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Vol. 11, #44 - Oct 30, 2006 - Issue #600
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MS Office: Now With Mandatory Piracy Check
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- EDITORS CORNER
- Welcome To Issue Number 600!
- IE7 Update Clarification
- Sunbelt Data Protection Seminars
- Quotes Of The Week
- ADMIN TOOLBOX
- Admin Tools We Think You Shouldn't Be Without
- TECH BRIEFING
- Exchange Server 2007 Will Propel iSCSI Market
- Migrate Or Merge Microsoft Outlook .PST Files
- SSIS Maintenance Plans In SQL Server 2005
- Vista's ReadyBoost May Not Be For Everyone
- Microsoft Longhorn Server Core: Security Implications
- WINDOWS SERVER NEWS
- Microsoft Wants To Get Into Chip Design
- Larry Ellison Hijacks Red Hat
- Bug Causes Microsoft To Push Vista RTM To Nov. 8
- MS Office: Now With Mandatory Piracy Check
- WINDOWS SERVER THIRD PARTY NEWS
- New Exchange Tool Released
- Running Just One Single AV Engine, Company Wide?
- Redmond Very Unhappy With One Third Party Vendor
- Easy: Protecting Yourself Against Disastrous Losses
- WServerNews 'FAVE' LINKS
- This Week's Links We Like. Tips, Hints And Fun Stuff.
- WServerNews - PRODUCT OF THE WEEK
- Stuck with Hard to Manage, Ineffective Antispam/Antivirus on your Exchange Server?
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Upgrade to Next-Generation Antispam/Antivirus for Exchange
And save 50% over your current product! Ninja is easier to manage,
has better multi-engine spam detection, and integrated multi-engine
antivirus.
Ninja gives you great end-user control. It is an excellent
replacement for Exchange products from Trend, GFI and Symantec.
Get your 30-day full function eval and see it for yourself:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Ninja
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EDITORS CORNER |
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Welcome To Issue Number 600!
We dressed it up a bit since it's Halloween too. And, since this has
been going on for 10 years now, I can inform you that as per Rule
Number Three of Sunbelt Software, I'm still having fun writing it!
Oh, you want to know Rules 1 and 2?
- Do it right the first time
- Do it fast
- Have fun while you do it!
That's the senior company policy we operate on over here. [grin]
IE7 Update Clarification
A reader sent me: "Regarding IE7, you wrote, "if you run either automatic
updates or WSUS, this more secure beastie will all on its own update in
November, and might break things." That's not quite true. WSUS and SMS
2003 will allow administrators to control the deployment of IE7 at their
discretion. Option #2 of "Options for Blocking Automatic Delivery" reads
as follows: "Deploy an update management solution that provides full control
over the updates deployed to computers in your network. Microsoft offers
the free Windows Server Update Services and the more advanced Systems
Management Server 2003 update management products. IT Administrators using
an update management solution should use the standard features of their
product, rather than the Blocker Toolkit, to control Internet Explorer 7
distribution." Thanks for a very insightful and entertaining newsletter!"
And thank you for the correction. [smile]
Sunbelt Data Protection Seminars
"What Every IT Manager Should Know About Centralized Backup and Protecting
Microsoft SQL and Exchange" - Join Sunbelt and Double-Take Software as we
discuss strategies for implementing high availability, remote availability
and offsite disaster recovery solutions for SQL, Exchange and other mission
critical applications using Double-Take.
Hosted at Microsoft in Houston, TX on Wednesday, November 1st. Register here:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Houston
Hosted at the Hilton Austin in Austin, TX on Thursday, November 2nd. Register:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Austin
Hosted at Microsoft in New York, NY on Friday, November 17th. Register here:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-New-York
Quotes Of The Week
This time not just one or two quotes. A whole TON of them, many truly
hilarious. It's the great "unknown" quote collection!
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Quotes
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TECH BRIEFING |
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Exchange Server 2007 Will Propel iSCSI Market
Analysts expect a 75.8% increase in iSCSI revenue between 2005 and 2010,
thanks in part to Exchange Server. And get ready for new 64-bit servers
for your "E07" Article at SearchWinIT.com:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Exchange-Server-2007
Migrate Or Merge Microsoft Outlook .PST Files
Learn about a third-party tool called Upstart that allows you to migrate or
merge Microsoft Outlook personal store (.PST) files, even if they're stored
in different formats and encryption types. At SearchExchange:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-UpStart
SSIS Maintenance Plans In SQL Server 2005
Using SSIS packages for your maintenance plans in SQL Server 2005 allows
for greater flexibility to customize tasks and also provides an execution
history for less difficult troubleshooting. Contributor Baya Pavliashvili
highlights how maintenance plans have improved with SQL Server Integration
Services while walking you through building your own with the Maintenance
Plan Wizard. Over at SearchSQLServer.com
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-SSIS
Vista's ReadyBoost May Not Be For Everyone
There are five stipulations you need to know about before you can take
advantage of ReadyBoost, the Windows Vista feature that allows flash storage
to be used for virtual memory. Check it out at SearchWinComputing:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-ReadyBoost
Microsoft Longhorn Server Core: Security Implications
Microsoft's Longhorn Server Core edition will allow you to build a
custom server from the ground up, using only the capabilities that you
absolutely need. Read about the security implications of this new modular
architecture in this tip from Jonathan Hassell.
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-LongHorn
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WINDOWS SERVER NEWS |
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Microsoft Wants To Get Into Chip Design
Monday, 23 October 2006 Microsoft the software company appears to be
morphing at a great rate of knots into a hybrid software-hardware
company, with the latest move being the establishment of a chip
design laboratory. According to a report in the New York Times, a
new Microsoft chip design group will have teams in both Silicon
Valley and Redmond.
Apparently the evolution of computing into multi-processor chips and
devices other than desktop PCs, such as games consoles, music players
and mobile phones, is leading Microsoft into areas where it needs to
more tightly control the integration of its hardware and software.
The result is the Computer Architecture Group lead by one of Silicon
Valley's computer engineering pioneers Charles P. Thacker. More at
the ITWIRE site:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Microsoft
Larry Ellison Hijacks Red Hat
Brad Reback in the CIBC World Markets newsletter 'Software BYTES'
reported something very interesting: "During his keynote at Oracle Openworld
yesterday, CEO Larry Ellison announced that Oracle will now offer support
to Red Hat Linux customers, as part of its Unbreakable Linux program.
Mr. Ellison indicated that the move is born out of trying to accelerate
the adoption of Linux, particularly at the enterprise level. According to
Mr. Ellison, while Linux has enjoyed significant growth over the years,
its growth is slowing, as true "enterprise-level" support is lacking and
current support providers fail to offer any IP indemnification. The company
contends it covers both of those bases with its Unbreakable Linux support
program.
"From what we understand, Oracle removes the Red Hat trademarks from Red
Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) and then adds its own bug fixes (which it will
also hand over to the open source community), as part of its support.
Interestingly, the company plans on offering the bug fixes to current and
future RHEL offerings, as well as older versions. By comparison, Red Hat
only supports the current version of its Linux offerings, forcing its
customers to upgrade to the most current version in order to receive updates.
As part of Oracle's "Unbreakable Linux Program," Red Hat users can expect
a similar service to that of Red Hat's "Red Hat Network." Only, according
to Mr. Ellison, Oracle's support is better and priced at less than half
of Red Hat's.
"The company has announced three broad support levels for RHEL: For "Enterprise
Linux Network Support" users pay $99 per system per year in exchange for
access to software and updates via Oracle's Unbreakable Linux Network (ULN).
"Enterprise Linux Basic Support" starts at $399 per system per year (up to
2 CPUs) and provides access to the ULN, as well as 24x7 web and phone support
on a global basis. This support price rises to $999 per year for systems with
more than 2 physical CPUs. Under the "Enterprise Linux Premier Support" level,
users pay $1,199 (for up to 2 CPU-based systems) for ULN access, 24x7 support,
as well as back port of bug fixes to older RHEL releases as well as Oracle
lifetime support. For systems with more than 2 CPUs, this support level rises
to $1,999 per system per year."
Bug Causes Microsoft To Push Vista RTM To Nov. 8
A bug discovered earlier this month will delay the release to manufacturing
of Windows Vista until Nov. 8, according to sources familiar with Microsoft's
plans. ComputerWorld has the story:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Vista
MS Office: Now With Mandatory Piracy Check
ComputerWorld via (IDG News Service) just came out with some interesting
news that also might become a headache for system admins. Here is a
quote from the article: "The Office productivity and collaboration suite
is about to become the next piece of software from Microsoft Corp. subject
to mandatory piracy checks. The company's Office Genuine Advantage (OGA)
program will require mandatory validation of Office software on Friday,
the software vendor quietly disclosed on Thursday. After that date, any
Office Online templates downloaded from within the Office 2007 Microsoft
Office System applications will require validation of legitimacy.
Similarly, starting in January, users of Office Update will have to validate
that their Office software is legitimate before they can use the service,
Microsoft added. The company said in a press statement Thursday that the
validation process will be "quick and simple" for users. The OGA program,
currently in the testing phase, is now available in 26 languages worldwide.
OGA is a sister program to Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA), launched in
July 2005 as a program that automatically checks a user's version of
Windows to ensure that it is not counterfeit or pirated. More at:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-MS-Office-Validation
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WINDOWS SERVER THIRD PARTY NEWS |
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New Exchange Tool Released
A new .NET/Exchange product was released. hostedExpress(tm) for Exchange
Server is a powerful administration tool for all who needs to maintain
MS Exchange, the Active Directory or just a piece of it via the Web.
Dedicate routine tasks such as maintaining active directory users and
Exchange mailboxes, public folders, calendars, contacts, ... to your
help desk(s). Reduce your maintenance overhead, improve your clients
daily work. If you are interested, check out:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-hostedExpress
Running Just One Single AV Engine, Company Wide?
In that case you need to take five minutes and watch this Flash presentation.
We have come up with all the ammo you need to convince your boss to get
some extra budget allocated to multi-engine AV on Exchange. It's worth
the time. It's on the Ninja page in the left column, but here is the
direct link (flash):
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Ninja-Presentation
Redmond Very Unhappy With One Third Party Vendor
Microsoft officials say they are unhappy that security software maker
Authentium has decided to bypass the controversial PatchGuard kernel
protection feature in its next-generation Vista operating system, and
said that the tactic could lead to eventual problems for users of the
company's software. Responding to Authentium's move to circumvent
PatchGuard in its products, company officials said that the decision
to hack the feature could prove unwise for the security vendor as
Microsoft will work to close off any flaws that allow unauthorized
kernel interaction, making technologies dependent on such access obsolete.
The rest of the story is at eWEEK:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Authentium
Easy: Protecting Yourself Against Disastrous Losses
Protecting yourself against disastrous losses is easier than you might think.
Double-Take(r) Software offers the leading data protection and availability
solutions - providing you with a continual, up-to-the-second copy of your
data that you can access the instant an outage occurs, with little or no
loss of data or productivity. And we make it easier to manage.
Double-Take Application Manager (DTAM) is a unified console where you can
manage all of your application protection options. Double-Take Application
Manager currently supports Microsoft Exchange and SQL Server. Exclusive
features offered by Double-Take Application Manager include:
- Four step process to complete application protection.
- "Pre-Flight Check" - Ensures that the application environment is configured
properly for replication and failover.
- "Configuration Cloning" - Helps to reduce administration effort and minimize
configuration errors by automatically configuring the application data sets
and configuration settings on the secondary server.
- Improved centralized management console - Controls the entire application
protection process from configuration through failover, data restoration
and failback.
- Automated recovery capabilities - Ensures that users experience minimal
downtime during recovery and that restoring services to the primary
application server can be done in the simplest way possible.
- Integrated Controls - Integrates standard Double-Take controls into the
management console to reduce the need to use other management interfaces
to configure the application protection environment.
- Configuration Change Persistence - The automated persistence of
configuration settings saves time and effort and simplifies application
protection management.
Why put productivity, revenue and customer confidence at risk with periodic
backup? Ensure uninterrupted access to your data and availability of your
applications with continuous data replication and automatic failover from
Double-Take Software. Then let Double-Take Application Manager streamline
your data protection management.
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Double-Take
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WServerNews 'FAVE' LINKS |
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This Week's Links We Like. Tips, Hints And Fun Stuff.
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WServerNews - PRODUCT OF THE WEEK |
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Stuck with Hard to Manage, Ineffective Antispam/Antivirus on your Exchange Server?
Save 50% over your current product! Ninja is easier to manage, has
better multi-engine spam detection, and integrated multi-engine
antivirus. Ninja gives you great end-user control. It is an excellent
replacement for Exchange products from Trend, GFI and Symantec. Get
your 30-day full function eval and see it for yourself:
http://www.wservernews.com/061030-Sunbelt-Messaging-Ninja
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