• Consulting

    Testing Restores on Backups

    November 17, 2006

    We’ve attended plenty of events that preach the importance of backup, but rarely is it approached from what is essentially at the heart of data protection – data recovery. For example, did you know that DLT tapes (still the media of choice across the board) are designed to be overwritten only 5 times? According to our valued partners at SonicWALL, Inc., administrators report that they use DLT tapes an average of 12 times. Also, something like 73% of the backed up data surveyed, was unrecoverable!!! Point being, a backup is only as secure as its recovery plan. The recommendation here is to run periodic recovery drills to test the viability…

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  • Business,  Consulting,  Network Infrastructure,  On the Road

    VoIP 101

    November 7, 2006

    I originally posted this at http://www.318.com/TechJournal As the name implies, VoIP refers to voice or phone calls that traverse data networks using Internet Protocol (IP). This may mean that the calls are going over the Internet, or it may simply mean calls are traveling over privately managed data networks that are using IP to transport the calls from one location to the other. This represents a fundamental change or shift in transportation and routing of traditional voice services work over analog wires. With VoIP, the voice stream is broken down into data packets, compressed and sent to its destination using the Internet (as opposed to establishing a ‘permanent’ connection for…

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  • Business,  Consulting,  Mac OS X

    Cage Match: Retrospect vs. BRU

    September 13, 2006

    I originally posted this at http://www.318.com/TechJournal Retrospect is the most historically respected backup package for Macs. After a lot of issues with the switch to OS X, Version 6 is a stable rendition of what Version 4.3 was for OS 9. The tried and true Retrospect interface is still used (just a little more soft around the edges). Retrospect 6 Server edition is capable of backing up server and client computers over the network and has increased backup performance dramatically. Tape loaders and libraries support has increased and barcode labeling of tapes is now supported. Retrospect 6 has also improved in the area of removable disc support, namely with CD…

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  • Articles and Books,  Business,  Consulting,  Kerio,  Mac Security,  Microsoft Exchange Server

    Email Privacy

    July 2, 2006

    I originally posted this at http://www.318.com/TechJournal Ever get an email from yourself that you didn’t send? Ever get spam from someone that you can’t reply to? Using the settings of an email program, it is possible to pretend to be anyone that you would like. If you want to send email from bill.gates@microsoft.com then that is entirely possible. Finding the address of who actually sent email is easy, but ensuring the identity of the sender is not part of standard email. This is where the protocols for PGP, Pretty Good Privacy, and GPG, or GNU Privacy Guard, come into play. GPG and PGP are Open Source suites of applications allowing…

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  • Business,  Consulting

    Web Hosting Primer

    April 10, 2006

    I originally posted this at http://www.318.com/TechJournal When you start a new hosting environment, you will probably handle many of the tasks that you will likely want your clients to handle later down the road. There are many products that help to ease the administrative burden of a shared hosting environment. These products empower users of your services to create their own accounts and perform other administrative tasks using easy to navigate web portals. • cPanel and Plesk are server management software solutions designed to allow administrators to create Reseller accounts, Domain accounts and email features. Administrators have the ability to assign users rights to various aspects of their hosting environment.…

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