Windows Server Code Name Longhorn has been released to beta testers today (five separate editions!!), with some of the most important changes coming to Longhorn Server Core. Core will support a grand total of 8 roles, double the 4 roles it had back in mid 2005. The grand total of roles available to Server Core includes:

• Active Directory
• Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
• DNS
• DHCP
• File/Print
• Windows Media Services
• Terminal Services (gets TS Easy Print and the new TS RemoteApp management interface)
• Virtualization (configuring a server as a dedicated host for virtual servers.) (won’t be available immediately.)
•  Network Access Protection (has greatly improved setup and integration)
• IIS7 (does XCOPY deployment; and lots, lots more…)

PowerShell is also included in the 3rd beta release of Longhorn Server, as well as the Windows Firewall being enabled by default.

And what if you want to try this great os and dont know how to run it? The folks at Microsoft have launched a new Windows Server “Longhorn” Technical Library on the Windows Server Tech Center, they have a detailed Reviewers’ Guide available to download and read, and perhaps coolest of all, they have teamed up with the folks in our Microsoft Learning group to develop free self-paced e-learning clinics. These interactive, multimedia-based clinics provide eight hours of training on topics like server management, centralized application access, branch office management, and security and policy enforcement. They keep track of which sections you’ve completed, so you can start and stop them whenever you like, and you can even download them for offline use to keep you company on transatlantic flights.

So-All-in-all its been a Massive day for Windows Server! I cant wait to download it give it a test run…
… I love you windows server 😛

Source: AeroXP and The folks at the Windows Server Blog 

Check it out – http://www.microsoft.com/getbeta3 (now live-so go grab yourself a copy)

Thanks to Jill Z, Navjot Virk, Sriram Srinivasan, and Shubhankar Sanyal for posting this over on The Filing Cabinet.   I wasn’t aware you could do this, so I’ve learned something new myself (and it’s useful because *everything* (offline files, my documents, pictures, etc) is redirected to my secondary partition now)

“Several customers have asked us how to move the Offline Files cache location from the default location (c:\windows\csc) to another volume. Here is a procedure for doing this.

Continue reading here…

Read the rest of this entry »

Want to know how to get the Admin Tools to work on Windows Vista?  Thanks to the Windows Server guys, there is a KB article here!  — http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/930056

From the Windows Server Weblog:

“One of the more popular questions on our Windows Server “Longhorn” discussion forums is around the Windows Server 2003 Administration Tools Pack. In particular, people have been asking why they can’t use the Admin Pack on Windows Vista. It can be installed, but it gives error messages and many of the administration tools seem to be missing or are not properly configured. Some of these issues are related to User Account Control and not having the necessary administrative privileges when attempting to install the pack.

Well help is at hand! We’ve just released a new Knowledge Base article describing how to get the Admin Pack working on Windows Vista, and describing some of the limitations that will still exist.

Note that this does not address managing Windows Server “Longhorn” from a client machine (either Windows XP or Windows Vista). We are working on a new version of the Admin Pack for Windows Server “Longhorn” and we will provide an update on our progress with this in the Beta 3 timeframe.”

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

– Patrick Elliott

Last month it was announced by Microsoft that testers would get a Free copy of Windows Vista RTM for those who had submitted One or more bug in the Technical Beta (it seems not many people can’t understand those two words =/ )

It was revealed today that if you were on the Technical beta that your keys are ready for you to request.
To do so you must select “Product Keys” from the left of the Vista Page on connect. From there you generate yourself a key from the package entitled “Windows Vista RTM Ultimate Keys”.

Each Beta Participant can only generate themselves ONE key only for the selected version that they chose upon apply for this offer (for example they can issue one key for Ultimate OR business-its too late to switch between versions).

So if you are reading this and you are on the beta Get cracking! As this deal is a limited offer!! You must request this key prior to December 10, 2006 because No more keys will be issued after this date.

Enjoy,
You Deserve it 😉 😀

I remember starting out beta testing-signing up on beta place ages ago to become a Microsoft Beta tester… Well overnight betaplace (beta.microsoft.com) has vanished, replaced by it successor Microsoft Connect (connect.microsoft.com) which has just recently been updated to version 2.2.
I am sure a lot of the MSFT staff will miss betaplace as Connect is sometimes labelled as a slow piece of software (but it can only get better right?)

Farewell beta place-Long live the memories 😛

Is finally here! Go to https://connectbeta.microsoft.com/site/sitehome.aspx?SiteID=3 and take a look around. You can do most of the things you can on the main Connect site, although you’ll find that the available programs list is pretty limited. None of the feedback or sites from the production site are available here, with the exception of the Connect demo site.

Take a look around and see what you think. After you sign in, click the “Manage My Profile” link at the bottom and fill out your profile data in order to be able to submit feedback. Keep in mind that this is a beta site, so the feedback isn’t going to be processed or resolved. Don’t enter your real bugs here- or do, but enter them on the real Connect site as well!

 After you’ve taken a look around, if you have any comments you can file a feedback or suggestion form on the main Connect site at http://connect.microsoft.com/Connect/Feedback.

A couple of notes about the beta site; some issues were found after the deployment to the beta site and have already been resolved internally.

• File uploads may not work correctly with Firefox 1.5. This is known and has been corrected in a later internal build.
• Feedback should work with both Opera and Firefox, although some display elements may not be correctly placed or visible in non-IE browsers. These issues have been largely eliminated in our internal builds.
• After attaching files, you may notice that the “attached files count” on the Feedback Details page always remains 0. This has been corrected in our latest builds.

Source straight from The Feedback Loop

Back by popular demand, Microsoft Certification Exam 70-500 will be made available in Beta form again starting October 16^th and running through November 3^rd! This is a Technology Specialist exam for IT Professionals in the mobility space.  If you were unable to participate in the last beta because registration was full, make sure that you don’t miss this opportunity!

The Preparation Guide is available for the Exam at: http://www.microsoft.com/learning/exams/70-500.mspx.

To register visit one of our independent testing providers:
* Thomson Prometric: http://www.prometric.com/Candidates/default.htm
* Pearson VUE: http://www.vue.com/ms/

Please use the following promotional code when registering:  BTA500
Source Backstage at MED

Testing software products is a stage of development which generally doesn’t receive much attention. To try and change this (and because I want to learn more about testing myself), I’ll be writing a series of posts on testing – not necessarily software, but rather testing in general.

But why is testing perceived as a minor, unimportant process? Several reasons can be attributed to the lack of attention given this vital part of product development:

1) High costs
2) The need to hire dedicated personnel
3) The belief that programmers can test their own code
4) A large number of other things I can’t think of right now

While 2) is true, 1) and 3) are not necessarily true. Much of the time and money spent on software development is usually spent finding and squashing bugs near the project’s due date – had these bugs been found earlier in the process, the time and money spent would have been greatly reduced.

Another usual practice is beta testing only the code. “What else can you beta test?”, you might ask. While at first sight it might that beta testing ideas and specifications is rather absurd, practice shows it is not.
Sometimes whole projects fail to achieve their goals because the initial specification wasn’t good or clear enough, or maybe because the idea wasn’t correctly captured. More often than not, only during the coding phase do developers find that functionality has to be added, removed, or changed.

Plenty of information on testing exists, but most of it is scattered or isn’t easy to find. With these posts I hope to give everyone pointers and ideas on how to better set up a test environment, so we’ll all build better software. Testing isn’t a burden or a minor task – it’s a task as important as planning or development, and which requires participation by all involved in creating the product.

I do hope you’ll enjoy reading this series of posts as much as I’ll enjoy writing it! And, of course, if you disagree with something I say… please comment! 😀