Staying Connected

Apple iPad is Not Actually a Tablet

After all this fanfare about Apple coming out with a Tablet, we now find out that they didn’t.  The iPad is an appropriate name, but to call it a tablet is inaccurate.  What makes a Tablet is not just a touch screen, but the ability to do handwriting recognition.  One should be able to write on the screen with a stylus.  However, the Apple iPad does not have any handwriting recognition.  None, Zip, Zero, Zilch, Nada.  What this means is that the iPad is actually a netbook without the keyboard.  How very disappointing. 

It is true that the iPad does have multi-touch, but that is not the same thing.  Okay, so you can tap on the screen to open files, navigate, and resize pictures.  But the majority of people anticipating the release of the iPad have been looking forward to taking the iPad into a conference room and writing notes on it and saving it as a file.  Students have envisioned taking it to class and keeping all their notes from their classes on one device instead of having different spiral bound notebooks for each different class.  Business owners and Managers have been waiting to open a contract on it, write notes in the margins, save it, then forward it to the other decision makers that need to see it.  Travelers have been anticipating being able to receive a form or agreement that they have been waiting on via email, open it, sign it on the screen, save it, then email it back to the sender.

Now none of this is possible.  There have been a couple rumors that people will develop an app for that.  But seriously?  C’mon Apple.  That’s like making a smartphone that doesn’t make phone calls and telling the user base that someone will make an app for that. 

This is a serious faux pas on Apple’s part.  They could have taken the Tablet market by storm.  Instead they will take the netbook market by a little windy.  A major letdown for many would-be customers.  I personally own a Tablet PC.  It’s the convertible kind (the screen swivels and folds down), and yes…it does handwriting recognition.  However, I had just about convinced myself to get an iPad to replace my Tablet PC which is a few years old.  But now, I’m asking myself, “Why?”  The iPad is cool, it’s new, it’s shiny, but it doesn’t do what a Tablet does.  So it would really be like a netbook without a keyboard, and with a touchscreen.

One group of consumers that will enjoy it are those who have been trying to decide on an e-reader.  The iPad will support e-books, and the one advantage that it has over current e-readers is that it does it in color.  That’s nice.  But at a price tag of $500 to $829, depending on features and storage space, it becomes a pretty expensive e-reader. 

Don’t get me wrong, it has some nice functionality like automatic re-orientation, but not putting in the handwriting recognition is a huge market mistake.  The blogosphere already has many people saying that they will not buy it until they see the handwriting app.

IBM Files Location-Based Security Patent

On Thursday, 01-21-10, IBM filed for a patent regarding location-based authorization.  The patent claims that access to a device can be limited to certain geographic areas.  In other words, if a company wants an employee to be able to use their laptop at work or at home, then they could, but not anywhere else.

This can also be useful for preventing data loss after the theft of computer equipment.  Keep in mind, this is only a patent filing; it’s not on the market yet, but keep your eyes open.  It is certainly worth watching.  This is the kind of technology that even if IBM beats everyone else to the market, others will follow suit with.

For those who want to read a little more about it, you can find the patent filing at the U.S. Patent Office’s Website here

ConnectWise and USF Welcome Skip Holtz!

ConnectWise has been a long time sponsor of USF and its athletic programs, and now ConnectWise joins the Tampa Bay community in congratulating Skip Holtz for being selected as the new Head Coach of the Bulls’ football team.

Holtz previously coached at East Carolina and accrued 38 wins in 5 seasons. He is excited to be coaching in Tampa, FL.

ConnectWise regularly has a presence at home games and frequently offers a raffle for students in which they have a chance to win a cash prize that is awarded to the student on the football field between quarters. With Skip Holtz and next year’s team, ConnectWise is looking forward to a great new season. Go Bulls!

Microsoft is Ordered to Stop Selling Word, but MS Finds a Workaround

This all started when a Canadian software company i4i took Microsoft to court alleging that Microsoft was using code in its Word program that i4i held the patent for.  The code allows users to more efficiently edit XML (Extensible Markup Language) which determines how the program interprets content.  Ultimately, the court found in favor of i4i and ordered Microsoft to stop selling the code in question by January 11, 2010 and to pay restitution to i4i in the amount of $290 Million.

Microsoft of course appealed the decision, but the appellate court upheld the lower court’s decision.  On the surface, one may think that Microsoft may have to stop selling Word, but it is only that one specific piece of code that deals with XML that is infringing on i4i’s patent.  Microsoft has had a contingency plan in the works since August and they are poised to remove that code from the Word program so that all copies of Word sold after January 11 are free of the patent-infringing code.  Furthermore, that code will not be anywhere in Office 2010.

So what does this mean to consumers?  Not too much.  No recall was ordered for current versions of Word, so no one is required to remove Word from their PC’s or destroy their disks.  If you need to purchase a copy of Office after January 11, go ahead; the offending code will be removed by that point.  If you have been looking forward to purchasing Office 2010, nothing is holding you back.  Microsoft is considering appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court, but until that decision has been made, it will comply with the court’s orders.

New Computer not as fast as you like?

The ConnectWise Engineers are finding ways to tweak out all the performance on new computers where they can. Most of the business class machines we install today just come with the standard integrated on board graphics card, and they work pretty good in a business environment. But, users that like to have lots of windows open may notice that the screen seems to drag at times, which is typically a result of having Aero Glass turned on (by default in most cases). Scott on our help desk makes this great recommendation to tweak your graphics settings on a Vista or Windows 7 computer for optimum business performance by turning off the full Aero Glass effect. 

How do you do this? Pretty Simple, these settings can be found in the control panel under System > Advanced System Settings

Leggo My Bandwidth!

AT&T, the exclusive carrier for the iPhone, is complaining about those darn bottleneckers.  Representatives of AT&T claim that network usage of iPhone owners has been increasing.  The primary culprit – streaming.  Streaming is when a user plays media from the Internet instead of having the media stored locally on their device and playing it from there.  If you play songs from your iTunes library, that’s local audio.  If you play songs from Pandora.com, that’s streaming audio.

AT&T now cites streaming audio and video as the top bandwidth usage of their network.  Furthermore, they say not everyone is streaming, but some users stream a lot.  And because streaming takes up so much bandwidth, it appears that 3% of users are utilizing 40% of the bandwidth (Associated Press, 2009).

As a result, AT&T wants to change the way bandwidth is managed.  There has been speculation about intentional bandwidth choking, or charging based on the amount of bandwidth being used.  AT&T has not made any official statement about what they are going to do aside from saying that they will “give high-bandwidth users incentives to reduce or modify their usage.”

What AT&T does not state is exactly how much bandwidth is currently being used.  Granted, a small percentage of users are consuming a majority of the pipe, but if the overall bandwidth usage is only 60% of what is available, then it isn’t a problem.  That does not mean that we shouldn’t plan for the future, but hopefully AT&T considers all the unintended consequences before implementing a plan that wasn’t well thought out.  The worst thing AT&T could do is use this as an excuse to oppose Net Neutrality.  If you are not familiar with Net Neutraility, you can read my article on it here.

Until AT&T decides what to do, it will be business as usual.  But keep in mind, consumers have some control in the matter as well.  If you want to listen to music on your iPhone and you don’t have the songs stored locally, then by all means, listen to streaming audio…that’s what it’s there for.  But if you do have the songs or playlists stored locally, then play them locally instead of streaming.  It will take some of the burden off the network and maybe AT&T won’t have to do anything.  So help a brother out,  think of it as e-conserving.

Associated Press, . (2009). At&t: tighter control of cell data usage ahead. New York Times, Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/12/09/technology/AP-US-TEC-ATT-Data-Usage.html?_r=1&ref=technology

Is the Cloud all Hype?

If you're in the IT industry, one of the loudest buzz words this year has been the Cloud. I personally have attended several events this year on what the cloud is and how to best migrate into the cloud. Google has clouds, Amazon has clouds, Microsoft has clouds, and even ConnectWise has clouds. You can get your cloud private, public, internally, externally, and even a hybrid of all of the above. So, is this cloud thing all hype, reminiscent of the great dot com bubble of 1999? 

How Many People are Still Using Office 2003?

Office 2010 is on the horizon. But I know there are some people who historically trail technology by 1 or 2 versions. So my 4--part question is,

 

1. How many of you are still using Office 2003?
2. Once Office 2010 gets released will you move up to 2010?
3. Or...do you consider yourself NOT an early adopter, and will you just upgrade to Office 2007?
4. Or will you not upgrade at all? (not recommended)

 

When you respond, include your reasons why. Thanks!

Cloning...It's Not Just for Sheep Anymore.

Have you ever downloaded a program from the Internet and found out that it is an .ISO file rather than an .EXE or .ZIP?  Maybe you’ve tried to install software from a server because the disk wasn’t available but again found that you couldn’t do anything with an .ISO file.  The reason is that your operating system requires an .ISO file to be loaded from a disk drive like your CD-ROM or DVD-ROM.

Here are your options.  If you are running any Windows OS prior to Windows 7, then you must acquire .ISO burning software.  You cannot simply copy the file to a disk; it will not work.  You must acquire and use .ISO burning software.  That is inefficient and wastes a disk when you don’t need to. if you are running Windows 7, you can use the built-in software to burn the .ISO image to a disk, then install the application from the disk.  That is a little better, but still takes time that is unnecessary and uses a disk when you don’t need to.  The best option is to mount a virtual drive.

An easy way to do that is to use Virtual Clone Drive produced by Slysoft.  Virtual Clone Drive is free to download and use.  What it does is creates a virtual drive that the .ISO file can be mounted to, then installed from.  This prevents you from having to burn the .ISO file to a disk before installing.  This is very convenient for any time, and it is a life saver when you do not have a disk with you to burn to.

Your iPhone sync appointments with Exchange have the wrong time?

Here is a quick tip for iPhone users that our Help desk recently came across: If your iPhone is being synced with an Exchange server, and your calendar appointments don't match up to the correct time, check the timezone support under Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calenders and make sure they are configured for the correct timezone.

Looks like the issue is corrected in the latest version of the iPhone (3.0), but if you have an older device (and not upgrading) this may prevent you from pulling your hair out (or missing that important haircut appointment!)

Is It Windy Where You Are?

Amazing that it's November 9th and we have been watching news about a hurricane since last week... especially for those of us in Florida we are keeping an eye on this one.

Forecasts show it all over the place, and even though it's not a major hurricane (right now it's good for clearing the dead leaves out of the trees), it's good to dust off the disaster recovery plans and make sure you are ready to go no matter what happens. Even though the threat looks minimal, keep an eye on the news and use this time to have a review.

Not sure what to do? Try our our Self Assessment form (paying attention to the backups section!) or our Business Continuity Planning & Backup & Disaster Recovery services if you are not confident in what your plan is currently.

What I'd like to really know is are you ready regardless? Did you take the time this year to develop a plan if you did not have one, or review what you already had to make sure it was relevant? Post your comments below!

Software as a (Valuable) Service

Raise your hand if you know what Software as a Service means.  Okay, for those of you who don’t…here’s the short of it.  Software as a Service simply means that instead of purchasing a license for the software and owning the software, you pay a subscription price to use the software for as long as you continue to pay for it.

This can be cost beneficial for some software, but not for others.  There is no golden key to determine which works best, but here is something to at least get you pointed in the right direction.  If the software is going to be changing constantly, has annual renewal fees, or has maintenance and support fees, then it is often times a good deal to engage it as a SaaS (Software as a Service) type solution.

 If the software is relatively static, aside from patches and updates, then traditional licensing will probably be the best answer.  Pay attention to the fact that I am leaving room for exceptions.  There is no blanket statement that covers every single situation.  But take a look at these examples.  Software such as Microsoft Office does not have an annual renewal, and it is very static.  It does get updates, but major versions only change once every few years.  This is a perfect candidate for traditional licensing.  Pay for it once, then own it.  This will probably be cheaper in the long run rather than paying a little bit each month. 

Anti-virus however is different.  You have to pay an initial purchase price, annual renewal fees, plus a new version can come out a couple different times within the span of three years.  Since this is a software that you would make add-on payments to in order to keep it updated, SaaS becomes a great option.  After adding up all the payments between initial purchase, annual renewals, and version upgrades, a small monthly subscription usually ends up being cheaper after everything is all totaled up.

ConnectWise offers some products that are Software as a Service, including anti-virus and anti-spam.  Check with your Account Manager to learn more details about available programs.

The Big Easy Offer is Back!

 

This is a great transition from my last post about not waiting until the beginning of the new year to make that purchase you’ve been thinking about.  From November 1 to January 2, Microsoft is running their Big Easy offer again.  For those who are not familiar with this program, it works like this.  You purchase qualifying products from Microsoft such as Server 2008, Pro versions of Vista or Windows 7, Office Small Business or Enterprise edition, or a choice of many, many others.  We send in the purchase information to Microsoft.  Microsoft sends you a credit voucher that you can spend with ConnectWise for services.  The services can be anything labor-based such as installing your new software, regular service calls, help desk support, etc.

At this point, the two most popular questions are, “which products are qualifiers?” and “how much is the credit voucher?”.  There are a lot of products that are qualifiers, but here is a list of some of the most popular ones:

• Windows XP Pro
• Windows Vista Pro
• Windows 7 Pro
• Any edition of Exchange Server
• Office Pro Plus
• Office Small Business
• Office Enterprise
• SharePoint
• Various versions and editions of SQL
• The following editions of Windows Server: Web, Small Business Server, Essentials, Standard, Enterprise, Datacenter (Standard and Premium where applicable)

This is not a comprehensive list.  If you have questions about a particular product, call us and we can look it up.

Regarding the amount of the voucher, it depends on how many products you purchase.  But here is an example.  Let’s say you need a new server and 5 new PC’s.  The server will have Windows 2008 Small Business Server, and the PC’s will have Windows 7 Pro.  In addition to that, each PC will get Microsoft Office 2007 Small Business Edition.  Your credit voucher will be great because you are buying multiple products from multiple categories (Server OS, Desktop OS, and Office System).  In this scenario your credit voucher would be $735.  And you would be able to spend that $735 for any labor-based services that ConnectWise offers.

But again, this offer is only good from Nov. 1 to Jan.2.  So if you are going to purchase equipment and software, now is the time to do it.  Well, wait a couple days…November 1 is the day to do it   :-)

Holiday Shopping…For Your Company

Suppliers of servers, PC’s, laptops, and other technology equipment are just like other companies.  They want to sell as much as they can by the end of the year.  As a result, prices often times start dropping in the last few months of the year.  This is the time that businesses can really take advantage of great pricing on many essentials. 

However, many business owners and managers do not realize this.  A common phrase that is heard around this time is, “Well, let’s wait ‘till the beginning of the new year, then we’ll get started on the project, the upgrade, the expansion, the etc.”  But waiting until the new year can cost you discounts that you will not receive in January.  So if you are thinking about doing an upgrade, a replacement, or making any kind of new purchase, go ahead and do it between now and the end of December.

Admittedly, sometimes December can be a hard month to start big projects because of your people’s vacation schedules.   So try to get the project going before the second week of December.  If you truly must wait until the new year to begin the project, then the savvy thing to do is go ahead and make the hardware and software purchase now so you can take advantage of great pricing, Then begin the implementation when everyone comes back in the new year.  But if you wait until first quarter to make your purchase, you miss out on a lot of savings.

Have you seen ScareWare lately?

Over at ZDNet, Dancho Danchev posted a great photo gallery of the last 2 years of "ScareWare" sites & products. These should become a mandatory review for end-users, so they will recognize the nasties like Antivirus 2009 above and show just how professional they will look. No mater how professional looking, they are still dangerous on your network and to the end-users that are on the front line.

What is Scareware? It's basically fake security software that attempts to look legitimate enough to get you to install it by scaring you into thinking your system is compromised. Not only do they steal money from you by collecting your credit card information (when you willingly purchase it), but they also make it difficult to remove as they use every trick in the book to prevent legitimate removal tools from working. It's become the most popular (and profitable) method for cybercriminlals.