Believe it or 2 2
not, a server is actually more than just hardware find out what I mean next. 3 3
>> You're watching I T pro T V. 4 4
[BLANK_AUDIO] 5 5
>> Yeah that's right you've decided to come back and 6 6
join well these two guys don't know what no we we know why you're here. 7 7
You're here of course for a comp tier server plus and of course we have another 8 8
great episode for you as we're diving into the realm of servers and server roles. 9 9
So West when it comes down to this idea, 10 10
I kind of teased it a little bit that server is actually more. 11 11
Than hardware because essentially the hardware serve itself is is what we 12 12
had said during the beginnings of this entire show. 13 13
It really is just kind of a super high performance computer but 14 14
that doesn't make anything special. 15 15
There's special things about a server that we can actually 16 16
do that make it really neat that's right. 17 17
>> Server roles are amazing they're really tasty with garlic and 18 18
butter on them because they are a little bit different. 19 19
So Ronnie, how about we go ahead and what do you say we stay focused for 20 20
a second on that term Rolls right. 21 21
And that term roles really kind of only makes sense if you look at the most 22 22
common networking environment that we really work in today right? 23 23
And that's the client server model and I should say networking model not really. 24 24
Topology if you will but 25 25
the networking model and we've got a series of computers right? 26 26
So just like Ronnie said all the computers within that model they're all computers, 27 27
what do they do? 28 28
They have operating systems and they allow us to user hardware but 29 29
it's the it's the functionality that they play right. 30 30
The relationship a client has to a server and the server has to a client that you 31 31
really have to understand when we talk about roles right? 32 32
Because the server, what you think about that a server provides a service, 33 33
it provides a certain service to other computers on networks well, 34 34
what are those other computers? 35 35
Well, those other computers honestly could be other servers, but 36 36
they're typically the client operating systems. 37 37
Where most of our end users work at their workstations, desktops or 38 38
laptops and try to maintain a certain level of productivity. 39 39
And the good thing about clients is unlike earlier models, like for instance, 40 40
that centralized model. 41 41
The great thing is that if the clients don't have access to some of 42 42
the services on the network, well, 43 43
they can still maintain a certain level of functionality all right. 44 44
But it's important to understand that just generically speaking, 45 45
a role is nothing more than the service or. 46 46
Functionality added functionality that server is bringing to your networks and 47 47
those clients that are requesting those services. 48 48
>> Now, let's kind of expound on that a little bit more because people probably 49 49
will still get confused at this if they haven't dealt with this sure. 50 50
The very fact is when we talk about the idea of a client, 51 51
it's a user sitting at that desk top like you said, like my laptop, 52 52
like your laptop or you're sitting at a workstation. 53 53
But when it comes down to a server west who's sitting at the server making it do 54 54
whatever we've assigned it to do nobody really. 55 55
>> That's one of the great things about servers, servers typically sit across 56 56
the network and some kind of hopefully centralized location. 57 57
Like a data center, a server closet, if you have multiple floors within 58 58
a building, it's not uncommon to have something known as like an I D F. 59 59
And intermediate distribution frame where you've got maybe it tucked away on a, 60 60
an upper floor but typically inside of our data centers. 61 61
And that's one of the great things is we turn our servers on, 62 62
we get them configured with the roles such as. 63 63
What we're gonna show you here in this episode and 64 64
we walk away from him were hands off. 65 65
>> That's right absolutely so the server itself, 66 66
in terms of what we're talking about is a role. 67 67
Once we define it, once we configure it to make it work, it functions without you or 68 68
me needing to tell it to do its job unless we mis configured it most definitely. 69 69
>> And I'm gonna raise my hand here I've done that on many occasions and 70 70
it could be just a simple flip of a number that can change everything here. 71 71
So that's what we need to understand all right now before we just dive into 72 72
roles that we're gonna install there are some considerations. 73 73
When it comes to the server hardware and that's one of the reasons we said, 74 74
we've said in some of our past episodes. 75 75
That it's important to understand what the service is, 76 76
what the functionality that server is going to be. 77 77
Because if that server is gonna be, let's say, providing a D http service, right? 78 78
That D http service typically doesn't require a lot of computational power. 79 79
However, if your server is gonna provide a role, such as the one that we're 80 80
gonna show you hear something like a directory service all right. 81 81
You might need to increase the levels of the hardware it and we'll talk about some 82 82
of those other roles here some of the other considerations right? 83 83
The main considerations that we have for 84 84
a long time are essentially how do we need this server to perform? 85 85
Obviously we wanted to perform well, but 86 86
how do we make it perform well without breaking the bank? 87 87
Right we could say put 100 and 28 processors in it and 88 88
put a terabyte of RAM in it and put an M V Emi drives Sure For 89 89
the nice price tag of around 200 grand right? 90 90
So if you had buckets of money to throw out everything, you'd be just fine but 91 91
we typically don't have that. 92 92
So we're gonna be strategic in how we build our servers right? 93 93
So performance is important right? 94 94
And that tells us, can our servers do our servers in this role? 95 95
Do they have to scale out? 96 96
Right do we have to add additional servers and 97 97
maybe a clustering fashion because maybe they're providing a web front end right? 98 98
Or do we need the ability to purchase a server to acquire a server and 99 99
then scale it up later saying, hey. 100 100
This server's motherboard has the ability to support eight CPUS current 101 101
configuration is only two because maybe that's all that we need. 102 102
So you have to take that in consideration when it comes to the role that you're 103 103
gonna install to. 104 104
Here's another thing that, maybe 15 years ago, we didn't really need to worry about, 105 105
will your company actually get the R O I. 106 106
On purchasing a physical machine that they put in the data center or 107 107
is this something that could be deployed to the cloud right? 108 108
Is it gonna be virtualized? 109 109
It's gonna be a physical machine or is it going to be a virtualized is going to be 110 110
a service that's running on a virtual machine stored in the data center. 111 111
So all of these things have to be taken into consideration and 112 112
one of the great things is that as far as functionality goes. 113 113
Whether it's virtualized or whether it's in the cloud or 114 114
on prem is pretty much still the same it's the payment models that change right? 115 115
Whether you're going to what's known as the Capex or not pecs model so that's 116 116
really gonna be contingent on the policies that your company has in place all right. 117 117
The other thing that we also have to worry about is the management in support of that 118 118
role functionality or service because. 119 119
You can have people that can support and manage and maintain the physical server. 120 120
But that doesn't necessarily mean that they have the talent to support or 121 121
the understanding to support. 122 122
If you will, the roles that are running on it let me give you an example, right? 123 123
I can help you repair a server, I can put a server online for you. 124 124
I can help you install the operating system, I can help you apply patches, 125 125
you put a sequel database on there and well. 126 126
I'm gonna have to turn to the d B A s who actually have the talent or 127 127
if you will to know how to manage that role. 128 128
So it's a lot more than just managing the physical service server itself. 129 129
And that's also important when it comes to determining the roles and 130 130
the features that you are going to install so Ronnie right? 131 131
If we have all these things in mind, right, 132 132
we've got a few different roles that they call out. 133 133
That they kind want us to be able to identify and 134 134
determine what is the functionality of this role, given a scenario on the exam. 135 135
So rather than just talk about it, we're gonna do some more talking here, but 136 136
we'd also like to do a little bit of a demonstration to what do you say? 137 137
We go ahead and we're gonna kick off an installation of a specific role. 138 138
And it's one of the ones that's in our list and 139 139
that's a very important role within a Windows networking environment and 140 140
that's called a directory services server. 141 141
In our case, the Microsoft directory service server, if you will, 142 142
is known as none other than active directory. 143 143
>> Yeah, that sounds like a great idea a lot of times to get our feet wet and 144 144
see the process going through is actually gonna be very helpful. 145 145
>> Sure so let's go ahead and we're gonna do this now I've got a couple of 146 146
servers and the goal here is we're gonna go ahead and 147 147
on one of our servers running Windows Server 2019. 148 148
We're gonna install and promote this to what's known as a domain controller. 149 149
The domain controller is the server that runs the directory service or 150 150
a combination of multiple domain controllers. 151 151
They can share that responsibility. 152 152
And that's another thing that you have to keep in mind. 153 153
Do you need more than one server? 154 154
Typically if you've got a domain controller, you don't want just one. 155 155
Because if that domain controller goes offline then you could potentially and 156 156
most likely will lose access to all of the objects within 157 157
your networking environment. 158 158
So you'll typically do this across a couple of different servers. 159 159
But in this case we're gonna install the active directory services role. 160 160
We're gonna promote it to a domain controller and 161 161
then we're gonna take a second server. 162 162
And we're gonna see if we've got that directory connectivity that is also called 163 163
out on the exam. 164 164
And while we're doing that we'll talk about some of the other roles that you 165 165
should be aware of. 166 166
So one of the first things that I'm gonna do in my server here is, 167 167
I'm gonna go up to manage. 168 168
I'm in the server manager by the way, 169 169
I understand that there's a few different ways that you can do this. 170 170
You can do this through the command line interface if you happen to be installing 171 171
a core installation where you don't have the gooey, 172 172
you're gonna do this in power Shell. 173 173
And you're gonna have to go through the process and know the syntax. 174 174
We're gonna go ahead. 175 175
We're gonna take the easy route on this one. 176 176
Already use a graphical user interface specifically through server manager. 177 177
Also know that the other graphical way that you can do this is through what's 178 178
known as the Windows Admin Center too. 179 179
But that costs or 180 180
that requires some additional steps to add on that management feature. 181 181
But so I'm gonna go ahead, I'm gonna go to server managers manage and 182 182
then add roles and features and here's our add roles and features, wizard. 183 183
And I would highly recommend it. 184 184
This is the first time you've done that. 185 185
Take the time to read through some of the information because it does give you some 186 186
valuable information in this wizard. 187 187
And so one of the great things about Windows server in general that I 188 188
really like. 189 189
It comes bundled in with a lot of onboard documentation. 190 190
But they've got a lot of hyperlinks here too that will connect you out to Microsoft 191 191
knowledge basis so that if you need to do some additional information, 192 192
you can get that. 193 193
All right, and we're gonna go ahead and choose next. 194 194
And it's asking us do we have a role based or feature based installation? 195 195
Ours is gonna be a role based installation. 196 196
And we're gonna go and choose next. 197 197
And then if I had a group of server, pool servers in the pool here, 198 198
I could select which one in this case. 199 199
It's gonna be DC01. 200 200
I've already named this ahead of time because I wanna be able to identify what 201 201
the functionality of this computer is. 202 202
And that's another thing about the roles and features. 203 203
If I would call this because I'm a big geek right? 204 204
If I was to call this optimist Prime, well, you know that I like transformers. 205 205
But if Ronnie had to come in here and 206 206
he had to administer anything within the server, unless I told him ahead of time, 207 207
he'd have no clue what the heck Optimist Prime meant. 208 208
So had given no indication of what the role is, 209 209
the functionality that server on the network. 210 210
But if Ronnie says, hey, 211 211
which server is at west that you need me to take a look at? 212 212
You're having troubles with and need some help. 213 213
I need DCL1. 214 214
He could say, well, that's pretty common name for a domain controller. 215 215
So we're gonna be looking at potentially active directory. 216 216
So that's another naming convention that you might wanna keep in mind. 217 217
I'm gonna go ahead and I'm gonna choose next. 218 218
And there's a variety of active directory services here that we could install. 219 219
In this case, we're gonna go ahead and let me pull this to the side, 220 220
we're gonna install the active directory domain services. 221 221
That's gonna make this a domain controller. 222 222
Now, that's important to understand the second part of our intro here. 223 223
What is roles and features? 224 224
All right, well, features add additional functionality and some of the features 225 225
might be required to include in the installation to be able to manage. 226 226
Not necessarily not all the time, but to manage the role that you're installing. 227 227
So we're gonna go ahead and we're gonna let the server install typically 228 228
what's known as our set the remote server administration toolkit. 229 229
We'll add this feature and we're gonna choose next in the wizard. 230 230
If there were additional features that I needed to install to support this role, 231 231
it would tell me ahead of time. 232 232
But we went ahead and we installed those. 233 233
Now there's a couple more things that we have to do. 234 234
We're gonna go ahead and choose next to the wizard. 235 235
And we're gonna go ahead and install our role here. 236 236
Now, while we do that. 237 237
And while we're waiting for this to install, running, what do you say? 238 238
We go ahead and we talk about some of the other roles that that we have in our list 239 239
that we should cover. 240 240
They call out to different types of servers and sometimes. 241 241
Well, a few but to specifically that can be a little bit confusing. 242 242
They call out what's known as a web server. 243 243
What's known as an application server. 244 244
What's the difference? 245 245
All right, well, 246 246
an application server can do a lot more than just what a web server does. 247 247
All right, a web server deals with a specific set of protocols http, https and 248 248
specifically html, the markup languages, hypertext markup language. 249 249
Right, well, an application server can do that, but 250 250
it can also support applications on the back end with additional protocols too. 251 251
So that's a little bit most of the difference, 252 252
you can also see application servers that provide middleware functionality 253 253
connecting to other applications together as well. 254 254
So, Ronnie, let's talk about a web server. 255 255
That seems to me one of the most common servers on the internet today, right? 256 256
>> Yeah, it pretty much is the common server that's actually out there. 257 257
The very fact is most companies may actually choose to even do this internally 258 258
so that they can display information that they need to their employees as they 259 259
want to. 260 260
A lot of times you may also of course use it in different ways and 261 261
fashions just like what he was talking about as they 262 262
actually have both roles installed on their application server. 263 263
And a regular web server to allow for 264 264
different functionality in the background too. 265 265
So, we might see something for example, 266 266
even certificate services relies on the web server 267 267
to be able to publish how they actually get access to generate the keys. 268 268
>> That's right, absolutely. 269 269
The online certificate requests that can be made absolutely. 270 270
So as we continue our discussion here and 271 271
we're not done with some of the roles that we wanna discuss. 272 272
Because we also wanna talk with the back talk about the back end servers, roles 273 273
that a lot of times those web servers and application servers connect to. 274 274
Now, one of the things you're gonna see is that the feature installation it's done. 275 275
But it's telling us that additional configuration is required. 276 276
When you install the directory service role here, 277 277
it doesn't actually make this server a domain controller. 278 278
We actually have to promote that. 279 279
So it's giving us this little hyperlink. 280 280
We could close this and do this ourselves. But I'm gonna go and 281 281
choose the hyperlink cuz it is there for us. 282 282
And then what it's gonna ask is are we adding a domain controller to 283 283
an existing domain? 284 284
In this case I'm creating a brand new forest now. We're not gonna go into what 285 285
the active directory infrastructure is. 286 286
But I highly recommend you check out some of our Microsoft content for 287 287
those of you that are gonna go on to vendor specific training, 288 288
if you wanna learn more about active directory. 289 289
And I'm gonna go ahead and 290 290
I'm gonna call this server plus dot local. 291 291
I'm just calling it dot local because I don't have a registration with top level 292 292
domain controller. 293 293
I'm gonna call it dot local and I'm gonna choose next. 294 294
And what it's gonna do is it's gonna call out to the network and it's gonna say, 295 295
hey, is there anybody out there that's already using this name and 296 296
it sees that it is unique. 297 297
And then I can figure out what is the functional level forest functional level. 298 298
I'm gonna leave all the defaults right now. 299 299
And it's asking me, hey, if you got to restore your server, 300 300
you need a password for the administrator that is gonna be able to 301 301
do authoritative restores should your directory service need that. 302 302
So I'm gonna go and put that password in there and 303 303
it is telling me a delegation for the DNS server can't be created exactly. 304 304
Because I don't have that delegation with the IcanN and 305 305
an external top level domain. 306 306
I'll doing all this internal and we're gonna choose next. 307 307
And it's gonna use net bios to call out to the local network and 308 308
say, hey, anybody using this net bios name right now and it's gonna listen. 309 309
And if anybody does respond, I'm gonna have to generate something new, 310 310
but it's not gonna find it. 311 311
And it's gonna apply the net bios name, we're gonna choose next. 312 312
And then what's gonna happen here is it's gonna ask me, 313 313
where do I want the database. 314 314
Choose next, we'll leave the defaults. 315 315
And if I wanted to automate this later, I could view the script, copy it, 316 316
put it in a file and I could automate this later. 317 317
And do a template deployment, 318 318
which is convenient when you're doing this multiple times. 319 319
Remember any time you can apply some automation and scripting to something that 320 320
you have to do repetitively, it's gonna make your life a lot easier. 321 321
So we'll go ahead. 322 322
And it looks like all the prerequisites are needed. 323 323
It's given me some security warnings about Kerberos and some anti for 324 324
security techniques, technologies that are kind of outdated and 325 325
could potentially cause a security vulnerability. 326 326
I'm not worried about that right now. 327 327
And again, we're not putting this into a production environment. 328 328
All right. 329 329
And again, it's given me some of that DNS information because it's trying to make 330 330
that DNS registration if you will. 331 331
And it's saying, hey, I can't communicate with whoever dot locals DNS server is, 332 332
it doesn't exist. 333 333
That's why. 334 334
All right. 335 335
So Ronnie, we'll let this continue. 336 336
And we talked a little bit about a web server and 337 337
we talked about the application server. 338 338
One of the other servers that is common to see on the internet is what those servers, 339 339
we talked about communicate and store data on the back end, all right? 340 340
And what is that? 341 341
That's the database server. 342 342
And the database server is another common server that requires a lot of pre planning 343 343
before you put it in the wild, right? 344 344
>> Yeah, the other thing about this idea is that usually is a dedicated 345 345
server as well. 346 346
We don't tend to mingle multiple roles here. 347 347
So you might hear the term Microsoft sequel server, 348 348
you might of course here no sequel, you might actually hear post, you name it. 349 349
There's a bunch of different servers that are out there. 350 350
All these normally require a little bit more additional configuration and 351 351
even more additional hardware to ensure they run. 352 352
But it's about keeping the data, you have any type of structure in which you're 353 353
storing the data, it's going to probably be in some type of database server. 354 354
Those things have to be secured as well as the connections that need to be made and 355 355
how we get data into them as well as how they report data from them? 356 356
You name it? There's a bunch of different things. 357 357
But just about every company that you're actually going to interact with is gonna 358 358
have some access to a database. 359 359
And we just have to ensure that we we do everything that we can do get it up and 360 360
running. 361 361
>> Most definitely another one that's on the list that we have to talk about is 362 362
what's known as a file server. 363 363
Remember a file server is just a server that is going to store shared folders and 364 364
resources, if you will. 365 365
More specifically for the files that are in those folders. 366 366
Now, what are some of the considerations when it comes to a file server, 367 367
do you need one at all? 368 368
All right, a lot of times an enterprise level environments, 369 369
we've got storage arrays where we store information, 370 370
we've got connections to those storage arrays to share information. 371 371
Now that doesn't mean that you don't need one because you might not have a fiber 372 372
channel implementation. 373 373
You might have something that needs something like NFS, 374 374
you might need the network file system. 375 375
In a windows environment, you're probably going to be sharing over SMB, 376 376
the server message block. 377 377
So file servers are important, but 378 378
it also is important to understand how you are going to store those files. 379 379
And if you actually even need today, a specific file server because 380 380
give it 10 years ago, that was definitely a very popular thing. 381 381
However, not saying that it isn't something that you wouldn't find today. 382 382
But the basics that we have those storage array storage area networks, if you will. 383 383
We have cloud based implementations, 384 384
where you might not even have any on premise storage. 385 385
It is one of the things that we have to understand that might be eventually going 386 386
the way of the Dodo Bird as we move into more cloud, information, 387 387
cloud based technologies and cloud storage. 388 388
Ronnie, here's the here's another one that is kind of, 389 389
I would say almost archaic today. 390 390
And that's the concept of a messaging server, right? 391 391
Again, 10 years ago or so, it wasn't uncommon that, 392 392
you would have the unified communications where all your video, your email, your 393 393
messaging, instant messaging, if you will, was all going to be controlled on prem. 394 394
And then we would have a messaging server that would link all these communications 395 395
together. 396 396
But Ronnie, we've got a lot of software as a service today that's doing that like 397 397
teams and zoom, right? 398 398
>> Pretty much and the nice thing about them is that the global reach and 399 399
the ability just to have them as a service is kind of the key. 400 400
A lot of these types of messaging service did require a bit of configuration and 401 401
set up to do to ensure that it actually did do everything that we needed to. 402 402
And as you added more components and things got more complex. 403 403
But the beginning of it was right here as just a regular messaging service, 404 404
which would include things like email, instant messaging. 405 405
Like what Wes was saying, if you actually need to do video calls, 406 406
it could include things like that as well. 407 407
And even your phone systems, all that could possibly go through this. 408 408
But it would actually require a lot more additional configuration, 409 409
very difficult to manage. 410 410
>> Most definitely. 411 411
All right, ladies and gentlemen, I'm looking to see that we have, 412 412
we have our computer, it is rebooting here. 413 413
It's trying to apply the settings. 414 414
Now we're running a little low on time. 415 415
So what I think we're gonna do right now is we're gonna use the magic of TV and 416 416
we're gonna let the server finish installing this role. 417 417
And then when we come back, we'll log into the server and 418 418
see if we've got an active directory environment. 419 419
All right, ladies and gentlemen, our computer has rebooted and we're logged in. 420 420
And what we can see here on our server manager. 421 421
Dashboard is that I do have the Active directory Directory services role 422 422
installed. 423 423
If I choose tools, I can see the variety of utilities that we have to 424 424
manage our directory services database. 425 425
And the last thing I told you that I would do is we would show you how to connect 426 426
this machine to our active directory database. 427 427
So what I've done is I pulled up the system properties here and 428 428
we're gonna go to advanced system settings computer name. 429 429
And we're going to change, well, I'm going to change the computer name for 430 430
one because that is the default installation name. 431 431
And I'm gonna change this domain from a work group to a domain. 432 432
We're going to call this domain after what I named the old main serverplus. 433 433
We're gonna choose OK. 434 434
And hopefully what it will do is it will reach out to the domain controller and 435 435
we're gonna type in our administrator and 436 436
we will type out our super secret password. 437 437
And we'll choose OK. 438 438
And what I'm hoping to do is that it will reach out to the domain controller. 439 439
It's going to register this computer with the domain and that means the domain 440 440
controller will add that computer to its directory services database. 441 441
And that at this point, all of the administration for the user accounts can 442 442
be done on the active directory directory services database. 443 443
Meaning that if I'm a directory member, 444 444
I can log into this domain with my active directory credentials. 445 445
And rather than it having it authenticate on the local machine and 446 446
we see that it is successful. 447 447
So it's telling me welcome. 448 448
And we'll go ahead and we'll restart this computer now. 449 449
And we're going to see that it's no longer going to have just that single name and 450 450
attached to the work group. 451 451
What we should see is that when it reboots it's actually going to have a new name, 452 452
the name that we named it, right? 453 453
The host name, if you will. 454 454
Server 01, all right? 455 455
And then what it should do is it should add the domain name to the end of it. 456 456
And we'll have sever01.serverplus.local. 457 457
So now let's check this out. 458 458
Let's verify that we have done. 459 459
What we said we set out to do. 460 460
Notice that we now have the other user option here. 461 461
That's because we can now do an active directory log in. 462 462
And what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go ahead, 463 463
I'll do the down level authentication by typing in the domain and a backslash. 464 464
In this case, serverplus/. 465 465
We'll, type administrator or administrator will put in the same credentials. 466 466
I used to log into the domain server or the domain controller. 467 467
And here we haven't we are logged in its building the profile. 468 468
And what we should see is that we get our desktop. 469 469
And most importantly, what I wanna do is I want to right click on our window actually 470 470
we can do this all from local server here. 471 471
And let me change that view real quick, I know that's kind of small. 472 472
And there we have it, ladies and gentlemen, we have our server. 473 473
There's the computer name and the domain name. 474 474
Serverplus.local. 475 475
So the fully qualified domain name with the server, 476 476
directory service connectivity is sever01.serverplus.local. 477 477
That's how you get a role installed up and running and 478 478
how you can test if it is actually functional. 479 479
>> All right. Well there you saw the idea 480 480
here of different server roles and that we actually discussed. 481 481
And Wes also of course installed the domain controller role itself in terms of 482 482
active directory directory services. 483 483
And showed us how we could join that computer back to that domain as well. 484 484
Well, that will wrap it up for this episode but plenty of more server plus to 485 485
come make sure you stay tuned as we'll see in the very next episode. 486 486
>> Thank you for watching It ProTv 487 487
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