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  • What Are Managed Services?

    Managed services are the kind of services that are provided by a Managed Service Provider for the client or customer. The client in this case outsources the managed services from the service provider based on the needs of his or her organization. The client and the managed services provider can work from different locations as this is entirely an outsourced function. Managed Services Outsourcing

    The use of managed services helps organizations improve on their quality output, improve efficiency and save money. How does saving the money works? Well, quick example, if the organization outsources at least 5 managed service providers from a different location, it can still manage to reduce office space for the extra 5 people, hence saving on paying the extra rentals. Managed service providers can also not have a fixed salary, helping the company only to pay for the performed work. Managed services are common in the IT systems space. Managed Services Support

    How do managed services work?

    The managed Service Provider enters into a Service Level Agreement (SLA) with his or her client before commencing work. Unlike back in the day when managed services where offered on demand, the two parties enter into a short to medium term SLA which details how the two parties will be working together, including hours of work, the limits to what the managed service provider can do for the client and how much the client will be paying and on which terms. Managed Services Help

    An IT managed service provider agrees to, on a 24-hour basis, monitor, manage and repair any systems malfunction for the client’s organization. This responsibility is maintained continuously. The managed service provider, if it is a company, assigns a client representative for different clients. This will be the person the client will always get in touch with, in case there is a problem from their side. The client representative may, from time to time, visit the clients and discuss issues affecting their business, including how the managed service provider has been of help to the client and also helping the client identify more services they may be in need of. Managed Services Repair

     

  • Chemical Safety When Working With Them

    There are rigid legal requirements regarding the proper safety using chemicals in the workplace, and there is a good reason for this. It is vital to observe these in their entirety, mainly for the safety of the employees and staff, but also for the moral conscience and good reputation of the company. There are too many hazards to list them all separately, so find out what chemicals are used where you work, preferably before starting, and what measures are taken to ensure employee safety. Each chemical is distinctive, and every country has different laws, but even if the law does not oblige a company to take certain safety measures, that does not mean they can not do so anyway. Chemical Safety 

    With around 7 million different chemicals and an estimated 400 million tons produced each year the dangers cannot be underestimated. The truth about working with chemicals, and therefore how to protect against the dangers, is frightening. The long-term, and in some cases, even short-term, effects of many chemicals are unknown, making safety a problem, so extra measures, rather than fewer are preferable. EHS Services

    Masks, “space suits” or whatever items may prevent chemicals entering should not only be provided but should be checked and replaced regularly. A wonderful total body suit and helmet is of no use if there is even a tiny hole through which a chemical can enter, and once inside, the damage is done.

    Regular medical check-ups should be mandatory for any worker who comes into contact, however briefly, with any dangerous chemical.Employees expected to have contact with dangerous chemicals should receive sufficient training before being allowed near the chemical.It is also important that the company regularly checks for leaks or spillage. If left unattended these could do untold damage. EHS Compliance

    One important factor, often overlooked is washing. The business should provide protective clothing, which is “washed” within the company – not taken home and put in the machine with the babies clothes. Showering facilities for employees should be on-site, eliminating the risk of transporting the toxin elsewhere.

    To sum up, yes the company is responsible, but only up to the point of the law. A company may feel a moral obligation or none at all, so employees must find out for themselves what the risks are and ensure adequate measures are taken. EHS Software

  • DISASTER RECOVERY PLAN

    The outline of a disaster recovery plan is a comprehensive document or statement of
    specific actions that are to be put in place before and after, and during a disaster. The disaster or catastrophe can be of any dimension and fall into three main categories -environmental, natural and human-made. Intentional human-made disasters related to violence or terrorism; unintentional often refers to accidents like the break-up or breach of a dam, building break-down. Disaster Recovery

    With increasing dependency on IT to run their business operations, more and more companies are devising s. A Continuity of Operations Plan is in place in most business processes to help with recovering assets, data, and operational facilities.

    Objectives of Disaster Recovery Plan

    Disasters cannot always be completed avoided, but the subsequent effects can be drastically minimized with careful planning and foreseeing the consequences.
    The primary objective of a disaster recovery plan is a protection of the company’s functions total failure; in that sense, it increasingly relates to the IT end that enables the running of all systems and networks relating to the main business areas and data storage. MSP ServicesTherefore the two-fold aspects of a disaster recovery plan, in a scenario where all systems and networks fail, are:

    i. Minimize downtime of the business. ii. Reduce data loss.

    The aims to minimize disruptions, it also ensures that some stability and a level or orderly recovery can be put in place after a disaster. The two aspects mentioned above can be gauged regarding two prime concepts – Recovery Point
     

    Objective and Recovery Time Objective

    The recovery point objective is measured from the time the disaster occurs – therefore the recovery point objective starts ‘backward in time’ and is the maximum acceptable volume of information loss or data loss that can be measured in time. Simply put, it means the age of the data in back-up storage that need to be pulled out or recovered to resume normal business functions again. HIPAA Compliance

    The recovery time objective is the time measure within which a company or business must restore its function in a way so that consequences arising out of a break in business continuity are avoided. Network Services

    Benefits of disaster recovery plan.

    Though not all loss can be claimed or recovered, these benefits go a long way in restoring confidence in the workforce. 

    • Guarantees the reliability and dependability of standby systems 

    • Helps to lower a visibly stressful work environment 

    • Minimizes risks 

    • Minimizes decision making at the time of a disaster 

    • Provides a strong sense of security 

    • Provides a standard system for testing efficacy of the plan 

    • Reduces potential legal liabilities




     

     

  • Data Center Cooling – Within Your Rack – The Do’s and Dont’s

    One of the biggest issues in any high-density server environment is keeping the equipment at safe operating temperatures. This issue grows even larger when the equipment spreads from a small number of racks into the much larger numbers commonly seen in data centers. This article will address data center airflow by looking at cooling within the individual racks 

    Cooling within a rack starts with the rack itself. It’s important to have a rack that allows for good front-to-rear ventilation. That means you want a rack with perforated doors – or no doors at all – and not a rack with solid steel or glass doors. Some racks will also have fans mounted on the top that may help depending on the type of installed equipment in the rack. Once the rack has been selected, the equipment should be laid out properly within the rack. It is advisable to install larger and longer equipment near the bottom of the rack and leave the top area for the smallest devices. This helps to ensure that the upper-level equipment does not trap a pocket of hot air within the central area of the rack where it is most difficult to remove. Next, ensure that all your equipment is setup for the proper front-to-rear airflow pattern. This is usually not an issue with commercially manufactured servers, but it’s a common problem with servers that are assembled from individual components by the end user. Some network devices – notably Cisco ASA firewalls – use a “backwards” airflow pattern and should be mounted backwards in the rack to allow the proper airflow. You can think of it as “cold in the front, hot out the back” airflow. Data Center Airflow Management

    Do you still see equipment running a little too warm? Especially near the top of the rack? There are two possible solutions to this problem: First, if the problem is only near the top of the rack one of the top-mounted exhaust fan options may help. Second, if you have a lot of unused space in the rack it may help to use blank rack plates to fill any unused spaces in the front of the cabinet. Open spaces between servers can sometimes allow for hot air from the rear of the rack to recirculate into the front of the rack resulting in the equipment running hotter than it should. The old trick of leaving a space between each installed server frequently results in hotter-running servers than if they were all installed together in a solid block!  

    In the back of the rack, it’s important to ensure that the cabling does not block the airflow any more than necessary. We generally recommend to our customers that they NOT use the cable management arms that some manufacturers offer for their servers. While these arms make the servers easy to slide out for maintenance, they also severely restrict the airflow in the back of the racks resulting in much less airflow for the servers they support. Cables should be routed from the back of each server to the side of the rack and then vertically along the side of the rack.