Provide auto configuration for your mail services

When you use exchange with outlook then the client configuration works almost magically.
This is also possible for non-exchange mail servers.

The simplest solution is the new software called automx
Together with two entries in your dns you get automatic configuration.

The system covers automatic configuration for Outlook and Thunderbird (and all others using the same configuration discovery).
You specify what pop/imap/smtp services should be used and what ports and ssl/tls encryption should be used as default.

We at aarboard have now enabled this autodiscovery service for all our client domains.

Automated backups for MS SQL Express

MS SQL Express systems do not allow you to backup the databases via sheduled jobs (Since the job sheduler is one of th emissing features in the express edition)

With this handy script you can however automate it and even compress and send the backup files to a remote resource.

automssqlbackup

http://devio.wordpress.com/category/automssqlbackup/

How to do a smooth upgrade for Sogo with Thunderbird 3.x to 10.x

With the new thunderbird esr versions out now, we also got full support for the sogo extensions.
For giving the users a smooth upgrade experience look here:

http://wiki.sogo.nu/TB-upgrade-3-to-10

SQL Anywhere: Why SQL Server Sucks: ISNULL

One (of the many) reaoson why MS SQL Server sucks:

SQL Anywhere: Why SQL Server Sucks: ISNULL

There are plenty others, but this one is just brain dead....

Changing keyboard layout when netbooting linux mint (And other debian variants)

When you boot the Linux Mint live cd to have a live recovery system (described here), then you have the default english/us keyboard active.
That's inconvinient when your keyboard has a different layout.

You can change it to the one you use by adding this to the APPEND statement in your boot configuration:

 locale=de_CH console-setup/layoutcode=ch

With these two setting, you receive most messages in german and the keyboard is set to swiss german.
The layout is correct in the X-Window system and in the terminals inside X.
On the console (Switch with CTRL+ALT+F1..F6) you will still have the us keyboard, if anyone has a tip...

Installing .net framework 3.5 via ADS GPO

Deploying .net framework 3.5 via group policy is not as easy as it should be.
No idea why microsoft did create packages which can't be used by microsoft products....

To get installable .msi packages you can do the following steps:

Deployment of Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 x86 using Active Directory.

Microsoft Windows Installer 3.1 must already be deployed.

1. Download dotnetfx35.exe from http://download.microsoft.com/download/6/0/f/60fc5854-3cb8-4892-b6db-bd4f42510f28/dotnetfx35.exe

2. Run dotnetfx35.exe /x to extract the files

3. Move wcu\dotNetFramework\dotNetFX20 and wcu\dotNetFramework\dotNetFX30 into the root, eg to D:\dotNetFX20 and D:\dotNetFX30

4. To create Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 SP2 admin install (a prerequisit) run
msiexec /a Netfx20a_x86.msi /update D:\dotNetFX20\ASPNET.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\clr.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\crt.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\dw.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\NetFX_CA.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\NetFX_Core.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\NetFX_Other.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\prexp.msp;D:\dotNetFX20\winforms.msp USING_EXUIH=1 REBOOT=ReallySuppress /log D:\dotNetFX20\netfx20a_x86.txt TARGETDIR=D:\dotNetFX20admin
then copy D:\dotNetFX20\Netfx20a_x86.msi to D:\dotNetFX20admin and move D:\dotNetFX20admin to network share.

5. To create Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 SP2 admin install (a prerequisit) run
msiexec /a netfx30a_x86.msi /update D:\dotNetFX30\WCF.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WCS.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WF.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WPF1.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WPF2.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WPF_Other.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\XPS.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WF_32.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WPF2_32.msp;D:\dotNetFX30\WPF_Other_32.msp USING_EXUIH=1 REBOOT=ReallySuppress /log D:\dotNetFX30\netfx30a_x86.txt TARGETDIR=D:\dotNetFX30admin
then copy D:\dotNetFX30\Netfx30a_x86.msi to D:\dotNetFX30admin and move D:\dotNetFX30admin to network share.

6. To create Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 admin install run
wcu\dotNetFramework\dotNetFX35\x86\netfx35_x86.exe /x and move vs_setup.msi and vs_setup.cab to network share.

7. Add Netfx20a_x86.msi, Netfx30a_x86.msi and vs_setup.msi in order to an Active Directory GPO.

An x64 version can also be created and deployed using this method.

Setting dbremote mail replication options via isql in SQL Anywhere

When you extract databases from a SQL Anywhere server you can then enter the mail settings on first run of dbremote.

When you are running dbremote as a service (under either linux or windows) then you will not see the dialog asking for the mail settings.

To prevent this you can enter the parameters via normal sql commands.
Here a example on how to configure the mail replication (smtp+pop3)

set remote smtp option smtp_host='smtp.domain.com'

set remote smtp option pop3_host='pop.domain.com'

set remote smtp option pop3_userid='mailaccount@domain.com'

set remote smtp option pop3_password='password'