One pitfall people and companies fall into is: if I do something one way, I assume other people do it the same way. Much of the frustration we feel with interfaces, workflows, products, and services result from this faulty underlying assumption. Fact is, different people learn differently. They also approach problems with vastly different strategies.

Let’s focus on learning. Basically, people learn in three ways: audio, visual and kinetic.

• Audio people learn best by listening to people;
• Visual people learn best by looking at something such as diagrams, text, instructions, etc.; and
• Kinetic people learn best by doing something, such as taking notes or doing exercises.

So how do people’s learning methods get incorporated in the real world? Part of our OnSight service includes the Support Center (Help Desk), staffed by Specialists who—in addition to having saintly patience—will tune their learning approach to the individual. Some calls come over the phone where speaking and listening are important, but if the person needs a visual demonstration, we can remote to their machine and show them how to resolve the issue. The Support Center specialists spend a lot of time at client sites, where if someone needs to learn through doing, our specialist can watch over their shoulder as they do it and learn.

Being aware of these differences and tuning your approach to them will result in better training and processes.

Some researchers yesterday announced the results of a survey finding that data leaks cost corporations on average of $1.82 million, when they can actually calculate the costs, that is. Editors Note: [like we have editors!], the research is tied to a McAfee product pitch, so for our purposes on this blog we will use these numbers just to get your attention. There are some other interesting stats from the survey: such as it costs approximately $250,000 to inform customers of a data leak alone, and that nearly two-thirds of respondents felt the leaks were an inside job. If you happen to be a law firm, those costs may include a malpractice lawsuit.

And here is an excellent point: talking about data leaks means “copies” too. The original will still be there, but the proverbial copycat is out of the bag.

David Carns, one of SAGE’s cadre of new consultants and former a IT Director, will be discussing mobile security at ALISM’s Annual Seminar on Managing Technology on May 23, 2007. Be sure to contact ALISM to register for this event. We will post more information as it becomes available.

While the interface is still maddening, SharePoint 2007 is a quick way to build collaborative tools like blogs, wikis, and discussion forums inside your firm. Built into SharePoint 2007 are a variety or collaborative features that can be up and running with just a few clicks. While each individual app may not be best in breed, it does provide your organization an opportunity to flirt with these “web 2.0” collaborative features to see if employees will participate on the content they generate increases everyone's knowledge and awareness.

• Blogs: create internal blogs to share firm news, client personnel changes, or developments on projects so the entire firm is “in the know.”
• Wikis: have everyone in the firm become contributors and build your knowledge base or reference library organically from the ground up.
• Discussion Forums: let the conversation happen online rather than in e-mail. It is easier for others who came to the discussion late to catch up and non participants get the benefits too.

The jury is still out, however, regarding SharePoint's "document workspaces." These collaborative sites within SharePoint are fully searchable, but the real sleeper feature is that almost everything has a newsfeed associated with it. So as content is added or updated, everyone in the firm will know.

CNet yesterday ran a helpful FAQ on virtualization technologies covering what it is, why it’s catching on now, and who are the players in the virtual arena. The article is a handy primer on the technology that is gaining significant steam in IT these days.

If that whets your appetite, we do a little roadshow here at SAGE called “Exploring the Virtual Computing Frontier” on virtualization technologies going mainstream.  The roadshow is going to the Mid-Atlantic Chapter of ILTA this Wednesday, April 25 in downtown Washington, DC. Our uber-engineer Doug Daniel provides a run down of the technology and delves into the costs and benefits, addressing the often touted myth of large cost savings. Based on his experience, Doug will also share the pitfalls to avoid when going virtual, and where virtual environments are heading in the near future.

The seminar is open to ILTA members and the general public. Sign up on ILTA’s web site. You even get a free lunch!

Many pixels are being devoted today to speculation over what caused RIM’s Blackberry service outage yesterday that left everyone suddenly feeling very unwired and disconnected. CNet has a good article on the possible causes since RIM hasn’t offered anything definitive yet.

What has been revealing about the incident is the fact that RIM has only two data centers that handle all the Blackberry traffic in the world. So two points of failure exist. If one data center is disrupted, the other could fail because of the increased load as well. According to the article, this is the price of the added security and convenience. Furthermore, it raises questions about RIM’s ability to maintain service quality as its subscriber base booms since going after the mainstream market.

So once you all stop feeling lonely and twitching from withdrawal, are you staying with Blackberry or looking to other options? Please leave your comments

We at SAGE are excited about all of the advances in web technologies.  Between Outlook Web Access, LegalKey's Attorney Desktop , Google Maps and GMail, we all know that today's web is nearly a replacement for desktop applications.  That realization will shape much of the thinking we do for future software and hardware deployments. 

So that's the good news.  The bad news is that the more sophisticated the web gets, the less we know about how secure it really is.  In the early days of the web, the technology was so simple, that there were very few security implications - it was a "READ ONLY" web.  Today, not only can websites allow you to read and write data (thanks in large part to the AJAX revolution), but they can do so without you knowing it.  Hackers picked up on this pretty quickly and there are now many Cross Site Scripting (XSS) attacks that plague unsophisticated web developers.  The biggest problem with XSS is that there is nothing you can do to prevent the problem, since the problems the hackers are exploiting are actually the very features in web that make it so useful today.

What should you do as an individual?  The web is here to stay.  You cannot avoid it: clients require it, coworkers prefer it and, chances are, you have too much invested already (family photos on line, personal email, etc).  So the best advice is to always visit reputable web sites that take security to heart, such as Google, Yahoo and Microsoft.  Those companies have headed the hackers off at the pass and have all but eliminated XSS vulnerabilities in their products.

What should you do as an IT Professional?  Ask your web-based vendors what their web security strategy is and what measures they have against XSS attacks. They should be happy to share with you the details of their approach.

Unless you are sell hardware or software, if you are in IT, you work for someone. Worse yet, IT is viewed as cost center. IT folk acting like they forgot these facts are the reasons for cartoons like this. IT exists for a purpose: to make people better at their jobs and more productive. IT doesn’t shine if the employees don’t shine.

[Rant ends].

No More XP on New Computers in 2008. News is filtering through blogosphere that Microsoft will end OEM sales of Windows XP come January 2008. This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone, as Microsoft is in the business of selling software. Developing it is just a step in the process. What it means to law and professional firms who tend to be behind the tech curve, is to start thinking about transitioning to Vista in the next couple of years. New equipment will only come with Vista, and soon licenses and then support will disappear. The X Factor in this equation is Exchange 12 and Office 2007, which take advantage of many Vista features.

Law.com Starts Its Quest. Google got into the legal research game in a tangential way with Patents and Trademarks search, now Law.com gets into the legal search arena with Quest (via Robert Ambrogi's Lawsites) Quest searches Law.com's own extensive network of web sites, publications, and blogs, and adds in a number of law firm web sites and other legal blogs.  If anything, it provides a more narrow scope to a search, but we will wait for the reviews to see if it has value for practitioners or just a way to bolster Law.com's advertising revenue.

Lessons from the Eye of the Storm. Since it's Friday the 13th, of course we come across a disaster recovery story. This article has some practical business continuity advice from law firms that have faced hurricanes in Miami. Their formula: a bunker(!), lots of laptops, and satellite office space for lawyers. Also on display is both sides of human nature, from managers instructed to call employees and ask them what they need in the wake of disaster, to clients who call to inquire about the condition of their documents without care for the attorneys or staff.

We like to pride ourselves on our integrity here at SAGE, but we can't blame you for thinking that touting the advantages of managed IT services seems a little self-serving. (SAGE OnSight is our take on managed IT, one that seems to work great for our clients).

So don't take our word for it.  PC Magazine has a complete rundown on what constitutes Managed IT Services and what small and medium business can expect.  Points the article covers are:

• What to expect in terms of service and capabilities;
  
• The advantages in terms of improved operations, technical expertise, and allowing the company to focus on their business;
• Whether your small and medium sized company is a candidate for managed IT services; and
• Tips on implementing managed services

Well worth a read if you are considering testing the waters or just learning about it.

As we all gear up our mojo for another work week, here are a few places to check on the web that are actually work-related.

Holes in Vista’s Sandbox. From the “Devil is in the details” department, Vista’s new sandbox feature “Protected Mode” turns off in a number of instances leaving machines vulnerable to hacks like the recent animated cursor attack. Trusted Sites and turning off the highly annoying User Account Control are just two instances. Webware’s article highlights all the scenarios where Microsoft kicks the user out of the sandbox and leaves open some vulnerabilities.

Dreams of a Web Operating System. Web applications are becoming more a part of our daily work activities—think GMail and Outlook Web Access—leading many to dream of an operating system based entirely in a web browser. (Never mind that an OS is still required to run the browser). This CNet article has a rundown on current developments and the technical and market challenges any web-based OS faces. Either way, look for webware to force an evolution into the staid thinking about operating systems.

Blackberries To Keep up With Home, Too. While many spouses and significant others have bemoaned the corporate tether that is the Blackberry (and its brethren), a new poll suggests that the workers are revolting and using their company-provided smart phones and laptops for personal reasons as well. We guess that turnabout is fair-play.

The newest engineer to join the crack troops here at SAGE is Colin Marks, who as a certified Cisco Network Engineer brings a wealth of networking and WAN experience. One appliance he has found that can help large firms is PacketShaper. It allows companies to easily manage their bandwidth to maximize performance and ensure quality of service. PacketShaper and other like applications let you prioritize, segregate, and otherwise manage your bandwidth. For example, dedicate a certain percentage for the VOIP system and give priority to Citrix applications over web surfing, especially on draft days for fantasy sports.

Another advantage to this class of network appliance is the easy management, bypassing the arduous task of manually configuring your routers. A GUI (Graphical user Interface) to set priorities or limits, monitor performance and get reports makes optimizing performance a much easier endeavor.

There are many different flavors to managed IT Services. SAGE OnSight falls into the category, but managed IT services come in many flavors and it is important for each organization to find the service that best fits its needs. Following are some more subtle points to consider when looking at managed IT service providers.

Personal Factor. Trust and confidence in your IT provider is vital in managed environments. You want someone on the other end of the line who is not only knowledgeable, but also responsive and trustworthy. It’s also nice to see them in person too.

Lock In—or Barriers to Exit. These can be contractual or monetary. Contracts can range from a few months to three years or more, and according to many lawyers we know, some are rather ironclad. Good service providers will require only a one month termination notice if the relationship is not working out after the initial contract period. Also consider the cost of creating a network if you decide to separate from a provider that completely outsources your IT. The infrastructure you once had now has to be rebuilt, from the E-mail server to the Citrix box, and it all comes with a price tag.

Speed and Responsiveness. While the Internet is great for working over great distances, network latency can affect the speed and responsiveness of your systems. Slow systems mean frustrated users.

Turnaround Times. How quickly will the service provider turn around new user accounts or have workstations set up for new employees? Good service providers know your time is valuable and people need to be productive as quickly as possible.

Control Issues. Many administrators who once lorded over the domain are sometimes locked out when the outsourced IT provider takes over. Instead of rolling up the sleeves and figuring out the problem, you are sending a service request. Many service providers monitor your systems and often know of a problem before you do, but you want prompt service if you are no longer in the driver’s seat. Also, having eyes into the system only increases your confidence if you can verify what the service provider is telling you.