Book Review - SMS 2003 Administrator's Reference
Another excellent addition to the resources available for the SMS admin. Especially for a new installation or new sms admins, follow chapters 1-13, to get up and running, and then go to Chap 15 and implement his SMS 2003 Web Remote Tools. Don't be fooled by the fact that there's only a few pages devoted to mentioning this tool; once you have SMS, and the default SMS web reporting site running, adding this virtual web site to your web reporting server is indespensible. It was for me; I'm pretty sure at least some of the raises I've received the last two years were justified in my review by last year: "implementing Ron Crumbaker's Web Console" and this year: "enhancing the web console".
If you are an SMS Administrator, for the most part your work is done behind-the-scenes. If you implement this web console and get your Managers, local technicians, helpdesk, etc. using it--it is a great way to answer that dreaded yearly review question "so, what did you do this year to help the company?"
As with almost any technology-geared guide, there is one thing I noticed that has changed. Microsoft just released (literally, just last Friday) an updated ITMU (Chapter 13), so the .cab file is now called wsusscn2.cab (not wsusscan.cab).
Grab this, the SMS 2003 Recipes from Greg Ramsey/Warren Byle, and lurk on the www.myitforum.com sms2003 forums, blogs, or email lists, and you'll have your sms installation humming along in no time.
The above is verbatim what I posted on amazon.com. What I didn't write in the review was that Ron mentioned my customizations in Chapter 15 to his web console. Way cool. (I am such a geekette. Sigh.)
http://www.amazon.com/SMS-2003-Administrators-Reference-Management/dp/0471749508/sr=11-1/qid=1163037785/ref=sr_11_1/104-1500369-0541565