Logout/Log off in Windows Server 2012

Let me show you where you can find  log off Option in Windows Server 2012. I know this might sound stupid, but let me tell you this..I struggled for a while to find out where this is 😀

Most of us are already aware of this, where to get power off option right…? (Shown in the below screenshot for whoever is completely new to Win 8 World).

I got this Vertical Window by hovering my mouse at Bottom Right Corner of my screen, Once you get this click on Settings and you see something as shown below..

Well, I can only see Shutdown and Restart Options!! Where is this Log off hiding at??

you’ve to Click on the annoying Start Button( you will get this by hovering your mouse at the bottom left most corner of your screen, shown below)

Now, you will get this Metro Style Screen, where you’ve to click on your User account Icon at the Top Right Corner of your Screen and you get options as shown below.

There you go…Sign out is our new Log Off Button 😀

 

 

 

Windows Server 2012 Core – Graphical Shell.

In this post, let’s see one of the best enhancements we got with Windows Server 2012, flipping Graphical Shell as needed!

As you can see below, I’ve Installed the normal Windows Server 2012 Datacenter Eval Edition.(I did not selected CORE during the Installation).

Nothing strange right…!

Now, let’s see how we can uninstall the graphical shell from this Server.

Let me tell you this, all it takes is one Powershell command!

 Open powershell and type “Uninstall-WindowsFeature Server-Gui-Shell” and hit enter. Before that I recommend to try the same with -whatif Option. Basically, It tells you what happens and what are the consequences if you enter that command in powershell instead of executing it right away:) See below for what I’m saying…

Okay, now I opened PowerShell as Admin and ran the same command without whatif, I got something like this.

After few seconds, it returned Success and requesting for Restart to apply the changes as shown below.

Once I restarted my Machine, all I got is the screen as shown below.(You’ll see Server Manager as well, I closed it)

Huhu…no Fancyyy pancyyyy GUI any more. All you got is cmd/powershell visible to you. The awesome news is you can just flip the coin the other way around and you’ll get your GUI back in place. No need of Re-Installing the OS from scratch 🙂

Behind the scenes, all it’s doing is adding and removing one of the features available in Windows Server 2012.

Adding back your GUI is as simple as it. Open Powershell from the command window you get and type the below statement as shown in the below screenshot…

Note: For actual execution run the above command without -whatif Option.

Once I restarted my Server, I was welcomed with normal windows appearance similar to first screenshot in this post 🙂

Bottom Line : Core OS is the Baseline which is always available and everything is built on top of the Core OS. Graphical Shell/Infra can be enabled and disabled as needed based on your requirements.

 

 

 

Windows Server 2012 – My Very First Impression!

Hey…I’ve Installed Windows Server 2012 Datacenter Edition today in my laptop and would like to share my initial experiences from twenty thousand feet distance 🙂 .

Let me tell you all, Installation Experience is awesome. It was very smooth and easy with less manual interventions! Everything was blazing smooth and fast. But I miss the Start Button 😦 Well, at least now everyone will start using Shortcuts and commands/Cmdlets 😀

Also, it looks like everything is built on Powershell 3.0 in Windows Server 2012. Most of the previous cmd utilities appears to be not working in this Version of Windows Server. Classic Examples, “DCPROMO” and “CLUSTER.exe” are no longer working. Looks like  Microsoft is pushing us towards Powershell, which is awesome. Well, there is lot of learning curve involved here!

Believe me folks…..GUI has been drastically changed from previous versions of Windows Servers.Few very basic screen caps are shown below just to show what I am taking about….

Very First Screen once you Install Windows Server:

As you can see below, there is no Start Button 😦

This comes with IE 10.0, which appears to be very better and fast compared to previous versions of IE 🙂

.Net FrameWork 4.5 and Powershell 3.0 comes out of the box once OS has been Installed.

Look at this strange new Add Roles/Features wizard below:

Though the core concepts remain same, it appears to me, MSFT made lot of enhancements and improvements for us.

Bottom Line – I liked it very much and I Should say, It’s time for exploring the real capabilities of PowerShell and ofcourse learning all the new features of this OS.

 

 

 

Cannot set a credential for principal ‘sa’. (Microsoft SQL Server, Error:15535)

In this Quick and dirty post, let’s see a simple fix for one of the annoying error messages you’ll see in SQL Server 2005. Basically, You’ll see below mentioned error in few cases when you try to change the sa password using SSMS.

The Simple trick is to check the box “Map to credential” as shown below after providing a new password and click Okay.

This should work…Hope this helps!

 

 

 

How to Failover the Cluster Group in Windows Server 2008/2008R2

In this short Blog post let us see how to move(Failover) the Cluster Group from one node to other in a Windows Server 2008 Failover Cluster. See here for more details on locating your Cluster Group for your Cluster.

Let’s get into the content! As you can see in the below Screenshot, I’ve my SQL Server running on Node2.

But How about my Cluster Group? I would simply issue “Cluster Group” from my cmd prompt for getting that info. As you can see below my cluster group is running on Node1.

Now, How to Failover the Cluster Group from Node1 to Node2 without any SQL Services Interruptions?

Sol 1 – Using CMD: Simply Issue the below command from your cmd prompt.

Sol2 – Using PS: Simply use Move-ClusterGroup “Cluster Group”. You might get the below Error if you are using Powershell for your Cluster for the First time.

This is because you haven’t imported Cluster Module yet for your PowerShell. You should be good to go once you import Failover Cluster Module. For More Information on Cluster CmdLets please see here.

Btw, There is no way you can do Cluster Group Failover from your Failover Cluster Manager GUI unlike Windows Server 2003!!

Hope this helps!