Tag: Office 365

Office365

Recently Microsoft announced an upgrade to BPOS. It is being revamped and renamed to Office 365. If you haven’t seen the announcement then it is worthwhile taking a look.

http://www.microsoft.com:80/presspass/presskits/office//videoGallery.aspx?contentID=office365_announce&WT.z_convert=Share

I think that this a major step forward for the product. I continually hear resellers criticize BPOS, pointing to all its failing and I have no argument with the fact that it is far from perfect. Most of these people are comparing to mature on-site technologies like Small Business Server (SBS). They are overlooking the fact that the online offerings from Microsoft are still version 1 (maybe even still beta realistically). To be truly fair you should be comparing to SBS 4.0 rather than SBS 2008.

The other thing that I find most interesting about these people’s attitudes is how they don’t realize how short sighted they are being. They continue to pick apart Microsoft online offerings, pointing to how it doesn’t do this, how it doesn’t do that and how the products they use are so much better.

Let’s come at this from another angle. Let me ask you this question – who wouldn’t want to be able to offer more product options to their customers? Who wouldn’t want to be able to offer more product options to prospects? Hmmmm…I think most ‘business’ people would certainly welcome more product options in their suite.

Let’s assume that you do a great job for your clients and their technology. Let’s assume that all your peers also do stellar work for their clients. Great. Does that cover every potential business using technology out there? Hardly. It probably represents some minute fraction of the potential market. What happens when a new prospect, who already has a cloud solution, comes to you seeking your services? Are you going to turn them away because you don’t do ‘cloud’? Are you going to tell them they have to dump the ‘cloud’ and go back to implementing infrastructure on premises?

I certainly hope you are. Why? Because it means more market share for me. I run a business and if you can’t services these clients then I am happy to do so no matter where they are. Yes, you read right – no matter where they are. I can achieve this with ‘cloud’ services can I not?

I’ll have plenty to say about Office365 in upcoming posts but I’m on board because I know it is only going to improve. The jump from BPOS to Office365 proves that, imagine what the next improvement will be? I can hardly wait to get my teeth into Office 365 and start offering it to clients AND prospects. Office365 is simply another ‘product’ that you can make money around. If you are not prepared to do so someone else certainly will (but if you send them my way I’ll pay you a finders fee at least).

CIAOPS BPOS Portal now live

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You are looking at the homepage of the new CIAOPS BPOS Portal. The portal is a SharePoint site containing everything you’ll need to know about Microsoft Business Productivity Online (BPOS). In there you’ll find links to media stories on BPOS, documents from Telstra and Microsoft, a calendar of webcasts and other BPOS events, marketing material, tutorial videos, templates, links, software download and more all in one place.

 

The best thing about the portal is that subscribers can also contribute information and have it published to the site. This means that the volume of information on the site will continue to grow as the number of subscribers grows. Combined with the ability of everything on the site to be searchable it makes finding the information you need about BPOS simple. The portal is supported and maintained by the CIAOPS as well.

 

Here’s a screen shot of some of the existing knowledge based articles.

 

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So what’s the cost? For people who already subscribe to the Windows SharePoint Operations Guide (www.wssops.com) it is a free addition. For those who aren’t the portal only costs $10 per month.

 

So how do you subscribe? You make a payment via credit card or by contacting me (director@ciaops.com) to arrange other payment methods.

 

If you are interested in Microsoft BPOS and want a central location for information then go no further than the new CIAOPS BPOS portal, you may also learn how powerful SharePoint is a collaboration tool!

Backup workshop roundup

Over the weekend we ran a Backup and Disaster Recovery workshop for SMB resellers. It was pleasing to see the event so well attended, with people even travelling from inter state to be present. I’d like to think that we did something a little different at this workshop by inviting a number of vendors to demonstrate the ability of their products to not only backup a standard SBS 2008 server but also to do a bare metal restore to different hardware without them actually touching the hardware (a volunteer was used to perform all the work). The consensus on day was that BackupAssist provided the best result in our tests but all vendors performed superbly and we thank them all for their efforts.

 

Another first for us was that the event was conducted over two days, stretching from our previous single day. Even then we could have probably gone another day but most attendees agreed that three days would be just too much. Apart from the content around backup and disaster recovery we also had a number of other technology presentations including those from:

 

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Jeff Alexander on Microsoft Data Protection Manager,

 

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Peter Vane from ITWest on selling Backup and Disaster Recovery to customers,

 

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Kieran Cook from Trend Micro and

 

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yours truly on SharePoint and Cloud Computing.

 

We where also luck enough to have both Susan Bradley and Kevin Royalty present remotely. Many attendees commented on how much they liked the mixed of presenters and topics over the two days so we take this opportunity to thank all those who did take the time to present over the workshop.

 

So what did people think? Well here’s a number of feedback comments from attendees:

 

“The SMBiT workshops are excellent. They offer real value for money with solid technical and business content. Almost as valuable is the time spent networking with other IT professionals. Well worth it.”

 

“For the busy IT consultant, these workshops offer a great way to learn a lot in a short space of time. Like TechEd but without the massive cost!”

 

“After the first day I can whole heartedly recommend attending the events that are run by the NSW group, the content is at the perfect level for the attendees in both technical and informational levels.”

 

“The SMBiT Workshop days are some of the best value for money seminars I have been to. They are real hands on rather than theory, powerpoint & overview. A lot of the additional value is undocumented such as networking with colleagues & other technical hints that come up during presentations.”

 

“Absolutely fantastic. You’d be crazy not to attend at least once! We picked up so many ideas from the two days, I’m looking forward to working out how to fit them into our business!”

 

Thank you Sydney SMBiT Professionals group for organising most stimulating and informative workshops. They were well run and had the level of information I was looking for. Each of the workshops were true to their names and the practical nature of them, was what I wanted to see and not the marketing hype of the vendors.
Well done and I am looking forward to more similar professional sessions. Great value for money and a good investment of my time.

 

You’ll also find some further feedback from Susan Bradley and Peter Vane that is very much appreciated.

 

A big thanks for the day must also go to Hilton Travis from QuarkIT who travelled down from Queensland to webcast and record the event (as well as provide his unique point of view on most topics) as well as Ryan Spillane and David Wales from Correct Solutions for the hardware and the pre work that went into getting it ready for the workshop. A heartfelt thanks.

 

We are now towards the next workshop on the 20th and 21st of August that will be around business development and cloud services. Make sure you reserve the days because after this one I’m pretty sure places are going to fill really fast!

WSSOPS May update available

I have just posted up the Windows SharePoint Operations Guide (WSSOPS) subscriber update for May. Inside you’ll find updated information about uninstalling and reinstalling SharePoint on SBS 2008 as well as a new chapter on SharePoint Foundation 2010 security.

 

Also, don’t forget the CIAOPS email support group at:

 

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ciaops/

 

which I am looking to build as a forum for information about SharePoint, productivity and cloud computing (as well as anything else related to the products and services of the CIAOPS). You’ll need a Yahoo Id which you can obtain from the above web site. Then you’ll be able to email through questions, answers and comments for everyone else on the list to see and provide feedback on.

 

So what’s coming in the June update for WSSOPS? Still early days but it is certainly going to have information about installing Office Web Apps, more information around SharePoint Foundation 2010 and most likely a detailed walk through of getting Search Server Express 2008 running on SBS 2008. Remember, this is only available to subscribers and for more information about that visit www.wssops.com.

 

Stay tuned.

WSSOPS turns two

I’m very proud to say that my Windows SharePoint Operations Guide (WSSOPS) has now turned two. It has certainly come a long way since that initial very rough release to the few foundation subscribers who were good enough to sign up back then. I certainly hope that their faith in what I have created has been justified.

 

There is also all the other subscribers who have come along over the years (and some who have now moved on). I thank you all for your support and hope that you have received value from what I have produced over the years. I continue to work hard every month to improve that value that you receive for your subscription.

 

I’d also like to thank Karl Palachuk from SMB Books who has provided me the opportunity of selling my Guide through his site. Due to his continued support, patronage and promotion I’m sure the Guide would not be as popular as it is now, especially outside Australia.

 

So where to now for the Guide? Well, from its initial focus on Windows SharePoint (WSS) and Search Server Express (SSX) the Guide has expanded to include information on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) and Windows Foundation Server 2010. Soon the Guide will include information about Microsoft Office Web Apps and BPOS SharePoint. As always I welcome any suggestions as to what people would like to see included.

 

As subscribers are aware, the Guide is more than just a tome of pages about SharePoint, it includes a DVD full of white papers, links, videos and other marketing material. It includes a free internet hosted demonstration SharePoint as well as a discount on support rates from the CIAOPS. As well, all subscribers gain free access to all of the CIAOPS webinars for their period of their subscription as well as any prior webcasts which have all been recorded. For a full list of benefits see www.wssops.com. I hope to keep improving these benefits in the future and welcome an suggestions people may have.

 

In creating the Guide I have also tried  to continue to produce a number of free resources for people who are interested in learning more about SharePoint. You can find free document downloads at http://www.slideshare.net/directorcia and free video tutorials at http://www.youtube.com/user/directorciaops. Recently, I also created a CIAOPS yahoo email list that allows anyone (once registered) to ask any questions or contribute on issues dealt with by the CIAOPS. More information about this group can be found in this blog post. I will be posting more information there this month and can hopefully encourage some really positive information around SharePoint, productivity and cloud computing (and anything else of interest).

 

So to the many, many people who have been supported of the Guide over the years I say thanks. I will continue to work hard to increase the information and the value that the Guide contains for subscribers going forward. I always welcome any comments or feedback so please let me know what’s on your mind via director@ciaops.com.

 

Finally, where’s the best place to keep up with Guide and what’s happening with Windows SharePoint? This blog of course!

Real world BPOS solution

I’m always on the lookout for real world solutions of Microsoft Business Productivity Online Services, especially those for SharePoint. As such, I came across the following blog post:

 

http://www.mickhuxley.com/?p=89

 

from Mick Huxley. Although he is a techie he is also a volunteer for the SES (State Emergency Services). Now this is basically a totally volunteer organization that provides a major amount of emergency and disaster relief. Interestingly, it seems that the SES has been given BPOS accounts.

 

Mick’s blog post talks about:

 

“Personally I have seen EOS/BPOS yield immediate results for my unit.  We have Distribution Lists, owned by our Controller for the distribution of incoming pages.  He is able to update the list membership on the fly to ensure that only unit members whom are active are notified.  Likewise each week an automatic email is sent advising of the Duty Officer, Team Leader and Operations Controller for the week.”

 

he also speaks of the benefits of SharePoint:

 

“SharePoint has provided us with a location to store our unit documents online and work on them away from Local Head Quarters (LHQ).  This has improved my Units ability to focus on training and incidents.  Whereas previously some members would skip training to complete “paper work” they can now work on the docs, outside of training nights, and spend training time increasing their skills.”

 

he concludes that

 

“Is the SES the only Organisation that would benefit from BPOS?? No, not at all.  Hosting these solutions outside the Organisation can reduce time to provision, reduce technical headcount, reduce carbon footprint, reduce datacentre requirements for cooling and power and reduce Capital Expenditure, whilst improving availability and potentially security.”

 

The trouble is that most people simply look at SharePoint and expect it to ‘magically’ do everything. You gotta mould to your needs and this requires some investment to get the most out of it. SharePoint is simply a tool, like Excel, you only get out of it what you put in.

 

To me this is simply more evidence that BPOS and hosted SharePoint provide real solutions for any organization, commercial or not. As much as I am disappointed by the current lack of uptake of SharePoint I feel better when I see stories likes these from the front lines. I know that one day soon we’ll reach a tipping point and people will begin to recognize the benefits SharePoint can play in their organization.

Cloud wars

Here are some interesting videos from both Microsoft and Google on their cloud based solutions:

Why Microsoft: Microsoft compared to Google – Total Value Overview

Up in the sky


A few posts ago (I smell fear) I was lamenting the fact that Microsoft seemed to be getting pretty desperate about getting resellers on board to sell its Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS). I pointed out that in my opinion existing resellers and their inertia when moving to this new platform was going to be a millstone around Microsoft’s neck that it needed to address.

Now the following article ‘Microsoft must sell the cloud to IT Pros in 2010’ covers similar ground. The article points confirms a number points that I have been speaking about for quite a while, such that if IT Pros

“don’t get in line to compete [with online services], they put themselves at a significant risk of being not there when real money starts to get spent in this space.”

and the fact that a majority of businesses are going to be dipping their toes into the world of online services:

“data also shows that only 16% of those who have adopted cloud computing, or will within 12 months, will go solely with an off-premises model. But 50% of those respondents will go with a mixture on both on-premises and off premises.”

and that BPOS is the best opportunity for IT resellers:

“The most popular is software-as-a-service, represented for Microsoft by BPOS, and infrastructure as a service, represented by SQL Azure and integration technology.”

and finally Microsoft has a major challenge on its hands but only a limited time frame in which to achieve it:

EMA’s Mann says couple all that with the fact that “IT never gets rid of anything” and you have a situation where “IT is not going to move to the cloud, they are going to add the cloud to what they have.”

And how IT can go about doing that will be Microsoft’s challenge. The clock begins ticking louder in 2010.

The reality is that most businesses are considering the adoption of some form of cloud technology in their business. It is certainly, not in the short term at least, going to replace on premise infrastructure it will supplement it. However the majority of IT Pros that I know have no online strategy at all, they like Microsoft, are focusing on the wrong aspects of changes online services are going to usher in. It is not about selling a per month service, it is about what opportunities become available with the wide spread availability of these tools.

To survive in this new environment you are either going to make money by volume (many sales at low margin) or specialization (fewer sales at much higher margins). It seems to me the option with the least effort required is simply moving up the food chain (i.e. the second option) but this appears to put the fear of God into so many IT Pros. Why? Because in past they became comfortable selling their IT knowledge. The reality is that Google has changed that landscape FOREVER. As evolution has taught us, now is the time to adapt or perish, because the window of opportunity will not remain open forever.