In the past, if a customer had a severe enough issue that we couldn’t fix remotely, they would be forced to send us their hard drive (or even their entire server) so we could fix the problem in our lab. This takes days depending on shipping times and severity of the problem.
And then there is the worry “When was my last good backup to DVD?”.
Is your data safe? Are you prepared should disaster strike? In addition to the local DVD or tape backup in your server we now offer an off-site cloud based backup service. To learn more about keeping your data safe in the clouds give this PDF a click.
Ingredients1 cup chopped onion
2 teaspoons chopped fresh oregano
5 garlic cloves, minced
3 cups chopped yellow squash
3 cups chopped zucchini
1 cup chopped carrot
1 cup fresh corn kernels (about 2 ears)
4 cups chopped tomato, divided
3 (14-ounce) cans low-sodium vegetable broth, divided
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup uncooked ditalini pasta (very short tube-shaped macaroni)
1 (15.5-ounce) can Great Northern beans, rinsed and drained
1 (6-ounce) package fresh baby spinach
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
1 cup (4 ounces) grated Asiago cheese
Place 3 cups tomato and 1 can broth in a blender; process until smooth. Add tomato mixture to pan; return pan to heat. Stir in remaining 1 cup tomato, balsamic vinegar and remaining 2 cans broth; bring mixture to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer 20 minutes.
Add pasta and beans to pan; cook 10 minutes or until pasta is tender, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat. Stir in spinach, salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Ladle soup into individual bowls; top with cheese. Garnish with coarsely ground black pepper, if desired.
Nutritional Information
Amount per serving
- Serving size: 1 1/2 cups
- Calories: 217
- Calories from fat: 25%
- Fat: 6.1g
- Saturated fat: 2.7g
- Monounsaturated fat: 2g
- Polyunsaturated fat: 0.6g
- Protein: 12.6g
- Carbohydrate: 30.5g
- Fiber: 7.9g
- Cholesterol: 12mg
- Iron: 2.7mg
- Sodium: 812mg
- Calcium: 206mg
‘Tis the season for . . . Physical Inventory prep!
As we approach the New Year it’s time to tidy things up and think about physical inventory. In addition to RGIS, who SUM/IT has been integrated with for easily over a decade, we now fully support WIS International too!
Keeping on top of your physical inventory is so important (and not just for tax purposes!). It enables you to accurately order for your store thus increasing your sales! And now that you have a choice between TWO nationwide companies you can get competitive bids and pick the service that’s right for you.
We’re here to help! No matter if you choose to conduct inventory yourself or you pick a cost-effective provider like RGIS or WIS we’re happy to help you work through the process. We’ve got a ton of experience and knowledge and we’re happy to share; if you would like more information just give us a ring!
Do you enjoy sitting at the local coffee shop sipping a latte and surfing the web? What about that great WiFi you enjoy on long plane trips across country? Well then you’re not alone as millions of users do this daily – but you may not be safe either.
Hopefully you’ve heard the news about Firesheep, a free hijacking tool that makes it easy – really easy – for just about anyone in that same coffee shop to hijack your session to sites like Facebook, Tiwtter and Amazon. Essentially taking over the page you logged into just on their laptop.
And while the best answer is to skip the unsecured WiFi altogether and use technologies like VPN or a 3G modem (or both) that just isn’t a practical answer for the masses. What you can do however is install a free tool called Blacksheep to watch out specifically for Firesheep users.
Blacksheep is free to download here: http://www.zscaler.com/blacksheep.html
In search of making a “Great” recovery smoothie for after the morning workouts I came up with this recipe. Comments are encouraged – maybe someone will have an idea that will make it even better!
Ingredients:
- 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
- 1 small banana or 1/2 of a large one
- 1 scoop protein powder (I prefer Monster Milk Mocha Latte)
- 2 tablespoons Oat Bran
- 1 tablespoon wheat germ
- 1 tablespoon ground flax seed
- Ice & water to desired consistency (I use about 2 cups of ice and 1 cup of water – makes the shake very filling and re-hydrating)
- 400 calories (a good size for a post-workout breakfast substitute)
- Calorie ratio (fat:carbs:protein) 24:46:30
- 11 grams of fat (mostly dependent on the protein powder)
- 2 grams saturated fat
- 8 mg cholesterol (again from the protein powder)
- 350 mg sodium
- 50 g carbohydrates
- 11 g fiber (great!)
- 17 g sugars
- 32 g protein
- 576 iu vitamin A
- 10 mg vitamin C
- 2,000 mg calcium (twice your daily need!)
- 3 mg iron (35%)
- 2 mg vitamin B-6 (200%)
- 18 mcg vitamin B-12 (750%)
- 100 mg caffeine
- I like the Mocha Latte flavor of Monster Milk because not only does it taste great, but it contains caffeine. Caffeine helps speed glycogen recovery in the muscles and reduces soreness.
- Monster Milk is also a favorite because it has added amino acids (BCAA and L-Glutamine) – but substitute your favorite!
- Wheat Germ is added for the known benefits of increasing testosterone levels.
- Ground Flax is added for the fatty acids Omega-3 and Omega-6, lignans, and fiber.
- Oat Bran has many benefits including lowering your cholesterol. This added fiber (and the protein powder) also helps satiate your appetite for quite a while.
- Unsweetened Almond Milk has a ton of benefits and a fraction of the calories of skim milk. Yes, it’s missing the protein in skim milk – but we get enough of that from the protein powder supplement. And you body can only process about 20 – 30 grams of protein at a time, any more is just a waste of calories. Any soy milk has a lot of negative effects for guys. I like the Silk brand – only 35 calories per cup and a great texture / thickness.
- I add a good bit of water and ice. You may want to reduce this for a sweeter taste of thicker shake but I like it after a hard workout.
- If you like coffee but have a different brand / flavor of protein powder consider throwing in some instant coffee like Via from Starbucks – instant healthy frappuccino!
- Bananas are almost essential to the smoothie. They add a texture like no other fruit I know. Plus the carbs are great for glycogen recovery, not to mention the potassium, fiber and vitamin B-6.
- 400 calories is a big breakfast. Just remember breakfast should be the largest meal of the day. And the main purpose of this smoothie is post-workout recovery, not for sitting on the couch! 😉
- Change things up if it gets boring! Try adding greek yogurt, honey, berries, peanut butter, almond butter, etc.
I’ve been using Google Voice for a few months now and have grown quickly to love it. It’s got some really useful features – you can ring several phones at once (i.e. cell AND home at the same time), you can put your phone number on Do-Not-Disturb for a set amount of time, even have a different greeting for different incoming numbers or even groups of people.
But one of the things I like most is reading your voice-mail. That’s right, reading it. It comes to you as a transcribed e-mail or even a text message along with the audio file you can play too. So if you’re in an important meeting (ummm . . . or movie theater) and don’t take the call, you can still glance down at your phone and read if the the message was important. Then you can archive your voicemails for searching later on – or even forward them to someone’s e-mail. This feature alone makes Google Voice worthy of a try.
Learn more: http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=188269
Cheers,
Mike
Virtual Machines have been in the large datacenter for years now – just out of reach to the small, and even medium sized, business owner. Until now.
What is a Virtual Machine, or ‘VM’ ?
Basically, in layman’s terms, it means that one physical computer can run many operating systems all at once. So one server can run Linux, Windows XP, Solaris – all at once. Eash OS has it’s own IP address and acts like its own computer. Now make it really easy to backup and manage and you’re starting to get the idea.
So instead of having to buy one server to run your Sun Rays, one to run you SUM/IT application, and yet another Windows XP machine at your desktop, you can just buy one box to do it all. One piece of hardware to manage, one system to do it all.
The equipment to run VMware ESX and ESXi (the host software for your Virtual Machines) once only ran on expensive rackmount servers in the datacenter. But the cost of these servers is coming down drastically. Entry level servers for VMware are under $1,000 now; a nicely loaded one is right at two grand (including SAS drives and Lights Out Management).
Think about that for a second. One server in place of several. Saving you electricity, administration, money.
SUM/IT is putting these servers into prodution now. It’s exciting stuff. We place one server in your office to run Solaris and your Sun Rays, Windows desktops, the SUM/IT application, etc.
In 2012, it won’t be the the end of the Mayan Long Count that preoccupies the technology industry — it will be running out of TCP/IP version 4 addresses. Great ZDNET blog entry about IPv4 running out.
Wired for the future with Sun Ray thin clients
Pretty cool news video on a “no textbook” school. They use “hotdesking” via the student’s ID card and Sun Ray thin clients. This is the exact same technology we specialize in. So glad to see it put to such good use!
[This post is sticky ~ blog entries below]
Since 1981, SUM/IT Systems has been providing complete computer systems and I.T. services specifically for the Specialty Retailer. We write custom software specifically for ASTRA, NSSEA and other Specialty Retailers. Our custom software provides complete and accurate inventory control – from point of sale to intelligent purchasing. We load this software onto ultra-stable hardware that uses a mere fraction of the electricity of the typical PC, saving you money every day compounded over its lifetime.
Our philosophy is to build and provide tools which allow you to succeed in achieving your business goals without having to worry about your I.T. infrastructure. Meet your new I.T. department, SUM/IT Systems.
mcornelia.com 