Status - QuickLinks

Microsoft: Unix modularity not so dumb afterall

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Fri, 07 May 2010 15:02:57 -0700

Of course, they won't come out and say it, but as they slowly alter Windows to adopt tried and true Unix models, you get the idea: Server Core Best Practices on Windows Server

Not having to install the kitchen sink on every server has long given *nix systems an edge in performance and security. Keep it up, and Windows will just be another Linux distribution in the crowd before long!

Cloud computing for small businesses

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 20:19:23 -0700

There are a lot of advantages to the cloud, or utility, computing model, but it can be difficult for small businesses to see exactly how those apply to their situations. If you are in that group, consider attending a free webinar tomorrow by Ventureneer titled "How, Why, and When Small Businesses and Nonprofits should use cloud computing." Unlike most such presentations, this one isn't being put on by one of the big providers and so looks to be about as unbiased an initial presentation as you will find on the subject.

In consulting, bigger isn't better

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 09:55:04 -0700

I run across these stories all the time, sometimes from the client's perspective, sometimes from the prospective of the consultant (almost always, actually, the former consultant), so this recent entry from MIT's Tech from an alum who worked for Boston Consulting Group isn't exactly a shocker. It is, though, one of the clearest and best written articles I have found in the leitmotif, so if you were still wondering why choosing a big consulting company is usually a mistake, it's worth a read.

Although some see these recurring themes in consulting engagements as a curse against consultants everywhere, in fact it is more an indictment of employees who didn't realize the game they were getting into and clients that didn't do their homework about the businesses they chose to rely on for vital business advice and guidance. Good advice is out there, and it's got great value; don't expect you're going to get it just because you are asking a firm with a lot of people on the payroll.

SMB-targeted Microsoft-hosted solution coming soon

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 15:37:10 -0700

Microsoft's Business Productivity Online Suite has made available the bundled products of Exchange, Sharepoint, and Live Meeting, hosted by Microsoft itself, for more than a year now. The $120 per year, per user fee has seemed a little steep, though, considering those same solutions have been available from third parties who have much more experience and for much less money than Microsoft itself. The target market of BPOS, and most of its uptake, has been with larger organizations (many of which were probably able to negotiate much better deals in private, anyway).

The market most open to the hosted services offering, though, and representing the larger total number of seats, is the SMB market. Microsoft watcher Mary Jo Foley reports that Redmond is finally getting around to rolling out the SMB version of BPOS, due sometime in the second half of 2010.

Pricing isn't available yet, nor is a better long-term perspective on where Microsoft is going with the whole concept. Despite Steve Ballmer's assertion that the company is "all in" on cloud computing, it's not clear that Microsoft really realizes this may be where their bread is buttered for the foreseeable future... and if they don't, then despite their apparently privileged position as the designer of the software in question, you may still be better off buying the same services from smaller third-party hosting companies who have enough skin in the Software as a Service game to encourage stability and reliability.

More Microsoft licensing resources

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 11:18:00 -0700

http://www.directionsonmicrosoft.com/samples/49-samples/912-five-essential-resources-for-microsoft-licensing.html

From Directions on Microsoft, a list of five important resources for deciphering and appropriately setting up your Microsoft licensing.

More Chromium

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 17:42:33 -0700

So, if you didn't entirely get what I was trying to say about the design philosophy and reasoning behind Google's development of their new Chromium OS, this guy says it all much better than I ever could.

Microsoft licensing simplified

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:37:38 -0700

Since Microsoft has pretty much committed itself to a course of obfuscating and complicating its software licensing terms and practices, it's left to third parties to come up with guides and explanations that make sense to the layman looking to decipher the options. While in the past you might have had to engage a pricey consultant to help make heads or tails of your license purchasing options, Ed Bott has compiled an excellently comprehensive and readable guide to Windows 7 license options that you can review and understand yourself.

Microsoft Online services update

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 11:27:31 -0700

By way of Mary Jo Foley's blog, information on the upcoming updates to Microsoft's Online services; hosted versions of popular enterprise products, aimed largely at the SMB community who otherwise find it difficult and expensive to build out infrastructure for hosting those applications.

The direction of this round of updates is welcome news for small businesses, as it leans toward opening up the services to work with platforms other than Microsoft's own; the addition of support for the POP e-mail standard allows any e-mail client to be used with the Exchange hosted service (although, as I have said time and again, Exchange really only makes sense as an e-mail host when used in conjunction with Microsoft's Outlook, which exposes the full features and power of the system), and Mac support for single sign-on authentication and Office for Mac allows businesses with mixed environments or home users with Apples to expand the utility of the service.

Google's Small Business Toolkit

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 09:32:15 -0700

Apparently the site has been up for quite a while, but I hadn't noticed it until I caught this post on the Google Public Policy blog linking to it. That's not unusual for many of Google's less polished or promoted products... they simply wander out the door and sit there, waiting for someone to notice them, a quality that is at once endearing and infuriating for anyone trying to figure out what the company is up to now.

At any rate, the Small Business Toolkit is a combination of policy information and practical suggestions of Google tools to use to solve common (or less common, depending on the tool) small business problems. Though most small business owners are too busy to keep close track of what is going on in the legislative world that might affect their livelihoods, Google's offering isn't exactly one-stop shopping; it's oriented mainly toward issues that might affect the big G itself, in the guise of reducing its access to consumers and small business. Still, it's more information than you might get from the evening paper, so if you're not otherwise keeping up with technology policy issues that could impact your business, it's better than nothing. And there may be some Google products or services you weren't previously aware of that could offer cheaper or more effective alternatives to your current solutions, which the company does a good job of laying out in layman's terms.

Morro preview

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 15:23:25 -0700

Well, "preview" may be a little excessive; Neowin has up three screenshots you can feast your eyes on, but nothing in the way of substantive information on features or performance.

Riding XP till the end

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Mon, 18 May 2009 21:12:27 -0700

I talk pretty frequently about holding firm with Windows XP through the Vista debacle and now even on into the Windows 7 era (due to begin later this year), but I have left the mechanics of doing so primarily as an exercise for the reader.

Information Week, on the other hand, has gone out and done the dirty work of assembling an actual list of practical instructions for those planning on hunkering down with XP for the foreseeable future, and it's all the good advice that I might have given you had I been less lazy or if you had actually be a paying client.

Read up!

Dell SMB Solutions Center

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 09:08:20 -0700

Dell's Small Business Solutions center has an article up about what the stimulus package might mean for small and mid-sized businesses. It's odd that this is coming out of Dell (although they have been making leaps and bounds in their SMB outreach efforts of late) but it's probably the clearest and most concise general summary of the impacts of this program that I have seen. There's not a lot in there (particularly if you're not in healthcare) but I think most SMBs knew they weren't going to be getting big AIG-style bailouts already. There are some useful provisions, however; worth a read if you're involved in finances in your organization.

Extreme Office Makeover

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 19:41:53 -0700

If you're a small business in the Seattle area, with no more than ten employees and no less than three computers, head on over and check out the Seattle Chamber of Commerce's "Extreme Office Makeover" competition for a chance to win free stuff.

I had a client who was the primary contractor on the actual "Extreme Makeover- Home Edition" and got to see some of the frenzy surrounding the filming of one episode of that show... I somehow doubt this will be quite so overwhelming, but hey, it's free stuff, right?

TechExecs Seattle CIO Forum

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:15:36 -0700

Just a quick pointer link; I attended the TechExecs Seattle CIO Forum today but all my write-ups of the presentations and discussions will be up over on my other blog, the CIO Weblog. Nothing earth-shattering happened so if you're not interested in that sort of thing you may as well skip those posts; nonetheless I enjoyed the discussions and the panel so if you are into geeky CIO type stuff you might like the write-up on what was discussed.

I thought IBM was for Big Business?

nospam@example.com (Scott Wilson) — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 17:41:02 -0700

Research and analytical firm Forrester is giving them props for their small business and mid-sized business portals.

They don't impress me all that much, but IBM is as hungry for business right now as anyone, so maybe they are restructuring to lower historically excessive prices, and incomprehensible internal organization and websites. So far, I haven't seen any signs of such efforts, though. YMMV.