Having covered hardware and software on our journey towards IT Utopia, let’s talk about the most crucial information-technology asset: your data.

Based on our utopian-model, your hardware is relatively current, under warranty and well maintained. Your software is the current rev and supported by the vendor. Your staff is equipped with the knowledge to utilize your software tools productively and efficiently. What could go wrong?

How about power outage, fire damage, riot, earthquake, flood, disgruntled employees or even…(shudder, gasp)…hard-drive failure! The technically astute among you (no offense to the technical neophytes of course) will invariably cry, “In IT Utopia, we don’t buy servers without at least RAID 1, preferably 5 or 10, making us immune to data loss due to hard-drive failure!” To which I respond, “Bravo! But are you sure all of your business-critical data is on your servers? Did you buy RAID for all of your workstations, laptops and thumb drives!?”

Where is your data? Where is it created and, more importantly, stored? The obvious recommendation is that it be stored centrally on a device equipped with hardware redundancy (meaning that a single component failure will not result in data loss).
Redirect your users’ data to your server or NAS or SAN. Don’t give them a choice! Make it a procedural imperative or, better yet, a technical control. Use a centralized or hosted email solution, so that you don’t have to worry about the end-user’s email data store, which is likely business-critical data. Then use a solid, commercial backup tool to backup your data, as well as a server imaging solution to take a nightly or weekly snapshot of your entire server system (allowing for bare-metal recovery to new hardware or virtual server), store copies of your data off-site, and rest easy!

Using this methodology, I have successfully recovered from catastrophic server hardware failure in a production environment in 45 minutes.

“What about workstations?” Remind your users that the workstations are tools, belong to the company and that personal customization is not allowed. Have a standard set of applications installed on all workstations, keep your data stored centrally, and use an inexpensive imaging tool to build, deploy and maintain. Spyware problems? Virus issues? Quirky Windows problems? Spend about 15 minutes troubleshooting and, if not resolved, NUKE it (I mean re-image but that doesn’t sound nearly as dramatic)! Again, I have literally used this methodology to take a trashed workstation to clean and pristine while the user took a slightly extended coffee break.

I am planning on one more post in this series (The Myth of Managed Services…if that title doesn’t get you excited, I don’t know what will!), and then we’ll return to some more web-centric topics. I confess to feeling a bit lonely, as no one is posting inflammatory comments or emailing me questions or suggestions (patterson “at” flexiss.net). I see the hit counter growing, so I know I have at least one fan (Hi, Mom!). Anyhow, feedback would be cool…see you next time for…The Myth of Managed Services!

Software…the bane of our existence! No wait, that’s healthcare or Google Buzz? In any case, to quote myself, “There are three primary struggles when it comes to the business value of your applications: usability (learning how to use the product combined with what it can and cannot do for you), cost (upfront and ongoing), and support.” Lets talk about cost and support.

There’s not much point in belaboring upfront cost. This is usually obvious and painful. There are myriad factors to determining which application is best for your business needs, but I can’t speak to that with authority unless you hire me as your contract CIO for a very reasonable fee. However, I would like to suggest that ongoing support costs, the longevity of the product, the support lifecycle and your support relationship with the vendor are oft overlooked and may even be more critical than the upfront expenditure.

You should expect to spend in the range (this is a generalization but generally accurate) of 10-20% of the total cost of the application for support per year. This varies somewhat depending on whether you are paying strictly for support or for support with software assurance. These numbers are negotiable and the best time to negotiate them is when you are considering writing the vendor a very large check for the initial purchase! Although, in this current economy, vendors are more flexible and willing to re-negotiate to retain your business.

Attempt to get a service-level agreement (guaranteed response times, guaranteed uptimes, penalties for failure to meet the SLA). Negotiate support payments for the duration you anticipate using the product (two years, five years, etc). Often vendors will agree to a fixed price for year one with a cap on percentage increase for the remaining year or two or three. Make certain you understand the product roadmap. How long do they anticipate supporting this product? How does the vendor manage planned obsolescence, because even if they won’t admit it, they do!

Once you are confident you have negotiated the best possible deal and are secure in the details for the support and maintenance agreement: buy it. Buy it the first year, the second year, the third year…you get the idea. Relate to is as a business requirement. If you are going to use the application as a business tool, you must keep it in good working condition. You must keep current on the fixes and updates. You must have someone to call who is an expert with the product, can answer your questions, give you instruction and fix it when it breaks. Don’t call me! Don’t call your aforementioned uncle Larry, unless he happens to be an ex-employee for the vendor in question!  Call the experts and get to work.

Lets talk about software as a business enabler, as a tool. Whether you use Excel, PhotoShop, AutoCAD, Quickbooks or SolidWorks, it is likely that you depend heavily on any number of business applications (software). There are three primary struggles when it comes to the business value of your applications: usability (learning how to use the product combined with what it can and cannot do for you), cost (upfront and ongoing), and support.
Lets tackle them in order.

Usability:

Not all applications are created equal. It is likely that no one taught you to use Internet Explorer or even Microsoft Outlook. It is, however, unlikely that you sat down to unlock the mysteries of PhotoShop or SolidWorks all by yourself, as these are complex, extremely powerful, not terribly intuitive tools. In either case (IE or PhotoShop), most users utilize a tiny percentage of the power of their business applications and, even at that, do so inefficiently.

Consider the value of training. Would you put a staff member in front of the assembly line,  ultra-sound or even pizza oven and say, “Good luck figuring out how to run it! We’ll expect you to be productive by the end of the day!”

For some applications, like Microsoft Office, there are a plethora of training resources: books, online, on-site, etc. For others, particularly specialized applications, you’ll likely have to send someone out of town or fly someone in.

Finding the right resource, the resource that works for you and your staff is critical.

Some scattered thoughts in this regard:

• Lecture is the worst possible method for knowledge transfer. It just doesn’t stick.
• Hands-on is a requirement for software training: people learn and retain what they do.
• Consider a train-the-trainer approach, particularly with specialized applications. Find an in-house resource, send them to class and let them train the rest of your staff upon their return.
• IMPORTANT: Your most savvy technical user is likely the WORST candidate for being your trainer! Trust me: it comes easy to them, they expect it to come easy to others and their presentation/people skills are likely minimal.

The ROI for business application training is consistently validated. As much as I dislike the phrase and as oxymoronic as it may sound…training is a no-brainer!

What tools does your business require: a hammer, a cell phone, a utility van? How long do you expect these tools to last: two years, five years, ten years? What drives your purchase decisions for these items: quality, reliability, functionality, performance?

I have a finish hammer that was my grandfather’s, I’ve never had a cell phone for more than two years , and I expect my utility van, in which I haul around my 327 children, to last at least long enough for most of them to move out!

What’s my point? Good question. My point is that for some odd reason most small businesses relate to their skid loader, 10-key or office chair entirely differently than their technology tools. They fail to consider the useful life of their IT equipment, fail to consider quality and value when making purchasing decisions, and fail to evaluate the impact of functionality and performance on the tools usefulness.

I’ve read that Oracle replaces their computers every six months, as their internal studies reveal that the increased performance of new computers leads to increased productivity for staff, which in conjunction with lower maintenance and support costs leads to immediate positive ROI. A bit extreme? Perhaps. I mean, what does Larry Ellison know?

Maybe your staff’s productivity isn’t so directly tied to the use of your technology tools. Maybe you can remain competitive while doing business on that Windows 98 eMachine you got free in 2001 with a three-year AOL contract. Maybe you can justify spending $3,000 over the next year in maintenance costs on the server you could replace for $2,500 (complete with 3-year warranty), increasing the performance of your business critical systems for all seven of your staff. Maybe not.

Practical Steps:

1. Make IT purchasing decisions based on value, reliability and performance, not just upfront cost.
2. Estimate useful life of equipment for the purposes of depreciation and budgeting for replacement, and account for these when determining the costs of goods/services that you sell.
3. Consider purchasing hardware warranty covering the entire useful life of the equipment.

Next, we’ll discuss software!

“You come into work in the morning with confidence that your backups ran last night, that your data is secure from hackers, hurricanes and hard-drive failures. You sit down at your computer. Your inbox is uncluttered, your browsing snappy and your business applications responsive. Your technology investment is reasonable and predictable, enhances your productivity and gives you a competitive edge.”

Is “IT Utopia” attainable? I just google’d utopia synonyms and came up with Shangri-la, bliss and pie in the sky, among others. So, frankly, no, IT utopia is, as you surmised, an oxymoron, akin to “government efficiency.” I also google’d utopia antonyms and came up with…hell. Is “IT Hell” attainable? You bet. I have multiple, sure-fire prescriptions, but will save them for another posting (I was thinking of calling it “Putting the Hell into Helpdesk,” but that’s just a working title). However, I would like to suggest that there are real-world, affordable, small-business strategies that can dramatically tip the balance away from “IT Hell” towards “IT Utopia.” So please join me as I begin a handful of posts in which I will attempt to succinctly spell out some practical steps towards maximizing your IT investment while minimizing your IT expenditure.

So feel free to hit me with questions, comments, suggested topics or “jargon alerts” if I drift off into techno-babble! Tune in next week for “Pay Now or Pay Later.” It’ll be cool…no seriously.

If you are like me, you may not understand all the ins and outs of adware, malware, spyware and every “ware” in between. Here at Flexiss, I work with all computer geeks, er … computer-knowledgeable web designers. The bottom line is I find that what is common knowledge to them isn’t for me. I’m the administrative manager here, not the technological guru of all-knowing malware greatness.

So for all of us adware-challenged folks, I’ve simplified a technical article, 10 Ways to Avoid Viruses and Spyware. Continue reading below for the easier to understand version, or if you think you can tackle the more involved jargon, click on the above title to read the full article.

1. Not all antivirus applications are alike. Even in a slow economy, this is an area where free is not ultimately beneficial. Do not rely on the free-anti-malware for complete protection. The list of computer threats changes frequently, so invest in an antivirus program that provides frequent updates safeguarding against a wide range of threats.
2. Real-Time protection is key. A difference between free anti-spyware programs and a professional paid and licensed program is what is called “real-time” protection. It’s ongoing and active. Rather than detecting spyware once it’s already invaded your system, select an anti-virus program that works in real-time to prevent infections.
3. Anticipate upcoming expiration dates. With social media sites running rampant, the threats to computer users spread like wild fire. If your license expires and your application is not current, you are floating in raging ocean waters with no motor or paddle … not a place you want to be. So know when your anti-virus programs expire and be diligent of keeping them up to date.
4. A scan a day keeps the viruses away. A good quality anti-virus program allows you to schedule automatic daily scans. Take advantage of this feature! Schedule the scan for a time you know you will be on the computer each day. Then allow it to run in the background while you work.
5. Say “No” to Autorun. Some threats are set up to automatically attack external hard disks, thumb drives, or network drives. So disable the Windows autorun feature by following Microsoft’s recommendations under their help and support section.
6. Disable automatic display images in Outlook. Something as simple as an infected email message with graphic codes can cause a virus. To disable image previews in Outlook, go to “Tools,” “Options,” and click on the “Security” tab. Make sure to check the box for “Don’t Download Pictures Automatically in HTML messages.”
7. Beware of the attachments and links. You’ve heard it said continually to not open attachments from unknown individuals. There is another area to be careful with as well — clicking on links within an email. This simple click could infect your machine and destroy your data. Choose instead to navigate to the website manually.
8. Be a smart surfer. Take advantage of the browser plug-ins that professional anti-virus programs provide. There are many drive-by threats you will unknowingly encounter when you surf the internet. The plug-ins are designed to safeguard against these threats. Also, leave your automatic pop-up blockers enabled.
9. Use a hardware-based firewall. Very simply put … hardware-based firewalls are harder to break through than software-based firewalls. Plus, they don’t bog down your computer’s resources. However, be aware that a hardware-based firewall is not a replacement for the software based version as they each have their specific purposes.
10. DNS Protection. Virus infections can happen just by simply visiting a compromised web page. Some are DNS (Domain Name System) attacks that direct you to an unauthorized website. Check out the free DNS services through OpenDNS to learn more about how you can protect against those types of attacks.

I recently read an article, Retailers See Web Offsetting Spending Slump, that shows the shifting tide moving towards online resources.

There are many retailers these days who formerly discounted the web as a viable means of generating revenue. However, they are now turning around on that stance and putting their investment dollars into online resources. Lately, retailers like Louis Vuitton and Juicy Couture have ramped up their online operations and utilized technology such as Facebook apps, Twitter feeds, and community forums as part of their marketing efforts. This is largely due to the impact the recession has had upon traditional brick-and-mortar stores. The above article sites that such impact has not been felt as much by online retailers.

In the past, most companies viewed an online presence as a secondary objective and a small piece of the pie. However, that priority has shifted and brought e-commerce initiatives to the forefront of market strategies. Liz Claiborne is one major brand in particular who ramped up their online marketing campaign, especially for their Juicy Couture line of clothing and accessories. JC Penney is yet another major brand jumping onboard, using the web to be more accessible and also to bolster promotions for in-store sales.

“It’s just not based on convenience alone.

It’s also being able to see the whole assortment and browse,”

-Myron Ullman, JC Penney

I know that I personally do a fair amount of online shopping, but I’m usually motivated by finding the best deal, and I search in general for run-of-the-mill items such as books, electronics, and media in discount venues. So how does an upscale company’s online campaign differ with that of a huge e-commerce retailer like Amazon.com? Perhaps this lingering question is one of the reasons such companies have avoided devoting many resources to the internet market. The article explains the ways in which such a company’s approach to online might differ.

Many of these higher-dollar companies have chosen a higher level of customer service and proactive interaction with their buyers in order to assist them in making informed purchasing decisions. Nevertheless, the online market holds many of it’s own unique challenges.

Steve Fishman, Chief Executive of Big Lots! Expressed it this way:

“If you think you’re in a competitive business when you’re in the four-wall retail business,

you have no idea what a competitive business it is when you go online.“

The online market is much more of a level-playing field for large and small companies alike. Because it is so accessible, you’re effectively competing with companies on a global scale.

Selling online can be an intimidating venture, but as the online trend continues to grow, the answer is not to avoid the web entirely but to be aware of the current trends and effective practices.

To read the original article in it’s entirety, click here

The other day I was watching TV and saw a commercial for a nation wide real estate company. They were showing search results of properties on a mobile phone. It wasn’t simple text but had nice images of the properties in a nice format. I wanted to research the status of this technology today. What technologies do we have today to deliver content to mobile devices? I’m going to discuss the Flash Lite plug-in by Adobe since I am a Flash/Flex developer. There are other technologies that developers use like Java’s JME technology which I won’t discuss here since Flash is a very comparable format. Flash Lite is an optimized version of the Flash Player for mobile devices and has shipped on more than one billion devices worldwide. As of 2008, 40% of all new mobile devices shipped with Flash Lite. That number will increase dramatically - which I will discuss shortly.

Mobile devices is a very large growing market. They basically become a “Third Screen” to most users today and many companies are developing sites to cater to this audience. Mobile devices are not just for phone calls anymore. They are everywhere, many people have more than one and more people are getting them. Texting is the most common use (if you have teenagers you know this already), but it is becoming more of a peer-peer content sharing device, infotainment, and is also becoming the jukebox, radio, TV and gaming device. Now that network speeds are increasing, we are using our mobile devices for current news, stocks, scores, weather and email.

The downside to this technology is there is little standardization. It’s comparable to the standardization to the personal computer of 10 years ago. It’s a consistently evolving platform. The mobile device has limited horsepower - the CPU is comparable to early personal computers and has limited memory. They have small screens, limited size, colors and limited content. Mobile devices have been a somewhat closed system or some have called a “Walled Garden”. The carrier is basically the gate keeper but other parties are now getting involved like device manufactures. We are seeing the carrier’s concern over the network stability, security and the possibility of a negative experience of an end user and what it can do to their brand has motivated the stock holders to look for some sort of standardization.

So how do we get around this “Walled Garden”? There is new technique emerging called “Side Loading” which is basically a way to download and transfer content to a mobile device. That leads us to the Flash Lite player. Now you can develop in one program and deliver to many platforms. It has rich multimedia features, and a great development language. It has a small footprint - player size is small (below 1 MB) and the memory usage is small as well.

Looking Forward

This is the current tool set we have to get your website onto a portable device but we are beginning to see an exciting direction for the Flash Lite player. Adobe is calling this project “Open Screen Project“. Adobe stated “We are seeing basically three undeniable market trends. First we are seeing an explosion in Internet content, applications, and video. This isn’t just for personal computers but there is also a demand for mobile devices as well as television. The increased growth in number of devices and these companies are now embracing a more open model to deliver this information. The major request is the demand for a seamless experience across multiple devices. Adobe is working with various partners to deliver a consistent running environment for all these devices using the Flash player and Adobe Air applications. The key players like device manufactures, carriers, chip set vendors and the content providers are all on board. Adobe is working with Intel to deliver an optimized Flash player on Intel processors to enable web content on TV and portable devices. Adobe is also working closely with ARM to optimize the Flash player and Adobe Air for ARM powered devices. QUALCOMM released their BREW Mobile Platform SDK that integrates Flash.”

We will begin to see better standardization on all mobile devices and it appears that Adobe’s Flash Lite will lead the way.

We at FLEXISS are always searching for ways to make our clients lives easier, as well as our own.  One thing that continually comes up as a problem, no matter what the arena, is communication.  What is it that makes communicating so difficult sometimes?  Ok, besides, email lost in cyberspace, busy phone lines and bad breath, sometimes you just can’t explain a technical problem - you have to show it.  We, being a technology focused company, have a lot of experiences like this.

A couple weeks ago, we had a client that we had setup a file managment system for.  This was an easy job that didn’t take a long time, as the whole project was centered around FTP.  The client needed to move many dozens of files back and forth from one user to another through ftp on a daily basis.  This is simple stuff for a web company.  However, an end user that looks at the web from the other end of the stick may not find this quite as easy a proposition.  To make the training of the client a bit more difficult, the end users of this project were spread all across the western US, including Hawaii.  While I thought it would be a great idea to fly over to train the user in Kailua-Kona, Ross frowned quite heavily on the prospect.  Enter video screen captures.

Flexiss is not new to video production.  We have a number of Flash demos under our belt.  Todd and our in housedesign team have worked together to create some really great, dynamic presentations for a number of clients.  However, what I was working on didn’t really garner a whole team to design, script, coreograph, score, produce, record and publish.  I need a simple “this is how you install FileZilla” video.  I spent some time trying out a few various tools that, to be honest, flopped.  I’ll not mention their names, just to protect those who are trying hard, but not quite able to fill my needs.  Then I found Jing.

Jing is a free product from TechSmith.  This handy little application is a baby brother to the well known application Camtasia.  Camtasia is an application that allows you to capture, in video form, all your actions on your screen.  Additionally, it allows you to narate and explain what you are doing.  Nice!  $300 price tag.  Not so nice.  Don’t get me wrong, Camtasia is well worth the money, but I’m thinking that it might be overkill for my FileZilla demo.  Here is where Jing comes in.  Jing didn’t cost a thing.  Jing does limit your videos to 5 minutes, but it adds an online account at screencast.com.  This nifty account houses all your screen captures and allows you to quickly take a screen capture - either a still image or video - and upload it to the web, then send a link to that capture via chat or email.  All in a matter of seconds.  If you decide to capture a still image, you have a number of anotation tools to mark up the image to explain yourself.

So, call me an evangelist, but I’ve found a great tool to help us communicate with our clients, and for them to communcate with us as well.  If you find yourself having difficulties with something on your website, try Jing.  Send us a snapshot of the issue, or a video explaining your question, and perhaps we can overcome some of the communication barriers that a telephone or email creates.  Check out the sample video below!

Cheers!

Scott

Spam.  I cannot say how I really feel about spam.  It would be impolite to use such verbiage on the web.  Spam is such an invasive, pervasive, often perverted and always unwelcome arrival in my inbox.  Spam is such a horrible disease in the www.world that it has affected  not only our inbox, but our outbox as well.

About every other month or so, we have to deal with “Spam Buster” services who block our users e-mails because those e-mails come from a web server that they deem (according to various standards) is a source of spam.  I’m sure that their services are benefitting the e-mail world in general.  However, these services are blocking e-mail for EVERYBODY on the server, not just the guilty party.  To make a long story short, spam has become such a problem on the web that everyone will be punished for the actions of those nefarious low lifes pedaling viagra and get rich quick schemes.

So, how can we as everyday web users combat this common enemy?  Are there steps we can take to reduce the spread of this contagion?  Yes, yes there is!  The suggestions below are a few different prescriptions for some powerful anti-spam medicines.  These will not only help prevent you from catching spam in your inbox, but will help those you communicate with, as well.

1. First off - Never reply to spam.  Never!  All this does is confirm to the spammer that this is a real e-mail address with a real person attached to it.  This is like running through the lions cage at the zoo, wrapped in pork-chops.  If you reply to a spam message, you have confirmed your address.  Spammers then sell “confirmed e-mail” lists to one another.  So, one confirmed spam message can become dozens - if not hundreds of spam messages.  Another trick, never click links in a spam message.  This does the same thing as #1 - it confirms that you received the message, and that your address is a keeper.
2. If possible, disguise your e-mail address on your website.  FLEXISS has a a handy little script that we use to make e-mail addresses appear as normal to human visitors, but hides them from spam bots - programs that crawl around on the web harvesting e-mail addresses.  Other tricks would be to type out your address in a human readable way, that spam bots are not looking for, such as: myname at yafoo dot net.
3. Opt out.  You are on the web ordering flowers for you sick aunt.  You have to use your e-mail address at most sites now-a-days, so you put your e-mail address.  Instead of getting 3 messages a week from flowersforsickaunts.com for the rest of your life, most reputable sites will have an option to opt out of their e-mailing lists.  While legitimate marketing e-mails may or may not classify as spam, they sure fill up the inbox.  However, some sites may sell your e-mail to other agencies.  I would classify this as spam.  It may be worth checking their privacy policy.
4. Cover your mouth when you sneeze.  Let me rephrase that - if you need to forward something that has been forwarded 97 bazillion times, clean out all the junk and all the other e-mail addresses.  We’ve all seen the forwards that have been around the globe multiple times, and contains more e-mail addresses than you would want to count.  This is unknowingly feeding spammers.  Don’t feed them!
5. Use a spam filter.  There a a number of relatively usefull spam filters out there.  Some are more user-friendly than others.  Here is a suggestion - select a spam filter that alerts your sender that they have been flagged as spam - or that they need to be confirmed as a friendly e-mailer.  It is rather frustrating to wait and wait for a response for a critical e-mail, only to learn much later that your message never hit the recipients inbox due to a filter.

If you are interested in combating spam, FLEXISS has a number of spam attack plans that we can implement on your FLEXISS website.  Give us a call, and we can discuss some options to help prevent your inbox from becoming a spam filled nightmare.

Cheers!

Scott