The Sys Admin

Looking for Help Sharing Experiences

I started this blog in April with the intent of providing additional resources to Linux, Unix, Windows and Network community. After taking inventory of all of my posts since April, most posts are Link related as opposed to content and discussion related. I have been focusing more on links as opposed to writing about How-To's or in depth configuration discussions. To better understand the difference that I am referring to, please look at my blog and compare it to any of the following System Admin Blogs:

Linux Screw, My SysAd Blog, The ITidiots, Ed's System Admin Blog, Bowulf Network Admin Blog

My Syadmin.net blog does not come close to these guys when it comes to in depth discussions, explanations and configuration information, and I would like to try and make up for some of that. However, I have certain time constraints and a couple of other blogs that I am contributing to, so I would like to ask for help from my readers, or others in the System Admin community that may want to write a post or discussion. I am willing post contributions and distribute id's on my blog to all those that would like to contribute. I would like to try and tap into the system admin community and especially the folks that have not posted or penned their own blogs.

This could be a great way to start writing and sharing what you know, and if you are like me, once you get the feel for writing and expressing your thoughts, you will probably want to start your own blog.

So to summarize, I am looking for contributors to help share discussions and thoughts about System Management Topics via my blog, and I will give each contributor full credit for each post and access to publish your own posts on my blog. I feel confident that this could work and point to a couple of examples like Friends in Tech and FastForward Blog as two successful blogs, with multiple contributers that manage content very well.

Please feel free to comment or send your thought to me at kevin@kmmm.net .

Technorati : Linux, Microsoft, System Administration, Unix

Acronis True Image

One tool that we often use is Acronis True Image with Universal Restore. Acronis True Image allows us to easily migrate off of older hardware onto new hardware with it support of dissimilar hardware types. You can take and Image of an application running on an older outdated piece of hardware and restore that image onto newer hardware. It does not matter if the seed or target servers have a Raid configuration, you simply re-apply the appropriate drivers and it works.We have done this many times and it is worth checking out.

This functionality is very similar to Ghost and although I have never used Ghost, here is a comparison of Ghost vs True Image.

Technorati : System Administration

Technet Webcast Weblog

In the last few months Microsoft has published a lot of content on their Technet Webcast Weblog. I have provided links to most of the new content which includes information on Sharepoint, Windows Server 2008, and the Communications Server:

SharePoint 2007 Podcasts - Collaboration, Content Management, Search

TechNet Radio: Network Access Protection (NAP) for Windows Server 2008

New Short-Format Audio Podcasts for Office System Productivity

New Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 Virtual Labs

SharePoint & Office Open XML Short Format Webcast Express Pilot

24 Hours of Exchange Webcast Series

Technet Audio Podcasts

If you are supporting Microsoft Infrastructure and would like to learn more about their newer products then the Technet Webcast Weblog is a great starting place.

Technorati : Microsoft

System Administration Tools

I came upon a great list of System Administration tools for all environments this evening after reading a recent Friends in Tech (FIT) post. The site is www.tlbox.com and they have a section of many System Admin Tools.

Check it out ...

Technorati : System Administration

Windows Server 2003 SP2

Windows Server 2003 SP2 became available at the beginning of the 2007 and now Microsoft is ready to distribute via Automatic Updates. If you have not fully tested SP2 in you environment you need to complete testing and possibly stop automatic updates or block SP2. Here is Mary Jo Foley's post about this on ZDNet ....

Microsoft to push Windows Server 2003 SP2 via Automatic Updates on Patch Tuesday by ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley -- On June 12, this month's Patch Tuesday, Microsoft will be delivering more than its usual bundle of security fixes and patches for Windows, Office and other products. The company also will be starting to push Windows Server 2003 Service Pack (SP) 2 to customers via its Automatic Updates patching mechanism -- unless admins opt to block it.

Technorati : Microsoft

More Microsoft Patches Next Week

There are 6 new Microsoft Security Patches coming out next week. Four patches affecting Windows with a Maximum Severity rating of Critical that will require a reboot, another patch that also impacts Windows with a criticality of Moderate and one patch that affects Microsoft Office with a criticality rating of important.

Here is the link to the Microsoft Security Response Center June 2007 Advance Notification and for more information about each patch, follow this to the technet link that outlines the impact to each product and Operating System.

Technorati : microsoft, patches

Microsoft Technical Server Documentation

How you had a Microsoft related question that you could not find the answer to? Did you have to call Microsoft and pay to get you answer? Well this may help ...

Here is a link to the Windows Server 2003 Technical Library and the Windows Server 2008 Technical Library.

Both links start at the top level index of Documentation for each product.

Technorati : Documentation, Microsoft

Windows Server 2008

Many of you may know that Vista is having problems with drivers and compatibility of older peripherals and probably will not settle down until Vista SP1 is shipped later this year. The same thing happened when XP shipped in October 2001. At that time many folks were comfortable with Windows 2000 Professional and did not move to XP and waited until September 2002 when Windows XP SP1 shipped.

This makes us a little skeptical when considering the new version of Windows Server 2008. One thing to realize is the Windows Server 2008 team is a different team than the Vista Team and the Windows Server 2008 team is still on track to ship Windows Server 2008 later this year. This does make me a little less skeptical, however we will probably wait until the Windows Server 2008 SP1 is shipped in the middle of 2008 before deploying in our production environment.

Folks interested in reading, trying or listing to information about Windows Server 2008 can check out the following link .... http://www.Microsoft.com/events/series/windowsserver2008.aspx?tab=overview.

I also came across a great blog hosted by a Microsoft IT Pro Evangelist named Arlino Alves. Arlino touches on many areas of interest but in particular has a number of posts discussing 10 reasons to look at Windows Longhorn (Windows server 2008). Check it out ....

Technorati : Microsoft

More Microsoft Resources

I also came across a Microsoft MVP blog that features SMS, MOM and Ops Manager.

It's called Pete's Management Blog, and Pete goes into a lot of detail in each subject area. Another link worth mentioning is a link that I found on Pete's Site to the Microsoft System Center Forum, which also has a lot of great information on MOM and Ops Manager.

Check it out ....

Technorati : Microsoft

Microsoft Exchange Webcasts and Virtual Labs

If you are looking to learn about Microsoft Exchange, here is a great free resource from Microsoft.

You can register for each session and view over 100 Free Webcasts on Microsoft Exchange Server, or if your preference is listening, you can download each cast to your favorite MP3 player and listen to the podcast version of each Webcast. Follow the link http://www.microsoft.com/events/series/tnexchangeserver.mspx for more information.

Also, if you prefer hands on Training for Microsoft Exchange, the Exchange Server Virtual Labs is a great link to all the working Exchange Server Virtual Labs.

Well worth a visit for those folks looking to invest some time improving their Microsoft Exchange Server skill set.

Technorati : Exchange Server, Microsoft