LANcom Technology Blog

Want to brush up on your computer knowledge? Woopid is a great video tutorial site covering everything from Windows and Mac tutorials, to tutorials for specific software like Office 2007 or iTunes.

Woopid has thousands on videos which you can search through using the search box or by going to View Library and choosing a subject, title, or vender. Woopid has also created video bundles where they group together similar videos for if you want to learn everything there is to know about a particular subject.

To visit the Woopid site and try it out for yourself click here.

The development team here at LANcom has found Microsoft Silverlight to be a powerful tool in creating online applications and have used it for both internal projects and projects for our clients.

Microsoft Silverlight is a development platform for creating web, desktop, and mobile applications. What makes Silverlight so great is it allows us to deliver rich media and business applications to anyone connected to the internet much faster and easier than was previously possible.

“Demand has been much higher than we thought; though it’s not surprising since it allows you to have a Windows application anywhere you have a browser” says Warwick Eade, LANcom’s founder. “Even better, by the end of the year everything we create will be able to run on Windows mobile phones”

If you are interesting in finding out about our development team and what they might be able to create for you, you can find out more infomation from here on our website.

Accidently dropped your cell phone in water and wondering what to do? Howcast.com has a great video on their site covering this, but here’s a quick summery.

1. Quickly remove your phones battery and the Sim card if it has one. This needs to be done straight away, the faster the better.
2. Dry all parts with a towel or paper towels and try to shake as much water as possible out of the phone.
3. Seal your phone, battery, and Sim card in a plastic container with some silica gel packs (you can often find these in packaging e.g. shoe boxes, but you can also purchase them).
4. Once your phone has had 3 days to dry out you can then attempt to turn it on. If your phone only works while plugged into the charger your phone will likely need a new battery.

To watch the Howcast.com instructional video on this topic click here.
To read about how to handle a laptop spill click here.

A while ago on this blog we looked at Apollo which is a great free tool for collaborating on and proofing documents online. The Commentor is a similar tool to this, but is made specifically for design mock-ups. With the Commentor you can upload an image of a design and then invite anyone whose feedback you need to post comments directly on to the sketch.

With free version of The Commentor you can:

1. Invite up to three people to post comments on a design
2. Download or print the design with or without the added comments
3. Upload new versions of a design and easy see previous versions at any time
4. Upload up to 100 images.
5. Easily monitor all the activity on a particular project from the project activity stream.

To learn more about the The Commentor click here to visit the site.

Hat tip to MakeUseOf for the idea for this post

Microsoft Exchange Online is a hosted service based on Microsoft Exchange 2007. With this technology you can have all the benefits of Exchange 2007 without the hassle and upfront costs of deploying it at your premises.

How does it work?

Your Exchange will live on Microsoft’s servers, and your employees will have access to their Outlook information anytime and anywhere there is an internet connection. Microsoft has geographically dispersed data centers, each with reliable redundant infrastructure, which it uses to support this service.

Microsoft will handle all the backend setup, provisioning, ongoing maintenance and upgrades of your Exchange Server infrastructure allowing you to focus your IT resources on the strategic initiatives that move your business forward.

Microsoft hosted services can be up and running quickly and easily and because it’s Microsoft, you can have peace of mind that the experts in this technology are handling everything for you.

With just a simple monthly fee you can have:

• Up to 25-GB of mailbox storage for each user
• E-mail, shared calendar, shared tasks, and contacts
• Spam filtering and antivirus capabilities
• Support for Microsoft Office Outlook, Outlook Anywhere, and Outlook Web Access
• Support for Windows Mobile 6.0 devices and support options for other devices like the iPhone 2.0 and Blackberry (Blackberry support includes additional fee).
• Low-cost “deskless worker” offer for workers who use a PC and messaging services on a limited basis.
• Daily backups and disaster recovery

Free Trial!

We are currently able to offer you a 30-day free trial of all the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite services. This trial includes 20 user licenses for Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting, and Office Communications Online. To sign up to your free trial of this service click here.

If you are interested in finding out if Exchange Online or the Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite is right for you please contact us.

If you’re interesting in finding out how to create a website with WordPress, MakeUseOf.com currently has a great free PDF guide available on their site. This guide is 34 pages long and covers everything you need to know to get your site off the ground.

To visit the MakeUseOf site and get this guide click here.

Ever wish you could record your computer screen so you could easily teach others how to perform a certain task? Or maybe you’d like to record when others teach you to help you remember? Recording your screen (screencasting) can be a great teaching tool because it allows the viewer to go back and re-watch the video whenever they need to.

There are both paid for and free screencasting tools available. At LANcom we have used Camtasia studio which has a lot of great features, but if you are interested in a basic free tool you may want to look at Screencast-O-Matic.

Screencast-O-Matic is a user-friendly online application that allows you to record your screen, no sign up required.

With Screencast-O-Matic you can:

1. Resize the recording window and move it to whatever position you need.
2. Record audio from your computers microphone.
3. Include video notes and choose whether to show your mouse curser and mouse clicks.
4. Download your recording as a MP4, AVI, or FLV file.

Recordings made with the free version of this tool will include a small Screencast-O-Matic watermark in the bottom left corner, but for $5 US you can purchase pro account to create videos without this.

To learn more about Screencast-O-Matic and to see a video of it in action click here to visit the Screencast-O-Matic site.

If you would like to learn about other free tools for creating screencasts, click here to view an article on MakeUseOf.com.