Vol. 23, #28 - July 16, 2018 - Issue #1190
Free Tool for Monitoring Exchange Server Status & Performance
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In this week's issue of WServerNews we focus our spotlight on Microsoft Hyper-V, the virtualization technology built into the Windows Server platform. You'll also notice that we've made several changes to the layout of our newsletter. For example, we've reorganized and retitled some of the section headings and moved key technical content up front where you can dig into to it more quickly. We've also expanded our Conference Calendar (formerly Events Calendar) to list upcoming conferences by region. And newsletter issues like this one that focus on a specific technology like Hyper-V are now prefixed with the phrase "WServerNews Spotlight" so you can know at a glance what the focus of the issue will be that week.
Anyways, we hope you like the new layout of our newsletter. And please don't forget to tell all your colleagues about WServerNews and recommend they subscribe right away by going here. Thanks!
Now let's dig into some of the recent news about and best technical guidance for Microsoft's Hyper-V virtualization technology.
If you run into difficulties with your Hyper-V hosts and virtual machines running on them, checking the event logs on your hosts is one of the first places you should look. But what kind of events are logged for Hyper-V and where are they found in Event Viewer? This post from the Microsoft Virtualization Blog has a description of each event channel category for Hyper-V:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/l8sti5i6/
If you work with the Hyper-V platform you'll be familiar with its Integration Services which provide important functionally to virtual machines running on Hyper-V hosts. As Hyper-V continues to evolve, so does its Integration Services -- but only up to a point. Chuck Timon has the details in this post on the Ask PFE Platforms blog:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/q6rajlrh/
As this documentation from Microsoft indicates, Hyper-V supports both emulated and Hyper-V-specific devices for Linux and FreeBSD virtual machines:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/ouirlkmt/
Supported flavors of Linux on Hyper-V include CentoOS, Red Hast Enterprise, Debian, SUSE, Ubuntu, and Oracle Linux.
Getting Linux to boot however in a Generation 2 virtual machine needs a small tweak as Microsoft MVP Thomas Maurer explains in this article on his website:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/y9b6wh54/
Microsoft Hyper-V Program Manager Ben Armstrong is no longer posting on his legendary Virtual PC Guy blog, but the blog still has tons of useful content on it if you use Hyper-V in Windows Server 2016 and earlier. You can find Ben's old blog here on MSDN:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/vrtq6mf6/
This step-by-step walkthrough on JDeployment showing how to implement a 3-node failover cluster for Hyper-V is one of my favorites:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/9fub3ve4/
But how do you detect bad state virtual machines in your Hyper-V cluster? This post from Heartbeat From The Datacenter gives a "quick and dirty" way of doing it with PowerShell:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/wldu2qp7/
Veeam the leader in availability across multi-cloud environments has some articles on their blog that can be helpful for administrators who work with the Hyper-V platform:
Hyper-V storage management best practice guide
http://www.wservernews.com/go/10o230r1/
3 Hyper-V management best practices
http://www.wservernews.com/go/zu0s27s1/
And more Veeam blog posts tagged with "Best practices Hyper-V " can be found here:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/gd1slxwh/
Can you recommend any tips, tools, or resources that are helpful for administering Hyper-V? Share your expertise with 500k subscribers of this newsletter by emailing us today at wsn@mtit.com
Got any IT pro tips you'd like to share with other readers of our newsletter? Email us at wsn@mtit.com
By using the new Office 365 Encrypt functionality together with Exchange Online Mail Flow Rules (formerly called Exchange Transport Rules or ETRs) you can now allow users to automatically encrypt emails and supported attachments by simply adding a keyword like #Encrypt to the bottom of their message. Learn how in this blog post by Kevin McKinnerney:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/desxmgzq/
GOT ADMIN TOOLS or other software/hardware you'd like to recommend? Email us at wsn@mtit.com
Join live session to see new features from Microsoft that can take hardening your Veeam backup repository to the next level.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/rzcz13gp/
Using VMware or Hyper-V? Grab your FOREVER Free copy of Altaro VM Backup!
http://www.wservernews.com/go/h510a0sf/
TBA2 lets you easily manage your administrator and other privileged accounts via AD Security Group. Our thanks to reader Marco Nicoletti for pointing this tool out to us:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/npm5kqpw/
Angry IP Scanner is an open-source and cross-platform network scanner designed to be fast and simple to use. Our thanks to reader Mike Hanseman for pointing this utility out to us:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/687u2z1u/
WinMTR is a free network diagnostic tool for Windows that combines the functionality of the traceroute and ping. Our thanks again to reader Mike Hanseman for pointing us to this tool:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/o4e2x6jn/
We continue to hear from readers who responded to our question in Issue #1185 about whether they remember seeing Stanley Kubrick's movie 2001: A Space Odyssey which was released 50 years ago in 1968. For example, here is what Gustavo from Canada says by way of reminiscence:
Hi Mitch. I didn't watch the movie 2001 A Space Odyssey when it came out in 1968 since I was 6 years old. However, I watched it in 1979 when I was in High School. I was flabbergasted by the movie, and in all honestly I didn't understand half the plot. At the same time my school was offering an Astronomy Club for all students, and the main attraction was a brand-new observatory. This perked my interest. So I joined the Club and also got the book "2001: A Space Odyssey" by Arthur C. Clark. I was hooked on both accounts!
After reading the book, I saw the movie again and truly enjoy it. I also started attending weekly meetings of the Astronomy Club. I became a "regular" and when I moved from High School to University, they allowed me to have access to the Observatory and I did a few tours with fellow students. The Professor in charge of the Observatory got me a summer job at the Science Center showing the sky with two telescopes.
It was there I met my future wife. She was working as assistant on the summer program for kids. At some point she joined me on the telescopes … and the rest is history! I literally showed her the Sun, the Moon and the Stars! And we've been married for 28 years.
Great story, thanks for sharing! Any other astronomy fans out there among our newsletter readers? Email us at wsn@mtit.com with your stories, factoids, and questions.
Your Editor has been reading several new books but hasn't had time to properly review them yet, so stay tuned for another episode of Book Corner in an upcoming issue of this newsletter!
Last week's factoid and question was this:
Fact: There are more Australian bees in Canada than there are Canadian people in the world.
Question: What does it feel like to be stung by a bee?
Here are some of the responses we received from readers:
It stings. --Doug from Iowa
Well, I've been stung a number of times. The first time was when I was four. My family was visiting a school friend of my Mom's in Illinois at their farm. In the barn was an old non-working tractor. As a four year old, I thought "Great fun!" and hopped up on the spring seat. Unfortunately, there was a hornet's nest under the seat. I remember nothing else until waking up in the hospital. My mom's friend's son (seven years old) dragged me out of the barn and swatted away the hornets. Unfortunately, he died two years later from childhood leukemia. Next time was when I was about eight. The next door neighbors had a crack in their foundation. Critters were in the crack. I had a jar. What could go wrong? Well, I caught some, but some escaped. One went up my shorts until it could go no further and struck. Boy, did that one sting!! The next time, I was twenty. I was cleaning up an old, overgrown me yard for someone. I had my lawnmower, which was taking forever. Especially after I hit a nest in the ground. I did not see it but then had some stings in my arm pit. Another sensitive spot -- lucky! --Bruce from Minnesota
A reader named Michael also sent us this bee trivia:
I never thought about bees all that much, until my brother showed up, one day, with a small wood structure filled with small cardboard tubes - it was housing for native bee species. And I was like... native bees, what the heck are native bees?? Aren't honey bees native bees?? It turns out that honey bees were imported to North America from Europe, back in the day, and without native bees doing the pollination, certain fruits and vegetables simply would not exist. And I was like... wow, who knew! Some bee trivia:
Native bees often better pollinators than honey bee (Berkley Research)
http://www.wservernews.com/go/jlwn99d1/
Native bees are better pollinators, more plentiful than honeybees, finds entomologist (Cornell Chronicle)
http://www.wservernews.com/go/ztm5bftj/
You're Worrying About the Wrong Bees (Wired)
http://www.wservernews.com/go/rozjbmc9/
Honey Bees vs Native Bees (Garden Myths)
http://www.wservernews.com/go/89b9iay3/
Urban Bee Legends (UC Berkeley Urban Bee Lab)
http://www.wservernews.com/go/ueo4kek2/
Now let's move on to this week's factoid:
Fact: IBM is launching what it calls a "skinny mainframe" for cloud computing.
Source: http://www.wservernews.com/go/4trekqzx/
Question: When was the last time you saw a real old-fashioned mainframe computer? And when was the last time you used one?
Email your answer to wsn@mtit.com
>> Got an IT conference happening in North America that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at wsn@mtit.com
Microsoft Business Applications Summit -- July 22-24 in Seattle, Washington USA
http://www.wservernews.com/go/hqgxv483/
Black Hat USA -- Aug 4-9 in Las Vegas, Nevada USA
http://www.wservernews.com/go/7sh7nwg1/
TechMentor -- Aug 6-10 in Redmond, Washington USA
http://www.wservernews.com/go/wxklbaqq/
SharePoint Fest -- Aug 20-24 in Seattle, Washington USA
http://www.wservernews.com/go/g2a0ve3a/
VMworld -- Aug 26-30 in Las Vegas, Nevada USA
http://www.wservernews.com/go/uxzv2p3k/
Microsoft Ignite -- September 24-28, 2018 in Orlando, Florida USA
http://www.wservernews.com/go/gazjf8nl/
IT/Dev Connections -- Oct 15-18 in Dallas, Texas USA
http://www.wservernews.com/go/gc41am7l/
>> Got an IT conference happening in North America that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at wsn@mtit.com
VMworld Europe -- Nov 5-8 in Barcelona, Spain
http://www.wservernews.com/go/o7th53ea/
Cybersecurity Leadership Summit -- Nov 12-14 in Berlin, Germany
http://www.wservernews.com/go/d5li13hw/
European SharePoint, Office 365 & Azure Conference -- Nov 26-29 in Copenhagen, Denmark
http://www.wservernews.com/go/qo5pp1z5/
>> Got an IT conference happening in Australia or Asia that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at wsn@mtit.com
No conferences listed at present.
Citrix Synergy announcements center on user experience
This year's annual Citrix Synergy event focused on products that have recently been launched or will be launched soon. Here's a look at some of these innovative products.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/bq1cd5k9/
How Altaro VM Backup helped me save 86% in backup storage
It has been really exciting to see all of the innovation that has been taking place in the backup software industry. Needless to say, I jumped at the opportunity to review version 7.6 of Altaro's VM Backup.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/l1zi0yx4/
Erase your mistake: Amazon Aurora Backtrack provides an 'undo' option
Everyone makes mistakes. But sometimes, a simple mistake in a database code can mean hours of finding and fixing. With Amazon Aurora Backtrack, you can undo your error quickly.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/4pigg831/
Golden rules: 'Old world' IT principles still resonate in a new tech world
To stay on the cutting edge, IT must adapt to new technologies. But sometimes, it's the old IT principles that have stood the test of time that are the best.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/4p9k9j5g/
Cloud risk: A look at real concerns and exaggerated worries
The cloud is good. The cloud is risky. The cloud is the future. The cloud is an unproven technology. Many companies are onboard, but many are afraid to go. Is cloud risk really something to worry about?
http://www.wservernews.com/go/bk8q3j1j/
Kevin Richardson - Lion Man
Kevin Richardson has an incredible affinity with lions - so much that they accept him as their friend
http://www.wservernews.com/go/xb0bpsn4/
Miho Tsukioka - Gymnastic Wheel World Championships 2016
A beautiful first time performance at the Gymnastic Wheel World Championships 2016 by Miho Tsukioka:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/6oeteoqd/
World's Best Jump Roper - Vivien Vajda
Vivien Vajda dazzles the judges and audience of America's Got Talent with her innovative jump rope routine:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/yscfxcpx/
The Dream Of Life
An inspiring speech about life by philosopher Alan Watts.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/7qa21zir/
Okta Oktane 2018: Okta partners with VMware Workspace One
The pitch is simple: Best-of-breed IDaaS with best-of-breed unified endpoint management. Read on for more Oktane news.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/ahcrpe6r/
What to know before implementing an IAM system
IT administrators have many features to choose from and requirements to meet when looking for an IAM tool. Check these boxes before committing to IAM.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/g6qcfw17/
How to Bring Back PING in Win10 1803
http://www.wservernews.com/go/jrb70a7v/
Build a VMware sandbox testing environment with Workstation
Using VMware Workstation to establish a testing environment for VMs is cheaper than consuming primary virtual resources, and it protects production hardware.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/38jgp3gq/
VMware extends NSX micro-segmentation to AppDefense
VMware micro-segmentation technology reaches from NSX to AppDefense and points to a new future for network security that emphasizes process-level security and behavioral analysis.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/p4prs8sy/
WServerNews goes out each week to more than 500,000 IT pro subscribers worldwide! That's a lot of expertise to tap into. Do you need help with some technical problem or are looking for expert advice on something IT-related? Ask Our Readers by emailing your problems and/or questions to us at wsn@mtit.com
>> Got feedback about anything in this issue of WServerNews? Email us at wsn@mtit.com
Free Tool for Monitoring Exchange Server Status & Performance
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Mitch Tulloch is Senior Editor of WServerNews and is a widely recognized expert on Windows administration, deployment and virtualization. Mitch was lead author of the bestselling Windows 7 Resource Kit and has been author or series editor for almost fifty books mostly published by Microsoft Press. Mitch is also a ten-time recipient of Microsoft's Most Valuable Professional (MVP) award for his outstanding contributions in support of the global IT pro community. Mitch owns and runs an information technology content development business based in Winnipeg, Canada. For more information see www.mtit.com.
Ingrid Tulloch is Associate Editor of WServerNews and was co-author of the Microsoft Encyclopedia of Networking from Microsoft Press. Ingrid is also manages research and marketing for our content development business and has co-developed university-level courses in Information Security Management for a Masters of Business Administration program.
