System monitoring is an important aspect of IT Management. Knowing when things go down and being able to predict problems before they happen are crucial in an enterprise environment. But, the keywords here are IT Management, as important as monitoring is, Management is doubly so. To borrow a phrase from old Ben Franklin, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

We’ve used Nagios (minimally) for monitoring and most recently WebMin for linux server management. However, as we all know, where there’s 1, there is many, so I decided to look around and see what alternatives exist.

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Are you responsible for multiple exchange (e-mail) mailboxes? Tired of sent items not going into their corresponding sent-box? Here is the solution for Microsoft Outlook

Email that you send on behalf of someone is not saved in their Sent Items folder

From: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2181579

This also works in newer versions of Outlook, just locate the appropriate registry key version.  Microsoft FixIt will also make the changes for you locally

From: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AutomaticallyMountPartitions

From: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Autofs

Also, auto-fs is great, it will dynamiclaly mount and unmount points based on use. For example, if your mount point resides on the network, it may be bandwidth-inefficient to have it mounted 100% of the time, even when it’s not in use. Auto-FS will mount nfs partitions dynamically as needed, thus potentially saving on bandwidth. I’m copying here in case this ever disappears.
PDF Below:
AutomaticallyMountPartitions

Sometimes outlook files become corrupt and/or Outlook begins to act slow. In case that outlook needs to be reset, the first think to try is to delete the identity. If you’re using exchange, this isn’t a problem because all your emails should be stored on the exchange server.

So, to delete your current identity, close down outlook and re-launch it while holding down the *option* key. The Microsoft Database Utility will open up and you should be able to select and delete your identity

Below are some more detailed instructions, including how to back up your identities folder before deleting:

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In Ubuntu, environment variables should be defined (globally) in “/etc/environment”

Use your favorite text editor (in sudo) to modify the file

for example:

(command) sudo nano /etc/envrionment

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A user called in today with problems formatting an external disk. I found myself having to give him instructions on how to use diskpart. I did a quick google search and found a nice protocol, compliments of icydock, saved me having to write up instructions!

http://www.icydock.com/PDF/Clean_the_drive_with_Windows_Diskpart_Command.pdf

Attachment:

www.icydock.com_PDF_Clean_the_drive_with_Windows_Diskpart_Command

IMO, the nemo file manager included in Linux Mint is pretty cool (you were right Leo), especially since it has a right-click ~”run as admin” option. I’ve had issues installing mint and had to go with Ubuntu, this site shows you how to install Nemo/Cinnamon on Ubuntu.

http://www.webupd8.org/2012/12/how-to-install-nemo-file-manager-in.html

You should also follow the directions found here:

http://www.fandigital.com/2013/01/set-nemo-default-file-manager-ubuntu.html

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Today I had a need for a list of all social media website URLs, amazingly enough,  digging this wasn’t as “fast” as I thought.

In the end, I found a nice website with a humongous categorized list of different websites, including social networks

http://urlblacklist.com

After combing the net, it looks like there are several policies that should be configured in order to properly allow non-administrator users to install printers

1. Computer Configuration (Administrative Templates): “Point and Print Restrictions”—>Set to Disabled (This seems to be the most important one, users kept receiving UAC prompts until I configured this policy)

2. Computer Configuration: “Devices: Prevent users from installing printer drivers”—>Set to Disabled

3. Computer Configuration (Administrative Templates): “Allow non-administrators to install drivers for these device setup classes” —> Define appropriate set up classes as found here http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff553426(v=vs.85).aspx

As always, I’m anything but omniscient, many thanks to the following sites for helping put all this together:

1. http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winserverGP/thread/67e34b3c-8e53-4a38-9e99-92c3dd53e38a/

2. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/ff553426(v=vs.85).aspx

3. http://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/show/1269-stop-the-windows-7-prompts-for-printer-install

4. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/7/archive/2011/07/11/allowing-standard-users-to-install-network-printers-on-windows-7-without-prompting-for-administrative-credentials.aspx

This should work with any Toshiba laptop that uses the *icon* method of selecting a boot device.

As soon as the computer is turned on, hit the “ESC” (escape) key, you should then hear a *beep* and be prompted to press “F1” to continue. Hitting “F1” will enter the BIOS Setup