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Digital Decor - Digital Pocket Viewer - How to get it to work (DPCI: 056-13-0705) (ASIN: B001GN416O) (Catalog #: 11018416) by jnelson

OVERVIEW So, it's Christmas time and you've either just received or just given the perfect $20 gift, a digital pocket viewer like the one from Digital Decor that you can find at Target DPCI: 056...
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Calculate a client's subnet mask when defining subnet boundaries (using BITWISE AND "&" in SQL) by jnelson

OVERVIEW I was recently pointed to Jeff Gilbert's blog where he has an article on determining a client's subnet mask and using them in subnet boundaries. http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/jgilbert...
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WQL - Using the bracket wildcard to match a range of version numbers (MNSCUG) by jnelson

At the Minneapolis area System Center User Group meeting last night, I mentioned the notion of using LIKE and the bracket wildcard [] to match a range of version numbers (which incidentally works for versions...
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SMS 2003 - SQL to compare software on two systems by jnelson

OVERVIEW You want to look at the difference in software between 2 computers, but you either don't have Desired Configuration Management (DCM) implemented, or you'd rather just compare the software...
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SMS 2003 - What do those C054 columns mean in reports? (Localized Name Lookup) by jnelson

If you look at certain pre-canned reports that come with SMS 2003, you'll notice some of them have wierd column names like C054, but show up in the report output as "Operating System". The...
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SMS 2003 - Query to pull logged on user records from all sources by jnelson

I was trolling the forums lately on MyITForm.com and was reading some conversations about logged on user records. It made me think of all the sources where you could get that information. Off the top of...
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SQL/WQL Tip - How to escape special SQL/WQL wildcard characters like % _ by jnelson

THE PROBLEM You've written a SQL query or a WQL query (like an SMS/CM collection query) and you need to look for a string that has a percent % or underscore _ in it. The problem is, those characters...
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SMS/SCCM vs Promisec Spectator - Part 2 of 2 (The rebuttal) by jnelson

If you read my previous post on the blood-boiling comparison between SMS/SCCM & Promisec Spectator, you've likely developed all kinds of responses in your head about how they're so wrong on...
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SMS/SCCM vs Promisec Spectator - Part 1 of 2 (Their Comparison) by jnelson

If you're an SMS or SCCM guy and you want to get your blood boiling, just look at this writeup the people at Promisec created that compares SMS to their Promisec Spectator. I mean no disrespect to...
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SQL 2005 Security - Revoke EXECUTE rights for PUBLIC on (potentially) unsafe extended stored procedures by jnelson

Where I work, we have an amazing crew of security architects and analysts who have decades of experience in all things security. Sure, at times they may seem paranoid, but that's just because they've...
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SMS/SCCM & Batch Files - Important notes on running .BAT files from UNC in SMS/SCCM by jnelson

THE PROBLEM When you run a .BAT file from a UNC path, the first thing you might notice is the warning about "UNC paths are not supported. Defaulting to the Windows Directory" All this really...
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Troubleshooting 301 - Finding a needle (bad program) in a haystack (list of 150 programs) in 7 tries. by jnelson

THE PROBLEM Stay with me on this one, I think it's a concept that every techie should understand and use at some point in their careers. The problem goes like this: There's one program somewhere...
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SMS Web Report (SQL 2005+) - Show SMS program execution chaining hierarchy visually using CTE (Common Table Expressions) in SQL 2005+ by jnelson

In response to a request on the forums, here's a SQL query that uses common table expressions (CTE) to visually return the program execution chain hierarchy. (something like this) 00000000 - ProgramA...
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SMS 2003 - Verify WMI Stability Backport on Windows XP/Server 2003 with this report SQL (deploy to them with this collection query WQL) by jnelson

BACKGROUND (click HERE to skip to the summary) I've been looking into our client health a lot deeper recently and something that I keep coming back to is how fragile WMI seems. After some great conversations...
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SCCM 2007 - SCCM Permissions Matrix by jnelson

This SQL query pulls all SCCM permissions for each user and displays them in a matrix. Put this into an SCCM Web report. This should work for SQL 2000, SQL 2005 and higher. SELECT UCP.UserName, SO.ObjectName...
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SMS 2003 - SMS Permissions Matrix by jnelson

This SQL query pulls all SMS permissions for each user and displays them in a matrix. Put this into an SMS Web report. This should work for SQL 2000, SQL 2005 and higher. SELECT UCP.UserName, SO.ObjectName...
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M@d Skillz - SMS Status Messages - ASP to show all MessageIDs and their meanings by jnelson

THE PROBLEM So I'm digging through the SMS status message views (v_StatusMessage, v_StatMsgAttributes, v_StatMsgInsStrings, v_StatMsgModuleNames) to find some pretty specific data to do my job, but...
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M@d Skillz - Use data outside the SMS DB in your SMS Web Reports by jnelson

OVERVIEW (note: this is written with SMS 2003 & SQL 2005 in mind because that's the environment I'm in right now, but I believe if the equivalent work was done in SCCM or in SQL 2000, the outcome...
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VBScript - (UPDATED) Script to export SMS Web report results to an Excel spreadsheet by jnelson

BACKGROUND In a previous post I created a VBScript in response to a discussion in the forums where somebody wanted to automatically run a report once per month and was looking for ideas. I wrote a first...
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SMS 2003 Performance - The performance benefits of an x64 DP in a busy SMS 2003 hierarchy by jnelson

QUICK BACKGROUND Although x64 is officially unsupported in SMS 2003 for any site components, the reality is that you CAN put the Distribution Point role on an x64 server in SMS 2003. Now, I'm sure...
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Perfmon - Common counters to find bottlenecks on a server with SQL (SMS/SCCM/SCOM) by jnelson

I'm seriously busy right now at my day job so I don't have time to get cr@zy with the det@ilz, but I would like to quickly post the Perfmon counters I use if I want to determine if a server has...
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WinBatch - Script to add boundaries to SMS by jnelson

This is a VERY old script I wrote in 2000 for SMS 2.0, that I've used for SMS 2003 too. I have no idea how well it works anymore, but I know it worked for SMS 2.0 and SMS 2003 RTM. The purpose of it...
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VBScript - Script to export SMS Web report results to a CSV file by jnelson

THE PROBLEM You want to automatically run a set of SMS Web reports, but you don't have something like SQL Server Reporting Services installed (which would give you the ability to have people subscribe...
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Windows Shell Script - Better way to run CMD as System by jnelson

Most people are familiar with using AT to open a command prompt as SYSTEM (LOCAL SYSTEM) at 11:05 /interactive cmd.exe This will open a command prompt as system (or actually, as whatever account the task...
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SMS 2003 Database - Where can I find things? by jnelson

Here is a list of common items that people want to query for and some locations they're found in the SMS database I'm basing this on SMS 2003, we have SP3+ Depending on your setup, you may not...
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M@d Skillz - SMS Web Reports - Passing a delimited list to SMS Web Reports like a table - (also convert list to rows in SQL) by jnelson

BACKGROUND Pass multiple items into a single parameter? With SMS Web reports, there's a lot of power in being able to pass parameters to your report query and have it substitute those values into the...
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SQL Function - Convert Bytes to KB, MB, GB, TB, PB or EB and format the output to human readable format by jnelson

When you query a bunch of SMS/SCCM data that has it's output in bytes or KB or MB, often times you want that expressed in a more human readable format. This function takes 2 parameters: a number, and...
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UPDATE - SMS 2003 - Selecting from v_Add_Remove_Programs still slow, even after applying 939872 by jnelson

I previously wrote an article talking about the slowness we were having even after applying 939872 --> HERE There are some additional things I'd like to mention: We have reorganized the data in...
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SMS 2003 - Selecting from v_Add_Remove_Programs still slow, even after applying 939872 by jnelson

!!!! UPDATE !!!! WHEN YOU'RE DONE, THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN UPDATED --> HERE PROBLEM I don't know if this is a function of the massive size of our SMS environment (100-200K clients) or if others...
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SMS - #2's #1 suggestion - Learn to read/write WQL/SQL by hand by jnelson

My #1 suggestion after years of working with SMS/SQL/WQL and then coaching/mentoring/training people is that it REEEALLLY pays to know how to read/write SQL/WQL by hand. I know, there are those people...
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