Technica - a techie's viewVincent is a second line network support engineer and has been with us since July 2011.
"Technica differs from the corporate support companies I’ve dealt with because although we are corporate it still feels like a small friendly IT business. I came from a company that literally started out in supporting home users from a garage, and grew from there. We had a very personal relationship with many many clients. Technica feels the same but with a far more professional and focused vision, and this is surprising. Handling some of the large clients and complex systems we manage you would expect the normal ‘IT guy in the background’ approach but not so with Technica we know our clients well, some personally, this makes a massive difference.
Predicting the future of IT is impossible to say, but people are becoming more comfortable with technology in their every day lives. You might think that this will slowly push traditional ‘IT Support’ out of the picture but I think as the systems supporting all of this day to day technology become ever more complex, we will see an increasing need for IT support. It may even take on a life management type of role as these technologies become literally indispensable to people.
My strengths with regards to IT lie in support and customer relations. Making a client happy is top of the list of priorities, they often don’t understand how you are helping them technically but they always understand good service and communication."
Follow Technica:
www.twitter.com @vaness_technica
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www.technicasolutions.co.uk
Vanessa Fisher, experienced marketeer and account manager has been brought into Technica with her optimistic and bubbly personality. Her attention to detail and 'can do' attitude provides a new friendly addition to the Technica family and for all our clients.
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Did you know that your Mac’s wireless network card has the ability to send Wi-Fi to other devices, as well as receive?
Turn your Mac into a Wireless Hot SpotThe Situation
You have internet on your Mac but do not have a wireless Access Point. Maybe you only have a 3G dongle or your ADSL router only has Ethernet. You don’t want to sit at your Mac all day while your Wi-Fi iPad, laptop or mobile phone remain offline. Your Mac’s wireless network card has the ability to send Wi-Fi to other devices, as well as receive!
To set this up follow these instructions:
1) Click on the Apple logo at the top right corner of the screen, and click System Preferences.
2) Within System Preferences, click the Sharing icon.
3) Click to highlight Internet Sharing, but do not click the check-box yet. You will see a drop-down menu next to “Share your connection from:” from here you will need to select the source of your internet connection. If you are using a 3G dongle, you will be able to identify this on the list. If you are plugged in via Ethernet cable, you would select Ethernet. If you are tethering from your iPhone, you can choose iPhone USB, etc.
4) In the “To Computers Using” section, tick the box next to Wi-Fi.
5) Click the “Wi-Fi Options” button to the bottom right of the window. You will be asked to give your network a name, though it will likely use your Mac’s name by default. Put something simple here as some devices struggle to connect to networks with complicated names.
6) Now, most importantly, in the Security option, choose 40-bit WEP and give your network a password. WEP keys can use numbers, or any letters from A to E. Repeat the WEP password in the Confirm Password box, and then click OK.
7) You will probably be prompted for your Mac password after clicking OK (don’t get this confused with the WEP key you have just created – this key is only for other devices to connect to your Mac’s wireless).
8) Now that we have set this up, tick the check box next to Internet Sharing and click the Start button when prompted. Within seconds you should notice your Wi-Fi icon at the top right of your screen now looks like a grey triangle with a white arrow pointing upwards – this means that internet sharing is now working through your Mac’s Wi-Fi.
9) To connect other devices, simply scan for Wi-Fi networks, find the network name you specified and type in the WEP key. You are now connected to the internet using your Mac as a Wi-Fi access point. You can connect multiple devices to this at once – as such it’s a great way to keep everything online even when your internet access is limited!
An Apple Certified Service Professional, Lee is an integral part of the Technica Solutions team and has spent six years in the IT industry. A self-confessed gadget addict he'll buy it regardless of whether he needs it - the electrical retailers dream customer!
www.technicasolutions.co.uk
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The situation:
Your Mac boots into MacOS but none of your applications work.
Typical symptom of this is that the icons bounce around in the dock but never launch.
If you need to get online ASAP, the following will help:
While all serious computer problems are best left to professionals to fix, sometimes you need to get online and cannot afford to wait. The good news is that, unlike Windows, the vast majority of software faults with MacOS X are what we call “profile specific”. This means that each and every file, setting, configuration for all your applications are stored in a Library folder within your user profile.
When these files become corrupted for any reason (inproper shutdown, interrupted update, etc.) all you need to do is create a new user profile and your applications will begin working again.
How to create a new user profile:
1) Click on the Apple logo in the top left hand side of the screen, and click System Preferences.
2) Once System Preferences is open, click on the “Users and Groups” button (Lion) or the “Accounts” button (Snow Leopard and below).
3) Click on the padlock icon at the bottom left of the window and type in your password (leave it blank if you don’t have one). You’re now ready to create a new user.
4) Click on the + button underneath Login Options.
5) In the drop down menu next to New Account, select Administrator.
6) Give the account a name – I usually use “Temp” as I rarely use this profile but you can call it anything you like. Give the account a password, then click Create User.
7) You have now created a backup user account. To log into this account, click the Apple logo at the top left again, then click the Log Out… option at the bottom of the drop down menu.
8) You will now be presented with a login screen in which you can select your new backup account.
Once you log into this, it will be like logging into a brand new Mac and all your applications should work. Remember, this is just a handy workaround as all your files and settings are still in your old profile.
Prevention is usually the best cure – there is nothing wrong with having a backup account set up just in case, even if your Mac is working fine. After you’ve created your backup account, click the Login Options button and make sure your regular account is selected in the Automatic Login drop-down menu. This means that, while your backup account is ready to be used at any time, you won’t ever see any reference to it unless you manually log off of your regular profile.
An Apple Certified Service Professional, Lee is an integral part of the Technica Solutions team and has spent six years in the IT industry. A self-confessed gadget addict he'll buy it regardless of whether he needs it - the electrical retailers dream customer!
www.technicasolutions.co.uk
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Apple has released iOS 5. It is a free update for iPads and all iPhones of 3GS and above, as well as some iPod touch devices.
What I like in iOS 5Apple boasts that there are 200 new features. Most of these you will not notice in normal use but the following features offer real improvement to the user experience:
Drag and drop email addresses
You reply to all, and then decide that you want to move someone in the CC: field to the To: field or to the BCC: field. Previously this was a nightmare to achieve and it was often easier to retype the addresses. Now you touch the email recipient for a few seconds and it floats and can be dropped on to an alternative field.
Formatting in Email
OK, it's not a full blown word processor interface but you can, at least, add a bit of Bold, Underline or Italic to your email as well as indent text.
Spelling and Word replacement
The really annoying iPhone/iPad word replacement feature is ever so slightly less annoying now that it really seems to learn words you use regularly. In addition you now have a full blown spell checker when creating an email with the red squiggly line that you get in Word like packages and spelling suggestions.
You also have the ability to select a word and look up its definition. Although I’m not convinced how useful this will be, as one would have thought you would know the definition of the words you are creating yourself.
Keyboard Shortcuts and adding Custom words
There is a new feature allowing you to create keyboard shortcuts. For instance you can create the shortcut:
lbf = llamas are bigger than frogs
and every time you type lbf it will replace these three letters with the phrase “llamas are bigger than frogs”
But the hidden power of this feature is it allows you to add word and phrases without assigning shortcuts and once added these words/phrases are in your custom dictionary. Thus they are not auto corrected and they are even used as suggestions by the autocorrect and the spellchecker.
Alert sounds
Finally there is an easy way to change the sounds your device uses as email and text alerts. We may now see a time when a text arrives on somebody’s iPhone and everyone in the room doesn’t reach for their pocket at the same time.
Having said that, the new choices of sounds are all extremely annoying. Anyone who selects the sound “Update” or “Anticipate” will soon found themselves without friends.
Jason Ozin is a well-known IT professional, technical architect and joint owner of Technica Solutions - www.technicasolutions.co.uk. Jason consults leading UK and international enterprises on real world technical and IT issues. Jason specialises in business infrastructure and IT security matters.
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As the first member of our technical team to receive the iPhone 4S I wanted to share my iPhone experiences so far.
I had an iPhone 3GS shortly after launch and loved it. I did however feel that there were a lot of features lacking and being a self-confessed tech geek this left me wanting more. Many of the features we take for granted now, were not included in the iPhone operating system to begin with. Multitasking, the notification centre, custom wallpapers, gestural commands, wifi tethering, etc. were all excluded. Over time, Apple included more and more of these features into the operating system – likely, to a large degree, to discourage jailbreaking.
Apart from this the iPhone 3GS was a perfect device for my needs. However, 2.5 years of wear and tear, it had a dodgy battery and a few scratches and was in desperate need of retirement. Having sat out a generation in avoiding the iPhone 4 and enduring a year and a half of having it rubbed in my face, I felt it was time to get cutting edge with the 4S. The recent release of iOS 5 pretty much put the finishing touches on my iOS wish list with the notification centre and iCloud backup, so I was pretty confident that with the performance upgrades and additional features, this would make it a worthwhile purchase.
With my brand new iPhone 4S in hand, my laptop was at home and my 3GS was flat. I had no access to iTunes anywhere for the old mandatory iPhone activation and I figured there wouldn’t be much I could do with it until I got it home. To my surprise, it booted, connected to the 3G network, and activated itself! Secondly, I signed in with my Apple ID, connected to the nearby wireless network, and asked if I’d like to restore from iCloud. I hadn’t even realised that this was an option. Three minutes later, the device rebooted and it suddenly looked a lot more familiar. All my settings, messages, call history, etc. had been transferred. Next, it began downloading all the applications I had on my old phone from the App store automatically. Within 10 minutes of automatic setup I had an identical clone of my old iPhone, apart from my music and videos which would require a sync with my laptop. From now on, if someone has updated the software on their current iPhone and makes an iTunes purchase, that purchase will sync between devices but as I hadn't updated mine I had to sync with my laptop.
Next, I decided to test out Siri – the voice prompt technology that there is hype about. Asking Siri to direct me to the nearest chinese food restaurant was disappointing as it only does business directions in the US. Apart from that, the system works well. I was impressed with how fast it accurately recognised my voice and became nearly flawless. It is still a novelty and not a game changer for me, however I can imagine that some people might find uses for it.
I played around with the camera which is easily accessible from the lock screen now and it opens substantially quicker. This, again, could be a reason to buy for a lot of people, but I don’t really take anything other than the odd snaps here and there so this is another novelty for me.
All in all, the improvements are there, just not obvious. It is a lot quicker, and with the iOS5 features it makes it the perfect upgrade. In my opinion it is vastly better than the 3GS, but I wouldn’t say it’s worth upgrading to if you already have an iPhone 4. The technology is powerful and underutilized at this point while everyone holds back on the processing requirements of their apps to make them compatible with older models. Where I’m always left wanting more, Apple always seems to catch up.
An Apple Certified Service Professional, Lee is an integral part of the Technica Solutions team and has spent six years in the IT industry. A self-confessed gadget addict he'll buy it regardless of whether he needs it - the electrical retailers dream customer!
www.technicasolutions.co.uk
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BE AWARE:
Spam emails affect all of us, whether it’s through business or personal methods. They are a nuisance and take up our time and use up our resources.
In addition to the inconvenience, spam has the ability to transfer harmful viruses, adware and spyware to a computer.
Businesses need to fight back against this invasion of communication.
According to a web site that specialises in anti spam laws 63% of all “Remove me from your list” requests are not honoured and 86% of email addresses posted on websites are used by spammers to send unsolicited emails.
We aren’t receiving spam just by email either. It has hit internet networking sites too such as twitter and facebook. Tweetjacking occurs when spammers reply to your @username, cleverly adding a URL which appears in your timeline. Whilst Twitter and facebook are dealing with this spamming activity, spammers are clever and are constantly finding new ways. Twitter users, have you ever noticed hash tags on trend topics? The # symbol, called a hashtag, is used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. It was created organically by Twitter users as a way to categorize messages. Spammers are using these to build up their own profiles despite twitter rules specifically setting out its rules on Spam and Abuse.
BE PREPARED:
When using a social networking site for business or personal use, think about what links you are clicking on and understand the way that spammers work.
Invest in Anti spam software. It is vital.
Follow Technica:
www.twitter.com @ Vaness_technica
Facebook: www.facebook.com/technicasol
Vanessa Fisher, experienced marketeer and account manager has been brought into Technica with her optimistic and bubbly personality. Her attention to detail and 'can do' attitude provides a new friendly addition to the Technica family and for all our clients.
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The last few years have not been universally kind to Microsoft. In July, the company posted record revenues and profits for the financial year just ended. Desktop operating systems are selling well, Xbox and Kinect are both positives and Office 2010 and Server OS’s continue to show good numbers.
Windows 8, putting the happy smiley back for Microsoft users?Public opinion however paints a different picture. If there was an index measuring how strongly the general IT-using public wanted to associate with Microsoft products, the graph would be bouncing along at the bottom of the scale. Whether Microsoft consider that a problem while posting record figures is open to debate, but why are Apple consumers almost delighted to be allowed to pay top dollar for that company’s offerings, while people seemingly part with cash for Microsoft products under duress?
Image would be most people’s answer, but perhaps that’s as veiled an answer as it obvious. Steve Jobs’ attention to detail and focus on design are well-known and have no counterpart at Redmond. But that was also the case ten years ago and far fewer people then would have been as disparaging about Microsoft’s core offerings as today – desktop and server products were criticised on a regular basis, but such criticisms were the more traditional gripes founded on security issues of the accepted business choices for operating systems. People criticised precisely because Microsoft were the obvious choice for the majority of users, business and personal, but our imaginary index was not as low as today, when even grudging respect is waning.
Innovation is a clear issue. In the technology sector it would be no surprise to have two companies in similar fields producing similar products which actually need not even be competition for one another. Microsoft don’t need to produce anything funky provided their products are fit for purpose; business users want reliability, function and convenience. Innovation and image are broadly similar, public opinion of Microsoft is familiarly low for both, yet that has also been the case for the last decade.
Vista and Windows 7 have perhaps been the biggest contributors to the bottoming-out of our association index. Treating these two operating systems as one (Windows 7 can only be considered the fixed version of Vista that Microsoft should have produced in the first place), Microsoft innovated for the sake of it. End-users are resistant to change, but less so when changes are enforced by improvement. A lot of the changes in Vista appeared to have been made simply for the sake of presenting something new and unless those changes have obvious benefit to the end user, aesthetically or functionally, they are unlikely to be welcomed. Improvements in security and performance are easily outweighed by the changes that forced users to become familiar with a new OS that offered few tangible benefits. Who wouldn’t have gladly sacrificed their Aero screen in exchange for a working search facility, or explorer, or even XP-style desktop icons?
The IT industry has never had a period like the one we’re in now. NT4 was the OS of choice for business for 4 years. Windows 2000 lasted perhaps 3 years. XP was in place for 4 years, but voluntary uptake of Vista was almost non-existent. Even today, after 8 years of XP, most businesses are only being forced into using Windows 7 because of the difficulty of converting modern laptops back to XP. Users have never had the opportunity to vote in favour of retaining the feel of an OS, they've always changed so regularly to incorporate new, worthwhile features. The pressure, inadvertent or otherwise, to change to an alternate OS, viewed by many as inferior and certainly not appearing to carry enough benefit to outweigh the aggravation of learning and using a new OS, has not done Microsoft any favours.
Over the same period, Apple have continued to refine OSX. Cheetah, 10.0, appeared in 2001 and the path through to 10.7, Lion has been one of almost universal acceptance of the improvements and refinements. It was never necessary to make the size of changes that Microsoft needed to make and that familiarity and confidence - that the OS was right to begin with, so that only tweaking was required - cannot be underestimated. To demonstrate this, how many users saw the need for the change in Start button between XP and Vista, or the change in icon size? Why are things not broken being changed, unless they were wrong to begin with? Changing such basic, and irrelevant, items does not engender confidence, or loyalty.
So while our desire-to-be-associated index stays low, profits are high and a new OS has been released in Developer Preview Mode. This is the third OS (after Vista and 7) to retain the current look, which has now been with us for nearly 5 years. While there’s low acceptance because of the way the new look came into being (seemingly for no good reason other than for the sake of change) at least there is now consistency. And the Metro interface could be very popular indeed.
The convergence between PC’s, ultrabooks, tablets and the cloud suits Metro (and no doubt Mango, the Windows phone equivalent) perfectly. Selecting and using programs through touching the tiles is natural and even enjoyable. Touchscreen size will be important – the monitor must be within comfortable arm reach, which makes choosing physical size and resolution vital. A 30” touchscreen around 50cm from your face may seem like sitting in the front row at an Imax.
In a remarkable turnaround, which genuinely could reverse the index and feelings of the last 4 or 5 years, Microsoft could have a product that businesses and home users are enthusiastic about. It’s very early days – the Developer Preview is pre-beta – but the logic behind releasing it has to be that Microsoft recognise they have come up with something that is innovative and useful and even if people prefer not to use it they can continue with the becoming-familiar and accepted Windows 7 interface. Even where this is the case, the fact that Metro could be used with the right hardware may just make the recent reluctance to new Microsoft OS’s disappear entirely. It’s just possible that Windows 8 will make the Vista and Windows 7 years appear as the blip rather than the rule and Microsoft will resume their respected, if not liked, position. It’s not a position that would affect profits adversely.
Windows 8 is expected to be released in Spring 2012
David Izen: Partner at Technica Solutions, responsible for systems, planning and procedure. ER-6n (windy), MP33 (pants), 1dIII (occasionally decent), Beardies (stinky), 1990C4Cab (dry!)
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This is my third week at Technica now and I thought I’d share my journey so far as I’ve now become an integral part of the team.
As I walk in the office every day there’s a buzz. Either the phone rings, or there’s computer banter between the team.
I’ve spent the first few weeks learning, observing, reading, researching, tweeting and blogging.
I had no idea how much goes on within a technical company. It isn’t just about clients ringing up about help with their computer problems and receiving excellent support. It’s also about forward planning, keeping up with the current technical ideas and communicating that to everyone, both internally and externally.
My first impressions during my observations were of the technical team on the phones and by email. Communication is a key factor for me and this is what I have found: The communication is tight, the phone rings no more than three times and the call is answered by a friendly voice. In front of me they can seem quiet but come alive on the phone. There’s no “pass the buck” feeling here at all. It is strong team work and I love it!
The three partners have their own offices separate to the technical floor, but instead of sitting in them they integrate themselves with the team downstairs on the main floor. Being a part of everything and staying connected to the team, this is fabulous for morale and communication and a will to do well from the team.
When multiple support calls take place it’s amazing, the floor becomes alive and an exciting buzz fills the room.
There is also a lot of email communication; if a client raises a “ticket” we all see it. It isn’t long before we all see the solution as well. Everyone knows what is going on with every client – it’s tight and from what I have observed each client is very special and important.
The IT technicians are so positive and happy to have helped with an issue. Not once have I heard a moan, just a strong work ethic, and an ethos that I am proud to be part of.
Follow Technica:
www.twitter.com @ Vaness_technica
Facebook: www.facebook.com/technicasol
Vanessa Fisher, experienced marketeer and account manager has been brought into Technica with her optimistic and bubbly personality. Her attention to detail and 'can do' attitude provides a new friendly addition to the Technica family and for all our clients.
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How to override the default 255.255.255.0 PPPoE Subnet mask used by a SonicWall device
Explanation
For some weird (and frankly stupid) reason, when connecting using PPPoE,
like when using UK Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) connections,
A SonicWall device chooses to ignore the subnet mask given by a Radius server
and uses 255.255.255.0 as the subnet mask regardless.
This usually does not cause issues except when attempting to connect to a SonicWall,
with more than one WAN connection, from an external address which happens to be within
the class C subnet defined by the SonicWall for the PPPoE connection.
In addition the issue is only seen when the connection is to one of the other WAN
connections.
So to give an example:
You have a SonicWall with 2 WAN connections.
One is PPPoE and the other is simple TCP/IP to a router. The PPPoE connection
will be given a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 regardless of what is intended by the ISP:
Example as follows:
X1 Interface: PPPoE connection: 22.22.22.22 Subnet 255.255.255.0
This should be: 22.22.22.22 Subnet 255.255.255.255
X2 Interface: TCP/IP connection: 44.44.44.44 Subnet 255.255.255.0
You attempt to connect to (ping in this example) 44.44.44.44 from an external address of 22.22.22.88
The connection is refused by the SonicWall with the following error:
Alert
Intrusion Prevention
IP spoof dropped
Source: 22.22.22.88, 46938, X2
Destination: 44.44.44.44, 8, X2
This is correct behaviour if the PPPoE subnet mask were accurate,
as the X2 Interface should not be seeing WAN traffic from an IP addresses meant to be on the X1 subnet.
Fix
The Fix is to hard-code in the correct subnet mask (in my case 255.255.255.255)
using the hidden Internal Settings page on your firewall.
You get to this page by logging in to your firewall (say it is on 1.1.1.1)
and then changing the address you see in the address bar to:
http://1.1.1.1/diag.html
On this page is a warning and a button marked Internal Settings. Press this button.
Work your way down the page until you find a heading called PPPOE Settings.
Under this heading is an entry for PPPOE Netmask:
Change this entry from 255.255.255.0 to the correct Netmask (in my case 255.255.255.255),
scroll to the top and click Apply.
Now, back in the main SonicWall pages, make your way to Network/Interfaces, disconnect
and then reconnect your PPPoE session and you will have the correct subnet mask.
Jason Ozin is a well-known IT professional, technical architect and joint owner of Technica Solutions - www.technicasolutions.co.uk. Jason consults leading UK and international enterprises on real world technical and IT issues. Jason specialises in business infrastructure and IT security matters.
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This is my first week working at Technica, or as my new colleagues call it, “Technica Towers” and I love it here already – what a great team! I’m really looking forward to getting to know our fantastic clients and speaking with you in the coming months.
This is the first of many blogs from me so watch this space.
Vanessa Fisher, experienced marketeer and account manager has been brought into Technica with her optimistic and bubbly personality. Her attention to detail and 'can do' attitude provides a new friendly addition to the Technica family and for all our clients.
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