January 2007 - Posts
Wouldn't you know I'd eventually get sucked into this. First, let me state my "political" views about Daylight Savings Time: it should be abolished. Ideally, we'd never switch over to DST in April (or now March, thanks to the US Government), or just split the difference and move a half hour one of the times and just leave it there. Given that I seriously doubt anyone would take seriously a suggestion of splitting the difference, I'll plant my stake on abolishment. Unfortunately, it won't happen in time to avoid the impending disaster that looms on the horizon.
What impending disaster, you ask? Well, unless you've been living under a rock, or just haven't been listening to the prophets of doom, there's a bit of an issue with making sure that our computers adjust for the new DST rules in the US in 2007, and we can thank Microsoft for that. As it turns out, Microsoft has released updates to several software tools that will be affected by the new DST rules, but not all of them, and not all at the same time. Currently, updates are available for the Windows XP operating system (so long as you are running SP2), Windows 2003 Server (original or extra crispy, I mean SP1), Windows 2000 (if you're under extended hotfix support), Exchange 2003 SP2 (yet another reason to update to SP2), Entourage 2004, and a few others. Most notably missing from this list are: Outlook 2003/XP/2000, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0, and a few others. Windows Mobile users are asked to edit the registry on their devices to adjust for the new DST laws, as are Windows CE device users (unless of course you just want to manually change the date/time yourself).
So what? Big deal, right? Well...
Let's say I patch my Exchange server and I patch my Mac running Entourage, but I don't patch my Outlook, and then I make some appointments for March 2007. This is entirely possible, as I'm traveling to Washington for an activity over the weekend that DST will change - how convenient - and perhaps I've already put appointments into my calendar in Entourage and have sync'd my mobile device to my Exchange server. It's possible that I'm going to see the wrong times in either my Outlook or my Entourage or my PocketPC device. For me, not a huge deal. For a company with employees spanning multiple time zones (which always seems to be confusing even when everything works correctly anyway), this could generate real headaches as people show up an hour early or late for meetings scheduled by someone else.
How on earth could we have never foreseen this coming and be so behind the times? After all, the act of Congress, literally, that spelled out these changes was written in 2005. And it's not like the US is the only country dealing with DST issues. Australia changed their DST in 2006 for the Commonwealth Games. Israel has had moving DST date targets for some time.
However, rather than beat up on MS for not getting the updates to the community in a manner in which the community would like to get them, could we please do away with DST altogether? Maybe I'll just move to Arizona and be done with it...
Well, I may be
going against the grain, but I've been telling my clients to hold off on thinking about upgrading to Vista. So much so, in fact, that it's the topic of tomorrow's eOnCall broadcast. Does this mean I think Vista is a bad thing? Far from it. But to really get my reasoning why, you'll either have to
tune in at 10am and 1pm Central time, or catch the
podcast at the show web site when it becomes available Friday morning.
What's the exact phrase? "The best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry"? Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. Sometimes Mother Nature just gets in the way. Take this past week, for instance. Tuesday, I started getting the head cold that's been going around on. Wednesday, I end up all day on a server migration that should have taken about 6 hours (sound familiar?) Thursday, i take a very rare day off and visit my doctor, to confirm that I have a sinus infection, but am also told that I've got the beginnings of walking pneumonia. Friday I have an all-day activity that ends up being walking tours of several areas, and I have to bail out early in the afternoon because I just don't have the energy to keep up. Then, with the ice covering the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex area al weekend (or at least the threat that finally comes through late Sunday), I opt to stay in bed all weekend to try and recover.
All that to say that even though the regularly-scheduled broadcast of eOnCall ran on time last Thursday, I didn't get the podcast version posted to the web site. And i've yet to get in to record the show for this coming week, so teh broadcast version may well be a repeat. Since we got iced in again today in Texas, perhaps I'll be able to get together with the crew at Tucker Communications and get a show put together later this afternoon.
In any case, the show from last week is finally up, and there will be some show broadcast on Thursday, but we'll have to see if it's new content or a repeat.
Even though I don't like to travel, 2006 was a big travel year for me, what with conferences in Amsterdam and Redmond, a migration project in Vermont, speaking to an SMBTN group in Detroit, and barely missing the second blizzard in Denver to end the year. Not two weeks into 2007, though, I've already had to make a number of decisions about travel for this year, and for a variety of reasons, I've had to make some really hard choices about where and where not to go.
Because of other travel commitments in March, I will not be able to attend the SMBTN annual conference in California, but I know quite a few others who will be at the SMBSummit event. I've also had to turn down an opportunity to go to the MS Publishing event later that month. I will also likely not be attending the SMB Nation conference in Redmond in September.
But the one event I absolutely, positively, unless I'm dead in the grave will be attending is the SBS Migration conference in New Orleans starting May 26. Yes, that's Memorial Day weekend, but SBS Migration founder Jeff Middleton has put together a conference that will be unlike anything we've seen before. You can get the full details on the conference at http://conference2007.sbsmigration.com/, but there are a few key items to note. Specifically, if you are planning on attending the cruise portion of the conference (that's right, I said cruise), you'll need to get your room(s) booked by March 26. That's the last date the conference block will be available, the last date you can get a 100% refund on the booking should you need to cancel (you won't), and the date you need to have full payment made.
Even if you decide not to do the cruise (which you should), the two day land conference will provide plenty of good information from the best and brightest in the industry, as well as an opportunity to mix and mingle with your peers. Not to mention that New Orleans is a pretty cool place (so I've heard; I've never been, but I'm looking forward to my first trip there) and there will be ample opportunity to take in the city.
So make your plans now. I will be there. Will you?
Microsoft had a pretty big stage Sunday night at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Vegas, and one item of interest was the freshly announced Windows Home Server (WHS). This device has been getting some advanced buzz in a few blogs and web posts, but the "real deal" was announced on Sunday. And the (mis)information cycle about the product has started in earnest.
Disclaimer 1: I have no knowledge of this product. I have never seen it. Until I get my hands on one, I have no personal experience to share.
Disclaimer 2: This product is not yet available.
But that's not keeping the bloggers and interviewers of the world from trying to speculate as much as possible about the device. Here are a few collective links about the product that you can peruse on your own to develop your own thoughts and ideas. As soon as I see/play with one, I'll post my own. Until then, here's what we've got:
Stop Digital Amnesia (the official site): http://www.stopdigitalamnesia.com/ (beware, I find the site annoying)
Jesse Lewin's blog post: http://on10.net/Blogs/jesse/windows-home-server-will-live-in-your-closet-simplify-your-life/
Paul Thurrott's initial review: http://www.winsupersite.com/reviews/whs_preview.asp
Charlie Kindel's Blog Post: http://kindel.com/blogs/charlie/archive/2007/01/07/3602.aspx (other posts aboue WHS are on his site as well)
Engadget's post: http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/08/windows-home-server-everything-you-need-features-rundown-scre/
Channel 9 video interview about WHS: http://channel9.msdn.com/showpost.aspx?postid=270965
I'm sure there will be many, many most posts about this, but here's a good start to see whta the product may or may not be for you.
This week's edition of eOnCall features a focus on several possible IT resolutions for small businesses. The content was inspired by a research paper discussion the top IT controls for small businesses. I'll let you listen to the episode either during the broadcast at 10am and 1pm Central time Thursday, or you can pick it up from the show archives on Friday. But as I was preparing for the show and reviewing the content in preparation for getting the archive posts ready, I got to thinking about my own resolutions for 2007. They're really goals, but given the time of year and whatnot, calling them resolutions seems appropriate. So, I'll share some of them here, but for obvious reasons, some have to remain private company information.
- Be more visible in the local community. I put quite a bit of effort into the show, but I've been really (really) lax about promoting the episodes, especially to my local clients. I got to thinking this morning that maybe less than half of my clients are even aware that I'm doing the show, much less actively listen to it. So, I'm getting my weekly e-mailer ready to send out a reminder and a brief description of the show content to my client base and make sure they're aware of what we're doing with the show.
- Be more visible in the global community. I could copy and paste what I said above here, but again, I've been lax about promoting the show to the global community. I know several IT support operations that recommend the show to their clients, and there may well be more that could also benefit. But more than just pump up the broadcast topics, I also need to get back into the habit of posting interesting technical tidbits in my technical blog, really dedicate some energies into this blog, and resume my activities at smallbizserver.net. Yes, all these things help me on a professional level, but I really enjoy these activities, too, and have missed the regular efforts I've had prior to the last three months.
- Get my music jones going again. Yeah, it may seem odd to throw music into this particular post, but for years, my involvement in music has brought all kinds of stress relief and overall joy to my life. I've used the excuse over the last couple of years that I've just not had the time to do any music, what with starting the company, getting SBS 2003 Unleashed out the door, and all kinds of other "worthwhile" activities. The flat fact of the matter is that I've simply not made the time to pull one of the guitars off the wall or fire up the recording gear, and I really think that my overall creativity has suffered. So while I may not write the next top ten hit (many would argue that I've not come close to writing one yet, but that's beside the point), if I can start the creative juices flowing in the songwriting part of my brain, it'll add a lot of benefit elsewhere in the life of Eriq.
The good thing about blogging resolutions (especially ones about maintaining blogs more regularly) is that there's incentive to actually follow through on them. The bad thing is that if there's six months between this post and the next, well, I've obviously not got my head right with reality.
That's my take on some of my resolutions for 2007. What resolutions have you made for your business, if any?
Well, I just found out that I have the honor of bearing the MVP designation for yet another year. I cannot fully express what it means to be awarded this recognition, other than I am very proud to represent the MVP community and really hope I don't screw things up.
Since they actually did this for a second year now, maybe I'll do something interesting to celebrate. Like moving one of my blogs to msmvps.com. Yeah, that's the kind of party animal that I am.
Here's another excuse to blog - it's New Year's Day and I haven't posted anything here in over three months. Well, I guess I know where this particular project has been on the priority list, don't I? At any rate, I have just a couple of observations to share as we get our (potentially) artificial restart on a variety of issues:
1. Just like the fiscal books, a new year is a great time to "start over" and do things differently than you have done before. Since 2006 was a huge improvement over 2005 from a business standpoint, I really want 2007 to have the same kind of improvement over 2006. I changed a few things about the way I did business in 2006, and those changes improved the overall business operation. I'll be doing similar adjustments this year, with two thoughts driving that. One, if you're not growing, you're dying. Two, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
2. We shouldn't forget the mistakes of the past, but we should definitely try not to repeat them. Would that this could happen globally, but I'll do what I can in my own neck of the woods.
3. Resolutions - yeah, people think about them, and I'll have a future post about resolutions in a couple of days, for reasons that will be obvious when I get there. I'll be making resolutions for my business in 2007, but probably not for my personal life. I have a nasty habit of breaking resolutions easily and, in some cases, going exactly the opposite direction. Example: after being frustrated with the dating scene in 1992, my only resolution that I make for the following year was "Date-free in '93." I was engaged four months later.
So let's dust off 2006 (as well as any remnants of previous years as well) and see where we can go in 2007. It's already shaping up to be an interesting year.