Kurt Shintaku's Blog

Microsoft Forefront Unified Access Gateway (UAG) is a secure application gateway, to manage, control, and optimize remote access for managed and non-managed endpoints, to corporate applications and resources. Forefront UAG RC0 provides a number of new features, including support for migration from Forefront UAG Beta 2.

Forefront UAG provides the following:

• Remote access: Using Forefront UAG you can allow and control access to internal resources and applications from a range of managed and unmanaged client endpoints.
• Application support: Forefront UAG provides broad application support for a wide range of Microsoft and third-party applications. Application optimizers, consisting of predefined settings and values, provide optimum settings for accessing a specific application via Forefront UAG.
• Access control: Forefront UAG provides granular access control, to ensure that only client endpoints complying with corporate health guidelines can access internal applications and resources.
• Authentication: Forefront UAG provides frontend and backend authentication mechanisms. Frontend authentication allows you to pre-authenticate users using a wide range of authentication mechanisms, ensuring that only authenticated traffic reaches published application servers. In addition, Forefront UAG provides a single sign-on experience for authentication to backend applications.

Links:

• DOWNLOAD:  Forefront Unified Access Gateway Release Candidate 0 (1203.6 MB)
  http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=a3f5729a-3989-4f60-980f-1b87dd198988
• PRODUCT SITE:  Forefront Unified Access Gateway 2010 Beta
  http://www.microsoft.com/forefront/edgesecurity/iag/en/us/uag-beta.aspx
• DOCUMENTATION: Forefront Unified Access Gateway Beta
  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd861463.aspx
• BLOG:   Edge Access (Forefront UAG)
  http://blogs.technet.com/edgeaccessblog/
• DISCUSSION:  Forefront UAG Release Candidate
  http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=156513

On September 29, 2009, Microsoft released the beta version of the third generation of System Center Data Protection Manager (DPM), previously called “DPM v3” or “Zinger”.

DPM 2010 Beta builds on the success of DPM 2007 as the Microsoft backup and recovery solution for Windows customers in four significant areas:

• Continuous data protection of Windows application and file servers to seamlessly integrated disk, tape, and cloud—with support for a growing list of Microsoft technologies, such as:
• Windows Server from 2003 through 2008 R2
• SQL Server 2000 through 2008
• Exchange Server 2003 through 2010
• SharePoint Server 2003 through 2010
• Dynamics AX 2009
• Essential Business Server 2008 and Small Business Server 2008
• SAP™ running on SQL Server
  Along with new workloads and support of the latest generation of Microsoft application servers, these platforms are gaining several new protection and recovery capabilities. Some enhancement examples include:
• SQL Server database administrators will see up to 2000 databases protected by a single DPM server and will get a self-service restore capability so that authorized DBAs can restore data themselves. Also, you will be able to protect entire instances of SQL Server, where all new databases will be automatically protected.

• SharePoint administrators will also see new content databases be automatically protected and will no longer need a recovery farm for Office “14” servers to do individual item recovery from DPM 2010.

• Robust and flexible protection and recovery for the following Microsoft virtualization environments:
• Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2
• Windows Server 2008 with Hyper-V
• Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V
• Hyper-V Server 2008 and 2008 R2
• Protection of Live Migration-enabled servers running on CSV in Hyper-V R2
• Flexibility to protect virtual machines from Windows guests or from the hypervisor host
• Host-based backups will now enable single-item restores from within the VHD
• Ability to restore virtual machines to an alternative host
• Industry-leading Windows client protection:
• Protection of Windows XP through Windows 7
• Centralized policy management from DPM 2010, but backups occur while laptops are online or offline by managing policies within the local VSS client/backup tools
• Restores can also be done while online or offline—from the local repository or the DPM media
• Intelligent and customizable filtering to ensure the right data gets backed up
• 4. Scalability, reliability, and manageability:
• Up to 100 servers, 1000 laptops, or 2000 databases protected by a single DPM server
• Significant auto-protection, auto-healing, and reduced alerting for a more “fire and forget” experience
• Enhanced disaster recovery options for long-distance data protection and business continuity initiatives

This list is a partial representation of the full feature set planned for DPM 2010. Test out it yourself by downloading DPM 2010 Beta.

DOWNLOAD:  Data Protection Manager 2010 Beta (1503.53 MB)
http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9686964

NEWSGROUP:  Data Protection Manager 2010 Beta discussion
http://www.microsoft.com/communities/newsgroups/en-us/default.aspx?query="Data Protection Manager" or "DPM"&dg=&cat=en_US_d02fc761-3f6b-402c-82f6-ba1a8875c1a7&lang=en&cr=&pt=&catlist=&dglist=&ptlist=&exp=&sloc=en-us

VIDEO:  Technet Webcast:  Announcing Data Protection Manager 2010 Beta
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032426727 

BETA PRODUCT SITE: Data Protection Manager 2010
http://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/dataprotectionmanager/en/us/2010beta-overview.aspx

Wow.  Talk about stealth releases.  I had no idea we’d revved Mappoint.  And even better… it’s now available to MSDN Subscribers!

MapPoint 2010 gives you more power to visualize business data, communicate insights with instant impact, and integrate maps into the work you do in Microsoft Office. New features include map settings to choose display details, expanded pushpins, and the ability to send routes to your GPS device.

(from the OMG-it’s-about-frickin’-time file…)

Customized Map Settings – Choose whether cities, highways, local roads and parks show on your map.  Create maps using custom Map Settings to display your data with selected details. Easily hide roads, geographic boundaries and labels for clear routes and directions. You can now control the look and feel of the native map data. You can turn on and off either the labels and/or the symbols for each of 4 categories with several sub-categories:

• Populated Places – Major City (1,000,000+ people), City (500,000 – 999,999), Minor City (100,000 – 499,999) and Town/Other Place (0-99,999)
• Boundaries – Country, State or Province, County, Postal Code and 3-digit Postal Code
• Transportation – Highways, Local Roads, Toll Roads and Railroads
• Miscellaneous – Water Features, Parks and Reserves, Points of Interest and All Other

You can do this for each of the 6 map styles (Road, Road and Data, Data, Terrain, Political and Night). You can also chance the fonts on the map to better support your needs for reading the map data…and to help those farsighted folks.

• More Pushpins – Get all of the pushpin images from previous MapPoint versions—over 300 included.
• Refreshed Data – Use updated geographic data in MapPoint to display trends and illustrate key points on maps.
• Navigation and Sharing – Create routes, share with others and send them to your navigation device. This requires a subscription to MSN Direct to send over the FM airwaves.
• The Road Warrior’s Copilot – Plan your trip on your PC and then print, or send your route to your GPS device. This requires a subscription to MSN Direct to send over the FM airwaves.
• Easy to Reroute – Drag-and-drop your route to go around a road or area.
• Show in Bing™ Maps – Quickly find listings when online and add them to a route. Use descriptive words such as “coffee” and “restaurant” to find points near your location. Bing!
• Manage Pushpins – Hide a group of pushpins without deleting. Also, show all pushpin clouds (info boxes) or hide them all at once. Finally!

• Export to GPX – Bundle trip route, pushpin and other information into a single file (.GPX) for easy exporting and sharing. Import data into MapPoint using a .gpx file.

A couple things to note:

• The new MapPoint Add-in for SQL Server 2008 works with MapPoint 2010, so download that if you want your geometry and geography types in SQL Server 2008 to render in MapPoint 2010.
• The OLAP and Spatial Data Import COM Add-Ins work with MapPoint 2010, so download those if you need them.
• There are multiple versions of MapPoint – Microsoft MapPoint North America 2010, Microsoft MapPoint North America with GPS Locator, Microsoft MapPoint Europe, MapPoint Fleet Edition – so make sure you get the right version.
• Streets & Trips 2010 is also now available, so check out the web site for more details. S&T 2010 also has a free trial, so you can play before you pay.
• If you don’t trust my clearly skewed Microsoft view of MapPoint 2010 read the following article from MP2KMag.com: http://www.mp2kmag.com/a158–mapfeatures.mappoint.html

[taken from the Bing Maps Blog]

Microsoft’s consumer-level AntiMalware product, “Microsoft Security Essentials” v1.0.1611.0 released to the web today as the final 1.0 release of the product.

MSE is the no-charge antimalware product that works in tandem with Windows Defender to protect consumers from virulent software and threats.  Driven by the “Microsoft AV Engine”, consumers now have the same quality of malware filtering protection as Microsoft enterprise customers using Forefront Endpoint Protection.

Rated by independent testing organizations AV-Comparatives & VB100 as being within the highest tier of quality in protecting users from threats, particularly against threats that are ‘unknown’/undocumented’ and don’t have pre-created signatures for.

• VB100 ranks Microsoft in the top 3 AntiMalware products, beating Symantec, McAfee, & Kaspersky
  http://kurtsh.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!DA410C7F7E038D!5567.entry
• AV-Comparatives ranks Microsoft in the top 3 AntiMalware products, beating Symantec, McAfee & Avira
  http://kurtsh.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!DA410C7F7E038D!5423.entry 

For a more thorough review of the functional differences between MSE & Microsoft’s Forefront Endpoint Protection: (formerly Forefront Client Security)

• BETA: Microsoft Security Essentials (a.k.a. “Morro”) now available in Beta

PRODUCT DOWNLOAD:

• DOWNLOAD: Windows XP (32 bit)
  http://download.microsoft.com/download/A/3/8/A38FFBF2-1122-48B4-AF60-E44F6DC28BD8/mssefullinstall-x86fre-en-us-xp.exe
• DOWNLOAD: Windows Vista & Windows 7 (32 bit)
  http://download.microsoft.com/download/A/3/8/A38FFBF2-1122-48B4-AF60-E44F6DC28BD8/mssefullinstall-amd64fre-en-us-vista-win7.exe
• DOWNLOAD: Windows Vista & Windows 7 (64 bit)
  http://download.microsoft.com/download/A/3/8/A38FFBF2-1122-48B4-AF60-E44F6DC28BD8/mssefullinstall-amd64fre-en-us-vista-win7.exe

Whaddya know.  This is actually pretty cool.

Keyboard shortcuts

Keyboard shortcuts are combinations of two or more keys that, when pressed, can be used to perform a task that would typically require a mouse or other pointing device. Keyboard shortcuts can make it easier to interact with your computer, saving you time and effort as you work with Windows and other programs.

Most programs also provide accelerator keys that can make it easier to work with menus and other commands. Check the menus of programs for accelerator keys. If a letter is underlined in a menu, that usually means that pressing the Alt key in combination with the underlined key will have the same effect as clicking that menu item.

Pressing the Alt key in some programs, such as Paint and WordPad, shows commands that are labeled with additional keys that you can press to use them.

You can also create new keyboard shortcuts to open programs. For more information, see Create keyboard shortcuts to open programs.

• Ease of Access keyboard shortcuts
• General keyboard shortcuts
• Dialog box keyboard shortcuts
• Windows logo key keyboard shortcuts
• Windows Explorer keyboard shortcuts
• Taskbar keyboard shortcuts
• Magnifier keyboard shortcuts
• Remote Desktop Connection keyboard shortcuts
• Paint keyboard shortcuts
• WordPad keyboard shortcuts
• Calculator keyboard shortcuts
• Windows Journal keyboard shortcuts
• Windows Help viewer keyboard shortcuts

• LINK:  Windows 7 Keyboard Shortcuts
  http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/Windows7/Keyboard-shortcuts

Forgot to post this:  “The Making of the Moment”

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=6441200&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1

Making The Moment (Commercial) from Loyale Music on Vimeo.

Brace yourselves.  Windows 7 launches in 3… 2… 1…

[taken from the description]

“With Windows 7, your PC becomes your entertainment hub. And when its time to get some work done, new features help you cruise through your PC like a pro.”

College students, check out the sweetest deal on Windows 7 and download the full song from this video at: http://www.win741.com

Director: Marty Martin

Producer: Keith Rivers

Support is now available for running Operations Manager 2007 SP1 and Operations Manager 2007 R2 on the following operating systems:

• Windows Server 2008 R2
• Windows 7

The official support statement is posted under Knowledge Base article 974722.  The supported configuration guides for R2 and SP1 will be updated shortly as well.  The following table lists the Operations Manager roles and components that are supported on these operating systems.

The updated Windows Server Operating System Management Pack (version 6.0.6667.0), which includes support for Windows Server 2008 R2, is available on the System Center Operations Manager 2007 Catalog web site at this time as well!  There are currently over 20 MP updates or new releases that are in the pipeline for months ahead to support this OS and when those management packs become available you can get them on the System Center Operations Manager 2007 Catalog web site and from the Operations Manager 2007 R2 Operations console.

Note: No support for Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows 7 will be provided with Microsoft Operations Manager 2005

(Taken from the SCOM Team BLOG Site)

Announcing Microsoft Asset Inventory Service 2.0. This is a new release of Microsoft Asset Inventory Service Microsoft Asset Inventory Service (AIS). AIS is a hosted service that provides customers a comprehensive view of their enterprise’s desktop software environment. It helps reduce TCO and improve license compliance through advanced software inventory scanning and by translating inventory data into actionable intelligence.

Asset Inventory Service (AIS) allows customers to rapidly collect software and hardware inventory information, and reconcile Microsoft volume license agreements against installed software applications. It is one of the six technologies in The Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP). MDOP is an essential part of the Windows 7 Optimized Desktop solution, with technologies that help reduce the total cost of ownership (TCO) of a Windows 7 desktop

This AIS 2.0 beta release introduces several new enhancements to the existing service:

• Enhanced hardware inventory capabilities
• New Silverlight-based user interface
• Redesigned client technology
• Scaled up to support organizations up to 100,000 PCs
• Improved volume license reconciliation capabilities

What you need to do to participate:

If you are interested in applying for this opportunity and reside in the United States, please complete the following survey by COB on Wednesday, September 30, 2009.

• https://connect.microsoft.com/InvitationUse.aspx?ProgramID=3615&InvitationID=AIS2-FTVM-82QY&SiteID=310

This beta program is available to MDOP and non-MDOP customers. More information about the currently released service, AIS 1.5, can be found here:

• http://www.microsoft.com/windows/enterprise/products/mdop/ais.aspx

If you are selected to participate you will be notified via email no later than November 1, 2009. Selected participants should be prepared to deploy the AIS client to a number of test machines, participate in newsgroup discussions, and provide feedback.

Take the survey now for your chance to participate in this non-public beta program. Thanks and we look forward to your participation!

Regards,

The AIS Beta Team
scobeta@microsoft.com

First of all, yes, this is compatible with both Internet Explorer 7.0 & 8.0 contrary to the product’s name.  (Not very good foresight on the part of the developers however an excellent product nonetheless!)

Seriously.  This is a must-have 3rd party tool for the ad blocking capability alone although the scripting functionality makes for some awesome automated fun on the world’s most popular & widely distributed browser. 

Yep.  Popup ads & noisy hover over Flash ads can take a flying leap.

IE7Pro includes:

• Tabbed Browsing Management
• Ad Blocker
• Flash Blocker
• Super Drag Drop
• Crash Recovery
• Proxy Switcher
• Mouse Gesture
• Tab History Browser
• Inline Search
• User Agent Switcher
• Webpage Capturer
• “Greasemonkey”-like User Scripts platform
• User Plug-ins

…and many more power packed features.

You can customize not just internet Explorer, but even your favorite web site according to your need and taste using IE7Pro.

• DOWNLOAD:  IE7Pro 2.4.7
  http://www.ie7pro.com/