Tips N Tricks

Various Tips and Tricks

1

Using A PAL Template To Easily Capture Performance Data

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

PAL Analyze Captured LogI recently blogged about using PAL to analyse an existing performance monitor log file.  That is great if you have an existing log, but what if this is not the case?  How can we easily capture the correct counters in the log file?  Again PAL can come to the rescue!

Let's assume that PAL is installed as detailed in the previous blog post, if not hit that post and get the tool running.  I’ll wait for y… Read the rest “Using A PAL Template To Easily Capture Performance Data”

1

Maximize Exchange Administrator Productivity With PowerShell-Part 3

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

In the previous articles in this series we looked at the basic aspects of PowerShell and then the underlying mechanisms that are used to connect both Exchange 2007 and Exchange 2010 management tools to Exchange.  These articles can be found as follows:

… Read the rest “Maximize Exchange Administrator Productivity With PowerShell-Part 3”
0

How to Fix: Log Parser – Log Row Too Long

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

The Microsoft Log Parser is a trusted and venerable tool to have when you are analysing log files.

One issue that does come up when analysing larger Performance Monitor files is that of the default buffer setting in Log Parser.  Typically you will see an error message saying  “log row too Long”.

When running the ExRAP toolset this will be shown in the console:

Error parsing query: Log row too long
LogF… Read the rest “How to Fix: Log Parser – Log Row Too Long”

0

Download Hyper-V Best Practices Analyzer (BPA)

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

This tool has been out for a while, but have seen multiple customers not leveraging it on their Hyper-V servers as it is not installed by default on Windows 2008 or Windows 2008 R2 Hyper-V hosts.

It is particularly useful for ensuring that the integration components inside the VM are the correct version.  Note the Best Practices Analyzer section at the bottom of this screenshot:

Server Manager with Hyper-V BPA Installed

You can use Hyper-V … Read the rest “Download Hyper-V Best Practices Analyzer (BPA)”

0

Windows Service Log On As Inventory

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

At a recent engagement a customer wanted to quickly scan through multiple servers to easily determine which services were set to log on as non-standard accounts, i.e. ones like network service, and local service were OK, but which ones were using an Active Directory logon for example?  They also wanted to search specific portions of the AD, so logic was added to start searching a collection of com… Read the rest “Windows Service Log On As Inventory”

0

Fine Grained Control When Registering Multiple IP Addresses On a Network Card

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Edit: 24-1-2013:  A second article using PowerShell 3.0 is here

Edit: 30-1-2013: – A third article is using advanced PowerShell 3.0 is here.

Edit 28-8-2013: – A similar issue with the setting being removed is present in Windows Server 2012.  Article with workaround is here.

The previous behaviour in Windows was to register all IP addresses that were entered on the network card’s property sheet into DNS… Read the rest “Fine Grained Control When Registering Multiple IP Addresses On a Network Card”

0

Custom Certificate Template Cannot be Issued

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

At an engagement yesterday, I ran into an interesting issue where a custom certificate template that was created was unavailable from the Certificate Services Web Enrolment page.

One quick peek into the KB revealed a match for the issue. 

You cannot have a Version 2 custom template of Type Minimum Windows 2008 Supported CA to be Available via Web Enrolment in Windows 2008

In Windows 2008, when yo… Read the rest “Custom Certificate Template Cannot be Issued”

1

How To Maximize Exchange Administrator Productivity With PowerShell–Part 2

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

In part one of this series we looked at some of the basic aspects of the PowerShell environment.  Let’s now look at the underlying mechanics on Exchange 2007 and 2010 servers.  We will need to address some aspects separately due to the different mechanisms that are used  between Exchange 2007 and Exchange 2010.

For part one please click here.

For part three please click here.

Let’s kick off by looking… Read the rest “How To Maximize Exchange Administrator Productivity With PowerShell–Part 2”

0

How To Maximize Exchange Administrator Productivity With PowerShell–Part 1

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Maximize Exchange Administrator Productivity With PowerShellAs a Microsoft Exchange Server focused Premier Field Engineer I spend a considerable amount of my time with customers at their work place and also when they attend training courses and workshops that I deliver. Naturally people want to talk and learn about the cool new features in Exchange 2007 and Exchange 2010, which is great as it shows their underlying passion in the product. What they often do… Read the rest “How To Maximize Exchange Administrator Productivity With PowerShell–Part 1”

0

Change DAG to DHCP

Posted on by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

One of the great changes to Exchange 2010 SP1 was that a DAG static IP address can be set using the Exchange Managemetn Console.  Prior to this in RTM, the Exchange Management Shell had to be used to set a static IP.  An example of this would be:

 

In the SP1 EMC to revert the DAG to using DHCP, simply remove all the IP Addresses that were assigned.

But how can you revert a DAG back to using DHC… Read the rest “Change DAG to DHCP”