There is no question that the secure, reliable retention of data is absolutely critical to good business operations – and, of course, that includes the ability to recover your data in the event of a disaster. Consequently, more businesses are prioritizing their data backup procedures including regular verification of data integrity and disciplined off-site storage of backup media. Yet, businesses are finding that even with rock solid procedures, there are still many areas of concern. Here are a few of the most prominent concerns:
Traditional Onsite Backup Issues
- Media (tapes or drives) must be tested regularly to ensure data integrity
- Reliability – most onsite backup systems (software & hardware) fail to backup all of your data. Often a few corrupt files, or an open database connection can derail the backup process
- Lifespan – a quality backup system will last between 2 and 4 years depending on the quality
- Maintenance – In order to have confidence in the backup system it needs to be maintained regularly.
- Security – For any given onsite backup solution, there needs to be an off-site option. Often, this amounts to an employee taking the backup media home with them. Obviously, this presents significant data security concerns – especially if the employee needs to be terminated at some point.
Make no mistake, onsite backup is a good thing – it’s just that there are some undeniable drawbacks. Consequently, more businesses are turning to automated offsite backup as a solution (i.e. backing up to the cloud). The one notable drawback is that you have an ongoing monthly cost, yet the advantages often outweigh the concerns about ongoing cost – especially considering the fact that costs have fallen significantly over the past 12 to 18 months. And the operational benefits are undeniable:
Benefits of Offsite Backup
- Security – Encrypted data transfer means that automated offsite backup is often far more secure the traditional onsite backup
- Automation – No switching tapes, drives, or transporting backup media to other locations
- Reliability – Today’s online backup systems are highly reliable.
- Retention – retaining data for more than two weeks is easy to accomplish, and for even longer retention periods, offsite backup is significantly less expensive than onsite data storage
Like all technologies, backing data up to the cloud isn’t for everyone. And even if you do decide to invest in cloud-based backup, it doesn’t mean you need to abandon your onsite backup. In fact, having some onsite backup never hurts because when it comes to your data, you have to be 100% certain that you can recover what you need when you need to recover it.
Though WordPerfect isn’t prevalent within most industries, it is still relatively common within the legal community. Many of these firms would like to switch to Word, but don’t want to eat the software, lost productivity, and training costs. Very understandable. But the reasons for moving to Word are growing by the day. As such (and since ITP works with so many law firms) I thought it might be valuable to post a recipe for switching from WordPerfect to Word that many firms have found successful…
Recommended Process
Though every firm is different, ITP recommends the following general process for moving from WordPerfect to Word. The transition is rarely seamless due to the inherent differences between the two programs, but following the process below can be instrumental in minimizing downtime and lost productivity.
- Assemble a project team or lead person that will manage the transition.
- Identify your key documents – Forms, templates, and other routinely-accessed documents are critical to your firm’s productivity. Ensuring they are available and functional immediately following the move to Word is key to keeping production high and limiting user frustration.
- Identify other document automation tools – besides forms and templates, macros, other software, and user-defined tools such as keyboard shortcuts and mail merges are also important to identify.
- Review options – There are always new software and tools that hit the market every year. Review your document automation options and decide upon the best tool (or mix of tools) for your firm.
- Planning & communication – develop a plan and timeline and then communicate that to your staff.
- Convert documents – Convert your forms and templates into Word format and test.
- Develop your training schedule – review your needs and the capabilities of your staff, and then develop a training plan specific to your needs.
- Purchase quick reference guides – No matter how much you invest in training, your staff won’t be able to retain all of it when they begin using Word. Quick reference guides can be a great tool for keeping productivity high and reducing user frustration.
- Training – Unless your staff is particularly familiar with Word, investing in at least two training sessions for each staff member (1 basic & 1 intermediate session) is recommended. Training sessions should be kept to 90 minutes or less in duration. Hands-on training is best for retention, but classroom-style training is often used because it is far less expensive and far less disruptive to operations.
- Walk-around Support – Schedule some time for supporting staff members with their specific problems. This can be scheduled as onsite or remote service.
- Remove WordPerfect from your systems – This step isn’t always necessary, and often WordPerfect can only be removed after some time has passed, but in most cases if staff members have access to WordPerfect, they will continue to use it.
There are few IT issues that are more pervasive or costly for businesses these days than spyware. Spyware not only affects the system it infects, but also tries to distribute itself to other systems. Additionally, it can be incredibly difficult to “clean” the infected system, often requiring the system to be rebuilt. Worse yet, standard methods of protection often fall short because users can easily circumvent them and click on a link or advertisement that invites spyware into their system by accident. Much like spam defense solutions, deployment of onsite devices have become more popular, and to some extent those devices are effective. But the significant upfront costs and the maintenance required to support the devices have both become detractors from these solutions. Consequently, cloud-based solutions have been growing in popularity.
In essence cloud-based web defense solutions provide:
- Protection against harmful links, sites, and spyware
- Granular control of the websites staff members can access
- Integrated reporting showing web activity for staff members
- Low-cost, zero maintenance solution
As always, this solution should be reviewed in context of your specific business needs and goals, but cloud-based protection against spyware have proven to be quite effective. And with the additional control you get for managing your outgoing web traffic, cloud-based spyware protection is quite a powerful solution.
It’s generally accepted that spam protection, is a requirement for the productive use of e-mail these days. Traditionally, businesses have used software to filter out the volumes of spam, but more recently, the use of local hardware appliances have become popular. Yet, there are drawbacks to both these solutions that have opened the door for more seamless solutions like cloud-based e-mail defense. In short, traditional solutions, whether hardware or software-based, allow spam to get to your network, using up your valuable bandwidth along the way.
Additionally, most (but not all) of these traditional solutions don’t:
- Provide e-mail continuity (retain e-mail when your e-mail server is unavailable)
- Provide the ability to securely view e-mails without downloading them
- Include the ability to send & respond e-mail if your mail server is down.
In essence, these are some of the greatest advantages of cloud-based spam protection. But there are other, less acute advantages, as well:
- Almost no upfront costs
- Zero internal costs for managing or administering the system
- Little to no training required
- Seamless deployment
- Integrated reporting
Like any technology, isn’t a perfect solution for every business and should be analyzed within the scope of your specific business needs, goals, and operations. However, the advantages are compelling enough that it’s worth taking a close look.
For many businesses the term “Cloud Computing” is this ethereal concept, pressed upon the business community as the new and greatest thing by IT powerhouses such as HP, Microsoft, Dell and others. As is the case with almost all new technologies, however, cloud computing isn’t really the greatest thing – at least is certainly isn’t at this point, anyhow. In my opinion, a more accurate description would be: it’s an evolving thing that has large potential value for business. There is no doubt that lots of small businesses have made the decision to invest in cloud technologies over the past couple years, and many of them, I’m sure, have invested quite successfully. But if that’s the case, what technologies have they invested in and what has made that investment successful? The answer to that question depends on the specific business of course, however, I believe there are 4 uses of cloud technology that are very likely to provide value to small businesses today. Check out my four-part series on some of the cloud solutions that could be valuable for your business, today:
1. Spam Defense
2. Web & Spyware Defense
3. Automated Offsite Backup
4. Email
Spyware is everywhere and it’s costing businesses and organizations a ton of money in lost productivity alone. Traditional methods of combating spyware (such as installing software on your systems) have proven mostly effective. The problem is that mostly effective isn’t really good enough. So what other options are there? Currently, I believe the two most viable options currently are:
- Deploy a device onsite
- Subscribe to a service
Onsite Protection
Devices like Barricuda Networks Web Defense device
and others work by filtering web traffic through their device which resides at your office between your firewall and your LAN (traditionally). It functions as a filter both for incoming and outgoing traffic and is quote robust from a configuration and reporting standpoint.
Benefits
- Powerful
- Robust functionality
- Granular reporting
Drawbacks
- Large upfront cost
- Annual maintenance costs
- Allows “malicious” traffic to utilize your bandwidth
- Need to maintain hardware
Service-based Protection
Service-based protection such as McAfee’s Web Protection Service works in a similar fashion to the onsite protection model except that the “filtering” occurs offsite. Basically, your web traffic is routed through your service-provider’s systems. In this model you don’t need to purchase hardware or maintain it – you just redirect your web traffic through their systems.
Benefits
- Easy to set up
- Very low initial cost
- Stops malicious traffic before it gets to your network
- No hardware maintenance or upgrade costs
- Highly effective
Drawbacks
- Recurring monthly cost
- Adequate reporting functionality
With these options, the days of combating spyware with just onsite software are probably coming to an end. Don’t get me wrong, onsite software is still necessary, but in all probability, adding another layer of defense is probably a solid, cost-effective decision at this point.
Tags: confidential data, filters, firewalls, malicious traffic, secure data, solutions, spyware, web defense, web traffic
Applications, Security, Technology Mangement, Tips and Tricks | Joe Ulm | 
January 10, 2011 2:49 pm | 
Comments (0)
Random Thoughts – Be Simply Consistent and You’ll be Surprised how Much Money you Save
Technology is complex. For most businesses it is also necessary. So most businesses go through quite a process to find and deploy the best technologies for their company. Then, of course, they spend as much or more time to manage and maintain their technology. Unfortunately, there really isn’t any better way. With the incredible array of technologies available to business these days, and the importance they hold within our companies, it’s no wonder that everyone spends so much time and money on their technology. Yet, it’s also easy to get carried away. That’s why I highly recommend keeping two principles in mind as you evaluate and deploy technology for your company: simplicity and consistency. Simply put, the more simple and consistent you can keep your technology, the less time and money you’ll spend maintaining it. After spending over a decade in the IT field, there are few things that have proven more true over time. Oh sure, sometimes multiple applications or a diverse technology environment is required. But even within those environments there are opportunities to keep patch levels consistent, or run applications on similar hardware. So as you begin tapping into your fresh, 2011 IT budget, consider a greater emphasis on keeping your technology simple and consistent - your bottom line will feel a little bolder at the end of the year.
MILWAUKEE, Wis., January 1, 2011 – Information Technology Professionals (ITP), a computer services consultancy serving the IT needs of the greater Milwaukee and Madison community, announced today the addition of software and services expressly designed to protect clients’ most important applications against downtime and data loss. ITP is now a channel partner of Stratus Technologies, a global leader of hardware, software and services that ensure the highest levels of uptime to critical applications.
“Reliable computer operations is critical to the success of nearly every small and medium businesses today, but typically difficult and costly to achieve” said Joe Ulm, President of Information Technology Professionals. “Guaranteeing 99.999% network uptime, complete with an enterprise-level disaster recovery solution, all for a price that’s affordable to small and medium-sized businesses is unheard of today. The ability to provide that will fundamentally change the way small and medium sized businesses deploy and manage their technology. ITP is proud to be the only firm in the Madison and Milwaukee markets capable of delivering this revolutionary technology to its clients.”
Stratus offers software and hardware approaches to availability, both with extensive built-in technology for service and system management to protect against downtime – planned and unplanned – and data loss. The Stratus Avance software now offered by ITP provides simple, affordable high availability to ordinary Intel-based servers. The Stratus ftServer system is a single server that delivers the industry’s highest levels of uptime. Both Avance and ftServer products support Windows and Linux applications, as well as virtualization technology.
“ITP has developed an excellent reputation for technical knowledge and quality of service, and we are pleased to be affiliated with the team,” said Eric Dougherty, Stratus vice president, channel sales. “ITP’s clients can now have essentially the same availability technology developed over three decades that many of the world’s largest financial institutions and manufacturing companies use to protect their critical systems from downtime. We expect this will be a very successful partnership for both companies.”
About Stratus Technologies
Stratus Technologies delivers uptime for the applications its customers depend on most for their success. With its ultra-reliable servers, software and services, Stratus helps to save lives and to protect the business and reputations of companies, institutions, and governments the world over. To learn more about worry-free computing, visit www.stratus.com.
What’s new at ITP
The new year brings us new challenges, new opportunities, and of course, new technologies for us all to review and consider. For many businesses this constant expansion of technology is both a blessing and a curse. Technology can be a great tool in fostering greater efficiency, productivity, and competitive advantage for businesses, but it can also be incredibly time consuming to navigate through, deploy, and maintain. As strange as it may sound, it’s no different here at ITP. Certain technologies like Microsoft are staples within the business world, but most others require rigorous investigation and testing before we can recommend them to our customers. As 2011 begins, ITP has added to our portfolio one of the most exciting technologies we’ve come across.
ITP is proud to announce its partnership (link to press release) with Stratus Technologies. Stratus Technologies’ Avance product guarantees 99.999% network availability. Yep, that’s 99.999%. With today’s need for businesses to be instantly responsive and “always available” to customers, this is great news for small and medium-sized businesses. See more about our partnership here www.itprosusa.com.
Tags: data loss, disaster recovery, downtime, Intel-based servers, linux applications, network, partnership, protection, uptime
ITP News, News, Technology Mangement | Joe Ulm | 3:11 pm | Comments (0)
There is little better example of integrated communications software than Microsoft Lync 2010. Microsoft Lync 2010 is a communication and conferencing suite that includes an impressive array of communication tools including, video conferencing, VOIP telecommunications functionality, document management and collaboration software, instant messaging capabilities, application & desktop sharing functionality and more. All of which can be used in countless ways to streamline communications throughout an organization and, of course, to improve communications to customers. At its core, however, this functionality is really just a combination of existing Microsoft products brought together to create a comprehensive suite of communication tools including Exchange (e-mail & calendaring), SharePoint (document management & collaboration), Office Communicator (instant messaging), and Office Live Meeting (web & video conferencing) .
Deployment
Microsoft Lync can be deployed in one of 3 ways: onsite, Microsoft-hosted, or hosted by a 3rd party (datacenter).
The onsite deployment requires a server (physical or virtual) and appropriate client deployment software (depending on what functionality you’re deploying).
Deploying the Microsoft-hosted solution is even easier because the infrastructure is already established and data simply needs to be migrated to the “cloud.”
Deploying to a datacenter may be the most complicated because it is similar to the onsite deployment, but since an offsite, 3rd party is involved, some additional complexity is included.
Pricing & Licensing
Pricing for each option can be found here
Want tons of other useful information? Click here
Subscribe