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Orin Thomas

Email orin@windowsitpro.com

Orin Thomas is a contributing editor for Windows IT Pro and a Windows Security MVP. He has authored or coauthored more than a dozen books for Microsoft Press, and he writes the Hyperbole, Embellishment, and System Administration Blog.

Articles by Orin Thomas

Learn What System Center 2012 Operations Manager Can Do for You

System Center 2012 Operations Manager sends email notifications about the status of all the servers, services, devices, and applications in your environment or you can monitor them from a central console. Orin Thomas shares how easy it is to create monitors, set up rules, and receive alert notifications.

Understanding System Center 2012 Configuration Manager

Learn the basics of Microsoft’s solution for managing the configuration of client computers and devices.

Windows Server 2012: Making DHCP Highly Available

Windows Server 2012 simplifies and improves DHCP availability by introducing a DHCP failover feature to the DHCP role service.

Top 5 Roles for Deploying Windows Server 2012

Learn the necessary steps to deploy Windows Server 2012 as an Active Directory domain controller, as a file server, and as the host operating system for SQL Server 2012, Exchange Server 2013, and SharePoint 2013.

Comparative Review: Exchange Server e-Discovery

Sherpa Software's Discovery Attender and Quest Software's Archive Manager go beyond the basic e-discovery functionality offered in Exchange Server 2010.

System Center 2012 Suite

A major overhaul in the Microsoft System Center suite helps IT pros configure and manage applications, services, computers, and VMs.

Product Review: VMware Protect Essentials Plus

The capabilities of VMware vCenter Protect Essentials Plus go well beyond what's available in tools such as the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer (MBSA).

Understanding System Center Orchestrator 2012

Leverage System Center Orchestrator 2012 to automate day-to-day systems administration tasks. Orchestrator provides a simplified way of building complex automation.

Product Review: Enterprise Random Password Manager

Centralize—and improve—the management of privileged account passwords with this comprehensive tool, but be ready for a bit of culture shock.

Review: Dell KACE K2000

The Dell KACE K2000 is a OS deployment appliance supports both Mac OS and Windows OS images.

Comparative Review: Application Restriction Products 3

If you want to use application whitelisting as part of your organizational security strategy, and you’re looking for a product that offers more than Software Restriction Policies (SRPs) or AppLocker, consider using one of these application restriction products.

Solve 4 Common Patch Management Problems 5

Use these tips to help find which updates have been deployed, prevent update traffic from saturating WAN links, prevent end-user interruptions, and establish a group of update testers.

Falsification as a Troubleshooting Methodology

Rather than trying to prove your theory about what has gone wrong correct when diagnosing a problem, try to prove your theory incorrect.

How to Efficiently Search and Manage Event Log Data

You can configure Windows to help you deal with event log data and find events before they prove harmful.

Security Steps: Use AppLocker Policies to Block Solitaire 1

It has been suggested that the Solitaire application causes tens if not hundreds of hours of productivity to be lost across organizations on an annual basis. In this screencast you will learn how to disable Solitaire using AppLocker Policies.

IT/Dev Connections

Las Vegas
September 30th - October 4th

You'll have the opportunity to experience:
• The Microsoft
Technology Roadmap
• Office 365 Implementation
• Hyper-V Optimizing
• Windows 8 Deployment
and much more!

Come See Paul Thurrott & Rod Trent in Person!

Early Registration Now Open

Upcoming Training

Testing with Visual Studio 2012

The importance of testing is undeniable in the overall application lifecycle. We have all been in projects where testing is inadequate. The result is significant effort and cost to fix bugs that are introduced into production; not to mention the cost of a damaged reputation. Many times, institutions do not invest enough to comprehensively test an application at all levels. It is either seen as too costly or too time consuming.

Register Now

Current Issue

June 2013 - Systems administrators need to understand Window 8's new security features, including application containers, SmartScreen, and IE Enhanced Protected Mode.