Just got back from installing an additional NIC in an ISA2004 firewall. The ole network bindings order gotcha hit me yet again so I thought it was time to write this down to remind me - and hopefully save you from this grief.

When adding a new network interface (phyiscal, wireless, 1394 etc) to a Windows machine (and I'm considering XP & Windows Server 2003 here but the same may well apply to other versions) you need to make sure you set the bindings order for all the network cards correctly in order to maintain proper operation.

For example, in your typical SBS2003 server there are 2 netowrk interface cards (NICs) and the server, when performing operations such as DNS lookups etc, needs to check with the internal NIC first because that's where things like DNS and WINS are bound first. Get the network card binding order wrong and you'll find DNS lookups will fail (this is why you ALWAYS USE THE WIZARDS!!! (excuse the shouting)).

Anyway, back to the story at hand. I installed an additional NIC into this firewall, giving it 3 interfaces in total. All appeared to be OK so I left the site. Got a call about 10 minutes later to be told "I can't browse the Internet from my computer". After spending some time RDP'd into the server (using my new Telstra Next-G card which totally rocks!!) I thought I'd disable the new NIC for now. Also noticed an error in the event logs about the proxy service not being able to bind to the internal NIC.

It was about this time that I thought of those darn network binding order settings. I checked them and sure enough the new NIC (for the DMZ) was at the top of the list. Moved it down to the bottom, restarted the ISA services but that didn't fix it.

We restarted the server and this proved the winner as everything was then able to start up & bind appropriately.

So, the lesson here is when installing an additional NIC into anything, in particular a server, check the bindings order. "Where is that?" I hear you ask?

Open your network connections folder and select the "Advanced" menu item. Click on "Advanced Settings...".

Check the list of connections for the order of the network cards - make sure the internal NIC (the one things are bound to) is the top one. {and one of these days I'll work out how to attach images to this thing so I can show you what to look for}.

Remembering this would have saved me from sitting on the side of the road for 25 minutes and let my client get out of the office a bit ealier.

We've had a few cases where RWW won't work on machines where they've had RDP 6 installed. The resolution when this happens is to uninstall RDP 6 as it appears there is a problem between the full RDP 6 client and the RDP 5.2 ActiveX component that RWW uses.

Whilst I've not personally tested this (I know - but it takes time!!) our "fix" in the meantime is to remove the RDP 6 client. Go to Add/Remove Programs, click the show updates checkbox at the top of the list and uninstall update KB925876. This takes you back to RDP 5.2 (in Windows XP).

Guess I'll do some trawling around to see if there are other articles about this anywhere but for the moment this is what we'll do.

If you know another "fix" that doesn't require removal of RDP 6 please let me know.

Monday morning just about all of us in the office were suffering "Jimlag", trying to remember what we'd learned the previous week & put it into practice. Ian (our implementer) was off in the bowels of north western Queensland so was out of reach for us, although the Happen support crew were just on the end of the telephone waiting for us.

But we survived Monday without having to ask for any support which was due to either us remembering what we needed to or being so ignorant that we had no idea we were lost!! (the former I think rather than the latter).

Today (Wednesday) saw the light come on, so to speak. We had quite a number of jobs to close off, products to finalise receiving in & then invoice. We went through the process of finalising & invoicing jobs and I gotta tell you - it's SOOOOOO much easier than the old way. Simply create the list of "ready" jobs and hit a few buttons.

It's amazing what a sound investment in the right tools can do for a business. I keep reflecting on last week & how interesting it was to be on the receiving end for a change & whilst it was hard going we're reaping the benefits already. I guess it's much the same as our clients have when we implement a new network - there's always some "pain & discomfort" (and I do warn them of that) but the benefits will certainly be there for their business.

It's the dawning of a new era for a business when the right tools are implemented properly & put to use.

Take a step back from your business every once in a while, look for the parts that need oiling, tightening up, cutting out etc etc & set about on a change for the better. Having gone through this and survived I can tell you it's worth it.

What tools have you implemented recently, to fix what pain points, and what has the result been? I'd love to know.

It's finally the end of a totally full on week - in fact probably the most incredible week I've had in business.

The implementation of our new Jim2 management system has gone really well with everybody knuckling down and tackling it full on. It's simply quite amazing what a positive impact a great management system can have on a business.

Jim allows us to track service and sales jobs as they are initiated, quotes and stock on purchase. It's giving us much greater visibility of what's going on overall.

I got really excited yesterday & today when Ian was showing me how particular tasks can be "processed" into defined steps so there are checks and measures for them. This paves the way for better quality control and reporting - how sweet!!

We had a large shipment of servers & related items come in today and once received it was a very simple task to see the status of these items for the project at hand - what was still on backorder and even the serial number of those items that have come into stock. So much better than the way we used to do things.

I'm not saying Jim is the answer to all your business issues, but rather than you really need to find systems for defining processes, checks & measures in order to make your business propell itself forward. This is, I know, going to make us so much better at what we do, and more professional in having more visibility of what's going on.

I can see that my life will be mine again (well....it'll be my wife's anyway  )

Just imagine being about to provide much better consistency and have predictability with processes as they are undertaken....it's like a dream come true (I know... I sound really "sad" don't I!!).

Anyway, the point is finding the right solution for your business is important when you want to grow it from being a "job" to a "business". Whether Jim2 is the right tool for you or not is irrelevant - you just need to find it. That being said, have a look at it (www.happen.biz) - it's really quite incredible what it can do.

Don't forget next Monday night, October 23, is the next meeting for the Adelaide SBS group.

We'll be at Ingram Micro again (our new home for now) which is level 2, 208 Greenhill Rd, Eastwood.

Park across the road on the north side of Greenhill Rd as the undercover carpark is known to 'eat' cars.

We kick off at 6:30 but come from just after 6pm for pizza & drinks. Not 100% what the topic will be yet but it will be worth your time.

As always entry is free unless you really feel like paying . If you are planning on attending please RSVP to info {at} sbsusers {dot} net.

Make sure you're there for the November meeting announcement - something special has been arranged.....

It's been a full on exercise getting the new system going internally. Whilst it hasn't been overly painful as such, it's a big change for everyone so there's a steep learning curve to climb, plus breaking old habits which is always a bit of a chore.

Ian, our implementer from Happen Business, has been very patient with us and been doing a great job. I have never had any misconceptions about my inability to be a trainer, and Ian solidified that further in that his approach is very different to mine. I simply don't have the patience and if someone asks me a question I tend to give them the answer. Ian, on the other hand has a lot more patience (or can fake it better than me!!) and when asked a question he gets us to think about the answer more often than just feeding us the solution (akin to teaching us to fish as opposed to giving us a fish).

We are live with Jim2 with service jobs, quotes, purchase orders and all other essentional functions going through it - and it's only been in since Monday morning! Quite an accomplishment really. If I wasn't experiencing it for myself I guess I would find it hard to believe.

It's really interesting being on the receiving end for a change. I'm used to being involved in major network upgrades for our clients where I can quite confidently walk in, turn the business upside down with a nice, shiney new network (typically SBS - what else!!!) and get them going before moving on to the next one. In this case my business is the one being turned upside down and it's an odd experience, but not one I'm shying away from.

Change is something that people will often try to avoid, mostly because they prefer certainty, even if this means they won't be happy. I'm not afraid of change though however I need to keep in mind that my staff may not attack change the same way I do - which is a good thing when you boil it all down.

Anyway, back to Jim. Performance is no problem - with the database running on a virtual server, and it's great the way things "follow" you around the network such that when I log off a session on my notebook and then hook into the terminal server from home, the same lists, jobs, stock items and reports I had open when in the office are there open & ready at my next session - this is a good time for change to NOT take place

Two more days to go before we're left on our own. There's still a lot to learn and based on what I've heard the first six weeks are the toughest - after that we'll be wondering how we ever got on with out it. I am getting home each night with a cracking headache but I know it will all be worth it.

I'm looking forward to what I'll learn tomorrow!!

Any change, particularly in small business, can either make or break a company. Good big change can propel a business forward whereas bad big change (or lots of bad small change) and kill a company. Today is one of those days where we undergo BIG change - but I feel confident it's going to be all good.

We're implementing a new accounting system, after sticking with MYOB for some 9 years it's time for us to get serious about things (Note: I'm not saying that MYOB is not serious software, or that it's bad software, we've simply outgrown it and need something different).

After doing some checking around we decided to go with Jim2 from Happen Software (www.happen.biz), a local Aussie product written and supported in Sydney. Ian is the consultant we've flown in (arrives in just over an hour) to help us implement it and train us all - boy is he in for something!

All that we've seen of Jim2 so far has been great - it's going to resolve a lot of frustrations I've had for some years, particularly with regard to things like serial number tracking, reports, and tying purchase orders of products in to invoices of products out.

Stay tuned - I'll keep you posted on how things come together. In a few days I'm sure I'll be telling you to go buy it for your own use too. (I'll also have to let you know about what I've done with our server infrastructure....)

I got a call yesterday from a client. The business owner & his wife were at the gym on Friday night - joined a few months ago to lose some left over Christmas cheer & get healthy.

Anyway, they were just walking along on the treadmill when she collapsed. Was on life support for a short while but didn't make it. She was not much older than me - around 37 I think.

Husband & 2 daughters left. It was all so sudden, no prior conditions or indications.

Makes you stop & think.

Go hug those you love, make the most of the time you have with each other. Put away the computer for a bit and spend some quality time together - there will always be email, there will always be blog posts, there will always be "things" to work on.

You may not always have those you love around you and you never know when they'll be done forever so make the most of the time you do have.

guess it's time I got back to blogging. I've been getting hassled by numerous bodies about my silence here and it has been suggested that I pull my socks up and hit the keyboard.

I've been spending the last few months focussing on my business and so haven't really had the time...even for a quick blog.

Add to that the fact that I've had several good ideas for posts but these have been when I'm away from any way of noting things down - in the shower, driving, camping in the middle of the outback. I then get busy or simply forget and...well...there goes another idea...

Anyway, I promise to get back here more often now. Having just returned from SMB Nation in Seattle my head is still buzzing and we've got lots of changes going on here at the office which might be of interest too.

Stay tuned - more to come...

I'm typing this on my new HP nx6125 notebook - it's got an AMD Turion processor, 2.2GHz. Currently got 1Gb RAM but I'll be updating it to 2Gb shortly. I hear these are great machines for running virtual machines and this also gives me the ability, should I feel like reinstalling everything now that I'm 40% of the way through setting this baby up, to run a 64-bit operating system (be it XP Pro or Vista).

It also features a biometric fingerprint scanner that can be used for logging into the notebook, my office domain and also for numerous web sites (including this one). Whilst I typically remember passwords/passphrases for sites I visit without too much trouble the benefit I see here is my passphrase tends to be rather long for the office network so simply swiping my finger across the scanner makes logging in a whole lot simpler.

I'll see about using another hard drive to test 64-bit Vista on this baby - will be nice to see it on a real machine at last rather than inside a virtual machine.

Stay tuned...

There have been issues reported around the place about problems when using USB drives as backup devices on SBS2003. Simply unplugging the drive to switch over to another one so the latest backup can be taken off site yields error messages from the server complaining about volumes with no disk space left.

The best way to avoid these errors is to stop the device before unplugging it from the server. But what if you want to do this without having someone first log onto the server? There are some tools around that allow you to script a "USB stop" to run as a scheduled task but it would appear this too is not always the fix (if you want a copy of a tool that can be used with the scheduled task let me know).

Graham from the Adelaide SBS user group was having a problem with USB drives where the server would simply lock up and using the utility for stopping the USB device was simply not successful. A call to Microsoft's PSS and they were able to provide him with a fix - albeit not one from the public knowledge base articles.

It's tied in to "USB device selective suspend". Use this ONLY if you really need to.

<in here goes all the typical warnings about editing the registry>

Create a DWORD key called "DisableSelectiveSuspend" under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CCS\Services\usb

Give it a value of 1 to disable selective suspend.

Once again - use this ONLY if you're having system lockups where using USB drives as backup devices and make sure you've got a complete backup of the system beforehand (kind of makes it hard to ensure you've got a backup in advance though doesn't it!!).

Be interested to get feedback on this one too...

SMB Nation 2006 is open for registration. This is THE premier event for SME consultants/VARs/VAPs/resellers and you need to do all you can to be there. The conference will once again be held at Microsoft's Conference Centre in Redmond, Washington.

There are only 800 places available so don't delay getting your registration in - you don't want to miss out by being number 801 to register. There's an early-bird special until the end of March where the registration cost is only US$695, following which it'll go up to US$795. That US$100 saving can be applied to your drinking money in the bar at the Marriot in Redmond [:D]

There's an impressive list of speakers for this year's conference (http://www.smbnation.com/Default.aspx?TabId=5) so you're sure to learn plenty regardless of which track you follow (technical, business, product/sales). I'll be speaking in the business track again and plan to get into more advanced business growth information - taking your business to the next level. If you're coming along and would like some specific information included then please let me know and I'll see if I can work it into the time available for the presentation.

Of course I think the best part of attending an event like SMB Nation is the ability to network with fellow SBSers from around the world. People with whom I communicate with by email or IM and it's great to put a face to a name or catch up with a face I've met before.

So what are you waiting for? Get your registration in and join in the learning, fun & friendship. Hope to see you there :)

2006 has already shown itself to be a very full year. In fact I've been struggling to keep up with my email traffic let alone all the other things happening around the place.

How's this for the current major projects on the go:

* office relocation mid-year to bigger and better premises (yet to find this place though)

* new staff - currently looking for a new consultant and sales person to help handle our continued growth

* baby blues - well not really "blues" but my amazing assistant Rebecca is going on maternity leave mid-year for her first baby so we've got to prepare for handling some time off for her plus someone to fill in

* home renovations - we're going to make the house bigger as our kids (http://www.sbsusers.net/atw/photo.htm for some older photos) just keep growing

* there's a few other things that I can't list here but rest assured it's not minor surgery

All this means I need to continually look for ways to improve the way I work, and my team, keeping my eyes & ears open for great ways to use time efficiently and effectively plus handle the information flowing through the place.

We're going to start using MS CRM 3.0 shortly which I anticipate helping with this significantly but that can't be the "be all & end all" of the solution. I'd love to hear about any great time saving/efficiency tools & practices you've come across and have found to be effective. By sharing these ideas around we can all learn to deal with the information superhighway that just keeps pushing its way through our lives - and enjoy some of the quieter sideroads at the same time.

We had a great meeting last Monday night (Feb 20), being our first SBS user group meeting for 2006. The topic was ISA2004, particularly with regard to its place in SBS.

Now I'm not going to profess to be an expert in ISA - there are plenty of others around that leave me for dead, but I certainly did learn a lot more in preparation for this meeting. I should point out that prior to any UG meeting presentation I make sure I research the topic that will be presented as well as I can in the time available to me. In this way I can provide a quality presentation with relevant and accurate information plus hopefully answer any questions that come up.

Congratulations go to Paul Cumberworth who was the only attendee able to list the 7 layers of the OSI model for networking. He won a Microsoft 64Mb USB stick for that effort - well done Paul :) (Refer to http://www.learntcpip.com/TCPIP/default.htm for an overview).

The slide deck has been posted to the UG web site (www.sbsusers.net/meetings.htm) so you can download it from there although the slides really only have the bullet points of what we covered. There were plenty of demonstrations using a real live virtual SBS server I carry around with me - better make sure you come to the next meeting then!! The slide deck also has some ISA references near the end so make sure you refer to those too for more in depth information.

For the record I relied not only on my own experience with ISA for the presentaiton but also refered to Eriq Neale's "SBS2003 Unleashed" together with Dr Tom Shinder's ISA2004 book. Great additions to your library.

Next meeting is March 20 at HP (148 Frome Street, Adelaide). Looking for ideas for the meeting presentation - what do you want to see?

The days between Christmas and new year were going to be the days I caught up with a heap of things in the office that had not received the attention they deserved through the rest of the year. Instead I was busy by a few clients that simply refused to take some time off :)

Anyway, I did manage to get SP1 finally applied to our own server, in readiness for CRM 3.0 (see previous post). Overall the installation when fine, apart from the ISA2004 upgrade. Now don't get me wrong, our SBS2003 server is not overly customised - we built our own server the same way we build them for our clients. Makes it easier to support overall.

So each time I went to install ISA2004 as an upgrade from ISA2000 it would complain and roll back the installation. I ended up manually uninstalling ISA2000 (remembering to export the self-signed certificates first) but still had problems. Evertime I went tp stop the IISADMIN service and its dependant services it would start up again.

To make a long story short, I had to change the recovery settings for the service. It was set to restart on first & second failures and on subsequent failures to run "iisreset". I changed all of these to "no action" and tried again - this time I was successful. (I remembered to set the recovery options back afterward).

So if you're rolling out SBS2003 SP1, or even just upgrading ISA2000 to ISA2004, watch for the service recovery options on IISADMIN. Hopefully this will serve to save you a little grief.

Our office was broken into a week before Christmas :( As it turned out we didn't have anything stolen ourselves although other tenants did. There was damage to one of the doors though, but the most important thing is it got me seriously thinking about our disaster recovery plan (DRP).

The phone call I got from one of the other tenants was along the lines of "lots of stuff has been taken - laptops and more. They've been right through the office. You'd better get here quickly." This was around 8am on a Saturday morning too.

The drive down to the office was, to say the least, one of major contemplation. I had no idea of what had really been taken or how extensive the damage was. Was my server gone? My Internet router? The main admin machine or sales machine? What about the printers and other peripherals? What was my strategy to recover if the worse had eventuated?

Well the good news is as I mentioned at the top - nothing had been removed from my office. But it certainly got me thinking more about what we really would do if things were removed from the office.

Fast forward a little - I spent quite some time from Christmas day (!!) to last Monday (Jan 2) digging up old clay pipes in the back yard and replacing them with PVC piping. Whilst working I was listening to the SBS Show (www.sbsshow.com) and lo-and-behold episodes 3 & 4 are about disaster recovery!! How very timely :D (In fact, I was also thinking our our home DRP in the event I couldn't get the pipes replaced properly or in time for the next flush!! I was successful in getting everything sorted out though)

So, this is where you've got to look for the silver lining - the break in got me thinking seriously about improving our DRP which will be MUCH MUCH better from here on. Save yourself from the anquish I went through and get started on improving your DRP now before it's too late. As I get things sorted out I'll have to make sure I let you know. I'd be keen to hear about your own experiences too.

Oh yes, the police called me the next morning to let me know they'd caught the guy that broke in - 30yo heroin addict!

Woo hoo, I've just successfully installed CRM 3.0 onto our office SBS2003 server. After nutting out a few installation issues I managed to get it installed using, of course, the SBS installation method (was around 9-10 clicks after all the other fiddly bits).

Now I need to set about configuring the finer details, learning how to use it and then show the rest of the team how to use it. I'm hoping to have it fully operational for February 1 in the office. Guess it's time I go visit a few MS CRM sites (www.mscrm.com.au for one - thanks Guy Riddle) and read the manual which I'd printed out just prior to Christmas.

So, this is a defining moment for Calvert Technologies - the beginning of a new phase in our development & growth. I'm excited about how this will help us share information between each other rather than be islands of information (we're not quite at that point though - I'm hoping to prevent this occurring).

Here's to a very exciting 2006.

{now, where's that Anne Stanton when you need her.....}

I'm just packing my bag for the brief trip to Perth tomorrow for the first leg of the Microsoft for Partners Roadshow.

Toothbrush - check

Shirts - check

Socks - check

Podcasts - check

Shaver - check

“What???” I hear you ask? “Podcasts?” Why yes, of course. Time in the air, or waiting for a flight, or sitting in a taxi is a great time to catch up on the SBS podcasts. With my little trusty Creative Labs MP3 player and Sennheiser PCX-250 noise cancelling headphones I'm all set.

Check out the podcasts. The latest installment from Vlad Mazek, Chris Rue & Susanne Dansey is available at http://www.vladville.com/sbsshow/ and you can get the podcasts from the Official SBS Support group at http://blogs.technet.com/sbs/default.aspx

I figure I've got the flight covered at least, plus some taxi time. Much more workable than trying to open my notebook in the confined spaces of the 737 I'll be on tomorrow.

And for when the gizmos need to be turned off, I've got my latest book to read - more on that later.

Attention Microsoft Partners, if you want to get your hands dirty with CRM 3.0 (for testing purposes only) check out http://microsoft.order-7.com/CRMpartnerBeta/ . You need to sign in with your MS Passport to get access to the downloads (462Mb for the SBE edition - just right for SBS).

WARNING: don't go installing this on your production server, it's not final code and so is for testing only. I understand the final product will be released over the next couple of months.

As covered at last Monday nights SBS user group meeting, my personal recommendation is you stick to your knitting when it comes to deployment of CRM or other specialised packages. If your focus is SBS infrastructure your best bet is to partner with an organisation that specialises in CRM. This will save you and your clients a lot of pain. Same goes for application development, web site creation etc. Stick to what you know best and work with those who can compliment what you do (see this post - http://msmvps.com/calvert/archive/2005/10/27/73027.aspx for more thoughts on strategy)

That being said, have a play with CRM 3.0 on your favourite virtual server so you can see what all the excitement is about.

Keep your eyes posted on the following sites for more updates:

www.mscrm.com.au

http://thenorwichgroup.blogs.com/

http://www.microsoft.com/businesssolutions/crm/default.mspx