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Microsoft TechEd Australia 2011

Paul Cunningham — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 13:08:47 +0000

I spent most of last week at Microsoft TechEd Australia 2011, which was held on the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia.

If you’ve never heard of TechEd before it is a conference that Microsoft runs each year in different countries, including Australia, that combines training, education, and fun for IT pros and developers alike. Here in Australia it is basically the biggest and best conference that IT pros can go to without leaving the country.

Though I’ve been to three TechEds now I actually missed last year’s due to family and work commitments, but this year I was determined to go. I had such a great time that I want to share some of the experience with you here.

The Conference Kick-Off

TechEd Australia 2011 was held at the Gold Coast Convention Centre from the 29th of August to the 2nd of September. The first two days are mostly pre-conference activities such as hands-on training and user group meetings. I didn’t plan to attend any of the training, but could have attended some of the free sessions put on by local user groups if I’d been able to make the drive from Brisbane earlier in the day. Something for me to try harder at next year.

On the Tuesday afternoon the opening keynote presentation was held in the main arena. The keynote was a celebration of “geek” and did a great job of inspiring the audience and getting us excited for what was coming in the days ahead.

The keynote was followed by the opening night party. This included dinner, drinks, the opening of the exhibitor hall (which the hordes of geeks promptly began looting for freebies) and just general networking.

After the official party came the unofficial party thrown by the AuTechHeads user group at a local bar. Around 200 people enjoyed a few hours of drinks and entertainment thanks to the AuTechHeads core team and the vendors that sponsored the party.

As it was only the first night people mostly behaved themselves although one or two were clearly going to have a rough start to the conference the next morning.

The Technical Sessions

Although I love the social aspect of TechEd the sessions are the main reason that I am there. I got started first thing on Wednesday morning at 8:15am with some Lync audio/video conferencing.

In general I stuck mostly to the Exchange/Lync track since that is the space that I work in the most, but I also sat in on a few other sessions when I had a free slot in my timetable. It is good to get some variety and open yourself up to the other things going on in the IT world that you may not come across in your own job very often.

Of the three days TechEd ran for my highlights were:

You can check out the slides and videos of those sessions by clicking on the links. If the videos aren’t available straight away the team says they should be up within the next week or two.

My two favourite presenters were Andrew Ehrensing and Scott Schnoll, both Microsoft employees and both delivering high impact level 300-400 sessions on Exchange 2010 and Lync 2010.

The Networking

The other main benefit of conferences such as TechEd is the chance to meet up with other IT pros. I lost count of how many former colleagues I bumped into while I was there and had a chat with, as well as all of the new people that I had never met or only met online before.

The AuTechHeads user group has become one of the most connecting forces in the local IT professional community thanks to the efforts of their core team members Matt Marlor, Mick Huxley, Simone Bennett, Hayden McManus, and Stephen Molkentin.

TechEd is also one of the best opportunities you’ll ever have to talk face to face with the leading experts in our field. For example, besides delivering two amazing sessions on Exchange 2010 Scott Schnoll was also happy to chat at the Microsoft booth in the exhibitor hall and answer all of the questions that I had (except for the NDA stuff on E15 which he didn’t budge on )

A lot of our local talent also presented strong sessions or ran free user group training such as Shane Hoey and Chris Brown’s pre-conference PowerShell training.

The Exhibitor Hall

The exhibitor hall is always popular with the crowd due to the free giveaways that are usually on offer. I grabbed a few toys for the kids and shirts for myself but other than that there is only so many pens and beer coolers you want to own in your life

It was a decent showing this year from the vendors. Microsoft had some cool demos of their new Lightswitch development tools, Microsoft Surface, and Xbox Kinect games for the fun stuff.

I also discovered PowerShell Plus from Idera. I’ve been playing with the 30 day trial and considering buying a license for it, though so far I have been happy with the free version of PowerGUI.

I did hear a few people complaining about the vendors “leaking” out of the hall and into some of the sessions themselves. I understand that people don’t want to be “sold” when they go to a conference like TechEd, but the reality is that we work within the Microsoft partner ecosystem and we can’t ignore the third party vendors.

I will concede there may be a better way of identifying which sessions are vendor-centric and which are Microsoft-centric, so that people understand what they are sitting down to watch. But I would not personally stay away from a session just because a vendor is involved. In fact I’d prefer it if they were quite up front about it, rather than try to soften their presentation to avoid seeming “sales-ey”. If you’ve got a good product then give it a strong presentation and let us decide on merit.

My TechEd Tips

As I said earlier this was my third TechEd and definitely the best one I’ve been to so far. If you’re considering going to TechEd 2012 I’ll offer these tips.

Start the day well – eat a good breakfast with lots of protein to help keep you from getting hungry. I had a room service breakfast each morning that kept me happy until mid- to late-morning when the 30 minute morning tea break was on.

Think about packing some snacks as well. Even though meals are provided during the day there isn’t always enough time to leave a session, line up for food, and then make it to the next session in time to get a seat.

I kept a few protein bars and small boxes of dried fruits and nuts with me, which allowed me to get to the next room before the crowds.

Have a plan, but be flexible – I had at least one session in my conference planner for each time slot, and often a second one as a backup. There was one or two instances where a topic or presenter didn’t quite catch my fancy and so I would skip the next one on that topic and watch something else instead.

Knowing your sessions in advance makes it easier to meet up with people as well, especially if you know someone in the coffee line and they can grab one for you while you go and get two seats for the next session.

It also helps to know the room layout and how long it takes to get from one side of the convention centre to the other.

Be social, but go easy – the parties are a lot of fun and who doesn’t enjoy a free beer! But it is hard to concentrate through 75 minutes of level 400 content when you haven’t had enough sleep or are fighting a headache. Take it easy, drink lots of water, and get plenty of sleep.

Pack the right gear – There are plenty of places to recharge equipment and free wifi provided as well. I took my laptop and netbook with me because I wasn’t sure which one I’d prefer to carry with me to the conference each day. Luckily I did have one of them with me each day because I forgot to pack the AC adapter for my iPhone, so to charge it at the conference I had to fire up my netbook and use it to charge the iPhone.

One thing I wish I’d taken was a better camera. Neither my regular camera or my iPhone took decent photos the entire week, which was disappointing.

Make the most of it – try to find the right mix of sessions, socialising, and speaking with the vendors in the hall. Three days is a long time but it also flew by very quickly for me.

Wrapping Up TechEd Australia 2011

Overall I had an amazing time at TechEd 2011, both in and out of the sessions themselves. As it stands now I plan to be there next year. A big thanks to CodeTwo and GFI for sending me some t-shirts to wear and hand out to other attendees. IT pros love a free shirt and people were very appreciative.

For those of you planning to go to TechEd 2012, I’ll see you there!

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Poll: Is the Cloud a Threat to Your Job?

Paul Cunningham — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 01:00:54 +0000

For more than a year now it seems like all anyone talks about is the future of IT being in “the cloud”. Some long time IT pros and journalists have started noting how vendors like Microsoft are putting a lot more focus on developers and their cloud visions.

I first started hearing the rumblings from the IT pro community back as long ago as 2006-2007, in conjunction with the first serious wave of talk about Software as a Service (SaaS); this was before the concept morphed into “the cloud.” I remember Microsoft touting SaaS, even then, as the future of software, and I remember the pushback from the IT pro community. Their concern: In this vision of a world where companies don’t need an IT department, what happens to me and my job? – Source

So what does this really mean for IT pros? And are you worried about the cloud taking away your job? Please vote in the poll below. If you have more to say please feel free to leave a comment as well.

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

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The Simplest Improvement to the MS Help and Support Site

Paul Cunningham — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 04:03:23 +0000

I’ve griped about a similar thing in the past. Web sites can tell what operating system and browser you’re using to visit them. They can use this info to tailor your user experience.

Microsoft definitely knows this, because when I read support articles from my admin laptop it warns me that the article doesn’t apply to my operating system.

Thats great. But also pretty pointless, at least for me. I guess its handy for your average home consumer if they happen to be researching KB articles.

But one simple way that Microsoft could use those same smarts to improve my experience would be to detect when I’m browsing from a Windows Server operating system, and serve me a version of the website optimized for low bandwidth conditions.

That way I wouldn’t have to wait while flashy graphics slowly paint their way across the screen, and then painfully repaint when I scroll or at other seemingly random intervals.

And they could stop offering me Silverlight or Internet Explorer updates that try to swoosh in from the corner of the screen as a graphics heavy popup. Ditto for surveys that appear as lightbox popups.

A very simple improvement that could really improve things for IT admins trying to support remote customers.

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Security descriptor error during Exchange Server 2007 schema extension

Paul Cunningham — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 03:19:00 +0000

During Exchange Server 2007 schema extension you may encounter a security descriptor error which will cause setup to fail. The error may occur specifically during the “setup /PrepareAD” stage.

>setup /preparead

Welcome to Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Unattended Setup

Preparing Exchange Setup

No server roles will be installed

Performing Microsoft Exchange Server Prerequisite Check

    Organization Checks              ......................... COMPLETED

Configuring Microsoft Exchange Server

    Organization Preparation         ......................... FAILED
     You do not have permissions to read the security descriptor on CN=Deleted O
bjects,CN=Configuration,DC=domain,DC=com,DC=au.

The Exchange Server Setup operation did not complete. For more information,visit
http://support.microsoft.com and enter the Error ID.

Exchange Server setup encountered an error.

To resolve this issue use the following steps for Windows Server 2003. For Windows Server 2008 skip to step 3, and be sure to launch an elevated privileges command prompt to run the commands.

Download and install the ADAM tools from Microsoft.
Go to Start -> Programs -> ADAM and launch ADAM Tools Command Prompt.

In the command prompt, run the following command (substitute your domain name where appropriate):

C:\WINDOWS\ADAM>dsacls "CN=Deleted Objects,DC=domain,DC=com,dc=au" /takeownership
Owner: DOMAIN\Domain Admins
Group: NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM

Access list:
{This object is protected from inheriting permissions from the parent}
Allow BUILTIN\Administrators  SPECIAL ACCESS
                              LIST CONTENTS
                              READ PROPERTY
Allow NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM     SPECIAL ACCESS
                              DELETE
                              READ PERMISSONS
                              WRITE PERMISSIONS
                              CHANGE OWNERSHIP
                              CREATE CHILD
                              DELETE CHILD
                              LIST CONTENTS
                              WRITE SELF
                              WRITE PROPERTY
                              READ PROPERTY

The command completed successfully

Re-run Exchange setup. It should now successfully extend the schema.

Link: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;892806

Updated: 25/2/2010 with Windows Server 2008 information.

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Steve Riley on hypervisor attacks

Paul Cunningham — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 07:42:15 +0000

You have to ask: is there malware on my system? You can be 100 per cent certain there is no malware that you can detect, but less than 100 per cent certain that there is no malware at all. Now, ladies and gentlemen, isn’t this true of every computer we already have? There is no difference just because it’s virtualisation.

Read the entire article at ZDNet.

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Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates Microsoft ad

Paul Cunningham — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 01:59:10 +0000

Not sure what they’re advertising…

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Windows Server 2008 activation gripe

Paul Cunningham — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 00:24:38 +0000

Here is a tip for Microsoft, if you’re going to pop up and remind me to activate my Windows Server 2008 installation, give me the option right here to enter my product key so that when I hit “Activate Windows online now” it doesn’t fail.

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Exchange Server 2007 is now supported for hardware virtualisation

Paul Cunningham — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 10:00:19 +0000

We’ve been virtualising Exchange Server 2007 since it was first released but this week Microsoft has announced their official support policies for virtualised Exchange environments. It is a bit heavy on the Hyper-V but also references the list of support partners for non-Microsoft hardware virtualisation. When I checked this earlier in the week VMWare was a notable absence but today Dugie confirmed for me that they’ve been added to the list, which now stands as follows:

Cisco Systems, Inc.
Citrix Systems, Inc.
Novell, Inc.
Sun Microsystems
Unisys Corp.
Virtual Iron Software
VMware, Inc.

If you’re planning an Exchange Server 2007 deployment using a virtualisation platform be sure to read Microsoft’s recommendations for sizing virtual machines.

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I deleted Temp files and now the SCE console won’t open

Paul Cunningham — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 08:50:12 +0000

I was doing a little cleanup of the C: drive on a server that was unfortunately created with too small a volume size. One of the things I deleted was all of the files and subfolders in the Temp folder of my user profile. A few minutes later I launched the System Center Essentials 2007 console and was greeted with this error.

Could not find a part of the path “C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Temp\2\0_u8ex1o.tmp”.

The fix was simple enough – create the “2″ folder again and then relaunch the console. Here is the stupid part – the “2″ folder doesn’t exist in the Default User profile on this server. So presumably the first time the SCE console is run it is able to create that folder itself as required. I guess after that it forgets how to do it.

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Exchange Server Pro » Microsoft

Microsoft TechEd Australia 2011

The Conference Kick-Off

The Technical Sessions

The Networking

The Exhibitor Hall

My TechEd Tips

Wrapping Up TechEd Australia 2011

Related posts:

Poll: Is the Cloud a Threat to Your Job?

Related posts:

The Simplest Improvement to the MS Help and Support Site

Related posts:

Security descriptor error during Exchange Server 2007 schema extension

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Steve Riley on hypervisor attacks

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Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates Microsoft ad

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Windows Server 2008 activation gripe

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Exchange Server 2007 is now supported for hardware virtualisation

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I deleted Temp files and now the SCE console won’t open

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