HelpDesk & Asset Management Software - Top Questions to Ask Before You Buy

Written by Natarajan Aravind


#5 You have hardware like PCs that come under various warranty periods. Do you know which batch of PCs are under warranty &repparttar number of PCs for whichrepparttar 139804 warranty is about to expire (so that you can plan for an AMC)? Can you split up & tell how much AMC charges you pay for each hardware component or for each vendor?

#4 Typically your company gets hardware parts and accessories from different vendors. Is your purchasing done centrally? Can you getrepparttar 139805 information of all vendors &repparttar 139806 products they offer on a single click? Can you compare prices & other information before placing an order? Can you modify a purchase order (PO), have a revision history & emailrepparttar 139807 vendorrepparttar 139808 updated PO? Can you track POs till allrepparttar 139809 items mentioned in a PO arrive?

#3 You might have entered into contracts with various vendors. Do you maintain & keep track of all your maintenance & support contracts in one place? How about having soft copies of actual contracts that are available to you through a web browser and is always a single click away?

#2 Your company has a variety of hardware like PCs, printers, scanners, OHPs etc and a plethora of software ranging from MS Office to Adobe Photoshop (all of various versions). Are you still using spreadsheets & manually tracking all these assets? Can you tell whether allrepparttar 139810 software you have comply with licensing? Can you tell how many of these hardware components & software copies are available with you at any instant? Can you tell how much of these are under utilized or not utilized at all?

Crack The Code - That's A Direct Challenge

Written by Darren Miller


You may reprint or publish this article free of charge as long asrepparttar bylines are included.

Original URL (The Web version ofrepparttar 139627 article)

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Crack The Code - That's A Direct Challenge

Title

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Crack The Code - That's A Direct Challenge

I Challenge You To Crack The Code

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I had quite an interesting experience recently. I was hired by a company to perform a vulnerability assessment and penetration test on their network. Duringrepparttar 139628 initial meeting, one ofrepparttar 139629 key technical staff presented me with a challenge; He handed overrepparttar 139630 NTLM hash ofrepparttar 139631 domain Administrator account and challenged me to decipher it. He explained thatrepparttar 139632 complexity and length ofrepparttar 139633 password would prevent me from deciphering it duringrepparttar 139634 time allotted forrepparttar 139635 project. He was actually quite confident in my impending failure.

In most cases, this individual would have been right onrepparttar 139636 mark. Onrepparttar 139637 other hand, I'm not sure he expected to challenge someone who has close associates with discretionary time on some ofrepparttar 139638 most powerful computers inrepparttar 139639 world.

6 Hours, 2 Servers, 64GB of Memory, and 32 Processors Later and.....

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It took just under six hours to decipherrepparttar 139640 password. Of course, my 'associates' were using a program of my choice on servers with 32 processors and 64GB of RAM a piece. It's nice to have friends with access like this. Especially in my line of work. Needless to say, my client was shocked when I called himrepparttar 139641 next day and gave him repparttar 139642 password.

Let's Have Some Fun: A Challenge For You

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(In order for you to do this, you need to go to: http://www.defendingthenet.com/NewsLetters/ CrackTheCode-ThatsADirectChallenge.htm)

Shortly after this experience, I started thinking about writing an article about it. Then I thought to myself, why write just an article? Why not come up with a challenge for our readers?

Cont'd on page 2 ==>
 
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