‘The Daily Show’ is back!
January 7th, 2008
Waaaay off topic…
I just got through watching the first episode of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Jon was unscripted and didn’t have writers. Although it was obvious that he didn’t have his writing team, I think he did a great job. I tend to watch and listen to the news on a very regular basis and this staple of my evening has been sorely missed.
Personally, I hope The Daily Show and the Colbert Report can work out a deal to get their writers back but, until then, if these guys can keep it at tonight’s level, we’ll all be able to get the good fake news.
TechRepublic blogs
January 6th, 2008
I originally created this site as a place to post random musings or other topics that might be of interest to the IT crowd. However, shortly after setting up my blog, I was invited to be a regular contributor to some of TechRepublic’s blogs. I’ve written articles and tips for TechRepublic for a long time now and liked the idea of branching out a bit. Now, I’m hosting TechRepublic’s Servers and Storage blog and, starting this month, am a regular contributor to their IT Leadership blog as well. As for this site, as I can, I’ll post and I’ll leave it up since some of the posts here get a ton of hits. If you’d like to see something in particular, please leave a comment!
60 billion kilowatt hours… and counting
October 12th, 2007
I’ve spent quite some time perusing the EPA Report to Congress on Server and Data Center Energy Efficiency. Quite frankly, the trends are disturbing. Regardless of whether you believe global warming to be caused by humans or just part of nature’s cycle, the fact is that data centers in the United States are requiring enormous amounts of electricity thus requiring ever more power production. Unless significant changes are made to how data centers operate, this electrical demand will almost double by 2011.
This is bad.
The EPA report outlines a number of steps that can be taken to curtail this anticipated massive increase in power consumption. In fact, the report provides three paths for the future, with the best case scenario resulting in a decrease in power requirements over the next five years. Besides being good for the environment, reducing power consumption also helps organizations save money once initial capital investments in new equipment are taken care of.
Virtualization is one technology that can, in a significant way, help in the efforts to combat the increasing power needs of burgeoning data centers. Read the report for more information as well. It is well thought out and, frankly, a little scary.
Exchange 2007 certificates - My Eyes Are Bleeding
June 22nd, 2007
I’ve read Sembee’s post. I’ve read the Exchange 2007 Wiki. I’ve read through a dozen community forum posts and TechNet pages. At this point, I’m thankful that I wasn’t the one selected to write the “Security” chapter in the Exchange Server 2007 Administrator’s Companion. Is it just me or has Microsoft made securing Exchange 2007 about as much fun as gouging out your own eyes with a dull spoon?
We’re running a single server and will be using ActiveSync, Outlook Anywhere (RPC over HTTP), Outlook 2003/2007, Unified Messaging and OWA. My understanding is that securing ActiveSync with our existing wildcard certificate won’t work since Windows Mobile devices have issues with such certificates. So now I’m looking at one of the new Unified Communication certificates that provide a subject alternate name field so that one certificate can protect multiple URLs. I could go the Sembee route and create a bunch of different web sites, but I suspect that doing so in my environment will just lead to future administrative hassles. We don’t use ISA (which, from what I read, does not support the new Unified Communication certificates, so I think we’d be ok.
Now, what the heck do I actually need to protect? As soon as I work it all out, I’ll report back.
It’s happened… I bought a Dell
June 19th, 2007
Since the beginning of time (ok, since the beginning of the current technology age), IT pros have prided themselves with their ability to pick just the right components and build the world’s most powerful system. These folks read the latest reviews on AMD vs. Intel overclockable processors, find the fastest RAM, and pick hard drives not based on size, but based on speed. And don’t get me started on graphics adapters!
Until today, I was one such IT pro. Every system I’ve owned for the last fourteen years has been meticulously built from the best components that money could buy.
No more.
Dude, I got a Dell. (I know… that line is so 1999)
I got tired of browsing NewEgg for the latest stuff. I got tired of not being 100% sure that the parts I bought would work exactly as expected. I got tired of the fact that the system I built just last year with great parts was not able to install Vista and I couldn’t just hit a single support forum to look for the answer.
I also came to the realization that, even though I play the occassional game, my computer has become much more than a lab experiment. It’s a tool that I use to do a job. I seriously depend on it for pretty much 100% of my income. Although I still enjoy reading about the latest technology, I simply needed the tool I use to be rock-solid. And, no more cutting my fingers on sharp edges!
My shiny new Dell Precision 690 pretty much rocks. VMware… a breeze. Vista… 5.9, baby. Office 2007… slow? No way.
Are any of you former “build it yourself” junkies? Leave a comment to tell me what pushed you over the edge.
Disappointed… Veridian loses key features
May 11th, 2007
Before I start, let me say that I like Microsoft’s products a lot. I’m rolling out Exchange 2007 and SharePoint 2007 in my organization, and am working on a plan to deploy Office 2007 at some point. That said, Microsoft is a pretty huge place. Why can’t they ship something intact? For example, even though there’s a lot more to Vista than it’s pretty new interface, a whole slew of compelling features were removed that would have added a ton of value to the product.
The latest casualty of this slashing process is Veridian, Microsoft’s attempt to take on VMware’s (a company that produces a product I adore, by the way) marketing-leading ESX product. Microsoft has announced that a number of features slated for Veridian’s release have been shelved for now, including:
- Live migration.
- The hot-adding of resources, such as additional RAM and processors.
The loss of the ability to hot-add resources is not, in my mind, horrible as long as the feature comes back at some point. Yes, this does affect availability, but isn’t necessarily critical. However, the loss of live migration (like VMware’s Vmotion) makes this product a non-starter for many enterprises. This is a critical availability feature that allows administrators to take down problem servers, upgrade hardware, and perform maintenance without loss of availability. The result: Until this feature (and hot-adding, eventually) is returned to the Veridian product, this solution simply isn’t a viable alternative to VMware ESX.
Microsoft needs to learn the “underpromise and overdeliver” mantra. Continually overpromising and underdelivering results in an erosion of faith in the company as a whole.
Almost out! Exchange Server 2007 Administrator’s Companion
May 10th, 2007
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For the past few months, I’ve been working with Walter Glenn, tech author extraordinaire, on the the Administrator’s Companion for Exchange Server 2007. It’s taken some time, but the book is supposed to hit shelves in mid-June. Amazon has it available for preorder if you would like your own. Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Administrator’s Companion (Pro - Administrator’s Companion) Get your mission-critical messaging and collaboration systems up and running with the essential guide to deploying and managing Exchange Server 2007. This comprehensive administrator’s reference covers the full range of server and client deployments, unified communications, messaging security, performance optimization, troubleshooting, and disaster recovery. With special emphasis on security, the top concern for messaging administrators, this book includes chapters on messaging security, policy, and tools and techniques to mitigate e-mail viruses, spam, and phishing. This book delivers the definitive information-messaging that professionals need to deploy and operate effective, reliable, and more-secure messaging and collaboration services. The companion CD features a fully searchable eBook and job aids–everything you need to help build enterprise collaboration solutions that improve worker productivity, save time, and help reduce IT deployment and management costs. |
Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1 - beta in April
March 9th, 2007
Exchange Server 2007 has barely come out of the oven, but the Exchange team is already hard at work on Service Pack 1 (SP1), due to be released to beta in April 2007. Personally, I’m very pleased with some of the functionality missing in the RTM release that will be returned to the product, including:
- The ability to manage Public Folders from the GUI.
- The ability to manage the POP3 and IMAP4 services from the GUI.
- The ability to view public folders from within the outstanding OWA 2007.
- Improvements to the move-mailbox command, making it a more suitable semi-replacement for some of ExMerge’s functionality. In SP1, move-mailbox will be able to export a mailbox to a .PST file.
- Rules return to OWA in SP1.
- Much more!
I could repeat absolutely everything, but why don’t I point you at the team’s blog instead: http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2007/02/23/435699.aspx
My absence
March 3rd, 2007
In looking at the logs, I’ve actually gotten more people looking at this stuff than I had anticipated. I’m very happy to see that! When I set up this blog, I had intentions of keeping up with it a whole lot more than I have. I have been embroiled in a number of writing projects, most notably, coauthoring the Exchange Server 2007 Administrator’s Companion. Once that project is complete, I’ll turn some of my attention back to keeping this thing current.
IT & condescendence
January 14th, 2007
The Information Technology field is filled with people who have the attitude that, because they know a whole lot about technology, they are better than or smarter than the average user. What it really boils down to is this: We all have different skill sets. I work in a college. I doubt that the Dean of Student Life is walking around telling people that I am an idiot because my knowledge of student affairs doesn’t match his. I also doubt that the Dean of Faculty thinks I’m a moron because I don’t teach. However, many IT pros do have this kind of attitude.
I will be the first to admit that, in my early years, I didn’t always say the nicest things about users. However, as I have progressed and realized that IT is a tool used by an organization to move forward, that we are not the end-all, be-all. That is not to say that IT is not vitally important to an organization–it is. However, is IT more important than the other functional areas? No. We do support all functional areas, but we’re not better than them. We simply have different skills.
So, what am I getting at? I just read a posting that sums it all up so well that I’m not going to keep going on my diatribe. This guy says it all in a great way.
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