Archive for July, 2009

22nd
Jul

Exchange 2010 New Features

ex2010-thumb.jpg With the new version of Microsoft Exchange (Exchange 2010) comes a new set of features. While there are a lot of new features,  I am posting just a few features here:
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  1. Database Availability Groups – allows Exchange administrators to have multiple copies of a database reside on multiple Exchange servers. In the event of a failure, the Exchange admin can bring up that secondary copy of the database on another already working Exchange server. A database failure will also be detected by Exchange automatically, and the secondary copy of the database will automatically be brought online within seconds.

    Another advantage of the DAG, is that having multiple copies of the database, allows Exchange to repair itself.. That’s right, it’s self healing..
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  2. Outlook Web Access Features – There are quite a few new features with OWA.
    • Side-by-side comparison of calendars
    • Ability to attach messages to messages
    • Integration with Communicator including presence, chat, and a contact list
    • Conversation View! – I’ve been waiting for this.
    • Support for multiple browsers such as Firefox and Safari
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  3. Unified Messaging Features :
    • Message Waiting Indicator
    • Voicemail Preview – This is basically speech to text that will display the text in your e-mail message to get a preview of what the voice mail includes
    • Personal auto attendants
    • Protected Voice Mail – Ability to track and restrict where voice mails can go
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  4. Store Functionality:
    • No more Storage Groups
    • Mailboxes are no longer connected to the server object
    • I/O Improvements requiring 30% less I/O from Exchange 2007, and 70% less I/O from Exchange 2003.
    • Backupless by having multiple database copies stored on DAG members. ( backups are still recommended in order to go back in time to restore deleted items )
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  5. Other
    • Multi-Mailbox Search
    • Text Messaging Integration (SMS)
    • Moderation and approval of distribution group submissions
    • Mail Tips – Will notify an Outlook user of an impeding error before it happens so the user doesn’t get a confusing NDR.  For example, if your message size limit is 10MB and the user tries sending a 15MB message, Outlook will notify the user before the user tries to send out the e-mail saving Exchange resources and making the failure experience more intuitive for the end user.

There’s quite a bit more, as I have only scratched the surface here. Read more about Exchange 2010 here.

Exchange My Mail, Inc has Exchange 2010 running internally in our Lab. We hope to be able to launch shortly after Microsoft releases the final version.

Stay tuned….

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1 Comment  |  Tags:
Posted in General, Hosted Exchange, Hosted Exchange 2010, Technology

2nd
Jul

How Bloggers Can Fight Spam –

How Bloggers Can Fight Spam:

no-spam

Bloggers all over the world have learned an unfortunate reality: spammers love to hit any Web site that lets them leave comments. Many spammers are not human – they’re programmed bots that hit numerous sites every hour, posting links in comments sections. Others are human – these spammers are also able to hit plenty of blogs each hour.

No blogger wants a cluttered, spam-infested comments section, but most don’t necessarily have much free time to deal with spam. If you have a blog, and you’re trying to fight junk messages, these tips will help you control the garbage without devoting a few hours a day to deleting unwanted comments.

* Require a login to post comments. Spammers might log in and comment anyway, but many will pass over your site in favor of a “friendlier” one. Making users login before they comment also discourages the anonymous Internet trolls, as they prefer to remain unknown.

* Enable the CAPTCHA feature. Anybody who wants to leave a comment on your blog must type the series of characters on the screen. This is fairly effective, as most spambots aren’t capable of reading the characters. Many human spammers can’t be bothered.

* Moderate comments. This feature lets you approve each comment before it appears on your blog. The disadvantage is that you do have to wade through comment spam. However, this is also an easy way to filter out comments from Internet trolls and just-plain-annoying visitors.

Those solutions, however, do not encourage visitors to interact with you, or return in the future. Many Internet users want things to be as simple as possible: they aren’t really interested in going through an extra step or two simply to comment on your blog.

One of the keys to fighting spam without discouraging your visitors is to keep things as simple as possible. There are, fortunately, several ways to accomplish this. These methods are not necessarily universal: some blog sites support them, and others don’t.  WordPress is the most popular Blogging software available, and has many spam fighting capabilities built in. There are also tons of plugins available to add additional functionality to your beloved blog.

If your not already using WordPress as your blogging software, you might have to switch your blog over to another site to take advantage of these features. However, that might be worth your time if it means that you’ll have a sizable advantage over the spammers.

* Look for spam-fighting scripts. These bits of programming are often easy to install and don’t typically require much maintenance on your part. Try different scripts to see which one works best with your blog.

* Create a “keyword blacklist.” You create a list of keywords that will trigger the blog site’s filtering system. If a comment includes one or more of the words on your blacklist, then the comment is not posted. This can be great for fighting spam, but difficult on your “real” readers. The blacklist looks for keywords, not overall content, so one “bad” word in a legitimate comment causes the site to scrap the whole comment.

These are just a few of the ways that you can fight comment spam. In most cases, these will drastically reduce the number of spam comments you see on your blog. However, you should check the blog site that you use to see what unique or site-specific measures it offers. Each blog site is a bit different from the others, so learn about what your site can do.

When deciding where to host your blog, remember that uptime is key. You don’t want your blog site down when your readers are trying to visit your site. Shared Hosting companies are offering some great deals now for WordPress blogs, however remember that these are shared servers. So uptime is not going to be that great. Even the best hsoting companies cannot completely control the environment. The databases are shared as well, and so one busy site, or a web developer who is doing sloppy work can easily cause problems for the whole server.

In order to ensure the best uptime, a Windows VPS Server may be your best option.  Because a VPS server is isolated, you are the only one using those resources, and you will not be effected by others like on a shard environment.

Related Articles:
Windows VPS Hosting – Bridging the Gap

Eight Reasons to Choose Windows VPS Hosting

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No Comments  |  Tags: , , ,
Posted in Gadgets, General, Software, Technology, Tips & Tricks, Windows VPS Hosting

1st
Jul

Eight Reasons to Choose Windows VPS Hosting:

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Virtual Private Server (VPS) or Virtual Dedicated Server (VDS) hosting is the type of web hosting in which one server is partitioned into several dedicated servers (virtual servers), which can be stopped/started and operated independently. As a normal computer can be operated on Linux OS or Windows OS, the dedicated server may also be run using either. In this article, let’s see the benefits of using Windows VPS hosting.

  1. It uses Windows: The most popular operating system in the world, Windows is familiar to almost all computer users. It’s so universal that it is the first choice of most users. Since the dedicated server in this hosting uses Windows, it will be a breeze for most people to set it up.
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  2. Technology:The hosting is perfect for high traffic websites and small business sites that include complex web-based applications using Microsoft technologies. Since setting up is also pretty quick, the Windows VPS hosting scores well over shared hosting packages, which are pretty limited in capabilities.
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  3. .Net and .Net Framework: Windows comes with built-in compatibility for the several programming languages in the .Net family, such as Visual Basic, Visual Interdev, and others. Hence, if your web business requires programming in any of these languages, then Windows server is the best choice.
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  4. ASP (Active Server Pages) is a very popular scripting language counterpart of PHP and JSP. This can be run only under the Windows platform. PHP can also be run on a Windows server, providing that much more functionality. Applications like WordPress which use PHP are running on many Windows Servers.
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  5. FrontPage Extensions: Microsoft’s most popular web design software program, FrontPage extensions are built into the Windows server. A lot of people prefer this easy-to-use, feature-rich application to other software for the purpose.
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  6. MSSQL Server and MySQL: Both databases are able to run on Windows Server without any problems. Some users prefer to use Microsoft SQL server, and others prefer to use the free open source version called MySQL. In either case, Windows Server is capable of running both, however Linux is not capable of running Microsoft MSSQL Server.
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  7. Microsoft Sharepoint (used to create corporate web portals) is available only on Windows Server.
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  8. Windows server is proprietary and well supported. The support of open source applications can never match the Windows. Also, Microsoft periodically publishes server updates and security patches. These updates make the server more robust. This is another major reason why many people prefer Windows hosting.
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Conclusion:
From this discussion, what we understand is that if you are a fan of the traditional Windows development platform and want the same capabilities in your website, then Windows VPS hosting is perfect for the purpose.

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2 Comments  |  Tags: , ,
Posted in General, SharePoint Services 3.0, Software, Technology, Windows VPS Hosting