Computer Management

Securing Windows vii

Jorge Orchilles , in Microsoft Windows 7 Administrator's Reference, 2010

Advanced User and Group Management

Although the Control Panel | User Accounts console is friendly and easy to manage users with, information technology has many limitations. For this reason, local users and groups may also exist managed with the Computer Direction MMC. This method offers many more than options for managing user and group accounts related to the local estimator. User and group accounts may exist added, managed, or deleted from the Computer Management MMC. Working within the Computer Management MMC for managing users and groups is much like managing users and groups in Agile Directory Users and Computers.

The Computer Management MMC may exist accessed in a variety of ways:

■

Right-click Reckoner and select Manage.

■

In the Administrative Tools console within the Control Panel, click the Calculator Direction shortcut.

■

Blazon Computer Management on the Start bill of fare Search.

■

Through MMC by adding the Computer Management snap-in.

As Affiliate five mentioned, the Computer Direction MMC is a great local management tool for administrators. It contains a variety of tools including system tools, storage, and services and applications. Expanding the system tools will testify the Local Users and Groups console. Inside the Local Users and Groups are the user and group accounts, where they may exist managed, as shown previously in Figure eight.ane.

Create, Rename, and Delete a User Business relationship

A new local user may be created in the Computer Direction MMC as shown in Figure viii.6:

one.

Right-click Users in Computer Direction | System Tools | Local Users and Groups and select New User… or right-click the open surface area in the details pane of users and select New User.

2.

Fill in the fields:

a.

Username – The logon proper name the user will use to log on. The proper name should follow the username policy convention.

b.

Full Name – The full name of the user for proper documentation and identification. This field is optional.

c.

Description – A description of the user, mostly, this is the title of the user. This field is optional.

d.

Password – Create a password for the user ensuring complexity and policy requirements are met.

3.

Select the appropriate check boxes:

a.

User must change countersign at next logon – If checked, the user will be prompted to modify his or her password at logon. This is standard when an administrator is creating an account for another user.

b.

User cannot change countersign – If checked, the user will not be able to change the password. Mostly, this is non recommended but cases may ascend when necessary.

c.

Password never expires – if checked, the password will not expire per policy settings. By and large, this is not recommended, but cases may ascend when necessary.

d.

Account is disabled – If checked, the account volition be disabled and the user will be unable to log on.

4.

Click Create.

Figure 8.6. New User

A user account may exist renamed. Renaming the user account will change the user's logon proper name and input required for credentials, but it will not change the user's SID meaning all settings will remain. To rename a user, right-click the username and click Rename in the Users view.

A user account can be hands deleted from this view as well. Deleting the user will remove the SID for the user, and it will be very hard to restore, by design. Deleting the user from here volition non delete the user'due south contour folder or files. Ensure prior to deleting the user that in that location is another local administrator account or you lot may lock yourself out. To delete a user, right-click the user and click Delete.

User Properties

Local user accounts may also be managed from this expanse much like managing users in Active Directory except with fewer options. To access the user backdrop, right-click the user and select Properties. Every bit shown in Figure eight.7, in that location are fewer tabs in the local user backdrop than in Active Directory user properties:

■

Full general tab

□

Full name – Alter the full proper name of the user. This should be filled correctly for documentation.

□

Description – A field for a brusk description of the user. This is often set to the user's title or role.

□

User must modify countersign at next logon – Makes the user change the countersign on side by side logon.

□

User cannot alter countersign – This does not allow the user to alter his or her ain password.

□

Countersign never expires – Overrides policy forcing passwords to be changed later certain time.

□

Business relationship is disabled – To disable an account, check this box. The user will not be able to log in to the organisation or access resources.

□

Account is locked out – Used to unlock or lock a user account.

■

Member Of tab – This tab displays the groups the user is a member of.

□

Add user to a group:

-

Click Add…

-

Object type – This is the type of object, in this case Groups.

-

Location – This tin can be the local estimator expressed as the computer name or a domain.

-

Object Names – Here you may type the group name and click Check Names to validate.

-

Advanced – This allows searching through locations for groups.

-

Click OK.

□

Remove user from group – Select the user and click Remove. This will remove the user from the group and any access allowed through that grouping.

■

Profile tab – Hither, the administrator may fix the user profile path, logon script, dwelling house binder, and a connected network bulldoze.

FIGURE 8.7. User Backdrop

Secure Guest Account

The guest account is disabled by default, only some environments may require a secure guest account on the organization. A standard user account will most probable be too much admission for the guest so creating a guest business relationship could exist a bit tricky:

1.

Create a new user as referenced in the previous department.

ii.

Create a secure password for the new account.

three.

In the user properties, remove the user from the Users grouping and add together to the Invitee grouping.

4.

For more than secure access, use User Rights Consignment from the Local Security Policy section referenced in this chapter.

Create, Rename, and Delete a Group Account

A new local group may be created in the Figurer Management MMC as shown in Figure eight.eight:

i.

Right-click Groups in Figurer Direction | System Tools | Local Users and Groups and select New Grouping… or right-click the open up area in the details pane of Groups and select New Group.

2.

Fill in the fields:

a.

Group name – The name of the group, using proper conventions.

b.

Description – A clear description of the group that illustrates its purpose.

c.

Add… or Remove… members.

iii.

Click Create.

Figure 8.eight. New Grouping

Grouping accounts may too exist renamed. Renaming the group account will not change the group's SID significant all settings will remain. To rename a group, right-click the group and click Rename in the Groups view. A grouping business relationship tin can be easily deleted from this view too. Deleting a group volition remove the SID for the group and information technology will exist very difficult to restore, by design. Deleting the group will remove all users from the group and the security access allowed to that group is deleted. To delete a group, right-click the group and click Delete.

Add User Accounts to Local Groups

Administrators will often need to add domain user accounts to local groups to grant access on the local figurer. Users that have not logged on to the local computer tin can exist added to groups to ensure productivity afterward. It is not recommended to add domain users equally administrators in the local system.

To add together a user to a group:

i.

Aggrandize Reckoner Direction | System Tools | Local Users and Groups | Groups.

2.

Double-click the group the user will be added to.

3.

Click Add…

a.

Object blazon – This is the type of object, in this instance Groups.

b.

Location – This tin can be the local computer expressed every bit the figurer name or a domain.

c.

Object Names – Here, you may blazon the group name and click Check Names to validate.

d.

Advanced – This selection allows searching through locations for groups.

four.

Click OK.

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Information and Computer Scientists as Moral Philosophers and Social Analysts

Rob Kling , in Computerization and Controversy (Second Edition), 1996

Computer Science Skills Involve More Than Developing and Integrating Hardware and Software

Data and calculator specialists, as well as management consultants, often propose computerized systems that, they argue, will help people and organizations in new ways. These planners often unconsciously engage in oversimplified romantic speculation, even when they adopt to be "difficult headed," "factual," and "simply technical." Utopian research and its anti-utopian opposite (which are examined in Part II) tin can be useful ways of exploring futurity possibilities. Much of the problem with Utopian thinking comes when people fail to realize how fanciful some of their assumptions well-nigh human beliefs and social alter are. Visionaries tend to focus primarily on desirable changes and assume that what should happen must happen later on a particular technology is introduced. i Their assumptions often go well beyond technology every bit it is traditionally conceived, embodying views of homo-machine interaction, human motivation, and the behavior of social groups. Thus, a disquisitional investigation into visionary viewpoints requires skills that lie beyond hardware and algorithm design.

Paul Goodman argued that technologists, including calculator specialists, are primarily social activists who act, in practice, as moral philosophers:

Whether or not it draws on new scientific inquiry, technology is a branch of moral philosophy, not of scientific discipline. It aims at prudent appurtenances for the commonweal and to provide efficient means for those appurtenances…. As a moral philosopher, a technician should exist able to criticize the programs given to him to implement. As a professional in a community of learned professionals, a technologist must accept a unlike kind of training…. He should know something of the social sciences, police, the fine arts, and medicine, every bit well as relevant natural sciences. (Goodman, 1970) 2

This is a remarkable position, since few information and computer professionals take systematically studied philosophy or the social sciences. One commonplace view of informatics and engineering is reflected in a report past the ACM three Task Force on the Cadre of Figurer Science:

Computer science and Engineering science is the systematic study of algorithmic processes—their theory, analysis, blueprint, efficiency, implementation and application—that describe and transform information. The key question underlying all of computing is, What can be (efficiently) automated? … The roots of computing extend deeply into mathematics and engineering. Mathematics imparts assay to the field; engineering imparts pattern. (Denning et al., 1989)

How different this view is from Goodman's! It makes Goodman sound somewhat Utopian in his desire that computer specialists be independent professionals who will exert a disquisitional influence on the shape of the products they are asked to produce. In the traditional view, technologists are often asked to refine the means they use to implement a production, but not to question the ends they serve. Ian Reinecke goes even farther in that direction, suggesting that technical communities are impervious to serious critical analyses:

Those who know most about technology are in many cases the worst equipped to appreciate its implications for the lives of ordinary people. Consumed past technical and corporate objectives that become ends in themselves, they fail to see that their work may very often be contrary to the interests of their boyfriend citizens. So frenetic is the pace of change that the few querulous voices raised from their ain ranks are swept aside. Where the voices are more insistent, they are branded as renegades, as unstable people whose work has somehow unhinged them. (Reinecke, 1984, p. 243)

I practise not share Reinecke's wholesale condemnation of technical professionals. Role VIII will examine some key ethical issues of computing, and the manner that technical professionals take articulated different positions in the controversies. Moreover, some of the meliorate informatics journals, such as Communications of the ACM, publish articles that examine the social aspects of computerization from different vantage points. Simply Reinecke's criticism is most apt for technologists who remain somewhat self-consciously indifferent to the social complexities of computerization, except to admit the importance of their own special interests. Further, relatively few of the practicing technologists whom I have met in some of the nations' pinnacle industrial and service firms read broadly about the social aspects of computerization. Sadly, a substantial fraction of computer specialists focus their professional reading on technical handbooks, such equally the manuals for specific equipment, and on occasional articles in the computer trade press.

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Managing Windows 7 in an Enterprise Surroundings

Jorge Orchilles , in Microsoft Windows 7 Ambassador'south Reference, 2010

Remote Direction

You accept a lot of options when it comes to managing your Windows 7 clients.

You can utilize the native graphical tools, such every bit Computer Management, Event Viewer, Performance Monitor, and and so on, to interactively work with the tools through the new Microsoft Direction Panel 3.0. You can apply PowerShell to write highly powerful scripts, which can be used to command the user'southward environs and modify the same settings that are available through the native tools. You tin also utilise Group Policy through Active Directory to control thousands of computer settings on the client computers so that your users have a consistent, streamlined, and secure desktop environment to work within.

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Troubleshooting

In How to Cheat at Microsoft Vista Administration, 2007

Opening the Event Viewer Console

Upshot Viewer can be opened as a snap-in to the Calculator Management console or as a standalone console. You will need to click the Continue push in the User Account Control dialog box to confirm your authoritative action. If you are currently logged on with a non-administrative user account, you will need to supply the Ambassador password. Outcome Viewer can be opened using any of the following methods:

■

Click Get-go and type outcome in the Search box. Click the Event Viewer link that appears in the Search Results box.

■

Right-click the Computer icon on the desktop and select Manage to open the Computer Direction console. The Effect Viewer is located in the Organisation Tools folder.

■

Click Offset | Control Panel | Organization and Maintenance | Administrative Tools | Event Viewer.

■

Click Offset | All Programs | Authoritative Tools | Consequence Viewer.

Effigy 11.8 shows the Issue Viewer every bit a snap-in within the Computer Direction console.

Figure 11.8. The Result Viewer Console in Windows Vista

Note

You can utilise the Event Viewer to view and manage event logs or troubleshoot problems on the local estimator as well as on a remote computer. To apply the Outcome Viewer on a remote computer, open the Event Viewer, right-click the Event Viewer (Local) node and select Connect to Another Computer. Type the name or IP address of the remote computer or click the Browse button to browse the network to locate the computer you wish to piece of work on. When continued, the focus of the Event Viewer will exist on the selected remote estimator.

Equally explained before in this section, the issue logs you may be most interested in are located under the Windows Logs node and Applications and Services Logs node. Expand either of these nodes and select the log category you are interested in. For example, Figure xi.ix shows the events recorded in the System category.

Effigy 11.9. Events Related to Arrangement Activities

The details pane in the center of the console shows the list of nigh recent arrangement events tracked and recorded. Each entry contains the following information:

■

Level Shows the type of upshot such equally information, warning, fault, audit success, audit failure, and then on.

■

Appointment and Time The date and time when the issue was tracked and recorded.

■

Source The source of the upshot. In other words, the application, service, or Windows component that reported the event.

■

Event ID A unique identifier for the recorded upshot. Event ID is very useful in getting online help from Microsoft support services.

■

Job Category The category into which the task falls.

For the purpose of clarity, Windows shows only the preceding columns in the details pane. You tin add or remove columns in the details pane by right-clicking whatsoever column and selecting Add/Remove Columns.

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Data Hiding Under Windows® OS File Structure

Nihad Ahmad Hassan , Rami Hijazi , in Data Hiding Techniques in Windows OS, 2017

Uncovering Hidden Partitions

As nosotros said before, there is no way to hide the partition completely from the Computer Management console (except HPA and DCO partitions as we will see later). Y'all tin can always check for subconscious partitions of whatsoever plugged USB device through this console.

Some other method is past using the DiskPart command line utility that comes as a part of the Microsoft Windows® family (Windows® 8, eight.1, seven, Vista, XP, and Server 2003). DiskPart is a text-mode control interpreter. This tool enables yous to manage objects (disks, partitions, or volumes) by using scripts or direct input at a command prompt.

To launch this tool, open a DOS prompt, blazon DiskPart, and press Enter. The DiskPart utility will appear in a split window (see Fig. 4.61).

Figure 4.61. Using DiskPart utility to uncover subconscious partitions.

In Fig. 4.61 nosotros typed List disk to view a list of connected hard disks to this PC and associated numbers (in my case I accept ane hard disk and ii fastened USB cipher drives). In club to view the partition of each disk you first need to select it through the select deejay  =  due north command, where n points to the deejay number that appears in the showtime control.

Afterwards selecting the deejay, type list sectionalisation to come across list of partitions that exist within this deejay; hither the hidden sectionalisation of our USB zippo drive (Segmentation 0–1147   MB) appears.

DiskPart is a powerful tool for disk direction under Windows® OS. Y'all can learn more than and run across a list of control line options for this tool in the link ginen in Ref. [21].

Yous can restore your USB zip drive to its original state by plugging information technology into your PC. Become to Device Manager, right-click information technology, and select Backdrop. Become to the Driver tab and select Coil Dorsum Driver. This will uninstall the software driver y'all already installed and return the old driver to this drive.

Another method to restore your old USB zip drive driver software is by using a costless tool chosen SD Formatter [22]. Use this tool to format your USB drive and it should returns to its original state before division it.

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Managing the Windows 7 Desktop Environment

Jorge Orchilles , in Microsoft Windows 7 Ambassador's Reference, 2010

Summary

Windows 7 includes a multifariousness of local direction tools. There is Control Console, the MMC, the Computer Management Console, the Local Group Policy Editor, and the Windows Registry. Each of these management tools provides a dissimilar function. They all come together to provide a total management solution for your Windows 7 system.

Information technology's important that your system hardware is properly installed and configured. Malfunctioning hardware can actually be a hassle to set up. Windows 7 includes applications like Device Manager and the Devices and Printers applet to help ensure that your hardware is properly installed. Device Manager and Windows Update can assist ensure that your devices are configured with the most up-to-engagement drivers.

Everything in your system relies on your disks and file systems. This is where all of your files are stored. If your disks and file systems are not properly configured, you lot system may not run at all. Windows 7 volumes can provide convenience through disk spanning or fault tolerance through RAID 5. You lot need to make sure that you lot choose a configuration that best suits your needs.

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Creating Remote Access and Site-to-Site VPNs with ISA Firewalls

Dr. Thomas W. Shinder , Debra Littlejohn Shinder , in Dr. Tom Shinder'south Configuring ISA Server 2004, 2005

Create the User Account for the Remote VPN Router

The remote site Sorcerer doesn't create a user account for the ISA Server 2000 firewall at the branch part to authenticate to the main office ISA firewall. We'll have to create that user account ourselves

Perform the post-obit steps to create the user account:

1.

Right click My Figurer on the desktop, and click Manage.

2.

In the Computer Management console, aggrandize the System Tools node, and aggrandize the Local Users and Groups node.

3.

Right-click on the Users node, and click New User.

4.

In the New User dialog box, enter the name of the demand-dial interface on the ISA firewall at the main part. In the current example, the proper noun of the demand-punch interface at the main function is Co-operative. Enter a password and confirm the password. Remove the checkmark from the User must alter password at next logon checkbox. Place checkmarks in the User cannot change countersign and Password never expires checkboxes. Click Create, and then click Close.

5.

Double-click on the Branch user account. In the Branch Properties dialog box, click the Dial-in tab. On the Dial-in tab, select Allow access in the Remote Access Permission (Dial-in or VPN) frame.

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Installing and Maintaining Hardware Devices and Drivers

In How to Cheat at Microsoft Vista Administration, 2007

Viewing Currently Installed Devices

☑

Currently installed hardware devices on a Windows Vista figurer tin can exist viewed from the Device Manager snap-in. The Device Manager snap-in is role of the Computer Management panel. To view devices on a remote computer, yous must utilize the Device Manager from inside the Figurer Management console.

☑

The Device Director tin can be used to view the status of the devices equally well equally the resources utilized past them. It displays device and resource data by type and connection.

☑

You can likewise employ the Device Manager to manage device drivers. Disabling a device, uninstalling a driver, updating a commuter, or driver rollback functions are performed using this snap-in

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Microsoft Windows Security and Audits

Craig Wright , in The IT Regulatory and Standards Compliance Handbook, 2008

Customizing the Display of Snap-ins in the Panel: New Windows

After calculation the snap-ins, you lot can add windows to provide different authoritative views in the console. In the left pane of the tree view in Figure 16.41 , click the [+] next to Calculator Management. Click System Tools.

Effigy 16.41. Console1 System Tools

Right-click the Issue Viewer folder that opens and and so click New window from here. As displayed in Figure 16.42, this opens a new Outcome Viewer window based at the Event Viewer extension to computer management.

Figure xvi.42. Event Viewer

Click on the Window bill of fare and click Panel Root .

In the Console Root window, click Services and Applications, correct-click Services in the left pane, and and then click New Window from hither. As shown in Effigy sixteen.43, this opens a new Services window based at the Event Viewer extension to Computer Management.

Figure 16.43. The Services Window

Close the original window with Console Root showing in it.

On the Window carte, select Tile Horizontally. The panel file should appear (see Figure 16.44) and include the data shown in Figures 16.42 and 16.43.

Figure 16.44. An Integrated View

You can now save your new MMC console. Click the Relieve as icon on the Console window, and requite your console a name. Your console is now saved as an .msc file, and you can provide it to anyone who needs to configure a computer with these tools.

Notation: Each of the two smaller windows has a toolbar with buttons and driblet-down menus. The toolbar buttons and drop-down menus on each of these two windows apply only to the contents of the window. You can run into that a window's toolbar buttons and menus alter depending on the snap-in selected in the left pane of the window. If you select the View card, yous can see a list of available toolbars.

The Microsoft Management Console also allows the user grouping information and functionality that previously would take required opening a Control Console option plus two split up authoritative tools. The modular architecture of MMC makes information technology easy for organization network developers to create snap-in applications that leverage the platform while easing administrative load.

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DVS Archiving and Storage

Anthony C. Caputo , in Digital Video Surveillance and Security, 2010

The Network Operating Organization

The NOS is the encephalon of the server; without information technology, it'due south just a computer. It offers applications and utilities that practice business faster and better. There are only a few popular choices – Novell, UNIX, Linux, and Windows. The complexity of NOS forces a elementary overview of the features and benefits.

Although Linux offers a complimentary download and a plethora of available features to part every bit a NOS, the well-nigh attractive aspect of this Microsoft production is the monolithic support structure and community. All VMS software works on Microsoft OS. Microsoft takes sophisticated tools and applications and makes them usable and affordable, and then that whatsoever size company can take advantage of a complete suite of server utilities and applications. Still, many people take a bias and adopt other systems to Microsoft or simply don't similar Microsoft. Years agone, 1 of my clients chose a Web servicing company that slapped together an assortment of custom and obscure technologies from which they created four unique Spider web sites. Providing them with a shared Oracle database gave my client a more toll-effective database solution, simply negated other features (for security reasons they were told) and locked them into using this particular Web services company. My client was unconcerned about this arrangement until the company found itself tied into multiple approvals and pattern changes to their Web site at $200 an hour. Arrangements like this can become very expensive. The IT director hated Microsoft and their products with a passion (there's one in every crowd). This prejudice steered the company to technologies that had no immediate support structure set into place. At 1 signal they attempted to internally convert the original NOS, Application Server, and dynamically generated Spider web sites from 1 not-Microsoft platform (Linux/Jrun/Java) to another non-Microsoft platform (Novell/Websphere/Java), simply they had a trouble finding a consultant with the appropriate skill set who was immediately bachelor.

After they spent a month of searching, experiments, and multiple dead ends, I walked into their building armed with a developer copy of the Windows Server NOS and asked for ane server car with a static IP accost and access to the Net. That was at about ane p.yard. and by five:30 p.m. (later on some BIOS upgrading), I had installed and configured the Windows Server NOS, configured a Web Server and Application Server, and installed all four Web sites. The director was bewildered at the rapid deployment, so much so that he asked me to prove him the process step by step.

Over 95% of calculator users utilize a Microsoft OS, which likewise means that most of the VMS software (equally almost all software) is adult for the Microsoft platform. It'due south an OS that'due south understood and has become more intuitive and an intricate office of our daily lives; thus information technology's the better pick for small or mid-sized companies with limited time and resource (human and otherwise).

Typically, a networking environment opens up shared resources such as files, printers, and an Internet connection. The Windows Server NOS provides a configuration sorcerer that gets the server upwardly and running within minutes. This too includes a few functions that are required for remote viewing of the VMS software such as a Web server or Concluding Services.

NOS provides more features than will ever be used, but in that location are a few select features beneficial for a DVS deployment.

Administrative Tools

Microsoft Windows, both for workstations or for servers, comes with a gear up of estimator management tools that assistance you manage the machine. These are very of import and should be pinned to the Start Menu. That tin can be done by navigating to the Administrative Tools folder in the Control Panel:

START   >   CONTROL Console   >   ADMINISTRATIVE TOOLS

Within the Authoritative Tools folder is an icon named Computer Management. Right-click on that icon and cull Pin to Start Menu.

The Computer Management console is a pre-configured interface with a number of administrative and troubleshooting components to salvage time. This panel can also be accessed by doing the following:

START   >   RUN and Blazon COMPMGMT.MSC

Scalability

I of the more important aspects of choosing a server over a workstation to function as a DVR is that the server and its NOS are more scalable. Somewhen, others may wish to monitor the video surveillance streams or admission archives and that can add extra burden to the single workstation. A server makes it easier to have a centralized location for recording and security procedures, including hallmark, accessibility, and command. As the demand for VMS access increases in the client/server environment, the installation of the client software onto another workstation is all that's needed.

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