Setting wss 3.0 site anonymous access

A couple of years ago I setup a secure WSS 3 web application which I now wanted to publish so that everyone (anonymous) could see it, however I couldnt find out how to do it.

Following the Microsoft guidance article it suggests Site Actions -> Users and Permissions -> Advanced Permisions -> Settings and then click on Anonymous access, however the option just wasnt there !

Further investigation reminded me I needed to make sure that my "authentication providers" needs to be set to support anonymous as otherwise its not an option to choose in menu above. To set this up go to Web Application Management -> Application Security -> Authentication Provider, choose the Zone you wish to edit and then make sure "enable anonymous access" is checked and save this setting.

Now go back to the first stage on the Advanced Permissions -> Settings drop down and voila, you can set anonymous for site, list level or none as you require.

Updating Windows 2008 Domain Account Policies

Whilst passwords meeting complexity requirements is all well and good in a production environment it is a pain in a development one. I have a Windows 2008 standard AD Domain Controller and and I needed a number of system accounts which I really didnt want to have to bother of recording complex passwords.

To change these settings is not intuative, however this is what I found:

To turn password complexity off in Windows 2008 Server or change other grayed out security options, follow these steps:
(1) Run gpmc.msc (Group Policy Management)
(2) Expand your Domain
(3) Go to Group and select Default
(4) Right click on Default Domain Policy or Default Domain Controllers Policy and choose Edit
(5) In the new window which opens expand computer Configuration->policies->windows settings->security settings->account policies->password policies
(6) Make your edits to the keys below:

There must be an easier way, which I am problaby missing !