18 July 2017

Databasecopystatus unhealthy after installing Security update KB4018588 for Exchange 2013 CU16

I encountered another weird phenomenon after installing the security update KB4018588 for Exchange 2013 CU16.

Installed CU16 for Exchange 2013 on the active database servers and everything went fine, after that installed the security update and that went fine as well.
As a good admin I stopped the maintenace mode on the servers I updated, and checked the databasecopystatus. And there it was, all passive databasecopystatusses were failed.
After some digging around in found out that the searchhostcontroller service was disabled.
Now this service is turned on by default and should start automatically and takes care of Microsoft Exchange Search.

After setting the Microsoft Exchange Search Host service startup type as Automatic and restarting the Microsoft Exchange Search service the dabasecopystatus became healthy again.

13 July 2017

Largest FREE Microsoft eBook Giveaway 2017 - Download them all with PowerShell

It's the time of the year again!
Eric Ligman - the Director Sales Excellence at Microsoft has once again published a ton of free e-books.
This is the third year in a row he does this, and we get to benefit :-)
Like previous year there's no catch, just download and read your eyes out.

Small list of subjects what to expect:
  • Azure
  • Dynamics
  • Licensing
  • Office
  • Office365
  • PowerShell
  • SQL Server
  • System Center
  • Windows Clients
  • Windows Server
To download them all save this file as ".ps1"
2017 Free Ebook Collection

Run the script and the Ebooks will be downloaded to your Downloads\Free Ebooks 2017 folder.


I added the 2016 version as well:
2016 Free Ebook Collection
(Not all the links work anymore, so you might get some errors and 404's and 503's)

And here is the 2015 version:
2015 Free Ebook Collection
(Not all the links work anymore, so you might get some errors and 404's and 503's)

And 2014:
2014 Free Ebook Collection
(Not all the links work anymore, so you might get some errors and 404's and 503's)

There's a 2013 version as well, not downloadable by PowerShell and a bit to old but if you want some old reference material here is the website:
2013 Free Ebook Collection
And the 2012 website:
2012 Free Ebook Collection