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Volume 2, Issue 11- November, 2007 - © 2009 by Moose Logic, All Rights Reserved
Cover Story: This Thanksgiving, Pass The “Storytelling Fork”
The Citrix Corner: Virtual Desktops - Why & How?
Misuse Of Company E-mail And Internet Growing
How To Keep Hackers At Bay
Moose Logic Coming Events
April Recommended Reading
(Moose Views is a monthly newsletter prepared by Moose Logic to bring you information and tips on maintaining a trouble-free network)
This Thanksgiving, Pass The “Storytelling Fork”
Plan on getting together with friends and family this Thanksgiving? Then pass the “storytelling fork” and
you’ll create incredible memories that no one will forget!
This tradition is a variation of the “talking stick,” which is an old Native American tradition used in council circles to give everyone a chance to speak.
When matters of great concern came before the council, the leading elder would hold the talking stick and begin the discussion. When he finished, he would hold out the talking stick, and whoever wished to speak after him would take it. In this manner the stick was passed from one individual to another until all who wished to speak had done so. The stick was then passed back to the leading elder for safe keeping. They believed that whomever held the stick was infused with the sacred power of words.
So how can you use this as a fun Thanksgiving tradition for your family? Before everyone leaves the dinner table, bring out your “storytelling fork” and request that everyone tell a story as a small payment for the meal they’ve just enjoyed.
To make it fun, tie a red ribbon around a silver serving fork and hold it up for everyone to see. Say, “This is a magic Thanksgiving fork. Although it seems like an ordinary serving fork, it has special powers that will imbue t he holder with amazing storytelling ability. When you hold this fork, memories and fun stories of people and places you’ve seen will come flooding into your mind. When you hold this fork, everyone will listen.”
Start by giving them a story of your own. Maybe you can talk about the day your children were born. Tell stories
of your childhood or previous Thanksgiving meals. Talk about how you met your spouse or an old friend, teacher,
or mentor who had a big impact on your life. Or talk about the funny habits or quirks of family members who have
passed away. Then, pass the fork for others to do the same.
Kids will love the attention they get when telling a story, and you’ll have several memories that will last forever! And finally, don’t forget to show gratitude to the storyteller! Applaud!
The Citrix Corner: Virtual Desktops - Why & How?
One of the themes at this year’s iForum conference was desktop virtualization. “What’s the big deal?” you say, “We’ve been delivering virtual desktops from Presentation Servers since the WinFrame days!”While that’s true, there have also been issues with deploying desktops from Presentation Servers. First of all, since you’re delivering access to a server, which is supporting multiple users, you have to be very careful to lock it down so that a user doesn’t inadvertently break something or do something that adversely affects the other users on the server. (I can remember cases where, for example, someone selected the “3-D Pipes” screen saver, then left for lunch or a meeting. Not good.)
In fact, entire companies, like AppSense, have grown up around making toolkits that helped administrators lock down servers so that users couldn’t break them.
Then you have the “personalization issue” - when you ask users to give up their desktop PCs for something else, you’re going to get pushback if they can’t exert some control over their environment—changing the desktop theme, using the kid’s (or grandkid’s) picture for the background, etc.
Finally, it is a server desktop, which doesn’t look like the XP or Vista desktop that they’re used to seeing.
So, now that we have platforms like the Citrix XenServer, which can run a bunch of virtual instances of XP Pro or Vista on a single piece of server hardware, companies are starting to look at the alternative of connecting “desktop appliances” (new buzzword that you’ll start hearing more often), on a one-to-one basis to virtual instances of XP Pro or Vista instead of to a shared server-based desktop. Gartner, in fact, believes that enough of you are going to jump on that bandwagon to make it a $10 Billion market by 2010.
These virtual PCs can be pre-assigned to specific users, or made to be “sticky,” such that the first user to connect to one will continue to connect to that one, so the users can customize their desktops to their hearts’ content. They can also be set up such that at the end of a user’s session, they always revert to their original, known state.
Users get a desktop that looks like what they’re used to, they get to customize it (if allowed), they don’t have issues with applications that are not “multi-user friendly,” yet administrators still have the advantage of having everything concentrated in the data center where it’s easy to upgrade or repair. Plus, assuming that the virtualization hosts are connected to some kind of shared storage, (1) storage gets used more efficiently compared to having unused space on every desktop hard drive, and (2) all of the data (including the stuff that users insist on storing locally even though you told them not to) will be on redundant arrays that get backed up.
At iForum, Citrix talked a lot about a new thing that will be called Citrix XenDesktop. This will be a combination of the XenSource virtualization technology, the Ardence provisioning technology (now called Citrix Provisioning Server), and the next generation of the Citrix Desktop Server, which will broker the users’ connections to the virtual machines and add some pretty cool management functions. We’ll write more about this next month. If you want to know sooner, see the insert in this newsletter about our December seminars.
Misuse Of Company E-mail And Internet Growing
According to an article written by Workforce.com, 31.8% of publicly traded companies in the U.S. were compelled to investigate a suspected violation of privacy or data protection because an employee of the company used the company’s electronic media (e-mail, the Internet, instant messaging, etc.) inappropriately.In a report by Forrester Consulting and Proofpoint, 26% of companies surveyed say they saw their business affected because sensitive or embarrassing information had been leaked this way—and the trend is not slowing down.
The Biggest Problem Is That Bad News Spreads FAST Online
Problems included losing trade secrets and client files to slander and defamation lawsuits—and almost 28 of the companies that participated in this survey said they had terminated an employee for misusing e-mail. Blogs and message boards were also cited as being problematic.
The biggest problem is that electronic media spreads FAST. If an employee sends an inappropriate joke from your company e-mail address, it can spread like wildfire causing harm to your company’s reputation, not to mention lost business and costly lawsuits.
How To Protect Your Company
First, companies should have an acceptable use policy (AUP) in place that all employees are required to read, understand, and sign. An AUP simply outlines how employees can — and can’t — use company e-mail, Internet, or other electronic media. But that is just the starting point...
If the requirements of your AUP are not enforced, employees will accidentally (or intentionally) violate your rules. That’s why every company needs to invest in good e-mail and web filtering software, or subscribe to a good filtering service.
Just having it in place will act as a deterrent for such activities, and if something is going on — like an employee leaking confidential information to a competitor or sending racial or sexist jokes through your company’s e-mail —you’ll be able to nip it in the bud before it comes back and bites you in the form of a lawsuit.
Enforce Your Policies!
Additionally, a good web filter will prevent employees from accessing inappropriate material online, wasting time on non-work related activities, downloading viruses and spyware, and using up company bandwidth to download photos and music.
If you would like our help in choosing and setting up an acceptable use policy and/or e-mail and web filtering for your company, call us on: 206-774-0619 or send an e-mail to info@mooselogic.com.
How To Keep Hackers At Bay
No one wants to have their network “hacked,” but what exactly can a hacker do? Plenty, and you are right to be concerned!One common way for hackers to access your network is through spyware or viruses, which are malicious programs written to imbed themselves into your network to gather private information, steal financial data, access passwords, e-mail addresses, and spread themselves to other users.
But one of the most common ways for hackers to access your system is through e-mail, or spam e-mail to be more specific. Even if you have the latest anti-virus software installed, hackers are very clever at getting you to circumvent your anti-virus software through “phishing” e-mails. Phishing is when a hacker sends you a legitimate looking e-mail that appears to come from a trusted source — like PayPal, your bank, eBay, or any number of other legitimate business web sites. These e-mails will tell you that your account is expired or will be closed if you don’t go to a designated web site and update or verify your account information. Although you may have seen these e-mails before, be very careful! Hackers are brilliant at making not only the e-mail seem legitimate, but also at making the web site you go to look like the real thing.
If you fall prey to their scam, the site will gather your private information (usernames, passwords, accounts, etc.) and then use that to access your bank account or to charge your credit card.
To protect yourself, install a spam filter and NEVER open or respond to any e-mail requesting account verification. Instead, call the company. If it is a legitimate request, you can verify that with them over the phone.
