RobC

Sqdge - follow this link and the very first question explains how to get the OCS NG functionality to work in GLPI. I've just been doing the same thing for my current company and it took me a while to find out how to get the two talking, but this doc explains what you need to know. Regards, Rob Cowan.

Ok, just to try and clarify what your problem is: 1. You have two domains - Black and White 2. Black domain contains a RIS server that contains an image for the Black domain 3. When you want a PC for the White domain, you install it from the RIS server and then change the network settings? Let me know if I'm off track here. Assuming the above are correct, how are you changing the domain of the computer? Are you removing it from the domain properly (Control Panel, System, Computer Name tab, Change button and then change domain) or are you simply changing the IP addressing and altering the domain within the registry? If you are using the Computer Name tab method, are you moving the PC from Old Domain to Temporary Workgroup, restarting and then moving from Temporary Workgroup into the New Domain? As you have two domains, I'm wondering if the easiest thing might be to have a separate RIS box for each domain. If you can let me know about the above and I'll try and help a bit further. Regards, Rob Cowan IT Specialist Mycourse Limited.

First thing I would suggest is to test each link individually - disconnect the cable for link 1, and run link 2 until problems arise. If you get problems, reconnect link 1 and disconnect link 2, running until problems arise. If one or the other gives no problems then the problem lies with the disconnected link (if that makes sense!!!). Also, are you getting both links from the same ISP? If so, the above test might not provide worthwhile results. Regards, Rob Cowan.

As the others have said, A+ is a great start. But that's what it's designed to be. It's not designed as a high-level qualification but as an entry level cert to say that you understand what you are doing with all these parts when you put them together. Usually those who have done their N+ before the A+ find the A+ to be a breeze. Don't get me wrong though, I'm certainly not de-valuing the A+ and when the time comes for our company to hire a new tech, that is something I will be looking out for from any applicants (especially as we teach it here too!). Also, I think the biggest factor to you passing with minimal study is experience. The A+ is designed so that if you have a large wealth of experience behind you, you will have no trouble at all with the exam. Either way, congrats on the pass. Thought of which way you're going to go next? Microsoft, Cisco or more CompTIA? Regards, Rob Cowan.

It really depends on which Certs you want to do and what sort of experience you have. If this is 15 days to do the whole of the MCSE then I wouldn't bother as you won't get all the training you need. As Simon said though, do you really need instructor-led training? If not, I can get you a much better deal (low-end three figure sum instead of four figure) for a one year's access on-line course. Doesn't include the exams, but all the course work you need and also tutor support by e-mail. If you're interested, PM me and I'll point you in the right direction. I won't put the details on here as it's for my company and I can't remember the rules on advertising at the mo. If it's allowed, I'll update the post with details.

Couple of things to add to this: Firstly, regarding storage. If offline files isn't an option, you could always use Partition Magic or something similar to create a suitably sized second partition on the laptop in which staff can save their data. Secondly, regarding staff and administrator access. Have a look into the principals of Least User Access. Basically, no one should use an administrator-level account on an everyday basis. If you require administrator level access, you will be issued with a logon for a secondary account that can be used for administrator level functions either by loging in with that account, or by using the RunAs command. Even administrators shouldn't be using admin-level accounts as their main accounts! Rob Cowan.

To tell you the truth, my job is now with an independant training/IT company and a LOT of my time is taken up by repairs. Basically, it is possible to fix a single/multiple missing file problem by doing a repair install of Windows and this is something that PC World's staff should most certainly be trained in (repair installs are also applicable to OEM machines with recovery partitions, such as Packard Hells as you can simply use a standard Windows CD). The only time we do a complete rebuild from scratch of the OS is if it is too badly infected with spyware/viruses, etc. to fix. On the training side, I instruct the CompTIA A+ course which covers all of this information and much more and to be honest, this is the sort of level of expertise I would expect a large company such as PC World to insist on simply in order to do a good job. Unfortunately, this is not the case. As far as networking on a dial-up connection, Windows comes with Internet Connection Sharing (ICS) which is more than adequate for networking multiple machines together in order to share a dial-up connection. Again, as a reputable retailer, this is an option I would have given the customer rather than simply moving wholesale to DSL. I personally know several people who will spend less in a quarter on dial-up charges than they would in a month on DSL fees and they are more than happy to keep it that way. To be perfectly honest, most of my company's business comes now from our building signage and word-of-mouth. I like to think that our customers are so happy with the work/advice that we give them that they wouldn't even think of going elsewhere. Unfortunately, I can't really provide any further info as that is all I know regarding the company. I wasn't really prepared to hang around when my contract was up. I will say though, that Grumbledook's description of their sales training is the real deal as that is exactly how they acted with the customers in the store I worked in.

Bat - I worked for PC World in Glasgow at the turn of the millenium as a finance filler (sales drone makes the sale, then I put their details into the comp & get them to sign the paperwork). That is precisely the reason that I didn't get a permanent job when my xmas contract ran out. On the two occasions that I tried my hand at sales, I got absolutely bollocked because I showed the customer what would be useful to them as opposed to what the sales drones were supposed to push that week. Also, Computing Which has already proven that the service there is poor and you will basically be ripped off.

I've answered with the Pizza Hut franchise, but it can end up pretty full of beer at times too! I spent about four or five years working as a barman in various places, so there's no chance of me not knowing what the stuff tastes like

Simple - Single Domain/Single Network. I cannot see any reason why you should have the Staff and Pupils in separate domains. It simply creates extra administration where none is required. Correct use of Group Policies, Security/Distribution Groups and ACLs should be more than sufficient to secure the network.

Right, time to help as best I can: 1. Serial. You are correct in thinking that a serial cable for connecting two PCs is a Null Modem cable. Parallel is possible, but not generally the correct answer. 2. This could be one of two things, although given that the device is not showing in device manager, I would say Control Panel, which would take you to the Add New Hardware wizard. This is because if it was a PnP device, even if the BIOS wasn't set 100% correctly, it should still show up in device manager, just as an unknown device. 3. Modify CMOS setting. Bus mastering is the process which allows all of your PCI slots to share one IRQ, and is purely dealt with within the BIOS. 4. I would say System Board Jumper Settings. Most motherboards now (and for several years previous) have included a jumper which, when set correctly, will clear the CMOS. If this is left in the "Clear" position, no matter how many times you re-enter the settings, you will always find that they are ditched when you reboot. It could possibly be batter voltage, but you would take New Battery to mean that they have got the correct voltage. Also, hardware changes generally (although admittedly not always the case) don't give this sort of message. Overall, these aren't the best A+ practise questions I have ever seen. Can I ask where you found them? As a personal recommendation, I would use the ProProfs website (http://www.proprofs.com) for your revision as they have a very good selection of practise questions, study guides, etc. If anyone has any questions regarding any of the CompTIA or Microsoft exams/certs, feel free to PM me and I'll see what I can do to help. Regards, Rob Cowan.

Hey guys - I'll post some proper feedback into this thread tomorrow (hopefully), but suffice to say that the A+ exam has been updated as of September 2006 so the newer exams get rid of all the legacy stuff and introduce things like SATA and PCI-E. My current job actually involves teaching the A+ course, so if anyone has any questions regarding it, pm me and I'll see what I can do to help. Cheers, Rob Cowan.

YAY, time for Windows Volume Licensing 101. Standard OEM and FPP (Full Packaged Product) licenses apply to bare-metal systems and also to upgrade situations so you can build a system from scratch or upgrade an older system using these versions. Upgrade versions of the FPP license generally apply to upgrading older systems, but you can also apply them to bare-metal systems if you have the original install media - this will be asked for during the install process. Volume licensing versions of XP Professional (no XP Home volume license exists) are upgrade versions only so there is no such thing as a full install version of XP volume license, however in this situation you aren't actually entitled to install it on a base-metal system as you are with an FPP upgrade license - it has to be an actual upgrade of a currently installed OS. Unfortunately, due to the joys of XP install media, you CAN physically install XP Pro using volume licensing media onto a bare-metal system. The wonderful side-effect of this is that if you do a bare-metal install using a VLK, WGA Notification will potentially see this as a non-legally licenced copy. Don't you just love M$ Licensing...

Not sure if this is a feature of Small Business Server or not, but on my work network (SBS2003, XP clients) OWA always pre-populates the domain both internally and when outwith the network.

I can relate to this as this is how my previous employer's setup is: The network (covering all primary/secondary schools in area) is provided by Fujitsu who have a central server farm located in one of the secondaries. There are also servers in every secondary to deal with local file/backup/proxy services, etc. The servers & infrastructure are owned by Fujitsu and the schools have no physical interaction with them. Maintenance must be logged to the Fujitsu helldesk & a tech (there are TWO for over fifty schools!!!) would attend. The desktops are wholly owned by the schools, althought they are bought from Fujitsu only to maintain consistancy, and schools pay a yearly maintenance fee per machine for support. All schools have the same Ghost image applied, but the schools can install their own software if they wish. Each school utilises one of their Technicians/Technical Assistants in the IT role, either as their primary role or as a secondary role. Their job is to basically act as tier 1 support for the school and have limited admin rights to the desktops. They can also add/remove/disable users & alter NTFS permissions on the network. In some cases, this works quite well, although where I worked I was continually frustrated by the inability to do some basic tasks myself (eg, a restore from backups had to go the helpdesk who passed it on to the network admins 50 miles away. They then phoned me up to change to the relevant backup tape, and then remoted into the server & restored the file(s). This could take anywhere from an hour up to a week in some situations!) Now I could have completed the task in this example in five minutes, and that included the travelling time to put the backup tape in. So it is perfectly feasible for a PFI company to run your network completely & still have in-house IT staff employed by the LEA, but your in-house staff run the risk of getting VERY frustrated! Hope that's not to much of a rambling rant... Rob.

With relevance to Dos Box's thread Here, A number of Step-by-step guides for Windows Vista are available Here. These cover a number of topics, but one that will be a lot of use is the fourth down on the list - Print Management Step By Step Guide.doc Covers push installs of printers on Vista, and how to back-port that ability to 2000 & XP machines! And there was much rejoicing.

Hey Grumbledook. Thank you for the run-down. Ranther annoyed I missed the site's first birthday. This is possibly the only site I've been part of from almost the beginning. (That's another reason I'm reluctant to leave!) It's also VERY good to see the site & the attendant community forging links with organisations such as NAACE & BECTA too. Anyhoo, back to checking up on the forums.

Hello everybody! I've been away from the site since the start of this year due to a change of employment. Basically, the small company I was helping at doing A+ training offered me a full time post training people, running their own network, fixing consumer pcs and doing network installs for businesses. And after much deliberation, I said yes. Since then, I've got several people through their A+ and one person through his Microsoft Certified Desktop Support Technician exams. I've also gained my MCDST and my Network+ with the intention of passing the Security+ in the next few months and then onto the MCSE. I have been absolutely run off my feet and am loving every minute of it. I've also kept in touch with my former employment and have assisted them on a couple of occasions while they've been without an IT tech. So, for those of you who wondered where I went, (and the larger number of you who didn't!) that's what I've been up to since March. Thankfully, everything's slowing down now and getting to a more manageable pace so I should be able to start catching up on Edugeek again. And if I can be of assistance, I shall continue to do so. All the best, Rob Cowan.

Hands up who thinks I should tell Preston that I have... A) The very drivers he needs for the exact physical printer he's on about (because it used to be mine) and... B) That there is a way of unblocking .exe files for Techs on that network but I just can't remember it off the top of my head. :twisted:

But really... It's a sad state of affairs when kids proclaim that they'd rather kill themselves than be without access to messenger (as at least two of the posters did)! Get. A. F***ing. Life.

Jesus, the spambots must be having a field day on splaTT's site! Oh well, off to do some blocking... :twisted:

We use Qwizdom here. We've found that it will crash very regularly for no apparent reason & will usually continue crashing until the machine is restarted. Also, they've been promising a network version for a long time now & nothing's shown up. It is possible to network it as it stands though. Rob C.

I'm hoping to get there this year with my new employer. Went two years ago when I was trying to start my own business. It was an interesting experience, but I wouldn't really say that much would be relevant to schools. Perhaps the Microsoft stand & one or two others, but it's mostly just trade suppliers, etc.

13 Useless Interview Questions For a few things to avoid when interviewing...

You can have more than one instance of MSDE running on the same server. It uses Instances in the same way that the full SQL Server does, but it doesn't allow you to actually involve yourself with the database at all. Hope that helps... Rob.