When to Retire a Legacy System
Does your company have a legacy system (or two) still running? If so, you may be wondering if it’s time to replace it. This post can help you decide.
Category Archives: Infrastructure
Create Custom Labels and Print From Any Mobile Device
So, you want to print custom labels from an iPad (or Android tablet, phone, whatever)? We recently finished this exact project. Here’s how we did it… First, a little background: our custom labels are price labels we print for our customers. The labels must contain the following: The retail price (not the price we charge… Read More »
5 Steps to IT Excellence – Step 1: Assessment
One of the benefits of entering an existing (but leaderless) IT environment is the fresh perspective we can apply while establishing the organization’s technology goals. When starting with a blank sheet of paper, you can’t take anything for granted. Sometimes this clean start can be helpful — even in strong IT environments. Every now and then, it’s good to question the status quo, reassess risk, and confirm past decisions. Why wait until things get bad?
Story of Faulty Hyper-V Implementation
Can hyper-v be implemented in a way that LIMITS your ability to provide high availability? You bet!
Can ITSM Help IT Succeed?
This article on ITSM is taken from a research paper completed as a requirement in a Master’s class taken Fall 2012. It outlines the use of ITSM to improve the traditional process where the development group builds systems that are thrown “over the wall” to another group who struggles to support them.
IT Optimization vs IT-run-amok
Over the past few years, I’ve been hired into IT positions that were vacant for a period of time (no CIO/ VP-IT/Director of IT). This means I was not aware of existing project plans or future goals. In this situation I’m starting from scratch, which means assessing the current environment to determine future plans.The temptation in this type of role is to immediately identify high-visibility IT projects and push them forward. As the new IT expert, your chance of approval may be higher if you push projects early. However, assuming new tech is needed without fully assessing the existing environment often leads to IT-run-amok.
Convert Sonicwall Export File to Plain Text
I’ve never worked on a Sonicwall firewall, but we’ll be gaining one shortly. This weekend, we’re moving a data center from Vermont to PA and incorporating it into our existing data center. We have very little documentation — none really. So we don’t know the traffic requirements for the data center we are inheriting. The… Read More »
Convert from Microsoft TMG to Squidguard
I used Squidguard at my prior company and it was a fairly easy system to manage. However, my old company was a Linux shop and my current environment is heavily Microsoft-leaning. Can a rogue Linux server be implemented in this environment without wreaking havoc on our team?