If the administrator restricted access to the shutdown option for certain users including your account type there is no way how you can do it remotely or locally. But you can just turn it off shuting down eletricity.
Server 2008 doesn't automatically shut down; that would be counterproductive in a production environment. I would need more information as to why your server appears to be doing this. The only reason I can think of for a shutdown is if the server were not activated or was past the evaluation date on an evaluation copy of the server.
three users
windows server 2003
open run and type shutdown -r
To shut down a Windows 2008 Server Core System, at the command prompt type: Shutdown -s -t xx where -s = shut down -t xx = time to wait before shutting down in seconds, where xx =0 to 600 To shut down a Windows 2008 Server Core System immediately, at the command prompt type: Shutdown -s -t 0 where 0 = wait zero seconds (shut down immediately) To restart a Windows 2008 Server Core System, at the command prompt type: Shutdown -r -t xx where -r = reboot -t xx = time to wait before shutting down in seconds, where xx = 0 to 600 To restart a Windows 2008 Server Core System immediately, at the command prompt type: Shutdown -r -t 0 where 0 = wait zero seconds (reboot immediately)
The administrator account and the guest account.
System Events.
sudo halt or sudo shutdown -h or sudo init 0
The newer version of server will, but not the older one. The NT dialog boxes still limited passwords to a maximum of 14 characters.
shutdown -Fr
There are some standard command line tricks, and also you can create a script which can do it automatically. For the command line Start->Run->cmd, shutdown /?. When you do that you see all possible parameters and options which you can use. For you is most usuful shutdown \\computerName... Note: Acording to my opinion never shut down multiple systems remotely at a time.
Windows 2000 Server and Windows NT Server 4.0 (SP5).