Microsoft has dramatically improved Terminal Services with the addition of Remote Desktop Services on its Windows 2008 R2 platform.   Remote Desktop Services is designed to provide a centralized desktop strategy for your organization.  This type of design helps your organization or remote users improve access to your company’s data.  This is done in a secure and efficient way, using as little of your network bandwidth as possible.

Here are some of the Key features in Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 as listed on Microsoft’s Windows Server 2008 R2 Remote Desktop Services Website:

• Microsoft RemoteFX introduces a new set of end user experience capabilities, enabling local-like access to media-rich applications for virtual and session-based desktops; it can be deployed to a range of thick and thin client access devices.  RemoteFX also supports a broad range of end user USB peripherals for virtual desktops.
• Full-Fidelity User Experience significantly improves the user experience of remote users, bringing it closer to that enjoyed by users accessing local computing resources. RDS provides multi-monitor support, support for Windows Media® Player redirection, bi-directional audio as well as support for rich media content such as Silverlight.
• RD Connection Broker creates a unified administrator experience for traditional session-based remote desktops and applications (session virtualization or “Terminal Services”), and emerging virtual machine-based remote desktops (VDI).
• RemoteApp™ applications appear no different than local applications, performing seamlessly with the new task bar in Windows 7. RemoteApp helps improve the end user experience and reduce training requirements.
• RemoteApp and Desktop Connections simplify access to a set of resources, such as RemoteApp programs and Remote Desktops that perform seamlessly with Windows 7. These connections are easy to set up and are automatically kept up to date so the user always has access to the latest resources that are being made available.
• App-V for RDS helps solve application compatibility on Remote Desktop Session Hosts and helps consolidate RDSH servers. Microsoft Application Virtualization (App-V) for RDS now supports 64-bit operating systems.
• RD Web Access helps simplify application and desktop deployment by making those resources available to Windows 7, Windows Vista and Windows XP clients from a web page or a SharePoint portal.
• RD Gateway helps provide a secure connection between internal applications and data to users outside the firewall. It delivers critical applications and data to mobile employees without additional VPN infrastructure.

Article Sources:

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 – Remote Desktop Services:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/rds-product-home.aspx

Delivering Business Value with Remote Desktop Services. March 2009
http://download.microsoft.com/download/5/B/D/5BD5C253-4259-428B-A3E4-1F9C3D803074/RDS_Business_Value_Whitepaper.docx

Brett Knight is a Business Systems Engineer with San Diego-based Bravura Networks, Inc.

Contact Brett at bknight@bravuranetworks.com

Whenever I’m reading or writing on my PC, whether it is an email or an article, I’ve always managed to find words that are not in my vocabulary. Put simply, I don’t know the word. Before the internet, I would need to open up a dictionary and manually look for the word. After the internet came about, I was able navigate through websites looking for the definition. Now I use WordWeb, a simple and small application that once installed on my PC, allows me to look up any word instantaneously. I’ve configured it so that any time I hold “Ctrl” and right click on a word, it automatically looks up the definition and displays it in a convenient window. It’s exactly as I would find it in a dictionary!

As far as system cleanup and optimization goes, CCleaner is one of my favorites.  Simple, yet comprehensive CCleaner have a variety of options including hard drive clean-up as well as temporary files (local and internet). It’s always a good idea to run CCleaner to clean my hard drive, unneeded files, registry, and a variety of other things, ensuring that my system is running as smoothly as possible. Even the CNET editors can attest for CCleaners strength, giving it a rare 5 star rating.

Lastly, I can’t believe how many viruses are out nowadays, how easy it is to be infected, and how hard it is to get rid of it. It’s not uncommon to hear a handful of users in a day report that their PC’s are infected, and quite often the only solution is to completely wipe the PC and rebuild. Besides having an Anti-Virus application such as AVG to protect my computer, I find that it is quite useful to have Spybot: Search and Destroy installed for spyware and internet browsing protection. Free and easily available online, everyone should have this installed on their system. It scans for spyware extensively, helping to minimize the possibility of a spyware compromising the system. Spybot can even be scheduled to run automatically so I don’t have to worry!

These are only a small snippet of the available free software available on the internet. There are many sources that provide downloads for free software. One emerging sector of the free applications market is the open source applications. These are applications created by freelance programmers who openly share with the community. These free applications include the original development codes so that anyone may evaluate and even improve upon. Best of all, because these applications are provided with the original codes like an open book, NO spyware can be hidden!

Two Recommended Free Applications Site:
Download.com (hosted by CNET)
SourceForge.net

ENJOY!

Tony is a Service Coordinator with San Diego-based Bravura Networks, Inc.

Contact Tony at ttran@bravuranetworks.com

That said, the current powerhouses in the smartphone market today are Apple’s iPhone 4, Motorola’s Droid Pro, and RIM’s Blackberry Torch. Barring all carrier issues, costs, and woes, let’s talk about the phones themselves and what benefits, or drawbacks, they bring to the consumer.

The iPhone 4, the most recent generation of its legacy, offers a 3.5” LCD, with dual cameras, one on the front as well as the back. One of the most appreciated upgrades to the iPhone 4 is its outstanding picture quality. Using a 640 by 960 resolution “retina display,” it is over four times sharper than its predecessor. For users who heavily watch videos and need sharp video rendering capabilities, the iPhone is the answer. Apple’s continual innovation is commendable, always striving to develop the latest and greatest. One of their newest features is Facetime, offering video call services using its front facing camera, moving them one step closer to a futuristic calling platform. Furthermore, what sets the iPhone apart from others is its multi-tasking abilities. This has been a user complaint for a while, and addressing it head on has given Apple a larger edge in the smartphone market.

Research in Motion (RIM)’s latest release is the Blackberry Torch, arguably their best phone yet. It offers a 3.2” LCD, 5.0 megapixels camera, and both a QWERTY keyboard and touchscreen virtual keyboard. As always with Blackberries, the Torch seem to have crisp and clear call quality as well as its usual powerful email and messaging services, stock-full of security features and remote wipe services for businesses. The biggest change in this development, however, is RIM’s new OS, the Blackberry 6. RIM has abandoned its previous web-browsing system for a new Webkit-based browser to remedy user’s awful experiences. Furthermore, using a new homescreen layout, they have aimed to make functions and applications more accessible, much appreciated from the “menus within menus” from before. However, the Torch is running on a 624 MHz processor, still behind the speeds of the iPhone and Droid Pro, clocked at 1 GHz out the box.

Motorola’s planned release for the Droid Pro on November 19 may hit hard for RIM. Termed the “Blackberry Killer,” the Droid Pro is seemingly aimed at Blackberry’s customer base. Droid Pro is marketed towards businesses, with an array of features that Blackberry has offered. Especially alarming is its close resemblance to the Blackberry’s familiar layout, including the QWERTY keyboard. A few of the key features the new Droid Pro offers include: Exchange and email sync, Flash, a powerful VPN integration system, and the long awaited Remote Wipe. Now offering the same business features that previously gave RIM a stronghold in the smartphone market, Motorola seems to have an advantage. With secure Exchange synchronization as well as VPN capabilities, businesses can seamlessly switch from Blackberries to the Droid without worrying about loss of connectivity to their business servers. Even more profound is the Droid’s new “Remote Wipe” feature, which has been solely a Blackberry service. With phone theft and loss on the rise, it is a much needed capability and a definite welcome.

All three phone moguls have their advantages and disadvantages, with their own loyal customer base built from years of service. However, as we move towards the future, brand loyalty will only go so far. What will set each of these companies apart will be their ability to adapt to modern needs and continually improve their features and benefits. The future of these smartphones is still unknown, but one thing is for sure: The phone to win the race is the one to deliver the best innovations and answers to user needs and complaints.

Tony is a Service Coordinator with San Diego-based Bravura Networks, Inc.

Contact Tony at ttran@bravuranetworks.com

Microsoft’s latest version of their email server software, Exchange Server 2010 was released on November 9th 2009. Microsoft made big changes with this version of Exchange Server in regards to availability, accessibility, compliance, and integration with their Office Communication Server program. Exchange Server 2010 is an upgrade from the previous release of Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 which was a very successful version of the software.

Although not something the end-user will see when an upgrade to Exchange Server 2010 occurs they can appreciate its availability. With Microsoft Exchange Server 2010, Microsoft has made changes to their Clustering / High Availability offering to allow for easier configuration and management of a high availability configuration. Microsoft has also reduced the operations per second that occur to the hard disks of the Exchange Server which allows for cheaper hardware in regards to disk cost without loss of speed or performance and also allows for larger disk space on the server. With the changes to the configuration behind High Availability in Exchange Server 2010 the underlying infrastructure has been improved to allows for easy configuration, low-cost, and high availability of the Exchange Server instance in most business which would have been previously out of reach.

With the changes in the industry and the discussion of the “Cloud” over the past few years Microsoft has made a large number of changes and additions to this version of Exchange to allow more access to the end-user from outside of the company. One of the changes that Microsoft has made with this version is by using Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync and the Exchange Server platform to deliver real-time access to the end-user through hundreds of devices. Users are able to email, voicemail, rights-protected messages, calendar requests, RSS feeds and even instant message conversations through the Exchange Server synchronization. With new features also including speech-to-text voicemail preview and Conversation View mobile users who previously may have had access to the information are able to view and respond to the email or voicemail more efficiently with Microsoft’s new offering.

Changes in regards to the archiving and compliance within Exchange 2010 will help a lot of companies which currently use expensive third-party programs for archiving and discovery or are currently in need or archiving and do not have a solution in place. Exchange 2010 allows for automated archiving on the Exchange Server level to an online and available archive. This is now available to the end-user automatically through Outlook or the Outlook Web App and fully configurable like a normal Inbox so that the user is familiar with how to use the Archive. This allows the data to be migrated out of the main Exchange Database storage without losing access to the end-user or relying on the end-user’s PC to keep the archive safe. Microsoft has also granted new access and tools which can be configured for Compliance Offers or Company Owners to run automated or on demand searches against other user’s mailboxes or all mailboxes in the company through a simple web interface. One of the other features which I know is exciting to our clients is the ability to place users on “Legal Hold”, maybe the user is of question or will be let go in the near future, this ability will keep a copy of all edits and deletions the user makes without knowledge to the user, allowing you to audit any changes they may make to their mailbox prior to termination. Something that was not possible in previous versions of Exchange.

These new features are exciting for all parties involved with the Exchange Server and Network for your companies. With new management tools and greater reliability for the IT team, lower cost for hardware and higher availability for management and few features for access and ease of use for the end user it’s easy to see why Exchange 2010 is being migrated to or implemented at so many businesses. Exchange Server 2010 is available now and we can help with your installation, migration and support if needed.

Daryl is a Business Systems Engineer with San Diego-based Bravura Networks, Inc.

Contact Daryl Jennings at djennings@bravuranetworks.com

The ribbon feature that was first introduced in Office 2007 returns, which was developed to reduce the complexity of finding and navigating the ever growing list of features. But while it was only available within a few of Microsoft’s applications such as Word and Excel, it is now available across all Office Products, including Microsoft Outlook. Improving upon its initial function, Microsoft’s new ribbon design is more dynamic and robust. Whereas the ribbons were mostly predefined within 2007, Office 2010’s ribbon offers more customization options, including the ability to create custom tabs and groups, allowing users to control their Office “environment,” especially useful if they use specific repetitive functions on a daily basis. This is exemplified with Outlook’s Quicksteps feature, where a user may customize and pre-set a string of tasks into a single command button to add to their ribbon. Microsoft soundly invested in a more user centric design, built on a platform that is geared towards the ability of the user’s needs for functionality.

Microsoft takes a step forward alongside competitors’ eagerness for access, anywhere and everywhere, by developing the Web App version of their Office product. Just as Google and other software developers have already released their online productivity tools, Microsoft now follows with a strong engine for users wanting full accessibility to their documents. It is multi-platformed, giving users more options according to their preferences, from Internet browsers to mobile devices. Whenever there is a need for quick edits arise, this Web App will prove useful for on-the-fly editing. Furthermore, as most users are familiar with MS Office products, this allows them to use the tools they normally use without the need to learn a different application.

Collaboration is becoming more on demand as users start to share work and responsibilities to finish projects. Whereas in the past a document was typically completed by one person, today’s reality require much more teamwork. With a need to pull individual resources together, Microsoft has answered by providing more collaboration and file sharing capabilities to its users. This allows for multiple users to edit a single file simultaneously, meaning documents can be efficiently completed, meeting deadlines faster as users work concurrently. A useful feature Microsoft offers for collaborators are the notifications that let other users know if the document is being edited, as well as by who, and which section. Knowing this, users can seamlessly work together to edit one document from multiple locations, thus allowing for faster and more efficient productivity.

With better, faster, more efficient functionality and accessibility between many different users, Microsoft has developed a dynamic and robust product to aid business productivity. With the upgraded tools provided within Microsoft’s Office 2010 suite, businesses can trust that their employees are able to perform their daily tasks utilizing a variety of features designed to improve employee effectiveness and curb inefficiency. Upgrade now, and keep innovation moving forward!

Tony is a Service Coordinator with San Diego-based Bravura Networks, Inc.

Contact Tony at ttran@bravuranetworks.com

It’s not just a firewall and it doesn’t just audit. It can block, it can allow. It is a great solution for keeping your company safe from cyber attacks and malware. It is Websense.

Websense is a great tool for auditing and protecting your company’s network and sensitive data. With employees constantly on the web for business critical applications you can no longer completely deny access to the internet in order to prevent abuse or malicious attacks. This is why it is important to use a piece of software developed from a company you can trust to manage internet usage. There are numerous companies that offer products similar to Websense, however, Websense is by far my favorite. Why do I prefer this product over others? I mainly prefer Websense over its competition because it is extremely easy to set up and use. Here’s what it can do for you:Web Security
Websense Web Security solutions provides the industry’s best security against modern threats. They use their state of the art web filtering technologies to classify and flag web sites so you know where you’re going before you click. The best way to protect your network is to simply filter out all malicious sites by not allowing your employees to visit them. This is done easily from Websense’s web interface.

With Websense you have the capability to limit the amount of time spent on certain sites or a certain kind of site. For instance you can set filters that only allows user to access Facebook from the hours of 11-1. Or limit the time spent on a site for a certain user: let’s say Bill can only use “Social Networking” sites for 30 minutes per day. Not only can you set limits but you can also monitor connections in real time or create reports on an ad hoc basis or have them emailed to an administrator daily, weekly, monthly or anything in between.

Data Security
Websense data loss prevention (DLP) technologies are part of the Websense TRITON solution and provide market-leading DLP capabilities designed to secure sensitive information and intellectual property, as well as manage and enforce regulatory requirements. With the ability to identify and monitor organizations’ sensitive data, Websense DLP solutions help prevent data loss through data transmission and exchange including email, Web, USB, and other channels.

Email Security
Websense email security solutions integrate best-in-class email security with web security and data security technology to achieve unparalleled visibility into emerging threats and one of the highest levels of email protection from inbound and outbound email security risks. Increase email protection with leading security against spam, viruses, and converged email and Web threats, backed by the power of the Websense ThreatSeeker Network.

We’re protected, our clients are protected, are you? Call us for more information and we’d be happy to answer any questions.

Contact Brad Reeves at breeves@bravuranetworks.com

Computer networks have evolved into complex operations throughout the years with the addition of many new technologies such as: switches, servers, boosters, firewalls, phone systems and much more. It takes a huge knowledge base to set up and maintain these systems and unfortunately wallets can feel the pain. The answer is here however. Virtualization will save you money in power and payroll, enable new technological capabilities, and reduce network complexities.

Virtualization is the method of partitioning one physical server computer into multiple “virtual” servers, giving each the appearance and capabilities of running on its own dedicated machine. Each virtual server functions as a full-fledged server and can be independently rebooted. The term virtualization broadly describes the separation of a resource or request for a service from the underlying physical delivery of that service. With virtual memory, for example, computer software gains access to more memory than is physically installed, via the background swapping of data to disk storage. Similarly, virtualization techniques can be applied to other IT infrastructure layers: including networks, storage, laptop or server hardware, operating systems and applications.

Using virtual technology such as VMware will help reduce operating costs up to 50 to 75%. The main money saver when it comes to virtualization is power. Today power is an enormous expense to all companies but by utilizing virtualization, power hungry server costs can be cut by as much as 6 times! Just the power consumption alone can sway a customer to virtualize, and by doing so they save hundreds or even thousands of dollars a month! Another way virtual technology will save money is by having the capability to cut payroll. Consolidation is the key here. If there is less to manage physically, there is no reason to have as many people on staff to manage the physical hardware. One person can easily manage literally hundreds of servers.

By implementing virtualization it not only can save hundreds or thousands of dollars a month in power and payroll, it also enables new capabilities for engineers to manage and test new solutions. VMware vCenter displays a comprehensive view of all the VM (Virtual Machines) across all virtualized servers and clusters. This function displays performance reports including: CPU usage, RAM consumption and more. With this information engineers can easily match VM’s that work well together in order to utilize hardware capabilities. Or even better they can turn on load balancing which does everything automatically. It is easy to add or delete VM’s on an as need basis. This is a perfect solution for test environments with little to no cost incurred to the company.

Please call us today and talk to one of our experts on VMware and virtualization

We are both VTSP and VSP certified!

Contact Brad Reeves at breeves@bravuranetworks.com

Sleep well knowing your data is safe

In such a technologically driven world virtually everything, businesses especially, rely on computers to generate reports, place orders, and even get lunch. Have you ever thought of what would happen if your computer died? Even worse, what if one of your business critical servers went down? I took numerous classes on “risk management” in college but I have never once thought about the subject for more than a minute since then.

A recent study discovered that, of companies experiencing a “major loss” of computer records, 43 percent never reopened, 51 percent closed within two years of the loss, and a mere 6 percent survived over the long-term. Now that we know the statistics what is the most reliable solution to stay protected? I’m glad you asked.

If you Google “backup and recovery software” you will literally get millions of links about possible solutions. Let’s take a look at some of the most common solutions and discus the advantages and disadvantages:

Tape
A tape drive is a data storage device that reads and writes data stored on a magnetic tape. Although many argue this is the most cost effective way to create backups, which I’m not going to argue, it is also the most unreliable. Analysts estimate that anywhere from 42 to 71 percent of tape restores fail. So in the unlikely event of a failure your odds of retrieving data are rare. If for some reason the tapes were good, even though they have been sitting in the closet for 4 years with an inch of dust on them, the process of retrieving the data is painstakingly long and tedious. Because they are literally “tapes” and are not random access the tapes first have to be analyzed entirely to be able to see the data, which takes time.

Ray Schikschnus, a business system engineer who deals with backup configurations for many large companies said, “If tapes are so good why does everybody want DVD’s and not VHS’s?” He highly suggests sticking to hard drives to back up data.

External Hard Drive
Backing up to an external hard drive is better than not backing up at all but still an ancient method. When a failure does occur and the data is backed up, the greatest cost incurred is now time. It can take days if not weeks to resolve hardware damage and if you have 30 people on payroll that can add up.

Hard drives are of course more reliable than tapes but corruption is still possible. It is recommended that someone checks the data by opening some of the backup files to check for data integrity. This kind of backup configuration may be the most cost effective because all one needs is to purchase an external hard drive and connect it to the server or PC, however, the more individual backup units you have the more likely it is that one of them will fail.

BIT Support™ COP
Continuous Operational Protection is by far the most comprehensive backup solution on the market. This solution combines the idea that backups should be on hard drives and addresses the many problems of conventional backup solutions. This method consists of one physical machine in house. Let’s look at the BIT Support™ COP in a little more detail:

Near real time backups: Bravura’s “Incremental Forever” methodology captures all changes to the initial image in increments of 15 minutes. The Incremental Forever technology not only backs up recent datasets but also allows end users to reconstruct the state of their data as it stood at the end of various 15-minute restoration points.

On site virtual Server: If any of your servers fail, our server virtualization technology embedded in the Network Attached Storage (NAS) allows customer servers and applications to be restored and rebooted in less than 1 hour in most cases. As you may sometimes endure a wait of several days in order to receive replacement servers from vendors, your NAS can have your business up and running. The NAS multitasks so that, even while functioning as a virtual server, it can continue to back up data from other devices plugged into the NAS. Our technology thus allows you to remain in business without any significant loss of data backup, server functionality, or application downtime.

A complete image: We generate an image of all hard drive partitions via an agent, which is warehoused on the NAS device physically located at your location. The data is stored using AES-256 bit encryption and compressed. We employ a block-level, not file-level, backup, which means that data is captured at the level of 1’s and 0’s. Block level data is raw data which does not have a file structure imposed on it. Database applications such as Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft Exchange Server transfer data in blocks. Block transfer is the most efficient way to write to disk and is much less prone to errors such as those that result from file-level backups. Additionally, block level backups are not affected by open files or open databases. The block-level image is an exact digital duplicate of the on-site server.

Secure remote Storage: After imaging the servers to which it is attached, the NAS device then creates an independent 256-bit encrypted tunnel and transmits the imaged data to a secure offsite location where it resides in an encrypted, compressed format. That remote site then replicates again to an alternate data center, creating a total of three copies of the data in three geographically distinct regions. Since the data is encrypted and only you have the key, no one has access at any of the remote storage facilities.

This method protects against virtually any kind of failure, from hardware to software to a natural disaster. For more information please call Bravura Networks and ask about our award winning BIT Support™ COP.

Ray Schikschnus is a Business Systems Engineer with Chicago-based Bravura Networks, Inc.

Contact Brad Reeves at breeves@bravuranetworks.com

Read, publish, and share- with Microsoft SharePoint

“Microsoft is a huge player when it comes to desktop software with their widely accepted Microsoft Office applications, including: Word, Excel, and Outlook, not to mention all of these applications run on a Windows platform like XP or 7.” Robert Gillespie, an Information Systems Professor at San Diego State University, lectured to his students. He continued with, “However Microsoft does not rule the business application market, a market they are trying to establish themselves in. “

Do not be confused, Microsoft has a strong hold in many aspects of business IT solutions with their many editions of Microsoft Server, Exchange and SQL but what they lack is decision support systems- then came Microsoft SharePoint.

SharePoint’s home page said it best. “Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 is an integrated suite of server capabilities that can help improve organizational effectiveness by providing comprehensive content management and enterprise search, accelerating shared business processes, and facilitating information-sharing across boundaries for better business insight.”

So how can SharePoint do all this? Let’s start with its ability to serve as a content manager and enterprise search. SharePoint is designed to operate on a company’s intranet, providing the needed security to store sensitive company data. Users of SharePoint upload files to the server instead of dragging the file to a shared folder, providing a gateway to everything that goes through it. Right off the bat SharePoint offers some unique features. Users have the ability to “check out” files to let others know that the file is currently being edited. Once alterations have been competed the file is “checked in” under a new version just in case you need to go back to an old version or would like to see what got changed.

One of my favorite features of SharePoint is the ability to do an enterprise search. Like I said, SharePoint provides a gateway to everything that goes through it meaning, if you upload a file not only can you search for the name of the files but more importantly SharePoint searches file content, an extremely useful tool when looking for something within a file. The search function can also be further modified to search entire contents of a file server, and the search indexes everything on the SharePoint server including, but not limited to: Wikis, documents, e-mails and faxes.

To better efficiency, businesses are adopting process based operations. By streamlining business processes, tasks can be performed faster and with less error. SharePoint has the tools to share these processes with the company easily with only a few clicks. Users can update coworkers of changes and new policies with one announcement, pointing them to an updated Gantt chart or workflow.

Yet another great feature in SharePoint is its ability to facilitate information with the use of wikis and blogs. A wiki is an article that anyone can edit at any time, like Wikipedia. A blog on the other hand is an article that cannot be edited by anyone, like a news article. These tools are extremely useful when collaborating with others in your company. And just like documents wikis have the ability to revert back to previous version and to track all changes made in between versions. For instance, if your company stores information about suppliers on a wiki page, and a particular supplier moves, anyone may update the information. The change is logged and if for some reason they never ended up moving the page can be reverted back to the version with the correct address.

I have only provided a glimpse of the capabilities that SharePoint can provide. If you are interested in implementing SharePoint in your company, Bravura Networks is here to help.

Robert Gillespie is an Information Systems Professor at San Diego State University for the College of Business

Contact Brad Reeves at breeves@bravuranetworks.com