a blog on technology in the real world

Here’s a quick one-line script I’ve been using to clean up some old computer accounts in active directory. It requires the dsquery and dsrm tools from the Server 2003 Admin Pack or the Remote Server Administration Toolkit.

@for /f %%a in ('DSQUERY COMPUTER -NAME *%1') do (dsrm %%a)

Save that in as a batch file and it’ll query Active Directory for computers including the argument passed.  Here’s an example with a naming structure where we have the last 4 digits of the MAC address in the name for uniqueness.

C:\>adrm.cmd 6736
C:\>(dsrm "CN=LABPC6736,OU=Labs,DC=yakk0,DC=org" )
Are you sure you wish to delete CN=LABPC6736,OU=Labs,DC=yakk0,DC=org (Y/N)? y
dsrm succeeded:CN=LABPC6736,OU=Labs,DC=yakk0,DC=org

I’ve been using a Drobo and Drobo Share since July. For those that don’t know, Drobo is an enclosure that accepts up to four SATA drives, and uses a proprietary RAID-like technology to make the drives appear as one drive to the operating system. Unlike RAID you don’t have to use identical drives, and the Drobo indicates when it’s almost full. When that happens, the smallest capacity drive can be replaced with a larger one and overall capacity is increased. Drobo Share is a network attachment that turns the Drobo into a NAS device. It’s been working fine until this past weekend when I noticed I couldn’t connect from my Mac. The lights on the Drobo appeared normal, and I could ping the IP for the Drobo Share. I tried all the troubleshooting options on the Drobo support site, including restoring the Drobo Share to defaults using a paperclip, but nothing worked. The Drobo itself is fine and still works over USB, so it was a relief that no data was lost. The Drobo Share appears to be dead though.

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