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How to map a network drive via Group Policy

Map network drive via GP

Map a network drive via group policy is a much easier and faster process than manually or logon scripts. user does not have to wait for the logon script to load or if the network path changes it automatically updates. It makes admin and user’s life much better and makes changes to the network without having to update each user. It should plan out the process, users, or groups it’s going to apply this network drive.

This is my process for this post

  1. File server: FileServ1
  2. Share Name: Accounting
  3. Drive Letter: S
  4. Group that’s applying to: Accounting
  5. how-to-delete-policy

Create a new GPO

Start>Windows Administrative Tools>Group Policy Management

or from Server Manager: Tools>Group Policy Management

Right-click on your OU (Organization Unit) where you want to create and link your Group Policy

Select Create a GPO in this domain, and Link it here …

You will see New GPO, name it whatever you want, something that makes sense, I am going to call it Accounting Network Drive

Configure GPO

Right-click on the Group Policy Object and select Edit

Expand User Configuration>Preferences>Windows Settings
Then right-click on Drive Maps and select New>Mapped Drive

Filling the details

You can see there are many options to select from

Based on select above you will see other options

How to Delete policy

First unlink from OU that’s linked

Then Delete from Group Policy Objects:

If you try to delete while still linked GPO, you will get this message, which also works fine too

That’s it, hope this help others


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How to Compact Virtual Hard Disk

These days most of us using virtual storage drives for a server, most of the time these virtual storage disks are configured dynamically, so it grows as we use it, but does not shrink when you delete data unless you do compact. If you are using Hyper-V servers, it’s very easy to do, other hypervisors also offer similar compacting, you may just have to look around.

Here is screenshot of before compacting drive:

To compact in Microsoft Hyper-V hypervisor:

Open the Hyper-V Manager
Select the VM
Right-click on VM, click Settings
Select the Hard Drive that you want to compact, then click Edit
It will give you the location of the Disk and warning, please make sure you have a good backup, just in case something goes wrong
Click Next

If you only see Expand option, that means your VM is running, you can’t Compact
Click Next

Summary of Disk, click Finish and it will start compacting, time it takes to compact are depends on speed of drive and how much data you have deleted.

This is what it looks like after compacting, the size will vary depends on how much of your data being deleted.

After Compacting:

That’s it, if you don’t get the drive space back, make sure to do the Drive Optimization first then re-do the compacting

To drive Optimize:

Login into server and right click on the drive select Properties

Click on Tools tab
Click on Optimize

Then select the drive if you have more then one and click on Optimize


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How to delete Active Directory user with privilege issue

There may be a number of reasons you can’t delete some users from Active Directory, one of them could be domain admin or enterprise admin privileges. Another could be some objects are still in use or not sync up with an exchange, they both have some many references, so can’t delete active directory user with exchange ActiveSync

I had come across one after migration to Office 365, some user account that may have old Exchange attributes that cannot be deleted and you will have to manually give your self full access. here is how to delete those account that has privilege issues.

First you need to change the view to: use the “view -> users, Contacts, Groups, and Computers as containers”

Then go to the user you are having issue deleting, give you self full permission to object then you should be able to delete it


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How to clean up old DHCP server’s entry in a domain via PowerShell and netsh command

It’s very easy to forget old server entries and it may cause an issue in your network.  Sometimes system/network admin wait for approval process or schedule to clean up or just simply don’t know how to.  Whatever your reason is, this should be done to keep your network healthy from any unknown issues.  Here are some ways to clean up, I have listed PowerShell, Netsh and via GUI.

Via PowerShell:

To see list of all DHCP server run PowerShell command:

PS C:\>Get-DhcpServerInDC

To remove it:

You have to be domain or enterprise admin to remove it otherwise, you will get error

PS C:\>Remove-DhcpServerInDC –DnsName YourDHCPserver –IPAddress

This is without error: if you have run as admin

To add it:

You have to be domain or enterprise admin to remove it otherwise, you will get error

PS C:\> Add-DhcpServerInDC –DnsName YourDHCPserver –IPAddress

Using netsh commands

To the list of commands: netsh dhcp list

To add:

Netsh dhcp add server NameOfYourDHCPServer IP address

To delete:

Dhcp delete server NameOfYourServer IP address

Via GUI:

To add:
open your DHCP server, right-click, and select add

To Remove:
open your DHCP server, right-click and select Manage authorized servers …
Then just remove HDCP server that’s no longer in use

That’s it


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How to redirect HTTP to HTTPS in IIS

Redirect are very common for web servers for most if not all websites these days.  This post I am using the URL Rewrite, if your server does not have already you need to download URL Rewrite extension which works With IIS 7, IIS 7.5, IIS 8, IIS 8.5, IIS 10.  Note.  If you already have the URL Rewrite you can skip to the section Adding Redirect Rule

Installation of URL Rewrite:

You can download directly from this link: https://www.iis.net/downloads/microsoft/url-rewrite

If you already have the Web Platform Installer, you can double click and find it there, under your web server>Sites>Select site>on the right-side panel you will see Management section

To start the installation double click on the URL Rewrite and click Install

Read the terms then click on I Accept

If everything goes well you should see, successfully installed, click Finish
you should see the URL Rewrite, if you don’t close the IIS Manager and re-open it.

Adding Redirect Rule:

Double click on the URL Rewrite for the site you want to redirect

Add your rules here, which fits your needs you may need more than one rules

I am going to create a rule to redirect HTTP to HTTPS:

Click Add Rules(s)
Then click on Blank rule (for Inbound rules)

Fill in the Name and other options shown in the screenshot, then expand the Conditions and click Add

This condition will check if user type’s https, then this rule will be ignored, so it avoids the loop

Nothing set on the server variables, unless you needed in some special case, you can add it, Next, we want to set up the redirect
https://{HTTP_HOST}/{R:1}

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/iis/extensions/url-rewrite-module/url-rewrite-module-configuration-reference

Your Rule should look something like this if you open your web.config file:
        <rewrite>
            <rules>
                <rule name=”http to https redirect” stopProcessing=”true”>
                    <match url=”(.*)” />
                    <conditions logicalGrouping=”MatchAny”>
                        <add input=”{HTTPS}” pattern=”^OFF$” />
                    </conditions>
                    <action type=”Redirect” url=”https://{HTTP_HOST}/{R:1}” />
                </rule>
            </rules>
        </rewrite>

If you have issues make sure to check following:

  • Make sure your webserver firewall ports 80 and 443 are opened
  • You may need to restart the IIS service for rule to take effect, also make your local cache is cleared for your browser.
  • Double-check the pattern of your rule make sure it’s correctly typed, not a typo

That’s it