Wow, the year is flying by fast. There’s a bunch of stuff to read here. Microsoft has stepped up the amount of information being released on WS2016 Hyper-V (and related) features. EMS is growing in terms of features and functionality. And Azure IaaS continues to release lots of new features.
Hyper-V
- The Mysterious Case of Infrequent Network Connectivity Issues on 2 Hyper-V VMs Out of 40 Guests: Some PowerShell troubleshooting.
- Storage Migration “Operation not allow for VM because Hyper-V State is yet to be initialized from Virtual Machine Configuration” (0x80070015): A fix or workaround to solve this problem.
- Missing Hyper-V VMs on Windows 10 – Build 10547: A bug in this insider build hides non v5.0 VMs.
- Hyper-converged with Windows Server 2016: Run your storage (Storage Spaces Direct, not SOFS) and Hyper-V cluster on the same hardware.
- Configuring site awareness for your multi-active disaggregated datacenters: Solving one of the biggest issues with using Failover Clustering as a DR solution.
- Introduction to Linux and FreeBSD on Hyper-V: The Linux Integration Services (LIS). Note that LIS 4.0 can be installed on some distros that have previous versions of LIS built in.
- Running Hyper-V on Nano in Windows Server 2016 TP3: For you large scale customers that can afford to lose a host.
- Running Nano from Windows Server 2016 TP3 on Hyper-V: Teeny tiny VMs for running born-in-the-cloud services.
- Do you know how fast your disks are? I’ve seen expensive customer deployments with over-specced hosts and sh1te SANs where one ordinary VM could effectively shut down the cluster because the SAN couldn’t keep up.
- Virtual Machine Storage Resiliency in Windows Server 2016: A very nice resiliency feature from the Hyper-V storage folks.
Windows Client
- Windows 10 servicing and deployment guidance now available: Learn about Windows as a Service.
- Introduction to Windows 10 servicing: How enterprises can keep devices current with the latest feature upgrades, make better use of Windows Update, and what the new servicing options mean for support lifecycles.
- Windows 10 – Reducing the disk footprint: how to deploy Windows 10 with the new smaller installation footprint – great for machines with smaller storage (tablets and ultrabooks)
Azure
- Azure Backup – Announcing general availability of backup for Azure IaaS VMs: This vital service for VMs has gone GA with a number of improvements.
- Azure Backup of IaaS VMs Generally Available: A post I wrote for Petri.com.
- Remote Desktop Services DR Solution using ASR – Guidance: A best practices guide from Microsoft.
- SharePoint DR Solution using ASR – Guidance: A best practices guide from Microsoft.
- Microsoft Exchange DR Solution using ASR – Guidance: A best practices guide from Microsoft.
- A VM that Azure Site Recovery helps protect goes into a resynchronization state: Each VHD must be 1023 GB or less.
- Source Control Integration in Azure Automation: Manage your automations scripts.
- Monitor your Azure RemoteApp environment with OpInsight – Part 1: A nice hack.
- Monitor your Azure RemoteApp environment with OpInsight – Part 2: Continuing the hack.
- Microsoft showcases the Azure Cloud Switch (ACS): Linux? Linux! Linux?! Yes; Linux.
- September update – Azure Preview Portal improvements: Ibiza continues to evolve in the very long preview. This is starting to feel like the GMail beta. There are some good improvements here, but the lateral scale of the UI needs to be chopped by 80%, or we should get an 80″ Surface Hub for free with every Azure subscription.
- Use Azure as Virtual DR Site for VMware and Physical Servers: A post I wrote for Petri.com.
- August updates to Azure RemoteApp: Some updates.
- How does Azure RemoteApp save user data and settings? I really do not like this solution – I prefer to use a virtual file server with domain membership on the VNet because I have some measure of control.
- ADFS Publishing via Azure Traffic Manager : Ah yeah, geo-redundant ADFS.
System Center
- Near Real-time Performance Data Collection in OMS: Could this be the start of the replacement of SCOM with a cloud service?
- Deploy Software Defined Networks using Virtual Machine Manager : A document based on TP3 of System Center 2016.
- 2nd Edition of Microsoft System Center: Building a Virtualized Network Solution now available and free to download: Featuring Irish MVP, Damian Flynn.
- How to Deploy Host Guardian Service using Service Templates in VMM Tech Preview 3: The new WS2016 Hyper-V security feature.
Office 365
- The New Office is Here: In case you missed it, Office 2016 launched this week. O365 customers will get is based on which servicing branch they are in. You might not see it for months if you are in the Current Branch for Business (Pro Plus plans default to this).
- What’s new in Office 2016: Why should you upgrade, and what should you look for if you have upgrade rights?
- Admins—get ready for Office 2016, rollout begins September 22: I’d tweeted several months ago that I’d heard September was the month, so I am not surprised at all.
- Announcing the Office 365 Service Trust Portal: STP is a service feature in Office 365 designed to provide deeper information on how Microsoft manages security, compliance and privacy.
- Office 365 Import Service—migration to SharePoint Online and OneDrive for Business just became easier: An out-of-band transfer using hard disks, similar to the Azure import service.
- Introducing Office 365 Planner: A “simple and highly visual way to organize teamwork”.
- Step-By-Step – Setting up AD FS and Enabling Single Sign-On to Office 365: Set up single sign-on.
- How to use your Office 365 subscription with Azure RemoteApp: There’s a new “with O365” template that you can use now. Use your ProPlus installation rights in Azure’s RDS.
EMS
- Coming soon – New features for managing Windows 10 and iOS devices: New features between September 25 and October 5.
- Day Zero Support for iOS 9 with Intune: Manage your iPhones and iPads.
- Azure Active Directory B2B collaboration: Inter-company federation via Azure AD.
- Azure AD Premium Dashboard is in preview: Microsoft has turned on the Azure Active Directory Premium Dashboard – available in North America only at this point.
- Azure AD B2C and B2B are now in Public Preview:
- Learn all about the Azure AD B2B Collaboration Preview: Learn more about the Biz-2-Biz preview.
Security
- Tracking a Bluetooth Skimmer Gang in Mexico: A whole new way of skimming your card at the ATM, thanks to the ATM engineers.
- Tracking Bluetooth Skimmers in Mexico, Part II: More on this story.
- Who’s Behind Bluetooth Skimming in Mexico? A very professional criminal operation.
Miscellaneous
- Microsoft heads back to court on September 9th: A post I wrote about the Irish datacenter and US warrant appeal.