Sunday, April 15, 2012
Friday, April 13, 2012
Sound Cloud
Sound Cloud is what MySpace use to be for independent musicians. I just created an account and started my site exploration. The interface is great and very user friendly. The Welcome tutorial emphasizes that this is not your Nana's FTP site and more importantly there is no file and cloud size limit. It is graphically exquisite and appears to be very easy to use. In addition, it does link up with other social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, and eBlogger.
I am in the process for generating some random tracks for uploading. I will keep you abreast of my experience with this. In the meanwhile enjoy the track below.
I am in the process for generating some random tracks for uploading. I will keep you abreast of my experience with this. In the meanwhile enjoy the track below.
Saturday, April 7, 2012
Chapter 4 - Communicating Online
GoAnimate.com: Online+Communications by vlayag
Like it? Create your own at GoAnimate.com. It's free and fun!
Like it? Create your own at GoAnimate.com. It's free and fun!
The World Wide Web ushered in a number of online tools that allowed users to communicate, collaborate, and share information in a number of ways. There is email, instant messaging, chats, wikis, blogs, and a variety of social and special interest network sites. Chapter four explores and explains these tools and how they are used by the online community. The most popular of all the online tools used today is email. Every business and person that I know today, including my 90 year old mother-in-law, uses email as a way to communicate. This form of communication appears to be replacing sending correspondence using snail mail or the phone.
The biggest take away for me was in the email section of the chapter where the differences between email protocols were discussed. I first subscribed to email in the mid-nineties through my ISP. It did not matter that it used POP mail servers since our family only had the one computer in the house and one email account. But this began to change as we approached the 2000s. DSL finally arrived in our area and the Web became more than just a dalliance. It was now a tool that we all used for research, banking, shopping, and more importantly communication. We purchased a second computer for the house and along with it my husband and I created our own YahooMail accounts which used HTTP servers. This protocol allowed us to get our mail on any computer that had Internet access.
Today, email is the most preferred way to communicate with my colleagues and other associates at my job in the local school district. This also includes our constituents, the students’ parents. Currently, the only correspondence that we send to parents via email is the weather and emergency related school closings. However, we are in the process of generating parent portals that would facilitate online communication between the district and parents. Similar to online banking, we would use email as a way to notify parents of important information that would appear in a secure Web-based parent portal of our SMS (student management system). It appears that parents are looking forward to this and are anxious of its eventual implementation.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Chapter Three Search Exercise
Mobile device use in business is actually a very interesting subject to use for our chapter 3 exercise. It is current and extremely relevant to what is happening in many types of businesses. Well anyway I did my searches through Google News to find articles on the subject for my blog. I typed in “mobile devices in business” which resulted 13,200 hits. I then narrowed the search to anything written about the subject in the past week. This is how current the discourse is about business mobile device use, the hits only decreased to 11,100.
As you can see from the sources I cited in my previous blog, I used mainstream and well established sources to base my blog. There was one that I did find intriguing and it was from the Sacramento Bee (www.sacbee.com) an old and established newspaper from Sacramento California. I liked the article about security with mobile device business use, but as it turned out it was a press release by a content lifecycle management company called Litera (www.literia.com). At least there was a disclosure added by the publishers of Sacramento Bee. Although informative, I would consider this unreliable source of information.
I then followed the link to PR Newswire. As it turned out this is a firm the specializes in public relations.
As you can see from the sources I cited in my previous blog, I used mainstream and well established sources to base my blog. There was one that I did find intriguing and it was from the Sacramento Bee (www.sacbee.com) an old and established newspaper from Sacramento California. I liked the article about security with mobile device business use, but as it turned out it was a press release by a content lifecycle management company called Litera (www.literia.com). At least there was a disclosure added by the publishers of Sacramento Bee. Although informative, I would consider this unreliable source of information.
 |
| Screen shot of "article" from Sacramento Bee Website Please take a look at the top gray area, there is a disclosure about the "article." |
I then followed the link to PR Newswire. As it turned out this is a firm the specializes in public relations.
 |
| Screen shot of PR Newswire site. |
Business and The Mobile Device
Tablets (more specifically the IPad) and smart phones (more specifically the IPhone) have given the anemic mobile device sector a desperately needed blast of excitement and energy. I have not seen so much fervent bustle and buzz since Netscape’s release paved the way for the ordinary non-techno household to access the new frontier called WorldWideWeb. Imagine, armed with a mobile device and the Internet, a user can access work, school and personal documents of all types, communicate through voice, text, internet phone using Skype of Facetime, or email, work collaboratively with colleagues using cloud based applications or through VPN, use the GPS to get directions, take pictures and record video and audio, write notes in a “new school way,” and so much more.
Whether they are for profit or non-profit, all businesses look for ways that would help their company improve productivity. So it is no surprise that businesses would look to mobile devices as a tool that would improve and streamline workflow. The user’s location away from the office will no longer play a role in completing tasks. In addition, as data communication infrastructure improves, it is possible to access to the most recent and accurate information in real-time. With these enhancements offered by mobile devices, the company’s workforce can work collaboratively with colleagues and team members unencumbered by geographical and time constraints.
Improving the operational workings of a company is not the only role mobile devices will play in businesses. According to Joshua Michele-Ross, learning how these devices work and are used by their customers is essential in understanding customers’ behavior and expectations. Such knowledge is crucial to making adjustments and changes to a company’s CRM system (customer relationship management). In addition, as the business models integrate mobile devices and mobile device management systems (MDM), senior executives and top managers may gather data from these sources to use in their company’s strategic planning.
Now that we know mobile devices can benefit businesses, there is one major disadvantage to employing them as part of a business model and that is security. Yes many agree that generating, sharing, and saving work digitally is far more efficient. And because of the portability and ease of use mobile devices offer, users are quicker and more responsive. However, there are two factors that these devices are more vulnerable to intrusion and data loss. The small size of the devices makes them easier to lose or be stolen, and second mobile device OSs are not as secure and do not allow for management like the traditional laptop operating systems. With the popularity of these devices, these issues have CIOs and their technology staff scrambling to find solutions to address them.
In spite of the risks, mobile devices are not going away and will dominate the computing scene. As the usage grows, there will be a greater demand by businesses, individual, and quite possibly the government for the makers of these devices invest in ways that will make it safer and secure for all users.
http://www.cio.com.au/article/402859/iphone_ipad_security_human_element/
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46622066/ns/technology_and_science-security/
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/28/tk-ios-gives-developers-access-to-photos-videos-location/?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha25
http://www.forbes.com/2010/01/15/iphone-twitter-computers-technology-breakthroughs-mobile_2.html
Whether they are for profit or non-profit, all businesses look for ways that would help their company improve productivity. So it is no surprise that businesses would look to mobile devices as a tool that would improve and streamline workflow. The user’s location away from the office will no longer play a role in completing tasks. In addition, as data communication infrastructure improves, it is possible to access to the most recent and accurate information in real-time. With these enhancements offered by mobile devices, the company’s workforce can work collaboratively with colleagues and team members unencumbered by geographical and time constraints.
Improving the operational workings of a company is not the only role mobile devices will play in businesses. According to Joshua Michele-Ross, learning how these devices work and are used by their customers is essential in understanding customers’ behavior and expectations. Such knowledge is crucial to making adjustments and changes to a company’s CRM system (customer relationship management). In addition, as the business models integrate mobile devices and mobile device management systems (MDM), senior executives and top managers may gather data from these sources to use in their company’s strategic planning.
Now that we know mobile devices can benefit businesses, there is one major disadvantage to employing them as part of a business model and that is security. Yes many agree that generating, sharing, and saving work digitally is far more efficient. And because of the portability and ease of use mobile devices offer, users are quicker and more responsive. However, there are two factors that these devices are more vulnerable to intrusion and data loss. The small size of the devices makes them easier to lose or be stolen, and second mobile device OSs are not as secure and do not allow for management like the traditional laptop operating systems. With the popularity of these devices, these issues have CIOs and their technology staff scrambling to find solutions to address them.
In spite of the risks, mobile devices are not going away and will dominate the computing scene. As the usage grows, there will be a greater demand by businesses, individual, and quite possibly the government for the makers of these devices invest in ways that will make it safer and secure for all users.
http://www.cio.com.au/article/402859/iphone_ipad_security_human_element/
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46622066/ns/technology_and_science-security/
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/28/tk-ios-gives-developers-access-to-photos-videos-location/?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha25
http://www.forbes.com/2010/01/15/iphone-twitter-computers-technology-breakthroughs-mobile_2.html
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