John Croson's Blog Home

I like scripting . It helps me manage my client PC 's, perform redundant tasks, push out software updates, among other things. Most of the users on my network do not have privileges to install software, so this affects how some of my scripts function . I discovered that setting GPO to install applications with elevated privileges doesn't mean that the logon scripts also get processed the same way. This annoyed me, and I quickly found a solution. Introduce CPAU, from http://www.joeware.net/ . A neat little utility that takes the place of RUNAS, and very easy to use. I use it to launch my domain logon script, as it copies a HOST file , and other batch files run locally by the scheduler service, which are not allowed write by ordinary users. The following line encodes a file that will run logon.cmd using the credentials provided it. \\mydc\netlogon\cpau.exe -u mydomain\UserWithPermissions -p UserWithPermissionsPassword -ex \\mydc\netlogon\logon.cmd -file \\mydc\netlogon...

As a consultant, I used GFI LANguard (7?...it was at least 2 years ago) as a tool, in conjunction with nmap and some others, to perform security audits for our clients. Now I've an opportunity to use it again, and agreed to give it a review. Environment Dell Dimension 5150 P4 3ghz, 2gb Ram SLED 10.1, running VMWare Server 1.x 768mb allocated for XP SP2 Instance LAN, 2003 Domain in mixed mode The download from GFI's website was surprisingly small; only 50mb. The installation was straight forward, with only two questions; installation location, and initial credentials to use for scanning your domain. The UI is no different, very intuitive. I'd expect nothing else from GFI, since most of their products are the same way. The product is broken up into four components: Management Console - the central location for launching scans, view saved scans, configure options, and use specialized network security tools. Attendant Service - runs scheduled scans and patch deploymen...