With the recent MS14-025 security patch Microsoft has removed the ability to configure passwords in Group Policy Preferences via the User Interface. However this update does not remove the password value from AD nor does it stop the value being applied to computers/users. So, if you have apply MS14-025 and you have also implemented another way of managing the local…

As per my previous blog post Microsoft has release MS14-025 that blocks the ability to configure passwords using Group Policy Preferences. However as part of the guidance they have also published a PowerShell script that allows you to set a random password to the user local admin account. This blog post show you how you can use this script (bad…

The Windows Remote Management (a.k.a. WinRM) interface is a network service that allow remote management access to computer via the network. It’s used  frequently as a conduit to allow remote management of computer via PowerShell. As a result WinRM is enabled by default on Windows Server 2012 to enable the Server Manager tool but it is not enabled for Windows client…

A number of month ago I did a blog post explaining why the use of passwords (a.k.a. cPasswords)  in  Group Policy Preferences was such a bad idea ( see Why Passwords in Group Policy Preference are VERY BAD). Well Microsoft have now taken the additional steps and now release a new hot fix for Group Policy Management Console that explicitly…

In my recent blog post about Internet Explorer 11 I explain how you can enable Enterprise Mode via Group Policy. The option “Let users turn on and use Enterprise Mode from the Tools menu” as the name suggest allows users to enable the option form the Tools menu in Internet Explorer. But as the description of this also mentions: Optionally,…

If you have updated your touch/slate device to Windows 8.1 Update you will have noticed that the Search button has appeared on your start menu but not the power button. If you were wondering how to enable this button then unfortunately there is no easy way to do this as it is dictated by the type of hardware that you are…

With the release of Windows 8.1 Update Microsoft has introduced a new feature Internet Explorer Enterprise Mode. This allows admins to assign via Group Policy a way to force web site to render using specific browser modes. Internet Explorer has has a long heritage and each new version of the browser shipped has had the rendering engine of the previous…

There is a setting in Internet Explorer that is called “Always switch to new tabs when they are created” which as the name suggests controls how tabs in the browser are created. This setting can of course be controlled via Group Policy so that tabs will either appear in the background or foreground in the browser when a user opens…