The Digital Education Revolution (DER) was an initiative announced by the Labor government during their 2007 election campaign, whereby federal funding would be made available to schools, for the provision of computer devices, audio video systems, and supporting infrastructure. The aim of the program, was to invest in Australia’s future digital economy, by ensuring that... Continue Reading →
The Benefits of Gamification and Game-based Learning
According to Karl Kapp (2012, pp. 10), an Instructional Design Doctorate and widely published author on the topic of learning and instruction, “Gamification is using game-based mechanics, aesthetics and game thinking to engage people, motivate action, promote learning, and solve problems” (Kapp, 2012). Gamification, or games based learning (GBL) as referred to when utilising actual... Continue Reading →
Targeting Devices for software and licensing, based on Security Groups
In almost all Active Directory (AD) environments, access to resources will be managed via security groups, and group emails handled by distribution groups. While it is also possible to add devices to security groups, and use these to perform some pretty useful functions, it’s mostly all about the users. Managing Active Directory on-premises is an... Continue Reading →
Hijack your audio for complete control (MacOS)
I've had my eye on software by Rogue Amoeba for a while, but thought I'd try to find free alternatives instead. The end result? Don't waste your time, and just buy their stuff instead. While this is a Mac solution, there are similar solutions for Windows, and I'll look to post those soon (as many... Continue Reading →
How Microsoft Lost it’s Cool (with Consumers)
Some would argue that Microsoft was never a cool company, but I dispute that: Just think back to October 2015, where Panos Panay took to the stage, to deliver a One-Windows reality that none of us expected; that spanned awesome Surface devices, Xbox, a wearable in the Microsoft Band, oh... and the HoloLens. There wasn't a tech... Continue Reading →
Use Surface MSIs to deploy driver and firmware updates
In 2015, I had the privilege of attending the Microsoft Ignite conference on the Gold Coast. While I loaded up my schedule with plenty of sessions on Azure and Office 365, I also made sure to attend as many Surface-centric events as possible: And I managed to get to quite a few. One of the... Continue Reading →
What is Click-to-Run (C2R)?
In my previous two posts, I described the Microsoft Installer (MSI), as well as Application Virtualization (App-V), and now it's time to talk about Click-to-Run (C2R). Click-to-Run is actually an installer stub, streamer, and command line technology, based on Microsoft's App-V technology, and is currently used for the delivery of Microsoft Office ProPlus products. Traditionally,... Continue Reading →
What is Microsoft Application Virtualization (APP-V)?
In my previous article, I covered the Microsoft Installer (MSI), which is a traditional installation technology; and a technology that requires that the entire installer be downloaded/cached, and which then proceeds to write to the file system and registry in one go. As far as legacy installers go, MSI technology offers many advantages, but none quite... Continue Reading →
What is the Microsoft Installer (MSI)?
Long story short, a Microsoft Installer - sometimes referred to as Windows Installer, or just MSI - is a relational database, that contains internal tables that define an installation: And is therefore a software installer, just like the typical 'setup.exe', only far more powerful. As of writing this post, the MSI format is now eighteen (18)... Continue Reading →
Secure Time Service may break authentication tokens
The Secure Time Seeding feature was shipped in the Windows 10 November 2015 (1511) release and is turned on by default. You may have seen the improvements in timekeeping on your Windows tablets and other Windows devices running this version of the OS, but you may have also found issues with broken authentication to SharePoint... Continue Reading →
Bypass authentication for Microsoft’s Network Tests to avoid Wi-Fi issues
An area where Windows 10 attempts to help users, but ultimately may cause problems in some environments, is with the network connectivity test the Operating System runs when establishing a new connection. Essentially, to work out whether your network connection is behind a captive portal or not, or has Internet access at all, Windows attempts... Continue Reading →
Windows Defender Security Center needs new Firewall Policies
Starting with Windows 10 Fall Creators Update (1709), many people have found some unusual behaviour with the new Windows Defender Security Center (WDSC), and most of these issues appear to be related to firewall policies. The WDSC was introduced in Windows 10 Creators Update (1703), however it appears that changes in more recent versions of may... Continue Reading →
Azure AD & Macs: Not for Binding
You've heard of Azure Active Directory (AAD), right? If not, here's the TLDR: It's Microsoft's cloud based directory for users, groups, and devices; It's the back end, that holds all the users, user attributes, and licenses for Office 365 (using AAD Free), and can be scaled up via Azure AD Premium licenses to provide enough... Continue Reading →