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JANUARY 2010

EI Here and Now:
Next Generation Service Delivery

As an IT organization, we strive to provide the best possible service to our clients. We are constantly evaluating new technologies and techniques to enable our customers to stay ahead of competition and deliver more for less. We spend thousands in underlying infrastructure, application licensing and tools to ensure the quality of our delivery. Typically this infrastructure is deployed in a highly redundant data center where rarely an expense is spared. With all of this focus on the data center, have we overlooked the actual user experience from the employee perspective? After all, these employees are the sales people, customer service providers, order fulfillment agents – the true heart of our clients’ businesses and the ones who produce the revenue. Yet, we always seem to find ourselves looking to the data center.

EI is developing a new product to change this view. "Next Generation Service Delivery" (NGSD) will create a comprehensive view of "End User Experience Monitoring." With NGSD we will be able to accurately gauge the performance users receive from virtually any application. We will be able to tell when the user experiences slower than expectable application performance, hung applications or generally poor system performance. Here are some highlights:

• Provide the real-time ability to:
• Visualize the Enterprise from an application centric point of view
• Detect issues from all areas of the Enterprise:
• Desktop
• Networking infrastructure
• Application delivery systems
• Middleware
• Backend systems
• Visualize the correlation of all events and provide total user impact
• Provide "Black Box" functionality to understand chain of events
• Provide "Most Probable" cause and resolution to issues
• Decrease Time to Resolution of outages
• Pinpoint issues in minutes
• Visual representation of issue and impact
• Issues passed to the correct teams
• Drive down operational cost
• Visually understand the potential impact of a change
• Application performance evaluation
• Application usage statistics

Over the next several weeks, we will continue to review the development efforts and theory behind NGSD. We plan on rolling out this new product in the first quarter of 2011. How could this help your business?

Top 5 trends for 2011 Predictions from the CTO:
Windows 7 as a Solid Operating System

2011 will see some major trends in technology: the top five being Windows 7 as a solid operating system, Virtual Desktop Infrastructure - Improved and Ready for Prime Time, Desktop Hypervisor - a new venture right for some, Cloud Storage - as an intriguing and cost effective alternative and Mobility as it is better and faster.

Each month we will take a closer look at one of the trends to help identify and highlight the pros and cons. This month's topic is Windows 7 as a solid operating system. Let’s start by defining the components of what I feel makes a solid operating system (your definition may be slightly different):

1. Simplified User Interface; moving from one operating system (like XP or MAC OS) to another (like Windows 7) should be somewhat intuitive for the end user.
2. Application Support; broad capabilities of supporting diverse applications with expectable performance.
3. Stability; consistent up time with minimal application hangs and need for restarts
4. Recoverability and Manageability; our clients, the architect, the accountant, the HR director, and the procurement specialist are not PC technicians and we need these components to assist when something does go wrong.

Windows 7 does a good job in all of these areas, but there is always room for improvement. In this article I will step through a few examples to point out an area or two where it can be improved through real world innovation.

The Windows 7 Graphical User Interface

I am impressed by the user interface improvements made by Microsoft.

Custom Power Button

Vista changed the way the Power Button (in your start menu) acts from the way XP normally did. In Windows 7, you can customize this to your own needs (Hibernate, Sleep, Shut Down, Log off etc.).

Extended Start Menu

The extended start menu (just like the Jump Lists) needs to be programmed by the creator of the application. But when done correctly, it can be really useful to the user. It allows the user to quickly do a commonly used action, open recently used files etc.

Jump Lists

The Jump Lists can be accessed by selecting the program in the task bar and gives you the same features as the extended start menu options. Great thinking here!

(Custom) Login Screen

Even the login screen in Windows 7 looks very good (by default). But what it makes even cooler, the OS finally supports customizing the background of this login screen.

Multi Desktop Settings

Many features from Windows 7 remind me of a Mac OS. The multi desktop settings are one of numerous similarities. Although the UI of this screen isn't very impressive, the functionality is. You can drag your second desktop around making identifying it easier. This application just works as you expect it to.

These were just a few of the enhancements that I liked a lot, go to http://www.microsoft.com/windows

Windows 7 Application Support

When I first migrated to Windows 7 64 bit from XP 32 bit, I used the PC Mover application, and this seamlessly moved all of my production applications to my new Windows 7 PC.  It took about 20 minutes to copy all of my applications and data.  Once it was complete all my applications worked and all I had to do was add my License Keys and re-activate them.  

I was truly surprised at the ease of migration, Vista was much more complicated and I ended up moving back to XP after just a few months because it was just too difficult to troubleshoot every application that did not work after the migration.  

There are a few reasons why Windows 7 is more adaptable to older applications, this next section covers what I felt was most important.

Under Windows 7  64bit , 32-bit applications run on top of an emulation of a 32 bit operating system that is called Windows on Windows 64, or WOW64 for short.  WOW64 intercepts all operating system calls made by a 32 bit application.

For each operating system call made, WOW64 generates native 64 bit system calls, converting 32 bit data structures into 64 bit aligned structures. The appropriate native 64 bit system call is passed to the operating system kernel, and any output data from the 64 bit system call is converted into a format appropriate for the calling application before being passed back.

Like 32 bit applications, WOW64 runs in user mode so any errors that occur in translating an operating system call will only occur at that level. The 64 bit operating system kernel cannot be affected.

Since WOW64 runs in user mode, all 32 bit application codes must also run in user mode. This explains why 32 bit kernel mode device drivers and applications that run on 32 bit, will not work under Windows 7.

None of my applications were impacted by the move.
However not every company will be this lucky and for that purpose Microsoft has included the ability to run an XP SP3 version virtual PC integrated with your Windows 7 Operating System.

This is an add-on that your tech department can provide free from Microsoft in case one of the old apps simply will not work on Windows 7.

For most companies, Windows 7 will support your applications; however you should pilot a group before migrating everyone to be sure.

Windows 7 Stability:

9 Months and never a crash; Windows 7 is significantly more stable than previous versions, early on there were issues with Outlook 2010 stability, but Microsoft quickly released a patch and that is in the past.

In 9 months of advanced testing and use, we have not seen Windows 7 crash, we have seen some applications hang and need restarting but this has been dramatically less than with any version of XP. I am not going to say that Windows 7 cannot be crashed, just that with normal day in and day out use, it is rock solid. So we researched why and here is what Microsoft attributes the stability to:

Improving Performance

Improving operating system performance was a key focus during the development cycle of Windows 7. This focus has resulted in overall operating system improvements and the further development of features that originated with Windows Vista.

• Windows 7 64-bit. Windows 7 fully supports the 64-bit architecture processors from AMD and Intel. The 64-bit version of Windows 7 can run all 32-bit applications with the help of the WOW64 emulator. However, the kernel does not support 16-bit applications, 32-bit installers, and 32-bit kernel mode drivers. All 64-bit drivers have to be digitally signed for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 64-bit editions. Unsigned drivers are not supported and cannot be installed on 64-bit Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. The digital signature check is done during both installation and driver load time.
• Networking: TCP/IP Stack and the Windows Filtering Platform. The networking stack was completely rewritten. Instead of the dual-stack model that exists in Windows XP (to support IPv4 and IPv6), the networking stack in Windows 7 implements a new architecture in which there is a single transport and framing layer that supports multiple IP layers.
• Windows Driver Display Model (WDDM). In Windows 7, WDDM introduced a completely new display driver model that improves display driver stability in Windows. While most of the applications from earlier versions of Windows should not be impacted by WDDM, some risks include:
1. DX games compatibility, resulting in DX run-time, IHV driver, or core graphics stack issues.
2. Mobile functionality such as keyboard shortcut, clone view, brightness, and zoom due to stricter Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) requirements.
• New Low-Level Binaries. To improve engineering efficiencies and foundations for future work, Microsoft has relocated some functionality to new low-level binaries. This refactoring will make it possible for future installs of Windows to provide subsets of functionality to reduce surface area (disk and memory requirements, servicing, and attack surface).

Removing Legacy Components

• Remove Kernel-mode printer driver support. In Windows7, all printer drivers must now implement user-mode rendering components.
• Remove Direct 3D Retained Mode (D3DRM).
• Remove Windows NT LAN Manager Security Support Provider (NTLMSSSP) Service.
• Remove Network Dynamic Data Exchange (NetDDE).
• Remove Microsoft Graphical Identification and Authentication (GINA). To simplify the process of developing authentication providers, as well as to simplify combining authentication providers (including biometric authentication), Windows 7  replaced the GINA model for authentication providers and replaced it with a new Credential Provider model. The new model significantly reduces the effort required to create authentication packages.
• Remove Windows registry reflection. The registry reflection process copies registry keys and values between two registry views, to keep them synchronized. In earlier 64-bit installations of Windows, the process reflected a subset of the redirected registry keys between the 32-bit and 64-bit views. However, this implementation caused some inconsistencies in the state of the registry. As COM was the only known consumer of the feature, COM was updated to no longer depend on the functionality.

Recoverability and Manageability

                Since EI opened for business we have been focused on delivering a “Raving Fan” desk side support service; we have touched a lot of desktops since 1998.  One thing we found early on is that there are a lot of simple and recoverable issues that often get classified as hardware failure or catastrophic OS corruption requiring a reinstall of the operating system.  This is expensive and time consuming, often requiring remote users to ship the PC back to the central office for repair.  In a study EI performed of a very large environment of more than 12,000 PCs we found that 10% of service desk calls were being classified as break fix, requiring the computer to be replaced. This often required shipping the PC to a central depot for correction.  In depth analysis proved that 80% of these issues were operating system corruption and only 20% were actual hardware failure.  So what causes OS corruption?

• Bad Disk Sectors - large hard drives often have a few storage sectors fail, when they fail in an area that stores critical OS files this can cause corruption
• Viruses - some bad viruses will corrupt and OS by deleting or modifying critical files.
• Administrative Rights applied to the end user - often a poor decision on the end users part when he is provided to high of a level of access on the pc.
• Anti-virus - it is not uncommon for the AV pattern file to shut down the functionality of the PC
• Patches - untested patching has led to a lot of frustration and rework for the IT group.

These are just a few of the possible causes of a PC to stop working as it is supposed to that are not hardware related.

In a Windows 7 install there are more tools to assist with getting the PC back functioning than ever before, making it more manageable and recoverable, unfortunately in my opinion it does not go far enough.  Below is a brief description of the Tools provided with the OS, and then I am going to discuss the EI Super Image as applied to Windows 7.

These tools provide the capability to recover from many of the typical PC problems around OS corruption.  They can also provide some base level hardware diagnostics.  Some of their issues are their complexity and in most cases they require the end user or IT department to have pre-configured them early in the life of the system to be able to recover to a fix time or image. It also requires the end user to make some decisions during the power up process, such as Press F8, Select Recovery Mode etc…

It is because of the complexity from an end user perspective: remember their job is not IT Support, EI created the “Super Image” approach.   EI originally developed the Super Image for XP in 2006 and has incorporated this methodology and toolset for Windows 7 to enhance remote supportability and system recovery.  This technology approach is unique to EI and has been leveraged by our largest clients for over 4 years to great success and reduced support costs.

Meet the Team: Charlene Bates

Charlene Bates has joined EI as Director of the Shared Service Desk, in this role Charlene will lead the service desk to increased efficiency and quality service.  Over the past 20 years Charlene has held leadership positions within IT customer service organizations such as Southeast Corporate Federal Credit Union in Jacksonville and TuringSMI where she established the US Manage Service organization and directed manage service operations in Europe, APAC and their Service Desk Operation in South Africa.

Charlene is actively involved in Help Desk Institute, founded in 1989, HDI is a global membership, training, and certification association for technical support professionals.  Charlene is the Jacksonville Chapter President and will be speaking at the National Convention in March on "Service Readiness."

During her spare time Charlene enjoys spending time with her husband and remains active with local charities.

EI Promotions

Steve Bisnett has been named Operations Manager MPS/Adecco.  Since his hire in July of 2006, Steve has successfully integrated himself into multiple areas within EI including Security, Enterprise Architecture and Rayonier operations.  In his new role as Operations Manager, Steve will ensure stable operations for Adecco.

Bob Bowden will be taking a position in the Office of the CTO where he will bring his experience and knowledge across our client base to improve service delivery.

Please congratulate Steve and Bob on their new positions!