2008, The Year To Come
1 January, 2008
Let me start off by saying Happy New year, by now most people will be back at work and wishing they could go back on holiday again!!
But let's look forward to the year. This year will see some big changes to IT yet again. Microsoft will be releasing their new Server 2008 product, which means they will also be releasing their new Small Business Server version too; it's called "SBS Cougar" at the moment, but will be given a standard name before launch.
Whilst we can't talk too much about SBS Cougar due to Non Disclosure Agreements with Microsoft, we can say that it is built on the next version of Windows Server 2008 and inherits a number of the security and performance enhancements that are part of that product. In addition, SBS Cougar promises to extend the functionality with Exchange 2007 for email, inbuilt AntiSpam capabilities, enhancements to Remote Web Workplace and other really cool features that are yet to be publicly announced.
While there are far more products coming out, I would also like to let you know about the year ahead for Correct Solutions.
The end of 2007 saw us install ConnectWise, CW is a support and ticketing system designed for IT companies only. This platform will help give us more transparency with how we support you as well as giving you greater insight as to the current status of any jobs we are completing for you. By now we would have spoken directly with you about this change, how you can log into the system to add work, print invoices and check on a status of a job, however if you still have questions or would like more information, please give us a call, we are more than happy to get feedback, both good and bad on areas where we can support our clients better.
And what would all these changes be without us changing and updating our website? One of our clients has helped us re-design our website to give it a new fresh look and to help us get away from the "geek" feel of the old site. Over the coming weeks and months we will be adding more content to the website as well as blogs and news items to keep the content fresh and current.
Lastly and most important, I would like to thank all our customers, suppliers and staff for their work during 2007 and look forward to working with you again in 2008.
A prosperous year to all!
Ryan SpillaneIntroducing WebSpy Insight for Microsoft SBS Premium
31 October, 2007
Introducing WebSpy Insight for Microsoft SBS Premium; an extremely useful software application produced by WebSpy, the makers of the highly respected log analysis tools Analyzer and the award winning Vantage.
As the name suggests, Insight for Microsoft SBS Premium works specifically with Microsoft SBS Server (Premium Edition) to provide you with a wealth of information on the use of your Internet, email and security resources.
Many benefits can be derived from this versatile application such as identifying users that are browsing the web unproductively, employees that are costing you money by sending or receiving large joke emails, and verifying your firewall is blocking or allowing the intended traffic. All this helps to reduce costs and eliminate risks in your business.
WebSpy Insight for Microsoft SBS Premium can be installed on a server in your SBS network (it does require SBS Premium 2003 SP1 & ISA 2004). Using Insight for Microsoft SBS Premium Insight imports log file data from Microsoft® ISA Server and Exchange, located on your SBS Server. Once data has been imported, you can access four main screens:
- Internet usage
- Email activity
- Security Overview
- Reports
The Internet Usage, Security Overview and Email Activity screens come in very handy when needing to quickly investigate a particular issue thanks to the simple right-click drilldown feature.
You can sort a list of websites on the Internet Usage screen by size downloaded and right-click any suspicious sites to drilldown to the users that visited them.
Alternatively, use the Security Overview screen to identify the source of an unidentified application, and the firewall rule allowing it to access the Internet.
You can even use the Email Activity screen to identify the source of confidential information leaks by checking the senders and recipients of certain emails.The Reports View provides a simple interface for producing some great SBS tailored reports covering web and email productivity, instant messaging activity, Remote Web Workplace usage, VPN activity, and external attacks.
There is also a fifth view called Users and Departments that enables you to group IP addresses, usernames and email addresses into real 'Users' and 'Departments' (this can also be automatically imported from your SBS Server).
Insight for Microsoft SBS Premium is a breakthrough for small businesses that need to EASILY identify a range of issues, from employee productivity through to bandwidth usage and security threats. For more information on installation and licensing, call us on 02 8831 8200.
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