They said it would be December and Microsoft actually kept a deadline… Only Just !
Powershell V2 CTP3 was released last night after several hints from @jsnover on twitter.
To download the latest Community Technology Preview here
Selected New and Updated Features in Windows PowerShell V2 CTP3
Following on from the last great meeting the next UK Powershell User Group has been announced…
The November meeting of the User Group will be on Thursday 20th November
Time
6.30 – 9.30
Location
Memphis Room
Building 3
Microsoft campus
Thames Valley Park
Reading
Agenda
The PowerShell Introduction is a new feature for meetings where they will explain a particular feature of PowerShell that has caused someone a problem or maybe a slightly more difficult concept.
Please visit the following site to confirm your attendance, please do not just turn up as ou will need to be regiestered….
http://richardsiddaway.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!43CFA46A74CF3E96!1872.entry
Ever wondered what Jonathan Medd from the get-scripting podcast looks like as well as sounds like ?
In an interview at TechEd in Barcelona Jonathan hosts a great Panel with some of the big names in Powershell, this is a must see, some great discussions in there….
Yes, the long awaited System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 (I’m sure they could have thought of a longer title) has just gone RTM.
As Hyper-V is now available Microsoft have some on-line presentations taken from the virtualisation launch last month.
These are available on their website at :
http://www.microsoft.com/
A good overview of Hyper-V is at http://www.microsoft.com/
Thanks to AP
OK, until now I have had respect for Microsoft, I have just read this article and a few others and I have to say, that’s completely below the belt, they are resulting to nasty underhand tactics to try and steal the virtualisation market.
Just proves that they cant do it with there software which is more comparable to VMware workstation than VI.
I cant wait for VI4 to come out and really kick some butt.
Rant over !
I would be interested in what your thoughts are on this subject.
On the back of some of the work i’ve done implementing Exchange 2007 recently, here are some vaguely useful powershell scripts!..
Change All mailbox Database settings
Having to apply new limits to databases etc can be a bit painful through the GUI. use this script to apply mailbox limits etc
80mb warning limit
100mb send prevention
35 day deleted item retendion
35day deleted mailbox retention
Get-MailboxDatabase -Server set-mailboxdatabase -IssueWarningQuota 80MB -ProhibitSendQuota 100MB -Prohibit SendReceiveQuota unlimited -DeletedItemRetention 35.00:00:00 -MailboxRetention 35.00:00:00 -RetainDeletedItemsUntilBackup:$true
Testing a server
These built in commands test the functionality of Exchange 2007, SCOM uses these for part of the manegement pack i think!
test-systemhealth
is a wrapper for ExBPA through the command shell, a good first point for call for testing
test-mapiconnectivity
tests MAPI access to all mailbox databases on the server
test-owaconnectivity
tests OWA access to a Client Acces Server, either run on a CAS server or specify in the syntax, you may also need to run new-testcasconnectivityuser.ps1 script to create the test account i.e
get-mailboxserver
test-mailflow
tests mailflow to and from a system mailbox on the server specified
test-servicehealth
A fast way to check the status of Exchange related services
Public Folder replication
There are a number of “builtin” scripts with Exchange 2007 that live in the \scripts folder in the exchange root
some useful ones
AddReplicaToPFRecursive.ps1
adds a server to a list of public folders and to its subfolders, I had some problems with this one, initially getting to to add a whole IPM_SUBTREE seemed a bit impossible. The script requires a top level folder parameter, but wouldn’t accept the root. which is a pain in organisations where they create all folders under the root. You can add folders explicitly, but this is painful if there are a lot!
if you specify “\” as the top level folder it appears to work…
Its a way of saving some effort, but I did find folders where replicas hadn’t been added and no errors reported so I added them manually…
get-publicfolderstatistics
get the list of public folders replicated to the server and theirs stats, useful to see if the list is approximately what it should be!
Looks like Ms has done a slight u-turn over public folders,
ever since I’ve known they have been planning to “remove” or “de-emphasise” public folders in the next version of Exchange, they attempted this in Exchange 2007, but demand (and development timescales) meant they reintroduced a lot of the management tools via SP1.
Now via a statement made in passing it looks like they are still planning support!
Public Folders and E14 – The Next Version of Exchange
Just like a certain segment of the blogosphere is concerned about Windows versions and gets excited every time a notice about “Windows 7” (the succeeding product to Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008) comes out of Redmond, I follow, instead the segment that gets excited about E14 – the next release of Exchange Server.
At this point, I would say that we probably know less about E14 than we do about Windows 7!
One of the MAJOR issues that came out of E12 (Exchange Server 2007) was that Microsoft chose to de-emphasize Public Folders. What this means is that they said they would support public folders for E12, but would not guarantee that they would be supported in releases after E12, nor would additional feature content be added to Public Folders.
Microsoft’s stated direction for public folders is the SharePoint product suite. Which, while it does a GREAT job at some things (document libraries come to mind) does poorly at other things (threaded conversations) and does not do some things at all (replication of content to many sites).
Well, in a conversation today it came out that Microsoft will support public folders in E14. Many of us were shocked, surprised, and very happy! The Microsofties in the conversation were surprised that we were surprised – they said that they had told us this ‘way back in 2006! They pointed to this blog post by Scott Schnoll from June of 2006.
Well, now we know! I’m sure we’ll hear more about this Real Soon Now ™. 🙂