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When Windows 7 was still in beta, I asked 4sysops readers about their opinion on the new taskbar in Windows 7, a.k.a. Superbar. At the time I wrote the article, I was not really convinced of the value of this new feature, but I needed more experience. Using such a feature on test systems is quite different from working with it in a productive environment. I have been using Windows 7 on my laptop for a while, and my final verdict about the Superbar stands now. I also want to share how I use the Windows 7 taskbar.
I think, this is an important topic, especially for IT pros, because we usually work with many applications simultaneously and switch between tools all day. Hence, finding the best method to switch tasks can increase your productivity significantly, even if the time needed to change from one tool another is only a second. These seconds add up over a long work day. Even more important is the fact that switching quickly between applications is essential for keeping your focus. If you need two seconds or more to switch between apps, then this will certainly have a negative effect on your concentration and will tire you out quickly.
More than 1,100 4sysops readers took part in this poll. I asked whether a graphical user interface (GUI) or a command line interface (CLI) was preferred when it comes to Windows administration. The results are quite clear: 66% prefer a GUI tool, 17% prefer the command line, and for another 17%, it doesn’t make a difference.
Bad times to come for iPhone and Windows PhoneMany things have been said about Windows 7 and its benefits. However, the talk rarely covered the topic of IPv6. Surely it isn’t a new feature: Vista was fully Ipv6 enabled and an IPv6 network stack exists for Windows XP. But in my opinion IPv6 is worth mentioning when talking about Windows 7.
Most networks today are still based on IPv4 because the Clients are not IPv6 capable. A lot of companies hesitated to migrate to Vista and still run Windows XP without the IPv6 stack. However, this circumstance will change with the release and deployment of Windows 7. Might IPv6, which technically is an old story, become more attention when Windows 7 is deployed en masse?
New features: Full Win7 support (including Aero and XP mode) and reduces EC2 prices by 15% Just played a little with it. Nice, but not breathtaking.In my last post, I described how you can perform quick queries with MaxPowerSoft Active Directory Reports 5.1.1.1. Today, I will focus on the tool’s special features, that is membership reports, filters and print preview. Note that you can win a license worth 299 US dollars (see info at end of the article).
When you load a report and then select some users, the “Load Membership” menu item becomes available and you can load membership for those selected users. The detail grid with membership information will be loaded as a sub grid of every record and the “+” sign will be highlighted meaning that membership is available for that particular users. You can click that little “plus” sign, extend that row to see membership information.
Checks if the Computer supports AMD-V, Intel VT or VIA VT
A few days ago, MaxPowerSoft released a new version of their Active Directory Reporting tool, which has quite a few interesting new features. 4sysops readers have the chance to win a license worth 299 US dollars (more information can be found at the end of this article).
The most obvious new feature of Active Directory Reports 5.1.1.1 is the new Outlook-like user interface. I think, it is the tool’s biggest advantage over competing products. It does not only look cool, it is also very effective. Even if you already have an Active Directory management suite, you definitely should have a look at this specialized AD reporting tool; it could speed up your reporting tasks significantly. You only need few minutes to have an idea about how you can retrieve all kinds of information from your domains with AD Reports.
I hope some of you followed my recommendation and played a little with Amazon’s cloud management tool, AWS Management Console. It is really fun! Another option to manage EC2 is the free Firefox plugin Elasticfox. I wouldn’t recommend starting with the tool if you haven’t previously used EC2. The AWS Management Console is the better tool for beginners. However, Elasticfox is not really difficult to use. It just lacks the AWS Management Console’s Launch Wizard which makes it easier for EC2 newbies to find an AMI (OS image) to play with.
However, Elasticfox is an interesting alternative once you understood how EC2 works. Its biggest advantage over Amazon’s tool is that it is snappier. Working with Elasticfox feels like using a desktop tool, whereas the AWS Management Console is a typical web app and often a bit sluggish although it is based on Ajax. Elasticfox is probably also the better tool if you have to manage many instances because it uses the screen space more efficiently. The spreadsheet-like interface allows you view all relevant information quickly.
Full support for Windows 7 and OS X 10.6, new feature: system favorite volumes, bug fixesUpdate: Amazon now offers an improved cost calculator which is much easier to use.
In my last article in this series, I discussed the storage costs for my Amazon EC2 server. Today I will focus on the bandwidth and instance costs. As we will see, things are getting a bit more expensive now.
One of the things I really dislike about EC2 are the bandwidth costs. One GB inbound data transfer costs $0.10 and one GB outbound traffic costs $0.17. This doesn’t seem to be much. However, in my case the bandwidth costs are a significant part of the overall monthly fees. In September, I paid about $15 for data transfer, which corresponds to approximately 90GB. I enabled HTML encryption in Apache after I moved to EC2, but this didn’t really help because most of my traffic comes from the screenshots. I also download backups of the database and the screenshots every day, which equals up to 15% of my monthly bandwidth costs. In my view, external backups are absolutely necessary because if someone hacks your Amazon account , then you might lose all your data even if you have backups within cloud.
I would even prefer Snow Leopard to Harry Potter 
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