6/30/2008Great Tool for Enterprise Backup now supports the latest Microsoft platform. The Windows Storage Solutions team that manages DPM 2007 is very excited to announce that the ‘Rollup Update’ for System Center Data Protection Manager 2007 is now available for download. The biggest new workload that DPM now has supported protection for is, of course, Windows Server 2008. While DPM2007 has actually been protecting “Longhorn” since Beta 3, this update makes Windows Server 2008 a supported protect-able workload. Specific new capabilities for Windows Server 2008 include: Protect Windows Server 2008 systems, including those running Core Protect Windows Server 2008 System State Ability to run the DPM2007 Server on a Windows Server 2008 platform Some of the other enhancements in the rollup update include: Protection for SQL Server 2008 Protection of Virtual Server 2005 R2 clustered hosts Tape Library Sharing - so that multiple DPM servers can share a single enterprise tape library silo For more details on what is included in the DPM 2007 “Rollup Update” or in the upcoming Service Pack 1, please check out: TechNet webcast on “What is coming next for DPM 2007” from April 23, 2008 The DPM 2007 Rollup Update is now available via Microsoft Update, if your DPM server has opt’ed in for updates … or it is downloadable from: System Center Data Protection Manager 2007 - Rollup Update - x86 System Center Data Protection Manager 2007 - Rollup Update - x64 Read More @> Windows Server Division WebLog : Data protection manager 2007 -- now backing up windows server 2008 6/29/2008http://blogs.technet.com/roblarson/archive/2008/05/15/getting-undo-functionality-with-hyper-v-snapshots.aspx Snapshots are not the same as UNDO disks in Virtual Server 2005…go here to read a previous post of mine to learn about how they work. That said, you get UNDO like functionality using snapshots…..with maybe a little more work. In Virtual Server, when you wanted to use UNDO, you powered down your VM and enabled UNDO on the Virtual hard disk tab. Then after you power on the VM, when you powered it off you will be asked if you want to Save, Commit, or Discard your changes. Selecting Save kept the changes separate, Commit merged them into the original VHD and then started the UNDO process over again, and Discard threw away the changes and started over again. All of this used Differencing disks in the background. In Hyper-V, UNDO is not an available option on the virtual disk menu anymore, you now have snapshots. If you want the ability to protect your VHD from any changes getting merged you need to do this. Before you first power on a VM (the same point you would have enabled UNDO in Virtual Server), take a snapshot and call it something like UNDO DISCARD. This just makes your VHD effectively read only and all changes are written to a working AVHD file. Power on your VM and work away. When you want to effectively “Turn OFF and Discard” all changes, then apply/revert to the UNDO DISCARD snapshot and it is all gone…start a new test scenario. Just remember that if you made any changes to the VM settings, they are also discarded. By default all changes are saved to the working file, so you need to do nothing to get the SAVE feature. If you want a COMMIT capability and want it permanent like it is with Virtual Server, then that takes a little more work. Once you create the UNDO DISCARD snapshot, there is no way to merge any changes back to the original VHD through the snapshot UI. You can do the following though to get the COMMIT functionality - Power down the VM
- Find the working avhd file
- Copy it to CHILD.VHD
- Backup up your original VHD for protection
- Use the Edit disk option in Hyper-V MMC to edit the new CHILD.VHD and select Merge for the action in the wizard
- Select to Merge to the parent
- Wait for the merge to complete
- Apply the UNDO DISCARD Snapshot (which throws away all the changes which you just merged from the copy and creates a new working avhd file that is the child of the original VHD)
- Power on the VM and work away
Once again remember that if you had made any changes to the VM settings, that applying the UNDO DISCARD snapshot would have thrown them away…..other than that have fun!! Robert Larson : Getting UNDO functionality with Hyper-V Snapshots SharePoint® offers a robust and scalable content management framework and collaboration toolset with support for structured workflows. Groove™, in contrast, is a collaboration toolset that allows rapid workspace deployment with little or no IT overhead. With support for document collaboration, threaded discussions, and calendaring among its features, Groove provides the ideal framework for dynamic, secure, ad hoc collaboration. In short, most users will naturally end up using these products in different ways. Moreover, the release of Groove 2007 adds built-in support for SharePoint integration using the SharePoint Files tool. This tool allows Groove workspaces to be synchronized with SharePoint document libraries and, as we will see, the built-in integration means you can easily make the most of both products. In fact, combining the flexibility and dynamic nature of Groove with the sophistication and power of SharePoint will yield significant benefits for many. Groove and SharePoint Together Today's IT world demands ever-increasing collaboration between organizations and their partners and vendors. However, the powerful collaboration solutions that are being implemented using products such as SharePoint tend to focus heavily on internal teams and the need to make information broadly available throughout an organization. In such cases, the challenges, both from an administrative and security perspective, of providing access to users external to an organization are often significant. In the face of such challenges, the goal becomes enabling users to reach out to external partners on an ad hoc basis. The combination of Groove and SharePoint offers exactly that solution. SharePoint provides intra-organization collaboration, content search, and a workflow framework; adding Groove lets companies extend those capabilities to include easy inter-organization collaboration. With Groove, users can quickly set up collaboration workspaces that cross company boundaries. Furthermore, support for 192-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) symmetric keys ensures that the collaboration is secure. In fact, Groove security is built-in and always on, so users don't have to worry about configuring it. The security architecture of Groove provides a high degree of protection for these workspaces and their contents, both while stored locally and during network transmission. The SharePoint Files tool allows this information to be bi-directionally synchronized with a SharePoint document library to ensure that the information is available centrally for easy internal access. Let's use a concrete example to see how this process works. ... Read more @> Communications and Collaboration: Create Powerful Connections with Groove and SharePoint From the OCS Supportability Guide: Virtualization is not supported for any server role in a production environment. That was easy :) BTW, The OCS Supportability guide is a great read to make sure your first UM project goes smoothly: ...high-level reference for supported Office Communications Server 2007 topologies and configurations. It is also intended to answer frequently asked questions. This document identifies supported topologies, configurations, and scenarios described in detail in the existing deployment and planning documentation. Read more @> Download details- Office Communications Server 2007 Supportability http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=1a83e112-8677-4e03-83c3-f1b7ebfc3a4b&displaylang=en&tm The Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 management pack is designed to be used for monitoring Exchange 2007 events, collecting Exchange component-specific performance counters in one central location, and for raising alerts for operator intervention as necessary. By detecting, sending alerts, and automatically responding to critical events, this management pack helps indicate, correct, and prevent possible service outages or configuration problems, allowing you to proactively manage Exchange servers and identify issues before they become critical. The management pack monitors and provides alerts for automatic notification of events indicating service outages, performance degradation, health monitoring, and centralized management. More Details: Download details: Exchange 2007 MP for SC Ops Mgr 2007 Great little Vista Sidebar gadget for Hyper-V.
I've created a sidebar gadget so I can see what the Hyper-V server is doing from my workstation. The gadget can list multiple servers at once and also support vmconnect when double clicking on a VM.
PS: The gadget uses WMI to connect to the server so the user need remote WMI access (Step 5) on the Hyper-V server. More Info @> Hyper-V Monitor Gadget for Windows Sidebar Looks like no Officially supported Exchange 2007 on Hyper-V until August 2008. As we recently announced at Tech.Ed USA, Microsoft will be publishing a support statement with respect to Exchange Server on Hyper-V within 60 days of today. Some of the more noteworthy bits of info from the session are: - Within 60 days of Hyper-V's RTM, the Exchange team will publish a detailed support statement for Hyper-V, and a TechNet article with best practices.
- Customers should not deploy Exchange on Hyper-V until our support guidance is available.
- Early results show that performance of Exchange 2007 on Hyper-V is quite good, and that it scales very well from 1-4 processors per VM.
In terms of best practices and requirements, the following guidance was released: - We're only supporting guests running Exchange Server 2007 SP1 on Windows Server 2008.
- We're only supporting fixed disks, and not dynamic disks.
- Storage should be on spindles that are separate from the Guest operating system VHD physical storage.
- Storage must be SCSI passthrough or iSCSI (with a preference of SCSI passthrough for queues, databases and log files).
- All Exchange server roles, except for the Unified Messaging server role, will be supported.
- There's a limit on VHD size of 2040 GB.
It was also mentioned that Hyper-V is a good fit when Exchange servers in branch offices cannot be consolidated to a central datacenter (for example, because of bandwidth or connectivity issues). In terms of workload, not every workload is a candidate for virtualisation. For example, server roles such as Client Access and Hub Transport can be good candidates, but a more heavy hitter like the Mailbox role (which often uses all available resources on a physical server) might not be the best candidate for virtualising. Read more @> Johann's Unified Communications : Hyper-V is here.. what about Exchange? Helpful tool when you can't find the command on Office 2007 new ribbon... The Office Labs team has released a Search Commands add-on for Office 2007 (for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint). Search Commands adds a new ribbon with a simple search textbox. Type part of the name of a command you're looking for, and the ribbon will show buttons for each of the matching results! The results also integrate guided help, which are step-by-step automations of common processes in Office, helping you each step of the way. Examples Searching For "Color" in PowerPoint:
Searching for "Export" in Excel
Search Commands will even offer spelling correction suggestions for the command names you type: 
Chris Bowen's Blog : Office 2007 Search Commands Add-On
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