Punk Rock CTO

Tech

Or the title could have been, Stop being penny smart and pound foolish Dominic.

I feel really stupid saying this, but I didn't think home inspectors were worth the money. My thought was I can test the dishwasher, look at the windows, and make sure all the outlets work. Why would I pay hundreds of dollars for someone to do those things?  If you, like me, hate the idea of ponying up money to pay someone else to inspect your home before your purchase it, read on.

I met Robb Johnson from HomeMD and I heard some crazy stories of the Louisville home inspections he has done. One example was during a home inspection in Jeffersonville he found a home that had significant low water volume and pressure on the line. When he inspected the grounds around the home he noticed water bubbling to the surface which indicated a broken main waterline from the street to the house. The homeowner is responsible for this portion of the waterline and could have cost the client $500 or more to make the needed repair.

Another example he showed me was a potential fire hazard he uncovered during a Louisville home inspection. Can you see anything wrong with this picture?

If you look close there is smoke coming from the vent fan in the attic space. The vent fan was improperly wired and could at any point cause an electrical fire to their home. That is something I know I would not have caught. While the repair cost, if caught early, may only run a few hundred dollars the alternative if left unchecked could be much more.

What about having a buddy in construction, engineering, or real estate do the inspection for you? It's not worth it, you may save a few bucks, but you won’t be getting expertise. I didn't know this until talking to Robb but believe it or not, home inspection involves specialized training that any of these professionals are unlikely to have. Also, if you go ahead and purchase the home that your dear old dad inspected for you and discover a costly defect later that you think the inspector should not have missed, wouldn’t you rather be angry with (and possibly sue) an inspector you don’t know than a relative?

I hope I have impressed upon you how important it is to get inspected. If you’re still looking to save money on a home inspection Robb has a deal you just can't beat. At HomeMD you can get your home inspection for free up to $1000. The information on how to do this is pretty easy and straight forward. More info can be found here:
http://homemd.com/free_inspection.html

Louisville Louisville Home Inspector, Louisville

It seems like every month a friend or family is having a premature baby. It's bad enough that these preemies are struggling for their life daily, but they are also separated from their parents for long periods of time. Most people don't realize a preemie may have to stay weeks and sometimes months in a NICU (neonatal intensive care unit), long after most maternity/parental leave.

I'm glad to see technology is helping out with this. www.NICView.net has created a webcam system that allows parents to view their bundle of joy from anything that can surf the web.

Tech nicu, nicu webcam, webcam, preemie

Sorry for not posting anything over the last little while, but crazy busy does even begin to describe it. What have we been up to? Over the course of seven nights, eight hours each night, we successfully moved the following:

Just under 2000 servers (Ranging from brand new to ten years old)
50+ Foundry switches
3 Compellent SANs
2 EMC SANs
Misc Core Networking Gear
Partridge in a pear tree

We knew that moving two Datacenters full of equipment was no small feat. To put it into perspective before the move we spoke with Dell. We just wanted to see what they would charge to come in and do it for us. They quoted us 4 million dollars and told us to expect a 12% failure rate of equipment.

With an amazing crew of a dozen or so, we pulled it off with a failure rate of barely 1% (20 servers). The failures ranged from RAM issues to a motherboard literally blowing up. Some issues were as simple as replacing a single component. Only a couple of the servers had to actually be rebuilt.

I couldn't be prouder by the fact that we didn't have a single customer cancellation directly related to the migration. I feel the reason for this is simple:

Communicate with your customers in an open and honest fashion. If you know their server is going to be down for a minimum of an hour, don't tell them it could be back up within 10 minutes.

There is no such thing as "over communicating" with your customers. If a notification is applicable to them, send it. They will let you know if you are being too chatty.

If you screw up, don't try to cover it up. Own up to it and take care of the customer. If you don't continue screwing up this honesty will  endear them to you.

Spend twice the amount time you think you should planning, but don't make it so ridged that it is set it into stone.

Have a Plan B and even C but more important have a plan that allows adaptability. Over the course of seven days we dealt with everything from snow, broken down trucks, and trips to the hospital. You can't plan for everything.

Lastly, force people to get rest. This is something I was guilty of not doing. I would move servers all night and drive home. Then I would crawl into bed setting my alarm for 3 hours of sleep. After a shower and the legal limit of coffee I would get up and start working until it was time to move servers again that night. Rinse and repeat for six more nights. This was stupid on my part.

Some of our migration process contains proprietary information but a lot of it is not. If you have a move coming up of 1, 10, or 1000 servers email me and I can give you some tips that will make you say "duh, why didn't I think of that?"

Tech server administration, datacenter

One question I get asked from time to time is, "how do I setup a reoccurring schedule to reboot my windows server?" Below are the steps to set this up.

1. Click Start. Navigate to All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Task Scheduler.
2. Click Create Basic Task.
 

3. Name your task and give it description.
4. Click Next. Define the schedule you would like the reboot to occur.

5. Click Next. Specify what time the reboot should occur.
6. Click Next. The action should be Start a program.
7. Click Next. Click Browse and locate shutdown.exe. c:\windows\system32\shutdown.exe
8. Add the following in the argument field (replacing servername with your server) /r /f /m \\servername /t 60 /d p:4:1 /c "name of scheduled task"
9. Click Next. Check Open the Properties dialog. Click Finish.

10. Change radio button from *Run Only when user is logged in* to Run whether user is logged in or not.
11. Check the box for Run with the highest privileges.

12. Click Ok. Enter the information for the user that would have the permissions to reboot the server.

Explanation of arguments in this command.
/r - Will Reboot the Server
/f - Force running applications to close without forewarning users.
/m - Is only used with \\servername and is handy if you want to reboot a remote server.
/t - Set the time-out period before shutdown to xxx seconds.
/d - Provides the reason for a shutdown. p:4:1 Will write to the event viewer "Application: Maintenance (Planned)"
/c -  Comment on the reason for the restart or shutdown.

Windows 2008 windows 2008, server administration