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iTWire: even rock star sysadmins need quality checking.

iTWire: Microsoft’s new enterprise grade security system learns a lot from Security Essentials.

iTWire: On the one hand, requesting help desk support should be a walk in the park. On the other hand, so many users are so bad at it yet wonder why they aren’t receiving support?

iTWire: Let me get contentious … if you don’t do this, then frankly you suck as a systems admin or IT leader. Keep the company address book up to date and consider the spin-off business benefits you can automate.

iTWire: To give your Microsoft Exchange users the most flexible access options you really need an independent verified SSL certificate. Here’s how to do it fast and efficiently with a minimum of fuss and confusion.

iTWire: The problem with corporate networks is they not only stop the bad guys coming in but also your users who want to work remotely, whether at home, at a client site or on the road. Here is where a VPN product comes in, and the simplest to deploy on Windows is a Linux virtual appliance called OpenVPN.

Thanks to Andrew Coates, I’ve just registered to take Microsoft exam 70-642 on Windows Server 2008 networking, next week.

I’m also interested in doing 70-640 but for some reason the Prometric web site didn’t list English as a language choice … !

You know a virus is big news when suddenly your users start asking about it instead of the usual “Good news” hoax variants (you know, “my friend’s brother’s uncle’s IT guy said don’t open an e-mail with the title ‘good news’ or it will melt your whole computer and eat your house. Microsoft has said there is NO cure !!!!!!”)

Now, good network admins already have their infrastructure under control – both for present and for future threats.

So, it’s prudent to send out an affirming message at this time letting your users know that they can have confidence their data will be protected from harm and they won’t suffer downtime.

Here are some template e-mails you can use – and not just for Windows, but for the Linux and MacOS guys too!

iTWire: With virtualisation becoming a mainstream technology, it’s becoming reasonable that Linux distros like Ubuntu will not always require a dedicated computer but instead be contained within a virtualised environment, whether on a Windows desktop or as part of a consolidated server farm. It’s not always plain sailing though – here are some problems you might encounter as well as their solutions.

ITWire: Here’s a real-world Linux app written for, and used by, an ISP. It gave help desk staff the ability to perform any sysadmin task which could be scripted for them. The app gave a controlled menu environment, using sudo to launch scripts with elevated permissions if necessary.

Digg it here.