Vol. 23, #49 - December 10, 2018 - Issue #1211
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As the Christmas season approaches we should remember those less fortunate than we are. I'm thinking particularly of how developments in modern technology can impact the elderly and some other segments in our societies. This has been brought home to me recently by several articles I read online recently which I wanted to touch on in this issue of WServerNews with two examples of technological changes that are greatly impacting our societies. We also have a new Ask Our Readers question about open source remote desktop environments which we hope some of our readers will be able to respond to. And speaking of reader feedback, our next issue will be our 2018 Recap Edition newsletter where we look at some of the IT news and developments that have caught our attention in 2018. I'll be sharing my own observations on recent technology developments and trends in that issue but we'd also like to invite you our readers to express your own thoughts about what's happened in tech this last year and what might be on the horizon for us as IT professionals in the coming year 2019. Send us your thoughts, comments, and stories: [email protected]
This article published on Quartz got me thinking the other day:
China's cashless economy threatens to leave its elderly -- and their money -- behind
http://www.wservernews.com/go/1a7b9w7w/
Those who are enthusiastic in general about welcoming technological change may want to read this article about what's happening in China. The part that caught my attention was this statement by a 63-year old Chinese man:
"Some old people find it difficult to keep up with technology. Many retirees have poor eyesight, and struggle to see the screen, or have a poor memory and keep forgetting how to use the apps."
The article then goes on to describe how an elderly individual in northern China was filmed arguing with the checkout person in a supermarket. The elderly individual wanted to pay for a bag of grapes by cash but the checkout staff insisted he pay using an app on his phone. The video went viral and garnered a lot of sympathy from those in China who saw it.
Which brings me next to that best of all possible worlds, the country of Sweden which appears to rapidly be turning into a cashless society. Will the end of cash usher in Nirvana? This article on ZeroHedge seems to think not:
Sweden Is On The Verge Of Going Completely Cashless: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
http://www.wservernews.com/go/3uur5zes/
The above article may be a bit over the top, but it seems from this earlier article UK newspaper in The Guardian that not everyone in Sweden is happy over this development:
'Being cash-free puts us at risk of attack': Swedes turn against cashlessness
http://www.wservernews.com/go/me40ctj2/
Again, those who are most likely to be negatively affected by this technological trend are those who are disadvantaged by virtue of their age, physical condition or level of education.
I personally wouldn't want to live in a cashless society. Would you?
One big concern that tech pundits have been grappling with lately is what happens when technological developments like AI eliminate jobs for a large segment of the population. The answer that most often seems to be put forward by those at the top of the technological pyramid (billionaires like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg for example) is giving everyone free money like they decided to do several years ago in Finland. After a two year trial of trying out universal basic income (UBI) the pilot program was ended so the results of the project could be analyzed. Whether the program is resumed, expanded, or discarded will probably be decided in a year or so as Wired UK indicated earlier this year:
No, Finland isn't scrapping its universal basic income experiment
http://www.wservernews.com/go/hd0v596x/
How serious is the problem that UBI is intended to solve? This recent news item from Bloomberg sheds some light on what may soon be happening at your local Walmart:
Robot Janitors Are Coming to Mop Floors at a Walmart Near You
http://www.wservernews.com/go/30x6zwld/
And who will these intelligent cleaning robots be replacing as this technological trend spreads? Disadvantaged workers who have fewer employment opportunities because of lack of education, or individuals of uncertain status in society like refuges and undocumented immigrants. Will the trend take hold regardless? Well what manager wouldn't want to replace a human caretaker with a robot that never calls in sick, doesn't need coffee breaks, won't steal stuff off the shelves, or join a union?
Will you still shop at your local Walmart if this happens there? Why or why not?
What do you think about how technology affects society's disadvantaged? Does it empower them or render them needy and helpless? What should be done? What *can* be done?
Email us at [email protected] with your comments and suggestions.
Cheers,
Mitch Tulloch, Senior Editor
WServerNews.com
Got any IT pro tips you'd like to share with other readers of our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Mail server admins and those who administer enterprise networks may want to make a note of this one. The Abuse Contact DB is a proxy database that provides you with the network owner [email protected] address, for any given IP address; to allow you to report network abuse directly to the appropriate network.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/bjr0y2qr/
GOT ADMIN TOOLS or other software/hardware you'd like to recommend? Email us at [email protected]
Try Altaro’s new WAN-Optimized Replication: Enables Hyper-V & VMware users to continuously replicate their VMs to a remote site so that users can be up and running in minutes should disaster strike!
http://www.wservernews.com/go/u0d2qrcz/
To celebrate the holiday season and show our appreciation, Veeam is offering three lucky winners a free trip to VeeamON 2019 in Miami!
http://www.wservernews.com/go/kc46e44t/
SmarterMail is a scalable business email server that meets the needs of small businesses, enterprise organizations and web hosts and ISPs:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/hbzw4if0/
ShadowProtect backup and disaster recovery software ensures on-prem business systems and data are fully protected and always available:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/st8i9uia/
This PowerShell module gives access to the Kerberos ticket cache. It can read and purge tickets of the current logon session.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/rqw15dn3/
A reader named Kelvin sent us the following question:
What I want ask the community about is open source remote desktop environments (RDP/RDS). Is there an open source server and client environment that mirrors as closely as possible Microsoft's RDS session host environment? There are a lot of pieces out there. Has anyone put them together to create a Linux server that can host multiple user logons simultaneously and run common Libra/OpenOffice applications? Are there other solutions? Let me know.
Can any of our newsletter readers help with this matter? Email us at [email protected]
Last week's factoid and question was this:
Fact: 'Doom' Player Uncovers a Secret That's Been Hidden for 24 Years
Question: What's your own all-time favorite video game?
My own all-time favorite is Dungeon Master which I played in the 80s on an Amiga computer. If you have 20 minutes to spare from your busy (yawn!) job as an IT pro you can watch a speed walkthrough of the game in these two videos:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/6nolzoai/
http://www.wservernews.com/go/81jz7bcc/
Ah, that brings back memories…
Some of the responses we got from our readers on this topic included:
Half-Life. It had the perfect balance of problem-solving and FPS action, and every time (except once) you thought you were at the end, it turned out there was still another section to go. Talk about getting your money's worth! --Murray from New York
Return to Castle Wolfenstein (RTCW). I've lost years of my life to this game. Basically all the Wolfenstein family of multiplayer versions online - RTCW, Enemy Territory, etc. I was a beta tester online for the original product so many years ago I was using dial-up. Not even sure if it was called RTCW yet at that time. --Doug from Iowa
Anyways let's leave those addictive games behind and move on to this week's factoid which is taken from my editorial in this issue:
Fact: Sweden Is on the verge of going completely cashless
Source: http://www.wservernews.com/go/i3hkgrgk/
Question: What can possibly go wrong with something like this? Think of how it might affect yourself in particular.
Email your answer to [email protected]
>> Got an IT conference happening in North America that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Ignite Tour -- Dec. 11-12 in São Paulo, Brazil
http://www.wservernews.com/go/n660ixa2/
Microsoft Ignite Tour - Jan 10-11 in Toronto, Canada
http://www.wservernews.com/go/6w6nzgho/
Microsoft Ignite Tour - Feb 4-5, 2019 in Washington, D.C.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/b47nrsr8/
Microsoft Ignite 2019 -- Nov 4-8, 2019 in Orlando, Florida
http://www.wservernews.com/go/usp5kuzt/
>> Got an IT conference happening in North America that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Collabsummit 2019 -- May 27-29, 2019 in Wiesbaden, Germany
http://www.wservernews.com/go/9kkchxin/
>> Got an IT conference happening in Australia or Asia that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Microsoft Azure Discovery Day 2018 -- 13 Dec 2018 in Adelaide, Australia
http://www.wservernews.com/go/hx7rptgl/
Microsoft Ignite Tour -- Feb 6-7, 2019 in Sydney, Australia
http://www.wservernews.com/go/ub2cn5wf/
Cisco Live 2019 -- 5-8 May 2019 in Melbourne, Australia
http://www.wservernews.com/go/ht9bb930/
>> Got an IT conference happening in Asia that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Microsoft Ignite Tour -- Jan 16-17, 2019 in Singapore
http://www.wservernews.com/go/or3w4dt7/
Microsoft Ignite Tour -- Feb 20-21, 2019 in Hong Kong, China
http://www.wservernews.com/go/6xfk15iy/
Microsoft Ignite Tour -- Apr 3-4, 2019 in Seoul, South Korea
http://www.wservernews.com/go/9amfaghk/
>> Got an IT conference happening in India that you'd like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Microsoft Ignite Tour -- May 22-23, 2019 in Mumbai, India
http://www.wservernews.com/go/kvw5pecz/
Network monitoring in a hybrid world: Talking with SolarWinds' Chris O'Brien
As businesses mix cloud services with on-premises hardware and software, network monitoring becomes more crucial — and more difficult.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/7on2mlut/
3 crucial lessons from a network security analysis
How secure is your network? Do you know where your weaknesses lie? Use these three important takeaways from a network security analysis to stay safe.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/adc1gxxc/
The hidden cost of storage for small businesses
Data storage has many hidden costs, especially for small businesses. What seems to be obvious becomes fuzzy when you try to look more closely at it.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/1320jue6/
Solved! Access token expiry error when deploying ARM Templates in Visual Studio
A strange error message during the deployment of an ARM Template using Visual Studio was a bit of a headscratcher, but fortunately there is an easy fix.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/3x9bv3bz/
T-Suite Podcast: Security, heal thyself — Talking with Fugue's Josh Stella
In today's T-Suite Podcast, we talk about security solutions that warn developers they are not following a best practice and automatically "heal" the gap.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/a56ey4dj/
Conan Rents A Family In Japan
Conan's real family is tired of him, but he found a 'rental family' in Japan that is more than happy to laugh at his jokes:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/is0xthq0/
Fastest Workers Compilation
Whatever you do in life, you can always do it better and faster:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/xeduuzj7/
French Magician Dazzles
Tony, a 21-year-old magician and digital illusionist from France, dazzled the judges and audience at America's Got Talent 2017:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/c5x5ox0m/
Funny Animals
Just like people, some animals like to share things and some don't:
http://www.wservernews.com/go/s3waxytm/
Low-code tools showdown: PowerApps vs. Appian
Low-code dev products, such as PowerApps and Appian, come with benefits and tradeoffs. Click here to see which option comes out on top in this faceoff so you can plan your workflow accordingly.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/9wgkzg57/
Jenkins on Kubernetes is promising, but integration needs work
Jenkins and Kubernetes are a natural fit for automated application development and delivery, and the open source community has plans to improve how Jenkins runs on containers. Read more about the popular pair here.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/b11ua7in/
Google Cloud CTO talks Cloud Services Platform hybrid play
Google Cloud CTO Brian Stevens envisions an IT landscape where enterprises can more easily develop and manage apps that span on premises and the cloud. Click here to see how Kubernetes will play a big role in this.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/27lxa8mp/
Cost management the next big issue in multi-cloud computing
Multi-cloud computing continues to make its way into the enterprises and, as it does, introduces some significant cost management challenges. Learn more about these challenges here.
http://www.wservernews.com/go/fetrkh2i/
WServerNews goes out each week to more than 500,000 IT pro subscribers worldwide! That's a lot of expertise to tap into. Do you need help with some technical problem or are looking for expert advice on something IT-related? Ask Our Readers by emailing your problems and/or questions to us at [email protected]
Got feedback about anything in this issue of WServerNews? Email us at [email protected]
Free Altaro VM Backup v8 for all Hyper-V & VMware users
|
Mitch Tulloch is Senior Editor of WServerNews and is a widely recognized expert on Windows administration, deployment and virtualization. Mitch was lead author of the bestselling Windows 7 Resource Kit and has been author or series editor for almost fifty books mostly published by Microsoft Press. Mitch is also a ten-time recipient of Microsoft's Most Valuable Professional (MVP) award for his outstanding contributions in support of the global IT pro community. Mitch owns and runs an information technology content development business based in Winnipeg, Canada. For more information see www.mtit.com.
Ingrid Tulloch is Associate Editor of WServerNews and was co-author of the Microsoft Encyclopedia of Networking from Microsoft Press. Ingrid is also manages research and marketing for our content development business and has co-developed university-level courses in Information Security Management for a Masters of Business Administration program.
