Thursday, December 24, 2009

Volume Shadow Copy – Simple Protection That Can Save you Lots of Pain

Ever lost a document, had a system malfunction because of a new driver or software installation or had a virus impact your files? I'm pretty sure I know the answer to this question. 

To avoid such situations consider using the  volume shadow copy feature. The feature is on by default in Windows 7 and easily added to Vista.

The feature allows you to launch System Restore and roll back to a working system state from before the installation. If you can’t get your system to boot, you can also do this from the Windows Setup DVD. This process is reversible, i.e. your current state will be automatically saved as a restore point, to which you can later go back.

In another situation, if you accidentally delete 10 pages of your dissertation, you can right-click the document, choose Restore previous versions, and access a previous version of it. You can open it (in read-only mode) or copy it to a new location.

If you accidentally delete a file or folder, you can right-click the containing folder, choose Restore previous versions, and open the folder as it appeared at the time a shadow copy was made (see screenshot below). All the files and folders that you deleted will be there.

I made sure I had the feature turned on based on past painful experiences. Something to consider...


Happy holidays
 

Monday, December 21, 2009

Security Makes the Headlines Again....

Interesting article in the WSJ recently about a tool called Skygrabber that insurgents are using to intercept video feeds from US drones over Iraq and Afghanistan. Of course the attention has overwhelmed the skygrabber.com website and is a lesson on being ready for your moment when it arrives but, the real issue here is one of security and how commercial enterprises are thriving on attacking vulnerabilities in networks and making a profit in doing so.



Here is a quote from Andrew Solonikov, one of the software’s developers.


"It (the software) was developed to intercept music, photos, video, programs and other content that other users download from the Internet -- no military data or other commercial data, only free legal content," he said by email from Russia.


Um, last time I checked, “free, legal content” can be downloaded and does not need to be intercepted. Intercepted is what you do when others own the content and you want to steal it. Looks like Andrew and friends don’t mind stealing from musicians, movie producers and software companies but, don’t want to mess with the military.

Any bets that the US intel community is capable of monitoring who downloads this software?

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Home Networking Security...Beware

Guess what happened to me the other day? I was using a DynDNS service to remote into my house and mis-typed the IP address. Instead of being rejected, I was provided a prompt to a DVR system login (I don’t have a DVR). I did a quick Google search for default DVR username/passwords and found a large list of common username and passwords.


It’s amazing how many home devices are now IP enabled, but also concerning when you think about how many people are still using the default password info that comes with the device.
Hopefully it becomes common practice for everyone (inside our industry and outside of it) to change the default information, whenever they get a new device.

P.S.
Did you know there will be 215 million IP enabled devices by 2012?

Friday, December 4, 2009

Put your Day on Auto Pilot with PowerShell Scripting…

Ok I wish it were that simple, but, it is possible to save substantial time and effort by automating many repetitive and common Windows IT tasks by creating scripts with PowerShell. There are lots of websites and books that have pre-written scripts for you. So, not only can you automate a good chunk of your IT tasks, you can copy and paste your way to automation. With that in mind, here are a few resources I’ve found helpful.

Microsoft Technet
The premier place for basic and advanced topics related to PowerShell. I’ve spent hours on this site and it has everything from training and free scripts to a download center with lots of goodies. Here are some MUST visit sections:


Library – More reading than I could possibly do this year. It’s the place to start with good example code to walk you through the learning process.

Download Center – Get PowerShell and the scriptomatic2 software to make scripts using a graphical user interface.


Scripts – Over 650 scripts on items from managing an IIS server to system backups and restores. Once you know how to use PowerShell, jump start your library here.


PowerShell.com
A great website with tips, tools, a forum, free scripts and lots more on PowerShell.

CBT Nuggets
CBT Nuggets provides an excellent online training program that covers PowerShell. Their sample tutorial is a pretty good primer on several basic commands and the PowerShell pipeline concept (like a workflow).

Quick Reference Card/Cheat sheet
DZone makes a nice set of free cheat sheet reference guides. These are handy to have printed and around when making/editing scripts.

Twitter
For Twitter users, you may want to follow these users:
http://twitter.com/powertip - Tip of the day tweets
http://twitter.com/ScriptingGuys - Tips and ideas straight from Microsoft
http://twitter.com/shitmydadsays - Because it’s funny