• Connect to SMB shares (including RDMA, leases, and Continuous Availability), copy large sets both ways, and interrupt and reconnect a session; exercise NTFS extended attributes, UDF mounts, and cloud-file hydrate and dehydrate.
• Create, checkpoint, and export a Generation 2 Hyper-V VM, enable a virtual TPM and BitLocker, and connect USB storage and MIDI devices.
• Install, repair, and uninstall an MSI package, and confirm UAC elevation still prompts.

Telephony, networking and core services

TAPI is the busiest component (11 entries) but carries only parity fixes; the rest spans TCP/IP, HTTP.sys, Windows Firewall, Bluetooth, wired 802.1X, and message queuing. Broad and shallow.

• Exercise TAPI line status and dialling locations against a shared line, and verify HTTP.sys under IIS over HTTP/1.1, HTTP/2, and HTTP/3.
• Confirm TCP/IP IPsec tunnels on IPv4 and IPv6, toggle Windows Firewall rules across a restart, pair a Bluetooth headset, authenticate wired 802.1X, and validate MSMQ send and receive.

Office and SharePoint

This August patch cycle affects click-to-run (C2R), Microsoft 365 Apps, and MSI deployments of Microsoft Office with the following updates:

• On MSI Office 2016, apply the client updates: Access (KB5002813), the ACE database engine (KB5002832), the Office proofing and UI components (KB5002791, KB5002795), Outlook (KB5002755), VBA (KB5002900), and Word (KB5002901), then exercise macros, external data, embedded objects, and line-of-business add-ins.
• On SharePoint Server, patch 2016, 2019, and Subscription Edition, then check browser-based editing; mind the rollback rules – server updates cannot be uninstalled and always require a reboot.

Microsoft Exchange Server

On-premises Exchange takes a security update this month, seven CVEs across Exchange Server 2016, 2019, and Subscription Edition: one critical elevation of privilege and six important, spanning further elevation of privilege, remote code execution, denial of service, spoofing, and a security feature bypass.