Alvinator, Alvinatorisageek

Windows XP after 30 June 2008

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 07:20:23 GMT

Yap, Windows XP is certainly coming to an end. Apparently, in addition to the the fact that OEMs can no longer order new licenses of Windows XP after 30 June 2008. Microsoft will end mainstream support for XP on April 14, 2009 and it will end extended support on April 8, 2014 - http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/01/28/04NF-save-xp-license_1.html.

Ironically, my current customer is still half way through its Windows NT4 to Windows XP migration. The most impact for my customer is that mainstream support for Windows XP will end next year and this may impact their licensing agreement with Microsoft.

I can understand that Microsoft is trying to push the sales of Vista. As my previous blog have mentioned, the uptake of Vista in the enterprise world is very slow. As for the retail space, there are genuine competitors such as Mac OS, Ubuntu and eePC GNU Linux. All of which is impacting the uptake of Vista. However, setting hard targets for ending the shipment of Windows XP and its support are NOT going to sway the enterprise customers to change to Windows Vista. At least in the Australia Market, most enterprises had a desktop hardware refresh in the past 12-24 months. Therefore, they are reluctant to go through another hardware refresh until they can get more values out of the existing fleet. Take Intel for example, http://www.itnews.com.au/News/NewsStory.aspx?story=79271.

I think Microsoft needs to accept the fact that because Vista is much more resource hungry than XP, until the Australian enterprise customers catch up on their hardware fleet, the uptake for Vista will remain stagnant.

MOSS 2007

Sun, 22 Jun 2008 03:23:21 GMT

Recently, there has been an explosion in the implementation of MOSS 2007 in Australia. Many large enterprises are using MOS 2007 for hosting websites, online collaborations and user productivity enhancement. Arguably, MOSS 2007 is part of the Next Generation Work Place (NGWP) phenomenon.

As of result, there has been a dramatic increase in the demand for experienced Sharepoint resources. Many IT professionals are updating their skills in this area. Many of them are focusing on the administration of Sharepoint website, creation of templates and management of workflows. While these elements of a Sharepoint design is important. However, I feel that in some cases the IT professionals and their organizations are neglecting the infrastructure aspects of MOSS 2007 such as high availability, fault tolerance, capacity and performance.

Often the most complex part of a MOSS 2007 design is the supporting infrastructure services such as clustering, replication of SQL data, backup and recovery, SAN storage and etc. An Infrastructure Architect should treat MOSS 2007 as just another application solution that requires infrastructure support. Therefore, it is still critical to be familiar with the "grass root" of infrastructure design and the architectural understanding of infrastructure requirements.

Windows Mobile versus Blackberry

Mon, 26 May 2008 07:10:46 GMT

Lately, several of my customers need to renew their Blackberry service fees. They have asked for advice on whether to continue using Blackberry or upgrade / change to Windows Mobile. Most of these customers are enterprises paying for about 100 Blackberry devices and they have outsourced this service to an external provider. This is a complex question because there are several factors in play:

1. Obviously, the cost of the service in the number 1 priority for the IT Operations Manager. Is it more cost effective to outsource Blackberry or maintain Windows Mobile infrastructure in-house?
2. User experience and functionality of the 2 products. Personally, I believe both products offer similar user experience and functionality. One exception is, where the customer is using Windows Mobile as handheld business application devices, whereas Blackberry is a primarily a handheld personal organiser device. However, don't take my word for it, this article goes through the functional comparisons in detail - http://www.laptopmag.com/review/software/blackbbery-vs-windows-mobile-6.aspx;
3. Manageability and support features of the 2 products. With the introduction of Windows Mobile 6.1 and combined with Systems Centre Mobile Device Manager (SCMDM) 2008, Microsoft solution seems to have a clear edge in terms of centralized management, more control of the devices including automatic deployment of applications and security update.

In the past, Windows Mobile certainly has been playing catch-up with Blackberry, but the gaps are closing and in some cases, Windows Mobile has surpassed Blackberry. Ultimately, I think the IT Operations Manager is going to make a decision on cost. Right now, outsourcing the Blackberry service still seems to be the cheaper alternative. Furthermore, many users would have the mentality of “if it is working for me right now, why would I change from a Blackberry to a Windows Mobile?” I will keep watching the development on this matter and see if the introduction of Windows Mobile 6.1 and SCMDM 2008 will challenge the market share of Blackberry in the next 12 months.

Windows XP Service Pack 3 RTMed

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 00:01:42 GMT

Thanks to my colleagues from Europe, I found out it was released today. Below is what I have gathered thus far on what is exactly contained in Service Pack 3 (SP3):

- http://download.microsoft.com/download/6/8/7/687484ed-8174-496d-8db9-f02b40c12982/Overview%20of%20Windows%20XP%20Service%20Pack%203.pdf, this Microsoft article contains the most of the techncial information on SP3;

- Apparently, this will be that last service pack for Windows XP;

- SP3 is essentially a roll-up of all post-SP2 security updates. Therefore, though not officailly supported by Microsoft, it is technically possible to install SP3 on a Windows XP SP1 desktop (without applying SP2). It is about 70MB in size;

- SP3 installs Network Access Protection (NAP), which is a feature that was previously only available to Windows Vista. NAP can validate the desktop against security policies set by the enterprise, before allowing the desktop to access the network. I think the availability of NAP on Windows XP is one more reason for enterprises to stay on Windows XP rather than upgrading the fleet to Windows Vista. Please see my previous blog on the slow uptake of Windows Vista;

- SP3 also enables black hole router detection, where the desktop will attempt to detect routers that silently discard packets.

Enterprise Deployment of Vista

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 05:09:25 GMT

Do you know any enterprise deployment of Vista that is in progress or have occurred in Australia? My definition of an enterprise deployment is upgrading a desktop fleet of 1,000+. I know a few POCs, but none of which is eventuating to an enterprise deployment. I did some research on the web and could not find any IT articles relating to cases of Vista deployment in Australia either. My point being the uptake of Vista among the Australian enterprises is few and slow (as at Q2 2008). In fact, XP deployment is still outnumbering Vista deployment in Australia - this is a fact because I am confident about my source of this data, which I cannot disclose on this blog. However, there are plenty of articles about this issue - http://www.crn.com.au/News/69053,australian-resellers-capitalise-despite-slow-growth-of-vista.aspx.

I believe the following factors are contributing to the slow uptake of Vista among the Australian enterprises:

1. At a product level, enterprises are not seeing any compelling reasons to upgrade from XP to Vista. In fact, a substantial number of enterprises are choosing to upgrade from NT/2000 to XP instead of Vista. Perhaps it is because XP is still a stable desktop platform that still works with many of the legacy business applications. Hence upgrading to XP would minimise the effort of application remediation or the procurement of new application licenses.

2. At a hardware level, Vista is more demanding and most Australian enterprises are probably wanting a few more years out of their existing desktop fleet before embarking on a major desktop hardware refresh.

3. The Australian market is relatively small compared to the rest of the world and as of result, the Australian IT market tends to lag behind say the US for a couple of years. The Australian IT industry is certainly not renowned for as an early adopter of new IT products.

So as a senior technical consultant of Microsoft technologies, what can I help to speed up the uptake of Vista? I don't have a silver bullet, but here are some of my thoughts - Perhaps we should not view Vista deployment as a traditional desktop upgrade project. Some key benefits of Vista are related to lowering the cost of deployment and management, hence providing better ROI in the long turn. Vista should be deployed using BDD methodology, which is a form of ZTI build and ZTI rebuild. Also, with the use of the System Centre product suite and Group Policy preferences, ongoing management of Vista would be cheaper compared to XP. So rather than selling Vista as a new desktop product, perhaps we need to concentrate on selling the solution of Zero Touch and centralised management. Vista is merely a component of the new deployment and management solution. Of course, it is still no easy sell because the overall solution is reliant on several new products such as SCCM 2007 and Windows Server 2008.

Starting the blog again

Fri, 18 Apr 2008 01:43:41 GMT

I stopped blogging about a year ago mainly because I changed my hosting provider twice and did not have time to rebuild it. Plus, I kept on receiving e-Mails with "colourful" comments from some IT enthusiasts. I think I will be using the site indefinitely now. As for the "colourful" comments, well... I am doing my best to contribute to the IT community and I am happy to stir up some controversies at times! I still would like to display my blogs in English and Chinese, if anyone has some bright ideas on how to achieve this easily (other than having 2 blogs), please let me know. Thanks in advance.

Photo Album: 2005 Gold Coast

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 11:29:37 GMT

2005 Gold Coast

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Photo Album: 2006 Sydney

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 11:28:29 GMT

2006 Sydney


International Bears	More bears	Sydney Operat House	Ice Lounge
	More ice	And more ice	And more
View from the office

Photo Album: 2006 San Diego, USA

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 11:27:11 GMT

2006 San Diego, USA


USS Midway Aircraft Carrier	Beer!	San Diego Sea World

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Photo Album: 2007 Tasmania

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 01:09:28 GMT

2007 Tasmania

P1010001

P1010002

P1010003

P1010004

P1010005

P1010006

P1010007

P1010008

P1010009

P1010010

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Photo Album: 2007 GuangZhou, China

Thu, 21 Jun 2007 00:16:32 GMT

2007 GuangZhou, China


GuangZhou

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Photo Album: 2007 XinJiang, China

Thu, 21 Jun 2007 00:15:36 GMT

2007 XinJiang, China


XinJiang

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Photo Album: 2005 China

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 05:56:28 GMT

2005 China

CBD

CBD3

CBDandShacks

CigaretteLighter

CigaretteLighter2

ExpensiveMansions

FireCrackers

FiveStarHotel

FlyingIntoUrumqi

FlyingIntoUrumqi2

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Photo Album: 2005 NAB Project Dinner

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 05:42:13 GMT

2005 NAB Project Dinner

Photo Album: 2005 New Years Eve

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 05:40:11 GMT

2005 New Years Eve

Photo Album: 2005 Portsea

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 05:38:00 GMT

2005 Portsea

Photo Album: 2005 Williamstown

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 05:34:34 GMT

2005 Williamstown

Photo Album: 2006 Tijuna, Mexico

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 05:30:23 GMT

2006 Tijuna, Mexico

Me!

Me again!

Photo Album: 2006 Yarra Valley

Sat, 17 Mar 2007 09:39:58 GMT

2006 Yarra Valley

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Photo Album: 2006 Chinese New Year

Sat, 17 Mar 2007 09:25:32 GMT

2006 Chinese New Year


Do not know who they are.	Mum and I	Kow Tow	Cousin, Mum and I
	Mum and I again

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Photo Album: 2006 Quest Weekend

Tue, 16 Jan 2007 05:09:19 GMT

2006 Quest Weekend

Drunk

Very drunk

Photo Album: 2006 NAB Project Dinner

Tue, 16 Jan 2007 05:03:00 GMT

2006 NAB Project Dinner

Woody and I

Dorro, Frosty, Tom and I

Photo Album: 2006 Lawn Bowling

Tue, 16 Jan 2007 04:53:47 GMT

2006 Lawn Bowling

Alvinator

Group Shot 1

Nathan, Jono, Alvin

Photo Album: 2006 Paintball

Tue, 16 Jan 2007 04:48:49 GMT

2006 Paintball

System Engineers 1

System Engineers 2