Aidan Finn, IT Pro

This is one of those times where if you’d told me this 5 years ago, I’d have laughed until my ribs broke.

In case you missed it, Microsoft and Novell have announced a strategic partnership to promote and support each others products. 

How it all came about, we may never know.  But I do have a suspicion.  A while back, Microsoft announced that they had found Linux distributions had infringed on Microsoft’s Intellectual Property (IP) rights.  This didn’t surprise me, especially after hearing Mark Russinovich’s presentation on how Linux compares with Windows.  Mark goes on to describe how the Linux developers constantly added new features to compare with advantages that Mark was point out that Windows had.  Microsoft said they were investigating on how to reconcile this.  Options included nailing the authors of the code (usually someone living in their parent’s basement – just kidding!) or suing enterprises who were using the offending products.

A major part of the announcement from this partnership is that Microsoft will not pursue anyone who is using Novell’s SUSE Linux product range.  Out of this, Microsoft will receive royalties from Novell on license sales.  Novell don’t make too much from licensing so this won’t be an issue for them.  They aim to make money from support and services contracts.  This agreement also appears to include Novell subsidiaries such as a product called Mono, a Linux clone of .NET.  It was also stated that Microsoft will not pursue authors of open source code that infringes on their IP rights.  If you read between the lines this would mean that CIO’s better start adding some $’s to their budget.

On a side note, Microsoft is extremely unlikely to send lawyers in to their "big 500" clients, i.e. the people who drive the design and sales of Microsoft’s products.  It would be even less unlikely they would pursue the smaller fish.  However, this is just a gut feeling and not a legal opinion.

So that’s the IP stuff out of the way.  What does the rest of the agreement include?

• Both companies will work on web services interoperability.  This sounds like Microsoft will work with Novell on their Mono product, the aforementioned .NET clone.
• They will work together on server management.  This could include Operations Manager 2007 management packs for SUSE, WS mangement, or maybe some ZENworks interoperability.
• Mangement of Virtual Machines.  Maybe these are VM additions for SUSE on Virtual Server, the "Longhorn" hypervisor or Virtual PC 2007.  It could include the Microsoft/Xen partnership.  It may even include Virtual Machine Manager that is currently in beta.
• OpenOffice file format (OpenXML) compatibility with Office 2007.  This was already something that some governments were trying to get in Office 2007.  Microsoft will aim to have seamless compatibility between Office 2007 and OpenOffice.
• Microsoft will issue 70,000 * 1 year maintenance agreeements for SUSE Linux.

What’s the big picture?  Microsoft had already been working on Linux interoperability.  OM 2007 was already going to have WS support and 3rd parties already provide Linux agents and management packs.  Companies like Quest already provide SMS clients for Linux.  Microsoft already had a relationship with XEN for a virtualisation solution for both Linux and Windows.  However, Microsoft is now openly supporting SUSE Linux. 

This alliance a visible acceptance that however good Microsoft thinks Windows is (and I think it is the best network server product out there) Linux has a justified place on an enterprise network.  Microsoft will expand it’s management to include SUSE.  But don’t think this is a generosity thing.  Microsoft will get paid for the usage of their IP if you deploy SUSE.  So even if you think you’re screwing Bill out of yet another ivory back scratcher when you go open source with SUSE, you’ll be wrong.

What’s there for the CIO signing the checks?  They still have the choice of going open source.  They will get support and interoperability.  They will be dealing with a mature and well accepted company in Novell.  And they will also feel like they are on a safer legal ground if they purchase SUSE products instead of some other Linux product.

Connect sent out a mail today saying that the Operations Manager 2007 team released RC1 versions of the Web Console and a reporting service for Audit Collection Service containing 18 reports.  Anyone who must do security auditing (IFSRA, SOX, pharms, etc) will seriously want to take a look at ACS.  I wrote a document or whitepaper about it on my last job.

I just got an email from Connect saying that the development stage of SP2 for Windows 2003 is nearing it’s end.  I’ve just started documenting the service pack.  Already, I’ve got 8 pages on how to install the thing!  I’m only getting to what’s in it now, let alone devling into Windows Deployment Services.

Details of the Vista MCP exam are on the Microsoft website.  It will be in beta testing from the end of the month until mid-November.

Crikey, I’d just love to get an exam opening this year from either Pearson or Prometric to finally sit 70-296, let alone Vista!

Credit: Bink

Microsoft OM 2007 (the successor to MOM 2005) RC1 is now available on the Connect website. Improvements over the beta include:

• Improved install process
• Major usability improvements made to the UI
• Updated Management Packs and new Active Directory MP
• Ability to Gateway
• Certificate manage non-trusted devices
• Support for more deployment topologies including multiple management servers
• Improved stability

You will need to uninstall the beta release to install RC1.  As promised, RC1 can be upgraded to RC2 and then to RTM.

OK, it’s not really much of an infrastructure story, but things have been slow in the MS world over the last few days.  Windows Media Player 11 was released late last night.  There’s a 32 and a 64bit edition.  For someone like me who just listens to the odd MP3, CD or ESPN broadcast, there’s not much of interest other than a nice new slate grey skin.  I’m told that media junkies will appreciate it, especially some new library functions.

I’m preparing to finally sit the 70-296 exam to upgrade my MCSE (about time).  I’ve done my brushing up and all I need now is an opening to actually sit the exam … come on Prometric!  I’m starting to work on Windows 2003 SP2 beta and Windows Deployment Services.  I hope to get a good bit done on that this weekend.  It’s looking much bigger than I originally anticipated.  Some documentation will appear on here when I’m done.  I’ve also started reading Mark Minasi’s (and co) new "Mastering … " book on Windows 2003 SP1 and R2.  It’s excellent.  The list of contributors is a real who’s-who in the Microsoft Windows world.

Betanews is reporting that starting from today, any downloads for Microsoft Office will require you to go through a validation process, regardless of your licensing.  Today it appears that only downloading templates is affected.  Starting in January, it appears all downloads will be affected.

If your copy is installed with a known stolen license key then you can expect some very bad things to start happening after going through this process.

I’m doing some stuff on VMware at home that requires a Windows 2003 SP1 RIS installation.  I set up my test domain with a DC and workstations.  I got RIS ready and started up a client in PXE mode only to get thisL

VXE-E53:  No boot filename received

PXE-M0F: Exiting Intel PXE ROM
Operating System not found

I’ve been working with RIS since 2003 and I thought I’d seen everything.  Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s been an excellent but underused part of Windows Server.  I used it for 2 years to build PC’s on the network that I designed and managed.  I googled about for a while and found plenty of people looking for help on this problem without any joy.  And then I found a blog entry by a Mark Michaelis that resolved the problem.

I had to add two scope options onto my DHCP server that I’d not seen before:

• 066 Boot Server Host Name: <RIS Server IP Address>
• 067 Bootfile Name: OSchooseri386startrom.com

I fired up the client again and everything worked.  Thanks Mark!

A quick update:

Note that my RIS server was also my DHCP server.  DHCP was previously installed and authorised.  This may have caused the above problem.  I also had another problem once I had succesfully laucnhed the RIS client.  The client failed to read configuration data for the RIS service.  I unauthorised and reauthorised DHCP and this resolved the problem.  RIS worked perfectly after this (and quite quickly too I must add).

Oh, I’ve only had a quick read, but anyone planning on using Windows Deployment Services (the succesor to RIS in Windows 2003 SP2 and Longhorn) will need to be familiar with the above two DHCP scope options.

My current client is in the process of deploying a new Windows 2003 Active Directory and a Citrix PS4 environment.  Requirements for the Citrix environment are:

• They want to use mandatory profiles (if at all possible).
• They wish to use controlled start menus and desktops.
• They want to install all applications on each server.
• They want to publish the desktop to users via WYSE terminals.
• They want to control access to licensed applications.
• License controls should be done via Domain Global or Domain Local groups.

Hmm. 

A well known Citrix expert consultancy firm recommended that they use scripts to build a users start menu and desktop based on group membership.  Nasty!  I like scripts but this would be a pain to own and maintain over time.  I first became aware of the Citrix requirements at a progress meeting yesterday.  I listened quietly and then I had a what was either a brainwave or a brain fart that evolved a bit.

• A single startmenu and desktop would be hosted on a DFS file share (replicated on the LAN).
• Shortcuts for all applications would be installed in the start menu (and desktop as neccessary).
• Shortcuts for restricted access programs would be permissioned using a suitably named domain group.
• The program folders for the restricted programs would be secured using the same groups.
• Users logging onto the Citrix servers would get the shared start menu and desktop via redirected folders and loopback group policy processing.
• ABE (Access Based Enumeration) would be installed on the hosting machines and configured for the replica shares.

One of the guys gave this a test and it worked.  A user with restricted access only downloaded the shortcuts they should have had access to.  I was expecting to see loads of USERENV errors in the application log on the server but there were none.  It appears to work really nicely.  I’m now wondering if we need ABE in this equation.  We’ll see how it goes in future testing.