Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Seamless Unified Collaboration

Seamless Unified Collaboration with Office 365/SharePoint


Whether you wish to implement intranets, extranets, or public collaborative platforms Office 365/SharePoint is undoubtedly the suite of tools of choice.  It is elegantly engineer for ease of use, intuitive learning curve for both IT and users alike; especially since all of the familiar features and functionalities of Windows and MS Office are brought forward with enhancements.

It is a comprehensive highly secured unified communications tool for online, offline, internal, federated team management, and/or customers’ social outreach.  Microsoft Office 365/SharePoint is essentially a turnkey highly customizable platform for Audio/Video/Web Conferencing, VoIP (Voice-over-IP) and VoI (Voice-over-Internet) using Lync 2010 or 2013.

On the back end, it offers Data Center Network Capacity, File Storage, Full Server Support, Award Winning Service Help Desk and World Class Training and Demos Microsoft’s standard of quality.
 
The most important concern of all is fully addressed by Microsoft’s State-of-the-Art Security, Back-up, and Recovery Technology ensuring privacy and data reliability, integrity, and  high availability.  With Single-Sign-On (SSO) the user has seamless authentication and ready access with the appropriate rights management.
 
Integrated with Microsoft SharePoint, you can sync your teams for easy collaboration using Office Outlook to manage schedules, contacts, and mail.   You seamlessly customize a dedicated intranet Team Site to publish/archive documents, calendar of events, create exchange through collaborative comradely and much more.

The Team sites as well as the public website can be designed/customized with SharePoint Designer. This outstanding tool is installed locally on the desktop or mobile workstation for taking advantage of powerful features.   


ADMIN DASHBOARD





Fig. 1 -  This is the Dash Board (Control Panel) of the Account Owner/Administrator (AO/A).  To familiarize yourself with the powerful tools integrated into the Office 365 with SharePoint I recommend that the AO/Admin open a VISIO stencil and begin to create the first layer of your project using the features and functionalities that you are planning to deploy.  I would include start and completion projected dates.


SETUP OVERVIEW




Fig. 2 -  It is important that you use layers so that each Specialist and/or team responsible for integrating the chosen services can easily follow the desired design and configuration standards.







Figs. 3 - 4 -   Using the items on the Setup Overview, the AO/A can begin to create a custom plan for the roll out.  Using the Custom Plan Pilot guide you can track it using MS Project integrated with VISIO interactive visuals

CUSTOM PLAN TRACKER







Figs. 5-6 - Each Task can be represented in VISIO as a layer detailing the steps to be taken and linking them to MS Project.





INTEGRATED DATABASES

 

 

 

Fig. 7 -  As you can see, you have everything readily available including outstanding self-help support with dynamic context specific streaming demos, award winning community assistance and/or options to hire a Microsoft Certified Specialist.

HOME

 

Users' Dashboard





Fig. 8 -  This is your licensed users’ dashboard.  If you notice, on the right the user will find all of the readily available Self-Help Resources as well as Community Resources and Blogs.

TEAM SITES


Each department can deploy Departmental level Team Sites, and each Project/Program Manager can customize their own projects team sites.   





Fig. 9 -  This is using the default layout that is readily customizable



Fig. 10 -  …and with a couple of clicks and drag-and-drops, I turned it into this.


Your Team Sites can be edited with SharePoint Designer which helps you to seamlessly to create or edit lists, pages, workflows, and adjust settings.

You may also edit Team Site on the fly using WYSIWYG and drag/drop
Full integration with Office Project, Visio, Access, and the complete Office 2010 suite of applications and tools.   This is ultimately important because this makes managing your teams a seamless affair through live and passive interactive collaboration.

VANITY DOMAINS

 

This is the optional vanity domain public site.  The integration of a public domain is seamless and painless whether you have an existing domain or you need to purchase a new domain Office 365/SharePoint carries you through the steps using easy to follow wizards or with phone support.

 

 


Fig.  11 -  Sample Enterprise Domain simply using the WYSIWYG available web parts.  Not one single line of code was written.

Please Note:  This is a high-level overview just to present a quick and dirty sampling of what Office 365/SharePoint Online Services has to offer to any size business; from Enterprise to Medium Businesses or SOHO Entrepreneurs.

Click the images to view them in the LightBox


If you have any questions or constructive feedback, feel free to contact me.


~ Virginia Benedict
Technologies Analyst (cir 1989)
IT Systems & Network Security/Computer Forensics (cir 2000)
Professional Social Media Managing Curator (cir 1992)
Market Engineering Strategist (cir 1984)

914-923-2103 (by Appt)

@System_Prompt

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Indispensible IT Pro Tools



The Value of a TechNet Subscription...

Author: Virginia Benedict, Techanalyst

If you consider yourself a serious IT Professional, a TechNet subscription is simply indispensable.  I know that I cannot do without it for more reasons that I can think off.  When I think of Continuing Education & Training, to prepare for critical issues and plan for future deployments, when I am in the middle of an IT project, double checking knowledgebase for specific how-to or tips & tricks, when I need to get updated on security trends, on and on…

Because a TechNet subscription allows me to download full versions of pre-release tools and software for testing and evaluation purposes, I can hone in and polish the skills I need to readily provide best of class technical support services, implementations, and prepare for seamless migrations.

The subscription level I recommend is the TechNet Professional with Media.  TechNet provides the subscriber with an on-line Portal. However, having the media will travel; especially when you are on-site and might not have ready access to broadband. 

The following are just some of the benefits included in the Professional with Media version:

1.       Exclusive Secure Portal Access from which you can Manage your Subscription and efficiently access your benefits in one place
2.       Usage Scenarios Supports the trial scenarios most utilized by IT Pros during the software evaluation process
3.       Microsoft E-Learning Provides collections (a set of courses with practice labs), typically 20 hours per calendar year.

TechNet also offers Volume Subscriptions. Microsoft Volume Licensing programs that are designed to meet the needs of a business and offer customized packages to suit the size and purchasing preference of a company.

For more detailed information go to:

Overview:
http://technet.microsoft.com/subscriptions/bb521230.aspx

Volume subscriptions:

Feature & Pricing comparison Matrix:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/subscriptions/hh442910