Some Notes on the Machines

Found a really good site today:

http://network-tools.com/

To see who’s logged on to Windows in any sense, locally or remotely, try this:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897545.aspx

Several ports may need to be opened in Windows Firewall, sometimes even if the service is turned off, and sometimes on both client and server. To accomplish this by command line, use these:

netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18082 name=VIPRE_client_1
netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18086 name=VIPRE_client_2
netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18087 name=VIPRE_client_3
netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18088 name=VIPRE_client_4

If you would like to have the above ports opened using an Active Directory group policy, edit the policy, go to Administrative Templates under Computer Configuration, then Network, Network Connections, and Windows Firewall.  Under both “Domain Profile” and “Standard Profile” you will find “Define Inbound Port Exceptions”.  In these, the following lines will be needed:

18082:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE1
18086:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE2
18087:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE3
18088:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE4

For our configuration of client install outside of the LAN, you’ll want port 591 added as a fifth item to the above, i.e., either this:

netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18082 name=VIPRE_client_1
netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18086 name=VIPRE_client_2
netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18087 name=VIPRE_client_3
netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=18088 name=VIPRE_client_4
netsh firewall add portopening protocol=TCP port=591 name=VIPRE_client_5

or this:

18082:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE1
18086:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE2
18087:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE3
18088:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE4
591:TCP:*:enabled:VIPRE5

Here are two very interesting articles with tweaks:

http://www.speedguide.net/articles/windows-7-vista-2008-tweaks-2574

http://www.stoufis.gr/blog/topics/709

A web file manager can be a very useful tool. eXtplorer is good, small, and fast; AjaXplorer is good, amazingly full-featured, and not so fast. Both of them need special PHP settings to run well (especially to handle large files), and if you’re using hosted web services, you’ll want to do this by special lines in the .htaccess file. The below is satisfactory if your provider’s web server is very powerful with lots of space reserved for you; if not, reduce reduce reduce!!!!!

php_value memory_limit -1
php_value upload_max_filesize 800M
php_value post_max_size 800M
php_value max_execution_time 50000
php_value max_input_time 50000

To configure VIPRE Business 5 to handle a laptop outside of the LAN, including installation of agents and automatic agent version updates, do this:

1. Set up a router configuration where an external DNS name is pointed to the VIPRE server, for ports 18080-18088 as well as port 591 (and see related info below). Test it via a telnet on port 18082; if you press Enter, the server should respond.
2. Set up a policy where that DNS name is specified as Policy and Update Server under Agent/Communication.
3. Under the top-level server properties, under Agent Installation, make sure the port listed is set to 591. The default is 80, which is in use on many servers, certainly SBS.
4. Create an MSI for the policy and copy it to the laptop.
5. On the laptop, set up the necessary firewall exceptions to be found here.
6. Install the MSI onto the laptop.

This looked rather interesting:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh144782.aspx

If you get an error like “The module … owssvr.dll could not be loaded due to a configuration problem”, e.g. having to do with IIS and Sharepoint (including Microsoft Search Server 2010), try going into IIS manager, under Application Pools, and open up Advanced Settings for each of the items which may be malfunctioning. You’ll see “Enable 32-bit Applications”, and if that’s set to “True” on a 64-bit server, that’s the problem, set it to “False” and you’re probably in!

Here:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/astebner/archive/2008/08/28/8904493.aspx

is a tool, by a Microsoft rep, which will reliably remove .NET frameworks. Very useful when the uninstallers fail. However, any other .NET frameworks you are using on the machine will probably need reinstalling, and the author recommends the following:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/astebner/archive/2008/03/07/8108332.aspx

be done first.

There is an issue which crops up when VIPRE 5 won’t upgrade its agent. Steps to resolve:

1. Go to the volatile data storage area. To find it, go to the properties of the Site (one level above the Policies), and go to Advanced Settings.
2. Look for a folder named SoftwareUpdate somewhere underneath that folder. Delete its contents (but leave the folder itself).
3. If that doesn’t do it (try pressing the “Agent” button in the Updates area), try creating this folder:
   [profile folder]\All Users\Application Data\Sunbelt\Enterprise\SoftwareUpdate
4. And if that doesn’t work, find the logs (they’re probably down in the “proper” volatile data storage area somewhere); within there is very probably an error which will tell you which folder it’s looking for. Create that folder, and you’re in.