Microsoft’s new Surface tablets are exquisitely engineered, and no one can accuse them of being me-too products. Yesterday’s launch was impressive, but it also left many questions unanswered.
Read the full article : The Ed Boot Report
At the time of this writing, the feature list is probably not yet complete. I will update this list whenever I stumble upon a new feature and post the update in the 4sysops news streams
Link : 4sysops.com
This week Apple rolled out a new version of Safari that includes a security-related feature aimed at Mac OS X 10.6 (Snow Leopard) and OS X Lion.
If you read Apple’s official announcement, you might think that Safari 5.1.7 will protect you from exploits that target vulnerabilities in outdated versions of Adobe Flash Player. That would be a fine feature indeed, except that Apple’s more detailed documentation says it does no such thing.
Source : www.zdnet.com/blog/bott
It’s been said, Microsoft Windows 8 won’t include DVD playback. Not necessarily a bad thing.
If you want to understand a little bit more about this, I suggest the 2 following articles by Ed Bott (ZDNet) :
XPERF, also known as Windows Performance Analyzer, ships as part of the Windows Performance Tools (WPT) kit. The latest WPT ships as part of the Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework. The WPT consists of:
- XPERF – an interactive trace capturing tool used in this case to enable ETL tracing of a slow user logon clearly not caused by the background loading of the OS (that is, a slow boot).
- XBOOTMGR – enables ETL tracing, reboots the host computer then stops capturing N # of (default 120) seconds after user logon for 1) slow boot scenarios and 2) slow logons caused by delays in the OS boot process.
- XPERFVIEW – views ETL traces captured by XPERF or XPERFVIEW in a graphical format linked with rich numerical reports and stack traces data to drill into delays for impacted and root cause components and functions.
Source : social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki
This breakdown of Kerberos settings and how they correspond to AD provides much-needed clarity
This ongoing need to clarify how Kerberos works and how it fails is a result of the fact that—although Kerberos remains the same—the services that use it and the ways they use it are often unique. The aspects that remain the same in each scenario, however, are what the settings in Active Directory (AD) are intended to address, and the difficult-to-interpret messages you’ll see when things fail.
Source : www.windowsitpro.com
A pair of high-profile malware attacks have given Apple a crash course in security response. Based on recent actions, 70 million current Mac owners have a right to expect much more from Apple than they’re getting today.
Eugene Kaspersky last week argued that Apple is “ten years behind Microsoft in terms of security.”
Source : The Ed Boot Report
Microsoft made available for download a new release of its free anti-virus/anti-malware program for Windows PCs, Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE), on April 24.
The MSE 4.0 release is available via the Microsoft Download Center and the MSE Web site. (I learned of its availability from a post on Neowin today.) The latest version runs on Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7.
Source : www.zdnet.com/blog/microsoft
This morning, even a bit earlier than we expected, Omar Shahine and Mike Torres posted on the Building Windows 8 blog on the new updates to SkyDrive that “make personal cloud storage for Windows available anywhere”
Immediately upon opening SkyDrive in the browser (once you are signed in), you’ll see a notice about something we hinted at the other day: future users are only going to be allowed 7 gb of free storage, instead of the 25 gb offered now. This is still bigger than Dropbox’s 2gb, or even the long rumored Google G Drive, which is said to be offering 5 gb
However, as early adopters, we’re getting a sweet deal: just click on the link in that message, which brings you to the managed storage page.
…click on the Free upgrade button, and you’ll keep your 25gb as free storage. From here, too, you can manage paid storage options, adding 100 gb of storage for $50/year.
Source : www.liveside.net
New features include:
- Support for System Center 2012 Configuration Manager
- Integration with Microsoft Diagnostics and Recovery Toolset 7 (DaRT) and Security Compliance Manager (SCM)
- Support for Windows 8 Consumer Preview for deployments in a lab environment
- Support for Windows Server “8” Beta
In terms of desktop management, Group Policy is the cornerstone of a Windows administrator’s arsenal. With Group Policy, you can deploy software, printers and drive mappings. You can configure default settings and manage client behavior. But how do you manage Group Policy? The built-in mechanics for managing Group Policy are simply inadequate for most organizations. Windows administrators either have complete access or no access by their addition and removal from the Group Policy Creator Owners Security Group. Further, Group Policy Object (GPO) management lacks in terms of change control, automated backups, and role based delegation. Microsoft’s Advanced Group Policy Management (AGPM) addresses all of these issues.
Source : 4sysops.com
Apple today has made good on its promise to release its own tool that detects and removes any instances of the Flashback malware onMac systems running Java. The tool is only available for systems running OS X 10.6 or later, and is bundled with a slightly updated version of the most recent Java runtime, but is a separate component that is installed and runs on its own.
Source : reviews.cnet.com
Today we're announcing Groups for Schools, which allow people with an active school email address to join groups at their college or university.
Source : newsroom.fb.com
Facebook is restricted to users under age 13, but according to a new survey, that hasn’t kept young children away.
MinorMonitor, a tool for parents to watch their children’s Facebook activities, surveyed 1,000 parents about how their children use Facebook, finding that 38% of children on Facebook are 12 and under. Of the 1,000 children represented by their parents, 40 were under age six.
Source : mashable.com
A common question that I come across when I talk about IIS is, How do I keep track of my application pools? I want to know every time my app pool stops etc etc.
There are several ways we can do this. Simplest of all would be to write a script (AppCmd or IIS powershell snap-in) and run it to check status. However, what I wanted was to keep a side-by-side web front end using which I could track the app pool status through the web. This means I would need to have a web server running beside IIS to relay me the data.
Enter IIS Hostable Web Core (HWC).
Source : www.iisworkstation.com
The nightmare scenario for Mac owners is here. At least 600,000 Macs worldwide have been infected, silently, by the Flashback Trojan, with no user interaction required. Here’s why this is just the beginning of a long-term problem.
Source : The Ed Boot Report
IPMI (Intelligent Platform Management Interface) is a specification defined by Intel and adopted by a number of companies for standardizing hardware management, particularly in server systems. IPMI supports both in-band (from the operating system) and out-of-band (from the network direct to hardware) management. The protocol IPMI uses for out-of-band management is not based on WS-Management and not the focus of this blog post.
Available since Windows 2003 R2, Microsoft has developed a generic IPMI Driver and IPMI Provider in Windows to enable management of BMCs (Base board Management Controller) that implement IPMI. The IPMI Driver (IPMIdrv.sys) is essentially a light-weight “pass-through” driver which takes IPMI requests and returns IPMI responses. The IPMI Provider (IPMIprv.dll) takes the heavy load of converting between IPMI and CIM.
One-third of mobile users say they've told others when they had a bad experience with a mobile app. But more than half say they've recommended an app based on a positive experience. Put yourself on the right side of that conversation with these seven best practices.
Article : drdobbs.com
Adobe just released a critical Flash Player security update. Good news: it includes a new automatic updater for Windows. Bad news: Adobe’s download page pushes a misleading “system optimizer” designed to scare users into paying for unneeded repairs.
Source : The Ed Boot Report
