Posted by Adam Ruth on Mon, May 31, 2010
Photo by thefuturistics
We all get frustrated from time to time (yes, even system administrators.) One very common way that we let off a little steam is with a few well-chosen words. It's one thing to let loose with a string of invective that would make a sailor blush out of sheer laughter when you're alone, but it's just not good form to do it while sitting at a user's desk with them watching over your shoulder. That is, unless you want to go to that $&#@% HR sensitivity training again.
We're all familiar with the standard replacement curse words such as gosh, dang, flip, crap, and dagnabit. The trouble with these is that people know what you really intend to say so they lose some of their power. So, I present you with 9 good swears to use while working in a public space that will be mistaken for technical jargon, or at least the ravings of a harmless homeless person (I'm not sure which is better.)
1. PEBKAC
An acronym standing for "Problem Exists Between Keyboard and Chair" which refers to the user as the source of a problem. When pronounced it sounds somewhere just technically complex enough that people will generally be afraid to ask what it means.
Example: How did that file get PEBKAC'ed from the disk *and* the backup?
2. Bent Prong
Having had the experience of dealing with fragile prongs in serial and VGA cables over the years, for me this curse comes from a very dark place. The fact that it sounds vaguely dirty is a plus.
Example: This installer is really bending the prong.
3. BitBlt
Short for Bit-Block Transfer, this is a programming term relating to efficiently moving pixels around on the screen (or in an image.) It's a good replacement for minor frustrations, such as when you accidentally hit the wrong button or forgot to enter the system BIOS and have to boot the system again.
Example: Bitblt it, I did it again.
4. Twisted Pair
Refers to a type of wiring or cabling, most commonly network cables such as CAT-5. It's a great replacement when referring to a faulty component where you might say "piece of..."
Example: Why won't this twisted pair stay connected for more than five seconds?
5. Sum of a BIOS
This nonsensical phrase won't easily get confused like the more explicit "Son of a Batch." It sounds just slightly jargony to the point that most people will be embarrassed to ask its meaning because they think they should already know.
Example: Is that sum of a BIOS keeping it from running?
6. Reg Hack
This one is already somewhat of a curse, and you can use it literally and still get the full effect.
Example: Looks like it's going to need a reg hack.
7. Feldercarb
This one will only be familiar to fans of the original Battlestar Galactica, so most people won't have ever heard it before. It's less dangerous to use than its more popular cousin Frak. It also includes the word "carb" which is its own dirty word these days.
Example: That feldercarb is going to get me to viper all over my cylon.
8. SCSI Disk
Always a fun one among computer nerds since its introduction. Scuzzy Disk just rolls off the tongue. Even with its vaguely dirty sound, it's much more light-hearted than other swears.
Example: Well, if that don't just initialize the scsi disk.
9. SCO
For when you need some extra punch, SCO is one that really has some weight behind it. "Get the SCO out of here" and "Shut the SCO up" are not only good replacement curses, they're also quite meaningful in their literal sense. Plus, even when explained to the uninitiated they still won't get the full meaning.
Example: Why won't this SCO just finally end?
Follow me on Twitter @AdamRuth
Posted by Adam Ruth on Fri, May 28, 2010
Photo by Pink Sherbet Photography
I was on a long haul international flight a few days ago, trying to endure 14 hours in a metal tube. As my troubleshooting mind usually does, it was thinking of ways to make the flight more comfortable and efficient. I had all kinds of wonderfully impractical ideas about ways to speed up baggage collection and deal with the poor sucker in the window seat needing to use the lavatory with two sleeping people blocking the path (one reason I always get an aisle seat.) As I was thinking of my brilliant plans, I kept discovering problems with them in the real world. The laws of physics can be really inflexible, for some odd reason.
It really highlighted to me why I like software development so much, because I get to be mostly freed from those laws. If I want the seats in my abstract airplane cabin to be able to move around in 3 dimensions, why that's not a problem. I can even have them pass through each other like a poorly programmed video game. That's not to say that the software version of my jetliner is of any real value, but at least I can "break" all of those pesky laws all I want if it makes sense to do so.
The real world just isn't so flexible, unfortunately. System administrators have to deal with the friction between the physical and electronic worlds even more than us software developers. Computers and users are real, tangible things for the system administrator while they are more abstract concepts for a developer. Now, a good developer will do as much as possible to treat the people as real in order to more fully create software to meet their needs, but unless the software is in-house then there is a disconnect between flesh-and-blood users and their abstract counterparts.
This friction between cyber and meat space requires a delicate balance for the typical system administrator. Server rooms require refrigeration, keyboards break, and users make angry voices on the other end of the phone. But at the same time shared folders can be on in another city, login scripts can be easily duplicated, and password policies can be exceedingly simple or complex. The best administrators are those who can find and keep this balance working, and one reason that software developers don't necessarily make the best system administrators and vice versa. Understanding the differences will help you to know where you will be the happiest.
People outside the industry don't really understand the subtle but important differences between various computer specialities. Especially relatives looking for help installing camera software they got for Christmas, for them a computer expert is a computer expert. There are administrators who love the hardware, those who love building scripts and automating things, and those who love working directly with people. Finding what speciality you like and then following it can be a very rewarding experience. It may seem really easy to identify what it is about your chosen profession that you really enjoy, but sometimes it's not so obvious. Take some time and really think about what it is you love about what you do. Once you do, you'll be able to see what kind of balance you need to strike, and what changes you need to make to achieve it.
If all else fails try out the System Administration Drinking Game to at least identify what it is you don't like.
Posted by Shane Corellian on Wed, May 26, 2010
Sys Admin Calendar
Matt Simmons, creator of Standalone-Sysadmin.com has created a Sys Admin event calendar. The purpose of this calendar is simply to provide a "one-stop" shop for you to find Sys Admin events in which you may wish to participate.
You may also submit events to be be posted. Don't worry about spam or other noise on the calendar as there are some good ground rules to prevent the calendar from becoming cluttered or just an advertising dumpster.
Also, as I have mentioned in other posts, I strongly suggest that any sys admins out there become a member of the Sys Admin network. It's nice to have a great resource of like minded social outcasts if you love, as I do, all things sys admin.
Fulfill your Sys Admin duties with Admin Arsenal. Remote Software Deployment, Inventory, Monitoring and more. Check us out.
Posted by Shawn Anderson on Mon, May 24, 2010
Photo by bb_matt
Slashdot writes on the downfall of rewriting applications from scratch. The article references an older article (Things You Should Never Do) from Joel Spolsky written in 2000.
If you're not familiar with Joel I highly suggest bookmarking his blog, JoelOnSoftware.com.
Though Joel's article focused on developing applications, I'd like to apply it to our jobs as system administrators. Specifically, the tools that we use everyday.
Too many system admins take the do-it-yourself approach when managing their systems. They have a few tools on which they rely, but as new challenges arise they simply use their old tools.
When all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail
I first heard that statement when consulting for an new company. They handled almost all systems management via batch logon scripts. The logon process was several minutes, and the patches did everything from verifying proper hostname to patching systems (this was before WSUS and Active Directory).
The organization was screaming for a new tools, yet they had one solution for every problem. More logon scripts.
Hit the pause button (or at the very least the 1/2 speed button) and take a moment to ponder if there aren't faster ways to do your tasks more efficiently. Then find solutions, remembering that you don't need to create from scratch.
You'll find everything from COTS (Commercial Off The Shelf) products, to freeware point solutions. (If scripting is in your arsenal of tools then you can even make a go at automating some of these solutions.)
Use Joel's logic to your benefit. Make these products work for what you need, or make them better. Just don't remake them from scratch.
Pstools from Sysinternals are some of my favorite admin tools. They're a free way to get a lot of things done that system admins need.
Which tools have become indispensable in your daily work?
Follow me on Twitter
@ShawnAndersonAdmin Arsenal -
a tool for every Windows Administrator.
Posted by Shane Corellian on Fri, May 21, 2010
Photo by quacktaculous
After a standard 22 hour shift of remote software deployment, getting medieval on UAC and completely wrecking the registry many System Administrators kind of create their own scent. If only Ralph Lauren could isolate the chemicals that our IT bretheren and sisters produce, an entirely new line of perfumes and colognes would spew forth. Here are a few potential products that come to mind as I recall the aromas of cluttered cubes and server rooms in my past:
- WMI Access Denied Mist - A rich blend of Green Monster and Cheetos. This cologne is known to leave an orange residue on your fingers and, subsequently, on your keyboard as you try and figure out the damn WMI security.
- Essence of Registry - Get lost in the blend of Outlaw Beef Jerky and Room Temperature black coffee (Folgers, of course).
- Infinity by Loop - This is the scent that, like that recursive sub-routine you wrote this morning, will never, ever end. The ingredients are a hodge-podge of Mongolian BBQ mixed with some Kimchee your co-worker swore that you'd love.
- Gamer by Gaultier - Oh yes, the cologne of gamers: Forget old-school BO and flatulence we now have Pizza Pockets and Natty (or whatever else your roommate has to drink in his fridge). Mix these ingredients with 3 day old skid marks and navel lint that the EPA now considers an official marsh and you have the perfect essence of the notorious Sys Admin Gamer.
- Hommes Taches de Traspiration (Men's Perspiration Stains) - This French cologne will ensure your legacy as the go-to-guy for all things BASH.
- Stallman by Richard Stallman (self-explanatory)
- LDAP by FCUK - The French Connection finally came through with a perfume that the ladies will love. Spritz this little joy on you at your next Microsoft Tech-Ed appearance and watch the booth babes weeping from loneliness as you run to the nearly deserted Women's restrooms to plan your ultimate exit strategy.
- UAC by Morgoth - This is the first cologne whose active ingredient is profanity. Trying to get that code to run as a service under UAC? This is actually a good starting point to play the Windows System Administrator Drinking Game. Mix in a 5th of Jack, some office violence and you have, UAC by Morgoth.
- Chamber of Halitosis by Tom Ford - Mix that 22 hour shift with in-N-out burgers, Cartesian Joins, chronic gingivitis and 7 straight years of abstinence and you have the ultimate Sys Admin aroma. Free, at no extra charge, you will avoid promotions into management, mandatory meeting attendance and, indeed, all human contact.
Remotely deploy your apps with a free trial of
Admin Arsenal and cut down that 22 hour shift to a manageable 16.
Subscribe to the Admin Arsenal blog for all of your technical non-hygiene enhancing needs.
Posted by Adam Ruth on Wed, May 19, 2010
Photo by user
Lately, I've been closely following what Microsoft is doing with Office 2010 in the cloud. It seems to be an inevitable direction for the industry, and while Microsoft isn't always the leader, you can at least get some glimpses into the future by watching what they're doing.
What they are going to be doing with Office and Hotmail really looks to be inspired by Google Docs and Gmail. I am happy to see these two powerhouses going head-to-head in this space, because it can only mean that something useful will come out in the wash.
Both companies are making great strides to push their cloud solutions deeper and deeper into the enterprise. From a system administration standpoint I think that what the future holds is still a bit fuzzy, but I can see the outlines starting to form. Small companies are latching onto this type of melding of e-mail, office, and the web. There's still a lot to be shaken out, but the big enterprises will eventually have to move that way to stay competitive.
In my opinion, system administrators need to keep up to date on this push further and further into the cloud, particularly those in large organizations. Once a tipping point is reached with features and functionality, the shift is going to be rapid and it will be all too easy to fall behind the curve.
See some examples of deploying Office with Admin Arsenal.
Posted by Adam Ruth on Mon, May 17, 2010
Photo by carl simourd
Admin Arsenal has a feature to run some of its functionality as a service in the background. This is handy, for example, if an administrator wants to keep their systems' inventory scanned and up-to-date without leaving their workstation logged on all day.
For more information on the value of computer inventory, read our white paper
Normally, this service is set to start automatically with the computer so there's minimal interruption to the tasks it runs. Some users noticed that it wasn't starting up with the computer even though it could be started manually after the computer was running. It was a bit puzzling until we discovered that they were all machines with UAC enabled. A little more investigation showed that the service was starting, but taking longer than the 30 second time limit to come alive and was being terminated.
New to Windows is an option to set services to start with a delay. This was added in Vista and Server 2008 as a performance option to speed up the boot process by reducing the contention for system resources early in the boot cycle. We're not certain why UAC slowed down the loading of our service, but it may have to do with the .NET Framework which does take quite a while to load for the first time. It's possible that UAC introduces a delay in the .NET Framework and subsequently any service that uses it.
So our latest build of Admin Arsenal sets the delay start option automatically. If you have noticed this problem, then simply switch to delay start and you should be good to go.
Follow me on Twitter @AdamRuth
Posted by Adam Ruth on Fri, May 14, 2010
Photo by crsan
The Registry is one of the most maligned parts of Windows, but it's something that is going to be with us for a long time and every system administrator will have to work with eventually. Not everyone is familiar with all of the types of data that it can contain, so here's a quick summary of those types. I will only cover those types that can be created with regedit.exe, the other types are rarely used enough that most administrators will never encounter them.
String
AKA REG_SZ
Probably the most common type, it's simply a text value. It can contain any text support by the system, which means it can contain Unicode characters which may trip you up if you export or import data from text files.
Multi-String
AKA REG_MULTI_SZ
Used a lot less than String, it's just a list of several strings together. The one thing that can't be stored in a Multi-String value is an empty string (which can be stored in String) because internally an empty string is used to mark the end of the value.
Expandable String
AKA REG_EXPAND_SZ
This type is exactly the same as a normal String. It is used to inform an application that the string contains environment variables that need to be expanded (such as %windir% or %programfiles%.) It's up to the application to do the expanding, though, so there's no guarantee that creating a value of this type will actually be expanded.
DWORD
AKA REG_DWORD
A 32-bit number in the range 0 - 4,294,967,295. This type is quite often used as a Boolean (true/false) value with 0 used for false and 1 used for true. Its name comes from Double WORD, since a WORD is 16-bits. (TRIVIA! 4-bits is called a Nibble.)
QWORD
AKA REG_QWORD
A 64-bit number in the range 0 - 18,446,744,073,709,551,615. This type was added to the registry in Windows 2000 and not supported by regedit.exe until very recently. It's still very uncommon and you'll see a lot large numbers stored in two DWORDs. As you can probably guess, its name is short for Quad WORD.
Binary
AKA REG_BINARY
A binary value is simply a bunch of bytes. Binary values are usually encrypted data or data that is encoded in a format that can only be understood internally by a program (such as ACLs.) These values can be edited with regedit.exe or reg.exe, but you'll want to be very careful because they aren't intended to be understood directly by a human (if you're a
protocol droid, then you'll be okay.)
Need to remotely edit the registry on multiple computers? Try
Admin Arsenal for free.
Posted by Adam Ruth on Wed, May 12, 2010
Photo by mikebaird
The Simple-Talk blog has a recent article on
Troubleshooting Windows Blue Screen Errors which I found to be quite interesting. I've never really had to deal with BSODs much beyond simply rebooting the computer, that's always been someone else's job.
I never knew what kind of information is available to deal with such crashes, both on the blue screen itself and in the dump files. Using the debugger to analyze a dump file seems a bit intimidating but once you know what to look for and what you can safely ignore it's not that difficult. Normally an error code and a driver name is all you'll need to get started finding out what's wrong and how to fix it.
Luckily, system crashes in Windows are much less common than they used to be but they still do appear from time to time. With a little searching around I found quite a few other guides to help out with the dreaded blue monster, here are a few to get you started.
Need to remotely troubleshoot Windows problems? Admin Arsenal can help, get a
free trial today.
Posted by Shawn Anderson on Mon, May 10, 2010
Prior to deploying IE 8 to all of your workstations, spend a few minutes with the Internet Explorer Administration Kit (IEAK). Here are just a few of changes that you can make that will keep your computers configured the same way. We also have a video demo below.
- Set (or disable) default browser
- Enable Google searching
- Preconfigured proxy settings
- Disable auto patch downloading
- Security settings
There are many changes that you can make, and just taking some time to tiptoe through the tulips of IEAK will let you see what is important to you.
We've put together a video to demonstrate how easy it is to use IEAK to remotely deploy IE 8 to all of your XP or Vista machines.
You can download IEAK 8 here.
After you've modified your IE deployment file you can use Admin Arsenal, or any other software deployment tool, to deploy the application to all of your computers.
Looking for more info on IEAK?
Follow me on Twitter @ShawnAnderson
Remotely deploy software to all of your computers with Admin Arsenal - Trial available.
Posted by Adam Ruth on Fri, May 07, 2010
Photo by joebeone
Okay, now you've got some servers consolidated using virtualization (you are consolidating servers, right?) But what do you do with the old boxes? Sure, you could donate them to a charity or recycle them in an eco-friendly way. But where's the fun in that? Here are some other ideas.
- Cubicle space heater.
- Fill with sand for large zen garden.
- Add realistic wind noise to flight simulator game.
- Glue front panels on fridge to hide beer in server room rack.
- Boat anchor for CEO's new yacht.
- Add some tubing, Mentos and Diet Coke to win contract for new fountain sculpture outside courthouse.
- Landscaping for new miniature golf course in old server room.
- Build vacation shack and show up that beer can house guy.
- Pizza warmer.
- Advanced new "laptop" for that guy in sales who's always making fun of your conference t-shirts.
Follow me on Twitter @AdamRuth
Posted by Adam Ruth on Wed, May 05, 2010
Robocopy, for those of you who don't know, is an advanced file copy tool from Microsoft which improves on XCOPY. It has a number of features, notably the ability to restart and retry failed copies (Robocopy is a portmanteau of ROBust COPY.) For me, though, the most important option is /MIR which not only copies new and changed files but deletes files from the target that have been deleted on the source. Why it's a part of the Windows Admin pack for a separate download and not included has always been a mystery to me.
It's a command line tool and that's all well and good for us command line jockeys but Microsoft has recently (in the sense that I just learned about it) released a GUI. This is good news for people who haven't used it before and aren't accustomed to all of the options. I like that it can create the command line equivalent, making it a good way to discover options and move to the command line when needed.
If you need to copy a lot of files around and haven't yet used Robocopy, give the GUI a whirl an see what it can do for you.
Posted by Adam Ruth on Mon, May 03, 2010
Photo by gurdonark
This post is both a rant and a warning. Simplicity is a noble goal, but far too often adding simplicity actually creates more complexity (usually in unintended places.) As I talked about in my post on security tradeoffs, no analysis of a security improvement is complete without first identifying where it weakens security. The same is true with anything that simplifies a process: Somewhere down the line something is being made more complex.
What I'm talking about specifically is a part of Windows Presentation Founation which is the new framework for writing GUI software in Windows. (My apologies to those that aren't developers, or don't want to be, but I will try to word this for computer nerds of all stripes.) WPF is a really amazing piece of engineering, but not without some compromises. The thing that's really been bugging me lately is the Visibility property used on UI elements.
Prior to WPF elements had a property called Visible that was a Boolean type (boolean types are either true or false.) So that, for example, if you wanted a button to show or hide based on some value within a program it was pretty clear how to do it:
SomeButton.Visible = User.IsAdministrator;
SomeButton.Visible = Customer.OrderCount > 100;
WPF has a different concept of visibility which is due to the way that elements are designed to flow around each other. When a UI element is hidden it is either just invisible and still takes up space or it is completely gone so that other elements may take its space. The WPF designers decided to turn the 2 value Visible property into a 3 value property called Visibility. Visibility can be set to Visible, Hidden, or Collapsed.
Now, this decision seems to have been made for the sake of simplicity. The other option would have been to create a second Boolean property such as IsCollapsedWhenHidden. Taking two properties and making them a single property is a good idea, right? Well, it may have simplified the writing of the framework, but it made things more complex for us developers. Coding the same things as above now looks more like this:
SomeButton.Visibility = User.IsAdministrator ? Visibility.Visible : Visibility.Hidden;
SomeButton.Visibility = Customer.OrderCount > 100 ? Visibility.Visible : Visibility.Collapsed;
When a developer is showing or hiding components they need to spend extra energy thinking about whether the component is to be hidden or collapsed, something that rarely every changes during the run of a program and is a decision that should have been made earlier in the process. This seems like it's not such a big deal, but it's just a small piece of the pie. WPF has a concept called binding where properties of elements are tied to properties of objects so that a change to the object is reflected in the interface automatically. Here's the code if Visibility was a Boolean type:
[Button Visibility="{Binding Path=IsAdmin}"/]
Pretty simple. Here's the code with the current type of Visibility:
[BooleanToVisibilityConverter x:key="boolToVisibilityConverter"]
[Button Visibility="{Binding path=IsAdm[in Converter={StaticResource boolToVisibilityConverter}}"/]
The BooleanToVisibilityConverter, as its name implies, turns True into Visible and False into Collapsed. But what if you want False to be Hidden? There are a couple of ways to do it, here's one:
[Button]
[Button.Binding Path="IsAdmin"]
[Binding.Converter]
[con:MapConverter]
[con:Mapping From="True" To="{x:Static Visibility.Visible}"]
[con:Mapping From="False" To="{x:Static Visibility.Hidden}"]
[con:Mapping]
[Binding.Converter]
[/Button.Binding]
[/Button]
There are other ways to get there, but they're all about as complex. All of this could have been avoided if early in the piece someone stopped to think what the consequence would be of the new Visibility property.
Any time you think of an improvement that will simplify something, take a moment to ask what all of the effects are. Making something simpler almost always makes something else more complex. Be especially wary of things that make life simpler for you but more complex for your users.
Find out how to simplify with Admin Arsenal (with little added complexity!)