SCOM Zombie PSA#27: Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate (RC)

I am not 100% sure when Microsoft released SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate (RC). And you can download it once you register for it. I am very interested in learning if System Center Operations Manager 2012 will play nice with it, and I don’t think there will be any support for OpsMgr 2007 R2. Here is what they have to say about it.

“SQL Server 2012 will deliver mission-critical confidence with AlwaysOn availability for faster failover and greater hardware utilization and in-memory ColumnStore for 10x the data warehouse performance gains. SQL Server 2012 will also enable breakthrough insights with business intelligence solutions such as Power View for stunning, interactive data visualizations and enhancements to PowerPivot. Lastly, SQL Server 2012 will uniquely support hybrid IT environments with common management and development tools, scale elastically, and extend applications directly to the cloud through SQL Azure.”

Register to access technical product resources—such as forums, solution accelerators, white papers, and webcasts—at the SQL Server 2012 Resource Page.

Review Microsoft SQL Server 2012 RC system requirements

Register for evaluation so that you may download and install the full-featured software for 180-day trial. Receive follow-up email with resources to guide you.

Additional Information:

• Available in these editions: 32-bit and 64-bit
• Available in these languages: Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Spanish

SCOM ZOMBIE PSA#26: SCOM 2012 Beta Video Series

 

Bryan Heath, posted some videos that we took the time in posting to the Community Evaluation Program for Operations Manager 2012. I’ve watched them and found them useful for anyone wanting to jump right in. And like him I am a visual person that like so see what I am learning and replicate it.

 

• Video One: Lab Suggestions and Prerequisites for OM 2012
• Video two: MSSQL, SRSS, and post install setup
• Video Three: MSSQL 2008 MP and Low Priv setup
• Dynamic groups with reg key part1
• Dynamic groups with reg key part 2
• Windows Logical Disk Management Pack
• Operations Manager Beta Series
• Operations Manager Beta Series - Orchestrator Integration part 1 
• Operations Manager 2012 Beta Series Gateway Server part 1
• Operations Manager 2012 Beta Series Gateway Server part 2
• Manager 2012 Beta Series Gateway Server part 3

SCOM Zombie PSA#25: MMS 2012 Registration Open

 

Registration began today for Microsoft Management Summit 2012 (#MMS2012). If you register by January 27, 2012 you should be able to some cash. about $300 bones, for the early bird special. After that you can expect to pay $1800 for the conference itself and to stay at the  Venetian Hotel, it will cost $2776.

Everything you need or want to know can be found here.

As much as I would love to go, I don’t expect that I will be able to this year, unless something special happens. I should be following the twitter feeds to keep up on everything. I did attend #MMS2011, and it was a blast; I really expect that this year will be huge with a large focus SCOM 2012.

SCOM Zombie PSA#24: SCOM 2012 RC

 

As of today Microsoft released System Center Operations Manager 2012 Release Candidate. But in order to receive the download you’ll need to register for it here.

Here are the key things that are of interest to me taken right from the Microsoft website:

Feature Summary

• Setup
  Operations Manager 2012 has a new Setup wizard. For important instructions about how to install Operations Manager 2012, see Install Operations Manager 2012 Beta.
  • Yes, this was a lot easier now, just make sure your pre-reqs are all established ahead of time.
• Highly Available Management Group Out of the Box
  In Operations Manager 2012, all management servers are peers; there is no root management server. The workload is split among all management servers in a management group, which provides high availability without requiring a cluster.
  • In a global enterprise where servers are everywhere, I am looking forward to deploying and pushing OM12 to its limits.
• Resource pools
  A resource pool provides the ability to distribute workloads across multiple management servers, such as availability, network device monitoring, distributed monitor health rollup, and group calculation.
  • Very promising, in the lab it worked as planned & yet my lab is very small.
• Web console
  Operations Manager 2012 introduces a new Web console. In Operations Manager 2012, all Operations Manager views are available in the Web console.
  • Interesting
• Network monitoring
  Operations Manager 2012 provides the ability to discover and monitor network routers and switches, including the network interfaces and ports on those devices and the virtual LAN (VLAN) that they participate in. You can also delete discovered network devices and prevent the deleted network devices from being rediscovered the next time discovery runs. For more information, see Monitor Network Devices.
  • Looking forward to this section of OM12.
• Dashboard views
  As part of the network monitoring and application monitoring capabilities, Operations Manager 2012 includes new comprehensive dashboard views that combine multiple panels of information into a single view. In Operations Manager 2012, you can add the new dashboard views to My Workspace.
• Display dashboard views using SharePoint
  The Operations Manager web part displays specified dashboard views and can be added to Microsoft SharePoint 2010 sites. For more information, see Add a Dashboard View to a SharePoint Site.
• Operations Manager Module for Windows PowerShell
  Operations Manager 2012 provides a Windows PowerShell 2.0 module containing a full set of new cmdlets. The cmdlets in this module are only compatible with Operations Manager 2012. You can recognize the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets by the "SC" preceding the noun. For additional information about the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets, open the Operations Manager command shell and type Get-Help about_OpsMgr_WhatsNew. For information about how the Operations Manager 2007 cmdlets map to the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets, type Get-Help about_OpsMgr_Cmdlet_Names.To use the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets, you must establish a connection to an Operations Manager management group. You can establish either a persistent connection in which you can run multiple cmdlets, or a temporary connection when running a single cmdlet. For more information about connections, open the Operations Manager Shell and type Get-Help about_OpsMgr_Connections.
• UNIX- and Linux-based computers
  In Operations Manager 2012, the Discovery Wizard is easier to use for discovering UNIX- and Linux-based computers. You can now use Windows PowerShell to manage UNIX- and Linux-based computers, for more information, see the UNIX and Linux section in the release notes. High availability is also supported.
• UNIX/Linux Shell Command Template Management Pack
  This Management Pack implements authoring templates that allow the creation of rules, tasks, and monitors based on execution of shell commands on UNIX/Linux agents.
• JEE Management Packs
  These management packs monitor JEE (Java Enterprise Edition) application servers. Management packs are available for IBM WebSphere, Oracle WebLogic, Red Hat JBoss and Apache Tomcat. ((I think this will be a key bonus for my systems))