ITG Networking did an interview today with our local CBS station WSPA talking about Phishing scams, Viruses, and how to avoid them.
Here is a link to the article.
http://www2.wspa.com/spa/news/local/article/internet_scammers_still_a_growing_threat/29169/
So recently I pulled out my iPod mini again to start using it when I run and workout. Since I use SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop obviously the standard iTunes program won’t work. I have found a very nice solution to this – a program called GtkPod. This program allows you to create playlists and sync and manage the music on the iPod.
The main screen for GtkPod
When you plug in your iPod it automatically see’s it and displays the music and playlists you have on it.
You are not able to play songs through GtkPod like you can iTunes however, using a combination of GtkPod and a program such as Banshee you can have the ability to use and sync your iPod with your linux machine with almost as much ease as using iTunes.
Hopefully this is a helpful piece of software to those of you out there reading this.
So over the last couple of days I have been testing out the Novell Open Enterprise Server (OES) version 2. OES is Novell’s next generation server system, replacing the older Novell Netware Operating System.
OES, which runs on top of SuSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) still has all the tried and true Novell services such as eDirectory, iPrint, Remote Manager, NetStorage, iFolder, and a number of other services you may remember from the Netware days.
Also just as before with Netware OES is capable of running Groupwise 7 and the new Groupwise 8 systems. For those who don’t know, Groupwise is an email system that is an alternative to Microsoft Exchange, that provides email, calendar, contacts, tasks etc and allows the sharing of that information.
Other benefits to using the Novell OES server is their iPrint server which makes setting up network print servers and making them available to end users very easy. iPrint allows you to securely and deploy and install printers across your network regardless of the operating system. There are iPrint clients for Windows, Linux, or Macintosh.
Also available is the iFolder server. The iFolder server allows you to securely share amongst multiple computers your files in a way that when you make a change on one computer, it automatically update the file securely through the Internet to all your computers. The iFolder system
So far the migration to OES from Microsoft Small Business Server has been very smooth and easy. I plan on updating the blog after having the OES server in place for a little while so check back.
Many businesses have run into the dilemma of, “Do we need a server?” Does the following situation sound familiar?
All your documents are spread amongst a number of different computers or perhaps the receptionist’s computer is the “server” but if she is not there and nobody remembers to turn on his/her computer than it is total chaos till it is turned on since no one can get to the files?
Do you have files that you need to give access to some people but restrict others from?
If are asking yourself these questions over and over again it may be time to consider a server of some kind. Now I know that you may think a server means you are going to have to shell out thousands upon thousands of dollars. Although you can spend yourself into the red on a server if you so desire, there are many ways to cost-effectively solve your need for a server, depending on what kind of server you need.
This can be as simple as an “inexpensive” Western Digital Networkable Hard Drive which may also be known as a NAS or Network Attached Storage. This acts as a mini file server, even doing very basic access control to the files.
The next step up is an actual server that provides file and print sharing services. You actually have a couple of routes at this poing that you can take. IF you are looking for a way to control users access to different folders etc then your options have jumped up to an actual server system such as Microsoft (R) Windows (R) Server 2008 or Novell Open Enterprise Server. Both are server systems that allow you to have separate security permissions for each individual user. Both provide a number of other services as well such as Printer sharing, Network services such as DHCP and DNS, as well as a number of security and update features.
The next step up is if you are looking at doing in house email with collaboration such as calendar, contacts, etc. The best options for those would be to use either Novell Groupwise or Microsoft Exchange.
In addition to the types of servers mentioned above there are also application servers such as a terminal server, or database servers etc.
These are all things to consider as you grow beyond passing files around to each other using USB sticks and email. If you are curious about any more of the different options please feel free to post comments.
So the other day I went to the first annual South East Linux Fest. Had a great time and cannot wait till next years event. Learned a lot about a bunch of really cool technologies, software packages, distributions, etc. One thing though that caught my attention was VirtualBox.
I personally like to tinker and play with new version’s of operating systems when they come out, whether it is a new version of Windows, or a flavor of *nix, I like to play. Problem is I haven’t don’t have a machine to always play with them on. In addition to that, I like to have a machine that is a “throw-away” in other words if I want to try a specific piece of software or someone is wondering if a specific site gave them a virus etc, I will use that “throw-away” machine to check out and try to recreate whatever issue they are having.
When I ran a Windows OS as my primary operating system I used VirtualPC, which I was very pleased with, to do this. Wen I moved back to using OpenSUSE as my primary OS I had not come across a Virtualized environment that I liked as much as VirtualPC – till now!
VirtualBox works very much like VirtualPC except one really cool thing is that VirtualBox will run on Windows, Linux, Mac, Solaris and OpenSolaris. Once installed on your computer there is a very easy to use GUI
Above is a screen shot of mine. As you can see it gives a status of the different machines on the virtual boxes.
This GUI allows you to with a couple of clicks, create from scratch a virtual hard drive. Within minutes you are on your way to installing whatever OS you are wanting to play with. As you can see from the screen shot I have an OpenSolaris box and an Ubuntu box, both of which I can use to learn more about those distros or I can use them for testing a change without breaking my OpenSUSE host machine.
Virtual Box makes for a wonder virtualization environment since it will run on Windows, Linux, Macintosh or Solaris allowing you to have virtual computers that you can move between different hosts, regardless of the host machines os. Hope you enjoy!
Obviously your company has at least a single desktop/laptop. If your a bigger company then you may have one or more servers. Many companies are trying to be “greener” or more environmentally friendly.
There are a number of ways though that you can counter-act this increase in power usage. Some are very simple physical changes that you can do to decrease power consumption when the computer is idle.
For example, use a surge protector to run all of your equipment through; which should already be the case to protect your equipment from power surges. When you go on your lunch break or leave for the day, hibernate or shut down your computer, and then turn off the surge strip, since even when your computer is “off” it still draws power. If you turn everything off, you will be amazed at how much money you can save. Other things that you can do is set your computer to put the monitor to sleep after five or ten minutes, again causing power to be conserved.
When it comes to your servers, there are also a variety of things that can be done such as setting up your server to be “headless” or in other words not have a monitor attached to it. If you need to manage your server on a regular basis you can set it up so that it can be remotely managed from another workstation or share monitors with another server if you have multiple.
You can also do things in the physical environment to promote natural cooling and airflow to a server room to help save on the cost of cooling a server room. Instead of constantly running the building air conditioner to cool the one room, while freezing out everyone just to get the server room cool, you may want to consider putting in a high efficiency air conditioner that controls the HVAC to that room only. By doing that you keep the building unit from constantly running just to keep one room cool, and the server room HVAC unit won’t have to run as often as well since it is a high efficiency unit dedicated to that room. You can also get the HVAC units so that they control the amount of humidity in the room, which is better for the servers anyway.
When it comes time to purchase new equipment, make sure that you are purchasing Energy Star certified equipment. Companies are also now coming out with “greener” servers and workstations that consume less power anyway, so you should try and watch for those and get them whenever you can.
Something that goes hand and hand with purchasing newer more efficient and “greener” equipment is what to do with the old equipment when you replace it. Don’t just chuck it in the trash, you can donate, sell, or recycle it. Some equipment such as CRT monitors have chemicals inside of them which can be very harmful the environment, people, and animals. Often times there are companies in your area that will help you recycle the old equipment properly instead of trashing it. A simple Google search will bring them up. An example of one in the Greenville, SC area where we are located is Ever-Green Recycling (http://www.ever-greenrecycling.com).
There are a number of other things that can be done, but this is hopefully just a simple overview that will give you some easy techniques that you can implement to help your company cut costs, and become more “green.”
Do you or your company have in place systems to protect your data from being lost whether due to hardware failure, a disaster (such as a fire, flooding, etc) or even just accidentally deleting the files? A couple weeks ago a client came to me with a laptop that had coffee spilled all over it and it fried the hard drive. I tried to recover the data but was unable too. I asked them – “Do you have a backup?” The very nervous reply was “No”. I have always pushed my clients to have backup solutions but it made me start to think about those of yall who are out there reading this that aren’t one of our clients.
Would you be able to go back and quickly, easily, and consistently replace the damaged or lost files?
There are a number of different ways in which you can ensure the protection of your data.
For your personal computer it can be as simple as using an external hard drive such as an Iomega or Western Digital drive that has software that will automatically synchronize and backup your data. Another option is an on-line solution, such as Servosity (http://www.servosity.com).
In a corporate environment with servers and multiple workstations etc, you are most likely going to want to implement a server based enterprise wide solution, to manage, monitor and ensure that your data is being backed up reliably all the time. These systems typically also allow you to very easily restore data that has been damaged or deleted with just a few mouse clicks.
Some solutions such as the online systems can work in either scenario, by simply installing the backup solution to the server as well, however one thing to keep in mind is that if your server is playing the role of a database server or an exchange server or other specialized role, sometimes you need special backup software that has the capability to back up the data that is in use by those functions.
If you still want a “traditional” solution that uses tapes that you can rotate through and take with you, there are software based programs such as Symantec Backup Exec. These programs allow you to setup systems that will back up your data to either tape, other disk drives, etc and will allow you to remotely backup your workstations and other servers as well.
If you are really worried about you can combine multiple methods of protection. We have some clients that do both online, and backup to tape, as well as others that do tape and external usb hard drive for the day to day and then the tape is done once a month or once a week.
Hope this helps yall out.
Are you tired of using Windows? Looking for a cheaper alternative to Macintosh? Do you do just basic Web Browsing, Email, Word Processing, Spreadsheet work, etc?
Than Linux may be the answer for you. Linux is a free (most of the time) operating system that is highly customizable, very secure, and easy to use.
There are many different types or distributions out there. I personally use OpenSuSE 11.0. Some of the other versions available out there are Ubuntu, Fedora, and Debian, just to name a few.
Currently we run OpenSuSE in our office at ITG Networking on a number of our computers. We have a windows terminal server that we run our Customer Management system and quickbooks on. To access those programs we just use tsclient a linux version of the Microsoft Remote Desktop Client to connect to our Terminal Server.
By using Open Office we are able to work with Microsoft Office files, allowing us to communicate with the rest of the world without issues.
Another piece of software that comes free and pre-loaded with linux is evolution, the linux world solution to Microsoft Outlook. This piece of software allows for connections to POP3 and IMAP (the most common types of email servers for accessing web-based email) as well as Novell Groupwise, Microsoft Exchange, and some other less used methods for sending/receiving email.
Through the use of these and many other programs if you do not need to always use applications that will only run on Windows and there is no way around having it, then maybe the world of linux is a possibiltiy for you.
So recently I had a couple clients that have had a need to filter sites that employees can access while using company equipment. They came to me asking how to block websites without having to install software on each individual computer, as well as preventing it if someone were to bring a computer into the network such as a laptop that was visiting.
There is a simple and easy as well as FREE (best kind) solution to this want.
OpenDNS.com is a resource that allows you to make a change in your network that allows you to point all your internet traffic through their service allowing you to filter based on the categories that they maintain, as well as either black or white listing specific sites. The categories that they give you are:
Adult Themes
You can select each one of these categories individually so that you are only blocking what you want to.
To find out more about OpenDNS check out their website
So have you heard the news that Vista’s replacement is already in the works. Enter Windows 7 (Beta that is).
