The Daily Dose

Organization Culture

2011-06-23T11:45:00.000-05:00

The Monkey Story
The experiment involved 5 monkeys, a cage, a banana, a ladder and, crucially, a water hose.

The 5 monkeys would be locked in a cage, after which a banana was hung from the ceiling with, fortunately for the monkeys (or so it seemed…), a ladder placed right underneath it.

Of course, immediately, one of the monkeys would race towards the ladder, intending to climb it and grab the banana. However, as soon as he would start to climb, the sadist (euphemistically called “scientist”) would spray the monkey with ice-cold water. In addition, however, he would also spray the other four monkeys…

When a second monkey was about to climb the ladder, the sadist would, again, spray the monkey with ice-cold water, and apply the same treatment to its four fellow inmates; likewise for the third climber and, if they were particularly persistent (or dumb), the fourth one. Then they would have learned their lesson: they were not going to climb the ladder again – banana or no banana.

In order to gain further pleasure or, I guess, prolong the experiment, the sadist outside the cage would then replace one of the monkeys with a new one. As can be expected, the new guy would spot the banana, think “why don’t these idiots go get it?!” and start climbing the ladder. Then, however, it got interesting: the other four monkeys, familiar with the cold-water treatment, would run towards the new guy – and beat him up. The new guy, blissfully unaware of the cold-water history, would get the message: no climbing up the ladder in this cage – banana or no banana.

When the beast outside the cage would replace a second monkey with a new one, the events would repeat themselves – monkey runs towards the ladder; other monkeys beat him up; new monkey does not attempt to climb again – with one notable detail: the first new monkey, who had never received the cold-water treatment himself (and didn’t even know anything about it), would, with equal vigour and enthusiasm, join in the beating of the new guy on the block.

When the researcher replaced a third monkey, the same thing happened; likewise for the fourth until, eventually, all the monkeys had been replaced and none of the ones in the cage had any experience or knowledge of the cold-water treatment.

Then, a new monkey was introduced into the cage. It ran toward the ladder only to get beaten up by the others. Yet, this monkey turned around and asked “why do you beat me up when I try to get the banana?” The other four monkeys stopped, looked at each other slightly puzzled and, finally, shrugged their shoulders: “Don’t know. But that’s the way we do things around here”…

Vacation

2010-12-01T16:05:00.000-06:00

OK folks I know its been a couple of months since I have posted anything of interest. I have been busy gathering research material and consulting on various IT projects. Stay tuned I will be adding new material soon !!!!

Implementing Database Mirroring

2010-07-11T15:37:00.001-05:00

Implementing Database Mirroring.
Database Mirroring helps minimize planned and unplanned downtime between databases. It offers high availability (instance-aware) on a per user database by keeping a mirrored replica either at the local or remote site (disaster recovery). It is an attractive choice to Failover Cluster or Log Shipping.

Database Mirroring does not support the Simple or Bulk-logged only recovery model.

Environment-Windows 2008 AD-Integrated. -SQL Server located in the same site and domain. Computer based Certificate enrollment authentication (Enterprise-CA) Adventureworks master key self signed certificate

1. Backup the Principal database (full and transaction log) and restore (no recovery) it on the Mirror.

2. Run DBCC CHECKDB ON each principal

3. Create Database Master key

--Run this on the Principal server
USE master

CREATE MASTER KEY ENCRYPTION BY PASSWORD = 'strongpassword';
GO

4. Create the server based certificate which will be used to encrypt the mirroring endpoints

--Run this on the Principal server
CREATE CERTIFICATE servernameofprincipal_cert WITH SUBJECT = 'servername certificate for database mirroring'
GO

5. Create the Database mirroring endpoint on the Principal using the certificate for authentication.

--Run this on the Principal Server
CREATE ENDPOINT Endpoint_Mirroring STATE = STARTED
AS TCP(LISTENER_PORT = 9999, LISTENER_IP = ALL)
FOR DATABASE_MIRRORING (AUTHENTICATION = CERTIFICATE principal Servername_cert,
ENCRYPTION = REQUIRED ALGORITHM AES, ROLE = ALL);
GO

6. Verify endpoints

select * from sys.endpoints
select * from sys.certificates
select * from sys.database_mirroring_endpoints
select * from sys.database_mirroring_witnesses

7. run netstat -ao to view hostname of established connections as well as ports the server is currently listening on.

8. Create exception or rule in the Firewall for port 1433 default port and endpoint port 9999 on the Principal and the Mirror

9. Export/backup Certificate to a file

--Run this on the Principal server
BACKUP CERTIFICATE servername_cert TO FILE = 'D:\MSSQL10.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\DATA\servername_cert.cer';
GO

10. Copy the Certificate to the mirror and witness

Copying the certificate to the mirror and witness allows you to associate a login for authentication.

Repeat steps 3-10 on the mirror and the witness modifying only the certificate name.

11. Associate the certificate we created in Step #4 with a user

--Run this on Principal

CREATE CERTIFICATE server_name_mirror_cert
AUTHORIZATION login
FROM FILE = 'D:\MSSQL10.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\DATA\server_name_mirror_cert.cer'
GO

12. Grant the CONNECT permission on the login

--Run this on testServer1

GRANT CONNECT ON ENDPOINT::Endpoint_Mirroring TO [login];
GO

13. Prepare the mirror server for the mirroring session

--Run this on mirror
USE master
GO
ALTER DATABASE Adventureworks SET PARTNER = 'TCP://principal:9999';
GO

14. Prepare the principal server for the mirroring session

--Run this on principal
USE master
GO
ALTER DATABASE Adventureworks SET PARTNER = 'TCP://mirror:9999';
GO

15. Failover test. Failover a Database Mirroring Session

--Run this on principal
Use master
GO
ALTER DATABASE Adventureworks SET PARTNER FAILOVER;

16. To turn on transactional safety (full)
--Connect to the principal
ALTER DATABASE SET PARTNER SAFETY FULL

17 to turn transactional safety offl
--Connect to the principa
ALTER DATABASE SET PARTNER SAFETY OFF

To disable database mirroring

--ALTER DATABASE SET PARTNER OFF

Create Database

2010-07-02T14:03:00.000-05:00

When creating databases consider using filegroups for large database that will have large tables. Also consider placing data and log files on separate disk and increase disk spindles in array.

USE master
GO
IF EXISTS (SELECT name FROM sys.databases WHERE name = N'CoreDB')
DROP DATABASE CoreDB
GO
USE master
GO
CREATE DATABASE [CoreDB]
ON PRIMARY
(
NAME = N'CoreDB',
FILENAME = N'D:\Test\CoreDB.mdf' ,
SIZE = 3048KB ,
FILEGROWTH = 0
)
LOG ON
(
NAME = N'CoreDB_log',
FILENAME = N'D:\Test\CoreDB_log.ldf' ,
SIZE = 1024KB ,
FILEGROWTH = 10%
)
GO

SQL Server 2008 Copy Database Wizard

2010-06-23T15:41:00.000-05:00

Ok I tried to use the copy database wizard and it kept failing so I just decided to use the backup/restore "copy database only" option. Which always works !!!

Mass infection of IIS/ASP sites

2010-06-11T15:50:00.000-05:00

Serves you right for letting web dev write shitty code that give direct access to your SQL Database (tables) instead of Stored Procedures...Blame it on rookie web devs and business to cheap to hire a real SQL DBA

Securing the Local Administrators Group on Every Desktop

2010-05-23T09:58:00.000-05:00

Securing the Local Administrators Group on Every Desktop

Tempdb Database

2010-03-05T13:22:00.001-06:00

Because the tempdb is heavily used in SQL Server 2008 you should move it to another disk after installation. Moreover if you are encounter error messages related to storage you will have to move it to another disk. Therefore as part of a best practices approach considering moving the tempdev and templog to seperate disk subsystems to increase disk read/write performance. Open QA and use the following script to determine the current tempdb location.

USE TempDB
GO
EXEC sp_helpfile
GO

To move the tempdb to the d:\sqldata run the ALTER DATABASE command. Note the templog file can also be moved to its own disk subsystem as well to increase performance.

USE master
GO
ALTER DATABASE TempDB MODIFY FILE
(NAME = tempdev, FILENAME = 'd:\sqldata\datatempdb.mdf')
GO
ALTER DATABASE TempDB MODIFY FILE
(NAME = templog, FILENAME = 'd:\sqldata\datatemplog.ldf')
GO

Restart SQL Server Service instance and delete the old files from the original location. Note the tempdb is recreated each time the sql server instance is started so there is no need to move the files after the service is restarted in the future. If a system database is moved and the master database is later rebuilt you will have to repeat the process because the system will create them back in the default location.

WTF process is running, why is my database so slow.

2009-12-15T05:07:00.000-06:00

WOW..had a customer integrate MS CRM AX into their environment along with some third party software. Turns out when they run a job that calls a SP it takes a long time. Here is a nice lil utility that will show which SQL statements are currently executing.

CREATE PROC [dbo].[dba_WhatSQLIsExecuting]
AS
/*--------------------------------------------------------------------
Purpose: Shows what individual SQL statements are currently executing.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

---------------------------------------------------------------------*/
BEGIN
-- Do not lock anything, and do not get held up by any locks.
SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL READ UNCOMMITTED

-- What SQL Statements Are Currently Running?
SELECT [Spid] = session_Id
, ecid
, [Database] = DB_NAME(sp.dbid)
, [User] = nt_username
, [Status] = er.status
, [Wait] = wait_type
, [Individual Query] = SUBSTRING (qt.text,
er.statement_start_offset/2,
(CASE WHEN er.statement_end_offset = -1
THEN LEN(CONVERT(NVARCHAR(MAX), qt.text)) * 2
ELSE er.statement_end_offset END -
er.statement_start_offset)/2)
,[Parent Query] = qt.text
, Program = program_name
, Hostname
, nt_domain
, start_time
FROM sys.dm_exec_requests er
INNER JOIN sys.sysprocesses sp ON er.session_id = sp.spid
CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_sql_text(er.sql_handle)as qt
WHERE session_Id > 50 -- Ignore system spids.
AND session_Id NOT IN (@@SPID) -- Ignore this current statement.
ORDER BY 1, 2
END

Enumerating members of Local Group

2009-12-10T06:18:00.000-06:00

Today I was tasked with getting the local admin users on each server in one of our customers domain. Simply enough right? Nope of course the local admin group has users but also has other groups that are nested in the group as well. So needless to stay I'm not going to logon to each server to get that info moreover having to look through each group is how can I say "ridiculous". So instead of speading countless hours acquiring this info I decided to "write" a script. So I googled it online and here is the script, Hats off to Richard Mueller MVP Directory Services Hilltop Lab for the script:
' EnumLocalGroup.vbs
' VBScript program to enumerate members of a local group.
'
' ----------------------------------------------------------------------

'
' You have a royalty-free right to use, modify, reproduce, and
' distribute this script file in any way you find useful, provided that
' you agree that the copyright owner above has no warranty, obligations,
' or liability for such use.

Option Explicit

Dim objNetwork, objLocalGroup

' These attributes must be declared in the main program,
' so they are global in scope.
Dim objTrans, strComputer, strNetBIOSDomain

' Constants for the NameTranslate object.
Const ADS_NAME_INITTYPE_GC = 3
Const ADS_NAME_TYPE_NT4 = 3
Const ADS_NAME_TYPE_1779 = 1

' Determine NetBIOS name of domain and local computer.
Set objNetwork = CreateObject("Wscript.Network")
strNetBIOSDomain = objNetwork.UserDomain
strComputer = objNetwork.ComputerName
Set objNetwork = Nothing

' Bind to local Administrators group.
Set objLocalGroup = GetObject("WinNT://" & strComputer _
& "/Administrators,group")

' Enumerate members of the local group.
Call EnumLocalGroup(objLocalGroup)

Sub EnumLocalGroup(ByVal objGroup)
' Subroutine to enumerate members of local group.
' The variable strComputer has global scope.

Dim objMember

' Enumerate direct members of group.
For Each objMember In objGroup.Members
Wscript.Echo objMember.AdsPath
' Test if member is a group.
If (LCase(objMember.Class) = "group") Then
' Nested group. Test if objMember is a local group.
If (InStr(LCase(objMember.AdsPath), "/" _
& LCase(strComputer) & "/") > 0) Then
' objMember is a local group.
' Call sub recursively to enumerate nested local group.
Call EnumLocalGroup(objMember)
ElseIf (InStr(LCase(objMember.AdsPath), _
"/nt authority/") > 0) Then
' objMember is local implicit group (special identity).
' Membership cannot be enumerated.
Else
' objMember is a domain group.
' Call sub that uses LDAP provider to enumerate
' nested domain group. objMember is bound with
' WinNT provider.
Call EnumDomainGroup(objMember, True)
End If
End If
Next

End Sub

Sub EnumDomainGroup(ByVal objDomainGroup, ByVal blnNT)
' Subroutine to enumerate members of domain group.
' blnNT is True if objDomainGroup is bound with WinNT,
' False if bound with LDAP.
' The variables objTrans and strNetBIOSDomain have global scope.

Dim strNTName, strGroupDN, objGroup, objMember

' Check if this function called before.
If (IsEmpty(objTrans) = True) Then
' objDomainGroup must be bound with WinNT.
' Setup NameTranslate. Connect to Global Catalog.
Set objTrans = CreateObject("NameTranslate")
objTrans.Init ADS_NAME_INITTYPE_GC, ""

' Convert NetBIOS name of group to Distinguished Name.
strNTName = strNetBIOSDomain & "\" & objDomainGroup.Name
objTrans.Set ADS_NAME_TYPE_NT4, strNTName
strGroupDN = objTrans.Get(ADS_NAME_TYPE_1779)
' Escape any forward slash characters, "/", with the backslash
' escape character. All other characters that should be escaped are.
strGroupDN = Replace(strGroupDN, "/", "\/")
Else
' NameTranslate already setup. Check if objDomainGroup
' bound with WinNT.
If (blnNT = True) Then
' Convert NetBIOS name of group to Distinguished Name.
strNTName = strNetBIOSDomain & "\" & objDomainGroup.Name
objTrans.Set ADS_NAME_TYPE_NT4, strNTName
strGroupDN = objTrans.Get(ADS_NAME_TYPE_1779)
' Escape any forward slash characters, "/", with the backslash
' escape character. All other characters that should be escaped are.
strGroupDN = Replace(strGroupDN, "/", "\/")
Else
' objDomainGroup bound with LDAP. Retrieve Distinguished Name.
strGroupDN = objDomainGroup.distinguishedName
' Escape any forward slash characters, "/", with the backslash
' escape character. All other characters that should be escaped are.
strGroupDN = Replace(strGroupDN, "/", "\/")
End If
End If
' Bind to group with the LDAP provider, if required.
If (blnNT = True) Then
Set objGroup = GetObject("LDAP://" & strGroupDN)
Else
Set objGroup = objDomainGroup
End If
' Enumerate direct members of objDomainGroup (bound with LDAP).
For Each objMember In objGroup.Members
Wscript.Echo objMember.AdsPath
' Check if objMember is a group.
If (LCase(objMember.Class) = "group") Then
' Call sub recursively. objMember bound with LDAP.
Call EnumDomainGroup(objMember, False)
End If
Next

End Sub

WSS 3.0 Central Administration Search Service-hung

2009-12-04T06:06:00.000-06:00

Issue: I encountered a problem with the search service failing to stop in the Central Administration. It was hung at starting.

Resolution:
1. navigate to C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN

2.stsadm -o osearch -action stop

Windows Sharepoint Server Search 3.0

2009-11-24T07:23:00.000-06:00

Wss 3.0 Sharepoint search not working. No results returned. Sharepoint search not updating. SQL Server Express, MSDE, SQL Server 2x
If you follow these steps non of these procedures are data destructive. Run SQL Server Express /advanced option after any MSDE installation (it will allow you to select full-text index)

Examine Event Logs for SharePoint Services errors in Application log
Verify Search Service started (domain account” least privilege). If service not available run SharePoint Product and Technologies Configuration Wizard (except defaults).
Run SharePoint 3.0 Central Administration. On the Home Screen under Farm Topology select the virtual server. Under Services on Server: select Windows SharePoint services search. In the service account and content access account select a configurable account for this component. Note the account must be a domain account that has access (connect) and read (select) privileges on the database. Highly recommend same account be used for both account (MMPSIT\Sharepointwebapp).
In the Database server name specify the piped instance of the server if MSDE. To get the piped instance go to services in windows services and to the properties of the Windows Internal Database the service name is the piped instance. The database server name is: np\\.\pipe\MSSQL$MICROSOFT##SSEE\sql\query
This will allow you to make a named piped connection to a default instance of sql server express which normally is not allowed. (Note using SQL Server MGMT Studio Express you can use this technique to connect to any default instance of sql server express.
In the database name enter database name typically database server and name are the same. Enter WSS_Search_%SiteName%
Select Windows Authentication and select indexing every 5 minutes. Click OK to start. The Windows SharePoint Services Search should start and building catalog and index.
Specify the host names that are mapped to the loopback address and can connect to Web sites on your computer, follow these steps:
         1. Click Start , click Run , type regedit , and then click OK .
         2. In Registry Editor, locate and then click the following registry key:                a. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Lsa\MSV1_0
               b. Right-click MSV1_0 , point to New , and then click Multi-String Value .
               c. Type BackConnectionHostNames , and then press ENTER.
               d. Right-click BackConnectionHostNames , and then click Modify .
               e. In the Value data box, type the host name or the host names for the sites that are on the local computer, and then click OK .
         3. Quit Registry Editor, and then restart the IISAdmin service.
Finally cd C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN> stsadm -o Spsearch -farmperformancelevel reduced

Are you serious?

2009-10-15T18:29:00.001-05:00

So what did Wall Street learn from wrecking and ruining our economy. Destroying families and ppls lives. The question is Why cant Wall Street stop paying big business.

Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog : Hey, Scripting Guy! How Can I Generate a List of All Groups of Which a User Is a Member?

2009-10-12T21:31:00.001-05:00

Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog : Hey, Scripting Guy! How Can I Generate a List of All Groups of Which a User Is a Member?

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Windows 7

2009-10-09T17:09:00.001-05:00

Well I just installed Window 7 on my Dell Latitude D830. I has a 2.2 GHz processor and 2.0 RAM

Sunshine

2009-08-13T08:13:00.000-05:00

Why does the son shine on me ? ? ?