Christopher Kusek, Technology Evangelist

It’s a dark night, you’re in a cold murky alley.   There’s a random file found in the root of your drive (or mount point).   Suddenly, your cluster goes offline.   WTF!

If you’re thinking, “Damnit, what did my storage vendor do now!” You’d be mistaken.

There’s this little doozy out there:

“A physical disk resource may unexpectedly fail or go offline when the IsAlive function is executed on a Windows Server 2008 cluster node” to the tune of Q953652

Microsoft declares it to happen when you meet the following scenario:

• You have a Windows Server 2008 cluster node.
• The IsAlive function is executed on the cluster node while a file is being accessed in the root folder of the cluster disk.

In this scenario, a physical disk resource on the Windows Server 2008 cluster node may unexpectedly fail or go offline. This behavior occurs randomly.

Or otherwise read as: If you have a file in the root of Drive letter or Mount point, the drive may ‘disappear’ when you have this configured in a cluster (This does not apply to Server 2008 single servers)

Quite often this is blamed on the storage (regardless of vendor) so be sure to keep your clusters up to spec and make sure to apply this Hotfix from Microsoft, especially if you meet this criteria!

Good luck Clusters, and those cold dark alleys won’t be so bad.

Every so often I get asked by people for help improving their skills, making them more marketable as well as ways to get access to training and resources.

And more often than not, I lead them in directions with the huge cost of $0.00 associated with it.    Whether you’re looking for Certification, access to Labs, E-Books, or Training information.

I’m a BIG fan of Free!

So, can you afford freE-Learning?

Thanks to our friends at Microsoft, here is another resource available to you!

By visiting this lovely site, it will display all of the available courses being offered by Microsoft Learning for Free!

What relevant topics are available on there at the moment:

1. SQL 2008
2. Application Virtualization
3. Terminal Services in Server 2008
4. Virtual Machine Manager for 2008
5. Hyper-V
6. ASP.NET
7. .NET Framework
8. Windows Security
9. Microsoft Security Guidance I-IV

…And more!

Seriously, there is a motherload of information here, so much training to wrap your teeth into!

If you saw my previous post about the voucher to get the Hyper-V training for free, this training is very complimentary to that and more! (Especially since that voucher seems to be faulty at the moment)

So get out there, get yourself something Free for this season.  It’s your education, do something about it!

Raise your hands up and praise Joanne Lin of the MSLCommunity for bringing us these little gems! (Gem1 and Gem2 ! :)) [Time for some verbatim copying!...kind of!]

Help celebrate our 25^th anniversary with a free e-book offer.  The November offers is valid from November 19 to November 26, 2008, so download the e-books soon.  You can also sign up for Microsoft Press Connection newsletter to get monthly update.

For November:

Windows Embedded CE 6.0 Fundamentals by Stanslav Pavlov and Pavel Belevsky:   This book examines the architecture, built-in programming tools, drivers, and build process, and shows how to take advantage of the Windows Embedded CE 6.0 Software Development Kit (SDK).

Download this e-book!

Windows Server 2008 Networking and Network Access Protection (NAP) by Joseph Davies and Tony Northrup with the Microsoft Networking Team:   Get the official resource for deploying, administering, and troubleshooting Windows Server 2008 networking and Network Access Protection (NAP) technologies.

Download this e-book!

Going for a SQL Class? Get a copy of SQL Server 2008 Standard Edition!

Microsoft Learning is teaming up with the SQL Server team to give away free copies of SQL Server 2008 Standard Edition to people who attend select instructor-led classroom training at a Microsoft Certified Partner for Learning Solutions (CPLS). Here’s the deal: The Deal!

So, if you’re looking for an early gift for yourself, or your friends.. Get them the Ebook that keeps on giving! :)

Happy Holiday-Season-Time! And spend that good money in this economy of free!

To make it easier to find out what tests are currently available in general and in Beta’s, I’m creating this “link” more or less, which I’ll keep current as I can. - All dates update 11/08/08

NS1-501: NetApp Certified Implementation Engineer:SAN - October 23, 2008 - December 31, 2008 (No Code needed)

70-113: TS: Windows® Server 2008 Active Directory, Configuring (Pilot) - July 31, 2008– December 31, 2008 (Code H640) (Qualifies you for 3 free vouchers after exam release)

71-505: TS: Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5, Windows Forms Application Development - November 25, 2008 - December 15, 2008 (Code: X356Y)

71-563: Pro: Design & Dev Windows Apps Using MS.NET Framework 3.5 - October 13, 2008 - December 11, 2008 (Code: DW897)

71-564: Pro: Designing and Developing ASP.NET Applications Using the Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5 - November 6, 2008 - December 1, 2008 (Code: RSC43)

71-565: Pro: Designing and Developing Enterprise Applications Using the Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5 - November 10, 2008 - December 3, 2008 (Code: 999TR)

71-403: TS: Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008, Configuring - September 30, 2008 - December 15, 2008 (Code: VMM08) (Code may be expired, keep trying it)

70-656 Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack, Configuring - First 500 Free (Code: MDOP)

71-433: TS: Microsoft SQL 2008, Database Development - September 22, 2008 - October 10, 2008 (Code: F589G)

NS1-060: NetApp Accredited Support Engineer - September 12, 2008 - November 7, 2008 (No Code needed)

NS1-050: NetApp Installation Accredited Professional - August 1, 2008 - September 12 2008 (No Code needed) - Extended to September 12th!

71-450: PRO: Microsoft SQL Server 2008, Designing, Optimizing, and Maintaining a Database Administrative Solution - August 18, 2008– September 16, 2008 (Code: 239F4)

71-451: PRO: Microsoft SQL Server 2008, Designing and Optimizing Database Solutions - September 2, 2008 - September 30, 2008 (Code: 14F65)

71-653: Windows Small Business Server 2008, Configuring - August 22, 2008 - September 25, 2008 (Code: SBS8)

71-654 - TS: Windows Essential Business Server 2008, Configuring - July 22, 2008 - ??? Sep 25?  (Code EBS08)

71-452: Designing a Business Intelligence Infrastructure Using Microsoft SQL Server 2008 -August 13, 2008– September 10, 2008 (Code: 3568C)

71-660: TS: Windows® Internals - July 21, 2008 - August 5, 2008 (Code WINT)

All older exams will not be referenced

Hey everybody! A few updates which will directly impact you that you should know about!

First of all, I’ve updated the Free Testing Archive to age old invalid certs and include new certs - So check it out!

Next of all, we’re getting closer to the availability of the NS1-501 SAN Exam from NetApp.  Prometric has the details published just not available to schedule a test yet.  That should change in the next week or so.   This is an entirely new exam so any old ‘test data’ which one has for it, likely won’t be valid anymore.    I’ll need to rewrite the study guide I wrote for the original version.

Next, welcome the first in a series of .NET 3.5 beta exams!

71-563: Pro: Design & Dev Windows Apps Using MS.NET Framework 3.5 - October 13, 2008 - October 30, 2008 (Code: DW897)

We have a number of folks to thank for this Exam! I’d like to make sure you know about the Beta Exam Blog where this was posted, as well as GerryO who posted about this :)

(This is also posted to the Free Testing Archive!)

Anyone who remembers my Second Chance Promotion post earlier in August (Second Shot)

Well, thanks to the MSL Community and GerryO again for this:

Second Shot now offers two incentives to get certified!
Today, Second Shot provides the benefit of a free retake if you fail a Microsoft Certification exam.
From October 15 – December 31, 2008, you will also be rewarded for passing the exam!
If you pass, you can now use the Second Shot offer to enjoy 25% off a different exam!
The Offer – 3-easy steps :
1.            Register for Second Shot offer and sit for the exam by December 31, 2008!
2.            If you fail the exam you will receive  a free retake exam that can be utilized until June 30, 2009
3.    If you Pass, you will get 25% off a second exam.  You have until February 28, 2009 to utilize the discounted exam.  
Note: If you pass the first exam but fail your 25% off second exam, you will not get a free retake on your second exam.
http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/offers/secondshot/default.mspx

So, there you go! 2 reasons and 3 ways to get you certified in 2008! Get out there, get your Second Chances and get your BETA On!