TRAINING
Resources to help you expand your skillsetChoosing the Right Operating System -One of the most important business decisions you can make!
What’s good for home use isn’t for business.
Microsoft gives you a variety of choices when it comes to an Operating System for your computer. Unfortunately, you frequently only hear about one or two. The home-based ones.
Operating Systems like Windows 10 Home and Windows 7 Home are all Operating Systems specifically designed for casual, home use. These operating systems are less expensive than their business-grade counterparts and dominate the computer world.
Unfortunately, for a reliable and stable business system you shouldn’t consider anything except one of the business-grade Operating Systems such as Windows 10 Professional.
Windows 10 Professional offers huge performance jumps over its home counterpart. Additionally, it is more resilient. If you’re sick and tired of the “Blue Screen of Death”, Illegal Operations, and lock ups and crashes, then the Professional version of Windows will be a welcome relief.
The business versions of Microsoft Windows crash infrequently, use memory more efficiently (making many tasks noticeably faster) and handle networking better than the home versions. Also, if a program does crash, there’s seldom a need to reboot the computer. Just restart the program and away you go.
More important than reliability is security. Windows Home versions provide significantly worse security than Windows Professional. Since the home versions cannot take advantage of centralized security features, such as those from your company’s server, or Microsoft’s cloud-based Active Directory, most people rely solely on a log in and password. Even if your computer is currently prompting you for a password when you turn it on, it is a trivial task to get around it. Even a slightly experienced computer user can still get to your sensitive data!
The business versions of the operating system however, provide true security, when configured properly. When connected to, and managed by, a Windows Server, whether in your office or in the Cloud, business computers can be locked down, encrypted, remotely wiped (in case of loss or theft), and take advantage of other security and maintenance features that simply are not available in the home version of Windows.
The downfalls of these operating systems? First off, they cost more. Secondly, they require more experienced users to configure them (but not to use them). But the trade-offs are well worth the extra expense and effort.
The bottom line is, if you value your data and want computers that run smoothly, then you’ll need Windows Professional and a properly configured server in your office, or the Cloud. Whether your business has 1 or 100 employees, resist the temptation to purchase the Black Friday, Back-to-school, or department-store deals. These systems rarely include Windows Professional, placing your company and its sensitive data, at risk in this age full of ransomware, identity thieves, and cybercriminals.
A Cool Way to Quickly Search for Related Images in Google Chrome
Google’s Image search (https://www.google.com/images) shows images related to your search. However, you can also search for related images using this technique. In Chrome, hold down the S key while you right-click an image. A new tab will open, displaying similar and related images!
Events from Email – New Office 365 Feature (and How to Disable It)
Microsoft recently rolled out “Events from Email”, a feature that works with Outlook to automatically add events to your calendar, based on emails you received. This has some real benefits, such as adding hotel reservations, flight details, and more. Google’s Gmail has had this feature for quite a while now. However, if you don’t want this feature, it is possible to turn it off! Click here for an article on how to disable it.
An Introduction to Microsoft Forms
Microsoft Forms is a new addition to your Office 365 subscription. Forms allows you to collect all sorts of data from surveys, to polls, to quizzes. Here’s an introduction.
How to Add Holidays to Your Outlook Calendar
You can add Holidays from several different countries to your Outlook Calendar. This process also works if Holidays are not showing up.
OneDrive For Business – Taking Your Business to The Cloud
OneDrive for Business, part of Microsoft’s Office 365 Suite, is one of the first steps to moving your company to the Cloud. Each user in your organization gets a whole Terabyte (TB) of storage space in OneDrive. In most small businesses, this is enough to hold all your “My Documents” files and the files you currently store on your server. Not only does moving your files to OneDrive take you one step closer to reducing the need for an in-house server, but it may also reduce your backup costs.
However, the real strength in moving your organization to Office 365, and OneDrive for Business, is that it opens up a whole new way to work, collaborate, and share files with your fellow employees, and the outside world. Not only can you now collaborate on a document in real time, simultaneously, but you can securely share files with people outside of your organization. Further, you can now share files that might otherwise be too large to email, by simply sending a link to the recipient.
If you haven’t had a chance to look into the powerful features of OneDrive, take a few minutes to get acquainted.
How to Create an Email Signature
In this video I show you how to create a quick, automatic signature in Outlook. The signature will automatically be used for new email messages and replies.
WI-FI Security Flaw – What You Need to Know
What you need to know, as a small business owner, about the recently discovered WPA2 security flaw affecting all WI-FI networks (in plain English).
How to Add Shortcuts to the Quick Access Menu
Make your life easier by adding shortcuts to your most used folder to the Windows Explorer Quick Access Menu.