Traditionally, using a VPN (Virtual Private Network) to connect to a remote site has been a technical – and oftentimes troublesome – requirement. With the growing popularity of using “remote programmers”, I see requests for purchasing Cisco routers and Windows...
Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC): In our last article we discussed speeding up your build by leveraging tools such as Electric Accelerator. In this article we will discuss the process of Continuous Integration (CI) along with a customer experience utilizing...
In part 1 of this series, I introduced the APCUPSD software package which allows you to monitor APC UPS units. As we head into the winter months, having a functioning UPS is critical for your infrastructure. Just as critical as the UPS itself is the ability to monitor...
This week we're going to talk about a system tool that's really multiple tools in one. I’m referring to CCleaner, which turns out to be a veritable Swiss Army knife of tools. Here is a short list of what's included in CCleaner: Reclaim space by deleting unneeded files...
With today's computers, cooling is critical. When moving to a new site, it's necessary to ensure the new server room will meet your needs prior to move-in. Using some quick estimation techniques, there's ways to ensure the needed power for your servers. Here's a...
Imagine (if you dare) the worst case scenario with your company's data. Double disk drive failure, all data lost. You need to recover that data as fast as possible due to deadlines. You've been diligent about your backups using Bacula, but now they are going to be put...
The other day, I went to a presentation of FlexPOD and was impressed. FlexPOD is a collaboration of efforts from Cisco, VMWare, and NetApp. What it offers is a highly flexible framework to grow IT datacenters they are calling Infrastructure as a service (IIAS). If...
Have you ever used Git? Git has quickly grown to become one of today's most popular source code management solutions for software engineering projects large, small, professional and personal. Developed by Linus Torvalds, Git is classified as a “distributed version...
Have you ever noticed that the wireless neighborhood is seemingly always located in the bad part of town? This is especially true in the crowded wasteland of the 2400 block of Megahertz Ave. Where might you find this undesirable neighborhood? Unfortunately, the answer...
As a systems integrator, I spend my time behind a variety of applications every day. Each of these applications stores its data in some type of database. The most common databases I deal with are typically MySQL, Oracle, DB2, Postgres, and MS SQL Server. As such,...
Software Development Using Kanban The SPK development team engages with customers utilizing agile principals. This typically means incremental sprint deliveries of code as part of a scrum model. At a recent engagement, we employed an interesting variation of this...
Software asset management tools, particularly license usage and monitoring software are gaining more and more interest among large corporations. It should come as no surprise since by utilizing such tools they stand to gain upwards to 10% in cost reductions and that...