How to create a stacked bar chart in Excel

How to create a stacked bar chart in Excel

My boss’ management is clamoring for metrics. They want to know, at a glance, what we’re doing and how far along we are. Sounds like a job for stacked bar charts in Excel to me. So here’s how to create a stacked bar chart in Excel.

Figuring out a way to track our progress was fairly easy. Figuring out how to make Excel display that chart in a meaningful fashion… Well, that took about five hours. I’ll try to make it easier for you than it was for me.
Read more

Patch management strategy

Vulnerability management and patch management are close relatives. In most companies, think of them as siblings who hate each other. That’s usually how it plays out. It doesn’t always have to be that way, but it takes some thought and strategy from both sides. Here are some ideas for patch management strategy.

Read more

Blu Studio One review

I needed a phone in a hurry the other day when my wife’s Moto E started acting up. We turned to the Blu Studio One, specifically model# S0110UU. This is my Blu Studio One review.

It’s an inexpensive midrange phone for people who want to bring their own to their carrier rather than (over)paying on a monthly installment plan. It works with GSM providers like T-Mobile and AT&T. It does not work with Sprint or Verizon, since they use the CDMA standard. Some of the smaller carriers also work with GSM. Buying a Blu phone isn’t a bad way to go when you’re looking to save on a cell phone.

Read more

The ACLU has a point about smartphone security

The ACLU complained to the FTC that carriers aren’t patching vulnerable Android phones. They have a point.

Phones are profitable, and the carriers are trying to have it both ways. Read more

If the AT&T/T-Mobile deal is dead, good riddance

If you haven’t seen, the Department of Justice voiced its lack of support for AT&T’s buyout of T-Mobile USA. I find myself agreeing with Sascha Segan’s analysis at PC Magazine.
Read more

AT&T buying T-Mobile isn’t good for anyone but AT&T

I suspect AT&T is going to be allowed to swallow up T-Mobile, but there’s nothing good about this.

T-Mobile survived solely on customer service and low prices. Let me tell you a story about T-Mobile.
Read more

DNS and iTunes and other streaming media

There are reports floating about regarding third-party DNS affecting downloads of movies and other media, particularly from iTunes.

So, if tweaking DNS settings used to be what all the cool kids are doing, maybe it’s about to become less trendy, thanks to advice circulating to ditch third-party, centralized DNS providers like Google and OpenDNS, because they “defeat the distributed nature of DNS itself.”

The answer of what DNS to use and why is more complex than that.
Read more

Secret Service BBS raids from the other perspective

I’ve written in the past about the Feds busting people using BBSs for nefarious purposes in the early 1990s. But the only stories I’ve ever heard were from the perspective of the people who got busted, often second or third hand.

Here’s a story from the side of someone who helped the Secret Service for three days in the 1980s.

Read more