Globalize Networks blog

I’ve been wondering why there aren’t more free internet remote support solutions given that there is very good open source code out there to accomplish this (i.e. VNC).  Using VNC requires knowing the host IP and having TCP 5900 open through whatever firewalls the host is using.  I have come across a couple of free solutions on TechRepublic that might serve this purpose:

crossloop.com

teamviewer.com

I like crossloop – built on VNC and offering a whole support community  sort of thing.  I have only tried it over a shockingly slow connection to africa though and it was pretty painful.

What should we do about Vista?  The major hardware vendors are making it harder to get XP pre-installed, so licensing will begin to get dodgy.  Also Microsoft will end “Mainstream support” of XP on 4/14/09 http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?LN=en-us&C2=1173&x=13&y=13

1. 1. Personally I would prefer to stick with XP until the bitter end, but we will begin to see increased support overhead after mainstream support ends.  My main concern is the “Non-security hotfix support” which will require a special agreement with Microsoft. http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifepolicy.
   2. It makes sense start putting  together a roadmap to transition to Vista.
      1. full environment software and hardware inventory
      2. determine possible hardware problems
         1. Printers, scanners, business-card readers, etc.
      3. Determine software problems
         1. Compatibility of standard software
         2. What about non-standard, business critical
      4. set up training for techs and end users

I went to my first SF Tech Meetup today and learned a little bit about widgets.  These are little chunks of content that you can embed in a webpage or blog and e-mail around.  Widget people like to use the word viral.  This seems like a good way to promote your website or your blog.  My favorite widgets were: clearspring which provides a simple way to create and distribute widgets and disqus which provides a blog commenting system (that I might implement here)