IT Tasks I Must Remember: February 2013

One of the most common questions we receive: What is the best way to contact Microsoft if you have a problem with a Microsoft product or service, or to ask a general question? This article is designed to give you a summary of the support options available to IT Professionals in New Zealand. Support options range from free support through to premium paid support.

Firstly let’s go through the options you can find on the web. On our recently-updated main support portal, you will find links highlighting our top support issues, top downloads, contact details, and can get support by product.

Talk to someone...

To contact Microsoft Customer Service about a specific problem you’re having, you can email our customer service team – they are surprisingly responsive, and are best briefed to deal with product information & pricing, product licensing, Microsoft event registration & details, Microsoft Profile management for email subscriptions, Product key generation, as well as general enquiries such as sponsorships, donations, business proposals, and even job opportunities.

If you would prefer to speak with a real person, you can call us free on 0800 800 004, between 7:30am and 9:00pm from Monday to Friday. You can also contact me personally, through my blog or @NathanM on twitter.

Our New Zealand team also runs the NZ TechNet blog, and @TechNetNZ on twitter – both with news and events for kiwi IT Professionals. For more consumer-oriented information, follow @MicrosoftNZ or, most relevant to this article, reach out to @MicrosoftHelps for support via twitter.

Microsoft Community forums online for self-help

Be sure to check out the Microsoft Community forums for finding answers, sharing ideas and solving problems. Describe what's going on, and our community members can help you understand the problem. Then they can show you how to resolve it with step by-step instructions. There are dedicated forums for each specific product and they are very active with questions and answers.

If you’re working in a technical role, we also have dedicated forums where you can go to for technical assistance – check out the TechNet Forums for IT Professionals or the MSDN Forums for Developers. I can really recommend these forums, they are full of useful information thanks to skilled contributors responding to questions.

TechNet Software Subscription for IT Professionals:
Use promo code NZTN13-1 to receive 30% off.

A 30% discount off a 12-month Microsoft TechNet Subscription makes this affordable for every IT Professional. I’d highly recommend it as it includes great paid support benefits that won’t break the bank. You can read about the different TechNet subscription options and benefits but they include:

Professional Support Calls – Professional subscribers receive 2 complimentary support calls and can talk to a Microsoft support professional for fast help with the toughest technical questions. TechNet Professional subscribers also receive a 20% discount on additional purchased support calls.
Priority Support in TechNet Forums – with your subscription you have unlimited access & priority support in TechNet forums, with your questions answered within two business days. Engage with other IT Professionals who have encountered the same issues you are facing. Answers are reviewed by a Microsoft support professional.
Microsoft E-Learning – Prepare for certification or simply deepen or develop new skills with a selection of Microsoft E-Learning course collection.
Microsoft Software Licensed for Evaluation Purposes – During your 12-month subscription you’ll have access to the latest Microsoft full-version and beta software you need for evaluation and deployment planning with no feature limits.

Microsoft Partners

As a Microsoft Partner, you have a range of Partner support options in addition to those listed above. First, sign into the Microsoft Partner Network where you will find a list of support options:

On that site you can also view the details of an incident you recently submitted or submit a new one. You can also see how many partner advisory hours you have available, or purchase more hours. As a Microsoft Partner you receive a range of benefits depending on your membership level, including:

Partner advisory hours that you can use for technical enablement and for technical presales and advisory services
Partner Support Community
Business-critical (customer server down)
5-Pack of Professional Support Incidents

Recommended Links

How-to Websites

Downloads

Security

Support

Popular resources

21 February 2013

Lync Server Labs

Virtual Labs for Lync 2010 are available here:

Microsoft Lync Server 2010 Enterprise Voice Configuration

https://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032488324&culture=en-US
https://cmg.vlabcenter.com/default.aspx?moduleid=3cae9be7-6a3a-4f74-8e90-345532e45de2

New Enterprise Voice Features of Microsoft Lync Server 2010
https://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032488325&culture=en-US

Other TechNet Labs:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/virtuallabs/bb467605.aspx.

19 February 2013

Get Exchange Mailbox Stats

Get-MailboxStatistics

Get-MailboxStatistics | ft DisplayName,TotalItemSize,ItemCount

Get-MailboxStatistics | Sort-Object TotalItemSize –Descending | ft DisplayName,TotalItemSize,ItemCount

References:
http://www.msexchange.org/articles-tutorials/exchange-server-2007/management-administration/getting-mailbox-statistics-exchange-2007.html

Successfully Shrink Database Log File (*.ldf) in SQL 2005

This may also work in other versions of SQL, but I've not tested it.

First, back the database up. I'm assuming you can figure out the details of backing up. I normally backup to disk and create a new file for the backup in a set backup location/drive/disk.

Then, set the database to use simple backup mode, as seen in the drop-down list in the image below.

Finally, shrink the database, ensuring you select the Reorganize files... option. Select a minimum freespace of anywhere from 0 to 20. If it is low, you are likely to see some instant growth in your database. If it is too high, you're wasting space.

Connecting Windows 8 to SBS 2008/2011 RWW

If you are using Windows 8 and cannot connect to computers via to SBS 2008 or 2011 Remote Web Workplace, the following may help.

It is likely that once logging in you can still access email via OWA and open the Internal Website, but you can't connect to internal computers.

This issue is (or will be) supposedly solved with an Update Rollup package, or you do the following in Internet Explorer to sort it out yourself:
- add your RWW site to Trusted sites,
- open the RWW site in compatibility mode.
After this, you will be able to connect to all computers.

References:
http://www.em-soft.si/myblog/elvis/?p=182

18 February 2013

Great AD Management Tools

Solar Winds have some excellent free (you need to register though) tools to help get the mundane stuff done in AD.

List old User Accounts
List old Computer Accounts
Bulk import User Accounts

This link came from my petri.co.il subscription, so you can see their details in it. I'm not sure how long Solar Winds will offer this either.

http://www.solarwinds.com/register/registrationb.aspx?program=1800&c=70150000000PH8s&CMP=BIZ-EML-PETRI-130214_Top5MicrosoftFT_Petri-MSFT-DL&email=%%EMAIL%%

Use Group Policy to Restrict Access to USB

To use Group Policy to restrict access to USB devices on your network, see the following:

http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/25619-blocking-usb-devices-and-removable-media

References:
http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/25619-blocking-usb-devices-and-removable-media

Sweet Java Install Automation

Check out http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/22997-use-a-batch-file-and-group-policy-to-cleanly-update-java?utm_source=swemail&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=resource for a sweet Java install/update method using GP and scripts.

Reference:
http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/22997-use-a-batch-file-and-group-policy-to-cleanly-update-java?utm_source=swemail&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=resource

12 February 2013

Symantec Endpoint Protection Has Detected Pending Changes

When installing Symantec Endpoint Protection, sometimes you will see an error message that "Symantec Endpoint Protection has detected that there are pending system changes that require a restart", but a restart does not fix the issue.

In that case, do the following:

Delete the registry key: "PendingFileRenameOperations" in "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager".

References:
http://www.symantec.com/connect/forums/win7-issue-symantec-endpoint-protection-has-detected-there-are-pending-system-changes-require