Alexander’s Blog

NextGov has reported on the security issue that concerns not just the folks at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) but all of us who pay taxes in the U.S.

“The Internal Revenue Service found more than 1,000 unauthorized Web servers connected to its networks, leaving the agency’s systems open to hackers, according to a report released on Thursday by the IRS inspector general.

In September 2007, the IRS Computer Security Incident Response Center scanned the agency’s Web servers and identified 2,093 that had at least one security vulnerability. When the center matched those servers to the IRS database of registered Web sites and servers, an inventory of systems that the agency uses to perform security maintenance and apply patches, it found 1,811, or 87 percent, were not listed in the database.

Of the unregistered servers, the IRS identified 661 that were used for legitimate agency business, leaving 1,150 servers being used for potentially unauthorized activity, according to the report.”

Read the entire story here.

If you’ve configured your SharePoint site with a specific URL (host header), e.g. http://webportal and then later decided that you want to change it to another URL, such as sharepoint.seattlepro.com, you can use the Alternate Access Mapping feature of Microsoft Office SharePoint  Server (MOSS) 2007. Here’s how.

1. Start SharePoint 3.0 Central Administration.

2. Click on the Operations tab.

3. Under Global Configuration section click on Alternate access mappings.

4. Click on Show All in the upper right-hand corner and then click on Change Alternate Access Mapping Collection.

5. From Select An Alternate Access Mapping Collection window, click the URL that you would like to change, e.g. http://webportal.

6. Click Edit Public URLs.

7. Change the URL listed in the Default box to the one you want. For example, change it from http://webportal to http://sharepoint.seattlepro.com.

8. Click Save.

9. The next step is to update the information in Internet Information Services (IIS). Start IIS Manager. In our example, we will assume you are running IIS 7.

10. Highlight the Web site whose URL you want to change.

11. In the Actions pane click Bindings (or right-click the Web site and select Edit Bindings).

12. Highlight the entry in the Edit Site Binding window and then click Edit.

13. In the Host Name box enter the new URL that you would like to use. For example, sharepoint.seattlepro.com.

14. Click OK, then click Close.

15. Go to the command prompt and run iisreset to restart Internet services.

16. You should now be able to use the new host header and access the site with the new URL (e.g. http://sharepoint.seattlepro.com).

NOTE: If your Web site needs to be accessible from the Internet and you are using Microsoft ISA Server, or another firewall, you need to make sure that you update the DNS server and the ISA Server rule that allows you to access the Web site from the external network. For example, you need to add a host record for sharepoint.seattlepro.com in a DNS server that is accessible from the Internet and add the URL sharepoint.seattlepro.com on the Public Name tab of the ISA Server rule that is publishing the Web site.

Using Alernate Access Mapping to Configure a Different URL for Internal Use

If you want to use a different URL for the intranet site internally (e.g. http//intranet), you can add that URL in step 6. On the Alternate Access Mappings page, instead of clicking on Edit Public URLs, click on the link Add Internal URLs. In the Add Internal URL box type the URL that you want to add, e.g. http://intranet, then click Save. You still need to go to IIS Manager and in step 13 add a Site Binding for intranet. Your site bindings will look like this.  Notice that you don’t need to type http:// in the Host Name box. Simply type the host header that you want to use (in our case its intranet).

Make sure you don’t forget step 15 after modifying the bindings. That’s it. Now your users can access the intranet site internally by typing http://intranet and externally by typing http://intranet.seattlepro.com.

This is one of many examples of how Alternate Access Mappings can be used in MOSS 2007. It demonstrates how the end user may type a different URL to access the site then the URL that is received by the Internet Information Services (IIS). With Alternate Access Mapping you can also associate multiple internal URLs with a single public URL, using one of 5 different authentication zones: Default, Intranet, Internet, Custom, and Extranet.

It’s no surprise that Microsoft is working hard on improving its search services. They’ve got loads of information on TechNet and MSDN sites that is searched by thousands of people each day. I heard that Microsoft has been working on its search for some time now so I figured it’s worth checking out. So, for the past 10 days I decided to use TechNet Search & MSDN Search exclusively to see if they are any good. Here’s what I discovered.

First of all, I should point out that both TechNet Search and MSDN Search are powered by Microsoft’s Live Search. However, that doesn’t mean that you should expect the same results from all three. They may be powered by the same engine but depending on which of the three searches (Live, TechNet, or MSDN) you use, the results you get are very different. Live Search results are more generic in nature, while TechNet and MSDN Search results are more targeted.

To prove this point do a search on a topic, for example Web Management Service on Live Search, TechNet Search, and MSDN Search. You’ll see exactly what I mean. Now, one might expect Microsoft to do a better job at searching their own Web site but that has not always been the case so people are naturally suspicious when it comes to using Microsoft’s search engine. Even the folks at Microsoft, at least in the past, have been using Google as their primary search engine. But that might be changing now. Microsoft has made some major enhancements in its search engine and I thought I should definitely take a closer look.

I decided to give TechNet/MSDN Search a try with an open mind. As I mentioned, I have been using it for the past 10 days and I must admit that I am impressed enough that I have added TechNet/MSDN Search to my primary browser (Mozilla’s Firefox).

Adding TechNet/MSDN Search to Your Browser

You can add TechNet/MSDN Search to your Internet Explorer browser by clicking on the link Get our search on either TechNet Search or MSDN Search page. You could also use the drop-down box in the upper right hand corner but using the Get our search link is much quicker. The TechNet Search is shown in the screen shot below. You will be given the option to make TechNet Search your default search by checking a box. Unlike other vendors, like Apple, who forces you to install iTunes, even if you were only interested in installing QuickTime, Microsoft was kind enough to let us decide what we want to do……simply add the search or add it and make it the default.

If you are using a Firefox browser, go to TechNet Search or MSDN Search page and then click on the drop-down button in the upper right-hand corner. You will see the option Add “Search Msdn”, as shown below. Don’t forget to first go to the Search page or else you will not see TechNet or MSDN listed in the drop-down box.

Cool Features

I discovered several nice things about TechNet/MSDN Search that are worth mentioning. You have the ability to refine the search by topic or source, which I really like. The auto complete is yet another useful feature (Google refers to this feature as Suggestions). I am also pleased with the overall speed at which TechNet Search displays the results. However, compared to Google I believe Microsoft is slightly behind in this aspect, but not by much. The lack of ads is another major reason why I decided to make TechNet/MSDN Search my preferred search for Microsoft-related topics. Do I prefer Live Search over Google? No! Not yet at least. Do I like TechNet/MSDN Search enough to use it and to recommend it to my students and other colleagues for Microsoft-related searches? Absolutely!

Room For Improvement

There is definitely room for improvement. The refinements could use some refinement. Autocomplete is good but needs to get better. The areas that Microsoft needs to work on the most to become a serious player in the search business are quality/relevance of hits and speed. One thing that I would like TechNet/MSDN Search to do is to offer better hits when searching for error messages. Unfortunately, when I used Event Viewer error messages in my search the results were disappointing. Another thing I would like Microsoft to improve upon is that the Search needs to be more forgiving and flexible. I discovered that unless you type the words in a way Microsoft Search expects, you may not get good results.

Let’s look at some specific examples. While working at a client’s site, I used copy and paste to search for an Event Viewer error message “Security policies were propagated with warning. 0×57:The parameter is incorrect.” TechNet Search found no results, while Google had dozens of hits and I found the answer on the very first page. At another time I was searching to find an answer with an issue in Exchange Server 2003. I typed “Exchange 2003 last logon by field”. TechNet Search had 49 hits but none of them were really relevant because I didn’t use the words “logged on by.” The first two hits on Google were pertinent. But when I typed the words “Last logged on by”, Google came up with several hits and the hits were okay but TechNet’s search results were excellent with far better results. That’s what I mean by TechNet Search not being too forgiving. Hopefully, over time these issues can be corrected.

One of the major challenges that Microsoft faces is to convince the general public that Microsoft’s Search is a viable contender in the industry and therefore it deserves a serious consideration. TechNet and MSDN’s enhanced search is a good place to start.

NOTE: TechNet/MSDN Search is designed to search information only on Microsoft’s Web sites and therefore ideal for searching only Microsoft-related technical data. You might want to keep that in mind when you compare it to Google or other search engines. If you want to search the entire Internet, Microsoft offers Live Search as an alternative to Google and Yahoo.

Conclusion

Overall, I am quite impressed by Microsoft’s efforts to enhance TechNet/MSDN Search. There are several reasons why I find TechNet/MSDN Search more appealing than Google for Microsoft-related topics.

Among other things, TechNet/MSDN Search:

- Has a cleaner look and feel
- Is fairly fast (but could use some improvement)
- Is very readable
- Is quite easy to use
- Contains links for the next page(s) on top (in addition to the bottom)
- Lets you refine searches by topic or by source……very cool!
- Let’s you add RSS feed with one click of an RSS feed button
- Unlike Google, no distracting ads plastered on the search result pages

Obviously, at this stage I haven’t used TechNet/MSDN Search for very long and my findings are based on a relatively short time frame of experience but here’s what I find very interesting. When Microsoft gets serious about something, watch out! There are numerous examples that can be cited. Internet Explorer was not a serious contender in the days before the browser war began. Netscape, the only player in town at one time, is now only mentioned in the history books. Why? Because Microsoft got serious about its browser.

Going back even further in time, Microsoft had hoped that NetBEUI would be the protocol of choice for everyone. When the rest of the world didn’t like Microsoft’s idea and TCP/IP also became the protocol of choice for the Internet, Microsoft got serious and made tremendous improvements to the TCP/IP protocol suite. Since then perhaps Microsoft has made more improvements to the TCP/IP stack than anyone else in the industry. It’s this “getting serious” business that should be noticed. Sure, there are other signs that you can point to (like efforts to acquire Yahoo) that one might think that Microsoft is willing to invest heavily to compete with Google in the search war. But it’s what Microsoft has done with the TechNet/MSDN Search that makes me want to believe more that Microsoft is really getting serious about this search business. Talk is cheap, actions speak louder. And that is bad news for Google.

Okay, so you know all about World Wide Web (WWW) or else you won’t be reading my blog but have you heard about World Wide Telescope (WWT) from Microsoft Research? Microsoft defines WWT as “a Web 2.0 visualization software environment that enables your computer to function as a virtual telescope—bringing together imagery from the best ground and space-based telescopes in the world for a seamless exploration of the universe.”

WWT is a single Web-based program that connects to data residing on multiple servers across the Internet and presents it in a seamless, interactive way. There are lots of things you can do in this application. To get started you might want to take advantage of one of the many guided tours. While you are in the tour you can pause the tour and come back later to rejoin where you left off.

Microsoft is providing WWT as a free resource to the astronomy and education communities. Click here to access the WWT homepage then click on the Download icon in the upper right hand corner, or you can click on the Experience It link to get to the Download link. If you are into astronomy, you’ll absolutely love WWT.

TIPS

1. You must use a browser that has JavaScript enabled (such as Internet Explorer) and the Adobe Flash Player plug-in installed. If you don’t have the Flash Player installed you will have the option to download it when you access the WWT homepage.

2. Once the application is installed you can access it in Windows Vista under All Programs, Microsoft Research.

3. Use the mouse to navigate around the galaxy by clicking and dragging. For example, if you view earth, you can click and drag to spin the earth until you get where you want then use your wheel mouse to quickly zoom in or zoom out.

4. If you are an advanced user and want to select one of the many telescopes, you must download and install the 5MB ASCOM platform and a telescope driver to control your telescope. The ASCOM Initiative is a loosely-knit group of astronomy software developers and astronomy device manufacturers devoted to vendor-independent plug-and-play control.

NOTE: I noticed that on my Internet Explorer page the page freezes after 99% content is loaded. I have to hit the refresh key (F5) to get it to 100% and access the Web site. The application is pretty buggy and don’t be surprised if WWT application crashes and you can’t get out of it. In that case run Task Manager (CTRL-SHIFT-ESC) and on the Processes tab kill the process WWTExplorer.

Google, the world’s most popular search engine, has quietly deleted more than 100 controversial sites from some search result listings. Absent from Google’s French and German listings are Web sites that are anti-Semitic, pro-Nazi or related to white supremacy, according to a new report from Harvard University’s Berkman Center. Also banned is Jesus-is-lord.com, a fundamentalist Christian site that is adamantly opposed to abortion.

Google confirmed on Wednesday that the sites had been removed from listings available at Google.fr and Google.de. The removed sites continue to appear in listings on the main Google.com site.

The Harvard report, prepared by law student Ben Edelman and assistant professor Jonathan Zittrain, and scheduled to be released Thursday, is the result of automated testing of Google’s massive 2.5 billion-page index and a comparison of the results returned by different foreign-language versions. The duo found 113 excluded sites, most with racial overtones.

“To avoid legal liability, we remove sites from Google.de search results pages that may conflict with German law,” said Google spokesman Nate Tyler. He indicated that each site that was delisted came after a specific complaint from a foreign government.

German law considers the publication of Holocaust denials and similar material as an incitement of racial and ethnic hatred, and therefore illegal. In the past, Germany has ordered Internet providers to block access to U.S. Web sites that post revisionist literature.

France has similar laws that allowed a students’ antiracism group to successfully sue Yahoo in a Paris court for allowing Third Reich memorabilia and Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” to be sold on the company’s auction sites. In November 2001, a U.S. judge ruled that the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech protects Yahoo from liability.

Google’s battles
The Harvard report comes as Google is becoming increasingly embroiled in international political disputes over copyright and censorship. China blocked access to Google last month.

Google was criticized in March for bowing to a demand from the Church of Scientology to delete critical sites from its index. In a response that won praise, Google replied by pledging to report future legal threats to the ChillingEffects.org site run by law school clinics.

As Google has become the way more and more people find information on the Internet, it has also become an increasingly visible target for copyright complaints about cached information and allegedly infringing links. ChillingEffect.org’s Google section lists 16 requests or legal threats the company has received in the past three months. One Google competitor and critic even suggested that the wildly popular search engine be transformed into a government-controlled “public utility.”

Check out the complete article and Google’s response here.