Roadblocks

One of the things in my career that I have been fortunate enough to not encounter is a problem that is too much to overcome. I am able to diagnose, learn and fix problems very quickly, and I have gotten used to using that ability to get me out of numerous jams over the years. Back in 2005 when I was working for Columbia Natural Resources, I was tasked with getting VPN tunnels working to support our WAN environment which in of itself was not a big deal. We were using an end-to-end Cisco solution and all had went well with the rollout until I got to Elkhorn City, Kentucky. At this particular location we had DSL from a local telco that I was trying to use with a Cisco router in order to build the tunnel but unfortunately it just was not stable at all. I worked on the problem for about a week but eventually figured out a way to use a DSL card and hard configure the router to act as the DSL modem which bypassed the poor excuse of a modem that I had been using. This fixed the issues and the telco wanted me to document what I did to make it work which I found pretty amusing.

Why take this trip down memory lane? Well these past few weeks I have been engaged with a client that is using software that simply isn't documented and doesn't work as designed. There is little to no documentation that exists and the developers of the product appear to be in another world. To summarize, it has been the most frustrating project I have ever been a part of in my IT career. I have read horror stories of poor project management and planning, seen the articles about how companies end up in situations that appear hopeless and I used to scoff at those poor souls who were in that situation. How did they get themselves in such a mess to begin with? Now, I can see how these "perfect storms" occur, which doesn't even explain how I am in this particular mess.

I have tried pretty much everything I know at this point, and time is running out on the project which makes it even worse. If you know me, you know I don't give up easily and will not say I quit until I am told to walk away. In situations like this, I think it is important to try to learn as much as possible about what you could have done better or why you are in such a tough spot so you don't repeat any past mistakes. Once I am done with this project, I hope to have a write-up of what NOT to do for folks that may be interested in such a document :-)

Traveling can be scary

As any frequent traveler is well aware of, always expect the unexpected when you are in the friendly skies. This morning I was finally able to get on a flight from Denver heading back home to Charleston at 6:15am MST. I didn't sleep too well last night as I was anxious to get home, and woke up at 3:15am to get ready and head to the airport. Not a lot traffic on the road at 4:00am but I was tired and rolled down all the windows to make sure I didn't pass out on the way to the airport. Returning my rental car to Hertz went smooth, hopped on the shuttle, checked in and managed to get through security at around 5:35am - just in time to get to my gate for boarding (it was a 757). On the flight, as I was busy working on my Macbook Pro and my iPhone listening to tunes, I hear a lot of gasps and people yelling from the back of the phone. I turned off my music and they were shouting for a doctor - some man had went into a seizure. I had never experienced anything like that before while flying, but a nice older guy who happened to be a doctor went and checked on him. Luckily the man was okay and we didn't have to make an emergency landing or anything like that, which is good when you are trying to get home as soon as possible.

The PA system here in Atlanta isn't working too well, which is making it interesting to hear announcements about my flight home. If all goes well, I should be safely on the ground in Charleston at 1:30pm. Wish me luck.

On the road

These past two weeks have been quite an adventure for me. I have been teaching Ellipse 6.3.1.0 system administration to internal Mincom employee's as well as external customers in Denver. My experience teaching and speaking in front of people, plus my laid back nature and the ability to make the class a bit more enjoyable I think has made the classes worthwhile. The feedback I have gotten from my students has been really nice and has made me good about my teaching abilities. I enjoy trying to teach others in ways that aren't overbearing or overly complicated. I want my clients and piers to grasp the key concepts about anything I am doing for them, not just click here and type this. If that was the case, what have they truly learned from me? More than likely nothing, and their company has wasted money to hire me in the first place. Some may want to hoard knowledge and try to build themselves a virtual wall, but not me.

This week I have made several new contacts that realize I know what I am talking about when it comes to system design, performance and maintenance - even outside the world of Ellipse and Mincom. Those types of contacts are invaluable as I move through my career and could help start a long, prosperous relationship for all parties involved.

One thing I learned a long time ago was that it isn't about how much you know or how smart you are - it is about how you treat people that makes them want to use you in the future. No one wants to deal with some egotistical asshole - they want to deal with someone who can help them and be friendly. Too often IT folks think they are just too good to be replaced and can treat people horribly along the way. Unfortunately, that type of attitude gets you absolutely nowhere.

The iPhone 3g - my impressions

What more can I possibly say about the new iPhone that hasn't already been said all over the web? In my opinion, this is the best cell phone that you can possibly ask for and more. I was in line for a little over 1 hour on Saturday to get my hands on one, and it was definitely worth it. The ease that Apple has integrated GPS with Google Maps, the fast 3g services, the sync'ed email/contacts/calendar from Exchange or MobileMe, the app store which features so wonderful free and cheap apps/games that you may want to use - the list can go on and on. If you haven't had a chance to check this phone out, you owe it yourself to see one in action.

The iPhone has sold over 1 million units in 3 days, which completely blows away the old iPhone which took 74 days to reach 1 million sold. Apple has now taken direct aim at Treo and Blackberry users with the sync feature for Exchange, which will appeal to many business users. The phone itself is lightweight and also takes great pictures with its built in 2 megapixel camera. Folks who get a lot of voicemails will absolutely love the visual voicemail feature which has the ability to let you listen to voicemails in the order that YOU want to. The only drawback that I have found so far is a lack of MMS messaging, but with the integration of email it is a very minor inconvenience that I bet will be fixed at a later point. Expect more great apps from the app store to come out soon with this many iPhones out there, which will make the phone even more powerful.

You really can't go wrong with this phone and I highly recommend it.

Turn your Windows Mobile phone into a modem

For those of you who may not have a wireless air card on your travels and with AT&T rolling out 3g service to more and more markets (even Charleston!) thanks to the iPhone marketing blitz, your cell is finally becoming a great way to get high speed internet. Of course, the size of the screen of your phone still leaves a lot to be desired to do any serious browsing, but what if you could tie your phone into your laptop and use it as a 3g modem? One of the great advantages of 3g is that you can use your phone for voice while you are using it for data so you won't have to worry about missing any important calls.

A great article at http://blackjack-ii.tattoowar.com/?q=node/3 goes into a great bit of detail about how to make the BlackJack II work on Mac OS X Leopard but the same concepts could be applied to Windows-based laptops as well. On the Mac, the drivers for the CDMA modem are already installed which is nice, but on Windows you will have to find the drivers for your particular phone. Once you get it all set up, you will be browsing the Internet with much faster speeds and not have to pay for wi-fi service at airports or on your travels.

Using your Windows Mobile phone with your Mac

I have owned the Blackjack II for a little over 4 months now, and I will admit that I am relatively pleased with it although it would be nice if Windows Mobile 6.1 would be released to fix some of the quirky bugs I experience with this phone (lack of threaded text messaging, randomly losing the ability to use IE, etc). At some point in the very near future I hope to get an iPhone 3g but until all of the activation bugs get worked out and I don't have to stand in line to purchase one I guess I will stay with this device for now.

Now that I am using a Mac as my primary machine, getting the address book, email, calendar and tasks to sync can be a bit cumbersome. I am no longer using Outlook for my email (I dont like the Microsoft Outlook product for Mac called Entourage) and am now using Apple's Mail program which is simple yet very effective. The built in Mac Address Book and iCal applications are not as cleanly integrated into the Mail product as I am used to with Outlook, but still perform well for what I need. Out of the box though, no Mac is going to sync with a Windows Mobile phone.

Enter Missing Sync for Windows Mobile. This handy product will sync your Windows Mobile device to your appropriate Mac applications. Some problems can arise especially when you attempt to sync your Contacts as the default field mapping doesn't quite line up right at first and it may take some fiddling to get it work properly. It does a good job of doing a sync, tries to be very user-friendly and is definitely worthwhile if you decide to keep your Windows Mobile phone around now that you are using a MAC.

Making the switch to the Mac

Recently, I decided I was fed up with Vista as a desktop operating system and decided to make the switch to the Mac. My fiance has a Macbook which I was able to play with in order to make sure that my applications and ability to actually do my job would not be impeded by my conversion. Two applications from VMWare really help to make the transition as seamless as possible, and I would like to sing their praises to give you a better idea as what they actually do.

The first product is the free VM Converter application. This application allows you to take any Microsoft operating system that is loaded on a machine and convert it to a virtual machine image. Imagine that you had a lot of applications installed on your laptop, some that may not work with Mac but you want to use a shiny new MacBook Pro. Just convert your machine to a virtual image, copy it to your laptop and then run the virtual machine and all of your favorite applications just like you did on your old hardware. The application is simple to install and is very user-friendly in guiding you through the conversion process.

The second product is cheap (around $20 on some websites) which is called VM Fusion. Fusion is an application that you install on your Mac that allows you to run and create various operating systems such as XP, Vista and Linux. Once you have copied your image from the VM Converter process, simply launch it via Fusion on your Mac which works great with OS X. You can NAT or Bridge your network connection, share and use USB 2.0 devices and also enable sound. There is experimental DirectX 9 support so that you can play some of your favorite Windows games without dual booting your Mac to go into Windows which is a big plus for those that don't want to reboot every time to run Windows applications.

Making the switch to a Mac can be a bit overwhelming and confusing at first, but once you go Mac you won't go back!

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Rick Mitchell

www.rickmitchellsolutions.com

Your Experience. Our Vision.

304-550-0508

Welcome to RMSBlog

Thank you for finding me. I am excited to share the various tips, tricks and hints that I come across in my travels and workings with various pieces of technology. When I find something that I think may be useful for my readers and clients, you can be sure that I will share that information here. Feel free to subscribe to the RSS feed so that you can keep up to date with my latest adventures.