A few days ago the IIS Team released yet another cool extension for IIS 7.0, the new extension “Dynamic IP Restrictions” has been released as a beta.
The Dynamic IP Restrictions Extension provides IT Professionals and Hosters a configurable module that helps mitigate or block Denial of Service Attacks or cracking of passwords through Brute-force by temporarily blocking Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of HTTP clients who follow a pattern that could be conducive to one of such attacks. This module can be configured such that the analysis and blocking could be done at the Web Server or the Web Site level.
The Dynamic IP Restrictions includes these key features:
- Blocking of IP addresses based on number of concurrent requests – If HTTP client makes many concurrent requests then that client’s IP address gets temporarily blocked.
- Blocking of IP addresses based on number of requests over a period of time – If HTTP client makes many requests over short period of time then that client’s IP address gets temporarily blocked.
- Various deny actions – it is possible to specify what response to return to an HTTP client whose IP address is blocked. The module can return status codes 403 and 404 or just drop the HTTP connection and do not return any response.
- Logging of dynamically denied requests – all denied requests can be logged into a W3C formatted log file.
- Displaying currently blocked IP addresses – a list of currently blocked IP addresses can be obtained by using IIS Manager or by using IIS RSCA API’s.
- IPv6 – the module fully supports IPv6 addresses.
Download it here:
For more information read this blog post.
The latest extension for IIS 7.0 has been release from the IIS team, Application Request Router (ARR) was released to the web (RTW) and is now available as download for everyone.
ARR, enables Web server administrators and hosting providers to increase Web application scalability and reliability through rule-based routing and load balancing of HTTP server requests. With ARR, administrators can optimize resource utilization for application servers, and so reduce management costs for Web server farms and shared hosting environments. Show me the money! The RTW version of ARR is fully supported and production ready, and adds new functionality since the Release Candidate, including:
- An improved way to allocate and identify servers for host name affinity by including 2 providers: one based on round robin and the other based on memory consumption, to more evenly distribute the “load” across shared servers
- Greater integration with IIS Manager, including the ability to manually override health statuses and configure HTTP and HTTPS ports for the application servers
- Performance improvements in least response time load balancing algorithm
Download it here:
Read more at IIS.net.
The latest issue of TechNet magazine includes a number of articles about the new OCS 2007 R2.
The articles are:
What’s New in Office Communications Server 2007 R2
Office Communications Server 2007 R2 introduces not only a number of brand-new features, it also delivers some significant enhancements to existing functionality. Here’s an overview of some of the most important new features and functions you’ll find in this latest release. By Author: Stephanie Pierce.
How Remote Call Control Powers OCS 2007 R2
The Remote Call Control capabilities in OCS can be used to extend your R2 deployment to legacy devices. Find out how to configure Remote Call Control to provide rich OCS capabilities in an environment with a PBX system. By author: Rajesh Ramanathan.
Securing OCS with ISA Server
To securely extend your OCS 2007 infrastructure to remote users and organizations, you need to deploy one or more Edge Servers and provide reverse proxy access to these servers. Here’s what you need to know to use and configure ISA Server 2006 as a reverse proxy for your OCS deployment. By author: Alan Maddison
Managing OCS 2007 R2 from the Command Line
Though you can configure Office Communications Server using wizards, there are times it makes sense to work from the command line. Explore the LCSCmd command-line tool and see how you can use it to set up OCS 2007 R2. By authors: Greg Stemp and Jean Ross.
A Powerful Tool for OCS Planning and Deployment
The Planning Tool for OCS 2007 R2 is a wizard that provides prescriptive guidance to help you prepare to deploy R2 in your organization. Discover how you can quickly generate a topology and create a list of recommended hardware to help guide your planning and deployment efforts. By author: Stephanie Pierce.
Read the March edition of TechNet magazine.
Along with the release of Office Communication Server 2007 R2, Microsoft has release the usual resources for OCS.
Planning Tool for OCS 2007 R2
The Planning Tool uses the information gathered from the administrator to dynamically draw a recommended topology for every site that the administrator identifies. Additionally, the Planning Tool calculates the types and amounts of hardware needed across the entire Enterprise, as well as for each site. The Planning Tool also provides links to documentation of the specific planning and deployment tasks that the administrator will need in order to deploy the topology.
Download it here.
OCS 2007 R2 Resource Kit Tools
The Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 Resource Kit Tools provide a set of deployment and technical reference information for Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2. The set of tools and documentation in the Resource Kit Tools can be used as a complement to the Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 documentation or as stand-alone tools.
Download it here.
The latest version of the Rollup Update patch for Exchange 2007 has been released.
Microsoft has released Update Rollup 6 for Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1 (SP1). This article describes the following information about the update rollup:
- The issues that the update rollup fixes
- How to obtain the update rollup
- The prerequisites to install the update rollup
Read more or download it here.
My latest article have gone live – I’ve written a new article on www.windowsnetworking.com. It’s Part 3 in a series about the new FTP Publishing Service for IIS 7.0.
This article will cover the different configuration scenarios of enhancing security of an FTP site, using a SSL certificate in the new FTP Publishing Service for IIS 7.0.
Read the full article here: IIS 7.0 – FTP Publishing Service – Part 3: Securing an FTP site
Today the latest version of Office Communication Server, OCS 2007 R2 was launched worldwide.
See the launch at www.ocsr2launch.com.
