in

myITforum.com

This Blog

Syndication

Rob Marshall @ MyItForum.com
... my god, it's full of stars

News

What Video Game Character Are You? I am Kung Fu Master.
I am Kung Fu Master.

I like to be in control of myself. I dislike crowds, especially crowds containing people trying to kill me. Even though I always win, I prefer to avoid fights if possible.

What Video Game Character Are You?

Blogs I read

Rob Marshall @ MyItForum.com


... my god, it's full of stars
  • WMUG Event 18th July 2009 media

    Just a quick note that you can now find Andrew Drivers Windows 7 slide-deck here: http://wmug.co.uk/groups/wmug_event_material/media/p/1891.aspx

     

  • WMUG Event - 18th July 2009 - Done and dusted

    Great event, thanks all that attended and thanks to Andrew Driver for presenting on Windows 7 and Johan Arwidmark for presenting on MDT.

    Went really well, we had a great turn out and hopefully everyone got something from the event, be it free pizza, chance to meet other like-minded folk, or just plain old knowledge!

    We'll be putting the Windows 7 slide-deck on the site very soon, in the meantime, as promised, here is the link to Johan's site: http://deployvista.com/

    The slide-deck that Johan used at the WMUG event is here: http://deployvista.com/Home/tabid/36/EntryID/91/language/en-US/Default.aspx

    And if you are going huh what event? Here is the info: http://wmug.co.uk/groups/wmug_event_content/pages/wmug-event-18-06-09-18-30-to-21-00-cardinal-place-london.aspx

    Also a small shout out for those winners who managed to get their named pulled out of the raffle hat, sorry the SWAG wasn't so hot this time, but thanks for sticking around to see if you were a winner.

    Talking of SWAG Andrew Driver has volunteered to put his Porsche up for the raffle at his next event, definitely worth coming along for that eh! (obviously he hasn't, so don't get all legal on my ass and demand a Porsche please, as us System Center admin's can't afford to give you one!)

    Can't wait for the next event. Talking of which, please email me if you are interested in a pure Windows 7 with a Management skew event again at Cardinal place. If we can get 15 of you interested we'll arrange it no problem.

    Also if you attended and haven't registered on WMUG, please do so now as we REALLY want to put some polls up and unfortunately you can only participate in them if you are actually logged in to the site. We want to do this to get an idea of the kind of content you are after over the coming months. As we like to say this is your User Group, we just facilitate.

    Again, thanks for attending folks, was cool seeing some of my old work collegues (damn isn't it a small world!), faces from previous events and people new to WMUG. I think Susan Smith (one of our resident bloggers) was there, sorry I didn't get a chance to say hi and thank you for blogging! Hopefully next time!

  • ConfigMgr reporting: Users get HTTP error 400 when browsing the Reporting Point

    We've been finding a few users are experiencing problems when accessing the traditional ConfigMgr Reporting Point.

    Odd, as other users are accessing the Reporting Point AOK, and no errors are appearing in the default web instance HTTP log (%WINDIR%\system32\logfiles\W3SVC1). However, a quick look in the HTTPERR logs and these error 400's show up (%WINDIR%\system32\logfiles\HTTPERR).

    2009-01-15 21:32:15 x.x.x.x xxxx x.x.x.x 80 HTTP/1.1 GET /smsreporting_<YOURSITECODE>/Report.asp?ReportID=xxx&NAME=<CLIENTNAME>&SITE=<SITECODE>&STATUS=&COLLECTIONID=<COLLECTIONID> 400 - RequestLength -

    I've obviously obfuscated the HTTP response from IIS, stripping out IP and other identifiying information. The important part of the response is in bold, 400 and RequestLength

    If you are seeing this, most likely these users are getting bounced off the reporting point due to their Kerberos ticket being too big for IIS to handle. It seems to be due to how many groups this user is a member of (including nested groups).

    Here are two interesting articles to aid you in fixing this:

    http://support.microsoft.com/kb/955585
    http://support.microsoft.com/kb/820129

    I won't suggest sizes for the registry keys, it's something you'll need to assess either by plucking values out of the air true jedi style, or follow the KB955585 articles procedure for determining the values.

    Some notes:

    • I refer to default web instance, obviously if you are using SMSWEB it's not the default instance you are looking for (that's two star wars references, I rock!)
    • Paths may be different, depends where you install stuff
    • The KB articles are not ConfigMgr specific, this issue will affect any IIS based application I believe
    • It doesn't say in KB article KB955585 (which is unusual for MS), but tweaking your registry can lead to pain, make sure you know what you are doing and I reserve the right to call you a numptee if you complain to me that I didn't warn you enough ;-)
  • A different kind of Patch

    I've been patching myself lately.

    Since Sunday, I've had Nicorette patches on. For those not in the know, they deliver nicotine in to the body to stave off the urge to have a smoke and thus help to give up smoking.

    So far it's been OK, although I’ve still got nicotine coursing through my veins, I've got absolutely no desire to light up. I'm avoiding smokers like the plague, even moving away from folk who are smoking on the street. And, although it's just been a handful of days I already feel a lot fitter.

    I'm on a reoccurring patch schedule, daily for 6 weeks, reducing the patches from 15mg to 10mg (which I’m on now), thereafter it's pure willpower. I think I'll cope ;-) If I ever do smoke it'll be after one of those Hollywood style moments where the world is about to explode, or, I’ve just saved thousands of people using my super human powers and need to light up after (no wait, I don't have super powers!).

    Anyways, I bet my air consumption while diving is going to change :-)

  • WMUG event: 18th of June 2009 6:30 start @ Cardinal Place (London)

    Just a final reminder that WMUG is hosting another event, at Cardinal Place, covering MDT (Johan Arwidmark MVP) and Windows 7 (Viral Tarpara and Andrew Driverand, both MSFT's)

    You must register to attend, do so here: http://www.wmug.eventbrite.com/

    Thursday is just around the corner, we'll be shutting the registrations a day before, so now is the time to register if you are coming!

    If you are attending ... See you there!

    WMUG EVENT - 18/06/09 - 18:30 to 21:00 - Cardinal Place, London

    We are delighted to be able to announce our next meeting on Thursday 18th June at Microsoft’s office in Cardinal Place London where this time we'll be kicking off with an in-depth look at Windows 7, courtesy of Viral Tarpara and Andrew Driver from Microsoft.

    After some refreshments, Johan Arwidmark (a fellow MVP) will be presenting highlights from three of his ConfigMgr / MDT sessions from this year’s MMS.

    Coupled with SWAG give always, networking opportunities, etc. this promises to be a great evening and best of all everything is FREE.

    To register simply use the following links so we know how many are coming so everyone gets fed and watered:

    http://www.wmug.eventbrite.com/

  • Microsoft patches for June 2009

    I've just finished dealing with the slew of Microsoft June 2009 patch set for our environment. Quite a few patches this time around, we're fully tested and no issues in our environment with the Office, IE or OS patches. All went swimmingly well.

    Now time to go home as I've got a headache from looking at SUM too much :>

  • o2 - Apple iPhone 3GS

    iPhone 3GS and o2 carrier package ... what a rip off! For what? a compass, larger capacity (who has 16GB of songs atm, many of us running out of space?), slightly faster process (but no FLASH!) and tethering? You've got to be kidding me!

    Read on: http://www.t3.com/news/o2-keeps-iphone-3g-s-exclusivitiy-reveals-pricing-and-tethering-tarrifs?=39087&allCom=y

    We have to pay large sums of money to get tethering with a few pitiful GB a month even though we are on an "unlimited data plan" hahaha!

    MMS is pointless, as again you have to pay heavily to use it ...

    As an existing iPhone 3G user I don't see ANY reason to upgrade, especially if I have to pay a hefty amount of cash to get out of my contract with o2 ... so I can get back in to a contract with o2 for another year and a half, which doesn't even sync with the hardware release cycle from Apple! What a complete joke!

    As soon as my contract runs out with o2 I'll be switching to another carrier as o2 are PANTS in London, UK. Such spotty 3G it's almost pointless using it unless you are standing still underneath a cell!

    Honestly, I think the iPhone won't be feature complete (version 1.0 in my eyes) until 2015! You may scoff at that but we're up to version 3.0 of their firmware and it's still not on parity with phones that have been out for years.

    I really dislike it when a company reduces their phone's features and drip feeds these features in to the product over many years to maximize their profit, sacrificing being leading edge and yet still posing and acting like they are pioneering.

    Hey Steve Jobs! Get over your angst with Adobe and get flash support working (now that you have a faster CPU what's holding you back now?), and tell your developers to get out of the habit of not introducing COMMON features so that you can SLOWLY introduce them under much fanfare without having to be innovative in the slightest. Stop riding the wave of vacuous marketing campaigns. This is proving that you just do not innovate anymore, your flash (arf) in the pan moment was releasing the product, we're over it already, the fancy marketing has dulled, lost it's edge, start showing us something worth buying\upgrading too and stop the nonsense with inflated prices and carrier lock-in and abuse.

    The iPhone was designed as a tool for carriers to extort money out of consumers, rather than a tool for consumers to get the most out of "todays" technology.

    Come on Microsoft, I've said this before, build a phone to compete with this one, make the SDK available to everyone (free download accessible to ANYONE) and build in support for Spotify so that iTunes can be removed from the equation entirely.

    Pioneer and innovate, lead ;-)

  • David Carradine - Goes to the fluffy kung-fu temple in the sky

    Heard this yesterday, David Carradine was found in a cupboard singularly performing strange sexual rituals. What a way to go. He was one of my favorite B movie actors. Legendary indeed. I guess his blocking technique wasn't up to par, or his shaolin monk training had slipped to the wayside over the years as he managed to off himself in a rather embarrassing way.

    Here's bio on David for those of you in the dark: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Carradine

    Most famous for his portrayal of a wandering monk Kwai Chang Caine in the TV series Grasshopper: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kung_Fu_(TV_series)

    Who remembers the intro to Grasshopper where he tries to take the pebble from his masters hand? Classic TV.

    Master Po: Close your eyes. What do you hear?
    Young Caine: I hear the water, I hear the birds.
    Po: Do you hear your own heartbeat?
    Caine: No.
    Po: Do you hear the grasshopper that is at your feet?
    Caine: Old man, how is it that you hear these things?
    Po: Young man, how is it that you do not?

    A sure sign that you are getting old when those that you use to watch as a kid on a Saturday morning, are, well, popping off like flies.

  • Another search engine about to hit the internet highways

    Check out Bing, a new search engine from Microsoft.

    Time of this posting it's not ready for public consumption, I believe it'll be ready for us on the 1st of June 2009.

    They do have a video posted, click here to view

    A few words on the subject over on CNET. They say it'll take market share from Google, is a lot more "solid" than Windows Live search, guess by that they mean it answers more questions.

    Search for Bing on Google

    Search for Bing on Windows Live

     

  • WSUS SP2 Beta - available for public consumption on Connect

    WSUS SP2 Beta is now available for evaluation on Connect.

    Here's an overview taken from the WSUS Product Team Blog:

    WSUS 3.0 SP2 Beta Overview

    New Windows Server and Client Version Support
    ·       Integration with Windows Server® 2008 R2

    ·       Support for Windows 7® client

    ·       Support for the BranchCache feature on Windows Server® 2008 R2

    WSUS Beta Feature Improvements and Fixes
    Auto-Approval Rules
    ·       New functionality lets you specify the approval deadline date and time.

    ·       You can now apply a rule to all computers or to specific computer groups.

    Update Files and Languages
    ·       This release provides improved handling of language selection on downstream servers. A new warning dialog appears when you download updates only for specified languages.

    Cross-Version Compatibility
    ·       The user interface is compatible between Service Pack 1 and Service Pack 2 for WSUS 3.0 on both the client and the server.

    Software Updates
    ·       Stability and reliability fixes for the WSUS server, such as support for IPV6 addresses greater than 40 characters.

    ·       The approval dialog now sorts computer groups alphabetically by group name.

    ·       Computer status report sorting icons are now functional in x64 environments.

    ·       Fixed setup issues with database servers running Microsoft® SQL Server® 2008.

  • WMUG Event: June 18th, 2009

    I am delighted to be able to announce our next meeting on Thursday 18th June at Microsoft’s office in Cardinal Place London where this time we'll be kicking off with an in-depth look at Windows 7, courtesy of Viral Tarpara and Andrew Driver from Microsoft.

    After some refreshments, Johan Arwidmark (MVP) will be presenting highlights from three of his ConfigMgr / MDT sessions from this year’s MMS.

    Coupled with SWAG give always, networking opportunities, etc. this promises to be a great evening and best of all everything is FREE.

    To register simply use the following links so we know how many are coming so everyone gets fed and watered:

    http://www.wmug.eventbrite.com/

    Look forward to seeing you there.

  • Microsoft Security Advisory (971492) - Vulnerability in Internet Information Services Could Allow Elevation of Privilege

    Related to WEBDAV and the Anonymous account (IUSER_<>)

    Microsoft is investigating new public reports of a possible vulnerability in Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS). An elevation of privilege vulnerability exists in the way that the WebDAV extension for IIS handles HTTP requests. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by creating a specially crafted anonymous HTTP request to gain access to a location that typically requires authentication.

    We are not aware of attacks that are trying to use this vulnerability or of customer impact at this time. Microsoft is investigating the public reports.

    http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/advisory/971492.mspx

  • Simple SQL query - Show collections a client is a member of

    Was just asked to create a ConfigMgr query to show which collections a client is a member of:

    Note: Collections do not replicate upwards, so running this on your Central for a Tier 2\3 client will not show anything. Either run it on the assigned site server, or from a higher up site server where all the collections are managed ...

    SELECT     v_FullCollectionMembership.CollectionID, v_FullCollectionMembership.Name as [Client], v_Collection.Name AS [Collection Name],
                          v_FullCollectionMembership.SiteCode
    FROM         v_FullCollectionMembership INNER JOIN
                          v_Collection ON v_FullCollectionMembership.CollectionID = v_Collection.CollectionID
    WHERE V_FullCollectionMembership.Name = '<MACHINE NAME>'

    This can even go in to a report, create the report, create a prompt called @ClientName, edit the above '<MACHINE NAME>' text (don't forget to strip the apostrophes out too) and replace with @ClientName, then replace the existing default query in the new report with the modified SQL statement from above.

    You could even link this report to the built-in "All resources in a specific collection" report, a good idea as that report then links to another report showing you the advertisements for that client which can then be drilled in to even further to give you the "Status of a specific advertisement". Very handy if you first want to know what collections the client is a member of (for deployment troubleshooting), then go through to the advertisement information.

    This will probably work on SMS2003 as well, I don't think those views changed ...

    (PS ... I hate the way community server messes with formatting, gets font sizes wrong, won't let you reformat easily, and generally makes a mare of things I post ... yes I even blame CS for my typo's, factually incorrect postings and everything else, grrr, double grrr)

     

     

  • WMI Troubleshooting tips

    More from the Configuration Manager team blog, which you really should subscribe to their RSS feed, or make a habit of frequenting their website for some really good ConfigMgr info.

    Brian Huneycutt has posted a super cool run down on solving WMI issues over on the Configuration Manager team blog

    A good summary of the steps to get WMI back on its feet. And a word of warning about just deleting the WMI repository (which we've all done I'm sure!)

  • SRS FAQ

     Bhaskar Krishnan has posted a great SRS FAQ over on the Configuration Manger team blog.

    Worth a read, and the team blog is worth bookmarking Smile

  • MMMUG - Exchange 2010 - 27th of May 2009

    MMMUG (Microsoft Messaging & Mobility User Group) is hosting an Exchange 2010 centric event on the 27th of May 2009 ... Read on:

     

    No point rewriting what Nathan has already done a superb job on ...

     

     

     

     

    Hi All,

    As you will no doubt have heard, Exchange 2010 was launched to the public on the 15th of April. This of course means that there is now a huge amount of new features and functionality to learn. So, to help you get started MMMUG will be running a series of events over the next few months covering many of the key areas.

     

    We start on Wednesday May 27th with an overview of Exchange 2010. I will introduce things by taking a look at the future of email, Microsoft Style! Then Brett Johnson will dive deeper into a few of the key new areas.

     

    To sign up for the event see the link below:

     

    http://www.mmmug.co.uk/forums/thread/28030.aspx

     

    In the mean time, if you want to get started then check out my blog posts on Prerequisites, Installation and Certificates here:

     

    Prereqs:

    http://www.mmmug.co.uk/blogs/nweb/archive/2009/04/15/27696.aspx

     

    Install:

    http://www.mmmug.co.uk/blogs/nweb/archive/2009/04/15/27697.aspx

     

    Certificates:

    http://www.mmmug.co.uk/blogs/nweb/archive/2009/04/21/27774.aspx

     

     

    Looking forward to seeing you at the event.

    Cheers

    Nathan

  • Getting a CMD prompt as LSA in Vista\W2008

    One of the best tricks for us sms admins to use while troubleshooting access (amongst other things) is to use a CMD prompt elevated to SYSTEM context. A godsend for those of us that are permissions challenged, such as Secondary site servers that we the sms admins have no permissions to access, but the parent site server does, or doing diagnostic tests (such as running Internet Explorer in SYSTEM context etc).

    Traditionally, we could pull this off on pre-Vista\W2008 OS's, but Microsoft have controls in place now to try to stop this kind of elevation from taking place (session 0 isolation).

    Kim Oppalfens linked me to Ben Griswold (JohnnyCoders) blog on how to make it happen. Definitly worth a read.

  • First Graphics Game written on and for a (16 bit) Home Computer

    Another Rob "Retro" Marshall posting i'm afraid Smile

    Well worth taking a peek at this link, worlds first graphical game for a 16-bit computer from the Adams family (Richard, Eric, Scott!) ...

    Today many computer enthusiasts write programs at home for their own graphical games. It's fun. This page documents the first graphical computer game written at home on capable home computer hardware. It turns out that both the game software and the computer hardware were created at home by three brothers all in college in the mid '70s.

    What a contrast to todays high-powered 3D computer games eh! I was about 4 years old when this was happening ...

  • MMS and Wolfram Alpha

    Lots of folk posting about MMS, some great stuff happening in the ConfigMgr space, cannot wait for the beta :>

    Also, I cannot way for this to launch ... new search engine toy, woohoo! May time!

     

     

  • Replaced my Mountain Bike

    Bought this puppy on the weekend:

    http://www.cycleworld.co.uk/product/17860/Gary_Fisher_Wahoo_Disc_2009_Gunmetal

    Rides nice ... lightweight, disc braking system, it responded well by soaking up a lot of feedback from the trail\road. Was actually really easy to navigate around at slow speeds rather than stalling and getting too twitchy like my old heavy framed bike did (which rode on hut off in to the big bike yard in the sky). Just need to find the time to take it out often!

  • Pittsburgh Pattern Recognition - Facing off with Star Trek

    Another "worth a read link"!

    Bit of Pittsburgh Pattern Recognition face mining from 67 Star Trek episodes ... you can see the face recognition in action with a clip from that classic Star Trek episode "from Where No Man Has Gone Before"

    Looks like they are getting that tech real tight, was cool watching the software adjusting the bounding boxes around Kirk and Spocks face as they shifted about the cardboard scene and dodgy primary school props hehe, and how it was trying to figure out the folk in the background ... impressive.

  • Bit of Bill

    Got a couple of links for my "worth a read" list on Our Lad Bill (sourced ./)

    Bill Gates the younger's growing pains from no other than Bill Gates Sr, and some photos from the Gates family album on the Wall Street Journal website.

  • World Digital Library

    Stumbled upon this earlier, if you love reading ancient history, right up your street ...

    Mission

    The World Digital Library (WDL) makes available on the Internet, free of charge and in multilingual format, significant primary materials from countries and cultures around the world.

    The principal objectives of the WDL are to:

    Promote international and intercultural understanding;
    Expand the volume and variety of cultural content on the Internet;
    Provide resources for educators, scholars, and general audiences;
    Build capacity in partner institutions to narrow the digital divide within and between countries.

    Click here to visit

    I found this on there, http://www.wdl.org/en/item/49/ - British Empire Throughout the World Exhibited in One View - By John Bartholomew (1831-1893) - Amazing to think we can access stuff from the 17th Century via the web!

    And a lots of stuff on America here - http://www.wdl.org/en/search/gallery?ql=en&a=-8000&b=2009&c=US&r=NorthAmerica

    And if you are in to your major league baseball history - http://www.wdl.org/en/item/29/

    Awesome resource, hope you enjoy stumbling on it like I did

     

     

     

     

  • Got a MAC? Are you part of the iBotnet (only if you are a dodgy pirate!)

    Interesting story over on ZDNET (I originally sourced this on Slashdot) about Apple MAC's and what's being called iBotnet ...

    MAC's may be so crippled that they don't get turned over by web based drive-bys, but they are not invunlerable to the invasion of the botnets!

    What's even funnier about this is that if you are a part of this botnet, the chances are high that you pirating some dodgy MAC software from a P2P network! haha talk about being exposed!

    http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=3157

     

  • Citrix and Application Virtualisation links

    A colleague passed me a link to his blog of sorts a few weeks ago, meant to post it on here ... contains lots of links about Citrix and Application Virtualisation. If thats your thing, then go pick through his links, see if there's anything that tickles your fancy.

    Arthurs netvibes

  • SMS / ConfigMgr Callback Information and Resources website

    Useful troubleshooting jump off point for when you need to raise a support case with Microsoft CSS. It's called the SMS / ConfigMgr Callback Information and Resources website

    Even if you are not raising a case, its worth being bookmarked for the tips and links off in to the ConfigMgr documentation library

    http://blogs.technet.com/configmgrcallback/default.aspx

  • Flight Control for iPhone

    I've got this game for the iPhone (yes apologies for mentioning the Apple beast here) called Flight Control. Has to be one of the most addictive games I've played in a long time. My fiance has same type of phone, and we have play off's once in a while, which is real geeky but great fun, especially since she never plays games!!!

    Essentially using gestures you swipe the screen on an airplane and draw it's flight path to the runway. Four different types of craft, helicopter, twin-prop, normal airplane and jet airplane. Screen gets real busy in waves, awesome idea, so simply!

    I'm currently at a score of 155, if you can beat that then drop a comment in the blog below!

    Here's a link for more info on the game: FireMint - Flight Control

  • Sunday morning panic

    This morning, around 1am I had to throw on some clothes and run outside to see why my car alarm was going off. It was the most bizarre way to wake up, I was half awake trying to make sense of what my fiance was saying ... "Zzzzzz .... wake up ... car .... alarm ... from TV or is it your Car?". We'd left the TV on, some cops and robbers show was on, sirens blazing in a car chase of all things, while in the background the gentle but insistant bleating of a car alarm, confusing or what!

    So, I went and peeked out of the window, normally all I can see of the car is the headlights as it's parked on higher ground, couldn't see a thing, got higher up and took another look out the window, where has my car is gone?

    And now, back to throwing clothes on and running outside, to see my car has rolled in to the road! On the way out I got the car keys and was pressing the Lock button in case someone was inside trying to rob the stereo or something, daft, but I thought i'd lock them for a few moments, no one in sight, the car had just literally rolled back off the parking bay, and in to the road, blocking almost both lanes! This is just after 1am when the roads here become busy with folk coming back from a night out, and already a few cars and a bus had pulled up and was waiting for me to get my car out of the way! Sheepishly I put her back on the parking bay, really engaged the handbrake and when back to bed. So lucky there wasn't an accident, someone passing as she rolled out of the bay, lucky she didn't continue to the other side of the road and in to the wall or something crazy!!!

    What a night, the Phantom hand-brake releaser strikes!

    She's in gear now, with the hand-brake, just in case ;-)

  • Microsoft DreamSpark free to High School, College and University students

    Microsoft DreamSpark now provides professional-level Microsoft developer tools, at no charge, to High School students. Previously, these tools were only available to College and University students.

    Back when I was programming, using IDE's, I had built in BASIC, DevPac for the Amiga and Turbo Pacal for the PC. When I look at what's available to teenagers now, the complexity of these tools, and what you could do with them, it makes me wonder how accessible they are for the average teen. I had my hands full understanding what look like primitive computers compared to todays standards. Now, they have on-hand help with links out to the help for more information, auto-completing IDE's with object pickers to write their code in, complex and powerful database and web server technologies to store and present things from. I'm sure if I about to switch on to computing at High School, with Microsoft giving this stuff away, I'd be absorbed by it totally.

    Just look at this bundle of tools we can give the kids:

    • Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition
    • SQL Server 2008 Developer
    • CCR and DSS Toolkit 2008
    • Expression Studio 2
    • Visual Studio 2005 Express Edition
    • Robotics Developer Studio 2008
    • Windows Server 2003
    • SQL Server Express
    • Game Studio 3.0
    • Windows Server 2008 Standard
    • Virtual PC

    Worth passing this info on to Parents you know.

    Check out Microsoft DreamSpark here

    And a Q/A on DreamSpark from Microsoft PressPass

  • Patching: Security Update for SQL Server 2000 Service Pack 4 (KB960083) Failed to install

    Security Update for SQL Server 2000 Service Pack 4 (KB960083) fails to install

    Not many of you will see this, problem manifests if a SQL instance service is set to Disabled.

    Client System EventLog:

    Installation Failure: Windows failed to install the following update with error 0x80070643: Security Update for SQL Server 2000 Service Pack 4 (KB960083).

    Client WindowsUpdate log:

    Handler :: START ::  Handler: Command Line Install
    Handler :::::::::
    Handler   : Updates to install = 1
    Handler   : WARNING: Command line install completed. Return code = 0x00002b33, Result = Failed, Reboot required = false
    Handler   : WARNING: Exit code = 0x8024200B
    Handler :::::::::
    Handler ::  END  ::  Handler: Command Line Install
    ...
    ...
    ...
    COMAPI   - WARNING: Exit code = 0x00000000; Call error code = 0x80240022
    REPORT EVENT: {B3B18A60-1D96-4D2B-A657-E4CDD945C7B0} <TRIMMED OUT THIS DATA} 101 80070643 CcmExec Failure Content Install Installation Failure: Windows failed to install the following update with error 0x80070643: Security Update for SQL Server 2000 Service Pack 4 (KB960083).

    Lovely errors! Pass those 3D-Glasses over the error above, and you should see hidden text saying "You have a service that is disabled".  If only!

    Hop on to the target, find the patch in the ConfigMgr CACHE and manually run it. The Wizard will prompt you to select the instances to patch. Click on any Instances listed and it'll tell you what is wrong, that in this case, the service is disabled. Quit the patch when you've spotted the culprit.

    To install it manually:

    • Enable the service (MANUAL best choice if it's already been disabled for a reason)
    • Apply the patch
    • Set the service back to DISABLED
    • Job done!

    How much impact is this to us? Well that depends, as you know everything in life, even stuff as sublime as "Should you have Milk in your tea?" really depends on your tastes and preferences, and in this case you may have a taste for disabling SQL Instances. If you do, then those clients will play dumb when it comes to applying the patch.

    The KB Article does indeed talk about Disabled Services:

    Q. Will the updates be applied to disabled instances of SQL Server 2000, MSDE 2000, and SQL Server 2005?

    A. No. Only those instances of SQL Server 2000, MSDE 2000, and SQL Server 2005 that do not have a Startup type of disabled will be updated by the installer. For more information on disabled services, see Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 953740.

    I just whipped this SQL Query up to identify ConfigMgr clients out there that meet the following: 

    • A) Have a service registered with a name that begins with "MSSQL$"
    • B) Has the service type set to Disabled

    SELECT     v_GS_SERVICE.DisplayName0, v_GS_SERVICE.StartMode0, v_R_System.Name0 AS Expr1
    FROM         v_GS_SERVICE INNER JOIN
                          v_R_System ON v_GS_SERVICE.ResourceID = v_R_System.ResourceID
    WHERE     (v_GS_SERVICE.DisplayName0 LIKE 'MSSQL$%' and V_GS_SERVICE.StartMode0 = 'Disabled')

More Posts Next page »
Copyright - www.myITforum.com, Inc. - 2007 All Rights reserved.
Powered by Community Server (Commercial Edition), by Telligent Systems