Microsoft Learning Releases Labs Online Training Product.

On January 15th, Microsoft Learning released their Labs Online training product.

This is great news for any Microsoft training partner (CPLS) for many reasons, several of which are highlighted in the summary below…

“The Benefits of Labs Online for Training Partners:

• Reduce training delivery costs

Microsoft Learning Labs Online greatly reduce time spent on setting up labs and downloading lab images, giving you a chance to better utilize staff and instructors’ time. In addition, expensive hardware is not required to run Labs Online – reducing hardware upgrade costs and initial set-up costs of building new classrooms or training centers.

Office 2010 - Pros and Cons - Should You Upgrade?

"With Office 2010 set to launch in June, businesses of all sizes are considering if it is worth the money and hassle to upgrade, especially for small and midsize companies that never moved from Office 2003 to Office 2007.

The Pros:

It Breaks Down Old Boundaries

Forrester lists three features in Office 2010 that make it "boundary breaking": The use of SharePoint Workspace (formerly known as Groove) to share and edit SharePoint content both online and offline; easing enterprise security fears by making Office Web Apps available privately as part of a company's license agreement; and integrating social media tools from sites such as LinkedIn in Outlook through Outlook Social Connector.

These new integration features -- if they work smoothly -- give Microsoft an upper hand over more established online productivity suites like Google Apps and Zoho, according to the Forrester report.

Simplified Suite Options for Enterprises

There are seven total editions of Office 2010, but for volume licensing customers (mostly enterprise-size companies), Microsoft has reduced that amount to two: Standard and Professional Plus. This is half as many as Office 2007 (Ultimate and Enterprise editions have been eliminated).

Five Tips For Deploying Windows 7 – Real World Case Study - BMW

"BMW, with over 85,000 employees worldwide, deployed Windows 7 to 500 employees in 2009 and expects to increase that to 5000 users by October 2010, with a view to have all 85,000 employees using Windows 7 by late 2011.

Being an early adopter and migrating that many people from eight-year-old Windows XP to Windows 7 is a monumental task, but one that many enterprises now face. At BMW, Bernhard Huber is taking a deliberate and systematic approach to Windows 7 deployments, rolling it out in phases.

IT executive Bernhard Huber, offers five tips below for deploying Windows 7 within your organisation:

Four Options for Free Storage in the Cloud

Here Are Four Options for Free Storage in the Cloud:

DropBox
Google's DropBox offers 2GB of free online storage. Other options include 50GB for $9.99 per month, or 100GB for $19.99 per month. When put your files in a DropBox folder in one computer, they're uploaded to the site's secure servers. Google Docs has a 250MB file size limit, but DropBox has no such limitation. You can access your files from other computers (Windows, Mac, or Linux) or mobile devices that run DropBox too.

Box.Net
Targeted at the corporate crowd, Box.Net is a little less generous in the storage department.

The site's free option provides 1GB of online storage with a 25MB file-size limit. For $10 per month, you get 5GB of storage and a 1GB file size limit. The $15 per month plan includes 10GB of storage, with the same 1-gig file cutoff. Pricier plans for enterprise customers (with unlimited storage) are available too.

Twitter Trials New Business Feature

Twitter Trials New Business Feature

Twitter has announced a trial of a new functionality aimed specifically at business users, indicating a shift toward commercialising the service.

The micro-blogging platform is currently beta testing the new ‘Contributors’ feature, which allows business users to manage how its employees are identified under their Twitter account.

More than one tweep can tweet from a single twitter account. Or in English, multiple users are now able to be credited in the by-line, freeing up the precious 140 character limit and making business to consumer communication more personal.