Checkpoint to buy Nokia Security Appliance Business

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-10127973-83.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

For those of us that have been Checkpoint administrators, or worked with their products on the IPSO platform, this is huge news. It leads me to lots of questions..

1.) What happens to IPSO? Will they keep it around? I for one that that IPSO added quite a bit of value that SecurePlatform (SPLAT) by Checkpoint lacked in a Security Operating System (SoS).
2.) What happens to the Edge devices? I for one would be happy to see them go. They always seemed to be totally underpowered, and management upgrades of the devices was always a dicey proposition.
3.) If IPSO isn't part of the deal... As I believe Nokia uses it on a couple other devices to deliver products like their SSL VPN, Mobile Web Caches, etc, what happens to the folks that are running IPSO / FW-1 clusters today?

Lots of questions, few answers. But I do believe that this is definitely a good thing for Checkpoint. I don't know what Nokia is getting out of the deal other than some badly needed cash.

Take Two Stock takes a tumble

http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6623772.html

The ultimate Home Brew Project

The Twitter Experiment

Ok,

So the Twitter experiment has blown into a full obsession. Yesterday I officially joined Facebook. I know, I had totally sworn off Social Networking as something that middle school students did. But as I started in the twitter experiment, I found myself wanting to post more pics, and finding other friends on twitter is almost impossible. Enter Facebook. Finding folks that I have known over the last 20 years has been a breeze. Its kind of exciting getting friend requests from folks I haven't seen or spoken to in almost 10 years. Very cool.

A horrible tragedy

I can't believe that the Planned Parenthood Organization in Indiana is selling gift certificates. What a giant crock. Lets give the gift of sin and death for Christmas. What a tragedy. What kind of society would allow this?

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=14494

A Visitor from the Past

by Thelen Paulk

I had a dream the other night, I didn't understand.
A figure walking through the mist, with flintlock in his hand.
His clothes were torn and dirty, as he stood there by the bed,
He took off his three-cornered hat, and speaking low, he said:

"We fought a revolution, to secure our liberty.
We wrote the Constitution, as a shield from tyranny,
For future generations, this legacy we gave,
In this, the land of the free and the home of the brave."

"The freedom we secured for you, we hoped you'd always keep.
But tyrants labored endlessly, while your parents were asleep.
Your freedom gone, your courage lost, you're no more
than a slave,
In this, the land of the free and the home of the brave."

"You buy permits to travel, and permits to own a gun,
Permits to start a business, or to build a place for one.
On land that you believe you own, you pay a yearly rent,
Although you have no voice in choosing how the money's spent."

"Your children must attend a school that doesn't educate.
Your Christian values can't be taught, according to the state.
You read about the current news, in a regulated press.
You pay a tax you do not owe, to please the I.R.S."

"Your money is no longer made of silver or of gold.
You trade your wealth for paper, so your life can be controlled.
You pay for crimes that make our nation turn from God in shame,
You've taken Satan's number, as you've traded in your name."

"You've given government control to those who do you harm,
So they can padlock churches, and steal the family farm,
And keep the country deep in debt, put men of God in jail,
Harass your fellow countrymen, while corrupted courts prevail."

"Your public servants don't uphold the solemn oath they've sworn.
Your daughters visit doctors so their children won't be born.
Your leaders ship artillery and guns to foreign shores,
And send your sons to slaughter, fighting other people's wars."

"Can you regain freedom for which we fought and died?
Or don't you have the courage or the faith to stand with pride?
Are there no more values for which you'll fight to save?
Or do you wish your children to live in fear and be a slave?"

"Sons of the Republic, arise and take a stand!
Defend the Constitution, the Supreme Law of the Land!
Preserve our great republic and each God-given right,
And pray to God to keep the torch of freedom burning bright!"

As I awoke he vanished, in the mist from which he came.
His words were true, we are not free. We have ourselves to blame.
For even now as tyrants trample each God-given right,
We only watch and tremble, too afraid to stand and fight.

If he stood by your bedside, in a dream while you're asleep,
And wondered what remains of our rights he fought to keep,
What would be your answer, if he called out from the grave?
Is this still the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave?

The story of PT 658

Cool Video - Catastrophic Wind Turbine Failure

WPA Cracked? Maybe not as bad as reported!

Just in the past few weeks, the headlines have been going by. Each of them stating in big bold black letters that WPA has been cracked, and that everyone is at risk. So naturally, from that headline it would seem that WPA has gone the way of WEP. This couldn't be any further from the truth. There are probably a couple of reasons for this.

1.) Encryption is a complicated subject, of which maybe 10% of all people actually understand the inner workings.
2.) WPA Cracked, is a much more attention grabbing headline than, hackers can inject very small packets onto your QOS enabled TKIP network.

So my point is, that yes TKIP, the protocol used in the WPA standard has some weaknesses, that have been breached. How big is the breach, well you can decide. Here's a rundown on the attack as I understand it.

1.) The attacker uses the Chop/Chop method of attack to the CRC or ICV portion of the packet. This is very similar to the previous WEP hacks. TKIP was actually born out of WEP, with several improvements bolted on.
2.) This is where it gets complicated. Once you have learned the ICV, your next target in the packet is the MIC portion. Through some MIC spoofing protections built into TKIP, an attacker has to wait 12 whole minutes before they can get a workable MIC.
3.) Through the use of the RC4 cipher, which is the cipher used in TKIP, as opposed to AES128 with CCMP in the WPA2 standard, an attacker can take the good MIC and ICV to inject packets onto the network. There is another TKIP protection that also defends against replay protection. Most routers won't be susceptible to these attacks. The gotcha occurs in routers with QoS enabled. Replay protection is still in affect, however its on a channel by channel basis.

So the bottom line of this hack, is that a hacker could inject very small packets onto your wireless lan. They can not decrypt your payload, yet. Does this mean that TKIP is totally unsafe for corporate or home use, probably not. But what it does mean, is that its days are officially numbered.

MotoGP 08

I just picked up the following game for my playstation. It is excellent.

Catholic Bishops cut off all funding to ACORN

http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=14309

Great story from CNA. Looks like the USCCB is sick of being duped.

Social Networking Foray

I joined Twitter to see what all the hype was about.

http://twitter.com/indylinux

Buell Blast Experiment

So far its been a success. Yes, I probably have spent a few more dollars on getting the bike the way I like it than I have saved on gas, however I think that the overall mission was a success. I've had it a little over three months, and have placed close to 1500 miles on it. I would say that 90% of those miles are work travel related, and 10% pleasure riding. Its begun to get very cold here in Indiana, however we are currently at the tail end of what appears to be the final Indian summer of the season.

Completed Projects:

SuperBike Bars
Buell Traction Grips
New Pirelli MT75 Tires
3rd Eye Bar End Mirrors

Upcoming Projects

Ceramic Coating of Exhaust (Black)
New Headlights
Possible New Front Fairing
Rejetting Carb to Run a bit Richer

So it could be a busy summer next year. Lets hope we aren't taxed to death!

Elections over!

Finally, after about two years of campaigning its finally over. Yes, many of my candidates didn't make the mark this time around, however there's always the next one. That's what's great about America. Its never the end of the road. We are a nation of so many, yet once the ballots are counted we are able to unite behind the victor and push for a positive direction. I'm not saying that I agree with President Elect Barrack Obama on many issues, but I do stand side by side with him as an American, and support him as our next President.

With that said, it looks as if his first challenge has already arrived. According to an AP story in the New York Times, it looks as if Russia has made the first move.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/06/world/europe/06russia.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

The world's watching. Lets hope that we can get this worked out in a peaceful, and long lasting manner.

An Open Letter to Mr. Obama

I received the following email today:

To Barack Hussein Obama,

The New York Times carried a story on Saturday, October 4, 2008 that proved
you had a significantly closer relationship with Bill Ayers than what you
previously admitted. While the issue of your relationship is of concern, the
greater concern is that you lied to America about it.

The Chicago Sun reported on May 8, 2008 that FBI records showed that you had
a significantly closer relationship with Tony Rezko than what you previously
admitted. In the interview, you said that you only saw Mr. Rezko a couple of
times a year. The FBI files showed that you saw him weekly. While the issue
of your relationship is of concern, the greater concern is that you lied to
America about it.

Your speech in Philadelphia on March 18, 2008 about 'race' contradicted your
statement to Anderson Cooper on March 14 when you said that you never heard
Reverend Wright make his negative statements about white America. While your
attendance at Trinity Church for 20 years is of concern, the greater concern
is that you lied to America on March 14.

In your 1st debate with John McCain, you said that you never said that you
would meet with the leaders of Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, and North Korea
without 'preparations' at lower levels ... Joe Biden repeated your words in
his debate with Sarah Palin ... while the video tape from your debate last
February clearly shows that you answered 'I would' to the question of
meeting with those leaders within 12 months without 'any' preconditions.
While your judgement about meeting with enemies of the USA without
pre-conditions is of concern, the greater concern is that you lied to
America in the debate with McCain.

On July 14, 2008, you said that you always knew that the surge would work
while the video tapes of you from more than a year ago show that you stated
that the surge would not work. While your judgement about military strategy
as a potential commander in chief is of concern, the greater concern is that
you lied to America on July 14.

You now claim that your reason for voting against funding for the troops was
because the bill did not include a time line for withdrawal while the video
tapes of you from more than a year ago show that you voted against
additional funding because you wanted our troops to be removed immediately
... not in 16 months after the 2008 election as you now claim. While your
judgement about removing our troops unilaterally in 2007 is of concern, the
greater concern is that you lied to America about your previous position.

You claim to have a record of working with Republicans while the record
shows that the only bill that you sponsored with a Republican was with Chuck
Lugar ... and it failed. The record shows that you vote 97% in concert with
the Democrat party and that you have the most liberal voting record in the
Senate. You joined Republicans only 13% of the time in your votes and those
13% were only after agreement from the Democrat party. While it is of
concern that you fail to include conservatives in your actions and that you
are such a liberal, the greater concern is that you distorted the truth.

In the primary debates of last February, 2008, you claimed to have talked
with a 'Captain' of a platoon in Afghanistan 'the other day' when in fact
you had a discussion in 2003 with a Lieutenant who had just been deployed to
Afghanistan. You lied in that debate.

In your debates last spring, you claimed to have been a 'professor of
Constitutional law' when in fact you have never been a professor of
Constitutional law. In this last debate, you were careful to say that you
'taught a law class' and never mentioned being a 'professor of
Constitutional law.' You lied last spring.

You and Joe Biden both claimed that John McCain voted against additional
funding for our troops when the actual records show the opposite. You
distorted the truth.

You and Joe Biden claim that John McCain voted against funding for alternate
energy sources 20 times when the record shows that John McCain specifically
voted against funding for bio fuels, especially corn ... and he was right
.... corn is too expensive at producing ethanol, and using corn to make
ethanol increased the price of corn from $2 a bushel to $6 a bushel for
food. You distorted the truth.

You and Joe Biden claim that John McCain voted like both of you for a tax
increase on those making as little as $42,000 per year while the voting
record clearly shows that John McCain did not vote as you and Joe Biden. You
lied to America.

You and Joe Biden claim that John McCain voted with George W. Bush 90% of
the time when you know that Democrats also vote 90% of the time with the
President (including Joe Biden) because the vast majority of the votes are
procedural. You are one of the few who has not voted 90% of the time with
the president because you have been missing from the Senate since the day
you got elected. While your absence from your job in the Senate is of
concern, the greater concern is that you spin the facts.

You did not take an active roll in the rescue plan. You claimed that the
Senate did not need you while the real reason that you abstained was because
of your close relationships with the executives of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac,
Countrywide, and Acorn ... who all helped cause the financial problems of
today ... and they all made major contributions to your campaign. While your
relationship with these executives and your protection of them for your
brief 3 years in the Senate (along with Barney Frank, Chuch Schumer, Maxine
Waters, and Chris Dodd) is of concern, the greater concern is that you are
being deceitful.

You forgot to mention that you personally represented Tony Rezko and Acorn.
Tony Rezko, an Arab and close friend to you, was convicted of fraud in
Chicago real estate transactions that bilked millions of tax dollars from
the Illinois government for renovation projects that you sponsored as a
state senator ... and Acorn has been convicted of voter fraud, real estate
sub prime loan intimidation, and illegal campaign contributions. Tony Rezko
has contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to your political
campaigns. You personally used your political positions to steer money to
both Tony Rezko and Acorn and you used Acorn to register thousands of phony
voters for Democrats and you. While your relationships with Rezko and Acorn
are of concern, the greater concern is that you omitted important facts
about your relationships with them to America.

During your campaign, you said: 'typical white person.' 'they cling to their
guns and religion.' 'they will say that I am black.' You played the race
card. You tried to label any criticism about you as racist. You divide
America.

You claim that you will reduce taxes for 95% of America, but you forgot to
tell America that those reductions are after you remove the Bush tax
reductions. You have requested close to $1 Billion in earmarks and several
million for Acorn. Your social programs will cost America $1 Trillion per
year and you claim that a reduction in military spending ($100 billion for
Iraq) can pay for it. While your economic plan of adding 30% to the size of
our federal government is of concern, the greater concern is that you are
deceiving America.

The drain to America's economy by foreign supplied oil is $700 Billion per
year (5% of GDP) while the war in Iraq is $100 Billion (less than 1% of
GDP). You voted against any increases to oil exploration for the last 3
years and any expansion of nuclear facilities. Yet today, you say that you
have always been for more oil and more nuclear. You are lying to America.

Mr. Obama, you claimed that you 'changed' your mind about public financing
for your campaign because of the money spent by Republican PACs in 2004. The
truth is that the Democrat PACs in 2004, 2006, and 2008 spent twice as much
as the Republican PACs (especially George Soros and MoveOn.org). You are
lying to America.

Mr. Obama, you have done nothing to stop the actions of the teachers union
and college professors in the USA. They eliminated religion from our
history. They teach pro gay agendas and discuss sex with students as young
as first grade. They bring their personal politics into the classrooms. They
disparage conservatives. They brainwash our children. They are in it for
themselves ..... not America. Are you reluctant to condemn their actions
because teachers/professors and the NEA contribute 25% of all money donated
to Democrats and none to Republicans? You are deceiving America.

Oh Mr. Obama, Teddy Roosevelt said about a hundred years ago that we
Americans should first look at the character of our leaders before anything
else.

Your character looks horrible. While you make good speeches, motivating
speeches, your character does not match your rhetoric. You talk the talk but
do not walk the walk.

1. You lied to America. You lied many times. You distorted facts. You parsed
your answers like a lawyer.
2. You distorted the record of John McCain in your words and in your
advertisements.
3. You had associations with some very bad people for your personal
political gains and then lied about those associations.
4. You divide America about race and about class.

Now let me compare your record of lies, distortions, race bating, and
associations to John McCain: War hero. Annapolis graduate with 'Country
first.' Operational leadership experience like all 43 previously elected
presidents of the USA as a Navy Officer for 22 years. 26 years in the
Senate. Straight talk. Maverick. 54% of the time participated on bills with
Democrats. Never asked for an earmark. The only blemish on his record is his
part in the Keating 5 debacle about 25 years ago.

Mr. Obama, at Harvard Law School, you learned that the end does not justify
the means. You learned that perjury, false witness, dishonesty, distortion
of truth are never tolerated. Yet, your dishonesty is overwhelming. Your
dishonesty is tremendously greater than the dishonesty that caused the
impeachment and disbarment of Bill Clinton. Your dishonesty is tremendously
greater than the dishonesty of Scooter Libby. You should be ashamed.

Mr. Obama, it is time for us Americans to put aside our differences on
political issues and vote against you because of your dishonest character.
It is time for all of us Americans to put aside our political issues and
vote for America first. It is time for America to vote for honesty.

Any people who vote for you after understanding that you are dishonest
should be ashamed of themselves for making their personal political issues
more important than character. Would these same people vote for the
anti-Christ if the anti-Christ promised them riches? Would they make a
golden calf while Moses was up the mountain? Would they hire someone for a
job if that someone lied in an interview? .... of course not. So why do some
of these people justify their votes for you even though they know you are
dishonest? Why do they excuse your dishonesty? because some of these people
are frightened about the future, the economy, and their financial security
... and you are preying on their fears with empty promises ... and because
some (especially our young people) are consumed by your wonderful style and
promises for 'change' like the Germans who voted for Adolf Hitler in 1932.
The greed/envy by Ger! mans in 1932 kept them from recognizing Hitler for
who he was. They loved his style. Greed and envy are keeping many Americans
from recognizing you .. your style has camouflaged your dishonesty .... but
many of us see you for who you really are ... and we will not stop exposing
who you are every day, forever if it is necessary.

Mr. Obama, you are dishonest. Anyone who votes for you is enabling
dishonesty.
Mr. Obama, America cannot trust that you will put America first in your
decisions about the future.
Mr. Obama, you are not the 'change' that America deserves. We cannot trust
you.
Mr. Obama, You are not ready and not fit to be commander in chief.

Mr. Obama, John McCain does not have as much money as your campaign to
refute all of your false statements. And for whatever reasons, the
mainstream media will not give adequate coverage or research about your
lies, distortions, word parsing, bad associations, race bating, lack of
operational leadership experience, and general dishonest character. The
media is diverting our attention to your relationships and ignoring the fact
that you lied about those relationships. The fact that you lied is much more
important than the relationships themselves .... just like with Bill Clinton
and Richard Nixon .. Monica Lewinski and Watergate were not nearly as bad as
the fact that those gentlemen lied about the events ... false witness ...
perjury .. your relationships and bad judgements are bad on their own ...
but your lies are even worse.

Therefore, by copy of this memo, all who read this memo are asked to send it
to everyone else in America before it is too late. We need to do the job
that the media will not do. We need to expose your dishonesty so that every
person in America understands who you really are before election day.

Mr. Obama, in a democracy, we get what we deserve. And God help America if
we deserve you.

Michael Master
McLean, Virginia

P.S. One thing not mentioned is that Mr. Obama will disarm all our defense
mechanisms in America, our missile systems, all defense research
programs,and more, making us a sitting duck for...who?

Voter's Guide for Serious Catholics

Put out by the USCCB.

ARRL appoints new youth editor

In a hobby that is constantly losing members due to age, its great to hear about youth that have been bitten by the bug. Best of all, it was due to HAM Radios intervention with the Boy Scouts of America, another great Pro-America organization, that helped get him into the hobby.

Article from ARRL.org.

http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2008/10/21/10395/?nc=1

Another great post from Jimmy Akin's Blog

http://jimmyakin.typepad.com/defensor_fidei/2008/10/who-gets-to-say.html

Part 2 of the posts regarding the Catholocrats, and actual Catholic teaching.

ACORN in tank for Obama

Non-Partisan tax funded group? I don't think so. This video is from ACORN's June convention, back when they didn't think that anyone was watching. There is also another video of another speaker at the convention in full ACORN attire that says "We must do everything we can to elect Barrack Obama!" I think that says it all. They've pulled all the stops.



Hmm.... $800,000. All of these folks should be in prison. Voter Fraud destroys the very fabric of democracy.

Now Joe Biden defines Catholicism over the Bishops?

Great post on Jimmy Akin's blog. Joe Biden has aligned himself with Nancy Pelosi, and their thoughts on Catholicisms, and their interpretations of what Catholicism is, and who is in control of its teachings.

http://jimmyakin.typepad.com/defensor_fidei/2008/10/john-xxiii-vs-j.html

Great post, and Jimmy's guest blogger hits the nail on the head.

What John McCain has to do in order to win

1.) Press the attack. Focus on Obama's plan to RAISE taxes. Focus on Obama's plan to RAISE spending. Show the futility of things like raising capital gains tax in a time like this. With the recent stock market bust, there won't be any capital gains for years for most folks. I also like the number of times that Obama states he is giving a tax BREAK to 95% of American's... That is not true, hell most of those folks pay ZERO federal income tax in the first place. Keep pushing on taxes and spending, and the poll leads will shrink, just like Clinton's did over Bush/Quayle.

2.) Followup on False Statements. The fact that, yes, Obama's first political fund raiser ever was at Mr. Ayers house, shows that Barrack bald face lied during the debate. This should be infuriating him, as it is the rest of us. The fact that, yes, Barrack actually trained many of the leaders of ACORN today showed yet another omission of the truth during the last debate.

3.) Continue to support the FREE market. Be sure that this rescue plan is followed through with, and that it is executed efficiently. American's aren't just upset, were pissed. We have been betrayed, and so far, as far as I can see, not a single person has been put in jail.

Why is this news?

I saw the following story on Fox this morning. I understand that they are trying to stand up for the folks in the middle of a media onslaught, however these folks shouldn't even be a blip on the radar.

http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/10/13/palins-future-son-law-clears-misconceptions/

Children should not be included when the media decides to vet out a candidate. Period. I think its hillarious that in the five or so weeks since Sarah Palin has been on the Republican ticket, we have found out more about her family, and her husbands possible DUI, etc, than we have about Barrack Obama himself. I am glad we have folks out there like Laura Ingrahm, and Sean Hannity. Without them, the facts about Obama's past associations with Reverend Wright, Father Pfleuger, Tony Rezko, and Mr. Daley would have never been heard.

Who is behind ACORN, and their actions

Question is, who is funding this group? If you guessed the Obama campaign, you are correct. It looks like the Obama campaign gave the group, which is under investigation for voter registration fraud in several states, close to $800,000

Here's the story from the Washington Post

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/oct/10/obama-camp-downplays-payments-to-acorn/

New McCain Ad

Its time to lay it all on the line. Below is the newest ad from the McCain camp that calls into questions Mr. Obama's past, as well as the lies he as told about them. I hope that they are able to get more of these facts out there, without looking too desperate.

The AIG Countdown

Why aren't these guys in jail. Now they have been caught being dishonest to the Congressional committe's that have been interviewing them.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/MELTDOWN_AIG?SITE=FLTAM&SECTION=HOME

What do you know, I actually agreed with Barrack Hussein Obama one time last night, when he stated that the AIG execs in charge of this lofty retreat should be fired. I would say to Mr. Obama, that we need to take it another step further. These folks should be in prison. They aren't wastefully squandering windfall profits here. These are hard earned tax payer dollars they are blowing. The only place they should be getting pedicures is a federal pen.

Yet more folks that should be in prison

ACORN. Assocation of Community Organizers for Reform Now.

What another croc organization. So far only 9 states are currently investigating them for massive voter registration fraud. Unbelievable. I wonder how long they rehearsed the "Its not our fault, our workers did it!" speech. Once is an accident, twice may be a coincidence, three or more times, and I would say that false registrations is one of their core mission objectives. I wouldn't be surprised if the entire organizations board were involved in this scam. Luckily states like Indiana has time to catch this before any actual voting takes place. Who knows how many totally bogus votes are being cast in Ohio by Tony Romo? These folks should be taken straight to prison. No questions asked.

Link to Fox News story.

http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/10/07/acorn-vegas-office-raided-voter-fraud-investigation/

Are you freaking kidding me?

So, a whole week after AIG pleads for and gets an $86 billion dollar loan from the American taxpayers, it has the balls to spend a half a million on a corporate retreat at a "hotel of legendary proportions". They should all be getting a one way ticket to San Quentin. I can't believe they went broke in the first place with such frugality being displayed as this.

Link to the story on Fox News.

http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/markets/industries/finance/aig-executives-blow--getting-bailout/

Link to the actual hotel bill.

http://www.foxbusiness.com/pdfs/AIG_hotel_bill.pdf

Bailout Hearings and tonights debate

So it happened, the bailout was approved, and yet my 401k is still in the tank for an almost 30% drop. What a bunch of crap. I listened to the folks from AIG, and Lehman Brothers get up and speak to the hearing committee. What a bunch of freaking theives. They take millions of dollars out of their companies, and then tell me that they feel sorry about the current status of their companies? Why aren't these guys in jail? Why haven't their assets been seized? This is an outrage. These guys should all be in striped suits, making license plates. Who suffers the most? How about all of those folks that have retired, or are pretty close to retirement who don't have the time to ride this thing out like I do? Where is their bailout?

Well, the debate is tonight. I will be watching. I hope that John McCain stops pussyfooting around, and shows his true colors tonight. He has to go after Obama. He has to go at him like a rabid dog. Why hasn't he pointed out that his cheif economic adviser is Mr. Franklin Raines, ex CEO of Fannie Mae. This man also made over 90 million dollars while the CEO of the now failed and bankrupt institution, that you and I, the taxpayers are now funding. Yet another character that should be behind bars. If McCain sits back, and doesn't light the fire in his stomach, then I fear this election is lost. Get ready for socialist collectivism for the next four years. Palin \ Pence in 2012.

Completed Indiana ABATE MSF BRC!

It was a great class. For those that may not know, Indiana has an association called ABATE. It may be in multiple states, however I am not totally sure. ABATE stands for American Bikers Aimed Toward Education, I believe. Their site can be accessed via http://www.abateonline.org. Anyways, I signed up for their Beginner's Riding Course. In Indiana, Abate delivers all of the rider education courses, as well as executes all of the riding tests for your motorcycle endorsement. The class was put together, and delivered very well. I had a great weekend relearning a lot of the basic building blocks that riding is built on. The first night, you spend a few hours reviewing the course book, doing some small group work, and watching some videos on basic motorcycle skills. The second day is about 70% riding, and 30% classroom. The third and final day is a few new skills, and then finally the riding and written assessments. I met a few new life long biker friends, and had a great time. I would recommend the class to anyone who thinks they may be interested in picking up the hobby.

Top 10 Reasons to oppose the 700 Billion Dollar Bailout.

- Taken from www.nowallstreetbailout.com - Visit the site and sign the petition.

1. It costs $700 billion dollars, which is as much money as the combined annual budgets of the Departments of Defense, Education and Health and Human Services. It amounts to $2,300 for every man, woman, and child in America.

2. This $700 billion will all be borrowed money. The plan raises the national debt ceiling to $11.3 trillion. That is $11,300,000,000,000.

3. It gives Sec. Henry Paulson, formerly the head of Goldman Sachs, the power to buy assets from his former firm with no court or administrative oversight.

4. Goldman Sachs, like many Wall Street firms, gave its CEO a $67.9 million bonus last year. That is more than 1,400 times what the median American earns. Yet the plan has no provision to cap salaries or reduce bonuses at Wall Street banks that take taxpayer money.

5.The bailout has a "reverse dutch auction" format that allows Wall Street firms to set the price taxpayers will pay.

6.The 5 companies managing the bailout auction are also Wall Street firms, and will likely receive billions of tax dollars in fees.

7. The plan buys "troubled assets" from foreign banks.

8. The plan hurts responsible U.S. banks by keeping reckless, insolvent investment banks in business.

9. The idea that taxpayers will make money is a fraud. If a profit was possible, private speculators would readily buy these "troubled assets." Instead, the bailout lets Wall Street push its losses on the taxpayer.

10. The plan violates basic principles of American capitalism by creating a system of "private profits, socialized losses."

iPhone 2.1

Wow. I don't know if this was an intended affect or not, however my iPhone made it through the entire weekend only using 40 percent of the battery. Pretty awesome. I usually could only make it from a Friday charge to about Saturday night, early Sunday morning, but here it is Monday morning, and it still shows over 50% charge remaining. Pretty Sweet!

Presenting Isabella Marie

Baby number four on the way

All, baby number four is on its way, and may be here any day.  Looks like we will be about three weeks early, but that has been par for the course for us.  We ask for your prayers that the baby is born healthy!

One kink in the armor

If there is any issues with VI3, it has to be the reliability of Virtual Center after its host machine crashes.  In the past 2 years of running virtual center, the Windows box on which it runs has lost power due to facility issues maybe 5 times.  Of the five major power surges/outages, virtual center has failed to fully come online 4 times.  So far each time has required a reinstallation of the application, and a restoration of the last full db backup.  Luckily bringing the hosts back under management isn't a very arduous task.  Even without the database backup, you can still bring all of the hosts back under the VC umbrella rather quickly.  You do however lose all of your cluster configuration options.  This particular fault bit me just a few weeks back.

After a VC reinstallation due to a power outage, I had what I thought was a suspect database backup and current DB.  So I wiped the old db, and created a new one.  I brought all of the hosts back into management, but had forgotten about setting the DRS to partially automatic, rather than the default fully automatic.  This caused the VMs on my 75% utilized production cluster to start VMotioning at will about 3 every 2 minutes.  After about 40 or so vmotions in an hour, we finally had one puke.  Luckily it was our corporate exchange server.  After looking at the logs, and seeing all of the VMotions, it became clear to me that I had forgotten to go back in and setup all of the cluster settings as per my preference.  Once this was done, a VM reset, everything was fine.

Moral of the story, when recreating a VC database, be sure to go in and inspect all settings of a cluster, before re-adding the hosts!

Telling it like it is!

Go Newt!  Way to put the bias media in its place!

McCain / Palin

What a great speech!  I don't think that she could have possibly done a better job than she did last night.  She was showed that she is a very strong VP candidate, and isn't afraid to take on the left wing machine that has tried relentlessly to discredit her.  She is a threat to them.  She is what America needs.  She symbolizes what real feminism is.  She stands for traditional family values.  She is the embodiment of us small town American's whose sweat, blood, and tears keep this country moving forward.  I believe that both John McCain, and Sarah Palin will truly enter the White House with a servant's heart.  No special interests, no Washington Elitism, just plain straight talk, and doing what's best for America.  I've never been prouder to be a Republican.

5 days so far... thats $50 saved in gas

I bought my bike to save money on gas.  I have about a 50 mile round trip commute to the office through the back roads.  Through two tanks of gas, I am averaging about 65 miles per gallon.  Not too bad!  Maybe this thing will pay for itself in the next 12 months!

Flyover

Check out what just flew over our building.  The picture isn't great, but it looked as if it was a stealth fighter.

iPhone 2.0.2 Released

Updating now.  So far I haven't had many issues.  Occasionally a downloaded app will crash on start, but hey they are free right!

Really Cool Turn Signal Mod

A poster over at BadWeb has created a really cool LED turn signal kit.  I believe you can also purchase them from him.  Send him a PM on the http://www.badweatherbikers.com/ (username Reuel) Buell message Board.

VLAN tags - How to make your switch Virtual

So you are an entry level IT person, maybe the only IT person in your company.  You need to deploy a virtual infrastructure on a budget that can't have too much in the way of extras.  One way to save some coin, and this is also used in very large installations as well, is to use VLANS.  For some reason, VLANS are still thought of as voodoo, or some type of black magic by quite a few network admins.  They don't totally understand what VLANS (Virtual Lans) are, or how they work.  In layman's terms, all a vlan is a logical seperation of your physical lan into multiple virtual segments.  This allows two ports on the same switch to by virtually isolated from one another.  One could be on say vlan 10, while the other is on vlan 20, etc.  Placing a switchport into a VLAN is rather simple.  Below is the syntax for creating a vlan, and assigning it to an interface.

First you want to instantiate the vlan.  This can be done a couple different ways, however this is how I prefer to do it.

Enter enable, and config terminal mode.

>vlan 20
vlan20>description Internet VLAN
vlan20>exit
>

That is all you have to do to create a VLAN, now lets tie it to an interface.
>int FastEthernet0/0
FE0/0>switchport mode access
FE0/0>switchport access vlan 20
FE0/0>exit
>
wr

Thats it.  That is how you create a vlan, and tag an interface.  Be sure that if you need to pass traffic between two vlans, you must place a routing device between them.

Diet Update

July was a little bit harder to get the weight off in.  Seems like just the change in diet isn't quite enough to keep the moementum I had last month.  Plus, who knows how much of the initial 15lb loss was probably water.  So, as of August 1st, I weighed in at 246.  Not bad.  4lbs in the month of July.  Since about the 20th of July I have been hitting my bowflex 2 or 3 times a week, which seems to help.  I don't know how much muscle gain vs fat burning is happening and how that's affecting the total weight, but I can report that the size 38 pants are beginning to fit again.

Pics of My Buell Blast

My 2005 Buell Blast

Its been awhile

When I started this blog, I was putting in an entry daily, now it seems to just be twice a week.  I am going to try to refocus, and get back to daily posting next week.  Things at the office have been pretty hectic, and finding time to blog has been pretty rough.

With that said, I wanted to throw a quick 30 days (or so) review of iPhone 2.0 out there.  So far, its been flawless.  I have several apps, which I outlined in an earlier post, along with about 3 or 4 email accounts depending upon the day.  The battery life is doing much better now that I have everything but exchange checking for mail every 10 minutes.  Do I miss the GPS, or 3G speeds?  Not really.  So far, the 2.0 software update has made me an even more ecstatic and completely satisfied iPhone user.

Buell pictures as promised will be posted very soon.

It's in the garage!

I ended up getting a used 2005 Buell Blast that I picked up in a private party sale from a family just 3 miles down the road.  I will post some picks this weekend.

Griffey to White Sox?

It seams that it is true.  The Reds have traded their best asset in selling tickets, and merchandise, and have decided to trade him to Chicago.  What did they get in return for the 6th all time home run hitter?  A no name pitcher, and an infielder that hasn't played a single big league game this year, and had a .230 average last year.  Woo Hoo.  Its a dark day in Cincinatti, and it may be quite a long time before I ever buy another ticket.

Network Monitoring Utilities

Looking for a quick, cheap, simple network monitoring utility?  Who isn't?

I've tried a few different setups.  I've tried Netsaint/Nagios, Zenoss, straight MRTG, and now Cacti.  Nothing really has everything that I'm looking for in a peice of software to do this work.

What am I looking for?  Well I see two important peices to good network monitoring: trending, and alerting.  Some would say that the ability for the software to executre remote functions or scripts is also important.  Its important, however not in my top two.

Netsaint/Nagios - Nagios, the current product name, has been around for around 7 years or so is some version or another.  It meets both of the top level requirements.  It does a great job of service trending and alerting.  It is a bit weak on the network utilization trending, but you can always bolt MRTG onto the web interface and get something workable.  It has a great builtin web based data reporting interface, but can be quite cumbersome to get configured correctly.  It requires a lot of work with individual text files, profiles, templates, etc.  All in all, once its running its a great utility, but for those of us that have semi-dynamic networks it can become quite an arduous task to play keep up.

Zenoss - Zenoss is an open source project.  Zenoss like Nagios has a pretty impressive web interface, and is capable of both service trending, and alerting.  Through the use of some additional third party host agents, like informant, you are able to get quite a bit of data through the web interface with minimal customization.  The issue with Zenoss is its lack of simplicity.  The way that the graphs and hosts are displayed can be quite confusing, and at times almost impossible.  I do believe that with some tweaking of some of the web layout, and a few changes to the config, it could be a bit more user friendly.

Cacti - Cacti is also an open source project.  Cacti is extremly good at monitoring service trends as well as network utilization trending.  Basically, anything that you can point an SNMP query at and get a response, it can trend.  The only problem with cacti is that it doesn't alert, or I haven't found a way to get it alert.  The interface is awesome, and the graphing layout is totally customizable from within the application itself.  No Perl required!  Cacti runs on Linux, and is also available as a virtual appliance to run on most virtualization platforms.

All three packages have their strengths and weaknesses.  I personally like Cacti, and am looking for some type of bolt-on alerting module, as I believe it has the most intuitive interface, and is easily deployable on a virtual infrastructure.

Thinking about getting a motorcycle

Ok, so the bug has hit me again, and there isn't much I can do about it.  My wife, of all people actually suggested that I get one to save on gas money back and forth to the office.  So, now, I have a quest.  To locate a great starter bike, and give it a try.  I am pretty set on getting a Buell Blast.  Why Buell?  For one, they are an American Made product.  They are built in the East Troy Wisconsin plant.  Buell is also owned by Harley Davidson, another great American Motorcycle product.  The Blast seems like it would be a good starter bike.  Its just under 500cc, is very road capable, and weighs in at about 360 pounds.  Now, the hard part!   Trying to find one has been an arduous task.  Neither of the dealerships near me have any in stock, new or used.  The new 2009 models just came out, so maybe they will get a shipment in soon.  I can't wait.

For more info on the new models, or Buell itself, check their website.

http://www.buell.com

How to hack everyday electronics

Really cool CNet article.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-9994305-83.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

Cool iPhone Apps - Something's missing

Even though I can make my phone a light saber, it can't actually deter crime.

Enjoy.

Really Cool Nagios / R2-D2 Integration

I found this while looking for the latest nagios package over at nagios.org.  Its a really cool video of some geeks using Nagios and an R2-D2 Projector to track alerts.  Take a look!

10 Best Practices for Safe Computing

I came across this list on the UC Santa Cruz website.  Its a great list of best practices, so I thought I would share them.

1.) Use cryptic passwords that can be easily guessed - and protect your passwords.  This is essential.  The first line of defense for your sensitive information, etc, is your password.   Adding complexity to your password or pass-phrase increases the work it takes to crack by an exponential factor.  I would also have to add, to use multiple passwords for different services.  Don't let your online banking password be the same as the password you check your email with, etc.  That way when  you lose one password, the attacker doesn't get into everything.  Its risk management 101.

2.) Be cautious when using the internet.  There are tons of bots, trojans, and keystroke loggers that can be installed via the web browser without you knowing it.  Make sure that you are only visiting sites that you know, or are run by companies you trust.

3.) Practice Safe Emailing - Don't open attachments from folks you don't know, or really from folks that you do know without confirming they meant to send it to you.  This is taken care of mostly by mail clients and AV software today, however we are about due for the next rendition of the I Love You virus.

4.) Secure your area before leaving it unattended.  Don't leave things out with sensitive information.  If you must, lock the door.

5.) Secure your laptop computer at all times.  This means every time you walk away, you lock the console.

6.) Shutdown, lock, log off, or put your computer to sleep before leaving it unattended, and make sure it requires a password to start up or wake up.

7.) Make sure that you have AntiVirus, and the latest patches for your operating system installed.  New patches are available on almost a weekly basis for most operating systems.  You don't want to leave a well documented whole open in your defenses.

8.) Keep critical information in more than one place.  A hard disk failure can be catastrophic if you haven't backed up that thesis paper, or the materials for your major project.

9.) Don't install unknown applications on your machine.  This is pretty self explanatory.

10.) Secure the backups of your data.  Use encryption.  Put tapes into a safe deposit box.

The full list can be found at http://its.ucsc.edu/security_awareness/top10.php

VMWorld Coming Soon

VMWorld 2008 is coming very soon.  Check out www.vmworld.com for details.

Quick Diet Update

Since getting the news from the doc to try a low-fat, low-sodium diet early in June, I have now lost 15lbs.  I started June at 265lbs, and am starting July at 250lbs.  My goal is to hit 210lbs by the end of the year. I think I can do it.  Cutting out all of the fat though, is quite a bit harder than I thought.  Just finding lifestyle compatible food without hidden saturated fat grams is incredibly hard.  I have however found a few good resources.  One is FitDay which I spoke about last week.  Its a great fitness/dietary journal web app.  See my other blog entry for more details.  Second is the number of decent fitness blogs out there that are run by folks like myself.   www.fit36.com is a decent one, and he has quite a few links to some others.  Finally, Mens Health magazine has got a great database of great things to eat, and simple recipes to follow.  I will post another weight update at the end of July.

Leadership Changes at VMware

Well,

I will always remember her as the incredibly enthusiastic lady presenting at the VMworld key note addresses.  It looks like Diane Greene's time at the company she founded may have come to an end.  I don't know if she decided she wanted to do something else, or what happened, however I do believe that she is one of those people that are incredibly successful at pretty much anything she does.

Here's the VMware Press Release.

http://www.vmware.com/company/news/releases/executive_leadership.html

iPhone 2.0 - 24 hours

Ok,

So I have been using 2.0 for about 24 hours now.  Here are my first thoughts.

1.) The battery life with push enabled is horrible.  It went from about 30 hours between charges to less than 12.  I have now gone in and setup "Fetch every 15 minutes" for my exchange mail info, however I don't know where or if I can do the same for contacts/calendar.  I can turn push completely off, but I still need those two items to sync, so I may be trapped.

2.) The apps are awesome.  With quite a few apps out there and available via the first day, I was pretty impressed with the quality of most of them.  I have installed a few, which I will review.

2.1) AIM - Free, as in beer.

One of my biggest beefs with 1.1.4 was that there was still no chat client that didn't eat up SMS messages.  In the past week or so, we have AIM, and the Google Talk Web App.  Both are still a bit buggy.  The AIM client works great, as long as it maintains focus on the phone.  As soon as you run a different app, you start missing IMs, or they come in blank.  Perhaps this will get fixed in a update.  iTunes also tracks software updates for each of the applications that you have installed.  The AIM Client was free, so I won't harp too hard on its issues.  For a Rev 1.0 app, it does alright.

2.2) MLB - At Bat - $4.99

This is by far my favorite app.  It works just as demoed at WWDC.  I used it to watch my Reds spank the Cubs yesterday.  Griffey sure had a nice three run shot.  Anyways, the only thing about this app, is that when you purchase it, MLB only guarantees it to work through the 2008 season and playoffs.  My bet is that there will be another one for next year, and follow the same type of pricing as MLB.TV, etc.  The good thing, is that none of the clips have any ads.  Which is always a plus.  It also scales the video quality to the connection type you are using, which helps videos load faster.  Another plus.

2.3) Google Mobile App - Free

This app rocks.  Its like Google Desktop for your iPhone.  It searches the web, messages, other phone data, etc.  Very good app.  Video below shows it in action.

2.4) Mobile News from AP - Free

Cool little app.  Works exactly as demoed at WWDC as well.  You can pull top AP news stories, the newest stories, and even pull data based on your Zip to get relevant local news as well.  It also utilizes the camera, and allows you to submit stories, or more info to already published stories.  This app has a lot of potential.

3.) Exchange Connectivity with Exchange 2007, has been flawless.  So far I haven't had any issues with over the air syncing of contacts, mail, or calendar.  Well, other than the noted battery longevity as explained above.

So far.  Its been a pretty good experience.  I went ahead and downloaded the early release firmware via the appleinsider post below.  It worked well.  About a 20 minute procedure to do the upgrade, and copy my 1200 songs back to the phone.  Now, if I could only get a 16GB 1st gen phone, I 'd be set!

Windows for Workgroups 3.1.1 Finally Dies

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-9988708-16.html?hhTest=1&part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

Great CNet article about Windows For Workgroups 3.1.1's support from MS finally ends.

Who still runs this stuff?

iPhone 2.0 for the brave

http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/07/10/apples_iphone_software_v2_0_available_early_for_brave_users.html

iTunes 7.7 Released today

So will we get 2.0 today as well?  I am upgrading my iTunes to 7.7 as I type this.  It should include access to the new App store.  I can't wait to get the MLB live app on my iPhone.  Being able to see the games in real time is going to be awesome.

Tracking Food Intake to Assist in Weight Loss

I don't know who isn't trying to lose weight out there, seems like everyone.  I have found a great site for using as a food diary.  FitDay (http://www.fitday.com) is a great web based food diary.  It allows you to enter each of your meals, along with specifying nutrition information for things that may not be in their large database.  You can also track your exercise, create goals, track your goals, and pull great reports on just about anything.  They also have a PC client that you can purchase if you don't feel like saving your info to the web.  

Give it a try.

Managing Nagios Config Files

I've been using Nagios in my professional life for about 8 years now.  Well, it was called Netsaint back in the early days, but its still pretty much the same utility.  

One of the hardest things when getting started with Nagios is learning to work with the configuration files.  In the more recent versions of Nagios, this has gotten a little simpler with the introduction of templates.  Now in version 3.0, the templates are even easier to use.

I always just modify the sample config files, and add my own templates for contacts, hosts, and services.  This way I can give visibility to each group of servers based on a contact group that is specified in the host definition.  

You can further simplify your config by using hostgroups appropriately.  When properly grouped hosts are together, you don't have to worry about typing every hostname into every service check.

More info can be grabbed at www.nagios.org.

SAPGUI on MacOSX 10.5

One of my ongoing challenges with making the switch to a Mac has been getting my Business Applications to run.  Until recently I wasn't able to find an SAP GUI client for Mac OSX.  A few days searching the internet, and the SAP Support forums, etc, I came across the Java Client.

It works great.  It is a little tricky to setup, but once done it is rock solid.

First you need to obtain the SAP GUI Client for Java Environments.  I am using version 7.10 Rev4.  You can get this from Service Marketplace on the SAP site.  You must have an SAP account in order to download.  See www.sap.com for full details.

Once you have the .JAR file, you can run it via Finder, and it installs.  Answer the default questions, and the installation should complete rather quickly.

Now that it is installed, you can run it.  If you are in an environment with quite a few of these clients installed, lucky you, ask your administrator for the config files.

If you are the first one, you can setup your connections to SAP systems manually rather quickly, and then save those profiles in the client.  Once the client is open, click new.  Give the connection a description.  From there, click on the advanced tab.  There you can manually specify a particular server to connect to.  The string should look like this.

conn=/H/server.domain.tld/S/3202&fast=true

I use port 3202.  Substitute the port that you use in place of 3202 in the above string.  Your system number determines the port for most folks.

Click Save, and you should be done.

Great 4th of July

Well. there's nothing like coming back to work in IT on a Monday following a long weekend.  

The family and I had a great July 4th weekend.  We spent our weekend camping out with my wife's parents at a camper that they own.  We spent the weekend eating, building camp fires, eating, sleeping, fishing, and made quite a few trips to the local playground.  We also gave the kids a few bike drawn carriage tours of the local camp.  It was a great technology free weekend.  

We did have some severe weather blow through on the 4th during the day, so we took the kids to town and caught WALL-E.  I didn't make it on that trip, but I heard that the movie was a little boring.  Maybe a Pixar short that went just a  little too long.  

No 2.0 yet!

Well,

Another day passes, and no 2.0 iPhone software getting released.  I guess we are all going to have to wait until the 11th.  It would be funny to launch it today, crash all the phones, and close tech support until Monday :)  Well, I am off to the woods for the weekend.  I will pick up posting again next Monday.  Everyone have a safe 4th of July!

Radio - Field Day 2008

I am an amateur radio license holder.  Each year, the world of amateur radio puts together Field Day.  This contest is quite unique, as you must leave your well built shacks, and take to the outdoors with all of your portable equipment.  You then spend 12 hours or so, putting up portable antenna structures, setting up portable power, and drinking a few beers.  

This year, I spent field day with my father, and the Flying Pigs QRP club at Ceaser Creek park in southwestern Ohio.  The cool thing about this group, is that they use very little power to do their communications.  QRP by its nature is a low power mode of operating.  All of the stations were battery powered.  We had several stations running CW on 20 and 40 meters, as well as a station running RTTY and PSK.  I manned a 6 meter rig hooked up to a quad.  The quad sat on top of about 25 feet of masting in what was one of the coolest portable mast kits I've seen.

Everything was set for a great field day, except for two main ingredients.  1.) Solar conditions were horrible.  2.) The weather included several severe thunderstorms, as well as "not severe" thunderstorms :).  One of the severe storms actually knocked several large branches down and onto our GOTA station's enclosure with a few folks in it.  Luckily, no one was hurt.

Between the brats, a single 6 meter fm contact, and few hours drive each way, a good time was had by all.  Here's hoping that FD 2009 won't be quite so wet.

Flying Pigs QRP Club website is located at http://www.fpqrp.net

Entourage 2008 - 30 Day Review

I am a switcher.  I have been running a Windows business desktop for the better part of 12 years.  Over the last year, I have been trying out an Apple Macbook Pro.  I purchased it along with VMware's Fusion product, so that I could still run my Windows Only business applications while I tried out Mac OSX.  Slowly over the past few months I have migrated to Apple versions of the business products I used daily.  Everything from MS Office to SAP's Gui client runs well on OSX.  The one thing that I had been hesitant about moving to was Entourage.  I have used outlook so long that all of the key combo's macros, etc, are second nature.  But, in the interest of giving this experiment its just due, I made the change over to Entourage.

At first, the change was pretty rough.  I have a little over 60k items in my mailbox.  Over a Gig connection it took roughly 3 days in the office to get Entourage caught up to my Outlook.  I think this may be due to how Entourage talks to Exchange, however it seemed very inefficient.  Rather than updating new items, and then backfilling the older data, it did the opposite.  This pushed the test back three days while I waited for it to be at a usable point.

Once I was able to begin using Entourage, I was pretty surprised.  The interface is decently different from that of Outlook, but its a good blend of Outlook and Apple Mail.  Everything works in and out of the client as it should.  Attachments I think actually work a little better because all of your options are displayed without having to click on any single item.  

Calendar is pretty close to Outlook.  Very easy to use with a straight forward interface.  It can also be setup to use SyncServer to push your Entourage appointments, and contacts for that matter, to your iCal and Apple Addressbooks.  This is useful if you plan on getting this data to your iPhone or iPod device. 

It will be very interesting to see if this ends up working with MobileMe, etc.  

Mac OSX Update Today

10.5.4 was released today.  Its about 60 mb or so.  Looks like about 13 security updates, and some other patches.  CNET has a great breakdown of the patches, as well as the Apple Support site.  Still no iPhone 2.0 software, maybe tomorrow!

iPhone 2.0 - How much longer?

I can not wait for iPhone 2.0 to get released to the public.  I am one of the enterprise users that have been in love with the device, but unable to support an enterprise rollout due to missing features like remote wipe, and Exchange 2007 connectivity.  I hope they roll it out before July 11th, but who knows.  I would think that the 3G phones would already have 2.0 on them when they shipped, so hopefully us first generation iPhone owners won't have to wait too much longer.

The end of an era

For those that may not be aware, today is Bill Gates' last day as a full time Microsoft employee.  I know there are quite a few of us that have made a pretty good living servicing and supporting Microsoft products.  For that I would like to send a "Thanks" out to Mr. Gates.  I hope that his second career as a philanthropist is as successful as his first one.

There are some cool Bill Gates videos on Microsoft.com, and on cnet.com.

VMWorld Session Proposal

Its official, my VMware Fusion sessions didn't get selected as an official session at VMWorld 2008.  Oh well, maybe next year.  VMWorld is a great conference.  I have been a few times, and am always blown away with what VMware has up their sleeves.  The keynotes are great, and the sessions cover everything you could possibly imagine.  This year its in Vegas in mid September.  If you have thought about going, I would highly recommend it.  Who knows what they will come up with for this year's technical presentations.  Seeing Continuous Availability last year was pretty awesome.  I am sure they will probably cover some of there new applications that have come out in the last year like Site Recovery Manager, or ThinApp.  Anyways, its a great show, and I would highly recommend it.

Time is running out on Windows XP

Everyone knew that it would eventually happen, however for those of us that are purchasing Windows XP Professional licenses to run XP based virtual machines, this is a significant moment.  After 6/30/2008, many distributors will no longer be selling Windows XP Professional.  So if you are planning a VDI deployment using Windows XP Professional, you may want to get your OS licenses ahead of time, other wise you are stuck with Vista.  I do believe you can downgrade a Vista license to XP, but I am not totally sure of the process or if its actually possible.  I also don't know if this affects Volume Licensing customers as well.

Cleaning an Apple Wireless Mighty Mouse

So, I have a shiny new Macbook Pro.  My first Apple that I have really used since my days at college.  I love it.  So to go along with it, I purchased a Bluetooth Wireless Mighty Mouse.  Its a great mouse, well, most of the time.  It gets dirty incredibly easy, and the scroll ball decides to quit without warning due to dirt buildup.  Until today, I couldn't figure out a good way to clean it.  I had checked the manual, and everything that came with it, however no luck finding a solution.  Today I finally decided to check google to see if I am not the only person on the planet with this problem.  I found a great video on youtube of all places.  I will place the link at the bottom of this post.  Anyways, it worked great.  There are also several good tips on keeping it clean down in the comments of that video.

Virtualized Desktop Infrastructure - VDI is for Real

So you have taken a big step, and have began virtualizing your server environment. You get all of the benefits of virtualization: 1.) Reduced the number of physical servers in your datacenter. Therefore reducing your power and cooling requirements. 2.) Increased utilization of remaining servers through DRS clusters. 3.) Added High Availability to every single application that you have using VMware HA clusters. And a few others. Now, what's stopping you from taking these same concepts and applying them to your desktop environment? The desktop environment has been one of the hardest IT based management tasks to keep under control. This is the case for several reasons. 1.) PCs are constantly being replaced. Either through hardware failure, or lack of processing power a PC usually has about a 3 to 4 year lifespan. 2.) You aren't replacing all of the PCs at the same time. This means that you now have to manage drivers and other OEM software for each different model that you are supporting. 3.) Users store data on their local hard drives. Most of the time this isn't being backed up by your Enterprise Backup solution. When hard drives crash, businesses can lose quite a bit of critical data. This is a very large risk for small businesses. 4.) Applications and even Windows can go haywire. Files get corrupt. Users delete system files. Its just a fact of life. So, getting back to the initial idea, why can't we take all the great benefits that we get through server virtualization, and apply them at the desktop level? What if you could replace 100 400 watt desktop machines with 100 16w thin clients? Well you can. Your first step is to create a base image. Through this base image, all of your user's desktops will be created. For most of us, you will be creating Windows XP Pro or Windows Vista VM's. Remember, that Windows XP and Windows Vista OEM licenses aren't transferrable to a VM. You must buy licenses from your provider of choice for the VMs. Once you have created your base image, you then convert that Virtual Machine into a template. I like to run sysprep on the image, just before making it a template. VMware VirtualCenter can also do this as a built in feature for many operating systems as you deploy from the template. From your template, you begin deploying your VMs. Watch your physical resources to be sure that you don't oversubscribe any of your hosts. I would also suggest that you keep desktop VMs seperate from server VMs. Desktop I/O and Server I/O is quite a bit different. On the client side you have a couple of choices. To keep it simple I will go over a quick 1 to 1 scenario. This means that for every XP Machine, there is one thin client machine configured to connect to it. The other choice involves the use of a Virtual Desktop Broker software package. There are several that are available today. I haven't used any of them as of yet. VMware is also releasing an update to their VDM in the coming months. For the thin client peice I am currently using several JackPC's from Chip PC. They seem to do the job that I need them for. They are small, and fit in a wall jack. The only drawback to them, is that they are CE based, and not XP Embedded, therefore there isn't as much flexibility to them that I would like. In summary, VDI has several benefits. You get a decent costs savings in your monthly power consumption by dropping your PC power requirements by close to 90 percent. You get the ability to snapshot your client VMs that may contain mission critical data, and even use the VCB to back them up. You can now quickly provision more desktop VMs through your created template. Plus you get all the benefits of HA and DRS.