Kurt Shintaku's Blog

(for any of you guys moonlighting as small/medium biz consultants… and you know who you are…)

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System Center Essentials 2007 is now available! 
Microsoft System Center Essentials 2007 is a new management solution in the System Center family of IT systems management products specifically designed for midsized businesses (up to 500 PCs and 30 Servers). Essentials 2007 provides a unified management solution that enables IT professionals in midsize organizations to proactively manage their IT environment with increased efficiency.    

• Download the trial software here.                   
• To view the demo, click here.
• System Center Essentials 2007 Overview Whitepaper
• System Center Essentials 2007 Datasheet
• System Center Essentials 2007 Reviewers Guide

Applied BizTalk Server 2006 R2 – $2,595.00
4 intensive days learning about BizTalk Server 2006 R2
BizTalk Server 2006 is Microsoft’s integration and business process management server offering based on .NET 2.0. BizTalk Server 2006 R2 is a release of BizTalk Server that brings it into the .NET 3.0 world, with integration between BizTalk and Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation (WF). R2 also includes full support for EDI, including both X12 and EDIFACT schema support, as well as support for EDI transaction batching. It also includes BizTalk RFID, which will enable integration between software and objects in the physical world.

Highlights:

Who Should Attend
Developers already familiar with BTS 2006 who are interested in learning about the new features found in BTS 2006 R2 and its support for key .NET 3.0 technologies.

Prerequisites:
Experience programming in C# using Visual Studio .NET and working knowledge of XML and Web services terminology is required. Experience with BTS 2006 is also required.

What you should expect to learn:
How to use the feature set in R2 to become a more effective BizTalk and service developer. You also will learn when and how to deploy specific R2 features, like the WCF adapters versus a .NET Adapter. In additional you will learn how RFID may fit into your enterprise by allowing you to integrate physical objects in the same way you can integrate applications with BizTalk Server.

Questions this course will answer:

• What is included in BizTalk R2?
• How does the WCF Adapter work in BizTalk R2?
• What is BizTalk RFID and how does it relate to BizTalk Server?
• How to use the WCF adapter in R2 for maximum performance?
• How can I use BAM to instrument my services end to end?
• Can I create both asynchronous and synchronous RFID applications?
• How can RFID events be passed to BizTalk Server?
• How can I use the WCF adapters with transactions?
• When do I use a WCF Adapter versus a .NET Adapter?
• How is the EDI support in R2 implemented?
• How to use Continuations with BAM and the R2 interceptors?

REGISTER:  http://www.pluralsight.com/courses/AppliedBizTalkServer2006R2.aspx

This is pretty cool.  It’s a game based on Silverlight that leverages the content from Virtual Earth to create a gaming environment over real satellite imagery.  It’s basically a scrolling shooter game where the objective is to destroy the invading UFO’s flying over a neighborhood of your choosing. Imagery provided by Microsoft Virtual Earth.

http://www.andybeaulieu.com/silverlight/
DestroyAll/Default.html

The source code is also available to the game on the main page:  http://www.andybeaulieu.com/Home/
tabid/67/EntryID/75/Default.aspx

Bahahaha!  Popular Science magazine rated working at the Microsoft Security Research Center as the #6th worst job in the world.

Granted this is a bit of an exaggeration, (Really?  Working at the MSRC is worse than risking your life like a hazmat diver, being responsible for other people’s lives like an air-traffic controller, or being up to your elbows in actual whale crap?) this is truly a hilarious article.

What do whale-feces researchers, hazmat divers and employees of Microsoft’s Security Response Center have in common? They all made Popular Science magazine’s 2007 list of the absolute worst jobs in science.

LINK: 
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2007/062607-microsoft-security-group-makes-worst.html?t51hb

Attention Sharepoint enthusiasts & administrators!
We just posted a Virtual PC .VHD file on Microsoft.com that contains an entire lab for learning & administering Sharepoint Server 2007.

What does this mean? Well, if anyone wants to “try out” Sharepoint Server 2007 and see what it’s like and what value it can provide, they can just download a Virtual PC file of it from Microsoft.com! The VPC includes the Microsoft Office Sharepoint Server 2007 (MOSS) Product Evaluation Guide on the desktop and is configured so the walk through at the end of the guide works with the image.

Direct Download here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=67f93dcb-ada8-4db5-a47b-df17e14b2c74&DisplayLang=en

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OTHER LABS AVAILABLE
If you like this, check out the other Virtual Machines we have available for download:
– Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2006 VHD
– Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition VHD
– Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2007 Beta 2 VHD
– Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Team Suite VHD
– Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 Enterprise Edition VHD
– Microsoft Windows Vista 30-Day Eval VHD

These can be downloaded from our Virtual .VHD Download web site at:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/try/vhd/default.mspx

If you would prefer to try our “virtual labs” where the labs & training are hosted at our datacenter and you are able to run the virtual machines remotely through a web browser, check out Microsoft’s Virtual Labs web site at:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/bb467605.aspx

We are proud to announce that Microsoft SoftGrid Application Virtualization Administration, Course #50016A, is now live and available from Microsoft Authorized Training Centers.  This enables them to deliver both the training material along with the Virtual Machines used in the training.

This also means that customers may use their Software Assurance/Enterprise Agreement training vouchers if they take this course through a qualified CPLS training facility.

Check with your Microsoft authorized training facility/partner for more details. 

• Quickstart
• Apex Infotech
• New Horizons
• etc.

This is funny stuff.  Hell – it even sounds like the guy that does our commercials.

http://images.soapbox.msn.com/flash/soapbox1_1.swf
Video: Parody of Microsoft Surface

Taken from Jeff Jones’ blog at CSO Magazine:
http://blogs.csoonline.com/windows_vista_6_month_vulnerability_report

I was somewhat surprised (but pleased) at the level of interest back when I published my Windows Vista – 90 Day Vulnerability Report.  It was about the earliest span of time I thought might give us some indicators, and the indicators did look good.  (Though, I did not give us an "A+", in spite of some of the attributions 😉

Six months is a much more interesting time frame, and gives us the opportunity to see if the early trend indicators are holding up, or if the early signs of progress were a short-term gain.  Also, I thought it was worth going a little deeper in the analysis to look at the total fixed and unfixed vulns as I did last time, plus these additional views:

• Include a comparison view of Linux distribution workstation builds that exclude vulnerabilities non-default optional components as well as OpenOffice and other applications that do not have equivalents on Windows XP.
• Include a comparison view that excludes Low and Medium severities to just focus on High severity vulnerabilities fixed and unfixed in the first 6 months, and
• A comparison view that combines both of these

For the full details, or to print the report, you can download the report in pdf.

Well, looks like Gartner has weighed in on the iPhone.

Gartner to IT: Avoid Apple’s iPhone
IPhone’s phone and music player lacks the features business users need, says Gartner.
http://napps.networkworld.com/news/2007/061907-apple-iphone-gartner.html

Fortify on iPhone
Fortify’s blog on Secure Software wrote this interesting missive on the iPhone:
http://extra.fortifysoftware.com/blog/2007/06/sorry_apple_wrong_answer.html

Sorry Apple, Wrong Answer

I love my iPod. I love my Powerbook. Fake Steve Jobs is not too shabby. Along with the rest of the universe, I was preparing to love the iPhone, until today when the real Steve Jobs announced the way third party developers would be allowed to add applications: the Web. That’s right, the iPhone will come complete with Safari, and developers will be able to harness the power of Web 2.0 to create software with all of the same bells and whistles as native iPhone applications.
According to Apple, this allows third party applications to "extend the iPhone’s capabilities without compromising its security or reliability." Uh … that’s scary. It’s already hard to get Web security right, and giving the Web browser access to your contacts, your photos, and your music just ups the penalty for getting it wrong. If the Web is the platform of the future, then cross-site scripting is the next buffer overflow. This is bad news.
I’m going to stop writing iPhone and start writing iP0wn.

Enterprise Security software for Windows Mobile
For those of you wondering about getting a Firewall for Windows Mobile, there’s lots and lots of choices:

• Airscanner® Mobile Firewall for Windows Mobile
• MobileArmor MobileFirewall for Windows Mobile
• Credant Mobile Guardian for Windows Mobile
• Bluefire Mobile Security for Windows Mobile
• ProtectStar Mobile Firewall for Windows Mobile
• F-Secure Mobile Security for Windows Mobile

Here’s a few Anti-Virus programs for Windows Mobile as well:

• McAfee Antivirus for Windows Mobile
• Kaspersky Antivirus Mobile for Windows Mobile
• JP Mobile Surewave Mobile Defence for Windows Mobile
• Symantec Mobile Antivirus for Windows Mobile
• Trend Micro Mobile Security for Windows Mobile
• Airscanner Mobile Antivirus for Windows Mobile
• Bullguard Antivirus for Windows Mobile

Here’s some Data Encryption products for Windows Mobile:

• Utimaco Safeguard PDA for Windows Mobile
• Safeboot Device Encryption for Windows Mobile
• SecuBox for Pocket PC
• PointSec for Pocket PC
• Trust Digital PDASecure for Windows Mobile
• Sentry 2020 for Windows Mobile
• Cryptostorage for Pocket PC

And here’s some VPN solutions for Windows Mobile:

• Windows Mobile native-PPTP/L2TP-IPSec VPN
• AnthaVPN for Windows Mobile
• Bluefire Mobile Secure VPN for Windows Mobile (Cisco-integrated)
• Checkpoint F1-SecureClient Mobile for Windows Mobile
• iPassConnect for Windows Mobile

These are some popular articles on Windows Mobile Security:

• Pocket PC Magazine’s article on Windows Mobile Device Security Policies
• Pocket PC FAQ’s article on Pocket PC Security
• Windows Mobile Device Management and Security Solutions Guide
• Windows Mobile Device Support & Corporate Guidelines for Device Lifecyles
• Network Security for the Windows Mobile Platform

I use the MSN dial up client for personal email on an MSN account.

Why do I use MSN’s client?  Well, there’s a number of reasons, but the biggest of them is the SPAM filtering.  There’s very little software out there that does a better job at filtering out the SPAM in email.  It’s just really really good, and it leverages both the server-side SPAM filtering that Hotmail and other online services has along with local client-based filtering that appears to be based on downloaded rules from MSN.

The only problem was, MSN didn’t appear to work on Windows Vista.  That’s right.  Our own consumer mail client seemed to have problems running on Windows Vista.  I had to secretly use my MSN mail from within a Virtual PC virtual machine with Windows XP.

Normally this wouldn’t really bother me but I discovered 3 rather ANNOYING things about doing this:

1. FREEZE DRY FAILURES
   Many times, I would ‘pause’ the virtual machine session (instead of saving the changes back into the VM) which would save the memory state of the virtual machine on disk to be reloaded precisely as I had last left it, with the anticipation of coming back to the currently running VM later.  This would make it very fast to stop the VM and restart the VM at a later date.  The problem was the ‘freeze dry’ or ‘pausing’ process would fail a lot.  I to this day don’t know what caused this but I do know that I’d have to completely reboot the VM again.
2. VIRTUAL MACHINE BOOT TIMES
   As a result I’d have to completely reboot the VM every time I wanted to use it.  This took 3 minutes or so which was annoying.  I should have to reboot a VM and login, then bring up the MSN mail client and login to that… just to check my mail.
3. STORAGE CONSUMPTION
   The VM took a lot of space.  It consumed some 5GB and even if I compressed it, it would expand out to 5GB again.  Really annoying.

HOW TO GET THE MSN CLIENT TO RUN ON WINDOWS VISTA
Fortunately, after spending some time ONLINE with MSN support I learned the following things about the MSN client:

• ONLY MSN 9.5 SUPPORTED ON WINDOWS VISTA
  The first important point is that MSN dialup client is in fact supported on Windows Vista.  There’s NO indication of this except for this page:  http://membercenter.msn.com/download.aspx?lm=en-us
  Note that this is also where you will install the "latest" version of MSN client. (9.5 currently)
• PREVIOUS VERSIONS OF MSN & INSTALLER FAIL
  No matter what you do, NO previous version of MSN or it’s installer will run.  They will always fail no matter what compatibility mode or what administrative mode you use.  It might work with SoftGrid but I haven’t tried that.
• MUST UNINSTALL ANY PREVIOUS VERSION
  If you attempt to install a previous version, you can not use the automatic software update feature of the installer.  Normally, you can go to Add/Remove Programs and run setup to update the software version.  This doesn’t work at all because the installer from previous revisions is incompatibile with Windows Vista.  Thus the whole MSN installation has to be uninstalled first.

Net net:  Uninstall any version of MSN that you have on Windows Vista and go to: http://membercenter.msn.com/download.aspx?lm=en-us .  From here you should be able to install the latest version of MSN client on Windows Vista and it should work fine.