Running A Sound IT Shop
Best Practices From
The Spiceworks IT Network
September 2008

What We’ll Cover
I. What is Spiceworks?
II. Where do these best practices come from?
III. Running a sound SMB IT Shop

What is Spiceworks?
 Spiceworks answers:
 What do I have?
 Is it all working?
 What do I have to do?
Free Network Management Software For SMB
www.spiceworks.com

Who Uses Spiceworks?
and 400,000 other SMB IT Pros...

The Value of the IT Network
 What do others like me do?
 What should I avoid?
 Will it work in my industry?
 How do I convince my boss?
 What if I don’t have the budget?

A Tour of the Community
Home Page

Spiceworks Community
 275+ Groups
 Technology,
Industry, Best
Practices, and just
for fun!

Conversations

SpiceLists

Ratings and Reviews

Running A Sound IT Shop
 Best Practices from the Spiceworks community
 Options not prescriptions
 Distilled from:
 Discussions
 Ratings and Reviews
 SpiceLists
 See for yourself and join the conversation
community.spiceworks.com

Sound SMB IT Shop
I. Setting Up Your Network
II. Setting Up Messaging
III. Maintaining Your Shop
IV. Supporting Your Users
V. Documentation

Part I: Setting Up Your Network
 Design Your Network
 Select a topology
 Select an addressing scheme
 Select a machine naming convention
 Server Rooms and Closets
 Power / HVAC / Fire Supression / Running Cable
 Connecting To The Internet
 Security
 Firewalls / VPN / User Access Control

Part I: Naming Your PCs
 Department-port number
 Roomname-number
 Asset Number
 Username + model
 Site-Device-OS-asset tag
 Airport Code - OS Type
 School type-teacher-room-id
 User Initials
 Department - Job Title

Part I: Setting Up Your Network
 Design Your Network
 Select a topology
 Select an addressing scheme
 Select a machine naming convention
 Server Rooms and Closets
 Power / HVAC / Fire Supression / Running Cable
 Connecting To The Internet
 Security
 Firewalls / VPN / User Access Control

Part I: Network Closets
How does your
network closet look?

Part I: Network Closets
We asked....

Part I: Running Cable
 Label both ends
 Number (jack #)
 Purpose (WAN / Router / AD Server, etc)
 Color code cables
 (Servers - blue, etc)
 Label Voice and Data separately

Part I: Designing A Server Room
 Raised Floor
 Proper Grounding
 Fire supression
 Physical Security
 Check door size
 Cooling
 Temperature Monitoring

Part I: Setting Up Your Network
 Design Your Network
 Select a topology
 Select an addressing scheme
 Select a machine naming convention
 Server Rooms and Closets
 Power / HVAC / Fire Supression / Running Cable
 Connecting To The Internet
 Security
 Firewalls / VPN / User Access Control

Part I: Connecting To The Internet
 Determining Capacity Needs
 Selecting an ISP
 Price / Performance / Reputation
 Service Level Agreements
 Document outages

Part I: Setting Up Your Network
 Design Your Network
 Select a topology
 Select an addressing scheme
 Select a machine naming convention
 Server Rooms and Closets
 Power / HVAC / Fire Supression / Running Cable
 Connecting To The Internet
 Security
 Firewalls / VPN / User Access Control

Part I: User Access Control
 Authentication
 Active Directory
 OpenLDAP
 User Name / Password schemes
 Policies

Part I: User Name Schemes
Plan For Growth. Avoid Problems Later
First Initial Last Name jsmith
First Initial, Middle Initial, First 5 characters of last name jhsmith
First 5 chars of last name, 2 chars of first name smithjo
First Name.Last Name John.Smith
First char of First Name First 2 chars of Last Name JSM / JS2 / JS3
Department, machine type, initials, computer # DeLaJS01

Sound SMB IT Shop
I. Setting Up Your Network
II. Setting Up Email
III. Maintaining Your Shop
IV. Supporting Your Users
V. Documentation

Part II: Setting Up Email
 Hosted vs Internal
 Email Server Software
 Anti-Spam
 Hosted vs Internal

Part II: Hosted vs Internal
 Why?
 Features
 Cost
 Why Not?
 Privacy
 Bandwidth
Buying Guide / Reviews

Part II: Setting Up Messaging
 Hosted vs Internal
 Email Server Software
 Anti-Spam
 Hosted vs Internal

Part II: Email Server Software
Popular Email Servers
 Exchange Other
26%
 MDaemon
 Lotus Notes Kerio
5%
Exchange
52%
Zimbra
 Zimbra 5%
Lotus Notes
5%
MDaemon
 Kerio 8%
 and 25 others...

Part II: Setting Up Messaging
 Hosted vs Internal
 Email Server Software
 Anti-Spam
 Hosted vs Internal

Part II: Anti-Spam Solutions
SpiceList
Buying Guide / Reviews

Sound SMB IT Shop
I. Setting Up Your Network
II. Setting Up Messaging
III. Maintaining Your Shop
IV. Supporting Your Users
V. Documentation

Part III: Maintaining Your Shop
 Backup
 Hosted vs internal backup
 Backup software
 Monitoring your network

Part III: Backup Strategy
 Select a backup strategy
 Determine systems that need protection
 Determine RTO
 Set up backup schedules
 Perform, monitor, and test backups

Part II: Online Storage
Cable Contest Submission
Product Pages / Comparisons

Part III: Maintaining Your Shop
 Hosted vs internal backup
 Backup software
 Monitoring your network

Part II: Backup Software
Favorite Backup Software
Acronis True Image
Enterprise Server
Others
26%
“Best investment we ever made, easiest and most BackupExec
reliable way to backup and restore servers or even 40%
migrate to VMware... “
EMC Retrospect
2%
CA Brightstor
JB 5%
SyncBack SE
7%
Mozy NT Backup
“Awesome for recovery and can be used for 3% Acronis 4%
incrementals to mount image to pull just one file.Easier 12%
than ghost! “
adamroof

Sound SMB IT Shop
I. Setting Up Your Network
II. Setting Up Messaging
III. Maintaining Your Shop
IV. Supporting Your Users
V. Documentation

Part IV: Supporting Your Users
 Why Use A Help Desk?
 Centralized
 Communication
 Reporting
 How Do You Get Your Users To Use A Help Desk!

Part IV: Help Desk Adoption
 Create shortcuts and bookmarks
 Priority for help desk tickets
 New user orientation
 Management support
 Tough Love

User Avoidance Techniques

Sound SMB IT Shop
I. Setting Up Your Network
II. Setting Up Messaging
III. Maintaining Your Shop
IV. Supporting Your Users
V. Documentation

Part V: Documentation
 Developing a Runbook
 How everything works on your network
 Keep it up to date
 Version control
 Keep it secure

Part V: Documentation

Join The Conversation
community.spiceworks.com