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How to reset the sa account on Microsoft SQL Server
by lunarg on December 11th 2024, at 09:36
Provided you still have administrative access to the server itself, and the server is running in mixed mode (i.e. you can actually use local SQL logins), you can perform the steps below to reset the password. Note that this will result in some downtime as the SQL Server service will have to be restarted in single user mode.

First, determine the service name (can be done via services.msc): if it is the default instance, it's usually called MSSQLSERVER. If an instance name was specified, it is usually MSSQLSERVER$instance-name. E.g. if the instance is called MYSWEETAPP, the service name would be MSSQLSERVER$MYSWEETAPP.

Open an administrative (elevated) command prompt or Powershell:

First, s  ...
 
Editing (default) room calendar permissions in Exchange
by lunarg on December 4th 2024, at 15:18
It is possible that room mailboxes have their default permissions set to show only availability, but sometimes you may want to allow users to see what has been booked (title of the meeting). You can either set this through Outlook but this is tedious as you'll need full mailbox access for this to work. However, admins can also set this via Powershell (for M365, load the Exchange Online module).

To view the current permissions:

Get-MailboxFolderPermission my-meeting-room:\calendar

To set the permissions to show limited details by default:

Set-MailboxFolderPermission -AccessRights LimitedDetails -Identity my-meeting-room:\calendar -User default

Optionally, if you wish to know who booked t  ...
 
Initialize and partition a new disk via diskpart
by lunarg on December 3rd 2024, at 10:14

On Windows Server Core installations, you don't have Disk Management available. But you can quickly initialize and partition a new disk via diskpart. Here's a quick reference to the necessary commands in order.

  1. select disk 1
  2. attributes disk clear readonly
  3. online disk
  4. select disk 1
  5. clean
  6. convert gpt
  7. create partition primary
  8. format quick fs=ntfs label="disk label" unit=64k
  9. assign letter="E"
 
Create an ISO from a folder in linux using mkisofs
by lunarg on October 8th 2024, at 16:43

The equivalent of creating a disk image from a folder like in macOS can be achieved in linux as well. You'll need the genisoimage package, which will install the mkisofs command. After that, you can easily create ISO files from a folder's contents. The additional flags, such as -J make the ISO Windows-compatibel.

mkisofs -J -l -R -V "Label CD" -iso-level 4 -o output.iso input_directory
 
Set Microsoft SQL Server memory limits via command-line (sqlcmd)
by lunarg on August 19th 2024, at 11:08
You can set the Microsoft SQL Server memory limits via command-line using sqlcmd. This is useful if you do not have SSMS available.

Connect to the server using sqlcmd. If you are running locally with the default instance, this is as easy as running the following from the command prompt:

sqlcmd -S

Note that you will need to have sysadmin permissions to be able to make the changes.

Run the following commands to set the minimum and maximum memory limits:

EXEC sys.sp_configure 'show advanced options', 1;GORECONFIGURE;GOEXEC sys.sp_configure 'min server memory', 1024;GOEXEC sys.sp_configure 'max server memory', 4096;GORECONFIGURE;GO

In the example above, we set the minimum memory to 1 GB (1  ...
 
Create bootable Debian USB on Mac
by lunarg on August 6th 2024, at 15:13
While there are a lot of ways and tools to write bootable ISOs to USB on a Mac, the most easiest is in fact by using the "linux" method, a perfectly valid option using internal command-line tools:

You'll need an USB device that's large enough. For netinst, 1 GB would be sufficient. Make sure that the contents are kept safe if needed, as the USB device will be wiped.

If you haven't done so already, you can download the proper ISO file for Debian from this page: https://www.debian.org/distrib/. Download only from a legitimate mirror.

Insert the USB device and open up Terminal. We need to verify the device identifier of the USB device as we will need this later. This will be in the  ...
 
Private network profile on domain controller (instead of Domain)
by lunarg on August 6th 2024, at 14:51
It can happen that the network profile on a domain controller switches to Private, usually after changing network settings or a network adapter. The network profile is then set to Private with no way to switch to Domain.

The first thing you can attempt is to restart the Network Location Awareness service. This service is responsible for setting the network profile depending on several parameters. It can sometimes get it wrong (usually because of startup order).

If restarting NLA helps, then there's an easy registry fix to permanently resolve it. This is the preferred method over manually configuring service dependencies in the registry, which is more complex and prone to errors. While the   ...
 
Factory reset Cisco Catalyst 9200 (without password)
by lunarg on July 30th 2024, at 12:14
To factory reset a Cisco Catalyst 9200 series switch (e.g. when you can no longer log in or have forgotten the password), you can factory reset the switch through physical access and a serial console connection.

First, connect the serial console cable and verify whether you have access to the serial console. Also, verify whether you have physical access to the switch and can unplug the power.

Unplug the power cable to power down the switch. While holding down the button at the left top corner (next to the "S" LED), plug in back in. Keep the button pressed for at least 10 seconds, until the "S" LED is solid green. The console output will also state the boot from "pa  ...
 
 
 
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