One of the unpleasant truths of being a network administrator is that when the time comes for a password to be reset, the little pop up reminder in Windows is not enough.
Most users ignore the warnings until…well until you drag yourself in one morning ( and without fail it will happen on a morning you have to drag yourself in) and find that 30- 40% of the firm is locked out of the network.
Why? Because they ignored the warnings that passwords would expire. Well there has to be a better way one would think. And there is SysOp Tools Password Reminder PRO.
Password Reminder PRO allows you to set up email alerts for users. While alerts on the screen go largely unnoticed by most users, many will not ignore emails.
This tool allows you to send email alerts to users on expiring passwords. It uses Active Directory (AD) and the existing domain password change security policy. So there are no extra steps, it installs nothing into AD and works passively making no changes to your AD or Group Policy infrastructure.
Password Reminder PRO also contains reporting features to keep you up to date on stale and unused passwords or accounts without passwords. I know I know, we do not have any accounts without passwords. Until we run an audit and find that software evaluation we did installed and account in Ad that had an empty password and has Administrative privileges to the domain.
Try Password Reminder PRO free for 60 days, pricing for a 100 user domain comes in under $300.00. Not bad for a tool that can save you time, helpdesk calls and aggravation.
Find out more about SysOp Tools and Password Reminder Pro at http://www.sysoptools.com/
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Ron Barrett is president of RARE-TECH, an IT Training and consulting company. He has been a technology professional for over a decade, working for several major financial firms and dotcoms. Barrett is a specialist in network infrastructure, security and IT management.
He is a co-author of The Administrator's Guide to Microsoft Office 2007 Servers, How to Cheat at Administering Office Communications Server 2007, and the Real MCTS/MCITP Exam 620 Preparation Kit and has been a contributor to Windows 2000 Enterprise Storage Solutions and Exam Cram –70-244-Supporting & Maintaining NT Server 4.
He has also contributed to several industry magazines and was featured in the book Tricks of the Windows Vista Masters. He has worked for Microsoft writing research and analysis documents for Windows Server 2008, Windows HPC, and PerformancePoint Server 2007. He has also created screencasts on Windows Server 2008 Administration for Linux Admins.
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The opinions expressed in this Weblog are those of the writer and may not represent the opinions of Network World.
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