FlashPlayer 10 will not work for nonadministrators

When installing Adobe Flash 10 on a terminal server. In some cases, the system will act as if it is not installed for non-administrators. One item to check is the security permission on the following registry key

HKCR\CLSID\{D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96BB-444553540000}

Ensure that the Everyone group has full access to this key

Grant User-Group permissions to all mailboxes

In Exchange 2007 sp2 by default domain admins have no permissions to all mailbox to rectify this enter the following

Get-Mailbox|add-mailboxpermission -user "\Domain Admins" -AccessRights "FullAccess"

Converting Office 2007 Templates to OpenOffice 3.1

Ever run into a situation where you have an Office 2007 template, but you need to convert it to OpenOffice 3.1 in Ubuntu? Here what I did in Ubuntu 9.04 64bit

1. Install rpm2cpio and cpio: sudo apt-get install rpm libgif4
2. Download the latest ODF Converter RPM from http://download.go-oo.org/tstnvl/odf-converter/RPMS/x86_64/ into a temporary folder.
3. Extract the package by executing: rpm2cpio odf-converter*rpm | cpio -ivd
4. Next copy the contents of /usr/lib/ooo3/program/OdfConverter to /usr/bin using the command: sudo cp usr/lib/ooo-2.0/program/OdfConverter /usr/bin
5. This program requires libtiff.so.3 which is not present in the 64-bit Ubuntu 9.04. Create a symbolic link in /usr/lib called libtiff.so.3 to libtiff.so.4 by executing: sudo ln -s /usr/lib/libtiff.so.4 /usr/lib/libtiff.so.3
6. Run sudo ldconfig to update the library cache.
7. The converter is now installed.

To convert a template, run:
OdfConverter /i .???x

This will create a OpenOffice template of the Office 2007 template in the directory where the template was saved.

Citrix Linux ICA Certificate issues

When using Linux ICA client you may receive the error
"You have chosen not to trust ..."
Then the client fails to connect. This can be resolved by placing the X509 certificate (with crt extension) into the citrix ICA keystore. From Firefox, highlight and export the CA in DER format. Next rename this file and change the extention to crt. Finally, with admin credentials, copy this file to usr/lib

/ICAClient/keystore/cacerts/. Close and reopen the browser. You can now connect.

Export a Selection List From BackupExec

For documentation purposes, it is sometimes necessary to be able to extract the selection list to a file. There are 2 ways to do this:

1. The first way is to schedule a new job with the same list. On completion of the job the selection list will be displayed. From this you can copy and paste into the document.
2. The second way is to query the Backup Exec SQL database. Execute the following SQL query to return all items in all selection list.
   SELECT [ScriptName],[ScriptDescription],[DeviceSelectionName],[PathName],[FileName] FROM [BEDB].[dbo].[vwScriptPropertiesBackup]

This query can be trimmed down using the appropriate where clause.

Exchange 2007 OWA "Insufficient Access Rights"

Occassionally, after transferring a mailbox from Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2007 OWA will not function for that mailbox. The user will receive a message "The user has insufficient access rights." To resolve this perform the following:

1. Launch Active Directory Users and Computers
2. From the View menu, select Advanced.
3. Locate the user in AD, right click, properties.
4. Navigate to the security tab.
4. Click "Advanced"
5. Click "Allow inheritable permissions from the parent to propagate to this object and all child objects.
6. Click Apply
7. Click OK and OK again.

Alter SQL Server Internal Name

SQL server maintains the local server name with the master database. The current server name can be identified by running the query:

USE master;
GO
Select * from sysservers;
GO

The srvname in the output reflects what SQL thinks the server name is. When altering a server's NetBIOS name that is running SQL, the srvname field needs to be updated. To achieve this execute the following query:

EXEC sp_dropserver 'oldname';
GO
EXEC sp_addserver 'newname', 'LOCAL';
GO

Where oldname is the server's original NetBIOS name, newname is the new NetBIOS name and LOCAL specifies that the server is a local (not remote) server.

Default Printer Cannot Be Set

In a windows 2003 system, if you receive this error message, or you cannot set the default printer check the following. In the registry verify that the key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\Current Version\Windows exists. If not create it. If it does verify that your account has full permissions to this key.

Chinese Delivery Status Notifications In Outlook 2002

If you are running Outlook 2002 with Exchange 2007, you may receive Delivery Status Notification Messages that appear to be Chinese. They are not. Exchange 2007 sends HTML DSN's in a format that Outlook 2002 may not be able to display. To resolve, turn off HTML format of DSN messages. This is done with the command

Get-TransportServer|Set-TransportServer -InternalDSNSendHtml $False

DFS and BackupExec

When backing up files that are part of a DFS replication scheme, do not select the files directly. While the BEWS selection list shows the files, since DFS has control over the files they won't be backed up. Instead, at the bottom of the selection list choose the option called "Shadow Copy Components". Under this node a folder exists called "User Data" within this folder is where the files handled by DFS can be select. Backupexec will then snapshot data and backup the snapshot.

HyperV Client Access Via Remote Destop

In order to connect to a guest OS within Hyper-V through an RDP connection to the Hyper-V server, you must install Inegration Services on the Guest OS. Without this mouse functions cannot be captured. Furthermore if the Guest OS is Windows 2003, it must be running SP2 before the Integration Services can be installed.

Exchange OWA Redirect

When setting up an exchange server and configuring OWA, you may want to create an AutoRedirect for your end users so that they do not have to type the complete URL. This is most simply accomplished by creating a default.htm file in c:\inetpub\wwwroot (or wherever the default web is loaded). In this file, place the following line of info (note to replace parenthasis with gt and lt symbols).

Exchange 2007
(script language="'JavaScript'")window.location='https:///owa';(/script)

Exchange 2000/2003
(script language="'JavaScript'")window.location='https:///exchange';(/script)"

This will allow redirection to the secured page for logon.

Speed Up Network Connections in Vista

With Windows Vista Microsoft has introduced new features to the TCP stack. In some situation, these features may adversly affect network performance. Therefore you may want to consider disabling them. These "features" are known as Receive Side Signaling (RSS), AutoTuning, and Chimney. To view the current setting for these features launch an elevated command prompt and type (note that all commands issues hereafter must be run from an elevated command prompt):

netsh interface tcp show global

To disable these, issue the following commands:

netsh interface tcp set global autotuning=disabled
netsh interface tcp set global chimney=disabled
netsh interface tcp set global rss=disabled

To re-enable the original settings, issue:

netsh interface tcp set global autotuning=normal
netsh interface tcp set global chimney=enabled
netsh interface tcp set global rss=enabled

Note that to re-enable autotuning set it to normal.

Grant Full Permissions to All mailboxes in Exchange 2007

To grant full permissions to all user mailboxes in exchange, issue the following command from the exchange command shell

Get-MailboxDatabase -Server Add-ADPermission -User -ExtendedRights Receive-As

Once complete, restart the Exchange Information Store service for the settings to take effect.

Remove Disconnected Mailboxes In Exchange

Removing Disconnected mailboxes in exchange is now a multi-step process.  The first part is to get a listing of the disconnected mailboxes so that the GUID of it can be obtained.  Then, using this GUID and the name of the mailbox database, the second command is then executed to actually remove the mailbox

To list all disconnected mailboxes, issue the following  command into the command shell:

Get-MailboxStatistics | where-object { $_.DisconnectDate -ne $null } | Select DisplayName,MailboxGuid

Then to actually remove the mailb0x issue:

Remove-Mailbox -Database -StoreMailboxIdentity -confirm:$false

If you wish to remove all disconnected mailboxes at the same time, issue the following from the command shell to get a list of all users:

$users = Get-MailboxStatistics | where-object { $_.DisconnectDate -ne $null } | Select DisplayName,MailboxGuid

Next issue the following to remove all:

$users | ForEach { Remove-Mailbox -Database "Mailbox Database" -StoreMailboxIdentity $_.MailboxGuid -confirm:$false }

Changing the SQL Server that Citrix IMA References

When moving a SQL based citrix server database, you must alter the MF20.dsn data source to point to the new server. Once verified, issue the following command from the DOS prompt to update the configuration

dsmaint config [/user:username] [/pwd:password] [/dsn:path to filename]

Enterprise Root CA Certificate Generation Issue

If you need to generate a certificate on an enterprise root CA, but get the error message that the CSR does not contain a template, this can be bypassed from the command line using the following syntax:

certreq -submit -attrib "CertificateTemplate: WebServer" WebServerCertReq.txt

This will force the server to use the certificate template for a server.

Oh My God! I Forgot My Ubuntu Password

What do I do now? Follow this procedure:

1. Reboot the system, when the grub loader screen appears, press [esc].
   
2. This brings up the boot selection screen, highlight the version you wish to load.
3. Press e to edit the loader.
4. Locate the line that begins with Kernel..... At the end of this line enter the following string
   rw init=/bin/bash
5. press enter to exit the edit mode. Then strike b to boot that version
6. The system will then boot into the root shell
7. Enter passwd you will be prompted for a username, enter the username as desired.
8. Restart the system. On restart the system will return to the graphic interface. Enter the new password for your username to logon.
   

Outlook 2003 and 2007 PST File Size Limits

Outlook 2003 and Outlook 2007 have a maximum PST and OST size limit of 20GB. These values are configurable downward via the following registry values per user (HKEY_CURRENT_USER)

Set the Maximum File Size
Name: MaxLargeFileSize
Type: REG_DWORD
Range: 0x00000001 – 0x00005000
Default: 0x00005000 20,480 (20 GB)

Set a Warning When Approaching the Maximum Size
Name: WarnLargeFileSize
Type: REG_DWORD
Range: 0x00000000 – 0x00005000
Default: 0x00004C00 19,456 (19 GB)

Maximum Size PST can grow after limit is reached
Name: MaxFileSize
Type: REG_DWORD
Range: 0x001F4400 – 0x7C004400
Default: 0x7BB04400 2,075,149,312 (1.933 GB)

Maximum Size for Warning beyond limit
Name: WarnFileSize
Type: REG_DWORD
Range: 0x00042400 – 0x7C004400
Default: 0x74404400 1,950,368,768 (1.816 GB)

This information taken directly from Microsoft KB Article KB832925

Exchange 2007 Mailbox Export Headaches

Once again, the Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 development team suffers from cranal rectal inversion! Included in the Exchange 2007 management shell are the utilities needed to export data from a mailbox to a pst file. However, in their infinite wisdom, this cmdlet cannot be launched from the Exchange 2007 server because it won't run in a 64bit environment. So you must set up the management tools on a member workstation running a 32bit operating system.

Exchange 2007 is not supported running on a 32bit OS, but this is OK as we are only going to install the management tools.

Pre-requisites:
.NET Framework 2.0 SP1
MMC 3.0
Windows Powershell 1.0
Outlook (2003SP2 minimum)

Once the prerequisites are installed, then run the Exchange 2007 install and install only the tools. Alternatively, you can acquire the Exchange 2007 32bit management tools from Microsoft


On completion, and assuming your account has administrative permissions into exchange you can execute the following cmdlet from within powershell.

Export-Mailbox -Id "alias or email address" -PSTFolderPath "path to PST folder"

Alter SQL Server Database Name after imaging

If you image a system running SQL Server 2005. The hostname listed in the sys.servers view will contain the old server name. This can be altered to the new server name by executing

sp_dropserver

then add the new server name by executing

sp_addserver , local

If this is not done then features such as replication and logshipping will have issues.

Exchange 2007 Default Mailbox Freature Setting

Exchange 2007 does not allow a default per-user setting of disabled for OWA or ActiveSync. This can be turned off globally for the entire server. However, if it is enabled then by default all users have this feature enabled. Per user this can be turned off via a Exchange shell script:

Set-CASMailbox -Identity emailaddress -OWAEnabled $false -ActiveSyncEnabled $false