Lukas Beeler’s IT Blog

The past few months have been busy, very busy.

Mergers and acquisitions have always been a big part of what the important people do.

Of course, theoretically, that wouldn’t be my problem. However, one wouldn’t believe on how much work it is to get rid of an old name throughout a whole network.

First comes Active Directory - it uses DNS as a primary means of identification. Renaming an Active Directory domain is purely theoretical, e.G. it doesn’t work and it’s not supported if you’re running Exchange 2007.

Then there’s numerous other stuff that depends on DNS, names and everything. But in the end, i did my part of this deal. It has been an interested time and now i really wonder how big companies like Swissair handled their renames - or are they still running their infrastructure under the old name?

My employer is now called Acommit AG.

Of course, the whole rename proved to be a really good argument to buy new servers and upgrade straight to Windows Server 2008 - that means on my side the renaming thing has worked rather well. I still don’t know a lot about the company we bought (Futura Retail Solution GmbH), but their main market is selling POS related products.

If you need the full details, you can get them here:

Futura Retail Solution GmbH
Acommit AG (soon to be updated)

Outlook Anywhere / Outlook Autodiscovery on Windows 2008 still has some problems.
Read this most excellent post that has all the details.

Long story shorts: Modify the hosts file, remove the IPv6 localhost (::1) and then add hosts entries for your server. I would recommend against disabling IPv6 on the Exchange server, as this is probably not a recommended or supported configuration.

The root cause is that Outlook 2007 can’t contact a DC/Domain Controller using RPC over HTTP/Outlook Anywhere when used on Windows Server 2008.

Also note that NTLM Authentification for Outlook 2007/Outlook Anywhere is broken on Windows Server 2008.

I’ve participated at a game at the TechDays Switzerland, and didn’t win an X-Box.

Well, at least i got my picture and story published on the Microsoft Learning Website.

(Still happy, still not better than you)

Well, not really. But exam results are still a good ego boost ;)

Thanks to Trika and her Microsoft Learning Team.

UPDATE:

The Microsoft transcript has already been updated, and you can order your Welcome Kits and downloads the logos:

Today i’ve tried to setup a new LPAR on our 9407-515. A small test LPAR, with a minimum amount of resources a allocated. Just a disk controller for the OS, and one for the optical drive to do installations. It all went smooth, booted from the optical drive, and then i’ve tried to install the LIC.

It failed with the following error message:

                  Install Licensed Internal Code - Error

Error:
   A device could not be selected to be the load source.

   Return to Dedicated Service Tools and run diagnostics
   to determine why a device could not be selected.
   Correct the problem and install the Licensed Internal Code
   again.

I checked the LPAR Configuration, checked the System Plan, recreated config in the System Planning tool, but all of them said it should work. I checked the disks inside the very limited pre-paging DST, but didn’t find anything wrong.

I posted to the Midrange-L, describing my problem. Not having much experience with LPARs, i expected myself to have set some silly flag wrong.

After a bit discussion with a few helpful repliers, it seemed that there wasn’t anything obviously wrong with my configuration. I checked the schematics again, and digged deeper into the limited DST, but still didn’t find anything. I called IBM hardware support, and he guided me through the limited DST again - then i suddenly saw it: “IO Bus: 1″. The disks were attached to the second channel of the SCSI RAID controller, rendering them unbootable but otherwise completely healthy.

I deactivated the partition, moved the machine out on the drawer and checked the cabling. Yep, it was definitively in the wrong SCSI Port of the adapter. I replugged it, moved the machine back and actived the partition. After a bit of waiting i was able to install the LIC.

Today and yesterday went by pretty well. We’ve spent a lot of time working on the exams and the only bad thing about it is that i can’t write about all the juicy details here (NDA).

One of the really good parts about it was that you could hook up with other people that also have A LOT of knowledge about and enthusiasm about their work.

Especially when talking about Microsoft technologies, nobody at my company wants to argue with me. This was different here, and i really enjoyed that.

It’s also great to see that Microsoft exams are a lot of hard work and a huge investment by Microsoft in order to provide up to date and accurate tests.

Keep in mind that when you make a Comment at a Beta Exam / Exam that they’ll be read by real people - they DO make a difference. So whenever you do not like a question for any reason, make a comment. It counts.

So, what now? It’s 1500 here right now, so i’ll try to find a few fun things to do before going to sleep. The same goes for tomorrow morning, my flight leaves at tomorrow 1600. And i’ll be back in Switzerland on Sunday 1200.

So it appears that i’ve survived my 16 hour trip from Zurich to Seattle, and i was even able to enter the US. Which is a good thing.

So, now i’ve spent a day at the Microsoft Campus and have worked on one of the exams. Unfortunately, i can’t tell write about the juicy details, but one thing is clear:

Microsoft Learning really makes a big effort in order to ensure that the quality of the exams is as high as possible. Much care is being taken to ensure that exam content is accurate, up to date and clear.

There were seven other people there with me, most of them know a lot more about this stuff than I do (which, I think, is rather good for my Ego).

So, if you ever sit in front of and Exam and think that a question is stupid and can’t be answered, it’s probably a good idea to think again - it probably makes sense, and you missed something (read carefully!).

So, what else to say?

• I’ve got a really nice rental car
• The hotel room is nice, big, comfortable bathroom, etc. everything you could ever wish for
• Americans have really strange ideas what “Breakfast” is - not that i don’t like it, it is just strange
• Transatlantic flights suck if you’re obese
• ZRH-SEA jetlag isn’t that bad. The other way around will probably be a lot worse
• My spoken English isn’t as bad as i thought
• Microsoft still uses CRTs
• AVIS in Seattle still has System i Twinax Screens in operation
• Cups and dishes made from Polystyrene (essentially Styrofoam) are popular here(?)
• Burger King has french fries boxy-thingies that fit into a cars cup holder
• There is such a thing as a Microsoft Dining Services eCoupon

It’s certainly interesting here. Hope the next two days turn out as well.

Let me start off with something quite obvious: I like working in IT, and i like working with almost any operating system and application you can throw at me.

But i don’t think that there is anything out there that is completely good and done, or perfected. As such, i always find things that need improvement or are implemented the wrong way for a particular use (or any use in some cases). And in other cases, there are also bugs that need to be resolved.

This is no problem in general, because many software manufacturers embrace (valid, constructive) criticism of their products, in order to provide better service and better products for their customers thus giving them more money and market share in the long term. Unfortunately, not all of them see it this way.

There are other problems in the IT industry (and some of these probably exist in other industries as well). One of them is unnecessary paperwork, or administrativa that prevent me from doing what i’m supposed to do (get something done). Of course, some of this is not avoidable and necessary - but in those cases it should be made in an easy, self explaining way with very fast turnaround times in case something goes wrong. Thus preventing the waste of time on administrativa and allowing to get the job done.

Those that know me personally know that I generally like to complain about stuff that doesn’t work right or better, doesn’t work the way i think it should, which is not always the same ;)

In many cases, this can help getting things done faster. Unfortunately, not everyone thinks that way. I don’t like making happy faces to a mess.

I’ve been in the receiving end of criticism more than i’d like to. No, i don’t like getting told that something i did was wrong. But shooting the messenger is exactly the wrong thing to do (even though i sometimes think that it would help my ego). In the end, criticism helps me to do my job better. But i still don’t like it.

You know who you are…

Yesterday i had a letter in my mailbox that i have received a registered letter from Bern and i have to pick it up at the post office. I thought that it was either my new passport (which would be a bit early) or something about my taxes.

But it looks like i did my taxes correctly - when i went to the post office this morning, i received my new passport.

So it looks like i have everything together for my trip to Redmond. I’ve also received lots of paperwork from Microsoft, which i signed and sent back. I don’t have much clue about German legalese, and i have much less clue about English legalese. So i just hope i didn’t sell something important.

So i’ve finally received a pile of legal paperwork from Microsoft, plus everything about expenses.

I’m now trying to plan a trip to Redmond, but it seems difficult within the allocated expense budget.

I don’t have a lot of experience planning international trips, but so far it is looking nicely. And yes, i have to sign an NDA, which means i won’t be able to blog a lot about this, which is sad but understandable.

I’ve also submitted all my biometric identification, so i should have a nice biometric passport by next thursday. Which is also cool :)

But hey, i’m really looking forward to this!