HIP Meeting Notes
Date: 1/14/2010
Attendees: Please see attached spreadsheet.
Location: Bubbas on Washington
Agenda:
· Introduce Group Objectives
· Introduce Attendees
· Discuss Meeting Logistics
· Determine preliminary list of topics to be discussed
Meeting Notes:
· 13 attendees
· Standing Meetings set for 2nd Tues of each mo.
· Keep meetings monthly
· Officially last 1 hr.
o Option to stay for 30 after to additional Q&A
o Rotate between Ergos & Poplabs offices
§ Need confirmation from Ergos
· Need to develop Google Group to communicate w/ HIP meeting participants
o Use to announce speakers
o Use to take recommendations
o Use to for attendees to post questions prior to monthly mtg
o Keep using Linkedin group to recruit from member list
· Discussed Potential Topics
o Cloud Computing –
§ First topic
§ Lead by Gurerin Woodgate
o MS CRM
§ 2nd Topic
§ Lead by Richard Weck
o Exchange 10
o Sharept 10
o Ms Office Communicator
o Google App Development
· Group needs to establish a leadership structure!
The HIP Group met in November to talk about how to tackle 2009 for the group. The first request was a request to move the meeting to the 2nd Tuesday of the Month. So the first meeting of HIP in 2009 will be the second Tuesday of January!
The next debate was where to meet! If anyone has any suggestions definitely speak up as this can be a difficult logistic. Ideally the new meeting location will have a phone and some quiet and potentially offer some ability for the sharing of food.
Other key items. The group is going to retain a similar format to the past HIP Meetings which includes industry professionals presenting on areas of expertise with a Round Table discussion to follow.
Tonight is the meeting of the Houston IT Professionals at Bubba's Sports Bar and Grill!
Come help kick off the after the Hurricane meetings
Are you ready to help reenergizing the Houston IT Professionals group?
WHEN: LAST TUESDAY of the month - November 25, 2008
I have moved from Houston, TX to Tampa, FL just hours before Hurricane Ike (it was definitely an interesting two day drive)
Stephen Johnson, has been empowered to be the primary leader of the HIP group and I hope that the entire initiative is not side tracked by either my leaving or Hurricane IKE. After just a few short months the mailing list of people interested in HIP has reached 100 IT Technology professionals. If you have not looked at the LinkedIN group take a peek!
I don't plan on being a stranger and if you end up visiting Tampa drop me a note or better yet come visit the Tampa Technology Peer Group. A similar group of IT pros who meet once a month to share technical knowledge.
I keep forgetting to get pictures at the meetings so this time I took out my cell phone and grabbed a couple of shots. In this first shot John Paul Cook brought up Hyper-V on his laptop and the group gravitated to the screen.
If you have not already done so please RSVP for the August 26th Meeting by sending me an e-mail
Anne Stanton - astanton2008 @ gmail.com
THANKS!
The Diva has a fairly comprehensive piece, published over the weekend, that goes over DNS forwarders and root hints in light of the recent DNS vulnerability. Which are better to use? Well, if were using root hints instead of forwarders lo these past years, you were more safe from the vulnerability!
But not for Windows XP. For Windows 3.11.
- Mike
Network Performance Daily has published an extensive investigation (that word again) on the law that reportedly requires Texas computer professionals to acquire a Private Investigator's license. If there's a point to be had from the three-part piece, it's that the recent hoopla is mostly hoopla. Mostly.
Both the bill's initial author and the Texas Private Security Bureau clearly wrote the bill without a full understanding of what terms like "investigation" might mean to an administrator or technician. What you or I might consider "investigative work," may or may not fall under the scope of the law. The language, indeed the answers given in interviews NPD conducted, is fuzzy.
What's worse is the Institute for Justice's lawsuit is likely to fail, according to NPD.
Network Performance is very cautious in their summary to say there's some smoke/little fire, instead opting to comment that the law is sloppy and will probably not mean much to anyone until some unsuspecting technician runs afoul.
-Mike
So, you may have heard about the DNS patch that was rolled out yesterday (Tuesday 7/8/08). This was an effort, kept fairly hush-hush, that patched up a problem in most DNS servers which would allow a website to pose as another. This is apparently a problem with the protocol itself. Microsoft and over 81 other vendors patched yesterday. You can find most of the technical details in a CERT advisory published in a Word document here.
But *you* need to make sure you apply MS08-037 on your servers. If you simply want to check your name servers, you can run a tool here. Please note that this will use whatever nameserver you have set up in your current configuration will be tested.
--
In other patch news...
MS08-038 Vulnerability in Windows Explorer Could Allow Remote Code Execution (950582)
MS08-039 Vulnerabilities in Outlook Web Access for Exchange Server Could Allow Elevation of Privilege (953747)
MS08-040 Vulnerabilities in Microsoft SQL Server Could Allow Elevation of Privilege (941203)
Fuller details at the MSRC.
- Mike
Apparently, there are reports of trouble...
Disk thrashing be darned, Microsoft wants you to know that you can move from XP to Vista with CONFIDENCE! (And, yes, the capital letters are apt.) You can have CONFIDENCE that your Vista machine is going to fit nicely into your SMB environment. CONFIDENCE that workers will see an increase in their productivity. CONFIDENCE that the new graphics will mesmerize CEOs into a catatonic state from which they may NEVER recover!
Ok, I made up the last. Still, Microsoft really wants you to buy Vista. Please? Details on what YOU get should you take the CONFIDENCE-inspired plung are here...
- Mike Whalen
More and more announcements are coming out of Houston this week. For one, MS has introduced its pricing schedule for the upcoming Microsoft Online Services. There are several tiers and, of course, pricing to go along with them. (I love the so-called "Deskless Worker Suite!" "Hey, where's my desk?" "Why, it's in the clouds!"
ReadWriteWeb is a full write-up.