IT Operations

October Patch Tuesday grounds JET Database Engine flaw

Administrators have a relatively light workload for October Patch Tuesday, but IT workers should pay attention to multiple workstation fixes and issues with older patches. Continue Reading

By

• Kristen Gloss

Tap the Chocolatey package manager to usher in Windows DevOps

Create a Chocolatey package with this tutorial on DevOps for Windows. Simplify package management and installation, and swap the GUI for a CLI client. Continue Reading

By

• Dan Franciscus

Make IT infrastructure documentation a regular task

Even though documenting IT processes might not be at the top of an admin's to-do list, they should not let it fall by the wayside. Learn documentation best practices here. Continue Reading

By

• Adam Fowler

Users mull Ansible Tower features' config management controls

Ansible users know their way around a CLI, but some envision an all-inclusive IT automation platform based on the Ansible Tower management console UI and features. Continue Reading

By

• Meredith Courtemanche, Director of Editorial Training

Automated root cause analysis moves into the mainstream

DevOps monitoring tools that offer automated root cause analysis are now in production within mainstream enterprises. When it comes to their ease of use, however, there is still room to improve. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Get to know the Hyper-V processor compatibility mode feature

Hyper-V processor compatibility is relatively easy to use, but it disables some advanced CPU features and is only intended for specific circumstances on a temporary basis. Continue Reading

By

• Brien Posey

Ansible roadmap steers toward network, security via integrations

Through simply written automation and granular access control, Ansible will attempt to put networking and security teams in step with IT infrastructure and DevOps counterparts. Continue Reading

By

• Meredith Courtemanche, Director of Editorial Training

Getting started with AWS Tools for PowerShell

Want to make a move from on-premises systems? The AWS Tools for PowerShell module builds on your knowledge of handling Windows machines and carries it into the Amazon cloud. Continue Reading

By

• Dan Franciscus

Incorporate NIST security and virtualization recommendations

Review NIST virtualization security recommendations with this overview of hypervisor security guidelines, including tips on VM lifecycles and hypervisor platform management. Continue Reading

By

• Robert Sheldon

Tame the virtualization infrastructure management beast

IT administrators must manage virtual infrastructure requirements, such as patches, reboots and component lifecycles, to create and maintain an efficient data center. Continue Reading

By

• Nick Moore, Assistant Site Editor

Understand how Docker works in the VM-based IT world

With advantages for microservices architectures, disaster recovery and utilization density, among other areas, containers should step out from virtual machines' shadow. Continue Reading

By

• Clive Longbottom

Compare Go vs. Python for infrastructure programming

Both code languages get the infrastructure-as-code job done, but each from a different angle. This comparison tutorial puts their similarities and differences center stage. Continue Reading

By

• Walker Rowe

Kubernetes TLS tweaks whet user appetite for easier management

Kubernetes TLS bootstrap improvements in version 1.12 tackle container management complexity, and users hope there's more where that came from. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

How to compare Windows and Linux for enterprise workloads

How do Windows and Linux rank when it comes to running production workloads? Organizations should consider more than just the initial cost. Continue Reading

By

• Brian Kirsch, Milwaukee Area Technical College

CloudBees sets a path to Cloud Native Jenkins

CloudBees advanced its core CI/CD platform to broaden developers' options to create apps and access additional services in the cloud. Continue Reading

By

• Darryl K. Taft

Is 'Continuous Delivery with Docker and Jenkins' right for you?

If your IT organization is ready to bring DevOps from mindset to tool set, containers and CI/CD are probably on the agenda. See what you'll learn from Rafal Leszko's book on Docker and Jenkins to advance a pipeline project. Continue Reading

By

• Adam Bertram

Top five SCVMM 2016 features to look out for

SCVMM 2016 provides new features, such as Nano Server management, and enhancements to existing networking and security features to better manage the entire virtualization stack. Continue Reading

By

• Nirmal Sharma

Design a custom Hyper-V Integration Services component

The steps for creating a new component of Hyper-V Integration Services include registering an app, creating and binding a Hyper-V socket, and compiling server and client apps. Continue Reading

By

• Nirmal Sharma

Windows Admin Center unlocks Server 2019 features

Not just for troubleshooting, Windows Admin Center helps admins unlock the full potential of the latest Windows Server offering. Continue Reading

By

• Tom Walat, Editor

Grasp container basics to plan enterprise adoption

To transition from virtualization that mimics hardware to a new level of portable, isolated workloads, absorb key tenets of containers and where container deployment differs from VMs and cloud instances. Continue Reading

By

• Tom Nolle, Andover Intel

How to drive an effective DevOps for business approach

Don't adopt DevOps for the sake of operational and development efficiency. Do DevOps because it yields business gains. In fact, what you should be doing is BizDevOps. Continue Reading

By

• Clive Longbottom

Docker for Windows shows permission errors on shared volumes

Understand and work around one of the more common Docker for Windows errors -- permissions for shared volumes -- to read, write and execute to the shared volume. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Mulling a public folders migration? Weigh your options

Should you stay or should you migrate? Microsoft offers a bevy of alternatives to public folders. This tip breaks down each option to help you make a decision. Continue Reading

By

• Reda Chouffani, Biz Technology Solutions

Use nested virtualization to run a container in a VM

IT administrators should familiarize themselves with the benefits and limitations of using nested virtualization to run containers in VMs before implementation. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Jenkins on Kubernetes is promising, but integration needs work

Jenkins and Kubernetes are a natural fit for automated application development and delivery, and the open source community has plans to improve how Jenkins runs on containers. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

A fine-tuned change request template minimizes user discontent

Change management is an essential ITSM practice, but it doesn't have to come at the expense of end users. Use templates to clarify expectations and set changes in motion without disruption. Continue Reading

By

• Adam Fowler

Is your VM frozen? Isolate the cause and problem solve

Many issues cause VMs to become unresponsive, including invoking particular tasks, such as snapshots or migrations, resource configuration and infrastructure unavailability. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Common VM network latency causes explained

There are many potential causes of network performance problems when it comes to VMs. Familiarize yourself with the most common causes to aid in troubleshooting. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Use VMware vSphere templates to manage VMs at scale

VM templates in vSphere enable IT administrators to manage large environments by rapidly deploying fully configured VMs using the content library interface. Continue Reading

By

• Stuart Burns

CloudBees Core sets its sights beyond enterprise Jenkins

CloudBees and its competitors vie to offer the visibility and data-driven performance measurement into CI/CD processes that enterprises need to strive for better DevOps governance. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

What are the steps for an Exchange certificate renewal?

An expired Exchange 2010 certificate is one of those issues that catches everyone's attention. Check and replace certificates with these basic commands. Continue Reading

By

• Edward van Biljon, Global Micro Solutions

DevOps security takes on the dark side of digital transformation

Without better organizational discipline, digital businesses are at risk for massively disruptive data breaches and attacks. Can DevSecOps transform IT in time to avert disaster? Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Create VM templates without encountering errors

Creating a VM template is a fairly straightforward process. Even so, it's a good idea to familiarize yourself with Microsoft's documentation to avoid common mistakes. Continue Reading

By

• Brien Posey

The journey to DevOps starts with solving problems

If you want to do DevOps, don't just follow the prescribed strategies and roadmaps that other companies lay out. Assess your own process, and start addressing your own problems. Continue Reading

By

• Rob J. Lambert, Cultivated Management

How to achieve application performance improvement in ops

With more complex infrastructure and applications comes increased need for sophisticated performance monitoring and management tools, accompanied by strengthened processes. Continue Reading

Explore the Cubic congestion control provider for Windows

Microsoft made Cubic the default congestion control provider for Windows 10 and plans to do the same for Windows Server 2019. Learn what this means for your organization. Continue Reading

By

• Brien Posey

IT experts exchange container security tips and caveats

Real-world container security requires users to dig in to the finer points of container, host, Kubernetes and application configurations. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Mix test and production environments with hyper-convergence

Despite the enhanced separation that hyper-converged infrastructure can offer, it's better to mix environments and use rules to create a hardware-independent workload balance. Continue Reading

By

• Brian Kirsch, Milwaukee Area Technical College

Adopt the Git version control system for configuration as code

Configuration files define infrastructure as code, which enables IT admins to control updates and enforce standardization. Start using a version control system to codify configurations with just a handful of commands. Continue Reading

By

• Stuart Burns

Microsoft shuts down zero-day exploit on September Patch Tuesday

Administrators should prioritize patching systems affected by four public disclosures resolved by the Patch Tuesday updates. Continue Reading

By

• Kristen Gloss

PagerDuty incident response tools loop in business stakeholders

PagerDuty follows Atlassian with incident response tracking for corporate management, while IT pros on the front lines of incident triage also seek enhancements to low-level alerting configurations. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Anomaly detection methods unleash microservices performance

When distributed applications run in containers, admins suddenly have a whirlwind of metrics to track instead of just a short list. These methods reach into the heart of the task. Continue Reading

By

• Kurt Marko, MarkoInsights

The future of composable infrastructure and virtualization

Composable infrastructures -- frameworks of compute, storage and network resource services -- will still make use of virtualization to run applications. Continue Reading

By

• Robert Sheldon

Microsoft Ignite 2018 conference coverage

Keep up to date on the latest developments from the Microsoft Ignite 2018 conference and get a closer look at the latest software and hardware offerings from the company. Continue Reading

Create and configure a shielded VM in Hyper-V

In just a few easy steps, including installing a Host Guardian Service server and creating certificates, you can shield a Hyper-V VM to protect it against access or tampering. Continue Reading

By

• Brien Posey

Windows troubleshooting tools to improve VM performance

Fine-tune virtualized workloads and diagnose performance issues with help from these Windows troubleshooting tools every server administrator should know. Continue Reading

By

• Brian Kirsch, Milwaukee Area Technical College

How does AD DS differ from Microsoft Azure Active Directory?

On-premises Active Directory or Azure AD? It doesn't have to be an either/or situation, as more cloud services are making their way into traditional data center environments. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Rev up IT with continuous delivery and DevOps

IT operations is on the software team with continuous delivery, continuous deployment and DevOps. Done right, the collaboration in tools and culture produces better software faster than previous methodologies. Continue Reading

Atlassian shops size up OpsGenie buy, Jira for incident management

Atlassian snapped up OpsGenie and rolled out Jira Ops as part of a shift in focus to IT incident management. Users will follow the strategy cautiously. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Build a secure Docker host environment on Linux systems

In the cutting-edge technology world of containers, don't lose sight of the fundamental security best practices that protect workloads and minimize attack surfaces. Continue Reading

By

• Stuart Burns

Learn the tricks for using Microsoft Teams with Exchange

As Microsoft Teams gains prominence for business collaboration, administrators should investigate the integration options with their Exchange Online or on-premises Exchange setup. Continue Reading

By

• Neil Hobson

Third-party Kubernetes tools hone performance for database containerization

Kubernetes tools look to carve out a market niche in database containerization with performance monitoring and quality-of-service management features. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Kubernetes community takes over massive Google test bed

Google will donate $9 million in GCP resources and undergo a three-year handoff process to put a massive Kubernetes test bed under CNCF control. Users wonder, what happens next. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Application performance metrics and tools fit for modern architectures

Distributed applications and cloud hosting have led to new application interactions and KPI categories -- and different performance concerns need different metrics. Continue Reading

By

• Alan R. Earls

Get into DevOps with cross-functional skills and culture

There's no well-traveled path to a DevOps career. But it's not rocket science. Learn how to explain DevOps and master skills, such as CI/CD, and you'll be on your way. Continue Reading

By

• Aymen El Amri

Open source hypervisor technical support, update considerations

Even though open source software itself is completely free to obtain and use, effective hypervisor technical support options for production environments might cost money. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Build an IT maintenance plan around infrastructure needs

Don't delay maintenance reboots. It's easy to forget to reboot hosts, tools and drivers, so use a reboot schedule to ensure your infrastructure remains functional. Continue Reading

By

• Brian Kirsch, Milwaukee Area Technical College

Free Kubernetes security tools broaden enterprise choices

Kubernetes security tools give enterprise IT shops strategic approaches to container security that go beyond shoring up individual container instances. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

VMware vSphere update tweaks HTML5 client, bundles AppDefense

Hoping to keep its broad base of vSphere users engaged, VMware debuted an updated version of the virtualization offering and a version bundled with AppDefense. Continue Reading

By

• Ed Scannell, Freelancer

Is the XenServer hypervisor worth the cost?

There is a free, easy-to-obtain version of Citrix XenServer, but additional features and commercial support from Citrix -- which some shops might need -- require a license. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Continuous delivery pipeline tools build IT efficiency

The range of CD tools available is as varied as the organizations that need them. Choose between three primary tool set constructions to suit your organization's structure. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Evaluate Oracle VM Server as a potential hypervisor

Oracle VM provides useful features such as high availability and live migration, but it's important for admins to size the server for the workloads it's intended to host. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

The DevOps hiring process should be audition-based

How do we ensure competence? Certification is now a big business, but the way we test a 6 year old should differ from the way we test a doctoral candidate or DevOps engineer. Continue Reading

By

• Bob Reselman, CogArtTech

Red Hat Virtualization hypervisor adoption considerations

IT admins considering Red Hat Virtualization might inadvertently overlook certain system requirements or forget to consider whether they need support. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Most jobs in the IT industry pay well, but skills matter

A survey of tech professionals identified which IT skills are most in demand. Find out how salaries compare from region to region, and how expertise affects compensation. Continue Reading

By

• Phil Sweeney, Industry Editor

Emotional intelligence in the workplace makes a difference

Technologists need to know people as well as they know their craft. Applying emotional intelligence in the workplace helps convey ideas and change organizations. Continue Reading

By

• Theresa Neate

Big data processing could be the way all data is processed

Some organizations take their time with new technologies to let first adopters suffer the growing pains. But there's no treading water in the big data stream; the current won't wait. Continue Reading

By

• Mike Matchett, Small World Big Data

Benefits of infrastructure as code range from speed to scaling

Provisioning large numbers of servers takes time. One of infrastructure as code's benefits is that once you declare a desired state, code maintains that environment with ease. Continue Reading

By

• Alan R. Earls

PowerShell logging boosts security in the enterprise

Want to track any suspicious PowerShell activity across your network? Use these PowerShell logging techniques to curb potential threats that originate from scripts. Continue Reading

By

• Dan Franciscus

Understand Active Directory basics for enterprise success

You can't get the most out of a tool unless you understand its features. This tip explains the basics of Active Directory and how it controls access and maintains order. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Big data processing could be the way all data is processed

 Continue Reading

Benefits of infrastructure as code range from speed to scaling

 Continue Reading

Most jobs in the IT industry pay well, but skills matter

 Continue Reading

Emotional intelligence in the workplace makes a difference

 Continue Reading

Microservices challenges fluster even the sharpest IT shops

Freed from the needs of a large and traditionally structured application, a development team working in the microservices architecture builds apps via services that can be more easily isolated, manipulated, updated and fixed. Still, developers and IT professionals should expect to encounter some microservices challenges as they make the switch.

One of the reasons IT organizations turn to the microservices architecture is to free themselves of the many unavoidable burdens inherent in monolithic applications. When done well, building in modules can greatly ease those burdens.

Among the biggest microservices challenges is the need to resist those habits formed when working in more traditional architectures. Those bygone ideas simply won't mix with the requirements of microservices. Mistakes and those old ways of thinking will get in the way of results and possibly even sink a microservices project.

Dependencies and configurations are too easily mishandled -- especially if development teams approach them with traditional and outdated IT mindsets. Some organizations will stumble in their microservices efforts by creating a microservice that's simply too small for the task at hand; others will encounter trouble by building them too large.

There is plenty that can go wrong when you are getting started in microservices. Bad things will result not necessarily from technical failings, but from a failure of imagination and plain old inertia. Applying the wrong thinking to microservices is, in effect, how an organization inadvertently sabotages an initiative.

TechTarget's Jan Stafford delves into these microservices challenges with her feature story in this issue of Modern Stack. She talks with experts about where these projects go wrong and how the missteps can be avoided.

Also in the new Modern Stack are features and columns that explore the role emotional intelligence plays in organizational change, how geography and specialty affect a tech worker's salary, why infrastructure as code deserves a closer look, how advances in big data may punish those who wait too long to get started, and why the pace of cloud innovation may begin to slow as hyperscale providers focus more on keeping their enterprise customers happy.

 Continue Reading

How a domain-specific language affects configuration management

Learn a domain-specific language -- it's easier than French! A DSL's programming style enables administrators to operate with more precision and flexibility, but don't write off YAML yet. Continue Reading

By

• Walker Rowe

SCVMM PowerShell commands for server health checks

Perform regular SCVMM health checks -- such as monitoring clustered shared volume utilization and host participation in SCVMM placement -- using simple PowerShell commands and scripts. Continue Reading

By

• Nirmal Sharma

Identify mutable and immutable infrastructures in action

Change is constant in app code, server configuration and VM security policies alike. IT orgs enforce consistency while embracing change with immutable infrastructure. So what does it look like? Continue Reading

By

• Emily Mell, Former Site Editor

Let's develop best practices for security in DevOps

We've turned to DevOps and microservices because they've made it faster and easier to release and update applications. It's past time we developed security practices for them. Continue Reading

By

• Clive Longbottom

IT incident management best practices -- and myths that scare you away

When IT activity inevitably goes awry, admins need to know the best course of action to take to ensure accountability, efficiency and accuracy -- and not get lost in myths. Continue Reading

By

• Adam Fowler

XCP-ng offers new hypervisor option for cost-conscious shops

A new open source fork of Citrix XenServer includes many features proprietary hypervisors offer, but it's not likely to displace market leaders any time soon. Continue Reading

By

• Stuart Burns

August Patch Tuesday closes CPU bug, two zero-day exploits

Administrators have their work cut out for them, with more than 60 vulnerabilities to handle for August Patch Tuesday, after reeling from the effects of a bad batch of July updates. Continue Reading

By

• Kristen Gloss

Set up Office 365 alerts to keep threats at bay

Office 365 offers administrators integrated tools to warn the IT staff about potential attacks or breaches of conduct. Find out what the options are and how to configure them. Continue Reading

By

• Steve Goodman, Content and Code

Network capacity planning in the age of unpredictable workloads

When you manage network spaces carefully and make informed choices, the flexible, easily scaled workloads of distributed public and hybrid cloud applications become manageable. Continue Reading

By

• Tom Nolle, Andover Intel

Manage VMM library servers with PowerShell

Using PowerShell commands can save you time when searching for all the shares on a VMM library server, exporting and importing VMM library resources, and checking for VMM templates. Continue Reading

By

• Nirmal Sharma

Troubleshoot common VM live migration errors

VM live migration errors in Hyper-V include connection issues, virtual switch mismatches and incompatible hardware. Learn more about these common errors and how to resolve them. Continue Reading

By

• Brien Posey

AIOps platforms delve deeper into root cause analysis

AIOps tools offer fresh insights into the root cause of IT incidents, triangulating between application outages, code changes and infrastructure issues. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Adopt these continuous delivery principles organization-wide

Follow these principles to advocate for, adopt and adapt continuous delivery. The work won't always be easy, but well-conceived continuous delivery pays off for everyone involved. Continue Reading

By

• Adam Bertram

Should you virtualize an edge computing server?

The need to pack a lot of compute power into a small package leaves many wondering whether containers and serverless frameworks could replace virtualization at the edge. Continue Reading

By

• Robert Sheldon

Application performance tuning tips and tricks

Tune hardware, resource allocations and prioritizations to make applications perform their best. Just don't do it without tracking the results. Continue Reading

By

• Brian Kirsch, Milwaukee Area Technical College

Write cloud-config automation scripts into the configuration file

Bypass the need for excess infrastructure, and put off the automation languages seminar -- you need to configure the cloud now. Fortunately, you can still do that. Continue Reading

By

• Stuart Burns

Enterprise IT struggles with DevOps for mainframe

Mainframe automation tools are nascent, and many mainframe experts are reluctant to embrace DevOps. But large enterprises must address legacy platforms to realize app delivery goals. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

SCVMM vs. Hyper-V Manager: Which tasks are best suited to each?

Although SCVMM offers capabilities far exceeding those of Hyper-V Manager, Hyper-V Manager has the advantage of being simpler to use and not requiring an additional license. Continue Reading

By

• Brien Posey

IT pros debate upstream vs. packaged Kubernetes implementations

As IT vendors race to package Kubernetes implementations, their fiercest competition is not from other vendors, but from pure upstream code and DIY container orchestration projects. Continue Reading

By

• Beth Pariseau, Senior News Writer

Support a guest security policy with endpoint hardening

Guest security relies not only on a series of tools and best practices, but also on a security mindset that starts with endpoint hardening and follows the deployment of every VM. Continue Reading

By

• Brian Kirsch, Milwaukee Area Technical College

Can container communication cross over to noncontainerized apps?

Can an application have Python as a container, run SQL queries on an external Microsoft SQL database and publish the results on an Apache web server container? Continue Reading

By

• Chris Moyer, ACI Information Group

Words to go: Incident management KPI categories

Because incident management is a vital task for IT operations departments, admins need a way to measure its success. This list of KPIs offers a good place to start. Continue Reading

By

• Emily Mell, Former Site Editor

Top continuous delivery benefits and how to get them

Continuous delivery doesn't come without challenges -- like getting every disparate IT team on board -- but its list of perks makes the entire process worthwhile. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor

Find the ideal incident management automation tool or tools

Unless the data center floods or a digger cuts a network cable, incident management takes place via software tools. The quality of these tools determines how quickly work can resume. Continue Reading

By

• Clive Longbottom

How do you decide to scale up or scale out a workload?

Scaling up or scaling out is not a decision to be made lightly. Use monitoring data to determine the strategy that fits your use case and to inform future decisions. Continue Reading

By

• Stephen J. Bigelow, Senior Technology Editor