Windows NT 4.0 Self-Paced Training Kits

An alternative to instructor-led courses and third-party books

People frequently ask me, "What's a good way to learn aboutWindows NT?" Several approaches are available, some of which we discussedin the training and support focus in July 1996. One method is the Microsoftself-paced training kits. I reviewed the NT 3.51 training kit in "Too Busyfor Class? Learn at Home," December 1995. This month I reveal how the newNT 4.0 training kits measure up.

Q: What Is in the Self-Paced Kits?

With NT 4.0, Microsoft offers two kits. Each contains a training manual anda CD-ROM with the course labs and support materials. The courses offered atMicrosoft Authorized Technical Education Centers (ATECs) do not divide neatlyinto Workstation and Server courses, which makes sense because so much overlapexists with no clear dividing line between the two versions of NT. The twoself-paced courses follow this same pattern.

Microsoft offers a "Windows NT Technical Support Training" courseand a "Windows NT Network Administration Training" course. Thetechnical support course includes a 773-page training manual; a CD-ROM with thelabs, videos, and other supporting materials; and 120-day evaluation copies ofNT Workstation and NT Server. The network administration course includes a519-page training manual, a CD-ROM that contains the course materials, and a120-day evaluation copy of NT Server.

The courses include simulations of certain activities, such as configuringfault tolerance disk arrays, that let you perform the steps without having theresources available on your computer. Although Microsoft intended thesimulations to be run from Internet Explorer (IE), as Screen 1 shows,you can run the labs and examples from the NT Explorer interface if you prefer.

Q: Which One Should I Buy?

If your primary responsibility is installing, configuring, and maintainingNT and the applications that users run on their computers, Microsoft designedthe technical support course for you. If you are more concerned with yournetwork's people aspects such as user accounts, groups, permissions, accessrights, and auditing, the network administration package is the one to buy.

Q: What Do I Need to Run the Courses?

For the network administration course, you need one computer capable ofrunning NT Server 4.0. For a few exercises, you'll need a second computer, butyou have the option of skipping these exercises. The technical support courserequires two computers: one conFigured to run NT Server 4.0 and the other todual-boot NT Server 4.0 and NT Workstation 4.0. Each computer will need about450MB of disk space, and you must partition the disk on the workstation computerinto drives C and D plus some free space. Obviously, you must network the twocomputers and ideally keep them separate from the rest of your network to ensurethat nothing you do affects other users. You need a sound card and speakers ifyou want to run the videos that come with the course. If your NT systems do notsupport multimedia, you can run the videos and simulations on a Windows 95computer. In case you cannot use two dedicated computers and have to useexisting computers on the corporate network, you can remove the coursematerials, shortcuts, and so forth from the computers when you finish thecourse.

Q: How Are the Courses Presented?

Unlike the classroom courses, which have a presentation followed by a lab,the self-paced courses are more hands-on, with practice exercises and labsinterwoven into the text. Each chapter includes review questions, and Microsoftprovides the answers at the end of each chapter.

Q: What Does the Technical Support Course Cover?

First, let's look at the technical support course. After a brief overview ofNT, the course covers installation in detail. It provides simulations of bothWorkstation and Server installation, and the simulations are realistic enough tomake you wonder whether you're installing NT again, as Screen 2 shows. If youcannot install NT on the computer you use for the course, the simulations make agood substitute, and they run a lot faster than the real thing.

The training manual explains unattended NT installation from a centralserver and the use of answer files and uniqueness database files (UDFs) toautomate the network installation process. The manual fails to mention thesysdiff utility for unattended software installation. Yet this tool is on thelist of topics that Microsoft can include on the Workstation exam. Continuingthe systems administrator theme, the course covers how to conFigure NT from theControl Panel and through the Registry and shows how to use System Policies tocontrol the configuration for end users.

The training course covers managing file systems, partitions, disks, anddisk arrays, including stripe and volume sets and fault tolerance. The coursealso illustrates these concepts with simulations that are useful if you do nothave three or four hard disks in your computer. The course even demonstratessupporting both 16-bit and 32-bit applications, with some interesting appletsthat cause general protection faults or system hangs in the 16-bit window butnot in NT.

Networking configuration and troubleshooting take a significant amount oftime and resources from any technical support organization. After introducingthe NT networking architecture, the training manual discusses NetBEUI, NWLink,and TCP/IP in depth. Under Networking Services, the training manual groups theTCP/IP components such as Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), WindowsInternet Name Service (WINS), and Domain Name System (DNS). The course includesthe Browser Service, but only briefly, even though the service contributes asubstantial share of network traffic. The course demonstrates Remote AccessService (RAS) services, including the configuration of the various dial-inprotocols, using a null modem cable between the two computers.

The section on the Internet, including the installation of InternetInformation Server (IIS) and IE, underlines Microsoft's commitment to pushingthe Internet technology into everything we do, like it or not. Indeed, theintroduction to NT Server at the start of the book states, "The integrationof IIS with Windows NT Server 4.0 means that Web Server installation andmanagement is simply another part of the operating system." The fact thatIIS will run only on NT does not make IIS integrated, in my opinion, and I seethe program as another application, not as part of the operating system. Beforeyou connect your corporate network to the Internet, you'll probably want moreinformation than the course provides.

Many NT installations occur in existing networks, so the section oninteroperating with Novell NetWare will interest many systems administrators.Screen 3 shows the simulation that lets you perform the installation andconfiguration steps for Client Services for NetWare without havingadministrative access to a NetWare server.

The section on network clients includes a discussion of licensing andlicensing replication that I have not seen anywhere else. It includes licensegroups and how to use the license manager utility to keep track of licensingacross multiple servers. And when you get to file synchronization and directoryreplication, the course has an introduction to Briefcase, another topic notoften mentioned. (For more information on Briefcase, see "Windows NTBriefcase," August 1997.) Replication requires two computers. I suggest youwork through this clear explanation and the exercises, because the replicationprocess works for some people but not for others, even when they apparentlyfollow the same directions.

Any technical support course would be incomplete without a discussion oftroubleshooting, and this course allocates space in several chapters to thetopic, beginning with a detailed discussion of the NT boot process. The bootprocess can be the most difficult part of NT to diagnose because if you cannotboot the system, you cannot use the NT diagnostic tools. However, a goodunderstanding of the boot process will make most problems easy to identify.

Q: What Does the Network Administration Course Cover?

The focus of the network administration course is different from thetechnical support course. Network administration does not go into technicaldetails, but rather concentrates on the tasks the system administrator faces.Beginning with the logon process, the emphasis is on setting up user accountsand group accounts. By the end of this section, you'll know the differencebetween local and global groups, where to use each one, and how to use thebuilt-in groups that NT installs by default. This course thoroughly coverssetting up account policies but has only a cursory discussion of domains thatrefers only to administering domain controllers.

The course covers setting and administering permissions, with both NTFSpermissions and share permissions discussed in detail, and explains theirinteraction. Network printing gets two chapters, although one is probablysufficient. The course continues with a discussion of auditing the users andmonitoring resource use from a system perspective. This course rounds out theadministrator's tasks with the Backup and Restore programs. Again, assuming thatyou might not have a tape drive available, the course provides a usefulsimulation, as Screen 4 shows.

Q: Will I Be Able to Pass the Exams After Studying with These Courses? WillThey Help Me Do My Job?

As far as passing the exam is concerned, the self-paced course will help.But to be sure, I recommend that you supplement these courses with furtherreading and hands-on experience. The packaging for these courses states thatthey'll help you pass the Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) exams--not enableyou to pass the exams, just help. And the exams mentioned are theWorkstation and Server exams, not the NT Enterprise exam.

In particular, the network administration course falls far short ofproviding the information that you need to administer a network and thatMicrosoft bases exam questions on. The most glaring omission is that the coursehardly mentions domains and fails to mention trust relationships, which arecrucial to a complete understanding of the domain model. This omission, whichalso occurs in the 803 Windows NT Administration course the ATECs give, seems toreflect an attitude at Microsoft that domains and trusts are too complex for theaverage person to understand. This assumption is certainly not true. Whateverthe reason for this omission, I cannot recommend this course until Microsoftrevises it to include the information that a systems administrator needs tocomplete network setup and configuration.

Both the Server exam and, to a greater extent, the Enterprise exam containquestions on domains and trust relationships that you will not be able to answerunless you have supplemented your studies with other materials. If Microsoftomits domains and trust relationships from the courseware, why are these topicson the exam?

As for helping you do your job, yes, these courses will help you. Thetechnical support course meets expectations fairly well and covers most of thetopics a support person needs to get started with an NT installation. Thenetwork administration course is adequate as far as it goes, but only forday-to-day systems administration. This course does not go far enough for anyoneplanning a multidomain network.

The Bottom Line
The technical support course is a good value; the network administrationcourse is less so. Will these courses work for you? If you do not have time totake a class or if you study better at your own pace, these courses can work foryou. They fall short of a classroom setting because you have no interaction withother students or additional insights from an instructor. With self-study, youcan repeat modules as often as you like, whenever you want. Are these coursesbetter than just reading third-party books? In some ways, the answer is yes,because the courses provide a lot of hands-on experience, which is the best wayfor most people to learn. Perhaps the best approach is to learn from theseself-paced kits and then supplement that knowledge with some of the moreadvanced third-party books.