Geek Choice Blog » email

Down goes Gmail! Down goes Gmail!

Joseph Ruthaford — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 14:32:19 +0000

Hopefully someone reading my blog gets the subject reference today. Google has reported that Monday a small amount of users logged into to see something very scary! No mail in their inbox. Not just that but any archives as well. The big sigh to take from all of this is the data was never truly lost. In a state on Google’s blog they reported what had happened and reassured everyone that everything was fine and they would have emails restored to normal shortly.
Here is the breakdown of what Google had to report:

* .02% of Gmail users were actually affected by this.

*Google apologized to all of the users that were affected “we’re sorry”

*The data wasn’t lost and many who have been affected have already seen their data restored

*it was a new storage software update that gave the bug life and Google caught it before it damaged more gmail accounts.

*Google is currently restoring the data from tape backups.

So to avoid the fear of this issue ever happening in the future, a good tip would be to backup your Gmail in an email client. Hopefully you won’t have to worry about this ever happening again.

Optimize your Email

Gregg — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 09:01:34 +0000

Email is the center of the work place, the tool that replaces the phone, and the communicator which connects people around the world. Even old folks got into it making life much more enjoyable sending emails to relatives and friends, especially forwards: my grandfather loves those. How did email come to be, and more importantly, how did it come to be such a Fustercluck!?

Back in the day, let’s say the 1970′s before crack-cocaine hit, electronic mail was sent to another computer that had to be on at the same time. It looked almost exactly identical to the emails you see today, with the header, the subject, and the body all there.

Did you know email predated the internet? That is right, and it actually helped to create it too. Originally email started as a way for two or more people in a business to communicate back and forth with each other about what they were working on. From this it has turned into THE way to communicate with each other, period. Try to call the guy you need a quote from, what will he say? He probably will not even pick up the phone, because he knows that the email will be on its way.

This is all great, really just fine and super, but what about the constant headache of spam, viruses, and all out email bombardment of messages from India to China? Well, I will tell you what that is about, that is about you! I know it seems hard to realize that the one at fault is the one reading this, but the truth is funny like that.

If you want to avoid all that spam? Do not give out your email address by signing up to websites such as Facebook, any site with a newsletter or membership, avoid anything that asks for your email address. How can you still operate without the hassles? Simple, two emails.

I found this out recently when I had so much spam and so much crap coming into the inbox that it seemed impossible to completely stop, until I opened up a new account with the same email server, which is Gmail. If you are like me and you have already screwed up your email account by giving it out too much, then there is a solution, and it is simple. Keep that first email address which still has some use, and get a new email account, call it the top-secret inbox.

Now you have two emails, one for all the spam and baloney that gets piled in the inbox, and the other you only give out to friends, family, and sites your trust will not give out your email address. I stumbled upon this great idea after a month has gone by without one message in the spam box! That is a beautiful thing, and the emails I do get I know for a fact that they are real and that they need my attention.

This saves me so much time wasted trying to delete random messages and spam I thought I marked as spam but now is hanging in the box. When you handle emails constantly every day, and the response time is expected to be short and prompt with replies, you have no time to be analyzing words and making sure they are okay.

To bring it all down to the heart of the matter, optimize your email by creating duplicity, and getting away with more because now you have a fall guy to take the hit for all those people emailing you and trying to ruin your email experience.

The Google Doc is In

Gregg — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 04:44:07 +0000

If you have not heard about this new word processor, then you have been missing out my friend, because Google Docs competes with Office and is completely online. There are so many benefits to this type of document platform that they are too many to write about in this blog. However, I will try to contain it in simple and easy terms that even a layman could lay down and understand.

The centerpiece of Google Docs is the collaboration feature that allows multiple people to look at a piece of writing and edit it simultaneously. I have used this tool I cannot count how many times, and it never fails to amaze me as well as save me. My editor could be across the country, yet by connecting via Gmail to the Google Docs folder, we can look at an article together like we were sitting next to each other. Technology shines light on how easy life can be with new tools which make working and writing much better.

Let’s say for example, that you are in the airport on your way to Wichita, Kansas for a big business meeting. On your laptop you have saved the big presentation, all on Google Docs, and there is not a cloud on the horizon. CRASH! No more presentation because the laptop is infested with a virus. What are you going to do? Head to the bar and drink your anger away? Get on the plane and have a breakdown and end up behind the bar? Or are you going to take a deep breath and realize that you are safe, with no fear because you can get onto the presentation from anywhere that has internet access! If you have an iPhone, iPad, or Android, there you go!

More great features include the auto-save and the organisation of Google Docs. When you are using an online application to write anything from school papers to business protocol, auto will save your life if the server goes down and freezes, making sure that data recovery is simple by saving all the time. As I write this blog, WordPress saves the document every minute, this action has literally saved my life and my blog a couple times when if I did not have this auto-save action? A lot of words would have been lost in cyber space this way, they are floating around out there when they should have been saved.

About organizing, Google Docs gives you a folder to share with others along with the ability to move folders and files to different locations. This is perfect for people who need to have things just so. Google Docs is perhaps the best way to write, save what you write, and to share what you write, organize it all in a nice package, and live life easy.

I strongly recommend using Google Docs if you are a writer like me, or work in any business related to communicating with the outside world where editing and proofreading are essential to getting the job done. Amen.

In Google Docs We Trust.

Office 2010 Adds New Features

Sean Wilcoxson — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 13:00:20 +0000

If you have not already made the jump to Office 2010, then you are still sitting on the lily pad, with all the other frogs deciding when to jump into something better.

The new edition of Office came out last June, changing the way people use the computer and how they conduct their business through it, and now is standard in new PC’s. Microsoft Office is really just an easier way to handle multiple operations at once when the operating system normally could not perform these tasks. For businessmen and professionals, Office has become the standard for email, meetings, and productivity.

Office provides Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, Outlook, Access, InfoPath, Groove, and Publisher. That is a ton of operation for one program to handle, and Office fits them all together for you to use them with ease. So if you have the old version of Office, why not turn your ‘ease’ into ‘easier’?

New Features

One new add on to Microsoft Office is PowerPoint LiveWeb, which is perfect for anyone who uses PowerPoint. Who does not love this program? Students especially have benefited from using this program greatly because it offers such a detailed and neat presentation. No more posters or weird looking projects that you have to spend hours on making. With this new feature, you can add web pages right to the slide making your presentation perfect. The OLD PowerPoint is so hard to configure because you have to add the code to the page.

To top it all off, a new feature called Producer takes the cake on ease. It lives up to its name, it produces results allowing the user to import video, photographs, and audio right into your presentation. If you are involved in e-Learning, a conference, office communications, and public speaking, Producer lets you do what you want to do: the best!

Office 2010 gets into the social network scene with Outlook Social Connector. With this feature you can see what your friends and business associates are doing instantly through Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, and Window’s Live Messenger. Using this feature allows people to follow each others progress and status when at work, school, or home.

Offisync is more than a combination between Office and synchronization, it is a revolutionary change in the way people share, edit, and communicate documents. If you use Google Docs, another multi-usage platform that combines a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation along with storage, then Offisync is the right stuff. With this feature you now have access to your Google Docs within Office. This makes it easier because you are free from being confined to the Google Apps. It is the key you have been looking for to unlock the door to accessibility.

For all of you that travel across the world seeking business and/or pleasure, Office has combined with Bing to create: Bing Travel Planner for Outlook. Especially if you have trouble to begin with trying to plan a trip or multiple trips over the year, Bing Travel Planner helps you schedule flights and also remember them.

Perhaps one of the most useful tools that Microsoft has added to its new edition of Office, is Microsoft Mathematics Add-In for Word. You can download this free of charge at the Microsoft website. What this allows you math illiterate people like myself to do, or math geniuses like you to accomplish, is graphing 2D or 3D, solving equations in arithmetic and algebra, and even completing statistical functions. How awesome is that? This is something that has been missing in computers, an application that is easy to use and effective in helping the student or businessman who has to deal with numbers daily, finish the work they started.

So for all you Microsoft Office Addicts out there who are off the wagon and need a fix? Office 2010 gives you all that need to satisfy that craving for more.

Microsoft Office 365 and the Pink Cloud

Sean Wilcoxson — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 01:57:32 +0000

Today Microsoft Office is on over a billion PC’s around the world. If you work in business or any company, chances are pretty good that email is involved, and Office is perfect for organization and ease of use.

Chris Capossela , who is the Senior Vice President of the Microsoft Office Division, has this to say on a new product that might interest users of Microsoft Office, and businessman who either own a small business or work in one.

“This is just the beginning; Office 365 allows us to take the Office suite and all the servers that go along with it, and move those to the Cloud with a world class productivity service. That really will define the next generation of productivity,” said Capossela.

It looks like the world of computers and internet is improving for the better. Major factors involved include ease of use, how fast it is, and results. Microsoft Office 365 delivers every day of the year, hence the name.

“No other online service can provide the rich productivity capabilities of Office 365, the ease of use and depth of services, combined with the communication and collaboration of Exchange Online, SharePoint online, and Lync Online, deliver incredible benefits for organizations of all sizes,” said Betsy Webb, who is the General Manager for the Microsoft Office Division.

Small businesses that do not have formal IT staff but have big business needs for communication and collaboration will find a home here. Office 365 provides services for small businesses who want to get up and running in minutes.

You can share your work right with others with the broadcast capabilities of Powerpoint. Make a presentation on your laptop at the office and have that sent to the people who cannot make the meeting.

Sharepoint Online allows every employee of your company to have their own website, a sort of Facebook that allows each employee and employer to find each other and connect in ways they could not before.

Certain abilities like PC to PC communication are great for small businesses. Employees are able to work across distances with audio and video conversations, Microsoft Office 365 creates an easy living world in your business.

Here is a look at the specifics.

Microsoft Exchange Online is designed for organizations who want to get the benefits of cloud-based email without sacrificing the business-class capabilities that Exchange Server has been providing for decades. Built on the same technology as Exchange Server 2010, Exchange Online provides organizations with the latest capabilities including built-in archiving, optional Conversation View, and MailTips, along with powerful web-based tools for managing online deployments. With Exchange Online, Microsoft handles the ongoing maintenance, patches, and upgrades of the Exchange infrastructure while providing IT administrators the control and flexibility they require.

With SharePoint Online the services are there for you to make life easier. Manage and share personal documents and insights with colleagues using ‘MySites’, a great feature like Facebook. Keep teams in sync with shared document libraries, task lists and calendars with Team Sites. SharePoint allows you to stay up to date on company news, events and business updates with Intranet Sites. Another good feature is the ability share documents and insights securely with partners and customers using Extranet Sites.

The last feature is called Lync Online. It is a next-generation cloud communications service that connects people in new ways, anytime, from anywhere. Lync Online provides intuitive communications capabilities across presence, instant messaging, audio/video calling and a rich online meeting experience including PC-audio, video and web conferencing. Transform your interactions with colleagues, customers and partners from today’s hit-and-miss communication to a more collaborative, engaging, and effective experience.

All in all, if you have a small business and already use Office 2007, the upgrade to Cloud could mean increases in productivity and results. Personally I have not checked out this Cloud business, as it is only in Beta form right now. It looks promising, with the future of communication happening today, I would check it out.