IT Manager's Journal

Paylocity provides payroll and human resources outsourcing services for companies that don't want the burden of performing those functions in house. Launched in 1997, is is the brainchild of founder Steve Sarowitz, who was previously a salesperson for other payroll companies. "My accountant said I might want to stop making other people rich and do it myself," Sarowitz says. Paylocity was birthed strictly with a Microsoft infrastructure, but over the last six years, open source has made some inroads on the shop floor.

From the concept of copyleft to the status of community projects, free and open source software (FOSS) raises endless legal issues, many of which are subject to rumors and misconceptions floating around the community. To help reduce the confusion for those managing software projects, the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) has released a freely distributable guide entitled "A Legal Issues Primer for Open Source and Free Software Projects." Although only 45 pages long -- shorter if you don't count the front matter -- the primer still manages to provide a highly structured introduction to these issues that carefully outlines options and is full of practical advice.

If you need to set up a secure, easily configurable Web server in as short a time as possible, then Abyss Web Server might just be the product for you. In development since 2002, its current version (2.5) runs on Linux, BSD, Windows, and Mac OS X. Its simple installation and setup (no obscure text configuration files) allows you to code your site with PHP, Perl, Python, Ruby, and even ASP.Net, if you're using the Windows version.

Metropolitan Bank Group is a large conglomerate in Illinois, comprising 10 banks and $3 billion in assets. As Metropolitan acquired more banking interests, IT Director Tom Johnson needed to find a way to reduce costs and increase efficiency in the face of the company's rapid growth. The solution was a migration from Windows to Linux.

The /proc directory is a strange beast. It doesn't really exist, yet you can explore it. Its zero-length files are neither binary nor text, yet you can examine and display them. This special directory holds all the details about your Linux system, including its kernel, processes, and configuration parameters. By studying the /proc directory, you can learn how Linux commands work, and you can even do some administrative tasks.

Perhaps the number one reason why people neglect to back up their desktops is the lack of workable solution. It can be difficult to find a method configurable enough to suite everyone's needs. One promising answer may be Restore, an application for enterprise and data center backup for Windows, Mac OS X, and Unix/Linux systems. It is GPLv2-licensed and freely available to download as a set of Debian/Ubuntu packages, virtual machine, or 455MB installable live CD.

Google's Web-based email service Gmail has generated lots of fans who appreciate the flexible power of its many features. In fact, combining several of these features makes a simple way to keep track of projects, meetings, and reports, especially for those of us slightly A.D.D. consultants who like to have everything in one place without having to remember to put it there. I'll show you how Google has captured and held my attention and brought more order to my daily work.

The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is a useful tool for examining the state of devices on a network. The open source world offers a number of consoles designed to manage the information from these devices and produce reports. However, there are circumstances in which access to the devices at a more customizable level is more beneficial. Given that the programming involved is minimal, it is worth considering custom applications for SNMP reporting.

There's always something brewing in the world of IT,especially when it comes to the open source community. Here are a few things you might have missed in the last couple of days.

Setting up a virtual File Transfer Protocol (FTP) server with a database back end offers many benefits. By using a database, you can store a large number of users centrally, so it's easy to manage. It offers more security than traditional Unix OS authentication methods, because virtual users can access only the FTP server's resources, not the OS's. You can use the many Web tools that are available to easily install, configure, and manage the database back end. A virtual FTP server also supports some special characters, such as @, that FTP itself doesn't support, which can come in handy if, for example, your company uses its employees' email addresses for identity purposes.

Does information want to be free -- of the corporate firewall? Whether companies are ready for it or not, many of their employees are already using public web tools such as IM, public e-mail, and social networks to share job-related information. Software vendors are rushing to simultaneously provide enterprise-class social tools and convince companies of their value, while some employers seek to block social networking sites like Facebook.

Notice the IT staff as they eagerly and innocently take their places in the conference room to listen to a well-known industry speaker. With a copy of the slides in their hands, the lights dim and the presenter takes his place on stage. After the first slide is displayed, their eyes glaze over and their brain slips into an altered state. They sit quietly, but do not listen -- hearing the presenter's voice without processing the message. Communication has broken down as employees fight to stay awake. Little do they know, they have just entered that place between logic and boredom. A place where little or no real communication occurs, and all productivity is lost. That place is: The PowerPoint Zone.

While you were gearing up for the big game, here are a couple of news items you might have missed:

For the fourth time in just a few days, problems with undersea cables in the Gulf Arab region disrupted Internet service on two continents. Though large-scale service disruption in North America is rare, it isn't unheard of, and experts have long recommended having a good strategy in place -- just in case.

In addition to speculating about who would win the Super Bowl, lots of tongues were wagging about what Microsoft's offer to buy Yahoo! might mean for SMBs. Google senior vice president, David Drummond, says the move "raises troubling questions" and suggests Microsoft could lead to a host of unfair practices and monopolies. Others, however, are optimistic about the value of such a merger. Reuters reports today that sources close to Yahoo! say the company might consider an alliance with Google if the conditions were right.

Version 8.3 of PostgreSQL, the popular high-performance object-relational database management system, was released today. It includes nearly 300 patches, changes that will substantially accelerate transaction processing throughput, and a slew of new features.

BSD-licensed PostgreSQL has been in development for over 21 years and has contributors from 18 countries. Together, they have produced a version that now includes:

• * support for ANSI-standard SQL/XML, including XML export
• * GSSAPI and SSPI authentication support
• * a full text search tool
• * new data types, including UUIDs, ENUMs

Performance changes include: Checkpoint autotuning, faster LIKE/ILIKE comparisons, and faster searches for results with LIMIT. PostgreSQL's source code can also now be compiled with Microsoft's C++ compiler.

Developers recommend that users with very old versions of PostreSQL may run into upgrade issues and suggest users perform "extra testing" before upgrading production systems.

Vivek Khera had a Web site called GovCon.com, a portal for government contractors in the United States where visitors could read about the latest federal procurement policies. Khera bought the information from the government and gave it away on GovCon, making money from selling advertising and ancillary services like newsletters and consulting. Khera says way to createhe never found a really good email service to send the newsletter, so he ended up developing his own product. When he sold GovCon, he decided to market a system for creating and emailing newsletters, called MailerMailer. "We took our expertise and built a system that would be easy for other people to use in a Web interface," Khera says.

In preparation for the February launch of three new products -- Windows Server 2008, Microsoft Visual Studio 2008, and Microsoft SQL Server 2008 -- Microsoft and Seagate are co-sponsoring a Web comic designed to showcase IT developers and professionals as "unsung heroes." The comic, named Heros Happen Here, takes a light-hearted look at the profession and its inherent challenges. Cartoonist and former DC Comics editor Jordan B. Gorfinkel is turning to IT workers in the trenches for inspiration and, according to a press release, is "counting on the IT community for ideas and support as this comic strip goes forward." Now instead of just imagining thought bubbles over the heads of your IT staff during team meetings, you might actually get to see it in pixels.

When Lena L. West contemplates the IT-related challenges her company must deal with in 2008, she specifically mentions online collaboration and mobile communications. In fact, IT analyst firm Gartner, there are 10 primary strategic technologies to be mindful of in 2008, including green IT, metadata management, virtualization 2.0, social software, mashup/composite applications, and more.

Many companies consider instant messaging to be a distraction, but IM can be an effective communication tool if used properly. OpenFire is an open source enterprise IM server that has lots of features to streamline communication within an enterprise. The server is written in Java and uses Jabber, which is one of the most popular open protocols for real-time communication. In addition to being cross-platform, OpenFire is easy to set up and administer.

If you were able to get out of the office and enjoy a relaxing weekend, here are three stories you might have missed.

The Computer Measurement Group (CMG), an IT think tank announced awards and fellowships for several industry leaders in recognition of "their contributions to the field of computer performance and capacity management." Winners include Adrian Cockroft of Netflix and Dr. Michael Salsburg of Unisys. Awards were also given to the authors of several papers on topics ranging from data visualization to server consolidation.

If you're planning on expanding -- and outsourcing -- your data center, have a look at FindADataCenter.com(FADC). Though it only launched this week, it's already populated with information on more than 800 facilities and includes information about security and connectivity, location, and amenities. FADC has a number of partners, including telecommunications consulting firm NEF, Inc. and FiberLocator, which "provides in-depth fiber network maps for 50+ U.S. carriers."

And in perhaps the oddest news of the week, an IT worker in Poland has calculated the exact speed of snail mail and discovered (surprise!) it's really slow.

Least privilege is one of the basic concepts of computer security in both daily administration and, more importantly, software design. It is defined as the practice of allowing access to a process, system, or piece of software only when absolutely necessary. However, according to security expert Dave Wreski, CEO of Guardian Digital, the maker of the secure GNU/Linux distribution EnGarde, it is a concept that's especially useful when combined with a free and open source security solution. It's also increasingly overdue for renewed attention by software designers. By understanding the concept, you can not only help to secure your company's networks, but also monitor their changing needs as computing continues to evolve.