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Welcome to the July edition of QTS QuikNews, our monthly
e-mail newsletter. In this monthly e-mail, you will
receive an update of what's new at QTS - new products we
support, new patches and upgrades, solution ideas and
promotions to save you money, and information about our
company and our clients.
In this issue:
-
QTS and Partner News
-
Events
-
President's Corner
-
QuikSecure Tip of the Month
-
Patches and Upgrades
-
Product Support Lifecycle Watch
-
Solution Spotlight
-
Special Offers
-
Partner Spotlight
QTS AND
PARTNER NEWS
WELCOME TO NEW CUSTOMERS
QTS offers a “welcome aboard” to the following new
customers:
·
C&M
Landscaping
·
CRT
Capital LLC
·
HealthSTAR
Communications
·
MVC
Capital
QTS IS HIRING!
QTS is recruiting for senior level technical personnel,
as well as an entry to mid-level sales/service support
specialist. If you know anyone who might be a good fit,
please have them submit their resume to Liz Meechan, our
Office Manager. Liz can be reached at
lmeechan@QTSnet.com, or (973)984-7600 x223.
FREE UPGRADES!
QTS
customers with Symantec Gold Support and/or
Veritas Support are entitled
to free license upgrades, respectively, to Symantec
Antivirus 10.0 and/or Veritas
Backup Exec for Windows 10.0. The Symantec release
includes anti-spyware
capabilities, while the Veritas
upgrade provides a variety of new features. QTS can
install these upgrades quickly, helping keep your
network current. For more information, contact
Christine Bongard at
cbongard@QTSnet.com, or (973)984-7600 x222.
PARTNER CHANGES
QTS
software development and collaborative solutions partner
Econium has merged into
Vis.align, a larger
organization with offices throughout the Northeast.
QTS document management, imaging and assembly partner
Wertheim, Inc. has taken on a new name, Enterprise
Information Management (EIM) International.
Both organizations will continue to maintain focus on
their core competencies, and their QTS partnership.
2005 CSI/FBI COMPUTER CRIME WHITE PAPER AVAILABLE
The Computer Security Institute and the Federal Bureau
of Investigation have released the 10th
annual CSI/FBI Computer Crime and Security Survey, an
extremely informative survey of IT managers from across
a broad spectrum of organizations. The 2005 study
presents very useful information on security trends and
patterns, and is available at no charge at GoCSI.com.
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EVENTS
QTS
and Symantec will be hosting a lunch seminar on Tuesday,
August 2nd at the Highlawn
Pavillion in West Orange to
present Symantec’s SNS 7100 Network Intrusion Prevention
System, and to discuss current security threats and best
practices. For more information or to register, visit
www.QTSnet.com/symantec or call Liz Meechan at
(973)984-7600 x223.
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PRESIDENT'S CORNER
It’s
late July, and as usual for
this time of year, I’ve returned from Microsoft’s
Worldwide Partner Conference earlier this month. This
is an important event for QTS, particularly this year
since I had the opportunity via a video segment to
introduce Andy Lees, Microsoft’s Worldwide
Vice-President of Server & Tools Marketing, at the
conference.
WWPC,
as the Microsoft folks call it, is an important event
for QTS, in that it allows us to align our business with
Microsoft’s key focus areas and goals. Since Microsoft
is by far our most strategic and important partner, this
is critical to QTS’ success, and to our customers and
other partners.
Interestingly, security continues to be clearly stated
as Microsoft’s number one priority, but their position
has subtlely shifted from a defensive “we have to catch
up” position to a more aggressive position based on
their accomplishments. Microsoft still acknowledges
that it has a lot of work to do in this space, but now
is coming at security from the perspective of taking an
industry-leading position. Microsoft emphasized its
accomplishments in reducing the security bulletins
following release of the 2003 platforms, versus the
greater number of security bulletins and vulnerabilities
in Linux. Emphasis was also placed on Microsoft’s
collaboration with law enforcement, and its use of
“bounties,” in brining hackers and worm writers to
justice.
SQL
Server 2005, code-named “Yukon,” is the big push, and
just as Windows XP SP2 was the major point of focus for
Microsoft from a development perspective last year, this
year it’s SQL Server. In addition to major improvements
in security, reliability and performance, Microsoft has
added considerable new features and functionality,
particularly around data analysis, reporting, and
business intelligence – clearly the focus is on helping
businesses better analyze and use the data they have in
their systems. The next release of Visual Studio,
Microsoft’s lead development platform, will also come
out at the same time, toward the end of this year. For
more information on SQL Server 2005, visit
http://www.microsoft.com/sql/2005/default.mspx.
Looking further out into next year, Longhorn (which has
recently been renamed “Windows Vista”) was a point of
important discussion. The client release of
Longhorn/Windows Vista, which will
supercede Windows XP, is targeted for release in
the second half of 2006, roughly coinciding with the
release dates for the next major releases of Exchange
Server and Office. This will obviously be a major point
of focus for QTS, as we ramp up and get ready to help
early-adopting customers benefit from these
technologies. We saw demos of Longhorn, which
emphasizes continued improvement in security,
reliability and performance (faster boot-up time,
improved hibernation and notebook functionality). New
technologies to improve document management and search
and retrieval will also be particularly important for
this release, and will tie into
SharePoint and Microsoft’s collaborative
strategy. Clear emphasis was placed on using SMS and
Microsoft’s management tools to deploy the next release
of Windows, so the work many of our customers have done
deploying SMS will be important here. For more
information on Windows Vista, visit
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/basics/default.mspx.
Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager was also
a point of focus, and is due to be released very
shortly. Data Protection Manager brings Microsoft into
the field of disk to disk backup – allowing for data to
be backed up to a DPM
Server. Since backup is to disk rather than to tape, it
is much faster, addressing common “backup window”
concerns. Also, tools are available for users to
initiate their own file restores. DPM is not intended
to replace tape backup, but rather to complement it,
with tape as the offsite component in a
disk-to-disk-to-tape hierarchy. The System Center
branding ties DPM into SMS and MOM as part of
Microsoft’s family of network and systems management
tools. For more information, visit
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/
dpm/default.mspx.
Mobility was also a major theme, with the upcoming
release of Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2 and the
Messaging and Security Feature Pack for Windows Mobile
5.0. Essentially, Microsoft’s vision is that mobile
devices (and optimally devices running Windows Mobile,
from their perspective) will become ubiquitous in the
very near future – and clearly that is becoming the case
now. Microsoft is focused on improving the tools to
connect those devices to data on Microsoft servers –
particularly Exchange – and to having the ability to
properly manage and secure those devices. The Windows
Mobile 5.0 feature pack provides the ability for
push-based email to Microsoft devices – similar to the
Good and Blackberry solutions on the market today, and
includes the ability to secure those devices through
policy, as well as to lock and erase lost devices. For
more information, visit
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/5/default.mspx.
To
me, the coolest technology was Microsoft Office Business
Scorecard Manager 2005, code-named “Maestro.”
Essentially, it is a tool to link business data to an
easy to use, graphical front-end. By defining Key
Performance Indicators (“KPIs”),
which are often OLAP cubes on SQL Server and then
defining how you want them presented, you can build
executive “dashboards” to provide real-time reporting on
the health of the business. This product will be
released toward the end of this year, and you can expect
to see QTS and its partners come to market with service
offerings to accelerate deployment of this high-impact
technology. For more information, visit
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/newsroom/
office/factsheets/07-19BSM2005FS.mspx.
On
the server side, the combination of 64-Bit, Dual Core
server technology and virtualization were important
points of focus. Microsoft expects that 50% of all new
server shipments will be 64-Bit/Dual Core, and the
64-Bit version of Windows Server 2003 provides Microsoft
with important pricing and performance advantages
competitively. Virtual Server 2005 will have a service
pack later this year providing improved manageability
and begin support for running Linux Virtual Machines
within Virtual Server. The Service Pack will improve
manageability and cluster support, making the technology
much more robust and ready for broader scale
deployment. For more information on Virtual Server,
visit
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/
virtualserver/default.mspx. For more information on
Windows Server 2003 x64, visit
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/
64bit/x64/default.mspx.
The
Knowledge Worker team put a lot of focus on the upcoming
release of Office and how it provides tools to sharply
change the way people work with data, both by itself and
through integration with the rest of the Microsoft
platform. This looks to be the most significant new
release of Office in some time. Tight integration with
SQL Server, Exchange, SharePoint,
Live Communication Server and other components will be
very powerful. And as for LCS, the new Office
Communicator client (formerly code-named “Istanbul”)
provides a range of new collaborative capabilities. LCS
was emphasized extensively in several of the breakout
sessions. For more information on LCS, visit
http://www.microsoft.com/office/livecomm/prodinfo/default.mspx.
It
was a busy conference, and a fun one, giving us the
chance to reinforce many of our key relationships within
Microsoft and our key partner companies. Now, over the
next 12 months, you’ll be seeing us work with Microsoft
and our partners to bring these technologies to our
customers so they can provide benefits to your
businesses.
As
always, feel free to email me your comments or thoughts
at
nrosenberg@QTSnet.com. Thank you.
Neil Rosenberg
President & CEO
Quality Technology Solutions
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PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
This
month QTS is spotlighting its network security and
penetration test partner,
Razorpoint Security Technologies, Inc. Based in
New York City, Razorpoint
Security specializes in researching and analyzing
security vulnerabilities and conducting comprehensive
security testing. Razorpoint
Security’s testing goes well beyond the average “port
scan” or “vulnerability scan” exercises. They look at
your network through the eyes of those looking to do you
harm. As Razorpoint
Security’s president Gary Morse says, “We know what they
know, we know what they see, and we know what they do.”
Razorpoint
Security’s assessments provide business leaders and
corporate clients the necessary security services and
solutions that help keep corporate networks secure.
They have exceptional expertise in network security,
attack/penetration testing and identifying security
vulnerabilities especially as they relate to Internet
solutions and web applications. They provide security
services that focus the view of your operating
environment. Razorpoint
Security offers all sectors of business the services to
maintain a firm grasp on the evolving state of network
security.
Razorpoint
Security’s attack/penetration tests identify potentially
disastrous security vulnerabilities and help ensure the
protection of network infrastructures and e-business
ventures. While many security firms provide singular
penetration tests with limited documentation,
Razorpoint Security offers a
year-round assessment schedule, customized documentation
deliverables, and monthly security advisories that help
keep clients up to date.
As Razorpoint Security
Technologies approaches the start of its fourth year in
business, they have clearly become a leading force in
the network security industry. In addition to providing
comprehensive security services to its clients,
Razorpoint Security has
become a prime media source on information security.
News outlets such as The New York Times Magazine, ABC/CourtTV,
CBS News, Crain’s NY Business, Entrepreneur Magazine,
CSO (Chief Security Officer) Magazine, CRN Magazine and
Wired News are among those that have tapped
Razorpoint Security for
their expertise.
As local leaders in the security field, QTS and
Razorpoint Security have
worked together to develop a Penetration & Attack
Testing offering that fits into QTS’
QuikSecure methodology and
is a logical progression for customers who have
completed QTS’ QuikSecure
Security and Vulnerability Assessment offerings. This
QuikSecure PAT offering has
been scaled, and priced, appropriate for the Medium
Business market space.
For more information on Razorpoint
Security Technologies, please view their web site at
www.razorpointsecurity.com, email them at sales@razorpointsecurity.com,
or call 212.744.6900. Or, contact your QTS Account
Manager.
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