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Published
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January 13, 2008 |
Last Updated |
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January 13, 2008 |
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Introduction |
After
you install a clean copy of Windows Server 2008, the
Initial Configurations Tasks (ICT)
is the first page that you will receive after you
logon to Windows Server 2008.
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This
article was written when Windows Server 2008 was still RC1.
Changes might occur later once the product is RTM'd
Once you get
through the setup process and finish installing a clean
installation of Windows Server 2008 ( in a clean
installation I mean the Custom Installation and not the upgrade installations, as you
will not receive the Initial Configuration Tasks page with
an upgrade installation), you will have a page that says
The User's password must be changed before logging
on the first time .
If you clicked on OK, you will be
asked to provide a new password and confirm
it, make sure to create a complex password.
Logon with the administrator account. Initial Configuration Tasks will open ,
ICT has three sections:
- Provide Computer Information
- Update This Server
- Customize This Server

-
Provide Computer Information
: It has
the following configurations to be set
-
Set Time Zone:
By default it is set to pacific
central time, change it to your time zone.
Click on
Set time zone
, if the date and time are not set
properly, then click on Change date and time
button to set them, to change the time zone which as I
said earlier it is GMT-08:00 by default, click on
Change time zone button and choose your
correct time zone from the drop down list > Click
OK > OK


The new time will be reflect inside ICT
page

-
Configure networking: is step number two in section one,
assign your server with a static IP address, or leave it
blank if you use DHCP.
To assign your server a static IP, click on
Configure networking,
the Network Connections page will open,
right click on the network card you want to configure >
click on properties > click on Internet Protocol
Version 4 ( TCP/IPv4) > Click on Properties > choose
Use the following
IP address and fill the IP/SM/DG/DNS as
required > then click OK >
OK

Once you set it, you will notice that changes
are reflected inside ICT

-
Provide computer name and
domain:
The last step in section one
is giving a meaningful name to your server machine,
join it to the appropriate workgroup or domain.
Click on
Provide computer
name and domain,
as you can see the machine has a long name, lets change
it to something meaningful. Under the Computer
Name tab, click on the Change
button, and give your computer a meaningful name.


By default it is joined to a
workgroup called Workgroup, if you want to change the
workgroup name, write a new name, then click OK. if you want to join it
to a domain, enable the radio button beside
Domain, and then write the domain name,
then click OK. For the time being I
will not join it to a domain, as I want to set this
server my Domain Controller future article.
Once you click the
OK button you will receive a message
that the computer must be restarted, close the system
properties page, then click on Restart Now to apply the
changes.


Once you logon to your machine,
ICT will open and you can see the new machine name
listed inside ICT.

with this we have
finished section one inside ICT
-
Update This Server : It has the
following configurations to be set
- Enable automatic updating and feedback
- Download and install updates
- Enable automatic updating and feedback : It is all
about sending and receiving feedback data, and
downloading/installing windows update.
Once you click on it, you will receive a box to
configure enabling manual or automatic configurations
for sending error reports back to Microsoft, downloading
and installating the latest updates , and allowing
Microsoft to collect anonymous usage information.

If you
clicked on Enable Windows automatic updating and
feedback (recommended), the Windows automatic
updating, Windows error reporting,
customer experience improvement program, will be turned on by default.
if you
don't want to enable all these, then click on
Manually configure settings in the first box you received,
then
click on the Change Setting button and then turn off
the settings that you do not wish them to be enabled.

Under Windows automatic updating, if you clicked
on the Change Settings button, you can change the
setting shown in the below image

Under Windows Error Reporting, if you clicked on
the Change Settings button, you can change the
setting shown in the below image

Under Customer Experience Improvement Program, if
you clicked on the Change Settings button, you
can change the setting shown in the below image

-
Download and install
updates : you can check for updates, or you can
change the windows updates settings by clicking from the
left side on Change settings, you will receive the same
settings page we had seen earlier in the Enable
automatic updating and feedback options

-
Customize This Server :
It has the following configuration options
- Add roles
- Add features
- Enable Remote Desktop
- Configure Windows Firewall
- All these tasks and more can be configured with a single console called
Server Manager that I am going to talk about it in future articles
by installing few features/roles.
-
Add roles: By default, the server
does not have any role, to configure this server with a
role, click on Add Roles, you will
receive the Before you begin page, take a moment to read
it and then click on Next.

You can then choose which role you want to install, for
example Active Directory Domain Services, DNS Server,
DHCP Server and so on. For the purpose of this article,
I am not going to configure any role or feature. As I
have said earlier, I will configure few features and
roles later on with future articles.

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Add Features:
Also once you have a clean install of Windows Server
2008, the server will
not have any feature installed on it, you can install
features by clicking on Add features, you will have a
list of all the available features, select any by
enabling the checkbox beside the feature(s) you desire to
install and then click on the Next button to continue
with the wizard.

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Remote Desktop : It is disabled by
default, and you will need to enable it if you wish to
remotely control this server.

-
Configure Windows Firewall :
The Windows
Firewall by default is turned on, if you desire to
change any setting, click on Change Settings

- To have a summary of all the configurations you have set
on your server, click on Print, e-mail, or save this
information.

An html page will open and will
display for you all the configurations you have set, you can
print , e-mail or save this information.
This page resides inside the following folder:
C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\ServerManager\InitialConfigurationTasks.html
Where C is the drive you have Windows Server installed on,
and Administrator is the name of the user you are logging with.

Last note, that is if you have enabled the option
Do
not show this windows at logon

you will not
receive the Initial Configuration Tasks at the next logon,
if you wish to launch the ICT again, all you have to do is to
go to Start > Run >
oobe
Summary
The Initial Configuration Tasks (ICT) is the first page
you will receive after you logon to a clean install of
Windows Server 2008. With ICT you complete few tasks that
are required once a server is installed, such as identifying
the computer to other computing resources on your network,
securing the computer, adding roles and features.
The next thing you would do as an administrator is to start with
Server Manager, which I will be working with for adding
roles and features to this server in future articles.
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