April 2009 – My information Resource (blog.mir.net)

New Windows 7 Site

This video blog provides insight on Windows 7 from the Microsoft engineers who helped build the product.

Additionally, it provides real-world commentary from IT professionals who have chosen to shift to a modern OS.

Watch. Connect.

Windows 7 Release Candidate Update

There certainly has been a lot of discussion about Windows 7 in the last few weeks. A lot of folks want to know when they can get their hands on the official RC, when we are going to RTM,

On the Microsoft Windows 7 Blog Brandon LeBlanc was pleased to share that the Release Candidate is on track for April 30th for download by MSDN and TechNet subscribers. Broader, public availability will begin on May 5th. !!!!!

To see some some of the changes and refine the new and improved taskbar, the behavior of Aero Peek, Touch, Windows Media Player, and much more. In case you have missed the previous E7 blog entry outlining some of these changes in detail, you can read about them here and here.

To see the full Microsoft official Blog notice go here..

Open Beta for MOF Companion Guide— Now Available for Download

Open Beta for MOF Companion Guide— Now Available for Download
Planning for ISO/IEC 20000: A MOF Companion Guide
The Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) team is extending the MOF 4.0 core content with the release of additional MOF companion guides. We’re pleased to announce the beta of the latest guide, Planning for ISO/IEC 20000. Visit the Connect site to download the beta now.
The companion guide will allow IT management staff and service providers to understand ISO 20000 requirements and assist them in planning for streamlined and efficient implementation using MOF as a navigation tool. The guide enables users to take informed steps toward certification, make cost-reducing process improvements, and increase organizational efficiency and flexibility. Ultimately, the steps outlined in this guide will help an organization meet ISO 20000 requirements and deliver effective IT services.
Tell us what you think! Test drive our beta guide and send us your honest feedback. What are your thoughts on the MOF companion guide? What other scenarios would you like us to address? We appreciate the input and will work to make each guide as helpful and useful as possible.
Tell your peers about MOF 4.0! Please forward this to anyone who wants to learn more about Microsoft Operations Framework.
More information about MOF 4.0: Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) 4.0 delivers practical guidance for everyday IT practices and activities, helping IT professionals establish and implement reliable, cost-effective IT services. It integrates community-generated processes, governance, risk, and compliance activities, management reviews, and Microsoft Solutions Framework (MSF) best practices. MOF 4.0 is a framework that provides guidance across the IT service lifecycle.
Join the Beta
This is an open beta download. See below for instructions on how to access the beta guide.
To join the MOF Beta, follow these steps:

Visit the MOF Beta at http://connect.microsoft.com.
Sign in using a valid Windows Live ID to continue to the Invitations page.
Scroll down to Microsoft Operations Framework.

If you have not previously registered with Microsoft Connect, you might be required to register before continuing with the invitation process.
If the link in step 1 does not work for you, copy and paste the link into the Web browser address bar.
Related Resources
Check out all the MOF team has to offer! For additional resources, including our latest companion guides and job aids, visit the MOF page on TechNet: http://www.Microsoft.com/mof.
We appreciate your comments and feedback. Please send mail to MOF@microsoft.com.
Already using MOF 4.0? We’d like to hear about your experiences. Send mail to the MOF team: MOF@microsoft.com.

Thanks Bill Chapman for originally posting this.

Changes in Windows 7 Security

In this and future blogs i will be talking about new changes in Windows 7 and security. Bitlocker allows you to protect a desktop, server or laptop with encryption solution.

This issue BitLocker Enhancements

Bitlocker 1st appeared in Vista and could only protect the system volume which required user to have 2 different partitions on for boot and one for data. With service pack 1 you could encrypt the full drive. The issues were this was not easy to deploy. There is now a new tool for migrating and existing drive to support BitLocker from a Wizard!

In Windows 7, enhancements include the management of BitLocker. and use of Group Policy settings that allow you to update your passwords and integrate with Smart Cards and manage fixed drives.

BitLocker to GO is all a new feature for portable devices and will discuss that in another article.

For information on how BitLocker work go here

Hyper-V Security Guide Released

This guide is designed to provide you with guidance, instructions, and recommendations to help you elevate the security of virtualized Microsoft® Windows Server® 2008 environments to address your business-critical needs.

The Hyper-V Security Guide focuses on three key areas and provides the following information:

• Hardening the Hyper-V role. Prescriptive guidance for hardening the Hyper-V role, including several best practices for installing and configuring Hyper-V with a focus on security. These best practices include measures for reducing the attack surface of Hyper-V as well as recommendations for properly configuring secure virtual networks and storage devices.
• Delegating virtual machine management. Prescriptive guidance to help you safely and securely delegate administrative access to virtual machine resources within an organization.
• Protecting virtual machines. Prescriptive guidance for securing virtual machine resources, including best practices and detailed steps for protecting virtual machines by using a combination of file system permissions, encryption, and auditing.

Get it HERE

A little history

I found a neat site that has the history or Microsoft by years

right now is 1975-1983 the link is here

Network monitor 3.3 Released

Supports WINDOWS 7 1

· Ability to capture on WWAN and Tunnel interfaces on Win7.

· Critical fixes to NM3.3 to operate correctly with Hyper-V.

· Right-click-add-to-alias. Right-click a frame in the Frame Summary window with an IPv4, IPv6, or MAC address to add that address as a new alias.

· Right-click-go-to-definition: Right-click a field in the Frame Details windows and select Go To Data Field Definition or Go To Data Type Definition to see where the field is defined in the NPL parsers.

· Auto-scroll. See the most recent traffic as it comes in. In a live capture, click the Autoscroll button on the main toolbar to have the Frame Summary window automatically scroll down to display the most recent frames as they come in. Click Auto-scroll again to freeze the view in its present location.

· Experts available online: Experts are stand-alone applications that analyze Network Monitor capture data. Various experts are available online at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=133950.

· Frame Comments: Attach comments to frames in a saved capture file. Select the Frame Comments tab in the lower-right window to add, view, edit, or delete comments.

· API Extensions: API methods have been added to enable access to conversation information, properties, field display strings, and comments.

· Ability to open ETL files and correlate information by Network Tracing scenario.

· Set of core parsers to improve parsing performance. These can be accessed by changing the Common and Windows set of parsers to stubs:

From the Tools menu, select Options

· Go to the Parsers Tab

· Select the folder you want to stub out (Common or Windows)

· Click on the Stubs button on toolbar

· See our Release Notes for a complete list of new features and known issues.

· Experts: Experts are stand-alone applications that analyze Network Monitor capture data. Network Monitor 3.3 provides a simple interface for registering experts with the product and invoking them on a saved capture file. We have made some initial experts available online. Do you have a network troubleshooting need that is not currently met by Network Monitor or our available experts? Why not suggest your own expert? Please use the feedback link on the left to submit a description of the analysis task you want to solve (you must first join our connection) and we will work with you to create an expert for the community to enjoy.

XOBNI (In box Backwards)

I use this daily and have been ask about it so here you go…

Xobni’s Outlook add-in saves you time finding email, conversations, contact info & attachments.

With Xobni, all interchanges between you and a contact are instantly displayed as a list of email conversations. Emails are threaded based on their subject and are shown in the order in which they occurred. Xobni also conveniently shows you which conversations include attachments with the help of a handy paperclip.

No more looking for attachment sent by Anita just look up Anita and all the files you sent are on one page

PS XOBNI is FREE at can be found here

Now you can send instant messages from the Windows Live Hotmail and People pages

Here’s what you get with the new web Messenger:

You can sign in to and send instant messages from any computer connected to the Internet, even if it doesn’t have Windows Live Messenger installed.
You can also send IMs to your Messenger contacts from the People page (your contact list). Just click the contact’s picture, and you’ll see Send an instant message on the dropdown menu.