In attendance -- Shelley Watson, Chris Dawe, Steve Sorbo, KC Dachtermann, Jeff Widmer and Tim Hannon

- - - Meeting Focus - - -
Shelley gauged interest in hosting a one-day study class for the Support Essentials 10.6 exam. Shelley offered to lead it in the offices of Wheelwrights. There was wide interest.

Shelley also gauged interest in a 2-day class on OS X's Terminal. Possibly to be led by ACN Scott Neil. Again, there was wide interest. Shelley will try to line this up.

In attendance: Jim Emery, Kurt VanderSluis, Ron Thomson, Michael Ross and Tim Hannon

- - - Meeting Focus - - -
Ron and Kurt were first time attendees. Both are based in Port Townsend. Kurt is service manager at Port Townsend Computers. Ron used to work at TekServe in NYC and is new to the Puget Sound area.

The conversation wandered over a wide range of topics including but not limited to:

- What do you think of the Mac mini as a server?
- Software temperature monitors
- Capacitor repair optins for iMac G5s
- Repair manuals from iFixIt
- In a down economy, there's a hightened likelihood that users will want to repair their Mac rather than replace it
- A rambling conversation on various old Mac models and versions of the Mac operating system
- What if Apple served corporate customers better back in the 90s?

MacWorld recap - Jan 28, 2009

 In attendance - Shelley Watson, Chris Dawe, Steve Sorbo, Mike Ross, Jim Emery, Susan Straub-Martin and Tim Hannon

- - - News Items - - -

Shelley indicated that Parallels has expressed some interest in presenting at one of our future meetings. Stay tuned. We'll see if they follow through this time.

Susan Straub-Martin, formerly of the Apple Store in Bellevue Square, is setting off on her own as an artist and Mac trainer. She's focusing on private lessons but could also do group lessons in the following areas: basic Mac OS X, iLife, iWork, Painter, Adobe Creative Suite

Steve suggested that we possibly have a future meeting to discuss business insurance options.

- - - Meeting Focus - - -
MacWorld Recap - Susan, Mike and Shelley had attended MacWorld so they share some of their opinions, experiences and product recommendations.

Q: What was the tone of MacWorld?
A: It felt like the last days of Pompeii
A: It felt like a balloon slowly loosing its air
A: You could tell a lot when Phil Schiller came on stage and said "Thanks for showing up."

Q: What will be the role of the ACN at next year's MacWorld?
A: It's unknown at this point. The folks who run the ACN program at Apple don't know and/or aren't saying. Since the ACN is sort of an arm of Apple its assumed that our role will be diminished.

Products
XSilva's POS (Point of Sale) solution. It offers integration with Daylite, MYOB and QuickBooks.

CheckPoint Technologies - full disk encryption for the Mac. Free trial on their web site

ProjectWizard's Merlin - Project management application, host on your own server or web host it. Working on iPhone access. Demo on web site.

Ntractive Elements SBM 1.0 is a “hybrid Web application” for systems running Mac OS X. While largely oriented around CRM, the product also lumps in features like project management and messaging. Ntractive used Apple’s open-source WebKit framework to create the software.

Susan Straub Martin's artwork was on display at MacWorld along with others'. CNET and other sites provided some coverage of the various artists' whose work was on display.

NW Mac Pro
5-30-08

In attendance: Shelley Watson, Tim Hannon, John Newhoff, and Wil Nelson

Topic -  10.5 Support Essentials Study Session

Shelley proposed putting together a day-long study session for people interested in preparing for the 10.5 Support Essentials exam. We decided it would be best to do it on a weekend and that each participant would need to do the following:
1. get a copy of the Peachpit book "Mac OS X Support Essentials, Second Edition" by Kevin White.
2. Download the Skills Assessment Guide and Sample test from the Apple training website. Download links appear below.
3. Bring a computer, partition, or other Leopard-bootable volume that is expendable for practicing various items in the group
4. Bring Leopard install media for your own use.
5. Be prepared to lead at least one chapter discussion. This doesn't mean teach it, just be prepared to lead the discussion. Once Shelley knows who’ll attend then she’ll assign chapters to each attendee.
 
 Download the Skills Assessment Guide
http://training.apple.com/pdf/support-essentials-sag-v10.5.pdf

Download the Sample Test
http://training.apple.com/pdf/support-essentials-sample-test-v10.5.pdf

Craig Swanson of CreativeTechs has offered the use of some of their office space for the class. The proposed dates are as follows. Contact Shelley ranking each of these dates.

June 6
June 14
June 21
June 28
 

Meeting held: 4-23-08

In attendance: Shelley Watson, Chris Dawe, Tim Hannon, Steve Sorbo, Jim Emery, Craig Swanson, John Newhoff, Mike Ross, Jordan Bojar, and Doug Ward

Topic -  Albert McMurry, Systems Engineer, and Joe Fleck, Account Executive, from Apple Enterprise talked about Promise RAID

Promise's RAID is a big change from Apple's XServe RAID which was recently discontinued. The XServe RAID's design was largely unchanged for the past 3 years. Apple simply increased it's storage capacity but they didn't improve it or keep up with changes in hard drive or RAID technology. Apparently, Apple has decided that rather than designing and building their own RAID they will certify third-party products to work with their products. Apple has setup a hardware qualification process for this purpose.

It's not known if other vendors are persueing this type of partnering/certification.

Promise is a 25 year old storage vendor that has their own dedicated engineers. They make their own hardware, write their own software and use their own products in-house.

Apple partnered with Promise to qualify one of their RAID products. Details and features of this product can be found on Promise's and Apple's web sites.

Albert was asked what, if anything, is different between the Promise RAID that is available on Apple's web site and the version that one can buy, at, for example, CDW.com?

Albert indicated that there are two big differences. Both versions use the exact same hardware, types of drives, controllers, etc. The primary difference is the version of firmware that is included. The version that Apple sells includes firmware version 2.4.2 which includes modifications to tuning and balancing that are specific for Apple XSan. The version that ships from CDW includes firmware version 2.3.1 Firmware 2.4.2 is only available from Apple.

A second difference is drive quality. Apple will populate the Promise RAID with hard drives from non-sequential batches and each drive must complete a 10-pass write test before it is used in the product.

Promise RAID is the only RAID product certified for use with XSan 2 and XSan 1.4 (latest versions).

AppleCare support for Promise RAID is available direct;y from Apple but they also use Promise support people as needed for hardware part replacement

Same Apple discounts available on Promise hardware available from Joe Fleck

Biggest appeal of Promise RAID are the active/active controllers which offers redundant controllers. If either one fails the other controller can control all drives however the price that one would pay is that the RAID takes a performance hit

Promise RAID offers upto 24 TB in 6U

Promise Inc. doesn't officially/directly support OS X Server.

Unrelated note:

IPfailover works in OS X Server version 10.5
IPfailover was introduced in 10. 4 but it broke on Intel-based Macs.
IPfailover now works in 10.5.2 as long as you have two intel or two PPC XServes

NW Mac Pro   3-26-08

In attendance: Shelley Watson, Chris Dawe, Bruce Robertson, Mike Ross, Tim Hannon, Steve Sorbo and Dave Richmond.

Topic - A discussion of best methods for setting up Macintosh computers.

The conversation focused on three areas: passwords, security and backups.

There was a lively discussion of techniques and options. Below is a collection of some of the comments and recommendations.

- there's no one best practice

- many attendees have different practices for residential clients and business clients

- Chris Dawe mentioned a theme in Apple's OS X Security training class/book --security should be viewed as a process. I'll elaborate on this theme in my own words. There are many steps that can be taken to improve the security of data, computers and networks. Thus it is the job of consultants and support personnel to help move our client along this path towards increased security.

Here's a list of some of the tips, policies, products and recommendations that came out of the discussion:

- It is recommended that one change the default username and password on a router, especially if remote configuration is enabled on the router. One consultant recommends using the router's serial number as the password. It'll be hard to guess but is readily available.

- There was a discussion about best practices for passwords for user accounts in OS X. Many practices are employed and different practices are used for residential and business clients. Here are some of the comments. Don't store your clients passwords. If you're going to store them then encrypt them. It is their responsibility. Use CodePoetry's free PasswordAssistant to generate secure passwords. Ask your client to type their password. Let them know that they'll either need to sit with you and type it in or write it down for you if they want to go do other stuff. Ask client to come up with memorable sentence and then generate password from first letter of each word in the sentence.

http://www.codepoetry.net/products/passwordassistant

-  Check security log and look for script kiddies banging on the door

- Rather than relying on passwords use Securi-Key USB dongle. Leopard compatible. Starter Kit costs about $125 and include one key and a backup/spare. Also available in multi-user kits. http://www.securikey.com

- Cryptocard was also mentioned. It combines a user-selected PIN number with a randomly generated number that appears on the cryptocard.

http://www.cryptocard.com

- There was a discussion about wether a person's everyday account should have standard vs admin rights. Some pointed out that while standard is more secure, it's often less convenient and a few apps won't work properly with only standard rights.

- Lojack and Undercover were mentioned. One consultant indicated that Undercover is better than Lojack as an aid for potentially recovering a stolen computer. Reportedly Undercover does not require a subscription and they have excellent customer service. Lojack requres a subscription and is more expensive.

http://www.orbicule.com/undercover/

http://www.lojackforlaptops.com

Data Backup

- document the backup plan

- if a client doesn't follow  your backup recommendations then send them an email to document your recommendation and make sure that the email includes a description of the risks that can be foreseen.

- off-site backup options. One consultant has been exploring some of the new online backup systems that offer online storage.

Jungledisk uses Amazon S3 http://www.jungledisk.com/

CrashPlan http://www.crashplan.com/

Mozy, recently bought by EMC the current developers of Retrospect, http://mozy.com/

New native OS X version of Retrospect coming in 2008

http://www.emcinsignia.com/products/smb/retrospectxformac

Iron Mountain - apparently now offers a backup services for Macs

http://www.ironmountain.com/digital/pc/

- some consultants won't work on a residential computer before it has been backed up

- one consultant has all business customers sign a contract that  includes a statement that the business is responsible for having a backup of their data

- for residential use one consultant recommends Personal Backup by Intego since it can perform backups, clone hard drives and sync folders.

http://www.intego.com/personalbackup/

In attendance - Shelley Watson, Doug Ward, Dave Richmond, Steve Sorbo, Mike Ross and Tim Hannon - - - News Item - - - Apple's Small Business Professional group can setup leases for small business customers. These leases can include services provided by ACN members. (Typically, leases only include tangible good like hardware and software so it's interesting that Apple offers leases that can include the labor of ACNs.) This group can also offer a trade-in value for used computers when sell new computers. - - - Meeting Focus - - - The meeting was primarily a brain-storming session of topics for future meetings. Please submit any additional ideas to Shelley Watson at shelley@dwpartners.net More importantly please volunteer to line-up a presenter or to lead a discussion at a future meeting. Here's the list that has been generated thus far: 1. Best Practices for Setting up a Mac - Steve Sorbo offered to lead this discussion. 2. Presentation by Apple's Small Business Professional group - Shelley Watson will try to arrange this but your assistance is requested. 3. How to Deal with Difficult Customers (ie techniques to use to corral them, what to do if they don't pay, how to handle customers that are difficult to deal with) - volunteer needed to arrange this 4. Presentation by a member of Apple's ACN Program - Shelley Watson will try to arrange this but your assistance is requested. 5. Presentation by Parallels about their products and reseller program - - volunteer needed to arrange this 6. Please send Shelley a list of other vendors that you'd like to see at future ACN meetings. Some possibilities that were considered are: OMNI Group, Kerio, Bento/FileMaker, Apple Enterprise)

In attendance: Chris Dawe, Jeff Widmer, Mike Ross, Steve Sorbo, Tim Hannon, John Newhoff, Doug Ward, Shelley Watson, Charlie XXX Fair - day long event at Apple Store Shelley Watson is working with the Apple Store in U-Village to put together an event that would showcase ACN and non-ACN consultants in the area in a series of 30-minute presentations. If you'd like to make a presentation please contact Shelley with a few sentences describing your presentation and the time of day that you'd like to present it. One recommendation is to have your presentation highlight you and the services that you offer -- in particular what makes you unique. This could be important since there will be a number of other ACN and NWMacPro members presenting throughout the day. (FMPro, MYOB, Daylite, videographers, musicians, etc) Shelley envisions one 30-minute presentation that focuses on giving an overview or introduction to ACN program as a whole. It'll explain to audience members what an ACN is and how they can be found as well as the advantages of working with one. She hope this can be presented several times throughout the day. She hopes to plug NWMacPros as well and encourages other presenters to plug it as well. The timeline for this event is sometime in June, possibly Wed June 20th. The Wed after WWDC. Hopefully there will be lots of buzz about new Apple products announced at the show. She'll need to confirm the date, speakers and topics by early May How will we publicize this event? Apple Store will send out email blast. It'll be listed on seminars.apple.com and Apple's Web Site Each of us can send out invites to our own customers/clients. Feel free to offer an incentive to your clients. Can try to get them to bring a friend Send Shelley an email with the following: 1. Which Wednesday(s) you prefer in June for the Fair. The Wed after WWDC is the current target. 2. Time of day you'd preferred to give your presentation 3. 3-4 sentences about what you'd like to talk about.

In Attendance:
John Newhoff, Chris Dawe, Doug Ward, Dave Ball, Tim Hannon, Brad Wressell, Robert ?, Shelley Watson.

Topic: VPN (Virtual Private Networks)
Presentation by Chris Dawe, MacPac, http://www.macpac.com

Here's an overview of Chris Dawe's presentation. We hope to be able to post Chris' outline in the near future.

A VPN is a way to establish a secure connection to a remote network via the public Internet.

Speakeasy's VOIP network is not secure even though they consider it private. So it does not qualify as a VPN.

Setting up a VPN can be challenging due to lack of industry-wide standards, interoperability issues. It can also be expensive.

There are 4 main types of VPNs.

1. The "Poor Man's VPN" -- send network traffic through an SSH tunnel. This is only a partial solution since one can only send TCP traffic through such a tunnel. It can't handle UDP traffic such as DNS, ARD and chat traffic.

2. PPTP - Point To Point Tunneling Protocol
Originally developed by Microsoft but has been widely implemented. Now it supports 128-bit encryption which makes it more secure than its 40-bit predecessor. PPTP is okay to use as long as you use complex passwords.

3. IPsec - IP security - It's a suite of protocols designed for IPv6 but it's been shoehorned to work over IPv4. IPsec does not include user-based authentication, only a commonly shared secret password. Authorization has been added such as X-auth. Microsoft and Apple use L2TP (Layer Two Tunneling Protocol) to add user-based authentication over IPsec.

Client-side weakness - IPsec performs a checksum verification and routers performing NAT (Network Address Translation) often break the checksum verification so IPsec connections fail to work properly since the routers change the header info. Some routers now have a "NAT Transversal" setting that addresses this issue

High-end IPsec connections can support keys upto 2048 bits in length.

4. SSL-VPN - new type of VPN. Tunnelblick is client software for OS X and Linux that supports SSL VPNs. http://www.tunnelblick.net/

Chris recommends IPsec for static VPN connections connecting two remote offices.
IPsec is the most secure type of VPN so it should be used in cases where privacy and security are of the highest priority such as being in compliance with HIPAA regulations.
Due to challenges ensuring that IPsec client connections will work widely PPTP can be used as well. Make sure you have long, secure passwords.

Chris recommends VPNTracker as a VPN client. It's been verified to work with hundreds of VPN routers. List is available on the manufacturer's web site:
http://www.equinux.com/us/products/vpntracker/index.html

VPNTracker has built-in support for NAT Transversal.

Members Attending: Steve Sorbo; John Newhoff; Mike Ross; Dave Ball; Brad Wessell; Doug Ward; Jeff Widmer; Miriam Reiss; Craig Swanson; Shelley Watson. It was great to have more folks attending than usual! Steve and Dave reported from MacWorld Expo. Steve focused on the variety of ACN events at the Expo, and Dave reported on the experience of actually holding an iPhone. (It's not a Flash demo, it's a real device!) Topics we discussed: we'd like to improve Apple Store employees knowledge of ACNs, both who we are and our expertise. Business Sales Managers are generally eager to meet consultants, ACNs or not, with specific expertise, so they can make a broad range of solution referrals to clients. To that end, Shelley will arrange for guest appearances by the business managers at our local Apple Stores. We also talked about what topics we'd like to discuss this year. Among the ideas: generating ideas that are working to build our businesses; improving relations and visibility within the Apple Stores; specialty technical topics; Leopard (when its released). If you have other ideas, please forward them to Shelley so she can arrange it. Our current meeting list is for VPN in February, and we're trying to arrange for Susan Straub-Martin of Bellevue Square to visit us in April. Please volunteer to lead a meeting on the topic of your choice. Our next meeting is set for: Wed., Feb. 28th, 1:00 pm at Pyramid Alehouse in Seattle. It is important that you RSVP if you plan to attend, so that we can have enough table space and chairs for everyone. RSVP to Shelley at info@technodivas.com. Thank you! Shelley Watson