Learning Microsoft MCTS 70-516 Exam

Microsoft certification exams are a great way to build your resume and let the world know about your level of expertise. Certification exams validate your on-the-job experience and product knowledge. While there is no substitution for on-the-job experience, preparation through study and hands-on practice can help you prepare for the exam. We recommend that you round out your exam preparation plan by using a combination of available study materials and courses. For example, you might use the Training kit and another study guide

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for your “at home” preparation, and take a Microsoft Official Curriculum course for the classroom experience. Choose the combination that you think works best for you.

This article will let you understand the core developers who write or support applications that access
data written in C# or Visual Basic using Visual Studio 2012 and the Microsoft .NET Framework 4.0 and who also plan to take the Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) exam 70-516. Before you begin using this kit, you must have a solid foundation-level understanding of Microsoft C# or Microsoft Visual Basic and be familiar with Visual Studio 2012..

Topics to know in C# or Visual Basic using Visual Studio 2012
ADO.NET Disconnected Classes
ADO.NET Connected Classes
Introducing LINQ
LINQ to SQL
LINQ to XML
ADO.NET Entity Framework
WCF Data Services
Developing Reliable Applications
Deploying Your Application

Most of the examples in the article could run very well on a single server running both the Active Directory and Exchange Server 2010, if you do not have the time or resources to set up a fully functional lab. (Keep in mind that it is highly recommended that the Active Directory Domain Controller and the Exchange Server do not coexist on the same physical or virtual machine in the real world for a variety of reasons.)

Make use of the Testing Engines that are available, as well as the free Webcasts. Practice test material is just for that... PRACTICE. It may help you pass the test but believe me you will only last one day in a job if you don't know what you are doing, so if you use practice material, read the question and if you don't know the answer, research it and learn it, don't just memorize the answer....I will tell you right now that their answers are not always right.

If your ready for career change and looking for Microsoft MCTS Training, Microsoft MCITP Training or any other Microsoft Certification preparation get the best online training from Certkingdom.com they offer all Microsoft, Cisco, Comptia certification exams training in just one Unlimited Life Time Access Pack, included self study training kits including, Q&A, Study Guides, Testing Engines, Videos, Audio, Preparation Labs for over 2000+ exams, save your money on boot camps, training institutes, It's also save your traveling and time. All training materials are "Guaranteed" to pass your exams and get you certified on the fist attempt, due to best training they become no1 site 2012.

About The Author
Hi I educated in the U.K. with working experienced for 5 years in multinational companies, As an IT Manager and IT Instructor, I am attached with certkingdom.com here they provide IT exams study material, the study materials included exams Q&A with Explanation, Testing Engine, Study Guides, Training Labs, Exams Simulations, Training Videos, Audio Exams Training, etc. for certification like MCTS Training, MCITP MCTS, MCSD, MCSA, MCSE Training, CCNA exams preparation, CompTIA A+ Training, and more Certkingdom.com provide you the best training 100% guarantee. “Best Material Great Results”

My Specialties
I’ve worked with a lot of technologies, but these are where my focus has been in recent years:
* Microsoft SQL Server (particularly high availability and disaster recovery)
* VMWare Virtualization
* Oracle (yes, Oracle, I’ve worked on 7-11)
* Microsoft Clustering
* Red Hat Linux (I can still write shell scripts)

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Over View Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 : MCTS 70-662 and MCITP 70-663

A number of articles have been published on Windows PowerShell, but very few of these are dedicated to Exchange Server 2012. I am an Exchange administrator. I am not a developer. Yet, I have found an increasing need to improve my development skills in order to be an effective administrator—first with Exchange Server 2007, then with Windows Server 2008, and now with Exchange Server 2010. Fortunately, with Windows
PowerShell and Exchange Management Shell, I can do so without having to learn a complicated language and extensive developmental concepts—something I really have no desire to do as an administrator. With just a simple verb-noun combination, I can achieve fantastic things in the Exchange organization and still be able to sleep at night without pieces of code swirling around in my head as I dream.

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What’s New in PowerShell 2.0
Microsoft Windows PowerShell is a combined command-line shell and scripting language designed primarily for administrators, not developers. Prior to the introduction of Windows PowerShell into operating systems, administrators were forced to learn a programming language such as Visual Basic to fully manipulate objects in the Active Directory and Exchange environment if the graphical user interface (GUI) did not provide
an easy means for administration. Mainly, an administrator found the need for additional tools, such as custom VB scripts, when he or she wanted to manage objects in bulk. PowerShell 2.0 includes significant changes from the original version.

Topics To Understand Exchange Server 2010 Portable Command:
An Overview of Windows PowerShell 2.0 for Exchange 2010
New Features and the Exchange Management Shell
Basic Techniques
Achieving a Comfort Level with PowerShell
Advanced Techniques
Customizing the PowerShell Environment
PowerShell and the Exchange 2010 Deployment Process
Standard Deployments
Disaster Recovery Deployments
PowerShell and Recipient Objects
Working with Recipient Objects
Bulk Management of Recipients
PowerShell and the Transport Roles Message Routing
The Hub Transport Role
The Edge Transport Role
Configuring Rules and Agents on Transport Servers
PowerShell and the Client Access Server Role
CAS Services
Working with Certificates
PowerShell and the Mailbox Role
Mailbox Servers and Databases
Working with Mailboxes
Using the Recovery Database (RDB)
PowerShell and the Unified Messaging Role
Working with Unified Messaging (UM) Role Objects
Managing Unified Messaging (UM) Users
PowerShell and Message Routing
Exchange Server 2010 Message Routing
Integrating Exchange Server 2010 into an Existing Exchange
Server 2003 Environment
PowerShell and High Availability in Exchange 2010
Database Availability Groups (DAGs)
Mailbox Database Copies
Using DAG to Mitigate Failures
Monitoring Highly Available Databases
PowerShell and Public Folders
Public Folder Database Management
Managing Public Folders
Public Folder Permissions
Troubleshoot Exchange Server 2010 Using PowerShell
Troubleshooting with the Test Cmdlets
Event Logging with PowerShell
PowerShell and Automating Exchange Server 2010 Administration
Using and Finding Scripts to Automate
Monitoring Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) Permissions,
Mailbox Audit Logging, and Reporting with PowerShell in Exchange Server 2010
Configuring Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) Permissions
Using Mailbox Audit Logging to Monitor Exchange Server
Reporting and Other Useful Cmdlets

Most of the examples in the article could run very well on a single server running both the Active Directory and Exchange Server 2010, if you do not have the time or resources to set up a fully functional lab. (Keep in mind that it is highly recommended that the Active Directory Domain Controller and the Exchange Server do not coexist on the same physical or virtual machine in the real world for a variety of reasons.)

Make use of the Testing Engines that are available, as well as the free Webcasts. Practice test material is just for that... PRACTICE. It may help you pass the test but believe me you will only last one day in a job if you don't know what you are doing, so if you use practice material, read the question and if you don't know the answer, research it and learn it, don't just memorize the answer....I will tell you right now that their answers are not always right.

If your ready for career change and looking for Microsoft MCTS Training, Microsoft MCITP Training or any other Microsoft Certification preparation get the best online training from Certkingdom.com they offer all Microsoft, Cisco, Comptia certification exams training in just one Unlimited Life Time Access Pack, included self study training kits including, Q&A, Study Guides, Testing Engines, Videos, Audio, Preparation Labs for over 2000+ exams, save your money on boot camps, training institutes, It's also save your traveling and time. All training materials are "Guaranteed" to pass your exams and get you certified on the fist attempt, due to best training they become no1 site 2012.

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Microsoft 70-640 Exam Quick Pass Tips (Windows Server 2008)

As the your know that getting good job you need pass Microsoft exams and get certified to eligible for the job. Some Microsoft exams are not as simple and easy to pass; you need get the core concept of the exam this article will help you to under stand Microsoft Server 2008 for the exams of 70-640, 70-642.

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WHAT IS WINDOWS SERVER 2008
Windows Server 2008 R2, or simply R2 for short, is the second release of Windows Server 2008 . It isn’t a completely new release, but rather adds additional features and refinements to the existing release . In this book, we focus on the new features and refinements in R2 . We assume you have at least a general knowledge of Windows Server, and that you have some familiarity with Windows Server 2008, although we don’t assume you’re actively running Windows Server 2008 . Where an R2 feature is a refinement of a feature that was new in Windows Server 2008, we provide background on the Windows Server 2008 feature to provide context .

THE ROLE OF SERVER ADMINISTRATOR
Windows server administrators who are responsible for hands-on deployment and day-to-day management of Windows-based servers for large organizations . Windows server administrators manage file and print servers, network infrastructure servers, Web servers, and IT application servers . They use graphical administration tools as their primary interface but also use Windows PowerShell commandlets and occasionally write Windows PowerShell scripts for routine tasks and bulk operations . They conduct most server management tasks remotely by using Terminal Server or administration tools installed on their local workstation .

9 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT WINDOWS SERVER 2008
1. What’s New in Windows Server R2
2. Installation and Configuration: Adding R2 to Your World
3. Hyper-V: Scaling and Migrating Virtual Machines
4. Remote Desktop Services and VDI: Centralizing Desktop and Application Management
5. Active Directory: Improving and Automating Identity and Access
6. The File Services Role
7. IIS 7.5: Improving the Web Application Platform
8. DirectAccess and Network Policy Server
9. Other Features and Enhancements

Make use of the Testing Engines that are available, as well as the free Webcasts. Practice test material is just for that... PRACTICE. It may help you pass the test but believe me you will only last one day in a job if you don't know what you are doing, so if you use practice material, read the question and if you don't know the answer, research it and learn it, don't just memorize the answer....I will tell you right now that their answers are not always right.

If your ready for career change and looking for Microsoft MCTS Training, Microsoft MCITP Training or any other Microsoft Certification preparation get the best online training from Certkingdom.com they offer all Microsoft, Cisco, Comptia certification exams training in just one Unlimited Life Time Access Pack, included self study training kits including, Q&A, Study Guides, Testing Engines, Videos, Audio, Preparation Labs for over 2000+ exams, save your money on boot camps, training institutes, It's also save your traveling and time. All training materials are "Guaranteed" to pass your exams and get you certified on the fist attempt, due to best training they become no1 site 2012.

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Three Ways To Be Productive Using SharePoint and SQL Server (Part 1)

Introduction
In the first part of my three-part series on increasing productivity when using SharePoint and SQL Server, we will focus on searching product data from the Adventure Works database, including the use of meta-data and managed properties. The second part will show how to link the search results to a page highlighting some of the Business Intelligence (BI) features of SharePoint based on product data. The third will focus on maintaining expertise in MySites in a managed fashion.

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Searching Product Data from the Adventure Works Database
One of the great benefits of using SharePoint is that it provides search, business intelligence, collaboration and portals on a unified platform. This provides a huge benefit in terms of cost-savings and productivity. To take advantage of the search functionality and provide the capability to search products in an intranet or public-facing website, it can be done by defining the taxonomy, putting that taxonomy into SharePoint and tying it to a crawl of the products database.

The products in the Adventure Works database are broken down into categories and sub-categories. Go into your Managed Metadata Service and define an Adventure Works Group.

Then, create a term set for both the categories and sub-categories. Now, add the items from the database. These can also be imported using the term store import functionality.

The next step is to create a view in the database that joins the products, sub-categories and categories to be indexed.

In order to connect to the data, go into your secure store application and create a target application to connect to the database. Name the target application “Adventure Works”. Use a Target Application Type of Group. Set the user name and password for Windows. Then, map the Members group to an AD Group that should have access to connect to those credentials.

Now open SharePoint Designer 2010 and connect to your site to create an External Content Type.

Click on External Content Types and choose the option to create a new one.

Enter the name of the content type. In this case, we will name it Adventure Works Products.

Choose Generic List as the Office Item List Type.

Hit the link named “Click Here to Discover External Data Sources and Define Operations” and choose SQL Server.

Enter the database server and database name and choose Connect with Impersonated Custom Identity. Enter the name of the desired secure store application used to connect to the AdventureWorks database.

Create “Read Item” and “Read List” operations for the view we created to expose the products, sub-categories and categories for searching by right-clicking the view name and choosing the new option for each. Accept all defaults on both.

Choose “Create Lists and Form” and name the list “Adventure Works Products”. Now, browse the list to ensure it pulls the products from the database.

Next, go into the Search Service Application to create a crawl of the external content type.

In central administration, open the search service application you wish to use.

Click on Content Sources, then choose New Content Source.

Once the full crawl completes, the next step is to map the Metadata Properties. Click the link to Metadata Properties under Queries and Results in the Search Service Application. Also, ensure the service account used to crawl the products has access to the Adventure Works BCS service application.

Click "Categories", then "Business Data".

At this point, there will be a list of properties from the products view.

Click the ProductCategory property and map it to the ProductCategory Managed property. Do the same for ProductSubCategory.

Run the full crawl again on the Adventure Works content source in the search service application.

Next, setup the action to view the product once it is returned by the search. Go to your business data connectivity service for Adventure Works Products, open it, and click the "View Profile" action and set it as follows:

Now we are set on the search of the products. Go to a search center or create one in your SharePoint environment. Add refinement filters to include the product and product subcategories.

Edit the search web page and modify the Refinement Panel web part.

Expand the Refinement grouping in the web part and de-select the Use Default Configuration option.

Add two tags to the XML in the Filter Category Definition property:






Search for Accessories and view the results. You can now search for products by product information, category and sub-category. Hover over the link to the product results and view the URL.

In the second part of the article series, we will create a product page with some BI features. .

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Microsoft touts corporate tools in Windows 8 Enterprise

'Windows to Go' runs images of company desktops on workers' personal PCs

Computerworld - Microsoft yesterday laid out the exclusive features of Windows 8 Enterprise, one of three editions of the upcoming OS and the only one limited to corporate customers.

Windows 8 Enterprise will be available only to businesses that have signed Software Assurance deals with Microsoft. Software Assurance is a kind of software insurance that lets firms upgrade to every new version of a specific product released during the life of the agreement.

Software Assurance fees typically run 23% to 29% of a desktop product's license price for each year of coverage.

In a Wednesday blog post, Erwin Visser, a senior director for Windows, outlined the features that will be limited to Windows 8 Enterprise, including the new "Windows to Go," which lets IT administrators burn an image of an in-house PC to a USB thumb drive.
Windows 8

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Windows to Go, which Microsoft unveiled last September, will run on PCs or other devices powered by Windows 7 or Windows 8.

Microsoft again touted the feature as a secure way for out-of-office workers to access corporate resources from personal or shared devices, and as a solution to the "bring your own PC" problem of people using their own machines, which may be less secure and more likely to be malware infected, to connect with the company's network.

Last fall, Microsoft declined to say whether Windows to Go was an enterprise-only feature and if it would come at an additional cost.

Yesterday, Visser said that Windows to Go -- and several other features he called out -- were "available exclusively to Windows 8 Enterprise customers." He also said that what he called "a new companion device license" was necessary if workers brought their own devices into the office for use with Windows to Go.

Microsoft has yet to set the price of that companion device license, according to Paul DeGroot, the founder of Pica Communications, and a well-known expert in deciphering Microsoft's complex, often-obtuse licensing.

Other features found only in Windows 8 Enterprise, Visser said, range from DirectAccess, which lets remote workers access corporate resources without a VPN, or virtual private network, to sideloading of company-built Metro apps, letting administrators control what goes on employees' devices and eliminating the need for them to tap into the consumer-grade Windows Store.

Several of the features Visser referenced, including DirectAccess, AppLocker and BranchCache, are not new but simply updated versions for Windows 8.

Microsoft has also removed the exclusivity label from some features formerly available only in Windows 7 Enterprise, and added them to Windows 8 Pro as well. Top on that list: BitLocker and BitLocker to Go full-disk encryption.

Windows 8 Enterprise is essentially Windows 8 Pro, the most feature-filled of the two retail editions Microsoft will launch later this year, with numerous exclusive features added to the program.

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Microsoft forms subsidiary to engage with open source communities

The new business unit, called Microsoft Open Technologies, will address the gap between Microsoft and non-Microsoft technologies

Microsoft on Thursday is spinning out a wholly owned subsidiary to bridge the gap between proprietary Microsoft technologies and non-Microsoft technologies in mixed IT environments by engaging with open source and standards communities.

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Microsoft stuns Linux world, submits source code to kernel
Called Microsoft Open Technologies Inc., the subsidiary is intended to advance Microsoft's investment in interoperability, open standards, and open source. "The subsidiary provides a new way of engaging in a more clearly defined manner. This new structure will help facilitate the interaction between Microsoft's proprietary development processes and the company's open innovation efforts and relationships with open source and open standards communities," said Jean Paoli, who becomes president of the subsidiary after serving as Microsoft's general manager of interoperability strategy.

[ Microsoft, which has had its disagreements with the Linux community in the past, has been ranked as a key Linux contributor. | For the latest on open source trends, subscribe to InfoWorld's Technology: Open Source newsletter. ]

"This structure will make it easier and faster to iterate and release OSS software, participate in existing open source efforts, and accept contributions from the community. Over time, the community will see greater interaction with the open standards and open source worlds," Paoli said in a blog post due to be posted this afternoon.

Microsoft, Paoli noted, already has engaged with such open source software organizations as OuterCurve, which the company had formed as CodePlex, as well as with Apache Software Foundation and many standards organizations. Open source environments like Linux, Hadoop, MongoDB, and Drupal have run on the company's platform, he said. But the company's relationship with Linux has been less than friendly at times, with the company charging Linux violates Microsoft patents and then reaching usage agreements with Linux users.

Formation of Microsoft Open Technologies might be the result of legal wrangling over open source, analyst Al Hilwa, of IDC speculates. "This is an interesting development. It suggests to me that this arrangement is the best one they could come up with to deal with issues Microsoft lawyers may have with open source code isolation and IP protection," he said. "As long as open source developers are legally working for Microsoft directly, there is likely a legal overview process that is not suited with open source agility. Additionally, accepting contributed open source code, authored by outsiders, may be problematic.

Leaked Microsoft roadmap shows 2013 launch for Office 15

Microsoft needs to better communicate plans to developers, enterprises and customers, says analyst


Computerworld - A leaked Microsoft roadmap shows that the next version of Office won't ship until the first quarter of 2013, according to the Dutch developer who found the document.

Maarten Visser, the CEO of Meetroo and a decade-long Microsoft partner, stumbled upon the roadmap a week ago after clicking on a link posted on Microsoft's Dutch website. The PDF was not password protected.

"I'm always curious about the roadmaps," said Visser in a YouTube video he posted yesterday. "For me, since we build SharePoint applications, the release of SharePoint 15 is an important thing. The better I know when this will happen, the better I will be to ready my products before launch."

Visser's Meetroo is building project management software that relies on SharePoint.

While Visser noted that much of the information in the roadmap was already known -- that Microsoft will release a public beta of Office alongside betas of supporting products like SharePoint and Exchange -- he pointed out that the document pegged the suite's final release as the first quarter of 2013.

The roadmap's date for the public beta, however, doesn't jibe with Microsoft's recent comments.

On the roadmap, the Office beta was marked as smack-dab between the third and fourth quarters. While Microsoft has not yet revealed a detailed timetable for Office, two months ago the executive who runs the Office group, P.J. Hough, said "Everyone will have the opportunity to try the Office 15 public beta later this summer."

To meet Hough's "summer" promise, the beta would have to appear in the stretch between late in the second quarter and near the end of the third.

Microsoft has not assigned the next Office an official name, but has used "Office 15" as a placeholder. The roadmap used the same label.

Another section of the roadmap showed timelines for Windows -- both client and server editions -- as well as Internet Explorer 10 (IE10) and Windows Phone.

Windows 8's schedule was bare, with only last September's Developer Preview marked, and others, including Windows Server 8 -- which is expected to launch at the same time as the client editions -- simply showing a label of "Historical Release Cadence" that stretched from mid-2012 through early 2013.

Most experts anticipate a formal release of Windows 8 -- at least the desktop version -- in the fourth quarter, possibly October, because they assume Microsoft wants new Windows 8 PCs on shelves during this year's holiday sales season.

IE10's launch was marked as some time in the second half of 2012.

One analyst said the roadmap demonstrated just how opaque Microsoft is when it comes to disseminating information to customers. "Not only do ISVs [independent software vendors] and corporations need to know release dates, but as a customer, you need to know them, too," said Michael Cherry of Directions on Microsoft.

"Everyone needs a timeline that's dependable, but it's not enough to just give us dates," Cherry said, referring to the leaked document. "You have to give us descriptions why those dates are what they are."

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That's something that Microsoft doesn't do early enough in its development process, Cherry said, making it nearly impossible for software makers like Visser, companies that craft their own applications for internal use, and customers -- especially enterprises -- to make intelligent decisions on developing for a new platform or migrating to it.

Cherry argued that a reliable timeline was more important for an operating system than for an application like Office, big as the latter is to Microsoft's revenue, because fewer partners work with Office than with Windows.

"For an OS like Windows, especially WOA [Windows on ARM], I'm kind of stunned at the lack of information available at this point," Cherry said. "There are a lot of people who need to be aware of the changes in Windows and WOA."

Directions on Microsoft creates detailed roadmaps for its clients, but the job is neither simple or easy.

"It's very hard to do, to represent [a roadmap] well," said Cherry, adding that it's necessary to show dependencies between products -- how Internet Explorer relies on Windows, for instance -- and timelines that include older products for those rare times when Microsoft takes features from a new edition and backports them to a predecessor.

Cherry highlighted the roadmap's Office 15 launch in early 2013 as another example of dependency. If Office won't be available until then, Cherry was skeptical of a WOA launch in 2012, what with Microsoft having stressed the importance of Office on that tablet-oriented OS.

"Apple can be secretive because they build the hardware," Cherry said. "The more you control the ecosystem, the more closed you can be. But I've always thought of Windows as open."

Microsoft declined to comment today on the roadmap that Visser uncovered.

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Weak passwords still the downfall of enterprise security

A pet's name or a favorite movie just isn't enough

Computerworld - A recent data breach that exposed the Social Security numbers of more than 255,000 people in Utah has once again highlighted the longstanding but often underestimated risks posed to organizations by weak and default passwords.

The breach, involving a Medicaid server at the Utah Department of Health, resulted from a configuration error at the authentication layer of the server hosting the compromised data, according to state IT officials.

Many security analysts see that as a somewhat euphemistic admission by the state that the breached server was using a default administrative password or an easily guessable one. By taking advantage of the error, the attackers were able to bypass the perimeter-, network- and application-level security controls that IT administrators had put in place to protect the data on the server.

Such mistakes, though relatively easy to avoid, are surprisingly common.
What I think we are seeing is really what I like to call 'the curse of the reusable password.'
Gartner analyst John Pescatore

In March, the inspector general of the U.S. Department of Energy released the results of an information security audit at the Bonneville Power Administration, which provides about 30% of wholesale power to regional utilities in the Pacific Northwest. According to the audit, vulnerability scans of nine applications used to support key financial, HR and security management functions at Bonneville identified 11 servers that had been configured with easily guessable passwords.

An attacker taking advantage of those vulnerabilities would have been able to gain complete access to the system. Four servers were configured to allow any remote user to access and modify shared files. One server hosted an administrator account that was protected only with a default password.

Earlier this month, a data breach at payment processing company Global Payments that exposed credit- and debit-card data belonging to about 1.5 million people was believed by analyst firm Gartner to have resulted from a weak authentication mechanism that allowed attackers to gain access to an administrative account. An attack on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce by Chinese hackers and a compromise of the open-source WineHQ database last year are also believed to have originated with compromised administrator accounts.

An enterprise can have anywhere from hundreds to thousands of account names and passwords. Many of these accounts often have privileged access to applications, databases, networks and operating systems. While not all of them are always critical to the enterprise, there are numerous accounts that, if abused, can cause serious disruptions enterprisewide.

Previous studies have shown that the number of people who require administrative access to a system for maintenance purposes, or for completing tasks such as patching and upgrading, is often far greater than the number that managers know about or track. Nevertheless, many companies allow users and administrators to apply easy passwords or even default passwords to protect access to such accounts.

When multifactor authentication is used, the measures often involve relatively easy-to-crack knowledge-based authentication (KBA) mechanisms where a user is prompted for an answer to a security question, such as a first pet's name or the name of a favorite movie.

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A report released by Verizon last month showed that attacks exploiting weak passwords are still endemic in the retail and hospitality industries. Attackers can still go to a vendor's site, get a client list and "just hit those [clients] with the default or guessable username-password combination," Verizon noted in its report. "These are relatively easy attacks that require little in-depth knowledge or creativity."

The tendency by many people to use the same password for multiple accounts is another huge issue, said John Pescatore, a Gartner analyst.

"A lot of Anonymous' recent success has been in attacks where they have obtained users' passwords to external services and then found the same passwords in use at sensitive internal applications or in email systems," Pescatore said. "What I think we are seeing is really what I like to call 'the curse of the reusable password.' "

One of the most important measures companies can take to ramp up their security is to raise the bar for passwords and authentication mechanisms, he said. "Similar to how you can't shift from 'Park' to 'Drive' without putting your foot on the brake, there ought to be 'safety interlocks' in any piece of software that make it very hard to shift into Drive without changing the default password," he said.

Adam Bosnian, executive vice president of corporate development at Cyber-Ark, a vendor of software for managing administrative passwords, said the problem that companies face is complex. While it's one thing to require that administrators use complex passwords, it's another thing to manage those passwords, he said. What often happens is that multiple administrators might need access to one system, and it is easiest to use a default or easily remembered password to control access to it.

When a complex password is used, administrators need to have three processes: One for securely sharing that password with each other, another process for changing the password when needed, and a third for keeping everyone informed about the changes. These processes can get especially difficult in larger organizations where the number of privileged accounts can be staggering, he said.

"The truth is, anyone trying to protect non-trivial assets should be using multifactor authentication and/or complementary controls to protect themselves," said Peter Lindstrom, an analyst with Spire Security. "The password has too many weaknesses, including the obvious human ones," he said.

Most password schemes that aren't protected by another form of authentication or lockout controls are susceptible to brute-force compromise, where automated tools are used to guess passwords, he said. "At this stage of the IT game, there is really no excuse for using default passwords."

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How to Create a Personal Webpage

How to Create a Personal Webpage
Need an online home for all things you? Landing page services make it easy to build a personal portal—one that's easy on the eyes.

It goes by many names: Web nameplate, personal home page, virtual business card, online résumé, or personal portal, among others. Whatever you call these "digital brochures of you" (I made that one up), a personal landing page is a webpage that contains info that is all about you. It has links to all the important information you want public: places you inhabit online (social networks and blogs), sharing networks for video and images, articles about or by you, your podcasts and performances, and more. If you need a centralized place to call home, build a landing page and get that URL to everyone you want to find you online.

How do you make a landing page, you ask? Of course, you could register a URL, rent space at a Web hosting service, and build your own. You should know, though, that there are plenty of services that make creating a landing page ultra-simple. All you need to do is provide the links and some graphics, or one big graphic. (Now is a great time to put your photographer friends to work.)

Here are six ways to create the ultimate personal landing page—and five tips for promoting it once you're done.

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Flavors.me
Flavors.me comes in two flavors. The free product offers seven layouts and gathers content from up to five services, and a paid version that has 17 layouts, links to unlimited service, and several more features. Once you've created an account, you can log in using a Facebook, Google, or Yahoo account (whatever is linked to your landing page).

The site welcomes you with that dizzying array of information and features, but when it comes down to it, Flavors.me is like most of its competition—to facilitate a landing page with a big beautiful background image and links to go with. Once you're in, you can customize any of the layouts, but it's hit or miss as to how well they'll work with your graphics; trial and error and patience may be required to get it just right. Naturally, you can link to just about any service on the Web because that's the whole point.

The extra options you get with the paid version are so varied that you probably won't need them all, but at only $20 a year, they're worth at least a try. They include real-time stats, a contact form, a mobile version of your site for smartphone access, a customizable favicon to show up in browser address bars, and, perhaps best of all, support for custom domain names that point to your page. (or you can go with the flavors.me/username address it provides.) A Flavors.me landing page looks pretty good on a smartphone, too.

Free and paid accounts get access to the "social stream" feature, which is like an RSS reader for all the social goings-on of your friends. It's one of those features you probably don't need and probably won't use, but it's at your disposal.

Flavors.me is a great, simple option for creating a personal landing page, with or without the paid extras.—Next: About.me, Sidengo, Skrawlr >


About.me
AOL's online profile service, About.me, is pretty much the old man of these kinds of sites, having launched back in 2009. (AOL scooped it up in 2010.) The About.me homepage welcomes you with its display of featured personal pages, so you can get an idea of what an About.me landing page will look like. The emphasis, naturally, is on a big photo as the background with accompanying links.

Once you create an account (e-mail address, password, and About.me URL), future sign-ins can be done via Facebook or Twitter. The About.me interface takes all the pain out of creating a site; you can easily upload a background image, enter your name, a "headline," and bio, and add links to just about any social/sharing/blogging service in the world. Basically, you set this data in a box that you can then position where you want on the background, relative to the most important part of the image.

What About.me doesn't have is the ability to support a domain name of your choosing—you get a URL that reads about.me/username.

There's no paid version of About.me, so what you see is what you get. About.me does offer "extras," however. It sell business cards for the cost of shipping ($5.50) that feature your landing page background image on the front and your contact details on the back. There's even a QR code to send people with smartphones directly to your page. An About.me-based e-mail address is provided, if desired. Stats are just a click away, so you can see how many visitors you get (although not where they came from).

What About.me lacks in paid features it more than makes up for with a perfect blend of simplicity and style.

Sidengo

Sidengo
Sure, Sidengo can help you create a single landing page, and it'll look great, but it can also help you produce an entire little website (with pop-ups more than actual pages, but why quibble?). It's geared toward small businesses, but can work for the individual as well.

The setup interface looks similar to Flavors.me, with its floating control panel at the top of the page. It provides areas in the main template for a site logo, slogan, and links to "pages" for About Us, Products & Services, and Contact Us (you can set this to be invisible, if unnecessary). Links to social network sites are limited to YouTube, Twitter, SlideShare, and Facebook Pages (not individual profiles). Your site URL will read sidengo.com/username.

Don't get it in your head that Sidengo is just a bunch of links—you need to be a writer, or enough of a writer to fill in data about yourself and your business/project. It's a great idea for a small biz because a Sidengo page not only looks good and provides great ways for users to contact you, but the sites are instantly mobile as well. You can generate website widgets of your page and paste them elsewhere online.

Options include: the ability to use Google Analytics to track page traffic on your Sidengo page, support for custom domains (you have to purchase from a registrar like Register.com, 1&1, or GoDaddy), custom favicons and iOS icons (for those who'd bookmark your site like it's an app), QR codes to link to your page, and best of all, direct integration with Facebook Pages.

All in all, Sidengo is a great option for a small business with little or no online budget. A caveat: the site is currently free as it's in "beta." At some point, there will likely be a monthly fee, though it will remain free for non-profits.

Skrawlr

Skrawlr
Skrawlr is a bare-bones method for creating personal landing pages. You can set up an account by filling in the form on the Skrawlr home page. It asks for some personal data and usernames for your social networks (Flicker, Picasa, YouTube, Twitter, Vimeo, and Formspring are all that are supported, but no Facebook). Then, upload a background image and viola. You're done. You get a site at username.skrawler.com.

Skrawlr doesn't do anything extra for you. It won't resize your background image to fit perfectly; you'll have to do that yourself (and make it smaller than 2MB when you edit it). If it's too big, it bleeds off screen, too small and it does that annoying tiling thing. You can't set a preference.

Skrawlr's downside is the complete lack of customization (you can't even choose fonts) and odd choice of link support. (There's no Facebook link, yet you can click a Facebook icon to share your page with your friends.) The upside is that it can be set up in mere seconds.


Résumé Landing Pages
For many, the landing page is all about showing a professional front. And what's more professional than your résumé? Re.vu and Zerply can help you create a résumé-based landing page, and if you have a LinkedIn account, half the work is already done.

Re.vu

Re.vu
The key to using Re.vu is to have an account with LinkedIn, the professional social network (a.k.a. the one where you try to get a job rather than post pictures of your friends at parties). When you set up a Re.vu account, it asks to use the LinkedIn importer, so it can build your résumé timeline based on the data stored there. The timeline is the core of your résumé landing page at re.vu/username. (You can upload your own standard résumé for employers to download, too.)

On your landing page, you can use Re.vu's custom backgrounds or upload your own. With Re.vu, the page is about the data, not the fancy background image, so you'll want something a little more generic in the background. The one provided with the template is probably best, unless you've got some serious graphic artistry chops. The timeline of your work and education is only imported once, and after that, you have to keep it updated separately. If you have typos on LinkedIn, they'll also appear on Re.vu.

You'll want to go into your profile and make edits anyway, because the fun stuff for the page isn't imported. The Infographics tab will let you insert vital stats (put in numbers for anything, like businesses you've started, articles you've written, etc.), as well as graphs showing your job duties, favorite pastimes, interests, and languages. You can also upload portfolios of your work (in PDF or MS Office formats). These are the extras that make for a more interesting online résumé—and, hopefully, will lead to a great job interview.

Re.vu provides stats and the ability to promote your new landing page via Twitter, Google+, Facebook, and LinkedIn. It will generate a QR code graphic to put on business cards, blogs, or even your traditional résumé. It's odd (and smart, at the same time) that it doesn't let you link to your other social networks since Re.vu wants to keep things totally professional. It's too bad your LinkedIn updates are not instantly seen at Re.vu, but again, this might be a wise decision. This might be the better place to send prospective employers.

Zerply

Zerply
Alternately, you could send employers to Zerply, another site that specializes in "going beyond the résumé." You can sign up quickly via your Facebook or Twitter accounts and it will pull some tags and your profile pic. (Don't worry, you can change it.) Provide a bio and tags about you, change that picture to something presentable, import your life experience from either Facebook or LinkedIn, link to some social networks (there's a long list), and then pick a theme.

You only get four themes to choose from, so preview each and make a choice. (If you invite three people to join Zerply, you can unlock a fifth theme or you can buy others for $20 each (ouch!)) Like Re.vu, this site is about showing your work history more than anything, so a fancy background image is not the most important thing. Once you're done, you get a zerp.ly/username URL to share.

Note that if you make changes to your experience on LinkedIn or Facebook, they're not reflected on Zerply until you do a new full import of the data. You can also edit it on Zerply, again creating two different sets of data. The presentation is much more résumé-esque than Re.vu, which isn't necessarily bad; in fact, Zerply's templates look pretty great.

Once directed to the Zerply dashboard, you'll see that, like Flavors.me, Zerply wants to usurp your time with a stream of data from others you follow. You'll be asked to find your friends on Facebook and Twitter also; as you know, that perpetuates more visits to the site, something that's far more for Zerply's benefit than yours.

There's an upgrade option of $15 a year to support a custom domain, pointing to your Zerply résumé. You'll have to buy it at a registrar first and then follow the directions so the domain name redirects.—Next: 5 Tips for Promoting Personal Landing Pages >

5 Tips for Promoting Personal Landing Pages

1. Make sure you put the URL for your personal landing page in your e-mail signature.

2. Share the URL in your social network bios, such as Twitter and Facebook.

3. Put the URL on your business cards. Check out About.me's offer to send you some "free" (plus shipping).

4. If the site generates QR codes for you, put them on your business cards and website, too.

5. Register your landing page with Google and Bing, so when people search your name, it's close to the first thing to pop up.

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70-620 Q&A / Study Guide / Testing Engine

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QUESTION 1
You are employed as a Desktop Technician at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a
single Active Directory domain named Certkingdom.com.
Certkingdom.com has acquired a computer named Certkingdom-WS624. The operating system on the computer is
Microsoft Windows XP Professional and its specifications are:
• 1 GB of RAM
• 2GHz processor
• 64-MB video adapter
• 60-GB hard disk with 15 GB of free space
You received instructions for installation of Microsoft Windows Vista on Certkingdom-WS624.
After performing fresh installation you need to identify the which of uCertkingdomrade is needed for
supporting Microsoft Windows Aero Experience?

A. You need to uCertkingdomrade the hard disk to 100 GB.
B. You need to clear 40 GB of free space on the hard disk.
C. You need to uCertkingdomrade the memory to 2 GB of RAM.
D. You need to install a 128 MB of RAM video adapter supporting Microsoft DirectX 9, and
Microsoft Pixel Shader 2.0.
E. You need to uCertkingdomrade the processor to a dual-core processor.

Answer: D

Explanation: To support the Microsoft Windows Aero Experience, you need a video adapter that
has at least 128 MB of RAM, support for Microsoft DirectX 9, and Microsoft Pixel Shader 2.0.

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QUESTION 2
You are employed as a network administrator at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a
single Active Directory domain named Certkingdom.com.
A client computer named Certkingdom-WS620 is running Microsoft Windows 2000 with Service Pack 3.
Certkingdom-WS620 also runs some legacy applications. The Certkingdom.com management wants all computers
to be running Microsoft Windows Vista. To this end you have received instructions from the CIO to
uCertkingdomrade Certkingdom-WS620 to Microsoft Windows Vista.
Which two steps should you take to uCertkingdomrade Certkingdom-WS620 and keeping the current applications
intact and not requiring reinstallation?

A. By Installing Windows Vista into a separate partition.
B. By using the Windows Easy Transfer wizard.
C. By uCertkingdomrading to Microsoft Windows XP Professional.
D. By uCertkingdomrading to Windows Vista.
E. By installing the latest version of the Service Pack.
F. By copying your user profile to a removable media.
G. By Performing a clean installation of Windows Vista.
H. By Copying the user profile to the C:\Windows\Users directory.

Answer: C,D

Explanation: To move to Windows Vista without having to reinstall your applications, you need to
do an ‘in-place’ uCertkingdomrade. However, you cannot uCertkingdomrade directly to Windows Vista from
Windows 2000 Professional (you would need a clean install which would delete your applications).
Therefore, you need to uCertkingdomrade to Windows XP Professional first. Then you can uCertkingdomrade to
Windows Vista and keep the applications.

---

QUESTION 3
You are employed as a network administrator at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a
single Active Directory domain named Certkingdom.com. All client computers on the Certkingdom.com network run
Microsoft Windows Vista.
Certkingdom.com contains a client computer named Certkingdom-WS621. Certkingdom-WS621 has been assigned to a
Certkingdom.com user named Andy Booth. You received a report from Andy Booth complaining that CertkingdomWS621
is performing slower than it should. You have a suspicion that it could be malware that is
causing the problem.
How can you find out what is causing the problems?

A. You need to run a Windows Defender scan.
B. You need to view the processes list in Task manager.
C. You need to view the startup items in the System Configuration utility.
D. You need to run Disk Defragmenter.

Answer: A

Explanation: Windows Defender is an application that can scan for malware or other potentially
harmful files. You can initiate a Windows Defender scan to scan all the files on your system for
malware or other potentially harmful files.

---

QUESTION 4
You are employed as a network technician at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a
single Active Directory domain named Certkingdom.com. All client computers on the Certkingdom.com network run
Microsoft Windows Vista.
A Certkingdom.com user named Andy Booth has been assigned a client computer named Certkingdom-WS629.
One morning Andy Booth complains that Certkingdom-WS629 does not produce any sound when he
views a video file clip. You open the Device Manager as shown below.



What configuration change should you make to Certkingdom-WS629?

A. You need to update the driver for the audio device.
B. You need to uninstall the device then run a hardware scan.
C. You need to enable the audio device in Device Manager.
D. You need to change the IRQ for the device.
E. You need to run Microsoft Windows Update and install the latest updates for Certkingdom-WS629.
F. You need to replace the audio device with one that is compatible with Windows Vista.

Answer: C

Explanation: The icon by the sound device (the Creative SB Live! Series device) shows that the
device is disabled. Therefore, to receive audio output from Certkingdom-WS629, you simply need to
enable the device. You can do this by right-clicking on the device and selecting Enable.

---

QUESTION 5
You are employed as a help desk technician at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a
Workgroup named Certkingdom. The client computers on the Certkingdom.com network run a mix of Windows XP
Professional and Windows Vista. You
The Certkingdom.com management wants to conduct a meeting with all their users. You need to facilitate
this meeting. However, invitation to the Certkingdom.com users are not getting sent as they do not appear
in the Invite people list of the Microsoft Windows Meeting Space meeting.
What should you do to be able to invite all Certkingdom.com users to the Windows Meeting Space
meetings? (Each correct answer presents part of the solution. Choose TWO.)

A. You need to instruct the Certkingdom.com users with Windows XP Professional computers to create an
exception for invitations from Windows Meeting Space in the Microsoft Windows Firewall.
B. You need to uCertkingdomrade the Windows XP Professional computers to Windows Vista.
C. You need to configure the Windows XP Professional computers to use Microsoft NetMeeting to
connect to the meeting.
D. You need to instruct all members of the Certkingdom workgroup to sign in to the People Near Me feature.
E. You need to install Service Pack 3 on the Windows XP Professional computers.

Answer: B,D

Explanation:

---

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IT investments deliver profits, study finds

Spending on revenue-enhancing IT systems more beneficial than focusing on streamlining processes to cut costs

Investing in IT departments can have a big impact on a firm's profits, more so than similar spending on R&D and some marketing endeavors, according to a team of university reasearchers.

The researchers reached their conclusions after examining the IT investments and financial data of about 450 companies in an effort to draw a link between IT spending and profits.

The work, published in the journal, MIS Quarterly , led to several key conclusions.

First, IT investments are "positively associated with profitability," according to the research paper .

The researchers said they were able to look deep enough at these unidentified global firms to draw insights into the type of IT investments that are most helpful. They found that companies are better off spending on projects that create revenue instead of reducing costs.

For instance, a company that builds or buys a business intelligence system that helps sell products will see more bottom line benefits than a company that spends IT dollars to automate internal processes to trim expenses, said the paper's lead author, Sunil Mithas, an associate professor Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland.

He noted that cost cutting systems are likely not unique, and thus don't offer a competitive advantage. "Your vendors will sell the same system to your competitors," Mithas said.

But firms that spend IT dollars on revenue generating products may come up with systems that "are highly differentiated from your competition" said Mithas, "It will be very hard for your competition to replicate that."

Mithas said the team was unable to pinpoint an optimum level of IT spending.

Some firms are good at managing IT spending consistently, while others may pull back on IT investments after a failed project, and thus become a laggard.

The team, which also included researchers from the University of Illinois, the University of Texas, and the IE Business School in Madrid, Spain, concluded that that IT investments are more likely to enhance profits than advertising or R&D spending.

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Even in R&D and advertising intensive businesses, such as the pharmaceutical industry, strong IT investments can prove fruitful. The paper cited a project Pfizer which "enabled virtual teams from different business units around the world to collaborate in research and develop new drugs."

The researchers examined IT investment and financial data from 1998 to 2003.

Mithas said there is no reason to believe that anything has changed since then -- even with constantly changing technology.

The IT spending data was gleaned from surveys conducted by a consulting firm that the researchers didn't identify due to a non-disclosure agreement. Mithas could only say that the firm is among the top IT consulting companies in the world.

The absence of a identified source for the IT spending data in this paper drew criticism from Paul Strassmann , a former U.S. Department of Defense CIO and acting CIO of NASA who has written about the correlation of IT and profits.

Strassmann said that "unless the authors disclose the origins of the critical IT numbers, the entire paper must be considered speculation and not verifiable analytic proof."

Mithas said the paper went through "a blind peer-review process by top academic scholars familiar with this domain of enquiry and such relevant data related details were shared with them."

The reviewers "appeared satisfied with the data quality and procedures we used for analyses."

Mithas said the findings are strong and said a characterization of the study's findings as speculation "is a little extreme."

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IE's browser share recovers, Chrome down for third straight month

T

Sign of a Microsoft turnaround, or just a calculation change by metrics company?

Computerworld - Internet Explorer posted another major gain in share last month, the second in the first quarter of the year, perhaps signaling a turnaround in Microsoft's fortunes, a Web metrics company said Sunday.

Meanwhile, every rival, including Google's Chrome, which is usually the one stealing users, lost share.

Internet Explorer (IE) gained 1 percentage point during March, said measurement firm Net Applications, to end the month with a 53.8% share, its highest level since September 2011. Last month's growth was the second this year of 1 point or more.

Chrome lost a third of a percentage point to close March with 18.6%, while Mozilla's Firefox slipped by about the same to 20.6%, the open-source browser's lowest number in more than three years.

Apple's Safari and Opera Software's desktop browsers also dipped, falling by two-tenths and one-tenth of a point, respectively, to 5.1% and 1.6%.

Chrome's decline is especially notable, as March's slide was the third consecutive month that Google's once-hard-charging browser lost share. In the first quarter of 2012, Chrome has dropped more than half a percentage point, representing a 3% decline from the browser's December 2011 number.

Previously, Net Applications has attributed Chrome's skid to Google's January demotion of the browser's search ranking and then last month, to recalculations that eliminated the extra activity generated by Chrome's pre-rendering feature.

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Google restored Chrome's search ranking last month.
It was unclear whether the rise of Internet Explorer (IE) and the fall of every rival was due to a rejiggering of Net Applications' numbers.

Like most Web measurement firms, Net Applications has more data on some nations -- the U.S., for instance -- and relatively small samples from others, such as China. To produce what it believes is a more accurate representation of global browser usage, Net Applications weights its Chinese data proportionally higher because that country has a greater percentage of the world's Internet users than the U.S.

Net Applications uses online population numbers provided by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), which has regularly tracked big jumps in China's part of the browser-user pie, and corresponding drops in the percentage of the world's users who hail from the U.S., Europe and other developed countries. Earlier this year, a company spokesman confirmed that it would revamp its calculations with newer CIA numbers at some point.

In February 2011, after Net Applications' last accounting change, IE's usage share jumped an eighth of a percentage point, at that time its largest one-month increase ever.

Because Chinese users overwhelmingly rely on IE, or a modified version of Microsoft's browser, the country can easily skew Net Applications' share estimates toward IE as more people there access the Web.

Microsoft, not surprisingly, applauds Net Applications' country-by-country weighting system, going so far last month as to explicitly challenge the accuracy of the data from another metrics company, Ireland's StatCounter, which also publishes monthly browser share numbers.

Net Applications did not reply Sunday to questions about whether it revised its weighting formula last month, and if so, what impact that had on IE's share.

Microsoft mentioned the overall gains of IE in passing on Sunday, but as it's done for months, focused on increases of Internet Explorer 9 (IE9).

"We ... see great strides made against our core metric: IE9 against Windows 7," said Roger Capriotti, director of IE marketing, in a Sunday postto a company blog.

Almost since IE9's debut, Microsoft has ignored IE's aggregate performance -- which admittedly has been dismal until late -- and instead focused on the growth of its newest browser among Windows 7 users, a combination the company has regularly claimed is the only measurement that matters.

By Net Applications' numbers, IE9 accounts for 34.5% of the world's browsers used on that operating system, an increase of more than four percentage points from February, and owns a 48.9% share of the Windows 7 browser market in the U.S., a jump of 8.5 points.

The browser's global share of all operating systems, however, is significantly lower, at 15.2%, but even that was a bump of 2.6 percentage points, the largest single-month gain since IE9's March 2011 launch.

Other editions of Microsoft's browser didn't fare as well: IE8 lost 2.5 percentage points to fall to 25.4%, while IE7 dropped to 4.5%. IE6, the nearly 11-year-old browser that Microsoft has been trying to bury, stayed flat at 6.9%.

StatCounter, however, told a different tale.
The Irish company, which neither adjusts its statistics for each country's online population nor discards Chrome's pre-rendered pages, said that IE controlled 34.8% of the browser market, down nine-tenths of a point, while Chrome grew by more than a point to end March at 30.9%. Firefox, said StatCounter, remained stable at 25%.

Net Applications calculates browser usage share with data obtained from more than 160 million unique visitors who browse 40,000 Web sites that the company monitors. More browser share figures can be found on the company's site.