In my last Blog entry, I speculated about the ongoing costs of Windows 10 after the initial Free for the First Year Free announcement.  Well, there's more, and it's good news.

Microsoft started their "Technical Preview" program for Windows 10 back in October, 2014.  We've been running the various new builds of this (on the Fast track) on several Virtual Machines here at the office to get a taste of what it's like prior to its official release, expected to be some time this summer.  

Anyone was able to sign up for this "beta" test, but it is highly recommended that you don't use this OS on a computer that you expect to work all the time.  Since this is beta software, it WILL fail sometimes as the bugs are worked out.

In our technology driven society the need for training would seem obvious. Most companies provide some kind of handbook, tutorial, or even on-the-job training for program and process changes.

One of the things I feel very fortunate about is that I was introduced to technology at a young age and at a depth that both interested me and challenged me in ways I didn't know something could. I attended a computer summer camp at UC Santa Cruz leading into my Freshman year in high school and had the opportunity to take two years of programming classes (in the BASIC and Pascal languages) in my Junior and Senior years. This was between 1982 and 1985.

Everyone uses passwords to access all sorts of information on their computer, online, at the bank machine, and many other places. One of the most common complaints we hear is that people have to remember too many passwords and as a result they tend to use the same one for everything. To make things worse, that password is often not a very strong one, leaving them vulnerable to loss of data, identity theft, and hijacked online accounts.

The mouse was a fantastic invention. Back in 1981, the first one was introduced for use with a Personal Computer; in fact, you can go as far back as 1964 to find the first prototypes, invented by Douglas Engelbart. Today, you can hardly get a computer without one and some features require a pointing device of some kind to access. But most features can still be accessed by keyboard alone, and many are more efficient when accessed via keyboard shortcuts. This month I share a few of my favorites with you.

Microsoft is listed as the #35 company in the world for 2013, according to the Fortune 500, but sometimes their product branding can be unclear. There are two different services that they offer and both are called Office 365, but the two are almost completely different from a feature set. In this article, I will describe each and what the appropriate uses are for them.

With the prevalence of mobile phones, tablets, laptops, and even convertible laptops that turn into tablets when needed, you may ask "Should I buy a desktop computer?". The answer depends on a number of things, but is mostly dependent on what you use your computer for. A few reasons why you might still want to have a desktop computer are business office use, gaming, specialized applications, or an interest in upgradable components.

In a recent survey by Wakefield Research commissioned by Citrix, one thousand Americans were asked about their understanding of Cloud Computing [1]. The end result showed that while more than half claim they never use it, 95 percent of that same group actually does use it, and on a regular basis. So I hope to clarify a few things about what exactly cloud computing is.

It's the first time in 7 years.  I got a new laptop - and it was no easy task trying to come up with an appropriate option.  You see, I'm pretty picky about the technology I use and I want it to last a long time.  After all, I DID have my last laptop for 7 years - and it still actually works quite well.

What I had before was a Lenovo Thinkpad X61 convertible tablet.  For its day, it was a quite capable little device.  Fairly lightweight, with the first generation of Core2 mobile chips, upgraded to 4gb of RAM and a 128gb SSD to make it quite fast - even running Windows 8.1 (update 1) with fast boot times and overall great performance.  So why did I replace it?  Well, the Thinkpad screens of this time period had issues with the adhesive that holds the screen cover on.  The glue strip that sits beneath the bezel on it breaks down over time and seeps out of every opening on the front of the device as well as allows air bubbles to get under the glass that covers the LCD screen.  There are a LOT of these bubbles on mine at this point, which is distracting.  Also, since I do a lot with websites and graphics, I need the screen to look good and translate colors well, which this screen was no longer doing.

If you get a new PC, odds are that it will have Windows 8 installed on it. Some have loved it and others have been critical. Here are 5 things that are really great about this new Operating System – things you can actually use in your daily routine.

When it comes to business, we often recommend (and setup/configure/support) Microsoft Office 365, but now Microsoft has officially announced the availability of Office 365 Home Premium.  This comes in conjunction with the newly announced Office 2013 Suite.  There is new pricing out for both choices, which includes the option of an online subscription for $9.99/month or $99/year.  For many households, this will be a good deal. 

Q: What is Joomla!? 
A: It's a Content Management System for your website - and the ! is part of the name.

Q: What is the 2.5 upgrade? 
A: An important "migration" from the old 1.5 version for security, continued support, and loads of new features.

I was given a copy of an article today out of the review section of the Wall Street Journal. I don't spend a lot of time reading the paper, but the nearly full page view of Larry Page and Sergey Brin (Google's co-founders) on the front with the headline "Google: The Beginning" grabbed my attention. So I sat down and "read the paper".

Which AntiVirus Software Should I Use?

I often get the question "which AntiVirus or AntiMalware software should I use?".  It's a difficult one to answer because there are so many new threats introduced each day and none of the packages out there are going to catch everything.  There are a lot to choose from as well, and some of what's out there purporting to be antivirus programs are actually viruses themselves.

I did a short presentation this morning about Windows Small Business Server 2008. Whenever I talk about the number of things that this system brings to the table, I get really excited for the small business owner with whom I'm potentially going to be working because it's so common to come across offices that have a lot of technology investments but aren't utilizing them to improve their business processes and boost their overall productivity. Instead, they (and often their employees) feel unproductive, and sometimes even "beaten" by their computers. They believe "this is just the way it is with computers".

If you were at my presentation on April 21, 2010 and would like an electronic copy (pdf) of the document I handed out, here's a link to Microsoft's website where it came from:

http://download.microsoft.com/download/B/8/A/B8A6537E-A709-414C-9F5D-0EAE781A6F6D/SBS%202008_Datasheet.pdf