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Implementing DKIM on Exchange 2019 CU11 with Microsoft DNS

Sometimes the path we choose is only met with minimal speed bumps. We’ll call that a good day. Spoiler alert, MS DNS doesn’t play nice. Who’da thunk it? đź‘Ž What, no middle finger emoji? I am appalled, Windows 10.

So, you’ve been putting it off for a real long time, maybe you got sidetracked reading r/ShittySysadmin on Reddit, and you haven’t felt like dicking with it, but today’s a new day, and you haven’t totally had your fill of punishment yet, so you decide to take the plunge.

For a little back story, after almost twenty years of being a sysadmin, dealing with endless server problems, Windows problems galore, buggy software, and providing direct tech support to crabby, ungrateful end-users, I’ve recently come to the conclusion that to be a sysadmin, whether you know it or not, you have to be a masochist deep down, because only a crazy man would willingly endure this kind of torture. Smh. It’s true, it’s true. 🙄 Anywho, I’ll be your copilot this evening, so let’s kick this bitch into overdrive, and get some shit done.

Here’s some basic instructions to implement DKIM signing on Microsoft Exchange 2019 CU11 relatively painlessly in about 15 minutos, pending you’re on a recent version of Windows. In my case, I was on Windows Server Standard 2019 LTS v1809, so no .NET dependencies needed to be met. Cue Ranier Wolfcastle, “Up and at them!“.

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Exchange 2010 – Add Send As Permission for All Users/Future Users from a User Account

No need for a bunch of hoopla, here’s the short and sweet version.

Add Send As Permission for All Users from a User Account

Get-Mailbox -ResultSize Unlimited | Add-ADPermission -User "YourDomain\Username" -Extendedrights "Send As"

To add send as permissions for future users, we need to create a powershell script with the above line in it, make sure you have enabled the use of unsigned scripts by issuing the “Set-ExecutionPolicy remotesigned” command at an administrator ran PowerShell prompt, and create a task scheduler job to run our script with the administrator credentials saved in there.
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HP 280 G1 MT/Intel HD4600 Dual Monitor DVI Problem Finally Resolved

Personally I’d been fighting this Intel HD 4600 DVI/dual monitor issue for several months now, but at the time I had bigger fish to fry, so I kept putting it off until today. Those poor people on the Intel forums have been complaining about this issue for like three or four years now because “they weren’t able to reproduce the issue”, very sad. Indeed it is a very strange problem. Initially I was convinced it was strictly a driver problem, but now I think it may be some sort of weird driver/OS oddity.

If you’re unfamiliar with the issue, there are multiple threads out there on the Intel forums and several I’ve seen on the HP forums as well. The problem is that after a system reboot, the display on the DVI port is no longer detected and all you get is a black screen. The second monitor is not detected in the operating system whatsoever and the monitor shows no input signal. Right after the initial installation of the display driver, dual monitors would work, but only until the next system reboot. One workaround for this issue was to uninstall/reinstall the display driver and just never reboot the machine again, which totally sucked donkey balls. Continue reading “HP 280 G1 MT/Intel HD4600 Dual Monitor DVI Problem Finally Resolved”

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Batch Script – How to Check if the Current User is a Member of a Group

Here is a batch script, using only DOS commands, to check if the current user is a member of a specific group. The way it is currently written, you can call a batch file containing this code using the CALL command and pass the short NetBIOS domain name (or possibly the computer name if it is a local account) and the group name to search for as arguments, and it will return a “1” if the user is a member of the specified group and “0” if they are not. Just be sure to put quotes around any group name that contains any spaces. Continue reading “Batch Script – How to Check if the Current User is a Member of a Group”

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HP Support Assistant – The Epitome of Spyware and How to Disable It

Sure there are several legitmate cases where the HP Support Assistant can be helpful, such as updating drivers or flashing the BIOS on the computer, but if you’re reading this, you’ve probably already established the fact that the software basically hijacks your computer and does a lot of shady shit in the background. I would absolutely classify the product as being spyware and would highly recommend that you take all steps necessary to disable it when it is not being used, and here are some reasons why.

My first problem is that by default, the HP Support Assistant does an intrusive scan of your network to search for “devices” every time the software runs and it appears you can’t turn that off. It doesn’t get much shadier than that folks, seeing as how you don’t really know what they are up to and why they are taking an inventory of your entire network.
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Cannot Log onto Windows – Trust Relationship Failed

There’s several different things that can cause the trust relationship issue and there are hundreds of post or more online about the subject. Sometimes simply resetting the computer account in Active Directory can fix the problem. Other times, unjoining/rejoining the computer from the domain will fix the problem. If either of those isn’t the case, usually that is a good indication that there is some sort of corruption in the Active Directory database that can only be fixed by manual intervention.
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Fuck You Microsoft, I Will Install the Cisco VPN Client on Windows 10 and Furthermore, You Can Suck It

Seriously man, fuck Microsoft, fuck Windows 10, and fuck you. No actually you are ok, as long as you don’t work for Microsoft or are some sort of freak MS enthusiast, but what kind of shithole stasi big brother state do we live in when your software vendor tells you what applications you can and can’t install on the operating system you purchased for your own PC? I mean I know they’ve been doing that shit for a long time, but tonight the stars revolt (seemingly misplaced Powerman 5000 reference).

I just had the joy of wasting an hour of my life getting the damn Cisco VPN client to work. When Windows 8 came out, there were a few workarounds to have to do, but now MS has stepped up their game of being total assclowns and won’t let you even run the installer. In your delight, you will receive the pleasantly authoritarian popup box that says, “This app can’t be run on this PC“. Fan-fucking-tastic.
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Windows Update Error 80073712 When Installing KB2943357 – OR – How to Repair Corrupted Windows Update Files on Windows 7 or Server 2008

Starting with Windows 8 and Server 2012, you can more easily fix corrupted updates using the “DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth” command, but what about on Windows 7 or on Server 2008? Well, to be honest, it is kind of a pain in the ass and quite a lengthy process.

This seems to be a prime candidate for some sort of automated batch or PowerShell script that could parse out the bad updates from the log file, extract the needed files from the KB .msu packages, move them to the temp directory, and then re-run the System Update Readiness Tool. Lord knows it would save a lot of people some time and headaches but I don’t know whether it is even worth the hassle of programming it all seeing as how mainstream support for Windows 7 will be up soon and extended support will be around until 2020. That and I’m sure a lot of people have been suckered into upgrading to Windows 10 for free as well. It’s ok, there’s nothing in that giant wooden trojan horse that they just carted into your living room. Your data is safe and there are absolutely zero privacy concerns, trust them. Go back to sleep zombie.

Anyways, if you have installed any Server 2008  or Windows 7 operating systems in the last say year or so, you probably have noticed that Windows Update gets broken almost every single freaking time and it is quite cumbersome. So here is the cliff notes version on how to repair your corrupted Windows Update files.
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