2013: In Tweets

It wouldn’t be the last day in 2013 without some kind of recap, now would it?  Sometimes I wonder about some of the things that pass me by in the fire hose of information on the Internet these days, so maybe you missed something here! (Some techy, some not!)
January:

• WIRED ‏@WIRED - Jonathan Coulton explains how Glee ripped off his cover song — and why he’s not alone. http://oak.ctx.ly/r/21k1

February:

• Safer Online by MSFT ‏@Safer_Online - Looking for a great way to teach your toddler #OnlineSafety? Look no further than "Digiduck's Big Decision." http://bit.ly/XpCfNX #PDF
• Elecia White ‏@logicalelegance - Why is the best book I've read lately about Rabies? Good book, neater subject than I expected. http://www.amazon.com/Rabid-Cultural-History-Worlds-Diabolical/dp/0670023736/

March:

• Ben Goodman ‏@benontech - Boxes sealed with ATHEIST tape lost by USPS 10X more often than controls - This will make @samj 's head explode http://bgis.me/16YcUSI
• Stephen Foskett ‏@SFoskett - Good read: The truth about the TSA’s pointless knife fight http://bit.ly/XuPPjy

April:

• Leaping Woman ‏@leapingwoman - Today my kid sister sent me the link to @zefrank’s chillout song. Her timing couldn’t have been better http://j.mp/ZTRHlA

May:

• BuzzFeed ‏@BuzzFeed - 19 photos you'll have to explain to your kids one day http://bzfd.it/YFQTH4 pic.twitter.com/Eb3saRW7dA

June:

• Hans Vredevoort ‏@hvredevoort  - New blog on how to use Boot from VHDX to quickly take advantage of #WinServ #12R2 and Windows 8.1: http://www.hyper-v.nu/archives/hvredevoort/2013/06/windows-server-2012-r2-and-windows-8-1-boot-from-vhdx/ … #TEE13 #teched

July:

• mars_seven ‏@mars_seven - The Pixar Theory: Every Character Lives in the Same Universe http://zite.to/12tJJG0 via @zite
• Marques Lyons ‏@tromboneforhire - RT @MSFTnews: Kinect connects sign-language users with their computers http://spr.ly/6016Znuu

August:

• In the Cloud ‏@InTheCloudMSFT - IT Pros, trust me on this: it's well worth your time to read this post about apps, dev tools, & how to lead. http://aka.ms/og659z
• Melody Bliss ‏@melodybliss - Don't text & drive - From One Second To The Next - Texting While Driving Documentary - Werner Herzog http://youtu.be/Xk1vCqfYpos

September:

• laen ‏@laen - http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/05/government-betrayed-internet-nsa-spying … <-- The US Government has betrayed the Internet. We need to take it back, an essay by @Bruce_Schneier

October:

• The Doctor ‏@virtadpt - Male #knitting in a coffee shop questioned by #police, turns out very differently than expected: https://madmanknitting.wordpress.com/2013/10/19/i-was-questioned-by-the-police/ …
• Heather Akers-Healy ‏@abbynormative - Extremely interesting read: Acquiring Forensic Evidence from Infrastructure-as-a-Service Cloud Computing http://www.csee.umbc.edu/~dykstra/DFRWS_Dykstra.pdf … #NSA

November:

• WIRED ‏@WIRED - Bye bye. These are tech sounds you'll never hear again. http://wrd.cm/1iVJisc #WIREDclassic
• Bill Oakley ‏@thatbilloakley - Describing today to someone from 1953: Every six seconds all your friends send you a telegram and a brand new LIFE magazine is thrown at you

December:

• WIRED ‏@WIRED - The IT department is dead. Long live the IT department http://wrd.cm/1feuZyy
• Daniel Donda ‏@DanielDonda - How to Install Hyper-V on a Virtual Machine in Hyper-V - Gilson Banin - Microsoft Premier Field... http://fb.me/6ASPg6REU
• Dane Jasper ‏@dane - "This 100-year-old deal birthed the modern phone system. And it’s all about to end." http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2013/12/19/this-100-year-old-deal-birthed-the-modern-phone-system-and-its-all-about-to-end/

Here’s to another year of sharing information!

Happy Holidays!

It will be a light week here in blog land!  Lots of holiday cheer and keeping busy with family and friends. I hope you are spending part of your week relaxing and spending time with the people you love!

When you do get back to your desk and start reconnecting with the tech community, I hope you take a moment to check out the Microsoft Technical Community website at www.technicalcommunity.com.

If you are a User Group Leader looking for resources, this is the place to go. Register your group and you can get $100 worth of advertising monthly for your meeting or event.  Also, for each event you register you will earn 50 points to save and use toward swag for your group!  You can also request up to $250 in cash for some events - to cover food, etc.

If you are a subject matter expert looking to find places where you can get speaking opportunities, list yourself as a speaker and other leaders can contact you for possible engagements.  This is a one stop shop for connecting people who are interested in technology and getting rewarded for it!

See you in 2014!

Do You Need More Books? Of Course You Do!!

I’m sure you need a resolution for 2014 to read more books about technology!  If that happens to be one on your list, here are few that might interest you.

• FREE eBook - Introducing Microsoft System Center 2012 R2 Technical Overview by Mitch Tulloch with Symon Perriman and the System Center Team. Read more about it at the Microsoft Press blog. This is also available in print format from Amazon, but you’ll need to pay for that.
• Practical IPv6 for Windows Administrators by Edward Horley.  Due out by the end of December, you can currently pre-order this title.  The Kindle version should be available in January.
• In early Spring, look for the release of Networking for VMware Administrators, by Chris Wahl and Steven Panto. While geared toward folks who work with VMware vSphere, I think it’s valuable to be able to understand virtual networking concepts and how they are used by various vendors, even if you aren’t a VMware shop. Estimated at about 350 pages, this isn’t going to be very light reading!

Do you have any reading recommendations? What’s on your list for 2014?

Future Users of Windows 8.1 - Ready, Set, Go!

A question that has been presented to me a lot lately is “How to I prepare the users I support for Windows 8.1?”

I will admit there isn’t a lot of “live” training out there for end users - when it comes to training for your business, you might want to consider my favorite way of getting users up speed on new tech - the “lunch and learn” or other optional/required training meetings.  With these models, you have the opportunity to figure out what features and changes are best to highlight for your office and customize it from there.

However, if you are looking for some online resources to get you started as you plan your training agenda or just want give people some online resources to reference themselves, here’s a short list:

• Windows 8.1 Business User Guide. This printable, 16-page quick guide provides a basic introduction to key Windows 8.1 features and capabilities in business settings such as how to get around, navigating menus, managing apps, working on the desktop, and personalizing Windows 8.1. Available in several formats so you can customize it fit your needs.
• How-To Video Tutorials. Each video is approximately 3 minutes long and demonstrates real-world business scenarios using touch, mouse, and keyboard guided by a voice over that provides additional information.
• Meet the new Windows
• Get around faster with the charms
• Your familiar desktop, only better
• Make Windows all about you
• From my friends over at Pluralsight.com - http://www.pluralsight.com/training/Courses/TableOfContents/windows-8-whered-it-go

Microsoft is also developing videos for more advanced Windows 8.1 features, like advanced desktop (file explorer, customizing taskbar, task manager), Internet Explorer 11, Windows To Go, device encryption, SkyDrive, SkyDrive Pro, PC settings, and more.

Do you have a short list of things users need to know to get started? What are your pain points with user training?

The Dell Venue 8 Pro: Ups, Downs and In Betweens

Shortly after it became available I purchased a Dell Venue 8 Pro. I partly blame Ed Bott, who had one at MVP Summit and it was a lot of fun to play with. The form factor is great for consuming content and playing games and I thought it would be great to keep at home so that family members would stay off my work-issued Surface Pro.

Setup was quick an easy, as it is for Windows 8.1 and my Mac-loving hubby enjoyed using it for about a week. The screen is awesome, the battery life is great and it’s small enough to use comfortably when reading in bed or as a “coffee table” device.

Then one evening when I wasn’t home, I got a message from my husband about it being stuck in Narrator mode (where it reads the screen if you are visually impaired).  I assumed he turned that on my accident and he left it aside for me to fix when I got home.

When I had time to look at it, I started out to fix this, the device was acting a little sluggish and I was having trouble navigating. I mostly blamed this on not being familiar with dealing with Narrator and decided to simply restart the device.  It was prompting for updates at the time, so I selected to install them and restart.

At the next restart it presented me with BSOD. It didn’t recover after another reboot and then attempted to self-repair. No love.  I tried a few more reboots without much success and resigned myself to contacting Dell Support. I used the “chat” method of contacting Dell, which is serviceable, particularly for me since I really don’t want to be tied up on the phone.

The representative had me want through the diagnostics testing, with no real issues. I got a complaint about the battery, but the device was likely not fully charged and wasn’t plugged in at the time. (To get into that menu, press the Volume Up key before the Dell logo appears after a reboot. Once in the menu, the Volume Down button acts as the Enter key.)

He suggested resetting the device and the unfortunately there isn’t any way to kick off that process from the diagnostics menu. The recommendation was to restart the device twice, each time after I got the spinning wheel at the boot screen, which did eventually kick off the Windows Advanced Repair options. I selected to “Reset” the OS, which was going to wipe everything.

Because Window 8.1 tablets are BitLocker protected by default, I was prompted to get my BitLocker recovery key. The Dell representative asked me if I needed a Product Key.
Our conversation went like this --

Agent: "Is it asking for a product key while resetting the system?"

Jennelle: "It's asking for the recovery key (Bitlocker)"

Agent: "I see. Let me check what best we can do for you in this case. May I please place this interaction on hold for 3-5 minutes; I need to do some research on this issue?"

Jennelle: "Sure."

Meanwhile, I recovered the BitLocker key using the Microsoft ID system.

Agent: "Thank you for staying online. I appreciate your patience."

Jennelle: "I got the key myself. It's currently resetting my PC."
Agent: "May I know from where did you get the key?"

Jennelle: "With Windows 8.1 the devices are already encrypted and it's tied to your Microsoft Live ID. There is a website you go to and can recovery the key there."

Agent: "Okay."

Jennelle: "I'd be surprised if you'd have a way to get that for callers, but it can be challenging if you have to explain to someone else where to get it."

Agent: "I appreciate your expertise in resetting and getting the key, Jennelle. Please let me know the current status."

Jennelle: "It's 64% done on the recovery. If the OS doesn't work properly or it crashes again after this recovery I'll just contact support again.

The agent assured me that I’d get a follow up call the next day and I continued on with the process. Once it was working again, I ran all the current Windows Updates and it crashed again.  I tried starting another recovery, but couldn’t get it to kick off properly and sent the device aside for the day.

The next day I did get a call back from Dell. I reported that the device was continuing to have trouble recovering the operating system and the representative immediately made plans to send me a replacement, which should arrive this week.

So while I’m not impressed with the knowledge level of the first tier support when it comes to BitLocker and Windows 8.1, they do want to make sure customers are happy and taken care of.

Stay tuned.  There is a lot I like about Dell Venue Pro 8 and I’m hoping the replacement will work without issue!

West Coast Virtualization Camps Come to a Close

Yesterday, I finished my last presentation of the Microsoft Virtualization Camp for 2013 in Los Angeles. Special thanks to Jessica DeVita, an LA local and Microsoft MVP who spent the day helping out as a lab proctor.  The day wouldn’t have be as smooth without her!

Here is a recap of some of the links and resources I’ve mentioned during my presentations:

• The VMware vs. Microsoft Blog Series - the entire series covers many of the differences between the products and goes deeper on some features than we were able to cover at the one day event.  Of particular interest is the “Shopping for Private Clouds” post.
• The Comparison Whitepaper - A pretty comprehensive feature comparison, good place to start your research.
• Microsoft Virtual Academy - there are at least 4 new sessions specifically around System Center.
• Build It Yourself - If you want to do a similar setup of the HOL environment at your desk or in you lab you can download Hyper-V Server 2012 R2, System Center 2012 R2 or the full version of Windows Server 2012 R2 using the links in the right side navigation bar. --->>  For tips on getting started, visit this post. (The contest is over, but the instructions can still get you started!)
• If you want some additional instructions for building labs in-house, please visit Tommy Patterson's Blog, where he provides lots of step-by-step guides. Tommy is one of my IT Pro Evangelist colleagues on the East Coast.

If you missed the opportunity to attend one of these camps in your area or you think someone else from your company might benefit from some of the content, please check out the Virtualization Camp Online being held next Wednesday, December 11th.

Fellow Evangelists Matt Hester and Tommy Patterson will be presenting and while you won’t be able to be “hands on” yourself, Matt and Tommy will doing some of the demos.  Keith Mayer, Yung Chou and I will be manning the chat room, so feel free to say hello!

For future virtualization related events coming in 2014, be sure to visit TechNet Events.