Time Doctor is one of the programs that combine time tracking with basic employee monitoring. Screenshots are taken at random intervals, then all of this is uploaded online for managers to review. Below is a detailed Time Doctor review, there are a lot of text and images, so if you are in a rush, just skip to the Summary.
Continue reading Time Doctor review 2014
All posts by Ruslan Sudentas
How to forward/redirect email in Google Apps
It is very convenient to open Google Apps account and use Google as your mail server. However the simple email forwarding becomes a challenge when for example you want two people send and receive emails using lets say support@yourdomain.com account. This post will explain how to setup email redirects in Google Apps. This assumes you are an administrator and know how to get to your domain management dashboard (from gmail’s wrench menu select “Manage this domain”)
Note that Google does not offer Google Apps for free any more:
“Prior to December 6, 2012, Google offered a free edition of Google Apps—also known as the Standard edition—that had a reduced set of business features. As of December 6, 2012, Google stopped offering Free edition to new customers.”
Email forwarding with forwarders in user’s account (simple)
- Create a new regular user (like support@yourdomain.com)
- Login as this user to Gmail
- Go to Settings > Forwarders and set up your own email (like john@yourdomain.com) as a recipient “Forward a copy of incoming mail to” – this will take care of receiving emails sent to the new account
- Note that this won’t work if you need to forward to multiple emails. In this case you are better off using filters to forward all (*) email
- Now login to Gmail as yourself (john@yourdomain.com) , go to Settings / Account and add the new email to “Send mail as” section – this will allow you to send email from the new account
Email forwarding with Groups
Note: this does not work as of 2014
Create a group – all of it’s members will receive a copy of the email to this group. Sending from this group is also possible, but recipients (in Gmail) will see “john.smith@example.com via gmail.com”. Some claim it is unprofessional. We think it is minor. This method also saves you from creating new users – in free version you are limited to only 10.
- Click Groups > “Create a new group”
- Name the group and check “Also allow anyone on the Internet to post messages”
- Add members (recepients)
Best DNS hosting and management services
Recently we have encountered a question of selecting a reliable and fast DNS service providers. Why? The main reason was that 1and1 – the registrar for some of our sites has the most terrible domain control panel ever that does not allow configuring TXT records that we need for SPF. See the comparison below.
How to use employee monitoring software and remain a great company
Employee monitoring software has become commonplace. Many apps take monitor screenshots, capture keystrokes and mouse movements, monitor active applications and visited sites and, in extreme cases, can even take pictures using webcam. It seems to be fair to track what your employees do when they are being paid for their time. After all, if they exchange their time for money, it seems fair for the employer to know what they are paying for. So, why does it still feel morally inappropriate in some cases? The question is far from being just theoretical. If a wrong decision is made, a company may suffer from lawsuits, experience a backlash and overall productivity drop (opposite from what was intended) from their employees or suffer damage to the company’s image. Let’s review in more detail what employee monitoring practices can be considered valid and what should be avoided.
Continue reading How to use employee monitoring software and remain a great company
Undelete from network share and protect using Shadow Copy
The problem
While working on a network share (Windows Home Server) from a Win7 notebook I’ve accidentally pressed Delete and OK on the wrong (and important!) folder. And then spent several hours trying to restore. Below is the summary of what I have found.
Continue reading Undelete from network share and protect using Shadow Copy
SQL backup to Amazon S3
Amazon S3 is a great and cheap place to keep your SQL Server database backups.
SQLBackupAndFTP starting from the Standard version now allows you to backup SQL Server databases to Amazon S3 directly.
To set up the backups you need to have your Access Key and Secret Key that you can find under “Security Credentials” in Amazon Web Services: https://aws-portal.amazon.com/gp/aws/securityCredentials#access_credentials
SQL backup to Google Drive
Google Drive starts you off with 5GB for free. Seems like a great place to keep you SQL Server database backups.
SQLBackupAndFTP starting from the Standard version now allows you to backup SQL Server databases to Google Drive directly. On the main form just select Google Drive as your backup destination, authorize the program with Google – and you are done!
SQL backup to SkyDrive
SkyDrive from Microsoft gives you 25GB of cloud space for free. Seems like a great place to keep you SQL Server database backups.
Here’s how to backup SQL Server databases to SkyDrive using SQLBackupAndFTP:
- When you install SkyDrive, it creates a special folder. Everything that you put into this folder will be synced to the SkyDrive servers in the cloud.
- Open SQLBackupAndFTP, select databases to backup, check “Store backups in a local/network folder” and set the folder to be that SkyDrive folder.
Note that there’s a big drawback – SkyDrive will sync only when you are logged in.
SQL backup to Dropbox
Dropbox allows you to store 2GB for free – this should be enough space to store SQL Server backups for the majority of small clients. Free version of SQLBackupAndFTP now allows you to backup SQL Server databases to Dropbox directly.
- Select the databases you want to backup
- Click “Add backup Destination” and select Dropbox
- Click Authorize button to allow SQLBackupAndFTP to save to your Dropbox account
- Click Test or Run Now to verify that backups work correctly
- The backups will be stored in Apps\mySQLBackupAndFTP folder in your Dropbox account
- Now schedule your SQL backups and sleep well
Remote Desktop to Console/Admin Session on Windows Server 2003
When you Remote Desktop to a Windows XP Professional computer, you always connect to the console (main/default) session. This is the default for Remote Desktop to Windows XP Professional. When you remote desktop to a Windows Server 2003 computer, the default is to start a new session.
This is how you can connect to the default/console/admin session:
Create a .bat file like this:
%SystemRoot%\system32\mstsc.exe “You RDP file” /admin
For options just run
%SystemRoot%\system32\mstsc.exe /?
This post is a good reference