ping! zine web hosting magazine - issue 40
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Server Monitoring Knowing When to Act! Have you ever wondered what keeps your support team busy? Despite having bought the best servers from the best data centers, your support requirements seem to always grow.TRANSCRIPT
cont
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8.4
seRVeR MonItoRInGKnoWInG WHen to Act!
A LOOK BACK AT HOSTINGCON 2010
CLOUDS EVERYWHERE!
CPANEL AUTOMATION BOOTCAMP 2010
CASE STUDY: VISION HELPDESK
WHY REBOOT? KSPLICE UPTRACK REVIEW
CAN GOOGLE ME SUCCEED?
PING! ZINE SERVICE DIRECTORY
THE SAINT OF SUPPORT
Have you ever wondered what keeps your support team busy? Despite having bought the best servers from the best data centers, your support requirements seem to always grow.
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012 SOFTLAYER & THE PLANET SHED LIGHT ON THE MERGER
014 HP ACqUIRES AUTOMATION COMPANY STRATAVIA
016 GREEN DATA CENTER MARKET TO REACH $13.81 BILLION
016 PARALLELS ANNOUNCES APAC SUMMIT
018 GODADDY IS FOR SALE
020 AOL LAUNCHES SAFESOCIAL FOR TEENS
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016 PARALLELS ANNOUNCES APAC SUMMIT
018 GODADDY IS FOR SALE
020 AOL LAUNCHES SAFESOCIAL FOR TEENS
Publisher Keith Duncan
Managing Editor/Art Director Derek Morris
Executive Editor Dave Young
Senior Editor David Dunlap
Marketing Director Daniel Hembree
Editorial StaffTechnical Editor John Burmeister
Commentary Editor Gary Crossland
Marketing Editor Trey Gardner
Headlines Editor Derek Vaughan
Contributing WritErSSheena M.G.
Robbert Van Geldrop
Tommy Kammerer
ContaCt informationPing! Zine, LLC
Post Office Box 516
Denham Springs, LA 70726
Phone (225) 791-3963
Website www.pingzine.com
General Info [email protected]
Sales [email protected]
Editor [email protected]
Design [email protected]
Ping! Zine Web Hosting Magazine © September 2010, Published and Copyrighted 2010 by Ping! Zine, LLC, P.O. Box 516, Denham Springs, LA 70726. All rights reserved.Permission to reproduce part or all of this issue must be secured in writing from the publisher. Complementary subscriptions are at the discretion of the publisher and may be cancelled or modified at any time. Unsolicited submissions are welcome. We assume no liability for lost or damage of submissions. We assume no liability for the content of this issue and all points and ideas are strictly that of the writers involved and not that of the publisher, publishing company, printing company or editors.This issue was printed on paper provided by Dunder Mifflin in Scranton, PA. We got it for free because their manager is an idiot! This issue is sponsored by WHoKairs Hosting: Need support? WhoKairs!
002 Black Lotus
005 Steadfast Networks
007 Server Sitters
009 Netsonic
010 CDG Commerce
014 Binary Canary
014 Assistanz
015 Purity Networks
017 ISP System
019 Reseller Club
021 Hexagrid
024 Lagniappe Internet
027 Turnkey Internet
028 Parallels
033 Accreditation.com
035 Host 4 Yourself
036 Sprynex
038 eBridge Marketing Solutions
039 Atlantic Metro
042 Versaweb
044 Vision Helpdesk
045 LinMin
045 24x7 Easy Support 048 Lionfire Solutions 051 Unity Mobile 055 R1Soft
056 VegasNAP
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the merger would create one of the largest dedicated hosting companies in the world with more than 25,000 customers and some 78,000+ servers.
in 2005, 10 of the planet’s management staff departed to form softlayer. five years later, softlayer and the planet are looking at a potential merger. in a move that doug erwin, ceo of the planet, jokingly referred to as, “what goes around comes around; life is an endless circle,” the planet and softlayer’s proposed merger would definitely be a fitting close of the loop. the merger would create one of the largest dedicated hosting companies in the world with more than 25,000 customers and some 78,000+ servers.
although the merger is not yet a done deal between the two companies, both lance crosby, ceo of softlayer, and doug erwin believe the end is almost in sight. during a phone conversation, lance and doug gave their thoughts on the merger deal brewing between the two companies.
“is this 100% done deal? well we can’t say we are 100%, but we are really close to that. and doug and i are really close to putting these two companies together in the next 90 days,” says lance.
doug adds, “let me put it another way. it’s not over till the fat lady sings.. and she is warming up on the side. there is a lot of work that needs to be done between our two staffs and i think we are going about it the right way, in that we hired an outside consultant... bain & company to come in and work with us.”
as both sides continue to look at the merger, one of the number one concerns has been to ensure the current customers are treated well. regarding the customers erwin says, “i think the biggest concern lance and i have is for a seamless integration that does not affect the customer.” to this end, bain & company consulting has been brought in to ensure that the possible merger avoids the many pitfalls that can occur.
“about 6 months ago g.i. partners approached softlayer about doing an investment in the company,” lance explains. “they have done a lot of investment in this space overall including digital realty, savvis,
Softlayer & the Planet Shed light on the Merger
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| by David Dunlap
Softlayer & the Planet Shed light on the Merger
Telx, The Planet and most recently viaWest. After they approached us and we started going through due diligence, we began to find there was a lot of common DnA with The Planet and so as we began to close the process over the last 30 days or so, we started exploring the possibility of putting these two companies together.”
That common DnA doesn’t just extend to the family history between the two companies. It also includes many mutual customers. They both target the dedicated and cloud hosting space. However, if both companies were purely similar, merging them would simply create a larger company, which is technically not a bad thing..., but it would be somewhat boring.
In addition to the similar fields of interest, SoftLayer brings their infrastructure know how. The plans for the merger include moving customers to Softlayer’s automation layer. This translates to the new company able to take on more customers, keeping staff low, and yet maintaining their high-grade support.
The Planet offers an enterprise level suite of services. namely, The Planet will bring colocation and managed hosting to the party. Along with these hosting addons, The Planet also brings in enterprise level hosting features and the expertise in handling those services.
Softlayer, up until recently, has avoided the colocation and managed hosting spaces. They have instead focused on their target niche and have not deviated from that path. And yet, if they do merge with The Planet, adding those services is part and parcel of the new company. So why now? Why would Softlayer, who have been disciplined in avoiding the watering down of their brand, want to increase their services and in fact, consider adding those services as a definite strength?
“It’s been on the drawing board for a long time and we are going to bring a Softlayer approach to those two types of services that are not yet seen in the industry. As we talk about it internally we are going to pull out a big stick and poke a lot of our competitors in the eye when they see what we are going to do to colocation and managed services,” says lance.
on the possibilities of an IPo, lance says, “I think that [an IPo] is the most logical step for the combined companies, putting them together they are going to be about 300 million in revenue and growing rapidly and you get to a point where the number of potential suitors out their drops dramatically simply because of the size of the company so an IPo becomes the natural choice.”
“So if you want to sum it up, you could say we are strapping on the gloves, “ says Doug. However, you sum it up, the potential merger between The Planet and Softlayer could be a hosting juggernaut rivaled by very few especially in the dedicated server market.
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hP acquireS autoMation coMPany StrataviaHP recently announced it has acquired Stratavia, a privately held database and application automation company based in Denver. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The acquisition of Stratavia will strengthen the HP Software and Solutions portfolio, adding deployment, configuration and management solutions for enterprise databases, middleware and packaged applications. The solutions will help clients simplify application deployment and management in hybrid IT environments, which consist of on-premise, off-premise, physical and virtual environments.
With Stratavia, HP clients can improve their time to market and increase agility for application deployment with a solution that ties the application development process to application deployment. HP clients will now have a comprehensive application automation solution that bridges the gap between application development and operational teams. The solution will support all aspects of the application life cycle, from modeling an application and releasing it into production, to ongoing management and the underlying infrastructure.“As applications and IT environments become increasingly complex, organizations need to
automate changes that range from large-scale application updates to simple one-line configuration updates with consistency and control,” said Bill Veghte, executive vice president, Software and Solutions, HP. “Stratavia’s database and application automation solutions, combined with HP’s leading Business Service Automation portfolio, give organizations a one-stop shop for infrastructure and application deployment management.”
Stratavia offerings also enhance the HP Cloud Service Automation solution by simplifying and automating the deployment of databases, middleware, and packaged applications in cloud computing environments. Clients can now accelerate the delivery of applications and business services by building up from the infrastructure to include databases, middleware, and web applications in a cloud environment.
“For eight years, Stratavia has been focused on developing application deployment automation solutions supporting tasks including provisioning, code deployment, configuration management, compliance, patching, as well as common user requests including migrations, refresh, and back-ups,” said Thor Culverhouse, chief executive officer, Stratavia. “Combining Stratavia’s offerings with HP Server Automation will give clients a way to simplify and automate application deployment operations, minimizing downtime and mistakes.”
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green data center Market to reach $13.81 BillionA recent report released by EL Insights is projecting the U.S. green data center market to reach $13.81 billion by 2015. This growth would represent a 29% increase (CAGR) from the current $3.82 billion market of today.
The report also finds that government spending on green data centers will reach $2.05 billion by 2015, accounting for a near 15% of the green data center market.
In addition, EL Insights finds that U.S. Government expenditures on green data centers will reach $0.86 billion in 2010 and increase to $2.05 billion in 2015, accounting for 14.9% of the green data center market in the U.S.
The EL Insights also predicts a regulation increase for energy monitoring in U.S. data centers. The report claims this,”will put pressure on green data center vendors to develop products tailored to the public sector and encourage established government contractors to increase their service offerings to include green data center advisory services.”
ParallelS announceS aPac SuMMitParallels announced it will bring together some of the biggest names in the Cloud services industry to discuss the future and profitability of the cloud computing in Asia at the Parallels APAC Summit on 24th – 26th September. Speakers at the Summit include executives from Microsoft, Go Daddy, VeriSign and Open Xchange who will address critical issues surrounding the adoption of public Cloud services in the region, including security, bandwidth costs, service availability and reliability, vendor viability and maturity. In addition, Parallels will host a Cloud services panel that will explore the environmental factors affecting business models, addressing issues such as the automation versus virtualisation debate, applications, competition and industry convergence. Confirmed participants include Bhavin Turakhia from Directi (India), Daryl Webb from Webvisions (Singapore), Jason Frisch from Tsukaeru.net (Japan), Michael McGoogan from AussieHQ (Australia), and Natalie Kong from PacHosting (Hong Kong). Small businesses are amongst the fastest adopters of Cloud services allowing them access to enterprise-class IT services in a cost-effective and flexible manner. The Parallels APAC Summit will take a close look at what hosters need to consider when targeting the small business market, including a focus on partnerships and customer relations, not just price. Daryl Webb, CIO, Webvisions Pte Ltd, comments: “I have no doubt that the Parallels APAC Summit will provide a valuable platform for shaping the direction of Cloud adoption in Asia. I hope that attendees will consider this a collaborative opportunity to grow the ecosystem, so we can have open and frank discussions around the market realities, challenges, issues and solutions.” The Parallels APAC Summit 2010 is open to all hosters and Cloud services providers, including web hosters, telcos, Communication Service Providers, distributors, VARs and ISVs. To register for free or to find out more information, please visit www.parallels.com/summit/apac.
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GoDaDDy is For saleThe Internet and Domain Registration site, GoDaddy has announced that it has put itself up for sale.
The privately held company could go for more than $1 billion, according to the Wall Street Journal. The firm has hired Qatalyst Partners to find buyers for the company. The Journal also writes that they expect private equity firms to soon bid for the company, which announced revenues between $750 and $800 million in 2009.
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aol launcheS SafeSocialA new AOL survey, conducted by The Nielsen Company, reveals the challenges of modern day parenting in a world with social networking. According to the survey, more than half of the children surveyed (54%) don’t personally know all of the friends accepted into their social network. While 76% of parents with kids on Facebook, claim to have “friended” their teens, 29% of teenagers are ready to “un-friend” their parents given the choice, and are twice as likely to want to “un-friend” mom versus dad.
In response to the dynamic safety and reputation management needs of today’s teenagers online, AOL today released a new product called Safe Social (www.SafeSocial.com). This comprehensive tool provides parents a 360 degree view of their child’s social networking life, with an easy-to-read report card of overall social networking activity and identification of potential red flags. With Safe Social, which requires up-front consent from the child, parents gain access to their teen’s friends list and what their teen posts on sites like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. Parents may also opt to receive real-time alerts regarding potential predator relationships and indications of at-risk behaviors, such as posted references to alcohol use or even bullying and suicide.
Child Protection Advocate and AOL’s head of Online Safety and Security, John Ryan, advises “Predators, whether bullies or sexual offenders, often masquerade as friends. The key is to unmask them. Safe Social takes an across-the-board look at your kid’s friends and checks them against more than 50 databases and other factors, such as distance, to help you find out if they are, who they say they are.”
Safe Social works to protect teen users by alerting their parents when someone identified as an adult befriends them, or when the person has no or few other mutual friends with their child. Parents can keep track of the friends in one easy-to-read gallery. Roughly one-third of parents (33%) feel they are mostly on top of things, but worry they aren’t seeing everything, while another 18% feel that it is tricky and too time consuming to keep up. Many parents are not able to effectively vet their children’s friends, with 41% saying they know half or less than half of their children’s online friends. Safe Social curbs this barrier with an up-front agreement with the teen user to allow parental access with a broader view. This arrangement is seamless to others, which 45% of children said they would prefer as compared to publicly being “friends” with a parent or parents who are able to post on their page.
Safe Social, which draws on underlying technology from Social Shield, also addresses the growing issue of teenage reputation management online by allowing parents to review postings, uploaded photos, and photos in which their child has been tagged for inappropriate behaviors and activities. The tool automatically notifies parents through an email alert of unsafe or questionable behavior when trigger words related to sex, drugs or alcohol are detected in conversations posted online. “I think parents are looking to strike a happy medium between giving their kids the independence to enjoy things like Facebook and being a responsible parent. Consumers have been waiting for a realistic solution like Safe Social that lets teens be teens and parents be parents,” explained AOL Consumer Advisor, Regina Lewis.
Safe Social is the first major product to be launched from AOL’s Paid Services Division. “AOL has been a leader in helping parents and their children enjoy a safer online experience,” said Ned Brody, President, AOL Paid Services. “We believe the launch of Safe Social underscores our commitment to continuing to evolve our offerings to match up with the changing needs of today’s families.”
The launch of Safe Social as a stand-alone product with a free trial and an ongoing $9.99 monthly price point augments AOL’s growing roster safety products and rich history in this arena. A separate study conducted for AOL shows that four in 10 parents are not using a Web filter. Those who do monitor their children’s Web browsing use time-consuming and possibly ineffective ways such as looking through browsing history, looking over the child’s shoulder while he or she is online or simply asking the child which sites he or she has visited. With this research in mind and the new findings from the Nielsen-conducted survey, AOL set out to offer multiple age-appropriate products to provide more effective solutions to keeping children, pre-teens and teens safer online.
Additionally, representing AOL’s continued commitment to provide child, pre-teen and teen online safety services, earlier this month the company introduced a free, easy-to-use and lightweight AOL Safety Toolbar available at www.safetytoolbar.aol.com. Features include a simple set-up process; a Web filter that checks against 13 million websites; family-friendly search that filters out inappropriate search results; Internet activity reports, and customizable controls. AOL’s renowned parental controls for younger children are available for free at www.Safety.AOL.Com
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Have you ever wondered what keeps your support team busy? Despite having bought the best servers from the best data centers, your support requirements seem to always grow.
A study of over 10,000 help-desk queries, revealed that: · 18 % of customer concerns were related to downtimes, · 20% related to vulnerabilities,· 15% related to spamming, phishing etc. · Only the remaining half were queries of support nature. An effective monitoring system gets your support team to be more proactive in keeping your systems/servers in good health. End result - your support team spends more and more time, addressing genuine help requests.
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An Ideal Monitoring SystemThe virtue of a monitoring system is more in preventing a possible service interruption. It comprises of:· Service Monitoring· Server Vulnerability Check· Server Health Check· Intelligent Reports Tools like Nagios and Groundwork cater to the need of monitoring and vulnerability checks. Server Health Check and Intelligent Reports are essential and is a must have add on for a monitoring system. Server Health CheckDoctors often recommend periodic health checks. This is to assess the individuals’ general health, diagnose a potential ailment, also to take preventive measures against diseases. Same is the case with servers. Server health checks are done to ensure that servers are in good health and free from vulnerabilities. You can include as many features to your server health check routine as you may want. This can be largely classified into two P’s· Periodic Maintenance checks· Performance Checks Periodic Maintenance checks are important to maintain overall server health, as well as ensuring that the security and disaster recovery plans are up to date. There are various features that can be included to a server monitoring system for periodic maintenance. The important features are:· Anti-Virus check · Backup success check · Windows patch management check· Firewall port and penetration check · Security check These periodic maintenance checks can be easily automated and run at scheduled intervals. Each check will generate reports and the system can be configured to send these reports to your support staff. These reports help the team to pro-actively work on servers, to enhance service uptime. Providing an interface for these features in the customer portal, will aid customers to see the status of each check in detail. Performance checks are essential to ensure the health of services running in the server. Basic performance checks that can easily be implemented in a monitoring system are:· Apache status· Memory usage· Disk Usage These checks ensure that the services are running on the server, just as expected. Similar to periodic checks, when any of the performance monitoring parameters goes above a certain threshold, say above 80%, there needs to be an alert generated to notify support to take preventive actions. For example: If Disk usage is higher than 80%, the alert will help the support team to login to the system and make sure, free space is made available, or additional disk is added.
Like periodic health checks with
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The table indicates a checklist for Server Health monitoring. It lists various checks, their frequency, the person to be notified and the tools used. In real time, frequency can vary from 5 to 15 minutes. You can configure this based on your specific requirements. The tools mentioned in the table are all open source tools. You can use any other tool that meets your requirement. These were some of the best “server health check” practices one can add in a server monitoring portal. Adding many more checks based on your requirements, will make the server healthier and stronger. The best method to figure out the features required, is to consult with your support team. Intelligent reportsA monitoring system is incomplete without proper reports. Intelligent reports will help greatly in making decisions that improve the performance of servers. Lets consider a scenario in which the CPU usage of a server is increasing. Almost all monitoring portals will have a graphical representation or a textual report of the CPU usage. But, how do you make it intelligent? If a monitoring system can find which process is causing high resource usage and if support team can be notified, that becomes intelligent reporting. The monitoring system has to be configured to send e-mail or an SMS alert to support and/or customers, to take quick actions.
Summarizing it all, an efficient monitoring system will bring three I’s· Increase in revenue and business. Since the customer is able to see the reports, he will use professional services offered to ensure nothing breaks, before it is too late. This brings in additional revenue.· Increased employee productivity. Support staff will not be spending much time in reactive measures, as most of the tasks will be automated and executed pro-actively before any actual damage has occurred.· Increased customer loyalty. The resulting transparency in quality of the servers and the proactive corrections being made in a timely manner, builds customer confidence. Our industry still has its focus on ‘automation’, mostly to increase efficiency. But to reap the best out of automation, one should be able to provide services that are truly ‘proactive’ in nature. Moving on to an efficient monitoring system, is one such way forward!!
These were some of the best “server health check” practices one can add
in a server monitoring portal
Writer’s Bio: Sheena M.G, Senior Software Engineer at Bobcares, has been working for over 5 years in the Hosting support industry. Over the years, Sheena has been leading teams that work in Technical Support and Server Administration. P!
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Wow! HostingCon 2010 was hot. Not only was the temperature hot in Austin, TX, but the show itself was hot with
activity surrounding “the cloud” and related hosting industry topics. With an estimated 30% more attendees this year and 25% more exhibit space that was sold out months ahead of the show, HostingCon 2010 was the largest HostingCon so far in its six year run. Ping! Zine was there covering all the latest details on what innovative companies are doing to leverage the power of the cloud. But we didn’t stop at talking about what the cloud has to offer. We heard from companies leveraging the latest in technological advances to deliver more powerful marketing tools to mobile users, new and improved versions of popular software brands you are familiar with, and general news on what to expect in the future of hosting and HostingCon 2011. HostingCon 2010 news and updatesWhether you attended HostingCon 2010 or monitored Twitter and Facebook, we thought you’d like to know about popular brands and what they launched or discussed at the show. Below is a quick review of each brand that we talked to at the convention. If your company is not listed, please make sure we get time in front of your company next year at HostingCon 2011. Parallels – Parallels announced the addition of seven Cloud services to the Application Packaging Standard (APS) catalog, allowing small businesses the ability to access essential tools like video conferencing, VoIP, client management, project management, mobile Website configuration, Webmail and shopping cart. Parallels also announced the launch of Parallels Automation 5.0 (PA5.0) and introduced new key features in Parallels Automation 5.0 including support for delivering Microsoft Exchange 2010, unified communications with Office Communications Server 2007 R2 services, improved cloud syndication capabilities, and customer on-premise directory integration, in addition to over 100 other features.
Steadfast networks – Steadfast Networks held a party for customers, vendors, acquaintances, competitors, and fans at a local bar, just one block from the convention center on the popular nightlife hang-out 6th street. An open bar, food, and Guitar Hero on a large projector screen was available for entertainment from 8pm until the doors closed well after midnight. Additionally, Steadfast Networks recently opened a new data center in Chicago to accommodate the expanding demand for Chicago colocation services and Chicago web hosting services.
cPanel – cPanel, a leading Linux control panel developer for web hosting companies, held the premier after party “Unleash Your Inner Geek” at Pure Ultra Lounge located on 6th Street, the destination hang-out for downtown Austin, TX. cPanel has made significant headway over the last two years in terms of ramping up product support by hiring additional staff to improve usability, security, and functionality of cPanel control panel. Expect to see new improvements available in the future from this popular and fast-growing Houston, TX company. CDGcommerce – CDGcommerce discussed their continuing support of 1-Step PCI compliance payment processing, offering merchant accounts and credit card processing to businesses and organizations looking for high quality, low-priced merchant services. CDGcommerce’s CEO, Chris West, discussed features available including a free payment gateway, free fraud defender and chargeback defender software, quickBooks compatible, and free MerchantPortal with full web reporting. r1Soft – David Wartell, CEO of R1Soft, demonstrated next-generation high-performance, cost-reducing CDP backup software that provides continuous data protection. R1Soft’s demonstration explored the different types of backups and how to improve virtualization storage performance using CDP technology through a web based interface. R1soft held a Hosting Partner Happy Hour at the Iron Cactus to give thanks to partners and customers.
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rackAID – Jeff Huckaby, managing partner at rackAID, presented “Outsourcing IT Management” and provided numbers and statistics on how to successfully outsource server management including finding a reputable IT management company and service offerings to reduce bottlenecks and increase return on investment. ISPsystem – ISPsystem discussed six unique products to the hosting market including a billing system, web server control panel, virtual private server and dedicated server management systems, name server management system, and IP address distribution system for data centers, web hosting companies, and education institutions. Certified Hosting – Certified Hosting announced their popular affiliate hosting program with the highest payout in the hosting industry. Certified Hosting’s CEO, Kacy Carlsen, also discussed the company’s exclusive specialty hosting services including CMS hosting, blog hosting, forum hosting, social networking hosting, audio/video sharing hosting, e-commerce hosting, and Softaculous hosting for businesses and personal users wanting to implement and build powerful social networking websites and applications. dotMobi – dotMobi showcased their latest dotMobi software and service where companies can purchase a .mobi TLD and build a mobile version of their website. The dotMobi service automatically detects which type of phone is being used by a visitor and displays support for that particular phone. Additionally, if a user visits a company’s main website address such as companyxyz.com on their mobile phone, dotMobi automatically redirects the user to the companyxyz.mobi version of the website. dotMobi is easy to maintain and update as designers can quickly and easily create a company’s website within minutes.
black lotus - Black Lotus announced their new wholesale mitigation product offering best effort protection on bulk bandwidth (transit, GRE, or colo) as low as $5/Mbps and their on-site DDoS protection implementation service enabling new and refurbished DDoS protection infrastructure at a fraction of typical retail costs. Black Lotus also announced the introduction of a Black Lotus branded DDoS protection appliance and service suite available in early fall.
logicboxes - LogicBoxes provided free ICANN Accreditation consulting help web hosting companies become registrars through their ICANN Accreditation division, Accreditation.com. Accreditation.com consultants conducted live, no-obligation consulting sessions and feasibility analysis for companies interested in an ICANN Accreditation. Consultants showed
hosting companies how they can buy domains at base cost and increase their revenues by offering domain related services. KEMP Technologies – KEMP Technologies showcased their popular line of LoadMaster load balancer suite of products for layers 4-7 load balancing, content switching, server persistence, SSL offload and acceleration, Windows Terminal Services, and application front-end caching and compression, all at some of the industry’s lowest prices. KEMP Technologies products provide high performance at a fraction of the cost of competing products according to Peter Melerud, co-founder and VP of KEMP Technologies. linMin - LinMin released their Bare Metal Provisioning Release 6.0 with cloud, hosting, and corporate data center enhancements including an optional Windows Provisioning Module that enables the deployment of Microsoft® Windows Server 2008 and Windows® 7 systems using the same graphical or programmatic interfaces used to provision all current releases of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Ubuntu, CentOS, Debian, Fedora, OpenSUSE and SLES as well as legacy Windows operating systems. LinMin also announced an upgraded API enabling cloud, hosting, and corporate data centers to seamlessly add provisioning and imaging support to their existing IT applications. rackmount Specialists – Rob Tyree, partner at Rackmount Specialists, customized server builders, announced the launch of VegasNAP, a new 14,000 square-foot data center facility located in Las Vegas, NV. VegasNAP, one of three Rackmount Specialists brands, offers colocation, disaster recovery, and managed IT services to companies requiring colocation in a disaster-free data center. San Diego, here we comeIf you attended HostingCon 2010, you learned that next year’s HostingCon 2011 is in beautiful San Diego, California. The convention center is located right off the edge of the Pacific Ocean. The weather should be incredible during August. iNet Interactive expects an additional 25% more exhibit space for HostingCon 2011 so if you plan on exhibiting, make sure you lock in exhibit space early, otherwise you’ll miss out on one of the best opportunities to showcase your products and services to the largest gathering of web hosting enthusiasts ever assembled on the planet. The Ping! Zine team looks forward to seeing you in San Diego, California at HostingCon 2011. Stop by and see us. Pull up a couch (yes, I said couch) and let’s have a discussion about your business, what you’re doing in the industry, and how we can help you get the word out to tens of thousands of Ping! Zine readers.
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clouds everywhere!
Cloud computing has become one of the strongest buzzwords in the history of the Internet, especially in the hosting industry. nowadays, cloud computing is everywhere. I can’t remember when cloud computing was coined the first time. The term was suddenly there, and like real clouds, the term appeared out of nowhere.
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cloud computing’s PredecessorCloud computing’s predecessor, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is still used as much as the term cloud computing. These industry terms summarize the (re)discovery that the Internet could be much more than just some text, movies, and pictures on a website. Cloud computing and SaaS can serve as an application platform. Where have we heard that before?
rembering aSPRewind 10 years. At that time, industry experts were discussing Application Service Providers (ASP) everywhere. ASP was the future of IT. If you compare the arguments for ASP with today’s arguments for cloud computing, you will see a striking resemblance. This is also true for all arguments against both trends. We all know ASP failed, but that doesn’t mean that cloud computing will be facing the same destiny.
There’s nothing new to see here people, just the Internet growing up
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cloud computing Security & argumentsMost arguments surrounding the future of ASP, SaaS, and cloud computing discussions are figurative, then and now. I think it is hard to prove lower Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for cloud computing applications and it is mostly an after-the-fact rationalization for most decision makers to consume applications in the cloud. Also, I think most cloud applications are far more secure then on-premise applications. An alleged lack of security is one of strongest arguments against cloud computing in the enterprise market.
cloud computing todayToday, the Internet has created mature and predictable industries with proven business models. ASP failed because its business model was broken. These business models are at the core of everything: cheaper storage, higher bandwidth, more application power, and mobile web. This is all possible because entrepreneurs are now making a decent living building applications using cloud computing.
cloud computing Market exampleThere’s a market segment within cloud computing that proves the success of the cloud in a very explicit way: online backup. As an innovation, early online backup services emerged prior to the existence of the Internet and needed the maturity of the Internet in both a technical and commercial sense. What was not right 10 years ago is working just fine right now. Today, the average online backup service is a reliable offering for a reasonable price.
In fact, cloud computing is probably the mature Internet. There’s nothing new to see here people, just the Internet growing up.
Writer’s Bio: Robbert van Geldrop is the CTO and Co-founder of BackupAgent. Robbert is an experienced entrepreneur with a strong background in software and technology. Robbert has a clear, strategic vision and sets the technical roadmap for BackupAgent. Robbert also holds a master’s degree in science.
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AUT
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Approaching its fifth year, the annual cPanel Conference is returning with the highly technical sessions attendees expect as well as some new features. cPanel Conference 2010 - Automation Bootcamp is being designed to train and prepare attendees to successfully compete in the world of web hosting.
Attendees will be immersed into an environment that provides system administrators, developers, and integrators with an in-depth, highly technical training experience. It also fosters an environment for them to network with their industry peers and cPanel staff members. Numerous exhibitors will also be present.
Some of the cPanel Conference exhibitors include VPS.net, CloudLinux, Platinum Server Management, Attracta, Microsoft, CentOS, SoftLayer, and HostDime. Official media coverage by Ping! Zine Web Hosting Magazine will also be present at the conference. While there will be numerous opportunities for attendees to learn and network with exhibitors, cPanel Conference 2010 has lined up
several highly technical, versatile speakers. Session topics will range from Enkompass, to documentation protocol, to integrating third-party applications into cPanel and Enkompass.
In addition to the technical sessions, cPanel will be introducing a new segment called ‘Lightning Talks.’ These five-minute presentations will be given by various individuals and organizations about a variety of topics. The presentations must be non-promotional in nature, and when the five-minute time period is up, a gong will sound to indicate that time has expired. If you would like to sign up for a Lightning Talk speaking slot, please visit http://www.cpanel.net/conference/10/lightning-talks.html.
cPanel has a reputation for hosting amazing industry events. For the second year in a row, cPanel will provide guests with after-hours fun at Joystix Arcade, which offers a wide array of games from old-school classics to the latest gaming fun. In addition, cPanel is partnering with SoftLayer to host the cPanel/SoftLayer Mystery Event. There are no details about the event available at this time, but if the cPanel “Unleash Your Inner Geek” party thrown at HostingCon 2010 is any indication, this event should be one for the record books.
Finally, cPanel just announced its cPanel Conference 2010 “Register to Win” Giveaway. Every week, starting on August 23, cPanel will enter registrants into a weekly contest to win great prizes including a 16 GB Apple iPad, and free hotel accommodations for this year’s conference. For more information about the contest, please visit http://www.facebook.com/cpanel.
cPanel Conference 2010 - Automation Bootcamp is sure to provide participants with great insight into cPanel operations, access to networking opportunities, and content-driven sessions. Those interested in attending cPanel Conference 2010 - Automation Bootcamp can visit the conference home page at http://www.cpanel.net/conference/10/index.html. This conference will provide every one in attendance with the tools to compete successfully on the web hosting battlefield.
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Dave Youngcase study
case Study
Still looking for the right helpdesk solution that’s affordable, easy to use, and supports multiple
brands – all from one system? In today’s highly competitive marketplace, it’s tough to run a successful web hosting company without a
helpdesk solution that provides all the features you need to deliver fast, responsive support to
your customers. Even if you provide support over the phone and through chat, you still need
a helpdesk system where customers can create, track, and follow issues with your support team.
Interview with vision Helpdesk
Currently there are several major players in the hosting industry that provide helpdesk solutions. but one has developed a true satellite helpdesk system where hosting companies can use the same system to manage multiple brands or multiple domains. Meet vision Helpdesk, an energetic company developing advanced, innovative software to help hosting companies increase productivity and efficiency. Recently I interviewed Sachin Jadhav, Director of vision Helpdesk, to learn more about vision Helpdesk’s popular satellite or multi-brand, multi-domain support for hosting companies.
What is vision Helpdesk?“Vision Helpdesk reflects state-of-the-art in web based helpdesk solution technology,” says Jadhav. “Vision Helpdesk derives its benefits based on Web 2.0 technology and is extensively designed with PHP and Ajax offering user-experience improvement, decreased user delay, decreased bandwidth usage, high-speed information retrieval, and other features support staff need to increase response times and productivity.” According to Jadhav, the Vision Helpdesk architecture is flexible and designed to suit for all small to large businesses. The unique satellite helpdesk feature allows users to manage support for multiple companies in one place, making Vision Helpdesk the perfect scalable helpdesk solution. vision Helpdesk’s Most Popular featureThe most popular feature available with Vision Helpdesk is the satellite helpdesk feature where companies can run multiple brands and multiple domains on the same helpdesk system using a single helpdesk license. “Many web hosting reseller companies are turning to Vision Helpdesk because of the satellite feature that allows hosting companies to offer white label end user support to their clients and it allows hosting companies to offer an on-demand helpdesk to reseller clients,” says Jadhav. “Web hosting companies using popular billing systems such as WHMCS can easily integrate with Vision Helpdesk to offer various modules including login sharing, fetching WHMCS fields, paid support, and other features hosting companies find useful in their day-to-day operations.”
Additional vision Helpdesk featuresIn addition to Vision Helpdesk’s satellite feature, Jadhav says there are other features that companies are using to increase support help productivity. Below is a list of a few additional popular features included with Vision Helpdesk. · Anti-Spam · Multi-Language · Google Apps and Gmail Support · SLA and Escalation · Custom Fields · Mobile Version and Desktop Alert System · Reports Generation “As you can see from the list above, Vision Helpdesk offers some advanced features that can help boost a company’s response times enabling them to offer better support to their customers,” says Jadhav. viewing the vision Helpdesk InterfaceHaving spent years in the hosting industry reviewing and using software from dozens of vendors, my first reaction to Vision Helpdesk’s interface is its simplicity. With so many features available, most helpdesk systems would struggle trying to make it this easy for users to navigate their way through features that can help increase the level of support offered to customers.
case Study
“Bottom line – vision helpdesk
supports any company that offers email support
to their customers”
“By using a combination of PHP and Ajax and investing a lot of time in usability testing, customers will experience a user-friendly, yet powerful interface for managing helpdesk tickets and support departments from administrator to technician to customer or any end user,” says Jadhav. Integrating vision HelpdeskVision Helpdesk offers a plug-in architecture, API, and custom hooks to make third party scripts integration simple. Vision Helpdesk also offers login sharing with various scripts like WHMCS, Blesta, Clientexec, Plesk Billing, OsCommerce, vBulletin, SM Forum, WordPress Blog, Joomla, and other popular web based systems. “Vision Helpdesk licenses are available in two formats – client server installation and hosted services. Licenses can be purchased either monthly or owned,” says Jadhav. “Vision Helpdesk also comes with a built-in migration tool which takes three simple steps to migrate tickets and users from other helpdesk software like Kayako SupportSuite, Cerberus, WHMCS, Perldesk, and Auracle.” Industries using vision Helpdesk Vision Helpdesk is not just for web hosting companies. Jadhav says they have customers from various industries outside of the web hosting industry. Below is a partial list of industries using Vision Helpdesk. · Web Design Companies · Software Companies · Support Companies · Outsourcing Companies · Web Hosting Companies and Data Centers “Bottom line – Vision Helpdesk supports any company that offers email support to their customers,” adds Jadhav. What Makes vision Helpdesk unique?“Compared to other helpdesk systems, Vision Helpdesk is feature rich, has an easy learning curve, and comes with friendly, knowledgeable support,” says Jadhav. Additionally, we offer competitive and economical pricing and offer fast turnaround on new feature development and bug fixes.” To learn more about Vision Helpdesk, visit www.thevisionworld.com.
Writer's Bio: Dave Young is a professional writer, technical writer, website auditor, marketing consultant, SEO guru, and founder of Young Copy, a leading promotional and technical writing services firm. Visit www.youngcopy.com to learn how you can boost your company’s revenues.
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Tony Kammererproducts
After meeting Waseem Daher (COO of Ksplice Inc.) at cPanel Conference in October 2009 and discussing what
exactly Ksplice is about, I was quite interested, as any admin would be, by the concept of rebootless kernel updates. Looking further into Ksplice I found that it was the winner of the 20th annual MIT $100k Entrepreneurship Competition in 2009. It seems the idea came after Jeff Arnold (CEO of Ksplice Inc.) delayed mid-week kernel updates on some busy MIT servers to avoid downtime only to result in having to restore the servers instead.
While computer "users" may find it annoying when they have to reboot to complete operating system updates (hello Windows Update, I said I'll reboot later!), when you are responsible for hundreds or thousands of servers in production use such as in hosting, the amount of hassle involved is extremely costly and inconvenient to all.
Generally most Linux distributions will release kernel updates on a monthly basis meaning that any system with uptime over a couple months is likely vulnerable to serious exploits.
Luckily we now have a solution in which kernel updates for some popular Linux distributions can be installed automatically or when you like without any downtime involved at all.
Ksplice uptrack applies kernel patches by momentarily freezing process execution and modifying the beginning of changed functions to point to the new, updated version of those functions, then changing data and structures within memory before resuming the processes where they left off.
Ksplice Uptrack is available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4/5, CentOS 4/5, Debian GNU/Linux 5.0 Lenny, Ubuntu Server (8.04 LTS, 9.04, 9.10, 10.04 LTS) and CloudLinux5 for a monthly fee of $3.95/month per system after a 30-day free trial.
For Virtualization on Parallels Virtuozzo Containers 3/4 and OpenVZ (EL5) the price is $9.95/month per system after a 30-day free trial.
For Ubuntu Desktop (9.04 Jaunty, 9.10 Karmic, 10.04 LTS Lucid), and derivatives based on the same kernel, and Fedora 13 it is available without a fee.
Why Reboot? KSPlICE uPTrACK
047
reboots required for kernel updates by major linux distributions during 2009
Without Ksplice Uptrack, if you’re not rebooting for security updates about once a month, your systems are vulnerable to well-known security problems.
For accomplishing some rather complicated changes, you might expect getting started with Ksplice Uptrack to be a minor chore when in fact it takes only the following simple steps (CentOS used for example) : 1. Register for a free access key at https://www.ksplice.com/signup 2. Download the Ksplice Uptrack repository installation RPM package such as the following for CentOS 4/5:wget https://www.ksplice.com/yum/uptrack/centos/ksplice-uptrack-release.noarch.rpm 3. Install the repository package:rpm -i ksplice-uptrack-release.noarch.rpm
4. Install uptrack via Yum:yum -y install uptrack 5. Edit /etc/uptrack/uptrack.conf and insert your access key.(Can also change to automated installation of updates or enable notices when updates are available or if updates have been installed) 6. Run the following command as root to bring your kernel up to date:uptrack-upgrade -y Now you can simply sit back and enjoy the warm feelings as you see your uptime climbing higher while you know that you have all the protection from kernel vulnerabilities that any admin would want.
Tony Kammerer is a professional administrator who resides in Houston, Texas. He has been the Senior Administrator for UK based United Communications Ltd (www.unitedhosting.co.uk) since 2006 and has been in the web hosting industry since working at RackShack prior to becoming Ev1Servers in 2003.
He may be reached by e-mail at [email protected]
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We build servers. We do it for less.
We value our customers.“Lionfire Solutions has helped us meet the demands of our web hosting clients by providing both great value and rapid response to our infrastructure needs.”
—Adam Wills, President, TurnKeyInternet.net
48-Hour turn around.
lionfiresolutions.com +1(800) 521-5174
049
When we think about Google we don’t immediately think
social networking. nor do we even associate Google with any form of success in that
space considering their three failures Orkut, Profiles, and
buzz. Google’s attempts so far, though technically equal to such networks as facebook, miss the
mark when it comes to offering consumers an easy to use
interface. As an advertising giant, Google has a lot to gain from starting up a powerful social network. The question is can
they after three failed attempts?
David DunlapBusIness
Can Google Me Succeed Where All The Others Failed Miserably?
To begin, Google must identify the weaknesses and strengths of their top competitors. In this case that would be Facebook and to a lesser extent LinkedIn. This stage Google has already done (I would say probably has done, but honestly, there is no reason why Google wouldn’t have thoroughly analyzed the competition; if they haven’t Google Me fails before it begins). If they have done their homework they will notice the following things:
Strengths· Huge population, if you want to find someone you go to Facebook· Lots of things to help you waste time (such as social games)· The use of recommendations and likes helps bring in business users· Extremely easy to use Weaknesses· People searching is laughable· Contact management can use a lot of work· Friend Lists are not truly compartmentalized· Security/Privacy is horrid· Lack of customization
g
We build servers. We do it for less.
We value our customers.“Lionfire Solutions has helped us meet the demands of our web hosting clients by providing both great value and rapid response to our infrastructure needs.”
—Adam Wills, President, TurnKeyInternet.net
48-Hour turn around.
lionfiresolutions.com +1(800) 521-5174
050
Interestingly enough, a lot of what Google
does meshes with these strengths and
weaknesses. One of their largest stumbling blocks to date has been a lack
of user friendliness. The second largest problem has been population...,
which when you think about it makes very little
sense since Google is the second most visited place
on the Internet. Through integration of some of
their current services and the addition of a powerful
search tool, Google should be able to wipe out
any other social network.
Social networks have been locked in a unique moment in time and I don’t think I am being too presumptuous to think that this hasn’t escaped the notice of Google. If we step back for a moment and take in social networks for what they are as a whole instead of locked on the details, we can see a brief moment in history roughly 15 years ago.
What is the killer app for Facebook? The ability to find people and network with old friends and new colleagues is probably what makes Facebook so largely popular and this continues to add more people into the network who then make it all the more easier to find people. However, Facebook is missing a key ingredient to make that killer app shine and that is a proper search.
15 years ago we had several search engines, which were considered record breaking. Lycos for instance had hit a milestone by indexing 390,000 pages. This was monumental. No one had ever done that before, it made headlines everywhere, Lycos’ search engine was huge. Two years after Lycos’ “record” the school project called Google indexed 60 million pages. Like the social networks of today, the search engine space was defined poorly with companies only going half way and thinking this is the maximum limit. When Google came along, the company showed everyone that not only did they not understand the search engine space, but that none of the competition understood how to take advantage of the search engine market.
Today we have social networks that do quite well. Businesses are even beginning to finally “get it” and jump on-board with at least some enthusiasm, but honestly what we see today is nowhere near what social networking can become and I think that Google has the opportunity to redefine social networks like they did with the search engine market.
Google’s Playbook According to Me· Google Must.... Make the interface simple and easy to use by anyone.· Google Must.... Get in good with game companies (oh wait they are already doing this).· Google Must.... Allow users to easily separate friends, family, and business contacts .· Google Must.... Allow users to separate apps completely from contact lists (games with friends, collaboration apps with peers, etc).· Google Must.... Use their search engine talents to create a network that is easily searchable and navigatable and leverage their current search engine to increase the user base.· Google Must.... Allow contact syncing with email clients and create API hooks.· Google Should.... Integrate Google Calendars.· Google Should.... Create easy to use privacy controls.· Google Should.... Adopt a strong security policy.· Google Should.... Allow some level of customization over a user’s own homepage.· Google Should.... Provide third-party app integration. If Google is finally getting serious about building a social network they need to be able to use their own past successes and failures and those of their rivals. They should ensure that they add games AND business tools for increased stickiness and usability. Quite honestly, for Google Me to be a strong, industry defining success, they should build it as if they were building a control panel for the Internet. If Google does that, then I think Google Me will win the social networking race, hands down.
Writer’s Bio: David Dunlap has been both a Web host industry analyst and commentator for the past eight years. Prior to his active writing career, David was a network and communications technician for four years. He currently is the Reviews Editor for WebHostMagazine.com
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Dave: Miss Adler?
Miss Adler: Please call me Sunshine!
Derek: Seems like the perfect name for customer support.
Sunshine: For what?
Derek: Customer support?
Dave: Customer care specialist?
Sunshine: Huh?
Derek: Customer... doesn’t matter pleased to me you.
*phone rings*
Sunshine: One second gentlemen let me get this.
Dave: Seems quite charming
Derek: Very much so.
Sunshine: LISTEN DIRT BAG I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU ARE INSINUATING BUT I NEVER ALLOWED ANYONE TO “PING” ME WITH SO MUCH AS A HOW DO YOU DO!!!
Derek: Huh.
Dave: Cat’s got claws
Sunshine: One second guys..... Hello police, yes I am go-ing to need another restraining order. Yes, sure I will come on over during my lunch break thanks.
Derek: Restraining order... on... your customers
Dave: A bit excessive I’d think.
Sunshine: Well they keep calling me and it really ruins my day.
Derek: *Blinks*
Dave: *Raises an eyebrow*
Sunshine: They ask me all sorts of silly things like why isn’t my DS... DSM pomegranated,
Derek: pomegranated?
Sunshine: Why did we shutdown their pipeline?
Dave: Seems like a good question.
Sunshine: Like I’m a plumber!
Derek: Lady they are suppose to call you, your job is to answer the phone.
Sunshine: The last guy said he wanted to “ping” me!!! Like I am that kind of woman!
Dave: Well now we know why they never call back.
Derek: Dave I think you read this wrong, it says Satan of Support.
Dave: That makes much more sense.
Sunshine: He can ping me alright! Ping me in hell!!!
They say once you call her you never call back. She handles support like no other, with a smile on her face and a paycheck in her pocket. Her peers know her as Sunshine Alder, but she has been called the Saint of Support at WHoKairs Hosting. And now, with Ping! Zine's Derek Morris, my name is David Dunlap from
Web Host Magazine and here is that interview.
THE SAINT OF SUPPORT
David DunlapfInale
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