29 October 2014

Offline Files and VPN

Windows offline files over VPN depends on IPv6.

See this guys post for evidence:
http://thommck.wordpress.com/2011/02/08/offline-files-versus-vpn-a-k-a-the-case-of-the-missing-work-online-button/

10 October 2014

Configuring an Automatic Resolution Policy for Offline Files

Due to the persistent investigations of Aaron Parker at http://stealthpuppy.com/, we have some useful info on this. The following instructions from Aaron's blog give us what we need. For further details, see his full blog entry at http://stealthpuppy.com/configuring-an-automatic-resolution-policy-for-offline-files-in-windows-7/.

An automatic resolution policy for Offline Files is implemented by adding a registry value for each network share for which you wish to control synchronisation, then specifying the policy for automatic resolution.
  1. Click Start, type regedit in the Start Search box, and then press ENTER
  2. Locate and then click the following registry subkey: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\NetCache
  3. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click Key. Type SyncConflictHandling, and then press ENTER
  4. Right-click SyncConflictHandling, point to New, and then click Expandable String Value. Type the path of the network share as the value name (for example \\servername\share)
  5. Right-click the value name, and then click Modify. In the Value data box, enter a value listed in the table below, and then click OK
The possible values for SyncConflictHandling and a description of each value is listed is this table:
ValueDescription
0No resolution. The conflict is unresolved. This allows the conflict to be processed by other handlers in the system.
1Keep the local state. This overwrites the remote copy with the local copy's contents. If the local copy was deleted, this deletes the remote copy on the server.
2Keep the remote state. This overwrites the local copy with the remote copy's contents. If the remote copy was deleted, this deletes the local copy in the Offline Files cache.
3Keeps both copies. Note that this resolution is valid only for sync conflict states where both the server and client copies exist and where at least one of the items is a file. This resolution type is not available when one of the items has been deleted or both items are directories.
4Retains the state of the latest operation as determined by last-change times of the items in conflict. If the local item was deleted, the time of deletion is used for comparison.
5Write an entry to the sync conflict log and perform no further attempts at resolving the conflict. The interactive user will resolve the conflict through Sync Center at a later time.
6Do not resolve the conflict. Do not record an entry in the sync conflict log
7Cancel the synchronization operation
References:
http://stealthpuppy.com/configuring-an-automatic-resolution-policy-for-offline-files-in-windows-7/
 

13 August 2014

Outlook Prompting for Credentials

There are many reasons why outlook might prompt for credentials. However, one of the reasons that I often forget is when outlook tries to access an internal address or server via a web proxy, i.e. it does not know to bypass the web proxy when looking for the address or server in question.

Ensure all servers (including aliases) that Outlook should connect with internally are excluded in your web proxy configuration.

For other potential causes/fixes,  Ilan Lanz (Ilantz) has created a great troubleshooting list here.

References:
http://ilantz.com/2011/02/08/authentication-pop-ups-and-annoyances-with-exchange-2007-2010-and-outlook-anywhere/

16 June 2014

Enable Manage-Out via DirectAccess when Internal LAN is IPv4 Only

Normally manage-out functionality is not available using DirectAccess if your internal LAN is IPv4-only. E.g. your remote devices will be able to access resources on your network, but you won't be able to connect to those devices from your management servers etc to check status, roll out updates, etc - unless your internal LAN is running IPv6.

However, the following link provides a potential way to get around this:


NOTE: This may not work in multi-site deployments. I haven't looked deeply enough into it to know why not.

References:

19 May 2014

Prevent Ticket Loops in Spiceworks

See explanation here:
http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/1588-how-to-stop-and-prevent-ticket-loops-in-spiceworks

Essentially, the settings you need to alter are in Go to "Settings-> Email Settings -> Additional Settings".
and you need to add a rule in one of the "Ignore" fields.

These fields use Regular Expressions, so search for that on the web to understand how Regular Expressions work.

15 May 2014

Setting up an Active Directory Network in Windows Azure

This article looks pretty comprehensive, but I've not yet tried it.
http://community.adxstudio.com/blogs/shan/2013-07-02-setting-up-an-active-directory-network-in-windows/

The next step would be to configure Direct Access and then join workstations to the domain using Offline Domain Join.

BOOM!

09 May 2014

Remove Server Manager and PowerShell from Taskbar on RDS

Best article on this is at

http://www.emware.nl/articles/remove-server-manager-and-powershell-icons-from-taskbar.html

The only thing I would add is to also include the following files



  • %AllUsersProfile%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Accessories\Windows PowerShell\Windows PowerShell (x86).lnk
  • %AllUsersProfile%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Administrative Tools\Windows PowerShell (x86).lnk
  • %AllUsersProfile%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Windows System\Windows PowerShell.lnk
  • %AllUsersProfile%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\System Tools\Windows PowerShell.lnk


  • References:

    Redirecting and Managing Modern Start Menu in Windows 2012

    The following text was created by the author of the http://msfreaks.wordpress.com/ blog. See that blog for more detail. Specifically http://msfreaks.wordpress.com/2014/04/17/step-by-step-redirecting-and-managing-the-modern-start-menu-in-windows-2012r2-rds/


    As a starter:
    - redirect the startmenu for all users to a shared location
    - enable access based enumeration for that share
    - copy shortcuts to applications to that share (best to make a folder for each application)
    - create security groups for the applications you wish to restrict to certain groups of users
    - replace the security on the folder in the redirected startmenu. remove authenticated users and such, and add the correct application security group with read rights
    If you look in the startmenu now, you will not only see the application folders as "groups" in the all programs part of the startmenu, you will also only see applications for which you were granted access rights.
    Login with a test user, arrange your tile-menu, and then, while this test user is logged on, export the .ms file holding the tile positions and such. Add this .ms readonly file to the correct location in the default user profile and mark it read-only, and make sure (script, gpo) that this .ms is marked read-write when a new user first logs on.

    Some other methods are available here also:
    http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj134269



    References:
    http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/da1b4dc6-efaf-4427-a1db-250b930e868d/2012-rds-and-publishing-full-desktop-and-lockdown?forum=winserverTS
    http://msfreaks.wordpress.com/

    06 May 2014

    Installing Exchange 2010 SP3 on Windows 2012 (NOT R2)

    There are plenty of easily found documents on how to do this, so I'm not going to repeat the instructions here. However, I ran into an issue that none of those articles mentioned, the details of which are below.

    I had installed all of the various Exchange 2010 SP3 prerequisites on Windows Server 2012 and followed all of the articles exactly, but whenever I ran setup.exe (GUI) or setup.com (CLI) to install Exchange, I got the an error containing the following phrase:

    Could not load file or assembly 'System.Management.Automation' or one of its dependencies.
    
    
    If you encounter the error message, you simply need to use Server Management Console to install the Windows PowerShell 2.0 Engine feature.



    References:
    Standard install instructions for Exchange 2010 on Windows 2012 (NOT R2)
    http://oxfordsbsguy.com/2013/03/24/how-to-install-exchange-2010-sp3-on-windows-server-2012/

    Installing the Windows PowerShell 2.0 Engine
    http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh849675.aspx

    The forum discussions that gave me a clue as to the PowerShell version issue
    http://stackoverflow.com/questions/15473734/could-not-load-file-or-assembly-system-management-automation


    01 May 2014

    Remote Desktop Server Configuration in Windows 2012

    Check this out. It's grand.

    http://blogs.technet.com/b/askperf/archive/2012/10/30/windows-8-windows-server-2012-remote-desktop-management-server.aspx

    12 February 2014

    Recover NTFRS Issues - Including Active Directory Replication

    This guy lays it all out: http://adfordummiez.com/?p=61

    And here is a copy/paste in case he ever takes it down:
    Environment:
    - Windows 2000/2003/2008 domain controllers using FRS (not DFSR).
    - More than one Domain Controller
    - Atleast one DC with a healthy SYSVOL
    Why do Journal Wraps occur?
    Instan at the AD Troubleshooting blog made an excellent blog entry about:
    You should give it a read to understand what is going on under the hood.
    Symptoms that might occur:
    • Event ID 13568 is logged in the NtFrs event log
    • A generic Event ID 1058 may be logged
    • You make changes to a logon script but not all users got the change
    • Changing a GPO or creating a new GPO is not applied to all users or computers
    • Missing SYSVOL share
    • A RSoP or gpresult report that data or policy object is missing or corrupt
    If you take a look at the 13568 event you’ll see that there is a “solution” to this problem:
    Set the “Enable Journal Wrap Automatic Restore” registry parameter to 1
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\NtFrs\Parameters”
    Restart ntfrs service.
    This is not a good solution for post-Server 2000 SP3.
    I don’t know why Microsoft still have this “how-to-fix” in event 13568, but they say in KB 290762:
    Important: Microsoft does not recommend that you use this registry setting, and it should not be used post-Windows 2000 SP3. Appropriate options to reduce journal wrap errors include…
    Update: I had to ask around about this since it was nagging me:
    The event was never changed because the product group didn’t want to pay for the localization cost, nor admit that this registry setting caused more problems than it fixed. It actually came down to ego – the developer of FRS was a real piece of work. So instead the public docs were updated to state not to use that autorecovery registry setting.

    Instead you should go for the Burflags method. This will kick start your SYSVOL up and running. Most often a “non-authoritative” (D2) approach will fix you up.
    The “D2″ key can be set two places in registry:
    Global re-initialization:
    HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\NtFrs\Parameters\Backup/Restore\Process at Startup
    or
    Replica set specific re-initialization:
    HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\NtFrs\Parameters\Cumulative Replica Sets\GUID
    If you’re using DFS replica sets that holds a large amount of data that is healthy, go for the “Replica set specific re-initialization”. If you set the Global Burflags, FRS will re-initialize all replica sets, including the DFS namespace the member holds. If they hold a large amount of data… that might take some time.
    To find the GUID of SYSVOL, look for the “Replica Set Name” named “Domain System Volume (SYSVOL SHARE)” under the subkey “HKLM\..\..\Replica Sets”:
    This screenshot have only one GUID since I don’t use DFS in my lab.
    Change the value of Burflags to D2 (hex).
    If you don’t uses DFS you could just set the Global Burflags to D2. It will not make any difference under what subkey you set it. This will re-initialize all replica sets the member holds (in this case the SYSVOL).
    After you have set the Burflags key to D2, you have to restart the NTFRS service on the affected DC.
    Overview of what happens:
    1. The Burflags is set to 0
    2. Event ID 13565 is logged. non-authoritative restore has started
    3. The content of SYSVOL are moved to the pre-existing folder
    4. Event ID 13520 is logged
    5. The local FRS database is rebuilt
    6. It re-join (vvjoin) the replica set
    7.  The “bad DC” will compare all files (file ID and MD5 sum) it has in the Pre-existing folder with the files from an upstream partner.
    8. If a match is found, it will copy the file from the Pre-Existing folder to the original location. If they don’t match, it will pull the file from the upstream partner.
    9. Event ID 13553 is logged
    10. FRS notifies (SysvolReady reg.key = 1) the Netlogon service that SYSVOL is ready and can be shared.
    11. The Netlogon service will share SYSVOL and Netlogon.
    12. Event ID 13516 is logged (finished)

    When you have verified that SYSVOL is shared and in sync, you can delete the content in the Pre-Existing folder to free up space.

    Authoritative restore (D4):
    If your SYSVOL is all messed up on every DC’s, you might have to do an “authoritative restore” using both the D4 and D2 values.
    By the way you should never, ever use the D4 flag on more than one DC as you will have a lot of collisions and morphed folders. The D4 flag should only be set like Microsoft says, as a last resort.
    Quick overview:
    1. Stop the NtFrs service on every DC
    2. Set the D4 flag on one DC that will be authoritative for the replica set(s). The SYSVOL content will not be moved to the pre-existing folder on the authoritative member.
    3. Set the D2 flag on the other DC’s (non-authoritative)
    4. Start the NtFrs service on the “D4″ DC.
    5. Check that Event ID 13553 and 13516 is logged.
    6. If step 5 is ok, start NtFrs on the “D2″ DC’s.
    For detailed steps, see “How to rebuild the SYSVOL tree and its content in a domain”

    References
    :
    How to rebuild the SYSVOL tree and its content in a domain
    http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315457
    Using the BurFlags registry key to reinitialize File Replication Service replica sets
    http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290762
    Backing Up and Restoring an FRS-Replicated SYSVOL Folder
    http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc507518(VS.85).aspx

    03 February 2014

    Allow Non-Admin Users to Install Print Drivers for Shared Network Printers

    Configure Group Policy settings in Computer\Administrative Templates\Printers\Point and Print Restrictions
    See also Computer Configuration > Policies > Windows Settings > Security Settings > Local Policies > Security Options > Devices: Prevent users from installing printer drivers

    22 January 2014

    OWA 2010 Website Is Blank

    After you install update rollups on Exchange 2010 it is common to get a blank white OWA page when browsing to the OWA page.


    the URL will show something like the following "https://mail.mydomain.com/owa/auth/logon.aspx?url=https://mail.mydomain.com/owa/&reason=0 ."

    To fix this issue you must run the Exchange Management Shell and execute the updatecas.ps1 command from the "C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V14\Bin" folder. This will fix your issue, it causes the owa install to complete correctly.

    References:
    Blantantly ripped off from this site
    http://www.prestigecomputersolutions.com/knowledge-base/entry/exchange-2010-owa-blank-white-screen-fix.html