Mis-Information from too much Information

The nice thing about blogging is that you can write it anytime, anywhere, then upload it later. Thanks to Notepad, this is exactly what I'm doing. Mother Nature has struck down my internet connection, which means I won't stay up too late!

I shared the link to my blog on Facebook, so I'm hoping to get some questions to add to my list of things to blog about.

The recent tragedy in Boston re-inforced the dark side of the internet and so many having smart phones. Mis-information went on a rampage and continues days later. Real research is no longer done before a story is posted. In the rush for the scoop or exclusive, a catchy headline is posted and little details are given, almost always wrong the first time and several corrections later. This fuels gossip, speculation, and the imagination to the point where it makes it more difficult to determine the real truth.

What irks me the most is the lack of discipline against news agencies for mis-informing the public. Or at least, we never really see much. Once in a while, we get an "oops, we were wrong" article, but are there any fines? Were the ones responsible reprimanded or fired? We'll probably never know.

I can see how daunting it may be these days because everyone is "connected" and siphoning fact from fiction. But still, I would rather NOT read the scoop and the false headline and wait until the real story is ready to be written and shared. We are always in such a rush! Some news isn't news at all. I could care less about Tom Cruise's movie casting troubles or who won Dancing with the Starts. That kind of news can be found by those that are interested, but put the good and the bad in the headlines of what's going here in the US and in the rest of the world. Most of the news is bad and tragic, but there are countless stories of triumph and courage that are just as riveting as bad news. We never see enough of that.

On top of all of that is the politics between different news sites. I find myself going to BBC News rather than Fox, Yahoo!, or MSN because they see the news from the outside and tend to not be influenced by our own politics. It's hard to truly find non-biased news and stories and I guess it depends on an individual's definition of bias. Is it actually possible not to be? We are human, so how can one not be influenced by his/her own culture, faith, political views, and philosophy?

Meh, despite no internet, I still stayed up too late! And I'll probably stay up later reading a good old fashioned e-book! ;-)

Passwords, passwords, passwords....

My poor dad gets so confused with all of the passwords my brother and I have set for him. I think it's time to set him up with a password manager. It's actually long overdue and will help if I'm not around or too busy to drop what I'm doing and fixed whatever got messed up again. :-)

I'm going to give Dashlane (https://www.dashlane.com/) a try and see if that does the trick!

I know passwords are a pain, but they are, unfortunately, highly necessary, especially on the Internet. My dad is a classic example of what I see every day when someone says they've been hacked. Simple passwords like "mousemickey" just don't cut it. And yes, he clicks on links from people he "thinks" he knows because it's a spoofed account all the time. Easy to remember passwords are just as easy to hack, especially if you "let them in" by clicking that link your "friend" sent you. I'll do another blog about recognizing those spoof e-mails.

Picking a password can be hard. Using a password generator is nice, but it's usually too complicated or not easy to remember. Phrases are a good way to go and can be personalized so they are easy for YOU to remember.

Examples:

I Love Puppies - 1LovePupp!e5
Babies are cute - B@b1esRcut5

It looks weird, but they are easy to remember and actually pretty easy to type, too!

"Yeah, but you work in IT, you HAVE to change your password or use complex ones!" True, but, so should "everyone else." It's the "average" user that typically gets hacked or experiences some form of identity theft that we, the geeks, end up trying to fix! :-) Don't wait for something bad to happen to decide it's time to make a new password that's more secure!

Being the geek I am, you'd think I'd have a password manager myself, but I don't. I keep all my passwords in my head and it takes about a day for me to "get used" to a new password. I keep the number of online shopping accounts to a minimum and use separate e-mail accounts for shopping, social networking, and "real" e-mail.There's also another that's my "junk mail" account.  I do keep a spreadsheet of which sites uses a particular UserID, but I think it's time to give Dashlane a go for my own stuff and see how that goes. This isn't a plug for them, I did a quick Google search, it got good reviews, and it's free. :-) I'll do my own review of it when I get a chance, but I'm not going to be one of those bloggers that downloads ten different products to see which one is best. I just don't have the time and it takes time to properly review and compare those kind of products.

At any rate, DO change your password at least once a month. DON'T use the same usernames and password for ALL of your accounts and sites where you have to log in or register. If you hate typing passwords or changing them, find a password manager program that suits you and take advantage of it! :-) Most are very easy to use and you only have to enter your information once. Some will even generate usernames and passwords for you, then log in automatically!

What I Do

The question I get asked most is "what exactly do you do?"

Well, if you're not technical it can be hard to explain without using a lot of geek words and acronyms. So, I'll try to explain in "normal" words.

The first part is easy, I think.

I manage systems. OK, so what does THAT mean?

Many companies need a way to know who has what and what is on it when it comes to computers. There are programs that "manage" this information and it usually involves installing an agent that collects all the information and sends it back to the "mother ship" (a central server). I'm on board that "mother ship" and one of a few people that work in the "engine room" to keep things running smoothly.

What is typically collected is hardware, software, and user information. The agent can tell me what model computer you have, how much memory is in it, how big your hard drive is, how much space you have left on it, the last time you rebooted, and everything you have installed. I'm then able to use this information to determine if you need a newer version of software, if you are missing critical patches, if you are using unlicensed software, and if you are eligible for a system upgrade. That's really the point of managing systems. To know what's out there and what can potentially be a threat to the company or you as an individual and being proactive with that information.

When I started managing systems, we had nothing. I was literally put into a room (aptly named the War Room), told to evaluate possible candidates for managing systems as well as build a new corporate image. This was the result of me giving two or three pages of feedback on the last corporate image build. I later learned that this task of building corporate images was "rotated" among the System Administrators, so it was never consistent and that's how I was selected to do the job. :-)

A corporate image - yeah, I get that blank look a lot when that's mentioned. So, to explain that, this is the best I can do. I take one computer and put everything the company wants on it for every user and "take a picture (a.k.a. image)" of it. That allows us to copy that "image" to other computers and keeps it consistent with who gets what when a new system is deployed. That's the simplest explanation, but it is a lot more complicated than that and that method I just explained isn't actually done anymore really, but the concept remains the same. :-)

LANDesk and Altiris were the two products I was evaluating and we were already leaning towards Altiris. We ended up going the Altiris route and thus my journey into system management and image building began. This was as a contractor. It would grow into much more and, when I look back, I'm still not sure how I did it. :-)

Seven years later, I was officially hired and was still the only person that did what I did with occasional help from a contractor. A team slowly started to build from there, contractors included. It was long overdue, not just being hired, but getting the help I needed to keep up with the growth of the company. On top of maintaining the images, I also built "packages" of software to deploy to systems, assisted with creating a database of "solutions" (the how-to articles referenced by the Help Desk), supplied endless reports, and become the person that people went to when help was needed beyond simple troubleshooting.

Now in my 13th year, I've been part of a team of experts for about three years now. My role has changed to focus on software compliance and patch management, but I still do most of what I've always done, which is manage systems. :-) Altiris faded way and Microsoft System Center is the direction we've gone as well as from Windows XP to Windows 7. I've adapted fairly well, but not near the level of administration with System Center than I was with Altiris. This was because System Center experts were hired to make the transition, thus relieving me of a huge responsibility and allowing me to focus on my new roles.

Software compliance is becoming a big deal, not just for where I work, but with every company. The fines are huge if not enough licenses have been ordered or the wrong version is being used. The process is unique to each company, so one must build a process from the ground up. This has been extremely challenging for me. Part of me enjoys the hunt, but another dreads the amount of data that must be collected and sifted to find the flaws to make the necessary corrections to prevent them. It's like untangling Christmas lights to give you an idea. :-) I'm still untangling the first string!

Patch management is exactly what it sounds like. We "patch" systems to hopefully block vulnerabilities and protect the company from virus infection. The only daunting part of this is the risk of causing the dreaded "blue screen of death" (BSOD) and getting people to reboot their machines (that's going to be another blog in itself).

The knowledge base tidbit I mentioned is where I decided that maybe blogging would be a good idea. I've written or co-written over 500 internal articles used by our IT department for how to install and configure most of our software, troubleshooting guides, performance tips, etc. I was reminded of how much I owned or was a part of when the technical writing team was tasked with reviewing all of our existing articles and validating with the authors if they were still relevant or needed updates. I had no idea I owned so many and last I looked there were 3700 overall.

This post ended up being lengthier than I thought it would be, but now you know "what I do" and I'm going to try and share what I've learned over the years that could be useful to those that are intimidated by computers or are just average users getting by with the tools and technology that changes almost every day.

Trying to Keep Up

I'll be trying to keep up with little tidbits and quibbles of stuff I know how to do, learn how to do, learn how to do better, or showed someone how to do. It seems a day never goes by where someone asks me a computer, social networking, or internet question. Some of it I know by heart, but a lot of the time, I'm on a search engine trying to find the answer. I usually do find one, it typically works, and I have one of those memories of "Oh, yeah! I've done that! Let me go look it up again!" So, I'm hoping to have my own "lookup" location from my own little blog and see if that helps me (and YOU!) maintain the geek in me.