(I went to Uni’ in Wales, so I feel duty bound to publicise this for my Welsh-speaking friends!)
Microsoft have worked with the Welsh Language Board to develop two new Welsh-language interface packs – one for Windows XP and another for Office 2003. They are free to download, and enable Welsh speakers to work more easily in their chosen language whether at home, in business or in education.
To find out more, visit the Welsh pages on the Microsoft UK website.
A couple of years back, I worked as a Project Manager in the IT department for a major fashion design, marketing and retail company. My main project provided a standard desktop operating environment, along with replacement mail and directory services, across Europe, vastly improving the overall reliability of the IT platform and the resultant user experience.
Being a retailer, our IT infrastructure budget was not huge, and it seemed that I was forever explaining why we “locked down” the desktop, and why we could not support users’ own devices on our network, be they notebooks, PDAs, or mobile phones (synchronising with our PCs). We had corporate standards, and they were set for good reasons (mainly supportability and reliability). It really didn’t help when senior executives started to buy Blackberry devices and expected them to work with our e-mail servers (and when the IT Director’s view was one of “just make it work”… but without an associated budget). Another bugbear was educating users not to open suspicious e-mails and attachments. On top of that, our users were spread across Europe, and there were cultural and legal differences which affected the way in which users considered “ownership” of their PCs and associated data (whether work PCs should be available for personal use, etc.).
Now Microsoft has published a document which would have been a really useful summary for my users (8 ways to help maintain your computer and devices at work). It may be a bit “high level”, but it is written for end users and it raises some valid points.
Actually, I think that the whole Microsoft At Work section of the Microsoft website is worth a look, with articles including:
I recommend that anyone who uses a computer at home or work, or who is responsible for supporting users in their daily IT activities should take a look.
Back in July, I reported that Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) had been delayed until 2005.
I’ve just read that, a couple of days back, Microsoft released the first release candidate (RC) build of Windows Server 2003 SP1. Windows 2003 SP1 RC1, is available to the public as a 316Mb download for 32-bit x86-based systems or as a 396Mb download for 64-bit Itanium systems.
According to the Windows IT Pro magazine network WinInfo Daily Update, Microsoft expects to ship the final version of Windows 2003 SP1 in early 2005, reporting that:
“Windows Server 2003 SP1 isn’t the huge architectural leap that Windows XP SP2 was [but it] includes an enhanced security infrastructure that borrows the pertinent low-level security features from XP SP2, including the data execution prevention (DEP) technology and Distributed COM (DCOM) restrictions; a new roles-based Security Configuration Wizard (SCW) that makes it easy to close unneeded services and ports given the tasks a server is assigned to perform; Windows Firewall, which provides boot-time and setup-based protection against electronic attacks; and the post-setup Security Update Wizard, which prevents client network access to the server until it’s properly configured.”
Last night, on my way home, I heard BBC Radio 4 reporting on IBM’s sale of its PC business to Lenovo.
So what! Another merger in the overcrowded PC manufacturing space. Well, absolutely, except that IBM invented the personal computer and were the third largest PC retailer in 2004!
It will be interesting to see how HP (who are still trying to get to grips with their acquisition of Compaq) respond to this latest move in the market. IMHO, Dell should also be watching their backs, as although they have over twice Lenovo’s new market share, there is much talk about the strong growth of the Chinese economy which may well allow Lenovo to reduce the business’ cost base, providing opportunities for further reductions in PC prices, in a market that is already largely commoditised.
Links
BBC News report: Lenovo: The making of a legend?
IBM press release
Lenovo press release