Chris Parkes: A PC is not just for Christmas... : Small Business

Demo Showcase 2008 SMB Edition

chrisp — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 14:34:37 GMT

The Demo Showcase 2008 SMB Edition is now available for download.

This is a set of 4 comprehensive click through demonstrations designed for partners featuring 12 different Microsoft technologies working together to resolve business needs!

Scenarios:
Business Productivity
Customer Acquisition and Retention
Security and Reliability
Business Solutions

Products:
Windows Essentials Business Server 2008
Windows Small Business Server 2008
Office 2007
Windows Vista
SQL 2008
System Center Essentials 2007
Dynamics CRM 4.0
SharePoint Server 2007

Download from here!

Ciao for now :)

Online Windows Small Business Server 2008 Training Webcasts

chrisp — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 10:40:57 GMT

Some great, free SBS2008 webcasts coming soon, a series of 8!

WES02PAL: Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 1 of 8: Introduction

Presented by David Fabritius, Nicholas King and Michael Toot

Thursday, August 21, 2008

10:00-11:00am Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

Join us to get an overview of Windows Small Business Server (SBS) 2008, an integrated server solution that is part of the Windows Essential Server Solutions family. Designed and priced for small businesses, it integrates enterprise-class technologies at an affordable price, offering the capabilities small businesses want at a 35-45% lower cost than purchasing standalone technologies. Windows SBS 2008 offers a more secure, reliable platform that’s built on proven practices, and built to grow along with the company. Full versions of component technologies, streamlined installation, centralized management, and remote access capabilities help customers increase their business capacity at a cost-effective and manageable pace, while the Premium Edition also provides advanced support for line-of-business applications.

WES03PAL: Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 2 of 8: Planning & Installation

Presented by Nicholas King, David Fabritius and Michael Toot

Thursday, August 21, 2008

12:00-1:00pm Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

Getting the right start is important, and the setup process for Windows SBS 2008 has been specifically designed for SMB partners and customers to ensure a successful deployment. Compared to planning, designing, installing, integrating, and configuring all the component technologies that are included according to best practices, the cost of deploying SBS is dramatically lower! Even compared to previous versions of SBS, the setup process has been improved, streamlined, and reduced to just a few screens. This webcast will cover the things you need to know to successfully prepare for and install Windows SBS 2008, including supported topologies, the minimum and recommended hardware and client OS requirements, what customer information will be needed during the install, and how to use the new Answer File Generator tool to help streamline deployments. You will also learn how to address some common installation issues.

WES04PAL: Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 3 of 8: Migration

Presented by David Fabritius, Nicholas King and Michael Toot

Friday, August 22, 2008

10:00-11:00am Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

When upgrading an existing Windows server environment, having a simple yet comprehensive migration strategy is essential. In this webcast, we will discuss migrating from Windows Small Business Server 2003 to SBS 2008. We will cover what you need to do to prepare the network for migration, how to automate the installation phase, and finally how to perform the actual migration. You’ll learn about:

∙ the tasks you need to perform on the existing server;

∙ running the Migration Preparation Tool;

∙ how the Answer File Generator tool is used to initiate setup for a migration scenario;

∙ what settings and data are migrated;

∙ considerations for migrating line-of-business applications; and

∙ the answers to many of the questions that arise as part of a migration project.

Note: For additional information and resources relating to Windows SBS 2008 migration, please visit http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc527593.aspx.

WES05PAL: Academy Live - Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 4 of 8: Management, Health, & Security

Presented by Michael Toot, Nicholas King and David Fabritius

Friday, August 22, 2008

12:00-1:00pm Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

A fundamental strength of Windows SBS 2008 is the ease of administration provided by the completely redesigned, task-oriented management console. In this webcast, you will learn about the full range of functionality provided through the completely redesigned Windows SBS 2008 management console, which was created not only to simplify administration of the environment, but also to prevent common configuration mistakes and reduce the maintenance costs of managing a server environment. Topics include how to:
∙ add users and groups;
∙ create user roles;
∙ manage server storage;
∙ configure backup and perform restores;
∙ monitor the health of the environment and create health reports;
∙ monitor and manage security;
∙ and more!

WES06PAL: Academy Live - Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 5 of 8: Messaging & Collaboration Management

Presented by David Fabritius, Nicholas King and Michael Toot

Monday, August 25, 2008

10:00-11:00am Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

For many companies, e-mail has become the primary method for communicating with customers, prospects, partners, and just about everyone with whom they do business. Windows SBS 2008 includes the enterprise-class messaging features even small businesses require, such as remote access to e-mail via Outlook Web Access and support for Windows Mobile devices. In addition, more and more businesses are discovering the benefits of using collaboration technologies to increase their productivity. In this webcast, you will learn how Exchange Server 2007 and Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 have been integrated into the Windows SBS 2008 environment, as well as how to manage and monitor these services.

WES07PAL: Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 6 of 8: Remote Access & Computer Management

Presented by Nicholas King, David Fabritius and Michael Toot

Monday, August 25, 2008

12:00-1:00pm Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

One of the most popular features in previous versions of Windows SBS is the Remote Web Workplace, a secure web portal that customers can use to check their e-mail, connect to their desktops at work, view the company’s intranet site, and even remotely manage the SBS server. And for those users who require remote functionality that’s not provided by RWW, Windows SBS 2008 makes it easy to configure VPN support as well.
In this webcast, you will learn how to manage these remote services, as well as the third-party and self-issued certificates required to establish secure connections. In addition, we’ll cover how to deploy and manage client computers in the Windows SBS 2008 environment, and other devices including printers and shared faxes.

WES08PAL: Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 7 of 8: LOB Support & Troubleshooting

Presented by Michael Toot, David Fabritius and Nicholas King

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

10:00-11:00am Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

Windows SBS 2008 Premium makes huge strides forward in the support of line-of-business (LOB) applications by including a second copy of Windows Server 2008 Standard and SQL Server 2008 Standard, enabling customers to run their LOB applications on a second physical server for enhanced performance, scalability, and compatibility. In this webcast, you’ll learn about what’s included in Windows SBS 2008 Premium Edition and the different configurations supported. We will also cover implementing additional servers in the Windows SBS 2008 environment—yes, you CAN have multiple servers in an SBS environment! And finally, we’ll explore advanced administration topics and troubleshooting tools.

WES09PAL: Windows SBS 2008 Core Technical Training, Part 8 of 8: Virtualization

Presented by Nicholas King, David Fabritius and Michael Toot

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

12:00-1:00pm Pacific Time (US & Canada) (GMT-07:00)

PLC Registration Link

Live Meeting Link

Level: 300

Partner Type: CPLS, Microsoft Employee, Regional Solution Partner, System Builder, Value Added Reseller, Value Added Provider

Partner Role: Exec/Owner, Implementer

Virtualization is one of the hottest trends around, and everybody wants to learn more about it! Are you wondering when and why small businesses might care about virtualization? In this webcast, we explore virtualization for small businesses and how it relates to Windows SBS 2008. Several different configuration scenarios will be explored, for both the Standard and Premium Editions of Windows SBS 2008, and what options the different editions provide. We’ll also take a look at the implications for product licensing and deployment considerations when Windows SBS 2008 is virtualized.

Need to Navigate Microsoft?

chrisp — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 14:04:24 GMT

Microsoft is a big company. Actually, Microsoft is a huge company! And one of the most common pieces of feedback I receive from partners and customers is that it's often hard to navigate Microsoft, to keep up with all of the changes and associated information disclosures etc. My response is generally along the lines of empathy, indeed ask anyone who works for Microsoft and you'll probably get that empathy from them too :)

Fortunately, Directions on Microsoft, an independent organisation dedicated exclusively to tracking Microsoft is on hand to help everyone see the bigger picture more clearly...

You can find some sample articles here including historical organisational charts and product roadmap information. My personal current favourite (published July 2008) is the Software Plus Services and Developers article. If every little helps, this could be of value...

Ciao for now :)

Small Business Server 2008

chrisp — Wed, 07 May 2008 17:50:52 GMT

Folks have been asking whether or not there will be a small business version of Windows Server 2008, and if so, when will it be available and what's going to be in it? The answer is yes, Windows Small Business Server 2008 is an all-in-one server solution recommended for organisations with up to 50 PCs available in the second half of 2008.

It provides many of the features used by larger companies, such as email, Internet connectivity, internal web sites, remote access, support for mobile devices, file and printer sharing and backup and restore.

You can find an overview and more interestingly differences between the standard and premium editions (premium is a two box application platform solution) on the main site. Also worth noting that processor and memory limits will match Windows Server 2008 Standard Edition.

Ciao for now :)

Get a Free Business Web Site!

chrisp — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 10:48:32 GMT

Are you running a small business? Did you know that when you sign up to Microsoft Office Live Small Business you get a free web site and e-mail? Plus, everything you need to create a professional online presence, including web hosting, domain name and 100 business-branded e-mail accounts?

There's also an online contact manager to help manage sales opportunities, contact information, and track every interaction with customers. Plus, a document manager to enable storing and sharing of company documents in one central place with easy access and version control!

Finally, to enable you to collaborate and share information with customers, partners, or employees, on line password-protected workspaces are available and even a project manager tool to help plan projects, assign tasks, and monitor your progress!

Ciao for Now :)

Microsoft Office Accounting 2008 - UK

chrisp — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 17:35:25 GMT

Microsoft Office Accounting is an easy to use, comprehensive accounting package that works with other Microsoft Office applications you already know. Because it works just like Word, Excel and Outlook, it's easy to learn. Anyone wanting to download the free, Office Accounting Express 2008 product should head here.

Designed for millions of startup and home based businesses, it provides a single place to manage business finances with the familiar look and feel of Microsoft Office system programs.

There's interactive insight available into business basics and more, familiarity and ease of use, office integration, digital dashboard and PayPal information. It's also possible to import information from Sage® Line50 (v11/v12) and Sage® Instant Accounts (v12).

It can help manage customers, suppliers, employees and stock alongside paying bills, tracking expenses, sending invoices and banking online!

It also provides a complete view of your business through customisable reports so you always know how you’re doing and allows you to see all your important data at a glance with the Digital Dashboard whilst also providing reminders of important deadlines, pending bills and overdue invoices...

Sounds too good to be true? Don't just take my word for it, see for yourself :)

Ciao for now!

Product Demonstration Resource for ALL Microsoft Partners!!!

chrisp — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 14:07:34 GMT

The Microsoft Partner Demo Showcase download has been extended to include Deep Dive/Product virtual environments which are available to ALL Microsoft partners, including SBSC. Only Demo Showcase remains as the Gold/Cert benefit moving forwards...

The following are now available globally for immediate download:

2007 Microsoft Office System

47 Hands-on Labs
25 demonstrations

Microsoft Forefront and System Center Demonstration Toolkit

Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager
Microsoft Forefront Security for Exchange Server
Microsoft System Center Operations Manager
Intelligent Application Gateway
Forefront Client Security

Microsoft Business Intelligence Demo (Data Warehousing, Reporting and Analysis, Performance Management)

Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007
Microsoft SQL Server 2005
Microsoft Office PerformancePoint Server 2007

Get your lovely new shiny Virtual Machine downloads here.

Enjoy :)

If You Know What it is, don't Turn Back

chrisp — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 17:00:10 GMT

A great thing happened yesterday...I saw a smorgasbord :)

I remember the first time I came across this, on a website at Microsoft. Most people would admit I have a fair handle on grammar but vocabulary...now there's something that's useful, like, mate. Now, every time I read a new word, I hit the Review tab shown at the top of the second screenshot below...

So, the "smorgasbord" bought to my mind utility companies and Star Trek films together in a symbiant circle, how bizarre! When I did research however, I learned the definition. I couldn't find it in the Thesaurus but you know what, it sounds like a feast to me!

Need to learn a new Word?

Find out more at the home of Office 2007...oh, and before you start to read the website, why not try using the ribbon bar with the tabs on at the top of the page :)

Parkesy

Have You Met the Partner Bot?

chrisp — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 19:20:53 GMT

You really really should if you haven't, Partner Bot is an Instant Messenger contact that can help to quickly signpost to information you need. Simply type in your question and Bot will bring back an instant response. By adding Partner Bot as a buddy in your Windows Live Messenger contacts, it will always be available whenever you're logged in.

You can use Partner Bot to help you get answers quickly, whether you’re in the office or mobile and to find partner resources, like blogs and marketing help, more easily. To add Partner Bot to your contacts, sign in to Windows Live Messenger, click on the 'Add a Contact' icon and add 'partnerbot@hotmail.com' into the Instant Messaging address!

Have You Tried The Microsoft Office Interactive Developer Map..?

chrisp — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 19:20:05 GMT

How fantastic, this is a must see! A Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) application that provides developers with resources for programs, servers, services, and tools that work with the Microsoft Office System. It guides the user through drill down access to each product and technology to aid learning about new features, objects, Web services, namespaces, and schemas required to extend Microsoft Office and build custom Office Business Applications (OBAs).

There is Office Development, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) content available alongside many others.

You can download and install the Microsoft Office Interactive Map via ClickOnce if you're running Windows Vista. For Windows XP users, you'll need to install the prerequisites and run the application.

The map is a living document that provides links to MSDN Library reference documentation, MSDN portal pages, and RSS feeds that describe how developers can use the 2007 Microsoft Office system and associated tools and technologies to develop solutions that meet their needs.

The map stores resource links in an XML file hosted on MSDN. Once you install it, the map pulls the latest version of the resource file. No need to reinstall!

Ciao for now :)

Microsoft Office Word 2007 and OpenOffice.org 2.2.0 Mail Merge Comparison

chrisp — Wed, 09 May 2007 00:35:42 GMT

I was reading Hugh’s post and the comments around whether open source software meets shareholder and CEO needs, I love the cartoon that goes with it. George Ou has some interesting stats in this area too.

It’s a serious debate and as well as shareholders and CEO’s, there is a need to consider whether or not open source software is capable of delivering against business needs and the effects it can have on employee productivity and staff overheads.

Following the theme of the cartoon, I undertook a mini science project to see whether OpenOffice.org (OOo) 2.2.0 Writer could deliver similar levels of performance and capability to business users of Microsoft Office 2007 Word. This blog post is documentation of my findings.

Consider the following scenario... An organisation is running Microsoft SQL Server (quite possible given the industry unit share) to hold a database table full of its contacts/customers/suppliers/whatever. Unfortunately, the company has delivered a defective product to a specific region and need to issue a product recall. The company decides to act swiftly and chooses to use direct mail to its database of contacts.

I ran the two desktop applications side by side on a Core2 Duo box with 2Gb RAM and around 80Gb of free hard drive space and also had SQL Server 2005 running locally.

I chose the AdventureWorksDW sample database and the dimCustomer table to perform a mail merge to both applications as it contains the following fields. There are 18,414 records in the table in total.

I downloaded and used the sample “Apology for Defective Product” letter from Office online, a resource I find very handy at times!

To begin with in Word, it’s as simple as switching to the Mailings tab and selecting the Step by Step Mail Merge Wizard. The next few steps are pretty simple also, select the document type, the starting document and then browse for a data connection.

Initially, I chose to create a new data source and was presented with the wizard which I used to connect to the SQL Server. I then selected the table and gave it a friendly name to finish.

Following this, I used the Filter option to select all people within a specific geography range (the range was 280-655 inclusive to pick out 7,818 records listed as being with the United States. Here’s a sample of the records returned.

The match fields had been completed by the wizard and therefore, I was able to quickly insert an address block and a greeting line.

All of the letters were immediately available for preview as well as edit, print and email.

The entire process took just under ten minutes for me to complete.

I then began to run through the process in OOo 2.2.0.

The first thing I needed to do in OOo was to create an Address Data Source using the wizard, configure the settings, choose ODBC (as this is the only way to connect to SQL Server,) browse for an ODBC setting and organise my data sources. The first thing I noticed here was that this may not be the way an average user would tend to think when it came to creating a mail merge.

Next came the need to add a User DSN through Windows ODBC Data Source Administrator (point to note, this would have to be installed on every machine that would need to utilise this as a data connection,) by choosing SQL Server, entering the SQL Server details, connecting using Windows authentication, changing the default database and leaving the rest of the settings alone.

With my data source created, I was able to successfully test the data connection and my data source was ready for use in OOo.

Next up, I had to select it from the list, ensure the properties were correct, choose the table I was going to use, match the fields manually, no automated mapping was completed (even though the field names were identical to the address block names in some instances) and give the data source a name.

With my new data source complete I then used the Mail Merge Wizard to open the Apology for Defective product letter. Initially, it took the mail merge wizard 40 seconds to open the first screen.

I set the document type to be a letter, not an email and I created a new address block (whilst applying the surprisingly ten minute time consuming geography filter at this step also,) salutation line and checked the layout.

The processing time during the initial steps was significantly greater than using Microsoft Office Word 2007, often taking up to 30 seconds to move from one wizard step to the next. However, the Adjust layout step took a full 3 minutes to move to the next step. I’m also unsure why I had to rematch the fields having done so earlier.

Finally, I started the mail merge which took approximately twenty minutes to complete...

All in all, the whole process took just under fifty minutes, five times longer than it did using Microsoft Office Word 2007 although this was considerably longer on my first few attempts as I struggled to locate the functionality in OOo and how to put the whole thing together.

The conclusion... The time taken to complete essential tasks therefore is extremely important. If organisational end users were to be so unproductive then staffing overheads would considerably increase. Whereas Microsoft Word 2007 handled the process with the minimum of fuss and flexibility, using OOo actually felt like a development tool at times and a throw back to the days of Word 95.

I've included the comprehensive screen shots here with the aim of allowing anyone to recreate this experiment. Thankfully, this is a science project, not a business.

Sign the Open XML Petition Today

chrisp — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 16:05:20 GMT

If you only do one other thing today, sign this petition and help safeguard the future of OpenXML.

Many readers of this blog may be aware that Microsoft called for the standardisation of Open XML via ECMA International and this was approved as open standard in December 2006.

Of the 21 members to vote, IBM were the only objection to the approval. Again, this was the case when ECMA agreed to submit Open XML as a standard for ratification by ISO. Ignoring the fact that the vast majority of ISO members chose not to submit comments, during the one-month period for consideration of Open XML in ISO, IBM globally campaigned that Open XML was not even considered. (NB. Notes does not support Open XML.)

If you believe that Open XML provides choice for customers and partners worldwide, and that Microsoft have finally listened to their customers needs by opening up the pre-2003 binary document formats, and you think that this should be standardised, why not sign the petition?

If you would like to understand more about the comparison of OpenDocument and Office Open XML formats prior to signing this partition you could refer to this, balanced Wikipedia article. For more information about developing with Open XML, head on over to http://openxmldeveloper.org/.

Regards,
Chris Parkes

The Demo Showcase for the Small Business Specialist Community (SBSC)

chrisp — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 21:15:00 GMT

I finally received some clarity from the upper echelons in Redmond around this...

The good news is that the Demo Showcase Small Business DVD should be delivered in the Microsoft Action Pack Subscription Special Edition for SBSC's mid-March!!!

Now, I wonder if this is just in the U.S.A.?!? As I understand it, this should be delivered to all SBSC members so here's hoping!

Ciao for now :)

Search and Destroy!

chrisp — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 20:15:52 GMT

Including contributions from (amongst others) McAfee, SonicWALL, Computer Associates and Sophos, this article is a great primer to help you understand all you need to know about cleaning malware off your computer

"The main malware differentiator is visibility: whereas a virus wants to be seen, Trojans and Spyware want to stay hidden in order to deliver their payload."

Content includes:

Defining the Dangerous
Visibility Issues
Isolate, Identify, Clean
Policy and Process
5 Steps to Success

Author, journalist and consultant, Davey Winder has been writing about security issues for 16 years and is the current IT Security Journalist of the Year.

Ciao for now :)

The Demo Showcase & Office 2007 Launch (Part 2)

chrisp — Thu, 11 Jan 2007 18:56:00 GMT

There's another fantastic scenario contained with the Demo Showcase which expertly shows off the amazing conditional formatting and newly designed table capabilities of Microsoft Excel 2007.

In the scenario, we assume the character of Patricia Doyle, a Sales Manager with Contoso. Maybe the silicon chip inside her head is switched to overload (but) she don’t like downtime. So, the race is on with regards to just how fast we can get better results faster!

First of all, we're introduced to the concept of galleries and the use of the new live preview capabilities of Office 2007. We also get to understand the benefit of contextual menus and the fantastic charting options available.

By using the blandest of spreadsheets, we are quickly shown how to transform it into a professional looking spreadsheet containing automatically created totals, filters and funky new charts!

Finally, the scenario wraps with a spreadsheet containing data bars, business intelligence style icons and more... All in less than five minutes. So much for that downtime, shame we can't do anything about Mondays!!!

Ciao for now :)