Jason Yoder, MCT

Microsoft Certifications do not expire. They simple lose value with time. For example, an MCSE on Windows NT 4 was all the rage in 1998. In 2009, that certification will not go far in a job interview. Microsoft publishes "upgrade" exams to help keep you up to date in your certification. The upgrade exams test you thoroughly on the new features of the OS. If you were starting for scratch or with a very outdated MCSE, you will have to take all the exams. This will not only test your knowledge of the new features, but also the basics that the certification requires. Here is a little Q and A I pulled from a Microsoft site: Q. How long will the certification be valid? A. For our newest credentials, such as Microsoft Certified Technical Specialist (MCTS), Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP), and Microsoft Certified Professional Developer (MCPD), the credential retires along with the product support for the technology being tested. The credential w...

Yes there SQL SanpIns for PowerShell. SQL is not my cup of tea so here is a link to a blog article by Rob Farley, owner of LobsterPot Solutions. https://msmvps.com/blogs/robfarley/archive/2008/03/04/sql-server-2008-powershell-snapin.aspx

The users experience in Remote Desktop is going to be controlled by one of three ways. 1) You can configure the options on the Remote Desktop Connection on each workstation. That is not ideal in any environment beyond one or two clients. You can control 2) You can open Terminal Services Configuration . Right click RDP and select Properties . Then under the Client Settings tab, you can control the color depth and device redirection for that Terminal Server. 3) You can utilize GPOs at Computer Configuration à Policies à Administrative Templates à Windows Components à Terminal Services à Terminal Server Remember to test your users experience across the slowest network connection that will be used. Latency will drive up cost due to lost productivity, not to mention your users tempers. Easy ways to decrease latency is to limit the maximum color depth. Many application will work well in 8 or 15 bit color. Restricting device redirection may a...

For prestaging to work in Windows Server 2008, you need to have WDS (Windows Deployment Services) installed. This is a role and can be installed from the Server Manager . Once WDS is installed, it makes a change to Active Directory Users and Computers. Before this change, when you create a computer name, it would not give you the option to set This is a managed computer . You would simply click OK and be done. After the change, you would enter the computers name and click Next . At this point you can provide the GUID for the new computer. You will find the GUID on the computer or on the shipping material. Now the computer is ready for installation utilizing WDS. The name will then be changed to what you set it to.

Windows PowerShell V2 allows you to access remote computers and execute PowerShell commands on those remote clients. The following steps illustrate how to create a session with a single client. For every client that we will be remotely accessing, we need to run the command: Winrm quickconfig Press Y at all prompts. This will open the ports on the firewall that we need open for remote management. Now, on the copmuter that will be making the remote connection, type: Enter-PSSession –computerName ComputerName In my case, the ComputerName parameter is MCT-1. Once the session is established, your prompt will look like this: [MCT-1]: PS C:\Users\Administrator\Documentss> Go ahead and type Get-Service . You should notice that what is returned is the services from the remote client. Type Exit to return to your local client. Now what about multiple sessions? Once you have run WinRM QuickConfig on multiple clients, you can set up multiple sessions. ...

In lab 1, Exercise 1, Task 4, we were asked to set a GPO policy to Allow Delegating Default Credentials . We set this delegation to NYC-TS-01 which was our terminal server. The reason that we did this was to support the SSO (Single Sign On) capability in Windows Vista and Windows 7. You may notice that when credentials are required, the client goes into the secure desktop mode. Not even the client software knows what you have typed. This is a security enhancement for you Windows Vista, Win7 and Win2008 environments. Reference: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc749211(WS.10).aspx

Testing shows that the Session ID is and RDP Session and not console when launching a remote session with the command MSTSC /admin. The purpose behind this is to allow you to connect to a terminal server without consuming a TS CAL. Reference: http://windowsitpro.com/article/articleid/97716/what-is-the-admin-switch-in-microsoft-terminal-services-client-mstsc-for-windows-2008-and-vista.html