We are oftentimes complicated in projects with small and medium sized organisations. Due to the size of these organisations often the network infrastructure ready is little as a corollary of smaller budgets than their larger competitors. One side succeed of this reduced funds is that our clients sometimes need hardware and software to function in ways it is not exactly designed for.
One example of this is often not being able to afford the licence fee for Windows Server and instead to use Windows Xp professional or even Windows Xp Home to run a central file, print or database server. Clearly this arrival would not work for a Microsoft Active Directory Domain Controller but can be used for many other types of server and there are times where there is no other option.
There are two usability downsides to be aware of for remote supervision when taking the decision to use Microsoft Windows Xp instead of Windows Server.
The first is that Windows Xp pro when accessed through Remote Desktop Protocol (Rdp) connections does not display a log off button or a reset choice on the shutdown - the only selection is to shut down the server which is not ideal and will mean that it won’t restart afterwards; this can be solved.
The simplest way to overcome the problem is to generate a batch file to restart the server, to do this:
1. Open Notepad (or someone else text editor)
2. Type: shutdown -r -t 5
3. Save the file somewhere sensible (such as the desktop) with a name such as restart.bat, the prominent thing is it ends with the postponement of .bat
To run the file just double click it, the switches in the shutdown command are:
-r = restart (instead of shutdown)
-t 5 = the estimate of time to wait before restarting in seconds - in this case 5 secs.
The second issue is that terminal services functionality ready to facilitate remote management through tools such as Rdp is only adequate to allow one user to log on at a time. This can cause problems if you use it as a amelioration server for example, but as a file store it is unlikely you want more than one or two administrators - with a small amount they can carry on the situation by phone calls.
Techita would recommend wherever possible to use the version of operating system designed for the role you intend the server to perform, however when this is just not possible this tip may make the administration that miniature bit simpler.
