Darren Mar-Elia

Darren Mar-Elia is president and CTO of SDM Software, a Group Policy solutions company. He has over 20 years combined experience in information technology and software development. He was senior director of product engineering at DesktopStandard (acquired by Microsoft), and before that, served as CTO for Windows management solutions at Quest Software. He was also a director of distributed systems at Charles Schwab & Co. and helped guide that company's use of Microsoft Windows technologies. Darren has written or contributed to 12 books on Windows management topics, is a Microsoft MVP for Group Policy, and is a contributing editor for Windows IT Pro. He also created the popular gpoguy.com website for information and utilities related to Group Policy.
Email:dmarelia@windowsitpro.com

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Author Articles

December, 2009
PowerShell and Active Directory
The wait for full-fledged PowerShell Active Directory support is over. Microsoft has shipped an AD module and PowerShell Drive provider to make managing AD from PowerShell a snap.
Windows IT Pro

June, 2009
Control Application Execution with SRP
Group Policy's software restriction policy (SRP) feature gives admins a powerful tool to control what code their users can run. Learn to use hash and path rules to set up application whitelists and blacklists and maintain a more secure environment.
Windows IT Pro

December, 2008
Deploying Office 2007 and Managing VPNs with Group Policy
Group Policy continues to be powerful—and difficult to work with. A few workarounds can help in using it to deploy Office 2007 and letting users connect to VPNs.
Windows IT Pro

October, 2008
Securing Windows Desktops Using Group Policy
Check out how you can use Group Policy’s security configuration management features to protect your company’s data and systems.
Windows IT Pro

May, 2008
Group Policy Results Screencast
View a five-minute screencast that shows how to run the Group Policy Results wizard and view the output.
Windows IT Pro

April, 2008
Mastering RSoP
Discerning the effective policy settings for a given user or computer can be hard, especially in larger organizations. Resultant Set of Policies cuts through the confusion and tells you what's happening with your Group Policy settings.
Windows IT Pro

January, 2008
Managing Microsoft Office 2007 with Group Policy
Take advantage of Administrative Templates and other new tools to set access and security policies for Office 2007 through Group Policy.
Windows IT Pro

January, 2008
Group Policy Essentials No Sys Admin Can Live Without
Ensure that Group Policy lives up to its potential—here's a primer about how GPOs are processed, how permissions and filtering work, and basic troubleshooting.
Windows IT Pro

December, 2007
Windows Vista and Server 2008 Group Policy Enhancements
New Vista and Server 2008 Group Policy features include the client service replacing system Winlogon, using NLA to improve slow-link detection, new settings for multiple local GPOs, ADMX format for Administrative Templates, improved logging and security.
Windows IT Pro

November, 2007
Ask the Experts
Discover the reasons why client machines might not be processing Group Policy and learn about patching multiple images in a WIM file.
Windows IT Pro

November, 2007
Troubleshooting a Group Policy Processing Error
Find out why client machines might be failing to process Group Policy.
Windows IT Pro

October, 2007
Moving a Deployed Software Package to a New Server
Find out whether there's a way to move software packages to another server without triggering a reinstallation of the deployed applications.
Windows IT Pro

October, 2007
Ask the Experts
Learn about problems associated with moving a software package to a new server, find out how to convert an ADM file to an ADMX file, and follow along as Mark Russinovich troubleshoots a file compression failure.
Windows IT Pro

March, 2007
The Group Policy Route to Office Deployment and Management
Use these two features of Group Policy to better manage Office—Group Policy Software Installation deploys Office and Office Administrative Templates locks down the behavior of various Office applications for your users.
Windows IT Pro

January, 2007
Group Policy Annoyances
Got Group Policy issues? Navigate Group Policy's troublesome areas with these solutions to common Group Policy problems.
Windows IT Pro

August, 2006
Troubleshooting Group Policy
Successful Group Policy troubleshooting results from knowing where to look, enabling Group Policy logging, and taking advantage of available administrative tools.
Windows IT Pro

January, 2005
Troubleshooting Group Policy–Related Problems
Learn how to track down, identify, and eliminate 2 common categories of Group Policy–related problems.
Windows IT Pro

January, 2005
Chat with Darren Mar-Elia
On February 25, 2005, at 12:00 pm EST, chat with Darren Mar-Elia and gets answers to your Group Policy troubleshooting questions.
Windows IT Pro

January, 2005
Take our Instant Poll
What area of Group Policy gives you the most trouble?
Windows IT Pro

June, 2004
Network Architecture 101
Build on the basics: Design a network that uses the right mix of technologies to meet your organization's needs.
Windows IT Pro

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eBooks

Playbook for a Virtualized Datacenter | During challenging times, optimizing the IT infrastructure becomes imperative. Many organizations are looking to extend their virtualization efforts to encompass the entire datacenter. Get a step-through of your technology options and more.

White Papers

As the advances in USB devices have made them invaluable to most business users’, they have also exposed organizations to enormous risks. Learn how to easily enforce device/port control and data encryption policies without requiring new infrastructure and additional admin overhead.

WEB SEMINARS

Is Flexible Lockdown Possible? Join Darren Mar-Elia for this free web webinar exploring the various methods you should consider to protect and control your desktops while also understanding the impact on the end user community.
View Seminar On-Demand.

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