@scottalanmiller said in Copper Termination Standards - CompTIA Network+ N10-007 Prof. Messer:

@jmoore said in Copper Termination Standards - CompTIA Network+ N10-007 Prof. Messer:

@scottalanmiller said in Copper Termination Standards - CompTIA Network+ N10-007 Prof. Messer:

@Pete-S said in Copper Termination Standards - CompTIA Network+ N10-007 Prof. Messer:

Company issued cell phones.

That's insanely expensive and very few employees are willing today to have two cell phones, it's awkward. That was a 2004 era experiment that failed pretty quickly once every employee already owned a smart phone.

Sadly, again, most of us are required to have two cell phones.

Yeah, but you don't work for a business and everyone in IT is actively using their positions to siphon public taxes into the hands of private companies so that those companies can give them kickbacks. That a public institution does it, implies a business would not

lol

@marcinozga said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@gjacobse said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@jmoore said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@gjacobse said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@jmoore said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@jmoore said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

One thing I found about portable apps is occasionally a smarter user will install these. Yeah, it gets around our permissions in Ad because they do not modify the registry. so I do not like them for that reason. I can't have users installing whatever they want.

Something else you can do to make chocolatey easier to install in multiple places is use an xml file with the apps you want for yourself or for departments. I made one for myself but I really don't use it, however I have one for a few different departments here because they some specific things and its hard to remember the install names on each. So I just carry them around on a flash drive.

I'm curious on how you set this up,.. I know I have just been using a simple batch file once the core is installed.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
    <packages>
      <package id="googlechrome" />
	  <package id="firefoxesr" />
	  <package id="flashplayerplugin" />
	  <package id="adobereader" />
	  <package id="jre8" />
	  <package id="7zip.install" />
	  <package id="vlc" />
	  <package id="powershell" />
	  <package id="silverlight" />
	  <package id="quicktime" />
	  <package id="irfanview" />
	  <package id="treesizefree" />
	  <package id="windirstat" />
	  <package id="crystaldiskinfo" />
	  </packages>
</xml>

this file is called staff.config
Then i just use:

choco install d:\packages.config –y

I'll have to give that a try on my next build. neat way to address the install.

Why not utilize proper configuration management tool for that? Ansible for example works very well with Chocolatey. The above approach might sound cool, but to me it's more of a stone age way.

Not approved here. However i can use powershell all I want.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

Right, but does HR know that your manager is a rogue security risk in the org actively working to undermine the CEO and the organization as a whole?

Well the highest HR position is called a director of HR and lower than our VP of IT so she powerless in that situation. I disagree with this model entirely also, our VP's have too much power over other departments.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

The temptation to try to rationalize our employers and assume that they are somehow acting correctly in a way we can't quite explain is dangerous, because rarely is that true but we can mislead ourselves dramatically if we are not careful.

I agree and I am as guilty of this as anyone, especially in the past when I had less experience. As I gain experience I am learning to evaluate things better little by little.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

his employers know nothing of IT at any level, and if he learned to react to every word out of their mouths as gibberish, and then researched to find out what is true, he'd move a lot faster

Yes i do take everything with a grain of salt. I was originally told we did not have a way to scan for rogue apps on our systems. Yet, I found a way to do it through wmic in powershell. I found that incredulous so researched it myself at home and found a solution quickly. After I presented it, she just said "good for you" and nothing more said of it.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

From a CEO / owner perspective, this is a huge security risk having a system admin that is willing to act this way, as you can imagine. Put yourself in the CEO's shoes... you task HR with keeping employees happy, and one lone rogue actor in IT decides that he doesn't appreciate the CEO and HR's decisions and takes it on himself to punish employees. OMG!!!

i agree totally. All these things you have mentioned have been the foundations of my complaints for years now. I just didn't voice them. I also agree it looks bad on me that I have stayed so long. I kept hoping I would be rewarded for loyalty and putting up with things. Bad logic, I know.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

If this was my company, and IT was attempting to sabotage employee relationships by attempting to seize HR's job and deciding unilaterally that the business wasn't allowed to make decisions and only a system admin in the middle of the IT stack was to run the company, you can bet we'd not look on it well.

Its not just the admin, its the vp too. I get put in all kinds of uncomfortable situations because of this.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

If any other user did this, IT would demand action against them. Right?

Well, I have never seen that happen either and there have certainly been situations where it should have happened.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

There is never a connection from "HR did X, so IT has to make up for it by doing Y". As an IT pro, that thought should never enter your head. This is what we call "AJ Syndrome", where someone in IT decided that "the CEO is a fool and I should seize control of the company by force, to protect them from themselves." It's never a good idea.

I understand what your saying and I agree. I am not trying to make any connection, I am just following orders. I feel like a Nazi now:(

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

That's incorrect. Whoever HR deals with them is how HR deals with them. What is "proper" is defined by HR. If HR doesn't "deal" with them at all, then the issue does not exist. Full stop. IT has nothing to do with defining what is proper. If HR approved or allows it, then it is IT attempting to undermine HR's decisions and IT that has gone rogue.

Well Hr does not deal with them and I am told by my management to deal with it like this. Management = my supervisor & vp.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@jmoore said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

and ask me to enforce it as best I can.

Because they don't know how, presumably

Quite possible. I figured out I can use wmic to do this so I made it a script and run it every few weeks.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

There is a huge gap between accepting when a rule affects you and you must follow it, and presenting a rule as something you agree with and understand.

Understood.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

No, you have no control. But you do have control over how you look at it and present it or talk about it. It's very, very important that you understand that it's hubris and confusion of an impotent admin who is attempting to flex his muscles (and failing) to try to show employees that he's their "master" and they must bow powerlessly before him, while defying HR and management, while also completely misunderstanding computing and failing to in any way do what he set out to do.

I get what your saying and am learning how to properly look at things. That is why these discussions are good!

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

Why is IT trying to enforce things HR is allowing? Why is one system admin deciding unilaterally that he's in charge of employee's and their jobs and that HR and their managers are not? And if he feels this way, why has he not addressed limiting the ability to run binaries?

Unfortunately I can't answer any of that.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

HR issues with end users breaking rules, not doing their jobs, or acting badly.

I agree totally but HR does not deal with them properly, if at all. I have never seen repercussions from someone doing these things. Basically we are paid so bad here , they don't get rid of people unless something truly outrageous happens and that is pretty rare. People almost always leave on their on first. We have a high turnover rate.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

But bottom line, it's not IT's concern because it's not part of the managed platform. And it's not something you control.

yes this is why it is frustrating lol. I am asked to control it as best I can.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

Nothing makes portable apps not get updates. You don't control them if the end users is the one using them, but they can certainly get updates.

Oh I know they can get updates. I am just saying they won't because I put chocolatey in my images and I run updates by my script every day. So that is the concern.

@gjacobse said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@jmoore said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

@jmoore said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

One thing I found about portable apps is occasionally a smarter user will install these. Yeah, it gets around our permissions in Ad because they do not modify the registry. so I do not like them for that reason. I can't have users installing whatever they want.

Something else you can do to make chocolatey easier to install in multiple places is use an xml file with the apps you want for yourself or for departments. I made one for myself but I really don't use it, however I have one for a few different departments here because they some specific things and its hard to remember the install names on each. So I just carry them around on a flash drive.

I'm curious on how you set this up,.. I know I have just been using a simple batch file once the core is installed.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
    <packages>
      <package id="googlechrome" />
	  <package id="firefoxesr" />
	  <package id="flashplayerplugin" />
	  <package id="adobereader" />
	  <package id="jre8" />
	  <package id="7zip.install" />
	  <package id="vlc" />
	  <package id="powershell" />
	  <package id="silverlight" />
	  <package id="quicktime" />
	  <package id="irfanview" />
	  <package id="treesizefree" />
	  <package id="windirstat" />
	  <package id="crystaldiskinfo" />
	  </packages>
</xml>

this file is called staff.config
Then i just use:

choco install d:\packages.config –y

I understand what your saying. I know ultimately its the fault of the users that decide to do this but its just not how it is handled here and I have no control over that. IT management chooses to do it this way and ask me to enforce it as best I can.

@scottalanmiller said in Applications; Portable vs. Installed:

because he has demonstrated that he has no concept of how applications work by thinking he was restricting "binary execution" when he was actually restricting installation, which is conceptually a different thing.

I'm sure he knows the difference, I was just explaining it badly which is on me.