If you’re looking for a no fuss VPN solution that doesn’t include opening ports, mucking with settings or bribing your IT manager, you may want to give Hamachi a try. A friend told me about it over two years ago and I’ve been using it since that time. One advantage is has over Windows built in Remote Desktop client is that it has clients for Linux and OSX in addition to Windows.

I blogged about this product before it was purchased by LogMeIn. I can’t tell that it’s changed much over time. But it didn’t need to.

I’m not going to provide a ton of detail here because Chris Pirillo does a good job of that here.

Back in college, I worked for a janitorial supply shop as a delivery driver for a summer. I spent a lot of time delivering floor supplies to the Delta Center and churches around the area.

We also sold a high-end commercial vacuum made by Windsor called the Versamatic. These vacuums were used in each Mormon church and temple around the area and many hospitals. Of course, there were many churches and temples around the Salt Lake City area so I kept quite busy delivering new vacuums each day. Very seldom would I pick one up for repair. They are notoriously sturdy and reliable.

One time a church returned a vacuum because they wanted a newer model and I bought one for about half price. Our model retails for between $650-$850 depending on accessories.

That was back in 1992 and we are still using that same vacuum. I’ve replaced the HEPA filters several times and the bags, of course, which I’ve only been able to find online. This past year I replaced the prong end of the electrical cord. Otherwise, the vacuum runs as well as the day I brought it home. What I love most about the vacuum is that it has two motors. One for the brush and one for the pull-out hose. The hose has stronger suction than many of the vacuums found at car washes. It also lays flat on the ground making it easy to reach under beds and tables.

I’ve tried a number of really nice vacuums from Hoover, Kenmore and even the trendy Dyson. None of them are in the same league as the Versamatic. And they shouldn’t be since the Versamatic is the only commercial grade model of the lot and is priced accordingly. The Versamatic is quite heavy making it not as easy to maneuver as most vacuums. But it’s such a powerful, reliable vacuum that I can’t imagine going with another brand.

I certainly don’t want to shell out $850 for a vacuum. But if it lasts 15 years or more I consider that a bargain.

I’ve come to rely on Mahalo for those times when Google spits back too many results for me to filter. Mahalo does a great job in bringing the most relevant results to the top of the page. I also like how they keep the presentation to a minimum. It’s clean and easy to navigate.

But I noticed one major problem today: The guides that create the pages cannot be informed about every topic, and some topics will require a person who really knows the product, service or brand to understand what others will be looking for and expect in a results page.

I’ll give you an example: Find the Mahalo page for the BMW 3 Series. Granted this is a product that has many rabid fans and BMW owners are a demanding bunch. They not only understand the history and culture surrounding the car, but they will be well-versed in its competitors and community. In a nutshell, they will know more about the car than a guide at Mahalo who has never owned a BMW and is creating the page based on Google search results.

I spent less than 15 seconds looking over the Mahalo page for the 3 series and could tell you it was created by someone who doesn’t own a BMW or knows much about them. And that’s a problem, because I expect this page to have been created by someone who knows MORE (or at least as much) about the BMW 3 series than myself. Corvette, 911, GTI, WRX, S4 and a host of other enthusiast car owners will expect the same.

Under the section “BMW 3 Series Competitors” the guide has listed the Lexus ES at the top followed by the Mercedes Benz C-Class and Audi A4. When I saw this, the page lost all credibility. The ES is not a competitor to the 3 Series. But the Lexus IS 250/350 is. The first competitor that comes to mind is left off the list: The Infinity G35/G37 which isn’t listed on Mahalo yet.

Mahalo’s results are still better than a basic Google search. But I expect more. I’m sure it will improve over time. Mahalo has a “recommend a link” feature that, if utilized, will help shore up the results. I created a Squidoo lens that I feel is a lot more in tune with what a 3 series owner or researcher would be after but it took 10+ hours to create.  Some of what I have under the 3 Series Basics should be on Mahalo’s Top 7. Mahalo’s top 7 links to “Car Domain” and some guy named Danny’s tricked out 3 series. Huh? This is just sloppy work.

I will still use Mahalo, but will be watching to see if the guides really do implement user feedback into the pages. Each Mahalo page needs to be more than what anyone could slap together in an hour. Jason Calacanis and his team have been open to suggestions so I have hope this will be improved. I’ll even volunteer to update the 3 Series page for free. 🙂

One of the least favorite parts of my job is doing  the occasional laptop audit at our office. This means I have to look for illegal music and software as well as pornographic material. It’s usually pretty clear when someone has been downloading and collecting such material. We aren’t after the one of two questionable files that could show up through an unintentional pop-up banner. Yet, it never feels good going through someone’s computer even if it belongs to the company. One of the main problems with doing an audit is making sure the procedure is uniform and fair for everyone. It’s one thing to search for illegal mp3 files, but another thing to look through someone’s browser cache.

Recently I read a positive review about a product called Guardware File Audit that appears to be a good solution for the way we check machines. In short, it’s a USB stick with software that checks for pornographic images, video and illegal music. Each stick costs $195 and can be used on an unlimited number of machines. So I bought two of them.

The two USB sticks arrived today and I decided to test it on my home system. I plugged one into a USB port and the drivers installed without a problem. Here is the first screen you see.

I unchecked “Music Files” because I don’t want it telling me the MP3s I trade with my brother and dad are illegal. I left everything else as is and started the scan. Everything seemed to go fine for the first minute and then it hung and popped up good ole’ Doctor Watson. I had to kill the good Doctor which killed the scanning. I tried several more times before realizing it was a single file in my Adobe folder that was causing the problem. Guardware even went so far to show a reminder screen asking that I email the suspected file which is a tiny Adobe icon graphic in .png format to them. I moved the file to my D: drive and started the scan again. About 5 minutes later it finished and presented me with a report of its findings as seen in the screen below.

 I like how it presents the images it suspects are pornographic. All but a few of pictures it suspected were stock photos found in my Adobe directory. The first two pictures of the girl in the hat are of my 6 year old daughter. I’m not sure what they contain that triggers Guardware. As I suspected, my machine is PORN FREE!

Overall, the scan was quick and I think it will work well for our needs at work.

Just for fun, I decided to download a picture of Paris, Britney and Clay Aiken. I selected these three for the following reasons: 

Paris is showing her newfound cleavage but otherwise she’d look at home in a Land’s End catalog. Britney needs to pull up her pants and put on a shirt. But she’s still covered. And I chose Clay for his seductive pose. Guardware says they check for this stuff so maybe Clay’s pose is just too over the top to pass the audit.

I started the scan like I did before and about four minutes later I was presented with the following results which gave me a good laugh. (Click image to enlarge)
 So it’s now clear that Guardware heavily weighs a person’s posture in determining what items to flag. It’s so certain that Clay is porn that he’s flagged 22 times! Paris only gets flagged 6 times and Britney minus her shirt but plenty of plumbers crack doesn’t show up once in the results. Could it be she’s not flagged because the picture is black and white?

I’m not sure what to make of these results, but I’ll bet Britney would be really bummed about them.