Rob Marshall @ MyItForum.com

Configuration Manager 2007 SDK (V4.0) - Part 2

2008-06-29T21:04:00Z

Doh, had to correct a URL in my previous post The Configuration Manager 2007 SDK link on http://www.microsoft.com/smserver/default.mspx is still pointing at an invalid address ... pinged customer services to let them know, but doubt i'm the first ;-)...(read more)

Configuration Manager 2007 SDK (V4.0)

2008-06-29T19:33:00Z

I noticed that the Configuration Manager SDK link that is shown on www.microsoft.com/smservice is turning up a page not found, it points to http://mscompub/dmt/dialogs/preview/preview.aspx?d=preview&user=deniselr&familyid=064a995f-ef13-4200-81ad-e3af6218edcc&languageid=f49e8428-7071-4979-8a67-3cffcb0c2524 .... which is obviously an invalid URL for us net users Must be a publishing burp, so here's a working link: System Center Configuration Manager 2007 Software Development Kit (SDK...(read more)

Microsoft Team - In the 70's

2008-06-23T15:02:00Z

Classic, check out Bill Gates and his homies back in the 70's , contrasted with a picture of them now (2008) With Bill taking the Microsoft off-ramp, and heading off in to the sunset over a 2 year period, Microsoft will definately become a different animal, no doubt about that. Isn't this a major cornerstone in Microsoft history? As far as I know, Bill's going to retire as a pig farmer, with a hefty chunk of shares in Microsft. Ok, maybe the pig farmer bit's not exactly true, instead...(read more)

SCCM2007 - Exam

2008-06-14T09:52:00Z

I passed the 70-401 - Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2007 exam yesterday (13th June 2008). Wasn't as easy as the SMS2003 exam I have to admit. But, I passed with a score high enough to make me buzz all day. I found some of the questions to be really challenging, a lot of NAP and Software Udpates questions, a spread of what I'm calling generic question (applicable to SMS2003 and SCCM). Overall, I'd advise any SMS2003 administrator to book this exam and go take it. I've...(read more)

Jeff Hawkins: More of ...

2008-06-11T19:44:00Z

I recently posted about Jeff Hawkins , and I got a comment back from Ginger Campbell from the Brain science podcast website , pointing me at a recent interview he did with Jeff. Thanks for showing me this Ginger. Episode 38 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Jeff Hawkins, author of On Intelligence. Hawkins is well-known for founding Palm Computing and Handspring. He invented the Grafitti handwriting recognition system and helped develop the Palm Trio SmartPhone. Since he published...(read more)

WMUG Site Poll: SCCM in Mixed or Native mode

2008-06-11T13:16:00Z

I've just put up a poll on the WMUG website, i'm trying to gauge how many people will go for a Native mode implementation of SCCM. WMUG SCCM Mixed or Native mode Poll Apologies but the site is not setup for anonymous posting (spambots and trolls abound), so you'll need to sign in to participate....(read more)

o2 - iPhone deals

2008-06-11T10:31:00Z

Now that the iPhone 2.0 (3G) has been announced, the UK o2 network are texting their iPhone customers about the arrival of the iPhone 2.0 and the packages they are offering . Good news for existing higher-tariff iPhone customers, the upgrade is free, but lower tarrif customers will have to fork out £99 to upgrade. All tariffs include unlimited browsing on your iPhone, unlimited Wi-Fi access, visual voicemail and reduced roaming rates with our International Traveller Service and are subject...(read more)

3G Iphone announced @ WWDC 2008

2008-06-09T19:02:00Z

iPhone 3G (and GPS!) confirmed by Jobs at WWDC 2008...(read more)

Jobs and his Phones

2008-06-09T08:37:00Z

The sold out Worldwide Developer Conference kicks off today, with a key note presentation from the CEO Steve Jobs. Rumour has it that Jobs will be announcing the next generation iPhone . I'm interested but not driven by this to be honest. The iPhone I have does the job, but it has some issues which limit it's functionality, which are mostly due to DRM paranoia and with the Shell implementation (which isn't as thought out as some might imagine, in fact if you use the iPhone for a few days...(read more)

Jeff Hawkins: Brain science is about to fundamentally change computing

2008-06-01T13:15:00Z

Jeff Hawkins covers a lot in this 20 minute video, defining a brain theory that's easy to understand and, in my opinion, the most interesting rendition of how the brain functions that i've ever heard. He defines us as Prediction Machines, check out the video to understand what he means. Step in the right direction for A.I me thinks...(read more)

WMUG Event - 12th May - Microsoft Reading Campus

2008-05-14T09:58:00Z

Yesterday evening, the latest WMUG event took place at the Microsoft Reading Campus. We had a great turnout, lots of questions asked of the MS Speaker (Paul Collins) who overviewed the System Center product range, and Gordon Mckenna who as usual, spent most of the Recap of MMS 2008 allocated time talking about Operations Manager! Unfortunately, David Scambler, who was going to shore up this discrepancy by talking about the best product in the System Center range, Configuration Manager, had to leave...(read more)

WorldWide Telescope

2008-05-14T09:35:00Z

Well, Cliff Hobbs has beat me to the post on the announcement that HP have snapped up EDS. Fair enough, considering Cliff works at EDS; It would have felt bad stealing his thunder so to speak ;-) So instead here's something I found today, Microsoft Launches WorldWide Telescope Sourced from SlashDot: WorldWide Telescope , developed by Microsoft's research arm, knits together images from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-Ray Observatory Center, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, and others...(read more)

Amazing data recovery of Columbia HDD

2008-05-08T21:24:00Z

Data Recovered From Space Shuttle Columbia HDD More pictures of the HDD's with the platters showing ;-) Good news around a sad subject. But an amazing data recovery that led to completion of a physics experiment. This may be showing up on MyITForum now, so, howdy and I hope as I blog I hit a subject that interests you :-)...(read more)

Review of Snowsoft Snow Inventory tool

2008-05-07T15:16:00Z

Managing, and collecting Asset information is a very important process for any business, small or large. And to get that job done, there are quite a few tools to choose from. Here I’m focusing on a product from Snowsoft called Snow Inventory to do the job. It’s quite a configurable asset information collection tool, but that’s not it’s only purpose in life. Using the software metering and application presence information from Snow Inventory, it can be used to under-pin another Snowsoft tool called...(read more)

SMS2003 - How to easily create reports - For reporting first-timers and the like

2008-04-15T13:14:00Z

I was pondering (like you do) how accessible report creation is in SMS2003. It requires a few skills to be under-your-belt (SQL, SQL tools, areas in SMS) before you can master this subject enough to produce quality reports. And, well I was taught (back when I was a padawan, I eventually killed my master in true Star Wars Sith Lord fashion while he slept after a heavy nights SMS2003 SP3 troubleshooting, the old fool! ;-) a trick for creating reports that lined up my knowledge a bit more and helped...(read more)

SMS2003, creating an Advertisement with a single assignment

2008-04-01T14:40:00Z

A collegue of mine spent hours researching how to create a simple advertisement assignment. He was using the SDK in VBScript and was frustrated at the lack of easy-to-digest information out there. He'd arrived at MSDN, Technet, poured over the SMS2003 SDK help file and even googled around. He almost had the problem solved when he came across references (via google books) to "SMS2003 Recipes". Unfortunately he just couldn't adapt the examples to his needs. I thought he was just doing...(read more)

Sir Arthur C Clarke moves on to Moon-Base-Alpha

2008-03-19T15:08:00Z

Sad to hear, but Sir Arthur C Clarke has passed away at the grand old age of 90. He wanted to be remembered as a "writer", rather for the myriad of other things he's got up to in his life-time. And that's how I'll always remember him, one of the best SciFi writers and technical visionaries to exist in the 20th Century. Hat off to Sir Clarke, I read a lot of his books in my "formative" years. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7304004.stm...(read more)

Robots - All you need to see to know they will walk amongst us soon!

2008-03-19T14:44:00Z

This is just the most amazing tech-demo of a functional walking robot i've ever seen. Boston Dynamics have produced a quad-legged robot called "The Dog". It trashes the kit coming out of china\japan, which are usually just a calculator in a (slow) mechanical suit. "The Dog" can keep it's balance even if it's kicked about, loses it's footing (ice beware!) or stumbles down-hill. An epic implementation of technology. I cannot believe this isn't main page news...(read more)

Does it blend?

2008-02-27T16:20:00Z

In my iPhone not-a-review-but-kind-of-like-one , I said I'd blend my iPhone if Apple divorce the Generation 1 model from future firmware releases (due to Generation 2 iPhones about to come to market) ... well here's a list of things that Tom Dickson from BlendTec has blended in the name of MAN-science! Chuck Norris - http://youtube.com/watch?v=NdD54rG9oQA&feature=related BIC Lighters - http://youtube.com/watch?v=Yx4QgK_xEfE&feature=related Golf Balls - http://youtube.com/watch?v=MC8Zvl...(read more)

10 Virtual tools you should (have at least heard of) know

2008-02-27T15:31:00Z

Baseline Mag has put up an interesting top 10 list of VM tools , that, for a virtual engineer you should know about. It's always a good idea to know the competing products and some of the third party add-ons\tools that are out there. Some of the stuff on this list i've never heard off, mainly due to them not being for Windoze I guess :> http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/Enterprise-Apps/10-Free-Virtualization-Tools-You-Should-Know/...(read more)

Microsoft must pay $1.4bn to EU

2008-02-27T11:57:00Z

Oh man! What a day for Microsoft!!! The European Commission has fined US computer giant Microsoft for defying sanctions imposed on it for anti-competitive behaviour 1.4 Billion! try saying that with a finger in your mouth in true Dr Evil (Austin Powers) style! How will we conquer the world Bill? ... With our "Lazors ... sharks with frickin lazors on their heads!" Oh darn we've just been fined 1.4Billion! Quick liquify some of our assets!...(read more)

Almost an iPhone review ...

2008-02-27T11:56:00Z

A couple of weeks back my cell phones contract was coming to an end, and I had a choice between getting a new handset and extending the contract, or going all out and buying the (£320+) iPhone with a new 18 month contract, while retaining my mobile number. I'd seen the iPhone in the media as well as having brief demo's and I liked the form-factor, weight and the functionality available. So I dived in head first and bought myself a fancy-pancy iPhone. I've been putting off writing about...(read more)

Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (KB937287) issues

2008-02-21T18:46:00Z

Seems Vista SP1 is causing a few headaches , so Microsoft have suspended it's download until they can iron out the issues and get it stable. It's suppose to only be a small percentage of users impacted, so a lot of us wouldn't have become entangled in it. I managed to uninstall SP1 Beta 2 before applying the real deal, SP1;and it all went fine. It was all done in around 45 minutes, and i'm noticing that startup\shutdown is a bit more responsive as well as it being a bit more stable...(read more)

What are the 14 greatest engineering challenges for the 21st century?

2008-02-21T11:29:00Z

Interesting article on the 14 greatest engineering challenges of the 21st Century Wonder how many of these will be put on the back-burner for the 22nd Century Secure Cyberspace sounds ominious ... Bring on that Virtual Reality! Talking of which I tried a set of these VR goggles a few weeks back. Did not rate them Felt like a raw version 1, not sharp, didn't fit correctly and could imagine my eyes becoming strained while trying to focus on the image. The focus problem was perhaps due to the product...(read more)

Holiday all over ...

2008-02-17T13:41:00Z

Well, pretty much back in to my routine with the Maldives (Meedhupparu) becoming more and more of a distant memory ... Such an amazing holiday. No internet for 7 whole days, no newspapers or TV. Just dedicated to chilling out, diving, eating, suntanning and snorkelling. I'd go again right now if I could organise the time off! It was a small island, not many people around, almost white sand with water warmer than that in the Infinity pool. Here's some of favourite pictures (out of 500+ taken...(read more)

SMS2003: Script to change SDK Site Control File Delta on remote SMS Site server

2008-02-07T11:11:00Z

Folks, Wrote another little VBScript , this one to change the SDK Site Control File delta value on a remote SMS Site server. This script affects the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SMS\COMPONENTS\SMS_SITE_CONTROL_MANAGER\Sites section of the Registry on the remote SMS Site server. I'd recommend reading up on this subject before you get this tool out and use it. When would you use this? After determining you have several SDK Type 2 Flags in the SiteControl table on your SMS Site server....(read more)

Holiday Time!

2008-01-24T16:33:00Z

First hot holiday of the year just around the corner! I'm almost packed, for a 7 day holiday to the Maldives. We fly this Sunday, with 12 a hour flight ahead of us. We leave late at night, so we should be able to get a good few hours of snoozing in before we have to grind our way through the in-flight movies, read books and generally idle the time away. Once we arrive we'll be flown via a sea-plane to the island itself. Cannot wait! We'll be staying on an island called Meedhupparu (aka...(read more)

SnowSoftware - Snow License Manager for SMS

2008-01-09T13:44:00Z

Rod Trent over at MyITForum blogged about this , looks like quite a cool tool so wanted to reblog here. Snow License Manager automatically combines infrastructure information provided by Microsoft SMS® with information such as software contracts, purchased licenses, ownership, and prices. Snow License Manager ensures central control of all your contracts and software licenses as well as enables you to track actual usage. With local administration and built in report generation, Snow License Manager...(read more)

SMS2003 SP3

2007-05-16T11:35:00Z

There has been some real good content generated by the communities for SMS2003 SP3 so far, and here is my ten cents worth in the form of a quick review located here.

Also, if you haven't checked out Roger Zanders SMS Client Tool (not the SMS toolkit version ;-) then check out a brief review and heavy linkage here :> Sherry Kissenger and myself converted the documentation to English, go check it out :>

Keep up the good work Rod\Ron, the new site is looking awesome :>

Mikes little bundle of SMS'ness :>

2005-11-10T16:50:00Z

Congrats Michael!

SMS2005 ... Watch out, Microsoft may turn up at your door and offer you $$$ to buy that name, or issue you with a legal notice to cease and desist!

I wonder if Sophia is going to operate on a 25hr clock?

BTW I think Sophia is one of the loveliest names to choose for a girl.