July 2008 Archives

I've had some discussions recently with church leaders about the need for content filtering on church networks.  Christian Computing Magazine just published an article supporting that discussion that I thought it would be good to share.

Yes it's important to have content filtering on your home computers.  What about your church computers?  Church and ministry leaders are no less susceptible to temptation than anyone else.  It's not just about ministry leaders, however, it's about anyone who may have access to the church's networked computers, whether they are supposed to have access or not ...  The article does a good job of explaining the need.

Churches with open wireless networks are especially vulnerable.

There are several option options worth considering.  I'm a big fan of the EtherShield device discussed in the the article, but it may not be the best approach for everyone.

Either way, good food for thought.

I often recommend that offices leave their computers on at night but lock them for security so that backups and updates can be scheduled to occur overnight when they won't impact work during the day.

A friend asked yesterday about putting a timer on a computer so that when the backup / update is done it could power off.  While at first glance that didn't seem like a good idea it quickly led to the thought of scheduling a power down or hibernation.

A quick google search pulled up a number of utilities for doing this.  Wondering if anyone out there is doing this? My immediate (haven't thought this through) list of requirements includes:

*  Ability to administer centrally
*  Ability to Hibernate or Standby rather than power off completely.
*  Sensitivity to someone working late -- can't ignore the user.
*  Ability to setup a variable schedule to accommodate different things on different days of the week.

There may be more, but the above would be ideal.

Any thoughts?

In a recent situation with a client the domain magically turned into a landing page for all sorts of internet goodies. Sadly none of those goodies included her website.

Another client just experienced this and it looks like they gave him 6 weeks with the appearance that all was well then his site just disappeared. Where did it go? Purgatory.

After that period of "grace" the domain enters this purgatory where it may remain for several months before its ultimate fate is decided... either back to the market or back to the original owner. The price of redemption is steep -- how does $80 to bring your domain back to life sound? About 5-10x the original price. Yikes!

Sadly for my friend this all happened a couple of days after a presentation where he specifically drove potential clients to his website.

The moral of the story...

• Pay attention to the renewal notices you get.
• Keep track of your domain provider login information.
  
• Check in on your domain from time to time to be sure your contact information is up to date.
• Add your domain name to the list of what needs to be updated when your contact information changes

Ministry IT can help with all of this... hopefully before your domain goes into purgatory.

Beautiful outside, but this is one of those days...

• Late last night I got a message that a computer at Lakeside Christian Church let its smoke escape and would probably need attention today. The great thing about that is that I was at Lakeside all day yesterday. Today I'm at the NACC all day.
• This morning I got up in time to go to the Y to do my workout only to discover that I forgot to bring my work clothes. Back to the house.
  
• This morning after I walked Darlene through using a different computer (hoping the data she needed was on the shared drive like she thought it was) I walked into the NACC to learn that one of the computers here wasn't seeing the network.
• While I'm troubleshooting that problem (appears to be a wiring problem) my wife called to tell me that the van had let its smoke escape (there is a pattern emerging).
• While I'm on my way to pick up my stranded family I get another call from Lakeside, one of their computers isn't connecting to the network. During that call I get a hint that the plan for Darlene to use another computer might not be working out so great.
• After gallantly rescuing my family and dropping them off at home I got the call confirming my fears about Darlene's setup. The data is on her hard drive and isn't backed up. I told her to grab the fire extinguisher (just kidding), fire up the PC (no pun intended) and see if it will boot and run long enough to get her data.
• Now I'm back at the NACC with a USB wireless adapter temporarily resurrect the PC here and I've learned that the Lakeside computer isn't going to startup.

It's still morning. Pray for me :-).

I'm loving the emergence of Kingdom minded IT professionals. Were it not for the power of blogging there is a good chance that many of us would feel like we're all alone.

Jason Powell, whom I've never met, IT Director at Granger Community Church, a church I've never been to, recently shared a helpful article on IT Best Practices in the church.

Jason did a great job of organizing some really good, practical advice directly related to the intersection of IT and ministry. Even better, he shared his presentation of this document to the GCC staff in both blog form AND audio. Thanks, Jason!

Except when it involves you blog. Don't worry, I've not abandoned ship. Was (working) at the North American Christian Convention (NACC) last week. Internet and time are scarce commodities there. Despite that it was a great experience!