Vlad Mazek – Vladville Blog

They tried really hard to avoid that stigma by the way, when I entered my keywords they would not let me misspell anything, including my last name. Way to go with the strict testing guys.

I’ll admit it, it took me a few minutes to figure out how this could ever be relevant or useful to someone and I think I got it. The Goolge Base service is basically a huge file sharing network. You can upload text, pictures, different objects and make them instantly searchable. Step back a little bit from the microscope and look at the big picture here: They are offering to hold content for up to 30 days and make it accessible and searchable. You can store a paper you are working for and share it with your coleagues. You can share your recipes or organize resources with a meeting.

Thats at least the dream I hope they had. With some access controls this could be an interesting response to Microsoft’s SharePoint technology that has a radically different approach but accomplishes the very same thing – intelligent, accessible file sharing.

Oh, and there is money in this. I haven’t said this in a loooong time but expect Google to make money with this project.

So I talked a lot about Exchange yesterday and more news are coming from Barcelona where Microsoft is really taking the covers off Exchange and even MOM to a degree. I have to say I am impressed, it looks like Exchange is heading for the full circle with the VoIP integration and messaging.

Steven Bink posted a video from the conference taping the demo of the call-in to Microsoft Exchange 12 server. I did not have the heart to send all of you and kill his bandwidth with this 6 meg avi so I’ve mirrored it locally.

Click here to view the Exchange 12 demo video.

It looks great. I know how many of you love the Live Communications Server (or at least the idea of it, before you see the price) and this is a direct integration of that. As always, you know the caveats… no idea when this will be out, chances are features will be added/removed, etc, etc. But it is cool!

Note: One thing that Steven noted was that Microsoft announced the change with IMF updates in SP2. Apparently, they will be shipping updates to IMF bi-weekly, something that I have not personally experienced. He brought it up to them and we’re waiting for a resolution.

Thanks to Tim Sullivan from the sbslist for finding this one, it is an announcement that Exchange 12 will be released as 64bit only.

Question 1: Why did Microsoft make the decision to offer Exchange 12 as a 64-bit only application?
Answer: Email truly is a “mission critical” application in most organizations today, and we heard from our customers that they were pushing the limits with their current messaging solutions. Demands being placed on messaging solutions continue to grow, and by nature 32-bit email server systems have memory limitations (4GB) which restrict their ability to cost effectively support these needs. Additionally, customers want to consolidate their servers to manage cost and complexity. 64-bit servers provide the system architecture required to meet both of these needs (accommodating new demands and consolidating servers).

Question 2: Isn’t 64 bit only required for very high scale customers?
Answer: The 64 bit architecture enables Exchange 12 to use inexpensive memory to reduce very expensive disk usage. Today, approximately 80% of the capital cost required to run Exchange is for storage. Our testing shows 64 bit Exchange 12 requires 4x fewer random IO’s per second than 32 bit Exchange 2003, which translate into large savings for all customers – especially as mailbox sizes grow.

Question 3: Will customers who want to upgrade to Exchange 12 be required to purchase new hardware?
Answer: The majority of server hardware being sold today is x64-based and many businesses are already enjoying its advantages and will not need to purchase new hardware. If you look at the CPU market today, the majority of the 32 bit only processors are diminishing greatly and being replaced with x64 capable processors. If a customer has not already made the move to x64 systems they will need to purchase new hardware for those servers upon which they plan to install and run Exchange 12.

Above is courtesy of Harold Wong mentioning it at a news conference. This would be a good time to check out the Opteron and familiarize yourself with the AMD x64 architecture. Their chips are very competitive with Intel on price (read: cheaper) and generally perform better (read: oh my god, it smoked a Xeon). Everything is going 64bit, so get ready. I bought a bunch of Celeron D’s last week ($80 chip) and they were all 64bit enabled.

Update: Its not just Exchange 12 going 64bit by the way. Remember, once the components go 64bit, so does SBS. As a matter of fact, Microsoft has promised 64bit optimized versions of Exchange Server 12, Windows Compute Cluster Server 2003, the Longhorn Small Business Server, Microsoft’s midmarket server, code-named “Centro,” and Windows Longhorn Server R2 (the Windows Server release expected around 2009).

Look at all the details in their press release:
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2005/nov05/11-15ITForum05UmbrellaPR.mspx

Steven Bink who was lucky enough to go to Microsoft IT Forum 2005 in Barcelona is reporting that Virtual Server 2005 R2 is now available.

“We saw a cool demo of a Running Virtual Machine migrating from a failing Virtual Server host to another Virtual Server host. This was done using new Mom technology, Microsoft cluster services and Windows 2003 Server R2.” – Steven Bink

What is really impressive about this announcement is the price. Virtual Server was a $799 and $1200 product when it was first released with this release being the SP1. Somewhere along the course of beta testing however, Microsoft decided to make this SP1 patch into an R2 and charge more.

The new pricing? $99 for standard, $199 for enterprise. This is how you kill two birds with one stone. You please your enterprise customers that didn’t buy it under SA because they were just testing it against VMware, and you bring in a ton of new customers who would otherwise be going to Vmware GSX server, now a part of IBM. I don’t know about you but I’m happy.

The fourth SBS Show episode was a more technical look at disaster recovery with Jeff Middleton and Scott Buchanan. We put the scare tactics aside but still had a presentation with two gentlemen that had to do some serious disaster recovery as both went up against a Category 3/4 hurricane and massive flooding. In contrast to episode #3, this show was more about restoring your business and doing things right.

We had a huge audience for show #3 because I suspect a lot of you forwarded this to your customers (or you’re lurking around) – either way, 15,114 people listened to SBS Show episode #3, 33 voice mails and a ton of nice people writing to us. I really appreciate it, thank you for promoting the show and finding the content useful enough to share with others.

So here is what happened:
– Talked to Scott Buchanan of PDQ Computer (pdqcomputer.net)
– Talked to Jeff Middleton, MVP of Swing Migration (sbsmigration.com)
– Talked about proper D&R design, implementation and restore process
– Talked about how to personally get organized in a crisis
– Jeff offered an exclusive free pamphlet on “How to move an SBS install intact to new hardware”
– Jeff mentioned the full D&R procedure outline in Harry Brelsford’s “Advanced Windows Small Business Server 2003 Best Practices” book, check that out if you’re interested in an in-depth technical overview.
– All else… check the show for details.

We never imagined we would have this many people interested in the show nor did we ever expect guests as impressive as the ones we’ve featured so far. Thank you for all your support and please keep on letting others know about this!

Download SBS Show #4: Recovering SBS in Crisis
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Orlando IT Pro presents Redhat Enterprise Linux 4
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
New Horizons, Orlando
6:00 PM – 9:00 PM EST

This is your invitation to join us next Tuesday evening for a very technical presentation on administration of Linux servers including installation, configuration and use on Windows networks. Learn how Redhat Enterprise Linux 4.0 is different from other Linux distributions, how it works and how you can take over and manage Linux servers. We’ll cover everything from installation to using it as a supplement to Windows servers and migration processes. As Linux servers emerge you will need to know how to manage them in small business so come over for a free (and free pizza) technical presentation and learn how to manage it yourself.

Please RSVP: http://www.clicktoattend.com/invitation.aspx?code=104833
Directions: Google Interactive Map

Meeting location:
New Horizons Orlando
1221 Lee Road
Orlando, FL 32810

Meeting Reminder: OrlandoNovemberMeeting.ics (click on this file to setup a personal alert in Outlook

Google Analytics has licensed Urchin statistics software ($199-499/month) to help its adwords publishers find out how to make more money. The nicest thing about it is the fact that it is free (capped at 5 million for adwords publishers) and gives places like Sitemeter a run for its money. It looks like Scoble’s take on how Google will become the next platform for commerce is in the full swing, combined with Froogle, Adwords and Analytics there is now not only a way to use Google for commerce, but also an incentive to promote it by bloggers world-wide. Think about it, when was the last time you saw a button directing you to eBay and Amazon like you used-to-could back in early .com era? Now look at adwords, they are on nearly every site out there… and now the free site statistics software right on top of it. Build, promote, cash in. Looks like the Underwear Nomes finally have their step #2 🙂

Nino Bilic is one of the guys behind the “You had me at EHLO” Exchange blog and according to Eileen Brown he has been writing some internal-only Exchange documents. Wouldn’t we all like to get a hand on those documents? In the meantime, several of those guides have been posted for your enjoyment. If you like what you see (or would like to see more/less of) please let them know as they produce more useful and more relevant documentation than whoever is putting it together for the product itself.

Engadget is reporting that iPodder had to change their name to Juice Receiver. iPodder is one of the best (and most popular) free podcast receivers but was forced to change their name because of the witch-hunt lawyers that work at Apple, company that cried so much about being sued by Apple Recording that it hunts down every company, manufacturer and partner and tries to extort every penny out of them. And despite years of mistakes, poor products and class-action lawsuits over defective and poorly constructed iPod nano they have found a way to stay in business thanks to millions of clueless people that are distracted with shiny objects. Way to go, Apple, my hat is off to you.

Back from Las Vegas for a few days before I take on the road again. We were at Treasure Island and saw Mystere for the first (and last) time. Now, the night before we did that we went to say Andrew Dice Clay at Luxor and to be honest I had no idea the man was so talented. In addition to his usual routine “Hickory Dickory Dock…” parade of profanities he did a few impersonations and three full musical pieces. The Diceman Cometh actually did Grease Lightning, with full voice and dance. Its one thing for skinny Travolta to pull that off.. but for Andrew Dice Clay.. wow. I was impressed and so was my girlfriend (yes, she went to the show willingly!).

Now I told you that story to tell you about Mystere: I uttered more obscene profanities during the 10 minutes of this show than Diceman did during his hour on stage. Let me explain. At one point during the show two dudes in white spandex come on stage and climb on top of a huge mushroom. They proceed with a few light acrobatic contortions and then start doing something that… I have no description for. It is… oh, just so very very wrong I have no words for it.

Now its back to business though. We taped the SBS Show #4 last night with Jeff Middleton and Scott Buchanan and I will be posting it later on today. If you’re in Florida please come out and see me in Tampa tomorrow and Orlando on Thursday, your friendly SST crew is coming through with Technet, TS2, Connections and MSDN.