1-800-HOSTING Blog » John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com Inside 1-800-HOSTING Wed, 02 Nov 2011 17:00:58 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Voice Recognition in the Work Place http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/10/voice-recognition-in-the-work-place/ http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/10/voice-recognition-in-the-work-place/#comments Mon, 24 Oct 2011 15:24:30 +0000 John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com/?p=2180

If I could have three wishes, one of them would surely be 100% accurate voice recognition with every electronic device that I interact with. I don’t mind typing but given the choice, I would much prefer to speak my commands rather than have to type them into a keyboard or hammer them out on an iPhone or iPad.

Voice recognition is obviously in its infancy but it is becoming quite good considering the tools we have to work with. In fact this blog post is being dictated into an iPad with the headphones that come with the iPad and so far it has been 100% accurate. I agree it could get confusing for a computer to decipher commands if you’re in a crowded room or there is loud music playing in the background or any other number of situations that might not be applicable to voice recognition.

That said how nice would it be to wake up in the morning and say, “turn on shower”. Or if you’re laying in bed at night and you want the lights off, instead of getting up to walk across the room you say, “turn off the lights”. How about you say, “did I remember to lock the doors” and the computer says “no, the back door is unlocked, would you like me to lock it for you now”.

It almost sounds a little like being lazy on the surface but I think it goes much deeper than that if you really ponder the possibilities. Steve Jobs seemed to be headed in the right direction before his untimely passing and I suspect that in the not-too-distant future, keyboard will go the way of the eight track.

Imagine how much we would save on hand sanitizer and carpal tunnel syndrome treatments.

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]]> http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/10/voice-recognition-in-the-work-place/feed/ 0 Disconnecting in a Connected World http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/08/disconnecting-in-a-connected-world/ http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/08/disconnecting-in-a-connected-world/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 16:16:19 +0000 John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com/?p=2057

To a large percentage of the world’s population, the Internet couldn’t be more irrelevant or any lower on the totem pole of life’s necessities. However, I happen to live in the group that relies heavily on the Internet to conduct business, perform research, communicate with friends, family and of course, waste time.

If you are like me, you are plastered with Internet access 24/7 in your day-to-day life, especially at work or at home. While I’m out and about, I’ve always got my trusty iPhone which can do 90% of the things that I need to get done with relative ease. If my iPhone lets me down, I can use my iPad to tackle the other 9% percent. The last 1% are probably things I could do without anyway, so they can wait.

I’ve been traveling this past week so I have experienced a fairly consistent lack of Internet connectivity and as a result, have had to travel a short distance (less than a mile) to a local café with free WiFi or maybe I got lucky and bummed free WiFi off someone with an unsecured network.

When I’m thoroughly disconnected and have no Internet resources whatsoever, something strange happens to me. I tend to notice things that are around me more because I’m not bumping into them while checking the weather on my iPhone. I also find myself engaging in conversation with more people because I’m not busy deleting spam out my inbox or replying to a text message. Does any of this sound familiar?

Yes I need the Internet and no I don’t need the Internet. Let me try this another way.. if I had to choose between never having access to the Internet again for the rest of my life or.. well, I can’t think of anything that would be applicable for a trade. You can’t say television because the Internet provides television. You can’t say the music or radio because the Internet provides both of those. We pretty much can’t say anything that you can’t physically put your hands on because the Internet provides all of that too. But you can say anything that you can touch, feel, taste, and smell. I left “see” out because as we already know, you can see everything on the Internet. Especially the stuff you have no interesting seeing.

What I’m trying to say is that I/we forget too often that the Internet is just a tool to help us do things and it’s not really very good at anything else. Have you ever tried to have a conversation with the internet? How about asking the internet on the date? Maybe go to dinner with the internet or make friends with the internet? Sure you can see the great pyramids on the internet but let’s be real, that’s no substitute for standing in front of them, smelling the air, feeling the sun reflect off of them or touching the stones. So I suppose it’s okay to be disconnected and in some cases, even therapeutic. It’s sad to say but I know people who would have a complete meltdown if they lost their Internet connection for a week or two. If you’re reading this blog post it’s very likely that I don’t know you, but it’s also very likely that he might be one of those people.

Not that you asked for it, but my recommendation would be to pick one day on the weekend to not use the Internet. That means disconnect the data portion on your phone as well because that would be cheating. You’ll survive an entire day without Google maps and even though your “real friends” on Facebook might be scratching their heads at your sudden absence, they too will survive. Just do it as a test and think about that day as it progresses. If you’re not an Internet junkie already, sorry to have made you waste another five minutes of your life on the internet.

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]]> http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/08/disconnecting-in-a-connected-world/feed/ 0 Using a Content Management System (CMS) http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/08/using-a-content-management-system-cms/ http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/08/using-a-content-management-system-cms/#comments Mon, 01 Aug 2011 15:17:04 +0000 John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com/?p=2090

Content management systems have been around for many years and while they have their pitfalls, they also offer a tremendous advantage over hand coded HTML websites. The primary difference is that the content management system provides you with a web-based interface to modify the contents of your website. If you are unfamiliar with HTML, this prospect might scare you. However, if you know how to use email than you have enough skills to use a content management system and update the content on your website by yourself.

Even designers are using content management systems for the final product because it’s much easier to hand off the completed website and a fully functioning back end control panel that empowers their clients to make changes without having to call the designer every time they want to add a new sentence or change a heading. There are lots of content management systems available but WordPress is probably the most commonly used. It’s easy to install, easy to manage and even easier to use. If you have a complex website that is database driven or have some special function that you think might be incompatible with WordPress, it’s very likely that the developer can integrate that functionality into WordPress and still give you enough control to make changes to your content without whacking all of the code that they created.

The thing that blows me away about Word press and other content management systems is that there is literally an army of developers who create widgets and plug-ins for WordPress and most if not all, are free. So if you need to add a scheduling function to your website, you can typically just search the plug-ins and find one that you like and that is rated very highly by other users, then easily add that your website yourself. This whole process could take (5) or (10) minutes as opposed to (5) or (10) days with a developer, and your cost is nothing.

Another cool thing about WordPress is that it runs on open source operating systems (you can run it on Windows too) and WordPress itself is totally free. So you can essentially run this free application on a server running an open source operating system and open-source web server software like Apache. WordPress is also a very light weight application so it will only use a small amount of resources on the server. This doesn’t mean that WordPress is not capable of serving up millions of webpages because it certainly is. In fact, there are tremendous amount of very popular blogs and websites running WordPress right now that serve tens if not hundreds of millions of page views monthly.

While WordPress is not for everyone and content management systems in general are not always a good fit, they’re certainly worth a look if you’re tired of waiting around for your Web designer or developer to return your phone call or email because you need to update the telephone number on your website.

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]]> http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/08/using-a-content-management-system-cms/feed/ 0 What is a Dedicated Server? http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/07/what-is-a-dedicated-server/ http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/07/what-is-a-dedicated-server/#comments Wed, 27 Jul 2011 19:22:35 +0000 John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com/?p=2071 What is a dedicated server? That’s a relatively easy question to answer but a short answer will only scratch the surface. A dedicated server is a physical server that is installed in a data center, connected to an IP network and used to host applications that are accessed via the web or to process database requests, email, DNS or any other number of tasks.

The thing that differentiates a dedicated server is typically that the full resources of the server are only used by one client, hence the word “dedicated”. This is also referred to as dedicated hosting. An example of how this would not apply would be for shared hosting because while you can have literally hundreds of shared hosting clients on a single dedicated server, those resources are not dedicated to any one particular client and are spread among many clients. The example of running hundreds of shared hosting websites on a single dedicated server goes back to the earlier comment about the short answer only scratching the surface.

Good examples of clients who would require dedicated servers would be clients whose websites have outgrown their shared hosting environment. That is typically a function of CPU and RAM requirements. If you are trying to run large database application on a shared hosting server while 200 other websites are competing for processing power, you will probably see a substantial degradation of service. It will likely still function, but it will also more than likely be very slow and at times even unresponsive. Not to mention that your provider will encourage you to migrate to a dedicated server or to managed hosting if you lack the technical expertise to manage the dedicated server.

What is a dedicated server vs. what is not. Dedicated servers typically imply that you have the technical expertise on staff to manage all of the technical aspects of that server, including security, routine maintenance, updates and many other things. If you do lack those resources, managed hosting would likely be a far better choice for you. While the cost for managed hosting is always more than dedicated, the peace of mind you will receive by knowing that your server is managed by a team of experts is always well worth the additional cost.

So there you have it. The next time someone asks you “What is a Dedicated Server?”, you can now give an answer that makes sense.

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]]> http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/07/what-is-a-dedicated-server/feed/ 0 Being Disconnected in a Connected World http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/07/being-disconnected-in-a-connected-world/ http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/07/being-disconnected-in-a-connected-world/#comments Mon, 25 Jul 2011 18:16:50 +0000 John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com/?p=2058

To a large percentage of the world’s population, the Internet couldn’t be more irrelevant or any lower on the totem pole of life’s necessities. However, I happen to live in the group that relies heavily on the Internet to conduct business, perform research, communicate with friends, family and of course, waste time.

If you are like me, you are plastered with Internet access 24/7 in your day-to-day life, especially at work or at home. While I’m out and about, I’ve always got my trusty iPhone which can do 90% of the things that I need to get done with relative ease. If my iPhone lets me down, I can use my iPad to tackle the other 9% percent. The last 1% are probably things I could do without anyway, so they can wait.

I’ve been traveling internationally the past couple weeks so I have experienced a fairly consistent lack of Internet connectivity and as a result, have had to travel a short distance (less than a mile) to a local café with free WiFi or maybe I got lucky and bummed free WiFi off someone with an unsecured network.

When I’m thoroughly disconnected and have no Internet resources whatsoever, something strange happens to me. I tend to notice things that are around me more because I’m not bumping into them while checking the weather on my iPhone. I also find myself engaging in conversation with more people because I’m not busy deleting spam out my inbox or replying to a text message. Does any of this sound familiar?

Yes I need the Internet and no I don’t need the Internet. What I mean is.. if I had to choose between never having access to the Internet again for the rest of my life or.. well, I can’t think of anything that would be applicable for a trade. You can’t say television because the Internet provides that. You can’t say music or radio because the Internet provides both of those. We pretty much can’t say anything that you can’t physically put your hands on because the Internet provides all of those too. But you can say anything that you can touch, feel, taste, and smell. I left “see” out because as we already know you can see everything on the Internet. Especially the stuff you have no interesting seeing.

What I’m trying to say is that I/we forget too often that the Internet is just a tool to help us do things and it’s not really very good at much else. Have you ever tried to have a conversation with the internet? How about asking the internet on the date? Maybe go to dinner with the internet or make friends with the internet? Sure you can see the great pyramids on the internet but let’s be real, that’s no substitute for standing in front of them, smelling the air, feeling the sun reflect off of them or touching the stones.

So I suppose it’s okay to be disconnected and in some cases, even therapeutic. It’s sad to say but I know people who would have a complete meltdown if they lost their Internet connection for a week or two. If you’re reading this blog post it’s very likely that I don’t know you, but it’s also very likely that he might be one of those people.

Not that you asked for it, but my recommendation would be to pick one day on the weekend to not use the Internet. That means disconnect the data portion on your phone as well because that would be cheating. You’ll survive an entire day without Google maps and even though your “real friends” on Facebook might be scratching their heads at your sudden absence, they too will survive. Just do it as a test and then think about that day as it progresses. You might surprised at what you experience.

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]]> http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/07/being-disconnected-in-a-connected-world/feed/ 0 Migrating to Cloud Computing http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/06/migrating-to-cloud-computing/ http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/06/migrating-to-cloud-computing/#comments Tue, 28 Jun 2011 20:56:29 +0000 John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com/?p=1694 Imagine that you could click a few buttons and migrate your environment from a dedicated server to a cloud computing platform. You won’t have to imagine for very long because that’s something that we’re working on right now.

It seems that one of the biggest obstacles for entry into cloud computing is the migration from your old server. We are working hard to find the best way to migrate dedicated servers or managed servers with very little input (or risk) from the end user. That would include migration of your operating system, all installed applications and of course, your precious data.

Testing has gone very well and we are confident we can roll this out in the very near future. At a minimum this provides a mechanism to get you quickly and easily into cloud computing and enjoying all of the benefits while sidestepping the hassles of a typical server migration.

Another area that is of great interest for us is helping clients migrate from server co-location to cloud computing. It’s essentially the same thing as migrating a dedicated server but the benefits and cost savings would be off the charts. We are still in the testing phase but making excellent progress and we expect to push something out to the public very soon. We have already successfully migrated from various platforms and the response from our techs is always the same, jaw-dropping ease and mind numbing efficiency.

Stand by for more news on this exciting development as we continue working hard to bring you the best cloud computing platform available.

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]]> http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/06/migrating-to-cloud-computing/feed/ 0 Properly Disposing of Obsolete Web Servers http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/06/properly-disposing-of-obsolete-web-servers/ http://blog.800hosting.com/2011/06/properly-disposing-of-obsolete-web-servers/#comments Fri, 24 Jun 2011 16:04:33 +0000 John Cunningham http://blog.800hosting.com/?p=1613

Compliance and common sense both dictate that tossing old servers in the dumpster is definitely not a good idea. We recently disposed of hundreds of old and obsolete servers and while it’s not the first time we’ve gone through this drill, we still have to take great care to ensure that it’s done the right way.

The proper procedure and process for destroying obsolete servers really centers around (3) things.

1. Total and utter destruction of the hard drives
There are lots of ways that you can destroy hard drives but there is only one way to ensure that no data will ever be recovered from a drive. There are lots of choices such as using a giant magnet to wipe them. You can also connect them to a professional eraser which will completely wipe all the data off the drive and make it available for use elsewhere. Our choice is to have the drives put into a machine specifically designed to grind and into tiny little pieces. Magnets are great but they are not fool proof, neither is the machine that erases the data. However when you hand someone a hard drive and they hand you back a cup full of the metal shavings that used to be that hard drive, you can rest assured no one will be accessing any of that data that may have previously been stored on that hard drive.

2. Ensuring that environmentally unsafe metals & chemicals are dealt with responsibly and ethically
Again, you must pick the right company but if you do, you will be assured in writing and via certifications that any dangerous materials will be disposed of according to EPA regulations and will not wind up floating down some river in China. There are lots of companies who will be more than happy to haul your equipment off to the black market were nobody knows what happens with it, but your best bet is to avoid those companies at all cost.

3. All salvageable materials are recycled in a safe and responsible manner
If you work with a professional and licensed company, they will always responsibly disassemble the servers and make sure that any recyclable materials are separated into the appropriate groups (metals, plastics, etc), Those materials can then be sold by weight back to companies that reintroduce those recycled materials into newly manufactured products which helps the environment. That’s a win-win for everyone and it’s incredibly easy to.

So there you have it. When the time comes to destroy old or obsolete Web servers or network gear, be sure and choose the right company and make sure you get certifications of destruction. The company we work with scans every single hard drive before they grid them and they send us back a list of cross referenced service tags along with a certificate of destruction for each drive. That’s the only way to really be sure that you are protecting the privacy of your clients and being both environmentally and professionally responsible.

Almost forgot.. don’t expect to get any money for that old gear. The compensation you receive is having the equipment removed from your facility without cost. Likewise you should never have to pay for this service because the compensation they receive is the ability to recycle the materials they have obtained from you.

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