March Meeting Notes

First off, thanks Ed Aldrich for a fun & lively presentation! Ed sent this today:

"Last night was a real hoot... my Minneapolis trip was among the very best!! You guys are doing a superb job with your group. Thank you very much for having me!!!
Thanks very much for extending your hospitality and interest in 1E, our solutions and services. It was one of THE most interesting and fun meetings I've participated in."

I think everyone got something out of the meeting last night. Even if you never plan to buy a 1e product, you've at least seen that people want more than what they get out of the box with SMS and SCCM and individuals and companies are filling in the gaps.

One of the benefits of going with a company like 1e is that you have a 11-year old company that's not going away. You can't say that force an in-house solution when too often, the author moves on and you're stuck with something you can no longer make changes to or support.

Regarding Marty's encryption question, Ed sent this today:

"In response to the one unanswered question that many had around our 1E WakeUp solution and disk encryption software (e.g. PointSec and the like): I've done some internal research on the issue of our tools interoperating smoothly with these types of disk encryption programs and offer the following to address any concerns. Simply put, it is generally not an issue that cannot be overcome.

Most disk encryption software (if not all, by design or not) have a way to bypass the preboot password or token on the next reboot or by other means. Safeboot, for example, has an option to allow the security Admins to add an "auto-boot" user to a machine or group of machines. This is how SMS/ConfigMgr can install a program on the system while the user is logged off. Safeboot has some other options to allow you to bypass or just disable the preboot check. Safeboot's preboot isn't at the BIOS level. 1E WakeUp also coexists nicely with Vista's BitLocker feature. We've also done extensive work with Unimaco. Can this be accomplished straight out-of-the-box? Generally, no - a consulting services engagement is usually required to integrate all the appropriate piece parts, and involving the appropriate security software administration team. Suffice it to say that with the number and size of many existing 1E customer accounts that deal with sensitive information (defense; financial services; etc), this is not a show-stopper."

Sounds like Tim wants to get a meeting for SoftGrid (now called Microsoft Application Virtualization). And next month (Wed, April 23rd), #2 and I would like to present the course we're planning for MMS - a dry run so to speak. The beauty is that if you can't make MMS, you at least get to see one class for free and if you can make MMS, you can go stand in the line for myITforum party passes instead!