I’ll See You at the Midwest Management Summit!

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Just in case you haven’t heard the news yet, my friends over at the Minnesota System Center User Group are sponsoring the inaugural Midwest Management Summit (MMS)!  This is going to be a great conference. Think old-school Microsoft Management Summit, remove the keynote, as well as the 100, 200, and most 300-level sessions. Oh yea, remove the marketing pitch too!

MMS 2014 will be a deep dive into the products you know and love – System Center 2012 (ConfigMgr, OpsMgr, SvcMgr, etc), Windows PowerShell, Service Management Automation.  These sessions are fresh, deep, and interactive.

Fresh – This is new content – not content that you’ve already viewed on Channel9, attended at Microsoft Official Curriculum courses, or anywhere else.

Deep – We’re talking as deep as 500 level stuff here (watch my blog for a few of my hot picks later this week).

Interactive – Have you ever heard of Birds of a Feather (BoF) sessions? These were always very popular at MMS in previous years, and were often fully booked, and you were unable to attend. MMS 2014 has a BoF session for every single presentation. That’s right-for every session, you will see 60 minutes for presentation, and 50 minutes for BoF, Q&A, and interactive discussion.

Here’s a list of the sessions that I’ll be presenting (review full session list):

ConfigMgr Applications and PowerShell – In Depth – My friend Trevor Sullivan and I will take you “to the deep end” of using PowerShell to manage ConfigMgr Applications, end-to-end. We’ll discuss and demonstrate native cmdlets, as well as diving into WMI to handle things that are not yet supported by the cmdlets.

PowerShell and ConfigMgr – Most Requested Scenarios and Procedures – My friend Kaido Jarvmets and I will take you through the most-requested items from our blog posts, for leveraging PowerShell with ConfigMgr. Send me any special requests too!

PowerShell DSC vs. ConfigMgr Settings Management (Compliance Settings) – You’ve heard a lot about PowerShell DSC in the past year. How is it different than ConfigMgr Settings Managment? What’s the right tool for the job? In this session, I’ll dive into scenarios and advantages of one vs. the other.

Server OS Deployment Deep Dive (with ConfigMgr 2012 R2) – You’ve ‘mastered’ OS Deployment (let’s face it, we all have room to grow in this space – but regardless, you’re pretty good with OSD in deploying workstation operating systems). This session will dive into the scenarios and nuances of deploying Server OS. Managing server firmware and hardware, handling static IP addresses, safety precautions, and more.

In addition to the sessions I’m presenting, I’m also excited to sit down and learn from all the other brilliant speakers! Stay tuned – I’ll post some of my hot pick sessions soon!

Greg

This post first appeared on http://www.gregramsey.net

Proof of Concept Jumpstart Kit v3.0 available for download

I evaluated version 2.0, and must admit, I was impressed. This is a great learning tool – take a look at the links below to see all the products that are covered (MDT, App-V, Win7, just to name a few.)

About the PoC Jumpstart Kit v3.0:

This self-contained, self-service kit will help you complete a Proof-of -Concept (PoC) at your organization, allowing you to quickly evaluate the new Microsoft desktop technologies, including Windows 7 SP1, Office 2010 Pro Plus, Internet Explorer 9, and Application Virtualization with Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack technology App-V. It will also familiarize you with some of the important deployment tools provided by Microsoft to assist with your broader deployment efforts. This PoC is not meant to be a comprehensive training mechanism but rather an introductory set of modules to familiarize you with tools and technologies.

Once you’ve downloaded it, you’ll find a decent amount of documentation presented in a “self-paced lab” format. Very handy to walk through.

Download v3.0: http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=1834

Visit the PoC Jumpstart home page: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/ff603537.aspx

Greg