I am a huge believer in software licensing. If you are going to use a software, pay for the software. With that said, I am also a practical man who teaches a lot of courses, and am also a consultant who believes that companies should thoroughly test software before using it.Microsoft Office 365 is a... Continue Reading →
Editor Breaking My Stride
There is a new feature in Microsoft Word called Editor. It reviews the document you are working on for spelling, grammar, clarity, conciseness, punctuation, and more. For people who need the help, it is a godsend. Who am I kidding? I use it rather a lot. It helps me from time to time, although more... Continue Reading →
Office Client Connections: Are you covered?
When Microsoft introduced Office 365, subscribers stopped worrying about new versions. As long as you were a subscriber, your monthly updates would deliver the newest versions of the client applications, and not just monthly patches. It certainly made life simpler. Still a lot of people prefer to purchase software, and not subscribe to it. That... Continue Reading →
Sharing is Caring… but don’t touch the merchandise!
Raise your hand if you still think that the only way to share a document is to e-mail it as an attachment? Those days are fortunately long gone; Microsoft 365 offers you the ability to share a link to a document that you have stored on your OneDrive for Business. It offers a few real... Continue Reading →
Office Customization without VL Media
Over the years I have written quite a bit about Desktop Deployment, especially using the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT). It allows us to install not only our operating system but also our drivers, patches, and applications with little or no user interaction. Recently I did some consulting for a small company of seven users. They... Continue Reading →
Activating Office 2013 Headaches… Here’s your Aspirin!
Hey Mitch, why is it that every time I install Microsoft office 2013 for my customers I have to log in with a Microsoft Account (Formerly Live ID)? Why can’t I just use a product key like I used to? I always use my own Microsoft Account, and I am now the registered user for... Continue Reading →
Office365 Outage: It happens… know about it.
I have been using Microsoft Office365 to manage my e-mail since the beta program, and last month purchased the full program for SWMI Consulting Group. Office365 includes, among so much more, the mail service in a cloud (Exchange 2010). I have had few complaints – someone else manages it for me, and I can focus... Continue Reading →
End of Days for Windows XP.
Quite a number of people have asked me why I continue to tweet the number of days until Microsoft ends support for one of it's most successful operating systems ever, Windows XP. Especially knowing that we seem to be a long way off - today is Friday August 12, 2011 and we are 969 days... Continue Reading →
Defective Microsoft Access? I don’t think so! Ask the Community!
Earlier today a LinkedIn contact asked me a question about Microsoft Office Access. I don’t know a while lot about Access, but here is why I am such a huge proponent of the IT Pro Community. The contact is someone who I met at a community event – an event I did on Windows Vista... Continue Reading →
Office 365–Complex or Options?
Last week Microsoft officially launched its cloud-based infrastructure offering, Office 365. As a virtual insider I have been using this solution for the past six months for my IT consulting firm, and frankly had forgotten that it was a beta offering. That is because while the packaging may be new, all of the applications –... Continue Reading →
The Wonder that is TechEd
The quiet of the Exhibitor Hall is disturbed by the sounds of preparation. To my left there is a crew frantically working to fix something with a carpet. There is some hammering, more yammering, and the sounds of carpet tape being unfurled. To my right there are two security agents talking, but they are too... Continue Reading →
Get on the Bus!
For the third year in a row the Springboard Bus Tour will hit the road leading up to TechEd. If you have never met the bus you are missing out, because it delivers expert advice, great learning, and huge career benefits to IT Pros. It delivers answers to questions you may have been having about... Continue Reading →
Mitch Visits One Police Plaza
A couple of weeks ago one attendee was a detective with the NYPD, and he offered to take me behind the scenes at One Police Plaza so that I could take a look at a few of the units that use information technology (IT) for a lot more than just paperwork and filing. I had... Continue Reading →