The News Review:
- ffice gets new subscription-only look
- Apple used to develop Claris branded software for its machines and…
- Why ‘no Macs’ is no longer a defensible IT strategy
- Building a Deep Leadership Bench
ffice gets new subscription-only look
NEWS.com.au – Apr 21, 2008
If launched Albany will mark the first time Microsoft the dominant maker of consumer office software has experimented with a subscription-based ffice product in the US. The company has already launched subscription-based versions of its ffice products in some emerging markets. The package will include the latest versions of word-processing application Word spreadsheet tool Excel and presentation-software tool PowerPoint. It will also include security tools to block viruses. A Microsoft spokesman said pricing and distribution details for the commercial launch of the product hadn’t been set and declined to comment on the planned launch date. Bryson Gordon group product manager for Microsoft Albany said on the company’s website that the test was designed to address consumer demand. "Consumers … expressed frustration at having to spend time and effort installing different types of software keeping current on new versions and getting their computers set up" he said.
Apple used to develop Claris branded software for its machines and…
stuff.co.nz – Apr 22, 2008
Likewise Numbers is a spreadsheet program that in some ways makes Excel look a bit drab. Its interface is more inviting and intuitive. Presentation package Keynote is probably the least used of the iWork programs but if Microsoft has Powerpoint then Apple must have its version. Now for the missing link. The days when you finished a document printed it off and handed it to your client accountant or whoever are vanishing fast in the rear view mirror. You'd expect iWorks programs to speak directly to Apple's bundled mail program Mail right?No you have to save and close your document and attach it to an email manually. However if you can work around that inconvenience there's not much else to fault Apple on and the price is right.
Why ‘no Macs’ is no longer a defensible IT strategy
InfoWorld – Apr 21, 2008
Microsoft: The elephant in the room Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of supporting Macs in a business environment resides in Microsoft’s less-than-fervent embrace of the platform. Macs are by no means frozen out from the powerful and popular Microsoft ffice productivity suite. In fact thanks to Microsoft Mac users can run Word Excel PowerPoint and utlook (called Entourage on the Mac) on their machines. This is crucial in heterogeneous environments as it allows users to share business files and participate in the same e-mail contact management and calendaring system as their PC cohorts. Yet Microsoft releases Mac ffice a year after Windows ffice forcing dual-platform businesses to wait a year before rolling out an ffice upgrade. Moreover the Mac version of ffice is never quite the same as the Windows version in ways that add irritation to both IT and users. For example display incompatibilities — due to differing graphics engines — have meant that ffice drawing and art tools do not produce the same visuals on both platforms.
Building a Deep Leadership Bench
GovExec.com – Apr 21, 2008
Service and a higher calling might seem like an old-fashioned pitch in an era obsessed with money but so far it’s working he said. The program has put 32 folks through its course in the past seven years and only two have left for industry. The PowerPoint CourseSince it seems that anyone who wants a leadership position in the Army must master PowerPoint presentations I asked Dmuchowski if PowerPoint courses are part of the training. He surprised me with his answer. Future knowledge leaders are trained in how to create and give PowerPoint presentations. That includes compliance with Army Chief of Staff guidance that says slides should have few words and the number of slides should be limited to the amount needed to get the point across Dmuchowski said… In the test the 9090 sends data to a hard-wired Defense network server with wireless gear from Aruba Networks. None of the companies above wanted to talk to me for obvious reasons but I did manage to gain insight into a slice of this project and its potential from Edwin Cowart a systems engineering manager at Juniper Networks which has supplied its dyssey FIPS 140-2 client to secure the bar-code Wi-Fi network. It’s not hard to add a FIPS 140-2 client to a laptop computer which has gigabytes of memory but it’s tougher with the 9090 which has only 64 megs of memory much of which is used for the Microsoft Mobile operating system. But Cowart said Juniper managed to stuff all the required FIPS 140-2 functionality into a small data store and is the only company to do so as far as he knows. I’m told that this secure hand-held reader system has attracted wide interest not just at the Army Materiel Command but across Defense including the Defense Logistics Agency and the U. Transportation Command which manages radio frequency identification tag projects that track supplies globally.