Tag Archives: beta

Trying to install System Center 2012

I have been battling this install for 2 days so far and not getting anywhere. There are a ton of sql prerequisites and the install error messages are very vague, like this message below:-IF
Surely it can’t be that hard to display the version of SQL server that is detected.

I’m currently following Harold Wong’s System Center install guide along with Matthew Peter’s guide and downloaded the Cumulative update 10 for SQL.
Attempting to install this patch on the server gives the error message below.
Screenshot - 1_3_2013 , 11_56_37 AM

The stupid thing about this is that neither 10.51.2500.0 or 10.1.2531.0 are valid sql version numbers. Select @@version returns the accurate 10.50.2500.0 which is sql 2008 r2 sp1 but it ignores the previous cumalative update that I’ve already installed.

So far my hopes for System Center have been severely dashed and buried in the ground. It’s a good job we don’t have windows in this office or I’d be tempted to set fire to the server and chuck them out of the window.

It’s been a long start to the new year.

 

Fixed – Right click option to scan files missing in Microsoft Security Essentials Beta

I’ve been doing a bit of work with the latest beta this morning and found that the option to right click on a folder or file and scan it was missing. According to the connect website, the “Item Scan with Microsoft Security Essentials is missing from right click menu because file shellext.dll is not registered in the OS (C:\Program Files\Microsoft Security Client\shellext.dll). To resolve this issue, open a command prompt with administrator permissions, type regsvr32 “C:\Program Files\Microsoft Security Client\shellext.dll” and press ENTER.”
Sure enough this works. Thanks to 777Andrey777 for the solution on the connect website (login required).

The other issues that I have also encountered include the Windows Home Server connector monitor flags the fact that my av is out of date or turned off when the computer is rebooted – this lasts for about 20 to 30 seconds. The instructions to provide feedback are also missing on the connect website (which was not very helpful). However log files can be generated by running “mpcmdrun -getfiles” from the Microsoft Security Client\Antimalware directory within program files.

Multiple calendar management in Outlook2010 – copying appointments

I’m using the Outlook2010 beta at home and loving it. The interface is nice and clean and there are several nice features that are new to the program. One of the things that I discovered this morning was that copying an appointment from one calendar to another automatically selects the same date and time on the destination calendar as the original calendar. This obviously makes sense as if you were going to copy an appointment from a colleagues calendar, or a shared internet calendar to your own calendar, it is likely that you want the same times. All you have to do is drag the appointment over to anywhere on the new calendar and  the appointment is automatically copied across. In outlook2007 the copy functionality is still there, but you have to get the right date and time as you copy the appointment – more flexibility but more time and care is needed when placing the appointment.

See the screenshot below for some details. (You’ll probably need to click on it to see the full details.Showing how to copy an item from one calendar to another in Outlook 2010

Initial SharedView thoughts

Kevin Devin asked how SharedView fits with Netmeeting and Livemeeting – my first thought when I was using this product was that it appeared to provide similar functionality to netmeeting. This product is actually the Tahiti product that Microsoft purchased, rebranded and re-released as a new beta product.
I’ve not used netmeeting for several years so the statements may not be entirely accurate.
However the differences I see are as follows

  1. Looks a lot nicer than the netmeeting did.
  2. You can share your desktop with up to 15 people – netmeeting was limited to 1.
  3. Works much better through firewalls – I’m guessing it is http based so no firewall tweaking needed.
  4. No directory support included – netmeeting had the ability to join a directory of available chats – this needs an email address to connect to the original host (but there must be a directory on MS’s servers somewhere but it is just not viewable to the public)

I didn’t find the performance to be that great, with my two pc’s connected the screen refresh was pretty slow and artifacts would often be left behind on the screen. I did like the fact that you could see the guests cursors (but this would be pretty hectic with 15 guests) but you can turn this feature off.
If another program was moved over the top of the shared application, a grey box would appear on the guest screen where the application was – this almost looks like screen corruption but it isn’t.
The host computer will only share one monitor, spreading the shared application over 2 screens will only share the portion of the application on the hosted screen
It takes a small part of the desktop as the controls get placed at the very top of the screen – a nice feature would be to merge this into the title bar of the application to recover a little more screen estate.
File sharing worked nicely and I was easily able to share files between the two computers. It would be nice to have the downloaded file appear in a most recently downloaded window or have the option to open the file once it was downloaded in the same manner ie/firefox does.
I’ll be adding my feature notes to the Sharedview forums shortly.