Thursday, July 19, 2012
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
July 2012 Newsletter Released
The July 2012 issue of the "Borough of West Chester - Employee's Technology Newsletter" has been released. Included in this issue: 
1. Technology Challanges in Local Government
2. Social Media & Local Government
3. Microsoft Releases Free Security Tool
4. What is Moore's Law?
5. Newsletters, Tweets & Blogs
6. App of the Month - Zite
7. Shared Calendars ... and more
You can download the newsletter by clicking here or the right menu bar of this fine blog.
2. Social Media & Local Government
3. Microsoft Releases Free Security Tool
4. What is Moore's Law?
5. Newsletters, Tweets & Blogs
6. App of the Month - Zite
7. Shared Calendars ... and more
You can download the newsletter by clicking here or the right menu bar of this fine blog.
Monday, July 16, 2012
Microsoft\'s Cloud Expands
by QUENTIN HARDY, bits.blogs.nytimes.comJuly 16th 2012
Microsoft says face it: work is everywhere and you should get used to it.
Microsoft is probably going to have to get used to a few things itself, including how it much money it makes in this world.
On Monday the company showed off the next version of its Office product for documents and spreadsheets, as well as changes to its Outlook e-mail and calendar service. The products are now cloud based, which means that powerful computers access over the Internet enable customers to access products from anywhere, and the products remember where a customer left off using them. A document that’s being edited, for example, will open up at the last point in the text where a change was made.
In addition, Microsoft showed how these products tie into other Microsoft products, like Skype or the Yammer corporate collaboration service. Bing maps can pop up in email to show where an address is, and customers can make notes on the map.
“This is the biggest, most ambitious release of Office that we’ve ever done in our history,” said Steve Ballmer, chief executive officer of Miocrosoft. Nowadays, he said, “people work in much more social and collaborative ways.”
The cloud does potentially tie together a number of Microsoft’s acquisitions, and things it has been working on, in an attractive way. Office was shown on tablets from Samsung running Windows 8. There was a demonstration of documents stored in SkyDrive, Microsoft’s cloud-based storage service, and opened up on a Windows 8 phone (which will be out in October.) There was a mock-up of a collaborative meeting that used a large high-definition video monitor from Perceptive Pixel, a company Microsoft bought last week.
What wasn’t clear was what any of this would cost, and how that would go over. All Mr. Ballmer said was “we have a lot of work to get the cost down.” The more he does, however, the more he may undermine the profitability of Office, Microsoft’s flagship product. Wall Street won’t like that. Microsoft could win in the cloud, but survival could be costly.
There was one other unintended note in the presentation: While the early demonstration supposedly focused on home use of the product, the stress was on being able to work from home. Brochures were redrawn, e-mails were attended to, people worked on projects near their kids. Even testimonials from customers flown in for the event underlined the world Microsoft sees.
“The neat part is, my office is now everywhere,” said Kim Grant, a mother and part-time lawyer from Houston. “I can get my work done from my daughter’s volleyball game.”
Say what you will, Microsoft understands, and shapes, the times we live in.
Microsoft says face it: work is everywhere and you should get used to it.
Microsoft is probably going to have to get used to a few things itself, including how it much money it makes in this world.
On Monday the company showed off the next version of its Office product for documents and spreadsheets, as well as changes to its Outlook e-mail and calendar service. The products are now cloud based, which means that powerful computers access over the Internet enable customers to access products from anywhere, and the products remember where a customer left off using them. A document that’s being edited, for example, will open up at the last point in the text where a change was made.
In addition, Microsoft showed how these products tie into other Microsoft products, like Skype or the Yammer corporate collaboration service. Bing maps can pop up in email to show where an address is, and customers can make notes on the map.
“This is the biggest, most ambitious release of Office that we’ve ever done in our history,” said Steve Ballmer, chief executive officer of Miocrosoft. Nowadays, he said, “people work in much more social and collaborative ways.”
The cloud does potentially tie together a number of Microsoft’s acquisitions, and things it has been working on, in an attractive way. Office was shown on tablets from Samsung running Windows 8. There was a demonstration of documents stored in SkyDrive, Microsoft’s cloud-based storage service, and opened up on a Windows 8 phone (which will be out in October.) There was a mock-up of a collaborative meeting that used a large high-definition video monitor from Perceptive Pixel, a company Microsoft bought last week.
What wasn’t clear was what any of this would cost, and how that would go over. All Mr. Ballmer said was “we have a lot of work to get the cost down.” The more he does, however, the more he may undermine the profitability of Office, Microsoft’s flagship product. Wall Street won’t like that. Microsoft could win in the cloud, but survival could be costly.
There was one other unintended note in the presentation: While the early demonstration supposedly focused on home use of the product, the stress was on being able to work from home. Brochures were redrawn, e-mails were attended to, people worked on projects near their kids. Even testimonials from customers flown in for the event underlined the world Microsoft sees.
“The neat part is, my office is now everywhere,” said Kim Grant, a mother and part-time lawyer from Houston. “I can get my work done from my daughter’s volleyball game.”
Say what you will, Microsoft understands, and shapes, the times we live in.
Friday, July 13, 2012
Subscribe to the WC Tech Blog
You can now subscribe the the "West Chester Employee's Technology Blog" and receive an email when new articles are posted. On the right side panel of the blog you will see an option to "Follow By Email". Enter your address, then enter the letters in the verification window. Afterward you will receive an email message confirming your subscription. Boy - it can't get any easier then that! 
New Password Warnings!
CNET\'s Declan McCullagh wrote a program to comb through the most frequently used passwords that surfaced in the breach. The most common password was 123456. Other popular choices include the word "password" and pop-culture terms like superman, starwars.
This should be a warning to everyone. Put some thought into your passwords, mixing up letters, numbers and special characters. And just as important DO NOT use the same password on all of the sites and services you use.
If you need help with coming up with passwords try a free password generator like the one you can find at http://strongpasswordgenerator.com
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
IPAD Test
OK friends it looks like I can post stories and articles quickly and easily right from my IPAD and IPHONE now. This is important because I often have great stories in my mind but they are often fleeting and after a few moments I forget them! Now I can post them as soon as I think of them.
Thursday, July 5, 2012
First things first. What exactly is DNS anyway? Basiclly DNS is short for Domain Name System. A Domain Name System Service resolves queried internet site names from [numeric] IP addresses for the purpose of locating computer services and devices worldwide easily & quickly. For example, without the DNS system, everytime you wanted to shop online at amazon.com you would need to remember 72.21.211.176 as opposed to simply amazon.com. What an inconvienance that would be, although it would probably save alot of us some money!
Apparently there has been a problem with this for some time and If you are one of thousands of people infected with the DNSChanger malware, you should get rid of it before Monday.
On July 9, the FBI will be switching off servers it has been using to keep those networks infected with the malware working on the Internet.
DNSChanger was first discovered in 2007 and was found to have infected millions of computers worldwide. It effectively modified a computer's DNS settings to redirect traffic through its rogue servers. When users typed in a domain name in a browser, the servers would direct them to other sites for the creators' evil plans.
Late last year, the FBI disrupted the crime ring and converted the rogue servers to clean servers to give infected users time to fix their systems. A host of tools and techniques have surfaced for removing the malware, but thousands of machines are still affected. If DNSChanger is not removed from those computers, users won't be able to connect to the Internet.
The good news is that we are OK here at the Borough. I double checked our server's DNS and we should be crusing the internet normally long after July 9, 2012. You can check at home to see if you are ok by clicking here. I will also cover DNS a little more detail in the July technology newsletter.
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