Benson has an unusual trait for a system and network engineer: he likes to talk about technology in a way that people actually comprehend. “I always try to have conversations that anyone from a beginner to a more advanced user will understand the first time,” he says. He’s also not afraid to “let the client know that I will need to look into something further to figure out the solution.” Refreshing! The UW grad, with a degree in English Lit, brings 9 years of IT experience to X-BAR.

Check out One Buy Away. It’s a free resource, started by students at UW, that keeps you informed by providing real-time bus arrival information (rather than having to rely on static timetables). Linked to King County Metro, the service offers a number of ways of getting up-to-the-minute arrival information for buses, including a telephone number, a mobile-accessible website, and even an iPhone app.

“Providing high-quality technology consulting is ultimately about relating to people,” she says. “I always strive to understand the business they live in and how to create solutions which will best support that particular business.” Amanda brings more than ten years of experience in the technology field—including technology consulting for clients across multiple industries—to every project. Away from work, she spends as much time as possible with her husband and two boys, and is trying to find the perfect Tuscan restaurant.

We have access to licensing experts from dozens of companies including Microsoft and Adobe, as well as hardware procurement specialists from manufacturers such as Dell, HP, and SonicWALL. These resources are here to help tailor solutions for your business.

Even if you have a vendor you’re already working with, it is always a good idea to run any quotes by us before making a purchase or renewing a service. This allows helps us stay informed of any IT changes you might be thinking about and might also give us an opportunity to find you a better deal.

We’ve had a number of clients get suckered into working with ineffective (and in some cases, less than competent) sales reps at nearly all of the local telecom and data companies. The good news is that we’ve identified a number of good reps and we’re happy to put you in touch with them so that you get the services you truly need.

Also, making changes to your voice and data services should be done in the context of your larger IT strategy – that’s where we come in. Let us help ensure the decisions you’re making are aligned with your long-term business and IT needs.

Construction crews on Main St. laying conduit for cable internet. Taken from our office.

Late this past fall we received word that, through some sort of budgetary luck, there was funding available to bring service to ours and several other buildings in Pioneer Square. The timing couldn’t be better as we’ve been struggling with the limited and costly connectivity options available to small businesses in the area. In fact, we’ve been seriously considering leaving the neighborhood in search of faster ground.

According to our friends at Comcast, service should go live in the next few weeks.

• Create a folder somewhere on your hard drive (example c:\temp)
• Name the folder GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}
• Create a shortcut and name it GodMode
• Copy the shortcut to your c:\windows folder
• Go to Start > Run and enter GodMode

Viola!  An uber-powerful Control Panel.  Enjoy!

Time to “Backupify”

There are many options out there to back up your individual online accounts but Backupify aims cover all your needs with a single hosted solution for the most popular services (Gmail, Facebook, Flickr, etc.). And, until January 31st, they’re offering free accounts (I couldn’t find current pricing on their site but others have mentioned their plans ranged from $3.95 to $14.95 per month before this offer).

What are you waiting for?

This all sounds great but what about the security implications of giving all my account information to one company? Not only do I need to trust this company with all my data, but, now that I’ve consolidated all this information into one account, I need to make certain I don’t let this account get into the wrong hands.

All things considered, I decided it wouldn’t hurt to go ahead and set up an account at Backupify while it’s free. I plan to wait until the company has been around longer before thinking about giving it access to more sensitive data such as my Gmail account but for now it’s a great spot to back up all my Flickr pictures.

On a related note, if you want to free yourself completely from the hassle of maintaining your online identity, you can always commit online social suicide to get rid of these account in one fell swoop (just be sure you’ve Backupified first!).

Here’s how to get around it:  Treat SBS 2008’s SSL management like you would any other Exchange 2007 box, and do it all from the shell.

Note: My walk-through is based on using GoDaddy for the UCC SSL cert, but this will work with just about any other SSL cert vendor, too.

Generate your SSL cert request

• Open Exchange Management Shell as an administrator
• Type or paste the following command changing the italic text to match your environment:

New-ExchangeCertificate -GenerateRequest -Path “D:\Shares\Install\SSL Cert\mail_ExternalDomaiName_com.csr” -KeySize 1024 -SubjectName “c=US, s=Washington, l=Seattle, o=CompanyName, ou=CompanyName, cn=mail.ExternalDomaiName.com” -DomainName autodiscover.ExternalDomaiName.com, remote.ExternalDomaiName.com, ServerPrivateName, ServerPrivateName.InternalDomainName.local -PrivateKeyExportable $True

• This will cover the SBS default public host name (remote.ExternalDomainName.com), our standard public host name for mail servers (mail.ExternalDomainName.com), the Exchange AutoDiscovery host name (autodiscover.ExternalDomainName.com), the server’s NetBIOS name and the server’s local fully qualified domain name.
• Go the GoDaddy site.  Purchase the cert credits.  After domain ownership verification, download the cert bundle from GoDaddy and save it to the SSL certs folder where you saved the CSR.  Unzip the bundle and you’re ready to import and enable the cert.

Import the SSL cert

• Open Exchange Management Shell as an administrator
• Type or paste the follow command changing the italic text to match your environment:

Import-ExchangeCertificate -Path “D:\Shares\Install\SSL Cert\mail_ExternalDomaiName_com.crt” -FriendlyName “CompanyName UCC Cert”

• Click on the icon in the upper left, then click Edit > Mark
• Highlight the Thumbprint that was displayed after Importing, then press Enter on your keyboard to copy it to the clipboard.  It will be pasted over the Thumbprint in the following command

Enable the SSL cert

• Open Exchange Management Shell as an administrator
• Type or paste the follow command changing the italic text to match your environment:

Enable-ExchangeCertificate -Thumbprint 081C3BASDF998603ld110F245F3074CC3BB3BA2-Services SMTP,IIS,POP,IMAP

Confirm the cert usage

• Open Exchange Management Shell as an administrator
• Type or paste the follow command changing the italic text to match your environment:

Get-ExchangeCertificate -Thumbprint 081C3BASDF998603ld110F245F3074CC3BB3BA2

• Check to make sure “IP.WS” appears under Services.  If they are not there then one of the services is not being SSL protected.
• Test Outlook Web Access, Remote Web Workplace and an Outlook 2007 client to ensure that the cert is working properly.