July 2010 - Posts

• Sysadmin Appreciation Day

  The last Friday of July is “officially” Sysadmin Appreciation Day.  The day to pat your self on the back and receive the accolades you all deserve for keeping things running and maintaining sanity while dealing with complaints such as “The Internet is down”. It’s a tough job but someone’s got to do it!  So take some time, enjoy the day, laugh at one of my favourite videos from DeadTroll.com and take off a little early and have a beer.  You deserve it!  Posted Friday, July 30, 2010 11:17 AM from Canadian IT Professionals | 0 Comments

• TechDays 2010 Session Abstracts & Local Flavours Submission Guidelines Now Available

  Over the last few weeks I have been getting more and more emails from individuals wondering when the abstracts for the 50+ sessions available at TechDays 2010 will be posted.  The wait is over!  You can view all of the sessions and their abstracts at www.techdays.ca/sessions  - remember to click on each track to see the sessions that are available in that track. I am really excited about this year’s content.  We have sessions on how to develop applications in Silverlight for both the PC as well as Windows Phone 7.  We have an entire track with great sessions where you will learn the tips and tricks of deploying Windows 7, Office 2010, Office Web Apps, and more in your organization, as well as how to troubleshoot when things go awry.  The Collaboration: The Next Generation track has sessions on migrating to SharePoint 2010 as well as Exchange 2010, and how to protect the content in these critical business applications, and more.  You will also learn how to take advantage of Microsoft-based development tools and good development practices and procedures to optimize the development and testing of applications whether developing as a group or individually.  Finally, you will learn how to effectively use virtualization in a variety of scenarios, protect your infrastructure, and tricks on how to make Active Directory work for you.  The best part is that you don’t have to pick sessions from only a single track.  You can make your own customized agenda of TechDays 2010 sessions allowing you to grow the skills you need in your job.  If you have not yet registered for TechDays 2010, register now at www.techdays.ca and then click on the “My Schedule” link in the top right to build your agenda; if you have already registered, go to www.techdays.ca and sign in with your Windows LiveID to start building your schedule. One more thing…there are six tracks at TechDays 2010 but you will notice that www.techdays.ca/sessions only lists sessions in 5 of them.  The Local Flavours track and its content is up to you and your peers!  We are looking for passionate individuals (developers, IT professionals, designers, IT architects, etc.) who have an idea for a great session to let us know and submit their session for possible inclusion at TechDays 2010 in your city.  The submission form and information on the process can be found at http://www.techdays.ca/sessions?Track=Local+Flavours.  Please download both documents, fill out the submission form with your great session idea and email to us at td_can@microsoft.com.  TechDays 2010 is shaping up to be the best yet.  Please visit www.techdays.ca for more information or to register and take advantage of the Early Bird rate of $349.99 plus tax - (about 50% off the full conference fee of $699.99). If you have a question about TechDays, send me an email at td_can@microsoft.com and I’ll get you an answer.  I REALLY do love getting your emails. Damir Bersinic TechDays 2010 Program & Skills Manager Microsoft Canada Posted Monday, July 19, 2010 10:53 AM from Canadian IT Professionals | 0 Comments Filed under: TechDays_ca, TechDays, #techdays_ca

• Security Bulletins for the Regular IT Guy - Episode 18 - July 2010

  Over pints Pierre Roman, Bruce Cowper and Rick Claus decided they would put together a concise and timely podcast each “Update Tuesday”. The object is to keep it simple by letting you know in plain non technical language what the updates are, what they resolve and why you should care. Have a listen directly from the embedded Silverlight player OR subscribe to the feed and download it to your iTunes / Zune software.  As always - if you have suggestions on making it better - please pass on your comments. Mail Rick directly  – rick.claus@microsoft.com Direct Download: Subscribe to the podcast: (so you don't miss an episode)   Disclaimer: This podcast was produced with the best information available to us at the time of recording. Your primary source for all things Security Bulletin related should always be the Microsoft Security Response Center blog. In Depth Webcast on this bulletin will take place: Wednesday, July 14th - 11:00 a.m. PST (UTC -8). (Registration link): Bulletins discussed for July 13th, 2010: MS10-042 - Vulnerability in Help and Support Center Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2229593) MS10-043 - Vulnerability in Canonical Display Driver Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2032276) MS10-044 - Vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office Access ActiveX Controls Could Allow Remote Code Execution (982335) MS10-045 - Vulnerability in Microsoft Office Outlook Could Allow Remote Code Execution (978212) Podcast Participants: Rick Claus and Pierre Roman Additional Technical Show Notes: Recorded at Mexicali Rosas on their patio in the Glebe, Ottawa, Ontario. Beverage of choice – a pair of frosty Corona’s with lime – no glasses. PodSafe music from PodSafe Music Network @ http://music.podshow.com/. Artist: Derek K Miller, song - “You’re the Big Sky - rock guitar instrumental” IT Pro Team Blog | IT Managers Blog |Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn Posted Tuesday, July 13, 2010 11:36 AM from Canadian IT Professionals | 0 Comments Filed under: Podcast, IT Guy / IT Gal, Rick Claus, Pierre Roman, Security Bulletins Podcast

• Cloud Services and IT Professionals – the prequel

  I’ve opened a can of worms with a post a couple of months back (ok – a LOT of months back – was it REALLY February?) about should IT Professionals care about Cloud Services yet and what type of cloud service would have a direct impact on IT Pros daily lives. That post had over 22 comments (albeit a big number from “mike”) prodding for more information about Privacy and Security (two very different things when it comes to cloud) and impact on things like Patriot act and other legislation here in Canada and around the world. This is not “the special post on security and privacy and all that S#&t” .  That one comes later THIS WEEK.  Yes “mike”, it’s finally almost here - months after you brought it up. The team has been busy, we’ve been planning and I’ve been talking with people inside and outside Microsoft about privacy, legislation, regulation, patriot act, security, ISO standards and the like. I’ve even been polling people on Twitter, facebook and Linked’in asking if they could give me their thoughts on their concerns on Cloud Services. Take a moment and fill out your response to this simple question: What concerns you about using “The Cloud” and hosted services? As for services that will impact IT Pros daily lives – have you checked out Windows InTune beta? It’s targeted at small and medium sized businesses for giving them a cloud based solution for anti-malware and antivirus, centralized reporting and control, software and hardware inventory and it’s independent of domain membership / workgroup membership / physical location. It’s in Beta now and was open (now closed) to the first 10,000 signups.  As of Yesterday (July 12th) it opened again (still open) for another 10,000 participants – I signed up and am using it on a dozen different PC’s and laptops I look after as the “friends and family” IT Consultant we all are. I’ll have a more detailed post on the overall experience and my thoughts on it – but I wanted to let you know it’s open once again for signups – go try it out!    IT Pro Team Blog | IT Managers Blog |Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn Posted Tuesday, July 13, 2010 8:37 AM from Canadian IT Professionals | 0 Comments Filed under: Commentary, Rick Claus, Security Bulletins Podcast, Azure

• Getting serious about OS Deployment with MDT 2010 Update 1

  Over at the Windows team blog – Stephen Rose wrote about the new RTM update of Microsoft Deployment Toolkit 2010 to what’s known as Update 1. For those of you familiar with MDT already – this shouldn’t be a surprise to you – it’s an incremental update that has been in the works for a while. For those of you who are NOT familiar with MDT – it’s our FREE (as in beer) solution accelerator that anyone can use working for any company (including independent consultants) of any size (yup – a few PCs to 100’s of thousands) to make their lives SO MUCH EASIER when undertaking the task of deploying and maintaining “builds / images” of workstations. Newbies note below: the basic flow of using MDT for Light Touch and Zero Touch. (more info at Microsoft Deployment Toolkit Home) You can use MDT to create and manage your deployment medium: anything from a simple bootable USB stick all the way up to an integrated mass deployment System Center Configuration Manager or PXE boot process.  Microsoft Deployment Toolkit 2010 Update 1 supports deployment of Windows 7, Office 2010, and Windows Server 2008 R2 in addition to deployment of Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2003, and Windows XP. Existing MDT users note: you will need to update your deployment shares. Make sure they are not currently in use or the upgrade will fail. Earlier reports of wrong files for download links have been resolved. You will need to uninstall Beta Update 1 before installing the final RTM of update 1. Check out Michael Neihaus’s blog for details and READ RELEASE NOTES. If you use MDT with SCCM - new User Driven Installation deployment method. Gives target users more guided control over their deployment. If you are a Light Touch user (USB stick, DVD or other) Office 2010 integration (still supporting older versions of office) Improved Driver importing to more accurately determine what OS version they are targeting. Common for Both SCCM and Light Touch users of MDT 2010 lots of fixes and improvements from Beta and feedback process continued support for older OS and apps (XP, Server 2003, Server 2008, Vista, Office 2007) If MDT is new to you or if you are about to start looking into deployment of new desktops / managed desktops – you really owe it to yourself to refresh your skills with deployment tools. MDT is LIGHTYEARS ahead of what I used to do as an administrator rolling out Sysprep’ed images of Windows 2000 Pro way back when. I’d give my right arm to be able to have MDT available when I was in charge of that customer rollout. Download for MDT 2010 Update 1 (including Print Ready Documentation) IT Pro Team Blog | IT Managers Blog |Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn Posted Thursday, July 08, 2010 11:35 AM from Canadian IT Professionals | 0 Comments Filed under: Microsoft Office, Windows 7, Rick Claus, App Compat

• Thinking of moving to the cloud? Get free compute time with Windows Azure

  Are you a developer looking to launch your new web application? Or perhaps you are an IT Pro or IT Architect trying to understand what “the Cloud” means to you.  Or maybe you have a need for some compute time to run some computations. Regardless of who you are, or why you are thinking about the cloud, Microsoft is making it easy for you try out Windows Azure as well as SQL Azure and AppFabric. If you visit http://www.microsoft.com/windowsazure/offers/ and select the introductory special you will be able to try a limited amount of the Windows Azure platform at no charge.  This offer is available through October 31, 2010 and is limited to one per customer.  For full details and disclosure take a look at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsazure/offers/popup.aspx?lang=en&locale=en-US&offer=MS-AZR-0001P If you are in Canada and have question about Windows Azure, my team and I are here to help and can answer your questions.  We would love to hear what you are using Azure for.  Please feel free to email us at cdnazure@microsoft.com. Posted Wednesday, July 07, 2010 1:55 PM from Canadian IT Professionals | 0 Comments Filed under: Azure