Eric A. Hall

These are some of the articles that I have written for various technical publications over the years. I've actually written much more than this, but the material that was published before 1996 is not available to me in electronic form.

Monitoring Windows Systems from Linux: Getting management data out of WMI from Linux can be challenging but rewarding. This article discusses some of the common techniques that are used to achieve this purpose. (Primer, 2009) [Read the original article on NetworkCircus]
SATA Overtaking Storage Arena in Record Time: SATA now accounts for the overwhelming majority of desktop drives sold, is on the verge of taking the lead of notebook drives, and is even beginning to eat away at the edges of enterprise and multi-user storage, all within five short years of initial specification. (Feature, 2007)
openSUSE 10.2 Earns A Seat At The Head of the Table: openSUSE 10.2 is the first release I've seen that's worthy of succeeding SUSE 9.3 as the centerpiece of my testing network. Although there are some serious kinks that still need to be worked out with some of the components, and it's quite obvious that the release as a whole would have benefited tremendously from another month or two of developer time, the operating system is quite stable while also providing several leading-edge technologies. (Product Review, 2005)
and a New VM for Mom: My Christmas present for Mom was to migrate her old systems into VMware Player so that she could still work with her research papers and programs from the 1980s, but using her everyday (modern) system, with the legacy stuff running in a virtual machine. (Lab Note, 2005)
Sun's Open Source Java Moves Are Bold, Smart, and Limited: Sun's recent decision to open-source some elements of Java is pretty exciting, but a few years overdue. (Opinion, 2006)
100 Gigabit Ethernet: Impractical and Unnecessary, But Coming Anyway: Last week, an article in InfoWorld reported that the IEEE was beginning to lay the groundwork for standardizing 100 Gigabit Ethernet networks. While this is an interesting development, and is sure to advance networking science and industry, it's totally unneeded from my perspective. (Opinion, 2006)
In Memorium of Ray Noorda: Ray Noorda's recent passing reminds us that he changed the very nature of the computing industry in several important ways, and that his vision for the future is still being played out. (Opinion, 2006)
New Samba Features Improve Interoperability: Samba 3.0.23c includes many important new features, including new support for BUILTIN/Users and BUILTIN/Administrators groups, a gateway service that makes UNIX daemons appear as Windows services, feature that maps UNIX log files into Windows-style event logs. (Lab Note, 2006)
Proxy Auto-Configuration Gives Relief From Internet Traffic Chaos: The most effective way to deal with uncontrolled Web traffic is to implement some kind of caching proxy server, such as Squid, or Microsoft's Internet Security and Acceleration Server, or any of the other dozen-plus similar offerings, and then force all client-side Web requests to go through the proxy server. Properly implemented, these servers can provide administrators with a single choke-point for all Web traffic, thereby providing administrators a way to actively manage the traffic. (Primer, 2004)
Miniature Storage Arrays Deliver Space-Saving Punch: After testing some 2.5" drives and carriers over the past few weeks, I'm happy to report that these devices are entirely practical for several important applications. The form-factor makes them especially useful for rack-mount and small-form-factor systems like departmental NAS boxes that require RAID for local storage, but which do not have enough physical space for four full-sized drives. And once the SATA drives are bundled together into a RAID setup, the magic of multiple spindles makes performance a non-issue. (Lab Note, 2006)
Adrem Software's NetCrunch 4.1: NetCrunch offers enhanced monitor and alert mechanisms, satisfying the system-management needs of most Windows managers. (Product Review, 2006)
Use Windows for UNIX Services: Microsoft's Posix subsystem for Windows lets Unix apps think they're using regular Unix when they're actually using Windows instead. (Lab Note, 2006)
Creating A Windows XP Recovery Console CD Image: If you're willing to get your hands dirty, it's possible to whittle the Windows XP setup files down to the barest essential components needed for just the Recovery Console, which collectively requires less than 10 MB of space. Using this technique, you can put one or more Recovery Console image onto a bootable rescue CD, without having to cart around the whole installation disc image. (Primer, 2006)
For System Recovery, DOS Is Still Boss: Even with all its faults—and there are many, starting with a general industry lack of support—DOS is still the preferred operating environment for building a rescue CD to help bring up a crippled system. (Lab Note, 2006)
New VMware Releases Present Upgrade Dilemma: When I was planning the infrastructure for my revitalized lab, I intended to have VMware play a central role in my network and application testing. While that objective was eventually met, it didn't turn out like I had planned, and the path was extremely circuitous, involving multiple changes in strategic direction. Now with the recent release of VMware ESX 3.0 and VMware Server 1.0 (a replacement for the GSX line), I'm having to revisit the decisions all over again. (Lab Note, 2006)
Virtualization Goes Mainstream: Yesterday the server-class VMware Server 1.0 was formally released with the official price of $0. This news follows Tuesday's announcement by Microsoft that the desktop-class Virtual PC 2004 now has a price tag of $0, too, and that the server-class Virtual Server 2005 will also be free when used with Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition. (Opinion, 2006)
The Web-CTI Revolution: The most significant potential for VoIP is the long-term capability for integrating voice services into your data services architecture. This is where Web service interfaces to voice networks offer the most promise—by wrapping the traditional communication services into well-defined XML messages which are then transferred across standardized SOAP protocols should allow organizations to bring telephony and messaging services directly to their applications. (Feature, 2006)
Remotely Monitoring Memory Usage: Optimizing PC memory isn't as easy as "just add more," and in fact there are plenty of times when adding more RAM is downright pointless. This article will cover some monitoring tools and techniques that will help you figure out what's really going on with your machine and when you do need to add more RAM. (Lab Note, 2006)
VoIP Problems Just Won't Go Away: Back in October 1998, I co-wrote a cover story for Network Computing on VoIP in the enterprise, introducing the technology to our readers and describing some of the deployment challenges that admins should watch for. What's interesting is that every time I've gone back and reread that article, I've expected to find it completely outdated, with most of the early problems resolved and newer challenges in place. But instead I keep finding that most of those old problems still exist in one form or another, even though we're now closing in on that article's 10-year birthday. (Opinion, 2006)
Hardware Monitoring On Windows: Surprisingly, hardware monitoring on Windows is much more complicated than it is on Linux. For one thing, there's no single extensible sensor engine like lm_sensors on Linux. Instead, there are a handful of monolithic engines for Windows that each have significant limitations. Worse is that the most extensible engine was abandoned a couple of years ago, while some of the more modern packages are lacking the basic functionality needed for hands-off management and reporting. (Primer, 2006)
Hardware Monitoring On Linux: Hardware monitoring on Linux is actually pretty straightforward, but like most other things, even the simplest stuff can be complicated. Basically there are three "layers" of software involved, all of which are based around the lm_sensors software package. (Primer, 2006)
Power Supply Management: The IT Blind Spot: The new Power Supply Management Interface (PSMI) specification promises to make power supplies manageable. (Opinion, 2006)
Xeon Heat Management: Rack-mount Xeon systems can be hard to make cool and quiet. (Lab Note, 2006)
Get A Grip On Athlon Power Utilization: 32-bit Athlon processors need special software to make them consume less energy and shed less heat. (Lab Note, 2006)
RADIUS Reinvigorated: Although RADIUS was originally intended for dial-up access gear, today it's capable of supporting a variety of connection types and is no longer limited to human identities. For the most part, this evolution has mirrored the evolution of Internet access technologies. (Feature, 2006)
Using Legacy NT-Domain Policies with Windows XP: Network policies can be extremely useful to even the smallest of networks, and are easily worth the relatively small amount of effort required to put them into operation. Furthermore, you can deploy Windows policies across any shared filesystem that a networked Windows system can read. (Primer, 2005) [Read the original article on NetworkCircus]
Plantronics CS50-USB Wireless Headset: The CS50-USB is an excellent add-on device for those who can get by with soft-phone telephony, and can afford to buy it (or can get somebody else to pay for it). It's one of the more innovative products around, and is very good at what it does. (Review, 2005)
Trapping Windows Events with SNMP: Windows and the applications that run on it use the event log repository to record all kinds of significant system events. Unfortunately, trying to pull information out of multiple event logs in a way that is both timely and usable can be difficult and convoluted. There is a way to use SNMP technology already bundled into Windows to generate lightweight alerts against pre-selected events, however, thus providing the basis for a flexible and scalable notification system that can work with existing network management tools. (Primer, 2005) [Read the original article on NetworkCircus]
Email Filtering Principles and Techniques: The only way to eliminate the costs associated with spam is to eliminate the spam itself, which is usually achieved by implementing one or more email filtering systems. There are numerous options for filtering email, and although not all of these mechanisms are viable for every organization or every user, eliminating the majority of spam from your network will return vast rewards in terms of saved bandwidth, storage and processing costs. (Primer, 2004)
21st Century TCP/IP: A successful standard requires significant commitment of intellectual, political, and monetary capital, which usually limits direct involvement to those vendors that believe that the standard will help them gain a competitive advantage. However, end-users have the ultimate veto over any standards, since they can refuse to deploy it. (Opinion, 2004)
An Introduction to E-Mail Authorization Systems: A bombardment of spam, increasing viral attacks and other forms of forged messages have made email a bigger job to operate and manage. One bright ray of hope in this mess is a new series of sender-authorization technologies. Three proposals in particular have captured the industry's attention: Microsoft's Caller-ID, the community-driven Sender Policy Framework (SPF) and Yahoo's DomainKeys. (Primer, 2004)
Mitigating DDoS Attacks: DDoS attacks have become so common that organizations need to be prepared for them in the same way that they would prepare for any other potential outage. As with other kinds of contingency planning, this means understanding your recovery options, choosing the appropriate path, and being prepared to execute your plan quickly when the time comes. (Primer, 2004) [Read the original article on NetworkCircus]
IPMI v2 Improves Server Manageability: IPMI stands for the Intelligent Platform Management Interface, which is a collection of tightly integrated hardware interfaces and network protocols that cumulatively provide a variety of network-enabled system-management hooks. As long as the target system's IPMI network interface is operational, an administrator can connect to the management interface across a network, redirect the server's console to a local management station, collect sampling data and reboot the server, even if there is no operating system loaded on the target server. (Primer, 2004)
Internationalized Domain Names: The Internet is becoming increasingly international, although the character set used by DNS and other core protocols hasn't kept up. One critical advance was made last year when the IETF published RFC 3490, which specifies the use of Internationalized Domain Names to display characters from foreign languages and alphabets. (Primer, 2004)
iSCSI: Storage Networking sans the SAN?: Because iSCSI runs over standard TCP/IP links, it's easier to build, manage, and justify than FC, making SAN technology more affordable and accessible for everyone. A small iSCSI SAN can be built on top of an existing network infrastructure and even use ordinary Windows or Linux servers as remote storage arrays. (Primer, 2004)
Network Performance Planning: Ensuring that your applications, servers and network infrastructure perform optimally depends primarily on how well you plan for deployment. That entails performing a comprehensive audit of your existing systems, building a replacement to meet those needs, testing it, deploying it, and then correcting the inevitible errors. (Feature, 2003)
Interior Gateway Protocols: Because routing protocols determine the path of IP packets, they also dictate whether packet delivery is timely or even successful. As a result, these services also control how well the higher-layer protocols, like TCP and SMTP, perform or if they are instead encumbered by lost packets, slow delivery, duplicate datagrams or any of the other problems that can result from routing troubles. (Primer, 2002)
A Silly and Unscientific Survey of Internet Charsets: This data comes from a simple perl script, which read through all 32,000+ newsgroups on my ISP's server and counted up each of the unique "charset=" tags that it found in the message headers. 4,024,487 messages were processed over a period which spanned 73 hours and 23 minutes (over my 1.5Mb DSL line). (Opinion, 2002)
Dynamic DNS: Big Gain, Big Pain: As Internet technologies continue moving ever closer to center stage as the key elements of the corporate NOS platform, the need for a dynamic name-registration service is proving to be more pressing. This is particularly true as technologies such as DHCP become increasingly popular for automated address management. When addresses change daily, the host names linked to those addresses also must be changed daily if the names are to be relevant. Dynamic DNS solves this problem, but does so with extreme complexity. (Primer, 2000)
Windows Services for UNIX v2.0: With Windows Services for Unix version 2.0, Microsoft has filled in some holes and improved the operational quality of the software. However, new problems have been introduced, and not all of the old problems have been eliminated. In addition, some of the new features are dependent upon the product being deployed on Windows 2000 servers, which is not an option for everyone who wants this functionality. (Product Review, 2000)
Unleash the Power of DHCP: DHCP is supported in most networking devices and software—from ISDN routers to firewalls to every mainstream operating system on the market—and networks of all sizes are using DHCP to help manage their infrastructure equipment. But despite a broad level of support for the protocol, surprisingly few DHCP installations go beyond its most basic features. This article will provide some tips and techniques for using DHCP to maximize network automation. (Primer, 2000)
Meet Win2000's Naming Service: Windows 2000 uses Dynamic DNS to add and delete resource records in DNS on the fly, letting Windows 2000 systems (or a DHCP server) modify host-name-to-address mappings dynamically without using NetBIOS queries. In addition, Active Directory systems use the DNS Service Location resource record for registering and locating the special-purpose servers, such as the Windows 2000 Active Directory domain controllers and catalog servers. (Primer, 2000)
the Internet Control Message Protocol: IP is an unreliable protocol, and as such, delivery is not guaranteed to occur. However, sometimes a problem crops up that will prevent all datagrams from getting through to their destination. When these kind of non-transient errors occur, IP uses the Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) for informing the sending system of the problem, so that it can inform the user or application of the fatal error. (Primer, 2000)
the Internet Protocol: IP can be thought of as being like a national delivery service that gets packages from a sender to a recipient, with the sender being oblivious to the routing and delivery mechanisms used by the delivery agent. The sender simply hands the package to the delivery agent, who then moves the package along until it is delivered. That's also how IP works: a system creates an IP datagram, drops it into the network, and leaves it up to the intermediary IP devices to deliver the datagram to the destination system. (Primer, 2000)
the Address Resolution Protocol: In order for IP-enabled systems to communicate with each other on the same network, they must first be able to identify the hardware addresses of the other devices. This service is provided by the Address Resolution Protocol. Other ARP services include providing an IP address via Reverse ARP (RARP), advertising a new IP address via Gratuitous ARP (GARP), checking for duplicate addresses via DHCP-style ARP, and more. (Primer, 2000)
Directing Your Network Traffic: Under the heading of Quality of Service (QoS), a variety of technologies promise administrators improved control over the data that travels across their networks, though none provide more bandwidth or less latency. Instead, they help you manage your existing resources so important traffic flows smoothly. In this article, we will help you pinpoint the most appropriate technologies for enterprisewide traffic management. (Primer, 1999)
TCP Performance Tuning: There are several TCP elements you can pick to tweak performance, but the most important one is the TCP window size; it dictates how much data a system can send at any given time. Large windows allow a sending system to transmit much more data than if the window were set at a smaller value. In contrast, small windows constrict the amount of data being exchanged, which can result in suboptimal utilization. (Primer, 1999)
Preparing Your Network for IP Multicasting: When people hear the term IPmulticasting, they usually equate it with multimedia—Internet-based audio and video feeds on their corporate networks. But IP multicasting also is useful with a variety of corporate-class networking services, including the Network Time Protocol, Router Discovery and Microsoft Corp.'s WINS (Windows Internet Name Service). Simply put, allowing and encouraging the use of multicast traffic offers more flexibility and less overhead. (Primer, 1999)
Always Late: I haven't written anything in a while, but that just means I've been really really busy, which is a good thing. Since I'm going to remain busy throughout the summer, I thought it might be best to send out a summary of my current projects, and share some of the lessons that I'm learning in this work. (Opinion, 1998)
Advanced TCP Options: When lost data is a problem (due to congestion or link failure), the use of the Selective Acknowledgment option can help quickly recover the data transfer. And, when combined with the Timestamp and Window Scale options, TCP virtual circuits can perform substantially better than they could in the past, particularly when used with slow and problematic links. (Primer, 1999)
An MRD for Linux on the Desktop: A lack of device drivers for networking, video, audio and storage cards is keeping me and many other users from running Linux on a daily basis. Apart from device drivers, the biggest problem for all of the UNIX platforms out there today is that they're just too damned hard to configure. Finally, as long as folks like me still have to dual-boot to load another OS so that we can use an application we need to get real work done, then it just isn't going to become our primary OS for everyday use. (Opinion, 1998)
The Best (and Worst) of 1998: If 1997 was a banner year for the networking industry, bringing a hoard of new technologies and products, then 1998 was the morning after, with most of us trying to make 1997's technology work. Rather than giving us whole new technologies, vendors spent 1998 trying to fix the half-baked technologies that were introduced in 1997. Sometimes it worked, with some products and technologies permanently altering the landscape, while others just proved that some technologies weren't really such great ideas after all. (Opinion, 1998)
We Should've Listened: Network-multimedia is becoming almost commonplace, with technologies like Voice-over-IP and LAN-based video-conferencing proving to be viable alternatives to their circuit-based counterparts. Yet, network-multimedia has some pretty stringent requirements in order for it to work successfully. The original Ethernet - with its shared-access coaxial network that depended on luck in order to function - is woefully unsuited for the job. (Opinion, 1998)
Selsius Systems' IP-PBX VoIP Solution: Selsius Systems offers a full product suite providing end-to-end connectivity services; the sum of the parts is a fully functional virtual PBX on your existing LAN. We tested a handful of Selsius' 12-button speaker-phones and software-based virtual phones, a dual-line analog gateway and call-management software for a couple of months, and found the solution to be more than adequate, though it has some annoying idiosyncracies. (Product Review, 1998)
Toshiba's Tecra 8000: In short, this system is highly configurable but at this point it is hobbled somewhat by its nonconfigurable elements. A typical corporate user needs built-in Ethernet support more than some of the multimedia services that come with the Tecra 8000. However, I expect that this situation will change as Toshiba improves upon their build-to-order capabilities. (Product Review, 1998)
Voice-over-IP Across the Enterprise Network: Today's voice-over-IP technology offers better quality, higher levels of audio fidelity and stronger support for industry-standard protocols, such as H.323. But there are still lots of holes in the technology and many vagaries in the implementations, leaving it an expiremental solution for most corporate networks today. (Primer, 1998)
Now and Zen: NetWare 5 signifies a major redefinition for Novell the company, signifying its egress from the general NOS market, and the beginnings of its transformation into a company whose business is based entirely upon directory services. (Opinion, 1998)
Standards Never Die: Support for forward-compatibility in network design is becoming a crucial issue, particularly as new technologies that push the envelope of network utilization are being deployed. As a result, many of the core elements of today's data networks are being retrofitted to allow these new technologies to work reliably. In some cases, entirely new protocols are being developed to get around those protocols that are so inflexible that they cannot accommodate any sort of tweaking. (Opinion, 1998)
Wandel and Goltermann's LinkView PRO with WG Examine: LinkView Pro 6.0 and WG Examine are W&G's entry into the software-based network analyzer market. Although the this is a solid offering, it is more expensive than competitive products. (Product Review, 1998)
Implementing Prioritization On IP Networks: To handle network congestion across your entire network, you must first provide for the prioritization of IP traffic. Doing this effectively raises a series of design questions. Does your internal network support IP-prioritization services? Does your WAN equipment? What about your Internet service provider? What about the infrastructure at the other end of the connection? If any device between two systems cannot provide IP-prioritization services, you won't be able to implement an end-to-end solution. (Primer, 1998)
Lucent's 802.11 WaveLAN Adapters: Leading the 802.11 pack is Lucent, which recently introduced its WaveLAN line of wireless products capable of sending traffic at speeds as fast as 2Mbps—at distances as far as 1,200 feet in unobstructed environments. They can even fall back to speeds of 1Mbps at distances as far as 1,400 feet or in environments that are heavily obstructed. (Product Review, 1998)
Bringing Prioritization Services To Ethernet: With the increased availability of network-centric multimedia and voice-over-IP services, the growth curve for network utilization is being thrown out the window. As such, a need for prioritization on Ethernet has become much more urget. Coming to the rescue are the IEEE 802.1p and 802.1Q specifications, which promise to turn Ethernet into a managed-access medium on par with Token Ring and FDDI. (Primer, 1998)
Internet Data: Internet technologies have lowered the barriers-to-entry considerably, allowing companies of every shape and size to build dynamic, cooperative business-to-business applications over the Internet. But we lack an open, universally-accepted database exchange protocol that allows this to happen. (Opinion, 1998)
Notes from the Reference Desk: Mailing lists are everywhere! Here are some of the best sources for news, analysis, opinion and general-fun that I've found. (Opinion, 1998)
LDAP's Past Shouldn't Be Prologue: The biggest problem facing LDAP today is the tight coupling to X.500. The most-vocal proponents of X.500 technology maintain that it should not be expanded beyond general white pages purposes. But if LDAP is to succeed, then it must provide access to a variety of network services other than 'people' data, meaning LDAP must be separated from X.500 entirely. (Opinion, 1998)
The Vision Factory's Cat@log 2.5: At heart, Cat@log is a database-centric rapid application development platform that just happens to include really strong commerce technology. You build a storefront, shopping basket and transaction services by tapping into your existing product and customer databases, wrapping the tables and fields with commerce objects and controls, and then fine-tuning the presentation with stock HTML commands. (Product Review, 1998)
A Reversal of Fortunes: For years people have been saying 'when we get better bandwidth to the user...' and other such nonsense, conveniently ignoring the fact that they couldn't handle all of us in the first place. With 1.5 Mbps available to me, I'm now able to exceed what many sites can give. (Opinion, 1998)
WebTrends Enterprise Suite 2.0: The latest version of this traffic analysis software provides a few much-needed improvements, making the upgrade a no-brainer for existing users. But the new features, although attractive, probably aren't enough to get people to switch from competing products. (Product Review, 1998)
Novatel Wireless' Minstrel CDPD Wireless IP Modem: Every so often, a product comes along that has the potential to change the way we work. Although Novatel Wireless' Minstrel Wireless IP Modem isn't earthshaking on its own, when used in conjunction with a 3Com PalmPilot Professional or IBM WorkPad handheld computer and some Internet-based applications, it's a dazzler. It allows truly mobile, wireless, pen-based access to standards-driven applications. (Product Review, 1998)
Communications Theory: It's embarrassing when your customers argue among themselves. But it's a hanging offence when customers tell prospects what a miserable product you have, on your own service. These are avoidable scenarios, once you understand how the different aspects of communications theory represent and dictate the underlying communication patterns. (Elephant Talk Redux, 1998)
Netscape's SuiteSpot 3.5: Continuing their push into corporate networks, Netscape Communications recently released SuiteSpot 3.5, a compilation of Netscape's Web, mail, groupware, and directory-server offerings. The key feature in SuiteSpot 3.5 is an increased focus on directory integration, with the various servers using Netscape's Directory Server as a common authentication and access-control repository. (Product Review, 1998)
Elephant Talk: This newsletter is a useful tool for expressing thoughts and discoveries that wouldn't fit cleanly into another forum. Think of it as an effective way for me to send the same journal entry to hundreds of people all at once, and you'll be on the right track. (Opinion, 1998)
Agenda-Free Computing: Linux teaches us many things about user-driven software, but primarily it shows us what can happen when development efforts are freed from corporate agendas. Without a vendor making crucial decisions, the technology is allowed to grow according to the wants and needs of the user community. But Linux also teaches us the difficulties incurred with user-driven software, like the need for commercial products and support, the two biggest holes in the Linux story today. (Opinion, 1998)
Site Technologies' SiteSweeper 2.0: Although many products will test a site for broken URLs, SiteSweeper goes well beyond this basic functionality. It checks images for proper dimensions, file sizes, predicted download times, redirected destinations, and almost every other thing that could possibly go wrong on your site. (Product Review, 1998)
Web Site Administrivia: Dynamic web documents just aren't going to work until we have a stateful protocol that allows the server to communicate with the client on a continual basis. Frames, style sheets and DHTML technologies are all a wash without this essential feature. (Opinion, 1998)
Viaweb Store 4.0: Rather than add another complex system to your local network, Viaweb Store is a self-contained, Web-based commerce server that runs on Viaweb's own Web site, where it is managed by Viaweb's professionals. All you have to do is create a storefront on their system using a Web browser, and then Viaweb does the rest. (Product Review, 1998)
Internet Commerce at N2K: Niche markets are, by definition, not typically well-served. N2K's family of web sites shows that if you can give a niche market the information and tools that your members will want, then you can build tremendous amounts of customer loyalty. (Case Study, 1998)
Novonyx' SuiteSpot for NetWare: The first round of products from Novonyx — the joint effort between Netscape and Novell to port Netscape's SuiteSpot line to the NetWare platform—debuts today, and for the most part the products work well. However, minor inconsistencies, different management tools, and the normal spate of early-release bugs keep them from being 'must-have' products. (Product Review, 1998)
Towards an Internet NOS: I'm tired of trying to make all my systems speak NFS when they all do such a poor job of it. Likewise, I'm sick of trying to synchronize my NDS-, NIS- and NT-based authentication services when each of the NOSes demand on being the primary source, refusing to even boot without a local copy of the data. So much for cross-platform networking! (Opinion, 1998)
WebTrends Professional Suite 1.0 and NetIntellect 3.0: You've finally got your Web site online, you've spiked the major directories, and now you're getting hits. But from who? And why? Both WebTrends' WebTrends Professional Suite and WebManage Technologies' NetIntellect 3.0 promise to tell you everything about your site's visitors. (Product Review, 1998)
ISDN's Last Stand: Let's face it: ISDN just hasn't hit mainstream status. The only people I know who use it are professionals who can comfortably be classed into the technology-enthusiast or early-adopter markets. There is a real, identifiable, justifiable need to make using ISDN a simple, plug-n-play experience. (Opinion, 1998)
LDAP Will Fail: First there was e-mail. Then web browsers. According to the folks who ought to know, a unified directory service is going to be networking's next Killer App. Although lots of progress has been made, we're miles away from commodity-class directory access. (Opinion, 1998)
Sonic Systems' Interpol firewall: Sonic Systems specifically designed its Interpol firewall to address the needs of small networks, enabling smaller businesses to protect their networks from outside intruders without much cost or effort. Although the product lacks high-end functionality, its simplicity makes installation and management extraordinarily easy and solid. (Product Review, 1997)
Caravelle's IPnetWatcher (beta): Caravelle's soon-to-be released IPnetWatcher network-management system is a Java-based, client/server network-monitoring system that, despite the buzzwords, provides a reliable, easy way to proactively administer a network. Although the beta version I looked at was a little rough around the edges, I found the overall product and concept more than usable. (Product Review, 1997)
Computer Associates' ARCserve 6.5 for Windows NT: Computer Associates' ARCserve 6.5 for Windows NT represents both a minor and major upgrade over previous releases. The core product offers a slew of enhanced features and services, but ARCserve's real strength lies in its add-on optional components. Taken together, these make ARCserve 6.5 a must-have backup solution for networks of any size. (Product Review, 1997)
The Best (and Worst) of 1997: By all measures, 1997 was a very good year for the computer networking industry. New and exciting technologies gave birth to strong products, which in turn helped many a bottom line. There were also a fair number of loser technologies, products, and companies, as well as the as-yet-to-be-decided contenders who offer strong possibilities, but who have failed to execute in one form or another. (Opinion, 1998)
Internet Commerce at TheStreet.com: One of the popular refrains heard on the Internet is that the low-cost, liberating nature of HTML and the Web will allow anyone to become their own publisher. The perceived problem—and one that has been proven correct by many failed ventures—is that Net surfers do not want to pay for content. Not so, says Brendan Amyot, Chief Operating Officer at TheStreet.com, which has 15,000 paying subscribers to its Web site. (Case Study, 1997)
Let Me Up I've Had Enough: Simply put, as a NOS, NT Server is nowhere near NetWare (and as a platform for running network services, it's nowhere near UNIX). Yet, I find I'm forced into using it simply because that's where the third-party market is. The argument for-or-against has nothing to do with technical merits, but instead it has everything to do with product availability and developer support, an area in which Microsoft totally dominates. (Opinion, 1998)
A Call to Arms: The future problem of spam is not in the 'see horney women' junk mail that we get today, but in the 'new from McDonalds' advertisements that will be distributed by legitimate organizations in the future. If spam isn't stopped, it will slowly become used by so many firms that eventually it will clog the net, and no mail will get through at all. (Opinion, 1998)
Dayna's NetCenter Hubs, Switches and Routers: Network infrastructure products such as hubs, switches, and routers are not exactly 'mainstream' products. Dayna Communications hopes to change that trend with its NetCenter infrastructure products for the mass market. The products should appeal to network novices at small sites, but their simplicity and lack of configurability make them unsuited for enterprise use. (Product Review, 1997)
i-Planet's RemotePassage Provides Secure Access to Intranet Resources: The network administrator's job—which is fundamentally to provide access to corporate network resources—is confounded by Internet access tools. Although they want to provide their users with remote access over the Internet, they must also protect against intrusion from outsiders. i-Planet's RemotePassage access server solves this dilemma effectively and gracefully, using network-based authentication services to selectively enable network access. (Product Review, 1997)
Intel's NetPort Express PRO/100 and NetPort Manager: Intel has released two management options for its NetPort Express PRO/100 print server customers: Web NetPort Manager, a firmware upgrade that provides an embedded Web server, improved functionality, and faster performance; and Windows NetPort Manager, which comprises new 32-bit Windows tools that provide better administration and direct-access printing functions. (Product Review, 1997)
Guilty As Charged: The Department of Justice has finally decided to show some teeth, suing Microsoft over their practice of forcing OEMs to bundle Internet Explorer with all copies of Windows 95. And they're right. (Opinion, 1998)
Funk Software's Steel-Belted RADIUS 1.3: Remote access can be a pain, especially when your site requires authentication and access control. Funk Software's Steel-Belted Remote Authentication Dial-In User Service (Radius) 1.3 reduces that administration burden and makes life easier for users at the same time. (Product Review, 1997)
A Comparison of E-Mail Systems: As the undisputed 'killer application' of networking, e-mail is so important to the future of your company's technology landscape that picking a messaging solution that you can live and grow with is critical. (Product Review, 1997)
Hewlett-Packard's Web JetAdmin 3.0 (beta): Printer configuration and job management via the Web have been possible for some time through Hewlett-Packard's Web-based version of its powerful JetAdmin software. However, it has always been the poor cousin of the Windows-based product. But the beta version of Web JetAdmin 3.0 indicates that this is about to change dramatically, bringing the Web product on par with the Windows version. (Product Review, 1997)
RadioLAN's 10Mbs Wireless PC Card: If your company has laptop users in highly mobile environments that require access to wireless networks at Ethernet speeds, the RadioLAN PC Card Wireless Interface Node provides a fourfold increase over most other wireless LAN offerings. Although RadioLAN has long offered 10Mbps wireless transceivers, the company has not provided them in PC Card form until now. (Product Review, 1997)
FTP Software's Internet Gateway 2.0 for NetWare: For administrators who wish to postpone their migration to TCP/IP but still want to provide access to the Internet and IP-based local hosts, FTP Software's Internet Gateway for NetWare 2.0 delivers the strongest IP-over-IPX gateway on the market. The gateway incorporates some niceties unmatched by products such as Novell's Internet Access Server and Microsoft's Proxy Server, included with BackOffice. (Product Review, 1997)
APC's PowerChute Plus 4.3 for NetWare (beta): Netware administrators who are migrating networkwide management tasks to Novell Directory Services (NDS) now have another tool to ease the process. The beta version of American Power Conversion's (APC's) PowerChute Plus 4.3 for NetWare implements an NWADMIN snap-in that lets you monitor the state of any APC uninterruptible power supply (UPS) attached to a NetWare 4.x server. (Product Review, 1997)
Novell's Distributed Print Services (NDPS) (beta): Just like Novell Directory Services (NDS) dramatically altered the landscape of NetWare security, Novell Distributed Print Services (NDPS) promises to have the same impact on network printing. The technology is both comprehensive and complicated, making early deployment efforts justifiable only to those sites with large initial paybacks. However, once vendors and users jump on the bandwagon, the technology will become sufficiently pervasive and deliver full benefits. (Product Review, 1997)
The ForeFront Group's ConsolePro 2.1: Although LAN management has always been relatively easy with NetWare, trying to manage the NetWare server itself has never been as simple as it could be. Chores such as updating NetWare Loadable Modules (NLMs) on the DOS partition, copying files between servers, and finding files are still cumbersome with NetWare. (Product Review, 1997)
Computer Associates' ARCserve 6.1 for NetWare: Despite the fact that Arcserve 6.1 for NetWare gave me more than its fair share of headaches during installation and configuration, the end result is a 'forget-about-it' backup solution that is there when you need it. (Product Review, 1997)
Deltec's PowerRite Pro II UPS: Deltec's PowerRite Pro II family of uninterruptible power supplies (UPSes) helps alleviate the problem of lost power to your network by using a single UPS among multiple devices. The product also makes other network devices aware of the current power situation through distributed power-monitoring software.` (Product Review, 1997)
Qualstar's TLS-4210 Tape Library: One of the most mundane aspects of network management is the care and feeding (literally) of backup tapes. Qualstar's TLS-4210 tape library aims to relieve you of this burden by bringing high-end tape library technology to the network market in an affordable, well-constructed package. (Product Review, 1997)
An Overview of Network Address Translation (NAT) Technologies: Although self-contained networks can use any IP addresses they wish, sites looking to connect to the Internet or other remote networks must use Internet-legal addresses for applications to function properly. While you'll be able to send packets from a system with an illegal address, the destination will not be able to return packets if the address you used points to another network on the Internet. (Primer, 1997)
ZyXel's Prestige 128 ISDN Router (beta): ZyXEL, a company well-known for its analog fax and modem technology, has developed the Prestige 128 ISDN Bridge/Router, an exceptional product that performs most of these tasks very well. This product comes with one ISDN port and two plain-old telephone service (POTS) jacks, providing everything a home office needs for central site or Internet connectivity. The Prestige 128 is one of the most impressive SOHO and Internet access routers we've seen. (Product Review, 1997)
A Comparison of Dial-On-Demand ISDN Routers: For those of us who spend lots of time on the Internet, using a modem for hours on end is just plain annoying. The call setup time seems to take forever. You're always disconnecting just before you remember another site you want to visit. You tie up your telephone line, and the bandwidth constraints drive all of us batty. (Product Review, 1997)
How Netscape Runs the World's Largest Web Site: In September of 1996, Netscape became the undisputed king of the hill with the most-often visited Web site on the Internet. According to I/Pro's Web traffic audits, Netscape was receiving more than 100 million hits per day. And by early October, Netscape had broken the 110 million hit-per-day mark, which consisted of more than 3 million independent sessions, 10 million pages, and 230 gigabytes of data per day. (Case Study, 1997)
A Comparison of Directory Services: Directory services can break the chain of network drudgery and bring unprecedented rewards through increased productivity and management. Then why aren't you running them on your network? (Product Review, 1996)
An Overview of How to Separate Internal And External DNS Servers: Domain Name Service (DNS) servers can provide a wealth of information about your network. They can show the number of nodes you have, the type of hardware and the operating system, the people responsible for those nodes and more. The information can be extraordinarily helpful to your internal systems management personnel. However, it also can be helpful to outsiders who shouldn't be privy to this information. (Primer, 1996)
Cisco's DNS/DHCP Manager (beta): Managing large Domain Name Service (DNS) and Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) servers is a difficult and time-consuming task. Trying to keep these two services integrated together is even harder. Cisco's DNS/DHCP Manager provides a single interface to these separate services, making your network management chores considerably easier. (Product Review, 1996)
An Overview of the Distributed Computing Environment (DCE): Mainframes. Midrange systems. Unix boxes and LAN servers. PCs, more PCs, Macintoshes and oh-wait-don't-forget-about-those-other-PCs. No wonder you're going crazy. Just as you begin to think of TCP/IP as the panacea for at least a minimal set of unified, vendor-independent network services, you discover that it falls short of providing most of what you'd expect from a contemporary network operating system. It falls way short. (Primer, 1996)
Network Computing Will Lead to Free Word Processors: As the computing paradigm shifts towards one of network-centric services, all of the related technologies - including word processors - will also get shifted at the same time. Since the next logical step for word processing technology is to the commodity phase, this means that for all practical purposes word processors will become 'free.' (Opinion, 1996)
An Overview of How to Manage Mass Storage: If there's one maxim that holds true, it's 'data expands to fill the space available.' It seems that no matter how much hard-disk space you have, people will find lots of creative ways to fill it. This unfortunate truism leads to an eternal search for more and better ways of maximizing storage options. (Primer, 1996)
Seattle Software Lab's WatchGuard Security System 2.0 (beta): Seattle Software Labs' WatchGuard Security System 2.0 is an easy-to-configure, flexible firewall well-suited for midsize organizations and networks. Although not as functional as some other products, WatchGuard is priced right and offers a sufficient level of functionality, making it a good choice for a variety of network environments. (Product Review, 1996)
NOS Standards Battle for Internet Dominance: If there were four different and incompatible versions of HTTP, the Web would have never been adopted as rapidly as it has. The same is true of all the successful standards, from SMTP to DNS. Without a similar multi-vendor standard for network file- and print-services, it seems unlikely that a widely-supported protocol will ever emerge. (Opinion, 1996)
An Overview of NetBIOS-Over-TCP/IP Name Resolution Services: In order for NetBIOS applications and services to run across a TCP/IP network, NetBIOS must see names while IP must see numeric addresses, although neither is allowed to use the other directly. A layer between the two must map NetBIOS names to IP addresses and convert IP addresses back to NetBIOS names. This layer is known as NetBIOS-over-TCP/IP (NBT). (Primer, 1996)
InfoExpress' Virtual TCP Online (beta): Many companies agree that the Internet is a decent, low-cost, dial-up solution for mobile and remote users. Rather than buying and managing dedicated modem pools and dial-up services for all these users, many companies would rather use the Internet as a 'free' connection—one that users can access from anywhere, saving in long-distance, equipment and personnel costs. (Product Review, 1996)
Station Wagons and Operating Systems: Although a station wagon offers adequate value across the board, it doesn't offer excellent value in any one particular area. It simply is not possible to combine the power of a sports car with the ruggedness of a Jeep or the capacity of a van. For a one- or two-car family that needs a general-purpose vehicle, a station wagon can be a great choice. But for people who want specific functionality, it's a foolish one. (Opinion, 1996)
An Overview of How to Manage Domain Name System (DNS) Services: Administrators who are forced into prematurely deploying IP often ignore DNS, figuring that they can get by with using native IP addresses or relying on HOSTS files as a backup strategy. They'll get around to DNS 'one day.' Meanwhile, the number and variety of IP-enabled systems on the LAN will have multiplied, with the same number and variety of local HOSTS files on all of those systems. The time it will take to rewire these devices into DNS will far outweigh the time spent learning and correctly configuring a DNS service. (Primer, 1996)
An Overview of the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP): For a detailed description of DHCP, we suggest that you download RFC 1541 from any of the Internet draft repository sites. A good place to start is ds.internic.net, available via FTP, Gopher and HTTP. For a less detailed description, read on. (Primer, 1996)
A Comparison of DHCP Clients: As we discovered in our testing, the various implementations are all somewhat off the mark, and there is still plenty of room for improvement. However, most of the implementations do interoperate successfully, so you should at least consider deploying the technology if not the specific products. (Product Review, 1996)
A Comparison of DHCP Servers: While DHCP offers relief from having to manually configure the TCP/IP setup on each of your PCs, it only shifts the management tasks away from the clients and onto a DHCP server. You still have to manage all of the addresses (or at least the address pools), and if the server isn't up to snuff, you'll find that it doesn't help you solve address management problems. While you may have had a hard-to-manage-but-efficient network before, choosing the wrong DHCP server could land you in an easy-to-manage, mediocre mush. (Product Review, 1996)
How The Internet Saved Novell: Let's face it: for the past few years Novell has been in danger of becoming completely irrelevant. File and print services are available from every operating system vendor on the planet, and are increasingly becoming available in snap-on hardware form as well. With a Lantronix print server and a Digital disk server, who needs a dedicated fileserver? (Opinion, 1996)
The Good Ol' Days Are Gone: Surprisingly, it is technology that allows for censorship to occur, given that the political infrastructure of the society allows it as well. And where there are no technical ways to prevent something, there are laws that allow the prevention of it, either explicitly or indirectly. (Opinion, 1996)
An Overview of NetWare/IP: WAN managers will tell you that their number one problem is managing NetWare traffic. Those RIP and SAP packets are killing bandwidth, and no simple solution is in sight. Filtering them out on a one-by-one basis is an administrative nightmare, while trying to implement NLSP and Packet Burst technology is more work than most people are willing to invest. The result: Most managers just turn off the NetWare services on their WAN and call it a cheap victory. (Primer, 1996)
An Overview of the Common Gateway Interface (CGI): Look around the World Wide Web, and most of what you'll find today are online equivalents of printed propaganda. There may also be some downloadable files or images—as well as the seemingly requisite overabundance of hypertext links to every imaginable corner of the Internet. But, for the most part, Web servers are about as interactive as their paper-based counterparts. (Primer, 1996)
The Web as Application Development Platform: For the most part, the web-based applications we've seen to date have been publicly-accessible databases or query tools published on some of the more technically-aggressive web sites. Everybody agrees however that in order for the technology to successfully displace WinTel, it has to be accepted and implemented on the corporate Intranets for use by the rank and file. (Opinion, 1996)
An Overview of Internet Firewall Technologies: It seems as if everybody is worried about connecting their organizations to the Internet, with widespread reports of hackers breaking into everything from banks to warehouses. If you're leading an internal World Wide Web development project for your company, you've probably had to face your own security advocates who decry the end of pristine systems yet offer no assistance in researching or developing a mutually satisfactory solution. Here's your help. (Primer, 1996)
An Overview of Windows 3.x' NBT Services: Windows for Workgroups' native networking architecture provides users in a small local area network with limited file- and printer-sharing capabilities. Users can connect to other Windows for Workgroups PCs, and use other systems' shared resources. This functionality is a result of the combined functionality offered by a collection of various networking components. (Primer, 1996)

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