HowTo: Seize FSMO roles

1. Log on to a working DC
2. Open Powershell with Admin privileges
3. Enter the following command to seize all roles

   Move-ADDirectoryServerOperationMasterRole -Identity "Target-DC" -OperationMasterRole 0,1,2,3,4
   
   

4. Run the following command to confirm all roles have been seized. You should see the "Target-DC" as now holding all roles.

   netdom query fsmo
   
   

   

HowTo: Remove a dead DC from the domain

**Warning** ntdsutil is a powerful and unforgiving tool. Be sure you know exactly what operations it will be performing before you proceed. You will also want to confirm that the DC you're removing no longer holds any FSMO roles before proceeding.

Overview

This guide will show you how to manually remove a Domain Controller (DC) that is no longer online, or is unable to demote itself as a DC.

Forcibly remove from AD DS using NTDSutil

• Open cmd.exe and run the following commands
• Be sure to choose the correct server, or your Active Directory environment could become unstable
• You will need to replace things like "serverName" with the actual name of the server you're working with

ntdsutil

metadata cleanup

connections

connect to server serverName

q

select operation target

list domains

select domain domainNumber

list sites

select site siteNumber

list servers in site

select server serverNumber

q

remove selected server

Click "yes"

q

Remove the DC from Sites and Services

• Open "Active Directory Sites and Services" from the programs menu (or run dssite.msc)
• Navigate to Sites → default-first-site-name → servers → serverName
• Right-click the serverName and choose "delete"

Manually remove DNS records

• Browse through DNS and manually remove any associated A, NS, or CNAME records
• Ensure SRV records no longer exist by opening cmd.exe and running the following commands. If any records for your dead DC, you will need to manually remove them.

nslookup

set type=all

_ldap._tcp.dc._msdcs.domainName

Commands: Sudo!!

If you're like me, you often forget to type sudo before a command that requires admin privileges and you probably see a lot of messages like this:

Simply type

sudo!!

to add the sudo command to the beginning of your last command

HowTo: Set up an Ubuntu workstation on an ESXi server

Overview

This guide will show you how to install a Ubuntu workstation on ESXi, and connect to it via RDP.

Initial Setup

• Download ISO http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop
• Build VM w/16GB & 100GB drives, 2 vCPUs and 4GBs of RAM
• Attach ISO, boot, install Ubuntu (installation guide)

VMware tools installation

• Initiate the VMware tools installation through vsphere client
• Extract the installer to the Desktop
  

  tar xzvf /media/<username>/VMware Tools/VMwareTools-9.4.0-1280544.tar.gz -C
  ~/Desktop/

• Run the installer
  

  cd ~/Desktop/vmware-tools-distrib
  sudo ./vmware-install.pl -d

Configure Static IP

• Open network configuration file

sudo nano /etc/network/interfaces

• Enter static IP information

auto <interface>

iface <interface> inet static

address 10.0.10.90

netmask 255.255.255.0

gateway 10.0.10.254

dns-nameservers 8.8.8.8 4.2.2.2

• Hold ctrl+o to write file

Update & Install necessary packages for RDP access

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get upgrade

sudo apt-get install xrdp

sudo apt-get install xfce4

sudo apt-get install xfce4-terminal

sudo apt-get install gnome-icon-theme-full tango-icon-theme

echo xfce4-session >~/.xsesson

Configure xfce for RDP access

Open file for editing

nano /etc/xrdp/startwm.sh

Update configuration to start xfce

#!/bin/sh



if [ -r /etc/default/locale ]; then

  . /etc/default/locale

  export LANG LANGUAGE

fi



startxfce4

Restart xrdp service

sudo service xrdp restart

Connect to your VM from a Windows machine