Thinking Outside The TechnoBox

Waupaca Bank Robbery

2010-01-20T14:08:00.001-08:00

This past week a robber struck a local Waupaca bank and we need your help catching him. Below is a link to the 'News' section of our city website which has pictures and the video of the heist. If you have any information please call the Waupaca Police Department at 715-258-4400.

Press Release: http://www.cityofwaupaca.org/newsView.aspx?nid=36

Surveillance Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2Z2pSb1F5Y

NextGen Technology, Small Town Budget

2009-11-16T07:49:00.000-08:00

When I started at the city six months ago, I was dismayed when I learned our main server was running Windows NT4 Server with no RAID and a tape backup (not kept offsite). I wasn't surprised to see NT4 still chugging along, but what threw me was the lack of redundancy and reliable backup options. To say the least, I wasn't going to be the one responsible for a total loss of data and a week of downtime trying to get the network running after a hardware failure.

I set out to find the most cost-effective and reliable technology available and was blown away at what I found. Don't get me wrong, I've been using virtualization on the desktop for several years now, but I had no idea that server technology had come so far yet is free. There were several options, but above all others stood Citrix Xen. With the ability to run multiple servers in a 'group mode' with High Availability for free, how could one go wrong.

Anyways, to make a long story short, three weekends ago I installed a new Dell server running Windows 2008 Std. on Xen (virtualized) for a total cost of around $4,000 (including licensing). With this we are now running RAID5 on 4 giving us redundancy and storing all data off-site along with images of the server which gives us minimal downtime in a disaster. The changeover went smooth, surprising even myself. In the end I can now sleep at night knowing the city is protected against whatever mother nature throws at us, and if something was to happen we could be back up and running in no time!!!

Prisoners Receiving H1N1 Vaccine Before Public

2009-10-29T06:57:00.000-07:00

Last Friday while talking with a friend the topic of swine flu vaccinations came up. This friend is an employee at Taycheedah Correctional Institution down in Fond du Lac and come to find out prisoners had received H1N1 vaccinations already. I became quite upset over this and decided to write to NBC26's 'You Ask. We Investigate'. Monday afternoon I received a call from Chad Doran at NBC26 and he said it was a good story and wanted to run with it. Yesterday at 5pm he came to our house and interviewed Becky (my wife) and I and ran the story last night. I hope this helps raise awareness of the very lopsided distribution of the H1N1 vaccine.

Article: http://www.nbc26.com/global/story.asp?s=11404278
Video: http://www.nbc26.com/global/category.asp?C=171398&autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=4252768&flvUri=&thirdpartymrssurl

A Blackberry Experience

2009-10-19T08:05:00.000-07:00

I grew up on Microsoft Windows operating systems (DOS 6 and Win3.11) so naturally when smartphones hit the market several years ago I gravitated to Windows Mobile-based phones. My relationship with my Windows smartphones can best be described as love/hate. I love ActiveSync (to Exchange) and the familiar Windows structure but I hate the buggy software (surprised anyone?).

A week ago my mobile life changed forever when I bought a Blackberry Pearl for my wife. She is as technology inclined as my grandpa who just turned 90 (love you hun) so to my surprise within several minutes of unboxing her phone she was surfing the Internet in glorious full-page format with a mouse pointer and trackball. Shortly after that she had her email setup with Google Sync to deliver her email, contact, and calendar in real-time....for free! WHAT? She then showed me the 'Auto-on/Auto-off' and 'Lock upon Holster' features...I was absolutely in love (with my wife of course)!

I was just amazed at the ease of use and the stability of the phone, not to mention it doesn't need to be charged every six hours. How could Microsoft have gotten so far behind in the smartphone market? I'm eligible for a phone upgrade the beginning of December and you can bet your pants I'll be switching phones...I can't wait to see how Google Android stacks up against Blackberry, but that is for a future post!

2009-09-29T09:12:00.001-07:00

How cool is it that one can blog from their cell phone? We'll see how often this actually happens...

I'm at the WAPC Fall Workshop and have met some wonderful station leaders and have gotten some very good ideas, but I've learned today just how much danger PEG channels are in. Please call our local legislators and ask them to support the new bill LRB-0945/7, making provisions to Act 42 which will sink a lot of PEG channels.

Save PEG Channels!

2009-09-29T08:06:00.000-07:00

This coming Friday I am attending the WAPC (Wisconsin Association of PEG Channels) Fall Conference to discuss and help fight for local television/PEG channels. I am a relative newcomer to the PEG (Public, Education, Government local access channel) scene and am looking forward to learning more about legislative issues we are facing.

PEG channels have long been providing local television coverage of councils and committees. Some stations have expanded beyond this simple coverage (WinTV's goal) to provide local news and event coverage. Current legislation and lobbying by AT&T (provider of U-Verse) aims to wipe out the existing protections that give the viewing public access to PEG channels, such as:

-Channel funding and financial support
-Accessible spot in channel lineup (ie. Channel 3, not 991)
-Free access to PEG channel - want to charge for access
-PEG channel quality - most are grainy
-More info:
http://saveaccesstvwisconsin.org/
http://wapconline.com/

If you enjoy watching Waupaca's City Council or Committee meetings or the 4th of July Parade on WinTV let your voice be heard, don't let AT&T, Time Warner, or Charter coerce our culpable state legislators into leaving PEG channels in the dust...

Importance of Government Transparency

2009-09-22T06:33:00.001-07:00

The latest recession is taking its toll on all levels of government, especially local entities. A lot of communities are facing shortfalls due to shrinking tax revenues forcing them to take drastic actions such as employee layoffs/furloughs and capital project deferment and cancellation.

Within this swirl of negativity shines a positive light, the chance for better government responsibility and transparency. Unlike a business whose income is earned from willing customers, government income is derived from a captive customer base. Transparency and responsibility, thus, is extremely important since government is spending another’s money.

This being said, I believe it is very important for all levels of government to be transparent in as much of their operations as possible. Here at the City of Waupaca we are undergoing a technology transformation which will better enable the sharing of information, from forms to audits to budgets to events. We recently rolled out our new website which has updated news along with all of our committee and board agendas and minutes. We also have a new section called the ‘Document Center’ which will make available all of our forms and publications which were only available in-house before.

With the age of government transparency upon us, there has never been a better or easier time to become involved in your local government…so check out our new website at www.cityofwaupaca.org today!!!

Windows Genuine Advantage

2009-09-22T06:31:00.000-07:00

On August 25th Microsoft released a tool called WGA Notifications to help fight piracy. WGA Notifications is downloaded with Windows Updates and, once installed, checks it’s key database for validity. If a Microsoft component on the machine (Windows, Office, etc) is determined to be non-genuine, a popup is displayed informing you about the problem. Microsoft says this program is not spyway, that it doesn’t send any machine or personal information to them, but a recent lawsuit claims different:

http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=5369

If you have a machine which has a pirated copy of Office or Windows, I would strongly suggest either purchasing a legal copy of this software (if not purchased), report to Microsoft a paid-for pirated copy, or look at an open source alternative such as OpenOffice. I would not be surprised if, in the near future, these pirated programs identified by WGA Notifications suddenly start experiencing issues or simply refust to start.

Microsoft’s WGA Website:
http://www.microsoft.com/genuine/AboutNotifications.aspx

Microsoft Piracy Website:
http://www.microsoft.com/piracy/reporting/default.aspx

Windows 7 - A Worthy Successor?

2009-09-22T06:30:00.000-07:00

I recently acquired a final release of Windows 7 Ultimate and promptly installed it on my main desktop, eager to see the hype first hand. After two weeks of running Windows 7 I can say that I’m very impressed with it’s balanced feature set vs. it’s ‘runability’ on average hardware, unlike Vista. I have only had two programming issues in the first two weeks, one with Quickbooks loader program (which a reboot fixes) and Internet Explorer randomly throwing an exception error and crashing. So far Windows 7 seems to be a worthy successor to XP, a feature-filled operating system businesses should be comfortable moving to. Hopefully Vista will finally go away now…

Coincidence?

2009-09-22T06:29:00.000-07:00

In my last post I wrote about the importance of Disaster Recovery Planning having only actually used it once or twice in my life for small file recovery operations. Lo and behold, yesterday I received a frantic call from a client stating that they could not access their Quickbooks data file. After some quick digging I found the folder had been deleted from the network, nowhere to be found. Permissions had been set on the folder so only the office manager and owner could access the folder, but the office manager was out the day prior and had left her computer running and unlocked.

Luckily, when I started with them two months ago we installed an online/offsite backup solution and we’ve tested it several times to make sure the backups were working properly. In the end, the Quickbooks data files were restored with no data loss and a valuable lesson was learned, never leave your desk with your computer unlocked!

Final note: The last Quickbooks backup prior to the solution we recently set up was from February 2007…what a disaster it would have been!!!

The Importance of Disaster Recovery

2009-09-22T06:28:00.000-07:00

Backups are often the black sheep of technology, frequently ignored or never set up to begin with. Its been said that companies who suffer a substantial data loss will close shop within the year 70% of the time - so why in the world would anyone ignore such a vital component of their company?

Over the past seven years I’ve worked with many clients’ backup systems, most of which were ’set and forget’. This ’set and forget’ method is arguably the most dangerous approach to backups, more so than not having one at all. An all-too-common scenario usually goes like this:

A backup solution is implemented upon sever installation by a ‘techie’. He or she doesn’t recognize the importance of business continuity, thus no disaster recovery plan is created with routine backups and data verification checks. Backups are set up on a tape rotation which are then assigned to ‘Jill in A/R’ to swap and rotate off-site. Jill doesn’t know if the backups are good or not, her only job is to make sure the tapes are kept off-site. After several months Jill takes a promotion and during that single hectic day of training Jill gives her replacement, one critical piece of training is left out, the off-site backup rotation. Does this sound familiar?

As silly as it may seem, this is typically the situation I encounter when working with a new client. Changes in staff or consultants occur and backups are easily forgotten about. Disaster recovery planning can be as simple or as complicated as a business wants or needs it to be, but either way, it is a necessity no business should be without. Below are some simple steps a business can use to evaluate it’s recovery needs:

Determine how critical your business data is. Does your data need to be backed up weekly, daily, or even hourly? How fast do you need access to your data after a disaster? An auto body shop, for example, may only need a daily or weekly backup if most records are kept by hand, but a law office which keeps everything electronically may want a daily and hourly backup.
Determine what backup type is needed. Is everything on a shared drive (simple online backup would suffice) or are there multiple databases running (imaging solution paired with online backups may be the best answer)?
Protect your backups. ALWAYS have a fully-operable, RECOVERABLE backup in a safe off-site location. Plan the location and the personnel who will carry this out.
Develop processes for recovering from disaster. Your business must be able to function again within the determined timeframe in Step 1.
Test the backup solution. Make sure backups work as needed and can be implemented properly.
Sustain!!! The last step is oft-overlooked and is the ’set and forget’ step in most businesses. Frequent validation of backups and mock recovery exercises are critical in ensuring the Disaster Recovery plan works as planned. The Disaster Recovery plan should be on every GM or Owner’s agenda at least once every quarter to make sure the plan is followed through accordingly.

No matter which way you slice it, backups will always be furthest from mind to most managers and owners. Backups are our friends if a disaster recovery plan is well thought out and kept up on. In today’s recession every business needs to have ‘the edge’, use disaster planning to your advantage because I’d be willing to bet your neighbors are not…

The Communications Quaqmire

2009-09-22T06:27:00.001-07:00

Every day a new communications service or product comes out and every day there are only a handful of people who bother keeping up with the changes. With the Information Age upon us, most people feel too overwhelmed to bother reading up on technology, much less take a look at how much we are paying for our telephone, television, and Internet services. I find this to be especially common amongst businesses who signed up for communications services several years ago with the only game in town and today are still with the same service at the same price.

This is where I usually come running in yelling … ‘WAKE UP!!!’. With less than several hours worth of research, most companies see a 25-30% decrease in their monthly communications expenses by either re-negotiating with their current provider or switching providers. What business owner wouldn’t want to drop a recurring expense by 25-30%??? I urge you to dust off your communication bills and take a closer look at what you are really spending and get out and start shopping around with other local providers - you will be amazed how much you will save. Or, as always, if you’d prefer some assistance you can give us a call and we’d be happy to help :)!

Viable Cable Alternative?

2009-09-22T06:25:00.000-07:00

AT&T’s entry into the ‘triple-play’ arena of TV, high-speed Internet, and phone is now available in the Valley and response from customers has been somewhat conflicting. Some differentiating features of U-Verse are not available yet as the product is still new. The package price of U-Verse is actually slightly higher, but the offerings are more diverse. I recommend people do their due diligence in making sure U-Verse is right for them before switching from their current service. If you are interested or have any questions you can contact Jon Hayden directly from AT&T Wisconsin at jh5509@att.com.

For more information on U-Verse check out the links below:

http://uverse.att.com/
http://www.foxcitiestv.com/node/906
http://www.foxcitiestv.com/node/894
http://www.foxcitiestv.com/uversepage