Please Use Protection

Last week we did this thing at work called “Tech Check” (or TekChek, or TechCzech, or something hip-but-actually-not) and I got to help a lot of new students try to get their systems to a minimum standard of functionality for their school year.

This was eye-opening. Viciously eye-opening.

The quantity of people who should be computer literate who were running wildly out of date systems with no anti-virus and no admin password was astounding. It was a combination of not knowing that they should and not knowing how to do so. I am not going to go into details about why these things are important, just quick, easy instructions on how to do it.

So, for anyone who’s reading this, I’m asking you to now, please, for the love of all that’s holy (or not), install A/V and updates and make sure that your user account has at least something for a password. Even if you’re using a Mac, you need to keep your system up to date and have a password.

Windows Instructions

1. Open Internet Explorer and go here: http://update.microsoft.com/windowsupdate. Follow the prompts to install all available updates. Go there over, and over, and over until it says there are no updates left to install. Reboot as many times as necessary. Then go there again, just to make sure.
2. Get anti-virus. If you want great protection, you have to buy it and this is the one I recommend: Eset NOD32. Purchasing a good A/V solution is extremely important if you are using your computer for business at all, and Eset NOD32 provides discounts for multiple computers or multiple years. Please do this right now. If you were unwilling to pay the “extra” money for a Mac, this is one of the costs you chose to bear. If you are unable to shell out $40 / year for a great solution, here’s an adequate, free solution: Avast! Home Edition. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than nothing. Note: lots of businesses and schools will provide anti-virus to their employees, students, etc. Often this will be pre-configured to download updates, run in the background, etc., and may never require you to purchase a license. Check with your employer or school.
   
3. Give yourself a password: Press Ctrl + Alt + Delete and click the button that says “Change password”. It is important that you remember what this password is, so make it memorable. Make it your drivers license number, or your license plate number, or your insurance policy number, or something else that you can have written down that doesn’t look like your password. Here’s an idea: pick something in your wallet that expires regularly, and use something from that (your insurance policy expiration date, for example). Then, every time that expires and you have to get a new one, change your password to reflect the new information.

Mac Instructions

1. Click the Apple logo in the upper left corner and choose “Software Update…” Install all available updates, reboot if necessary, and keep checking until there are no updates left to install.
2. Give yourself a password. Click the Apple logo and choose “System Preferences”, then click “Accounts”, your account should be highlighted with a button that says “Change Password”. It is important that you remember what this password is, so make it memorable. Make it your drivers license number, or your license plate number, or your insurance policy number, or something else that you can have written down that doesn’t look like your password. Here’s an idea: pick something in your wallet that expires regularly, and use something from that (your insurance policy expiration date, for example). Then, every time that expires and you have to get a new one, change your password to reflect the new information.

Please remember that this is just a base level of security meant only to deter the casual intrusion – kinda like wiring your bike to the bike rack. It’s not going to protect you from someone who is dedicated, but it should help you from being one of millions of people who get pwned just because it was so easy.

Also, feedback is always welcome. If you want more instructions for making your computer safe, let me know and I’ll write more documentation.

UPDATE: Eset has a free online virus scanner.

iPhone Adventure

A few days ago my iPhone decided that it would rather be an iPod Touch – meaning that it wouldn’t connect to the cellular network enough for me to make of receive phone calls. Totally uncool, iPhone.

So I called up AT&T to get it working again and they transferred me to Apple. We tried a few things over the phone and in the end I had to go to AT&T to see if my SIM card was the problem.

Going into a cell phone store is like going to a used car dealer: even if you have a car that you love, and you bought it from them, and all you need is for them to give you the manual, they still try to sell you another car. And I knew it was coming as soon as the rep shook my hand. I told him exactly what the problem was and what I needed and he tried to tell me that I had scratched my phone all up and therefore needed to buy a cover, and that I had excess dust in my phone so I need a belt holster (yeah, that’s a good look), and why don’t I just buy a 3GS ’cause I qualify for upgrade pricing if I renew my contract. Ugh. And when he gave me a new SIM (finally) turned on my phone and it connected, I was said “Awesome, thanks.” and walked out. And then it lost signal again. So I went back in and he was in the middle of conning this old woman and trying to use my problem as justification for her to buy a warranty. I rudely interrupted and said “Didn’t work” and then he tried to sell me Applecare even though I knew I didn’t qualify.

He, and AT&T’s army of his ilk, is the reason that I am leaving AT&T as soon as possible.

So, phone still borked, I get back on the phone with Apple and they tell me to take it to any store and they will take care of it. And they were nice, and helpful, and friendly and fun to talk to. And the rep referred me to his old boss at the Fields Museum who will probably give me a background tour if I drop his name. And they let me buy Applecare 19 days after they should have. And then I went to the Apple store on Michigan Avenue and they fit me in as soon as possible and traded me for a brand new, working iPhone and the rep looked around to try to give me a screen protector – they were out, but it’s the thought that counts. And Less Than Jake played a show IN THE STORE the next day. Also, this store is incredible. Just amazing.

When I was talking to one of the reps he said, and I quote, “Wow. They let you buy Applecare 19 days late?! That has to be a record. Someone here really loves you.” And I couldn’t agree more.

Apple, keep this up and I just might ask you to marry me.

iPhone 3.0

I am fully aware of the fact that everyone and their dog has written about iPhone 3.0 in the last couple of weeks, but I’m doing it because some of you read my blog but not dozens of tech blogs on a daily basis.

A while back I wrote a post about Getting in Sync where I talked about trying to get my digital life in order and all of my data everywhere sync’ing without using a third party service. The conclusion of that process was that I was right back where I started because of one stupid, little problem: iPhone IMAP does not function correctly with an Exchange server. Instead of moving messages, it copies messages. So if you trash a message from your inbox, you have a copy of it in your inbox and a copy of it in your trash.

Last night I updated to iPhone 3.0 and that problem still exists. That is seriously uncool. I’m going to keep testing, ’cause it might have something to do with the fact that deleting messages doesn’t happen immediately. Why? I don’t know.

Other than that, I’m liking 3.0.

• Copy and paste is finally here and it’s already saving me a lot of trouble. Entering server names, UPS tracking numbers, and flight confirmation numbers is no longer awful.
• You can now select multiple photos and delete or e-mail them.
• Same with individual SMS messages.
• Search is pretty cool. Especially for email.
• You get another screen for all your apps. Because you clearly need more than 48 apps.

Still annoyed about a number of things:

• AT&T is the worst carrier ever. Expensive as hell, no MMS, no tether, etc. As soon as my two years are up…
• No video recording? WTF? (This can be achieved by jailbreaking)
• No voice control. Seriously? (Likewise, jailbreak)
• Still can’t remove Apple’s apps (Stocks, Notes, etc.)
• Still can’t customize homescreen notifications – like put my upcoming events, weather, etc.

This is definitely an improvement, but I am actually looking forward to my warranty expiring so I can hack my phone without consequence.

Getting in Sync

I don’t know about you, but I have a lot of information in a lot of places – personal email, personal computer, work email, work computer, iPhone, etc. Today I decided to spend some time figuring out how to connect them all together to keep my information in sync and accurate. Mostly anyway.

While the primary goal was to get all of my data in sync, the secondary goal was to protect my data from loss or exposure.

Here’s what I’ve done:

• Work PC (Outlook) syncs email & work calendar with Work Server (Exchange 2007)
• Work PC (Outlook) syncs work calendar with Google Acct using Google Calendar Sync
• Google Acct syncs all calendars (work, home, holidays) with iPhone using Google Sync for Mobile, (which, stupidly, only does calendars and contacts)
  
• iPhone pulls work email via IMAP and sends work email via work SMTP
• iPhone pulls Gmail via IMAP and sends personal email via Google SMTP
• iPhone syncs with Address Book via iTunes (the only cabled connection)
• Address Book updates iCal’s “Birthdays” calendar
• iCal syncs work, home, and holdiay calendars with Google via CalDAV

The final result is this:

• My personal and work data are visible from home or work and on my iPhone.
• My personal data are on my personal equipment and not my work equipment.
• I can lose my phone without losing any data.
• I can lose my job without losing (or exposing) any personal data or having my data wiped by my employer.
• I can lose my personal computer without losing any data (Time Machine, FTW).
• I can lose my work computer without losing any data (Iron Mountain).

What is lacking

• iPhone does not have my birthdays calendar (so no reminders, sorry everyone).
• Outlook on my work computer has to be running in order for Google to get my work calendar.
• Google contacts does not match Address Book or iPhone.
• I still have to use a cable to sync my iPhone with my Mac when my phone and my computer both have Bluetooth. WTF, Apple!? Fix that.

Google’s contact management still needs some work. I tried sync’ing that at one point and it screwed everything up -  lots of duplicated contacts: Google had their email, iPhone had their phone number, so now I had two contacts. Google has finally given us the ability to merge contacts (and it works well), so I’m going to work on getting that cleaned up. What really needs to happen is that Google updates my contacts automatically when they update their own contact info – like Exchange.

If anyone wants more details about how I accomplished any part of this, post and I’ll fill in the details.

Another’s Shoes

I have been a systems admin for years, whether my business card said it or not. I have dealt with hundreds of users and systems.

Growing up I mostly had Windows machines. I had come to digital maturity using 95 and 98, and really came into being a sysadmin on 2000 and XP. I had learned to deal with, expect, and train others in the daily headaches of dealing with windows systems.

Then I started dealing with Macs. For the first years I was dealing with far fewer Macs than PCs, so I chalked up the lack of incodents to the smaller market share. Then I started dealing almost exclusively with them. And it wasn’t until then that I figured out that they really are that much better. And I grew accustomed to it. No longer was being an admin a daily headache, no longer was I apologizing to users because their systems crawled to a stop while it scanned for a virus, removing and reinstalling hardware so that the drivers might work, or re-installing the entire OS because I couldn’t explain why some problem couldn’t be fixed.

And now I am working in a place that is almost all Windows Vista on ThinkPads and ThinkStations. And Windows is so much worse now.

Vista is a nightmare. Vista is such a nightmare that IBM, who built the Thinkpads, will not install it on their company systems. It is what happens when committees of sheltered, brain-washed people make decisions. It is the result of “good enough”, of settling, of people accepting gruel because that is all they’ve ever had.

But people are learning. Learning that they get what they buy. Learning that their computers should be helping them get work done and enjoy their time with them.

Now, if only businesses woud stop “drinking the Microsoft Kool-Aid” I think we could make some real progress.

The only way that this is going to happen, I think, is if they try it out. See what they’re missing. See why so many people love their Macs. See why it takes half as many admins to run a network of Macs.

When your computer is a constant obstacle to getting work done, it’s time to look at new options.

WordPress for iPhone

WordPress is now available as a client from the App Store. Enjoy typing on a tiny keyboard with no tactile or haptic feedback? Done!
I’d give you the link, but I can’t copy and paste, so just go here for more info:
http://iphone.wordpress.org
If you see how to add photos, let me know.

iPhone 3G Ringtones from your MP3s

Here’s how to convert any MP3 in iTunes to a ringtone that works on your sparklin’ new iPhone 3G:

1. Open iTunes and go to iTunes > Preferences, then choose Advanced at the top, and Importing right below that. In the drop-down for “Import Using:” make sure you have selected “AAC Encoder”. Now choose General at the top and make sure Ringtones are enabled.
2. Control+Click the song you want to use and choose Get Info.
3. Under Options you can specify a start time and a stop time. Ringtones are limited to 30 seconds, so specify the 30 seconds you want to capture. If it’s the first 30 seconds of the song, just specify an end time of “0:30″. Choose OK.
4. Control+Click that song again and choose Convert Selection to AAC. This will convert the song from whatever format you have it in to an AAC (“Apple Audio Codec”) file with an .m4a extension.
5. Control+Click the NEW one you just created – If you forgot which one it is, it’s the one that’s only 30 seconds long – and choose Show in Finder.
6. Quit iTunes.
7. Back in the finder window that you just opened, the .m4a file should be highlighted. Change the extension from m4a to m4r.
8. Re-open iTunes and drag that file into iTunes. It should now show up under Ringtones. Make sure your iPhone is set to sync ringtones and the one you want is enabled.
9. On your iPhone, open Settings, then select Sounds. Specify your ringtone there. You can also assign ringtones to specific contacts by going into Contacts.

iPhowner

Confession time:

Until this weekend, I had never owned an Apple portable device. That’s right, I’ve never owned an iPod. Weird, huh? For such technophile, I would’ve expected me to have lots of them. Nope. I spent like $35 on a cheap Zen Nano to take to the gym and that’s the only portable music device I’ve owned since my portable CD player got stolen out of my friend’s car four years ago.

Also, until this weekend, I had never had my own cell phone. Every job I’ve had for the last 3 years has provided me a cell phone. This has meant, of course, that every time I change jobs, I get a new number. This one is finally mine.

I passed on the first-gen iPhone for two reasons: initial cost and low bandwidth.

iPhone 3G solved both of those problems, so I got one.

It’s glorious.

I still haven’t figured everything out on it and am not using it to its potential, but I’m getting there.

Here are a few things that I would like to see, so if you know something I don’t, please share.

The “slide to unlock” screen should show my last couple of emails/txts, today’s weather, etc. Right now it’s a pointless (but gorgeous) picture of Earth. I want to glance at my phone and get useful information, not have to unlock it.

VNC. Mocha VNC Lite came out today. Awesome. Remote control my computer from my iPhone.

Google everything. You did it for BlackBerry (RIP, RIM). Do it for iPhone. A browser interface is not an appropriate solution.

Auto On/Off. Or at least auto plane mode. I don’t need to receive emails, browse the web, send texts, etc. while I’m sleeping. I’d rather save some battery and put this thing to sleep for a few hours every night.

It’s easy to criticize, but these are simple features that I’m used to having and miss – like MMS, video, copy/paste, etc.

Apple, you guys have done a great job, take a break. Google, get on it. You developed a great suite for a dying handset. Do it again for us.

I am not a Software Developer

…but I respect them.

In college I studied Mathematics and Computer Science. When I was a kid, for some reason, I thought the life of a coder would be what I wanted – long restless nights of coding in the dark, followed by days sleeping on the couch at the office, bloodshot eyes, big headphones thumping techno and blocking out distractions so you can focus on the code. I may have watched too many movies like “Hackers”.

In one of my junior year’s programming classes (3D Animation, I think), I discovered that it’s not actually fun. It’s boring. And tedious. Programming is 10% writing something new and 90% finding the bugs in what you wrote. At least, it is when you’re just starting out.

So, I started doing other things – graphic design, troubleshooting, networking, etc. Basically putting to use what developers had created. Let them worry about compiling errors, product cycles, iterative loops, customer specs, and so on. I’ll use it when it’s ready for use.

But having some programming and business behind me helps me understand what it is to develop software.

Without going off on several tangents in the same post, the point of this is to bring some attention to this great series of articles about one developer switching from Windows to Mac (Win32 to Coca). And, in particular, his description of A developer taxonomy.

I won’t contend that this is not boring for 99% of the world – probably more. However, when you’re shopping for software, implementing new software, or running through a demo, having an understanding of the type of people who wrote the software you’re looking at makes it much easier to see the madness in the method calls.