In today's ever changing and evolving electronic age it can be a daunting task to keep yesterdays technology working efficiently never mind attempting to keep current with today's technology and how tomorrow's technology will affect your business needs.

Quite often businesses put IT issues on the back shelf, have not budgeted for IT support, or a full time IT department is just not economical. Although technology is becoming more user friendly there is nothing friendly about Network crashes, printer glitches, and hardware/software failures that seem to happen when our businesses can least afford a loss of productivity due to computer glitches. This leaves business owners and managers alike scrambling to find a reliable affordable IT guy. Many small to midsize firms implement a patchwork solution when it comes to technical issues, relying on "chiphead" friends, hotline support and instruction manuals.

Wouldn't you like to have an experienced consultant who knows your company to call when a problem/any problem occurs; a solutions provider who is available when you need, for what you need? Lemoine Hyland Group can provide you with affordable solutions for your Information Technology needs. Contractual or on demand hourly rates.

Weather you need to develop your Internet presence with an industry Certified Web Master, implement an easy to administer e-mail system, fix the annoying printer glitch, roll out a complete network from the ground up or have a Microsoft Certified Professional train employees to be more productive. Call 905 275 7794 or e-mail The Director of Information Technology Services at Lemoine Hyland Consulting the people who know your IT needs best.

To simplify the confusion around the available technology, we adhere to some pretty basic but very important IT Management rules:

1. The Business Needs Should Drive Your Use of Technology
Match your information technology plan with your business plan Do a business case for each major proposal; does it justify the expenditure and how does it take the business towards your destination? It is important to keep on top of advances in computing - don’t be at the bleeding edge – let others assume that risk For smaller scale technologies like handheld computing, use the system first on a personal level

2. Have a forward-looking IT plan
IT planning should cover a 3 year rolling period; IT plans should cover major expenditures and system rollouts. Recurring IT activity is now a part of daily business life Allow enough time – even small systems can take months to implement IT plans should include team member training on all applications – most people only use a fraction of the features of a product and do not exploit what they have paid for; Make the owners and other techno avoiders take the training

3. Invest in High Quality Components
Use high quality hardware form a single manufacturer offering 24/7 phone and Web support and next day on site service Memory and disk space are relatively inexpensive so don’t crimp – set a minimum standard for your business and review it annually Consider higher bandwidth for office Internet applications – the productivity and reliability outweigh the cost Microsoft products are familiar, inexpensive and reliable – consider the alternatives carefully before committing to other software for your business

4. Set and Use Standards and Policies
Have standards in place for configuring your PCs and be consistent Use the same general configuration of each PC, install software in the same location; Be consistent with naming conventions for files and take advantage of long, descriptive file names Publish policies for appropriate use of systems Team members should NOT install personally licensed copies of software, especially things like games and cutesy screen savers

5. Keep it Legal
Using “pirated” software for which you have no license is against the law. Planning ahead and buying software in volume can save you money, keep your systems consistent and keep the Company onside with vendor agreements In some cases you may only need the license, rather than the full package with CD and manuals. These open licenses or license packs are readily available at a substantial discount in price Standard software upgrades keep you current with software releases while keeping costs down; Keep your licenses together with your product in a safe and central place

6. Know Your Own Capabilities
Know the areas that you have expertise and those you don’t. Don’t play with mission critical systems Partner with a reliable and reputable service, check at least three recent work references Everyone should understand the processes to which the computer systems are being applied, even if they can’t manage it IT management is now a core activity and increasingly you will need to have in house expertise – consider it a cost of doing business much like rent

7. Ensure Availability
Have computer systems available 24/7 Design redundancy through the use of drive arrays and hot swappable drives in server class machines Keep on-hand floater equipment that can be deployed on immediate notice Maintain one or more dial up lines and modems as a back up to your leased data line Cross-train team members and formally document how to use critical systems so that the knowledge does not reside with just one team member

8. Disaster Recovery is Vital
Perform incremental back ups nightly and full back ups weekly Keep the back up media in a safe and secure location If back up is moved offsite ensure it is insured and with responsible personnel who are aware of the integrity and confidentiality of the dataDon’t forget your Web site

9. Take Virus Protection Seriously
Things will only get worse so be prepared Buy and religiously use software such as Norton AntiVirus to protect your systems Regularly update your virus definition files to ensure protection against the latest viruses – these updates are free once you purchase the software Take advantage of free software updates available from Microsoft that protect users of Office applications against macro viruses and worms

10. Take Security Seriously
Require passwords to all systems containing confidential information. Use passwords at least eight (8) characters in length that contain both alpha and numeric characters Anonymous logons to any systems should not be allowed Dedicated connection to the Internet should have a firewall or similar control in place to block unwarranted attempts to gain access Avoid giving contractors and outsiders “God” rights on your network

Spam, a minor nuisance two years ago, has increased to epic proportions. Nearly 40 percent of all Internet e-mail is unsolicited and unwanted—up from 8 percent in late 2001, according to Brightmail, a company that blocks spam for many of the leading ISPs. Jupiter Research, which tracks Internet activity, claims the average e-mail user received 2,200 spam messages over the past year.

A fine line exists between putting restrictions on worthless and annoying junk e-mail (or even forcing such messages to be prefixed by the header ADV, for advertisement) and banning the distribution of information that has the potential to be socially valuable. Direct marketers make the point that eliminating spam entirely limits consumer choices and the free market. It also restricts the potential success of small companies that can't afford more expensive types of marketing. The lack of consensus on the legal definition of spam (is it essentially unsolicited, bulk, or commercial mail?) makes this problem even trickier.

CAUCE (the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail, www.cauce.org) largely opposes the popular opt-out solution, pointing out that it won't improve the current state of spam and might even make the situation worse. "If you pass a law that says you're free to send spam until someone asks to be removed, you're essentially giving the green light to everyone who's ever wanted to send e-mail to anybody in the country," says attorney Ray Everett-Church, founding member of the volunteer organization. Additionally, a recent FTC study showed that more than 50 percent of tested opt-out e-mail addresses given were invalid.

Perhaps the toughest nut to crack is that much spam isn't sent from a domestic source. After all, how will the law ever stop spam coming from Russia or Taiwan? Evidently it's going to take a worldwide resolution against spam rather than simply a domestic one, and that's unlikely to happen anytime soon. Individuals and business owners will be better off making room in their budgets for antispam protection, rather than waiting for a legal solution. Technology has a better chance of catching up with the problem than the law does.

Top Anti-spam Tips

1. Guard your in-box. Don't give out your e-mail address to anyone but the people you actually expect to correspond with. For dealing with everyone else, see tips 2 through 4.
2. Use free Web mail accounts. For merchants and legit others you don't correspond with regularly, use Web mail, such as Hotmail's or Yahoo!'s. You can abandon it if it gets spammed. Many have spam filtering built in.
3. Use a disposable e-mail address. The premise is simple: When, for example, an online merchant asks for your e-mail address, you just use the service to generate a disposable one. The service then forwards any e-mail sent to this address to your real e-mail account. If the disposable address gets spammed, you can simply close it. As a bonus, if you use multiple addresses and keep track of which one you give to whom, you'll know who's to blame if you start receiving spam at any of your addresses. At that point, you have to decide whether to trust the source of the legitimate mail with a new disposable address or not. Some of the disposable address services do a better job than others of helping you associate addresses with the accounts on which you've used them. But there are other things to consider: If someone sends you a message on a disposable account and you reply to it, you will probably end up disclosing your real address in the From: field. 
4. Use fake addresses. Most Web-based sign-up forms require an e-mail address, but ask yourself, do they really need it? If you don't want to hear from the site (and don't need a confirmation e-mail or tech support), don't give a real address.
5. Don't post your address. Resist the impulse to post it on Web sites, guest books, contact lists, newsgroups, chat rooms, and so on; spammers harvest from these places. If you absolutely must reveal yourself, use a Web-mail account or a DEA. You can also put something extra in your e-mail that humans will know how to read but harvesting robots won't: you@yourdomain.com could become youATyourdomainDOTcom.
6. Don't answer spam. Ever. You won't stop spam by writing to the spammers, even if you ask nicely. At best, you'll flame a robot, which won't mind. At worst, you'll confirm that your e-mail address belongs to a naive human being—a valuable commodity for spammers. Ignore the "remove me" e-mail addresses, too. Many of these lead to dead or inactive e-mail addresses.
7. Opt out. When you do sign up for or buy something online and you have to give out an e-mail address, remember to opt out of everything you're not absolutely sure you want to receive.
8. Read the privacy policy. Make sure you understand what a Web site promises to do (and not to do) with your e-mail address. If there's no privacy policy, see tips 2 through 4.
9. Use a spam filter. Even if you follow tips 1 through 8, you're going to get spam. If you get more than you can handle. Some personal spam filters are listed below. Our choice for ease of use and accuracy is MailWasher