In the Metrics, Metrics, Metrics series of articles I wrote about PTC Integrity Lifecycle Manager, I talked about how you can use metrics information gathered from fields on your report to build custom reports, charts and dashboards. Now that the main series is...
Infrastructure
Creating “Custom” Facts in Puppet
The servers that I’m managing can be divided into two groups, colo and local servers. While most of the configuration has been similar between these two, there have been a growing number of things which I’ve had to configure differently through Puppet. The latest...
Electric Flow 8.0 New Feature: Manual and Automated Retry on Error
Electric Cloud recently released version 8.0 of their build and deployment orchestration tool, Electric Flow. This latest release includes many new features, but the focus of this article will be the ability to retry tasks and stages from a failed pipeline and why...
SPK Earns Place on MSP 501 List of Top Managed Services Providers in the World
SCOTTS VALLEY, Calif., Aug. 12, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- SPK and Associates, LLC (SPK) is excited to announce our recent award as one of 2019's 501 most elite Information Technology managed service providers in the United States. The Channel Futures /...
5 Reasons to Use ntop for Network Management
One of the most critical aspects of your network infrastructure is how well it's performing. The question that I often get asked as a provider of infrastructure services is, "Am I getting the most out of my local network and my internet bandwidth?" This is the one...
Declutter your multi-computer desktop with ‘Mouse without Borders’
For the everyday user with a laptop or desktop, this article may not apply. And for those of you who have no need to have more than one PC on your desk -- kudos! But from time to time, its necessary to have several PC's on your desk at the same time -- especially...
What’s New in Git 1.8.5.1
Call me weird, but for whatever reason I find version control really interesting and a crucial part of your build and release model. Maybe it's because it's saved my bacon a few times so I appreciate what it does, or maybe it's because it lets me see how my code has...
Ultrabooks Place in the Workplace
Ultraportable laptops and Ultrabooks have become the new machines to have. They are smaller, thinner, and lighter making them the preferred choice for most engineering and IT professionals over the older clunkier notebook workstations. Even before the push by Intel...
Executives, Can you Afford to Stay on a Windows PC?
As the CEO of a technology services company, my personal computing necessities are actually quite simple. I've got to have easy, reliable access to the Internet, the basic Microsoft suite of tools, and I need synchronized email with Gmail, my computer and my mobile...
Mobile CAD Applications – Ready for Primetime?
One of the main reasons people purchase a smartphone is to have information at their fingertips. Does that apply to the world of CAD applications? The answer is very dependent on what you want to actually do with this data. Do you want to design a complex...
How Engineering Pros Can Work From Home For the Holidays
Because the benefits are endless, I couldn't even hope to list them all, but here are a few great reasons for engineering pros (or anyone else) to work from home during the holidays: 1. It's the universal excuse to escape from household chores and awkwardly boring...
Is the Windows Phone 8 Ready for the Enterprise?
Is the Windows Phone 8 Ready for the Enterprise? I suppose the short answer would be, 'compared to what?' I've been an Android user, an iPhone user, and now I'm using a Windows Phone 8 -- and I have my gripes about all of them. Of course the real problem is that I...