IT Knowledgebase Articles

The biggest challenge in network operations isn’t always finding the problem. It’s getting the right context to the right people at the right time. Consider a routine overnight incident that quickly spirals into hours of investigation, handoffs, and decision-making. The alert goes off at 2:47 a.m. with a BGP flap, an instability in a core…

Are you researching Windows Deployment Services alternatives? Windows Deployment Services (WDS) is going away. Not soon, but you should start preparing for it. I recommend considering the deployment outcome, not with a search for a like-for-like WDS replacement. Use Windows Autopilot and Microsoft Intune when devices can retain their OEM Windows installation and receive configuration…

An employee contacts the service desk requesting a password reset. They know their username, department, and manager’s name. But how can the agent be sure they’re speaking to the right person? Increasingly, groups like Scattered Spider are exploiting this challenge, using social engineering as their entry point into organizations. It’s a reminder of why verifying…

In case you haven’t heard by now, there was quite the buzz recently in the Entra community when the ConnectWise backup application was the source of a supply-chain attack. Huntress reported that attackers obtained the ConnectWise app credentials. They used those credentials to authenticate to more than 170 Microsoft Entra tenants. Every multi-tenant app has…

This guide compares the 7 best Active Directory change auditing tools for monitoring, investigating and reversing changes across hybrid identity environments. Active Directory remains a critical control plane for enterprise access. An unauthorized change to a privileged group, Group Policy Object (GPO) or directory permission can give an attacker extensive access, while an accidental modification…

Microsoft Sysinternals Active Directory Explorer is a tool for quickly inspecting Active Directory attributes, tracing unexpected directory changes, reviewing permissions, and comparing the directory at two points in time.   Without a baseline comparison, you can’t easily determine what changed.  What is Active Directory Explorer?  Active Directory Explorer is an investigation and comparison tool, not the…

One question I still hear regularly from IT pros planning a new rollout is whether it’s acceptable to install a certificate authority (CA) on a domain controller.  The short answer is yes. Microsoft fully supports installing Active Directory Certificate Services on a domain controller, and the setup process doesn’t prevent you from doing so. However,…

Until recently, conversations about enterprise AI have focused on models, infrastructure, and computing power. But according to Karthik Sj, who leads Generative AI at LogicMonitor, many organisations are discovering that the real challenge isn’t the technology itself. It’s whether the business is prepared to use it effectively. The timing could hardly be more significant. AI…

I’m going to say something unpopular. Brace yourself: You don’t need to create an agent. AI agents are everywhere in the Microsoft conversation right now. They promise to answer questions, find information, make decisions, and take action across business systems. Some of that promise is real. But that doesn’t make agents the right answer to…

In this article, I look at how to choose between a Windows Active Directory (AD) domain or workgroup. A Windows workgroup distributes identity and administration across individual computers, while an Active Directory domain centralizes them. That means the real choice is not how the PCs are grouped, but whether your organization can safely continue managing…