Looking for a specific Group Policy setting?
This search tool will be very helpful when there is a need to figure out a setting or series of settings for a particular environment.
There is also a Windows Phone 7 App that works just as well as the online version. Check it out!
Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book
We are in the process of downloading the RTM bits for Windows 8:
So far, the downloads for the RTM bits only show on the MSDN site with RC showing on TechNet.
There are a lot of servers working these downloads so the downloads may or may not be available in other geographical areas.
Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book
*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.
I am into cars as has been mentioned in this blog before. Having discovered computers just as I was digging into my last year towards a Journeyman’s ticket as an automotive mechanic, I got the tech bug and never looked back.
We all know where I ended up with that bug now don’t we? ;)
While reading the above Jalopnik article on the 2010 Ford Focus RS which looks to be an amazing little car, one of the lines in the article mentioned folks faces personifying the Interrobang (Wikipedia) when they first saw the Focus RS.
Ah, the writer in me sees the above character as being _very_ useful for those occasions where “?!?” just won’t cut it or other expressions/acronyms are just not quite polite enough! :)
Now, a neat thing is that Microsoft kindly included the Interrobang in their created for Office default font called Calibri.
This is what the Interrobang looks like in a Web based font: ‽
Note that in Windows Live Writer the character shows up fine. But, it may get toasted by the upload process to Blogger or by Blogger itself when it renders this post.
As mentioned, I see the Interrobang as being very useful for those of us that write. Now that I have discovered it, it will probably find its way into the various writings that I do.
From the MSDN Font Blog comments comes this little gem from Si:
Both shortcuts work quite well. What I did not know was about the second one and how Unicode characters work in Office Applications.
In Microsoft Office type the Unicode string number with the keystroke combination ALT+X after it to bring up the Unicode character. After firing up Word and typing 203D then hitting ALT+X sure enough the Interrobang showed up!
To date, I would either used the ALT+# (not possible on a Microsoft Entertainment keyboard that has no separate number pad) or the Character Map tool in Windows.
Using the Advanced view I can search for a character quickly when I know its name then copy and paste it into my work.
Not bad from one Jalopnik article eh‽ :D
Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book
*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.
It looks as though we have taken a step back when it comes to the version of the Windows desktop OS on the DVD:
It seems the days of having the various versions of the OS on the same DVD are gone. The above screenshot was taken of the TechNet portal we are using to download the Windows 7 RTM versions.
Server 2008 R2 does not show up in our TechNet downloads portal yet. So, we will grab those ISOs at a later date.
We are going to download the required Ultimate and Professional x86 and x64 versions for us to use for VM work and such.
We will, however, be using a USB Flash drive to install the OS as a rule.
We have formatted our OCZ ATV Turbo flash drive and made it Active as per the instructions above. We then copied the contents of a Windows 7 Ultimate x64 DVD onto the flash drive.
From there, we will edit the content on the USB flash drive to allow us to install the OS edition we need:
The file that needs to be deleted, ei.cfg, is found in the \Sources\ folder according to Method 1 in the above article.
Here is the content of that file found on our Windows 7 x64 flash drive:
We deleted the file and booted a machine via the USB flash drive that will have Windows 7 Ultimate x64 installed on it.
After clicking on install we were presented with the various OS Editions to choose from.
Now, one thing to keep in mind when it comes to this install methodology is the fact that the EULA on the DVD image or OS install flash drive will be from the original OS edition installed by that image.
So, if the original DVD/ISO used to delete the ei.cfg file was Windows 7 Ultimate x64, then the EULA placed on that installed system will be the Windows 7 Ultimate EULA.
Since it looks like there will be some significant differences in the EULA between editions again, the reasoning behind the multiple OS DVDs becomes clear.
Once we confirm that the EULAs are indeed different for each OS edition, we will be using a dedicated flash drive for each edition to honour the EULA.
Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book
*All Mac on SBS posts will not be written on a Mac until we replace our now missing iMac! (previous blog post)
Apparently the servers we connect to from our location here in Canada are not updated yet:
Hopefully we will see them updated sometime soon so that we can begin downloading both the 32bit and 64bit versions of Windows 7 RTM.
Anyone out there downloading yet?
Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book
*All Mac on SBS posts will not be written on a Mac until we replace our now missing iMac! (previous blog post)
