Windows Unwrapped Episode 5 recorded Sunday July 17, 2011
Welcome to Windows Unwrapped your show for Windows related news, reviews, and interviews.
In today’s show we’re going to talk to the CEO of the worlds first Windows App Store, talk a little about Microsoft’s secret social network, and more…
Guest: Thibauld Favre – CEO of AllMyApps.com (Crunchbase profile)
AllMyApps.com is the first ever Windows App Store. You can download new apps and keep your existing ones up to date easily with a single click just like you can on your mobile device.
We talk to Thibauld about the websites past, present, and future for software developers and consumers alike. Very exciting!
Twitter and Microsoft Hammering Out Bing Integration -
PC Magazine. Steve’s been working on a cool link filterer for twitter to get to the good stuff. Microsoft is trying to get real time feed information to do something similar. Google failed and just decided to make their own social site.
Windows XP last 1,000 days
“1,000 days left of Windows XP support has created a buzz on the web. Companies should think about switching before the last minute as preparing the roll-out of a new OS is time consuming in itself.
“Windows 8 will be able to run on a wide range of machines because it will have the same requirements or lower”. Interesting… (Tom’s Hardware)
It Unwrapped Episode 8 for Saturday, June 25, 2011
In today’s show we’re going to talk about the Pentagon super hacker simulator, IT Admins gone wild, bosses who neglect security, and more!
Topics
Pentagon building Internet simulator to practice cyber war????
The pentagon is getting serious about the hacking business it seems. This goes along with another story I saw about the govt. announcing that military action is on the table for cyber attacks.
IT admins gone wild! (Infoworld)
A list of things to look out for when someone has admin access on your network. How to keep these things from happening.
Welcome to IT Unwrapped your entertaining source of IT related frivolity
In todays show, we’re going to talk about some more security breaches, hacker in-fighting, we pour one out for Rim, and what every IT person should know …
Topics
Citi Credit Card Hack
Bigger than originally stated (was 210K, now 360K people). This is the second breach for Citi Bank announced in a weeks time on June 9 (two Thursdays ago).
Account numbers and email addresses were taken but no SSN. “The Times reported this week that the hackers easily penetrated the company’s network by using a commonly known technique called parameter tampering against a vulnerability in the Citigroup website”
The other attack was three from Romania and one from Austria in an ATM scheme where they replaced key pads to capture pins
Sega hacked just like Sony – Lulz wants revenge
“Customer email addresses and birth dates, which can be read in plain text were taken, as were passwords, which could not be read in plain text because they had been scrambled or encrypted using security software before being stored in the database.”
“Sega – contact us,” Lulz said in its Tweet to the video game developer. “We want to help you destroy the hackers that attacked you. We love the Dreamcast, these people are going down.”
LulzSec hackers taunt with a POTS telephone hotline
“A recorded greeting featured a man speaking with an exaggerated French accent explaining that “Pierre Dubois and Francois Deluxe” were unavailable because they were up to mischief on the Internet.”
“Incoming 614-LULZSEC calls now redirect to HBGary. You take care of the horde while we’re gone @AaronBarr, thanks mate. Bye for now.”
RIM is going under?
Article that says that RIM stock is plummeting and they are planning major layoffs. IT pro’s beware of using RIM tablets and/or other products as a company standard. Why RIM is getting left behind – Crap hardware??
Network world says RIM has had too many issues with not having cutting edge hardware when compared to other companies. I think it’s probably a combination of that and the fact that they just don’t have anything above Apple or Android tablets. They seem like a generic version of big name tablets without the app environment. Their apps store hold about as many apps as the Windows marketplace for the WP7. The difference is that Microsoft seems to have deeper pockets to make things happen. MS also released API converter for the Android and iPhone apps. MS Windows 8 tablet looks as if it will blow the Blackberry OS away and MS also is saying that they will have a major OS release every year now for their phone (maybe tablet).
The 30 skills every IT person should have
Taken from this weeks Spiceworks community post of the week
One thing not on the list… Programming!! Steve said this when I first started and it’s absolutely true. Programming helps IT people get past some pesky hurdles. You don’t have to be an awesome programmer but knowing how to throw together simple apps can save you (and/or your department) from having long manual processes to get things done.
This week we are talking about vendor experiences, the state of the IT job market, more RSA security fallout and some of our favorite community posts
Interesting things through the week
Steve: A vendor shipped us a PC with an expired password and the account was prevented from changing the password. Had to set BIOS date back in order to reset.
Topics
IT worker demand remains robust despite slow economy InfoWorld
Tech unemployment is roughly half of the national average for other occupations
Especial growth in Mobile, virtualization, and cloud skills
The data breaches in the news means that now is a good time for infosec workers
RSA offering SecurID replacements following Lockheed Martin attack Link
“However, many RSA channel partners contend that the security company’s efforts came too little too late, following more than two months after the breach was first detected, and only after a high-profile company disclosed that they were the victim of a cyber attack”
Art Coviello executive chairman of RSA open letter
International Monetary Fund says it’s been a victim of a sophisticated cyberattack
They “have much more to reveal” at their developer event, BUILD (Sept. 13 – 16 in Anaheim, Calif.)
Jason Hiner from TechRepublic.com thinks that they will force that UI on the desktop market – we disagree
And so does MS: “We also showed effortless movement between existing Windows programs and new Windows 8 apps. The full capabilities of Windows continue to be available to you, including the Windows Explorer and Desktop, as does compatibility with all Windows 7 logo PCs, software and peripherals.”
Can switch between touch interface and old style Windows UI. They say it’s all one shell, not a Packard Bell ripoff 20 years later
Cool Features
16:9 Widescreen display
snap windows to the side to run apps side by side
An app called “Chatter” that does video chat (built in)
Swipe from the right to get to the “Start Menu”
Wonder what the “Connect” button does?
Swipe up from the bottom to get application options
SteveE – “Ah boy, sometimes I feel like an old fart, but touch technology doesn’t thrill me at all on a large scale. Phones and tablets, yes, my 22″ monitor…no, I don’t need cheeto stains on that thing.
It’s going to be a while before anyone takes my trackball and ergo keyboard away.”
Intel claimed that there would be at least 4 versions of the OS and that 3 out of 4 wouldn’t support legacy apps. Microsoft: “factually inaccurate and unfortunately misleading”
a company co-founded by recent University of Pennsylvania graduates Meredith Perry and Nora Dweck, thinks it may have a solution for those days when you realize you’ve left your laptop cord at home: Wireless charging stations
Charge your devices using UltraSound
Pizo crystals vibrate, transferring the audible sound into electical sygnals
$30-$50 for the battery pack and probably a bit over $100 for the charger!
Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen says the argument with Apple over supporting its Flash software on the iPad and iPhone devices is over. “It’s an argument that the press likes to continue bringing up,” he said in an on-stage conversation with Walt Mossberg at the D conference
IanFaganOKS: “Whats that… you want us to allow all of our corporate secrets and customer info on to our employees iphones? Sure why not… whats the worst that could happen!”
Front page has many articles all related to the virtual environment including storage servers for virtual desktops and servers, Operating system changes in MS, VMware, Citrix.
Opinion articles on technology all pertaining to virtual enviroment.
Excellent resource for any IT person that is wanting to learn about virtualizing or already works in a vitalized environment and wants to stay on top of the rapid changes that happen within it.
Resources for learning courses
Many “how-to” videos
Tech Tip of the Week
Paste in Google Docs without formatting <ctrl><shif><V> (only works in Chrome)
What we use or where we go to get our tech news info
an app?
Dean uses “tech news” for WP7 and “Siesmic – directory, tech section”
Google? Steve mentioned “Tech republic.com” as a good resource for news.
Opinion, which sites usually seem to have the “breaking stories” the fastest?
Twitter add-on “TWinbox” to Outlook and how it helps to get news faster through search and filters.
Stories
“mashable.com” – Amazon servers may have been used in Sony Playstation network hack.
They say a source said someone or “someone’s” set up a amazon cloud computing server with fake information and used the server to mount the attack. The FBI will be looking into the amazon servers where the attack came from.
Sony still believes that the hackers were “anonymous” citing the calling card phrase “We are legion” found on sony’s servers.
Burson-Marsteller was hired by facebook to put out a smear campaign against google. Chris Soghoian was asked to help with the smears and instead posted the e-mails from Burson. The e-mails were posted.
Smear campaign basically said that google was going too far by posting peoples information in google’s “ Social Circle” tool.
TIVO
Hulu announced that it was coming to Tivo back in Sept. “http://www.zatznotfunny.com” says that they are doing Beta testing for Hulu on the Tivo.
“Technolog” , msnbc- Youtube announced that they will have 3,000 movies available for stream soon. This will give them 6,000 movies available total which will put them in the running to compete with Netflix and Amazon…. $3.99 each -vs- $9/month for netflix
Comcast will make their “on demand” compatible with Tivo. I was told that “on demand” wasn’t compatible with “tivo” firmware in the past. Had to pay $100 for a tech to come out and install a cablecard.
Amazon and Netflix are available through Tivo already which makes it even more desirable.
Chicago Pete:
Same here across the pond mate.
We have new employees show up on Monday’s, HR tells us they need a email account etc…, we ask where are they sitting, what PC are they using and do they need a phone – all of which we do not have. Fine impression for a new employee.
Left hand meet Right hand…
Quivern:
A good CIO/IT director/IS director makes a point to be proactively talking to the other business unit managers to find out if anything is coming down the pipe. It’s fairly rare for business unit managers to remember that business decisions are likely to have IT consequences, so it’s the role of the CIO to make sure that the IT consequences are considered. If you do this aggressively enough, eventually your senior management will get the hint and require business unit managers to get IT signoff on any new proposal.
Nick1337:
sadly, i think that we’ll make them feel stupid when we point out the obvious, even though we do our best to buck that stereotype, i think that’s why people avoid telling us things.
Dan5825:
Whears when HR gets a new user, their first thought might not be getting logon details for them, you’d have thought when management teams from 2 schools get together and school A specifically tells school B “Your IT team will now need to look after this”, you would expect the management team at school B to then tell school B’s IT team.
The sad thing is not only did I see it coming, if the situation was reversed we’d probably not get told either. We’d just get a call out of the blue a few months later “can you come here and fix my computer?” “I’m sorry, where are you calling from?”
HR software company
A HR company that has heavy integration with AD so that makes it harder for there to be mistakes made. They provide a GUI for HR people that syncs with their HR software that automatically will keep AD up do date if someone gets added/removed/changed in HR system.
IT Unwrapped Episode 1 for Saturday April 29, 2010
This is the pilot episode for a new bi-weekly podcast focusing on Information Technology. IT Unwrapped (ITUW) is a laid back lounge style show where Steve and Dean Bostedor reflect on current IT related topics and offer advise based upon experience or too many big boy drinks.
