System Administration on Madhusudan Upadhyay — ICT Support Executive | Microsoft 365 & Endpoint Management

Bypass Microsoft Account Setup in Windows 11

Fri, 09 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Windows 11 pushes hard toward Microsoft accounts during setup. But plenty of us still need local accounts: for privacy, lab machines, or plain organizational policy. The start ms-cxh:localonly command gets you there. Below: what it does, how to use it step by step, and where it falls short.

Robocopy: Reliable File Copying Utility

Tue, 07 May 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Robocopy (Robust File Copy) is Microsoft’s command-line directory replication tool, built into Windows since Vista/Server 2008. It replaces xcopy with superior reliability, resume capability, and advanced features for enterprise file operations.

Why Robocopy?

Feature	xcopy	Robocopy
Resume on failure	❌	✅
Multi-threaded	❌	✅ (/MT)
Mirror directories	Limited	✅ (/MIR)
File attributes	Basic	Full preservation
Retry logic	None	Configurable
Logging	Minimal	Comprehensive
UNC/Long paths	Problematic	Native support
Bandwidth throttling	❌	✅ (/IPG)

Essential Syntax

robocopy <Source> <Destination> [<File>[ ...]] [<Options>]

Key concept: Robocopy works with directories, not individual files. Source and destination are folder paths.

The App Management on Windows 11

Sun, 07 Aug 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Windows 11 modernizes application management with a redesigned Settings interface, improved Microsoft Store, and the winget package manager for command-line automation.

Settings > Apps Interface

Installed Apps (Settings > Apps > Installed apps)

Sort by: Name, Date, Size
Filter by: Drive, All apps
Actions per app (three-dot menu):
- Move (if supported)
- Modify (repair/change)
- Uninstall
- Advanced options (terminate, repair, reset, permissions)

Default Apps (Settings > Apps > Default apps)

Set defaults by file type - .pdf, .jpg, .html, etc.
Set defaults by link type - mailto:, http:, ftp:
Choose defaults by app - Select app > see all associations

Startup Apps (Settings > Apps > Startup)

Toggle per-app startup behavior
Impact indicators: High/Medium/Low/None
Startup folder locations:
- User: shell:startup (%APPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup)
- All Users: shell:common startup (%ProgramData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup)

Microsoft Store

Store App Management

Library - Owned apps, updates, downloads
Automatic updates - On by default (Settings > App updates)
Offline licenses - For enterprise/offline deployment

Store for Business/Education (Deprecated)

Replaced by Microsoft Intune for app deployment
Win32 app packaging - MSIX format for Store/Intune distribution

winget - Windows Package Manager

Installation

Built into Windows 11 (App Installer). Update via Store or:

Linux System Configuration and Log Files

Thu, 28 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This article is part of a series.

Part 1: How to Create Bootable USB? Windows and Linux
Part 2: Introduction to Linux File Systems
Part 3: This Article

Introduction

You will find descriptions of the configuration files you need to set up the different features that make up Linux systems. The two major locations of configuration files are your home directory (where your personal configuration files are kept) and the /etc directory (which holds system-wide configuration files). Most important things for troubleshooting.

Introduction to Linux File Systems

Wed, 27 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

This article is part of a series.

Part 1: How to Create Bootable USB? Windows and Linux
Part 2: This Article
Part 3: Linux System Configuration and Log Files

Linux File System Hierarchy (FHS)

/ (root)
├── /bin → Essential user binaries (ls, cp, mv)
├── /boot → Kernel, initramfs, GRUB
├── /dev → Device files (sda, tty, null)
├── /etc → System configuration files
├── /home → User home directories
├── /lib → Shared libraries for /bin, /sbin
├── /media → Mount points for removable media
├── /mnt → Temporary mount points
├── /opt → Optional/add-on software
├── /proc → Virtual filesystem (kernel info)
├── /root → Root user home directory
├── /run → Runtime variable data
├── /sbin → System binaries (fsck, reboot, ip)
├── /srv → Data for services (web, ftp)
├── /sys → Virtual filesystem (kernel devices)
├── /tmp → Temporary files (cleared on reboot)
├── /usr → User programs (read-only, shareable)
│ ├── /usr/bin → Non-essential binaries
│ ├── /usr/lib → Libraries for /usr/bin
│ ├── /usr/local → Locally compiled software
│ └── /usr/share → Architecture-independent data
└── /var → Variable data (logs, spool, cache)
 ├── /var/log → System logs
 ├── /var/spool → Print/mail queues
 └── /var/cache → Application caches

Common Linux File Systems

ext4 (Fourth Extended): Default for Most Distros

Feature	Details
Max file size	16 TB
Max volume size	1 EB
Journaling	Yes (metadata + optional data)
Backward compatible	ext2, ext3
Defragmentation	Online (`e4defrag`)
Best for	General purpose, SSDs, HDDs

# Create ext4
mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdX1

# Check/repair
fsck.ext4 -f /dev/sdX1

# Tune
tune2fs -l /dev/sdX1

XFS: High Performance, Large Files

Feature	Details
Max file size	8 EB
Max volume size	8 EB
Journaling	Yes (metadata only)
Parallel I/O	Excellent
Online grow	Yes (`xfs_growfs`)
Online shrink	❌ Not supported
Best for	Large storage, media, databases, RHEL default

# Create XFS
mkfs.xfs /dev/sdX1

# Grow (online, mounted)
xfs_growfs /mount/point

# Check
xfs_repair /dev/sdX1

Btrfs: Modern, Feature-Rich

Feature	Details
Max file size	16 EB
Max volume size	16 EB
Copy-on-Write	Yes
Snapshots	Native, instant
Compression	zstd, lzo, zlib
RAID	Native (0,1,10,5,6)
Self-healing	Checksums + redundant copies
Best for	Advanced users, snapshots, Fedora default

# Create Btrfs
mkfs.btrfs /dev/sdX1

# Snapshot (instant)
btrfs subvolume snapshot /source /snapshots/backup-$(date +%F)

# Compress
mount -o compress=zstd /dev/sdX1 /mnt

Other File Systems

FS	Use Case
FAT32	USB drives, cross-platform (max 4GB file)
exFAT	Large USB/SD cards, cross-platform
NTFS	Windows dual-boot (read/write via `ntfs-3g`)
ZFS	Enterprise, data integrity (separate kernel module)
JFS	Legacy, low CPU overhead
ReiserFS	Legacy, small files

Disk & Partition Management

View Disks

lsblk # Tree view
lsblk -f # With filesystem info
fdisk -l # Partition tables
parted -l # GPT/MBR details

Partitioning (fdisk/parted)

# MBR (legacy BIOS)
fdisk /dev/sdX

# GPT (UEFI)
parted /dev/sdX mklabel gpt
parted /dev/sdX mkpart primary ext4 1MiB 100%

Common Partition Schemes

Scheme	Boot Mode	Partitions
MBR	Legacy BIOS	Up to 4 primary (or 3 primary + extended)
GPT	UEFI	128+ partitions, >2TB disks

Typical Linux Layout (GPT/UEFI):