Commercial Solutions:

Google Apps – http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/business/index.html

Zoho – http://www.zoho.com/

Frequently misunderstood as an “also ran”, they have attempted great strides in innovation in this space without the benefit of Google’s infrastructure or finances.

On the Open Source side, the competition gets a lot more rough and tumble.

Feng Office – http://www.fengoffice.com/
Features – http://www.fengoffice.com/web/features.php
Demo – http://demo.fengoffice.com/en/index.php?c=access&a=login

EyeOs – http://eyeos.com/

The previous three products mentioned could quite reasonably be called applications, something that is launched within an environment. But what if was possible to create not only the apps, but the complete online office environment and what if that environment could be completely customised? Enter EyeOs,

It is interesting to see just how many and varied options have become available for use today. If you could design the solution to your work flow challenges today, might one of these tools be of use to you?

A big thank you to Pedro Lozano for the first image.

Two recent examples, Anti-Virus Live and Anti-Virus Soft apparently from similar families. I only have a screen shot from the first unfortunately, But as you can see it appears to be a “legitimate” piece of software, and very nicely laid out visually. Unfortunately it also will prevent you from accessing most of your system including task manager on Windows and there are uncertified reports of it preventing system shutdown on a Mac. Plus how did it get there if you did not install it?

Now for the good news, removal instructions for Anti-Virus Live.

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/virus-removal/remove-antivirus-live

and Anti-Virus Soft

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/virus-removal/remove-antivirus-soft

Happy hunting and my best wishes for a disinfected machine. If anyone runs across either of these two beasts on a Mac, let me know and I will update this article with your removal instructions as well.

A major branding update for Global-Christian.net was completed yesterday. One of the major new elements is a “dashboard” built from twitter lists. Through well curated lists new content is always available at a glance, and constantly updating.

The menu bar provides a straight forward understanding of the actions and resources available to the visitor and takes a utilitarian focus by not using additional drop-down menus adding additional complexity. Search has been given strong focus with an upper right hand location. All designs need constant tweaking but this one has come the closest to the founder’s idea of original mind’s eye concept.

Connect with Global-Christian.net and on twitter.

A big thank you to The Forge Web Creations for providing the basic canvas on which to paint.

A humorous but revealing look at the past year. With the best of hope for the new year!

The interface draws from a number of different technologies from i-frames, online storage to store files, to social media to enable you to share your binders with others. Will it hit mainstream? Not sure but it is an interesting technological seemingly underdog that perhaps deserves more attention than it has received so far.

Disclosure: I have received no compensation of any sort for this mention of the Live Binder product.

Web 2.0 is all about going out to your market and talking directly with your customers and prospects. It’s about building connections, collaborating, sharing information – being more transparent than you have been in the past – and getting prospects and customers more involved in your business and with each other than they have been before. – From Marketing Ideas You Can Copy

Ultimately speaking its not about the tools, as much as how you desire to contribute to your community locally, nearby, and around the globe. Here’s a guide from the Fedex Global Citizenship Blog

Giving Back To Your Community

Try to focus on one or two issues, and develop a plan for evaluating charitable requests and focus in those main areas. Your Chamber of Commerce or local United Way may have done a community assessment study about the most pressing needs in your area. Give your employees a say and remember it’s all right to start small. Remember that philanthropy doesn’t need to be something you “do” after the business day ends, it can also be integrated into the way your business operates.

And across the aisle much can be learned from non-profit organizations as well. While a business is in business to make money, there ultimately can and should be a greater good that the owners of the business aspire too. If this is the case then perhaps there is a place to,

Think like a Nonprofit

What have you learned from this elaborate dance?

CCleaner Affectionately know by a much more colorful name, CCleaner is a wonderful free tool that can scan your computer for unneeded files, check for registry errors, and look into your computer’s start up procedures and allow you to stop potentially unnecessary programs from starting.

Spybot S&D Another tool with a colorful naming past, this tool checks for software that you may have accidentally downloaded from the web, which does not have your best interests in mind, otherwise known as spyware. This tool is regularly updated, for new threats and has proven itself quite capable for a number of years.

AVG & Avast Once the system has stabilized, I generally will install one of these two free anti-virus products to root out the last of any infections that might be present. (Please note it is unwise to install two anti-viruses on the same computer as they will conflict with each other.)

Disk Defragmentation After these steps have been completed, many systems benefit greatly from a little reorganization of their files. Much like a library having its books in order, running Windows Disk Defragmenter or other tools such as Smart Defrag can be immensely helpful in helping the computer find its way through its archives as fast possible.

Each computer and situation are different, but using these tools in sequence I have generally found that many systems can be rescued from unusability quite handily. Questions?

Thanks to xcaballe for the image!

Social Media ROI: Muhammad Saleem Interview

Here are my efforts to begin journaling my life on line. Warning, technical geekspeak ahead!

Create a category in your blog to devote to this project. I call mine “stream” to strike a balance between lifestreaming and story streaming.

Add this code to your functions.php file to exclude the posts from your front page and main rss feed.

function exclude_category($query) {
if ( $query->is_home || $query->is_feed) {
$query->set('cat', '-XXX');
}
return $query;
}
add_filter('pre_get_posts', 'exclude_category');

Replace XXX with the category number from your lifestream category. A big thank you to Jangro.com for this tip!

Download and install Twitter Tools and FT-Facepress. When you install Twitter Tools, make sure you install the bit.ly plugin for it as well. Twitter tools will automatically tweet each of your posts and if you want, it can keep an archive of your tweets and publish a daily and/or weekly digest as well. Installing FT-Facepress will automatically update your facebook status with the title and and permalink to each of your posts.

Find the rss feed associated with your new lifestream category, at http://yoursite.tld/category/feed and run it through your rss analytics and email subscription package of choice and then add it to your subscribe page or widget.

Use the “Press This” bookmarklet which comes standard with each Wordpress installation under tools, to begin collecting content that you have interacted with around the web and publish to your lifestream category.

You now have a means of collecting and curating content important to you, with a built-in hub and spoke approach to publicizing your content. Its not Posterous, but its on your domain and you reap the SEO benefits of your research and travel across the internet while retaining full integration with the rest of your site.

Update: 11-06-09 Want to add the latest posts from your lifestream to your sidebar? You have two options. For the easiest and fastest way, something like the Category Posts Plugin is probably your best bet. Install it and set the widget to display the latest post from your lifestream category. For the more adventurous, try adding something similar to this code to your sidebar.php file.

Photo Courtesy of Retro Traveler

May I suggest that many of us simply want to be valued by as many people as possible, and furthermore know why…?

Historically speaking time, distance, and ease of transportation have limited the number and type of people we relate too. Those boundaries are dropping fast. Crossing cultures, timezones, and distances are as easy as walking up to your computer. With tangible limitations gone, we find ourselves bumping up against the intangible ones. Religion becomes a common grouping point, interests also, there are also perceptions and feelings about everything from the minutia of daily existence to political parties and the presence of aliens. Some have suggested that social media is ultimately a narcissistic enterprise, “what is in it for me” but I would suggest that bigger question is how do I fit in with the greater whole. Who do I respect, why do I respect them, and what must I do to fit into the crowd. There is definitely an element of personal responsibility but it comes within an element of responsibility to the ever evolving community.

How to engage in the midst of this chaos?
– Provide a call to action and a narrative played out continuously which conveys the value of being apart of that narrative.

– Listen to the community, as you are ultimately their servant. Do you genuinely care? Yes you maybe a businessman or a leader, and yes you have to make decisions based on the best interests of your organization but carefully consider what guides you in those decisions. That decision framework is more obvious than you know. If you have an agenda it will show.

– Provide a vision for a better future and provide results. Make sure you continually revise your strategic planning to ensure those results keep happening.

– Communicate the three points above!

The community is ultimately platform agnostic. It is enabled and empowered by certain online platforms, but ultimately will continue to surge forward relentlessly regardless. Facebook, twitter, and rest can rise and fall on a dime – what will you do maintain contact with those important to you?

Photo Courtesy of niallkennedy