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Software Information
Groupware and Online Collaboration: Collaboration Series #4
This article is the fourth of a series of articles exploring specific aspects of groupware. The brief informational articles in this series discuss some of the technologies associated with groupware, as well as some of the characteristics of groupware. Some of these characteristics may go hand in hand with business collaborative needs. Other characteristics go beyond what some groupware providers have to offer. The purpose of these articles is to equip the groupware user or investigator with helpful knowledge about the product in order to enable more effective use or to lead the investigator to the groupware service he or she is looking for. This fourth article explores the ability of groupware to facilitate online collaboration.
Fast Car Knoppix
Small can be beautiful! Working with Knoppix for the past two years has been a joy. Two terms to describe this distribution, simple, elegance. See Knoppix is one of the many operating systems that runs from the CD, so it doesn?t have the hardware conflicts associated with many instruction sets between hardware and software.
Linux Dual Boot-How To Format
Just the thought of a duel-boot scares many people away, but over the years it?s developed into an easier process. Most people are running Windows, so I?m assuming it?s your choice of preference:
Linux ? Keyboard Or Mouse
Just stress testing one of the latest Linux distributions. Been testing it for about two months. You know, Linux has advanced some distance since 1992-1993. It looks great! Because Linux is customizable, I decided to change a few of the resident commands. These were not wholesale changes and everything worked out o.k. So I started thinking again. You know, that can lead to solutions you can?t get out of. In this instance, everything worked like a trusty timepiece.
The Religion And Philosophy Of Small Internet Business
I have always had a tendency to focus on the positive. We, all of us, know the negative details in society and governments. So why not focus on solutions? Most self-actualized grownups even solve problems in this manner.
Chances are we'll always have the mammoth corporations. Large corporations have their good and bad points. Click? Want to strike back at the aristocracy? Develop and advertise a business website. And it does not matter what country you are from either. Advertise your specialty 24-7-12.
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Think of this, first we had the HAM Radio, then the bbs and now the Internet. Linux and the various other x systems are the next evolutionary step toward enhancing Global 2-way communications. And the best part, its virtually free!
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Microsoft Business Solutions CRM proved to be reliable solution in the whole spectrum of industries and market niches: transportation & logistics, education, recruiting & placement, supply chain management, pharmaceutical, oil & gas, aerospace & defense, manufacturing, wholesale & retail. When corporation is looking into CRM application to choose from ? one of the fist questions is security. In this small article we?ll try to give you the highlights on the most typical questions we are receiving in the security area.
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Disclaimer: All the thoughts expressed are my views only! Your perception might differ...
Microsoft Great Plains & CRM in Transportation & Logistics ? Overview
Microsoft Business Solutions Great Plains and MS CRM (client relation management system) are very popular in various industries and market niches. In previous article we described Microsoft Great Plains implementation for transportation & logistics company. Having more material, we would like to share with you how you can leverage Microsoft Business Solutions products to automate your business. We?ll try to be both technical and business processes specific and be laconic to comply the rules of tiny article.
Did You Ever Want to Completely Erase Everything on Your Computer?
Did you ever want to erase everything on your computer? This is a program I found that does that for you quickly and easily.
Online PowerPoint Presentation ? Convert PowerPoint to Flash
Although we don?t know whether Microsoft ever envisioned such a big market about PowerPoint on its first release. Today this software is impacting profoundly on education and corporation?s activities in the way that nobody could ignore. With a wealth of visual and audio effects people rely on it to express their ideas, plans more intuitively with more effective communication outcomes.
The Hidden Power of Online Manual
Writing software manuals is boring, isn?t it? We often think: ?My software is easy to use. The user interface is intuitive. Why should I waste so much time for writing the document which nobody reads anyway?? Sometimes it?s true ? I?ve never read the WinZip or Internet Explorer manuals ? everything seems clear without explanations. Nevertheless, even if your manual doesn?t help to your software users, it may help to you. Publish your manual online and turn its hidden power into the real benefits for your business.
Online Manual Makes Your Web Site Visible
User manual is a huge bunch of words, the highly targeted words, which are specific for your software market. For instance, if you develop a database management system, its user guide will certainly contain such words as ?database?, ?query?, ?transaction?, ?table?, ?record?, and etc. On the other hand, people use these words in their queries when they are looking for a database management solution on the Google, Yahoo, or other search engine. Let the interested people to find your web site and your product. Upload your manual on your web server and make it available for indexing by search engine spiders. This area specific content will make your web site and your software more visible to potential customers. Making the user guide available online will increase your web site rank in relevant search results and will bring highly targeted traffic to web your site. Let the manual to work not only for your users, but for you as well.
Online Manual Saves Your Time
A picture worth a hundred words. Those who are engaged in user support know this for sure. When replying to user concerns, very often we have to write sentences like this ?Open the Document settings dialog. Choose the External modules tab. Select the ?ABC Spell Checker? in the module list. Enter your registration key and verification code in the corresponding text fields which will appear at the bottom of the window. Then, press Activate?. If your application is simple the user will likely understand you right and will do everything as you have explained. However, if your application is a complex system with lots of setting windows which behave differently in various modes, the user may be puzzled which window and which fields do you mean. In this case you risk getting into a long conversation by repeatedly explaining the same things again and again.
The screenshot could be a very helpful illustration of your explanations. You may run your application, go to the certain window, open that tab page, activate the corresponding item in the list. Then make the screenshot of the window by using Alt+PrtSc key combination or another screen capture tool, save the picture in a file, and finally attach it to your message. Sometimes it?s also necessary to add callouts, annotations and other enlightenments to the screenshot picture. Thus, you have to launch your image editor and to manually draw all the elements required. As you see, it may takes up to a half hour to reply to a single message only. And how many messages are yet in the queue?
Having the screenshots prepared is a good approach which may save your time. But having screenshots already prepared together with callouts, explanations, and annotations is a great approach which will save you much more time. Most likely, you have all that stuff prepared in your software manual but it?s not very polite to reply to the user: ?Read that fantastic manual?. User may have no idea where the manual is on the PC and on what page is the looked-for solution located. On the other hand, you may also have no time to manually cut particular pages with screenshots and related instructions from the manual and to attach them to each support message.
The solution is easy. Put your manual on your web site in the form of HTML pages. Make all the pictures, screenshots with callouts, descriptions, and instructions accessible for every user. When you are processing another support request, simply insert an URL link to the appropriate page of your online manual and add just a few clarification words ? more words and pictures are already on that page. You will save much time and nerves because you will be sure that the user is looking at the same thing which you are describing. At the same time, the user will get a fast solution which is supported by clear pictures and neat instructions.
Online Manual Makes Your Products Trustworthy
Besides the users get the faster and more helpful support, they also see that you did this tedious job ? writing the handy and well structured manual with great screenshots and clear explanations. They know that this job is boring and developers don?t like to do it. Therefore, if you did it and if you did it perfectly, it means that you respect your customers, not only their money. Good manual means that you consider your business and product seriously yourself. This helps your business to look more credible and serious. So, make your manual available online and prove your respect to your existing and prospective users. Make them trusting in you and in your product before they even download a demo copy of it.
Online Manual Brings Sales
As we see, the software manual which is a part of your web site generates a targeted traffic. The people may easily find your product because online help makes your web site more visible in relevant search results on the search engines. Those new visitors get more loyal when they see a well done help system. Also, if a prospect experiences difficulties with your software and asks for technical support, you may easily resolve the issue by referring the user to a certain page of your online help. With just a one click the user will see screenshots and explanations which will help them to settle the case. So, you have a motivated and targeted visitor, who feels loyal to your company and products, and whom you can easily help in case of a technical problem. The probability of such visitor ordering a license is several times higher than of the average one.
Microsoft CRM for Corporate Business ? Working Offline
If your company has regional and worldwide operations, you might already realized that it is very hard to get decent internet connection in your remote locations. In this small article we will try to give you highlights on how to implement Microsoft Business Solutions CRM for worldwide operations with restricted internet connection.
Microsoft CRM USA Nationwide Remote Support
Remember old good days when your company probably had Great Plains Dynamics? If you are in San Francisco Bay Area ? you had local Great Plains Software partner consulting company, who served you basically coming onsite and charging you four hours minimum, even if the problem deserved 5-min fix? This was at the end of 20th century and remote support technologies were not very advanced ? Citrix was making good progress and taking market over from Symantec PCAnywhere. Today, when Microsoft Terminal Server and Citrix are remote support standards and IT department uses them to host application server for nation-wide and world-wide users, you should probably be thinking of getting remote support for your ERP and CRM systems. In this small article we?ll take a look at Microsoft CRM remote support, customization, reporting, implementation and integration.
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