Vermyndax’s Lair

Like others, I was having mucho trouble getting Back to my Mac working. I’m happy to say that now it works pretty reliably on many networks that I’ve tried to connect from.

I should start by saying that I do have one of the Apple-recommended routers at home… to be more specific, I have an Apple Airport Extreme 802.11n.

Since I have this router and it supports the NAT-UPnP that is needed for my home tower to open the ports, I didn’t have to do any specific forwarding. However, I did have something going on that was foiling it quite well. I had port 443 opened and forwarding to a Linux server on the local network. Turns out, that’s one of the ports that BtmM wants to use - 443/tcp and 4500/udp, to be specific. I took off the specific port mapping for 443 and it was all about the authentication at that point.

That did get me thinking though. For some multitudes of broadband users, BtmM probably won’t function. Apparently, BtmM uses 443/tcp to handshake and then negotiate the connections with your .Mac password. That’s fine, but what about all of those ISPs that block well-known web ports like 80 and 443?

That’ll pose a problem. So if you’re on an ISP that likes to do something like that, there’s a good chance that BtmM will not work for you. If you’re not in that boat, try the following:

- Make sure you have an Apple-branded router (or Apple recommended)
- Make sure you’re not using port 443 for something on your home network (or 4500/udp for that matter)
- Make sure UPnP is enabled on your router
- Make sure all computers involved are on OS X 10.5.2 or higher
- Make sure all routers are on the latest firmware
- Make sure your authentication is set up properly. On my laptop, my username is different than what I use on the tower at home. Therefore, initial connections fail because after using .Mac to authenticate, then it wants to use the local username of the machine you’re connecting to. Make sure your keychain agrees with that.

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There’s one thing that’s been on my mind recently. I’m sure you’re familiar with the news that Apple has been delivering Safari by default to Windows users with iTunes installed. I think just about everyone agrees that this is committing a fairly heinous crime against your users, but let’s analyze a different take on this.

Back in June of 2007, Steve Jobs declared his intention to get “the best browser in the world” on as many Windows PC’s as he could. This declaration was reinforced at Macworld 2008 in January of this year. Mr. Jobs was hell bent on gaining market share with his browser on both major platforms. He wants that market share like, uhh, well, now.

One has to wonder if perhaps that market share just isn’t happening like he wanted. Perhaps that’s what led up to Apple making the nuclear decision to install it by default on the next iTunes update. I know that subsequently, I’ve seen many Windows PCs with Safari installed and yeah, I’ve even heard Windows users trying it out. Some like it, some don’t. That’s beside the point. It was a Bad Idea ™ for Apple to force it down their throats, hypocrisy and all… but that’s not why I’m here.

I’m here in this article because you see, I don’t get it.

I absolutely, positively do not understand the browser wars. In the day and age where Internet Explorer was not standards compliant a-tall, sure that made a difference because webmasters bent the standards to their whim to the browser with the largest market. Now that Microsoft has “seen the light” and intend to go as fully standards-compliant as possible in IE8, why do the browser wars matter?

Firefox is pretty standards compliant. Safari is very standards compliant. IE is going to be.

So why does it matter anymore?

Market share for browsers is not the real battle - it’s the desktop and the ecosystem, which of course, starts in the home. But the browser wars just do not have a point that I can gather at all.

Therefore, I’d like you, dear reader, to explain it to me.

Technorati Tags:
Browser, Mac, Microsoft, Web, Internet Explorer, Safari, Firefox

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Some of the #morphixers may find this hard to believe, but I’m not going to defend Apple on this latest round of controversy.

Trying to sell your browser by suddenly including it in the newest autoupdate procedure for Windows users was a bad move. It reeks of that “unfriendly neighbor” feel like Microsoft forcing IE4 down your throat (remember those days?) I understand the idea and the approach. It would have been one thing to make it available - checking the box by default is another thing altogether.

I will tell you this, though; if my stepfather is any measure of success, the ploy worked on him. He blindly clicked through the dialogue and ended up with Safari on his system. Curious, he decided to give it a go. He wasn’t too impressed, though.

I was never sure that using Safari as the ambassador to Mac technology was a good idea. Safari takes a very minimalist approach to web browsing, which I (and many others) like quite a bit. However, Windows users are not known to minimalist and I doubt will see the merits of that approach. Instead, I would suspect they would see it as a featureless, bland piece of software that has now squirmed its way onto the system. The deal sealer for Mac technology has always been the OS itself, not the squeaky-clean apps that run on it. Let them put OS X in a box and I’d bet you’d start to see different results.

I agree with all of the statements that the pundits are making… it’s unfair to expect a user to keep up with a piece of software they were not necessarily aware had gotten onto their system… gives it another attack vector, etc. etc. Safari isn’t the most insecure thing on the planet, but still, installing software in a sneaky, snarky way like this is just not the right thing to do.

One day, I’ll write an article about how I just don’t understand the browser wars anyway.

Pull it back, Apple, before your black eye gets larger.

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Do your users try to get through the day with Entourage 2004 or Entourage 2008? (Believe me when I say “get through the day.”) Do you have your domain controllers locked away behind a VPN? Are your users depressed that they cannot access GAL information from outside your iron curtain?

E’rage users should feel less enraged with this interesting Applescript. This little guy makes a shortcut key available that will use Outlook Web Access to query your GAL and return information. It was pointed out to us by a Microsoft engineer. They did not verify that it worked with Exchange 2007, but I can tell you that it does function with Entourage 2008 with Exchange 2007.

The only downside to the script that I can find thus far is PKI. If you use your Active Directory to publish PKI certificates for users, this script will not see/use them. If you need PKI functionality with directory lookup, you still need to be able to talk to that global catalog/domain controller.

Still, it’s nice to have a backup when the global catalog is taking its sweet American time to process your lookup…

Technorati Tags:
Entourage 2004, Mac, Microsoft, Office, Entourage 2008

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Once again, the iPhone rules the press with a heavy dollop of enticing news.

There’s a lot here on the surface and a lot below the surface. Let’s scratch the surface first.

The announcements about Apple licensing ActiveSync are interesting. There was lots of speculation in this regard and greetz to those who called it. I myself lost a bet. I was thinking that Apple might actually thumb their nose at ActiveSync and employ webdav for Exchange 2003 (much like Entourage) or web services for Exchange 2007. Of course, that would not be a quick route to policy controls on the device itself (i.e. remote kill), so ActiveSync makes the most business sense both in time and money. It’s a good investment. I was just hoping they wouldn’t just… well, because.

But they did. Let’s analyze what this brings:

- Sync with email (effectively push email, but it’s not TRULY push email… ActiveSync, even on Windows Mobile, IS NOT PUSH EMAIL. It just appears that way).

- Sync with contacts

- Sync with calendars

- NOTICEABLY ABSENT: sync with tasks

- Policy control over device. The You Had Me At EHLO blog states that this is about at the Exchange 2003 SP2 level of device control, which means it’s not as feature rich as the Blackberry, but a good starting point.

Other items of note for enterprises:

- Cisco IPSEC and VPN clients

- Two-factor authentication

What’s missing? Well, you saw me point out that task syncing is missing… Merlin Mann is likely pissing himself right about now over that. But I noticed today that there were no federal government folks present and… here’s the bad news for those federal workers… Jobs never mentioned encryption of data at rest. Thanks to an OMB directive, encryption of data at rest is a requirement for a mobile device on a federal government network. Guess what device is the only one to meet that requirement?

If you’re thinking of a berry in the color of night, you’d be right.

You’d also be right if you’re thinking of the next version of Windows Mobile… 6.1, I believe they call it. Last I remember, that also had encryption of data at rest.

So unfortunately, this may leave the iPhone out of the federal government networks for a little while longer. Perhaps it’s an oversight that it wasn’t mentioned - but I’m betting that it was left out deliberately.

All in all, I wasn’t crazy about the iPhone before but I certainly am now. The fact that they’ve really turned it into a platform with an ecosystem makes this very, very exciting. One of the challenges of the OS X platform was the lack of an ecosystem. Now with OS X advances, the freely-available Xcode and now the freely-available iPhone SDK, Apple stands to really rock the world with an ecosystem that could quickly rival Microsoft.

To make sure they’re shaking things up, there’s that iFund thing. What a fantastic idea. Folks, when was the last time Microsoft paid you to develop applications for their platform? If you want to get into the Microsoft developmental mafia, you’re likely looking at an MSDN subscription ($2500 or so the first year, $1500 each year afterwards… PER SEAT!)… you’re looking at heavy software licensing costs and hell, they don’t even distribute the application or updates for you.

Apple is not only making the price of entry into their ecosystem dirt cheap ($99), the development software is free and they will distribute your applications/updates. Folks, this is a hell of a deal and I’m betting there are small businesses and garage developers everywhere getting excited about this.

I really, really think Microsoft is in trouble on many fronts. It’s going to be hard to stop this kind of excitement. I don’t even intend to develop apps for the iPhone or the Mac and I’m excited.

Truly, there was an earthquake today in California. It may have been a subtle earthquake for some, but I felt it quite strong here on the other side of the states. I’m excited about computing again - and that’s something to cheer about.

Technorati Tags:
Apple, Mac, OS X, iPhone

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Full text of MSFT e-Mail: Microsoft execs on Vista problems: “Full text: Microsoft execs on Vista problems
A federal judge today unsealed internal Microsoft e-mails that have been used to support the plaintiffs’ case in the lawsuit over the ‘Windows Vista Capable’ program. Snippets were previously read aloud in court, but the full messages go further to reveal extensive hand-wringing, at the highest levels of the [...]“

(Via Dvorak Uncensored.)

It just occurred to me, while reading Mr. Dvorak’s post, that there’s a possibility that Intel specifically torpedoed Microsoft and Vista over the past few years to turn the tide in favor of Apple.

I’m not one to actually apply paranoid-style conspiracy theories, but this just came to mind. You could quite easily take these emails, examine Intel’s past actions, combine them with Vista and Apple timelines and it certainly seems quite suspicious.

While discussing this with a co-worker, he had a brilliant observation. “Microsoft and Intel are like the two parents who should have divorced long ago, but stayed together for the kids.”

Indeed.

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Apple, Mac, Microsoft, Intel

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Here’s a late night pondering for you as I traipse off to bed.

Ask yourself: does the subject matter of a blog control what browser share you’re likely to experience on your site?

Given the stats that I’m getting, I can say (without much of a doubt) that yes, that’s true…

#	#reqs	#pages	browser
1	5132	2910	Firefox
 	4002	1992	  Firefox/2
 	986	837	  Firefox/3
 	144	81	  Firefox/1
2	2535	2189	Safari
 	2534	2188	  Safari/523
 	1	1	  Safari/417
3	1750	973	MSIE
 	705	478	  MSIE/6
 	978	428	  MSIE/7
 	67	67	  MSIE/5

Eh. Just interesting is all.

Once again, I’ve stayed up far, far too late. Someone shoot me so I can get some sleep, please?

Technorati Tags:
Web, Browser

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iTWire - From Windows to Linux - and back again

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again… the battle for the corporate desktop is fought at home. Microsoft has known this for a long time - Apple knows it too. That’s why Apple is sneaking up on Microsoft and they’re just not paying attention. They’re too busy mucking around in other businesses that they don’t belong in instead of focusing on the real business (operating systems, servers and Office).

The be-everything-to-everyone will kill you, Microsoft.

While we’re there, let’s raise a glass to them over the Yahoo purchase. When did Yahoo start making a competing operating system? Oh, that’s right, they don’t. This plays into Microsoft’s search and advertising obsession. Or, as one might call it, the slay Google obsession. Yeah, silly me. The more they diversify, the weaker the products get. When it affects your core business (like it has with Vista), you’re really sliding down the slippery slope.

Oh yeah… and hello, how are ya? Thought you might like a helping of opinion to start your Wednesday.

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I’m really enjoying the new setup - especially the part where I get to blow money on stuff like a USB headset mic… printers… bleh, stuff like that. This has been a good setup. This Mac Pro screams. It’s by far the most elegant computer I’ve ever come into contact with.

I’m starting to get a little disappointed in the Canon PIXMA MX700 though. For some odd reason, it keeps thinking the genuine Canon magenta cartridge is not recognizable and refuses to print anything. Okie, why have a printer if it won’t print anything? It’s starting to get on my nerves. I see some people have the same problem, so I’m trying some web solutions.

In other news, I almost bought a Logitech Quickcam 9000, but I wanted to make sure it was fully working under OS X with all of the little fun proggies that come with it. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look that way, so I’m holding off until Apple releases an updated camera of some kind. They should, right?

Also I’m not so sure I’m getting used to how small this wireless keyboard is… when you take my prodigious tummy and sit in front of it, trying to work around my rotund figure to meet the dimensions of the little, thin wireless board to type on starts to become a challenge…

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I’m in awe of the raw processing power of this Mac Pro. Really. I’m even going to see how it handles Vista.

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