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I had the enjoyable opportunity over the last few weeks to jump in and do a basic Cisco voice install. It was about 110 phones, with the Cisco Unified Communications Manager Business Edition. This is a single box that includes Call Manager 6.1.3, and Unity Connection 2.1. It had to be done fast, and it had to be done right, so I stuck to mostly tried and true configurations. 

Since this was a price sensitive design, we used the 2800 router to its maximum potential. The 2800 is an amazingly flexible piece of equipment; it can be configured to do large variety of things. Sometimes known as the Integrated Services Router, or ISR, it can be set up as a router, firewall, VPN, Voice Gateway, SIP session border controller, transoder, conference bridge, and survivable remote gateway, all at the same time, on the same box! read more »

I recently did a somewhat complex install of a Cisco 2800 Integrated Services Router. I enabled many of the features that come standard in the Advanced IP Services IOS, and thought it would be useful to show what a relatively current configuration would look like.

What made this installation fun was the use of object groups on the 2800 router. That is a new feature in the 12.4.20T version of code that made things interesting. The router has a GUI, but of course everything was set up in command line. I learned some neat things from this install, and based on the experience, I created a clean reference config for discussion purposes. This example is for the NAT and VPN, I will leave the voice configuration for a different example. Also, I did not set up SSL VPN on this box, nor did I use the newer version of firewall – this one is based on CBAC. read more »

I have talked with a number of public safety organizations over the last few years about how they extend network connectivity to patrol officers that make stops. The benefits are tremendous. By having the ability to run a car tag and a driver’s license through the Georgia Crime Information Center, the officer is able to immediately identify individuals with warrants out for their arrest, stolen cars, and any number of other issues.

The ability to run this information through the GCIC database is always available, by calling in the information over the radio, and having it looked up, but at that point it sometimes becomes more trouble than its worth. read more »

OK, I have all the basics in place. We use a great mail filter at work, and I hardly ever get spam or phishing email, and have never gotten a virus by email. Still, I was getting about 20-30 emails that I would delete without reading, every day. Finally last week I started to do something about it.

I could have taken the shortcut of putting blacklists on the mail filter, but I felt that was not yet necessary. Instead, I decided to see what could be accomplished by a concerted effort of unsubscribing from the drip marketing campaigns that were aimed at me. read more »