I’ve created a script Get-PhotoByTag that:
- Gets the tags for all photos / pictures / images in a folder.
- Gathers their meta data including tags.
- Allows you to specify which tags need to be in the meta data tag of the file.
- Returns the files that match the criteria.
Use cases
- Last summer I attended a large wedding in Serbia and a lot of photos were made during the day (2000+). At the evening, people could buy these photos. In general, people desired and bought only photos that contained the bride, groom and people they knew. With this function, after the photos are tagged, the desired photos can easily be determined and copied based on the tags.
- I have a pet parrot called Lucky. Pictures of him are scattered over numerous folders. Using this function, these photos can easily be determined.
Download and more information
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Tags: File, filter, function, image, meta data, metadata, photo, photograph, picture, Powershell, Script
In this blog post I will explain why to automate installations of Windows applications and how you can do this.
Why automate the installation of applications?
But first, why is this useful? Well this depends on your situation and there are probably many good reasons. For me though, it basically boils down to this:
- I often reinstall my computers with new (preview) versions of Windows operating systems and having to install applications each time is a waste of time. Also sometimes you forget to install some things.
- On a regular basis, friends and family either want me to install or upgrade their PC and I want to provide them with a standard set of programs that most people need/want without having to spend a lot of time on it. By example virus scanner, burning program, media player, codecs, etc.
- I want to update existing installed applications to the latest (and hopefully more secure and feature packed) versions.
- When installing applications, there are often checkboxes enabled to install other applications (you generally don’t want to install). Automated solutions using packages generally prevent these additional unwanted applications from installing.
Which tools to use to automate the installation of applications?
Before PowerShell 5 preview was released, I used both Ninite and Chocolatey to perform to automate installations. They both have their advantages as described on this wiki page.
The PowerShell 5 preview version of OneGet installs and searches software from Chocolatey repositories, but support of additional repositories will come in subsequent versions.
How to automate the installation of applications using PowerShell 5 preview?
To automate the installation of applications a couple of things are required:
- You need to determine which applications you want to install automatically.
- You need to determine the package name that Chocolatey uses for this application. Options include:
-Using a browser to browse the Chocolatey packages
-Using PowerShell and a part of the name of the application you’re looking for. By example if you’re looking for Irfanview, use:
Find-Package -Name “fan”
- Store the package names to install somewhere (e.g. in a .txt file on OneDrive for easy access). My .txt file by example includes:
AdobeReader
Directx
ffdshow
Flashplayerplugin
GoogleChrome
Imgburn
IrfanView
Javaruntime
Keepassx
Mp3tag
mpc-hc
PDFCreator
Silverlight
TeamViewer
Totalcommander
Winrar
greenshot
- Use the Install-Package cmdlet to install all the packages whose name is in the file from step 3.
Install-Package -Name (Get-Content C:\OneDrive\AppsToInstall.txt) -Confirm:$False
- Wait for the programs to install
My opinion
It’s great to be able to use PowerShell to install my list of favorite applications similar to like I did with Chocolatey and I’m also looking forward to see what benefits the additional repositories will bring in the future.
I did encounter some errors however while trying to install some applications like Firefox and dotnet3.5. But since it’s still a preview, this will probably be fixed.
For regular users, I think they are better off sticking to by example Ninite because they’re often afraid of anything that involves a CLI.
Blog posts by other people about OneGet
Some other people have also blogged about the OneGet module and have gone in more technical detail, so be sure to take a look at their posts as well:
More information about PowerShell 5 Preview including a download link
Windows Management Framework v5 preview, includes also Desired State Configuration (DSC) improvements and NetworkSwitch commandlets to manage network switches that pass the Certified for Windows Program. For more information including a download link, you can read the initial blog post. : Windows Management Framework V5 Preview
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Tags: application, automate, automation, Chocolatey, CLI, installation, Ninite, Powershell, Script
Exam dumps
Unfortunately I’ve received numerous requests for an exam dump of 74-409 which really upsets me.
For those that are not aware of it, you are not allowed to share or use exam dumps. “If Microsoft learns that a candidate used a “brain dump” site to prepare for an exam, this candidate will be permanently banned or prohibited from taking any future Microsoft Certification exams and may be decertified from the Microsoft Certification Program. In addition, test scores and certifications, if applicable, may be revoked. These actions may be taken even if the candidate did not intend to defraud the Microsoft Certification Program.”
For more information, see:
http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/btl/b/weblog/archive/2013/01/02/why-brain-dumps-are-bad.aspx
Preparing to take the exam
This is generally what I do for preparing to take the exam:
- Determine the skills that are measured in the exam 74-409
- View the online course Server Virtualization with Windows Hyper-V and System Center at Microsoft Virtual Academy (MVA)
- Reflect how confident you are that the online course has provided you with sufficient skills to take the exam.
- Optionally enhance your knowledge using:
- If you (know someone who) attended the course for this exam (20409A-ENU), then be sure to take a look at the book. It contains a lot of details that are missing from the jump start videos.
- Windows Server 2012 R2 Private Cloud Virtualization and Storage Poster and Mini-Posters
- Community/user created content for taking the exam
–Study resources 74-409 Server Virtualization with Windows Server Hyper-V and System Center
–Born To Learn wiki
–Veeam Study guide
–Free MCP Training study guide (in progress)
- Blogs by people that already took the exam, to see how they prepared.
- Recordings and slides of the Virtualization IT Camp
- Additional Hyper-V and Server 2012 R2 related courses on Microsoft Virtual Academy (MVA)
- Real life or virtual meetings, presentations and user groups. Microsoft has started a Microsoft User Group Portal wiki, but unfortunately it’s not widely being used yet. Therefore I suggest searching the internet or taking a look at the Microsoft Events website.
- Your own lab to work with the products. You can use the existing Microsoft Test Lab Guides (TLG) or if you don’t have the hardware for your lab, just browse the document.
- Technet library documentation about Hyper-V. This can also be downloaded here for offline use.
- Technet TechCenter
- Training videos. By example on YouTube, or from commercial companies like CBT Nuggets and PluralSight. Nowadays you can get monthly subscriptions or just get trials for a couple of days to help you get a good start.
- Great TechNet Blogs.
- Guided labs / guided experiences like by example the Microsoft Private Cloud Guided Labs. Note: these might not be updated to 2012 R2 yet, but they should provide you with a better understanding.
- Virtual labs (search for hyper or virtual machine manager)
- Twitter by following people with interesting information on Hyper-V, by searching for tweets containing hyperv or hyper-v or by connecting with the community.
- Forums to discuss and share information. Since I’m from the Netherlands I use Tweakers.net a lot and can be found discussing Microsoft Certification related stuff in the topic “[Microsoft Certified] Ervaringen en discussies”.
- Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V Best Practices (In Easy Checklist Form)
- Free e-books:
–Introducing Windows Server 2012 R2
–Microsoft System Center Microsoft System Center
–Windows Server 2012 R2 Overview White Paper
–Windows Server 2012 R2 Server Virtualization White Paper
- Printed books, but as far as I know there are no specific books yet for 74-409 and most books covering Windows Server 2012, Hyper-V or System Center 2012 have not yet been updated to the R2 release.
- Channel 9 to search for relevant content.
- Technet Video to search for relevant content.
- Server Posterpedia Windows store app or component architecture posters.
- Infrastructure Planning and Design (IPD) Guides
- Survival guides
Specific topics and resources I used while studying:
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This week Apple released OS X 10.9 Mavericks for free through the App Store. Even though downloading from the App Store works great for updating, I also want to be able to perform a clean install and create VMs running OS X 10.9 Mavericks. I also don’t want to download the 5+GB update file every time I upgrade a system.
Unfortunately Apple doesn’t provide an ISO download or a tool to create an ISO or bootable USB drive. There are however many people with similar needs that provide information on how to create both. The downside of these methods though, is that you need to have a working OS X system to be able to use them.
Create an OS X 10.9 Mavericks bootable USB flash drive
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Tags: App Store, Apple, Apple App Store, clean install, Diskmaker, Diskmaker X, DiskmakerX, InstallESD.dmg, ISO, Lion Disk Maker, Lion Diskmaker, LionDiskMaker, mac, Mac App Store, Maverick, mavericks, OS X, os x 10.9, osx, osx 10.9, Untitled, VM
In the first part of this LAB setup guide, I described the hardware selection process.
In the second part, I described the hypervisor selection and installation.
In the third part, I described VM guest considerations and preparations.
In the fourth part, I described Configuring Server 2012 VM as DC with DNS and DHCP using PowerShell
In the fifth part, I described easily creating (many) proper AD users with PowerShell
In the sixth part, I described creating a local PowerShell v3 Help Repository with PowerShell
In this post I will describe how you can make your lab available over the internet.
When you’ve created your home LAB, you want to be able to use it anywhere. Depending on your situation, one of these options probably best meets your needs.
Examples include the use of:
- Remote desktop connection to your server
+ Easy to configure (enable on server and configure NAT forwarding if appropriate)
– On many enterprise or public networks TCP3389 is blocked by the firewall.
– Connects only to specific server. Even though you access the rest of the network from there.
- VPN connection to your network
- Using your hardware router
+ Connection to network, not just a server.
– No dependency on Windows Server
- Using Windows Server 2008 / 2012
+ SSTP VPN (TCP443), is generally not blocked on enterprise/public networks.
+ Connection to network, not just a server.
– Dependency on Windows server.
– Requires more configuration.
– The root CA certificate for the certification authority (CA) that issued the server authentication certificate needs to be into the store Local Computer\Trusted Root Certification Authorities. For a self-signed certificate, this means that you need to have local admin permissions to add it.Note: DirectAccess is a great feature, but it requires the client to be a member of the domain. And in my case this would limit where I can connect from, therefore I don’t plan to use it. For other situations it might be a better solution though.
- Using 3rd party tools like logmein, teamviewer or VNC
+ Connects only to specific computer.
Since I want to be able to connect from within enterprise environments as well, I chose to use SSTP VPN in Windows Server 2012. The basic steps you have to perform, include:
- On the server, you have to install and configure the VPN service.
- On the server or your own PKI, you would want create and install a machine certificate. You can create a Certificate Signing Request and request a 3rd party public certificate. Alternatively you can create a certificate using your own Certificate Authority, or you could create a self-signed certificate, For creating the self-signed certificate you can use the great PluralSight SelCert tool.
- On the client, you have to make sure the created certificate will be trusted. This means you have to add the certificate to local system\trusted root certificate authority if you’re using a self-signed certificate, which requires local administrator permissions on the client.
- On the client, you have to set-up the VPN connection to the server. Preferably you want to connect by DNS name. For your home lab you can also utilize dynamic DNS services like by example no-ip.com or alternative solutions.
For some more information, you can also take a look at this:
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Tags: CA, certifcate, certificate, certificate authority, direct access, ICT, lab, no-ip, PKI, PluralSight, public certificate, remote access, routing and remote access, Routing and Remote Access Services, RRAS, self-signed certificate, SelfCert, sstp, sstp vpn, VPN
My blog reached 50.000+ views. Thanks everybody, this really exceeded my expectation and motivates me even more to keep going. Special thanks go out to my fellow bloggers in my blogroll and to those who shared my posts on Twitter, Facebook and other social networks.
Even though my blog exists since January 2012, I really started to blog actively around August and ever since I’ve tried to keep posting on a regular basis. At the start of 2013 I even intended to blog every day. I was able to keep it up for a short while, but it was just too time consuming. Now I try to blog something at least once every 5 days. The blog post count is now at 170.
Personally I think Microsoft is on the right track. I’m really looking forward to all new Microsoft product (preview) releases including Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2 and System Center 2012 R2 and you can expect some blog posts about this in the near future.
Popular posts
From the stats, it turned out these are the blog posts that are being viewed most, if you’ve missed any of them you might want to take a look at them:
Stats
For those interested in the view stats, here they are:
Comments and suggestions
If you have suggestions about what I can do to improve, please let me know. Also if you’d like to see some things covered more or in more detail, just leave a comment.
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Tags: Apple, blog, blog post, blogpost, Microsoft, milestone, Mountain Lion, Office 365, OS X, POST, Server 2012, Sharepoint online, views, Windows 8, Windows Server 2012, wordpress
Future events
Before starting with my summary of 2nd DuPSUG meeting, I want to inform you about some future events first:
- Dutch PowerShell User Group Meetings
- To keep track of news, use the links to LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and the RSS feed on the DUPSUG website.
- In the future, the plan is to meet every June and November.
- The next meeting will probably be at November 7th at VX Company.
- The idea is that community members will also present their own experiences, use cases, scripts, tools, methods. If you want to do so, please contact the DUPSUG group.
- Remko Weijnen | Blog | Twitter | LinkedIn might be one of the people presenting at a future DUPSUG meeting.
- Jeff Wouters might be able to arrange one or more copies of the PowerShell Deep Dives book from Manning since he’s contributing to it. The book isn’t complete and released yet, but Manning has an Early Access Program which means that you will get access to the completed chapters now and will get the full version when it’s done. Until June 13 there’s even a promotion to get a 40%-50% discount and it also applies to other great PowerShell books.
- Inter Access Microsoft Summer Summit (Hilversum, July 2nd 2013 17:30-22:00 CET)
This event
Last Thursday I attended the second Dutch Powershell User Group meeting in Hilversum hosted at Inter Access and sponsored by Sapien Technologies Inc.
Just like I mentioned in the summary of the first meeting there were manu interesting sessions that provided me with more insight and inspired me for practical uses. It was also great to discuss current developments with other knowledgeable and passionate people. The main differences with the previous meeting was that:
- This meeting was completely in Dutch, while the previous one was completely in English. As such, the workshop descriptions were also in Dutch and you needed to bring your own laptop.
- The format of this meeting was more of a workshop, while the previous one was mainly presentations.
Thanks go out to all attendees, especially those presenting, organizing and sponsoring the event. Special thanks to Daniel Bot for helping me fix a (stupid mistake in a) script I was working on 🙂
Goodies and giveaways
Workshops / presentations
And now on with the really interesting stuff, the sessions/workshops. Below are the sessions with some info about the speakers and their sessions. I also added notes I took and other information I looked up afterwards. If you come across any errors or have comments, please leave a reply so I can fix it.
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Tags: $PSBoundParameters, -asjob, -passthru, Azure, background jobs, Cloud, Compliance Settings, DCM, Desired Configuration Management, Desired State Configuration, devops, DHCP, DHCP failover, DNS, DSC, DuPSUG, Dutch PowerShell User Group, error handling, Event, Exe, Filters, flickr, forms, Functions, graphical user interface, gui, GUI applications, high availability, Hilversum, HTA, HTML Application, Integrated Scripting Environment, Inter Access Microsoft Summer Summit, InterAccess, InterAccess Microsoft Summer Summit, Interface Video Training, IPv4, ISE, Jaap Brasser, Jeff Wouters, job, jobs, Manning, module, msi, nslookup, Out-Gridview, parallel, parallelization, passthrough, Ping, PowerGUI, Powershell, PowerShell 3, Powershell 3.0, PowerShell 4.0, PowerShell Deep Dives, PowerShell GUI, PowerShell GUI applications, PowerShell Runspace, PowerShell RunSpaces, Powershell v3, PowerShell Workflow, presentation, PS2Exe, Resolve-DNSName, Richard Siddaway, runspace, runspaces, SCCM, script block, script blocks, scriptblock, scriptblocks, ShowUI, splat, splatting, System Center Configruation Manager, Test-Connection, The MSI Wizard, VisualStudio, VX Company, Windows, Windows 2012, Windows 2012 Server, Windows 8.1, Windows Forms, Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, WinForms, workflow, workshop, WPF
The PowerShell Summit took place in North America in April and many of the prominent PowerShell people were there. And from what I read there were a lot of great presentations.
The PowerShell Summit 2013 North America conference schedule can be found here. Thanks to Don Jones and PowerShell.org (most of) these sessions are available for download: http://powershell.org/wp/2013/04/22/summit-downloads/
Videos are available here:
http://powershell.org/wp/2013/05/07/powershell-summit-videos/
So even if you weren’t able to attend, you can still learn from their presentations. Or if you did attend, you can review them again.
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Tags: conference, conference schedule, Don Jones, download, downloads, North America, Powershell, PowerShell Summit, PowerShell Summit 2013, PowerShell Summit 2013 North America, PowerShell.org, schedule, session, sessions
Like many other people nowadays, I have a network share containing my photos, videos and documents. I prefer to access these over the network, which is possible using explorer.
The problem however (especially on my Windows 8 tablet), is that this method in general does not work (properly) for Windows 8 apps. Instead they extensively use the Windows libraries (Documents, Music, Pictures, Videos).
So my first thought was to simply add the content on the network share to the Libraries. Apparently this is not how Microsoft wants it to be used, since I got an error stating: “This network location can’t be included because it is not indexed.”
I don’t need/want it to be indexed though, so I went to look for other solutions and found elaborate step-by-step guides. I also found the Win Library Tool, which simplifies adding an unindexed network location to the Windows libraries.
I still hope Microsoft will make it easier to add unindexed locations to the library though.
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Tags: documents, index, indexed, libraries, library, Microsoft, Music, NAS, network, network share, photos, share, This network location can't be included because it is not indexed, Tutorial, videos, Win Library Tool
In the past I’ve created a post to get my public site to become a SharePoint 2010 style team site. The only thing I’d been missing since was a way to allow public/anonymous users to use the search (when trying to perform a search you would have to logon).This also meant that filters in the lists I created weren’t working 😦
Because of the unsupported customizing I did on the SharePoint site, I thought this just wasn’t possible.
Thankfully however, a visitor of my blog (Denis) came across my post “Provide anonymous access to sharepoint lists on Office 365 (Sharepoint online)” and shared this blog post to enable search for an Office 365 / SharePoint Online public site which refers to https://dotnetmafia.sys-con.com/node/1918049/mobile
So now my website http://www.bjornhouben.com and all the content inside it, including the lists is completely searchable.
Thanks again Denis.
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Tags: design, layout, Microsoft, Office 365, Sharepoint, Sharepoint online, sharepoint public, Sharepoint public site, site
blog.bjornhouben.com 