Unified Communications Posts

About a month back I requested from the Google Wave team an invitation to try out Google Wave. Yesterday I was happy to see an email regarding my invitation to preview Google Wave. Image by Lovati’s Photos.

To accept the invitation, I just had to click on a link in the email which brings me to wave.google.com. After that I proceeded to sign in excitedly using my gmail account.

After logging in, I saw an interface very similar to our standard email application.

Initially I was quite lost as to what I could do with Google Wave. Then I decided to read up a little more on how to use Google Wave via this article Google Wave 101, developed by the Lifehacker folks. I also checked out the complete guide to Google Wave for even more info. Continue Reading »
My Google Wave Experience, anyone want invites?

How many of you still use email to communicate on a daily basis? Hands up!

I’m sure we can see many hands!

Did you know that email sent in the early 1970s looked very similar to one sent on the Internet today? (Source: Wikipedia)

Wow, if we are all still using 40 years old technology then it must be really efficient and works well. Image by H.M. Guerrero.

I myself have used email for more than 10 years now for the following purposes:

• Keeping in touch with friends and family
• Receiving news alerts
• Collaborating on projects

Whenever my team and I are working on new projects, we would try to set up a sharepoint site to put in all documents and information with regards to the project. However, we almost always fall back to using emails to send working documents for review and discussion purposes. In summary, email communications is still a vital tool for us when collaborating on projects or a specific activity. Continue Reading »
Shareflow – a solution to simplify email communications

Is your organization currently using Microsoft Exchange Server for unified communications purposes?

If yes, do you have trouble managing the various types of emails which are being sent out to the public?

Most organizations have email usage policies in place to warn and educate email users on what they should or should not do with their corporate email address. Image by FunnyBiz.

However, it can still be a challenge for server administrators to manage users who are using company emails to:

• Spam others
• Leak out confidential information
• Transmit viruses or malwares
• Send out hate mails
• etc…

As an organization, don’t allow your business be held responsible for inappropriate employee email usage. Continue Reading »
Automatically add signature or disclaimer within Exchange

The other day, I was reading an article which stated that ITSM and UC are beginning to be adopted by more businesses and will become even more significant during these hard times.

ITSM stands for IT Service Management and its key aim is to assist in providing excellent services to customers through proper and proven IT processes. Implementing the right ITSM tool is vital to differentiate your services from your competitors.

As for UC, it’s a concept very new to me. I researched about it, only to find out that UC stands for Unified Communications.

Basically UC refers to a trend in business to simplify and integrate all forms of communications. Photo by msandy.

Forms of communications these days refer to Voice Over IP (VOIP) phone calls, instant messaging, emails, voice mails, etc. In the olden days when the Internet did not exist, businesses relied on private branch enchange (PBX) to accept calls and route them to the correct extentions. Having such capabilities then helped to ensure communications were effective.

Today, having a flawless communication system within the office environment is a must. For business users, they can be more productive by relying on their communication system to manage calls and voicemails, send instant messages and even schedule meetings.

Some common Unified Communications software includes Microsoft’s Exchange Server and Office Communications Server. Another good one which is worth mentioning is UNISON – unified communications alternative to Exchange Server and Office Comunications Server. Continue Reading »
UNISON – a unified communications alternative to Exchange Server