Windows Server Administration Intermediate capstone
A team needs a production-ready windows server administration design with evidence that it survives failure and rollback.
Business context
Ultiblob uses this exercise to train windows systems administrator candidates on realistic private-cloud lab operations rather than static videos.
Technical objective
Design, validate, document, and recover a windows server administration environment using the provided templates and checks.
Student instructions
- 1Open the lab workspace and review the topology map.
- 2Launch the required templates and wait for all provisioning checks to complete.
- 3Complete the configuration task in the course module.
- 4Run validation and capture the result for instructor review.
- 5Create a snapshot before any risky troubleshooting or failure exercise.
Troubleshooting
- If access fails, confirm the bastion session is active and the instance is not expired.
- If validation fails, inspect the lab event log before rerunning the check.
- If configuration drifts, restore the latest clean snapshot and repeat the module task.
Cleanup
- Export notes or reports required by the instructor.
- Restore or delete temporary snapshots created during the exercise.
- Use the teardown action when the module is complete or allow the TTL policy to expire the lab.
Provisioning readiness
Click Launch lab to start the provisioning flow and watch each stage complete.
- Request accepted
- Capacity reserved
- Templates queued
- Validation running
- Workspace ready
Required templates
- Windows Server 2022 base - defined
- Domain Controller template - defined
- Windows 11 client - defined
- Windows Admin Center template - defined
Validation checks
- AD DS and DNS healthy: Directory services, DNS, and LDAP checks pass inside the tenant network.
- Domain joined: Computer account is present and secure channel validates.
- Windows management reachable: The student access gateway can open a Windows console session.
Expected result
The lab reaches Healthy state for AD DS and DNS healthy, Domain joined, Windows management reachable.
Reset policy: Student can reset to the last clean snapshot; instructor can force reset from admin view. Teardown policy: Automatic teardown at TTL expiry with manual instructor override for cohorts.