But Wait, There's More

Windows Storage Server 2003 R2 Goes to Beta

Windows Storage Server 2003 Release 2 (R2) was released to beta testers last week, according to Microsoft, and it appears the new release of the file server operating system is on track for release to manufacturing by the end of the year, and general availability in product form through business partners will arrive by next spring. Windows Storage Server 2003 R2, which will be sold through Microsoft's business partners as part of an integrated hardware/software solution, will bring several enhancements, including: support for the single-instance storage feature, which will cut down on the number of duplicate files stored on the server; better performance through improved interoperability between the network file system (NFS) and server message block (SMB) protocols and the elimination of NFS-only mode; native 64-bit support on all components; better performance and scalability; and a better interface, according to Microsoft. Microsoft is also building its portal offering, called Windows SharePoint Services, into Windows Storage Server 2003 R2, and will be supporting name-space virtualization (DFS-N) and self-replication (DFS-R), which will make this operating system ideally suited for remote office deployments, company officials say.

California Passes Anti-Phishing Law

Phishing scams are the "most significant and rapidly growing threat Internet users are facing today," says Ron Teixiera, executive director of National Cyber Security Alliance. "For example, the recent devastation caused by the hurricanes Katrina and Rita provided criminals with the opportunity to establish Web sites that posed as online charities to lure in potential donors and obtain their financial information," he says. "Consumers don't always know that they are actually being victimized." Microsoft has teamed with the NCSA to promote October as Cyber Security Awareness Month, which is not to be confused with International Talk Like a Pirate Day, which was September 19, in case you missed it. Hopefully some day we'll have licked the phishing problem and be able to make light of the devastation caused by cyber crooks with a "Talk Like a Phisher Day," but that day is still far, far away…except maybe in California.

Motorola Picks Microsoft to Ensure Availability of Law Enforcement Applications

Microsoft and Motorola unveiled a new partnership yesterday that will see Motorola develop a collection of law enforcement applications using Microsoft's .NET tools and its Windows Server system. As part of the agreement, Motorola has agreed to develop new justice, public safety, and public service applications using Visual Studio .NET 2003 and Windows Server software, including SQL Server, BizTalk Server, and Web services built on the .NET Framework. Motorola chose Microsoft to help it develop the next generation of applications that ensure our public safety and protection from criminal elements because "mission-critical environments demand unparalleled reliability and continuous data access" and "the Microsoft platform allows us to meet, even exceed, those demands," according to Timothy Boyle, vice president of business development at Motorola. According to a written statement released by the two companies, Motorola's current NetRMS Records Management System and its Computer Aided Dispatch software (which are already based on the Windows platform) will take advantage of this agreement immediately.

Zenprise Unveils Tool to Diagnosis, Fix Problems with Exchange

Zenprise last week unveiled new tools to help diagnosis and resolve problems with running Microsoft Exchange Server. The product, which also goes by the name Zenprise, enables administrators to solve complicated problems in minutes, Zenprise says. "Email is not just mission-critical, it is the must-work killer application for businesses today," says Jayaram Bhat, chief executive of Zenprise, which is based in the San Francisco Bay Area. "We've brought the best minds on Exchange and systems management together to create a product that quickly and accurately diagnoses and resolves e-mail problems." Instead of requiring an administrator to analyze multiple infrastructure components like Active Directory, DNS, and network devices to pinpoint the cause of a problem, a Zenprise customer could use Zenprise to automatically correlate errors occurring across the various components, and provide the administrator with detailed steps to fix them. The product does this by observing Exchange Server activity, creating a baseline of performance expectations, and then using various algorithms to correlate the most likely cause of the problem and to come up with ways to fix them. Zenprise, which costs $15 per user, can be deployed using agents or run in agent-less mode, and installation takes only minutes, according to company reports.

IBM Streamlines Product Configuration with Director 5.1

IBM this month is launching Director 5.10, a new release of its suite of systems management software that supports--and is shipped free with--the full range of eServers from Big Blue. A number of new features are available with this release, which brings support for Linux on the zSeries and pSeries systems, as well as support for IBM's new System z9 mainframe. One of the primary goals of Director is to centralize management of a range of platforms into one interface, so it's no surprise that the user interface was targeted for improvement with Director 5.10. IBM says the new interface has been streamlined for greater productivity, while lightweight agents and more customizable deployment options will make it easier to deploy. There's also a new Software Health Check feature that's designed to save administrators time by determining which systems need an update, while a new Event Action Plan Wizard provides a step-by-step guide for telling Director what to monitor and what actions to take in response to an alert. eServer shops deploying BladeCenter servers will benefit from new Director tools for managing the configuration of BladeCenter chassis and subsystems, while Wintel users will see closer integration between Director and Microsoft's Systems Management Server and Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) products. IBM Director supports i5/OS, Windows, Intel Linux, Power Linux, zSeries Linux, AIX, and System z9 across iSeries, xSeries, pSeries, zSeries, BladeCenter, and OpenPower servers.

Encrypting Data Tapes: Soon to Be All the Rage

Last week, our Big Iron mainframe newsletter reported that IBM was working on special encryption features that will allow mainframes to begin encrypting data stored on tape archives. These features for the z/OS platform use the native encryption facilities in zSeries processor complexes and their encryption keys to allow tapes to be encrypted and then decrypted at remote sites where tapes are often stored or used for data interchange. As far as I know, this is the first time such tamper-proof encryption has been delivered natively in a server, and it probably won't be too long before the iSeries has such features.

But you might have a lot of different platforms to cope with, and Iron Mountain, one of the big names in offsite data vaults with over 40,000 customers, doesn't want you to wait to get your data encrypted, and has recommended that companies buy an encryption appliance to encrypt the data they store on tape. Iron Mountain is practicing what it is preaching, and has opted for the DataFort encryption appliance from Decru, a division of NAS array maker Network Appliances, to do its internal data encryption. Don't let your data tapes be the ones making headlines on the news.