techSOAP

Let virtualization change you!

More than ever companies are looking for ways to improve.  If you're not they you are doing your clients or your company a disservice.  I challenge you on this, let virtualization change you.  I remember being a jr sys admin and having to try and restore our Exchange 5 server by myself with my boss out of town.  I was scared out of my mind.  It took me all weekend but I figured it out, waited for the tapes to catalog, then restore, then replay the database.

That all seems so foreign to me know.  Virtualization has changed the life of an IT consultant/manager.  Don't get me wrong you can still screw up big time, but recovery (in a well managed environment) has become something that should breed confidence in a job well-done.   The flexibility afforded to IT folks by virtual machines means the hardware and services offered to your users are moving farther apart.  "The server is down." excuse doesn't fly in a virtualized enterprise.  If the "Server is down" then you drag and drop to get it up again. Every key area that used to be filled with excuses when things went wrong has been improved in a virtualized environment:

• backups
• disaster recovery
• number of servers needed
• cost
• adminstration
• uptime
• performance

Nothing replaces the good IT consultant/manager.  There isn't one thing that can make a bad IT consultant/manager good either.  Virtualization either makes the good ones look even better or helps the bad ones continue to look bad.

 

Technorati Tags: technology,virtualization,vmware,hyper-v,IT,management,CIO,change

Location based services are going to explode

I can't wait to see how the new iPhone app store from Apple is going to revolutionize location based services. I write this after having just updated my Twitter profile with my current latitude and longitude with a tap in the twitterific iphone app. Stay tuned this is going to get interesting.

Summer Blog Break is Over....

I took the summer off from blogging in an effort to refocus myself both professionally and personally as well to just have some good old fun! 

Welcome back to the faithful followers if there are any left.

What was the best thing you did this summer?

Whats a wiki? In plain English...

Watch this video from the commoncraft show for a plain English explanantion of what a wiki is.

Click To Play

Technorati tags: wiki, web 2.0, collaboration, explanation

What is RSS? In plain English...

I frequently get asked what blogs are and why should someone start reading them.  Followed promptly by, how do you know the author isn't a nutjob just making stuff up? 

I won't go into my full monologue about blogs, rss, etc.  Rather, let me say that reading blogs through an Reader like NewsGator/FeedDemon, Google Reader, Bloglines is like building your own personal newspaper.

Watch this video from the commoncraft show for a plain English explanantion of RSS.

 

 

Click To Play

 

 

Technorati tags: rss, blogs, readers, mass collaboration

Twitter Value....

Anyone in the Web 2.0 world knows twitter.....however, I am struggling to find the BUSINESS value of twitter....so help me out people!  Am I right to understand that twittter is only fun and/or valuable when you have friends or co-workers on it? 

I am willing to hear that twitter has no BUSINESS value for the avergae company, but I still have so much to learn about it.

BTW, my twitter handle is cozthegrov

 

Technorati tags: twitter, twittr, tech, web 2.0, business, value

WebsitesForHeroes.com

Here is a great site that just recently got some press.

 

Tech2point0: WebsitesForHeroes.com Makes Love Connection for Soldier in Iraq

 

Here's a link direct to WebsitesForHeroes.com if you want to sponor a site for a military family.

iPhone from Apple ANNOUNCED today....

Some details from TUAW.com

• Single front button.
• 3.5 inch widescreen display featuring the highest pixel density ever shipped in a portable device.
• 2 megapixel camera.
• iPod dock.
• Proximity sensor which switches between modes and screen orientation based on how a user holds it.
• 11.6 mm thick.
• Syncs with iTunes
• GSM/EDGE
• Wifi
• Bluetooth
• Cinglar only.
• Visual voicemail - shows a list of your voicemails like you see a list of emails.
• Error correcting on-screen keyboard.
• Gestural interface
• Mail.
• Safari.
• Google Maps.
• Widgets.
• Switches seamlessly between EDGE and WiFi.
• Free Yahoo! IMAP email to all iPhone customs.
• GPS
• 5 hour video battery life.
• 16 hour audio battery life.

The 4GB costs $499 and the 8GB $599 (includes a 2 year contract). It is shipping in June.

Increasing Productivity in 88 simple steps....

I am smack dab in the middle of a book that has begun to change my entire workday.  The book is from Gina Trapani,  one of the writers of lifehacker.com.  the book contains 88 lifehacks to improve your life as it relates to the technology that so many of us have come to rely on day in and day out.

I must say that using this as a follow up book to Getting Things Done has systematically begun to change my every day work life.  Chad over at tech2point0 has joined me in this search for sanity in our daily lives that are flooded with information from so many different streams.

click here to purchase the book from Amazon.com.

Online File Conversion Service

FROM TechCrunch

 

Zamzar, a free online file conversion tool, launched last week. Like a similar tool, Media Convert, Zamzar allows users to upload a file and have it converted into a number of formats.

Common uses for Zamzar include converting PDF documents to Word, iTunes AAC files to MP3, and Flash (flv) files to MP4 for iPod use. Up to five files can be converted simultaneously. The process takes a few minutes - Zamzar emails a link to the converted file when it is done. It worked well in our testing. Note, however, that Zamzar is not able to convert DRM’d files. The maximum file size is 100 MB, but there are no limits on the number of files converted. For more on Zamzar, see Go2web2.

Zamzar has a better interface and design than existing service Media Convert, although we found Media Convert to convert files more quickly in our testing. Media Convert also allows input files to be locally stored or from a URL, saving users an extra step if a file is on the Internet. Also, Media Convert converts the file while you wait, and gives a download link on screen when the process is completed. Since no registration is required, users are not required to give up an email address as they are with Zamzar. However, only files that are 50 MB or less can be converted using Media Convert.

Both services are useful, particularly when converting flash movies (from YouTube, etc.) to MP4 for viewing on an iPod.