iPad for Productivity…IT Perspective. Post #3

Email: the tool we all hate to love these days.

Unified inbox includes mail, social media and linkedin #playbook #rim (Photo credit: Florian SEROUSSI)

Here, in a nutshell, are my pros and cons of my time experimenting with the Mail app for the iPad.

PROS:

Larger Screen:  If I am comparing the iPad to a smartphone, as with web browsing, mobile email solutions benefit from a larger screen size.  Less scrolling and possible resizing, more room for images or attachment viewing, etc.

Interface:  The newer version of Mail for iOS comes with the Unified Inbox, enabling me to see all my new mail from multiple accounts in one Inbox.  I can, of course, still scroll and select individual accounts and folders as required.  The Move command for mail items is nice and intuitive as well, bringing up a nice interface to select the destination.  The ability to sync/push multiple folders and set several other features is not different from on the iPhone per se, but are still good features.

CONS:

No Attachment Support:  This is the big one.  There are workarounds in the form of Apple and third-party apps.  However, one of the largest complaints I see among business users of the iPad is the lack of a dedicated file and navigation system in iOS for documents and such.  This rears its ugly head in a number of places, but the most painful one is around mail.  In order to send attachments via email on the iPad, I can’t do it from Mail.  I have to do it from another application, such as Pages, or DropBox, etc. and this is counterintuitive when I spend a good chunk of time reading and composing emails and passing and receiving attachments.  The solutions I have come up with are OK, but are not great, and this is one of the single biggest limiting factors in using the iPad for productivity (at least, if your productivity includes lots of emails and attachments!).

Interface Oddities:  Some things about the Mail interface bug me.  When you navigate to a message and select it, it makes the active mailbox/folder the one the item is in.  When I want to change from this item to an item in another folder, or the inbox, for instance, I have to go through a series of selections and scroll operations to move back and forth.  This can be a nuisance for those with heavy mail operations where moving around between folders is a common task.   Another area is with the virtual keyboard.  Though it works, it is not as natural for me as I had hoped, and compared to the iPhone, I actually think I make more typos on the iPad keyboard.  Also, the screen real estate loss is frustrating.  Hooking up a bluetooth keyboard for this is fine, but requires the extra work.

SUMMARY: 

This is obviously not a super-comprehensive review of all email-related features and issues on the iPad platform, but it provides an overview of my most favorite pros and cons.  Bottom line: Mail for iOS is a solid email client, but nagging interface issues and lack of organic attachment support prevent me from finding it a completely suitable replacement for a dedicated computer and keyboard in the form of a laptop, ultrabook, or even netbook.

Website Design and Hosting for Small Organizations

As part of my duties as IT Manager for NSI Partners TechConnect, I also oversee our Hosting services.

Image via Wikipedia

In today’s marketplace, the Internet, and the Web, are everywhere.  From desktop and laptop computers, to tablets and smart phones, to TVs, other home electronics, and even some cars, the ubiquity of the Web is enormous.

Whether you are a for-profit or not-for-profit organization, a web presence is essential to draw attention, provide services, get new customers, and communicate with constituents.

Many places today offer simple, easy-to-configure, bottom-dollar priced do-it-yourself site design and hosting.  Some of these sites, such as our own NSIHost, offer such services and additional features you can easily add in (e-commerce, SSL certificates, various Social Media plugins, etc.).  This is a great option if you are willing to spend a little time getting comfortable with the interface, tools and walk-thrus available to build your own site.

Another option is to contract with a provider (NSI Partners provides these services as well) to design a site for you, often using images and graphics you provide, with a layout design you have input into, and features / add-ons that make sense for your goals and organization.  This, of course, is more expensive, but gives you the luxury of a no-hassle site designed by experts without having to spend much time fiddling with the site design yourself.

There are other choices to make, such as the registration of domain names (e.g. www.mycoolsite.com), whether or not you want email accounts for your registered domains, and whether you want your website in a shared or dedicated hosting environment.  In addition, Search Engine Optimization is very important if you want to be found.  Many online marketing firms offer services in these areas, including NSI Partners, and money spent on various forms of online marketing usually means more visitors, links from others, and ultimately, customers.

The main point here is that if you are part of a new small business, a non-profit or ministry organization, or represent some other organizational interest, you need a website, and it’s not as complicated or intimidating as one might think.

If you are ready to get started, follow one of the links in this post, or fill out our contact form, and one of our Design and Hosting experts will reach out to you and assist you in the next steps for your agency!

Migrating to Office365 from onsite servers

Image by Microsoft Sweden via Flickr

This week our team will be doing another “move to the cloud” for one of our clients.

Small and Medium Organizations who have previously installed onsite Windows Servers in order to run Microsoft Exchange for email, contacts, and calendars can benefit from the new cloud services Microsoft is offering.  This is a particularly well-timed decision when you might be considering upgrading an aging Small Business Server 2003, or other aging Server platform running Exchange.

Why?  Because the cost of migrating a smaller organization to Microsoft Office 365, plus the ongoing annual cost of a relevant subscription tier, can be less than

or equal to the cost of a new server and associated costs.  The added advantage of much lower ongoing maintenance and upkeep costs (as Microsoft staff do 90% of that work at no additional cost) can be a very wise choice in today’s business and technological marketplace.

Beyond email, as I have written about previously, Office 365 offers online, browser-based versions of Office applications for document creation and editing on-the-go, and also features the newest Microsoft SharePoint cloud interface for online document storage and sharing (as well as other intranet-related features).  The newest addition to the offerings is Microsoft Lync, which replaces the older Office Communicator and Live Meeting products and empowers instant messaging, real-time voice chat, screen-sharing, and other cool communication tools.

A small business or organization without an on-premise Windows Server or Exchange environment can easily setup new accounts and enable better email, calendaring, contact management, document sharing and storage, and IM and collaboration tools than they have previously had available.

All this can be had at around 6.00 per user per month for the features I have described, a price competitive with Google Apps for Business but which integrates much more organically with Windows operating systems and Office products.

More and more of us are moving to the cloud for essential services for our agencies andy businesses.  Office 365 provides a cost-effective and very useful set of tools for any organization today.

If you are interested in learning more or want to receive a free quote on how NSI Partners TechConnect can assist your organization with cloud-based technologies, contact us today at tech@nsipartners.com !

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Smartphone Apps and the “New Workflow”

Image via Wikipedia

Small Business IT Support Colorado Springs

Today’s small business or organization needs cost-effective, competitive IT and technology support and solutions. That’s where NSI Partners TechConnect comes to the rescue. On-demand, as-needed technical expertise to help your business or nonprofit with:

-computers     -software     -operating systems     -printers     -scanners

-smart phones     -mobile devices     -networks     -routers     -switches          -file sharing     -data backup

-application choices     -databases     -training and tutorials

-cloud services

When you’re looking for just-in-time IT staffing that will help technology work FOR you rather than the opposite, choose NSI Partners TechConnect.

CONTACT US now at 719-328-0042, ext.810 or email tech@nsipartners.com

Instant Communications in the Dispersed Workforce

Despite advances in smartphones and SMS, collaborative workspace and desktop-sharing applications, and social networking, there is still no replacement for instant-on text chat via an IM client for our dispersed workforce at NSI Partners, Inc.

There are many options in the landscape today for Intant Messaging clients.  Ranging from traditional options such as AOL Instant Messenger (AIM)  http://www.aim.com/, Windows Live Messenger http://explore.live.com/windows-live-messenger?os=win7, Yahoo Messenger http://messenger.yahoo.com/, to more contemporary applications such as Skype http://www.skype.com/intl/en-us/home and Microsoft Office Communicator http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/communicator/default.aspx, there are many choices for instant internet-based communication.

Here at NSI Partners we have decided to use one of several popular IM aggregation programs called Trillian — http://www.trillian.im/. This class of application is designed to link to multiple accounts or profiles with one or more popular services, including all those listed above (AOL, Yahoo, Live/MSN).  New versions of the Trillian application can even link to Facebook, MySpace, and a host of other social network/chat services.  There are, of course, some disadvantages to activating multiple IM/social network clients with an active application such as Trillian.  For one, simply wading through the potentially giant list of contacts and updates, as well as managing “presence” or “status” for each of the various services can become tedious quickly.  If I am using one of these network profiles, such as AOL, to communicate with all my co-workers, I run the risk of getting distracted by friends, family, or other contacts from one or more of the other services depending on my presence/status/availability.  Programs such as Trillian do a decent job of making the management of my status with various services somewhat streamlined with its user interface.  But at some point, I only want to stay logged in with one service – the one I use to talk to co-workers.

There are advantages to using a single, dedicated platform that is singular in its profile/account focus but provides other features not available with programs such as Trillian.  For example, Microsoft’s Office Communicator, though not as pretty or “new web” friendly as many other clients, is great at doing what it is designed to do — connecting staff in a company who are in one or more physical locations with a chat client.  This particular chat client can do other things as well that integrate with other Microsoft technologies, which offers businesses some features not available with other IM clients.  For example, “presence indicators” in the IM client can also pull information from the organizations’ Exchange server (assuming they have one), and provide Calendar information about staff.  So rather than just being listed as “Away”, I might show up as “In Meeting — Next Free in 1 hour”, based on what information I choose to share.  From inside Communicator I can also right-click on another user and initiate a voice or video chat, or a Live Meeting session, if my organization uses that software for collaboration.

The client or application that will work best is the one that meets all our instant-communication needs, both internally among the staff, as well as outward-facing to clients, partners, vendors, etc.  This is one area of application development that has dozens of options which are always changing, so it can pay to review the options from time to time.  In the end, though, as long as I can send an instant text message to a co-worker who is located several miles or states or countries away from me, and we can engage in quick conversation, I am a happy worker

Remote IT Support Colorado Springs

Today’s small business or organization needs cost-effective, competitive IT and technology support and solutions. That’s where NSI Partners TechConnect comes to the rescue. On-demand, as-needed technical expertise to help your business or nonprofit with:

-COMPUTERS -SOFTWARE -OPERATING SYSTEMS -PRINTERS -SCANNERS

-SMART PHONES -MOBILE DEVICES -NETWORKS -ROUTERS -SWITCHES

-FILE SHARING -DATA BACKUP                - APPLICATIONS -DATABASES

-TRAINING -CLOUD SERVICES

When you’re looking for just-in-time IT staffing that will help technology work FOR you rather than the opposite, choose NSI Partners TechConnect.

CONTACT US now at 719-328-0042, ext.810 or email tech@nsipartners.com