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 Time time of year everyone is rushing to get things done both work and in their home life. As you rush to the get ready for the holidays – you might also be like a lot of IT folks who relish the time in-between December 25th and new years eve. This slower / quieter time at work could open up an opportunity – a brief window of time - where you can try some things out before the new year.
(I personally loved this break when I worked as an IT admin – I literally had the run of the office and time to try out new things.)
If you are in this situation and are looking for something to try out and expand your skill base to make you into a Hero at work – might I suggest checking out our System Center 2012 product line? It’s currently in Pre-Release RC mode (Release Candidate) that will be upgradeable to Full product when it goes RTM in the new year. Management solutions like our System Center release of products put you in the drivers seat of your datacenter.
- Need to manage the plethora of new devices coming into your office after the workers return with shiny new tablets, slates, iWhatevers – System Center Configuration Manager 2012 has you covered for those Consumerization of IT woes.
- Backups slowing you down? Need something more effective then tape, in multiple geographic locations? System Center Data Protection Manager has you covered.
- Want some down and dirty consultant-in-a-box performance monitoring and optimization across all your datacenter and non Microsoft devices like routers, switches and mystery distributions? System Center Operations Manager 2012 has your back
- Grappling with your physical AND virtual worlds with multiple hypervisors? Living in the land of VMware, Citrix and Hyper-V? System Center Virtual Machine Manager simplifies your virtualization woes and gives you a silver lining to your Private Cloud.
If this isn’t enough to get you interested in getting the jump on your skills adjustment and checking out our latest offerings before they RTM (I mentioned they are upgradeable to RTM, right?) – how about I sweeten the deal for you, while they are downloading?
Let me simplify it for ya.
- Use this link to get started
- Sign in with your WindowsLive ID (to pre-populate your data)
- Verify your SHIPPING details to your mailing address and other pertinent data. (you will want to ensure it is correct)
- click FINISH – the download manager will start to download your evals in one click.
Why was step #3 so important?
We’ll ship you a gift card from a famous Canadian coffee retailer (rhymes with Jim Morton’s) for about 5 double-doubles for your troubles and enjoyment as you work through the evaluations and how they’ll make you a Management guru in your work environment. Heck – you can even check out some of the free online training at www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com while you are waiting for them to complete their DL.
What are you waiting for? Don’t Delay – we’ve only set aside a certain number of cards. Once they are gone – they are gone! That link again is http://www.microsoft.com/canada/technet/system-center/
oh – and before anyone asks – this offer is valid and available to ALL CANADIAN Citizens in Canada, INCLUDING Québec! 
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 As many of you know I work for Microsoft Enterprise Services as a Senior Technical Account Manager. I've been here for 6 years and I constantly get the question “what is it like to work for Microsoft?”. I always answer the same thing. “it’s fantastic!”. You get to work with really smart, interesting people, on challenging engagements. and the environment and culture is second to none.
 While we’re on the subject of places to work. Microsoft Canada has earned the coveted “Best Workplaces in Canada” and we’re very proud of that.
The list was published as a Special National Report in The Globe and Mail on April 12, 2011
Anyway,back to the point of this post. We’re growing. This is a year of growth for us and we are constantly looking for additional talents to join our Services family.
To that end we will be hosting our own Microsoft Canada Career Webinar on On Wednesday, April 20th, at 6:30pm.
By attending you could discover new and exciting career opportunities in the following areas:
- Technical Consulting
- Support Engineering
- Service Delivery Management
By being part of this event and have a chance to interact with leading professionals in the industry. so go. Visit www.microsoft-webinars.com and register for the Webinar.
The webinar will highlight:
- An introduction to Enterprise Services
- Current open opportunities and future growth opportunities
- Testimonials from our technical professionals
you won’t regret it. such an easy thing to do in order to get a glimpse of what’s possible for you.
Cheers!
Pierre Roman, MCITP, ITIL | Senior Technical Account Manager | Directeur de Compte Technique Senior
IT Pro blog | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn 
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As Pierre Roman pointed out on April 5th, Microsoft released its Software iSCSI Target to the Download Center (The Microsoft iSCSI Software Target is now free). I call it The Great Equalizer. Let me explain:
There are two ways of creating shared storage.
- Network Attached Storage (NAS) is file-level storage that you create by formatting a volume on a server (or workstation or NAS device), and then enabling Sharing. Depending on the type of share you can assign different types of permissions to different users and groups. You access a share by using a Share Name (formerly called User Principal Name – UPN) such as \\servername\sharename. If the share was created on a Windows server (or client) you could access the same directory by navigating to the shared location in Windows Explorer.
- Storage Area Networks (SANs) are a block-level shared storage, which means they are accessed very differently. The SAN device is an array of disks that is ‘sliced’ into Logical Unit Numbers (LUNs). Each LUN is in effect its own hard drive, which is assigned a drive letter (i.e.: M:\) and can be formatted by the computer accessing it (using an iSCSI Initiator). This gives us options that we could never have with shares… such as NTFS permissions and actually booting servers from a LUN (diskless boot).
There are actually two different SAN technologies in play:
iSCSI (Internet SCSI), which uses familiar RJ-45 cables and communicates over standard TCI/IP networks. As such all of what we know from basic networking applies, and although it is usually recommended that the storage network be segregated from the production networks, this is often done by using VLAN tags rather than separate NICs (actually referred to as HBAs (Host Bus Adapters) and cables. By default (for those of you implementing or simply studying for an exam), iSCSI traffic is transmitted on TCP Port 3260.
Fibre Channel (FC) uses proprietary ports, cables, and switches. Although it essentially speaks the same language (SCSI protocol) it is encapsulated in Fibre Channel packets. Fibre Channel is usually the more expensive of the two options.
The problem is that neither of these technologies is cheap. While the investment for an organization has obvious benefits and the ROI is apparent, neither technology is really prevalent in small business because of the cost. It is very rare that an individual – even an enthusiast – would have a SAN at home.
Does this really affect anyone? You bet it does.
- It affects the guys trying to get into the industry who don’t enrol in a school, but rather try to learn on their own. They can read all about clustering in books, but until they get their hands on it they will never really know it… and without a SAN they will never really know it.
- It affects the IT Pro who have been pigeon-holed in a role and see no possibility for advancement in their organization, and want to take a few certification exams before they update their CV.
- It affects the small business IT Pro whose organization hasn’t invested in SANs, but wants to grow into the ‘Enterprise.’
- It affects anyone who wants to learn virtualization and pass the MCTS exam for Windows Server Virtualization.
- If you don’t have a SAN that you can play with, it affects you!
Microsoft iSCSI Software Target 3.3 changes all of this.
- It allows an IT Pro – anyone, really – can install it on Windows Server 2008 R2 and create a software iSCSI target – essentially a simulated SAN.
- It is going to allow us to create clusters in our basements, without investing heavily in hardware.
- It means that the youngsters of the industry – our future – can implement and learn Clustering, Live Migration, and all of the other great tools that Windows Server 2008 R2 offers.
- Because it is now a supported product from Microsoft, it means that smaller organizations that are interested in virtualization, but scared that it means they are creating a single point of failure if they aren’t able to invest heavily in a SAN device.
In fact, the product is not new… it was released with Windows Storage Server 2008 R2, which was only available through the OEM channel. Prior to that it was only available internally. Now that it is being made available widely, it is be supported for (smaller) production environments.
So what are you waiting for? Go forth and cluster!
(In my next article I will take you through the step-by-step implementation of the iSCSI Software Target… stay tuned to this space in the next a couple of days!)
Mitch Garvis, MCT | Senior IT Consultant & Trainer | SWMI Consulting
My blog | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn | MVP Profile
I'm a PC 
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I wanted to help out my friend Dan Nerenberg in Montreal with something he’s involved with as part of Microsoft Learning and TechEd NorthAmerica. He’s part of a contest that has four teams of certified professionals competing with each other by helping charities and not for profits in multiple cities across the US en route to TechEd in NewOrleans. You can help him by joining the “Team Red” pit crew at www.itgrandprix.com and selecting “Join The Race” to sign in and associate your Live ID with the team. It’s simple to do, fun to follow the exploits of the team and also do something good for yourself (flex some of that certified learning / exams / helping others muscle) as well as others. If they win the points score / challenges (YOU plan an active online role in the points area) $10,000 will get donated to Team Red’s charity of choice – NetHope – an organization that provides IT services and collaboration amongst international aid organizations. Here’s Dan to explain a bit more how YOU can participate in the points challenge.  IT Pro Team Blog | IT Managers Blog | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn ----------  Hello Everyone,
For those who don’t already know me my name is Daniel Nerenberg, I’m an MCT, MCITP and an MVP for the past 4 years. I am the Team Leader for the Red Team in the IT Grand Prix. This is a competition being put on to raise awareness of Microsoft Learning, Microsoft training opportunities, and Certification. Starting on May 31st My team will be racing throughout the US to help local Charities solve their IT problems. The winning team gets to donate 10 000$ US to the charity of their choice. Our team is racing for the charity NetHope. They work all over the world to help aid groups leverage technology on the ground better. This could include bringing in technical people to build network infrastructure, or providing training to locals so that they can continue to build and support technology that solves all sorts of problems. This race has 2 components. We will be racing on the ground in each city. We will also have online challenges. That’s where you come in. If you could register as a member of the Red Team’s virtual Pit crew on the website www.itgrandprix.com and help us out with some of the online challenges our team would really appreciate it! Once you’re registered here’s how you can help! Let your followers know all about the IT Grand Prix, ask them to sign up for the RED team! How do you help the team GET POINT? Complete online challenges!! You can start right now: 
Challenge: Take a certification exam Criteria: The team with the most MCP exams taken by their pit crew between May 1 and June 4, 2010 wins the challenge. Action: Register with Prometric and take your exam by June 4, 2010. No other action required. 
Challenge: Recruit friends and colleagues to join your pit crew Criteria: Each certification held by each new pit crew member (though May 21, 2010) is worth points to your team. | 1 point | MCDST, MCSA, MCAD | | 2 points | MCSE, MCSD, MCDBA, MCTS | | 3 points | MCITP, MCPD | | 4 points | MCM, MCA | Action: Recruit your friends and colleagues to join your pit crew by May 21, 2010 
Challenge: Participate in Born to Learn Discussion Forums Criteria: In the IT Grand Prix forum, your ground team will moderate discussion threads. Participate in those discussions and the team with the most relevant posts wins the challenge. Action: Visit the ITGP forum, find your team's threads ( your team color will be in the title), and participate in the discussion. 
Challenge: Did you know you can track the number of times your VBC is viewed? Create and promote your Virtual Business Card to win this challenge. Criteria: The team with the most cumulative views of their pit crew's Virtual Business Cards wins. Action: Create your VBC and share it. Make sure you have the VBC linked from our servers (image versions do not count)! 
Challenge: Take the Are You Certifiable Challenge Criteria: Play the Windows 7 track and the team with the highest cumulative score will win. Action: Play Are You Certifiable, (make sure you login with the same Live ID you used to register for IT Grand Prix), and select the Windows 7 track. 
Challenge: Update your newsletter subscription preferences Criteria: We recently added the ability for you to choose how you want to receive your MCP or MCT newsletter: monthly, weekly, or even daily. The team with the most people who have updated or confirmed their subscription preferences wins. That's it! Action: Update or confirm your subscription preferences. Update your MCP Flash newsletter preferences Update your MCT Flash newsletter preferences We also have a Facebook fan page where we will update you as we move throughout the challenge you can find here: If you want to find out more about NetHope check out www.nethope.org Thanks so much for helping out! If you have any questions about this don’t hesitate to reach out! Daniel Nerenberg
Principal Consultant InfraOp Inc
MCT,MCITP,MCTS,MCSE,MCSA,MCP
Microsoft MVP – App-V Twitter: @danieldcn | Blog: http://thelazyadmin.com 
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Yesterday the Windows team disclosed some information on what you can expect for Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2. While there are no new features set for Windows 7 SP1 there is a change to XP Mode available for Windows 7 Professional and up. Until now your computer needed to support hardware assisted virtualization for XP Mode to run but that has changed. XP Mode will now run on all CPUs! This is great for those people with 2+ year old computers that have the horsepower to run Windows 7 but don’t have the CPU extensions, or the BIOS support to enable hardware assisted virtualization. You can get the bits here.. The more exciting news (to me anyway) were the announcements around Server 2008 R2 SP1. There are two big new features that will be released with this service pack… RemoteFX is a technology (from the Calista acquisition in 2008) that give remote workers using Remote Desktop Services (aka Terminal Services) the full Windows Aero desktop environment, support for full motion video, Silverlight apps and 3D applications. You’ll be able to extend the same experience to users with thin clients accessing a VM on Hyper-V R2 as they would get on a full featured PC. Dynamic Memory is a technology that will allow you to dynamically allocate memory to VMs running on a Hyper-V R2 host. Now those of you with experience with ESX might think this is like memory overcommit but it is different. In a nutshell both technologies allow you to assign more memory to your VMs than the host has. For example I can start 5 VMs each with 4GB of RAM eventhough the host only has 16GB of RAM. Memory Overcommit is different in that it uses paging files for that extra address space. As you are aware paging has a negative impact on performance. I am simplifying but that’s basically it. Today, on a Hyper-V host when you assign a VM 4GB of memory and start it, it locks out the 4GB of address space on the host for that VM. Now that VM might only be utilizing 1GB meaning that the other 3GB is essentially idle until the VM requires it. With Dynamic Memory we will still assign the VM 4GB of RAM however it will only lock the address space the VM is utilizing leaving the rest available for other VMs. When a VMs memory utilization increases, it will draw from that pool and when memory utilization decreases it will release it back into the pool. Again I am simplifying things but that is how it works in a nutshell. What this means is that you’ll be able to use the physical memory in your Hyper-V hosts more efficiently without impacting performance in your production environments. You can see a demo of RemoteFX and find out more about these changes at http://www.desktopvirtualizationhour.com 
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As we announced in 2008, support for Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) will end on July 13, 2010. Support for Windows 2000 will end on the same date. Support for Windows Vista Release to Manufacturing (RTM) will end on April 13, 2010. NOTE: There is no Service Pack 3 for the 64-bit version of Windows XP. If you are running the 64-bit version of Windows XP with Service Pack 2, you are on the latest service pack and will continue to be eligible for support and receive updates until April 8, 2014. To find out if you are running the 64-bit version of Windows XP, right-click My Computer, then click Properties. If you do not see "64-bit" listed, then you are running the 32-bit version and you need to install Service Pack 3 . If "64-bit" is listed under System, then you are running the 64-bit version. If you are running Windows Vista RTM then you need to download and install at least Service Pack 1 but I would recommend installing Service Pack 2. If you already have either of those installed you will continues to be eligible for support. If you are running Windows 2000 you will need to upgrade to XP SP3, Vista SP1 (or SP2) or Windows 7 to continue to receive support. You can find out more about what is supported and until when on the enterprise products support lifecycle page. 
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Note: I was very excited to learn more about the new Windows Phone 7 Series launch that happened on Monday. So much so – I tethered my Samsung Omnia II phone to my laptop in order to browse around and find out more details while I was up at the cottage. In case you missed it – My colleague Joey Devilla did an Awesome post on the launch, details and resources over on the Developer Connection blog. Rather then duplicate his efforts – I’ve brought it over here for you to have a look see. Make sure you check out the Channel 9 video for a real nice look at it (it’s better then the actual Launch IMHO). The post in it’s entirety is below: 
A New Windows for the Phone Ever since joining The Empire, I’ve been saying that Windows Mobile needs to go back to the drawing board. While there was good technology lying in its innards – mobile versions of the .NET framework, SQL Server and Office – treating the mobile form factor as “the desktop, but much, much smaller”, was the wrong approach. In the meantime, the Esteemed Competition were doing the right thing: designing their phones’ OS features and interface from the ground up rather than attempting to force-fit the desktop UI into a pocket UI. Today at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Microsoft previewed the latest in a series of steps forward – consider Xbox to Xbox 360, Windows Vista to Windows 7, Live Search to Bing – there’s now Windows Phone 7 Series. A Quick Look at the Windows Phone Experience A good starting point is this video, which covers Windows Phone’s features in three minutes, thirty seconds: You can take an interactive tour of the UI at the Windows Phone 7 Series site: 
A Closer Look at the Windows Phone Experience Over at Channel 9, Laura Foy has posted her interview with Joe Belfiore, VP Windows Phone 7 Program Management, who gave her a walkthrough of the goodies in Windows Phone (the video is 22 minutes, 18 seconds):  Some quick notes from the video: - There are three mandatory hardware buttons, which are context-sensitive:
- Back
- Windows (the “Start” button)
- Search
- The screen is a capacitive touch-screen, capable of supporting multi-touch
- The Start menu is built up of tiles: little block representing the information and features that you care most about
- You can add your own custom tiles; Joe shows a “me” tile linked to his Facebook profile
- A browser with:
- Snappy performance
- Support for multitouch actions such as pinch zoom, double-tap to zoom and finger drag
- Very readable text, that to sub-pixel positioning in HTML
- Phone number recognition in HTML documents; touch them to dial them
- Street address recognition in HTML documents; touch them to get a map
- Multiple tabs
- The “People Hub”
- Aggregates Exchange, Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo! Mail and other mail contacts
- Provides a live feed of your contacts
- Context-sensitive search:
- Press the “Search” button while in the People Hub, and you search your people list
- Press the “Search” button while in the Start menu, and it runs a web search
- Based on your query, it knows whether to give you a web search result or a local search result
- In the demo, Joe does a search for pizza and gets a map and results for pizzerias near him, and a quick pan over to adjacent pages yield directions and reviews
- A tap on “nearby” yield the locations of useful things like parking, ATMs and so on near the selected pizzeria
- In another demo search, Joe does a search for “Avatar” and it returns a list of nearby theatres and times for the movie Avatar; a quick pan to an adjacent page yields the results for local business and places with “Avatar” in the name
- Email:
- Easy pivoting between unread, flagged and urgent emails
- A caching system prevents you from seeing the dreaded “loading” screen
- Press “Search” within email and you perform a search of your email messages, by subject, text and so on
- Rotation: you can operate the phone in “portrait” or “landscape” mode
- Calendar:
- Support for both work and personal calendars
- ActiveSync works in the background and keeps the phone synced with email, contacts and calendar
- User-customizable UI colour schemes
- The “Pictures Hub”
- Gallery: Lets you browse all the pictures on your phone
- Mosaic: Recent and favourite pictures
- What’s New: New photos from your social networks
- Camera roll: A folder for photos taken with your phone
- Support for photo albums from Facebook and Windows Live, which you browse as if they lived right on your phone
- Music and Video
- History: Most recently played music and videos
- New: New music and videos added since the last sync
- Zune HD-style marketplace searching and support for Zune subscriptions with unlimited music plays
- The “Me” tile
- Lets you update your status on places like Facebook
- Nice little typing features like auto-spelling-correction and a special soft keyboard for emoticons
- The UI concept: Windows Phone is task-centric, not app-centric, with a hub associated with each: people, photos, media
- There's also a games hub, which ties into Xbox Live
- Third-party applications and games? Wait…
Wait a Minute…What About Third-Party Apps and Games?  Can you wait a month?
Here’s the deal: the announcement at Mobile World Congress was about showing what Windows Phone can do. As for what’s possible on the developer front, it’ll all be announced at the MIX10 Conference, which takes place from March 15th through 17th in Las Vegas. There will be a dozen sessions at MIX10 for Windows Phone, and they promise to be quite interesting. I’ll be at MIX10, and will blog what I learn from these sessions when they take place. You can save $200 off the price of MIX10 registration if you register before February 21st, so if you want to get in on the ground floor with Windows Phone and save some money, register now! What the Tech Press is Saying Pretty good stuff, actually. Rather than bury you with links to a zillion blog entries filed from Mobile World Congress, I thought I’d pick two of the big tech blogs, Gizmodo and Engadget: Here’s what Gizmodo has to say about the new Windows Phone: It's different. The face of Windows Phone 7 is not a rectangular grid of thumbnail-sized glossy-looking icons, arranged in a pattern of 4x4 or so, like basically every other phone. No, instead, an oversized set of bright, superflat squares fill the screen. The pop of the primary colors and exaggerated flatness produces a kind of cutting-edge crispness that feels both incredibly modern and playful. Text is big, and beautiful. The result is a feat no phone has performed before: Making the iPhone's interface feel staid. If you want to know what it feels like, the Zune HD provides a taste: Interface elements that run off the screen; beautiful, oversized text and graphics; flipping, panning, scrolling, zooming from screen to screen; broken hearts. Some people might think it's gratuitous, but I think it feels natural and just…fun. There's an incredible sense of joie de vivre that's just not in any other phone. It makes you wish that this was aesthetic direction all of Microsoft was going in. Here are Engadget’s impressions, after having some hands-on time with Windows Phone: The design and layout of 7 Series' UI (internally called Metro) is really quite original, utilizing what one of the designers (Albert Shum, formerly of Nike) calls an "authentically digital" and "chromeless" experience. What does that mean? Well we can tell you what it doesn't mean -- no shaded icons, no faux 3D or drop shadows, no busy backgrounds (no backgrounds at all), and very little visual flair besides clean typography and transition animations. The whole look is strangely reminiscent of a terminal display (maybe Microsoft is recalling its DOS roots here) -- almost Tron-like in its primary color simplicity. To us, it's rather exciting. This OS looks nothing like anything else on the market, and we think that's to its advantage. Admittedly, we could stand for a little more information available within single views, and we have yet to see how the phone will handle things like notifications, but the design of the interface is definitely in a class of its own. (In another article, Engadget simply summed it up with “Microsoft is playing to win”.) Watch this Space! We’ll have more announcements about Windows Phone over the next few weeks, so keep an eye on this blog! [This article also appears in Global Nerdy.] 
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 Hi I’m Christian Beauclair, Senior Developer Advisor at Microsoft Canada. Listening to IT Professionals across Canada, we heard clearly that in today’s ever-changing IT environment, you are tasked with finding new ways to with do more with less. From increasing productivity, reducing costs, and helping your organization move forward, flexibility is the key and you are looking for a solution, not just technology to meet your needs. We’ve also heard loud and clear it is a challenge keeping up with technology.
It’s my role and our team’s mission to ensure that we support you in understanding the possibilities of what technology can do to help you deliver on real-world solutions. That’s why we created the Energize IT Program. Energize IT is about showing you what’s possible from a solution perspective, connecting you with your peers while highlighting what others are doing in an effort to support you and your organization. In just a couple of weeks, we will be announcing EnergizeIT program details, including registration options to our complementary event series to TechNet Flash newsletter subscribers. If you are not a subscriber, I’d encourage you to subscribe today! 2010 EnergizeIT program will be kicking off and wanted to give you a heads up. This year’s focus is on how you can leverage the Microsoft platform to help satisfy business requirements while increasing IT and end-user productivity. Through Energize IT: From the Client to the Cloud events that are being scheduled in cities across Canada , along with webcasts, our team will show you how to take advantage of the Microsoft-based platform to help your organization navigate the choppy waters of the current reality, and help provide guidance on how to get there. You will learn how to help reduce capital costs while increasing scalability through Microsoft’s Client and Cloud approach of bringing together the best aspects of Software and the best aspects of the Internet - Software+Services. We’ll also show you the value and potential of the new Microsoft Office 2010 platform, including SharePoint 2010, to take the way you work to the next level, and how to develop the next generation of applications, both on premise and for the Cloud, using Visual Studio 2010. You will see how the power of the Microsoft platform can help you as a developer form a solution perspective. . Subscribe to the TechNet Flash newsletter today to be the first to hear about the free Energize IT program offerings and registration details including, From the Client to the Cloud event series; Community connection events; Install Fest events, podcasts and more. I look forward to connecting with you in the near future, Christian Beauclair
Senior Developer Advisor, Microsoft Canada Inc. 
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This alert is to provide you with an overview of the new security bulletin being released (out-of-band) on January 21, 2010.
New Security Bulletin Microsoft is releasing one new security bulletin (out-of-band) for newly discovered vulnerabilities:
| Bulletin ID | Bulletin Title | Maximum Severity Rating | Vulnerability Impact | Restart Requirement | Affected Software | | MS10-002 | Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer (978207) | Critical | Remote Code Execution | Requires a restart | All supported versions of Internet Explorer on Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008*, Windows 7, and Windows Server 2008 R2*. | | * Where indicated in the Affected Software table on the bulletin Web page, the vulnerabilities addressed by this update do not affect supported editions of Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2008 R2, when installed using the Server Core installation option. Please see the bulletin Web page at the link in the left column for more details. |
Microsoft will host a webcast to address customer questions on this bulletin: Title: Information About Microsoft's January 2010 Out-of-Band Security Bulletin Release Date: Thursday, January 21, 2010, at 1:00 P.M. Pacific Time (U.S. & Canada). URL: http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032440627
Public Resources related to this alert
· Security Bulletin MS10-002 – Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer (978207):
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-002.mspx
· Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC) Blog: http://blogs.technet.com/msrc/
· Microsoft Security Research & Defense (SRD) Blog: http://blogs.technet.com/srd/
· Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) Blog: http://blogs.technet.com/mmpc/
· Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) Blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/sdl/
New Security Bulletin Technical Details
In the following tables of affected and non-affected software, software editions that are not listed are past their support lifecycle. To determine the support lifecycle for your product and edition, visit the Microsoft Support Lifecycle Web site at http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/. | Bulletin Identifier | Microsoft Security Bulletin MS10-002 | | Bulletin Title | Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer (978207) | | Executive Summary | This security update resolves seven privately reported vulnerabilities and one publicly disclosed vulnerability in Internet Explorer. The more severe vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user views a specially crafted Web page using Internet Explorer.
The security update addresses these vulnerabilities by modifying the way that Internet Explorer handles objects in memory, validates input parameters, and filters HTML attributes.
This security update also addresses the vulnerability first described in Microsoft Security Advisory 979352. | | Affected Software | All supported versions of Internet Explorer on Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008*, Windows 7, and Windows Server 2008 R2*.
* Where indicated in the Affected Software table on the bulletin Web page, the vulnerabilities addressed by this update do not affect supported editions of Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2008 R2, when installed using the Server Core installation option. Please see the bulletin Web page at the link below for more details. | | CVE, Exploitability Index Rating | · CVE-2010-0244: Uninitialized Memory Corruption Vulnerability (EI = 1) · CVE-2010-0245: Uninitialized Memory Corruption Vulnerability (see note below) · CVE-2010-0246: Uninitialized Memory Corruption Vulnerability (see note below) · CVE-2010-0247: Uninitialized Memory Corruption Vulnerability (EI = 1) · CVE-2010-0248: HTML Object Memory Corruption Vulnerability (EI = 2) · CVE-2010-0249: HTML Object Memory Corruption Vulnerability (EI = 1) · CVE-2009-4074: XSS Filter Script Handling Vulnerability (see note below) · CVE-2010-0027: URL Validation Vulnerability (EI = 1)
Note: Please see the Exploitability Index table of the bulletin summary page for more details: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms10-jan.mspx | | Attack Vectors | · A maliciously crafted Web page · A maliciously crafted HTML e-mail | | Mitigating Factors | · Users would have to be persuaded to visit a malicious Web site. · Exploitation only gains the same user rights as the logged on account. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights. · By default, all supported versions of Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Outlook Express open HTML e-mail messages in the Restricted Sites zone. · By default, IE on Windows 2003 and Windows 2008 runs in a restricted mode. | | Restart Requirement | The update will require a restart. | | Bulletins Replaced by This Update | MS09-072 | | Publicly Disclosed?
Exploited? | CVE-2010-0249 has been publicly disclosed prior to release. CVE-2010-0249 has been exploited in the wild at release. | | Full Details | http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/MS10-002.mspx | | | | Regarding Information Consistency
Microsoft’s security content posted to the Web is occasionally updated to reflect late-breaking information. If this results in an inconsistency between the information here and the information in Microsoft’s Web-based security content, the information in Microsoft’s Web-based security content is authoritative.
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Are you running Windows XP? Are you feeling the pressure of creating a deployment plan? Have no fear! Leveraging learning’s from two Windows 7 early adopters this session will give you the skills you need to proceed with your own deployment. The session will focus on free Windows 7 deployment planning and deployment tools that customize operating system packages and automate deployment planning and network deployments seamlessly. Look for a city near you and come out and learn how to deploy Windows 7 into your organization! Vancouver – January 26 Victoria –January 27 Winnipeg-January 28 Calgary-February 2 Edmonton-February 4 Mississauga-February 8 Waterloo-February 11 Montreal-March 2 Ottawa-March 3 (note date may change to the 4th) Regina-March 16 Saskatoon-March 18 
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 Ladies and Gentlemen – start your download engines.
Like most of the “geek” world of technical enthusiasts and professionals who have been waiting with baited breath for the official RTM ISO files to be available – I have been watching the Subscriber Download site most of the day in the background and hitting refresh periodically. Well – the wait is over.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-ca/subscriptions/securedownloads/default.aspx
(alternate “top downloads” link for faster download of ISO only)
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/subscriptions/securedownloads/dd692862.aspx
I’ve got it up and running on a couple of boxes (grabbed an internal ISO last week) and I can say that I’m quite impressed.
While you are waiting for the download to complete – some things to think about:
- You can install without a key and have it run for 30 days. Great for a lab environment.
- there are plenty of resources you should check out – notably the Canadian SpringBoard site.
- There is an “upgrade advisor” tool to see if your hardware and applications have any known issues (get it here).
- Check out the great video series on XP to Windows 7 migration my friends Adam Carter and the gang from edge.technet.com have created.
- If you have a Beta or RC version installed now – you are going to want to use migwiz.exe to save your data/settings and do a clean install.
- Looking for some great technical training on Windows 7? Check out www.techdays.ca to register for the client track at a city near you.
Share your experiences and thoughts on Windows 7 here on the blog, Drop me an email for inclusion in a future post or blog / tweet / facebook it yourself. Use the #cdnwin7 tag to stay connected with other Canadian experiences with Windows 7.
Happy Downloading!
Rick Claus | Senior IT Pro Advisor | Microsoft Canada
phone 613.940.3320 | Live messenger rick.claus@hotmail.com
IT Pro blog | IT Manager blog | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn
My Shared Bookmarks
I'm a PC
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Culminis and Microsoft’s User Group Support Services (UGSS) are pleased to announce their co-sponsorship of a 9 User Group tour of Canada, between May 26 and June 18, 2009, by world renowned security expert, Kai Axford (CISSP, MCSE-Security). Kai is a Senior Security Strategist in Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing Group and is based in Dallas, Texas. A ten-year Microsoft veteran, Kai is responsible for discussing and recommending security solutions for both private and public sector organizations. In addition, he conducts Chief Security Officer councils worldwide, taking executive feedback and affecting change within Microsoft’s security products and processes. Kai started with Microsoft in 1999 as a Server Support Engineer and then moved on to become an IT Pro Evangelist, focusing on his peers through the Microsoft TechNet Events program. Kai has delivered more than 300 security presentations on a variety of topics, including digital forensics, security management, incident response, and computer espionage. He is a frequent speaker at security conferences, executive meetings, and business seminars around the world. He is finishing an MBA in Information Assurance and is a member of ISSA, INFRAGARD, ASIS, and the North Texas Electronic Crimes Task Force. He was the recipient of the 2006 “Rising Star” award from the Information Security Executive council. Kai is interested in security management and hopes to become a Chief Security Officer one day. Prior to Microsoft, Kai served as a leader in several real-world operations with the U.S. Army's elite 75th Ranger Regiment. Kai is an outstanding speaker and is in constant demand around the world. So we are very fortunate indeed to be able to provide this opportunity. Following 3 hugely successful previous tours of Canada Kai is back for a 4th time. Kai’s presentation will cover: · Windows 7 Security Tidbits - Windows 7 is coming and the boss is asking you about all those new security features. Perhaps you've heard some buzz about AppLocker? What’s this about DirectAccess connecting securely to your corporate network without a VPN? What’s up with BitlLocker To Go? In this fun and interactive session, Kai Axford, a Microsoft Senior Security Strategist with Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing team, will demonstrate some of the new security features in Microsoft's newest desktop operating system. Bring your questions and get the scoop on these upcoming Microsoft security technologies! · Understanding and Preventing Insider Threat – Many analysts have stated that the Number One issue facing corporate customers today is the threat of targeted corporate espionage coming from within the organization. Join Kai Axford, a security strategist from the Microsoft Trustworthy Computing team for an entertaining and engaging session, as he shares real stories from the trenches about the risk this threat presents for both you and your customers. He’ll demo the means by which these attacks occur and discuss the mindset of the attackers. Don’t miss the chance to see how this is done! Mississauga - May 26 - https://www.clicktoattend.com/invitation.aspx?code=138016 Toronto - May 27 - http://www.task.to/events/upcoming.php Winnipeg - May 28 - https://www.clicktoattend.com/invitation.aspx?code=137944 Montreal - June 2 - http://www.mitpro.ca Quebec -June 4 -http://www.gsiq.org/ Vancouver - June 16 - http://www.clicktoattend.com/?id=137335 Edmonton -June 17 - http://www.clicktoattend.com/?id=137132 Calgary – June18 - http://www.clicktoattend.com/?id=137822 For those who can’t make those events there will also be two LiveMeeting sessions where you will be able to take part in the presentations as well. Live Meeting SESSION 1 - Windows 7 Security Tidbits (6/9/2009 12:00 PM (CDT)) June 9 6/9/2009 12:00 PM (CDT) https://www.livemeeting.com/lrs/microsoft1/Registration.aspx?pageName=7kt1pnfszjxs6dcc Live Meeting SESSION 2 - Understanding and Preventing Insider Threat June 11 6/11/2009 12:00 PM (CDT) https://www.livemeeting.com/lrs/microsoft1/Registration.aspx?pageName=82ftzmtpd8dcbwg5 
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Note: To be completely transparent – I am pulling for Halifax on this one. :-) I was born in Fredericton, grew up in Saint John and have a particular soft spot for “out east” or “down home” when it comes to this question. A couple of weeks ago, my colleagues and I were swinging through the Atlantic Region with a whirlwind tour of 5 cities over 4 days as part of EnergizeIT. We took the opportunity to meet with as many people as possible during the structured events in the evenings, but we also went out of our way to hold informal/unstructured “meet and greet” events like ”CoffeeAndCode” in each location. The method to our Madness was really to get out, be accessible and make some new connections as well as keeping up the existing ones. We don’t get the opportunity to get out East as much as we’d like to – we have to take advantage of every trip down that way that we can. Not surprisingly, one conversation topic that came up a lot was “Why doesn’t Microsoft care about <insert: Halifax, St. John’s, Moncton, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Atlantic Provinces> and why don’t you come down this way more often?”. You know what? We do care, but like everyone else – we have constraints on two resources: Resources and Money. If you’ve followed this blog or know my team – we’re 7 people that cover all of Canada and our mission is to make a difference in the Canadian ICT community by being the face to Microsoft – connecting and LISTENING to you – all of you. Remember those constraints? Well, 7 people have a budget we are able to allocate to travel and expenses – and it’s stretched pretty darn thin over the course of the year. This means we have to make choices whenever we plan “what we do” and “where we do it”. This brings me to the title of this post - “7th City for TechDays 2009 – Halifax or Edmonton?”. A quick bit of review for those not familiar with what is TechDays in Canada. TechDays was our first “Paid For” event that my team produced in Canada last year. It’s goal was to provide Technical Training to multiple geographies in Canada based on the best of the best content pulled from TechEd, Mix’08, TechReady (internal technical training exclusive to MS) and PDC. It was delivered by Microsoft employees AS WELL AS local Technical Experts (76 of them across Canada) focusing on current technologies and current issues you are facing today in your work environments. This was about as FAR AWAY from marketing as you could get and was designed to hit the sweet-spot depth of content level for 80% of the technical audience who would be attending. I said “Paid for” event – but it was setup internally to be a cost recovery conference with a modest cost of $500 for 2 days of sessions (with an early bird price of 50% off). So in a nutshell, we were bringing the best 40 sessions of technical content to a city near you where you had an a-la-carte selection of 8 sessions over two days with 5 tracks of sessions to choose from. How was it received by last years attendees – phenomenally well, exceeding our expectations. There is no way we could not do this again this year – so we are, but with a slight twist.  We’ve made all the cities 2 day cities and we’re going to most likely keep the price the same as last year ($500 for two days with a 50% savings in the form of an early bird rate). The full price and early bird discount is still not 100% official, but it is definitely looking like it is going to be in the same range as last year.
We’ve booked venues in 6 of the 7 cities. Vancouver (9/14&15/2009) and Toronto (9/29&30/2009) are up first for the month of September, with Montreal (12/2&3/2009), Ottawa (12/9&10/2009) and Winnipeg (12/15&16/2009) taking the month of December. Smack in the middle of November is Calgary (11/17&18/2009) and one UNKNOWN city on the 25th and 26th. The challenge – where should it be? The cool part – You decide! Your choice is either: -> The Atlantic Region with it taking place in Halifax (11/25&26/2009)
-> Another Western Region city with it taking place in Edmonton (11/25&26/2009) How are we measuring interest in either of these two choices? You have to send my colleague Damir Bersinic an email indicating how many people at your place of work are willing to commit to coming out and registering for one of these two cities? Remember – this is a Technical Training Conference that was designed from the ground up to give you the skills you need to be successful in your job. Either you, your boss or others on your team need to send in an email of support for either the Halifax OR Edmonton location of the November 25th&26th open slot. It has to be in by MAY 15th in order to count. The city that shows the most support by email by May 15th will become the 7th confirmed city for Techdays 2009. <Atlantic region bias> Hey Atlantic Canada – I’m talking to you. We’re BEHIND the level of support already expressed by Edmonton.
If Halifax is going to be an option – we need to get the vote out! </Atlantic region bias> I’m very excited to be part of the team that is putting TechDays on in Canada once again – it was an absolute blast last year. We’re getting more community involvement with content selection this year and we’re already deep in planning stages to make it a bigger success then last year. We are aiming to have the updated TechDays website up and online in June with a complete listing of tracks, sessions, dates, speakers and all sorts of resources live for you to see as well as registration for TechDays Canada 2009. IT Pro Team Blog | IT Managers Blog | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn My Shared Bookmarks
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Wait a second!
Why am I announcing this on the Canadian IT Pro blog? Well – I wanted to bring this resource to your attention as well… and maybe ask you a favor.
What? Why?
We have been talking about Infrastructure Optimization for a while now. We went out last fall to IT Managers (your bosses) with the AlignIT series of events and talked about Infrastructure Optimization – this time in their terms. In case you forget - you can use the tools we provide with IO optimization and identify areas in your IT arsenal that could stand to be shored up or improving in order to make your overall life as an IT Professional more proactive instead of reactive.
Besides showing you where you can get more information on Infrastructure Optimization, I thought I would give you the tools to give to your management in order to discover this type of information themselves by announcing to you “the IT Manager Portal now online.” I thought it would be good to ask YOU to share the news about the portal with your boss and with your team. One thing that we’re trying to address with the IT Manager Portal is the aggregation of contextually relevant information for IT Managers. Right now, information for IT Managers is rather fragmented across multiple sites and not necessarily easy to locate. Our team hopes that with the creation of this portal, we’ve taken steps to address this.
So here it is – we’ve launched a portal specifically designed for IT Managers in Canada.
I spent some time perusing the page recently and I wanted to draw your attention to some highlights:
- Direct contact / email to our team. Damir Bersinic is our point person for IT Manager related activities and resources on our team. He’s put up his info and email address right on the page in case you have any need to talk or make a connection to someone who’s passionate about IT Managers at Microsoft.
- Links to our most asked for resources from AlignIT – our IO model, evaluation tools and reference information. We’ve got Infrastructure, Application Platform and Business productivity highlighted on the main page with more resources to follow.
- Hot Topics like Licensing and platform architecture / blueprints for solutions.
- Beneath the fold resources include links to Podcasts, webcasts, events and training for IT Managers and your staff.
The design of the page is such that we can feed in new and relevant content as we create it or as it’s identified to us as something to share. It is also designed to leverage Social Bookmarking from our TechNet/MSDN community driven Social bookmarking engine.
Check out the site – give Damir or myself your feedback and ping us if you feel there is something we can add to provide more value to the IT Manager Portal. Let us know what you think and what your manager / team thinks of the resource.
I am anxious to see how it evolves over time.
![3132742065_d10cff983c_o[1]](http://blogs.technet.com/blogfiles/canitpro/WindowsLiveWriter/NewCanadianITManagerportalnowonline_C76F/3132742065_d10cff983c_o%5B1%5D_thumb.jpg "3132742065_d10cff983c_o[1]")
IT Pro blog | IT Manager blog | Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn
My Shared Bookmarks 
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