Server 2012 R2 RDS Farm RemoteApp not working externally

So, I've just had one of those RDS breakthroughs.

The domain is dedicated to RDS to host an application externally in Azure.

Two DC's Two RDHosts, where to put the Connection Broker and Gateway? The DC's obviously, right? Wrong!

It turns out after much troubleshooting that YOU CANNOT USE A DC FOR RD CONNECTION BROKER.

If only that was made clear.

Adobe Reader has stopped working - The exception unknown software exception (0x06d007e) occured in the application at location ox7c812afb

After upgrading Adobe Reader XI on a 2012 R2 RDS session host, Reader crashes with the following error.

"The exception unknown software exception (0x06d007e) occured in the application at location
ox7c812afb"


The solution is to disable Protected Mode in Reader, but as the app crashes you need to do this via the registry, create the following key.

Using Regedit browse to HKLM\Software\Policies\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\10.0\FeatureLockDown

Create a 32bit DWORD, Name: bProtectedMode Data: 0

Exchange 2010 Distribution Group Delegation

Run the following in Exchange Power Shell.

Add-ADPermission -Identity "Group Display Name" -User "User Display Name" -AccessRights WriteProperty -Properties "Member"

SBS2011 Essentials

Uh oh, you just added a user via Active Directory Users and Computers rather than SBS 2011 Dashboard. You've probably tried editing the ADSI properties without luck.

The essentials version of SBS allows home editions of Windows to be added so uses some new tricks, so the old way no longer works.

Heres how to add an AD user to SBS 2011 Essentials.

Browse to C:\Program Files\Windows Server\Bin
Double-click WssPowerShell.exe
At the prompt type import-wssuser and press enter, you'll be asked for the username, enter that and your user will become an SBS user.

I removed an RDS deployment then reinstalled and zombie apps are showing on RDWeb

Previously published RemoteApps can be removed from the RDWeb via regedit

HKLM\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ Windows NT\ CurrentVersion\ Terminal Server\ CentralPublishedResources\ PublishedFarms\ <RDSCollectionAlias>\ Applications

Simply delete the registry branch relating to the orphaned RemoteApp.


You can also enable or hide the full server desktop link from RDWeb via the 'ShowInPortal' key found in...
HKLM\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ Windows NT\ CurrentVersion\ Terminal Server\ CentralPublishedResources\ PublishedFarms\ <RDSCollectionAlias>\ RemoteDesktops\ <RDSCollectionAlias>

RDS 2012R2 'remoteapp publisher cannot be identified'

RDS allows you to change the published name of your server to match the installed certificate, this is useful when you use "split-brain" DNS (domain.local) internally.

The PowerShell command to use is:
Set-RDSessionCollectionConfiguration –CollectionName QuickSessionCollection -CustomRdpProperty "use redirection server name:i:1 `n alternate full address:s:host.example.co.uk"

Error when installing .net framework 3.5

You'll need your install media for this!

At an elevated command prompt, run the following command:
Dism /online /enable-feature /featurename:NetFx3 /All /Source:<drive>:\sources\sxs /LimitAccess

Note In this command, <drive> is a placeholder for the drive letter for the DVD drive or for the Windows 8 installation media or a shared folder containing the files.

For example, you run the following command:
Dism /online /enable-feature /featurename:NetFx3 /All /Source:D:\sources\sxs /LimitAccess

Quick VPN setup

Have you ever wanted to make it easy to copy or distribute VPN settings to users computers? Or even to make it easy to back up the settings?

How about a single file that contains all of your VPN's, can be copied to any windows PC, double-clicked and there are all your VPN's again?

Do this.
1, Right-click the desktop and select New/Text File.
2, Change the filename to VPNs.pbk and you are done!

Double-click the file and it should ask you to set up a VPN or dialup connection. You can add multiple connections to the same file and the properties button gives you access to the settings for the currently selected connection.

Email alerts from Windows Server Backup

If you attach a notification to Event ID 4 in the Windows-Backup Event Log, you can send yourself an email that the backup has completed successfully using mailsend.exe or similar in a script..

Log Name:      Microsoft-Windows-Backup

Source:        Microsoft-Windows-Backup

Event ID:      4

Task Category: None

Level:         Information

Keywords:      

User:          SYSTEM

Description:

The backup operation has finished successfully.

You can also attach to ID 49 and 19 to get a message that the backup has failed.

Working with Outlook Email Templates

Here's how to use Outlook Email templates without the fuss of reading about every feature available. ;)

To create a template save a normal email as filetype Template. You can then drag the file from Windows Explorer on to the Outlook icon on the taskbar to pin it to the jump list!

Open your pinned template by right-clicking the Outlook icon.

Not sure where your Enterprise CA is?

Open CMD and enter:

certutil -config - -ping

Managing Exchange 2010 External/Internal URL's via PowerShell - TechNet Articles - United States (English) - TechNet Wiki

Very useful.

Managing Exchange 2010 External/Internal URL's via PowerShell - TechNet Articles - United States (English) - TechNet Wiki: "get-webservicesvirtualdirectory"

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