When to use Drupal paths instead of aliases
One of the best features of using a CMS like Drupal is the ability to quickly and easily generate clean URLs. These clean URLs, or aliases, can be used most anywhere on your Drupal site but you should avoid using them in certain places. Where to NOT use aliases and why When defining your default […]
Windows 7 – Right Click Context Menus on the taskbar
I love toolbars. I would never use the start menu if I could help it, so some of the shortcuts that Microsoft Windows 7 has put into the interface are a great welcome. Right-clickable context menus is a great time saver for those that do repetitive actions with their computer. So how do they work? […]
Using the Blackberry Enterprise Server to restrict phone calls
This is a handy way to restrict incoming or outgoing calls using the BES server. You can be very precise, restricting calls to or from only a certain number, or using a much wider field, such as country code. See the excerpt below from the Blackberry Administration guide for the proper usage to create a firewall based […]
Backup Exec ejecting LTO 4 Tapes
One issue I ran into this past week that I had forgotten about is how Backup Exec handles LTO 4 tapes when it comes to ejecting the tape after the backup. The latest LTO standards added some additional requirements to the tape drive hardware. These requirements added a sensor to detect if the tape is […]
The basics of tags
Tags are a form of a metadata. For those unfamiliar with the term “metadata”, it is data that describes data. Like the musical genre of an album or the category a book belongs to (cooking, history, etc). Tags have greatly expanded in popularity thanks to services like Flickr and Delicious and blogging platforms like WordPress […]
How to Execute and Monitor an Agent Job Using T-SQL in SQL Server 2005/2008
In SQL Server 2005 and 2008 it’s possible to start an agent job with T-SQL syntax. This is frequently useful. For example, you may have a job that you’d like to have an outside application invoke. Jobs can also be used to execute SSIS packages. Using T-SQL to execute a job that runs an SSIS […]
Excellent utility for copy, mirror, backup, etc.
For years I have been writing xcopy and robocopy scripts to do things like copy data between two directories or machines. Some of you may know about this one, but I just learned about it this week and it is great for all kinds of similar tasks. It’s called SyncToy and it’s a free app […]
Why a RIM outage affects users on a corporate BES.
How a RIM outage affects your organization when you have a BES With the recent massive Blackberry outages, I have had many clients ask me why their Blackberry mail flow was interrupted when they have their own in-house Blackberry Enterprise Server (BES). The answer always seems to surprise them. For those of you that don’t […]
Finding lost Backup Exec License Keys
Ever had problems with finding your misplaced license keys when Backup Exec won’t open? Try this little trick: Look for besernum.xml in c:windows or windowssystem32. This little xml file should contain the license keys needed to reinstall back with your current licenses.
Getting started with LINQ queries in C#
With the advent of C# 3.0, Microsoft introduced the Language Integrated Query (LINQ) feature to provide .NET developers the ability to query and transform data using any .NET language. This data can come from XML documents, relational database tables, or other objects. LINQ is quite flexible and is integrated with the .NET framework very well. […]
