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,...
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...
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...
This post is in response to David’s excellent post about Gold Disk. I recently performed some DIACAP Compliance testing using Gold Disk on one of our products, which was built on Windows XP Embedded. That process is fairly straightforward, even though Gold Disk is...
All of us who work in software development want the products that we release to be high quality, and also low cost to maintain in the field. This is no big revelation; it’s common knowledge, and it’s common sense. It’s not clear that there is any silver bullet in...
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...
Today, we're bringing you a rewind of the most popular IT Infrastructure posts of 2011. Enjoy these favorites from our blog as this year winds down. Number 5 - Solve 100 Problems with a Bootable USB Flash Drive What everyday device can be used for troubleshooting 100...
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...
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...
Picking a linux distribution can be an extremely daunting task. Wikipedia lists at least several hundred of them, although many of them are targeted for very specific hardware architectures or embedded devices. In the PC world, there are still a ton to...
Has your organization started integrating virtual infrastructure into your overall IT services plan? If not, a quote from Star Trek may be in order, "Resistance is futile." In today’s IT world, the likelihood that your organization is running some sort of...
Holes in your IT infrastructure can make for some awkward situations. Whether you're dealing with sensitive customer information, upcoming product designs, or simply just don't want people messing with your stuff, maintaining system integrity can be difficult....