Blogs

The Force Field SysAdmin Response

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Keith Albright from the Mind of Root podcast started a SysAdmin/Scripting Meme and called me out this week to answer the questions. I had to really think about them for awhile as some of it takes me back a few years. it’s a little fuzzy but I will do the best I can to answer them.

 

How old were you when you started using computers?

I was somewhat fascinated with the concept of computers as depicted in science fiction films when I was a kid and looked forward to a future when I could have and use one myself. I grew up watching movies such as Colossus: The Forbin Project, 2001: a Space Odyssey and TV shows such as Lost in Space and Star Trek, all of which featured computers with artificial intelligence. I thought the Batman series in the ’60s was cool because he had a computer in the Bat Cave that somehow seemed to know everything. Some of my favorite movies and TV shows were enjoyable for the technology factor alone.

It wasn’t until I was in my 20’s that computers were made affordable and easily accessible to the public, but as soon as I could afford it I purchased one. That was in 1982.

 

What was your first machine?

My very first real computer was a Commodore Pet 2001. I couldn’t afford a new one, so I purchased it used for around $300. It had a built-in 9 in. display, cassette tape drive and a little chicklet keyboard. The computer had a whopping 8k of memory which consisted of a set of static RAM chips socketed to a mainboard that blew frequently. I found a supplier for chips and replaced them as necessary. The computer was a course in computer repair. The first thing I learned about it was ESD.

 

What was the first real script you wrote?

My Commodore PET required knowledge of BASIC and I had to learn it in order to write my own programs. I recall writing a simple database script to catalog stuff. I also recall Hello World and a couple of other exercises but I don’t remember which was actually the first. When I purchased a Commodore VIC 20 and later a Commodore 64 I wrote a few other BASIC programs for myself but by that time there was so much software available for the 64 I didn’t need to do much scripting and only used BASIC to fix bugs in existing programs.

 

What scripting languages have you used?

I dabbled in Commodore Basic, some batch file scripts in MS-DOS, a little PHP (not a guru but I can tweak existing code) but I am not a programmer and have little patience for it. There are so many useful free scripts out there now that I can usually find what I need and tweak it instead of writing it myself.

 

What was your first professional sysadmin gig?

I ran my own computer business for nearly eleven years and act as SysAdmin to a few of my business clients. My first paid job as an outsource Admin was for a pain management clinic and the first thing I had to do was clean their network and all their backup media of virii. It was a massive infection. The second thing I had to do was bring them into license compliance and then build a new server, new workstations and the latest version of their medical software. Then I completely rebuilt their network.

If you knew then what you know now, would you have started in IT?

Good question. I would probably still be doing something related to IT but I would have done a lot of things differently and I probably would have stayed more focused on the web and media related aspects of IT instead of working with hardware and small business networks. To be honest, I would rather research, write and talk about IT and emerging new technologies than stare at a file server all day.

If there is one thing you learned along the way that you would tell new sysadmins, what would it be?

Listen to everyone, especially end users. Keep an open mind and research everything before making decisions. Never assume anything and always assume the worst. Keep your ear close to the ground. Stay alert to new trends, techniques and technologies and think of ways you can utilize their potential in your network.

And finally, whatever you do, don’t cut the red wire.

 

What’s the most fun you’ve ever had scripting?

I never really had fun scripting. It is just something I do when I have to do it. Well, I did have some fun with Hello World. It was a chore after that.

 

 Who am I calling out?

All listeners and members of The Force Field! 

 

You can hear the Mind of Root podcast on The TechPodcast Network . It is also available in the Media Center here at TheForceField.Net.

 

 

System Management News

 

 

Open Office Releases Patch to fix critical security vulnerability

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Open Office released a patch to fix a critical security vulnerability. It affects versions 2.0 through 2.4.
The patch fixes a vulnerability in the heap flow. The patch can be obtained at http://www.openoffice.org .
There hasn't been any reports of a working exploit.
The full article can be read here http://news.yahoo.com/s/pcworld/20080611/tc_pcworld/146970

Twitter – a serious marketing tool?

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Recently I was surfing around the various tech forums and noticed the same question posted everywhere asking what is quickly becoming an almost universal catch phrase. “Do you Twitter?” Not surprisingly, one of the first responses is invariably an almost classic one. “What’s a Twitter?”

If you are one of those respondents, don’t be ashamed. Twitter is a fairly recent phenomenon in the social networking space. It is a free “microblogging” service that allows mobile users and others to connect with one another in quick text message blasts consisting of 140 characters or less. Twitter was officially launched in October 2006 and quickly grew in popularity among the social networking crowd. More recently, however, Twitter has enjoyed a surge in popularity and growth. It is so popular, in fact, that it suffers from periodic glitches and down times from overload, or “too many tweets.” One such outage occurred as recently as this morning.

With this surge in popularity comes potential opportunity. Where there are people, there is an audience. Where there is an audience, there is a potential market. Where there is a market, there are potential customers for your products and services. There is potential here.

I first found Twitter within the podcast community while searching for new ways to promote The Force Field. I admit I thought it rather juvenile at first and was actually astonished to find so many other people and organizations who were already connected to hundreds, and in some cases thousands of other people – often complete strangers – who were sending messages to each other. I thought it was completely bizarre, but immediately realized how powerful the concept was, considering that these social connections were virally stimulating even more connections.

I believe it helped fuel the growth of both the podcast and the web site in recent weeks.

I also discovered that many other companies and organizations have already realized the marketing potential of Twitter and are using it to promote their products and services to an entirely new space. They are using it to advertise and communicate with their customers and potential customers in a more interactive and personal way than with traditional media. Building relationships with customers in this way can potentially have a great impact on brand awareness, customer loyalty and, ultimately, the bottom line.

Best of all, it’s free, and you can’t beat free.

A couple of weeks ago I polled the Providers in the OnForce forums to find out if anyone else was thinking about using Twitter as a marketing tool for their business. Interestingly enough,  75% of those polled chose “What the heck is a Twitter?” These are folks in the IT industry, the ones who are supposedly on the cusp of technology, new forms of communication and new trends. Strange.

I view this as a potentially powerful tool for communication, marketing and support. Imagine setting up a Twitter account for your business and telling your customers about it. Suddenly they have an instant line to you when they need you – then you answer when you are ready for them. You have an instant line to them when you have a new ad or coupon to deliver or a special to promote. You and your customer have an instant line for support in a pinch.

Likewise, imagine if techs were connected to each other this way, they could support one another when in the field when a peer is in a pinch.

There likely other uses for Twitter as well that are yet to be developed. For now, the marketing potential alone is sufficient to justify an account. The question is, if it can be used as a tool to market your business, would you utilize it?

You can Twitter me @theforcefield.

http://www.twitter.com/theforcefield

 

 

Systems Management News

 

Want to learn the business? Read the trades

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When I started selling computers as a business in 1997 I had aspirations of building a business empire. I had no plans to spend the rest of my career as a tech. I wanted to run a tech business. I wanted to be, first and foremost, an entrepreneur. Selling and repairing computers was not my primary goal. Building a business was the main objective. My position as a tech was intended only as a temporary one until I could afford to hire someone to take my place. Years later, I was still waiting.

I knew how to build and repair computers, but I didn’t know much about the computer business. My competitors were certainly not willing to help me and there were few resources available at the time that I could turn to in order to educate myself. I learned it all the hard way, by making business mistakes. And I made a lot of them.

When I joined  ComputerRepair.com in 2004 (now known as OnForce ) and Yahoo! newsgroups such as computerbusiness@yahoo.com in 2005 I found that I was not alone. There were a lot of other techs who jumped into it the same way I did, dealt with the same problems and made the same mistakes.

One of the problems I had with running my business was keeping up with all the new technologies and all the industry “buzz” words. Acronyms like “NAS” and “SAN” were thrown around in the field and terms such as Software as a Service, Web 2.0 and,more recently, Managed Services  were freely exchanged during phone discussions and seminars at trade shows. It’s a dirty little secret in this business that when two or more IT professionals meet and such terms are interjected in the discussion, the heads nod silently and at least someone becomes a deer in the headlights but no one asks what they mean because no one wants to come across as out of touch or less informed about the business than their peers. It’s kind of a geek ego thing.

So some in business run around and say things like “the vertical systems market is opening new opportunities for resellers in the channel” and  “we just tapped into selling Managed Services to our SMB clients and we’re looking to expand into the enterprise by Q1 of 09” and the rest have no idea what these individuals are talking about. Well, you can. You just have to keep up with the latest news and industry trends.

One of the best ways to do this is by reading industry trade publications .

Every industry has at least one trade magazine that the professionals subscribe to and follow to keep up with what is going on in their industry. The IT industry is no different; in fact, our industry has one of the largest – if not the largest – collections of trade magazines, white papers and web based content  on the entire planet. There is a plethora of them covering every niche and sub-niche in the IT marketplace.

These publications- the magazines, white papers, multimedia webinars, etc. are rich with news and content about products, services, issues and trends in the industry. Some of it is self-promotion, some objective. It can be analytical, speculative, dry or entertaining – but it’s all readily available to everyone who needs or wants to know more about what is happening in the IT industry and how they can leverage that knowledge to start and grow their own businesses.

If you want to learn and keep up with the latest “buzz” words in the industry, reading trade publications is a must, since some of the terms are created, coined or spread in these publications. In other words, you will learn about them right from the source.

These magazines are a great way to educate yourself because you can read them at your leisure, you can subscribe to as many as you need or want or you can focus on the ones that are specific to your area of the business. 

The best thing about these publications is that nearly all of them are FREE. Of course, you need to work in the industry. All you have to do is fill out a qualifying form to show that you are an industry professional.

Understand that these publications are not aimed at laypeople or the general public, so the form is necessary to filter out those who are not qualified. It takes a few minutes to fill out the form, but once you do and are approved, you are in. Overall, it is well worth the investment. After all, they are free, and you can’t beat free.

The goal of The Force Field portal is to help IT pros who are in business or want to be in business equip themselves with the information and knowledge they need to be successful. One of the paths to that goal is to provide access to the latest news and trends in the industry to help entreprenurial techs educate themselves and understand how to do business with the rest of the players in their field.

When we first launched the portal in beta form late last year I painstakingly collected a personal list of trade magazines that I felt were useful and relevant to my peers and posted them in both the FF forums and the IT Business Resource Directory . Many of these are publications I actively subscribe to and learn from. In the last few years I have learned a lot about running an IT business from reading these periodicals. I posted the list so you can subscribe to them and learn from them as well. 

To make it all easier for you to browse the list and subscribe to them, we recently launched theforcefield.tradepub.com , a collection of leading industry trade magazines from respected publishers. Instead of sorting through the original list in the forums or in the directory and going through the time consuming task of contacting the subscription department of each publication, I felt it would be better to display them all on the site and make it as easy and convenient as possible to sign up.

In addition to the magazines you can download white papers, webinars and podcasts across 34 industry sectors. It is a one-stop shop for the leading trades in the IT industry and I think it is well worth it.

Sign up for a few today and the next time you meet up with other IT business pros at a trade show, forum or meeting and someone mentions a new buzz word, you’ll be able to tell them what it means. 

 

Website Magazine Ad

Firefox Download Day~June 17th~Update~We did it!

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Mozilla is trying to set a new world record for the most downloads in 24 hours for Firefox 3.0.
Read the full article here: http://news.yahoo.com/s/cmp/20080530/tc_cmp/208401028
Make your pledge here at http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord/
They have set June 17th for Download Day.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/pcworld/20080612/tc_pcworld/147024
UPDATE: We did it, over 8 million downloads! Firefox is now in the Guinness World Records for most downloads in 24 hours.
Download Day

Firefox is not a browser, it’s a lesson

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The word is out. Mozilla announced that it would delay the release of Firefox 3.0 final a few days and release RC2 first, due to the discovery of over three dozen bugs in the latest version of the powerful web browser considered to be the prime contender to Microsoft Internet Explorer.

On the surface this seems like a setback. Those are a lot of flaws that require a lot of fixes and it would seem the open source application is no better than its proprietary competitor, which itself has been plagued by bugs and security flaws since initial release of its latest version, IE7.

In reality, however, nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, I no longer view Firefox as just another browser (as if it ever was), but a lesson in how a software company should operate and what software should be.

One of my beefs with the entire software industry is and always has been the shoddy way they write and support their products and the apathy and sometimes even disdain they hold for the customers who use them. Software is often released to market and sold to the public at premium prices containing bugs and errors that are often patched at the will and whim of the manufacturer, usually at in the next release, when the bug-weary user must pay again for the latest version with old bugs patched and new features – along with new bugs – introduced. It’s a vicious cycle and a never -ending one. That is what drives revenue for commercial software companies.

Software vendors seem to spend just as much, if not more, on marketing the product as they do developing it. That in itself is fine, if the funds for development are spent on ensuring a quality product. Often times that isn’t the case. Even so, when bugs are found one would assume the developers would want to fix them as soon as possible and distribute them to users in a timely manner – hopefully not at their expense, either. After all, the customer purchased the software in good faith that it would work as performed. If it doesn’t, the customer deserves a free fix.

One of the arguments made for commercial proprietary software vendors and against the open source community is the support, or the lack of it, for a given product. The popular wisdom is that proprietary software is vastly superior simply because it has the financial backing of rich and powerful corporate companies to hire the best and brightest programmers and attend to every detail of its development. As the curator of Jurassic Park would say, “spared no expense!”

But like Jurassic Park, this thinking is flawed. It equates a big budget with big results. Money does not always equal success. In fact, the bigger the budget, the greater the risk of failure. Why? Because now the focus is on spending the money on the project instead of the project itself. The programmers are no longer writing code for the application, they are writing it for a paycheck. They become lazy and slothful. Deadlines are missed, but no worries, they can handle it. They have a big budget.

Microsoft adopted this philosophy a long time ago. Here is a company with what seems like a bazillion dollars and when they are presented with bugs and security exploits in their browser it can take them months (and in at least one case, a year) to patch them. Then there is Mozilla Foundation, a non-profit 501(c)3 organization that does not have wads of cash in their cubbies, yet can turn around a fix for Firefox within 48 hours. What is wrong with this picture?

It’s simple. It is all about attitude and focus on the real priorities, the product and the user.

It isn’t that Firefox is inherently a better browser than Internet Explorer (although in many ways I think it is), it is that it is better managed and maintained. Both Microsoft and Mozilla have popular products. Neither product is perfect. Both have bugs. Those bugs are discovered and reported regularly. The difference between Microsoft and Mozilla is in how they react to those bugs. Redmond is notorious for sitting on them and taking their sweet time to repair them. Mozilla doesn’t wait around.

It’s not about the money. It’s all about the effort. Microsoft is focused on serving their own agenda. Mozilla is focused on serving the community.

Mozilla will delay final release of Firefox 3 for about a week. So what? It’s only a week. When it is released it will be stable and it will work, and that’s what counts. On top of that, it will be free. You can’t beat that. Will the same be said for Microsoft Internet Explorer 8? Who knows? They are still patching old bugs in IE 7.

There’s a lesson in there.

 

 Groundwork Free Open Source White Paper

Technibble Webmaster guests on The Force Field

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The Force Field episode 20 is scheduled for release Saturday night May 24, 2008 at 12 Midnight EDT. Our guest will be Bryce Whittly, creator of Technibble.com. Technibble is a site for techs who own or want to own their own IT business and is based in Australia.

In this episode we will discuss the differences and similarities of the IT industry in The Land Down Under, discuss the Technibble web site and find out where Bryce thinks the industry is headed.

You can download and listen to promos here.

15 second promo

30 second promo

I welcome everyone’s feedback. If you would like to call in and comment on any episode you can call the Skype line at savoiacomputer or call 407-CPU-JOY8 (407-278-5698) this weekend May 24 and 25, 2008.

 

Squishing Bugs

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    It's Saturday morning and I just finished doing my weekly chores around the house. While I wait to swap the wash, I'm updating SSH on my Debian servers. It seems the random number generator within the application was broken, so that when the RSA keys are generated they may not be so “unique”. The fix was very simple; one command in a terminal and the application is updated, new keys generated, and the SSH daemon restarted. For those not comfortable in the shell, most GUI package managers either automatically updated the system or notified the user that an update was available. A simple click and you're safe once again.

    Why do I feel compelled to share this with you? Well, this recent vulnerability with SSH reinforces the fact that even those of us that choose not to use Windows must remain vigilant and keep our systems updated. More importantly, it points out a major difference between FOSS (free and open source software) and proprietary software; there is a marked difference in the way vulnerabilities are handled.

    Open source software is frequently criticized by its pundits as insecure and dangerous due to the very fact that the source code is freely available. The argument is that “since the source code is available, it's very easy for the bad guys to find the flaws”. The counter-argument by the FOSS folks is that “since the source code is available, it's very easy for the community to review and find flaws”. Basically, the code is reviewed by a large number of people on a regular basis which should result in an inherently safer product. Case in point: the vulnerability with the random number generator within SSH was discovered and announced on May 13. Within hours, the open source community had resolved the issue and had an updated version of the software available.

    Lets look at the other side now. Proprietary software does not make the source code available. It is up to the manufacturer of the software to review it for vulnerabilities and patch as necessary. We are left at the mercy of said manufacturers and must assume that the software has been tested and is safe to use. What happens when a user finds a security issue? While there is much debate on how this should be properly handled, the standard procedure is for the discoverer of the bug to notify the manufacturer. At this point the manufacturer will determine if there really is an issue, what (if anything) they are going to do about it, whether they should go public with the disclosure, etc. There is always the possibility that the manufacturer will never let the public know about the vulnerability, not issue a patch, and simply hope no one else discovers the flaw. A more common scenario is that the manufacturer releases an announcement of the flaw in conjunction with a patch, months (sometimes years) after they were initially notified or simply waits until the release of the next version to fix the flaw. This puts users of the software at risk for the whole period between the initial notification by the discovering party and the release of a patch.

    So, which do you prefer, FOSS or proprietary? I'll stick with the stuff that has nothing to hide, thanks.

Are You Really an Independent Contractor?

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This question has come up numerous times in various tech forums among members who evaluate their relationships with their customers and I am surprised how often it is asked. More surprisingly the terms of such a relationship are often confusing to the client as well.

They blame it on the perceived ambiguity of a general description of the term given by the Internal Revenue Service and to a point they are somewhat correct. The IRS paints the term somewhat broadly and its boundaries can be interpreted in more than one way. This very argument is one that is often presented in legal disputes between clients contractors and the government itself and in the end is usually determined how the IRS interprets it on a case by case basis.

But is it that difficult to determine? Is it as broad a term as some say, or can it be more clearly defined with some simple common sense?

I visited a tech forum today concerning a particular issue about client contracts and posted a rather long diatribe to refute certain policies regarding these contracts. To support my argument, I quoted the definition of the term “Independent Contractor” as defined by the IRS directly from the agency’s web site. The statement was not in legalese, but in simple layman terms. After comparing the statement to examples, it was not that difficult to understand at all. It is only interpreted differently depending on which side of the fence you sit on and what you have to gain or lose from it, the client or the contractor. In other words, taken literally it is says what it says This is the way the IRS looks at it. To some clients, however, it can theoretically be manipulated to create loopholes in an attempt to gain from it – at the contractor’s expense.

Case in point. Who among us is in business to offer products and services to our clients such as onsite service, system warranties, software and hardware, licensing, tech support, remote support or managed services, networking,  integration, what ever – and does not require our customers to sign our contract, delivering the products, services and solutions they need and want on our terms, our schedule and our prices?

Yet those of us who contract our services through other national contractors are required to accept their customers terms and contracts with little or no negotiation or without the ability to require the same of them. We willingly waive all of our rights as Independent Contractors to succumb to the demands of the middlemen companies and their customers.

What does that make us? Do their contracts and terms supercede ours? Did we only waive our rights to our terms? Does that still make us Independent Contractors in the eyes of the law? Or have we now become – at least to the IRS – something else?

The Internal Revenue Service defines an Independent Contractor as follows:

“The general rule is that an individual is an independent contractor if (the person for whom the services are performed) has the right to control or direct only the result of the work, and not what will be done and how it will be done or method of accomplishing the result.” – Source: IRS web site.

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=115041,00.html

According to the IRS, in order to be considered an independent contractor, the client can only dictate the actual scope of the project itself or what work they need the contractor to perform. They cannot tell the contractor how to do it or dictate the terms of the work.

It is very clear to me. I will let you decide. 

 

The Force Field Launches New Features

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If you haven’t browsed TheForceField.Net lately you may want to check out some new content and features that are currently being added to the site. Some of these new features are already in place and a few are still under construction and will be released shortly. All of them are designed to enhance your edification, enjoyment and overall experience inside The Force Field.

Blogs – Previously our blogs were officially listed as editorials. To allow for more personal commentary we created a separate Blog section for our administrators, contributing editors and writers. As with the other content on the site you can rate and comment on the articles. You can access the official, personal blogs of The Force Field team by clicking Blogs on the main menu on the left sidebar.

Team Bios –  Ever wondered who the Team administrators are? Read their professional bios! Several have already been published and more are on the way. You can read bios on The Force Field team by clicking Team Bios on the main menu.

Media Center – This new section contains a selection of audio and video podcasts, tutorials, webinars, special publications and other media resources hand picked for the members of The Force Field. Some of the podcasts in this collection are my personal favorites and are highly recommended. We also accept member and visitor submissions and suggestions. You can access the Media Center from the Media Center link on the main menu.

Free Publications – The Force Field has partnered with a major media distributor to bring major trade publications, white papers and other resources in 35 industries to your fingertips in one convenient location. These publications are FREE to professionals who qualify. I personally subscribe to many of these publications and have learned much about trends the IT industry from both a technical and business aspect by reading them over the years. This is a dynamic business unlike many others and if you want to remain profitable and successful you need to keep up with it. Reading – even skimming through industry trade publications and white papers help keep you informed of the latest in industry trends.

I have subscribed to some of them for many years. My personal reading agenda includes such trades as CRN, eWeek, PC World, Technet, Redmond Magazine, Videography, Windows IT Pro, RAM and Electronic Design. While some of these are not currently available through The Force Field.Net, many others are. PC Magazine is here as well as Electronic Design, SC Magazine and Cisco on Cisco News.

If you want to know more about the business of technology, this is a great way to educate yourself. Best of all, it’s FREE and you can’t beat free. You can access the Free Publications by clicking Free Publications in the main menu on the left sidebar.

Updated content in the IT Business Resources Directory and the File Downloads – We are currently adding more entries to existing directory listings as well as new sections and categories. During the next few weeks you will be able to search through lists of legal resources, business tax information and marketing. We are also planning an update in the next few months to make it easier to find and access the information.

As always your feedback is welcome. Any suggestions and ideas for new features and improvements are encouraged. You can send feedback by clicking on Contact Us on the main menu or you can send an e-mail to media@theforcefield.net.

Rick