Feed aggregator

This week, Novell customer, the city of Fresno, California, is featured in an article by Bill Jackson in Government Computer News. In the piece, the city of Fresno’s Paul Pedron discusses his long relationship with Novell and how he is using Novell ZENworks 11 SP2 to manage more than 2,800 network endpoints. He specifically recognizes Novell for its responsiveness, new power management feature and ability to fully secure and lock down lost or stolen devices.  You can read the article here.

Click here to learn more about the power and capabilities of Novell ZENworks 11 SP2.

Archiving over the Network

The GroupWise engineering team has recently completed validation on a couple new GroupWise archiving options.

We are updating our support statements, documentation and best practices with regards to Archiving over the Network. The following statement will be included in the upcoming readmes.

The recommended location for a Windows client user's archive is on his or her local workstation. Creating an archive on a network drive is supported in the following two configurations:

1. The Novell Map Network Drive feature of the Novell Client is used to map a network drive from the user's workstation to a Novell Open Enterprise (OES) Linux server or a NetWare server where the archive is located.

   The OES Linux server must use NSS volumes, and you must use NCP access with cross-protocol locks enabled in order to ensure safe client access to the archive. The setup for Windows client access to an OES Linux server is the same as for Windows ConsoleOne access to an OES server. For setup instructions, see "Configuring the OES Linux Server for NCP Access from Windows" in "ConsoleOne Administration Tool" in the GroupWise 2012 Administration Guide.

2. The Windows Map Network Drive feature is used to map a network drive from the user's workstation to an OES Linux server using Novell CIFS access.

Note: Other configurations, including Samba on a SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) server, are not currently supported.

Open Horizons survey!

Our partner, Open Horizons, is conducting the following survey. It is also a chance to win an iPad!! It only takes 2 minutes – so well worth the investment.

Welcome and thanks in advance for taking a few minutes to run our Collaboration Survey 2012. All participants who enter their contact information at the end of this survey will automatically be entered into a draw for a brand new iPad:

Take the survey >

New Novell Vibe Product Flyer

Novell has recently published a new product flyer for Novell Vibe. Here is the headliner:

Virtually everyone works on projects and shares documents. Because these processes are fundamental to productivity, improving them can have a significant impact on your organization's success. With its unique combination of next-generation collaboration tools and powerful document management capabilities, Novell Vibe™ is equal to the task. Deploy it today and see how it can boost productivity and streamline projects like never before.

Read it today >

Michael Fauscette, Group Vice President, Software Business Solution at IDC says:

"Businesses want solutions that help their employees get work done but don't create security problems. Novell Vibe gives CIOs the balance they need between keeping their workers productive and protecting corporate assets and business knowledge."

Novell Vibe is getting noticed! Are you using it to help your employees get work done?

Dean

• End-User Computing

Archiving over the Network

The GroupWise engineering team has recently completed validation on a couple new GroupWise archiving options.

We are updating our support statements, documentation and best practices with regards to Archiving over the Network. The following statement will be included in the upcoming readmes.

The recommended location for a Windows client user's archive is on his or her local workstation. Creating an archive on a network drive is supported in the following two configurations:

1. The Novell Map Network Drive feature of the Novell Client is used to map a network drive from the user's workstation to a Novell Open Enterprise (OES) Linux server or a NetWare server where the archive is located.

   The OES Linux server must use NSS volumes, and you must use NCP access with cross-protocol locks enabled in order to ensure safe client access to the archive. The setup for Windows client access to an OES Linux server is the same as for Windows ConsoleOne access to an OES server. For setup instructions, see "Configuring the OES Linux Server for NCP Access from Windows" in "ConsoleOne Administration Tool" in the GroupWise 2012 Administration Guide.

2. The Windows Map Network Drive feature is used to map a network drive from the user's workstation to an OES Linux server using Novell CIFS access.

Note: Other configurations, including Samba on a SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) server, are not currently supported.

Open Horizons survey!

Our partner, Open Horizons, is conducting the following survey. It is also a chance to win an iPad!! It only takes 2 minutes – so well worth the investment.

Welcome and thanks in advance for taking a few minutes to run our Collaboration Survey 2012. All participants who enter their contact information at the end of this survey will automatically be entered into a draw for a brand new iPad:

Take the survey >

New Novell Vibe Product Flyer

Novell has recently published a new product flyer for Novell Vibe. Here is the headliner:

Virtually everyone works on projects and shares documents. Because these processes are fundamental to productivity, improving them can have a significant impact on your organization's success. With its unique combination of next-generation collaboration tools and powerful document management capabilities, Novell Vibe™ is equal to the task. Deploy it today and see how it can boost productivity and streamline projects like never before.

Read it today >

Michael Fauscette, Group Vice President, Software Business Solution at IDC says:

"Businesses want solutions that help their employees get work done but don't create security problems. Novell Vibe gives CIOs the balance they need between keeping their workers productive and protecting corporate assets and business knowledge."

Novell Vibe is getting noticed! Are you using it to help your employees get work done?

Dean

• End-User Computing

By Wendy Steinle, Director of Product Marketing, Novell

There’s nothing like attending a sales conference when you have a lot to celebrate. I recently had the chance to spend time with Novell’s global salesforce in Orlando, FL to kick off our fiscal year, train on the hottest industry topics and recognize those who made the greatest strides reconnecting and building relationships with our customers in the past year.

The annual fiscal year kickoff is a great time to look closely at what’s driving success, what our challenges are and where we’re headed. I want to hone in on one of the items Novell President, Bob Flynn, named a success: Novell’s “re: focus” campaign.

As a Novell marketing leader, I was gratified to see this campaign make the cut. But reveling in congratulations is a passing pleasure. Understanding why our “re: focus, re:turn, re:kindle” campaign was, is and will continue to be a success is the key to why you should continue your relationship with Novell or try us for the first time.

From my perspective, re: focus is more than a marketing campaign—it’s Novell’s approach to doing business. The campaign merely distilled what Novell is about, what we’re committed to and what our customers can expect. In short, the campaign is about Novell’s ideals: build great products, deliver exceptional value and nurture lasting relationships.

But words are only words. Success comes from saying what you’re going to do then going out and doing it. This is why I make the claim that re: focus is a way of being for Novell—not just a campaign.

How do I know?

We recently asked our customers this question: Why are you with Novell? The responses were like a mirror to our ideals of great products, exceptional value and lasting relationships. Watch this video on why our customers are with us. How many of our competitors can hang that on their wall?

To see our brand ideals reflected back at us in the reality of our customers’ experiences is heartening. Are we perfect in every way, all the time? Heck no. But the point is, these ideals are the beacon that illuminates our target as we move forward with long-time customers—and the road we traverse as we earn new business relationships.

Eventually, you’ll see our re: focus campaign replaced with a new message, but our brand ideals—our commitment to you to build great products, deliver exceptional value and nurture lasting relationships—will endure. Thank you to all our customers for helping us see what it is that makes Novell great and for standing up to say, “I AM Novell!”

Bundle Commander simplifies the configuration and management of Windows applications with Novell ZENworks Configuration Management

New competitor comparison charts/tables were recently published on the GroupWise product page. Check them out!

Take a look here!

Since releasing GroupWise 2012, many customers and partners have wanted an updated document spelling out some of the key differentiators between GroupWise and some of our competitors. The GroupWise Marketing team, with support from Product Management, Sales and the awesome GroupWise community have produced and published several new pieces of material and posted them on the GroupWise product page.

The GroupWise Blog already discussed and highlighted one of those pieces ‘GroupWise: Features You Lose!’. Now, there are a couple of other ones for you to review and share.

GroupWise 2012 vs. Exchange/Outlook 2010

This table highlights several of the large areas where GroupWise shines while also touching on some of the specific features and capabilities that set GroupWise apart. As many Microsoft shops are still running old versions of either Exchange or Outlook, comparisons to earlier versions of the products on a customer to customer basis can also be very useful and informative.

It is also important to point out again that the power of any product is only as strong as the use and exposure of the capatilities and functionality. Making sure that your end-users know how best to use the tools that your organization has invested in will pay dividends for a very long time. Not only will end-users be happier about their experience with the product, but it will become more integrated with their day to day processes. This level of expertise makes the products, like GroupWise, harder to live without and makes comparisons less necessary.

You will see from this chart that GroupWise has several advantages over our competitors. From strengths in administrative options like ‘Installation and Deployment’ and ‘Easy Move User’ to end user features like ‘Task Management’ and ‘Silent Email Retraction’. Please take a look at this list and provide us feedback on other areas that you find GroupWise superior/easier/better!!

GroupWise 2012 vs. Google Gmail

This particular comparison is so easy! You are comparing more than two products, but two very distinct product categories. It is difficult to communicate the huge chasm of differences between Integrated Collaboration Environments (ICE) and commodity email solutions. Even industry analysts do not put these products in the same category. In addition, there are very few collaboration customers, or even ICE customers, who have commodity email systems today. Those customers who choose to replace their collaboration platform with a commodity solution will soon find that they got exactly what they paid for. Not only will the perceived cost savings soon evaporative, but the mission critical communication platform that their business, their employees and their customers rely upon will soon become a key productivity drain and the soft costs associated will such a decision will never be returned.

There have been several high profile examples that illustrate this far better than can be argued here. In addition, there are arguably many other examples that will never make it to public scrutiny because the embarrassment associated with admitting to this type of decision is covered up by a simple financial sheet defense.

Check out the comparison table and share with us how many of your users will be happy taking such a huge step backwards. Now if your users have never experienced an integrated collaborative solution, they may not know what they could be missing. They may argue that the very basics meet their needs. For some users, this is adequate. However, for your organization to be competitive, I argue that adequate does not create the most productive experience possible.

Maybe we should have a bake-off. Put the most experienced gmail user up against the most experienced GroupWise user and give them a series of tasks to complete. Then just for fun, unplug the internet and see their 99.99999% uptime go to zero while GroupWise caching mode allows for continued 100% productivity!

Please let us know if this information is useful for you and your conversations. Also tell us if there are things we should be adding to this list.

Dean

• End-User Computing

New competitor comparison charts/tables were recently published on the GroupWise product page. Check them out!

Take a look here!

Since releasing GroupWise 2012, many customers and partners have wanted an updated document spelling out some of the key differentiators between GroupWise and some of our competitors. The GroupWise Marketing team, with support from Product Management, Sales and the awesome GroupWise community have produced and published several new pieces of material and posted them on the GroupWise product page.

The GroupWise Blog already discussed and highlighted one of those pieces ‘GroupWise: Features You Lose!’. Now, there are a couple of other ones for you to review and share.

GroupWise 2012 vs. Exchange/Outlook 2010

This table highlights several of the large areas where GroupWise shines while also touching on some of the specific features and capabilities that set GroupWise apart. As many Microsoft shops are still running old versions of either Exchange or Outlook, comparisons to earlier versions of the products on a customer to customer basis can also be very useful and informative.

It is also important to point out again that the power of any product is only as strong as the use and exposure of the capatilities and functionality. Making sure that your end-users know how best to use the tools that your organization has invested in will pay dividends for a very long time. Not only will end-users be happier about their experience with the product, but it will become more integrated with their day to day processes. This level of expertise makes the products, like GroupWise, harder to live without and makes comparisons less necessary.

You will see from this chart that GroupWise has several advantages over our competitors. From strengths in administrative options like ‘Installation and Deployment’ and ‘Easy Move User’ to end user features like ‘Task Management’ and ‘Silent Email Retraction’. Please take a look at this list and provide us feedback on other areas that you find GroupWise superior/easier/better!!

GroupWise 2012 vs. Google Gmail

This particular comparison is so easy! You are comparing more than two products, but two very distinct product categories. It is difficult to communicate the huge chasm of differences between Integrated Collaboration Environments (ICE) and commodity email solutions. Even industry analysts do not put these products in the same category. In addition, there are very few collaboration customers, or even ICE customers, who have commodity email systems today. Those customers who choose to replace their collaboration platform with a commodity solution will soon find that they got exactly what they paid for. Not only will the perceived cost savings soon evaporative, but the mission critical communication platform that their business, their employees and their customers rely upon will soon become a key productivity drain and the soft costs associated will such a decision will never be returned.

There have been several high profile examples that illustrate this far better than can be argued here. In addition, there are arguably many other examples that will never make it to public scrutiny because the embarrassment associated with admitting to this type of decision is covered up by a simple financial sheet defense.

Check out the comparison table and share with us how many of your users will be happy taking such a huge step backwards. Now if your users have never experienced an integrated collaborative solution, they may not know what they could be missing. They may argue that the very basics meet their needs. For some users, this is adequate. However, for your organization to be competitive, I argue that adequate does not create the most productive experience possible.

Maybe we should have a bake-off. Put the most experienced gmail user up against the most experienced GroupWise user and give them a series of tasks to complete. Then just for fun, unplug the internet and see their 99.99999% uptime go to zero while GroupWise caching mode allows for continued 100% productivity!

Please let us know if this information is useful for you and your conversations. Also tell us if there are things we should be adding to this list.

Dean

• End-User Computing

Hey all you fans of BlackBerry, we are pleased to report that Research In Motion (RIM) has officially announced certification of BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) 5.0.1 with GroupWise 2012. You can find the certification details in the BES Software Compatibility Matrix on RIM's website.

We know there are a lot of people who have been looking forward to this milestone, as GroupWise is the email platform of choice for many organizations across public and private sectors, and, according to a recent Forrester Research report, “The State Of Workforce Technology Adoption: U.S. Benchmark 2011,” Blackberry has the largest installed base of smartphones for work at a 42 percent majority.

With this certification in place, BlackBerry users can upgrade to GroupWise 2012 with full confidence – and take advantage of new GroupWise features like relevance sorting, graphical busy searches, integrations with Novell Vibe and Skype, and much more. Whether they are working from a desktop, a web interface or their BlackBerry device, these users will have access to powerful GroupWise email, calendaring, contact, and task management features that will keep them connected, productive, and operating at peak performance. For more updates on GroupWise and related products, check out our new interactive product roadmap.

Novell recently published a 'Top Ten Features Users Lose If They Move' flyer that spells out just a few of the things GroupWise users love about Novell GroupWise!

You can access the flyer here.

The document lists the following features:

1. Superior message tracking
2. Silent message retraction
3. Native attachment viewing
4. Recurring appointment flexibility
5. Managing group tasks
6. User-controlled proxy rights
7. Enhanced busy search
8. Simpler folder sharing
9. Calendar view of future tasks
10. Managing sent appointments and calendar items

Of course, the flyer goes into more detail on each of these items and provides explanations. There were many features and capabilities to choose from, but these are the ones chosen for this flyer.

What would you miss?

So - now that I have your brainstorming attention - what are those things that you use every day in the GroupWise product that you simply could not live without?

Personally, I have a long list of things that are leveraged in GroupWise and that are customized to a particular way of working - MINE!! I have customized the highly productive habitat to manage my workload, schedule, and information. GroupWise is not only my calendar, task list, contact manager, and principal communication mechanism, but GroupWise is also my information storage and recall nerve center.

Most work days start and end with GroupWise!

Share what features you would miss or that you use the most!!

Dean

• End-User Computing

Novell recently published a 'Top Ten Features Users Lose If They Move' flyer that spells out just a few of the things GroupWise users love about Novell GroupWise!

You can access the flyer here.

The document lists the following features:

1. Superior message tracking
2. Silent message retraction
3. Native attachment viewing
4. Recurring appointment flexibility
5. Managing group tasks
6. User-controlled proxy rights
7. Enhanced busy search
8. Simpler folder sharing
9. Calendar view of future tasks
10. Managing sent appointments and calendar items

Of course, the flyer goes into more detail on each of these items and provides explanations. There were many features and capabilities to choose from, but these are the ones chosen for this flyer.

What would you miss?

So - now that I have your brainstorming attention - what are those things that you use every day in the GroupWise product that you simply could not live without?

Personally, I have a long list of things that are leveraged in GroupWise and that are customized to a particular way of working - MINE!! I have customized the highly productive habitat to manage my workload, schedule, and information. GroupWise is not only my calendar, task list, contact manager, and principal communication mechanism, but GroupWise is also my information storage and recall nerve center.

Most work days start and end with GroupWise!

Share what features you would miss or that you use the most!!

Dean

• End-User Computing

As the event owner for ATT Live, I want to reach out and extend one last invite to this year's ATT Live conference in Las Vegas Nevada - May 15th-18th. For as long as I can remember, this has been a December conference, with an occasional repeat in the early spring based on demand. However, this year... the sunshine and warm weather of May are awaiting us in Vegas, and it could not be more welcomed!

If you have not attended ATT Live in the past 10 years, I encourage you to check it out. You can link to the live landing page at www.novell.com/attlive. Over the years, we have made this the premier technical conference and each year we listen to our attendee's feedback making each year an improvement on the previous. This year is no exception!

I wanted to share some highlights of this year's conference for your consideration, and if you are looking for that last attempt to get approval these things might just help.

• Additional hands-on sessions - We have extended our tracks from 10 to 12, offering a good mix of sessions across the three Business Units. You will find 6 tracks focused on Novell ZENworks, Open Enterprise Server and GroupWise. Three tracks on NetIQ, both legacy Novell Identity and Security products and legacy NetIQ products, giving you a great opportunity to explore some new products in this space, and last, but not least, three full tracks on Suse Linux. Check out the full schedule here - http://www.novell.com/training/attlive/sessions.html
• We have invited more product experts - In order to extend our tracks, we have invited more services employees to help deliver these sessions, adding their product knowledge and real world experience to the sessions. Product managers will also be coming to explore product roadmaps and take your feedback back to the office.
• Certification and Practicum - Whether you are seeking certifications to validate your knowledge, seek a career advancement or just test your knowledge, certification has been included in the price of the event. We ran out of seats last year, so we opened up more sessions this year to make sure all those wanting a chance to test, have the chance. The Linux practicum will also be available in limited slots to help you get that professional Linux certification. Of course we would want you to pass, but because there is no additional charge, no one has to know if you fail.... nothing is harder than submitting a failed exam on your expense report.
• More food, more afternoon sleeping - The M resort is known for its excellent food, buffets, and restaurants, so we are taking what worked well for us last year and have extended our buffet vouchers for lunch, giving you your choice and quantity of food, not ours. If you have any complaints on the food, you can only blame yourself for filling up your plate with the wrong things.
• First ever Alumni event, a thanks to those who always support us - If you are an ATT Live Alumni we want to welcome you to our first Alumni event on Tuesday night. We are excited to have the M Resort open up the Winery for our use. Make sure if you are registered that you plan to join us on Tuesday night. Check out the venue here - http://www.themresort.com/dining/hostilegrape.html
• Low travel costs. Vegas always offers the most affordable travel costs of anywhere I know. Seems you get more for your money when you keep it in your pocket and off the tables. However, I thank those that put the money down, seems to keep the expenses for the rest of us to a minimum (as if... I keep my money in my wallet). We have worked hard to keep the costs of the hotel down, with a low rate, and travel to and from the airport included.

There are plenty of reasons for coming, and we look forward to "filling" the hotel during the week. We will have one of the highest attendances yet, and look forward to seeing you there. If you have considered attending, don't wait, it will be well worth your time and investment.

If you have any questions or comments, you can reach my team at training@novell.com. We will be watching the inbox for your interest and will do what we can to get you there, and home happy that you came.

Thanks -
Jeff McMurdie

• Cool Blogs: Official Novell Bloggers

Several pieces of information to share and communicate regarding GroupWise 2012 and what has been happening in the last 30 days or so.

RIM Announces GroupWise 2012 Certification!

RIM has officially announced certification of BES 5.0.1 with GroupWise 2012. Certification was recently completed in the QA labs at RIM and the external software compatibility matrix is now updated.

BlackBerry Enterprise Server Compatibility Matrix

Novell’s participation at Blackberry World Novell will be participating at Blackberry World in Orlando, May 1-3rd. The lead Mobility engineer, Nadeem Nazeer, will be presenting a session on all things mobile coming from Novell and GroupWise. If you are attending Blackberry World, make sure you take in the GroupWise session at the event and meet Nadeem.

Quality of GroupWise 2012

We recently evaluated the initial quality of GroupWise 2012 as we near the first 90 day mark of the release. We first evaluated Novell’s production GroupWise systems. The feedback from both the backend perspective and the helpdesk perspective has been very positive. In fact, according to Kevin Crutchfield, “we are not aware of any serious inhibitors for GroupWise 2012. You might find this interesting – here at Novell we are still running GroupWise 2012 shipping code/agents. We have not identified anything that warrants updating our Novell production system.”

We also spoke with our Novell Technical Services group to see what call volume has been like and what types of issues have been reported or escalated. The feedback from this group has also been positive. There has not been a spike in service requests or in defects resulting from those service requests. This is not to say that there have not been reported issues. Nor is it to claim that every customer has had a smooth upgrade. Some customers have reported issues and engineering has addressed those problems, made FTFs available and included the fixes in the upcoming Cardiff release. We are still on schedule for the Cardiff release and the overall number of fixes taken has been very controlled.

ATT Live – Las Vegas

ATT Live is coming to Las Vegas May 15-18th. This is a four-day, hands-on training conference that is being held at the M Resort, Spa and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. The training sessions will cover a variety of topics from all areas of the Attachmate Group business including content on Novell products, NetIQ, and SUSE. There are over 100 sessions that will be presented. I will be attending and presenting a GroupWise/Collaboration Roadmap session on Tuesday, May 15th. I expect to see you all there and look forward to discussing with the audience the releases, technology and insights that have happened since BrainShare and GWAVACon.

Learn more here –>

The next scheduled GroupWise release is GroupWise 8.0.3. Please watch this blog for updates and announcements!

• Data Synchronizer Cool Solutions

Several pieces of information to share and communicate regarding GroupWise 2012 and what has been happening in the last 30 days or so.

RIM Announces GroupWise 2012 Certification!

RIM has officially announced certification of BES 5.0.1 with GroupWise 2012. Certification was recently completed in the QA labs at RIM and the external software compatibility matrix is now updated.

BlackBerry Enterprise Server Compatibility Matrix

Novell’s participation at Blackberry World Novell will be participating at Blackberry World in Orlando, May 1-3rd. The lead Mobility engineer, Nadeem Nazeer, will be presenting a session on all things mobile coming from Novell and GroupWise. If you are attending Blackberry World, make sure you take in the GroupWise session at the event and meet Nadeem.

Quality of GroupWise 2012

We recently evaluated the initial quality of GroupWise 2012 as we near the first 90 day mark of the release. We first evaluated Novell’s production GroupWise systems. The feedback from both the backend perspective and the helpdesk perspective has been very positive. In fact, according to Kevin Crutchfield, “we are not aware of any serious inhibitors for GroupWise 2012. You might find this interesting – here at Novell we are still running GroupWise 2012 shipping code/agents. We have not identified anything that warrants updating our Novell production system.”

We also spoke with our Novell Technical Services group to see what call volume has been like and what types of issues have been reported or escalated. The feedback from this group has also been positive. There has not been a spike in service requests or in defects resulting from those service requests. This is not to say that there have not been reported issues. Nor is it to claim that every customer has had a smooth upgrade. Some customers have reported issues and engineering has addressed those problems, made FTFs available and included the fixes in the upcoming Cardiff release. We are still on schedule for the Cardiff release and the overall number of fixes taken has been very controlled.

ATT Live – Las Vegas

ATT Live is coming to Las Vegas May 15-18th. This is a four-day, hands-on training conference that is being held at the M Resort, Spa and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. The training sessions will cover a variety of topics from all areas of the Attachmate Group business including content on Novell products, NetIQ, and SUSE. There are over 100 sessions that will be presented. I will be attending and presenting a GroupWise/Collaboration Roadmap session on Tuesday, May 15th. I expect to see you all there and look forward to discussing with the audience the releases, technology and insights that have happened since BrainShare and GWAVACon.

Learn more here –>

The next scheduled GroupWise release is GroupWise 8.0.3. Please watch this blog for updates and announcements!

• Data Synchronizer Cool Solutions

As the event manager for Training Services, I strongly felt it was time for us to reconnect with our loyal customers by investing and focusing on some new face to face offerings for ZENworks, GroupWise and Open Enterprise Server trainings.

Recently we ran several events that we called "TechShare" in select cities. It was awesome to be back face to face and see the response of the Novell faithful. It reminded me of years past, which many of you will remember when we ran those TechShares from yesteryear.

However, we had many customers wondering when we were coming to their city. I realize that going out on the road city to city limited the reach. In listening to the feedback, the solution is to now bring this TechShare event in to the virtual world. Not to diminish the value of being face to face with so many customers, it has been an awesome experience to see the interest in these events, but in order to address more customer's needs for training across all of North America, we are now planning to run a Virtual TechShare for the first time ever!

Here are some of the details....
Dates planned for this first event is June 5th and 6th and below is a list of session titles offered over the two day training. You will be able to choose the sessions that interest you most from these 3 tracks dedicated to ZENworks, GroupWise, and Open Enterprise Server.

ZENworks Sessions
- Deploy ZENworks Configuration Management 11.2: Introduction and Features Overview
- Managing Macintosh OS-X with Novell ZENworks Configuration Management 11.2
- Introduction to Novell ZENworks Application Virtualization 9
- Staying out of the Front Page Headlines Using Novell Endpoint Security Suite (NEPS)
- Preventing Data Breaches Using ZENworks Full Disk Encryption

Open Enterprise Server Sessions
- What's New in Open Enterprise Server 11
- Bridging NetWare® Skills to Open Enterprise Server 11
- Novell Open Enterprise Server 11: Migration Strategies
- Novell Open Enterprise Server 11: In Place Migration
- Novell Open Enterprise Server 11: Introduction to Filr

GroupWise / Collaboration Sessions
- Introduction to Novell GroupWise 2012
- Novell Data Synchronizer – Mobility Pack
- Migrating Novell GroupWise 2012 to Linux
- Introduction to Novell Vibe™ and its Integration with GroupWise
- Deploying the GroupWise Client Using ZENworks 11 Configuration Management

By registering , you will have access to 2 full days of training. The cost for the training is US$350. That's $1,000 less than our standard online training fees for a two day class! We feel it is that important to get this training out to as many customers as we can and address the feedback we have received where the city tour was not feasible.

If you are concerned about this being virtual, you can learn more about our online training at this link - http://www.novell.com/training/online/

We have been doing virtual training for years, and it is a great way to keep travel costs down, attend the training in your pajamas, with hair uncombed and still get all you need with a solid hands-on and interactive experience.

If you are interested in the event. you can register by clicking on this active link:
http://register.novell.com/calendar/?action=event....

If you have questions or feedback about the offer you can email training at training@novell.com.

I hope that you will consider this offer, there is a lot of exciting things happening with these major Novell products, and this is a great way to be informed, plan integrations, upgrade to the latest versions or just get a peek at some of the new products in this space.

Looking forward to having you in the virtual TechShare classrooms.

Jeff McMurdie

• Cool Blogs: Official Novell Bloggers

license:  Free

Nagios is an open source tool that can be installed on SLES/OES that allows you to monitor your network and servers. The plugins attached are specifically written to monitor some of the functions of Open Enterprise Server and eDirectory, so you can remotely see how your server is performing. A big thanks to Novell Technical Services in Germany who contributed these scripts.

The wonderful thing about Nagios, is anyone with some scripting ability can write additional monitoring plugins. The intent here is that this will start as a good base of plugins and that other administrators would contribute additional plugins.

Send me a note if you have an additional plugin you have written to monitor SLES or OES and I'll update this thread with the additions. You can also post it separately on cool solutions as a tool and earn additional points!

AttachmentSize nagios-plugins_and_docs.zip698.68 KB

• Open Enterprise Server Cool Solutions

Operations Center is built on Java and therefore requires some attention to configuration of the Java Virtual Machine (JVM). One of the nice features of the JVM is specifically around memory management. In some of the other programming languages such as C, developers had to manage the memory themselves. The developer had to allocate and deallocate memory on the fly as needed and in turn, had the potential of memory leaks (ie: allocating memory over and over again without freeing it up when it was no longer needed). There is still the possibility of memory leaks in a Java application, but with Java managing the overall allocating and deallocating, the risks are lower

The way in which you tune a JVM is via the commandline arguments that are used for starting up the java application. You can look in the Operations Center Customizer to see each main processes JVM arguments that are used for you implementation. By default, Operations Center installs with some basic settings such as specifying the maximum amount of memory to use and the log file for example. These settings are to just get an implementation started and not the recommended production implementation settings for any/all implementations. Since each implementation of Operations Center has different amounts of elements, alarms, types of users, etc, the amount of memory and how memory needs to be managed can be different. The best starting point is to get a system fully loaded with all adapters and views. From there, you can start the tuning process.

The JVM tuning process is both a science and an art. In the Operations Console (thick client), if you navigate to the Administration/Server element and switch to the performance view, you will notice that you can chart several different metrics. These metrics are specific to the JVM's memory utilization and can help you during the tuning process. The most commonly charted metric is "Total.Heap.Memory.Used". While this implies the amount of memory used, it is not the amount “allocated”. Depending on –Xmx and –Xms JVM settings, the system may not allocate the full –Xmx on initial startup. Charting other metrics will assist in the tuning, but this is typically where I start, ie: how does it appear to be working with managing the memory.

The thing that I look for in Operations Center is to see the Total.Heap.Memory.Used to show a mostly fixed high and low water mark, but also show memory going up and back down, similar to a saw tooth type of look. This means that as the system is running, memory is allocated and deallocated on a routine basis due to standard processing of alarms, elements, user requests, etc.

When Operations Center server first starts, a low amount of memory will be used. Over time the memory used will slowly grow but typically it should stabilize. If the server has been running for a long period of time and the amount of data coming is not growing, the overall memory used should be roughly the same.

Getting back to memory allocating and deallocating, there is a term used around Java based applications, it is called Garbage Collection. Garbage Collection (AKA: GC) is the process of the JVM going through the allocated memory and removing (deallocating) unused/unneeded memory. GC’s are not a bad thing, something referred to a “Full GC” is something that needs to be avoided. While you are not able to avoid a Full GC via a commandline argument, you must tune the JVM to avoid these from happening. In a nutshell, a GC walks around the memory and free’s things up. At some point either due to the amount of memory currently being used and the maximum allowed memory (-Xmx setting), the JVM may decide that it MUST really, really, really deallocate memory right now. In order to do that, it literally pauses all threads running in the JVM (think of someone hitting the pause button on Operations Center, no new alarms will come in, no elements updated, no response to end users clicking on things). You may from time to time see a Full GC that lasts a few seconds, those are not that bad. When your memory used gets very close to the –Xmx setting, the JVM may go into a panic state and do Full GC’s back to back to back to back (IE: Operations Center will appear locked up). This is a bad situation for Operations Center, back to back Full GC's means that pretty much everything in Operations Center has come to a halt (ie; paused) while the JVM is struggling to free up memory because it needs to store more data.

Within the logs directory, there is a file called fsgc.log, this file will assist you in understanding when, how and type of GC’s running. The file is re-created everytime Operations Center starts. You will see Full GC’s on initial startup, they are not a problem, mostly because they run in such a short period of time, they will not be noticed. After the system is up and running, you should rarely see them. Below is an example startup fsgc.log file from an initial startup.

0.378: [GC 13312K->4879K(47936K), 0.0064363 secs]
0.804: [GC 18191K->6444K(47936K), 0.0066296 secs]
1.349: [GC 19756K->6805K(47936K), 0.0035868 secs]
1.795: [GC 20109K->8710K(47936K), 0.0043142 secs]
2.345: [GC 22022K->11267K(47936K), 0.0046819 secs]
2.731: [GC 24579K->12802K(47936K), 0.0064709 secs]
3.260: [GC 26114K->13095K(47936K), 0.0052920 secs]
3.722: [GC 26407K->14679K(47936K), 0.0056979 secs]
4.380: [GC 27991K->15332K(47936K), 0.0054607 secs]
6.525: [GC 28644K->16929K(47936K), 0.0065346 secs]
7.892: [Full GC 29568K->17472K(47936K), 0.0682771 secs]
9.953: [GC 30784K->18141K(48000K), 0.0037259 secs]
10.499: [GC 31453K->20318K(48000K), 0.0079776 secs]
10.623: [Full GC 22873K->19975K(48000K), 0.0726967 secs]
11.387: [GC 33335K->20965K(48396K), 0.0040743 secs]
11.459: [GC 34405K->20925K(48396K), 0.0023190 secs]
12.123: [GC 34365K->21307K(48396K), 0.0017868 secs]
12.310: [GC 34747K->21474K(48396K), 0.0018603 secs]
12.402: [GC 34914K->21588K(48396K), 0.0015354 secs]
12.838: [Full GC 32341K->21694K(48396K), 0.0899491 secs]
13.453: [GC 36350K->22583K(52608K), 0.0023321 secs]
13.610: [GC 37239K->22784K(52608K), 0.0022271 secs]

The first column (0.378) is the seconds since the JVM process has been started (IE: Operations Center has been running for .378 seconds)

The second column ([GC 13312K->4879K(47936K)) shows the type of GC (partial or full), as well as the allocated memory before and after. The line can show an increase or a decrease in the amount of memory being used within the JVM. Remember, memory used and allocated are different. Think of the -Xmx setting as the maximum size of the hard drive, but you are only using a certain amount of disk space. -Xmx is the max amount of memory (roughly, it may grow a small percentage past that) the JVM *should* use, the Heap Used metric shows what is currently being allocated (used).

The third column of data (0.0064363 secs) shows how long the GC ran Signs that your system is having memory problems that potentially impact the system and/or end users, are lines like the one at 10.623 where there was a Full GC, but since this one ran in .072 seconds, it’s not an issue. On a memory starved Operations Center system, you could potentially see a Full GC line executing, the amount of memory before and after is not changing much and the duration of the Full GC is represented seconds, ie: 5 seconds, 30 seconds, etc. Worse case, it is followed up by more and more and more Full GC’s.

As I indicated before, turning a JVM is a science and an art. I recommend that you work with the Consulting Team to assist you and/or read up on the JVM settings, how memory is used and tips and tricks on tuning. I recently ran across a very well written blog by Rupesh Ramachandran, Principal Solution Architect on Oracle's "A-Team" and a whitepaper from the Managed Runtime Initiative on the subject that would be a good starting point.

Since it doesn’t make sense to do the actual tuning testing on the production implementation of Operations Center it is important to set up a development/test environment that closely mimics productions elements, alarms, load, etc. The dev environment must represent production as closely as possible to ensure the memory settings tested in Dev make sense to use in Production.

- Tobin

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novelloes: Prepare to Install OES11 DSfW: http://t.co/xKJKPhQn via @youtube

novelloes: Bio-metric Authentication with Authasas and Domain Services for Windows - http://t.co/MmKgUTFe #novell

novelloes: New Automated and Unattended Upgrade to Open Enterprise Server 11, saves on deployment costs - http://t.co/oydcLC2z #novell

(Note: To see a list of all the sessions planned for ATT Live 2012, go to http://bit.ly/Asgjo4.)

At ATT Live 2012, Dr Bjoern Lotz, the designer and creator of the CLP 11 exam scenarios and evaluation scripts, will be presenting 3 sessions on the various common issues and mistakes that most often make the difference between passing and failing the SUSE Certified Linux Professional (CLP) 11 Practicum Exam. These sessions are:

• Dr. L's Treatment for the CLP Pain Points #1: Scripting in the CLP
• Dr. L's Treatment for the CLP Pain Points #2: NFSv4 and Syslog-ng
• Dr. L's Treatment for the CLP Pain Points #3: Apache and Samba

These sessions will be especially helpful for SLES 11 server administrators who want to achieve the SUSE CLP 11 certification. And ATT Live 2012 is a prime opportunity to get this certification because the CLP 11 practicum exam will be offered for free on days 3 and 4 of the event.

I asked Bjoern to provide a bit of useful information from each session that would give you an idea of what to expect if you're interested in taking advantage of this opportunity to prepare for and take the CLP 11 exam. The following information is just a taste of what you'll learn in these sessions. You'll really need to come to ATT Live if you want the full learning experience--demonstrations, hands-on labs, interaction with the instructor, etc.

Scripting in the CLP

One of the common issues that comes up when performing scripting tasks in the CLP exam is that the script does not execute without errors. Among the steps you can take to make sure the script executes properly is to use the following script troubleshooting techniques:

If you do not immediately see why a script is returning errors, you can

• Add set -x at the top of your script - when executing the script you see additional information that can help you find the error
• Put echo in front of commands – that way they are not executed but displayed in the output
• Put read into your script to pause it – hit enter to continue it
• If you don't want to run the whole script, put exit at the point where you want it to end
• Don't forget to remove (or change into a comment with #) the above when you are done

NFSv4 and Syslog-ng

The common mistakes made when performing Syslog-ng tasks in the CLP exam arise from not knowing how to create filters or modify existing ones. Filtering rules that will help you in performing these tasks successfully include the several criteria that can be used for filtering:

• Facility:
  filter f_news { facility(news); };
• Priority
  filter f_alert { level(alert); };
• Program (regular expression)
  filter f_dhcpd { program(“dhcpd”); };
• String (regular expression)
  filter f_firewall { match(“IN=”): };
• Hostname (regular expression)
  filter f_gateway { host(gateway); };
• Elements can be combined:
  filter f_errcrit { level(err, crit); };
  filter f_mailnews { facility(mail, news); };
  filter f_iptables { match(“IN=”) and match(“OUT=”) ; };

Apache and Samba

A common mistake seen in the exam related to the CLP 11 Practicum Apache tasks is there are missing elements in the virtual host configuration. Some tips to keep in mind to perform these tasks successfully are:

• The configuration is distributed across several files in /etc/apache2/, including
  • httpd.conf
  • default-server.conf
  • vhost.d
  • listen.conf
  • error.conf
  • Some configuration options are contained in /etc/sysconfig/apache2, which are used to create configuration files in /etc/apache2/sysconfig.d/
• Virtual hosts are used to provide the Web pages of several domains on one IP address
• To create a virtual host, you need to create a configuration file in the /etc/apache2/vhsots.d/ directory
• The file name has to end in .conf
• The /etc/apache2/vhosts.d/vhost.template file lists the needed parameters with comments explaining their use. You can copy that file and edit it for your virtual host

Register today for the event and for Dr L's CLP 11 Pain Point sessions before they fill up at: www.novell.com/attlive!

ATT Live 2012
May 15-18, 2012
Henderson (Las Vegas), NV
4 days of instructor-led, hands-on advanced technical training for only $1,750

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