / Virtualization professionals targeting the following Microsoft certification:

Join Us: Become our next Early Expert!
**NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Open only to IT Professionals who are legal residents of the 50 U.S. states or D.C., 18+. Sweepstakes ends on June 30, 2014. See Official Rules.

Can’t Make it to Houston?

At this year’s TechEd we’re going to take the wraps off a range of new products and services, and we cannot wait to talk about—and demo—some of the remarkable new capabilities and functionalities we are going to deliver to the IT and developer industry.

Can’t make it to Houston this year for TechEd 2014? No worries – just join us online via Tech Ed Live Streaming all week long from the keynote and technical breakout sessions.
Register Now for the Tech Ed Live Stream
In this article, I’ve included the schedule for this week’s TechEd sessions that will be live streamed and the registration link you can use for joining us online.  Hope to see you there virtually!

Don’t miss these TechEd Live Stream sessions!

We have a full week planned of great technical content via the TechEd 2014 Live Stream sessions. Be sure to tune in for these topics …

Day Time Session Title Primary Speaker
5/12/2014 09:00AM – 10:30AM Central Time Tech Ed 2014 Keynote Session Brad Anderson,
Corporate Vice President, Windows Server and System Center
5/12/2014 11:00AM – Noon Central Time Enabling Enterprise Mobility with Windows Intune, Microsoft Azure, and Windows Server Adam Hall; Andrew Conway; Demi Albuz; Jason Leznek
5/12/2014 01:15PM – 02:30PM Central Time Windows PowerShell Unplugged with Jeffrey Snover Jeffrey Snover
5/12/2014 03:00PM – 04:15PM Central Time RemoteApp for Mobility and BYOD Demi Albuz;Samim Erdogan
5/12/2014 04:45PM – 06:00PM Central Time Microsoft System Center 2012 Configuration Manager: MVP Experts Panel Greg Ramsey;Jason Sandys;Johan Arwidmark;Kent Agerlund;Steve Thompson
5/13/2014 08:30PM – 09:45AM Central Time INTRODUCING: The Future of .NET on the Server Scott Hanselman;Scott Hunter
5/13/2014 10:15AM – 11:30AM Central Time DEEP DIVE: The Future of .NET on the Server David Fowler;Scott Hanselman
5/13/2014 01:30PM – 02:45PM Central Time Group Policy: Notes from the Field – Tips, Tricks, and Troubleshooting Jeremy Moskowitz
5/13/2014 03:15PM – 04:30PM Central Time Microsoft Desktop Virtualization Overview Session Demi Albuz;Robin Brandl;Thomas Willingham
5/13/2014 05:00PM – 06:15PM Central Time TWC: Sysinternals Primer: TechEd 2014 Edition Aaron Margosis
5/14/2014 08:30AM – 09:45AM Central Time Making Sense of the Microsoft Information Protection Stack Chris Hallum
5/14/2014 10:15AM – 11:30AM Central Time Mark Russinovich and Mark Minasi on Cloud Computing Mark Minasi;Mark Russinovich
5/14/2014 01:30PM – 02:45PM Central Time Entity Framework: Building Applications with Entity Framework 6 Rowan Miller
5/14/2014 03:15PM – 04:30PM Central Time Windows PowerShell Best Practices and Patterns: Time to Get Serious Don Jones
5/14/2014 05:00PM – 06:15PM Central Time What’s New in Windows Server 2012 R2 Hyper-V Jeff Woolsey
5/15/2014 08:30AM – 09:45AM Central Time Real-World Windows 8.1 Deployment: Notes from the Field Johan Arwidmark
5/15/2014 10:15AM – 11:30AM Central Time Async Best Practices for C# and Visual Basic Mads Torgersen
5/15/2014 01:00PM – 02:15PM Central Time VDI Deployment Walkthrough John Kelbley;Rich McBrine;Robin Brandl
5/15/2014 02:45PM – 04:00PM Central Time 2014 Edition: How Many Coffees Can You Drink While Your PC Starts? Matthew Reynolds

Join TechEd from wherever you are.

Use the link below to register for the TechEd Live Stream to watch the sessions online this week – live from Houston TX.
Register Now for the TechEd Live Stream

Join the discussion! What are you most excited about?

Which of the announcements, new features or enhancements are you most excited to begin leveraging in your IT organization? Let us know your thoughts in the Comments area below!  In addition, be sure to follow us online via the #MSTechEd hashtag on Twitter.

FREE Windows 8.1 Camp: Discover Key Windows 8.1 Solutions for IT Pros

IT Camp: Windows 8
As IT professionals, it’s your job to keep up with the latest demands – ensuring your organization has the fastest, most intuitive technology and uninterrupted services, while giving people the freedom to work anywhere, anytime, on a variety of devices.

Join us (the IT Pro Evangelists!) for the upcoming IT Camp, “Empowering People-Centric IT with Windows 8.1 for IT Professionals,” and learn about the new features in Windows 8.1. These capabilities simplify the migration, deployment, and management of tomorrow’s IT environments, while tangibly improving the end-user experience.

At this IT Camp, you’ll get hands-on experience with Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2 in the enterprise. Explore the new Windows 8.1 feature set while you dive deep into key enterprise scenarios around System Center Configuration Manager 2012 R2 and Windows Intune management, deployment, security, desktop virtualization, side-loading apps, and mobility.

Session Requirements

  • Be sure to bring a modern laptop that can run the following prerequisites.
  • Modern operating system, including Windows 7, Windows 8, Linux or Mac OS X
  • Modern web browser supporting HTML5 and Javascript, including IE 9 or later, Chrome, Firefox and Safari
    Remote desktop (RDP) client – included with Windows platforms.  Mac and Linux RDP clients can be downloaded for free at http://www.2x.com/rdp-client/

Visit http://www.technetevents.com to learn more or register by clicking on the city closest to you.

Date
City
State
4/29/2014
WI
4/29/2014
TX
4/29/2014
FL
4/30/2014
MI
4/30/2014
NY
4/30/2014
CA
5/1/2014
IL
5/1/2014
FL
5/6/2014
MN
5/6/2014
NY
5/7/2014
OH
5/7/2014
GA
5/7/2014
PA
5/7/2014
CO
5/7/2014
CA
5/8/2014
KS
5/9/2014
FL
5/20/2014
OH
5/20/2014
VA
5/20/2014
IL
5/21/2014
TX
5/21/2014
MA
5/21/2014
NC
5/22/2014
WA
5/22/2014
MO
5/22/2014
AZ
5/28/2014
TX
6/4/2014
CA

Much thanks to Matt Hester, who let me “borrow” his blog post to re-post! Why reinvent the wheel, right? 🙂

Top Support Issue Blog now available via Windows App

In January, I wrote about the Microsoft Top Support Issues blog, a blog you could visit where the top support issues for a host of Microsoft products would be listed with the best resources for solutions.  The blog is updated quarterly, but if you want quick and easy way to get to the content at any time, be sure to check out their new Windows App

Now you can just pick your product of choice from the App and it will take you right to the post with those support topics.

Cloud Security: Help Shape the Future!

Are you a Systems Administrator or Security Analyst?  Would you like to influence the future of products to manage and secure your virtualized infrastructure? Here is your opportunity to be heard by Microsoft Cloud and Data Center Management Research and Program Managers! They would like to talk to IT Pros that manage and secure your organizations virtualized and cloud environments.
If you are interested in talking further with Microsoft, please complete a short survey that will help us to determine how your job fits within the management and security of cloud and datacenter virtual computing.
The team is looking to run a series of interviews over the next few months. Join the discussion, we want to hear from you!

Help Shape Microsoft’s Cloud Technologies: Join the IT Pro User Panel

IT Professionals: Have you ever been deep in the guts of a gnarly infrastructure deployment, automation, configuration, trouble-shooting or similar task, and thought to yourself something like this: “Why didn’t that darn product team at Microsoft make this tool work better, more like what I need it to do?” If you see yourself in this story, we have an opportunity for you!
The Windows Server System Center design and development team is looking for IT Pros with knowledge & experience in all aspects of infrastructure and services management. We need to know how to make Microsoft technologies supporting these scenarios work better for you.
IT Pros like you with these specialized knowledge and skills are hard to find, so we’ll make it worth your while. Here’s what you get from participating in the Panel:
·       Opportunities to influence WSSC design and development in areas such as
o   Prioritizing tool capabilities (what do you need MOST in these tools and technologie?)
o   User interaction (how would you expect this to work?)
o   User interface design (does this wording or picture, etc. make sense to you? Can you suggest something better?)
·       A thank you gift! After participating in a study, you’ll have the option of selecting from a list of Microsoft software, hardware, games, and more. Since IT Pros are the hardest folks to find, you get the best gifts!
If you’d like to be considered for the IT Pro User Panel, please complete this brief survey.
If you want to know more about Microsoft User Research overall, see the Microsoft User Research page.

Note: Microsoft full or part-time employees, vendors, or contingent employees are not eligible.

Where Have You Been All My Life?

My subject line might be a bit dramatic, but the last two weeks has been a busy whirlwind of travel for technical training and team building.  Microsoft has announced the new CEO, I’ve got a growing list of meet-ups and community groups I want to check out in 2014 and my days have just been flying by.   My head is filling with ideas for things to bring to you on Techbunny, but I haven’t had the time to write them down.

But don’t fret, you’ll have plenty to read about starting on Monday. I promise. Particularly if disaster recovery planning is on your list!
Check back here or follow me on Twitter @jkc137.  And did you know I’m on Facebook? Yep. That too. 
Have a great weekend!