Link Your Information: Use MS Outlook and MS OneNote as a Team

OneNote makes a perfect team with the other components of the Microsoft Office system. For example, you can create a diagram of your current quarter’s results in Excel and copy this page to the meeting preparation page in OneNote where, during the past few weeks, you have been gathering ideas that you want to discuss with your colleagues. Or somebody sends you a Word document containing a report summary that you insert as a picture. You use a text marker to highlight specific sections and comment with handwritten keywords (see the “How to add documents as pictures” procedure earlier in this chapter). During the meeting, you write down the results and all resulting tasks, and then make the page available to your colleagues in the meeting workspace of a SharePoint site as the meeting minutes. Afterward, you copy the tasks you are responsible for into your own personal task list in Outlook with just one click per task.

Understanding the Cloud Approach to Services

Today, there is a wide spectrum of services available in the cloud, including messaging solutions, collaborative solutions, identity management solutions, storage solutions, customer relationship management, and many more. Major vendors have also released cloud services based on their widely used on-premises software products. For example, Microsoft has released Office 365, which provides an online version of SharePoint Server, Exchange Server, and Lync Server. Microsoft also provides the Windows Azure platform, which makes the Windows Server operating system and other features available as services.

Collaborating with DropBox

So exactly what is dropbox???...........

Well Dropbox is a free service that lets you bring all your photos, docs, and videos anywhere. Any file you save to your Dropbox will also automatically save to all your computers, phones, and even the Dropbox website. This means that you can start working on your computer at school or the office, and finish on your home computer. Never email yourself a file again!

 

MS Office: Using Layout and Design to Organize Your Content

Design elements should help your content stand out. Good design and layout organizes and emphasizes your content. So, how do you make choices about what design and layout elements will effectively organize your important points? Following are a few suggestions to help you get started.

 

·         Choose one or two complementary colors to use in heading text and to highlight key pieces of information, such as shading table cells or bordering a paragraph. Adding small details—for example, using one of your highlight colors for bullets or numbering (not the paragraph text, just the bullet or number)—can help lend organization and style to the page without overpowering the content.

 

·         Use basic formatting, such as a border beneath top-level heading text or a left indent on body content, to help organize the page. Highlight colors, discussed in the preceding bullet point, can also help to organize the page when used for elements such as heading text and borders.

 

·         Use graphics only when they help convey information more effectively. A picture is only worth 10,000 words if it conveys the particular 10,000 words that matter. For example, a chart of key data, a relationship or process diagram, or an image that demonstrates a core concept can convey much more than text. But using a piece of clip art just for the sake of adding an image to the page doesn’t emphasize your content—it detracts from it.

·         Similarly, avoid graphics that talk down to recipients, such as block arrows on the page that do nothing but point to pieces of content. If the recipient doesn’t know how to read a document without those cues, creating the document is a waste of your time.

Top 10 benefits of server virtualization - Blade Server guide

The use of blade servers in enterprise data centers continues to climb. Market analysts peg the growth of x86 blade servers at twice that  of the overall server category. Blades have become an essential component of data-center trends such as network convergence, server  virtualization and cloud computing over the past few years.

 

The high density, scalability, easy configuration, and lower energy costs offered  by blades help to drive business innovation and eliminate server sprawl. What’s more, enterprises that deploy blades are enjoying  significant savings—often more than 50 percent – when compared to traditional servers

So what are some the benefits virtualization of servers can be bring to organizations - Get further insights from the presentation below;


 

Smart Phones Buyers' Guide

The smartphone has transformed  communication between mobile  workers and their offices but at a  cost. Even Microsoft has realised it  missed a very important trick not  having a mobile operating system  that can compete with the likes of the iPhone, Android and Symbian.

But  how should CIOs and senior IT professionals manage this extension of  corporate IT systems to the anytime, anywhere use? This eight-page  Buyer’s Guide to Smartphones assesses the market and the latest  developments.

 

 

smart phones buyers' guide

CLOUD COLLABORATION: Understanding the Options to Find the Right Fit

Every CEO’s wish list includes a desire for tools that enable innovation, growth and boost the productivity of today’s increasingly distributed workforce. The question of how to bring the best resources together, facilitate the exchange of ideas, foster innovation and do it all without the lost time associated with traditional face to face meetings falls to the CIO to answer. As the market responds to this growing demand, the solution offerings available to the decision makers have made the task of selecting the right tools and platform complex, if not daunting. A Collaboration tool’s Integration with other systems must be considered. Today’s end users expect communication and collaboration tools to work together seamlessly and across a growing fleet of mobile devices. Tools can no longer be stand-alone applications that “bolt on” but don’t fully integrate with existing solutions. Add in the pressure to contain budgets and securely manage the network, then the selection process can become stressful, time consuming and delay implementation while decision makers focus on making sure they get it right.

The accompanying presentation herein, provides an understanding of the options to find the right fit, when it comes to cloud collaboration AST-0074297_cisco_cloud_collaboration