WServerNews: Fade to black

In this week’s newsletter:

Adios, TechNet forums; Not yet dead; Linux vs BSD; Let’s all take Friday off; NIST password recommendations. Also a TIP on Optimizing your network for imaging workstations, some MAILBAG observations about non-compete clauses, a FACTOID question about whether CS degrees are worthless, and a bunch of links to new articles on our TechGenix site and other sites including fun videos from Flixxy.

And just a reminder that our FitITproNews newsletter is coming out this Wednesday so stay tuned for it in your inbox!

Enjoy this week’s issue of WServerNews and feel free to send us feedback on any of the topics we’ve covered — we love hearing from our readers ๐Ÿ™‚

 

Editor’s Corner

This week’s ruminations from Mitch Tulloch our Senior Editor…

Adios, TechNet forums

Earlier this summer the much-loved (at least by me) TechNet Blogs finished being moved over to the Microsoft Tech Community site:

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/

The idea for this seems to be to consolidate together Microsoft’s events, learning resources and technical blogs into one integrated mobile-friendly site. The blog section can be found here:

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/custom/page/page-id/Blogs

Note that this appears to pool together both what used to be the TechNet (IT) blog content and the MSDN (dev) blog content from the TechNet and Microsoft Developer Network sites.

This earlier change frustrated me as there were a number of TechNet blogs I read frequently such as Ask Premier Field Engineering (PFE) Platforms and I had bookmarked a number of useful posts on these blogs over the years as a frequently needed to refer back to them.

All of those helpful links are now broken…

Oh well. Times change, I guess.

But now comes this announcement from Microsoft that seems to indicate that they also plan on retiring the much-used TechNet Forums (and MSDN Forums) and replace these with a new integrated, mobile-friendly site called Microsoft Q&A:

https://docs.microsoft.com/answers/articles/388/microsoft-qa-frequently-asked-questions.html

The site Microsoft Q&A is currently in preview and links to topics (called “tags”) on it can be found here:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/teamblog/introducing-microsoft-qanda

For example here is the Q&A tag for discussion of issues relating to Azure Active Directory:

https://docs.microsoft.com/answers/topics/azure-active-directory.html?WT.mc_id=launchblog-blog-QA

And a list of all currently available tags on Microsoft Q&A can be found here:

https://docs.microsoft.com/answers/topics.html

Note that Microsoft Q&A is everything Microsoft Azure at this point. But the previously pointed to announcement seems to indicate that bit by bit all of the topics on the TechNet and MSDN forums will be migrated over to Microsoft Q&A over the coming months, and as each topic is migrated the existing TechNet/MSDN forum will be frozen. And I suspect that just like the TechNet/MSDN blogs we’ll soon see the URL for the home page of the TechNet/MSDN forums turned into redirects to the home page of Microsoft Q&A.

At which point all of the old TechNet/MSDN forum content that was painfully complied together over the years — questions from frustrated users, expert responses from peers, cut-and-paste replies from Microsoft FTEs — will vanish.

Sigh. It’ll be like DejaNews all over again. Does anyone here remember what happened with that?

Doesn’t Microsoft realize that some of us working in IT still have to work from time to time with older Microsoft products that are running in server rooms? Why can’t they just create a site called archive.microsoft.com and move everything old over there instead of deleting it when the technology or product gets superseded or falls out of lifecycle?

I sometimes get the feeling that the new Microsoft under Satya Nadella wants us to forget that versions of Windows earlier than Windows 10 ever existed — and that the Windows Server and System Center platforms ever existed too.

Everything is now cloud as far as Microsoft seems to be concerned. Azure is now everything, everything else fades to black. Even Visual Studio looks like it’s going to eventually be moved into the cloud:

https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/services/visual-studio-online/

What do readers think about all this? Email me at [email protected]

Not yet dead

Rumors have been going around that System Center products like System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM or ConfigMgr) is dead. Read this recent post for example from the AskWoody blog:

https://www.askwoody.com/2019/hey-admins-is-sccm-finally-dead/

The Microsoft article being referred to by Brad Anderson, Corporate Vice President for Microsoft 365, and it can be found here:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2019/11/04/use-the-power-of-cloud-intelligence-to-simplify-and-accelerate-it-and-the-move-to-a-modern-workplace/

Is this simply another in a long series of rebranding exercises by Microsoft? Or is there something more nefarious at work that will lead an impending demise for SCCM? Share your thoughts/opinions with our readers about this by emailing us at [email protected]

Linux vs BSD

Albert Vanbuena has only been in IT a few years but he’s already posting thoughtworthy stuff on his blog called “Admin… by accident”. This recent post by him asks whether there are any advantages that Linux has over BSD the open-source version of UNIX. If you’re thinking of entering this side of the server OS world you may want to take a look at what he says:

Linux VS open source UNIX (Admin… by accident)

https://www.adminbyaccident.com/politics/linux-vs-open-source-unix/

Although I don’t consider myself very knowledgeable in this area, it seems to me that Linux distros still have better hardware driver support than the BSD family does. What do readers think? Email me at [email protected]

Let’s all take Friday off

The site MS Power User has an article that tells how Microsoft Japan has been experimenting with employees having a four-day work week:

Microsoft thinks we should have 3 day weekends (MS Power User)

https://mspoweruser.com/microsoft-4-day-workweek/

If productivity goes up under such an arrangement, why hasn’t Microsoft as a whole embrace this workplace innovation? What’s holding them back? And what are your own thoughts about having a shorter workweek? Would it make you more productive? Do you think your bosses would go for it? Why or why not? Email me at [email protected]

But don’t email me on Friday ๐Ÿ˜‰

NIST password recommendations

And finally, last week we talked about how changing passwords is so 80s and is no longer regarded by Microsoft as good password practice. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) apparently agrees, and they have some other recommendations about password polices that are worth taking a look at as they mostly make good sense to me:

NIST Special Publication 800-63: Digital Identity Guidelines – Frequently Asked Questions

https://pages.nist.gov/800-63-FAQ/

Hope you find that useful.

Got more thoughts about anything in this newsletter?

Email us at [email protected]!

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Got questions? Ask our readers!

WServerNews goes out each week to more than 200,000 IT pro subscribers worldwide! That’s a lot of expertise to tap into. Do you need help with some technical problem or are looking for expert advice on something IT-related? Ask Our Readers by emailing your problems and/or questions to us at [email protected]

 

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Tip of the Week

>> Got any IT pro tips you’d like to share with other readers of our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]

Optimizing your network for imaging workstations

If you find yourself needing to image a large proportion of your client or server systems within a narrow window of time during a deployment or migration scenario, you may want to create a separate network subnet for the target systems and put them in this subject. That’s because imaging them on your normal production network is likely to flood that network making it difficult for users to get their work done.

 

Admin Toolbox

>> Got any admin tools or software you’d like to recommend to our readers? Email us at [email protected]

Look at six critical areas of common ground for business and IT decision-makers, address modern digital business challenges, and learn how Cisco and Veeam can help you with it.

http://www.wservernews.com/go/08ai4qyb/

Bulk Crap Uninstaller lets you remove large amounts of unwanted applications quickly:

https://github.com/Klocman/Bulk-Crap-Uninstaller

Memreduct is a lightweight real-time memory management application to monitor and clean system memory on your computer:

https://github.com/henrypp/memreduct

Ksm is a fast, hackable and simple x64 VT-x hypervisor for Windows and Linux. Builtin userspace sandbox and introspection engine:

https://github.com/asamy/ksm

 

Mailbag

In last week’s newsletter we talked about how non-compete clauses in contracts of IT workers can impact our future career and employment prospects. This generated a couple of thoughtful responses from our readers. Franz Diemel who is an IT consultant said:

Hi Mitch:

Good morning. Love the newsletter. Anyway, DC loves it’s noncompetes. Here are a few that I have run into:

1) You will not work for 18 months after you leave us. (Unpaid of course).

2) You can not work within 100 miles of the client. (Basically, NOVA and DC out).

3) You may not compete against us in current or future businesses. (AWS’ lovely 18 page noncompete).

4) No noncompete but we own anything you do (on your own time, equipment, etc) (SAIC).

and on and on.

My current noncompete is limited to one year with my current client. Cheers.

Franz also added:

Better over worked and stressed than boredom any day.

Amen to that. IT pros like ourselves probably score high for ADD in psych tests, I know I probably do — bring it on!

Next here are some observations from Martin Urwaleck who shares a European perspective on the subject:

Hi Mitch, it’s a little different here in Europe. Most of non-compete clauses don’t hold up when people go to the labor court (and most do when they have a clause), simply because the impact on working life is too high. As long as the non-compete clause only touches the companies’ area of expertise (sorry, didn’t find a better word) you’re working with they are OK (because of possible business secrets) — but not if they touch your personal expertise. So if your’re a logistics guy – a non-compete clause for other logistics companies would probably be invalid because within your area of expertise you can’t reasonably work in marketing or accounting.

Another thing is refunding training expenses — but there’s also a time limit and the amount has to decrease over time. That’s perfectly valid.

Sounds like a pretty good system to me!

If any other readers would like to share their thoughts on this subject you can email me at [email protected]

 

Factoid – Are CS degrees worthless?

Last week’s factoid and question was this:

Fact: Developers everywhere jump on the Dark Mode UI bandwagon as The Latest Thing.

Question: What do you think of the new trend towards Dark Mode?

Only one reader named Joy responded to this one, saying:

Yes even OneNote 2016 is getting Dark Mode:

https://www.engadget.com/2019/11/08/microsoft-onenote-2016-revival/

I’m soooo excited.

Cynicism noted, thanks ๐Ÿ™‚

Let’s move on to this week’s factoid:

Fact: I read this recently in a comment on a board somewhere: “CS grads are guaranteed a six figure income: $000,000. All zeroes.”

Question: Is this true? Does a Computer Science degree have any usefulness nowadays when it comes to employment, career advancement, or earnings potential in the IT/dev fields? What has been the experience of our readers? Email your answer to [email protected]

 

Conference calendar

>> Got an IT conference or event happening that you’d like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]

Microsoft Business Applications Summit

April 20-21, 2020 in Anaheim, California

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/BusinessApplicationsSummit

Microsoft Build

May 19-21, 2020 in Seattle, Washington

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/build

Microsoft Inspire

July 20-24, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/inspire

 

Other Microsoft events

Microsoft Licensing Boot Camps – Dec 9-10 in Seattle, Washington

https://www.directionsonmicrosoft.com/training

 

Infosec conferences

Cyber Security Summit – Nov 21 in Houston, Texas

https://cybersummitusa.com/houston19/

Cyber Security Summit – Dec 5 in Los Angeles, California

https://cybersummitusa.com/losangeles19/

 

Other conferences

European SharePoint, Office 365 & Azure Conference – Dec 2-5 in Prague, Czech Republic

https://www.sharepointeurope.com/

SharePoint Fest – Dec 9-13 in Chicago, Illinois

https://www.sharepointfest.com/Chicago/

 

Podcast Corner

Capsule8 chief scientist Brandon Edwards (Risky Business)

https://risky.biz/netcasts/risky-business/

Microsoft Information Protection with Gagan Gulati and Adam Hall (Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast)

https://www.msclouditpropodcast.com/

Microsoft Ignite 2019 – That’s a Wrap! (Microsoft Cloud Show)

http://www.microsoftcloudshow.com/podcast

DevOps for DBAs with Kendra Little (RunAsRadio)

http://runasradio.com/

 

New on Techgenix.com

Who says configuration management can’t be fun?

Managing change in an enterprise isn’t easy and it’s usually no fun. Here’s a book on configuration management that will give you a whole new perspective.

https://techgenix.com/configuration-management/

Sky is falling: Will the cloud end up bankrupting your small business?

Cloud computing offers many benefits to small businesses, but it also brings certain risks, including the risk of bankrupting your company.

https://techgenix.com/cloud-bankrupting-your-businesses/

Is SD-WAN going to replace MPLS?

SD-WAN is frequently touted as a solution that will eventually replace MPLS everywhere. But is this a realistic assessment?

https://techgenix.com/sd-wan-replace-mpls/

Sound idea: Protecting your hearing in the datacenter

Now hear this: And you used to think rock music was loud. But have you ever worked in a datacenter? Huh? What did you say?

https://techgenix.com/protecting-your-hearing/

Plugging the gap in cyber insurance

The need for cyber insurance is gaining traction across all levels of business. But are the policies currently available adequately addressing these needs?

https://techgenix.com/gap-in-cyber-insurance/

 

Fun videos from Flixxy

Dazzling Drone Light Show In Guiyang China

526 drones light up the night sky in Guiyang, China, with a spectacular performance:

https://www.flixxy.com/dazzling-drone-light-show-in-guiyang-china.htm

15-Year-Old Kyra Poh’s Amazing Wind-Tunnel Dance

15-year-old Kyra Poh’s amazing wind-tunnel dance – a gold medal winning performance at the Wind Games 2018:

https://www.flixxy.com/15-year-old-kyra-poh-amazing-wind-tunnel-dance.htm

What Have The Romans Ever Done For Us? – Monty Python

What has (fill in the blanks) ever done for you? You can probably think of something …

https://www.flixxy.com/what-have-the-romans-ever-done-for-us-monty-python.htm

Paris 1900 – The City of Lights

Paris between 1900 and 1914 – restored and fully colorized, this footage presents a previously unseen journey through time and space:

https://www.flixxy.com/paris-1900-the-city-of-lights.htm

 

More articles of interest

Top server sizing strategies for VMs

How many VMs can you put on a server? That depends on whether your hardware and virtual environment are well-matched. This tip offers four criteria to select the right servers.

https://searchservervirtualization.techtarget.com/tip/Sizing-server-hardware-for-virtual-machines?Offer=Content_Partner_OTHR-_2019October18_TG_A1

Four VDI monitoring tools

There are a lot of options for VDI monitoring tools out there. Learn about a few products that can help you keep virtual desktops in check.

https://searchvirtualdesktop.techtarget.com/tip/Sampling-four-VDI-monitoring-tools?Offer=Content_Partner_OTHR-_2019October18_TG_A2

Test your VMware NSX-T, NSX-V knowledge

VMware’s software, NSX, enables admins to stand up networking in a software-defined data center. Take this quiz to ensure you’re getting the most out of NSX.

https://searchvmware.techtarget.com/quiz/Test-your-VMware-NSX-T-NSX-V-knowledge?Offer=Content_Partner_OTHR-_2019October18_TG_A3

Public vs. private cloud applications: Two critical differences

Private cloud applications are similar to public cloud applications, but there are a few key considerations, experts warn.

https://searchcloudcomputing.techtarget.com/feature/Public-vs-private-cloud-applications-Two-critical-differences?Offer=Content_Partner_OTHR-_2019October18_TG_A4

 

Send us your feedback!

Got feedback about anything in this issue of WServerNews? Email us at [email protected]

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