technical solutions and commentary

Ms. Dewey - is a Microsoft Search site which showcases the power of combining Silverlight with Windows Live Search. This site is completely interactive using video to response to your search terms before it provides text results. It also has a “Best Of” button that plays the best interactive video clips for a particular search query.

The site name comes from MS for Microsoft; Dewey from the Dewey decimal system used to catalog item in a library. Combined you get MsDewey.com, which is a very entertaining site.

August 21, 2007, 10:00AM PST - Microsoft launched the Tafiti web site which combimes Windows Live Seach with Microsoft Silverlight technologies to give a unique user experience to internet search. “Tafiti” means “do research” in Swahili is an emperimential search site that is designed to help people use the web for research projects. Search queries can be saved and accessed easily on the web site. The site also allows you to store the results interactively by dragging them to the margin of the website interface. Another advanced feature is the ability to share your relevant search results.

Yout can access tafiti directly from http://www.tafiti.com.

There is a little confusion around the Server and Client Access Licesnes around Exchange 2007. I am going to attempt to clear up the licensing and configuration quesitons in this post. Let’s begin…

There are two types of Exchange Server 2007 Licenses - Standard and Enterprise. This is the same as with Exchange 2003/2000/5.5 etc.

• Exchange Server Standard does not allow clustering and has limits on storage -although starge limited have been tremendously increased.
• Exchange Server Enterprise (from a high level) provides the ability to build high-availabilty clusters, and increases the storage limits per server.

There are two types of Client Access Licenses - Standard and Enterprise.

* this includes such functionality as tying into your phone system and adding voicemail capabilities to the Exchange Mailbox, dialinf into Exchange and having your messages (E-mail, V-mail, Calendar items) read to you over the phone. you can also change calendar items via voice.  

Where the confusion often occurs is that many think that if you have and Enterprise Server you need an Enterprise CAL. This is not the case. Lets run through some examples:

• 1. If you do not need high-availability and do not want the UC functionality, EHS, or Forefront you can purchase Exchange Server Standard and Exchange Standard CAL.
• 2. If you do need high-availability and do not want the UC functionality, EHS, or Forefront you can purchase Exchange Server Enterprise and Exchange Standard CAL.
• 3. If you do not need high-availability and do want the UC functionality, EHS, or Forefront you can purchase Exchange Server Standard and Exchange Enterprise CAL (+Standard CAL).
• 4. If you do need high-availability and do want the UC functionality, EHS, or Forefront you can purchase Exchange Server Enterprise and Exchange Enterprise CAL (+Standard CAL).

This post does not attmept to address scenarios where you may have different Exchange Server roles (such as Mailbox Server, Mail Transport, Hygene, Edge, UC) in the environment where you may mix the editions of Exchange Servers - such as Clustered Mailbox Servers running Exchange Server Enterprise and Hub Transport running on Exchange Server Standard. This post is to help clear up the misunderstanding in the licensing scenarios.

As always, before you make a purchase decision you should work with a Microsoft Certified Partner or you Microsoft Rep to understand and determine your specific licenisng needs.

Here are a few Microsoft resources that will provide further details about the functionality and the licensing of Exchange 2007…

• Exchange Comparison - http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/evaluation/features/ex_compare.mspx
• Exchange Editions (Server & CALs) - http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/evaluation/editions.mspx
• Exchange 2007 FAQ’s - http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/2007/evaluate/topquestions.mspx

The Windows Live team has released an update to Windows Live SkyDrive ( formerly Winodws Live Folders). You can access the service directly from http://skydrive.live.com. The free storage service is in open beta available in the US, UK, and India.

Windows Live SkyDrive has a stoage limit of 500MB which isn’t enough to back up your PC, but is enough to store files you want access to from any PC with internet access. The dirve has default ‘folders’ that allow you to store documents for private use - you will need to login using your Windows Live ID to access. There is also a Public Folders area where you can post doucments and files to be shared with anyone - you can send direct links to the files you want to share as well. This is great for sharing large documents without using Email attachments - as long as the data isn’t sensitive and you don;t care if someine else is able to access the file. IF you need to share private data with someine else you could use “Windows Live SharedView” which allows to to share a desktop, files, etc with another person over the internet. It is sort of a Office Live Meeting lite.

The Windows Live SkyDrive feature update includes:

·         An upgraded look and feel – new graphics to go along with your new features!

·         “Also on SkyDrive” – easily get back to the SkyDrives you’ve recently visited

·         Thumbnail images – we heard you loud and clear, and now you can see thumbnails of your image files

·         Drag and drop your files – sick of our five-at-a-time upload limit? Drag and drop your files right onto your SkyDrive

·         Embed your stuff anywhere – with just a few clicks, post your files and folders anywhere you can post html

Get more information on the Windows Live SkyDrive team blog at http://skydriveteam.spaces.live.com. Tell them what you think, and even suggest service improvements - like the ability to add extra storage for a low cost. :-) 

Windows Server 2008 Group Policy Reference can be downloaded from Mcirosoft.

Windows Server 2008 IIS 7 goal is to enable deployment and operation of high performance, high security, and high availability. Windows Vista IIS 7 is about enabling people to develop applications on IIS.

Bill S does a good job of explaining the technical differences. It’s about half way down the post he has on his blog here: http://blogs.iis.net/bills/archive/2006/09/18/IIS7-_2D00_-Vista-vs.-Longhorn-Server.aspx

These steps will remove IE Hardening (IE Protected Mode) for members of the Administrators and Users group. Only disable IE Protected Mode after serious consideration of the consequences – especially on a Server.

All these steps require Administrator privilege.

1. Set the following registry values:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{A509B1A7-37EF-4b3f-8CFC-4F3A74704073}]

“IsInstalled”=dword:0000000

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{A509B1A8-37EF-4b3f-8CFC-4F3A74704073}]

“IsInstalled”=dword:0000000

2. Run the following command lines: (from an elevated command line window.)

Rundll32 iesetup.dll, IEHardenLMSettings

Rundll32 iesetup.dll, IEHardenUser

Rundll32 iesetup.dll, IEHardenAdmin

3. Delete these registry keys: (must be done after the commands in step 2)

[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{A509B1A7-37EF-4b3f-8CFC-4F3A74704073}]

[-HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{A509B1A8-37EF-4b3f-8CFC-4F3A74704073}] 

Note the minus at the start of the key path is the format for a .reg file to delete a key.

Completing these steps will modify the default home page and add a registry value to show a warning page on first run. 

Optional: Disable the warning page on first run.

Delete the following registry value: 

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main]

“First Home Page”=-  Re-enable IE7 protected mode by reversing the process in steps 1 and 3, step 2 remains unchanged.

I have heard rummers of this type of development project in the past years, but have not seen a good execution of the concept… until now. Take a look at the StartForce Web Browser-based Desktop.  You have to register for a free account which only takes abot 5 minutes. You have a 1 GB file storage and transfer quota with your account. There is a short video demo of this on CNET.

I never thought I would be using a web browser with-in a web browser baased desktop to be surfing the web. - http://www.startforce.com/

An older video, but still one of the funniest spoof videos… “Bill Gates Goes to College” - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKbb1qY5ON8

You can now downlaod two different posters on Windows Server 2008 from Microsoft. These posters provide a detailed visual in the workings of the feature set in Windows Server 2008, and the details of Active Directory in Windows Server 2008.

These posters are a great aide to understading the inner-workings of Windows Server 2008. If you have access to a large format printer, they are great technical poster for adminstrators and engineers to have easy access to.

Download the ‘Windows Server 2008 component posters’ directly from Microsoft.