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Getting in the business? Gotta have a plan

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Last week we posted an announcement from Palo Alto software promoting a small business webinar. At the time I thought it something to pass along to anyone who would be interested. But a while ago I started thinking about it and it occurred to me that for some techs getting into the IT business, such a webinar, while promoting the company’s products, might actually be a good first step toward opening up shop.

The thought came as I glanced over my shoulder at the bookcase behind me in my office and my eyes fell on the retail box for Palo Alto’s Business Plan Pro 2005, which I purchased a few years ago to update the business plan for Savoia Computer. I had used an earlier version of Business Plan Pro and felt compelled to upgrade for some of the newer features. I had also prepared a business plan with BPP for a client as a paid consultant and wanted to be able to update his as well. I hadn’t used it for awhile and after I  built a new computer for myself last year I just never reinstalled it.

It isn’t that I didn’t want it on my system, it’s just that I had been thinking about getting out of the computer business to do something else and felt that I really didn’t need it anymore. But so far the other pursuits have not paid off as quickly and easily as I thought they would and I haven’t been as organized and focused as I should be in reaching those goals.

I watch a lot of techs get into the business without a business plan. When asked, they say that they know what they want to do and how they are going to get there. They say they aren’t planning to get a loan from a bank, so why go to the trouble of creating a business plan? Apparently they think that a business plan is something you create as a formality to impress a loan officer in order to convince them that your idea will work so they will lend you the money. It isn’t something you actually need to run a business.It is just part of the process of securing a loan.

Actually, that isn’t the purpose of a business plan at all. Sure, it’s needed for a loan and required reading for potential investors, but it isn’t something created solely for that purpose. It is a document bankers and investers refer to that is supposed to already be there – a living, working roadmap for building your business.

The business plan isn’t a marketing piece for investors, although it can be one. It is a blueprint for starting and managing your business. It is a tangible layout of your idea, a method of putting your ideas on paper to flesh them out and ensure that you have a clear vision of how you will proceed in your venture and what turns you expect it to take. It is a timetable for your business project and a roadmap of your goals for success. It isn’t something to doodle up on a restaurant napkin and toss out with the dinner tray, it is something to write down, reference and follow. It is your plan of action for success.

My client is a perfect example of someone who did not understand the purpose of having a business plan. I spent a considerable amount of time and effort preparing a business plan for the client only to have it come to naught. Sure, he paid me for doing it, but his sole purpose for the plan was to obtain a business loan. Yes, he got the loan and as soon as he did, the business plan was put away and forgotten.

If there was anyone who needed a business plan to follow, it was this guy. He is the type who tends to come up with an inspirational idea one day, implement it on day two, then decide it isn’t really what he wants to do on day three and by the end of the week has changed his mind completely, abandons it and comes up with something else.

He had some good ideas, some of them had great potential, but he wouldn’t really see them through.  He would start projects before he really thought them through and drop them before they had a chance to really develop. Needless to say his business isn’t doing very well at all. In fact, he still owes me money for another venture.

This is not to say that a business plan has to be followed to the letter. On the contrary, you need to be flexible and change your plan as you go along. As I said earlier, it is intended as a living, breathing document that changes and grows according to the needs of your business.

However, without a solid plan, you risk becoming like my client, forever struggling because you have no real sense of direction.

So, while attending a webinar on business planning isn’t mandatory, I highly recommend it. 

The Force Field Investigates: LAN/WAN Professional.com

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I received an invitation today to receive free training to be a LAN Administrator as part of a “LAN/WAN Internship and Placement Program”. “Woo hoo!”, I thought to myself. “free training. You can’t beat free.”

The invitation was sent under the guise of “newsletter@lanwannews.com”. Immediately the red flag went up.

Now, I subscribe to dozens of tech newsletters so that in itself wasn’t cause for alert, but I know what I subscribe to and I don’t recall subscribing to this one. On closer inspection, it wasn’t really a newsletter at all, it was an unsolicited e-mail offer. Spam.

The first line said it was an “official e-mail” and said that I was “authorized” to receive a $2,995 training program gratis. Well, I thought, I guess I had better read the entire e-mail and find out just how free this offer is.

As it turns out, it wasn’t as free as they claimed. In fact, it wasn’t free at all.

The word “free” means just that. FREE. No strings attached, nothing to buy, no conditions. It is something given without clauses, without any charge, without supplemental fees. It costs absolutely, positively nothing, zero, that is why It’s called “FREE”.

The training program is offered by a company called LAN/WAN Professional. Although the first paragraph of the e-mail stated that I would receive the “LAN Administrator Remote Training” free of charge, it later states that the offer is limited to “Stage 1” of the training only.  Further down it adds that this “free” training requires a $95 application fee, a $195 registration fee (aren’t “application” and “registration” generally the same thing?) and a $29 materials shipping and handling fee. Excuse me, but aren’t we are missing something here, the “r” in “free”?

So it isn’t free, it’s fee.

The e-mail went on to spew out starting salaries for IT professionals and statistics about how job growth in the industry is expected to be 53.4% over the next ten years. Considering that figure is spread out over ten years, which is a long time in the IT industry, that margin of growth isn’t too impressive, but it sounds great in a sales pitch to someone who isn’t already in it.

They even set a deadline for application of November 13. That is only five days away. “Well, I’d better get busy then”, I thought. There was a contact name, phone number, fax number, e-mail address and URL to a web site. I decided to give them a call.

The name of the contact was Patrick Pule, Director of Client Relations. It was a 949 area code, which was California. It was around 9:15 AM when I called and Mr. Pule wasn’t in, but he had voice mail, so I left him a message. Of course, I had no intention of signing up, but that wasn’t why I was calling. I wanted to check them out and find out if they were legit, or just how reputable they were. Since he wasn’t available, I decided to Google around. What I found out was very interesting. I feel it is important to post it on The Force Field, in case anyone else gets such an e-mail and is in the market for certifications.

First, the company now called LAN/WAN Professional was previously known by another name, Tech Pros Group. Apparently this company, also known as TPG in some forums and web sites, has quite a shady reputation. The company was allegedly founded by Eric Choi and operated by Choi and his brother, Ray. According to the company web site, their guaranteed success of the IT professional is somehow tied to or dependent on the “financial success of the company”, A strange statement for an organization that purports to train applicants for IT certifications. What does the financial success of the company have to do with how successful an IT professional becomes after he is trained and certified? Is this marketing double speak or an indication of the company’s real objectives? One has to wonder.

But that was only the beginning. As it turns out, a number of techs and techs in training signed up with the company for the alleged “free” training that was pitched to me. The results of this training, depending on who you talked to, were mixed.

Complaints were posted and logged on a number of web sites. TechRepublic had the longest and most controversial discussions on the company and I only had time and patience enough to wade through about half of the posts about LAN/WAN Professional.com . One notable and ardent supporter of Tech Pros Group/Lan/Wan Professionals was Steve Copeland, allegedly Vice President of Business Relations at Tech Pro Group, both defending his company and blasting dissenters for their posts.

Consumer complaint site complaintsboard.com seemed to corroborate at least one of the stories posted by members of TechRepublic.The Better Business Bureau also had something to say about Tech Pros Group, saying that the company “failed to respond to complaints”, “their advertising is grossly misleading”, “they are not in compliance with the law’s licensing or registration requirements” and gave the company an F rating.

The company marketed itself heavily on CareerBuilder.com until complaints and bad publicity prompted CareerBuilder to suspend their accounts in August. This may have been, at least to some degree, due to a series of postings in a blog by Brad Reese on NetworkWorld called Brad Reese on Cisco , in which Reese investigated complaints against TPG/LAN/WAN Professional and its questionable tactics in July 2008.

Among the controversies circulated in several of these venues was a concept that brought into question the validity of the training program itself. Despite the claims by TPG that their internship and placement training program was “proven to fast track you to a professional level position as a LAN/WAN administrator, engineer, analyst or project manager”, the company  was not actually an accredited school or training center for IT certification. For instance, TPG had advertised Microsoft\Cisco paid internships on CareerBuilder that were actually marketing pitches to recruit applicants for their training programs. Reese posted an official statement on his blog August 1 from Fred Weiller, Director of Marketing for Learning@Cisco, in which Weiller said emphatically that TPG/LAN/WAN Professional.com had no affiliation with Cisco.

“Cisco has no relationship with them, and Cisco does not endorse their programs in any way”, Weiller was quoted as saying. “Eric Choi is not registered as a Certified Cisco Systems Instructor CCSI.”

As for the actual certification, CertGuard, a company that validates IT certification testing sites and certification integrity, advised users in its forums to check out the company thoroughly before giving them any money for training programs.

While it is possible you may not receive an e-mail from TPG, LANWAN Professional.com or LANWANProfessional.net (there were links to both a .com and .net domain, so beware), It is likely you will receive similar solicitations for other IT training and certification programs from time to time. There are many of them out there and this industry is just as prone and vulnerable to solicitation from companies, individuals and organizations with questionable intent as any other.

Just because we are in a field which requires us to be aware of all manner of schemes, scams and fraud against our customers doesn’t mean we are always on guard against such things ourselves, as evidenced by complaints and lawsuits lodged against companies like TPG. As such, I will include such companies and organizations in the IT Business Resource Directory from time to time in the future, not as an endorsement, but as a red flag to those who are solicited by these companies and want to know more about them before they get involved.

FireBoard – an open source project not so open

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If you have participated in the FF forums you probably are aware of the current bugs and performance issues. If you are new to the site, this is the primary reason the forums are not as active as they were in the beginning and the top complaint among users who stick it out and still post in the threads. They are terribly cumbersome and slow.

 There are good days and bad days, but overall, the current forum software we are using, FireBoard, just isn’t cutting it. To add to the problem, the developers of the FireBoard forum software are not very communicative and seem to get on the defensive even when approached about the communication issue, which doesn’t help.

I have looked at migrating to other forums but doing so would either risk losing some features, require a bridge to the site that would necessitate separate forum memberships, possible loss of existing topics and posts, or all of the above. I really don’t have the time or resources to deal with it, either.

The developers of Fireboard promised a new, improved, completely rewritten, compatible and faster version of this forum component. The downside to all this is that they won’t tell us when. All we know is it is “90% complete” and that it will be released “soon”. Apart from that there is no updated roadmap, at least not one that is publicly available to view.

So, that left us with a very difficult decision. Do we go ahead and migrate to something else that will require a separate database, membership, with no guarantee that we will be able to keep our posts or do we just sit and continue to wait indefinitely for a better version of the current component that may or may not arrive this year?

At first I decided to wait it out, however doing so has definitely affected participation in the forums due to current issues with slow performance. However, during the past few months I decided to stick with my decision on the promise that Fireboard 2.0 would be released “soon”.

Recent events have caused me to reconsider.

While some may think we as users can’t complain about the development and shortcomings of an Open Source component (unless we contribute code or $$ to it ourselves) we still invest a lot of our own time and effort learning it, working with it and supporting it ourselves. It is easy to say the users have no cause to complain but I think some forget that without users there is no one to fully test the component in a real world environment and without users there is no point to development in the first place.

Awhile back I wrote a long diatribe in one of the FireBoard community forum threads about support and community. I was frustrated with the lack of response to queries by the developers of FireBoard and attempted offer some insight as to how communication with the users and keeping them informed would help get the community more involved. I returned to find that there was less communication than before.

It seems like there is a we/them attitude between the developers and the members of the FireBoard community. That is exactly what hurts any Open Source community. I kept up with a lot of the FireBoard forum discussions and I found that many members of the FireBoard forums support each other and the product as best they can. They help each other find fixes, patches and work arounds to code they didn’t write and are struggling to understand themselves. That takes real dedication and loyalty. It also takes work. Collectively, the community is the support arm of the project. For this reason they are as much a part of the development of the FireBoard forum software as the developers are.

For this reason, in a sense, they do have a right to complain. At the very least, they certainly have a right to be kept in the loop, and not in the dark.

I went  there in search of answers. Instead I found a site with more ads than answers and other users of FireBoard just as frustrated as me. If there was more communication between the developers and the users there would be a lot less frustration. Why? Because a strong bond of communication bonds the community. Users would feel like they were a real part of the project and would become more involved themselves, they would understand what the developers go through better and would be more patient with the development process (especially when there are delays) and they would be less prone to complaining because they would have a greater sense of what is happening and why. They would give the developers and FireBoard more loyalty, support and sympathy. There would likely be more donations. This should be a symbiotic relationship, not a we/they conflict.

Okay, it’s an Open Source site, but can you blame some of us for our frustrations?

Yesterday I visited the FireBoard forums again in search of an update on its progress. Instead, I found a thread started by someone else in search of the same. Unfortunately, he was “silently” told to take a hike.

So I posted. Again I explained the importance of keeping the users in the loop and again I explained the importance of community to the health and survival of an open source project.

Today, I finally received an answer.  The entire thread was removed.

At first it appeared we were censored. Several members who had posted and monitored the thread started another one to inquire about the missing posts. By the afternoon the missing thread was restored, with an apology from one of the mods and an explanation that it was removed accidentally while moving around the forum categories.

I wonder if it was done as a reaction to the new thread. (Supplemental Note: I published this blog post and linked to it in the new thread an hour or so before the missing posts were restored; whether this post had anything to do with it or not is debatable, but the timing was interesting). I will add that the entire thread was restored, but locked to prevent further posts. The act of locking the thread says volumes.

This is very disappointing. Instead of acknowledging the problem and rallying developers and the forum community together, they didn’t like what they heard and chose to “silence” us. I suppose if they could have they would have simply shot us in the middle of the square instead?

This does not build community. It only serves to alienate members more.

Well, I guess this was their answer. So much for community. I guess it really is “we” and “they” and they want it to stay that way. I guess they really don’t want us to meddle in their project.

I was planning to just try and stick it out until the release of FireBoard 2.0 and I was defending this decision in discussions with the members of The Force Field because I believed in the FireBoard project. It is now clear I made a very poor choice installing and supporting FireBoard on our site and I should have just listened to our members. I apologize to each and every one of you.

I spent a lot of time and effort writing numerous posts in the FireBoard forums during the last year on this one topic of communication and getting the community “involved” by keeping it in the loop. Removing or deleting the thread was a slap in the face and very disrespectful to the very users who could help propel FireBoard to the top of the heap of Joomla! components – the FireBoard fan base.

Well, I’m done. It is clear there is no real community there or the developers of the FireBoard project have no interest in building one. If there really is a FireBoard 2.0, they can have it. Until the attitude from the FireBoard team changes, FireBoard will receive no more consideration from me and no further endorsement.

All right, I’m ticked. I trusted the FF forums to an open source project and got burned. It’s my fault, really. I trusted the site with a project that showed promise but really wasn’t ready to fulfill it.

Then again, it does go against the mantra that Open Source is supposed to espouse, that of building free and open software by building a community.

You don’t have to be a cynic to run an IT business, but it helps

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I was involved in a discussion this morning in one of the tech news groups about a particular ‘national’ contractor and the question of its legitimacy as a trusted partner. It prompted me to think about these companies in general and how many IT service providers have been burned or ripped off doing contract work with a few of them.

For the most part, well established nationals, to a great degree, can be trusted. Yes, there are exceptions (I can hear you yelling names like Barristers already) and even then it is sometimes a matter of unfortunate circumstances that cause a national company’s demise rather than intentional misconduct.

However, this industry is also has more than its share of less than reputable companies and scams simply because there is really no requirement to meet in order to set yourself up for business other than getting a license to operate as one. There is no certification, no regulation, no quantification of any sort that filters out the unqualified and undesirable. The field is wide open to anyone who wants to try it. It is a freedom to operate in such an open marketplace that is at once both wonderful for opportunity and frighteningly dangerous.

This was why I felt it was important to compile the Directory of National Contractors in the IT Business Resource Directory on the site.  I originally compiled the directory in response to constant discussions and queries about nationals both in the Yahoo computerbusiness group and the OnForce forums. I would often read the same questions over and over “anyone know anything about (insert national name here)? Are they any good?” and I realized it would be a lot easier to have a list of them all posted online which we could all rate and comment on, eliminating the hassle of responding to the same questions constantly and make it more efficient to get a general, collective assertation of each company.

I was not the first to do this. There was another list of national IT contractors on the Internet that was popular several years ago, but it wasn’t kept up and I don’t think it is active, if it is even
still around. However, as I recall there was no rating system except a recommendation from the web site owner and since individual experiences will vary with many nationals I felt it best to rate them based on a consensus rather than my own opinion.

I presented above to the computerbusiness group in response to a query about a specific national. Someone did his own research on the company in question and walked away with the conclusion that although it sounded good, the company’s business model just didn’t add up.

This what I told him: I think you are wise to ask those questions and really check them out first before dealing with them. There are a lot of these companies out there and while there are some with good intentions not all of them can be trusted.

Although I intend to maintain neutrality on this, I am compelled to say, for the sake of those new to the computer business, that just because a company says it has secured funding for this or that or just closed a huge contract doesn’t necessarily mean anything. I have spoken with owners of such businesses before that boast acquisition of such funding or contracts that sound impressive but isn’t entirely accurate or even true. Companies typically flaunt such things to legitimize themselves and bolster confidence in their companies; the psychology is that if someone is willing to invest millions in their operation it surely means the company is worth investing in and they now have the money to spread around.

A lot of us have been burned enough to be wary of any company that shows up and claims to be the new ‘industry leader’, but there are many techs just starting their own businesses who are not aware of this and are ‘ripe for the picking’, so to speak. Those are the ones I am most concerned about, because I started out as one myself many years ago and I can say first hand that unless you go into this business with a lot of preparation, a little caution and just a bit cynicism, your business can get eaten alive.

Yes, I do sound somewhat cynical, but I’m just telling it like it is.

Ubuntu 8.10 “Intrepid Ibex” To Be Released This Week

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Ubuntu 8.10 "Intrepid Ibex" is due to be released on October 30th. It will be Ubuntu's ninth release and the fourth anniversary since the first release, 4.10.

The Desktop version of Ubuntu 8.10 features increased mobile digital with 3G wireless support and guest sessions that allows users temporarily share computers without compromising security.

System Requirements, 256 MiB of memory, some of the systems memory may be unavailable due it being used for a graphics card.

In order to take advantage of the automated process users of older versions, pre 8.10 must upgrade to 8.04 LTS then upgrade to 8.10. Upgrade instructions can be found here: http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/upgrading

Auditing and Logging

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Is auditing and logging enabled on your servers and workstations? I bet many of you answer “yes”. My follow up question to your reply would be “When did you enable it?” That's right folks, basic logging is NOT enabled by default within Windows. This may come as a surprise to some but Windows Event logs are not considered basic auditing and logging. 

 Strap on your tinfoil hats and follow along with this scenario: Imagine that your database server is hacked. You are tasked with finding out what happened. Which files have been modified? Who hacked the machine? How long has it been compromised? Was it an inside job? 

 Lets start with the server itself; Which files have been modified recently? Probably easy enough to figure out by looking at the timestamps. Now, who modified them? What's that? You don't have logging enabled for object access? Or directory access? That's right, it's not enabled by default.

 Perhaps you can narrow down the time frame to somewhere between 2-2:15 AM last Sunday night. So, who logged into the server at that time? What, you don't log successful and failed logons? (again, not enabled by default) You get the picture………

 Another real world example: A colleague was having issues with an Exchange server sending large amounts of spam. Apparently an external entity was using the box as a relay, yet the box was not misconfigured as an open SMTP relay. So what was going on? Basic Exchange logging was useless. After enabling detailed logging, it was discovered that a 3rd party backup utility installed on that server and configured with default credentials was being used to obtain a valid logon and send mail through the box (let this be a lesson about changing default credentials).

 As we can see, logging and auditing is very important. You can utilize it for forensics purposes, to detect anomalies before real problems surface, troubleshooting, and to gain a better understanding of what is going on within your network.

 One of the oldest forms of logging is syslog, from the Unix world. This is an accepted standard and format that *nix machines have used forever. Unix and it's variants are very good when it comes to logging (some may say a bit too anal about it). These machines tend to log all operating system and user related events along with a majority of events generated by any applications running on the machines. Troubleshooting becomes very easy with this detailed level of logging. 

 But, alas, we're not here to talk about *nix machines only. Windows uses the Event Logs to keep track of what's happening with the device. The only pitfall is that even basic events are not logged by default. Successful and failed logons, object access, etc, is not logged. I can't stress how important it is that you develop a policy of enabling this on all of the servers that you build. Here's a good primer on getting started:

Recommendations on what to log

A simple "how to"

 All of this logging tends to rapidly eat up drive space, which is most likely why it is disabled by default in Windows. You will find that the best solution to this is centralized log aggregation (required for regulatory compliance in many industries). Basically, you point all the logs from all of your servers to one log server device. This gives you a central repository for the information and allows you to control access to the logs (an important security consideration) and increase your log retention time (dedicated space for log storage). Most central log servers also have a search interface and some even have a correlation engine that allows you to set up alerts based upon certain thresholds or events. Examples include the Kiwi syslog products, Cisco Mars (more of Cisco-centric product), a simple home-built Linux syslog server, xDefenders ESM appliance (shameless plug), etc.

 There are some issues with central logging in a network environment, not the least of which is the fact that Windows Event Logs are created in a proprietary format that is not directly compatible with the syslog standard. This is not a problem if you have a pure Windows network, don't want to log anything from your firewalls, switches, routers, etc., and are using a central log server that understands the Event Log format. I prefer to not only log my servers, I also want all that juicy information from my other network gear as well. Fortunately there is a solution in the form of products that can convert Event Log to syslog format. The best one by far (in my experience) is the Snare Agent for Windows. This product is free (everybody likes “free”), does a great job of formating the information into the syslog standard, and has a very powerful web-based interface to configure stuff to your heart's delight. The best feature of the Snare Agent is the fact that during the installation process it will ask you if it should enable some basic auditing and logging. Nice!

Get Snare Agent for Windows here

 In summary, enable some basic logging on all of the important devices on your network, implement a central log server, and start to utilize the benefits that logging can provide for you. Some day you'll thank me.

Copyright Todd Hughes 2008

The real reason why MS Office still dominates the market

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I read an article in Computerworld this morning by Eric Lai in which he and Michael Croan, Senior Marketing Manager of Microsoft, provided the reasons why Microsoft Office has greater market share than OpenOffice.org. I thought it was completely off the mark. The comment by Croan was typical of a marketing shirt but was, nonetheless, was another example that Microsoft is basically full of itself and out of touch with reality.

This was my response to the article:

While I will concede that Microsoft Office is well integrated, this is largely due to the fact that it is usually running on a Microsoft OS with other Microsoft products that are designed for interoperability with each other, which does put OpenOffice.org at a disadvantage.

However, I disagree with Mr. Croan’s claim that MS Office is well supported compared to OpenOffice (yes, I know he was referring to open source in general, but I think we all know what he was alluding to). Actions speak louder than words.

Microsoft is known for taking their sweet time to patch their products (if and when they actually admit their is a flaw to be patched). In contrast, organizations such as Mozilla and OpenOffice.org are usually more responsive to such flaws and are quick to patch their software. So tell me again who offers better support?

As for the reasons OpenOffice.org is not widely adopted, I think the article is on the wrong track. According to the article Lai wrote, “OpenOffice.org’s total usage, while unknown, remains small overall, despite its free price. That is due to document compatibility fears and Microsoft’s aggressive, tactical discounting.”

Sure, there are certainly document compatibility concerns, but they are not concerns about the ability of OpenOffice.org to work with MS documents, but the other way around. That’s not the fault of OpenOffice.org. It uses and supports ODF, which is a standard format (something older versions of MS Office cannot claim). It is Microsoft that has resisted the call to support that standard, opting instead to stick to its closed, proprietary document format in order to lock customers in to their product. Even so, that is not the issue it once was, since MS has recently supported the development of plug-ins to add ODF support to its office suite, so that argument is moot.

However, the assertion that the other reason for low adoption of OOo is due somehow to Microsoft’s “aggressive, tactical discounting” is out of touch with reality and makes absolutely no sense. The article is essentially telling us that one of the reasons MS Office is more popular than OpenOffice.org is because this popularity is driven by a price factor. Let’s be real. No matter how aggressive the pricing, OpenOffice.org is free. MS Office isn’t. (I contend that MS Office is still overpriced, but that is another discussion). It is still more expensive than free. So if price is a primary main factor, how can MS Office possibly win over OpenOffice.org? It can’t. So it isn’t really a factor here.

No, the real reason is two-fold.

First, Microsoft Office is a household name. users are already familiar with MS Office and so they are comfortable using it. Users generally don’t like to go through the hassle of retraining themselves on new applications. They typically want to just sit down, load it and get down to business. Anything new to them is something they don’t want to deal with if they don’t have to.

This is one reason why it is sometimes difficult to sell new, better vertical applications to companies that have been on old, horrid systems for years. As old and cumbersome as these apps are, users are comfortable using them and do not want to deal with the hassle of migrating their entire operation to something else, even if it is better.

The other reason is simply product marketing and awareness. Microsoft is a household name. Microsoft Office is well-known throughout the world. That doesn’t make it a better office suite, just a famous one. It is well established and Microsoft pours tens of millions of dollars each year into making sure it stays that way.

OpenOffice.org does not have the power of branding that MS has, nor the marketing budget to create and perpetuate it. If you ask the man (or woman) on the street if they know MS Office you will likely get a positive response, since most people have at least heard of it. Ask those same people about OpenOffice.org and chances are you will get a blank stare. Most of them have never heard of OpenOffice.org and have no idea what it is.

There’s your real reason.

I have downloaded and installed OpenOffice.org 3.0 and I contend that it is every bit as good as Microsoft Office, and in some ways better. The problem is that most of the world doesn’t know it yet. That’s the real reason.

 

 

GoToAssist

 

Vista SP2 beta on its way, come what may

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Apparently Microsoft a preparing to release another service pack for Windows Vista. Neowin.net reports that Redmond is sending out a heads up to beta testers that Microsoft Windows Vista SP2 beta 1 is due for release sometime within the next month and is actively soliciting them to sign up. If so, this will be the second service pack prepared for release this year.

The latest service pack will allegedly include all the recent updates and bug fixes for Vista as well as support for Bluetooth and the VIA 64-bit CPU. The official statement from Microsoft is available in KB948465 .

It isn’t really unusual for Microsoft to release two service packs so close together. Remember the early days of Windows NT 4? It has just been awhile since they were on top of things like this. I guess we have become so accustomed to delays and heel dragging when it comes to major product releases and updates that some of us are actually surprised when Microsoft picks up the pace. It’s about time, too.

Vista was launched way behind schedule and stripped of many key features initially promised simply because Microsoft ran out of time to fully develop them and meet their latest deadline, which had already been pushed back several times. It is my belief this is the prime reason for Vista’s troubles at its release; it simply wasn’t ready for launch, and it showed.

This is why I call Vista “The New Millenium”. The look and feel of Windows Me was that of an operating system that was thrown together just so Microsoft could have something out there while it was wrapping up Windows XP. As soon as Windows XP was launched, Millenium was given a quiet sweep under the rug.

I am not saying that Vista will suffer the same fate, at least not to the extent of Millenium. Obviously Microsoft is fully supporting the product as evidenced by the release of SP2, which is two service packs more than it supported Millenium. This is likely because Microsoft invested a lot more in the development of Vista than it did with the Forgotten One.

However, it is becoming clear that Vista’s days are numbered. Microsoft is hastening release of Windows 7 and Windows  XP has been given yet another reprieve. To keep a nine year old operating system alive while prepping one two generations after it is a bit unusual and indicates their lack of confidence in Vista to carry the torch until the next release. The latest operating system may be getting a second new service pack, but I get the strange feeling that as soon as Windows 7 is launched, Vista will be riding into the sunset, never to be seen or heard from again.

System Management News

 

To run a tech business, you need to know both ends

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There are interesting discussions in some tech forums these days about the value of joining vendor reseller and affiliate programs. What interests me most about the discussions is that many  IT service providers and resellers seem to be unaware of the potential to extend their marketing power by partnering with vendors and manufacturers of the products they sell and support and some are unaware that these programs even exist.

I have been following a couple of discussion threads in the Technibble forums that touched on this topic and after reading through them I realized how many providers are missing out on an opportunity to really expand and grow their businesses.

There is a logical and understandable reason for this, of course. Most IT service providers start their businesses the way I did. They do it on the side, grow their customer base, then quit their day job and go solo in the field as an Independent Contractor or open up their own office or shop. No one mentors them on the business end. No one hands them a list of vendor contacts or distributors and tells them how to establish business relationships with the companies whose products they sell, service and support. They are completely on their own.

The downside to starting cold is that they are usually not privvy to or aware of a lot of the “secrets” of running a business. They don’t have the business to business connections to be an “insider” in the industry and give them a competitive edge. The problem is, they aren’t really searching for it, either because they are too busy in the day to day operations of their businesses.

A few weeks ago I was talking with Robert Danese, Executive Director of NASBA , the Association of Channel Resellers. We discussed this very topic and why many providers, resellers and consultants are seemingly not aware of the power of utilizing vendor partner or reseller programs. I think the reason is simply because most of us started as techs, not business people and such concepts are not tech, but business related. Some professionals who run their own IT enterprises rely primarily on their knowledge and experience as techs with the expectation that technical expertise alone will carry their business. Unfortunately it doesn’t work that way. That is one major reason why many tech businesses ultimately fail.

There are two parts to the term ‘tech business’. You have tech and business. You can be the tech and run the business but if you want to start one you need to know something about both. That is where partnerships with both vendors and other IT businesses can help.

I posted a thread in The Force Field forums awhile back about doing a series on vendor partner programs in the future. After reading the discussions in the Technibble forums and my discussion with Mr. Danese, I think it should be sooner than later.

 

 

 

Channelpro

 

Wall Street woes and the IT industry

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I am not going to go into a news report of the entire Wall Street/banking industry bailout mess. I think everyone is already aware of the problem and its wall-to-wall coverage in all media outlets right now. Simply reporting it would be redundant and I doubt there is anything I would say about it that hasn’t been said by someone already.

I would like to say something about its potential effects on our industry.

There is a lot of speculation about how this will play out in the IT market. Some industry pundits say the current situation will have little or no effect on our business. In fact, it could strengthen it. Others say it will affect IT in the short or long term, although to what degree it is uncertain.

We really don’t have a lot of past performance metrics in such an event to make any predictions in this matter. The banking industry has been around for centuries. Wall Street itself has a long history to draw from. IT is a young market compared to the others and while deeply integrated into both the finance and stock markets, the tech sector as we know it today hasn’t been in the mix long enough to predict any real future based on past performance in such a scenario.

There was no IT industry during the Great Depression of 1929. Although tech stocks were around during the great recession of the 70’s the IT industry in general was not as we know it today. The recession we experienced during the new millenium was a different animal under different circumstances. What we have now is something the IT industry has never experienced before. So, what data do we really have to make any sort of honest assessment of the future in IT?

The truth is, no one really knows what is going to happen next. It is all pure speculation. So my personal advice, take it or leave it, is to sit tight, hold on, stay alert, watch the market very carefully, and be ready to adapt as necessary. Prepare for the worst and hope for the best. In other words, just be prepared.

 

 

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