Microsoft Certification Exam – Windows Server Virtualization

Randomly browsing the Internet yesterday brought me to a interesting post – a free beta exam. This was posted up on the Channel 8, a students community supported by Microsoft.

So I took up the challenge, and signed up for the exam that’s on today. With one night’s preparation time, I wanted to see how far I can go at this exam. Wait – I don’t even know what’s in the exam!

A quick search led me to the exam topics for Exam 71-652: TS: Windows Server Virtualization, Configuring:

• Install Hyper-V (14%)
• Configure and Optimize Hyper-V (20%)
• Deploy Virtual Machines (30%)
• Manage and Monitor Virtual Machines (36%)

Ok, Now. Hyper-V sounds like it’s something to do with “hypervisor”. I do recall seeing this word somewhere… Oh well, I’ll just see what I make of it later tonight.

Back home, I pulled out a spare computer, and installed Windows Server 2008 on it. Following some instructions on TechNet, I tried to install Hyper-V, only to find that this feature is only available to 64-bit installations of Server 2008.

No, I can’t just reinstall a 64-bit Server 2008, because my test machine was the Acer Laptop with a Pentium-M (x86) processor. It just so happens that I don’t have any computers that had 64-bit capability! Not even my Lenovo V100 – it has the first generation of the Intel Core processors, so it’s only 32-bit.

I guess there was nothing more I could do. I went back to studying for the uni exams next week.

Today, armed with a general knowledge of computers, I took the exam at Excom Education Sydney. Well I have played around with several virtualisation tools before – Connectix/Microsoft Virtual PC, vmware server and player, Basilisk II, PearPC, (k)qemu, innoTek/Sun VirtualBox, and Microsoft Virtual Server 2005, but nothing really specific.

At the end of the exam, I survived. I think.

But all I can say is that the focus of Hyper-V is not just another virtualisation tool, it is something that offers much more in terms of enterprise integration and management. (Think ESX in VI3). It’s not just about making something work, it’s also about best ways to optimise for performance and availability.

Even though the exam was not easy, it was fun. If you’re thinking of taking this exam, you better hurry because the beta period ends on June 23!

Vista SP1 RC1 Update Scare

Today I decided to upgrade my Vista Ultimate to Service Pack 1, Release Candidate 1. After spending a few hours downloading the required files, it soon started install. When Windows Update reports to have successfully installed the update and promoted me to restart, I did so immediately. Doing what Windows always do, it takes its time “configuring” the updates.

After almost an hour, it still says it is at 97% while configuring update 1 of 3. I forcefully powered off my computer and restarted it, since I knew it was getting nowhere. When it restarted, I chose to start Vista normally (as I often do after an improper shutdown). Low and behold, my Vista was broken. My system complains of a bad or missing acpi.sys. This was bad news. I don’t have my Vista DVD with me, and don’t particularly feel like spending a few hours to download it from MSDN.

So I decided to restart my computer (as one would do), and tried again. Same result. The next best thing to try would be either last known good configuration, or safe mode, and see if a miracle would happen. I chose to start my Vista in last known good configuration, because it was a little less intrusive to my windows startup.

To my surprise, it actually allowed me to continue to start my computer as if the update had not been configured yet. Could it be that Vista restored the old acpi.sys, so that I could start my computer? I don’t really know, and I’m just glad that I was able to boot my computer into Vista, and it would automatically configure the SP1 update before I log in.

On the usability of the Windows Taskbar

Windows taskbar is the strip of icons, usually at the bottom of the screen, that contains the start menu button and an area where windows minimise to. This is a unique feature to Microsoft Windows, and it has been there for over 10 years ever since Windows 95. It is clear that that this user interface acts as a familiar starting point for Windows users, so that they are less intimidated when having to adapt to new versions of Windows.

I propose a positioning of the Windows taskbar, that makes good use of the desktop space, and improves its usability generally. By default, Windows taskbar is a thin strip located at the bottom of the screen. While many people do not have problems with the taskbar at its default configuration, some find that it is difficult to manage the windows when they have quite a few open. I would disable grouping of similar taskbar buttons so that I switch between multiple windows quickly without having to expand a group before selecting the window. I have also seen some users who increase the height of the taskbar. I know Andrew Coates has his taskbar at twice the height to accomodate more icons.

I have my Windows taskbar positioned at the left of the screen rather than at the bottom. See the screenshot below:

There are several key advantages to having the taskbar this way: Read more »

Hosting with Windows Server 2008

I had a great time at the Windows Server 2008 Hosting Roadshow in Sydney today. Since this event was quite fully booked out, I was actually quite lucky to be able to register for this event. Perhaps it was the Melbourne Cup? Thanks to the Philip Meyer and Jorke Odolphi, I had the chance to see some of the best features of the new IIS 7 and Windows Server 2008 working in harmony.

We used Microsoft Virtual PC 2007, to run two Windows Server guest machines at the same time. It’s really quite convenient since you now don’t need an entire computer lab to play with Windows networking. We had a tour around the new IIS 7, including the new modularised design. A fresh installation is secure by default with only the minimum number of modules. Less junk means less things to go wrong.

Creating, backing up and restoring 4000 web sites was really not that tedious after all. It only took 30 seconds to create them all! It can even be done using the command line.

Perhaps the most interesting feature that opens up a new world of possibilities is that IIS 7 now stores its configuration as an XML file rather than a metabase as it has done in the past. This makes the configuration much easier to reproduce and to restore. It allows what’s called “Shared Configuration”, where multiple servers in a farm uses the same configuration so that all configured servers can now host the same websites. Again, it really isn’t that difficult to set up!