I work as a Remote Systems Administrator for the largest health care company in the world and that means I’m responsible for a lot of different servers at a lot of different companies across the United States. As a RSA, I’m continually challenged to learn new things that make for streamlining operations, thereby making my job easier. Here’s a page that lists a few tips and tricks that I’ve picked up along the way.
- Cron Job Alternative - April 15, 2011
I needed to run a cron job that would allow me to split up my database queries and lessen the load on my host's processor. My MySQL queries were taking 2 - 3 minutes to run. Step 1: Make sure the column that your query is based on is indexed. A...
- VPS Hosting - February 28, 2011
The time has come to enter the world of VPS Hosting. I recently launched my 100th website and I have pretty much maxed out my shared hosting plan. I run a Python script to watch memory and my memory allocation is often running over 40MB all night l...
- How to Copy Your Backup Database to Another Server With a SQL Job - November 12, 2010
I had a client call and inform me that their TSM (Tivoli Storage Manager) backup agent wouldn't work on their database server. This essentially defeats the purpose of TSM but they asked if I could simply copy the database and hourly transaction log b...
- Some Notable Differences in Windows 2003 and 2008 - November 8, 2010
If you're just now migrating to a Windows 2008 Server, there's a few subtle nuances that you might want to be aware of. These are just some FYIs to make your System Administration life a little easier: ALL USERS DESKTOP: Windows 2003 all user’s...
- How to Kill an Application Remotely - November 7, 2010
How do you kill an application that's running on a remote computer if RDP (mstsc) isn't available? Yesterday, I talked about a great little program that would restart your hanged applications if you're on the server console. Today's a related topic...
- How to Restart a Crashed Program Automatically - November 6, 2010
Ever have an server application that you absolutely need to keep running but it continues to give you problems? Well over a year ago, I was getting to the point of swearing at a particular program that was giving me fits and continually requiring me t...
- How to Execute a Batch File Based on a SQL Condition - November 4, 2010
As a Network Administrator, you might have a situation where you need to execute a batch file, based on a SQL condition. In short, here's the logic I needed to work out: - Check for SQL condition (if temp table exists for this situation) - If co...
- How to Query a Database With a Batch File - November 3, 2010
No doubt there are times when you need to query MSSQL but Query Analyzer isn't at your disposal. The answer? Use a simple batch file! OSQL is a powerful utility that should already exist on your Windows XP laptops/workstations. If not, it's easy eno...
- Performance Issues With Intel 82574L Gigabit Network Card - November 2, 2010
If you're running an Intel 82574L Gigabit Network card and seeing performance issues, you might try the following: Under Performance Options ---> Interrupt Moderation Rate ---> changed from "Adaptive" to "Off" Under Power Management ---> Turned...
- How to Clear Server Event Logs using Task Scheduler - October 15, 2010
I sometimes run into a problem with the event logs filling up. There are options to overwrite but I find a quicker and neater method to just put this above in a .vbs file and schedule via Task Scheduler
