Recently I had to force a SYSVOL replication between two Windows 2008 R2 DCs and I’ve found a nice way to accomplish that. Before of that I need to mention that the SYSVOL replication is triggered by the AD replication as defined in Sites and Services. So the SYSVOL folder will replicate at the same interval with the rest of AD data. By forcing replication with REPADMIN we also force SYSVOL replication.

But how to do it only for SYSVOL? By using DFSRDIAG:

The previous command will sync the local replica with the one located on the DC named SERVER1 and it will keep that sync up for one minute (this means that everything that will be changed in that time interval will be replicated; so all that will appear in the backlog).

HTH,

Andrei.

It’s not a fully functional browser, but just a frame to test the newly capabilities of IE9 (like hardware acceleration). It can be installed on Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2 without affecting the current browser.

A friend noticed me that we also gen an alert when we try to send an email to an external recipient; it’s just that by default it doesn’t do that. This option needs to be enabled at the organization level.

With Get-OrganizationConfig | fl *mailtips* we can see the mailtips settings.

To activate mailtips for the external recipients we use the following command:

Set-OrganizationConfig -MailTipsExternalRecipientsTipsEnabled:$True

Now when I try to send an email to an external user I get the following warning in Outlook:

Same is happening when I try to send an email to a distribution list that contains an external recipient.

MailTipsLargeAudienceThreshold is refering to the number of members that a distribution list may contain to be considered Large Audience.

To better understand what MailTipsGroupMetricsEnabled is all about take a look here. MailTips uses Group Metrics to determine in a group is Large Audience or contains external recipients. Group Metrics runs once per day on the server that generates OAB and the only method to force it to run outside of his schedule is to restart the Exchange Service Host service. Be careful when you have Exchange 2007 together with Exchange 2010: if the OAB is generated on a Exchange 2007 server, Group Metrics will not be generated. Same is happening when OAB is distributed only via Public Folders.

The Group Metrics data are stored in a share folder named Group Metrics on the server that generates OAB, and are retrived by the CAS server through the Exchange File Distribution Service.

The last option we are mentioning is MailTipsMailboxSourcedTipsEnabled and is refering to object level MailTips. Object level means: mailbox, contact or group. To do this we use the parameter MailTip in the following cmdlets:

Set-Mailbox
Set-MailContact
Set-MailUser
Set-DistributionGroup
Set-DynamicDistributionGroup
Set-MailPublicFolder

In the following example I have set a description for a group, description that will be shown every time somebody tries to send an email to the group.

There’s a 250 characters limit for these MailTips and translations can be set using -MailTipTranslations parameter.

That’s all for today!

HTH

I will show you how Mail Tips work by using a very simple scenario. Sending an email to an user that has set Out of office auto reply. before I will have a chance to send the email, I am warned that the destination user has an Automatic reply set – so it’s very likely that my message will not be read (or not very soon).

Other examples where Mail Tips are useful are: sending an email to a user with a full mailbox; emails with attachments that do not comply with the organization rules, or emails sent to a restricted recipient (delivery restrictions are set).

Mail Tips warns the user when the email is sent to a distribution group with more than 25 members (this is the default settings and can be changed), or when one tries to Reply-All BCC – reply all to a message where you were initially in the bcc field.

These MailTips can be customized at the organization level or even at the recipient level, but more about that in another post.

It’s about http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS10-015.mspx �
A good chance to remember: test it before mass deployment.

More at http://blogs.technet.com/msrc/archive/2010/02/11/restart-issues-after-installing-ms10-015.aspx

Companies using Active Directory Rights Management Services (AD RMS) should hurry up and implement the following update before Feb. 22:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=979099

Without this, users will be unable to access protected content from Internet Explorer and Outlook.

I’ve just hit one issue trying to install OCS 2007 R2 on Windows 2008 R2. In the page where I’m asked to install Windows Media Format Runtime, I click OK and nothing happens. Without this the installation will not continue.

The solution I found was to manually install Microsoft Windows Media Format Runtime by running the following command:

pkgmgr.exe /ip /m:"C:\Windows\servicing\Packages\Microsoft-Windows-Media-Format-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.7600.16385.mum"

PS: OCS 2007 R2 is not supported on Windows 2008 R2. Not yet.

This was a problem since Windows Vista was launched. People used with 2000/XP/2003 were really annoyed by the lack of a shortcut to quickly see a network adapter properties. Going through Network and Sharing Center was a waste of time.

The quickest way to go to Network Connection is by creating a shortcut to NCPA.CPL:

A double click to the newly created shortcut will send me to the Control Panel Network Connections window:

It took me some time to find out how to do this. I wanted to achieve the following (on all domain computers):

If you did not notice, the network logo/icon and the active network name is custom.

It can be done via Group Policy – Computer Configuration\Policies\Windows Settings\Security Settings\Network List Manager Policies. In my case I’ve edited the default domain policy so it will apply to all domain computers. Pictures are self explanatory.

Of course you will need Windows 7 or Vista on the enduser workstations.

Ever happened to get this error message when running Windows 7 or Vista + a wireless network and a VMWare product (like Player or Workstation)? I’ve run into this error message “This connection requires an active Internet connection” many times when trying to connect via the Connect To menu.

The classic resolution is to initiate the VPN from the Network Connections window, not from the Connect To.

The other solution found on the internet is to change the network binding order and to hope this will never happen.

But I’ve found another temporary solution. Restarting the WLAN Auto Config service (wlan connection will drop for a couple of seconds) will fix this issue without a system reboot.

I still hope for a MS update to fix this.