CDE Software: From the desk of Lance Rasmussen

One of the features that CDE has had for a few years now, is remote technical support.  This feature allows us to view and control your desktop to see what you see and help assist you.  This requires that the computer with the CDE product be connected to the Internet.  Due to slow speeds, we prefer that your connection be broadband or faster.

cnet recently posted a great article talking about the importance of remote support at http://tinyurl.com/2qc8a8

We have found this tool to be really usefull when sometimes things can not be duplicated or hammered out over the phone.

Over the years, I’ve tried many different products.  Norton’s suite of products, MacAffee, Panda, Kapirsky, AVG and others.   I’ve often been asked “whats the best”?

 After the past few years, I’ve gravitated to simple, effective and focused tools.  I don’t need or want to install a suite of 5-10 products that does stuff I don’t need or want to understand.  I simply want something that will keep my inbox clean from viruses and protect my desktop in case I somehow run a product that is infected.

NOD32, from http://www.eset.com has become my favorite of late.  It’s simple.   It’s not the most prettiest interface on the block, but I don’t need pretty.  The application sometimes will update the virus definitions several times a day, which tells me that is something is “hot of the virus press” that I’ve got a great shot at not being compromised.

The email scanner works well with Outlook / Windows Mail, which I only use for newsgroup reading.   I used Mozilla’s Thunderbird 2.0 for email and NOD32 works like a champ, optionally tagging my incoming emails letting me know its been scanned.

Is it free?   No.  But it is very reasonable in price.  I find you get what you “pay” for with free products.  I don’t want spyware on my system to be used as the price, nor do I want to be staring at advertising, which helps fund the free versions to the software authors. 

Does this have several utilities?  No.  It’s virus protection done well and is focused on just that.  I would rather use a tool that ranks as one of the top tools for spyware protection to deal with that part of the suite from a company focused only on making that type of product be the best.  I don’t need a company doing a LOT of things… mediocre.

Most, if not all autoscoring manufacturers prohibit the connection of their scoring system network to the Internet.  Why, you may ask, are they that picky?

 Well…  really it’s a simple reason.  Viruses.  Can you really blame the manufacturers?  Do you really expect them to fix the problems (on their dime, not yours) because you or an employee checked their personal email at the center and clicked on a file attachment called “Ha Ha Ha”?

For the most part, there is little reason why a scoring system network needs to have access to the Internet.  However, there are some things beneficial to having the Internet, such as remote technical support or uploading league standings to LeagueSecretary.com (for free and sanctioned/unsanctioned leagues) or Bowl.com.  Also getting program updates is handy as well.

To upload leagues, we have an alternate solution available in the form of a special licensed copy of BLS.  As always, each computer a CDE product is installed on must have a unique license and serial number (and for the most part, most other programs from other companies do too).  This special license can be used to install BLS on a computer that is outside of the computer scoring network, but still in the bowling center.  A league is simply backed up from the scoring network version of our product and transported via USB Memory or other removable media and then restored on the Internet computer.  From there… upload the league.

This does give you an advantage of having another computer with a backup of your league in case of a hardware failure. 

Also, the Internet enabled computer can download updates to the CDE (or other) products and saved to USB Memory or other removable media and installed on the scoring network computer.

 Some centers who are savvy enough and have invested in technology and anti-virus protection have connected their systems directly to the Internet.  Should you do the same?  I would strongly encourage you to contact your scoring system and find out the ins and outs of warranty and other things that could be effected by that decision.  These centers understand the risk and have taken the appropriate precautions to justify paying for a support incidence related to viruses.  In the mean time, this workaround generally will make the scoring manufacture happy and still allows you to connect your center to the information super highway.