Introduction

Administering and maintaining servers can sometimes appear daunting. In fact, a lot of industry studies say a majority of IT resources (such as budget, personnel, and time) are spent just maintaining existing servers and infrastructure. As administrators, we also do not always have the time to learn how new technologies can improve our day-today tasks, and we often rely on the status quo the server can provide.

Although this book is not designed to dig deep into the details behind Windows Server and server technologies, it will provide you with a quick and easy reference to many of the tasks you perform daily. This book will also get you quickly up to speed with many of the new features in Windows Server 2008 R2 as well as show you how Windows Server 2008 R2 can improve your daily administrative tasks.

You will notice that the book is organized specifically to help you find information quickly. It is organized into parts that categorize chapters into major topics. Then each chapter deals with a specific subject. At the beginning of each chapter, you will see what the chapter will cover and where you will find it in the pages. This method of organization is designed to assist you in finding the information that you need to solve immediate problems or begin a process as painlessly as possible. Ideally, this book will become part of your everyday tool belt, something that you can pick up whenever you need a quick reference or a reminder.

We hope you enjoy this book.

Who Should Read This Book

This book is designed for anyone who administers a Windows server environment. It is for experienced and new administrators alike. This book is also for administrators looking to learn how to use many of the new enhancements Windows Server 2008 R2 can bring to their existing networks. This book will show administrators how to improve many of the day-to-day tasks of server administration.

This book will provide guidance for many common server tasks, such as setting up Group Policy and backing up and recovering your server. This book will also show you many of the new and improved features built in to Windows Server 2008 R2 to help you improve server administration and management.

How to Contact the Authors

We welcome feedback from you about this book or about books you'd like to see from us in the future. You can reach us by writing to Matt at raid78@msn.com or to Chris at cj.henley@hotmail.com. You can also contact us via our blogs at http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/ or http://blogs.technet.com/chenley/.

For more information about our work, please visit our websites:

http://blogs.technet.com/matthewms/

http://blogs.techent.com/chenley/

Sybex strives to keep you supplied with the latest tools and information you need for your work. Please check its website at www.sybex.com, where we'll post additional content and updates that supplement this book if the need arises. Enter Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Administration Instant Reference in the search box (or type the book's ISBN, 978-0-470-52539-5), and click Go to get to the book's update page.