Windows XP Service Pack 3 RC Preview is now available on Connect

Microsoft just released Windows XP Service Pack 3 RC Preview is now available on Connect.

Beta testers can get it now!

Source: connect.microsoft.com

...

Goodbye Windows Vista!

Goodbye Windows Vista!

A little over two weeks ago I gave up using Windows Vista, reformatted my hard drive and reinstalled Windows XP.

For now, this is only a temporary Goodbye while we wait for the Windows Vista Service Pack 1 and I’m not quite ready yet to say Goodbye Microsoft.

Why Windows XP instead of Windows Vista?

Quite simply because I got sick and tired of this revolutionary operating system being so slow and of having to wait while it would load up dialog boxes for opening or saving files.

This type of ordinary operation on a regular workday sometimes had me waiting for over half a minute before allowing me to see the contents of the directory I was trying to explore.

In the end, a lot of time wasted every day and therefore a decrease in productivity.

Since the change, everything is great. My PC now runs with clockwork precision and I no longer spend time waiting for my computer’s operating system to finish off some unknown or imaginary task before finally doing what I’m asking it to do.

English translation of the French article “Goodbye Windows Vista !” by Andrew Kovacs, Ph. D.

...

Create Windows Live Messenger Buttons !

Create a handy button for your Windows Live Messenger contact so your friends can easily add you to their contact list.

Buttons make it easy! Use the button builder to create a button that fits your personal style or even just your mood. Add the button to your Windows Live Hotmail, Outlook and other email
signatures, Windows Live Space, or blog, and your friends and family can simply click your button to add you to their contact list.

Click here for Button Builder.

...

Get Serial Number of Main Board from command line

Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 contain the WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation) Wmic.exe command-line utility. By using Wmic.exe we can get a lot of information about computer (server).

To display the local computer name and serial number of Main Board I’ve created a very simple script, SerNum.bat. SerNum.bat contains:

@echo off
Setlocal
For /F %%a in ('wmic baseboard GET SerialNumber /value^|find "SerialNumber"') do Set %%a
@echo %Computername% - %SerialNumber%
endlocal

On my desktop, the above script displays:

PELEKAN-XP1 - VF0SA75A0SK

...

Apache looses share to IIS again, never been so close

In the October 2007 survey we received responses from 142,805,398 sites, an increase of 7.6 million sites since last month. This continues the strong gains seen last month, a rate of over 5% monthly growth, with MySpace, Microsoft Live.com, and Google's Bloggereach gained over 1 million sites this month. Benefitting from the gains at MySpace and Microsoft Live, Microsoft-IIS now hosts over 50 million sites.

Total Sites Across All Domains August 1995 - October 2007

Apache loses 2.8% share this month, partly through the strong growth at the major blogging systems, and partly due to 2.5 million domains on Apache expiring at trouble-free.net. Apache has around a 10% market share advantage over IIS now, which is the smallest gap between the two since IIS was launched in 1996.

On the active sites measure which excludes templated sites, Apache gains 1 million sites this month, though this is eclipsed by growth of nearer 3 million for Microsoft-IIS.

Market Share for Top Servers Across All Domains August 1995 - October 2007

Source: news.netcraft.com

...

SharePoint End User Training Kit now available!

The SharePoint End User Training Kit is our offering, and it's available at no cost!

The initial release of the kit includes training content for SharePoint's collaboration capabilities. To be added over the next couple of months are additional modules covering portals and personalization, enterprise content management, search, business processes, and business intelligence. All of the content will have been written by the Office Online User Assistance team.

The kit will be provided with two deployment options. The first, which is available now, is via the SharePoint Learning Kit ("SLK"), which is SCORM 2004 conformant e-learning delivery and tracking application built as a WSS 3.0 solution. With the SLK, IT personnel can control the look and feel of the training kit, matching it to corporate branding standards, and administrators can add or remove content and customize it as necessary. The SLK also provides a reporting function that shows which topics have been completed and by whom.

The SharePoint End User Training Kit will also have a standalone deployment option, which can be installed on a PC and used by an individual. This version of the kit will be available within the next few weeks.

For more information about the kit and instructions on how to obtain it, please go to our end user focused "Get the 'Point" blog.

Source: http://blogs.msdn.com/

...

Understanding Windows Server 2008 Server Core

One of the most exciting new features of Windows Server 2008 is its ability to install as a Server Core machine.

A Server Core installation provides a minimal environment for running specific server roles, which reduces the maintenance and management requirements and the attack surface for those server roles. A server running a Server Core installation supports the following server roles:

• Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS)
• Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services (AD LDS)
• DHCP Server
• DNS Server
• File Services
• Print Services
• Streaming Media Services
• Windows Virtualization

...

AdminINFO.CA

Hi Folk,
As far as many of you know, I've a web site targeted to Netwrok / System Administrators. I've been trying to post news, tips and tricks useful for SysAdmins and not just for them. The main address of this website is http://TheSystemAdministrator.com but from now on, you can also rich it by using these addresses:
http://en.n-admin.com and http://www.AdminInfo.ca

...