VMware Clouds Their Vision

As widely reported and covered in this ChannelWeb article, VMware is promoting a cloud computing strategy with the potential to integrate internal clouds and vendor clouds. A few thoughts: Is an “internal cloud” really a “cloud”, or just an traditional data center abstracted across virtual servers and resources? Are you getting full benefit from your […]

Gartner Recommends Buying Google Apps from a Reseller

In a publication titled “Google Apps Reseller Channel Puts ‘Feet’ on the Street”, Gartner recommends companies purchase Google Apps through the reseller channel. “Procure GAPE via the reseller channel and drive toward acost plus price, which could potentially reduce the overall GAPE price byalmost 20%.” With bundled implementation, migration, and integration services, Gartner identifies qualified […]

Levels of Cloud Computing

“Cloud Computing”, as a term, is quickly becoming a catch-all term for any service available over the Internet. This post from the vendor Rightscale provides a great definition of the three basic levels of Cloud Computing.

Hamilton Beach Blends Savings with Gmail

Reviewing newsletters, I ran across an interesting article from TechTarget in mid-January. Hamilton Beach Brands made the case for moving from an in-house email solution to Google Apps Premier Edition. With a large IT staff, they managed the project in-house, buying direct for Google. For many SMB’s, reseller expertise can speed the planning, implementation, and […]

Helpful Hint: Google Apps Contacts

Do you have duplicate contacts? Select the contacts and use the “merge these contacts” link.

Incremental Features Address Security Concerns

In a feature enhancement for Google Apps Premier Edition in January, Google greatly enhanced security with the addition of new administrative features.Administrators can now: Set minimum and maximum password length requirements for their users View visual indicators of the strength of their users’ passwords With these features, administrators can now better implement password requirements in […]

Spreadsheets and Forms Get A Boost

The following new features are available in Google Spreadsheets: A mobile-friendly view with filtering, sorting and row-by-row editing The ability to define attributes of a cell and require that input meets those data validation rules, improving how spreadsheets can be used to gather and manage data A form summary page with information about completed responses, […]

Google Calendar User Interface Upgrade

Last week, Google added five new User Interface improvements and features to Google Calendars (all editions): Collapsable screen area for all-day events Ability to add Google Docs files to events Streamlined settings for sharing, unsharing and deleting calendars New ‘Save and send emails’ option for new events Better accessibility with improved support for screen readers […]

Previewing the Print Preview Feature

In early February, Google announced a new Print Preview feature for Google Apps (all editions). For those familiar with Google’s nearly flawless PDF generation capabilties, the preview function looks familiar. In fact, Google is using the PDF engine to provide the Print Preview, with a helpful index of page thumbnails as well. If you haven’t […]

Google “gets it” with Groups

Google Apps Premier Edition has been update with new email list features. As importantly the provisioning APIs available to qualified resellers makes it easier to use these features. Google Apps email lists are now called “groups” Admins can now set permissions to determine who can send to each group: Group owners Group members Domain members […]

Verdict Out on ActiveSync and Google

In “Google Time”, the availability of ActiveSync for calendar and contact synchronization with iPhone, Windows Mobile, and other PDA’s is old news (announced on 09-Feb-2009). Currently, the team at Horizon is prepping our contacts and calendars so that we can fully test the new features. The big caveat is that starting up ActiveSync replaces all […]

If Microsoft Resellers Don’t Like Licensing Options …

If Microsoft’s resellers don’t like the licensing options available to small and mid-size businesses (SMB’s), why should you? Yesterday, ChannelWeb (A CMP Publication) reported that Microsoft was mulling over changes to its SMB volume licensing programs, again. This is just another salvo in the ongoing debate over licensing complexity championed by David Schrag and other […]

Pundits Mix, Match, and Misunderstand Google’s Enterprise Solutions

On February 11, Keith Ferrell posted a blog entry at bMighty.com entitled Google Apps: Right For The Small Business Buck? (And Does Google Even Want Your Bucks?). In the article, Mr. Ferrell confuses the market positioning of Google’s Message Encryption Service, part of the Google Apps Security and Compliance Suite, with Google Apps Premier Edition […]

More Offline Features

Google Apps Premier Edition offline (Beta!) now includes offline, read-only access to your calendar.This represents another example of the continuous, incremental development and improvement strategy behind Google products and services.

Google Apps Contacts Mature

One of the differences between Google Apps Premier Edition and MS Outlook with Exchange is that Google Apps does not have the concept of the Global Address List. Companies use the GAL to share contacts and distribution lists, even though the GAL is a separate entity from the Personal Address Book, which is also separate […]

Incremental Improvements in Gmail Should Help Enterprise Adoption

Google Apps Enterprise Edition users have seen some a number of small changes to the user Gmail user interface. While some are cosmetic — colors, borders, highlights — others should ease user adoption and comfort with Gmail. One of these changes is the Move to button that appeared this morning.One of the big differences between […]

Will There be a G Drive in Our Future?

Several stories like this one from Jan 30 on ChannelWeb point to signs that the often-rumored GDrive is coming from Google. Like Amazon’s Simple Storage Service (a.k.a S3 Drive), the word on the street is that Google’s GDrive will provide large quantities of low cost, or even free, storage in the cloud. More interesting with […]

Offline Access for Gmail

With the recent announcement that users can access their Gmail service offline, Google continues to move Google Apps towards a fully independent working environment. Offline access to Gmail should mitigate the need for other email clients, such as Outlook. For Google Apps Premier Edition, some offline capability already exists across the Docs, Spreadsheets, and Presentation […]

Tech Media Miss the Mark on Google App Reseller Launch

When Google announced the launch of the Google Apps reseller channel on January 14, the technology press and reseller channel pressed jumped on the story as this is big news for the industry. Google continues to prove it is serious about enterprise computing and challenging the status quo models for in-house computing. With the opening […]