bitsconsultants.com e-mail newsletter

November 2003

The New Microsoft Office

Microsoft has released the new version of Office. The biggest improvements seem to be XML integration, some interface upgrades to Microsoft Outlook, shared document workspaces, and IRM (Information Rights Management) which is a document rights management technology.

XML integration will reap benefits down the road for medium and small business, but at this stage it's something for larger businesses and software developers to play with.

The interface improvements to Outlook are more than just cosmetic. One welcome improvement is that mail notifications give you enough information to know if you want to read a message or not instead of just telling you that one arrived. It's also easier to search through stored messages.

Shared workspaces may be of interest to small businesses that produce documents through collaborative effort. After an investment in server side technologies, it can allow for structured real-time collaboration on documents.

The IRM document rights management may be of interest to smaller businesses that do a lot of document processing and work with confidential information. I believe that mainly this will appeal to government agencies and larger businesses. IRM enabled document production requires a significant investment in server technology. 

Tech News Highlights

Outlook Improving for Tech Firms

Many technology companies reported better than expected earnings results in October including Intel, Motorola, IBM, Yahoo, E-Bay, and Apple. Surveys published in October indicate increased spending on technology is on the way, including one study that indicates almost half of CIOs expect to increase spending on technology next year.

Senate Votes for Spam Legislation

In October the Senate voted for legislation designed to curb e-mail spam on the internet. The bill would make it illegal to falsify return addresses or routing information, or promote fraudulent products. Also, online marketers would be required to label sexually explicit messages to allow users to block them. The bill would also prohibit marketers from sending unsolicited messages to consumers who place their e-mail addresses on a "do-not-spam" registry. The house is currently debating competing versions of a similar bill, and the White House supports the legislation.

Ask Randy

Q: I would like to upgrade from Windows 98 to Windows XP. Is there anything I should know before I start?

A: I strongly recommend that everyone running Windows 98 should upgrade to Windows XP. But yes, there are lots of things you should think about, know, and do before you start.

• First, decide if you would be better off just buying a new computer. New computers are relatively inexpensive and will come preloaded with Windows XP. Although every situation is different, as a general rule, if the computer is older than four years old, I recommend replacing it rather than upgrading it.

• Make sure that your hardware exceeds Microsoft's recommendations for good performance. Microsoft recommends a 300 Megahertz processor, 128MB of system RAM, and a video card and monitor capable of running 800x600 resolution. Based on my experience, a user would be very disappointed with the performance of a system with those specifications running Windows XP. I like to see at least 256MB of RAM, a 500 megahertz processor, and 16MB video card before I'm comfortable that the performance in Windows XP will be good. If your system does not meet these recommendations, you should upgrade the hardware.

• Run Microsoft's Upgrade Advisor on your computer before decide whether to upgrade a system to XP or not. It will tell you which hardware and software will not work with the new operating system and which will have to be uninstalled and reinstalled in order to work correctly.

• You should make sure that you have installation CDs for all your important programs. If you don't have them, and can't get them, you might have to purchase a new copy.

• Prepare your system to receive the new operating system: back up all your data; perform a disk cleanup, scandisk, and defrag the hard drive; and uninstall rarely used programs as well as those identified by the upgrade advisor. 

After completing these steps, your odds of a trouble-free upgrade are pretty good; and your computer will likely be much safer, more stable, and better performing.

Tip of the Month

Pasting text from the web in Microsoft Office.

I cut and paste a lot of text from the web into e-mail, documents and spreadsheets. When I just "paste", the text retains the formatting (font, color, paragraph spacing, etc.) of the website. Usually, I want the formatting to match my document. In order to get the formatting right, I use the "Paste Special" command on the "Edit" menu. This allows me to insert only the text and not the formatting.

Places on the Web

DMOZ Austin Directory - If you know of a more complete or current directory of Austin websites, let me know.

Longhorn Screenshots - See what the next version of Windows will look like.

Bug on a Wire - Don't get eaten by the crows.