Take pictures and insert them directly into your presentation, additional cloud storage partners, and more. See what's new here in February here
February has been another busy month for releases across our Office clients on Windows, Mac, iOS and Android. There are a number of exciting new capabilities in Outlook, Word, Excel and PowerPoint. In addition, we released the first cumulative feature update since the initial September release of the Office 2016 apps—otherwise known as the “Deferred Channel” build—for our commercial customers. Read on for the details.
What is a CRM? Part 1
By Ben Ward, Applications Analyst, MCTS, MCP, MS
Think of a CRM as a glorified database with a user interface attached to it. CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management and depending on a user’s role or department, it can perform a variety of everyday operations. Here are a few scenarios on how CRM’s can help businesses:
Sales - Sales Associate:
Sellers can store, organize and take leads and contacts through a virtual sales cycle more efficiently due to the ability to associate leads and contacts with notes, activities, accounts and opportunities. Sellers have the ability to create activities for leads, contacts and/or accounts from within a CRM to set reminders for phone calls or emails, etc.
Marketing – Marketers:
Marketers can use a CRM coupled with a marketing plug-in to log marketing efforts and results for individual leads and contacts. For example: A company is hosting an event and needs to send out email invitations to a specific group of people. Marketing can add the contact details of the recipients to a CRM and create a specific marketing list for the recipients. An email invitation template can be created and sent (with or without personalization) to each of the recipients on the marketing list. This allows the marketing department to streamline operations and cut down on labor time. Once mass emails are sent, CRM’s can track the results and analytics regarding the email send. This can be achieved using one application instead of multiple websites due to CRM integrations with major email service providers and plug-ins.
Analysts can use the data retrieved from marketing efforts to analyze marketing efforts and suggest improvements. Suggestions could be as simple as changing one word in a subject line of a mass email to revamping the entire design of a marketing campaign.
CRM’s can be heavily customized to fit almost any specific business need. Administrators have the ability to customize CRM out-of-the-box features and expand the functionality exponentially using JavaScript or C#. There are many features available out-of-the-box, especially with CRM’s such as Microsoft Dynamics CRM that have business value, however there are a few that may not be pertinent to every business’s needs. These can be easily removed by administrators which will result in a streamlined CRM business process.
About the author:
Ben has worked at Managed Solution for over two years and is currently working on CRM customization and administration, Microsoft SharePoint integration and customization as well as Business Intelligence analytics including SQL reporting. Ben is a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist, Microsoft Certified Professional, Microsoft Specialist and has six Dynamic CRM certifications.
By Jason Moore - September 30, 2015 as written on Onedrive.com
Today we’re releasing a preview of our new OneDrive for Business sync client for organizations and we wanted to share what this means for users and IT administrators alike. Based on your feedback, we’ve focused our innovation in three key areas: improving sync reliability, enriching the user experience and delivering greater IT control.
Improving sync reliability
We talk about this as a ”new” client but it’s actually built on the well-proven sync client from our OneDrive consumer service, which is run by millions of people every day. We have added necessary functionality for the client to connect to and sync files from OneDrive for Business. We’ve taught it to speak both OneDrive for Business and OneDrive consumer protocols. It’s now smart about using Azure Active Directory credentials to connect to OneDrive for Business in addition to the Microsoft account it supports today for the OneDrive consumer service. Additionally, the new sync client provides clearer, simpler messages and guidance if the odd sync anomaly arises.
Enriching the user experience
Whether you are a new or existing OneDrive user, setup is quick and easy. New users can simply download and install the client to their PC or Mac. If you already sync your personal files, then all you have to do is add a OneDrive for Business account via Settings. If you already sync your OneDrive for Business files, the new client will simply take over the syncing functions on the device maintaining your settings and use the existing sync folder – there’s no need to re-sync, saving you time and IT a bandwidth headache.
Selective sync is a key feature in the new client (and your most requested one), allowing you to choose which folders to sync to your device. Better yet, it’s specific to each of your devices so that you can optimize based on how you use each device and its local storage constraints.
Delivering greater IT control
Many IT organizations want to be able to deploy the client to large numbers of devices on behalf of their users. The new client offers IT administrators silent deployment options using a much smaller installation package (~10 MB), easing network constraints and speeding installation. Additionally, IT administrators are able to block sync for the OneDrive consumer service as well as set the default sync folder location, which can be set to local or removable media.
Updates to the new sync client will occur independently of Office and Windows updates and furthermore there is no need for users to have local administrative privileges for installation and updates. While existing file quantity and size limits remain unchanged for the preview, when we release this broadly we will remove the 20,000-file sync limit for OneDrive for Business and increase the individual file size limit from 2 GB to 10 GB – which is again based on your feedback.
Getting started
We want to give every customer a great experience, so we’re rolling out our preview in stages to manage high demand and to make sure that the set-up experience is smooth and reliable. We’ve established a waitlist website where you can reserve a place for your organization. Once it’s ready, we’ll send you a notification email with all the instructions on where to download it and how to set it up. The preview is available for both Mac (OS X 10.9 and later) and PC (Windows 7, 8 and 10, with support for Windows 8.1 being added in Q1 2016).
The sync client is just one of many enhancements we’re releasing today. Read about all of them here. We’re just getting started so stay tuned for more announcements soon on our continued innovation with OneDrive for Business!
Microsoft quietly launched its new screenshot tool, Snip (beta) for Windows. The tool lets users take screenshots, snip, and annotate as well. The main feature of Snip is the ability to add voice your voice to the screenshots. Users can share this videos as MP4, and embed them on web pages as well.
If you take a lot of screenshots on Windows, you should definitely try it out as it makes the processor of editing and explaining a screenshot much easier. It’s worth noting that the app is currently in beta, so don’t be surprised if you hit some bugs. Thankfully though, the app is available for download for everyone, and you can grab it from here.
With Minecraft being shown off at E3 2015 on the Microsoft HoloLens VR headset, we take a look a the possible release date, price and the specs and games - by Chris Martin
With virtual reality headsets such as the Oculus Rift and Sony's Project Morpheus looking like the future of gaming, we investigate the Microsoft HoloLens including release date and price with it making an appearance at E3 2015.
Microsoft said: "Our vision for holographic computing is to transform the world with holograms – seamlessly connecting the digital world with real life. With the ability to design and shape holograms, you will have a new medium to express your creativity, a more efficient way to teach and learn, and a more effective way to visualize your work and share ideas. This means your digital content and creations will be more relevant when they come to life in your world."
Microsoft HoloLens: Release date and price
Although the HoloLens was announced earlier this year at the firm's January event and we've just seen it again at E3 2015, there is still no release date or price to speak of. We expect it to be expensive, of course, and the fact that Microsoft isn't saying when we'll be able to buy it suggests a 2016 arrival at the earliest.
We'll keep this article up to date when more details on the HoloLens release date and price become available.
Microsoft HoloLens: Specs, features and games
Despite the lack of availability information, we do know that Minecraft will be the first game to work with the HoloLens, following Microsoft's Xbox Media Briefing at E3 2015. Minecraft for HoloLens isn't a recreation of the Minecraft game. Instead of a first-person perspective, players get a god-like perspective that allows them to view other players from above, or dive down into the scenery to explore below the surface of the game world.
"Microsoft HoloLens introduces all new ways to game with mixed reality, including “Minecraft” on HoloLens, a fully-featured version of “Minecraft” that allows players to explore the game world in full 3-D," said the firm.
The demonstration at E3 2015 was similar to the one in January but the HoloLens headset mapped out the room including a table and chairs bringing them into the Minecraft world. At E3, Microsoft used a table-top to simulate the Minecraft environment (see the video below).
As you would expect, the HoloLens is compatible with Windows 10 and will come with three processors: CPU, GPU and HPU. The latter is the Holographic Processing Unit which will handle the data from sensors. In real-time it will recognise your gestures, know where you're looking and spatially map the world around you. It uses augmented reality rather than blocking out the world around you.
"The advanced sensors in HoloLens capture information about what you’re doing and the environment you’re in," Todd Holmdahl explained on the Lumia Conversations blog. "This is done through the inertial measurement unit (IMU) which includes an accelerometer, gyroscope, and magnetometer. It’s this IMU, coupled with head tracking cameras, which enables HoloLens to understand where your head is and how it’s moving."
The HoloLens has spatial sound so you can hear holograms even when they're behind you. It doesn't have a surround sound system so instead synthesizes a binaural sound which simply tricks your ears and brain.
Microsoft said there is a microphone array to capture your voice commands, a depth sensor that is used to spatially map your environment and interpret your hand gestures and a camera so you can share what you're doing with others.
