Andreas M’s Windows Home Server AddIns

This new release of the Advanced Admin Console AddIn for Windows Home Server is now fully compatible with Internet Explorer 8 (previous versions were not). In order to achieve compatibility with IE8 some fundamental changes have been implemented under the hood. As a result, the Workgroup item is no longer available. To compensate this, access to the recycle bin has been added. There’s also a new “Launch Desktop” button, which when clicked launches a full Windows Desktop session. Make sure to logoff from the server when using this. You can either logoff from the WHS console or the start menu.

Another new feature is the integration of Windows Search. I consider this feature experimental. Please feel free to provide feedback on Windows Search integration in AAC.

Here’s a screenshot of AAC 0.5.0 running on Windows Home Server (Power Pack 2) with Internet Explorer 8 installed:

This version has been thoroughly tested on Windows Home Server (RTM, PP1, PP2, IE6, IE7, IE8).

Download Advanced Admin Console AddIn Version 0.5.0 Beta.

CRC-32 52180D53
   MD5 F2170EFD359C106A169862F3B68F0B4B
  SHA1 49376A6DD5256B2AD3AFCF59899341B6A6104206

Important: Before installing the new release, please UNINSTALL any previous version!

Feedback is welcome via Email, at the WeGotServed-Forums (english) or Home-Server-Forum (german).

Windows Home Server

As posted earlier this week, after installation of Internet Explorer 8 on Windows Home Server most of the functionality in the Advanced Admin Console AddIn is broken. If you have already IE8 installed on your WHS and want to uninstall it from within the Home Server Console by using AAC to get to the control panel then you’re stuck: AAC cannot take you there anymore, because IE8 prevents AAC from displaying the control panel (well, this is a little oversimplification – I will go into the technical details of the problem in another post soon).

You still have at least two options if you want to uninstall IE8:

Open a command prompt from within the Advanced Admin Console, then enter

RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL appwiz.cpl,,0

This will open the Add/Remove Programs control panel applet. There you can uninstall all IE8 updates (if any) and IE8 itself.

OR

follow Philip Churchills great walkthrough on mswhs.com. This guide will not only explain how to uninstall IE8 but also how to permanently prevent it from being installed automatically again.

Andreas M.

Windows Home Server

Internet Explorer 8 is currently being pushed to Windows Home Servers around the world. Unfortunately Advanced Admin Console will no longer work when IE8 is installed. I’m 99.9% sure that this is a bug in IE8 and I’ve already spent a lot of time to find a workaround to the problem. However, it seems there’s no way to make it work.
I have updated the Advanced Admin Console addin to version 0.4.4 0.4.5 Beta. With the new version installed, the Home Server Console will no longer crash when you click on an administrative item in Advanced Admin Console. Instead, a message will be displayed when IE8 or higher is detected.

To make it clear:

PLEASE DO NOT INSTALL Internet Explorer 8 on your Windows Home Server if you plan to use Advanced Admin Console.

Download Advanced Admin Console AddIn Version 0.4.4 0.4.5 Beta.

UPDATE: I’ve just released version 0.4.5 Beta. Version 0.4.4 did not display the IE8 incompatibility message in the correct language.

CRC-32 EC6A053D
   MD5 35967DAC1942451596DB337F250EA30E
  SHA1 4EDB92357FD5DE4EEBD6C0A92B4D8EAE96DB150B

Important: Before installing the new release, please UNINSTALL any previous version!

Feedback is welcome via Email, at the WeGotServed-Forums (english) or Home-Server-Forum (german).

Windows Home Server

This addin displays the complete system update history so that Windows Home Server owners can make sure their machine is fully patched and up to date.

This is what it looks like:

Updates can be listed in groups (grouped by installation date). The details panel shows descriptive information on the update selected in the list. For updates that contain a Microsoft Knowledgebase article id in their title a direct link to the respective article is provided.

You can review the Windows Update log file and the system event log from the toolbar. So in case an update installation failed you can easily access the logs to find out the reason for the failure.

Download Update History AddIn 0.2.0 Beta.

Have a lot of fun with this release. Feedback is welcome via Email.

Windows Home Server

As of January 2009 patch tuesday (27th), Microsoft finally started pushing the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 via Windows Update.
The package itsef has been around for some time but had to be deployed manually to end user machines/servers. It’s good to see that Microsoft is now automatically deploying it via Windows Update to every supported platform (Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Home Server) so that developers can make use of it without having to deploy it along with their applications.

So for new releases of my addins, the system requirements will read “Windows Home Server with all high-priority updates installed”.

Here’s a screenshot from the Microsoft Update Catalog:

Windows Home Server

If you want to give your Windows Home Server’s home page some personal touch, you can try changing the image files under c:\Inetpub (at your own risk, of course).

For example, I changed the file c:\Inetpub\home\images\i_landingpage_main.png so that it shows a picture of my Fujitsu-Siemens SCALEO Home Server.

Before:

After:

If you’re also a SCALEO home server user and want to use the same picture on your server’s home page, just download i_landingpage_main.png and put it in your server’s c:\Inetpub\home\images folder.

Instead of fiddling around in the c:\inetpub folder, you can simply use Andrew Grant’s WHIIST AddIn to change the picture.

Windows Home Server

When I started putting together my Windows Live Space keinplatz.spaces.live.com about a year ago I had no idea how long it would live. Since the Advanced Admin Console AddIn for Windows Home Server seems to be somewhat popular around Home Server owners, I have decided to launch this website dedicated to Windows Home Server AddIn development. All content and downloads have been moved over to this site, so please update your bookmarks, resubscribe to my RSS feed because some new and interesting stuff is coming up during the next couple of weeks.

I’m currently busy developing a new addin for Windows Home Server, but it’s still a little too early to talk publicly about it. I’m planning to give out a first beta preview version of it to a private group of testers. If you happen to have a large collection of cd/dvd disc image files (like .iso-images) stored on your Home Server I’d really appreciate if you would join the beta and give valuable feedback to influence further development.

Right now the software isn’t ready yet, but when the time comes I’ll be posting a call for beta testers here so stay tuned.

Andreas M.

Uncategorized

It’s been a long time since I last heard of an allegedly upcoming client side SDK for Windows Home Server. At PDC ‘08 the Windows Home Server Team will be giving a session called “Developing Connected Home Applications and Services for Windows Home Server”. The session description contains this line:

create and deploy a PC application for controlling the service

I hope this hints to the existence of a soon-to-be-released client side SDK for Windows Home Server.

UPDATE: Unfortunately there’s still no sight of the Client Side SDK. Maybe the Windows Home Server Team have canceled their plans for it

Here you can watch the PDC ‘08 session videos. CJ Saretto mentions in one of them that they do not offer any form of universal communication channel for client/server communication (to/from Windows Home Server) at all. Well, I’m too disappointed right now to look up the exact position in the video…

Windows Home Server

Da einige Besitzer eines Fujitsu-Siemens SCALEO HomeServers (darunter auch ich) die SCALEO PowerManagement-Oberfläche recht umständlich finden, wenn es darum geht mal eben einen Überblick über die eingestellten Betriebszeiten zu erhalten, habe ich ein kleines Tool geschrieben welches die PowerManagement-Einträge in einer einfachen Liste darstellt:

Um das Tool einzusetzen muss es auf dem SCALEO HomeServer unter C:\Programme\Windows Home Server abgelegt werden. Anschließend kann es mit der Advanced Admin Konsole gestartet werden.

Falls beim Start folgende Fehlermeldung erscheint, so liegt die ScaleoPMViewer.exe entweder nicht im korrekten Verzeichnis, oder es wurde versucht sie zu starten, obwohl das SCALEO PowerManagement nicht auf dem Server installiert ist.

Download ScaleoPMViewer.exe Version 0.0.1.0

CRC-32 409A8069
   MD5 3F58CB62504BB095859ADD67AD8CA45B
  SHA1 0090529FB3269BD602031B33FFF35419272C34BB

Windows Home Server

Die Berichte über Datenpannen bei Behörden und Unternehmen häufen sich in letzter Zeit. Man sollte denken dass dies zu einer gewissen Sensibilisierung führt, das trifft aber zumindest auf die MediaMarkt-Filiale, in der ich kürzlich (endlich!) meinen Fujitsu-Siemens SCALEO Home Server gekauft habe, nicht zu:

Da MediaMarkt offenbar vor einiger Zeit damit begonnen hat, die noch auf Lager befindlichen SCALEO Home Server abzuverkaufen, hat mir die hiesige Filiale das letzte Gerät (Ausstellungsstück) für EUR 499,- angeboten. Der Verkäufer versicherte mir, das Gerät am Vormittag noch einmal getestet zu haben, und dass es einwandfrei funktioniere. Ich nahm den Server also gleich mit und wollte ihn am Abend in mein Heimnetzwerk integrieren.
Dabei stand ich dann zunächst vor dem Problem, dass der Server bereits in Betrieb gewesen war und somit die Ersteinrichtung, die die Vergabe des Serverpassworts einschließt, bereits durchgeführt worden war. Der Kennworthinweis lautete “Name vom Gerät + 1″, aber damit kam ich erst einmal nicht weiter. Am nächsten Tag erfragte ich dann telefonisch (bei einem anderen Mitarbeiter) das Serverpasswort, welches er mir auch ohne Umschweife nannte. Es lautete “homeserver1″, worauf ich im Nachhinein auch selbst hätte kommen können.
Mit dem gültigen Passwort konnte ich mich nun also auf dem Server umsehen, und entdeckte gleich, dass der Server noch ein Backup von dem Client-PC enthielt, von dem aus der Server ursprünglich eingerichtet worden war:

Das machte mich dann neugierig. Ich habe also das vorhandene Backup geöffnet und mich ein bisschen auf Laufwerk C: des BENUTZER-PC umgesehen:

Ein T-Home Präsentationsvideo zum Thema “Entertain“.

Ein Musikalbum, das leider nicht ganz meinem Musikgeschmack entspricht.

Fotos, die einen Transportschaden an HP-Druckern dokumentieren.

  
Druckvorlagen für MediaMarkt-Preisschilder im Excel-Format.

FAZIT: Alles in allem waren keine Daten dabei, die in den Händen von Menschen mit ausreichend krimineller Energie dem Unternehmen hätten Schaden zufügen können. Dennoch halte ich es für höchst bedenklich, dass man die Daten nicht gelöscht hat, bevor man mir das Gerät ausgehändigt hat. Bei dem Verkäufer, der mir den Server verkauft hat, handelte es sich übrigens um den “Bereichsleiter neue Medien” (Der Link führt zu einem Jobangebot der MediaMarkt-Filiale Aschaffenburg und soll nur das Jobprofil dokumentieren Meinen Server habe ich dort NICHT gekauft!).

Was mich abschließend interessieren würde: Welche interessanten Daten habt ihr denn so auf Euren Ausstellungsgeräten gefunden?

Windows Home Server

So I’ll be heavily testing it for compatibility with my addins for the next couple of weeks.

Go get it from Microsoft Connect (you actually did register for the beta, right?)

Andreas M.

Windows Home Server

In this release the following changes have been made:

• New wizard for adding URL shortcuts
  This new wizard makes it easy to add URL shortcuts to the Advanced Admin Console toolbar. This way you can access the web configuration interface of other devices in your home network from within the WHS console.
• Shortcuts to folders and URL shortcuts are no longer opened in external windows. Hold the Shift key while clicking on a folder or URL shortcut  to open it in an external window.
• The tooltip of an URL shortcut displays the URL of the shortcut.
• Update availability notification
  An update notification bar is displayed in the Advanced Admin Console when an updated version is available. You can turn this feature off in the settings dialog.
• Setting for displaying the shutdown button removed from the settings dialog
  This setting was a leftover from an earlier build where the shutdown button was displayed in the toolbar. Since the shutdown button is now located in the status bar the setting became unnecesary.

Here’s a screenshot of the new settings dialog:
 

And this is what the URL shortcut wizard looks like:
 

When a new version of the Advanced Admin Console AddIn is released the following notification will be displayed:

Download Advanced Admin Console AddIn Version 0.4.3 Beta.

CRC-32 3FBE7E00
   MD5 6439A6F4B19352C1DA6A00B3739155A5
  SHA1 7F619197019ADF6134DCE75493EDF15CE833714F

Important: Before installing the new release, please UNINSTALL any previous version!

Have a lot of fun with this release. Feedback is welcome via Email, at the WeGotServed-Forums (english) or Home-Server-Forum (german).

Windows Home Server

In this release the following features have been added:

• New Statusbar displaying current folder location and server uptime
• Shutdown and minimize buttons in status bar
• New setting for enabling/disabling the display of the shutdown button

Here’s a screenshot of the new release:

The minimize button was added so you can minimize the console in case you have launched a program that sits in the background and is inaccessible to you. To get back to the console simply double-click the minimized window’s title bar.

Clicking the shutdown button in the status bar will bring up this enhanced Windows Home Server shutdown dialog:

The Advanced Admin Console adds a Log Off button to the shutdown dialog. It is useful if you connected to the console from a client computer and have started up a couple of programs from the Advanced Admin Console. Clicking the Log Off button will close the Windows Home Server Console and all programs that where launched from the console are closed as well. Please keep in mind that the enhanced shutdown dialog is only available from the Advanced Admin Console’s shutdown button in the status bar. The shutdown button from the settings dialog will still display the regular shutdown dialog.

Download Advanced Admin Console AddIn Version 0.4.0 Beta.CRC-32 7F1C49BC
   MD5 37F940924A1B3389E93D0FC55AC75ABB
  SHA1 20D51508B439EA3B146E64F4A2567EB5844D2A2F

Important: Before installing the new release, please UNINSTALL any previous version!

Have a lot of fun with this release. Feedback is welcome via Email, at the WeGotServed-Forums (english) or Home-Server-Forum (german).

Windows Home Server

With the download numbers being steadily high and the amount of user feedback declining, I can only assume that the HomeServer community’s interest in the Advanced Admin Console addin is unbroken and there are neither major bugs left nor are there any critical features missing.

As my conclusions are only based on non-feedback I ‘got’ during the last weeks, why don’t you do it just like Anonymous here and post your feature requests, bug reports or general feedback. In fact, doing so soon would be great because I’m currently preparing a new version of the Advanced Admin Console that will (optionally) have a shutdown button in the left corner of the toolbar, just as Anonymous requested.

This is what it will look like:

So you see, your feedback can have a direct impact on the next version.

If I won’t receive any feature requests until Microsoft’s release of Power Pack 1 for Windows Home Server I will consider the Advanced Admin Console ‘done’ and move on.

I’m looking forward to hearing your ideas about what still can be added/changed. But please keep one thing in mind: The Advanced Admin Console is a tool for advanced users and it’s goal is to make things easily and quickly accessible. Thus I won’t change anything that will bloat it or have negative impact on it’s main use.

If you prefer to share you opinions in the forums rather than commenting on this blog-post, here’s your place to go: WeGotServed-Forums (english) or Home-Server-Forum (german). Of course you can also email me.

Andreas M.

Windows Home Server

A minor bug has been fixed: The navigation buttons stopped working or were disabled.

Download Advanced Admin Console AddIn Version 0.3.2 Beta.CRC-32 9AB2BF7C
   MD5 226DDA077974DFEDFACC90B460F6EA9F
  SHA1 B43A5C64B1C52AB842D86472D1553413CF5CEBE2

Important: Before installing the new release, please UNINSTALL any previous version!

Windows Home Server