Best posts made by Carnival Boy

He wrote "My experience before I moved to vcenter"

This implies he currently uses vcenter and he previously used ESXi free.

Just to be clear, I'm definitely not saying ESXi is better in anyway and I completely understand why ESXi users in their thousands are choosing to switch to XenServer. If life was a little bit longer, or if I had any interest in hypervisors, I'd probably do the same myself. I just don't think I'm crazy for sticking with ESXi for the time being.

Anyone know how much Scarlett Johansson charges?

I guess that if your LAN has web filtering it is protected from malicious websites (in theory), so any devices connected to it (via VPN) should go through that filtered connection rather than through the unfiltered connection of the remote users (which might be McDonald's Wifi). So when you're not connected to the VPN you're free to browse Russian porn, but when you're connected to the VPN (and hence exposing the LAN) you're blocked from Russian porn. Does that make sense?

We run web filtering via our Trend anti-virus software installed on every client, so this doesn't apply to us. I think we probably should start running a proxy, if for no other reason than to provide an audit trail when bad things happen.

@travisdh1 said in Burned by Eschewing Best Practices:

I'd argue that using a proxy for web filtering isn't needed. Either your users are trustworthy or their not, either way they are management's problem. If management has asked you to add that ability then do it, otherwise it's in the "not my problem field".

I agree. I'd make management aware of the risks (by writing them an e-mail, not by installing actual malware on a VM!) and give my recommendations and if they decided not to take my advise then fine. Then if the **** hits the fan, it's their problem.

I find it hard to believe that web-filtering is going to reduce the risk of malware that much anyway, if at all. Unless your filtering is so strict that users struggle to even use the internet. I think it just creates a false sense of security. And when the **** hits the fan management are going to turn around and say "but you told us your proxy would stop this!" and suddenly it's your problem big time.

@scottalanmiller said in ESXi Evaluation Period:

Except the name "trial license" kind of gives it all away. Maybe not the details, maybe not the time frame.... but the name alone tells you it's non-viable and not an option.

I'm not aware that ESXi uses the term "trial licence"? It has "Evaluation Mode" which doesn't have a licence key.

I'm hoping he'll respond. I was under the impression he just wants to know how to install a licence key for the free version so he can get his VMs powered up because he didn't realise that you have to install a key. But maybe not. I never know what these posters think!

No. ESXi is one product with one download ISO. The licence key determines which features are unlocked. If you want to run ESXi free you download and install the full product and then install a licence.

Can you change Windows Desktop to Windows Server just be changing the licence key? No. They are seperate products.

I have recently downgraded from ESXi Essentials to ESXi Free simply by entering a different key. It's the same product.

Any experts on ML?

The Marketing Department has employed the services of a company to do an audit of our existing site with a view to rewriting it in Wordpress. I didn't really want to get involved as I have no interest in websites but their review has made a few technical criticisms of our site and since I wrote the existing site it has piqued my interest (some of you will know, I dont take criticism well :))

Google Analytics shows that some visitors to some of our pages get the case wrong eg they visit Products.htm instead of products.htm. They said this is screwing our SEO because Google sees it as duplicate content and recommended using .htaccess to redirect all URLs to their lower case equivalent.

Now, we're running IIS, which I would have expected that they would know. I'd also expect them to know that IIS doesn't use .htaccess. So that worries me for a start.

Now obviously the main reason Products.htm works as a URL is because IIS runs on Windows and so isn't case sensitive. Now the question is, so what? Is Google really going to punish us because some websites have links to some of our pages with the incorrect case? And is it worth spending $$$ to have this company write custom code to dynamically convert upper case in URLs to lower case? And does anyone know of any other websites that do this? I can't find any - all the ones I've tested are either case insensitive or give 401s if you get the case wrong.

As they are writing our new website in Wordpress I have noted that Wordpress isn't case sensitive either. So they will have to mod Wordpress to behave differently from its default. Why?

I'm not a web expert, or even a hobbyist. It simply doesn't interest me. But this all sounds nonsense to me.

Any views please?

Just to be clear all our URLs are lower case, it is just some links to our site from external websites that may use uppercase.

..apart from MangoLassi

@IRJ said in SEO for dummies:

Unix based systems are the king of web servers and case actually matters on these systems.

Not so much these days since sites run CMSs and don't rely on the underlying OS. Wordpress, for example, as I've mentioned, isn't case sensitive, despite the majority of Wordpress sites running on Linux.

I think you're right. The renewal notice for my support contract said "Unlimited support requests. Quick resolutions to technical issues through remote support" and my contract say "Support and Subscription (SnS)", but the small print line details say "Subscription Only".

Carry on, people.

@scottalanmiller said in Over Investing Early Can Be Big Time Failure:

So the rule of thumb is, keep it very small today just meeting your current needs. If the business grows, grow the infrastructure tomorrow.

That's been my rule of thumb. Vendors try and encourage you to over spec because extra capacity equals extra dollars for them.

I've only ever used and managed iPhones at work and it's gone very well - both in terms of reliability and minimal levels of user support. I use Meraki MDM. Every now and again, someone high up in the organisation asks if we should switch to Android phones. My gut feeling is always to say no because I perceive that it will involve considerably more work from me and my team in terms of both management and user support. But I don't have any direct experience of Android in the workplace (I use them personally at home, so occasionally have to give user support to my wife).

I was just wondering if anyone here has made the switch, or manages both and can give me some feedback on what it's like and how they compare. This is not about personal preference for your own device (I prefer Android, btw) but managing and supporting other users' devices.

@dafyre said in Managing Android mobiles:

If you office is already heavily invested in the iPlatform, I'd suggest keeping it that way for now.

Oh, so would I. So would I. I'm just looking for real world experiences so that I can better persuade upper management exactly why we use iPhones.

@scottalanmiller said in Managing Android mobiles:

The question is, what value does management perceive in Androids

Well, apparently the salesman from the phone company told someone here that Samsung phones have better phone reception (lol!). Yeah, nothing to do with the margins they'd make on selling us said phones.

The only two advantages I can think of are

1. There is an awesome app for our Samsung PBX system that is only available on Android.
2. Up-front cost. Maybe. I don't even know. I think equivalent Android phones are marginally cheaper than iPhones. It's a trivial amount but management often (well, make that 'always') over estimate the importance of up-front costs versus TCO. I think they work under the misconception that we don't actually have salaries in the IT department and all the work we do managing equipment is free of charge (we do it for love, or free fairies or something).

@scottalanmiller said in To Password Protect a network folder or not:

Having a second password for a file or folder will not actually increase security,

I agree on folders. Not sure on files. Using NTFS only, is it possible to set permissions to allow access to only a specific user and no-one else? Ie can you restrict the domain admin or the file server's local admin account from access? And if you could, could you still back the file up? I wouldn't want a file on my file server that I, as domain admin, was restricted to. I'm not sure it would work?

Some users will password protect Office files from within Office and I don't have a particular problem with that. I can still access the file to back it up, restore it and change NTFS permissions, but I can't open the file in Office. That suits me. I wouldn't encourage it, as if the user leaves or forgets the password, I can't help. It adds more risk to the company than it solves.

@scottalanmiller said in Why is Hyper-V More Confusing:

in the real world, actual Windows admins are really, really unable to figure Hyper-V out. They are totally lost (at least in nearly all cases over the years that I've seen.. and it is a huge majority

Really? Wow. It's hardly rocket science. What is wrong with these people? Maybe I should become a Windows admin and blow these people away.