Dennis Chung's Blog

Source: http://www.microsoft-watch.com/content/server/microsoftcom_goes_virtual.html

I love this set of figures.. Don't you just love numbers?

Microsoft.com "handles 15,000 requests per second, 1.2 billion page views per month, and 280M worldwide unique users per month as well as supporting ~5000 content contributors from within the company," Rob blogged. "This site has close to 300GB of content consisting of some seven million individual files on each server.

Today, Rob Emanuel, a Microsoft technology architect, blogged about Microsoft using Hyper-V technology for Microsoft.com. He earlier blogged—and much more briefly—about using Hyper-V Release Candidate 0 for the MSDN and TechNet sites.

Presumably, Rob's post supports today's Hyper-V release to manufacturing. I didn't see the blog post until this morning (it wasn't there at midnight Pacific time), even though it has a time stamp of 4:38 p.m. PDT yesterday. I assume that Rob simply forgot to update. Too many pesky blogging systems label time when a post is created, forcing the blogger to manually update time and date later on.

I love it when Microsoft employee bloggers describe how the company's dog food is caviar—and that's meant as a compliment, by the way. Microsoft is quick to use its own technology, but it's not as fast telling other people about it. That's changing, and Rob's post is indicative of the trend. The best Microsoft case study is Microsoft.

Rob has put together a nice, concise primer, including Microsoft.com site stats and deployed hardware. Companies like Microsoft don't easily disclose this kind of information. There are competitive and even security considerations, which make the post's existence that much more impressive.

As of today, Microsoft has "25 percent of production traffic" running on Hyper-V, Rob blogged. "Based on these results we are ready to fully host www.microsoft.com web servers on Hyper-V and we're targeting end of June for 50 percent of the load. As soon as we complete deployment of our new hardware infrastructure in diverse data centers, we'll complete the full virtualization."

I don't want to excerpt too much from the post, but these statistics are worth calling out: Microsoft.com "handles 15,000 requests per second, 1.2 billion page views per month, and 280M worldwide unique users per month as well as supporting ~5000 content contributors from within the company," Rob blogged. "This site has close to 300GB of content consisting of some seven million individual files on each server."

Microsoft transparency is best when the company opens up the soul of its own IT operations. No case study is better than Microsoft.

Posted by Joe Wilcox on June 26, 2008 1:36 PM

/Dennis

I was told of these 2 videos by Eric White.

It features 2 screencasts showing how IT Pros can use OpenXML.
First video shows how to use Open XML to compare 2 documents.

Video: How to compare two Open XML documents

 

This video talks about Open XML with PowerShell.

Video: PowerTools for Open XML Introduction

/Dennis

I received this from a fellow teammate. I thought this was hilarious and so cleverly crafted. Enjoy and have fun.
I do not know who really wrote this, but kudos to you for being able to craft such special messages... Awesome and fun.

Teaches me to read between the lines.. ;-)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The HR manager received the following appraisal report one day:

   1 Bob Smith, my assistant programmer, can always be found
   2 hard at work at his desk. He works independently, without
   3 wasting company time talking to colleagues. Bob never
   4 thinks twice about assisting fellow employees, and always
   5 finishes given assignments on time. Often he takes extended
   6 measures to complete his work, sometimes skipping coffee
   7 breaks. Bob is a dedicated individual who has absolutely no
   8 vanity in spite of his high accomplishments and profound
   9 knowledge in his field. I firmly believe that Bob can be
   10 classed as an asset employee, the type which cannot be
   11 dispensed with. Consequently, I duly recommend that Bob be
   12 promoted to executive management, and a proposal will be
   13 executed as soon as possible.

Later that day, the same HR manager received the following addendum:

Addendum:

That idiot was standing over my shoulder while I wrote the report sent to you earlier today. Kindly re-read only the odd numbered lines.
Thank you and Have a Nice Day

/Dennis

Software + Services competition. This is a great change for you to learn about Software+Services by taking part in competition in creating a video. You get a chance to go to Macau!!

What we want you to do is to spread the word about Software-plus-Services. All you need is a video camera, this script, and lots of creativity! First prize is a trip to Macau, where you will stay at the Venetian Hotel!!!

For rules and conditions, check the website....

/Dennis

Together with Matty, we are doing a series of informative, simple and fun videos on Windows Server 2008.
This is a mirror post.

Welcome to the first edition of ANWYCDFYSBWYSCDFY (Ask not what you can do for your server but what your server can do for you).

Yes Ill admit its a terrible title, but the intent behind these videos is to quickly show you what can be achieved with Windows Server 2008 and its various features. They videos themselves aim to be informative and fun, so we hope you feel the same way when you watch it too!

Please leave comments and let me know if these are beneficial/fun for your to see. ;-)

/Dennis

Is Mother Earth falling sick?

If you live on this planet, and have access to newspapers, you will probably have noticed about every week there is an article that is related to the planet. Was it a week, or was it daily.. hmm... Being a living thing on this planet really makes me feel that this planet is our home. Well, it is. It is about time that humans start thinking about taking care of Earth, just like we take care of our homes.

In recent disasters, for example, the Quake in Szechuan, China, the floods in many places and the typhoon that hit Myanmar, makes me think Earth is getting a little crazy now. Wonder if it is because we have upset Earth and it is making corrections. Just like if you're sick, you see a doctor and recover.

In Singapore, we have the Saving Gaia campaign, driven by MediaCorp. I urge you to visit the site and rethink what you're doing for Earth. In Singapore, plastic bags are a no-no on Wednesdays at all major supermarkets. This is a move to help us reduce the use of plastics bags.

Anyway, i think each and everyone of us can play a part. Lets do something for Earth.

Why do we need Green Computing?

You see, computers uses electricity to run. Electricity are generated using various methods. Most commonly, by burning fuels that turns turbines which generates electricity. Hmm, or at least i think it does. ;-)

Because we burn fuels, carbon dioxide or what i heard commonly as green house gases are introduced into the atmosphere. This traps heat and in turns brings up the temperature of the globe, also known as Global Warming.

By reducing the amount of energy used to power your computers and equipment, in fact anything, not just computers, will help reduce the amount of electricity you use. This translates to you reducing your carbon footprint.

What can i do?

Everyone uses a computer, who ever uses a computer has the ability to reduce their carbon footprint. Remember, the whole objective is to reduce power consumption.

1. Power off / hibernate your computer when not in use
2. Configure Power Options. You can tell the computer (XP/Vista) to turn off things like monitor, hard disk, etc.. Read this -> Power Management in XP, Power Management in Vista
3. When you are going for lunch, power off your monitor

These are some simple practices to help save some power.

Is that all you can do? NO. IT Pros !! You can do a lot more!!

In any computing environment (except the end user computers), the data center / server room is usually the most energy consuming one, but a lot more can be done to reduce power consumption. Watch this space. I am currently doing a consolidation project and i will share with you the experiences. Going Green in the Server Room can take many forms. In a separate blog entry, i will share you with more on what you can do in that Server Room.

All in the name of GOING GREEN and Saving energy !! ;-)

/Dennis

I cranked up my machine and ended up doing this blog post with a sceencast.

Let's get into the subject proper. We have been looking at Server Core operations in the past videos. Now it would be good to have Server Core running as a Domain Controller. It is designed for handling that role. If you have also been reading about Windows Server 2008, there is a new type of Domain Controller, known as Read-Only Domain controller aka RODC. Now this is the perfect combination. Server Core + Active Directory (Read Only). Perfect combination for having a domain controller do its work, but yet provide security to Active Directory such that physical security of that Read Only Domain Controller in the Branch Office is not possible.

It can be quite a challenge to install a DC into Server Core if you do not get any guidance or help. So here, i want to help you know how to install it. In the video, I used an answer file. To make it easy, you can copy and past the following;

[DCInstall]
InstallDNS=Yes
ConfirmGC=Yes
RebootOnCompletion=Yes
ReplicaDomainDNSName=insiders.com
ReplicaOrNewDomain=replica or readonlyreplica
ReplicationSourceDC=dc1.insiders.com
SafeModeAdminPassword=P@ssw0rd
UserDomain=insiders.com
UserName=administrator
Password=P@ssw0rd
CreateDNSDelegation=No

Save it as a unattend.txt file and then fire off the command "dcpromo /unattend:unattend.txt" in Server Core Watch the Video for more explanation. Yawn, time to sleep.. ;-)

 
Video: DCPromo a Server Core as DC in existing Domain

 

/Dennis

UGTV !! A monthly webcast dedicated to bringing informative programming to Users Groups worldwide.

If you are a IT Pro User Group Leader, this is the video for you.
BTW, i'm a roving UGTV Roving Reporter.. ;-)

 

UGTV (User group Television) for ITPro Debuts!
/Dennis

This is a super early demo at the Multi-Touch Capabilities in Windows 7.

Windows 7 is the next generation of Windows Operating System.
Check it out, its really Cool.

 

Video: Multi-Touch in Windows 7

/Dennis

Skydrive is now in SouthEast Asia. Countries covered are Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.

What is Windows Live SkyDrive?

Ever want to show pictures to friends or family when you’re not at home? Or edit a document you’re working on when you’re out of town?

With Windows Live™ SkyDrive, you can store up to 5GB of files that you can access from virtually anywhere! All you need is a computer and an Internet connection. And your information is protected too – it can only be accessed using your Live ID username and password. It’s up to you who sees what, and SkyDrive is integrated with other Windows Live services. No more worrying about losing your documents or misplacing a flash drive.

Click here to watch a demo of Windows Live SkyDrive
What’s new in this release of SkyDrive?

· Comments. You can leave comments on any file in SkyDrive and see all of the recent comments people have left for you.

· Captions. A picture's worth a thousand words, but sometimes you need a few more. Now you can add captions and descriptions to your files and photos

· Browsing widget.  When you click on any file, you can speed through all the files in the folder:

· Larger photo previews - we've made the photo previews even bigger.

How many files does 5 GB really let people store?

5GB of free storage equates to approximately 30,000 Office documents of average size, or 30,000 digital photos at a resolution of 1200x1200.   

Is there a limit to the size of individual files uploaded?

Yes, there is a 50MB limit on each file uploaded.

/Dennis