Community Support

Posted: 11:32 pm
February 27, 2006
Podcast, SMB
5 Comments

Susan Bradley, icon of the SBS community, is slowly but surely losing her mind. While it is an interesting plea for feedback to see what works and doesn't work in keeping people informed I think that there is only one place to consistnetly point the blame for you not being informed well enough: you. While it is true that there is a lot of information out there, it has never been easier to organize, discover, prioritize and store information than ever before. Again, it requires you to do something. Last week I was presenting at a Technet seminar in Orlando. One of our business partners was chatting with JJ who dragged me over to give some feedback on Swing Migration. Coincidentally, I just did an SBS Show on Swing Migration a week ago. Did he listen to it? No. His excuse? Too busy. So let me get this straight: I take time out of my busy day to produce content for the IT community that improves not just your technical but business skills as well but you're too busy to listen to it and demand a summary.. an itemized list with timestamps.. a way to search it.. AND you want me to talk you through the really important parts live? Sorry kids, you picked a wrong profession if thats in a set of your expectations. There is a reason we make more money than doctors, lawyers, engineers and nearly all other professions. It requires constant retraining. If thats not something you can set aside time for then don't look to Susan to organize it better for you, look to Susan Bradley to drive through your drivethrough window in her Mercedes Benz and ask you for your opinion on whether she should get crushed Oreo's or M&M's in her McDonalds Frosty.

Exchange 12 available as 32 bit eval

Posted: 6:00 pm
February 27, 2006
E12
3 Comments

This is an update for all of you that attended last weeks Gulf Coast Partner Technight presented by Rene Alamo and James Cuomo. Conversation about the availability of 32bit E12 had many speculations so let me clear up a few details. Exchange 12 (codename E12) will be 64bit only. Longhorn Server will not have full functionality on current 64bit motherboards. Some functionality will require hardware support on-board which is currently not available. Exchange 12 (codename E12) will have a 32bit release point for testing/evaluation purposes, it will NOT be a supported platform in the production environment. SBS Cougar (or 2007) will be a 64bit only platform. So there you go, that is all the clarity I can provide at this point.

Blogcasting Death by PowerPoint

Posted: 12:00 am
February 26, 2006
Podcast
10 Comments

My sidekick Chris seems to have his feathers ruffled by Technet providing more information in the form of podcasts. Let me share a little meeting my head had with a brick wall when I did what Technet is attempting to fail at: I was asked to convert some of Amy Babinchak's ISA webcasts into a podcast. These shows were over two hours in length and basically had a PowerPoint presentation with ISA demonstrations embedded in them. There is nothing in podcasting to help the "What we are clearly able to see on this console is…" Here is the problem — when do you listen to podcasts? While driving, in the gym, before bed, while walking to work.. believe me, I've heard them all. Without exception, you are doing something else, something where a 100% of your attention cannot be assigned to the podcast at hand. The only way podcasts work in technical fields is when they are approached in terms of a conversation. Let's get together and have a geek lunch, talk about technology. Works great, even if its a head above what everyone else is doing. Try doing that with a 200-300 level webcast – technical or sales – and you will lose people. Recently we had a TS2 conference call where people were asked "What would make this podcast/webcast #1" after admitting that webcasts are little more than a background noise. The answer was, at best, sketchy. Media can only capture audiences if it is entertaining and insightful. A very high level course gets muted when a phone call comes in. A very entertaining dribble gets ALT+F4'ed by anybody seriously at work. Doubt that? Look at the next webcast you are in, check out the seating chart. I bet you they reach less than 30. SBS Show and Inside SBS reach thousands, weekly. We collectively beat an average Microsoft webcast attendance by at least a factor of 1,000 (that means multiply by 1,000) — I hope TechNet takes a note of what makes these podcasts successful before they start massive dumps of incoherent LiveMeeting death-by-powerpoint and instead allocate resources where they can actually help. For example, give Mark more money for Inside SBS. The notion that you will be able to reach more people that already do not care about your webcasts by trying to overlap their R&R time will likely lead to Level 300 webcasts getting cut off by lip-syncing talents of Ashlee Simpson on your audiences iPod.

Step after Sale, Implementation and Documentation

Posted: 11:33 pm
February 25, 2006
IT Business, Microsoft
3 Comments

Orlando IT Pro was very fortunate to host Mike Sanders from Kaseya earlier this week and see how professional managed services can benefit IT solution providers. So when the following tool was announced I was all ears: Baseline TCO Assessment Tool. Most successful IT solution providers are well versed in assisting the sales process, implementation and documentation of any network, systems and services put in place for the client. But does, or rather, should it end there?

This project guide provides sales staff with a simple, step-by-step approach to performing a total cost of ownership assessment using the Baseline TCO Assessment Tool, and using the assessment and its results to simplify the sales process. Through the use of the Baseline TCO Assessment Tool and this guide you can help your customers increase their operational efficiency through increased awareness of the costs and complexity of their existing IT infrastructure. It will also help them understand the Return on Investment (ROI) possible through performing a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 upgrade or an Exchange Server 2003 migration. Using the Baseline TCO Assessment Tool and the guidance contained in this project guide you can shorten the length of time needed to close a sale by simplifying the process of providing evidence that details how much money your customer can save and how to improve the allocation of your customer’s financial resources.

Holy crm-jockey is that a huge pile of BS. Let me explain what Microsoft is saying here as simply as I can: "Make your clients feel good for dumping a ton of money in Microsoft software" Opinion fair or not is not the point, is this something to be routinely done for your clients. Obviously we are in business to solve a pain, we close on a sale with many promises, start fixing things immediately through implementation and minimize future problems by providing constant monitoring, management, patching and advisory services. But how often do you sit down with your clients to sell them again? Yes, sell them again. They bought your story, your proposal, your service, your managed plan, your suggested hardware… how often do you sit down and break out just how much this investment is continuously worth to them even though they have already paid for everything? Thats value. If you do not have a process in place to constantly show your clients what it is you do for them or have done for them by all means check out Microsoft TCO Assessment tool and integrate it with your platforms, products and offerings. Show your customers business benefits beyond the core technology.

Whats new this week?

Posted: 10:25 pm
February 25, 2006
Web 2.0
4 Comments

With all my community and business stuff I have not had a chance to touch Vladville in a few hours and some of you noticed, thank you for writing. Here is the scoop on a few things I'm watching (hold down CTRL in Firefox and click away): Microsoft appears to be releasing a new device, Project Origami. Interesting part is that it runs full version of Windows (not Windows Mobile) so it might be the ultimate mobile productivity device. Of course, plenty of rumors around on this being the portable Xbox (Xpad), the mp3 player that will kill iPod, cure for the common cold… you know the drill. On the subject of humility, it must be rough over at live.com. Their new Office Live project by all accounts of those of us in the beta program is just a miserable failure. It is very nice of Microsoft to give people interested in beta testing this product a free license (even to the premium services) but so far everyone that has seen it has been disappointed. It is slow, it is not very feature-rich, it is not overly intuitive and with all the promise it has been hyped with it lives up more to the bCentral rehash than a new way to do business with Microsoft productivity applications. It is still in beta so things may change but they may have to change drastically for it to be worth the second (or for some of you even first) look. One of my friends that helps with the Microsoft Campus Start program got a chance to meet with me this week and he was pretty insightful about whats going on: "Vlad, its all about the free domain name. I'll hop on just for that, even though I have no intent to ever use it." Is that a smart strategy, instead of spending a lot on advertising spend about $4-5 a year per account to draw them in on domain alone. If thats the thinking, its brilliant, $5 to acquire a new account is an amazing deal, lets hope they have a strategy to actually convert on that account once it is there. Now on how to execute well: Google Pages. It launched earlier this week as Beta and is already leaps and bounds ahead of Microsoft. No extended signup process, no credit card or verification (for what is a free account anyhow) no confusing schemes. You just log in and start creating web pages in a simple WYSIWYG. If you're wondering how to pronounce that, it is wizy-wigg, but I'm getting off topic which is: simplicity. Sometimes it works (virtually everything Google does) and sometimes it fails miserably (Google Talk). This is why so many products succeed and fail over bad strategy: certain applications should be as simple and minimalistic as possible and get out of the way of the user trying to get work done. Others need big flashy graphics, features, toys, widgets, simleys and need to be infinitely extensible and flexible. With exception of Talk, Google does this better than anyone else. And with all the talk of web applications and stratigery, here is something you can use right now to impress the masses: use a web app to create pretty web forms. Enjoy the rest of your weekend, SBS Show comes out tomorrow.

On Honesty

Posted: 12:28 am
February 25, 2006
Vladville
Comments Off on On Honesty

Slight departure from the regular Vladville to bring you a quickie on honesty. This has been a big community week for me with all the events, shows, groups, podcasts, interviews and even a dinner with a partner from UK (Paul Young) that came all the way to Orlando to see my seminar. Here is one thing that I've heard this week, over and over and over, and it never ceases to disappoint me that this observation is actually stated out loud:

"Wow, you don't sugar-coat anything, do you? Just call it like it really is?"

I am not sure if something about my look screams slimy insurance attorney but I am often taken back by people who are surprised to meet someone with ethics and integrity in IT. The one thing that keeps the economy and civilization in tune is honesty. Honesty with oneself and honesty with the general public. I am by no means "shoot from the hip, I don't care what anybody else thinks" kind of a guy but when we talk about business or my job there are things I do and things I stand for. The faster I can tell you who I am and what I think the faster I can get to actually helping you and letting you know what I and my work represent. In all my years in IT I have learned that there is only one fundamental truth: if you BS you will be called on it. I have learned another truth about business: if you sell it eventually you will be asked to deliver it. So think of that when you try to lie, the person you are talking to can read straight through you. If they cannot, they will bite and then make you live up to your promises. Be honest. If your customer cannot appreciate you for what you do and stand for, they do not deserve to be your customer. So here is my short code of conduct: Life is short. Games are for kids and politics are for bad attorneys. If you're mortal and over 18 get over your insecurities and stand for something. Life is too short to be spent on posturing, manipulation and deceit. Stand for something, you will be respected for it by some and those will never abandon you for being a decent human being.

ISA and all those Apps

Posted: 12:25 pm
February 22, 2006
Friends, Security
2 Comments

Amy Babinchak, Microsoft MVP in ISA, has started a section on her blog with instructions on enabling some of the applications that need extra steps to work with/through ISA. Add her to your aggregator. She will also be on the SBS Show this weekend to talk about small business security so send your questions up.

Minimo.13 for PocketPC

Posted: 9:47 am
February 21, 2006
Mobility
3 Comments

Ok, you need this. Thats all I can say. The new PocketPC web browser based on Mozilla/Firefox code has just been updated to 0.13 and it has some huge improvements. First of all, tabbed browsing. Yes, tabbed browsing on your phone. No more navigating back and forth, open as many maps, pages and directions as you need. Second, and finally, a decent RSS aggregator for your Pocket PC. Need I say more? Go download it! Ok, now the eyecandy:

Inside SBS: Transition Pack to Lower Fidelity

Posted: 8:41 pm
February 20, 2006
Podcast
22 Comments

Inside SBS podcast folks decided excellent sound quality just was not working out for their show so they've gone back to Live Meeting. Join Mark, Peter, Damian or Justin (whoever gets punished into podcasting this week) to find out what happens when you outgrow your SBS. It's this Wednesday, Feb 22, live at 11:00 AM CST. Phone number for the live call-in portion of the podcast: (866) 500-6738 and use participant code: 7508158. Now a slight self-serving message: I'll be in Dallas next Friday, if time permits I'll go and see if they would be interested in recording another podcast at the Buffalo Wing House accross the street. Why am I asking you? Well, we're trying to figure out how to cash in on the average of 18,000-20,000 of you that listen to the SBS Show during its first week of release. So I'll be up front about this: How much would you pay to hear Microsoft PSS after 5 beers? 10?

Unifying E12, De-emphasizing and Mindreading.

Posted: 4:16 pm
February 20, 2006
E12
6 Comments

Terry Myerson of the Exchange team finally comes out and talks about the "de-emphasizing" of the Public Folders in the Exchange releases after E12. What is particularly insighftul is the comment by Paul Robichaux, fellow Exchange MVP:

Given that PFs will be officially supported until at least 2016, I think it's a safe bet that the SharePoint folks will provide a distributed multi-master replication facility sometime before PFs fade off into the sunset. My experience has generally been that many of the organizations now using PFs have lots of PF content that they don't need and aren't using, so PF cleanup is always one of the first things included in any supportability review I perform for customers.- Paul Robichaux, MVP

Remember that this will not be a shotgun implementation with your Public folders disappearing overnight. Microsoft has a 10 year support on its server products, which means should E12 ship this year you will have 100% functionality in your Exchange Public Folder infrastructure through 2016. Do you REALLY plan your mail strategy that far in advance? Really? Do you? In 2016 I expect my Exchange server to read my mind, write my emails, strip out any profanities and make me more coherent than my thoughts. I also want it to have an ass-detector of the person that I am thinking my message to – so if they are cool it automatically inserts a snide remark, like the following quote from an unnamed MVP:

No. "De-emphasized". Used in a sentence: "I de-emphasized him with a brick".

Unify THAT Exchange.