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Russell Smith

Editorial Director

Russell Smith, the Editorial Director at Petri IT Knowledgebase, has over two decades of hands-on experience in IT, in both small business settings and government IT infrastructure projects.

Russell started writing for Windows IT Pro Magazine in the early 2000s. Since then, he has contributed insights to various IT publications, including Petri and CDW. His authoritative voice has resonated across industry blogs, where he dissects complex topics into an ‘easy read’.

Russell has authored over a thousand articles, each a testament to his depth of knowledge. His expertise doesn’t stop there: he wrote a book on Privilege Management and co-authored another for Microsoft’s MOAC series. Moreover, Russell’s commitment to education shines through in the courses he crafted for Pluralsight.

He is also presenter on his own YouTube channel, This Week in IT, and the current presenter of Petri Dish.

LATEST

Microsoft Endpoint Manager’s Updates Aim to Simplify Mobile Device Management Policy Creation

Last Update: Sep 04, 2024

Rolling out in public preview early February 2021, Microsoft is adding a new feature to its Endpoint Manager (MEM) solution called settings catalog.

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Patch Tuesday – March 2021

Microsoft released patches to fix 82 security bugs in Windows and other software this month. There are critical bugs in IE, Exchange Server, and Windows Server DNS. Windows and Windows Server Windows gets two patches for critical remote code execution (RCE) flaws. CVE-2021-26876 is a vulnerability in OpenType font parsing and CVE-2021-26867 is a flaw…

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How to Configure BitLocker Auto Unlock

Last Update: Aug 05, 2025

BitLocker is a full-disk encryption tool that is built-in to Windows 10. Full disk encryption prevents someone who gets physical access to a disk from reading the data stored on it.

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1725494998 security hero

How to Enable Passwordless Authentication with Azure AD

Last Update: Nov 19, 2024

Microsoft announced at its Ignite conference, which ran March 2nd – 4th 2021, that passwordless authentication is now generally available. Microsoft has been pushing passwordless over the past couple of years as a more secure way to provide access than passwords and multifactor authentication. Now that passwordless authentication is generally available, organizations can roll out…

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Windows Server 2022 Now Available in Preview

Today Microsoft officially announced the availability of Windows Server 2022 in preview at its Ignite conference, which is running March 2nd to 4th. Windows Server Insider Preview build 20292 is a Long-Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) release and which first appeared at the beginning of February. On the download page, the build was labeled ‘Windows Server…

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Microsoft 365 Universal Print Now Generally Available

Last Update: Sep 04, 2024

Microsoft officially announced today the general availability of Universal Print at its Ignite conference.

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Microsoft Enhances Azure Active Directory With Several New Features

At Microsoft’s Ignite conference this week, there was a series of announcements for new Azure Active Directory features either entering general availability or released in public preview. AWS Single Sign-On (SSO) The Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) app gallery now includes AWS Single Sign-On (SSO). AWS SSO is a cloud service that is designed to…

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Everything You Need to Know About Windows – February 2021

In February, Microsoft announced its plans to release Windows 10 version 21H1 and that Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC support will be cut from 10 years to 5. And Windows 10 ‘in cloud configuration’ is a new recommended device configuration that can be applied to remote devices for frontline workers and others. Plus, much more. So,…

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How to Block Adobe Flash Player Using Active Directory Group Policy

Last Update: Sep 04, 2024

Flash Player is a plug-in for browsers that is installed and maintained separately. Although it came bundled with some browsers. Not only that, but it was responsible for some scary security vulnerabilities over the years. So, developers and IT admins alike were glad to see the back of it.

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Microsoft Improves Security for Windows Server Update Services

Last Update: Nov 19, 2024

There haven’t been any significant changes to Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) for years. But recently, Microsoft released two updates that aim to make it easier to secure WSUS. In this article, I’ll look at how the two changes, introduced in September 2020 and January 2021, can help improve WSUS security. By default, Windows clients…

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Automate Azure VM Best Practices Configuration Using Azure Automanage

Last Update: Sep 04, 2024

Azure Automanage helps you to make sure your virtual machines (VM) are consistently configured with Microsoft’s best practice recommendations. And that’s a valuable service because Azure is constantly growing and changing, making it hard for IT professionals to keep up with best practice recommendations. Automanage is currently in preview. It is designed to configure and…

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What’s New in PowerShell 7.1

Last Update: Sep 04, 2024

The latest versions of PowerShell are not included out-of-the-box with Windows 10. So, you might not know that PowerShell is already on version 7.1

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