Active Directory

In this video post, Jeremy Moskowitz, Group Policy MVP and founder of PolicyPak software walks us through his Group Policy add-on, PolicyPak, and shows how you can deliver Group Policy settings over VDI to lock down applications.

Learn about the new XML-based file system in Windows Server 2008 for Administrative Templates for Group Policy Objects. Michael gives a brief overview of these new file types and shows you where they need to go depending on the administrative needs.

A review of Train Signal’s Web Servers Video Lab Training – Product Details. See more details at Train Signal’s website. We start with the Concepts video where the advantages and disadvantages of various web servers are discussed: IIS 4, IIS5 & IIS6 and Apache (Apache being the dominant server at this point in time) Difference between…

As you already know, Active Directory utilizes a multi-master replica scheme to store data. This allows AD to be used in any environment, from a Mom-and-Pop store-front to huge, global corporations. It allows the placement of domain controllers anywhere that the number of users justifies the (ever decreasing) expense of hardware and the cost of the server…

Specops has recently announced a new product called Remote Admin CTP, and have also updated their Gpupdate product to Version 2.0. They are currently seeking beta testers for both products. New in Specops Gpupdate 2.0 Commands Improved WoL functionality including custom Mac/IP address lookup and support for no-DHCP environments. Immediate WSUS client update UI New…

Deciding how many Global Catalog Servers to have on your network, and where to place those servers can be tricky. If there are too few Global Catalog Servers, you could cause severe performance problems or possibly a single point of failure. At the same time though, having too many Global Catalog Servers can also cause…

How do I automatically upgrade a server to a domain controller during installation? You can automatically run DCPROMO during an unattended installation. Enter the command ​dcpromo /answer:%path_to_answer_file% You’ll see a dialog box that says DCPROMO is running in unattended mode. Then, the machine will reboot. You can also add DCPROMO to the unattended file that‘s…

As you probably read in my previous articles – “Recovering Deleted Items in Active Directory” and “Restore Windows Server 2003 Active Directory“, an administrator might sometime need to restore deleted objects from the Active Directory database. You see, when an object is deleted from Active Directory, it is not immediately erased, but is marked for…

How can I disable the password requirement for a user in a Windows Server 2003 Active Directory domain? Windows Server 2003 provides security policies that ensure that all users select strong passwords. Creating a password policy involves setting the following options in the Default Domain Group Policy object. These policies, with the exception of those…

Looking for an overview of what’s new in Active Directory in Windows Server 2003? Daniel points out the highlights and noteworthy additions.