2007 August

Adding Another Hat

Thursday, August 16th, 2007
by James Connors

Some of you may know that I recently accepted a new position as the Network and Web Administrator for Generations Incorporated.  If you’ve read this blog for long, you know also that I’m currently working desktop support for Boston University.  It’s about 10:30 here in Boston and I was thinking about the transition in skills and knowledge of a job such as this.  Desktop support with Information Systems Planning and Support has been a really great experience where I’ve learned a great deal from the technical aspects to time management and relationship maintenance.  These are all skills that I’m able to apply to this new organization I’m working with.

Unfortunately, as a student employee and the nature of the desktop support position, I have not learned much in the way of server technology.  Sure, this means that Generations Inc (GI) took a bit of a gamble with me since their prior admin was basically a brain-child genius.  On the other hand, having worked in an environment where you don’t always see the whole picture or deal with users that honestly don’t know what happened, I have learned the ability to troubleshoot problems.  Perhaps this, the ability to systematically find problems and resolve them in an orderly fashion, has been the greatest benefit I’ve gained from my work with ISPS.

Troubleshooting skills aside, I face a large learning curve when it comes to specific technology such as Windows 2003 Server, Windows Small Business Server, Terminal Services Server, and Microsoft Exchange Server 2003.  These particular OS’s are my bread and butter - the daily grind if you will.  My primary tasks on a day to day basis are communicated via the task application of outlook and revolve around server maintenance and backup, desktop user support (similar to my position with ISPS), and longer term research and development projects.

I think I’ll mention a couple of the projects I’m working on right now.  The first, a full inventory and audit of computer assets, users, policies, and infrastructure.  This is a rather basic concept - figure out what we have, where it is, and who uses it, then make changes as necessary.  Since we’re such a small shop, it won’t be difficult to get any one bit of information but to do the updates and remediation that I think will be necessary, I expect that I’ll need some out of hours time.  The other big project I’m working on is to align mobile computing to our network where users with Blackberries will be able to sync with our servers or perhaps Windows Mobile devices will use the AirSync technology.  I’m still in the research phase for this project, gathering the raw numbers and information to then present to the directors in a report.

So what spurned all of this?  Well, I was bored for one.  I’m in the midst of a book that teaches the Windows 2003 Server information in a crash course sort of way.  I’ve been reading about installing, domain controllers, all sorts of bits about network infrastructure that I just needed a bit of a break and here I am.  In any case, I will bring this to a close.  I know I haven’t been writing often but I think that my more regimented schedule will do well for my publishing cycle.

Thank you to all that continue to read and support City Streets, my professional blog and website!

People Search With a Twist

Wednesday, August 1st, 2007
by James Connors

When you post messages to your friend’s wall, do you consider how an outsider might perceive your message?  Are there any items in your “interests” or “activities” sections of your profile that you wouldn’t want your mother, teacher, or future employer see?  If so, you need to keep reading.

Computer users my age have a false sense of privacy while they prowl through the pages of Facebook and Myspace.  They tend to believe that just because someone isn’t their “friend,” they can’t see what information you’ve posted.  This isn’t true.  There are a number of technologies out on the market and in development that facilitate the quest to gather more information about YOU.

Two new projects are leading the charge of indexing social networking as a method of profiling every user on the internet.  SPOCK is a search engine in private beta testing that browses and analyzes internet profiles of a few major social communities.  The fore-runner of the social indexing project is WIKIYOU.  This search engine launched last month and provides a robust interface delivering search results for close match names as well as exact match.  Both of these engines have the same mission but  operate in a different manners.

When searching for myself, SPOCK presented to me four pages of users with real names matching “James Connors” scattered all around the world.  My actual entry existed on the last page and contained a number of inaccurate items.  Spock prowls profiles looking for identifying information such as your zodiac sign, age, hometown, occupation, etc.  The engine then builds a tags for your entry into a profile that users can then “claim.” Similarly, WIKIYOU allows users to claim their profile for their engine as well.  Their method of indexing is to pull clippings, or small snippets, of your various profiles online and reproduce them in their search results matching keyword searches.

This movement towards social indexing represents a major shift in the way the internet works.  Instead of categories or keywords, tags and social networking provides the basis for search results.  The most important bit about these programs is that you do go and claim your profiles because, as in my experience, there can be false information contained within your profile.  Claiming these profiles also allows you to build out the interface with your activities, other links, and aliases throughout the net thus providing potential employers or other checkers the accurate and correct information.

I’m planning another blog entry regarding this idea of claiming your identity on the net in the next few days because I think it’s a really important issue to remember as an internet user of the 21st century.  Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you… next time.