Ssl certificate blues

The Exchange server certificate for this organisation, I work for expired in the first weeks of me joining the organistion and I was tasked with always advising users to click on the "Continue to this website" warning so they could use Outlook web access.

I received a number of calls depending on the different browsers that users used, with Firefox having the scariest message "This Connection is Untrusted" and warning users to stay away from this particular page unless they understood the security risk!

This went on until a security certificate from thawte was purchased. Tasked to install the certificate using the instructions provided I got more confused but a support guy from Thawte told me that once a CSR is generated with powershell, the certificate should also be installed via powershell and if generated with Microsoft IIS so it should be installed, this was new to me but non the less I followed his advice and had a new CSR generated with IIS.

The whole certificate install process is pretty simple task as I had done a google search prior to starting on this whole process which I thought would be done in a couple of minutes and since I had trouble following the instructions on Thawte's website I opted to instead install the certificate with help from their support staff through live chat , which made the process really easy... I later noticed that Go-daddy and other vendors had much easier instructions one could follow for the whole certificate installation process. However,with the support staff below are the steps we followed and were able to create a new CSR and also install a new Certificate on the server.

1. Create a temporary website in IIS
2. Generate a CSR using the wizard on the temporary website
3. Send the CSR to the particular vendor you wish to buy the certificate from.
4. Once you receive the Certificate install it on the temporary website in IIS.
5. Then install the intermediate Certificates using Microsoft Management Console (MMC). In the Intermediate Certification Authorities under certificates import the different certificates you wish to install.
6. Then go back to IIS on the default website you wish to use the certificate on, using the wizard replace the current certificate with the new you got (Installed on the temp site). Please view the details just to be sure its the right certificate.
7. Restart IIS on the server, this will shut down the website temporarily.
8. Then depending on the particular vendor of the certificate you could check your website and see if the annoying message has left and also if you have the https:// section of your website in green!

I finally had the thawte certificate installed and working fine although the installation guide on their website is really annoying, the live chat support staff are a blessing!

Google et al..

Attending the Google day events here in Kampala, we were showed a variety of Google products by the Google team from the famous search engine GOOGLE to a number of different Google Apps and products.  Google has invested heavily in several software applications and the best thing about these Applications is that most of them are freeware.

After the Google day events I have found myself more inclined to using the Google products than others if Google has an alternative, testing and using the several applications that we were introduced to us, I have become more impressed with Google!

Currently using some of the Google products like Google sites check http://tinyurl.com/288b7z7 blogger, having set up an Adsense account and use Google analytics to monitor the visitors and my different sites, blog and picasa web album. 

I also set up my first Google Apps Standard Edition for a small company here in Kampala and they are really excited at the prospect of having their company email on their own domain name, despite the fact that outlook failed to work well with the Apps Mozilla Thunderbird is doing really fine. More details of this project will be posted here when completed.

Google also announced recently that African bloggers who use adsense could be paid using western union as credit card penetration and use in Africa is still low.  I hope many more African bloggers can use this service!

However shockingly Google has had several other very useful applications which I thought were not really well marketed or really hyped for one reason or another, apart from Google Mail (Gmail) and ANDRIOD several other applications like the Google Maps, Directions, Docs, Sites, Adwords, Adsense, Admob these were not really marketed yet they had been in existence for a while!

Regardless of all that I still think GOOGLE with all of their products KICK ASS!

Waiting for my HTC Hero

For over 3weeks now I have been looking forward to the arrival of my new phone the HTC Hero. I thought I really needed this phone and anyway should spoil myself after the many hours I spend behind my desk in at work. This ANDROID powered phone from HTC and Google, I considered to be the king of all mobile operating systems, it’s the major reason I wanted this piece.

It’s a pretty decent smart phone. I have had sleepless nights anticipating its arrival since a friend who traveled abroad promised to hook me up with one.

The day arrived last Saturday and this fella returned, however since I was to refund this fellas money on his return he opted to get me the HTC S740 instead of the HTC Hero (I know it must be  cheaper than the Hero) as he was running short of money and could not trust a Ugandan brother to pay back!

This whole week I have been reviewing the HTC S740 and I am slowly failing in love with it, I particularly love its design and size. However the major drawback on this smart phone is that it comes with Windows mobile OS (Windows 6.1) however it has pretty impressive hardware compared to the other smart phones in its league.

With a Qualicomm processor 7225 running at 528MHZ and its got total memory 256mb, the other standard features on smart phones are also available.

Since that Saturday afternoon I got this piece, I have explored this phone, installed Windows Mobile Device center which I found very lacking and also found out the phones weak and strong point. Despite having the windows mobile operating system, it’s a good piece for texting and browsing the internet due to its QWERTY keyboard. I have installed a number of windows mobile Apps (applications) and only wish I could be able to install ANDROID on this piece.

Cheers,