Apple restores iCloud after global disruption hinders services

Apple says it has resolved a widespread iCloud issue that caused service disruptions for 40 percent of its users—that comes out to at least 128 million people, based on a company customer count.Several services, including iCloud Mail, had been running slower for some people, Apple said in an early status report. Apple later updated iCloud’s status page to reflect that all services were working normally. The service issue lasted for around seven hours, starting at approximately 2:15 a.m. ET and ending around 9:30 a.m. ET, according to the service’s status page.Apple didn’t provide details on what caused the disruption or how many people were affected. However, the company said in a 2013 earnings report that 320 million people use iCloud, which lets them back up and sync information stored on Apple devices via the company’s cloud.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

No, I do not believe this steak was cooked by an iPhone, but I’ll bite anyway

Generally speaking, I’m pretty good at skipping past ads in my Twitter stream, but this one grabbed my attention with a clickbait headline that proved harder to resist than a perfectly grilled slab of beef.“Would you believe this steak was cooked by an iPhone?”Not for a nanosecond, of course, despite the multitude of stories connecting fire and iPhones over the years.But I couldn’t escape the attendant curiosity: What in the name of Steve Jobs might allow a marketing professional – no, make that even a marketing professional -- to suggest such a preposterous feat might be possible.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Using an Apt Proxy

In this post I’ll show you how to use apt-cacher-ng as an Apt proxy for Ubuntu systems on your network. I’m sure there are a lot of other resources that also provide this information, but I’m including it here for the sake of completeness and making it as easy as possible for others. Using an Apt proxy will help reduce the traffic coming from your network to external repositories, but it simpler and easier than running your own internal repository or mirror.

This isn’t the first time I’ve discussed apt-cacher-ng; almost two years ago I showed you how to use Puppet to configure Ubuntu to use apt-cacher-ng. This post focuses on the manual configuration of an Apt proxy.

On the server side, setting up an Apt proxy is as simple as one command:

apt-get install apt-cacher-ng

I’m sure there are some optimizations or advanced configurations, but this is enough to get the Apt proxy up and running.

On the client side, there are a couple of ways to configure the system. You could use a tool like Puppet (as described here), or manually configure the system. If you choose manual configuration, you can place the configuration in either /etc/apt/apt. Continue reading

The path to enterprise IoT may not be as steep as you think

The tech challenges that accompany IoT projects shouldn't deter companies from attempting to find meaning in data gathered from connected devices. The solutions may be closer than they think.The IT behind the Internet of Things, including sensors, databases and analytics software, has been around for a while. The challenge is getting these disparate systems and components to work together, said Phil Regnault, a senior vice president with Hitachi Consulting, on a panel at MIT's CIO Symposium. MORE ON NETWORK WORLD: 12 most powerful Internet of Things companies Data analysis tools and data storage, technologies that are key to IoT, are extremely affordable, according to Richard Soley, executive director of the Industrial Internet Consortium. "There's no excuse for not using this technology today," he said. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Thursday, May 12

Senators block vote extending NSA dragnet powersFour U.S. senators ground the chamber’s business to a halt Wednesday in an effort to prevent voting on a bill that would extend a law that’s legitimized the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of telephone and business records. The relevant section of the Patriot Act expires at the end of the month, and to stop it from being renewed, a bipartisan group took control of the Senate floor in a filibuster mid-Wednesday.Hack hits health care target, reaps data on 1.1 millionTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Thursday, May 12

Senators block vote extending NSA dragnet powersFour U.S. senators ground the chamber’s business to a halt Wednesday in an effort to prevent voting on a bill that would extend a law that’s legitimized the National Security Agency’s bulk collection of telephone and business records. The relevant section of the Patriot Act expires at the end of the month, and to stop it from being renewed, a bipartisan group took control of the Senate floor in a filibuster mid-Wednesday.Hack hits health care target, reaps data on 1.1 millionTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Amazon adds groceries, meals to one-hour Prime Now delivery service

Amazon.com has expanded its Prime Now one-hour deliveries to include groceries, meals and baked goods from local stores in New York, in a move that will soon be extended to other cities.The deliveries will be available in some Mahattan neighborhoods starting Thursday, and then expand across the island in the coming weeks. The Prime Now website lists 11 zip codes where residents can use the service. Amazon will add local stores in other cities soon, it said.The first batch of stores are D’Agostino, Gourmet Garage and Billy’s Bakery, and Eataly and Westside Market will be the next, according to Amazon.Prime Now and the Android or iOS apps people use to shop were announced in December last year. The service is also available in Atlanta, Austin, Baltimore, Brooklyn, Dallas and Miami. It can be used from 6 a.m. to midnight, seven days a week. Two-hour delivery is free and one-hour delivery costs US$7.99. As the name implies, users first have to sign up for a regular Prime membership to use the service, which is priced at $99 a year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Stupidities of Switch Programming (written in June 2013)

In June 2013 I wrote a rant that got stuck in my Evernote Blog Posts notebook for almost two years. Sadly, not much has changed since I wrote it, so I decided to publish it as-is.

In the meantime, the only vendor that’s working on making generic network deployments simpler seems to be Cumulus Networks (most other vendors went down the path of building proprietary fabrics, be it ACI, DFA, IRF, QFabric, Virtual Chassis or proprietary OpenFlow extensions).

Arista used to be in the same camp (I loved all the nifty little features they were rolling out to make ops simpler), but it seems they lost their mojo after the IPO.

Read more ...

Lenovo’s profit hit by acquisitions of Motorola, IBM server business

Lenovo’s recent acquisitions have taken a bite out of the company’s earnings, with its net profit in the first quarter dropping 37 percent despite strong PC sales.The Chinese company paid US$2.9 billion for Motorola Mobility and $2.1 billion for IBM’s x86 server business. Prior to the acquisitions, Lenovo typically reported strong earnings on continued PC demand in its home market.The impact of the acquisitions was not unexpected. The Chinese PC maker has said its net profit will fall in the short-term, following the acquisitions last year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Lenovo’s profit hit by acquisitions of Motorola, IBM server business

Lenovo’s recent acquisitions have taken a bite out of the company’s earnings, with its net profit in the first quarter dropping 37 percent despite strong PC sales.The Chinese company paid US$2.9 billion for Motorola Mobility and $2.1 billion for IBM’s x86 server business. Prior to the acquisitions, Lenovo typically reported strong earnings on continued PC demand in its home market.The impact of the acquisitions was not unexpected. The Chinese PC maker has said its net profit will fall in the short-term, following the acquisitions last year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Using Check Point Identity Awareness with NAT

Check Point Identity Awareness is problematic in environments that have multiple customers, overlapping private address space, and NAT. It can be done, if you understand the traffic flows, the connections needed, and how to combine several features. Here’s how I did it.

NB: This post is not a full explanation of Check Point Identity Awareness, nor is it a discussion of the product design decisions, good or bad. It assumes that the reader understands what Identity Awareness is, and focuses on how to implement it when you also need to use NAT. It will be pretty dull reading to everyone else.

Background: Typical Check Point Management Flows

A quick reminder of the traditional flows used for Check Point firewall management:

Check Point Management FlowsCheck Point Management Clients (e.g. SmartDashboard, SmartLog) connect to the management server to configure policies, view logs, etc.

Policies are compiled and pushed from the management server to the firewall(s). Logs are sent from the firewall back to the management server. All good.

Identity Awareness: Additional Connections

Identity Awareness lets you define rules based upon user identities, rather than IP addresses. So you can say “This AD group is allowed to connect directly to the SQL Server.” Much nicer Continue reading

US proposes tighter export rules for computer security tools

The U.S. Commerce Department has proposed tighter export rules for computer security tools, a potentially controversial revision to an international agreement aimed at controlling weapons technology.On Wednesday, the department published a proposal in the Federal Register and opened a two-month comment period.The changes are proposed to the Wassenaar Arrangement, an international agreement reached in 1995, aimed at limiting the spread of “dual use” technologies that could be used for harm.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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