Setting Postfix up as a smarthost's pretty straightforward. I've done it in reverse as an inbound mail gateway instead of using an MS Exchange Edge Transport role. I'm guessing you'd be allowing access based on IP?
While you want to keep it simple, I can't stress strongly enough to use at least outbound spam filtering. That way, in case you do somehow start churning out spam, it'll get caught before your IP gets blacklisted.
@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
why aren't you using O365 to relay your text messages?
O365 is not a relay. It's an end point.
If you're sending less than 500 emails per day, it's a relay as well.
@Hubtech said:
I hate content...is that weird?
Not at all. Churning content is more of the creative/artistic mindset, whereas getting a site running's more of a practical one. Any time I've done web work, I've had others feed me the content. "You want your website to look like your latest product catalog? Ok, send me a copy of it and the content you want to show up." It's easier to have a goal/image to work to rather than create "stuff".
@ryan-from-xbyte said:
Our biggest hurdle is customers who have their servers hosted at a datacenter. The extra step of having to go to another facility makes a non-onsite warranty difficult to use.
But since the equipment's in a datacenter, the power's generally cleaner, and the environment's favorable on the servers. Wouldn't that generally result in lower failure rates? Most datacenters I've been to have workbenches to do hardware work and space for customers or remote hands to get work done while they wait for a tech.
@ryan-from-xbyte said:
@Nara How do you handle that now? Even a 4-hour response warranty would result in a half day downtime.
When possible, I get an extra server for N+1 onsite, or set up a server with a replicated copy offsite.
@scottalanmiller said:
Office 2013 is slower. It just is. You have moved from a Windows native app to a web app. They don't tell you this anywhere but look closely. Office 2013 is actually running in a frameless browser.
Are you sure on that? I just took a stroll through my office directory and found all the appropriate DLL files and such that would go along with a regular program. Outlook still has all the native quirks, features, and errors that wouldn't be part of a web app.
A recent ML post has me building out AD in my second lab site and testing out DIrectAccess. Beyond that, I'm toying with the idea of writing an AWS Server 2012 optimization script.
Multitasking is a great way to nibble at things without making solid progress in any of them. Humans are designed to work on one thing at a time. The key is breaking down things into manageable chunks that you can get through one at a time. That way, you can work on chunks of different projects, yet still be able to give each chunk your full attention. Some of what I say may sound familiar. It's part of the Getting Things Done method. For more information, check out http://gettingthingsdone.com. I've been a practitioner for 4 years, and it's turned my ability to handle workload right around.
@Dashrender said:
@scottalanmiller I agree. Since Microsoft is still selling MSSE as the protection in their Intune product line they make sure it stays relevant or people might leave Intune.
System Center Endpoint Protection (which is bundled with Intune) is the same platform as Security Essentials, but has some minor boosts to it. I like Intune for the system management aspects of it, and choose to use Webroot instead of SCEP. SCEP's much better than nothing, and I've seen it outperform some "leading competitors" during deployments, but it's only "good enough", which really isn't good enough as far as I'm concerned.
Sorry for being a bit late to the party. I'm quite a fan of Webroot. The low system utilization is quite impressive. It's quite unobtrusive. The IE plugin's a little slow, but if you have a gateway filtering device, it's less needed. What really impressed me was how quick they are to react to new threats. On average, they protect against new threats within 3 hours of my submissions.
My experience with remanufactured cartridges is primarily on inkjets and higher-yield laserjets. On many occasions, ink would glop out onto the printouts. One memorable experience was when the cartridge just let go and oozed ink onto the table. For toner, I've had decent luck with the quality being on-par, but have had issues with noticeably less pages per cartridge (7,000 instead of OEM's 10,000) and/or excess toner discharge that gets loose in the printer.
@scottalanmiller said:
Yes. If you plan to do web design, maintain you own portfolio site. You don't even need customers for that.
Another option is to build websites for businesses you know. Perhaps it's your local pizza place or your housekeeping service? You know what the business is like, so making a site for them should come easily. You get to build a portfolio and they get a site. Who knows, maybe you'd get some free pizza or a cleaning out of the deal?
During a project in a standing-height workspace, I stood. Over those 3 weeks, I noticed that I had more energy and my trunk and legs had toned up a bit. If you do consider going standing, get an ergonomic industrial floor mat and a comfortable pair of shoes (sneakers?). The cushioning will help tremendously. Doing this in a traditional pair of dress shoes and hard flooring will get old quite quickly.
It's more of the present than the future. Private cloud's already becoming more and more mainstream as the cost of VDI implementation decreases. Sure, some of the data-heavy and graphics-heavy processes like CAD will stay much as they have been, but it's commonplace, if not soon to be the standard to have one's IT infrastructure off in either public cloud such as AWS or Azure, or have a private cloud in a datacenter or colo somewhere else. There may be an extension of that infrastructure in the office, such as a local DC/DFS replica server. IT's still doing the same things it always has, which are keeping the systems running optimally for the business, supporting users, training and developing the userbase, and helping choose technology to help the company grow and perform. The where and how of it have just changed a bit.
With the exception of manufacturing and companies dealing in physical items, the office isn't the company anymore. It's just where people come to work. Keeping legacy infrastructure around goes against that culture shift.
@Bill-Kindle said:
@scottalanmiller said:
It's the only install option that I normally use. I only install the GUI if there is a specific site technical deficiency making it necessary.
It's the default option and the option that is suggested with all new 2012 R2 installs thanks to the Server Manager and PowerShell. The really nice thing is that you can deploy Server Core, and if you so choose at a later date install the full GUI and even revert it back to Core. It's not a irrevocable decision now with 2012.
That has saved me a few times so far.
@ryan-from-xbyte said:
@Nara some of our customers use some of their savings to buy extra parts to have in the shelf. They can then swap out in case of a failure. That gives them even less downtime than having a 4 hour warranty.
That could be handy.
@scottalanmiller said:
You have to compare the cost savings of the refurb gear to the cost of downtime. Downtime is always assumed to be expensive but in an average SMB is actually very cheap.
For a SMB, perhaps. I work more with SME and Enterprise. For example, a 67-person service company pulling in $23M per year would be out about $88k for a day of downtime (assuming a 5-day workweek). They wouldn't be able to service clients, post new data, or take payments.
@JaredBusch said:
@scottalanmiller said:
It only saves so much as you still need hardware for it. But you can push more packets for cheaper.
you can potentially have it on your virtualization platform though. I would recommend some dedicated hardware (basic super-micro or something) though.
I've had great luck running pfSense as a VM. In a multi-host environment, I can move it around as needed and not worry about firewall hardware failure.
@Hubtech said:
compared to an Asa 5505? Why one over the other?
For the price of an ASA, the feature set is lacking. In that price range, I'd go after a UTM appliance such as Sophos. Cisco has missed the boat with the ASA of late. While it makes for an excellent VPN appliance, as a security device, it's merely mediocre.