Technology can increase productivity and foster creativity. Explore some ideas that can help you take maximum advantage of the Internet and IT to improve your business.
One of the most compelling promises of computer technology for business is collaboration. Working together without being together. EasyStreet uses a collaboration and document control application called ClearSpace to manage project teams and ideas. It also is a resource to know “what’s going on” within the company.
EasyStreet will be providing a managed ClearSpace server for the attendees at the “Putting Collaboration to Work” conference taking place on Friday, June 8th. ClearSpace will be one of the web2.0 tools used to illustrate and demonstrate collaboration issues at the conference.
As a thank you, the conference organizers have invited us to extend a 50% discount to any who wish to attend. Visit the PDMF website and register with the discount code “Friend50″.
Last week I found myself immobilized when the parental monitoring software (SafeEyes) on our family computer could not attach to its mother server. Parental administrative override didn’t work either. Fatal error message. I was offline until the SafeEyes server came back online.
I expect to need an Internet connection for applications such as email. Somehow, what I do on my computer needs to get to your computer. But when working independently on a document, I don’t want to be dependent on being connected to a distant 3rd-party server. That’s why I invest $$$ for desktop applications from distant software giants like Microsoft and Adobe.
The estrangement of desktop applications and web-based applications may be coming to an end. On May 30th, Google released a set of tools called Google Gears to software programmers to help make online applications available offline..
Google plans to use Gears to make other programs like Gmail, Calendar, and most notably, Docs and Spreadsheets, available offline. Google’s Reader application is the first to incorporate the new tool. In technology terms, evolution and intelligent design are converging.
How about your business? Ready to retire your expensive office productivity suite?
It is estimated that 1.5 exabytes (1.5 x 1018 bytes) of unique new information will be generated worldwide this year. That is more information than in the previous 5,000 years. Zowie!
Michael Wesch, cultural anthropology professor at Kansas State, shares some insight here. This 4½ minute video traces the trajectory of the Internet and how this explosion of data will be organized (the video is not really fuzzy after you click on it).
The surprise answer is: “You (all of us) will organize all this data.”
Web 2.0 allows me to include the above video from YouTube delivered as content on this page. Google, Yahoo, Flickr and MySpace are all examples of this custom service.
These digital personal assistants locate information of interest that you specify and deliver the information directly to you. Thanks to the FeedBlitz widget, you can subscribe to this blog and receive an email when new content is added (see the sidebar on the right). It becomes a useful feature that I don’t need to code or maintain.
The upside: We are less likely to be buried in unwanted information (spam).
The downside: We won’t see important new ideas because we didn’t know to ask. Information may get confused with wisdom if our sources are restricted to our own biases.
The challenge: To leverage technology in our personal and business lives to broaden our opportunities rather than to restrict them.
As the new generation of browsers are rolled out (Opera 9, Firefox 2 and IE7), all include methods to customize and add functionality with widgets and plugins.
One of the nice features I have used for the past year is Rollyo which allows creating a custom search engine within the Firefox browser. These accounts can be shared. For example, mine is http://rollyo.com/daytooley/easystreetsites/ which searches the public websites of EasyStreet. Rollyo uses Yahoo's search database.
Now, Google has stepped up with their version. Here is an example you can try which also searches the four EasyStreet websites (main website, support, Rich Bader's blog, and this business blog).
For those businesses who have a website, it is an easy way to add search capabilities to your site without having to program custom code. Notice the Google Custom Search box added at the very bottom of this page.
I am tempted to swap my beloved Firefox 1.5 browser for Opera's new release. There is a lot to like.
All good browsers support tabs (even Internet Explorer 7 will have tabs), but Opera 9 has some nice features including a tab preview of the page and it's title when you hover over the tab. If you close a tab, it can be recovered from a little trash can.
Power users will appreciate the efficient use of computer resources. With 20 tabs open, Firefox was using 140MB of RAM and 35% of my CPU. Opera with 20 tabs open used a modest 78MB of RAM and only 2% of my CPU!
With Web 2.0 gaining traction, Opera's inclusion of widgets promises extending browser customization to suit each user. I like the weather widget, particularly touchtheSky. And of course, the tinyURL is a must. It isn't as easy to use as the right-click ease in Firefox. But widgets seem to be the future doorway, just look at Google.
The way that Opera 9 captures RSS feeds is effortless and displays content as formatted. However, it only shows the last 10 posts, which won't work for active sites who have dozens or hundreds of posts such as Slashdot. I'll stay with my SharpReader.
Another strong feature is that it can Identify as Internet Explorer and convince IE-Only sites such as Microsoft Exchange web administration to reveal all without having to launch IE. That should attract those still stuck with using IE 6.
Finally, Opera 9 can be voice activated and can read web content to you through your computer speakers. Highlight some text and press 'v'. Here's what this paragraph sounds like: (Click Player Below)
You can download a copy of Opera 9 and see all the features here. If only Opera could bring me a latte.
I am tempted to swap my beloved 
Standard Podcast: 