PacITPros Hits July with a Storm of Events!

Don’t let the summer slip by without taking advantage of some of the free or low cost events brought to you by Pacific IT Professionals.

San Francisco July 5th Meeting – The meeting sponsor is OpenDNS! Many network admins go to great lengths to secure their networks using costly security appliances, all the while leaving a critical network layer – the Domain Name System – unprotected. This discussion explores the way malware and botnets leverage the DNS to infiltrate your network and cause damage that costs you both time and money. And also how you to easily secure your DNS layer and smartly stop command center communication between malware and your network, rendering the malware harmless. Secure your DNS and block malware and botnets once and for all, before they ever even infect computers on your network, and cut off malware that’s already infected your network at the knees. Protect every device at your company, everywhere it travels.

Los Angeles, July 12th – Windows Deployment from ACT to ZTI with Stephen Rose – Do you know how to use the free tools to move your users from Windows XP to Windows 7 and Office 2003 to Office 2010 in less than 30 minutes? Paying money for deployment tools is so 2000! In this session, Stephen will show you how to use the many free tools available to manage and deploy Windows, Office and Internet Explorer while reducing cost and ensuring you never having to manage multiple images again. We will cover MDT, ACT, MAP, WDS, the PoC and other tools that will do network inventory, application compatibility, shimming, image management and automated Windows and application deployment.

San Francisco, July 15th – Deploy Windows 7 Using Microsoft’s FREE Deployment Tools – MAP, ACT, WAIK, MDT, WDS and SCCM – which tool does what? In this one day jam-packed session you’ll learn how Microsoft’s free deployment tools can help you get Windows 7 up and running as quickly and easily as possible!

Exchange 2010 Lab: Things I’ve Learned So Far

This month, I’ve been trying to concentrate on working on my test lab for Exchange 2010. I’ve done a lot of reading about Exchange 2010, but now is the time where the rubber hits the road and I can start seeing what I’ve been reading actually means in practice. Also, this gives me a reason to start paying attention to PowerShell, since I’ve have little need for it so far and I know I need to start learning it!

I did a pretty standard, “out of the box” installation of Exchange for this first test and I was having a problem moving mailboxes and creating databases. If you are already a member of the Organization and Recipent Management groups in AD, then you might need to rerun the “setup.exe /PrepareAD” command to reapply the permissions.

Yes, the PrepareAD switch is run when you do the standard install. And yes, even when I manually checked all the permissions they looked fine. However, rerunning /PrepareAD solved my issues. Want to read more about Exchange Trusted Subsystem permissions and how they fit in? Go here, to Richard’s Exchange Ramblings on TechNet Blogs.

And for a little useful PowerShell, here’s how to find the versions of Exchange you have installed in the entire organization:
Get-ExchangeServer | Format-Table Name, *Version*
For reference, all build numbers listed in this KB Article – http://support.microsoft.com/kb/158530

Finally, if you’ve been tweaking the Rentention Policies and want to kick off the Managed Folder Assistant immediately to see if your policies work for a particular user, here’s the PowerShell for that too.
Start-ManagedFolderAssistant -Identity *MailboxOrMailUserIdParameter*
The full explanation of that command can be found here.

IT Pros and Plastic: Being a Better Steward for the Environment

Last week for some of my “pleasure” reading, I read “Plastic: A Toxic Love Story”, by Susan Freinkel. It was a pretty enlightening read and you might be wondering how this topic applies to you as an IT Professional. I know we spend a lot of time dealing with intangible things in IT. Virtual machines, the “Cloud”, bits and bytes and software and the physical things always seemed very metal-centric – we even talk about installing things from “bare metal”.

But if you stop and look around for just a moment – it’s probably more plastic than anything else. Where are you reading this post from? Your desk? Your keyboard and monitor are plastic, your desk is probably even mostly plastic. Your laptop is mostly plastic, or if you are using an e-reader it’s plastic too. Just about any mobile device is in a plastic case these days. You might be surrounding by CDs/DVDs and their cases – plastic. Network cables – coated in plastic. Those swag items you have from that last conference – probably 99% plastic.

As IT Professionals, we rule a world of plastic. And we need to be better stewards of the plastic that is in our control. It’s so easy to see many of those plastic items as “throw away” – they’ve been designed that way. Cheap swag pens, demo CDs, mobile devices replaced annually with the newest model, the list is pretty endless once you start looking around. But really, plastic is for all practical purposes, forever.

So where to being? First, take advantage of e-waste recycling programs that are in your area. Make sure that the electronic items that are no longer in use in your office have the best opportunity to be repurposed. Second, consider your inventories of tech related “consumables” – make sure you are only buying what you need, so that items that have a shorter shelf-life don’t go into the trash unused. Printer cartridges and smaller capacity storage media are things that come to mind.

Third, think about what you are buying for yourself and your family when it comes to popular consumer items. I’m not saying you should deny yourself a new iPod or a better smart phone. But think about options for your older devices before they languish in the back of your closet – many organizations take working cell phones to be given to abuse victims, and while you might not want last year’s iPod, someone shopping at Goodwill or some other thrift store might.

As I finished up my reading on my first generation Kindle, I realized that even though some of the newer models are sleeker and faster, what I have is probably good for now.

Bing and It’s Done. For Real.

I’ve been dreading planning some summer travel. Or more specifically finding reasonable flights for summer travel. I spent the last several weeks checking some travel websites and have been frustrated with the prices – Would they go down? Should I just buy them and be done with it? Will I be kicking myself for not waiting another week or day or be annoyed that I waited to long?

It was suggested that I check out bing.com for travel. Now I can’t say that I use Bing much for my regular Internet searches. I’ve used Google since the beginning of time and I’m comfortable with it for what I usually need. But hey, Bing is the “decision engine” and I wasn’t getting anywhere fast with my ticket search otherwise. It was worth a shot.

And then it was mission accomplished. Bing. Done. Wow.

To be fair, the search results are powered by kayak.com, and I’ve used Kayak directly in the past but it never struck me as any better than Expedia, which had been my go-to travel site for years. (Like my use of Google, old habits die hard.) Though often, I’d find the flight on Expedia and then book it directly from the carrier to elimate the middle man, especially since I don’t often need travel packages.

With Bing you have all the features where you can customize your results based on number of stops, the travel times, red-eye or not, etc and you can look for hotels and other deals as well. Once you select your flight, Bing redirects you to the carrier so you can complete the purchasing process directly. From the main functionality standpoint, most flight search sites hand you the same base features and Bing doesn’t disappoint.

The big selling point was the prominance of the price predictor and the fare history. This is where the “decision” with booking flights comes into play. This was the cleanest presentation of the where prices had been and where they might be going – it was the perfect stock ticker for travel.

Perhaps I just got lucky but according to those tools, I was finally hitting the right time. Ticket prices were the lowest they’d been in about 4 weeks and would likely go higher – I finally had the information I needed to move forward and put my money on the line.

Now I can check that off my list and you can be sure I’ll use Bing for travel again in future. I guess everyone can learn a new trick now and then.

Summertime Tech

And with that, the summer season is upon us! There’s always something to attend when it comes to technology, so don’t miss out some great upcoming events:

As always, PacITPros has regular monthly meetings in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Check out the website at www.pacitpros.org for meeting dates and locations.

Also in Los Angeles in July, don’t miss a free TechDays event featuring Stephen Rose and Windows Deployment from ACT to ZTI. Register now to reserve you spot!

Don’t forget that tomorrow is World IPv6 Day. Learn more about what to expect and how to take part in it if your organization is already implementing IPv6.

Are you one of those developer types? Be sure to check out the SoCal Code Camp happening later this month in San Diego.

Finally, are you an ImageRight user? Start planning now for the Vertafore Connections Conference, taking place in Atlanta in mid-September.

Exchange 2010 on the Horizon

I started this week and hopefully I’ll get to spend more time next week working on my lab for migrating from Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2010. Today I’m using the Exchange Server Deployment Assistant, which asks a few questions about your environment and then generates a checklist of things for you to check and do as you move through the installation process.

I’m also hoping to find some time to run the Exchange Pre-Deployment Analyzer in my production environment and see if that give me some good news.

Happy Friday Everyone!

When Its Not Quite A Licensing Issue…

Sometimes, a Windows XP boxes seem to have trouble connecting to a Terminal Services (aka Remote Desktop Services) server. The user sees an error about the server being out of licenses and the server reports errors that the workstation couldn’t get a license.

At first glance, you think you need to buy more licenses, but it might turn out that you have plenty availble. The reality is that it’s probably the client machine that needs tweaking, not your server.

Pop over to your client machine, fire up REGEDIT and delete HKLM\Sofware\Microsoft\MSLicensing\Store\LICENSExxx. Take out all the license keys under the store.

The client machine will get new keys when it connects successfully the next time around.

TechEd 2011… Come and Gone!

Time sure flies when you spend nearly a week in conference-land! I had a great time at TechEd in Atlanta this year, I spent a lot of time catching up with other Microsoft MVPs, staff and favorite vendors as well as making some new friends. I also had a great time talking to other attendees about Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP) during my session and in the Technical Learning Center during the week.

I didn’t catch as many sessions as I hoped to this year, but you and I can check out the recorded sessions at MSDN’s Channel 9. I caught some sessions on Exchange 2010, but missed one on transitioning to Exchange 2010 because the room filled right before I arrived! That will be on my to-do list when I return to the office next week for sure.

Next year, TechEd returns to Orlando in June. Bring your walking shoes, as always.

TechEd 2011… Here I Come!

Are you gearing up for TechEd 2011 in Altanta, GA? If so, I hope to see you around!

This year, I’m not only looking forward to attending some of the sessions and events, but I’ll also be presenting on MDOP. If you want to check out some the tools in the MDOP and see some demos, be sure to add “WCL311: Solving Common IT Pro Pain Points with the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack” to you schedule.

Other things on my schedule this year are spending some time working the MDOP booth in the TLC area, hitting several of the Exchange 2010 sessions and enjoying the “Women in Technology” luncheon.

I’ll miss out on the Attendee party this year, but I expect it will be a great way to unwind after a packed 4 days of learning and networking.

Adventures with at&t

Here’s a story about how a company can have horrible customer service, yet have some wonderful customer service employees all at the same time. It started over 2 years ago when some at&t representative showed up at our office to review our accounts and help us with our contracts. Now, I’m no at&t contract expert. That’s why you have an account rep who does these things for you. Seriously, telecom contracts are worse that Microsoft licensing.

Anyway, over 2 years ago, it was suggested that we have an ABN account set up so we can get the most discounts, etc, based on our usage. As I understood it, this ABN was like an umbrella account over all our other accounts (PRI, Long Distance, Internet) and we got credit for how much we spend or use. There’s a penalty charge if you don’t use the amount of service you agree on in the contract. We sign all the necessary paperwork and the representative heads off to get all these goodies set up. We do our job by continuing to pay our at&t bills as usual.

A year later, I get a mysterious bill for $15,000. A phone call brings to light that we didn’t meet our “commitment” with the ABN contract, thus the penalty. I thought this was odd and more digging brought to light that our pre-existing accounts were never brought under that ABN account we signed up for the year before.

I called our representative and found out they were no longer assigned to us. A new representative, “Daniel”, showed up to our office, reviewed everything and promised to resolve the issue, since it clearly wasn’t our fault the accounts weren’t put under this umbrella. We were told not to pay the bill and we’d get credited as soon as it was sorted out. That was almost a year ago. Every few weeks, I attempt to follow up, only to be told “it’s being worked on.” I’ve been trusting in at&t to resolve this.

Moving on, last September we upgraded our Internet service, cancelling our old Frame Relay connection and putting in some nice fresh fiber. Little did I know, this new account was properly linked to the ABN account. An account that had a $15,000+ unpaid balance attached to it. (Can you see where this is going?)

I still haven’t heard anything definitive about our billing dispute and haven’t had a real interaction with our “official” account representative, Daniel, in a long while. All my contact was with a technical consultant, “Beth”, that was working with my rep, but I digress.

Then in early March, our Internet connection mysteriously dies – at&t cut our service due to the non-payment of the ABN account. Now, mind you, the account for the Internet service specifically has been paid for every month. A few calls later to Beth and our Internet was back up. Beth tells me not to worry, she’ll contact billing and we’ll get this resolved. It won’t happen again.

Then yesterday, it happens again. I called Beth and got voice mail. I left a message. I called Daniel, got voice mail and left a message. I called Daniel’s boss and got voice mail. Left a message. I called the 800 number for at&t customer service and got “Patrick”. Patrick rocked. He pulled up my account, looked at the ridiculous number of notes on it, muttered something under his breath about how crazy it was that I still had a ticket from June of 2010 and went to find a manager. About a half hour later, I got a call from “Laverne”, who managed to sort enough of it out to get our Internet turned back on. Laverne also rocks.

She couldn’t fix the whole billing issue, but told me that it really needed to be handled by our account team.
I told her I knew that. And that I’ve left several messages. Clearly the phone company loves their voice mail features.

I tweeted about this fine event yesterday. I got a response (and a nice phone call) from “Troy” on at&t’s team who’s monitoring people who vent about at&t on social media venues. Troy lso told me that he’d work on it and I’d have some more information by Monday. Troy also appears to rock, but that remains to be seen.

So while I appreaciate some of the great service and response I get from some at&t employees, I’m overall really annoyed with at&t in general. They have too many departments doing too many different things and no one appears to read any notes before they go throwing switches.

I guess I’ll go leave a few more voice mail messages now.