At the companies I’ve worked for , disk space on the system disk ran out on a regular basis for some systems and caused a lot of monitor calls. These kind of boring repetitive tasks are always the ones you want to automate.
So when I came across the great blog post “Weekend Scripter: Use PowerShell to Clean Out Temp Folders” on the “Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog”, I wanted to post it on my own blog as well. The blog post also describes the process of creating the script very well, which is very convenient for those who are relatively new to PowerShell to scripting and want to learn how to do it better.
If you want to take it even a step further, you could automate it even more. By example by automatically running the clean script when an event is generated that the disk is running out of space. You can configure this using by example:
Or you could use PowerShell remoting to do it on many systems at the same time. This could come in handy by example when after WSUS patching the content in “C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\Download” is not deleted automatically.
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Tags: automation, clean, disk full, disk running out of space, disk space, Event, Powershell, SCOM, Script, Scripting, System Center Configuration Manager, temp, temporary, temporary files
The recorded HPO webinar ’Hoe bouw je een High Performance Organisatie’ is in Dutch and takes about 30 minutes. It will explain the definition of a High Performance Organization (HPO) that is being used and which factors are relevant for being/becoming an HPO. You can find the recording of the webinar here.
If you want to know more about High Performance Organizations, take a look at my previous blog posts regarding HPO. These are written in English and also contain links to other useful resources.
While browsing the site I also came across a nice Dutch article about profiles of Dutch High Performing Employees (HPE). This article describes two profiles that have been defined for High Performing Employees (HPE). One of the profiles is defined from a manager’s point of view and is appropriate for evaluating current employees and recruiting new employees. The other profile is defined from a colleagues point of view and can be used for development and coaching programs. For more information, read the article.
There’s also an English HPO Leadership toolbox app available at the Apple Store and at the Google Play Store. This includes a quick test to determine your current HPO scores.
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Tags: André A. de Waal, André de Waal, boek, Book, book event, Dutch, Event, Grohe, Grohe Netherlands, High Performance Employee, High Performance Organization, Hoe bouw je een High Performance Organisatie, HP, HP Defence, HPE, HPO, HPO Center, Maastricht School of Management, MSM, Nederlands, What Makes A High Performance Organization
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
This script will create an event in an existing event log or a new event log.
This can be useful to keep track of what happens in your script either locally or using monitoring tools like SCOM. You can also use it to test if custom event monitoring you’ve configured is working as expected.
Or run a task in response to a given event as explained here.
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Tags: create-event, Event, event log, event monitoring, eventlog, Powershell, SCOM
On a regular basis Microsoft and its partners host Free IT Camps. In the past I’ve blogged about them because I really think they’re a good way to quickly get up-to-date on products and technologies. Besides that it’s also a good way to get to know other people.
On the Microsoft Events website you can see which future events are available and not just IT Camps events.
Also should you not be able to attend an IT Camp, for Server 2012 you can also use IT Camps On-Demand.
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Tags: Event, Events, Free, IT Camp, IT Camps, IT Camps On-Demand, Learning, Microsoft, Microsoft Events, Microsoft IT Camp, Microsoft IT Camps, MS IT Camp, MS IT Camps, study
General
Last Friday I attended the first Dutch Powershell User Group meeting in Eindhoven at Master IT Training and it was great. There were a lot of knowledgeable and passionate people and the interactive sessions were great as well. Thanks go out to all attendees, but especially to the ones presenting and organizing the event.
The fact that we were asked to leave the building (because it was getting pretty late and they wanted to lock up), also stresses the passion of all attendees because. If this wasn’t the case we probably would’ve stayed a lot longer.
Be sure to check out the Dutch PowerShell User Group (DuPSUG) website and Twitter on a regular basis for articles and future events. Ed Wilson also wrote a post of the meeting on the “Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog”.
Photos

Original photo on flickr
Sessions
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: Active Directory, AD, AD DS, ADDS, ADSISEARCHER, Apache Subversion, CIM, CodePlex, Common Information Model, dcom, distributed com, DuPSUG, Dutch PowerShell User Group, Ed Wilson, Eindhoven, Event, git, Integrated Scripting Environment, ISE, Jaap Brasser, Jeff Wouters, LDAP, Master IT, Mercurial, Powershell, Powershell 3.0, PowerShell Remoting, Powershell v3, Richard Siddaway, rpc, snippets, splatting, SVN, team foundation server, Team Foundation Server 2012, Team Foundation Service, TFS, The Scripting Guy, The Scripting Wife, Version control, Windows, Windows 2012, Windows 2012 Server, Windows 8, Windows Server 2012, WinRM, WMI, workflow, ws-man
For those who don’t know what a High Performance Organization is, please read my previous blog post because this post will only cover the event organized around the latest book from André A. de Waal called “What Makes A High Performance Organization”
The event was held at the Maastricht School of Management (MSM) and was very well organized. Food and drinks were available and all aspects regarding logistics (including parking) had been properly taken care of as well.
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Tags: André A. de Waal, André de Waal, Book, book event, Event, Grohe, Grohe Netherlands, High Performance Organization, HP, HP Defence, HPO, HPO Center, Maastricht School of Management, MSM, What Makes A High Performance Organization
For those unfamiliar with High Performance Organizations (HPO), this is the definition of an HPO:
“A High Performance Organization is an organization that achieves financial and non-financial results that are exceedingly better than those of its peer group over a period of time of five years or more, by focusing in a disciplined way on that what really matters to the organization.”
For more information about the HPO Framework, you can read more on the HPO Center website.
For those who want to know even more about HPO, they can either:
- Order the book “What Makes A High Performance Organization“.
- Attend the book event “What Makes A High Performance Organization” that includes a signed copy of the book from the author André A. de Waal. For more information about the book event, check out this link.
I’ve already read “What Makes A High Performance Organization“. And even though I was already very familiar with the HPO framework (because of previous books from André A. de Waal), I really liked the fact that it was very practical and included many real life examples and experiences from companies all over the world including Microsoft, SABMiller, Svenska Handelsbanken, HP, Unilever, Umpqua Bank, Tata Steel and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.
I look forward to the book event and hearing more about how other companies went about transforming their organizations to HPO. If you’re attending this book event as well, please leave a comment.
Also if you want to keep track of new developments regarding HPO, you can use the following resources:
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Tags: André A. de Waal, André de Waal, Book, book event, Event, High Performance Organization, HP, HPO, KLM, Microsoft, SABMiller, Svenska Handelsbanken, Tata Steel, Umpqua Bank, Unilever, What Makes A High Performance Organization
Today I attended the free “IT Camps Windows Server 2012” event in Eindhoven at Master-it in Eindhoven and I really liked it. It was a real hands-on IT Camp in which they tell you some interesting things about Server 2012, while you are also able to immediately use the technologies you learn about. Ofcourse it’s also a great work to get to know new interesting people.
They also used feedback from previous IT Camps very well. This was very noticeable because now everyone was able to join the hands-on labs. Because of better preparations there was also still plenty of time to explore all assignments and go into more details.
Many thanks to Tony Krijnen and Daniel van Soest from Microsoft for this great event.
There are still IT Camp events planned, but I don’t know if you can still register for them. Check the link below for more information about the event contents, dates and locations:
http://www.microsoft.com/netherlands/evenementen/event.aspx?eventid=675&date=20121016&eventtype=TechNet#locations
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Tags: Active Directory, AD, Cluster, Clustering, DAC, Dynamic Access Control, Eindhoven, Event, Events, Free, hans-on, Hyper-V, Info Support, IT Camp, IT Camp Windows Server 2012, lab, labs, Master IT, Master IT Training, Powershell, Server Manager, Storage Spaces, The Netherlands, Training, Windows 2012, Windows 2012 Server, Windows Server 2012
Today I got a mail informing me about free “VMware Your Cloud or Mine” events being hosted in the Netherlands:
- Thursday October 18th in Rotterdam
- Tuesday October 23rd in Eindhoven
- Thursday October 25th in Utrecht
- Tuesday October 30th in Zwolle
Check the link to sign up and get more information about the event.
I will be attending the event in Eindhoven at October 23rd.
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Tags: Cloud, Event, Free, ICT, Learning, private, Private Cloud, public, Public Cloud, VMware, VMware your cloud or mine, VMware your cloud or mine event, Your cloud or mine