When I got all excited after my previous post telling my husband which of our favourite shows were returning, he asked about the one show that has really grabbed him and that was sadly not on the list, Dexter (mostly because there were no Showtime shows on the list).

From what we could previously see, the future of Dexter was in the balance, but I did a bit of googling last night, and it would seem the scales tipped the right way, because, thank goodness, Dexter is returning.

 

Note: Cross posted from electric bunnies.
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List from here. I have highlighted the ones I am really happy about in green, highlighted those I am unhappy about in red and left those I haven’t seen/don’t watch/don’t care about untouched.

ABC
The Bachelor: Already renewed.
Better Off Ted: Officially renewed.
Brothers & Sisters: Already renewed.
Castle: Officially renewed.
Cupid: It's a goner.
Dancing with the Stars: Already renewed.
Desperate Housewives: Already renewed.
Dirty Sexy Money: Officially canceled.
Eli Stone: Officially canceled.
Grey's Anatomy: Already renewed.
In the Motherhood: It's a goner.
Lost: Already renewed.
Private Practice: Already renewed.
Pushing Daisies: Officially canceled.
Samantha Who?: Could go either way. Prospects brightening.
Scrubs: Officially renewed.
Supernanny: Already renewed.
Surviving Suburbia: A long shot.
Ugly Betty: Already renewed.
The Unusuals: A long shot.
Wife Swap: Already renewed.

CBS
The Amazing Race: Already renewed.
The Big Bang Theory: Already renewed.
Cold Case: Could go either way.
Criminal Minds: Sure thing.
CSI: Sure thing.
CSI: Miami: Sure thing.
CSI: NY: Sure thing.
Eleventh Hour: Now a long shot. Hearing the crew is looking for other work.
Flashpoint: A long shot. Could continue airing in Canada.
Gary Unmarried: Could go either way.
Ghost Whisperer: Officially renewed.
Harper's Island: It's a goner.
How I Met Your Mother: Sure thing.
The Mentalist: Sure thing.
NCIS: Sure thing.
New Adventures of Old Christine: Could go either way. ABC poised to pick up if CBS passes.
Numb3rs: Safe bet.
Rules of Engagement: Safe bet.
Survivor: Already renewed.
Two and a Half Men: Already renewed.
The Unit: Now hearing it's a goner. Back to being a long shot.
Without a Trace: Could go either way.
Worst Week: A long shot.

FOX
24: Already renewed.
American Dad: Already renewed.
American Idol: Already renewed.
Bones: Sure thing.
Dollhouse: Officially renewed for 13 episodes.
Family Guy: Already renewed.
Fringe: Officially renewed.
House: Sure thing.
King of the Hill: Officially canceled. <--AWWW
Kitchen Nightmares: Already renewed.
Lie to Me: Officially renewed for 13 episodes.
Prison Break: Officially canceled.
The Simpsons: Already renewed.
Sit Down, Shut Up: It's a goner.
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: A long shot.
'Til Death: Already renewed (unfortunately).

NBC
30 Rock: Already renewed.
The Biggest Loser: Already renewed.
Celebrity Apprentice: Already renewed.
Chuck: Now a safe bet. (Yay!)
Friday Night Lights: Already renewed.
Heroes: Sure thing. Now officially renewed.
Kath & Kim: It's a goner.
Kings: It's a goner.
Knight Rider: It's a goner.
Law & Order: Safe bet. I hear they're already working on next season's episodes.
Law & Order: CI: Could go either way.
Law & Order: SVU: Already renewed.
Life: A long shot. Now hearing it's a goner. Now officially canceled.
Lipstick Jungle: Officially canceled.
Medium: Safe bet. Reportedly renewed for 13-16 episodes.
My Name is Earl: Could go either way. Fox may rescue it if NBC passes.
The Office: Already renewed.
Parks and Recreation: Officially renewed.
Southland: Officially renewed for 13 episodes.

The CW
90210: Already renewed.
America's Next Top Model: Already renewed.
Everybody Hates Chris: It's a goner.
The Game: It's a long shot.
Gossip Girl: Already renewed.
One Tree Hill: Already renewed.
Privileged: Prospects brightening.
Reaper: It's a goner.
Smallville: Already renewed.
Supernatural: Already renewed.

I have been holding my breath for weeks now about Chuck, and I am so glad to see things are looking up for this show. Also very very glad Big Bang Theory has been picked up for at least another two seasons – I am completely addicted to these geeks.

Why am I disappointed that Smallville has been renewed? Well, let’s see. We are going onto season 9 now of a show that started off really awesome and then morphed into a badly written soap. I cannot believe this drivel is being continued while good shows keep getting the axe.

Note: Cross posted from electric bunnies.
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Your results:
You are Spock

Spock 80% An Expendable Character (Redshirt) 75% Data 71% Jean-Luc Picard 70% Worf 65% Deanna Troi 65% Beverly Crusher 55% Will Riker 55% James T. Kirk (Captain) 50% Mr. Sulu 50% Geordi LaForge 50% Leonard McCoy (Bones) 45% Mr. Scott 35% Uhura 35% Chekov 30%

You are skilled in knowledge and logic. You believe that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Click here to take the Star Trek Personality Quiz

I wants one!!!!

Darth Vader Toaster

When sipping your morning coffee from Darth Vaders helmet, you can now also brand your toast with a silhouette of the Dark Lord of the Sith, using this Star Wars toaster.

This black, ominous kitchen appliance easily leaves the mark of Vader’s helmet in every yummy piece of toast. Slather some Bantha butter on top, or make two pieces for an extra-Sithy BLT. Force power not required to operate toaster.

The Darth Vader Toaster is estimated to arrive in January 2009 and the product can now be pre-ordered for $54.99 from the official Star Wars webshop.

Darth Vader Toaster | GeekAlerts

source

Note: Cross posted from electric bunnies.
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We used a script in our MOM environment to notify us on an hourly basis of agents that have not reported in x amount of time. I modified this script this week for SCOM.

The script retrieves the agents from the database that are marked as not available by SCOM, and then pings each of them. The ping status is included in the email.

Option Explicit

Const strMOMSQLServer = ""
Const strMOMAdminEmail = ""
Const StrFromEmail = ""
Const strMailServer = ""
Const strMailUser = ""
Const strMailPass = ""
Const strCustomer = ""

Dim objMsg
Dim objConf
Dim objFlds
Dim dataconn
Dim rs
Dim strBody
Dim n
Dim strPingStatus
Dim objWMIService
Dim colPings
Dim objPing
Dim strAgent
Dim strIPAddress
Dim colAttrib
Dim colGroups

set objMsg = CreateObject("CDO.Message") 
set objConf = CreateObject("CDO.Configuration")

Set objFlds = objConf.Fields
With objFlds
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/sendusing") = 2
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/smtpserver") = strMailServer
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/smtpauthenticate") = 2
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/sendusername") = strMailUser
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/sendpassword") = strMailPass
  .Update
End With

Set dataconn = CreateObject("ADODB.Connection") 
dataconn.Open "Provider=SQLNCLI;Server=" & strMOMSQLServer & ";Database=OperationsManager;Trusted_Connection=yes;"

Set rs = dataconn.execute("SELECT BaseManagedEntity.Path, MT_Computer.NetworkName, MT_Computer.IPAddress, BaseManagedEntity.IsManaged," & _
                          "ManagedEntityAvailabilityView.IsAvailable, ManagedEntityAvailabilityView.AvailabilityLastModified " & _
                          "FROM BaseManagedEntity INNER JOIN MT_Computer ON BaseManagedEntity.BaseManagedEntityId = MT_Computer.BaseManagedEntityId " & _
                          "INNER JOIN ManagedEntityAvailabilityView ON BaseManagedEntity.BaseManagedEntityId = ManagedEntityAvailabilityView.BaseManagedEntityId " & _
                          "WHERE (BaseManagedEntity.IsManaged = 1) and (IsAvailable = 0) and (IPAddress is not null) " & _
                          "order by AvailabilityLastModified asc")


strBody = "<p>The following agents have not reported in the past hour:</p>"& VbCrLf 
strBody = strBody & "<table border=""3"" bordercolor=""2A8588""><Caption><b><u>Daily Agent Health Check</b></u></Caption><tr><td><b>Server Name</b></td><td><b>Last contact</b></td><td><b>Ping Status</b></td></tr>"& VbCrLf

n = 0

do while Not rs.eof

strAgent = rs("NetworkName")
strIPAddress = rs("IPAddress")
PingStatus(strAgent)

strBody = strBody & "<tr><td>" & strAgent & vbTab & "</td><td>" &
rs("AvailabilityLastModified") & vbTab & "</td><td>" & strPingStatus & vbTab & "</td></tr>" & VbCrLf

n = n + 1
rs.movenext
Loop

strBody = strBody & "<tr><td colspan=3 align=right><b>Total: "& n &"</b></td></tr></table>"


With objMsg
  Set .Configuration = objConf
  .To = strMOMAdminEmail
  .From = StrFromEmail
  .Subject = strCustomer & " - Server Health check - " & Date()
  .HTMLBody = strBody
  .Fields.update
  .Send
End With

set dataconn = Nothing
set objConf = Nothing
set objMsg = Nothing

Function PingStatus(strAgent)

Set objWMIService = Nothing
Set colPings = Nothing
Set objPing = Nothing
strPingStatus = "Unreachable"

Set objWMIService = GetObject("winmgmts:" _
        & "{impersonationLevel=impersonate}!\\.\root\cimv2")
Set colPings = objWMIService.ExecQuery _
        ("SELECT * FROM Win32_PingStatus WHERE Address = '" & strIPAddress & "'")

    For Each objPing in colPings
        Select Case objPing.StatusCode

        Case 0
                        strPingStatus = "Replied"
                        Exit For

                Case Else
                        strPingStatus = "<font color=""red"">Unreachable</a>"
        End Select

    Next

Set objWMIService = Nothing
Set colPings = Nothing
Set objPing = Nothing

End Function

Update the following:

Const strMOMSQLServer = ""  - Name or IP address of your SCOM DB server
Const strMOMAdminEmail = ""  - Email address(es) of recipients, separated by a semi-colon
Const StrFromEmail = ""  - From email address
Const strMailServer = ""  - Mail server address
Const strMailUser = ""  - If required, username for sending mail
Const strMailPass = ""  - password for mail user
Const strCustomer = ""  - the name of the customer/branch. This is used in the subject line of the mail. If you only look after one customer, or don’t need any distinction, you may remove this from the .Subject field in the script.

And, as always, no real commenting, so feel free to leave a comment should something not make sense. And if you have a better solution, please let me know!

Note: Cross posted from electric bunnies.
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I wrote this script recently to extract the percentage free disk space on all servers in a SCOM environment, and email it.

set dataconn = CreateObject("ADODB.Connection")
dataconn.Open "Provider=SQLNCLI;Server=<SCOM Server>;Database=OperationsManagerDW;Trusted_Connection=yes;"

set objMsg = CreateObject("CDO.Message")
set objConf = CreateObject("CDO.Configuration")

Set objFlds = objConf.Fields
With objFlds
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/sendusing") = 2
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/smtpserver") = "<mail server>"
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/smtpauthenticate") = 2
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/sendusername") = "<mail user>"
  .Item("http://schemas.microsoft.com/cdo/configuration/sendpassword") = "<mail pass>"
  .Update
End With

set rs = dataconn.execute("SELECT TOP (100) PERCENT Perf.vPerfDaily.DateTime, vManagedEntity.Path, dbo.vPerformanceRule.CounterName, " & _
                      "vPerformanceRuleInstance.InstanceName, Perf.vPerfDaily.MaxValue " & _
                      "FROM  Perf.vPerfDaily INNER JOIN vManagedEntity ON Perf.vPerfDaily.ManagedEntityRowId = vManagedEntity.ManagedEntityRowId INNER JOIN " & _
                      "vPerformanceRuleInstance ON Perf.vPerfDaily.PerformanceRuleInstanceRowId = vPerformanceRuleInstance.PerformanceRuleInstanceRowId INNER JOIN " & _
                      "vPerformanceRule ON vPerformanceRuleInstance.RuleRowId = vPerformanceRule.RuleRowId WHERE (NOT (dbo.vManagedEntity.Path = N'nul')) " & _
                      "AND (Perf.vPerfDaily.DateTime = (SELECT MAX(DateTime) AS Expr1 FROM Perf.vPerfDaily AS vPerfDaily_1)) " & _
                      "AND (vPerformanceRule.ObjectName LIKE N'%logical%') AND (vPerformanceRule.CounterName LIKE N'% Free Space') " & _
                      "ORDER BY vManagedEntity.Path")
if rs.eof then

else

strBody = "<p><font face=""Arial"" size=""1"">Percentage free space in environment.</font></p>"& vbCRLF
strBody = strBody & "<table cellpadding=""1"" cellspacing=""0"" border=""0"" bordercolor=""#C0C0C0"">" & vbCRLF

do while not rs.eof

if not rs("path") = strComputer then
strComputer = rs("path")

strBody = strBody & "<tr><td colspan=""3"" bgcolor=""#C0C0C0""><font face=""Arial"" size=""1""><b>" & strComputer &"</b></font></td></tr>" & vbCRLF

end if

strDrive = rs("instancename")
intValue = CInt(rs("maxvalue"))

If intValue < 10 Then
    strValue = "<font face=""Arial"" size=""1"" color=""red""><b>" & intValue &"%</b></font>"
Else
    strValue = "<font face=""Arial"" size=""1"" color=""black""><b>" & intValue &"%</b></font>"
End if

strBody = strBody & "<tr><td valign=""top""></td><td valign=""top""><font face=""Arial"" size=""1"">" & StrDrive & "</font></td>" & vbCRLF
strBody = strBody & "<td valign=""top"">"& strValue &"</td>" & vbCRLF

rs.movenext
Loop
strBody = strBody & "</table>"

With objMsg
  Set .Configuration = objConf
  .To = "<email addresses, comma seperated>"
  .From = "<from address>"
  .Subject = "Daily Report - Disk space - " & Date()
  .HTMLBody = strBody
  .Fields.update
  .Send
End With

end if
dataconn.close

Update the fields between the <> and save as a .vbs file. Not a very elegant solution, but far quicker than having to configure the disk space report in SCOM reporting. And, as always, I suck at commenting, so feel free to leave a comment if you get stuck.

SQL query was refined using a bored colleague at work with some time to bash through the DB and the following sources:

• Ian Blyth - Disk Space CPU Report Table
• Ziembor.pl - System Center Reporting Performance Overview MP
  

Note: Cross posted from electric bunnies.
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