How to export a list of users from an Active Directory group

Every now and then you will come across these little annoying problems while working with Active Directory, which should be easy to solve but requires special tools, for example, that there is no way to export all members of a group in Active Directory Users & Computers . That's when "dsquery" and "dsget" comes into the picture. Here is how to list all members of a particular group.

List all members of the group "MYGROUP":

dsquery group -name MYGROUP | DSGET group -members

You can always send the results to a text file by adding  "> mygroup-members.txt" in the end.

Shortcut key for new folder

Something that I have always missed in Windows Explorer, and today found out is that there is now a shortcut to create a new folder!

•  CTRL + Shift + N: Creates a new folder in Windows Explorer

Requires at least Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows 7.

Hidden computers in WSUS

Client machines created from an image with a duplicate client ID appears only once in the WSUS admin console. Each client must have a unique ID generated for each individual installation. WSUS admin console will display only one client for each unique ID. If you have multiple clients created from an image that share the same ID, only one appears in the WSUS admin console. All clients will check in and receive updates, but only one will appear and display the status in the WSUS admin console. In cases where clients do not check in, and they were created from an image, the following steps will restore the existing duplicate client ID.


a. Run regedit and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate
b. Delete the PingID, SUSClientID and the AccountDomainSID values
c. Stop and start the Wuauserv Service
d. From the command prompt run: wuauclt /resetauthorization /detectnow

Automatic creation of user folders for home, roaming profile and redirected folders

Every now and then I get the question: "how do you automatically create user home folder, roaming profile and/or redirected folders?". Luckily, Microsoft Directory Services team posted a very good article on this.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/askds/archive/2008/06/30/automatic-creation-of-user-folders-for-home-roaming-profile-and-redirected-folders.aspx

How to install network shared printer in Windows 7 without admin rights

In Windows XP, you can install a network printer as a "normal" user but not in Windows 7. Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 requires that the printer installation package is digitally signed or built into Windows. This means that most printers can not be added by a normal user without administrator rights on their computer. Microsoft has written an excellent article on how to make a Group Policy that allows ordinary users with Windows 7 to install the printer without having to be an administrator on their computer.


http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc753269.aspx

How to manage KMS activation in an environment with multiple domains

To successfully launch a KMS server is usually pretty straightforward, but if you have multiple domains that KMS server needs to handle. How do you do? That has Shariq Sheik written a good article about.

http://www.shariqsheikh.com/blog/index.php/201008/can-one-kms-server-activate-clients-in-multiple-domains/