A SQL injection attack consists of injection of a SQL query via the input data from the client side to the application. A successful SQL injection exploit can read sensitive data from the database, modify database data (Insert/Update/Delete), execute administration operations on the database (such as shutdown the DBMS), recover the content of a given file present on the DBMS file system and in some cases issue commands to the operating system. SQL injection attacks are a type of injection attack, in which SQL commands are injected into data-plane input in order to affect the execution of predefined SQL commands.

Although a common problem with web applications, this vulnerability can affect any application that communicates with a database management system via Structured Query Language.

A SQL injection occurs when the application fails to properly sanitize user-supplied input used in SQL queries. In this way an attacker can manipulate the SQL statement that is passed to the back-end database management system. This statement will run with the same permissions as the application that executed the query.

Modern database management systems are powerful applications. They usually provide built-in instruments to interact with the underlying file system and, in some cases, with the operating system. However, when they are absent, a motivated attacker can still access the file system and execute arbitrary commands on the underlying system: this paper will walk through how this can be achieved via a SQL injection vulnerability, focusing on web-based applications.

Many developers and web administrators are complacent about SQL Injection vulnerabilities if the attacker cannot see the SQL error messages and/or cannot return the queries result directly to the browser. This topic was first addressed in a white paper written by Chris Ansley of NGSSoftware (http://www.nextgenss.com/papers/more_advanced_sql_injection.pdf). This paper will expand on possible ways this threat can be used. When trying to exploit SQL Injection in an application, an attacker needs a method of determining if the SQL injected is executed on the server. As well, a method of retrieving the results is needed. Two built-in functions of SQL Server can be used for this purpose. The OPENROWSET and OPENDATASOURCE functions allow a user in SQL Server to open remote data sources. These functions are used to open a connection to an OLEDB provider. The OPENROWSET function will be use in all the examples but the OPENDATASOURCE function could be used with the same results.

This statement will return all the rows of table 1 on the remote data source:

select * from 

OPENROWSET (‘SQLoledb', 'server=servername;uid=sa;pwd=h8ck3r',

'select * from table1’)

Parameters:

1. OLEDB Provider name

2. Connection string (could be an OLEDB data source or an ODBC connection string)

3. SQL statement

The connection string parameter can specify other options such as the network library to use or the IP address and port to which to connect. Below is an example.

select * from 

                       OPENROWSET ('SQLoledb', 'uid=sa;pwd=h8ck3r;Network=DBMSSOCN;Address=10.0.0.10,

                        433;', 'select * from table’)

In this example, SQL Server will use the OLEDB provider SQLoledb to execute the SQL statement. The OLEDB provider will use the SQL Server sockets library (DBMSSOCN) to connect to port 1433 on the IP address 10.0.0.10 and will return the results of the SQL statement to the local SQL Server. The login sa and the password h8ck3r will be used to authenticate to the remote data source.

By injecting this SQL statement, an attacker can determine if the statement is being executed. If the SQL is successfully executed, the attacked server will issue an outbound connection attempt to the attacker’s computer on the port specified. It is also unlikely that the firewall will block this outbound SQL connection because the connection is occurring over port 80. This technique allows the attacker to determine if injected SQL statements executed even if error messages and query results are not returned to the browser.

RECOMMENDATIONS

The strongest recommendation is to ensure that you do not have any SQL injection vulnerabilities. This is the most important recommendation because even if you address all the issues brought up by this paper, other issues will surely arise. To prevent SQL injection, it is recommended you use parameterized queries and filter all user input for non-alphanumeric characters.

The most systematic method to do so is to set coding standards that require this to be done. If the code is already written, a code review should be done to detect any vulnerabilities. It is also recommended you look at some of the automated tools available for detecting these types of problems.

Even if you feel you have closed all known vulnerabilities, it is still in your best interest to prevent these specific attacks by disabling some of SQL Server’s functionality. This is not practical if you are using the functionality. Fortunately, the functionality we are looking to disable is not used often.

You should disallow ad hoc queries through OLEDB from SQL Server. Ad hoc queries from SQL Server through OLEDB providers are controlled by setting the value DisallowAdhocAccess in the registry.

If you are using a named instance (Microsoft SQL Server 2000 only), set the value DisallowAdhocAccess to 1 under each subkey of the registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL\Server\[Instancename]\Providers. 

If you are using a default instance, set the value DisallowAdhocAccess to 1 under each subkey of the registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\MSSQLServer\MSSQLServer\Providers. 

Follow the steps below to set this value:

1. Start the Registry Editor (regedit.exe).

2. Find the registry key listed above.

3. Select the first provider subkey.

4. Select the menu item Edit\New\DWORD Value.

5. Set the name of the new DWORD value to DisallowAdhocAccess.

6.  Double click on the value and set to 1.

7. Repeat for each provider.

If you are particularly paranoid, you can also set the registry keys to read-only to be extra sure they cannot be edited.

It is also very important that you keep up to date with the latest security fixes and apply them as quickly as possible. In order to keep up with the security holes, it is recommended that you sign up for the AppSecInc Security Alerts targeted specifically at Microsoft SQL Server: http://www.appsecinc.com/resources/mailinglist.html

As a final precaution, configure and test firewall filters to block all unnecessary outbound traffic. This not only helps secure your databases but helps secure the entire network.

An organization’s brand, reputation and even intellectual property could be at risk as well.

That’s why it is recommended to perform a penetration testing to assess the security profile. It can help an enterprise build a more robust and reliable security posture. The purpose of penetration testing is to find vulnerabilities in an organisation and check whether an attacker will be able to exploit them to gain unauthorized access to an asset.

Potential benefits of a penetration testing include:

• Identifying possible security holes before an attacker can gain access

• Identifying possible vulnerabilities in a network or computer program

• Providing information that can help security teams mitigate vulnerabilities and create a control mechanism for attacks.

As security develops, the attacking methods are improving as well so there is a process here that empowers itself. This is the reason why every organisation should think about security as a culture rather than a task.

Some penetration testing coupled with proper user training and education will yield the best results for the long run.

There are different technologies and challenges during the penetration testings and they range between new web applications to relatively outdated systems. Most of known vulnerabilities such as SQL injections, Cross-Site Scripting (XSS), Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF), XML injections, Security Misconfiguration and Path Traversal are usually found during a penetration testing.

Firstly, it is recommended to understand the scope of work and the business objectives prior to the penetration testing.

The second step is to perform a vulnerability assessment. This step includes a preparation of test cases and executing them for each element in the scope. In fact, vulnerability assessment can be manual and automated to find more holes in IT systems. Here is an example of two popular automated penetration testing tools - Metasploit and Burp Suite.

For example, metasploit is an open source framework created by H D Moore. It is written entirely in Ruby, and contains a comprehensive range of exploits and payloads required for testing vulnerability of a remote system. Metasploit can be used for both legitimate as well as unauthorised activities.

The basic steps for exploiting a system using the Metasploit Framework include:

1. Choosing and configuring an exploit for a specific target. Metasploit has over 300 exploits for various operating systems.

2. Checking whether the intended target system is vulnerable to the chosen exploit.

3. Choosing and configuring a payload. A payload is essentially code that will be executed once the targeted system gets compromised — for example, remote shell.

4. Executing the exploit.

There are several other options available for advanced exploiting. Metasploit also helps in testing and developing of exploits.

Another good example is Burp suite which is a web application testing framework used by security professionals or web developers to identify attack vectors and to find security related flaws in their web applications.

Burp Suite helps you identify vulnerabilities and verify attack vectors that are affecting web applications. In its simplest form, Burp Suite can be classified as an Interception Proxy. While browsing their target application, a penetration tester can configure their internet browser to route traffic through the Burp Suite proxy server. Burp Suite then acts as man in the middle by capturing and analyzing each request to and from the target web application so that they can be analyzed. Penetration testers can pause, manipulate and replay individual HTTP requests in order to analyze potential parameters or injection points. Injection points can be specified for manual as well as automated fuzzing attacks to discover potentially unintended application behaviors, crashes and error messages.

The next step is to validate the vulnerabilities that have been found for exploitation and weed out false positives. False Positives occur when a scanner, Web Application Firewall (WAF), or Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) flags a security vulnerability that you do not have. A false negative is the opposite of a false positive, telling you that you don’t have a vulnerability when in fact you do. A false positive is like a false alarm; your house alarm goes off but there is no burglar. In web application security, a false positive is when a web application security scanner indicates that there is a vulnerability on your website, such as SQL Injection, when in reality there is not. Web security experts and penetration testers use automated web application security scanners to ease the penetration testing process. This helps them ensure that all of the web application attack surfaces are tested properly in a reasonable amount of time. But many false positives tend to break down this process. If the first 20 variants are false, for example, the penetration tester assumes that all the others are false positives as well and ignores the rest. By doing so, there is a good chance that real web application vulnerabilities will be left undetected.

The last step is to generate a report of penetration testing which should include recommendations. In penetration testing, report writing is a comprehensive task that includes methodology, procedures, proper explanation of report content and design, detailed example of testing report, and tester’s personal experience. Once the report is prepared, it is shared among the senior management staff and technical team of target organisations. If any such kind of need arises in future, this report is used as the reference.

Due to the comprehensive writing work involved, penetration report writing is classified into the following stages :

• Report planning

• Information collection

• Writing the first draft

• Review and Finalization

• Report planning starts with the objectives, which help readers to understand the main points of the penetration testing. This part describes why the testing is conducted, what are the benefits of pen testing, etc.

• Information collection is the complicated and lengthy process, pentester is required to mention every step to make sure that he collected all the information in all the stages of testing. Along with the methods, he also needs to mention about the systems and tools, scanning results, vulnerability assessments, details of his findings, etc.

• Once, the tester is ready with all tools and information, now he needs to start the first draft. Primarily, he needs to write the first draft in the details – mentioning everything i.e. all activities, processes, and experiences.

• Once the report is drafted, it has to be reviewed first by the drafter himself and then by his seniors or colleagues who may have assisted him. While reviewing, reviewer is expected to check every detail of the report and find any flaw that needs to be corrected.

 A penetration test is vital for any company or organisation who takes cyber security seriously. As already stated, if a penetration tester manages to compromise your application or network, then a real hacker can too. Penetration tests offer a proactive approach to maintaining high levels of security.

This article summarises all the latest updates, features and tricks the Teamwork guys have released in the past few months. We have summarised them all in one list with some short instructions. We also included the original links to the full official Teamwork.com articles and help docs.

1. The options to view a User’s Upcoming Calendar Events

Need an easy way to see if your team members are available for a meeting? this feature lets you view their events directly from their profile. In just a few clicks, you can see if their schedule is open.

How to use:

Go to the People section at the top of your screen —> select a user to view their profile —> In the profile view, select the Events tab.

2. Use Triggers in Board View to Automatically Add Subtasks

when you move a card into a column, you can set up a trigger that allows you to add subtasks — either from a standard list you create manually or from an existing task list template.

How to use:

3. New and Improved Notebooks for Smarter Collaboration

Now multiple users can view and edit Notebooks simultaneously and see changes in real time. Versioning feature that allows you to roll back is still available.

How to use:

4. Intuitive Project Dropdown Menu

Redesigned the project drop down menu to be more visible — making it easier for you to access project options in an instant.

How to use:

You can find these new menus anywhere you find a list of projects —> Look for the three dots next to the project name —> select them to open the project’s options menu.

5. Use Triggers in Board View to Send Custom Notifications

A new trigger that lets you automatically send a custom email notification to task assignees, task followers, or specific team members when a card in Board View is moved to a specific column, making it even easier to keep team members in the loop.

How to use:

Hover over a column name —> select the column dropdown menu —> select Column Settings.

Next —> select Add Trigger and click Send custom notification to notify task assignees, change followers, comment followers, or designate a specific user to notify. A text box for a custom message will also appear, so you can leave specific instructions or a friendly note.

6. Teamwork Projects for Gmail Add-on

Teamwork Projects users can now save time and effort by creating tasks directly from emails in their Gmail mobile app. When creating tasks directly from your Gmail inbox, you can add your task to specific projects and task lists, assign tasks to the right person, estimate times, and add a due date, tags, comments, or priority level. Then, when you’ve filled out all the details you need, simply select “add email as attachment” and your email will be added to the task.

How to use:

7. New Filters Let You Find the Information You Need Even Faster

Teamwork has created new filters that make your job easier every day. Now you can hide subtasks, show tasks that do not have tags, show tasks without a column and show projects without an owner.

All these filters will allow you a much better control and more granular search.

How to use:

8. Increase Accountability with Change History for Milestones and Tasks

Change History lets you see every single change detail of a milestone or task in one convenient place, so you can focus on the big picture progress of your project without losing sight of the specifics.

How to use:

Change history Tasks

9. New Metrics Panels for Dashboards

New, powerful dashboard feature, which is currently available on our Beta Program.

You can build up any number of saved Dashboards and choose which metrics you want to see for specific projects. You can also choose whether you want to see your personal data only or the data for your whole team. It’s also easy to switch between Dashboards, depending on the type of information you need to see at any given time.

How to use:

Make sure you have this feature enabled.

Teamwork settings —> Beta Program Tab—> Enable “New Dashboard”

Once enabled, you and your users will see your new and improved dashboards in the Home area of your site.

10. Task Breakdown in Workload

With this feature, you can see exactly which tasks your team members are working on. No need to click away from the Workload screen to remind yourself who’s working together or individually on specific tasks. 

How to use:

Go to the Everything tab at the top of the screen —> select Workload —> Click on one of the boxes under Tasks that has a number in it.

A list of all of the tasks associated with that number will appear, giving you all of the information you need.

11. Clock In/Clock Out Feature

The new Clock In/Clock Out feature lets your team record their hours at work each day without having to log time on individual tasks. This gives you accurate reporting and its flexible enough to allow breaks and calculate overall operation time.

How to use:

In Settings area select the Beta Program tab —> Enable Clock In/Out.

12. Desktop App for Teamwork Projects

Teamwork released a brand new desktop app for Teamwork Projects that will give you all the functionality of the browser version in a beautiful, distraction-free environment.

How to use:

Download the app —> Run the installation file and the shortcut will appear on your desktop post the installation. From here you run it like any other app.

13. Manage Your SharePoint Documents Directly from Teamwork Projects

Access your SharePoint document library directly from Teamwork Projects for an even more productive workflow. If your team uses SharePoint to create, store, and share files across your company, then our latest integration is going to make every project a whole lot easier. Link files between SharePoint and Teamwork Projects for more efficient document sharing and collaboration across projects.

How to use:

14. New Teamwork Projects and Zapier Integration

The new Teamwork Projects and Zapier integration now has triple the power with 30 Actions, 23 Triggers, and 17 searches to choose from.

New Triggers:

• Task Updated or Deleted – Triggered when a task is updated or deleted.

• New Calendar event – Triggered when you add a new calendar event.

• New Invoice – Triggered when you add a new invoice.

• Project Updated – Triggered when a project is updated.

New Actions:

• Create Calendar Event – Creates a new calendar event.

• Mark Task Complete – Marks a task complete.

• Create Invoice – Create a new invoice.

• Create Task Comment – Creates a new task comment.

New Searches:

• Find Task – Finds a task by searching. 

• Find Project – Finds a project by searching.

• Find Company – Finds a company be searching

How to use:

Here you go, lot’s of extra functionality and features in the past couple of months that given us better insights and visibility, better filtering and more productive workflows We hope you found this summary helpful.

This tutorial will provide the steps to set up your SSL certificate to ESET Remote Administrator Virtual Appliance. In this example, the procedures are applied to ERA version 6.5 using a Windows 10 computer as a workstation.

Requirements

Before we start, the following items are required:

• SSL private key
• Primary certificate (your_domain_name.crt)
• Intermediate certificate (CA_Bundle.crt)

Procedures

1. Open a text editor (such as Notepad++) and paste the entire body of each certificate into one text file in the following order:

The Primary Certificate - your_domain_name.crt

The Intermediate Certificate - CA_Bundle.crt

Make sure to include the beginning and end tags on each certificate. The result should look like this:

-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----

(Your Primary SSL certificate: your_domain_name.crt)

-----END CERTIFICATE-----

-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----

(Your Intermediate certificate: CA_Bundle.crt)

-----END CERTIFICATE-----

2. Save the combined file as customCert.crt. The .crt file is now ready to use.

3. Download and install the latest version of PuTTY

4.  Using PuTTY, establish an SSH connection to the ERA VA using your credentials (Username: root)

5. For security, make a backup of server.xml and keystore files located in /etc/tomcat. Use the command cp server.xml server.xml.bak and cp .keystore .keystore.bak.

6. Type the command nano server.xml to edit the file. Scroll down until reaching the keystorePass field and enter your strong password. Take note of the chosen password as it will be needed.

7. Save the file and exit with Ctrl+O and Ctrl+X. 

8. Download and Install the latest version of KeyStore Explorer.

9. Create a new JKS KeyStore

10. Import a Key Pair in OpenSSL format

11. Browse the private key and the customCert.crt created in step 2

12. Enter tomcat as alias

13. Enter your strong password for the Key Pair defined in step 6

14. When saving the file, a prompt for the KeyStore password will be displayed. You need to enter the same password as defined in step 6

15.  Now we need to copy the keystore file into the ERA appliance via SSH and name it .keystore. To do so, open the command prompt and type the following command:
pscp c:\<folder>\keystore.jks root@<ipaddress>:/etc/tomcat/.keystore
Here is an example:
 

16. Reboot your ERA VA. You can shutdown the appliance via SSH using the command shutdown -P now. Then you will manually need to turn back on.

17.    At this stage your ERA server should be able to see the SSL certificate successfully installed in your browser.

Note: If you get an error “Login failed: Connection has failed with state 'Not connected'” after rebooting the server, via SSH try to stop the ERA service and start again with the command service eraserver stop and service eraserver start

We also use Teamwork as our collaboration and project management platform so we thought, why not have the option of dictating reminders to the Apple watch which will be converted to tasks in a Specific project. This can be quite useful to quickly add tasks on the go. We have found a way to do that using an online automation and integration tool called Integromat. 

* This can be done with a wide variety of other supported and integrated apps, we chose Teamwork as this is our platform of choice. This can be also done using your iPhone or iPad.

* Even though this solution is working, there is a bug at the moment which makes it less perfect but still usable. Details at the end of this guide.

* This guide is for iOS devices. Android functionality is also supported on Integromat using various triggers but is not included in this guide and wasn't tested.

So, here are the required steps to get this running: 

1. Enable the Apple watch iCloud reminders as this is the default app that receives the reminders. These reminders will be converted to tasks.

2. Create a free account with Integromat. 

3. Install the integromat app on your mobile.

4. Register your mobile by using the sign in that you have created in step 2.

5. On the Integromat app on your iPhone, go to "Settings" and enable the following options:

6. Back on your PC, head to "Scenarios" section. Click "Create a new scenario"

7. From the list, choose "iOS" and "Teamwork Projects" and click "Continue>"

8. This page is basically your lab. Click on the question mark in the middle of the screen and choose "Apple iOS" --> "Watch reminders".

9. Click on the added module, choose your mobile device. Click "OK".

10. Hover over the side of the module and click on "+"

11. Choose "Teamwork Projects"  --> "Create a task" and under "Connection", "add" your Teamwork Projects account details. API key can be found under your account details in Teamwork.

12. After setting up your Teamwork Projects account, choose all the required fields and settings that you want to action once the trigger is activated. 

Your fields to fill in this stage would be:

• Project: choose the project where you want the task to go
• Task list: choose the relevant task list
• Assigned users: who will be the assigned user for this task
• Tags: apply the relevant tags. 
• Content will be your "title"
• You can setup priority of the task
• You can also add a start date and due date

13. Once all done, click "OK". Turn on scheduling, leave it on immediately. This setting is on the bottom panel.

14. Save the scenario. 

15. On your Apple watch or iPhone, record a reminder using the regular format. As an example: "Hey Siri, remind me to walk the dog". Go to your app, refresh it and see it appears as a task in Teamwork in the project you specified in stage 12.

At the moment, there is a known issue where the Integromat app does not refresh in the background preventing the trigger to fire. Sometimes you will need to give it a push by running the Integromat app on your phone. This issue is apparently on iOS side so I have a pending ticket already about this. Hopefully, it will be resolved soon. 

There are many other cool things that can be done using these tools. For example, I've set up a scenario where a task can go to a specific project by just saying the project name. This can be done using the "Router" tool and some filtering options. 

If you are looking for some automation or integration functionality for your business please feel free to contact us. 

Who is this for?

This use case is for people with remote families that want the ability to share their special moments and give the other side the ability to choose what and how they want to see it . We use our mobile, webcam or iPad but the main problem is that static camera does not capture the whole experience, sometimes it doesn't catch anything because it's just out of sight or wrong angle. This method is very impractical as the chile for example moves around and runs all over the place so we need to constantly follow him and adjust angles, distances etc... the whole experience becomes annoying, not to mention frustrating to both sides plus we always need to be there.

Why not give the ability to tilt, zoom and pan to the other side? That way, the grandpa or grandma or auntie on the other side can control the camera and follow the kids themselves gaining a better view and the feeling that they are physically closer, this will mean the world to them. This provides a much better experience and gives us some time off as a bonus. I can definitely say that it works great for me and the feedback from my family is awesome.

So how does it work?

As I have mentioned, there are many PTZ camera options and their prices range from an affordable $300 to a pretty expensive $4000 or more. You can go as far as buying a PTZ camera that will be able to follow a moving entity, which takes this solution even one step further (haven't tested). A higher range of PTZ cameras will also have an Optical and better zoom. 

In my case, after a long research, I've decided to use the first option which is simple and affordable. For myself, I have used the Logitech BCC950 and I'm very happy with the results. It provides a good video quality, fair digital zoom and a good microphone which is very important for a good video call experience.

Next, all you need is the free Zoom account and you are ready to start the setup.

Setup:

1. Connect the camera to your PC, install it using the online provided drivers.
2. On your PC, log in to your Zoom account. You will need to enable the "far end camera control feature" to be able to give the camera control to the remote user. Note: only the host can request a camera control so the host will not be you but the other side. Use this guide to enable this feature.
3. Install Zoom application on your PC. Download here.
4. Create the account for the other end as both calling partners need to have a Zoom account for this to work. 
5. You can now establish a call, test this feature and start using it. Make sure to read the link from step 2.

If you have any question or you need help implementing this solution, please contact us. 

WHAT ARE IT MANAGED SERVICES?

IT managed services can be defined as a model in which a third-party service provider, often known as the MSP (managed services provider), takes responsibility of managing, running, and ensuring the functionality of the operations of the IT systems of a business for a period of time for which the managed services provider incurs a fee from the business.

WHY SHOULD YOU ENGAGE IT MANAGED SERVICES?

• Centralise the operations

By working with an IT managed service provider, you will be able to manage all your IT systems in a single place rather than them being scattered across multiple parties. As the business owner, you will have one address to all your IT or Technology questions, this to be defined more accurately by the SLA (service level agreement).

• Reliability and durability

A reliable IT managed service will ensure that your IT systems are being handled by a team of experts who are familiar with the field at the question and have full command over the technical aspect. Since the infrastructure of any IT managed service is run under 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, you can rest assured of 24/7 monitoring of your IT systems.

• Saving on costs

Using an IT managed service that charges you a fixed fee on a monthly or annual basis means you have a complete picture of and control over your IT maintenance and operationality costs. Because of this, you will not have to be wary about unexpected charges, price hikes, or other financial insecurities. You will also save indirectly by minimising downtimes as in today's reality it can translate to a lot of money.

• Increased efficiency of IT operations

In a world where large corporations and enterprises, as well as regular individuals, are so integrated with technology in the form of computers, smartphones, and the internet, it has become essential for companies to employ the use of a wide range of IT systems to stay relevant and maintain a competitive edge in the industry. However, technology is not always reliable and is prone to damage, breakdowns, bugs, security breaches and more. Instead of hiring a special team dedicated to maintaining and managing these systems, these complex and troublesome IT operations can be outsourced to an IT managed service where your IT operations will be handled by a group of experts who know exactly what they are doing, resulting in increased IT operability.

• Decreased downtime

As mentioned above, continuous 24/7 monitoring and service of the managed service provider means that your service downtimes will be minimised, thus greatly reducing operation outages resulting in financial and reputational damages. 

• Central focus

Most importantly, by unloading the burden of IT systems and operations from your shoulders, you will be able to divert your attention to the parts of your business that actually require it. Instead of getting tangled up in complex IT operations that are outside of your scope, you can focus on the core of your business its direction, and utilisation of resources to achieve those goals.

Execute

According to your planning, the execution will basically mean to start running your backup plan. The first few backups are the most important as this will set and define the backup routine. When running the first few backups, please try to keep the computer free of background tasks to determine the backup is running smoothly without interruption. At a later stage, you can work as usual while the backups are running in the background. 

Remember that backups with encryption and high compression rate can be heavy on your device so adjust accordingly after the initial run.

Maintain

In this step you need to maintain your backup routine to make sure your backup is running as planned. Here are a few recommended tasks: 

1. Notifications - you need to set notifications\alerts. These normally go to your email upon success, failure or warnings. Normally, it's a good ideas to set to receive failures only otherwise you'll be just receiving too many emails, but then again, it's completely up to you. Notifications can also alert on your desktop. For a larger solutions, notifications and alerts will be collected into a central system that analyses them and generates relevant reports.
2. Manual checks - you can simply start the software and check its latest status. You can also access your backup target and browse your backup and identify abnormalities. This can be done randomly or not at all, depends on how important this is for you.
3. Scanning - always scan and maintain your backups targets to make sure they are in a good working order. Remember: hard drives will fail, the main question is when so you need to be always prepared with plan B and C (3-2-1 concept).
4. Review - adjust your backup plan according to your business and data requirements. This means that if you created some new folders in new locations, make sure they are included in the data backup plan. Same applies for folders and files you no longer need, exclude them to save space in your target.  You can also archive backups that are too old but you still want to keep them "just in case". 
5. Optimise - after running your backup routine for a while, you will notice ways to improve your backups, reduce resource requirements and find the best formula for you.

Test

This is the most important step many people and companies tend to overlook. After all, you running your backups and everything seems to report good results and you feel confident. Then something happens, you start your recovery but then just to find out it's not recovering as expected. This would be devastating.

Always test recovery after the first backup to make sure that it actually recovers the data and that all your encryption codes are working. To go one step further, try to recover to another device. The reason for doing this is to simulate complete failure where you need to recover to a completely new hardware. 

Make recovery testing as your routine if you're a business. Your business continuity depends on this. In a business it's not only if you can recover but also how fast, time is money. 

Microsoft takes elements of portability and convenience and converts them into a physical solution that is ideal and fit for the modern day busy individual. Microsoft Surface technology is equipped with detachable keyboards and lightweight frames that make carrying them around and setting them up anywhere at any time as easy of a process as anything. With time, Microsoft has moved on from producing portable laptops to creating actual tabletop desktops that can be dismantled, stored and carried, and set up at any location for immediate use without any problem. Needless to say, Microsoft Surface tech is defining the present and the foreseeable future of portable technology and associated accessories.

THE SURFACE BOOK

The Surface Book goes above and beyond what the top laptops of this generation, such as Mac, have to offer by boosting up its battery life by 70%, adding features such as a touchscreen and biometric security, and all the while improving the overall resolution a quality of the system.

Equipped with the latest family of Intel Core processors, up to 17 hours of battery life, powerful dual GPU usable in laptop and tablet mode, a 267 PPI PixelSense razor-sharp resolution display, and a 13.5” and 15” screen, the Surface Book can be used in a variety of modes, ranging from a classic laptop with a keyboard and touchpad, a tablet mode by detaching the keyboard, an efficient studio mode with which Surface Dial and Pen can be used for creative purposes, to a stunning view mode ideal for displaying information presentations, or just sitting back and enjoying a show.

THE SURFACE PRO

By far the most prolific best seller of the Microsoft Surface technology, the Surface Pro accounts for over 33.3% of all Surface sales. Microsoft Surface tech is equipped with the high-quality PixelSense display which makes for absolutely astonishing and stunningly clear viewing, adding up to an otherworldly experience. The laptop is supplemented with a kickstand and a Surface Pro Signature Type Cover to provide the complete personal computer experience.

The Surface Pro has the capability to be turned into a fully equipped and highly qualified studio whenever you need it. You can do so by simply unhinging and folding down the kickstand and adjusting it for the ideal angle for you to work with. With accessories such as the Pen Tip to complement the Surface Pro, Microsoft gives you the option to use Windows Ink and the Surface Pen to develop and innovate in your very own portable workstation.

THE SURFACE LAPTOP

The perfect balance of portability and performance. You don’t have to choose between power and travelling light. Starting at a weight of just 2.76 pounds, Surface Laptop gives you an ideal balance of both, plus all-day battery life — up to 14.5 hours.

The surface laptop vs the Surface Pro will give you a feeling of a full-size laptop so you don't have to compromise if the screen size is important for you.

THE ULTIMATE CREATIVE SURFACE STUDIO

Turn your desk into a Studio. Surface Studio is designed for the creative process. The 28” PixelSense™ Display gives you a huge canvas for all kinds of work. Use it upright, or draw on it like a drafting table. Surface Studio, with its strikingly large and incredibly thin Display, lets you visualise ideas as you paint, edit and design. Then watch those ideas leap off the screen with 13.5 million pixels of true-to-life colour and clarity. Surface Studio is a device created around you and your thoughtfully designed workspace. The minimal and modern design sits perfectly on your well thought out desk, with clean lines and a small footprint.

With such a wide choice of products and option, there is a solution for every user.

Before we start, there are a couple of concepts I'd like you to keep in mind:

1. The 3-2-1 backup approach - this approach states that you need to have a total of 3 copies of your backup, of which 2 are local and another 1 offsite. Note that a backup of a backup doesn't count as it's not from the original source and cannot be verified (if the original image was corrupted then its copy will be corrupted as well). For more information on this approach, check the link on the bottom of this article.
2. CIA - Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability - this concept is taken from the security domain but still applies to our discussion. It means that your data needs to be Confidential by being accessible only to the entities you choose. Integrity means that your backups are not to be tempered with resulting in changes to the data. Lastly, the backups need to be Available for you if and when you need them. Think about this every time you make decisions about permissions, encryption, backup target and ownership.

So, what exactly is the difference between assessment and planning? 

Assessment is the theory part, while planning is the preparation for the actual backup strategy choosing specific products and solutions. In the planning stage, these will be the key areas:

Software

There are many options when it comes to a backup software\solution and each one of them has advantages and disadvantages. Here, I will offer some of the solutions commonly used today by the industry, which are reliable, user-friendly and most importantly are working well (we personally work with them). Here you will need to choose the right product for you by doing some research and comparison. 

• Veeam - this is probably the market leader. Veeam supports both physical and virtual backups. It fits a wide range of users, starting from a home user with its free "Veeam Agent for Microsoft Windows" and all the way up to an enterprise solution with monitoring and centralisation tools. Veeam will support image level backups with an option for a file level recovery. It will also support scheduling, backup automation and notifications. The recovery process will require the initial image created upon configuration.
• Shadow Protect (SPX) - this solution is aimed more towards the SMB (small and medium-sized business) and higher. It requires a paid license and will support Physical and virtual host backup. This solution can be controlled centrally using "SPX Shadow Control" and monitored actively and remotely. For the best recovery, it's recommended you would create a recovery image, there is a process for this documented here.
• Acronis  - another big player in the backup market. It offers solutions for a wide range of users, from home all the way to enterprise and service providers.  Acronis delivers easy, complete and affordable data protection across any environment—virtual, physical, cloud and mobile.
• Duplicati - mainly built for an online backup so it might be useful for running your offsite backups. The software offers encryption, scheduling and more advanced functions. To configure advanced features it does require some knowledge but you can find lots of help online. Note that this is a free solution in its beta release. Always test recovery.
• Apple Time Machine - for the Apple users, this function is built in and works quite well. Easy to set up and maintain. The functionality is basic but works quite well. This solution is aimed at the home user or small home office. 
• VMware data protection -  vSphere Data Protection is a backup and recovery solution designed for vSphere environments. Powered by EMC Avamar, it provides agentless, image-level virtual-machine backups to disk. It also provides application-aware protection for business-critical Microsoft applications (such as Exchange, SQL Server and SharePoint) along with WAN-efficient, encrypted backup data replication. vSphere Data Protection is fully integrated with vCenter Server and vSphere Web Client. This solution is common in the large-scale - enterprise. 

Backup Target

Choosing your backup target is crucial. When performing a backup, you want to avoid a single point of failure. Storage becomes cheaper every day and it allows us, the end users, to have much more flexibility and capacity. Not long ago, some of those options used to be out of our reach due to high costs and high learning curve. The most common options for a backup target:

• External USB drive - for a home user, this will still be the most common media. It's a simple, cheap plug and play device that does the job. The downside is that it offers no redundancy and the performance is limited so if you store really big backups, this might not be the right solution for you. Note that you can find many ragged options so if you take your backups with you, definitely use a ragged one. 
• NAS (network attached storage) - this would be probably your best choice. This is kind of "one size fits all". A NAS can include one or more drives. If you decided to get a NAS, do yourself a favour and get at least 4 bay NAS, this way you can get redundancy in RAID 1 and 5 and eliminate a single point of failure. NAS will also have much better performance as there are more drives working at the same time, resulting in higher read and write speeds. Recent developments have also allowed the NAS to support SSD's and SSD cache modules to increase performance even further. Some NAS models can even act as servers allowing you to virtualise servers and other hosts. The most common to use would be QNAP and Synology. There are many comparisons online, we personally prefer QNAP.
• Fireproof\waterproof Storage (ioSafe) - this company manufactures both USB drives and NAS appliances powered by Synology DSM. The main advantage is that this storage is water and fireproof. This would be a great secondary backup target as part of your DR(disaster recovery) strategy.
• SAN - SAN operates on a fibre channel. Normally, SAN would aggregate a number of local storage devices into one and will be directly attached as a local storage (SCSI). This solution is used in large-enterprise scale companies due to implementation and maintenance costs.
• Cloud - cloud storage is a very affordable and reliable storage. There are many options like AWS, Google Drive, Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive, Azure and more. Use cloud storage as an offsite backup option. The performance will highly depend on your WAN connection so this solution performance may vary. When backing up to cloud always remember to encrypt your data to secure it as much as possible.
• Tape drives - if you can, please avoid using these targets. The tape is still being used but for a home or SMB use, I would avoid going with this option. I know some people may argue otherwise but I personally avoid them unless there is a very specific reason to use them.

Type of backup

Choosing the type of your backup is a very important consideration. This depends on the available capacity you have, the rate of changes to your data and your future recovery strategy. Where possible, always enable the VSS (Volume Shadow Copy Service) to allow backing up files in use avoiding errors or locked files. Backup type breaks into 3 main categories:

1. Image level backup - is a barebone backup of your device used for recovery from scratch. This is a must for a proper business continuity plan. This includes the data and the settings. You can create hardware independent image if you want the option to recover to another hardware in the future. Make sure this option is available with your backup solution.

• Full - includes all your data. It's not practical for everyday backup. It is mostly used as the first backup in the series.
• Incremental - includes all the changes since the last backup. This option saves on space, but the recovery process becomes longer as it requires the full image plus each one of the incremental images to the required point in time.
• Differential - this backup includes all the changes since the last full backup. It is a better option for fast recovery but requires more capacity to store the images.
• Active Full - this is normally being done to assure the integrity of your backup series. This will run a full backup at designated points in time according to the schedule. This backup will not act as part of a series so incremental and differentials will not be affected by it. Note, this will require the same amount of capacity as a regular full backup.

2. File Level backup - this level of backup will be mostly used by home users or other specific cases where the operating system has a little importance. This will backup files only.

• Full - includes a full set of all your files in your chosen source directory.
• Changes only - will include all the files which were modified since the last backup. 

3. Settings level backups - this level will backup the system state and all related settings. Your personal data will stay untouched. This is normally a useful type of backup to do before wide system changes and firmware and software upgrades.

• Snapshots - snapshots take the machine back in time to precisely how it was. They are the equivalent to taking an incremental image backup without being part of a chain of backups.
• Restore-points - helps you restore your computer's system files to an earlier point in time. It's a way to undo system changes to your computer without affecting your personal files, such as email, documents, or photos. It's designed to take the system state back not to roll back the entire system.
• System state - will backup system settings only.

4. Other backup types and solutions - there are specific backup types for a specific solution on which I will not extend in this blog. Some of them include: 

• Database
• Exchange
• Sharepoint
• Etc...

Backup Retention

Retention policy defines the timeframe of the option to recover your backups to. This can be set up to any timeframe as long as you have made the right calculation to sustain it in terms of capacity. There are two key factors you should take into account to estimate the required capacity. The first is what is the data change rate and the second is the length of the required retention.

To calculate your required estimated capacity, you can use the following tool.

Backup Permissions and other consideration

• Always create a service user for backup purposes. Never give the backup full administrative rights to avoid security and other access issues.
• Place your backup device when possible away from water and hot places. Storage devices can easily overheat.
• Keep your encryption keys in a safe place. Do not lose them. Recovering encryption keys will be impossible. 

Reference: 

https://www.backblaze.com/blog/the-3-2-1-backup-strategy/

https://propartner.veeam.com/restore-point-simulator

To be continued in part 3

In this guide, I'll show you how to automate your posting to your LinkedIn business page from Squarespace. Please note, this is a workaround that works for free and requires you to have a Zapier free account and a Facebook page for the same company. 

When sharing your blogs and news from Squarespace, you'll find that it only shared to your personal LinkedIn profile, it will not post to your company LinkedIn page as this is a Squarespace limitation. I did find a way around that by using a 3rd party tool that uses the data posted on the Facebook page.

Who is this guide for? 

For those users of Squarespace who want to post the same updates and blogs across their social media platforms and business pages automatically. By default, Squarespace won't allow to include your LinkedIn company page in this campaign.

1. Open a Zapier account

You can register an account for free. It will allow you up to 5 "Zaps". For this operation, you'll need to use 1 Zap.

2. After the login process, click on "Make a Zap" 

3. In this step, it's assumed your Squarespace connected and posts to your Facebook page. Choose the first Trigger App as "Facebook Pages"

4. Choose the Trigger "New Post to Your Timeline"

5. Connect your Facebook page by providing the relevant credentials. Click "Test" to verify the connection is successful. Click "Save and continue" to proceed.

6. Choose the Page that includes the posts submitted by Squarespace. Click "continue" to proceed.

7. Click "Fetch & continue" to proceed. Then click "continue" again.

At this point, you have completed the first part of the integration. Let's now connect the LinkedIn page.

8. Search and click on "LinkedIn" app

9. Choose the "create company update" Action. Click "save + continue" to proceed

10. Connect to your LinkedIn account by providing the credentials of your LinkedIn account. Click "Test" to verify a successful connection. Click "continue" to proceed.

11. Under "LinkedIn Company Page", Choose the company page you'd like to post the update to. 

12. Under "Update Content" click the "+" icon on the right to add the relevant fields. (to make it simple, just choose link).

13. Click "continue" to proceed.

14. Click "Send Test To LinkedIn". Open your LinkedIn page to verify that you can see the post. If you can see it, you've done everything correctly. You can also skip the test but I do recommend you to test it's actually working. 

15. Give your Zap a name that will make sense. Try to be descriptive as you might have more Zaps in the future. Turn your Zap ON and you're done. This Zap will auto-run every 15 minutes.

I hope this guide helps some of you. 

A similar process can apply to re-post on Twitter and Facebook. 

Comment below if you have any questions.

When it comes to backup, I recommend applying the same practices to both personal and business where the later one requires more planning, but the concepts are similar.

So, what is my approach to backup in a few words?

Assess, plan, execute, maintain and test

Assess

This stage is basically a risk management stage. The leading questions here are:

"What if I lose this folder or this file?"

"What happens if someone sees, opens or modifies my files?"

"If a disaster strikes, how fast can I recover to be back in business?"

So, you should look at your data and decide what are the implications of losing it and what would be its value. Not always value is counted in dollars. 

During the assessment, you should consider:

Location

Where is your data stored? For the average user, the data can be on multiple devices like laptop, mobile, tablet, PC, work PC, cloud and more... it's important to mention right here, having your data in the cloud does not guarantee much, you should always aim to keep an offline copy. To have a better control over your important data, try to centralise it, this means, try to have a central point of storage on which you will later apply your backup solution. Always have a copy of your data in at least 2 physically separate places.

CAPACITY

You need to assess the capacity of your data, including future expected capacity. This means, if you're generating heaps of data every day, then you should take it into account as this is going to have a big impact on your backup plan. Capacity is impacted by the quality of the videos, images and sound. For example, a 4K format video will be much bigger than HD. So you should consider if you want to store a backup of the full version or a reduced version to save some space. You can also apply compression with some of the backup solutions that will be described further.

RETENTION

Data retention policy basically means how far back can you go with your data recovery. Retention is simply restore point of your data, so not only you can recover your data, but you can also decide from which date and time to you want it to be recovered. This can be very useful when you deleted some file by accident and only found out about it a month later. Of course, you cannot retain data forever so the factor here is how much data do you have vs how much storage is available for you.

Security and privacy 

This is a big consideration. When backing up your data, always assess how secure it will be at the backup target. Don't assume "it's secure", this will be the most common mistake. The best approach to keep your data secure and private is to apply an encryption. If an encryption is applied to your backup, it cannot be recovered without the encryption key so make sure you have it somewhere safe (KeePass for example).

We’ve put together a list of tools and technology to help you focus on the things that make your agency successful and stay focused on your customers.

Time Tracking Software

As a digital agency, it all boils down to how you and your team spend, bill, and manage time. While some agencies may have started with (or may still be using) an Excel spreadsheet to track hours, it can be quite painful to maintain accurate data — especially as you grow.

Because every minute counts in an agency environment, you'll want to get your time-tracking technology squared away quickly.

Here are some tools that can help you to make a better use of your time:

Easy Timesheets

You want something that’s user-friendly for everyone on the team and offers a mobile app, automated time tracking features, and easy-to-access reports and visual summaries of timesheet approvals and completion.

If it's not easy, your team won't accurately track their time.

Agency Insights

Tracking time worked on projects is simple. What is much more interesting, is how employee time affects agency operations. Beyond just having visibility into how long something took and the associated billable hours, it's important to understand:

• Employee utilisation by a person, team, and client
• How actual costs stack up against estimates
• How costs are allocated to different activities or groups

There are dozens of reasons why agencies should track time, and while it might not be the most enjoyable part of running a business, it's the most effective way to measure operations and accurately bill clients.

Employee Resource Planning

Knowing the capacity of your workforce is at the core of managing your projects and starting new ones.

Imagine how much more effective your agency could be if you had real-time visibility into employee capacity? Managing employee capacity is key to keeping costs down and knowing when to hire new team members.

That’s what resource planning software is designed to help you do.

While the specific features vary across platforms, the goal is the same: to streamline the management of your people and their hours. And the larger your agency becomes, the more important it is to properly understand and schedule future employee time.

Expense Management

How many expenses does your team submit each month? How much time does it take to enter the data, collect the receipts, submit them to Accounting or HR, and then reimburse employees?

If these questions are making you feel uncomfortable, it's probably time to move to a more modern expense management system. There are literally hundreds of different expense management software that can save your organization time and money, and reduce confusion around who can expense and approve various gifts, drinks, meals, mileage, etc.

CRM

Customer relationship management is critical to running a successful agency. As your business grows, you'll need a system that will organize and manage the relationships with existing and past customers, as well as your prospects and leads.

CRM solutions are great for:

• Storing and maintaining accurate customer information
• Managing customer communications
• Understanding and measuring customer engagement
• Tracking billing and other payment histories
• Improving customer communications for your sales and customer success teams

Also, to add on to the third point, it may also be a good idea to automate your social media for optimal engagement.

Project Management

Every agency needs to manage projects, and there are a number of simple project management tools that can significantly increase your employee's ability to get work done quickly.

Teamwork has a great overview of project management software that we recommend you check out!

Finding the right project management software for your business is not an easy task, but much like time tracking, it's an essential part of running an agency.

Team Communication

How do you communicate with your team throughout the day? In-person? Phone? Text?

At YMtech, we're huge fans of Teamwork Chat, which makes it easy to chat with anyone in your organisation. Teamwork Chat allows you to create specific channels, which help guide discussions and makes it easy to build simple integrations with your CRM, time tracking, expense management, and other software.

Ticketing and Support System

To efficiently support your clients, there are a few solutions on the market. Here at YMtech, we love Teamwork Desk. Teamwork Desk is at the heart of all your customer interactions, making communication effortless and seamless, ensuring nothing falls through the cracks.

You can receive and resolve tickets, assign them to your team, assign priorities and eliminate the use of email for that purpose while providing a fast response to your clients. It can even track time for you. 

With so much to focus on — from changes to Facebook’s privacy rules to updates to the Instagram algorithm, marketing can often feel like a game of whack-a-mole. Rather than running from one thing to the next, here are some time management hacks that can make your day more productive — and less stressful.

1. Focus on Tasks Linked to Revenue

Do you ever leave work feeling like you were busy all day, yet wondering what, exactly, you accomplished? It’s easy to lose time on so-called “busy work” — answering emails, sitting in meetings, and responding to news alerts — without actually achieving anything. There are so many distracting, shiny objects: email, social media, meetings, calls. Before you realise it, the day is already over.

Try this experiment: keep an eye on your daily activities over the next week to see how you’re spending your time. ClickTime’s time tracker or a gadget like ZEI can help you see what takes up most of your energy and attention during the workday. Then, recalibrate. What activities are helping you directly achieve your marketing goals (and thus, gain revenue), and what activities are simply getting in your way? Focus on the things that have the highest impact on your business, and re-prioritise everything thereafter.

2. Automate As Much As Possible

Bring on the robots! The best time management hacks? Having free tools do your work for you. Buffer and Hootsuite are good options for scheduling your social media posts ahead of time. MailChimp and Customer.io let you automate email campaigns. Hubspot and Marketo can help streamline your lead generation and inbound sales funnels. For marketers, these tools can turbo-boost your marketing campaigns in no time.

As for your personal productivity, look for tools like Teamwork to keep your teams running a tight ship. To improve and create automatic workflows, use Zapier or Integromat. Content writers can improve their prose with the Grammarly app, which checks your grammar and helps you optimise your sentences.

3. Maximize Your Minimum Effort

Have you heard of the 80/20 Pareto rule? Simply, the Pareto rule states that 20% of your input can produce 80% of your return. This is a key principle for marketers and for time management overall. First, it means 80% of your revenue comes from 20% of your customers. Therefore, you can streamline your marketing efforts to target those select few — and spend less time, energy, and resources on far-flung marketing efforts to the whole universe of potential customers.

Likewise, as a productivity hack, it means that 20% of your time can produce 80% of your results. The Pareto rule lets you focus on the few things that are truly important on your to-do list. It feels great to cross everything off your to-do list, but spending time on small tasks is preventing you from focusing on the larger items that will have a bigger impact.

4. Set Productivity KPIs

Key performance indicators are a marketer’s best friend (or worst enemy, depending on how your campaigns are doing). You likely already have KPIs for your social media channels and marketing initiatives. Did you know you can also set informal KPIs to see how you can best use your time? Hack your to-do list to make it more specific, measurable, and action-oriented. Rather than “write social media posts,” your KPI should read “write 10 Instagram posts by Friday at noon.” This gives you a better sense of how long a task will take, and motivate you to allocate time accordingly.

5. Make Your Calendar Work for You

Sometimes, one of the hardest parts of time management is defending your actual time. Working in an office comes with lots of interruptions, distractions, and commitments. Make your calendar your first layer of defence against time creep. Block off time in your calendar for to give yourself uninterrupted work time. Pad offsite meetings with travel time to reduce the stress of rushing from place to place. Set up self-reminder events in your calendar to keep track of deadlines. 

Take a deep breath, carve out some time for your headspace, and use some handy tools to take control of your workday. By using your calendar, marketing automation hacks, and some strict prioritisation, you suck more energy out of your day (and get back to living your best life).

As a rule, lower frequencies have a longer wavelength and can travel further than higher frequencies. Of course, obstacles do further weaken the wireless signal. 2.4GHz travels further than a 5GHz wave and will get more easily through an obstacle.

2.4GHz APs have a longer history than 5GHz capable APs. The problem is, that in most places the 2.4GHz spectrum has become overcrowded with competing APs (neighbours AP, Bluetooth, Baby monitors, Wireless Headphones etc…)

All these devices using the same frequency range from 2400 MHz to 2483 MHz can cause saturation. "Channel saturation" happens when too many Wireless Access Points ("WAP") have a Wi-Fi Network SSID operating on the same channel and are too close together.  This causes interference which in turn causes network slowness and network disconnects.

5GHz gives you much more flexibility. It offers more non-overlapping channels to choose from than the 2.4GHz spectrums. Mind that the number of available channels for 5GHz depends on the region you live in.

Because 5GHz provides shorter signal coverage than the 2.4GHz and has more available channels, will be the right choice to choose for a high-density situation for example shared offices, buildings and highly populated areas.

To avoid interference and maximizing the performance of Wi-Fi it is crucial to understand how channels work.

In radio communication, an AP receives a channel and bandwidth assignment over which it transmits and receives signals from clients. This channel assignment pertains to the centre frequency of the first 20MHz used by the station. Latest technologies use channel bonding, this permits to use larger channel bandwidth for higher throughput.

Unifi defines that with HT20, HT40 and HT80 (20MHz, 40MHz and 80MHz). Higher width means more throughput but, the drawback is that this uses more available radio spectrum and you'll have less clean channels to use for additional APs. The wider you run your AP, more power must be spread across a wider channel. This results in a shorter range.

For 2.4GHz it's recommended to use HT20 with channels 1, 6 and 11. HT40 and HT80 are best used with 5GHz.

It's important to know your environment, you should aim to use channels with low utilisation. To achieve this, you can do an RF scanning in advanced Wi-Fi equipment. For example, you can use the ability of the latest Unifi AC APs to do an RF-Environment scan. This scan will show you also radios that a "normal" Wi-Fi scanner won't see. It can scan the full spectrum and shows the utilisation of each available channel and channel width.

In a normal case, you would install your AP without making this scan resulting in a very low throughput and you wouldn’t know why!

Why is it important to use a clean channel?

There are two reasons. First is noise.

Imagine you're in a packed bar with lots of people and you're trying to talk to a friend just a few feet away, but you're not allowed to shout. You're only allowed to talk.

The more noise there is, the less you'll understand, and you will have to repeat your words until your friend understands you or in some case may need to come closer otherwise the message won’t reach him.

The second reason is a clearly defined communication from a neighbouring RF source talking place on your channel. To understand this one, you need to understand how a communication is regulated by the 802.11 standards.

It is based on CSMA/CA Carrier Sense Multiple Access/Collision Avoidance Protocol. An 802.11 station will listen to the wireless channel prior to transmitting the data. If the channel is available, then the station will transmit. If the channel is occupied the station will wait a random time until it listens again. This is done to avoid that two stations transmit at the same time. The receiver would experience a collision and data would have to be retransmitted. The more stations you have the more likely a collision is to occur.

Also, an optional protocol is the RTS/CTS Request to Send/Clear to Send. The station asks if it can send data at this moment, the AP tells all the clients to be quiet for a given amount of time and sends the requester a clearance as an approval to send for that specific chunk of time.

All the above is a so-called Collison Domain. A collision domain is a network segment connected by a shared medium or through repeaters where data packets may collide with one another while being sent. The collision domain applies particularly in wireless networks

Now since the carrier is an RF signal and has a defined channel, It could be that your AP hears on the same channel many other stations that are not part of your SSID. And this will make you Collision Domain much larger. More stations, more waiting and more collisions = slower throughput.

If you'd like to know more, please refer to:

https://dl.ubnt.com/guides/training/courses/UBWA_V2.1_Training_Guide_03-09-17.pdf

Reference: https://community.ubnt.com/t5/UniFi-Wireless/RF-enviroment-how-and-why-and-what/m-p/1648191/highlight/false#M176776

The general trend in the development of modern technology has been the progression towards higher productivity and efficiency than before. The goal of developing technology is to be able to utilize it to allocate our time to various tasks more effectively and ultimately initiate a net increase in our overall productivity.

SINGLE VS MULTIPLE MONITORS

According to a research commissioned by Fujitsu Siemens Computers, dual monitors can boost productivity by 20% and triple monitors can cause a 35.5% increase in productivity. Moving on from a single monitor to either dual, triple or multiple setups depends on the requirements of the business or your task. The trend line indicates that more and more people move to use more than a single monitor and the reason for this change is a better software compatibility that allows having multiple sessions of the same software allowing you to see multiple functions while having the ability to compare allowing a boost in your productivity.

We live in an extremely fast-paced world which is incredibly dependent upon the utilization of technology to perform tasks at a much faster rate and with a much higher efficiency. For businesses that specialise in digital work or data entry such as large spreadsheets or comparisons, larger and multiple screens can be a huge benefit in terms of saving the time that would otherwise be spent flipping back and forth between windows or documents.

INCREASING PRODUCTIVITY WITH A SINGLE MONITOR

Don’t want to have multiple monitors with all the cabling mess but prefer to be able to achieve the same productivity that you would obtain in a multiple monitor system with a single monitor? then modern technology has you covered in this regard as well. A new line of monitors allows you to have the advantages of multiple monitors on a single monitor.

One of these is the 34” Ultra-Wide Curved Monitor with a 21:9 aspect ratio for an immersive viewing experience. Such a panoramic display allows you to split the screen into two. Along with providing you with outstanding picture quality, it also lets you view two different but compatible input sources at the same time and multitask efficiently.

Want a triple monitor setup in one? There is a solution for that as well. Samsung’s 49-inch Ultra-Wide Curved Display is one of the widest displays currently in the market and one of the most productive single monitors, allowing you to use the effect of having three monitors in one. A resolution of 3840 x 1080 with an aspect ratio of 32:9 ensures dynamic and immersive graphics which can be viewed in multiple windows on the solitary screen.

PRODUCTIVITY WITH MOBILITY

A huge factor that also plays into the productivity of a system is the mobility. Modern laptops have increasingly become much more lightweight and versatile, allowing you to carry them anywhere you would like along with docking stations. This can allow you to setup multiple work environments for yourself across multiple locations. This can be very useful for people who work across multiple offices wanting to have the same level of productivity wherever they go.

There are many laptops and portable devices that will support multiple monitors, make sure you check compatibility before planning your configuration.

USE CASE

I have a Microsoft Surface Book 2. I travel across 3 offices on a regular basis always aiming to achieve the same level of productivity. To achieve that, I have 3 docking stations across the offices, in one office I connect 3 monitors while in the other locations I have a 34” wide monitors. By implementing this setup, I get a comfortable and productive working environment, working on the same device without leaving it behind which really increases my confidence that no-one touches my computer – important.

COST

When the goal is to increase productivity, cost should be really counted against the benefit. This is not for every user, so you really should weigh the benefits before making the commitment, those solutions are not cheap. After all, we

With a software platform like Teamwork, you can eliminate factors such as miscommunication and delays that often stem from seemingly disconnected and nonintegrated management tools. A streamlined management software that offers a wide variety of tools which allow for thorough communication between team members, provides constant visibility to clients regarding the status of their projects, and employs a ticketing system that is customizable and adjustable.

Managing a team consisting of various personalities each of whom has different ideas and way of working is not an easy task. Particularly in the case that the size of the team is large or in the case that the group is segregated, you may run a huge risk of nonexistent synchronization and the project will end up all over the place. Teamwork Projects allows you to integrate this management software into your existing system over the cloud and use this platform to clearly lay out the details of a project and highlight its progress along the way. Since Projects will be accessible to everyone on the team on whatever devices they own and any location, it will promote flexibility, communication, collaboration, and organization.

Teamwork Projects have features like boards, portfolio, charts, reporting, risk register and many more to help you manage your projects in the most effiecent way. 

One of the most critical parts of your entire work as a service provider is to ensure that your clients are always in the loop and receive the best possible services. With Teamwork’s Desk software, you can employ a much greater degree of collaboration through your design, development, and marketing teams as they manage customer emails from a single collaborative space and focus more on delivering constant and satisfactory updates and customer service to the clients of the business. Teamwork Desk also gives you invisibility, a feature that makes it appear as if you are delivering personal emails to your customer even though you are using a ticketing system. This helps to form a more personal connection with the client all the while maintaining your performance and efficiency.

For constant and optimum collaboration between the team members, Teamwork Chat provides the ideal platform to keep in touch with each other and each other’s ideas. It works just like a chat would, allowing to send messages, mention team members, attach files, send pictures, and make decisions. Not only that but since Chat is integrated with Projects, you directly create tasks from chats and send them over to Projects to be completed after a discussion has been done. All in all, an incredibly convenient platform that not only forms a bridge between the members of a team but also gives direct access to the main software.

Teamwork Chat will also allow you the same level of communication with your clients which gives that extra bit of required communication and service level. Your clients will love the engagement.

HOW DO WE USE TEAMWORK

YMtech is an IT service provider engaged with multiple clients from different industries, different requirements and different business models. We have always used systems to manage and track our projects, tasks and communications but we didn’t have one central solution that will allow the flexibility, availability and productivity. The result was mainly a lot of mess, miscommunication and a waste of the most valuable asset – time.

As we were exploring different options, we came across Teamwork Projects. From the beginning, it was a game changer for us. We could finally arrange all our clients providing them with a portal access, integrate with our existing online storage, upload all the files while having a high level of security and support on which I’d like to talk further.

Teamwork support is an example of how a customer support should look like. We have never waited longer than a couple of hours for a response, in most cases, it’s less than that. The support is fast, professional and organized, nothing gets left behind. So, when a business implements a new solution, a good support can be a deal breaker or a deal maker.

YMtech is using all 3 tools that Teamwork offers. We use projects to manage all our projects and on-going contracts, Desk for all the support tickets and communication with our clients and Chat for mainly internal team communication, it is much better than having emails back and forth.

The tools integrate quite well and really give you the feeling that you have an all in one command control that will give you a good reporting and business analysis.

As Teamwork offers an open API with Webhooks, we have created some custom functionality for our system to automate some of our everyday tasks. For example, we implemented an auto-tagging system that will auto-tag certain items in certain folders given some conditions are met. We also use the API to create reports about server availability and other required properties, so it is flexible and will allow you to get the most out of it. 

Teamwork can also integrate with some automation tools like Integromat and Zapier which can allow you to integrate your online platforms and take your automation to the next level.

After using Teamwork for the last 4 years, we are running more than 50 projects and we are not missing any tasks and our productivity is at its best.

DO YOU NEED HELP WITH TEAMWORK?

Are you a business or an agency looking to optimize your operations with the help of Teamwork but don't know how to go about it? Get in touch with us and let us know your troubles - we would love to help you out and provide you with expert consultation and training on how to use this software and customize its function according to the needs of your business to ensure maximum efficiency and productivity.