Key Links for SharePoint 2013

These are some key links for SharePoint 2013:

• Capabilities and features in SharePoint 2013

• Topologies for SharePoint 2013

• SharePoint 2013: presentation: IT pro training

Overview Video of Microsoft SharePoint 2013

Google Nexus – Delivering Beautiful Hardware and Software – Consumer beware!

Looking at the Google.com/Nexus site, there no doubt Google want to | and do – deliver a “Wow!” factor around their consumer device portfolio : Nexus : – (phone|tablet|player)

This is going to go a long way to help Google establish a firmer foothold in the digital consumer market, beyond their stronghold of web services and grow the Android mobile platform into a core delivery platform | access gateway into many other Google products and services.

My impression is that this has the potential to bring them on par with the established market-share that Apple holds with it’s iOS (iPhone, iPad, iPod, AppleTV) product set.

This will also be a warning shot to other digital consumer stalwarts such as Microsoft, Amazon and Sony.  Particularly as these are working to combine product with services.  There are a whole bunch of hardware and product manufacturers which will be also watching, but much of their activity is in becoming “manufacturer of choice” to these conglomerate mega-brands.

However, this is not an overnight takeover, for a start nowhere on Google.com is there any link to the Nexus mini-site.  However, it is highlighted on the Google Play mini-site:- in fact the Nexus 7 is available for pre-order now! (in the UK)

Google Play is the consumer storefront for its digital products and services (music, movies, books, magazines, apps (games)) – though not all services are globally available yet.

While Apple has iCloud , Amazon the Kindle store and Amazon Cloud Drive and Music player (again not generally available outside the US), Microsoft Xbox Live and Sony the Playstation network.

I think there will be a pang of regret and surprise (amongst these competitors : Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Sony) at how comprehensive a service | product suite that Google is establishing and how rapidly these parts have been assembled. Certainly looking at how these companies are evolving their web presences for the digital consumer, I think it is fairly clear that Google has a well thought strategy and presentation to the consumer market.   Amongst the others, it seem more “mixed message” at what it is they wish to be their primary delivery to the consumer (e.g. just products, already established services) – but not necessarily such a “front & centre” digital consumer experience.

What do you think? 

Is Google on to a winner with Google Play to become a digital consumer products and services hub?

Or do you think another provider has a better set of products and services?

A Curiosity about Windows Explorer Jump Lists

I really enjoy the Jump List feature in Windows 7 and I’ve described how useful Windows Jump Lists are before.

Here >> Helpful tool for Apps that don’t use Windows 7 jump lists

The Curious Frustration:

However, I found a frustration about the manner in which the “Frequent” folders list get populated.

It considers folders that are “Frequent” to be those that you open files from them (they contain files).

Therefore if you have folder of folders e.g. “My Documents\JumpList Folder\” – it won’t be counted or included.

Even though you open it and access it plenty of times, it won’t appear on the “Frequent” list on the Windows Explorer Jump list.

The Demonstration:

To demonstrate this – I created three “sub folders” (see image below).

I created a notepad document in both “Sub Folder1” and “Sub Folder2”.

I tested this by theory by opening the Notepad document in the folders “Sub Folder1” and “Sub Folder2”, those folders appeared on the Windows Explorer Jump list immediately. (see image below)

But, however much I accessed the empty folder “Sub Folder3” or the folder of folders “JumpList Folder” – neither appeared in the Windows Explorer Jump list.

Now I understand that empty folders don’t need to classed as a “used” | “pin able” item.  However, I think it strange that a folder containing folders doesn’t captured by the Windows Explorer Jump list.

I also haven’t found any documentation to state this?  Anyone seen anything useful here?

Jump List Hint & Tip:

So my Windows Explorer Jump list hint & tip, is if you use a “folder of folders” which you wish to pin to the Windows Explorer Jump list – create a txt file in it, and open it, pin the folder to the Windows Explorer Jump list and remove the file!

For another Windows Explorer Jump list tip for removing stuck pins check out : Fix for When Pinned Jump List Items Get Stuck in Windows 7 by HowtoGeek

Jive Anywhere – a social browser extension from Jivesoftware

Jive released a browser extension today : “Jive Anywhere” (article via Techcrunch) also see “Jive Anywhere: socializing the web.”

In the print screen examples below you can see how the extension expands out from any browser tab to show the discussion and content in your community related to that page.

This print screen shows the expanded discussion thread taking place.

When it’s not required it can be easily tucked away onto the right hand scroll bar, like so.

I have to agree with other commentators like Alan Lepofsky who write :

“I don’t say this often, but Jive Anywhere has the potential to be one of those rare “game changing” technologies with respect to the way people work.”

In his article “Jives Latest Release Takes Integration To 11”

I think of this tool in the following way:

In the world of the hunter|gatherer, the foraging for knowledge by the information worker, this is now a must have tool!  Jive Anywhere brings the community to bear and support that virtual roamer, and allow them to return the goods into the heart of community – the people and context that matter in an instant.  At its best reducing the time to action and response, but in simple terms helping people stay in touch and up to date.

This pervasive availability of connectedness into your core community, to garner and share knowledge in this way is a real step change.  Especially with the support of context “cartridges” for particular sites or service providers. (e.g. Salesforce.com)

I liken this to the evolution of browsers that brought social network connectivity into each tab, via  the extension apps and underlying API integration of from the social network.  Also this mimics the advantage that blackberry had when it brought email, voice and texting into a single mobile device.  In some way Jive are jumping ahead of their competition with this browser extension release.

There are a couple of things I would like to see evolve in this extension:

• multi-community support – in the same way that some twitter extensions support multiple twitter, it would be useful to use the tools for different communities and contexts.
• better support of SSO | Identity federation – I don’t see it supporting common enterprise security configurations in its current state.
• mobile browser | app support -  many people will browse the web on smart phones or tablets, and they will need this extension in those devices contexts as well.

Download and Install Jive Anywhere from >> here 

What do you think?  Have you tried this yet?

Some thoughts on the latest G+ User Interface

Last week Google made a significant refresh of the user interface to their G+ social network system.

Google+ – UI update Introduction

 

 

There were obviously much comment made on the likes and dis-likes of the revised interface.

I see it as a positive improvement and also a stepping stone on to further service integration and UI tweaks.

The reason I see it as a “stepping stone” move, is the number of comments the perceived unused quantities of “white space” that have been placed into this iteration of the UI.

      I like the vertical left navigation menu that Google has introduced.

   What I’d like to see the options is

• GMail
• Google Docs
• Google Drive (? – see this link)

Like this:

So you can see | view Gmail in the same interface window (browser tab) as G+.

So perhaps the “whitespace” section could be preview of the GMail inbox | Google Docs,  or by using the GMail |Google Docs icon from the vertical menu you would use those services inside the G+ wrapper.

I would even suggest Gmail could deliver message notification inside the G+ stream, while still being able to filter into the inbox, the time | activity stream of G+ and Gmail message can occupy the same flow.

For example Photos are already well integrated into the G+ interface – so I don’t particularly see why others can’t be.

In fact both these  Photos lead to the same place.

Universal Menu – Photos	G+ Menu – Photos

So Google is duplicating its menu system across its “common” menu system and in G+  vertical menu.  I would expect to see convergence in this area.

I don’t like having to switch tabs to use these other Google services or that clicking on links would open in new tabs.

This is what Facebook gets right – all their services happen in a single browser tab.  Whether it is messages, notifications, other services all operate within a single browser tab.

I hope & think Google will come around to this way of delivering its services too.

What do you think?

Do you prefer multiple tabs or single tab for multiple services?

Would seeing Gmail messages appearing inside G+ appeal to you?

Helping cut down Email Stress – My Tips for dealing with Inbox overload

Everyone is spends some of their time processing the flow of information through their inbox or in-tray.

Sometimes I’m sure folk feel like their inbox is part of a production line and they need to process stuff as quick as possible before something breaks or hits the floor.

You may feel like you’re in your own version of this classic Mario Bros. game…

Classic Mario Bros. (Mario Bros Game & Watch)

I hope you’re not in this persons’ shoes!

(attribution : dpstyles)

Or if you are, it’s not stressing you out.

It’s not uncommon for the number of messages (read or unread) in an email inbox to lead to a feeling of stress – getting behind on your tasks, or getting snowed under.

So unless you’re comfortable with everything in the inbox (everything’s in 1 place) – and you don’t mind that.  Then these may be helpful tips to reduce that email stress.

My Tips for helping to deal with Email:

1. Use the sender and subject lines – to help decide how much attention you need to give a message before it’s opened
2. Use filters or agents (rules) to mark unimportant (email subscriptions |newsletters) as read as soon as they arrive or move them out of the inbox – saves you a mouse click or two  [Gmail is brilliant at this]
3. Use your preview function – to scan through email
4. Get your folder structure right (it helps you track where you are with categorising and prioritising your work – especially if you receive tasks | actions via email)
5. Use buttons or shortcuts to move messages into folders quickly and simply – again saves you a mouse click or two (then the email dealt with… but you can come back to it later if needed)
6. Turn off the New Mail Alert pop-up or sound alert (especially for busy times when you’re concentrating on something else)
7. Reduce the frequency to check or update the inbox (make it every 15 or 20 minutes instead of 5 minutes for example)

Organising your Mail File Folders:

Your approach to this will be reflected in how you think of email.  Do you treat it as personal knowledge repository (it’s not what email was created to do, and there are better options), or if you see it as part of your general information processing and flow?   If you see it as information delivery and processing service that can really help shape your strategy to sort and categorise the messages you receive.

Personally, I now treat email as a temporary information|content store, a processing station for sorting out each message as it requires.

I see 3 main categorises of messages:

• Actions  -  processed by prioritising and then action
• Knowledge -  processed by keeping & moving to appropriate content store (not email!) or disposing
• Responses -  processed by keeping & moving to appropriate content store (not email!), an action or dispose

Therefore I have the following folder structure in my mail file:

Follow Up : – Actions I need to respond to

Keep : – Medium to Long Term messages that need to be referenced infrequently for a particular topic (folder names make that obvious) – delete or purge once no longer relevant

Processed :- Where messages that have been read, actioned (if required) are moved to – eventually deleted.

Subscriptions :- Where newsletters, collaboration system notifications, subscriptions are moved to – rapidly deleted (after 10 days).

Useful Toolbar Buttons:

As a Lotus Notes user, there are couple of additional tweaks to the client UI that can be helpful in speeding up the processing of email.

Lotus Notes has a configurable Toolbar:

This can configured via the Preferences section: (via File > Preferences > Toolbar > Customize) or right click on the Toolbar and customize

The useful Toolbars to customize are:

• Navigate View
• Read Document

These appear automatically in context (in any view or folder or when reading a document) – as they are context sensitive.

I’ve set up a couple of “move to folder” buttons:

They use the formula:

@Command( [Folder] ; “Folder Name” ;”1″ )

or

@AddToFolder(“MovetoFolderName“;”RemovefromFolderName“)

So use this as many times as you need for the folders you have.

I’ve also added a button for showing only unread mail – helps clear away the clutter.

That uses the formula:

@Command( [ViewShowOnlyUnread] )  

Again it saves a few mouse clicks – the current action in

is rather hidden away and fiddly to use.

Formula Language Text Annotation notes:

Black font:- Formula language and key variables – only change if competent and knowledgeable about Lotus Formula language and structure.

Red font:- Indicates Lotus Notes folder name to be inserted into code to give destination folder of processed documents.

I’ve also written about another customisation of the Lotus Notes toolbar here: Filing knowledge into services via Email  – this provides a more thorough “how-to” on creating Toolbar buttons for yourself.

So there you go – nothing perhaps that is new and ground breaking but a helpful reminder.

What are your hints and tips for dealing with email?

More thoughts on the user experience in G+

Having been in G+ for a short while now, and joined in with a lot of folks on the G+ field trial, kicking the tyres and joining in on some of the various discussions about it.  I wanted to put down some more of mine own thoughts about this interesting platform.

For the uninitiated & curious this is a quick introductory video:

credits: Google

 

The obvious thing that most people notice is there space and cleanliness of the Google UX, which has sprung from this initiative of Google (Evolving the Google design and experience).  Of which I am a fan, as I mentioned in a previous blog post about G+.

Many observers have pointed out that the G+ UI is very similar in layout to Facebook, by using a central column of activity with adjacent switches and controls to help navigate the UI. I presume research on user interface design, indicates that best practise for an information flow format would be a central column feature with blank margins or edges to the browser window to draw in the eye to the core content.  Though in my mind it does leave a lot of unused space available in the browser, which could be exploited – perhaps for not for primary content but as supplementary content or additional control features.

However, in spite of this good stuff, I see the following limitations with the current (mid – July 2011) UX of G+ which inhibit my full participation in this platform.

You can only view one stream of activity at a time (a particular circle or the whole stream):

 

• Compare that to most Twitter clients (Tweetdeck, Seesmic etc.) where there is a lot of flexibility in the number of columns on view combined with the Twitter list feature is a very powerful mechanism for tracking multiple activity streams simultaneously.
• I am not sure the web UX of G+ will develop a multi-stream UX soon (I may be wrong).  Though I expect on the release of the API – 3rd party clients will provide this feature pretty rapidly.
• Perhaps Google will allow users to create additional tabs|spots for favourite streams here would be a possible solution?

(For example, I already use the Google+Tweet integrated extension – so it can be done)

Circles are missing activity notification features:

 

• Currently UI indicates the displayed stream by highlighting it in a red font.  But it provides no information about the status of activity in other circles|streams you may be interested in, therefore your decisions on where to view next are more pot-luck than driven by useful information.  This could be fixed by providing..
  • An unread count for each circle (though will that make it feel like email all over again?)
  • Give new post indicators (e.g. change of font colour of updated circles, or place updated circles at the top of circles list, blinking circle icon etc.)
  • Indication of new posts in a stream by a different background fill colour, like unread marks, but that fade on scroll or mouse hover.
• Obviously, this is more applicable when viewing a particular circle stream, rather than your whole activity stream, but knowing what circles are active or dormant should be indicated visibly to assist your management of the G+  service.

G+ needs more than just Circles (in their current form):

 

• Circles are great, they help out a lot.  They help channel, tailor and focus the conversation to an audience that grasps the tacit context and content around the information shared.  Also these are the early days of G+ – so we need to give Google a fair crack of the whip and respond to feedback etc.
• However, my gripe is this. Circles provide a method to categorise or filter people and how you share with them, but not necessarily where content should be shared.  Or actually where to find that content again…
  • I can’t search for posts or comments from inside G+ (I know there’s Chrome browser search work around), but it’s not brilliant.
  • Utilisation of topic (hash) tags are missing.
  • All circles are private, there are no public equivalents.
• I feel this leads to a random spray (scatter gun) of information and knowledge across G+ which users find hard to grasp and navigate.  Which is why I think we’re all mostly talking about G+, rather than other things. see this example
• I’m sure Google will be working on this, but I feel there needs to be either an implementation of public circles or topic specific pages|groups.
• Then not only does the individual user have the ability to post content in context or to the right audience, but community|shared knowledge actually has a conceptual container & residency.  Therefore if you’re interested in “X” you join the page|group about X, and as a consequence find the associated experts, latest information, debate etc. Then you can create your own related circle to be your receiving filter for that information stream.
• To me it just seems to be something missing in G+.  Each one of us is creating our own circles of content consumers and creators, with very little reference apart from our own social graph.  Which seems fine for private or intimate level of social kinship. But at a community sharing level I think there needs to be a higher level of visibility on the nature of content shared or purpose for sharing. To build and cement connections in that community, as well to motivate, inspire and drive it forward.  Do you disagree?  Do you think G+ can seed such strong communities without that conceptual framework?

I hope Google does address some of these issues soon, as I feel a little reticent to fully engage in the platform, as at some level I’m not quite comfortable with this scatter gun approach to content sharing. I think this is partly because of the richness of the conversation factor within G+, it seems  that as a platform more deserving of quality discourse and sharing, so it feels important to do that in the place of most social value – and I can’t tell where that is in G+.

I feel it is more deserving than Twitter, because of fully developed conversation model (chronicled comments and stream),  and the removal of the character limit on the individual post or share.  And also more deserving than Facebook, because at the moment it remains free of commercial interference … whether that will continue?  That is probably unlikely as Google will need to monetise the platform at some point, and that’s bound to mean more than just Adsense links.

My first thoughts on Google+

So I go where many of the leading technorati (an example list) have already gone…  played about Google +, drawn their conclusions & evaluations, then posted and shared their thoughts with many peers and watchers (at least the vocal ones).

So I won’t past comment on Google +’s evolutionary history or how it compares against the usual suspects.  If you need that information please visit your preferred search engine.

What excites and interests me about Google +   is the slickness of integration with basic and existing services that Google has delivered with this primary iteration of the service through general UI revision.  Gmail, Google Chat, Photos etc. are all plumbed in well (perhaps not exactly as people wish, but that’s why the feedback button is there).

They’ve combined these key services and nicely presented them in the revised Google UI – which provides sensible toolbar menu and workspace with simple clean lines and uncluttered space in the browser.  The top right-hand side being particularly useful with the constant presence of the notifications and share menu, along with the context|service sensitive help and setting options.  All this I’ve easily get used and start taking for granted immediately.

So I’ve realised that Google + is almost the sort of connected set of services and social connections where I could use and work everyday.   Until now, I’ve not had a visualisation of a connected web worker interface and services that flow and connect together so well as Google +.  Perhaps that means I’ve missed something somewhere, or only had fleeting interactions with such a platform available elsewhere?

So why do I think it’s particularly suited for supporting the workplace?

These are my call-out features that make it a potentially great Enterprise collaboration platform:-

• Google chat conversations that remain active and sync’d no matter which Google service tab you have have active, keeping continuity of contact and context.
• Google +’s Hangouts (video conferencing) present a step change for multi participant video chat services, with intuitive launch and privacy controls.  This will be an excellent service for remote teams.
• Google +’s profiles are well done, with key controls and updates, to help viewers choose how they wish to interact with that person.  It’s certainly made me think Google account profiles, are an important digital business card as well as sign post to the rest of your digital identity.
• Google +’s sharing and circles, are there to help drive adhoc collaboration and project activities forward. Helping people target conversations and activities to relevant individuals and groups. Combined with the notification & filter features, your attention handling overhead is reduced. So you can focus on updates when they come in, but otherwise dedicate your focus elsewhere and let things move on in the background.
• Google has done a good job of the activity stream implementation so far, delivering different filters/views on your stream via the circles categorisation.  Activity streams are more effective than an email inbox in helping an individual track a large flow of data in a loosely coupled manner, as well providing a more flexible engagement and participation model.
• Gmail and Mobile integration (Huddles – group texts) (primarily Android currently), are already well done and obviously be subject to further improvements in future iterations. It’s also all browser based so the form factor, OS or the resources of the end-point device are not so much a limitation of the service but help to extend it’s reach and serve mobile users better.

It’s not complete by any means so there’s a couple of key things to come that Enterprise will be interested in:-

• Google Apps, the current Google Enterprise services, look a great prospect for integration with Google +.  It will interesting to watch how that implementation takes shape, and the security and identity features they put into manage privacy, identity and content publication needs.  They’re already done some implementation of dual accounts in the Google+ toolbar, and you can switch IDs see here: account switching
• Google +  API, another great prospect to integrate both consumer services and enterprise grade application services.

So I’m going to be interested to see how Google + evolves, there’s certainly being no lack of expertise and feedback for Google to exploit to help it change Google +  in the right manner.  It’s certainly good to have a strong disruptive influence in the social networking market place.

For reference this GigaOM post is also a great summary of the potential of Google + as enterprise workplace.

OpenNTF FileNavigator is great! – Why didn’t I know about it before!?

However, I had mentioned in passing using Evernote with Lotus Notes in the last couple of days.

As far I know if someone done something with Lotus Notes as a development project the place to look is OpenNTF.org (which is looking great a Domino web app!) So my searches for “evernote” didn’t reveal any results.  So I checked the most popular downloaded projects. (Of course you do, if good and free it will be there)

I was drawn to File Navigator – since I’ve been using the sidebar in the full version of Lotus Notes, the missing item has been direct interaction with OS file system. And now it’s available!  Of course, Lotus Notes has supported drag and drop across folder windows on to notes documents to add attachments.  But File Navigator is great because it’s there in side bar… so much better!

(sample screenshot)

So now it sits in my sidebar with my Sametime contacts and calendar, and I don’t need to move to OS folders to interact with the documents I’m sending or receiving.

How easy was it to install? Super simple…

The File Navigator catalog page (with the screenshot) has an icon on the top right like this:

You simply bring up the “My Widgets” sidebar area:  (update your preferences if required)

Then drag the icon to the sidebar panel… it downloads in the background, you accept the install and restart Lotus Notes.(then you can hide away “My Widgets” sidebar via your view menu options).

You need to be running Lotus Notes 8.5x in the standard (using eclipse).

Insight Client Event – Manchester Sept 9th 2009

 

 

Overview:

A major set of vendors were present in Manchester to promote their products and services.  The focus was in small & medium business spectrum but there were elements that were relevant to the enterprise scale as well.  The vendors represented were also across the spectrum of the IT and computer services industry – memory and chip manufacturers, hardware manufacturers, infrastructure software to specialist application software vendors.

The most prominent stands (key sponsors) at the show being the Blackberry, Microsoft, Symantec and Sony, though as the host Insight was also well represented throughout.

Keynote talks were given on a number of current hot topics – Security (Symantec), ‘Recession proofing your IT department’ (Quocirca), Windows 7 (Microsoft) and Cloud computing (Google).

I attended both the Microsoft and Google keynotes – and you can find the my overview and conclusions on them here:

Microsoft Windows 7 Keynote

Google Cloud Computing Keynote

Conclusion:

I wonder if this moment in time cross-section of service (software, hardware, services) providers reflects in some ways the roll-call or roster of the early-millennial IT market at the end of that era?  With the economic and delivery models of IT evolving towards utility based industrial-scale services, and businesses keen to reduce cost, complexity and overhead, perhaps this combination will precipitate some sort of consolidation and simplification in the range and breadth of service providers (even in the SMB market) – rather like the reduction of motor vehicle manufacturers during the period between and post the 2nd World war, as a large-scale industrial players absorbed, out sold and out played smaller less nimble providers and manufacturers.