I’ve just read through an off-topic thread in the SMS/SCCM mailing list on MyITforum, and thought about some of the interviews that I’ve participated in over the past few years (both where I was the interview-er, as well as the interview-ee).

I thought this would bring up a good topic for discussion outside the thread, so here goes:

What is the most interesting question you’ve either asked or been asked in a job interview?

As an answer from me, as the interview-er, I have asked the following:

• So what do you want to do when you grow up?
• Explain your job to a 4 year old.

As the interview-ee, I’ve been asked questions like:

• If one day, you have what appears to be a perfectly running SMS environment, then the next day you come in and all of your collections are empty, and after a collection refresh, they’re all empty, what do you do?

So, come on, what are some of the questions?  I thought this might make for some useful insight and all questions are welcome!  As far as the answers go, I’ll leave it up to you as to if they’re posted or not. 

The technical question above that I was asked was where the person conducting the interview had experienced this in the past, and was looking for a specific answer (corrupt DDR).  However, he was quite impressed when I walked through the troubleshooting aspects to figure out what was going on, and therefore provided positive feedback for the interview.

Stephanie and I are on a  two week vacation that started Friday afternoon with us headed out to Ohio, where we visited some of Stephanie’s friends from a few years back that recently moved there, as well as I went to the Dayton Hamvention for a couple of days.  Several highlights that we’ve encountered so far are:

• Visiting the Cadora’s (Thanks Matt, Lisa and Alex for putting us up for a couple of days!)
• The Dayton Hamvention (that one was mine!)
• Dinner with Rod & Megan Trent – this was a true blessing!  Stephanie was able to meet some people that I highly regard as good friends.  We both had a wonderful time, and I’m glad to know that Megan had no issues with the seafood that was mistakenly served to her!

Today, we’re in Buffalo, NY and are about to head out to visit some vineyards as well as see about looking into the Niagara Falls options we have.  Although the weather doesn’t look to good right now, we’re optimistic that we’ll still have a good time.

Stephanie and I are both well rested (we slept until we were finished!), and ready to take on the day.

We’ll post more later!

Well, I just got my invite to download and play with this new tool for Outlook that Bill talked about almost a year ago.  After the install, it took about an hour to index all of my email, and so far, I’ve become very used to seeing it in the Outlook window.  This tool pretty much blows anything else I’ve seen away as far as search and indexing. 

Imagine, you read an email from someone, then on the right side, you see the contact details, who else they’ve cc’ed on emails to you, as well as all conversations and any attachment files that you’ve exchanged with them.

So far, I’m less than 24 hours into the testing, and I’m already addicted.

More to follow as I learn more about what this can do…

I’ll be spending most of my time at MMS in the 1E Booth on the Vendor floor this year.  I hope to be blogging a little here and there as well, so keep an eye out for it! 

For insight on what 1E will be presenting this year, check our website.

Once again, I look forward to seeing everyone there!  It’s a great time for me to catch up on friends that I’ve met over the past several years, as well as get introduced to new ones. 

Also, as you’ve seen in Rod’s newsletter, 1E is actively searching for new talent! 

So, here’s the release from the Forums:

Do you have what it takes?  1E Inc is continuing its rapid expansion in the US and is looking for the best SMS/System Center talent in the country.  We are currently hiring both consultants and presales solutions engineers with a minimum of 3 – 5 years SMS consulting experience with large enterprise organizations.  System Center Configuration Manager experience is highly recommended.  If you meet these qualifications and are interested in learning more about joining our incredible team please come to booth 311 at MMS with your resume in hand or send it to usrecruitment@1e.com.

 

So, if you think you have what it takes, bring your resume along, and get us a copy!

See you there!

Well, here we go again.  Whoever runs the Atlanta TSA group has achieved a new high (or low, depending on how you look at it).  Anway, these guys have intentionally created a minimum 30 minute backlog getting through what used to be a 10 minute wait at the security checkpoint at TSA.  The sad thing is that it’s all throughout the day now, rather than just at rush hours. 

This is extremely problematic, almost like they’ve reverted to back right after the WTC fell.  It’s unfortunate that they’re not trained well enough to detect everything that goes through, but the fact that they also make fun of people that they stop (I’m an eye witness to this), and make the passengers appear foolish, when not completely understanding the reasoning behind who is thinking what.

As an example, there was a lady that (wrongfully, I realize this) took some cans of hair product through, and the cans were too large to go through, she misunderstood the policy and thought that since the cans were almost empty, it would be ok.  Well, understandably she was mistaken.  The TSA representative (I use that word loosely!) basically chastised her for having “empty cans” in her bags, and once he had confiscated these items, proceeded to two other agents to let them in on his find and amazing success. 

This behavior is fully unprofessional and unwarranted.  I am filling out a TSA comment card, and do have the representative’s name, so I hope that the TSA will be listening and will take action.  However, I doubt it. 

It’s been confirmed.  1E will  be at Booth 311 (almost right in the center of the action!).  We look forward to seeing you there.  For a map of the booths at MMS, click here and you’ll be redirected to Rod’s map of the vendor floor. 

The event will provide attendees with an opportunity to learn directly about Microsoft System Center technologies and the latest Windows Management and PC power management solutions from 1E. This event will also offer organizations the chance to discuss their technical and business challenges directly with the 1E CEO, Sumir Karayi, and representatives from Dell, Microsoft and the Gartner analyst group.

Highlights of the day include:

Morning – Technical Session:

·         Microsoft System Center overview and demo – John Roller, Management Solution Specialist, Microsoft.

·         1E Software, Services and delivering a ‘Real World’ System Center Solution – Brian Tucker, Solutions Engineer, 1E

·         Dell on Dell, Donnie Taylor, Systems/Configuration Management Engineer

Afternoon – ‘Go Green’ Session:

·         Gartner Green PC – Terrence Cosgrove, Senior Gartner Analyst, The Gartner Group

·         1E Go Green PC Power Management Presentation, Sumir Karayi, 1E CEO

·         Dell Green PC Case Study – Jay Taylor, Global Strategist, Dell

Our expertise in helping organizations with large IT environments, to reduce complexity, power consumption and their carbon footprints has gained us the trust of over 8 million users across 1,000+ businesses in 36 countries worldwide. For more information, please visit : http://www.1e.com/roadshow

Alternatively, call Daniel Acorda directly on Toll Free 1 866 592 4214 ext 9023. 

Well, the Webinar went off without a hitch.  I want to thank everyone that showed up and attended.  I hope the content was useful. 

The guys at 1E over in London thought it was pretty good, because they’ve asked me to do it again!  So, it’s now official!

For those of you that missed my February 26 Webcast on 1E Nomad and SCCM, I’m doing it again this next week on Wednesday, March 5 at 11:00 Eastern time.

If you’re interested in participating, you’ll need to sign up in advance of the session.  You can go here to sign up.  If you’ve never run LiveMeeting 2007 on your computer before, you may want to download the client early and get it installed and tested, because it does take some time to install.  To get the LiveMeeting 2007 client, go here.

Thanks again to all of those that attended, and I look forward to seeing a lot of you that didn’t make it to the next one on March 5!

On February 26, I’ll be presenting a short webinar on the advantages of 1E Nomad Enterprise. 

Seats will be filling fast, so get your registration in now here.

I've downloaded and have been messing around in Windows Server 2008 for a while, and found some interesting information that should prove to be valuable to anyone that installs and uses this beast of an OS. 

First of all, there's Keith Combs, who has a very good post on his blogsite with videos running through the most popular features in Windows Server 2008, such as Hyper-V, running Server Core, just to name a  couple.  I would encourage anyone to check it out. 

 Also, there's the standard Windows Server 2008 Technical Library at Microsoft that's packed with all kinds of information.

March 14, 2008

A while back, like in June of 2007, my wife and I bought a house and did some work on the deck (like tore one down and put a newer, bigger, better deck up). I threw some pics up of the process and tried to document it a little. if anyone wants to check it out, you can find it here.

so I found this program for Windows Mobile called Diarist that lets me do this from my Treo.

when I get back to my laptop, I will be checking this out so I hope this works! It's free, so it already has a good start!

Well, if you’ve seen this error, you have had some of the same issues I’ve had.  This error is a Windows Vista error that affects Virtual PC images and keeps them from being executed.  The issue is rather simple to fix, and by clicking on the error image below, you’ll be directed to the source that I found to resolve my issues.  I’ve chosen to link to the soliton rather than provide it here as by forwarding you over, proper credit for this is given.

This has evidently been confirmed by Microsoft, and there is a fix on the way.  For more on this, check this link:

http://blogs.msdn.com/excel/archive/2007/09/25/calculation-issue-update.aspx

It appears to be a display only bug, and the calculations are actually correct, but if you look down in the comments, you'll see it gets even more confusing.  Looking at the results below, this gets pretty wierd:

I know, I know, Windows Vista already has one.  But, if you miss looking at all the colorful blocks and watching the process, I have found a little tool (think it was in Windows IT Pro magazine a while back) called AusLogics Disk Defrag.  It’s free, and it gives some pretty decent reporting after the fact.

This article came out internally in an e-mail today, and I thought I'd share.  The article is a brief step into history on the creation of 1E, as well as core principles.

Enjoy!

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/enterprise/article2283117.ece

Mobility Site » Blog Archive » Do You Know About Google Voice Local Search (1-800-GOOG-411)?.

Just got this off of MobilitySite this morning.  Looks like there’s a lot of publicity around carriers in the US determining what phones their customers will have.  Whereas in Europe, phones are pretty much interchangeable throughout the different mobile provider networks.

When will the US Mobile market get a clue?  Hopefully soon!

From MobilitySite:

Its official title is “Wireless Innovation and Consumer Protection,” but “Really, they’re the iPhone hearings,” says public interest lobbyist Ben Scott. The House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet is expected to consider the future of cellphone and wireless data communications, including the “unbundling” of cellphones from their carriers, while activists are pushing for a new wireless data network in newly-available spectrum. Both developments could ultimately affect AT&T’s exclusive carrier status with Apple.

Wireless carriers find their phone and internet services facing new scrutiny after AT&T’s exclusive carrier deal with Apple’s iPhone. “Congress doesn’t need to run a hearing on whether the iPhone is the coolest, shiniest gadget on the market.” says Scott. “The reason they’re having a hearing is because the iPhone.is going to set the mold. This device and how it’s treated by the Congress and the regulators in Washington is going to determine how we access the internet from now on with every device that follows in the iPhone’s footsteps.”

Markey set the tone for the debate, telling The Street that “the more portable these devices are, the more innovation we’ll see.”

Also, another post from MobilitySite:

David Berlind, executive editor at ZDNet asked that question in his blog today.

Customer choice is apparently out the window these days when it comes to picking a cell phone. Imagine for example, if when you purchased a car, it was only allowed on certain roads. You’d have to figure out which roads you most travel, and then buy a car based on which one was allowed on most of those roads. Would you tolerate this?

and

When there were a lot of complaints that the iPhone is only available for one of AT&T’s two networks (reminder: the slower of the two), I thought “normal.” Business as usual. When I realized the phones Microsoft was offering to me for testing only worked on certain networks, I thought “normal.” Today, while I was at the Samsung gadget fest in NYC and saw an array of phones, most of which were carrier-specific, I thought “normal.” But then I wondered, why are we letting them (the proverbial “them”) define normal. Or maybe it’s me. How did I come to blindly accept this status quo? This isn’t normal. This is anti-consumer choice. Maybe the network over there isn’t the best. But in Europe, at least you can easily interchange phones and providers without finding out that you have to give up on owning the one handset you’ve had your eyes on for six months.

Go watch the video here (a good rant and worth watching)

Maybe they’ll get the picture soon?

iPhone plans announced - Image View (phone Arena).

Palm Announces Treo 750 Windows Mobile 6 Update.

Sustainable IT | InfoWorld | When PCs don't snooze, you lose | June 14, 2007 03:00 AM | By Ted Samson.

Today, I was setting up a couple of Dell PowerEdge 1900 servers to use Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1.  All was going well, until I cranked up a guest machine using Virtual Server.  I’m running on Windows Server 2003, and had just used the default drivers out of the box, so I figured it would “just work”. 

I should have known better!  When starting up a guest OS using Virtual Server, the host network stopped functioning altogether!  I have two of these servers to set up, so I thought I’d try and replicate it on the other box – funny, it did the same thing.  Whenever a guest started that was configured to use the Host NIC, the host network would stop functioning.

After some research, I found that others were having this issue as well, and the issue seemed to point to the NIC itself.  After doing a little research, I found a write up by Ray Comvalius that pointed me in the right direction.

I’ve copied and pasted his procedure below:

This is the procedure that worked for me:

Step 1) Ensure the latest drivers from Broadcom are installed on the

host machine (not the DELL ones). These are available from

http://www.broadcom.com/support/ethernet_nic/netxtremeii.php


Step 2) Grab update package from Broadcom that will disable IPMI as
appropriate to your O/S

a) Windows 2003 X64 – ftp://Net_sys_anon@ftp1.broadcom.com/web/utility_x64.zip

b) Windows 2003 – ftp://Net_sys_anon@ftp1.broadcom.com/web/utility_x86.zip

Step 3) Determine the MAC address for the NICs you want to "fix". You
can get this from Start -> Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools ->
System Information : Components : Network : Adapter. There are lots of adapters listed here so be careful to choose the right ones.

Step 4) Extract and execute "run.bat" and enter the MAC address collected in step 3

Well, it's been announced that Cingular should have two phones added to their line of devices in the near future.

First, the Cingular 8525 (or HTC Hermes) is due in stores on November 16.

Second, the long awaited Palm Treo 750, which was released in exclusivity to Vodafone in Europe, has finally passed FCC Certification for use in the US.  This announcement was just released today. A small blurb is available here.

 I have purchased a Cingular 3125 and am evaluating it now.  It's a great little smartphone!  Here are some of my likes and dislikes about it:

Likes:

• The phone is really thin - this goes well as it's almost weightless on the belt
• Both displays are easy to read - When checking e-mail and reading news off the internet, the pages and messages are rendered pretty nicely and at pretty much any font size, it's easy to read.  The display is clean and crisp.
• The camera takes pretty nice pictures - I haven't used it much, but from what I can tell, it does take pretty decent pictures.

Dislikes:

• Keypad - I'm a true PDA user, and typing on a telephone dialpad is somewhat difficult to get used to.  I'm doing "ok", but I still prefer the full keyboard.
• Speakerphone - the speakerphone is somewhat "tinny" in sound, but I can understand what people are saying, and the other end seems to hear me ok when talking on speaker.
• Battery life - I receive a lot of e-mails, and connecting to the Edge network to send/receive via POP3 consumes a bit of power.  The handset (from about the 456 row down to the bottom) gets warm after about 3-4 minutes of consistent use, whether it be an extended check of messages (I subscribe to a couple of forums, so email numbers to my gmail account can get there pretty quickly), or surfing via the built in browser can make the handset pretty warm.

That's just a few points on the 3125 I've noticed. 

All in all, the 3125 is a definite phone lover's phone.  I'm more of a PDA type myself, so the 3125 will have a short life with me.  I'll be getting the 8525 when it comes out next week, unless there's a Treo announcement in the wings at Cingular (it has to be out before the 18th, as I'll be leaving for three weeks to be in orientation at my new job), or I'll have to wait until I get back.

 Either way, I'll update on my adventures with the new phones!

Well, today in the SMS mailing list, I made it public that I'm transitioning from my current employer, Intellinet, to go to work with 1E as a Systems Engineer in the Southeastern United States.  I view this as a tremendous opportunity, and look forward to becoming more active than I have been in the communities as well as getting to meet several of you on the MyITForum site.

 My time at Intellinet has been very challenging and rewarding.  Life as a consultant shows you many different aspects of life, and I have found the past few years to be exciting and fulfilling.  Intellinet is a wonderful company to work for, and they have a solid group of people.  I'm hopeful that I'll be able to retain a good working relationship with the folks at Intellinet and will continue to keep in touch with them.  Many thanks to those at Intellinet who have helped me along the way, as well as kept me on track!

I look forward to working with those at 1E and can't wait to get started!  The future is bright for this guy, and I hope that I get to meet more of you as my new position allows!

A friend of mine is on a Desktop Deployment project, and they have just started deploying SAV 10 throughout their network.  Once they started this, his deployments stopped working.  After researching the issue, he found that SAV 10 was detecting command line utilities, then actually going into the scripts and editing them out!

Here's the email from him:

I ran across an interesting issue today at a client site.  They started rolling out SAV 10 this week (upgrading from SAV 9) and some of our desktop deployment automation scripts started failing on the new systems.  Symantec 10 has added a new category of threat for “hacking tools” and is beginning to classify a lot of command line utilities as such and prevent them from running.  The main one affected here is a command that controls desktop windows, and is also used by many hardware manufacturers as part of their install routines.

But my favorite part of the story is that SAV went a step further.  It not only quarantines the file, it actually edits the batch file that called the command line tool in the first place, and deletes the line from the script.  I confirmed this multiple times with different witnesses to make sure I wasn’t loosing my mind.  Everyone who likes AV products editing your scripts and removing things they don’t like raise your hand.

Obviously in the corporate edition of the product, the administrators can configure these options, but it is important to be aware of the issue, and what the next steps may be this and similar products.

I haven't confirmed it, but will be posting it to the SMS mailing list for confirmation...

http://www.engadgetmobile.com/2006/09/13/cingular-...