2014 - A Passionated System Admin's Blog

How to check multiple Forward and Reverse DNS records in Powershell

Tired of spending hours manually querying DNS records? A few days ago, I had to query over 100 DNS records to determine if both forward and reverse records were working properly. Making the nslookup over 100 records is a time-consuming and daunting task for a system administrator. Therefore, I decided to write a powershell script to automate the job.

How to convert VDI to VMDK or VHD in easy way

While third-party tools like VMware Standalone Converter and Starwind V-2-V exist for converting VDI to VMDK or VHD, leveraging VirtualBox’s native capabilities offers a speedy alternative. You can follow our step-by-step guide, applicable to both Windows and Linux environments, and optimize your virtualization workflow effortlessly.
Go to virtualbox install directory in windows command prompt and type the following command.

VBoxManage.exe clonehd c:\DiskVirtualold-disk.vdi c:\DiskVirtualnew-disk.vmdk –format vmdk –type normal –variant standard

Now, you can attach the converted vdisk to the VM of your choice.

See the example screenshots below.

Powershell: Check the Internet Accessibility for Multiple Computers

Sometimes, you need to make sure all your servers have internet access or not, especially after network change or for monthly auditing purpose. With powershell, you can achieve this by using .Net call to sockets. And, I found the script on this site to work as a baseline and use Mr. stevethethread’s code to colorize the output. You will need to save the list of servers in Server.txt in the same directory as script, and change the port number in the script as needed. Continue reading “Powershell: Check the Internet Accessibility for Multiple Computers”

How to add missing windows services in WMI monitoring with Non-Administrator account

Update: The purpose in this blogpost is about giving permission of specific windows service to specific monitoring user. So, you can replace step-6 (setting DNS service permission to specific account that will monitor service) with easier methods in my new blog post.

There are three methods for monitoring windows servers:

By installing Agents (such as Zabbix,SCOM Agents).
SNMP v1,v2, v3 regardless of platforms.
WMI Monitor for windows servers.

And today, I’m going to make the WMI monitoring in a couple of steps, plus how to monitor the missing windows services that is unavailable in the default monitor method. Here, I’ll use the Microsoft DNS Server as a monitoring client for DNS Service + basic resource monitoring.

Continue reading “How to add missing windows services in WMI monitoring with Non-Administrator account”

PowerShell: Join Domain Users to Any Specific OU

I have been exploring ways to automate domain joining so that end-users can perform the process themselves without requiring specialized knowledge. Although I found several scripts online that accomplish this, none of them seem to be a comprehensive, all-in-one solution. Additionally, I want to avoid the practice of storing usernames and passwords in text files distributed to each user. Therefore, I decided to create a complete script to enable automatic domain joining for users.

Powershell: Find the Windows Service of a Running Process

Today, I need to find the registered services of some running processes & its installed path. Here we can use some third-party tools, such as Process Explorer, Process Hacker and find each process’s associated service. But, I want to use the built-in options, so WMI with Powershell is the way to go. I also checked the windows task manager and it only listed the service & it’s associated service name, not the process name. So, I need to do some scripting to get it through.

How to Enable PowerShell Remoting in Easy Way

Empower yourself with the ability to perform administrative tasks on multiple servers remotely, even while users are logged in or away. PowerShell remoting, available since PowerShell version 2 and above, opens up a world of possibilities for system administrators.

If you’re using Windows 7, 2008R2, or newer, PowerShell remoting is already at your fingertips. However, for legacy environments like Server 2003 and Windows XP, a few additional steps are required. You’ll need to install the Server 2003 Service Pack 2 and the Windows Management Framework.

How to stop unresponsive Windows Service

In windows system administration, understanding how to stop windows services which is not responding or hanged is a crucial skill. Whether you’re troubleshooting a misbehaving process or aiming to optimize system resources, knowing the ins and outs of service management can significantly impact your computing experience.

In this example, let’s forcefully stop the windows time service by killing the associated process.

Change grayed out Windows Service Startup Option

You might sometimes encounter grayed-out services, particularly in scenarios like antivirus programs where certain services are intentionally safeguarded against tampering for security purposes, can pose challenges in managing your system effectively. However, there are strategies you can employ to navigate this hurdle and regain control over these services.