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ABOUT THIS BOOK

Network administrators and consultants are confronted with numerous mundane and
time-consuming activities on a daily basis. Whether it is going through thousands of
users in Active Directory Users and Computers to grant dial-in permissions to a select
group, or changing profile storage locations to point to a newly added network server,
these everyday tasks must be completed. In the enterprise space, the ability to quickly
write and deploy a Microsoft Visual Basic Script (VBScript) will make the difference
between a task that takes a few hours and one that takes a few weeks.
As an Enterprise Consultant for Microsoft, I am in constant contact with some of the
world’s largest companies that run its software. The one recurring theme I hear is,
“How can we effectively manage thousands of servers and tens of thousands of users?”
In some instances, the solution lies in the employment of specialized software pack€
ages—but in the vast majority of the cases, the solution is a simple VBScript.
In Microsoft Windows Server 2003, enterprise manageability was one of the design
goals, and VBScript is one path to unlocking the rich storehouse of newly added fea€
tures. Using the techniques outlined in Microsoft Windows Scripting Self-Paced Learning
Guide, anyone can begin crafting custom scripts within minutes of opening these
pages. I’m not talking about the traditional Hello World script—I’m talking about truly
useful scripts that save time and help to ensure accurate and predictable results.
Whereas in the past scripting was somewhat hard to do, required special installations
of various implementations, and was rather limited in its effect, with the release of
Microsoft Windows XP and Windows Server 2003, scripting is coming into its own.
This is really as it should be. However, most Administrators and IT professionals do not
have an understanding of scripting, because in the past scripting was not a powerful
alternative for platform management.
However, in a large enterprise, it is a vital reality that one simply cannot perform man€
agement from the GUI applications because it is too time-constraining, too error prone,
and after a while too irritating. Clearly there needs to be a better way, and there is.
Scripting is the answer.