There are plenty of free services that will allow them to monitor their website Uptime is one of them. In one check then can monitor their website AND their DNS service. Heck, tell them you'll sign them up for the service if they like (most are available for free). Why not utilize (or tell your customers) about a free service that can help both of you out?
Why let a third party come in in the first place? When you can spend a bit of time proactively to make your customers happy and avoid the whole mess.
Well, you didn't say so but it sounds like your business is in a building that is owned, not rent, leased, etc. If you are rent, leasing, etc. in most cases it is the responsibility of the owner to maintain the electrical system up to code.
Electrical codes and responsibilities from state to state but the building owner is the responsibile party.
Now if you have issues with the power coming in and the main it self, in addition to have 220 or 480 service, you'll need to actually work with two people: the supply power source and an electrician.
Most areas have an Electricians Union that can be a good source for reasonable rates and a certain level of accountable for the work.
Most likely they will recommend a few solutions that might cost a bit but are good ideas (isolating the mains between voltages, power sources, etc). A good electrician will understand that you can't be without power for a prolonged amount of time and working within a budget.
It probably is not as costly as you think, depending on the building codes, etc. that you may need to follow.
You'll also have to be sure you follow any city laws that might require permits, etc.
Umm, OpenACS is GPL'd (as what ACS/TCL). They wouldn't have to bought into anything if they wanted (Open)ACS. Heck there are already OpenACS RPMS out there. As others have stated, I think the real reason behind it was the customers.
I've followed and help with OpenACS and I don't think anybody on the OpenACS project has been contacted by RedHat about anything.
Maybe RedHat bought the assets so they could move into aD's offices?:)
Actually, chapter 11 is used to project a serious debt or can even been use to project against serious (in value) lawsuits claims.
I know that USG (http://www.usg.com) filed for chap 11 (http://www.usg.com/special/) basically as protection for a class action lawsuit against serveral serveral companies (including them) for asbestos-related claims. As they were the only company that had not filed Chap 11, everybody was going have them.
Chap 11 can be used to project a company because of large debt. Allowing them to restructure and the debt and while making sure they don't increase it.
While it is true that those plans may not work. Chap 11 is designed to allow companies to attempt to corrected a large debt problem will still providing to the people we are entailed to the money.
Just because a company files Chap 11 does not mean they are doomed. It means they made stupid mistakes before and hopefully they can correct it.
If Loki is making money (minus of course the debt) then they have a good chance of continuing to move forward.
The best way I found to stop this is to always have two mail servers. One that users use that only allows SMTP AUTH to send mail and one for relaying to that server. Yes, you have two servers, but the front one only stores and forwards. You can then add a bit more checking (virus scanning, type checking, spam check) without effect your users server. Usually I sync up the user database on the bankend server to virtusers on the front end and reject anything that isn't in virtusers. The front machine my get beat on a bit, but atleast the mail that is getting through to the users is valid emails.
Then just write a script that monitors the sendmail logs of many rejects and add that IP address to your access file, blocking it of course.
The second lesson would be desgin around the process not around the tool (Okay, ties into the first, but it still is important). If you are picking the right tool then this will not really be a problem.
Writing software to accomplish a process will almost always force you to use the right tools and allow you to switch easily to a differnt tool if need be.
Coding around problems with your design choices is just a bad idea.
I think that Corel's biggest problem is itself. For as long as I can remember, the company has had some sort of finicial problem, doom seems to always be around this company. Although it does somehow manage to keep going. I'm not sure how though. One only has to look at the Netwinder to realize that his company has some serious marketing issues. The Netwinder was a good product at a reasonable price (at least when they first came out) but they never gave it the push that it need in the market area, and it has now taken a backseat just about everything else. Now that Corel has taken such an interest in the Open Source area, people are now going to attempt to plan open source on their troubles? Corel had troubles BEFORE taking on open source, I recall articles with themes of "Corel last ditch hope","Corel embracing Linux in hopes of changing Market Share", etc. Corel has and always has had, more problems then what the surface shows, I only hope the correct things before open source is given the blame. Other than that, I'll just keep running WP6.1 for dos in dosemu:)
(This comments are from my severely coffee deprived brain, so it might be wrong on a few points).
I believe DPT got stung with some of the code that was used because they got part of it from the I20 orginization and it has be be kept seperate from the kernel due to licencing issues. But, there has been quite a bit of work being done to get the I20 drivers in the kernel to run the DPT cards, and thus you wont have to use the one provided by DPT.
I haven't look into it for a while, I'll guess I'll have to revisit it now.
From his MSNBC talk, Linus stated that IRC was difficult though his company firewall. which is why he did the MSNBC chat over the phone and somebody typed for him. People have to understand that the news areas are going to goto the lowest possible level. The speaker may know IRC, but many of the people going to the site may not:)
Slashdot Mirror
Why let a third party come in in the first place? When you can spend a bit of time proactively to make your customers happy and avoid the whole mess.
Well, you didn't say so but it sounds like your business is in a building that is owned, not rent, leased, etc. If you are rent, leasing, etc. in most cases it is the responsibility of the owner to maintain the electrical system up to code.
Electrical codes and responsibilities from state to state but the building owner is the responsibile party.
Now if you have issues with the power coming in and the main it self, in addition to have 220 or 480 service, you'll need to actually work with two people: the supply power source and an electrician.
Most areas have an Electricians Union that can be a good source for reasonable rates and a certain level of accountable for the work.
Most likely they will recommend a few solutions that might cost a bit but are good ideas (isolating the mains between voltages, power sources, etc). A good electrician will understand that you can't be without power for a prolonged amount of time and working within a budget.
It probably is not as costly as you think, depending on the building codes, etc. that you may need to follow.
You'll also have to be sure you follow any city laws that might require permits, etc.
Umm, OpenACS is GPL'd (as what ACS/TCL). They wouldn't have to bought into anything if they wanted (Open)ACS. Heck there are already OpenACS RPMS out there. As others have stated, I think the real reason behind it was the customers.
:)
I've followed and help with OpenACS and I don't think anybody on the OpenACS project has been contacted by RedHat about anything.
Maybe RedHat bought the assets so they could move into aD's offices?
Actually, chapter 11 is used to project a serious debt or can even been use to project against serious (in value) lawsuits claims.
I know that USG (http://www.usg.com) filed for chap 11 (http://www.usg.com/special/) basically as protection for a class action lawsuit against serveral serveral companies (including them) for asbestos-related claims. As they were the only company that had not filed Chap 11, everybody was going have them.
Chap 11 can be used to project a company because of large debt. Allowing them to restructure and the debt and while making sure they don't increase it.
While it is true that those plans may not work. Chap 11 is designed to allow companies to attempt to corrected a large debt problem will still providing to the people we are entailed to the money.
Just because a company files Chap 11 does not mean they are doomed. It means they made stupid mistakes before and hopefully they can correct it.
If Loki is making money (minus of course the debt) then they have a good chance of continuing to move forward.
The best way I found to stop this is to always have two mail servers. One that users use that only allows SMTP AUTH to send mail and one for relaying to that server. Yes, you have two servers, but the front one only stores and forwards. You can then add a bit more checking (virus scanning, type checking, spam check) without effect your users server. Usually I sync up the user database on the bankend server to virtusers on the front end and reject anything that isn't in virtusers. The front machine my get beat on a bit, but atleast the mail that is getting through to the users is valid emails.
Then just write a script that monitors the sendmail logs of many rejects and add that IP address to your access file, blocking it of course.
Writing software to accomplish a process will almost always force you to use the right tools and allow you to switch easily to a differnt tool if need be.
Coding around problems with your design choices is just a bad idea.
I think that Corel's biggest problem is itself. For as long as I can remember, the company has had some sort of finicial problem, doom seems to always be around this company. Although it does somehow manage to keep going. I'm not sure how though. :)
One only has to look at the Netwinder to realize that his company has some serious marketing issues. The Netwinder was a good product at a reasonable price (at least when they first came out) but they never gave it the push that it need in the market area, and it has now taken a backseat just about everything else.
Now that Corel has taken such an interest in the Open Source area, people are now going to attempt to plan open source on their troubles? Corel had troubles BEFORE taking on open source, I recall articles with themes of "Corel last ditch hope","Corel embracing Linux in hopes of changing Market Share", etc.
Corel has and always has had, more problems then what the surface shows, I only hope the correct things before open source is given the blame. Other than that, I'll just keep running WP6.1 for dos in dosemu
(This comments are from my severely coffee deprived brain, so it might be wrong on a few points).
I believe DPT got stung with some of the code that was used because they got part of it from the I20 orginization and it has be be kept seperate from the kernel due to licencing issues. But, there has been quite a bit of work being done to get the I20 drivers in the kernel to run the DPT cards, and thus you wont have to use the one provided by DPT.
I haven't look into it for a while, I'll guess I'll have to revisit it now.
From his MSNBC talk, Linus stated that IRC was difficult though his company firewall. which is why he did the MSNBC chat over the phone and somebody typed for him. People have to understand that the news areas are going to goto the lowest possible level. The speaker may know IRC, but many of the people going to the site may not :)
It was always a good idea to check out LinuxHQ and read the latest Changes to see if you need to upgrade. 2.2.4 had a TCP explot fixed.