Google sees new browser displacing desktop software

MOUNTAIN VIEW, California (Reuters) - Google Inc is challenging Microsoft Corp with its own Web browser that lets users run many applications that once worked only when installed on local PCs, executives said on Tuesday.

Google introduced a public trial version of its new browser software, Chrome, which is designed to handle not just text and graphics, but more complex computer programs.

Chrome, available in 43 languages in 100 countries at www.google.com/chrome, has been designed to download software and Web pages faster than existing browsers. It even allows users to keep working when one of its windows crashes.

This represents Google's long-anticipated head-on attack on Microsoft and its Internet Explorer, which has three-quarters of the Web-browsing market. Google has backed Mozilla Corp's Firefox browser, which holds about 18 percent of the market.

Google engineers and executives call Chrome a "fresh take on the browser," a 15-year-old technology that is supplanting 25-year-old desktop software as the basic way users interact with computers.

"You actually spend more time in your browser than you do in your car," said Brian Rakowski, group product manager for Google's browser project.

Chrome was seen by analysts as partly a defensive move due to Google's fear that the recently upgraded Internet Explorer 8 (IE 8) could be used to lock out Google. Google's core business of Web search and related advertising depends on browsers.

A Microsoft executive said IE 8 gives users control over how and where they navigate, improves their day-to-day browsing experience, and keeps people safe from new security threats. "Microsoft understands that Web browsing is crucially important for hundreds of millions of people, which is why we invest in Internet Explorer so heavily," Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of Internet Explorer, said in a statement.

CHALLENGE TO MICROSOFT WINDOWS?

Google co-founder Sergey Brin said Chrome was designed to address the shift to using software from within a Web browser rather than as locally installed computer applications running inside Microsoft Windows or some other operating system.

"I think operating systems are kind of an old way to think of the world," Brin told a group of reporters after the news conference at Google's Mountain View, California headquarters. "They have become kind of bulky, they have to do lots and lots of different (legacy) things."

Google believes any task done in a standalone desktop computer application can be delivered via the Web and Chrome is its bet that software applications can be run via a browser.

"We (Web users) want a very lightweight, fast engine for running applications," Brin said.

"The kind of things you want to have running standalone (on a computer) are shrinking," he said, adding that he still edits photos on his computer rather than using a Web program.

GOOGLE BORROWS FROM APPLE, FIREFOX

Chrome borrows liberally from other browsers running open-source software code, including Apple Inc and Firefox, and company officials said they planned to fully share Chrome code with other developers. "We have borrowed good ideas from others," Google Vice President of Product Management Sindar Pichai said. "Our goal here was to bring our point of view, but do it in a very open way."

Because Chrome relies on Apple's open-source WebKit software for rendering Web pages, it can run any application that runs on Apple's Safari Web browser, Pichai said.

"If you are a webmaster, and your site works in Apple Safari then it will work very well in Google Chrome," he said.

Greg Sterling, a Web analyst with Sterling Market Intelligence, said Google's entry into the browser market has echoes of the bruising "browser wars" of the late 1990s, when Microsoft crushed Web pioneer Netscape Communications.

But while the competition between Microsoft and Google is likely to produce many improvements for consumers, the likely fallout from the battle will be other browser makers that have only recently begun to pry market share away from Microsoft.

Sterling said Firefox could become a victim of "friendly fire" from Google as many of its users are the same early adopters who are most likely to switch and try a new browser.

"Firefox has softened up and paved the way for Google. Without Firefox, Chrome would not be possible," Sterling said.

Brin said Google planned to continue to work closely with Mozilla, whose primary financial backing has come from Google in recent years. He said he hoped to see future versions of Chrome and Firefox become more unified over time.

Chrome organizes information into tabbed pages. Web programs can be launched in their own dedicated windows.Among Chrome's features is a special privacy mode that lets users create an "incognito" window where "nothing that occurs in that window is ever logged on your computer," according to a Google promotional guide.

iYogi Announces Launch of Monitoring and Performance Tool For SMBs

iYogi – a leading provider of technical support services with horizons in the US, UK, Canada and Australia – today announced the launch of its exclusive server monitoring tools for small businesses. The new product offers integrated technology solutions to surmount the users’ unique IT support requirements thereby enabling them to derive and share information, data, enable network performance analysis, and security trends critical to plan and mana ge their set of servers – 24x7.

Uday Challu, iYogi’s CEO commented, “Holding a significant niche for itself in the computer support industry, iYogi has always known to be on the forefront of adapting breakthrough technology to exceed customer service expectations. This time we have developed a tool offering value-add functionality which will help small business customers maximize the business outcomes of IT.”

iYogi’s monitoring tool provides real time observation and monitoring solutions to ensure more robust and reliable IT support and infrastructure for small buinesses. Small Business owners also get a comprehensive assesment of their IT environment to meet technology needs with the scalability for future growth and create preventative measures based on quick analysis of network device alerts, pre-failure indicators, performance benchmark and security issues.

The new Monitoring and performance tool will provide small business with the opportunity to test all technical and non-technical aspects of their servers and help them to strengthen overall IT infrastructure. The array of services will include: Patch Management, Security Auditing, Site Inventory, Real Time Alerting Script Based Management, and Rights Management Services for all critical server issues.

“Irrespective of the business being small or large, when the consumer chooses iYogi, he leverages the potential of an elite taskforce of Microsoft Certified System Engineers and Cisco Certified Network Associates, ready to service their critical assets, using the most advanced network asset tracking and Performance monitoring”, adds Challu.

Another factor where the Company aims to distinguish itself from its competitors is product pricing. Embracing the concept of service quality, iYogi offers competitively priced technical support services at no-haggle, low prices.

As for its small business support, the Company has integrated its exclusive Monitoring and Alerting Services under one price umbrella of just $480 annually. per server i.e. $49.99 per month. The price is certainly hard to find anywhere else.

For more information on iYogi Small Business Support, visit http://www.iyogibusiness.com/

Contact Details:
Company Name: iYogi Technical Services Pvt Ltd
Address: iYogi Inc.
12 Desbrosses Street
3rd Floor
New York, NY 10013
Toll Free no:1-800-237-3901
Work Number: 1-212-229-0901
Fax Number: 1-888-867-2715
E-Mail: awadhesh.singh@iyogi.net

iYogi Secures $9.5M in Series B Funding Led by SAP Ventures, With Follow-on Investment from Canaan Partners and SVB India Capital Partners

iYogi Secures $9.5M in Series B Funding Led by SAP Ventures, With Follow-on Investment from Canaan Partners and SVB India Capital Partners
iYogi, a Direct-to-Consumer and Small Business Technical Support Provider, Paves the Way for Personal Offshoring to Become India’s Next Success Story

New York, 24 July, 2008: Personal Offshoring, which is driving the next wave of India’s outsourcing success story, got a huge boost today when iYogi - a remote technical support provider from India - raised $ 9.5 million in Series B financing from SAP Ventures, a division of SAP AG, Canaan Partners and SVB India Capital Partners, a venture fund affiliate of Silicon Valley Bank.

iYogi (www.iyogi.net) delivers technical support services directly to consumers and small businesses and is the first, global, technical support brand based out of India. The company offers its customers an unlimited, annual service subscription for $119.99 per desktop that includes support for a wide range of technologies, including PC hardware Microsoft Windows operating system, software applications, peripherals and multifunctional devices.

“Personal Offshoring has created new investment opportunities in India with incredible growth potential,” said Doug Higgins, partner at SAP Ventures. “It is very exciting to see companies like iYogi challenging the traditional enterprise-focused offshore-service delivery model by creating a consumer-focused, direct-to-customer personal offshore model. iYogi is one of the fastest-growing companies in this market segment, and we look forward to working with them to create India’s next success story.”

“Our focus on the customer experience has helped us achieve a 93 percent satisfaction rate across more than 50,000 customers,” said Uday Challu, CEO of iYogi. “We are delighted to have the support of three terrific investors as we increase our market share and continue to provide the best technical support experience possible for our customers.”

iYogi will use the funds to fuel its expansion into 12 new regions, including the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada, and to increase its delivery of new services including PC recovery, anti-virus/spyware, data back-up and PC optimization.

“As consumer technologies grow in sophistication, consumers will be seeking the kind of home IT support services – including remote services offered by companies such as iYogi – to help them solve their most complex problems,” said Kurt Scherf, vice president and principal analyst, Parks Associates. “In primary research, we found more than one-third of consumers are willing to pay for competent and professional remote support services, and 60% express a strong interest in software solutions – what we refer to as ‘PC Dashboards’ – that automate many basic PC performance enhancement and troubleshooting features, solving many PC-related problems before they even are noticed by end-users.”

iYogi had previously raised $3.1 million in Series A financing from Canaan Partners and SVB in April of last year. “iYogi is one of the most promising investments for Canaan Partners,” said Alok Mittal, managing director of India at Canaan Partners. “Third-party, vendor-independent technical support is an exciting new service category, witnessing explosive growth. Customers are looking beyond the traditional vendor-provided support to remote channels for better problem resolution, faster service, and greater overall satisfaction. iYogi has created an incredible value proposition and price offering for its customers that is hard to beat.”

”Several next generation outsourcing companies from India are delivering a range of personal offshoring services for individuals and small businesses in the U.S. including online tutoring, tax preparation, remote executive assistance and research services,” said Suresh Shanmugham, managing director of SVB India Capital Partners, a venture fund affiliate of Silicon Valley Bank. “iYogi has leveraged the technical skills available in India along with process expertise to scale as a global technical support provider for millions faced with increasingly complex technology”.

About SAP Ventures
SAP Ventures invests in innovative and disruptive software and services companies globally. We pursue opportunities across all stages for outstanding financial return. Our goal is to bring substantial benefit to all parties by facilitating interaction between portfolio companies and SAP and its ecosystem of customers and partners. SAP Ventures has a successful track record of building industry-leading companies by partnering with outstanding entrepreneurs and top-tier venture capital firms since 1996. For more information, visit www.sapventures.com.

About Canaan Partners

Canaan Partners is a global venture capital firm specializing in early-stage information technology and life sciences companies. Founded in 1987, Canaan Partners has $2.4 billion capital under management and has invested in more than 240 companies, completed 63 mergers and acquisitions, and brought over 50 companies public. The firm catalyzes the development of innovative mobile, Internet, CleanTech, networking, semiconductor, enterprise software and services, biotechnology and medical technologies to build next-generation market leaders. Canaan was an early investor in Acme Packet (APKT), Aperto Networks, BharatMatrimony.com, Blurb, DoubleClick (DCLK), ID Analytics, Match.com and SuccessFactors, along with dozens of other market-leading companies. Canaan is headquartered in Menlo Park, California and also has offices in Connecticut, India and Israel. For more information visit: www.canaan.com.

SVB India Capital Partners Fund and Silicon Valley Bank

SVB India Capital Partners Fund is a $54 million equity fund that is focused on Indian companies and co-invests across industries and stages with top-tier venture capital firms. Silicon Valley Bank is the premier commercial bank for emerging, growth and mature companies in the technology, life science, private equity and premium wine industries. Founded in 1983 and headquartered in Santa Clara, Calif., the company serves clients around the world through 27 U.S. offices and five international operations. Silicon Valley Bank is a member of global financial services firm SVB Financial Group, with SVB Analytics, SVB Capital, SVB Global and SVB Private Client Services. More information on the company can be found at www.svb.com.

About iYogi

iYogi is the first direct-to-consumer and small business technical support service from India. Providing an annual unlimited subscription to technical support for $119.99 per year, iYogi now boasts more than 50,000 customers. The company employs 450 professionals servicing customers in the U.S., U.K., Canada fast expanding to 12 new geographies across the globe. iYogi’s resolution rate of 87 percent and customer satisfaction rate of 93 percent are amongst the highest published benchmarks in the industry. For further information, please visit www.iyogi.net.

SAP and all SAP logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and in several other countries. All other product and service names mentioned are the trademarks of their respective companies

Any statements contained in this document that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements as defined in the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “expect,” “forecast,” “intend,” “may,” “plan,” “project,” “predict,” “should” and “will” and similar expressions as they relate to SAP are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. SAP undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations The factors that could affect SAP's future financial results are discussed more fully in SAP's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC"), including SAP's most recent Annual Report on Form 20-F filed with the SEC. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of their dates.

The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. iYogi shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.

SAP and all SAP logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of SAP AG in Germany and in several other countries.
All other product and service names mentioned are the trademarks of their respective companies.

Any statements contained in this document that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements as defined in the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “expect,” “forecast,” “intend,” “may,” “plan,” “project,” “predict,” “should” and “will” and similar expressions as they relate to SAP are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. SAP undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations The factors that could affect SAP's future financial results are discussed more fully in SAP's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC"), including SAP's most recent Annual Report on Form 20-F filed with the SEC. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of their dates.



Contact:


Company Name:
iYogi Technical Services Pvt Ltd

Address:
iYogi Inc.
12 Desbrosses Street
3rd Floor
New York, NY 10013

Toll Free no: 1-800-237-3901

Work Number: 1-212-229-0901

F ax Number: 1-888-867-2715

5 Key Service and Technical Support Considerations

When your business buys a new addition to its IT systems, it is also buying the company behind the product or service. Your company will look to the vendor for service and technical support as it installs the new technology, learns to operate it and uses it on a day-to-day basis.

It is imperative to know what to expect from a vendor in terms of remote technical support and service before your company buys. Here are some of the considerations that should go into the purchasing decision.

1. Who will install the product? A simple product, like a word processor, can be installed by end users without much difficulty. However, complex systems like ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) software require professional installation. Somewhere in between lie the systems that vendors and customers can install together. The question is, what remote technical support will the vendor provide during installation? Will there be on-site technicians to walk you through installation, or will you have to go it alone and call a remote technical support hotline when you get stuck?

2. Who will provide telephone remote technical support? Many vendors now outsource remote technical support overseas to people whose expertise and command of the English language may not be the best. It is always a good idea to meet the people who will be providing your company's tech support before you sign on the dotted line.

3. Is remote technical support “free” (included in the purchase price), or will there be ongoing charges based on usage? The former may seem preferable to paying by the service call. But if you don’t anticipate needing much support, going with a per-incident service plan may lower both the technology's purchase price and its overall cost of ownership.

4. If on-site service is needed, how will your business be charged? Some vendors charge for time spent traveling to and from an organization's location, while others start the clock when they get there and stop it when they leave. Certain types of service calls may be billed at a flat fee, while others might be billed by the hour and include materials charges.

5. How quick is the vendor's response time? You should negotiate with the vendor regarding how long it will take to get a service person on-site when your company places a service call. The final agreement should include some consequences if the vendor fails to meet the response-time goal. Define clearly whether you want availability 24/7 or just during business hours. If you opt for the latter, keep in mind that the business's systems could be down for more than 72 hours over a three-day weekend.

When negotiating service and technical support agreements, keep in mind that greater coverage equals greater cost. Get a line-by-line quote on each service/support feature that your company wants, and ask the vendor what the price differences will be if it settles for less.

Get all agreed service and technical support features in writing. A service or technical support agreement should spell out what the new system should do when it is working perfectly. This agreement should also detail terms covering response time, service fees, support details and so on. The more detailed the agreement is up front, the less room for finger-pointing there will be later.

source: itmanagement.com/features/5-service-support-considerations-061908/

Software Helps Companies Virtualize IT Staff with remote technical support

The only provider of appliance-based remote technical support software, today announced the release of Bomgar 10.1. The newest version of this industry leading product includes features designed to help organizations easily virtualize the people involved in IT support, enabling them to be more efficient and effective. Help desk virtualization allows support staff to remotely control and troubleshoot end user devices quickly and accurately, anywhere in the world.

Advancements in mobile technology have made telecommuting a viable option for most enterprise employees elevating such workplace flexibility as a key to recruiting quality employees. Recent changes in the global economy including rising gas prices, and the mounting costs associated with travel, are further reinforcing the attractiveness of telecommuting. For IT managers this workplace trend requires a centralized support platform that allows staff to manage issues anywhere employees or offices reside. Additionally, IT managers want to extend this new flexibility not only to enterprise employees but also to the help desk staff.

“Enterprises are already deploying virtualization in their server environments to reduce costs. Since employing IT staff is often more expensive than buying servers, it only makes sense to invest in technologies that increase the effectiveness of these highly skilled employees,” said Joel Bomgar, CEO and founder, Bomgar Corporation. “With the release of 10.1, we are giving enterprises the tools they need to effectively virtualize IT staff. The result is higher productivity, lower costs to the customer, and happier employees.”

The new version of Bomgar’s remote technical support platform helps enterprises maintain a delicate balance of keeping both users and help desk staff productive and content. With Bomgar’s support platform, IT organizations no longer have to travel onsite for routine maintenance or computing issues. Bomgar 10.1 allows IT to “virtualize” staff resources so that a representative can instantly and remotely support resolve users’ technical issues regardless of operating system or geographic location. Additionally, it allows the help desk staff to “break the chains” that tie them to the office by enabling them to provide effective troubleshooting and routine maintenance from home or on the road.

Key features include:

• Software Development Kit (SDK) for Faster Deployment of Virtualized Support: With Bomgar 10.1, the company is introducing a SDK that enables easy integration of Bomgar’s remote technical support software with existing help desk solutions. It includes instructions, methods and pre-configured pieces of code for creating customizable applications that leverage Bomgar’s software for back end solutions, such as trouble ticket systems or knowledge base software. The SDK allows Bomgar’s customers to cut down time spent integrating Bomgar with other systems by nearly 75 percent, enabling them to be up and running with a complete support application in days versus weeks.
• Macintosh Client for Support Reps to Provide the Greater Flexibility: Bomgar 10.1 includes capabilities that allow support reps to provide assistance from a Macintosh platform. The addition of this feature expands Bomgar’s IT rep platform support to all major computing operating systems.
• Administrative Dashboard to Manage Resources and Speed Time to Resolution: Bomgar has added an administrative dashboard to its 10.1 product that provides IT directors with visibility into the entire support organization, regardless of where the IT support reps are logged in from. The dashboard gives IT managers a direct view into what each rep is working on as well as what his or her workload looks like. The manager can move sessions from one representative to another to evenly distribute the call load. This helps the reps provide faster, more customized support to each end user.

"IT organizations are in a difficult position. Calls for them to do 'more with less' have become louder as fears of an economic slowdown or a recession have grown louder,” said Matt Healey, research manager, software and hardware support services program, IDC. "In this environment, it is important for IT departments to invest in tools that can improve the productivity of the support staff. I believe that the new generation of 'clientless' remote technical support tools can provide the productivity improvements that IT departments are looking for by reducing on-site visits and reducing the time required to support end users."

Source: businesswire.com/portal/site/google/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20080624005323&newsLang=en

London School of Economics uses web-based remote support tool to improve helpdesk service

LogMeIn Rescue is a web-based remote technical support tool that enables a technician to easily connect to a remote Mac or smartphone often in fewer than 60 seconds, without pre-installing software. Rescue enables IT technicians to –remotely diagnose system issues, manage multiple simultaneous support sessions and resolve end-user issues, regardless of organizational size.

Using LogMeIn Rescue, LSE’s IT support teams are able to remotely diagnose and resolve technical issues on PCs, Macs and smartphones across campus and support staff offsite, ensuring prompt and effective support for IT incidents.

“After an extensive evaluation, LogMeIn Rescue was adopted at the start of the academic year as a key tool for delivering helpdesk services,”

said Adam Gale, IT Services senior support officer at LSE. “Rescue has been used for remotely diagnosing and resolving remote technical support issues for the LSE user-base and the tool has been easy to use -- providing all the necessary functions for the support teams to deliver first-class remote IT support.”

Rescue provides technicians with powerful but easy-to-use functionality including diagnostics of hardware and software images, as well as critical system information, file transfer and text-based end-user chat.

“The previous remote technical support tool employed by IT Services suffered from screen-freeze issues -- which depicted inaccurate screen information,” said Gale. “We believe Rescue resolved this and proved reliable and predictable, giving our IT support staff complete confidence when tackling support incidents.”
From a service delivery perspective, IT staff have been able to provide a more responsive and effective service when handling support calls.

Rescue has on occasion eliminated the need for IT staff to pay a desk-side visit to their users or for LSE staff and students to go to IT Services for assistance. “Instead we can remotely access a computer, deal with and resolve a complex issue which has been far more effective than trying to do the same over phone or email,” added Gale.

LSE IT Services currently supports a large number of staff and students in halls of residences and away from the school. Although not a distributed campus, the pilots have shown IT staff can support users no matter where they happen to be located. “Computer users at LSE have commented they felt reassured knowing an engineer is just a mouse click away,” continued Gale. “We had a particular user in France and my team was able to deliver remote technical support and dialogue all within the application.”

IT Services at LSE comprises several IT support teams, which provide IT helpdesk services to all academic and administrative staff, and research and taught-students. LSE has an IT-estate of approximately 1,700 staff and approximately 1,000 student on campus and halls of residences as well as a number of Linux, Mac and smartphone users. IT Services also supports more than 80 networked applications for the teaching, research and business functions of the school.

“The London School of Economics and Political Science is a world class centre for its concentration of teaching and research across the full range of the social, political and economic sciences and we are proud to be part of delivering the IT support solution to this iconic learning institution,” said Erik Driehuis, VP of sales, Europe, LogMeIn, Inc. “We believe LogMeIn Rescue has made it possible to more quickly, easily and cost effectively diagnose and repair hard to reach computers and the association with LSE continues that work."

source : publictechnology.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=16204

Move Your Business from Windows to Linux and get remote technical support

Windows Vista debuted to muffled applause, followed by lackluster sales. Up until June 30, cash-strapped businesses looking to avoid the cost of upgrading to new Vista-compatible hardware could still purchase . Now, however, Windows XP is available only as a costly "downgrade" from Windows Vista--if you buy a copy of Vista, you can install the 6-year-old XP operating system using the Vista license.

If that feels like a waste of your small business's precious IT budget, and you're still , look no further than . The latest distributions are free, easy to install, and highly customizable; they harness your existing hardware without overtaxing it; and they include a wealth of productivity applications and utilities. You may already have a closet Linux expert on staff, but if you don't, paid support is usually available at rates far less than Microsoft's.

Making the switch from Windows to Linux will incur some costs as employees and support staff adjust to the new system's configuration settings, utilities, and applications. Even so, the savings in future hardware and software upgrades could be huge.

No License, No Fee, No Problem

Though you can purchase boxed commercial versions of Linux that include support, every Linux distribution is also available for free under the terms of the open-source Once you figure out which distribution you'd like to use (see below), you can simply download, burn, and install it on as many systems as you choose. Your software licensing fee is zero, compared with the $300 per seat for the full version of Windows Vista Business Edition. And, another bonus, Linux lacks Microsoft's intrusive activation requirements.

In addition to thousands of other free applications ( for some of my favorites), most Linux distributions come with a copy of Though not a feature-for-feature substitute for Microsoft Office, OpenOffice.org definitely does the job, and for $500 less per workstation than the cost of Office Professional 2007. OpenOffice.org lacks an equivalent to Microsoft Outlook, but just about every Linux distribution includes Novell's free PIM.

A few key Windows-based applications such as AutoCAD and Photoshop lack Linux replacements, but for many office workers the missing functionality hardly merits spending $800 more for Windows and Office. Many Windows applications will run at native speed under Linux via the utility included with most distributions. For those that don't work with Wine, two more options exist: You can install a copy of Windows using one of the available free virtualization utilities, such as or you can install Linux to dual-boot with Windows.

For most distributions, the same disc will contain server applications, including the Apache Web Server, the MySQL database engine, virtualization, and support for leading commercial databases and CRM applications from companies like Oracle, Sybase, and SAP. The Samba networking software emulates Windows Server's networking features admirably, and for free, versus starting price of $999. You can even replace your costly Exchange server installation with the free, open-source .

Whether you're using desktop or server versions of Linux, the operating system is famous for one other important feature that Microsoft is still gradually adding to Windows: security. Linux is not somehow magically immune to viruses, worms, and other Internet-based attacks. However, the reality is that the vast majority of existing attacks target Windows and Windows applications. Mostly , Linux is simply not subject to most of the Internet-based malware that threatens PCs. The targets Windows.

Don't Panic at the Distro

No two Linux distributions are the same, differing mainly in how user-friendly their installers are, how willing they are to include experimental or nonstable versions of software and utilities, and how they offer access to updates.

Linux distributions also differ in how well they support your particular hardware, especially wireless networking devices and display adapters. Perhaps the easiest way to directly assess this support on your particular hardware without having to actually install Linux is to download, burn, and boot a live-CD distro. Ubuntu, OpenSuSE, and literally hundreds of other Linux distributions come in versions.

Get Help, If You Need It

The reality of operating system support is that it costs a lot of money, whether it comes from Microsoft, Apple, Novell, or Canonical. Your copy of Windows Vista comes with 90 days of remote technical support via phone, e-mail, or chat that starts the day you activate the product. After that, Microsoft charges $60 per support incident.

Commercial Linux distributions offer similar, but less expensive, support options. The community-supported OpenSuSE 11.0 comes with 90 days of installation support. For long-term support, choose SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (currently in version 10) for $50 per year, or go with Ubuntu and buy a support contract from maker Canonical starting at

If you're already doing without dedicated support staff for Windows, one year may be all the paid support you need for Linux. Ubuntu users joke that simply googling for technical support usually results in the exact answer you're looking for on Canonical's forums.

Linux is different from Windows, but it isn't an alien life form. The human investment you make in transitioning away from expensive Windows and Office licenses may pay for itself quickly. More important, you'll be free to run the desktop and server software of your choice, on hardware you can afford.

source: pcworld.com/article/147879/move_your_business_from_windows_to_linux.html

Bosch Security Systems announced earlier this week that they have made several upgrades to their CCTV technical support center in Lancaster, Penn. On

Bosch Security Systems announced earlier this week that they have made several upgrades to their CCTV remote technical support center in Lancaster, Penn.

One of the biggest upgrades that the company made to the center was to add a team dedicated especially to solving issues related to customers with IP video surveillance products. Essentially, according to Bosch Technical Manager Don Boling, they have created "two CCTV teams," one that handles analog applications and one that handles IP.

"This structure is helping the company develop deeper expertise within each product groups’ remote technical support team," Boling said a in a prepared statement.

In addition, the center itself has been restructured to feature an open seating plan and centralized equipment racks to help encourage cooperation and sharing of information among the staff.

Source: ipsecuritywatch.com/web/online/IPSW-News/Bosch-upgrades-technical-support-center/512$14716

Who will provide Online vista tech services

OK, I'm probably not the first person to think of that headline, but what the heck. Today, we're mourning the passing--sort of--of an old friend here, and I think it's OK to be informal given the egregious amount of time he hung around in the first place. I won't bore you with the specifics of the rest of XP's life cycle: I spelled that out earlier in "Microsoft Will Not Extend XP Lifecycle Again: Here's What's Really Happening" (http://tinyurl.com/3oucfg). Instead, I'd like to just take a few moments to look back on the somewhat inglorious early history of Windows XP, which should make for an interesting comparison with Online vista tech services first year. Because for some reason, with XP, a lot of people seem to have the one-sided memory that often accompanies a passing. It wasn't all ice cream and pie, people.

First of all, Microsoft has sold several hundred million copies of Windows XP, and the OS is undoubtedly the best-selling Windows version ever. But it was that successful only because the product was artificially kept on the market longer than necessary. If XP had been replaced in 2004, as it should have been, it would have gone down in history as one of the most forgettable releases of the product ever. Instead, Microsoft kept XP alive by giving that 2004 release away for free, calling it Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2).

Before that, XP launched with a whimper in October 2001--I noted that the disappointing "midnight madness" events Microsoft organized were "neither midnight nor madness" in a Short Takes article from that month, and they took place after a "boring and long" launch event. Even Microsoft group vice president Jim Allchin was sanguine about XP during the launch, noting, "It's only a product." Gateway CEO Ted Waite revealed on stage during the launch that XP would have no effect on his company's sales at all.http://tinyurl.com/576tol

Just after the XP launch, Microsoft settled its antitrust case with the US government. As I wrote at the time, "I think the settlement fails miserably [at] punishing Microsoft for its illegal activities and preventing it from continuing such activities in the future." What it did do, of course, was change the way Microsoft bundles products with its OSes. And you can thank/blame the rise of Windows Live applications on this change.http://tinyurl.com/5pyut2

With XP complete, Microsoft turned its attention to XP SP1, unlike with Online vista tech services, where they pretended there wasn't an SP1. And Allchin revealed that the next Windows version, codenamed Longhorn, would hit beta in 2002 and ship in 2003. That worked out wonderfully, as you may recall. Note that after Online vista tech services shipped, Microsoft refused to discuss the next version of Windows (Windows 7). Clearly, the company's XP experiences guided this change of strategy.http://tinyurl.com/5dpx2f

XP was barely out the door before the OS's first major security vulnerability hit, a serious UPnP flaw that left XP owners open to electronic attack. Microsoft responded to this threat by asking Web sites to stop popularizing security breaches in its products. Yes, seriously.http://tinyurl.com/6aywgr

In December 2001, Allchin said that XP sales were "on track," and the company was "very happy." However, analysts and retailers were reporting that XP wasn't selling as quickly as had previous, consumer-oriented Windows 9x versions. And retail sales of XP were still lagging those of Windows 98 at the time.http://tinyurl.com/6bsndb

With 2001 ending, pundits seized the opportunity to jump all over XP in a manner that would later be repeated with Online vista tech services . There are two differences, however. More people are online now, so Online vista tech services looks worse by comparison. And XP's issues were actually quite serious, unlike those that users faced with Online vista tech services over the past year. I'll take a missing printer driver over systemic OS flaws any day. Call me crazy.http://tinyurl.com/6esl5z

By the end of December, panic had set in. XP retail sales plummeted from 400,000 copies in October 2001 to just 250,000 in November 2001. Windows 98, meanwhile, had sold 580,000 copies in its first month on the market and 350,000 in its second. Microsoft chairman Bill Gates announced at CES 2002 in January that XP sales were "double" those of the previous version, using licenses sold by PC makers as the barometer for that statement.http://tinyurl.com/6gavuv

Speaking of CES, Microsoft also revealed a software project there called Freestyle. This would go on to become Windows XP Media Center Edition, which entered the market in late 2002. Microsoft eventually shipped four different XP Media Center versions over the years, as well as two XP Tablet PC versions. But as Apple has so frequently reminded us, the Cupertino company shipped three versions of Mac OS X between XP's release in 2001 and Online vista tech services release in 2006, while Microsoft never upgraded Windows. Curious.http://tinyurl.com/5ml5x7

By January, XP's security problems were so bad that Bill Gates wrote a memo called Trustworthy computing, a concept he described as the company's highest priority. "There are many changes Microsoft needs to make as a company to ensure and keep our customers' trust at every level - from the way we develop software, to our support efforts, to our operational and business practices. As software has become ever more complex, interdependent and interconnected, our reputation as a company has in turn become more vulnerable. Flaws in a single Microsoft product, service or policy not only affect the quality of our platform and services overall, but also our customers' view of us as a company."http://tinyurl.com/69m7jt

What Gates was really saying was that Microsoft would begin promoting security over new features in its products. This switchover was years-long in the making, and the company eventually halted Windows Vista ("Longhorn") development for nine months so that it could go back and perform a full security review of XP.http://tinyurl.com/5aag7c

And with that, we're just three months into XP's existence. Good times, good times.

By the way, Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing work eventually resulted in Windows XP SP2, which was given away free to customers in late 2004. XP SP2 was the first major software product revised during the Trustworthy Computing era and Vista, released in late 2006, was the first completely new Trustworthy Computing product. Note that the time delta between XP and XP2 was actually longer than the delta between XP SP2 and Vista. Just a thought for the next time you want to talk about product development time.

As for the Online vista tech services complaints of today, we might reflect for a moment on our short memories and remember that Windows XP, in just its first few months on the market, suffered from more problems that Online vista tech services has had in its entire lifetime so far. As with any major Windows release, Vista came with its share of compatibility and performance issues when compared to its predecessor (though those are almost completely resolved by now, of course). That's nothing new. But as XP heads off into a distant sunset, I prefer to be honest about that product. Yes, it was the best that Microsoft could do at the time and a big technical advance over the 9x versions of Windows. But Online vista tech services is the superior product, and that's especially true when you compare both XP and Vista with regards to the times in which they were respectively released.

Source : http://windowsitpro.com/mobile/pda/Article.cfm?ArticleID=99604&News=1

Beware of Hidden Costs When Purchasing Mobile Home Park Software and Remote Technical Support

These updates can include new features as well as “bug fixes.” Charging for these updates is standard practice, but you can find companies that provide these updates for free. Some companies force the user to purchase updates even if their software is running fine. They force the issue by refusing to do remote technical support for the user unless they have purchased the latest version. A more reasonable approach is to provide the remote technical support and, if it is discovered that a problem the user is experiencing has been fixed in a later version, to notify the user. The user can make their own decision whether they want to find a work-around for the problem or to go ahead with the purchase of the corrected and newest version of the mobile home park software.

Additional Feature Modules:

Many software companies have a standard price, but additional and often necessary features cost extra and can really increase the price. Look for software which includes all of the features you need, or make sure to add up the additional costs when you are making price comparisons.

Technical Support:

Technical support represents a very important ongoing relationship with the software vendor. Most companies offer a user manual included with the software but this is often not enough when you are confused about how to use the software or are experiencing an error in the software. It is important that the vendor has free or low cost options for remote technical support for those with a quick question or error to report. For example, there may be a free user forum or free email remote technical support. All software has occasional errors. A vendor that allows you to report errors without penalizing you by charging for reporting the error is a must.

It is important that the software vendor offer some type of telephone support for those who don’t want to search the manual. For those who need to get back to business quickly and want to be able to pick up the phone for quick answers, a telephone support plan is useful. Telephone support is almost always a paid option. However, the cost of this telephone support can reflect on the software program. Software vendors must maintain some sort of recurring revenue from their customers in order to stay in business, and to pay their trained technical support representatives.

However, if the telephone support is overly expensive, it may suggest that the software is full of errors and requires a lot of hours spent working with technical support.

Software Supplies:

Often a software vendor will add features into the software which require you to purchase more products from them. For example, a software program that offers a check printing feature may require that you use their printing company to purchase check forms that are compatible with the software’s banking feature. Other companies will also offer an alternative and less expensive option, such as the option to use checks compatible with QuickBooks or other software for which it is easy and inexpensive to purchase check stock.

Value Added Services:

Many software programs offer value added services embedded in their mobile home park software. For example, there may be a credit card processing service that will process payments for you. Often the software company itself receives a portion of the user’s cost for each use of the feature. You need to decide if you can get the feature less expensively elsewhere or if the added cost is worth the convenience of the feature interacting seamlessly with your software.

Source :prudentpressagency.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=4636

NetApp Pushes remote technical support Performance

NetApp unveiled new products this week with a message that could be summed up in a word: performance.

The new offerings, which include midrange unified storage systems and a storage acceleration appliance, are aimed at helping data centers and high-performance computing environments do more with less. NetApp cites as target markets software development, product lifecycle management, electronic design automation, healthcare, energy, media/entertainment and government.

"It's all about time to market with these environments, and that's where performance really helps," said Patrick Rogers, NetApp's vice president for solutions marketing.

NetApp claims its new FAS3140 and FAS3170 storage systems offer better performance and scalability than other midrange systems, and the company included a benchmark showing that the FAS3170 outperformed the EMC Celerra NS80G in a file services workload benchmark
The FAS3140 scales to 420TB and the FAS3170 to 420TB, and both support and offer eight I/O slots.

The company also unveiled the new V-Series V3140 and V3170, which it says extends virtualization to other vendors' legacy arrays and uses the same Data ONTAP operating system as other NetApp FAS systems.

The Storage Acceleration Appliances, which include the SA200, SA300 and SA600, are based on NetApp FlexCache technology. Rogers said the appliances can double throughput while reducing latency. They can be used to accelerate performance at the data center where the central data repository is located or to improve response time and enhance collaboration within Remote Technical Support offices.

NetApp is also offering a Performance Acceleration Module, an add-on intelligent read cache for optimizing performance of mainstream storage platforms and random-read intensive workloads such as file serving. One or more modules fit into PCI Express slots of an existing storage controller, where they function as a read cache to increase throughput and reduce latency without having to add additional disk drives to increase I/O rates. The module consumes 95 percent less power than a shelf of Fibre Channel disk drives.

NetApp also introduced Remote Technical Support Agent, an intelligent Remote Technical Supportdiagnostics data collector embedded in NetApp systems, which will proactively open support tickets and let NetApp support engineers remotely access system log files to diagnose and resolve issues.

List prices for the FAS3100 storage systems start at $69,780 for 7TB of storage, while the V3100 systems start at $56,365 with no storage included. The Performance Acceleration Module lists at $15,000, and the software for the module is $20,000. One software license is required for each storage controller, and between one and five modules can be installed in the controller, depending on the model. Pricing for the Storage Acceleration Appliance models varies depending on the configurations, number of disk shelves and Performance Acceleration Modules.

Source : enterpriseitplanet.com/storage/news/article.php/3752806

Changing Technical Support for the Better

Hiring is a major decision because you will be getting the technical support skills, personality quirks, emotional stability, and overall attitude of each person. The goal is also to maintain long-term staff (more on this later), so you will want to live with the consequences of your selections for a long time. Consequently, spend some time thinking about what you really need in a support person.

The first step in this process is to create a list of the minimum technical skills you want your new team to have. You can then prioritize that list and decide which skills will apply to which position. Skills may include:

• Operating system, database and specific application knowledge
• Problem-solving skills
• Phone presence
• Spelling and grammar skills

You should also think about what character traits you want your team to have. Here are some important ones for technical support staff:

1. Trainability

Some people learn faster than others and fortunately you can test a candidate for this during an interview. Find a few puzzles that build upon each other in complexity, show the first to your candidate, and then ask him/her to solve the second one. Can this person apply the information under pressure? If not, he/she is probably the wrong person for your team.

2. Responsibility

Your team members will constantly be taking care of other people’s problems, so they need to have a strong sense of responsibility. This is easy to determine—look for people who take responsibility in their personal lives. This can be gauged by asking questions about one’s connections to family, or even how they are paying back their student loans.

3. Empathy

We once hired a management consultant to help us figure out how to cut costs. She was dubious about one of my technical support people, so she chose to sit at a desk where she could hear him doing support. After a few weeks she revised her opinion, saying, “The angrier and more frustrated the customer gets, the more he communicates, ‘I understand your frustration.’” Empathy.

I usually ask a candidate’s references, “Would you describe this person as empathetic?” If you want to get candidates to take a Meyers-Briggs personality test, you will find that the ‘F’ personality types tend to be more empathetic than others. I didn’t give my people personality tests until after they were hired, but as it turns out, all of them are ‘F’s. My wife also happens to be an ‘F’. What does that say about me? In part, it says that I’m an INTJ, and I over-analyze everything.

4. Logic

Logical support people have the ability to approach a tricky system with the assumption that somehow it all makes sense. That is very important, so I test for logic during all of my interviews. All you have to do is find a few logic puzzles online and make them multiple-choice. Give them to the candidate and let them work on them for five minutes before going over it. See how they do before you consider hiring them.

5. Curiosity

Working in technical support is essentially solving a long series of rational problems. Sometimes, however, the problems aren’t so rational. A person who is naturally curious will be much more diligent in searching for solutions than someone who is not. In interviews, I ask about hobbies to find out if a person is curious. Curious people tend to have active hobbies (e.g. building things, learning how various systems work, etc.).

6. Character

Imagine that you are going on a long vacation, and the person you are interviewing is a friend of yours. Would you trust this person to take care of all of your personal business while you are gone—feed your pets, get your mail, water your plants, pay your bills? If not, don’t hire them.

Management 101

Hiring is important for getting the right people in the first place, and management is important for both keeping them and helping them be successful. Here are some key things to address in your management plan:

Proper Training

Just imagine trying to do technical support on systems that you aren’t trained on. “No ma’am, I don’t know how that is supposed to work.” This is why proper training of new staff is extremely important. In addition, your current staff are probably under-trained. As you reinvent your technical support processes, get real product training scheduled for their first few days. And make ongoing training—especially around new releases—a priority.

Note that you are going not going to be able to train people on the exact problems they will need to solve. Don’t put them into entirely unfamiliar systems and ask them to demonstrate proficiency quickly. Be reasonable and realistic when you train.

Goals and Boundaries

Goals are easy. Make them SMART. (SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Timely. Do a search on ‘SMART’ goals if you need help—it’s an article series by itself.)

Boundaries are a bit more complicated. People need to know what they can promise on behalf of the company and what they cannot. It frees them from guesswork and hesitation, as well as responsibility for the tough decisions. My father, who worked in the contracts department of a large company, knew exactly how much money his signature could vouch for. That is an example of a well-set boundary, in my opinion.

Communication

Someone once told me that a manager’s job is to help people do their jobs better. I take that to mean that I am the one-man technical support team enablement department. Every member of your technical support team will need help and advice, and they have to know that your door is always open. Not only that, but you should also try to be proactive in your leadership, rather than wait for them to call with problems.

Performance Reviews

Everybody needs to know how they are doing, which is why your staff will benefit from performance reviews. If you want to keep your people long-term, and you do, then you will also need to have a job growth plan in place.

Holding regular team meetings will allow you to review the performance of the team as a group. For example, each team member might be burning through cases twice as fast, but if the incoming case load has tripled, the team has a problem. Everyone needs to be aware of this dynamic and understand how the team is doing on the whole. If there is a problem, I usually approach it without assigning blame. “I was thinking about this process, and I’m not sure that we’re really following it like we should be. I’m also not sure that it’s the best process. Let’s discuss the process—why it is the way it is, why we don’t follow it when we don’t, and how we might improve it.” Letting the whole team participate in such discussions will provide you with significant insight and suggestions that will benefit your department in the long run.

Trusting Your Staff

The point will come when you just have to trust your people to do their jobs. This gives them a sense of self-confidence that will ultimately improve their performance, so go get a hobby. Do whatever it takes to allow yourself to stand back and let the magic work.

Keeping Morale Up

Your team will have plenty of reasons for morale to drop, considering the anger and frustration they will deal with day in and day out. For this reason, you need to do small things for them to keep them happy. For example, my team gets lunch more often than any other department in the company, and when a customer compliments them, I ask them to email it to the entire company.

Source : accountingsoftware411.com/Press/PressDocView.aspx?docid=9974

Market undergos huge pressure due to lack of technical support

The breach of important technical support invited more spec selling, which put the market under a lot of pressure throughout the week. After some damage was done on the daily chart over the last couple of months, the market was trying to hang on to a major uptrend line on the weekly chart, which ran through about 66.50 cents this week, but to no avail. The market clearly broke through this line of defense, which triggered a lot of spec selling that forced the market down to a low of 63.10 cents before rebounding slightly.

Speculators were clearly the driving force behind this selloff and there was again a lot of talk about the potential impact the CFTC investigation might have on spec long positions. Some prominent market commentators stated that a regulatory backlash against hedge funds could lead many of them to exit positions. However, we do not necessarily share this pessimism, because in the case of cotton these specs do not have that much of a long position left to liquidate.

According to the latest CFTC "Commitment of Traders" report, large speculators held just 45'000 contracts of outright longs, down from almost 99'000 contracts at the end of February.

Meanwhile, large outright spec shorts increased their position to almost 27'000 contracts, up by over 9'000 contracts in the week of May 20 - 27 alone and up by over 21'000 contracts since the end of February.

Source: http://www.fibre2fashion.com/news/company-news/plexuscotton/newsdetails.aspx?news_id=57691

UC launches new online library

With a new online resource that became available Tuesday, users can browse the collections of all libraries throughout the , as well as thousands of libraries worldwide.

UC officials joined with the OCLC Online Computer suppport Library Center to create what they describe as a "next-generation, shared online catalog" that allows computer users to view and find collections from each campus library, including UC-Berkeley, UC-Davis, UC-Santa Cruz and UCLA.

Founded 41 years ago, the OCLC Online Computer support Library Center of Dublin, Ohio, is a nonprofit, membership, computer library service and research organization that works to expand access to library systems worldwide. At present, more than 60,000 libraries in 112 countries and territories around the world use OCLC services to locate, acquire, catalog, lend and preserve library materials.

"OCLC's vision for seamlessly integrating discovery of locally held library resources with resources held elsewhere across the international bibliographic network is similar to ours," Karen Butter, UC-San Francisco librarian and chairwoman of the UC/OCLC executive team, said in a statement. "The partnership with OCLC offers an opportunity to present the vast UC library collection in ways that are consistent with the discovery needs of today's faculty and students..."

OCLC's WorldCat system permits users to find a selection of article citations, archival materials and UC and other universities' digitized books. Other features include a single search box, relevancy ranking of search results, result sets that bring multiple versions of a work together, easy ways to refine results, citation formatting options, reviews and cover art.

Source : http://www.bizjournals.com/eastbay/stories/2008/05/26/daily14.html

Technical support global partner program

Xceedium, a company providing security and compliance solutions, said it has launched the Xceedium Xcelerate Partner Program to expand its market presence.

The debut program is designed to enable partners to quickly tap into compliance requirements for the financial, utility, manufacturing and government markets, and to enhance their current security practices with products and services revenue.

"We're a high-growth startup that's been growing very rapidly, in a direct manner with our own sales people," explained Cheryl Traverse, CEO for Jersey City, N.J.-based Xceedium. "We've now reached the point where our volume demands to go and build a channel. So we hired Dave Ballard -- an experienced channel person from HP Opsware -- to basically build this channel for us."

Moreover, Xceedium identified its pain points and subsequently delivered new requirements for the estimated $15 billion (US) compliance markets, Traverse continued.

"Where we come in is the privileged (internal IT operations) user and external user (vendor, applications developer, or outsourced IT operations person)," she said. "Eighty-six percent of all internal attacks came from a current or former technical support employee and 60 percent of all companies do some sort of technical outsourcing . . . in the government (sector) that figure is 70 percent.

"Lay all the compliance regulations on top of that . . . and you've put the pressure on companies to come up with ways to take the privileged and external users and figure out a way to implement and validate controls for them."

"We are targeting a select group of partners with existing security practices that are looking for differentiators in key hot markets, such as PCI compliance, vendor access control, enhanced security for the Citrix environments and secure touch free support," said Ballard, the vice president of sales at Xceedium. "Most importantly, we've put together a solid team dedicated to enabling and supporting these partners."

The Xcelerate Partner Program includes:

Channel Commitment -- a dedicated team of partner resources to help partners quickly roll out and sustain their businesses.

Partner Portal -- an exclusive online repository of partner-specific sales, marketing and technical tools.

Dedicated Technical Support -- a separate 800 number and exclusive instant messaging link directly to technical support reps.

Opportunity Registration -- Partners can register their deals and receive all the support necessary to close opportunities; also provides partners with price protection and qualifies them for additional margin.

Maintenance Renewals -- Xceedium would work with partners on renewal tracking and alerting to ensure regular, up- to- date maintenance for their customers.

Education -- all the necessary training to sell and install Xceedium solutions from delivering pre-sales tools through to implementation.

Field Support -- Xceedium works directly with partners in the field to ensure clients receive the highest level of service and education both prior to and following their deployment of Xceedium solutions.

Joint Marketing -- joint press releases, seminars, tradeshow exhibits, conferences and webinars to increase their visibility in the marketplace.

Joint Development of Security Assessment Practice -- For solutions partners and systems integrators, Xceedium provides a comprehensive set of tools and services for risk assessment, policy creation and deployment, and reporting and usage data for privileged users.

Xceedium channel and solution partners benefit from a comprehensive training process, including sales training and pre- and post-sales technical training. Additionally, partners at the solutions partner and systems integrator level receive Xceedium Security Assessment enablement training. Xceedium also offers a Referral Partner Program for those organizations that would like to recommend Xceedium Gatekeeper and Xceedium services to their customers.

http://www.foxriverantiques.com

Source : http://www.echannelline.com/usa/story.cfm?item=23303

GlobalLogic Speeds Software Time to Market with Open Source Application Framework

VIENNA, Va., April 16 - GlobalLogic, Inc., the leader in global product development, has introduced an open source framework, Velocity Objects, that can shorten a product's time to market by as much as 30 percent. Velocity Objects, based on the company's award-winning GlobalLogic Velocity(TM) Method and Platform for distributed agile software development (, combines J2EE components with best practices so that GlobalLogic's engineers can bring client products to market even faster.

"There is no need to reinvent the wheel each time a software product is developed," said Peter Harrison, CEO of GlobalLogic. "There are many components that are common across products, and code can be re-used. GlobalLogic has spent the last six years assembling a library of reusable components and frameworks that can accelerate the development of the next generation of software products and services."

Velocity Objects provides a sound architecture, framework and building blocks for developing high quality products swiftly. It ensures quality by integrating best-of-breed open source technologies and code components developed by GlobalLogic and its partners, which have already been used successfully in other commercial products. The offering speeds development by making components reusable and eliminating the need to write infrastructure code or research the hundreds of available frameworks to find the right one for a given product.

"We needed a cutting-edge technological solution for meeting our aggressive automation needs. The solution needs to scale linearly and at the same time be extensible enough to cater to future requirements," explained Ashish Sharma, Manager Technology at iYogi, a VC-backed company in the technical support industry. "GlobalLogic's Velocity Objects helped iYogi craft a product by assembling the 'best-of-breed' components available in the open source world. Sound design principles, along with reusable frameworks and components, helped us reduce the time to market. Additionally, the flexible architecture served well to seamlessly incorporate our growing demands."

GlobalLogic Velocity is employed across a growing number of the company's 140 technology client software product development initiatives Objects is particularly applicable to the company's newly announced Version 1.0 service offering, which helps both entrepreneurs and established technology companies rapidly launch new products and enter new markets without the need for an engineering team Velocity Objects is already helping these clients accelerate quality products to market.



source : http://news.thomasnet.com/fullstory/543200

Digital Support Technology Releases New Computer Support Automation Utility

Menlo Park, CA May 2, 2008 -- Digital Support Technology, Inc. a pioneer in automated computer support over the Internet, announced the release of PC Fixer, a proprietary computer technical support automation utility today.

With an innovative Reverse Search Engine and a comprehensive knowledgebase of support procedures, Digital Support Technology has the ambition to empower individual computer user to diagnose and fix problems on a computer. By downloading and installing PC Fixer, a computer user connects the computer to the Reverse Search Engine, which not only detects problems on the computer but also explains the problems to the computer user. After going through details of the computer problems, the computer user may decide which problems to be fixed by PC Fixer. At present, Digital Support Technology fixes the majority of computer problems for free and charges a nominal fee for some specific fixes.

Since the beta release of the automation utility, thousands of computer users have tried the simple, secure, fast and easy-to-use tool and provided enthusiastic feedback. One user of the tool acclaims, "Great job in fixing my problem. I only wish I had discovered your service sooner, I could have saved myself a lot of time and frustration. Kudos to you!"

Although the online computer support landscape is already crowded with established players like Geek Squad and Firedogs, and new comers like iYogi and Support.com, Digital Support Technology intends to differentiate itself as the most innovative and the most cost-effective online technical solution provider for millions of computer users. In addition, the company commits itself to protecting privacy and security of computer users and builds its software on the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES).

source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2008/05/prweb908264.htm

'Consumer Reports': Apple technical support is aces

The surveyed its readers to gather their experiences with technical support for personal computing, and Apple's organization far outpaced its rivals in the PC industry. Readers assigned the company a score of 83 for its computer technical support, which translates to "very satisfied" on Consumer Reports' rating scale. You have to be a Consumer Reports subscriber if you want to access the articles and graphs on its Web site.

Lenovo and Dell ranked second and third, respectively, with scores of 66 and 60, or "fairly well satisfied." Hewlett-Packard, , received the lowest score and the worst rating for its technical support staffers. Apple also led the desktop technical support pack with a score of 81, trailed by Dell and Gateway with scores below 60.

Apple has also ranked well on the , a yearly measure of consumer taste in various brands. The company solves problems quickly, especially for customers who take their Mac to one of the company's retail stores for service. But if you don't live near an Apple Store, the company offers the shortest amount of free telephone support of any of the PC companies.

When it comes to the number of problems that appear, Apple's record wasn't as stellar. The company was ranked last in the number of defects that cropped up in its notebooks between 2003 and 2007, although the margin of error in that survey meant that all the surveyed manufacturers essentially tied with defects found in between 20 percent and 23 percent of their notebooks.

source: news.com/8301-13579_3-9937231-37.html?tag=nefd.only

SCC Soft Computer Improves Customer Service With Knowledge Management Module Of Soffront CRM

the leader of mid-market CRM software, recently announced that SCC Soft Computer (SCC) has implemented Soffront Knowledge Management System (KMS), a module of the company's popular Soffront CRM solution. SCC, a leading Laboratory Information Systems (LIS) vendor and one of the largest LIS programming houses in the world, is using Soffront KMS to improve customer service and save time.

"We needed a better way to organize, maintain, and reuse knowledge," explained Mary Ann Cavener, Knowledge Base Administrator, Team Leader. "We found it difficult to provide customers with timely technical data in our manuals alone. We stored important data in notes, documents, and emails--resources that were unavailable to customers. Additionally, if a knowledgeable employee left SCC or documents were misplaced, our resources were negatively impacted."

SCC evaluated many KMS solutions before selecting Soffront. "Soffront offers robust features, such as a powerful search engine, category assignments, and hot topics," continued Cavener. "Soffront has all of the features we needed at a lower price than other leading KMS solutions."

Cavener noted that their favorite feature of the software is its data storage structure. "Soffront KMS categorizes data and multi-assigns articles to different areas of interests, thereby streamlining the information. The robust search engine and advanced search options also enable SCC to organize the data by interests and categories. These features allow customers and employees to find data quickly."

Soffront has helped SCC meet the needs of both their internal users and customers by improving the documentation available to them. "Since deploying Soffront KMS in 2007, our computer Technical Support Center Resolution rates have improved dramatically," concluded Cavener. "We resolve issues faster, which saves us time and money."

source: crmmarketplace.com/content/news/article.asp?DocID=%7B83CB8A49-0A73-41B1-8FB6-038FAFDD23B6%7D&Bucket=Current+Headlines&VNETCOOKIE=NO

Amazon LaunchesTechnical Support For EC2 Developers

Customers of Amazon Web Services can signup to get questions answered or to receive TECHNICAL SUPPORT for operational issues during development, testing or integration of applications running on Amazon's infrastructure. The service covers an unlimited number of technical support cases and is available through a monthly subscription with no long-term contracts.

Amazon leases processing power and storage on its giant data center over the Web. The retailer's Elastic Computer Cloud is the development and deployment environment; storage is through its Simple Storage Service, or S3; and the Simple Queue Service, or SQS, covers storage, computing and query processing. The new technical support plans cover all of those services.

Amazon is offering two premium support plans, a Silver and Gold. The former offers response times ranging from four business hours for high severity issues to two business days for less serious problems. The cost is the greater of $100 a month or 10% of total monthly usage of the applicable Amazon services.

The Gold plan provides 24-hour phone technical support and response times of one hour for urgent issues. Pricing is the greater of $400 per month or 10% to 20% of total monthly usage of the applicable services.

In addition to the support plans, Amazon launched a Web-based dashboard that provides information on the operational status of each of its services. The dashboard uses green, yellow or red indicators to display the health of services with additional information "provided as relevant," Amazon said. Customers have access to this service at no charge either through the status page on the Web or via an RSS feed.

For developers who don't want to pay for support, Amazon offers online forums, FAQs and a resource center. Amazon has launched a site for customers who want to sign up for the premium service.

Source: informationweek.com/news/software/development/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=207400320

Chaos as bank computer crash wipes out ATMs

Tens of thousands of people were feeling short changed last night after a massive system failure wiped out all the Northern Bank's ATMs.

Throughout the province yesterday, frustrated people found themselves unable to withdraw money from hundreds of machines.

Customers trying to use Northern Bank debit and credit cards also faced misery as their transactions were refused, leaving many embarrassed and unable to make purchases.

The problem - which arose after the Danish- owned institution's central system crashed - affected all of the Northern Bank's 94 branches nationwide, including 25 in the greater Belfast area.

Speaking to the Belfast Telegraph last night, a spokesperson for the bank apologised to customers and blamed a glitch in the ATM network.

"This issue is the result of a technical problem with IBM who support this network," she said.

"We are working closely with IBM to restore service to our customers as soon as possible.

"We apologise unreservedly to any customers who are being affected by this situation."

Last night, the Belfast Telegraph tried to withdraw money from cash points at two of the major branches in the city centre, but found them still 'temporarily out of service'.

The spokesperson, however, stressed that engineers were making every effort to repair the fault and said the network would be up and running again as soon as possible.

"Any customer who urgently needs to withdraw cash can still do so at any Northern Bank branch or can use their chequebook," she added.

Messages outside the Northern Bank's headquartwers in Belfast yesterday alerted customers to the problem.

But it is understood that the system crash went wider than Northern Ireland, also affecting machines in Europe owned by the Northern's parent Danske Bank.

This is the second time in recent months that the Northern Bank has been at the centre of a problem with cash machines.

In February, it emerged that Nationwide customers using Northern cash machines were not having pay-outs debited from their accounts.In that case, however, the error was not linked to Northern Bank technology, but to Nationwide's.

source:belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/article3598167.ece