Cloned computer missing from WSUS

When you count your computers in Active Directory and compare it to computers in Windows Server Update Services, you probably see a difference. In my case I saw several computers missing in WSUS. After investigating, I realized that those computers were cloned.

In administrative PowerShell window on WSUS server computer I checked, that the computer really doesn’t exist:

Get-WsusComputer –NameIncludes PartOfYourComputerName | ft -a

Actually you don’t need to sysprep those working systems. All you need is following four lines (in web browser they will wrap to a little more lines) running in administrative command prompt on WSUS client computer:

net stop wuauserv
REG DELETE "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate" /v SusClientId /f
wuauclt /resetauthorization /detectnow
wuauclt /reportnow

And almost instantly you can see this computer appear on WSUS management:

Outlook 2013 one year limit for item searching

If you are used to Outlook 2010 searching experience, then the first thing you notice in Outlook 2013 is, that the search gives you only up to 1 year old results with the text “Showing recent results…”. When you click “More”, then older stuff will be searched from Exchange Server. Actually full timeframe search will be carried out and local cache is not used.

So we used local computer power to search something and then again Exchange Server resources to search again. It seems a wasteful way to search things.

This search limit is there because Outlook 2013 stores only 1 year old items in local copy of the mailbox (.OST file). Luckily this behavior can be customized in mail profile. Following procedures are with keyboard shortcuts. If you find some of them useful, you can leave a comment on this blog entry.

1. Open Control Panel (Press Win+R, type “control”, press Enter)
   
2. In the search box type “mail” (in Windows 8 the cursor is automatically in search box), wait for search results to appear, then hit TAB so that the Mail icon text is highlighted and press Enter.
   
3. Mail Setup windows appears. Press Enter or Space to press the selected “E-mail Accounts…” button.
   
4. In Account Settings window press ALT+A to press the “Change…” button
   
5. Move the slider from 12 months to the rightmost option “All”. Hit 3 times TAB and press END.
   
6. Close all opened windows. Press 2 times Enter (Next and Finish) and then 3 times ALT+F4 (Closes active window).

Close and open Outlook. Wait for entire mailbox to be synchronized and enjoy fast local search. And you can search everything offline too.

System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012 SP1

When you install System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012 SP1 on your administrative Windows 8 workstation, you will get the following error message:

Console Add-ins Warnings and Errors
The following warnings and error were encountered while loading console add-ins.

Could not update managed code add-in pipeline due to the following error:

Access to the path 'C:\Program Files\Microsoft System Center 2012\Virtual Machine Manager\Bin\AddInPipeline\PipelineSegments.store' is denied

When you start your console as administrator, you don’t receive the error message.

Easiest thing to do is to open the following folder in windows explorer:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft System Center 2012\Virtual Machine Manager\Bin\AddInPipeline

You will get the prompt about not having permissions on that folder. Press Continue.

And voila! Your “Virtual Machine Manager Console” will open after that trick without any errors.