Spy Journal 3.0 Filtering the web for you

• Office 2010, Hello World
• Green IT is good for your bottom line
• iheart OneNote You Tube video
• HOWTO: Virtual Desktop Pools by Using Remote Desktop Web Access
• User Account Control Step-by-Step Guide
• Microsoft Online Partner Roadshow – all cities - enrol now!
• New EBS 2008 and SBS 2008 Click-through Demos Available For Partners!
• Most popular Windows Home Server Add-ins
• Publishing problem - HTML brackets stripped from post? – a live writer issue – caused by PHP5 settings on the host – we experienced this problem last week and made the changes below on the server to make it work.

For reference, the fix for cPanel servers is to create a file called all_php5 under /var/cpanel/easy/apache/rawopts/ and add the following two lines then recompile Apache:

• -with-expat=builtin
  -with-libexpat-dir=/usr/lib

For those who are not using cPanel but instead manually compile PHP, the fix is to add the following line after the other ./configuration options then build as usual:

• --with-expat=builtin --with-libexpat-dir=/usr/lib

SBS2008

We have our new server commissioned and running.

Hardware Specs

• ASUS TS700-E4/RX8 Intel Core Xeon Server
• 2 x Intel Quad Core Xeon 5405 1.6GHz CPU
• ASUS Server Mainboard
• 32GB of ECC Fully Buffered DDRII RAM (4 x 8GB)
• 12 DIMM slots support Quad channel DDR2 533/667 FBD up to 48GB
• ASUS Pedestal Server Chassis with 730W Power Supply
• 2 x 300GB Seagate SAS Hard Drives
• 2 x 1TB Seagate Drives 24/7
• up to 8 hot-swap SAS or SATAII HDDs
• Onboard RAID 0, 1, 1E
• Hardware RAID 5 via optional ZCR RAID card
• 2 PCI-X 133/100 MHz (one support ZCR RAID card)
• 2 PCI-E x 8 slots
• 1 PCI-E x 16 (x8 link)
• ASUS 16x DVD-RW Drive
• Dual Intel Gigabit LAN
• ASUS ASWM 2.0 & Server Anti-virus License
• 3 Years Hardware Warranty
• Powerware 5110/1500VA UPS

We are running SBS2008 which works very nicely. We found that there is a dearth of how to’s out there on the web in relation to a number of specific configuration issues we came across but we seem to have solved most of them now. We did use Philip’s excellent SBS 2008 setup list as a starting point. We also found lots of good helpful stuff on his website. we were both doing similar migrations from SBS 2003. In our case we didn't use any migration tools but manually moved data and mail. I actually copied every users mail out of exchange into a PST file, and then re-imported them into the new box from the PST file. The main reason for this was to avoid bringing over corrupted profiles and other bits and pieces from the old server. The value of this paying off already with quick profile load times and no errors.

Here are some useful SBS2008 articles from Philip:

There’s been a lot of things happening this week. Not the least being the possibility of a swine flu pandemic. Read on for a scientific explanation of swine flu.

General Microsoft News

• Amit has written article explaining How to Download Images from an Outlook Email.Tip – one of the options works for PowerPoint also.
• Sarah Perez lets us know that PhotoZoom Becomes DeepZoomPix. This is now using Silverlight. I believe this technology has also changed inside PhotoSynth in order to allow Mac users better access to the technology.
• She also lets us know how to Twitter in Excel – how to actually run twitter in side an Excel client.
• Windows 7 Beta keys are still available. The Release Candidate itself is due shortly. From the Windows Team Blog:

I’m pleased to share that the RC is on track for April 30th for  download by MSDN and TechNet subscribers. Broader, public availability will begin on May 5th. Link for rest of article.

And what a week is has been – with all sorts of amazing announcements, reversals and more on the Australian Domain Registration front with Bottle Domains and the auDA (Australia’s Domain Name Authority) slugging it out in the Supreme Court. This press release sum sit up well - auDA recklessness damages Australian domain industry

More Announcements:

Andy and Carrie Lee had their little baby. There was no sign of facial hair (fortunately!)

Service Pack 2 for the 2007 Microsoft Office System due to ship April 28th

Exchange 2010 Beta Released

Office 2010 announced – official press release - Next Wave of Microsoft Office Products Will Redefine How People Work

Updated Version of Outlook Connector 12.1 Available

And some other news:

Translate Your Outlook Emails into Other Languages

Word Team Blog blogger Joannie Stangeland started up a vodcast series called A Writer's Guide to Microsoft Office.

Tonight the site WMpoweruser leaked the image of the Zune HD – and world is awash with rumours surrounding its specs and capabilities – looks like a device that is way in front of any Apple iPod products with rumours of HDMI, HD display, touch screen, HD Radio and WiFi.

Robin Good has a fantastic guide on How To Blog Anonymously And Maintain Control Of Your Personal Privacy. He lists techniques, tools and other strategies.

He also has written this one How To Embed And Display RSS Feeds On Any Web Page: Best RSS-To-HTML Publishing Tools – linking to lots of great tools.