Date: 20 July 2008 - 08:47
Steve Rachui: A common step in imaging is to use the 'Apply Network Settings' task sequence item to configure joining a system to the domain.
There are two options for supplying a username to use in the join - supply username in the Domain\User format or use a variable. In this task sequence step, the Domain\User option expects a domain name that is 15 characters or less - anything more will result in an error exclamation marker. Provided the total domain name is no more than 15 characters you can use either NetBios or FQDN names. With FQDN names longer than 15 characters it is still possible to configure this task sequence step but you must use a variable as shown above. When you choose to use a variable there must be a preceding step in the task sequence that sets the value of this variable. The screenshot below shows the task sequence order and then step where we set the value of our variable, domacct.
Date: 20 July 2008 - 08:44
Rod Trent: Weve dealt with AV exclusions for SMS and ConfigMgr for a long time, so having information about recommended exclusion practices for OpsMgr 2007 is definitely welcome.
While not officially documented, the OpsMgr teams recommends the following(
continue at source)
Date: 20 July 2008 - 08:42
Steve Rachui: I've seen the question several times now about whether ConfigMgr supports setting OpsMgr agents into maintenance mode during software deployment. The answer is mixed.
Notice that the text says that setting this option in ConfigMgr will result in any alerts being suppressed for the duration of the program. When you set these options ConfigMgr WILL stop alert generation ON THE AGENT by simply pausing the health service. However, there is nothing done to suppress the alerts that may be seen from the various other components that may be interacting with the agent, such as the health service watcher. We are aware that there needs to be improvement in this area and are anticipating some changes in how this performs so that, when selected, all components will be placed in maintenance mode.
Date: 20 July 2008 - 08:40
Date: 20 July 2008 - 08:33
Jeff Gilbert: I'm updating the official documentation for this right now, but since there seems to be a lot of confusion about this process, I figured I'd post here as well. This way the information will be 'out there' before the next documentation update to the Web (planned for when Configuration Manager 2007 R2 RTM's).
First off, you can only do this with the Asset Intelligence feature included in Configuration Manager 2007 SP1 so if you are not running that stop reading and go upgrade your site!
Anyway, the quick intro to this is that by using the Asset Intelligence License Import Wizard included in ConfigMgr SP1, you can import both Microsoft and non-Microsoft software license information into the site database to help in inventorying the licensed software in use in your enterprise. You can then use Asset Intelligence reports to compare what you have versus what you paid for. Pretty handy. (
continue at source)
Date: 20 July 2008 - 08:25
System Center Virtual User Group Weblog: Congratulations to our second category winner, for the Command-line or Web-based Tools category, Vicent de Vries, who submitted the SDK Connector Tool for System Center Operations Manager 2007.
You can download the SDK Connector Tool for System Center Operations Manager 2007 at
http://www.systemcenterusergroup.com/files/folders/contest/entry117.aspx
Date: 20 July 2008 - 08:03
System Center Virtual User Group Weblog: Congratulations to our first category winner, for the SCCM Configuration Pack category, is Jason Scheffelmaer, who submitted an SCCM Roles Wizard. While not technically a Configuration Pack, his solutions goes far beyond being a simple script, and as such, Jason was declared the winner for this category.
You can download the SCCM Roles Wizard at
http://www.systemcenterusergroup.com/files/folders/contest/entry114.aspx
Date: 17 July 2008 - 01:01
The work that needs to be done in the Configuration manager 2007 admin console is often spread out amongst different team members. Not all of these team members require access to the full admin console. Most environments do configure the permission set in a somewhat restrictive member so that team members only have the permission they need, but what is often forgotten is building a custom minimal admin console with just access to the features people need.
This shouldn't be done from a security point of view, the additional security this brings is neglectable, but more from a usability point of view. It makes the admin console easier to use, and avoids access denied errors, or empty detail panes because someone clicks on a heading in the admin console for which he doesn't have permission.(
continue at source)
Date: 16 July 2008 - 01:08
Steve Rachui: Every OSD administrator knows the feeling of configuring a complex (or even simple) OSD Deployment, testing and releasing - only to have the deployment fail. At failure, OSD will begin a countdown to reboot and, on restart, the logs are often lost and we administrators are left wondering what went wrong. To find out we have to start the deployment again and spend time waiting for the failure. Wouldn't it be cool if we had a way to automate forcing OSD to collect logs when it fails before exiting? Good news! :)
I have spent some time recently working on just how to do that and we have two examples - both use the same approach but one is for generic task sequences (those sent through advertisements,etc) and the other is for OSD deployments. Lets start with the generic one, explain the needed steps and the show how we incorporate that into OSD.(
continue at source)
Date: 16 July 2008 - 12:45
As you may of may not know, Virtual Machine Manager 2007 was only available as part of available as part of SMSE (System Center Server Management Suite Enterprise). Good news: Virtual Machine Manager 2008 will be available for purchase separately as well.
The System Center blog mentions: one thing thats new with the release of VMM 2008, is that well be making it available to customers and partners as a standalone product; VMM 2007 was only available as part of the SMSE. While the feedback from customers on the synergy of the products in the SMSE has been exciting over the last 8 months, we also wanted to offer customers the choice of VMM 2008 standalone as well, as we do with the other products in the System Center family including Configuration Manager 2007, Operations Manager 2007 and Data Protection Manager 2007. (
continue at source)
Date: 15 July 2008 - 01:36
Vista SP1 Installations Deployed Using Operating System Deployment Cannot Hibernate
Issue
When the Configuration Manager 2007 operating system deployment feature is used to deploy a Vista SP1 image, a new boot configuration data (BCD) store is created using the BCD template. Configuration Manager 2007 explicitly creates the Boot Manger and Operating System objects from the BCD template, but allows the Resume object to be created implicitly by Windows Vista when it goes through mini-setup. Vista SP1 correctly generates the Resume object during mini-setup but the associated Resume settings objects are not generated. Because there are no Resume settings objects, hibernate functionality does not work.(
continue at source)
Date: 15 July 2008 - 01:25
Satya Vel: If you are like me and just itching to try and install OpsMgr 2007 DB and Reporting on Longhorn and cannot wait till SQL 2008 to install SQL on Longhorn as they do not support SQL 2005 on Longhorn you can try my HACK!! Yes, this is NOT supported by the OpsMgr team and our test manager will probably kill me for posting this on the web but what the heck that why there are blogs. These steps are a culmination of things Stephanie and Melissa on our test team and I have tried to get it to work. So here it goes
(
continue at source)
Date: 15 July 2008 - 01:23
The Service Level Dashboard for Operations Manager 2007 is a new Solution Accelerator that addresses IT Service Managers need for near real time, end-to-end reporting of the performance and availability of their line-of-business (LOB) applications. The accelerator provides a unique view of a business application from the users point of view by simulating user interactions with the business application and reporting on the experience. A small number of agents are deployed in the enterprise network to provide an accurate sampling of all the different conditions under which the business application operates. The data is then collected and interpreted.
Results are displayed in a single Web-based user interface, providing both top-level and drill-down views. The top level view reports the Service Level Agreement (SLA) status (compliant or non-compliant) of every application being monitored. The detailed views reveal component-level information that can help administrators investigate the possible causes of noncompliance reported at the top level.
You can read more
here and you can also watch a video overview
here.
Download Service Level Dashboard Management Pack for System Center Operations Manager 2007
Date: 15 July 2008 - 01:21
Have you ever wanted to create email notifications for Alerts based on Alert Descriptions? This cannot be done using the E-mail Notification Channel and Subscriptions settings.
This can be done however with the use of the Notification Command Channel with uses a vbscript that sends an email based on the information in the Alert Description. All the logic and sending of the emails is done by a script.(
continue at source)
Date: 15 July 2008 - 01:20
An important aspect of virtualization is the actual management: as an administrator, you want to have a single console for managing all your virtual machines and hosts. With software such as VMwares VirtualCenter, you can manage a complete ESX environment and add a ton of extra features (such as DRS, HA, intelligent placement, templates, etc). Microsofts answer to the management question is System Center Virtual Machine Manager (also known as VMM).
This piece of software is your one-stop shop to all your Virtual Server 2005 R2 (and in the 2008 release) Hyper-V hosts and even your VI3 infrastructure. VMwares VirtualCenter can be added and so ESX hosts can be managed from within VMM. Virtual Machine Manager 2008 provides most VirtualCenter Server functionality including VMotion. More complex tasks such as adding hosts to an ESX cluster must be done using VirtualCenter itself.
It is also tightly integrated with other System Center products (such as integration with System Center Operations Manager 2007) and PowerShell. A very interesting feature is Performance and Resource Optimization (or PRO). PRO is a feature of VMM which can dynamically respond to failure scenarios or poorly configured components that are identified in hardware, operating systems or applications. VMM 2008 also integrates with the new clustering support in Windows Server 2008 to allow for fault-tolerant and cluster aware virtual machines to be created. It leverages the much talked about Quick Migration technique.
In this article, we will install and explore the basics of System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008. (
continue at source)
Date: 15 July 2008 - 01:19
Kristian F. Thomsen: When ConfigMgr is configured in Mixed mode and client computers are re-imaged/re-installed; by default a new ConfigMgr computer object is created and the old computer object will become Obsolete. Well, this is by design, but it might become a problem. If the client has many direct collection memberships, these direct memberships will not be preserved when a new computer object is created. Therefore, these have to be re-created.
When ConfigMgr is configured in Native Mode, the client identity is automatically migrated since we are using certificates.
Well, with ConfigMgr, this problem can be handled. However, it is a manually process. In the Site properties dialog, on the Advanced tab, there is a section called Conflicting records. From here it can be configured how ConfigMgr should handle conflicting records. That is, clients with duplicate hardware Ids.(
continue at source)
Date: 30 June 2008 - 01:40
Microsoft reaches a significant milestone for customers and partners with the release of Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, the hypervisor-based virtualization feature included in select versions of Windows Server 2008. Those who have already deployed the x64 versions of Windows Server 2008 can receive Hyper-V from 