Project Runspace

Book Review: Windows Server 2025 Administration Fundamentals, 4th Edition

Eric Siron — Tue, 29 Jul 2025 17:00:00 +0000

Project Runspace exists to help up-and-coming server administrators find their way in the world of IT. We welcome all work that forwards that goal. So, the title “Windows Server Administration Fundamentals” by Bekim Dauti caught our attention. I have read through the book and prepared a thorough review of its contents. Disclaimer: Packt Publishing offered …

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How to Install Windows Server 2025

Eric Siron — Tue, 04 Feb 2025 18:00:00 +0000

Most administrators don’t spend a significant portion of their careers installing operating systems (a good thing!). The activity sits at the foundation of our profession, however. From painful lessons learned from Windows installations in the 1990s, modern Microsoft operating system installers follow a minimalist philosophy. The process focuses on aspects that you cannot change later …

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Windows Admin Center v2 with Certificate Cannot Load Site

Eric Siron — Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:00:00 +0000

Microsoft released a substantially upgraded Windows Admin Center with build 2410. Microsoft has offset it as “v2”. You can read the release announcement on the Windows Admin Center blog. You can download Windows Admin Center from aka.ms/windowsadmincenter. This article explains how to fix a condition when you use a true PKI certificate and cannot access …

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Kernels, Shells, and Operating Systems (Re)Visited

Eric Siron — Tue, 20 Aug 2024 17:01:00 +0000

While recording a podcast episode in the wake of the 2024 Crowdstrike Incident, I spoke briefly about the reactions I had seen from the technical community. At that moment, I realized that, even though many of us treat the terms “kernel”, “shell”, and “operating system” as 101 level, basic, simple concepts, we should not. You …

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Commonly Misused IT Term: Deprecate

Eric Siron — Thu, 11 Jul 2024 17:00:00 +0000

When a company “deprecates” something, it means that they won’t put any more resources into developing it. They will usually continue to support it. Sometimes that support has a clear end date, sometimes it does not. As a fairly famous example, Microsoft deprecated the SNMP feature quite some time ago, but you can continue to …

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PowerShell Parameters: Combine Effects of Mandatory and Default Value

Eric Siron — Tue, 21 May 2024 17:00:00 +0000

Understand how PowerShell's ValidateNotNullOrEmpty combined with default values can address the shortcomings of Mandatory parameters.

Supercharge Powershell with Github Copilot

Eric Siron — Tue, 12 Mar 2024 17:00:00 +0000

Hey sysadmins! Do you want to automate more, but get bogged down in the time and complexity of bulletproof PowerShell scripting? After a period of skepticism and reading a lot of negative opinions on Copilot, I finally decided to try it out for myself. I discovered that you can’t simply allow it to go off …

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Understanding the Two Virtual Machine Licenses with Windows Server Standard

Eric Siron — Fri, 08 Mar 2024 18:00:00 +0000

Software licensing is a special form of awful that nearly rises to the frustration level of dealing with printers. Windows Server licensing pushes it even further. Virtual machine licensing in Windows Server takes it to an extreme. This topic has a lot to unpack, but I want to scope specifically down to the subtopic of …

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It’s OK to Like Light Mode

Eric Siron — Tue, 05 Mar 2024 18:00:00 +0000

Gatekeeping is one of the worst ills of the technology world. Someone with no authority finds an arbitrary reason to tell you that you’re not a “real” something, or they use it to try to shame you. For reasons that I certainly can’t explain, many people in tech love jumping on the bandwagon and gatekeeping …

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No, Hyper-V Is Not Dead

Eric Siron — Fri, 26 Jan 2024 18:00:00 +0000

(Somewhat) jokingly, I have long said that a certain company famous for virtualization has set a goal of bankrupting all its customers as its victory condition. That company was recently purchased (again), and the new owners promptly set about trying to prove me correct with massive price increases. As part of their campaign to do …

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