WORLDCOM AND XO CONNECTIVITY CUSTOMERS OUT ON A LIMB?

Worldcom and XO customers looking to secure their connectivity by transferring providers or arranging back-up providers face a workload they didn't anticipate. Here's a partial list of tasks that may be required.

Selection & negotiation of alternative carrier
Synchronizing transfer of DNS and email to minimize disruption
Navigation of local telco organization to address inevitable circuit problems
Acquisition & configuration of routing equipment
Change TCP/IP configuration on all network boxes

If instead the decision is to arrange for backup connectivity, the above tasks must still be addressed to expedite any necessary future cut-over. Plus managing assignment of redundant IP space. Your backup solution should be integrated into your current operations.

If you want expert assistance to review your options, feel free to call Jake Baillie, VP of Internetwork Engineering. He and his team are veterans of seamless transfers between connectivity suppliers. They also have depth of experience in transferring between ISPs, should you be currently hosting your site with one of the troubled hosting services.

BAILING ON FAILING WEBHOSTS

If you're co-located, you can always go pick up your server. Of course, there's the time you're off-line while you load it into your Ford Explorer and drive it to its next home. (Just kidding!) We can help you minimize off-line disruption, while improving synchronicity during the transfer to a new location.

If you're on a shared box, you must be sure that the server you're transferring to is spec'd similarly or substantial coding changes may need to be made on your site. Priva is ready to help ensure the new server is ready to work with your existing code or make any necessary code modifications.

We should mention that Priva offers its own flexible and high reliability hosting services. We are able to provide the personal service that cannot be matched by large server farms. Plus we have a highly respected programming department that make additions and changes to your website's functionality with benchmark efficiency, when a site is hosted on our servers.

PRIVA HOSTS MOZILLA 1.0 / NETSCAPE 7.0 DEBUT PARTY

Priva recently hosted a party to introduce Netscape's new generation of source code, four years in development.

The scene: Little Bar & Grille in Cleveland's Warehouse District. Among the VIPs (very interesting people) was Eric Meyer, whose card reads Netscape's "Standards Evangelist" and who has authored the definitive text on CSS.

When the party broke up at 2 am, at least 20 people remembered what they were celebrating.

WHY SOAP WILL NOT GO DOWN THE DRAIN

Jake Baillie, our VP of Internetwork Engineering, on Web Services:

On July 15, a major Internet institution proved that web services are in fact a reality! Amazon has opened its site up using Web Services protocols like SOAP. Now you can in effect build your own rebranded amazon.com. The web service gives you the power to access any of their major website features, such as product display, searches, editorial reviews, shopping cart, gift registry, and many others.

Last year, Google made a similar move. Google's web service is still in its beta phase, but it allows your website to incorporate much of the functionality of this popular search engine through a programmatic interface.

One of the first successful applications of web services was the integration of different travel providers reservation systems to allow booking of hotel, airfare and car rental from a single user interface.

As more and more websites start to open up their content and functionality via web services, the possibilities for web sites become endless, and automation becomes much easier. Websites simply subscribe to a service, which provides them with a certain amount of functionality or content. You can interact with your partners to dynamically update pricing information, or check on the pricing of a flight for all of your sales reps.

Personally, I think one of the major free web-based mail services will be developing a web service soon. You can implement your own branded "Hotmail" service, without building your own email infrastructure.

This should give you enough to get you started thinking about how you might take advantage of web services. Have any good ideas or plans for a web service? Email them to us at imho@priva.com, and we'll include the ideas in a future issue of IMHO.

DANGER ON THE STREET

During his walk, our colleague was armed with nothing more sinister than a Compaq iPAQ PocketPC (and of course some commonly available network utilities.)

Not only was he able to confirm the open access points, he could have pinpointed the specific businesses, but we didn't want to further compromise the security of such vulnerable networks. He could have logged on to these networks and start using their bandwidth and data.

Our point was to bring network security to the forefront of everyone's mind. It should be. Based on its own study, the FBI projects compromised security to reach 90% of all companies.

Priva offers a suite of security services, called Shogun, that are especially designed to affordably meet the needs of medium to small businesses. It begins with a comprehensive audit to identify vulnerabilities on your network.

If you're interested to learn more, please CONTACT us or go to www.priva.com and click on Security.