I'm Robert Marshall, director and senior consultant at SMSMarshall Ltd who's specialism is in the Microsoft System Center 2012 Configuration Manager product and all of its dependent products covering all aspects from Architecture, Implementation, Migration to Break-Fix.
I've been using computers for over 30 years, beginning as a programmer and now a senior consultant in an enterprise product. I only count my career as starting 17 years ago when I began my first serious role as a deployment engineer. I've seen 8 bit through to 64 bit, the rise and constant refinement of the GUI, the rise of the Internet from land-line based modem access to the powerful broadband connections we have today, mobile phones come into existence, and I've seen Microsoft evolve from a handful of employees to the company it is now while pretty much tinkering with every OS they have released; As well as seeing an industry that has evolved around those humble beginnings to become what we have today. You could call me an IT Dinosaur but I'm still as mentally able as I was back then, perhaps even more adept now since I've had broad exposure to so much and seen trends come and go. I'm a keen technical puzzle solver, which sets me apart as I love to solve gnarly problems around my area of specialism.
I like to share, i do so by blogging here, and helping out when I can as a moderator and answering questions when I have time on the TechNet Social forums for ConfigMgr 2012 and ConfigMgr 2007. I am a guest poster on TechNet UK Flash magazine and an MVP since 2009 (Most Valuable Professional) in the ECM (Enterprise Client Management) exclusively dedicated to ConfigMgr. the MVP status helps me to help others in more depth due to the closeness to the product group and access to other MVP's the program affords me.
The blogs pretty much about ConfigMgr, but on the odd occasion I also use it as a platform to express my random urges to post something I've stumbled across, be it technical or non-technical, and which I imagine would entertain you or what not as equally as it did me.
(2013)
Found this handy article in the July 2007 edition of Technet Magazine, describing an excellent Hierarchy mapping tool written up by Jeff Tondt.
Qoute:
A picture is worth a thousand words. This familiar proverb refers to the idea that complex stories can be told with just a single image, or that an image can be more influential than even a substantial amount of text. It also aptly characterizes the goals of visualization, where large amounts of data must be absorbed quickly. To a System Management Server (SMS) geek like me, seeing the whole SMS hierarchy in one picture helps me understand how my infrastructure is laid out. You could use such a picture, perhaps, to show the before and after of an SMS migration plan to management. In certain troubleshooting cases, such a diagram could be very useful in finding a solution or at least in getting help from others. And, of course, as a responsible SMS administrator, you need to document your system hierarchy for all sorts of other reasons.
A picture is worth a thousand words. This familiar proverb refers to the idea that complex stories can be told with just a single image, or that an image can be more influential than even a substantial amount of text. It also aptly characterizes the goals of visualization, where large amounts of data must be absorbed quickly.
To a System Management Server (SMS) geek like me, seeing the whole SMS hierarchy in one picture helps me understand how my infrastructure is laid out. You could use such a picture, perhaps, to show the before and after of an SMS migration plan to management. In certain troubleshooting cases, such a diagram could be very useful in finding a solution or at least in getting help from others. And, of course, as a responsible SMS administrator, you need to document your system hierarchy for all sorts of other reasons.
SMSMap V1.0
It has some dependancies, such as DOT NET and Visio etc ...