2015: Microsoft's biggest year ever?

Windows 10, new devices and a new outlook made for an exciting year

With major product announcements and a number of big bets on the future, 2015 is in the running to be one of Microsoft's most important years on record.

Topping it was the launch of Windows 10. First previewed a year earlier, 2015 was the year we finally got to see the new operating system in full. Microsoft unveiled key features, including its virtual assistant Cortana reaching beyond Windows Phone and onto the desktop, and its new Edge Web browser.

Windows 10 also brought a new Windows Universal App Platform that lets developers build one app that works across Windows 10 Phones, tablets and computers. It’s part of Microsoft’s play to try and raise the number of apps available for Windows 10 tablets and smartphones by tempting developers with a build once, deploy everywhere strategy.

Since it launched in July, Windows 10 has seen massive adoption. Not everybody likes everything about it and Microsoft has made its share of missteps, like keeping details about what personal information was sent from the OS to its servers under wraps until well after users raised privacy concerns about it. But overall, it has been very positively received.
surface book

One of the most unexpected moves of the year was Microsoft's entry into the laptop computer business with the Surface Book. For years, Microsoft has relied on partners like HP, Dell and Toshiba to produce laptops -- and they aren't out of the picture -- but with its own machine it's attempting a bit of Apple's successful business model, directly selling the computer it thinks customers want.

The machine has a powerful keyboard with some serious computing power that has a detachable touchscreen, which can serve as a tablet. Early reviews are favorable, and the device is definitely cool. But its premium price and somewhat awkward design don’t lead one to believe that it’s a slam-dunk for widespread consumer adoption beyond Microsoft’s die-hard fanbase.

In the smartphone space, the year was one of contraction. Microsoft laid off thousands of people from its phone hardware division and saw its market share decline from 2.7 percent to 2.2 percent, according to IDC estimates.

The Lumia 950 is Microsoft's flagship Windows 10 smartphone. It's a snazzy piece of hardware, but still hurt by the mobile operating system's lack of apps.

During the year, it released the Lumia 950 and 950 XL flagship phones that were supposed to help drive Windows smartphones back towards relevance. Reviews for the phones are good and it packs some cool, whiz-bang features, like the ability to use iris recognition to unlock the device, but the biggest drawback is a familiar one for Windows smartphones: The small selection of apps.

But Microsoft hasn't given up on building smartphones yet.

One new technology, Continuum, lets users connect their phone to a keyboard, mouse and monitor for use like a PC. It's awesome, but requires application support that isn’t really existent in Windows 10’s third-party ecosystem yet. Microsoft is betting that the Windows Universal App Platform will prove popular enough among developers to shore up its lack of apps, but that hasn’t happened yet.

There's a lot more excitement building over another hardware project: HoloLens.

When it was unveiled in January, Microsoft showed off something that largely wasn’t even rumored: A headset crammed with technology that let users overlay digital objects on the physical world around them. It’s futuristic stuff, and while the HoloLens doesn’t quite offer wide-angle augmented reality, it’s still a massively cool piece of kit.

One of the most exciting things about it is that the developer tools handle much of the heavy lifting for accessing the device’s hardware capabilities. Voice recognition, spatial mapping and gesture recognition are easily handled by the HoloLens developer tools, so that app makers can focus on building their software. It bodes well for the future of the device, which will be made available for purchase to select developers early next year.

But new software and new devices were only one part of the strategy Microsoft pushed this year. The company also began working with its competitors in ways that it never would have before. Satya Nadella talked on stage with Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff at Dreamforce, and other high-level Microsoft executives have appeared at major events hosted by the likes of VMware,

The company also went on a major acquisition spree, snapping up a mountain of other companies, including teams behind apps like Wunderlist and Sunrise Calendar.

And there was the one that got away. The rumored deal between Microsoft and Salesforce reportedly didn’t happen because Microsoft declined to pony up as much money as Salesforce was looking for.

Acquisitions are a pretty dry business, but these deals show a Microsoft that’s hungry to augment its capabilities with the help of outside companies that have proven solutions.

Looking ahead to 2016 is when we get to see if all of the big bets Microsoft set up this year pay off. Analysts expect that this coming year will see a bunch of enterprises upgrade to Windows 10. Microsoft is also gearing up to more aggressively push consumers to upgrade, which in turn may incentivize developers to build applications for the new OS.

But the Windows Store could go the way of the Mac App Store rather than the iOS App Store or Google Play Store. The concerns that system administrators have about Windows 10’s mandatory cumulative updates might stunt adoption. The HoloLens might turn out to be a futuristic flop. Clearly, Microsoft has an intended outcome for all of those moves, but the company’s big bets don’t always work out as intended.

And 2016 is also when Microsoft’s new strategies of going cross-platform and collaborating with other tech companies will stop being new again. At this point, it wouldn’t surprise some observers if Nadella showed up alongside Tim Cook at an Apple press event -- a vast departure from the Microsoft of 2012, but not from the company’s past year. Stay tuned, folks; Microsoft is in for one heck of a ride.

Click here to view complete Q&A of MB2-706 exam

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MB2-706 Training at certkingdom.com

10 signs it's time to look for a new job

 In the high-stakes world of high tech, a subtle look can be enough to know it's time to jump ship to a new gig

10 signs layoffs are coming for your job next
The signs are usually hiding in plain sight. Your boss doesn’t give you the time of day anymore. Large groups of people go out for lunch -- then never come back. The company stock takes a nosedive.

When these things start to happen, it may be time to grab a life jacket and head for the nearest escape raft. Yes, the boat is sinking and about to take you with it.

Don’t go down with the ship. Downsizing and layoffs aren’t a laughing matter for those who suddenly find themselves without a paycheck. But many companies have become a parody of themselves in how they handle such monumental changes. That’s why we decided to have a little fun at their expense. Hopefully if you’ve experienced a layoff yourself, this will give you a laugh, too.

Here’s our take on the signs you should watch out for. If nothing else, you may know what the problem is if your email suddenly doesn’t work.

Co-workers simply ... disappear
Weren’t Devin and Susie simply making a run for the nearby food truck? That’s what you thought -- but that was Tuesday. Today is Friday. Yes, right before the layoffs begin, you might notice a slow drip of people who peace out for good. Usually it means that something is up, and for some reason others are privy to the details. Time to ask around and find out if you should be the next one to check out one of the mysterious taco trucks.

Big company meeting, little advance notice
The dreaded all-hands meeting -- as you might have guessed, a lot of things that aren’t all that good come from it. It could be a new product rollout. Or it could be the word you haven’t been waiting for: you and your colleagues don’t work there anymore. If you get an invite to an “all hands on deck” meeting, maybe you want to have one foot out the door just in case.

The company bus careers right by
You show up to work as normal, coffee in hand and ready to get some work done on the company bus. You see it coming. You make sure your bag is adjusted, laptop in hand.

Then, there it goes. Yes, the company bus has blown by you. Sure, this scenario may be a little far- fetched, but with the way that some companies treat those whom they unceremoniously dump, is it really so unlikely? It might be worth taking the train or walking to the office the next few days if there are any signs of this unsavory behavior.

You start getting strange looks
Maybe you’ve noticed something different about the way your boss looks at you. Their eyes tend to glance off into another direction. You approach him or her with a question, and instead of answering, they suddenly have a phone call or a meeting to run off to. You’re getting the cold shoulder. Was it something you said? A reflection on your performance? Nope, it’s the look of someone who knows too much.

That (dreaded) meeting is cancelled
You likely aren’t thrilled by the weekly calendar invite to the team planning meeting. Before you rejoice that you’ve avoided the most boring part of your week, consider another scenario: It’s cancelled because there’s no one to attend. Companies tend to slack off right before a major cull, so be wary if your schedule suddenly frees up because all those riveting meetings are canceled.

The mood swings low, low, low
Company morale often ebbs and flows. But you may want to pay particular attention to things if there’s a longer, widespread depression spell. You know the feeling -- everyone looks around like they’re an extra in "The Walking Dead." No one chats around their desks or the time-honored water cooler. If you see such symptoms, ask around and see if there’s more to it. This way you don’t have to show up one day to an empty office.

Suspicious training assignment
It may sound innocent enough. A fresh face arrives in the office, and you’re assigned to show them how things work. All goes well until you realize they have the same title and responsibilities as you. Yep, you’re training your replacement. It happens, so be a bit wary about that next eager hire who gets a little too comfy at your desk.

Merger talk
It’s often best to avoid rumors, but sometimes you have to pay attention so that you aren't left out of the loop when it comes to a potential merger. Yes, usually before a company is acquired by another there is some type of scuttlebut that leaks out. Listen to those who engage in such nefarious talk or implore you to keep information on the down low. This may be your tip that it’s time to dust off the résumé and hit the pavement for a new gig.

Your company’s stock price upends
If you work at a publicly traded company, keeping investors happy is a major part of success. Investors are like your mama: If she’s not happy, ain’t nobody happy. Just like what happened with Twitter, when the stock tanks and numbers (in this case user growth) aren’t good, then get ready to see fewer co-workers around. If things are heading south, perhaps you should be heading out.

The box of shame
Most businesses love Dropbox. It holds onto what you want and is easy to use. Unfortunately, there’s another beloved storage tool that fits the bill: a cardboard box. If you see such a contraption on your desk, you’re probably about to be sent packing. Gathering your stuff and heading out the door is the office equivalent of the walk of shame. The best you can do is to get through it. But at least you’ll have a new toy for your cat.

More InfoWorld slideshows
• 10 users IT hates to support
• The 12 most dreaded help desk requests
• EvilCo! 8 sinister sci-fi corporations (you could be working for soon)
• 9 movies that get IT (almost) right

Click here to view complete Q&A of 70-246 exam

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft 70-246 Training at certkingdom.com

Microsoft acknowledges bug led to Windows 10 November upgrade stoppage

Restores 1511 to download site, restarts Windows Update push

Microsoft has restored access to Windows 10's November upgrade from its download center, saying that it pulled the upgrade because of a bug.

"Recently we learned of an issue that could have impacted an extremely small number of people who had already installed Windows 10 and applied the November update," a Microsoft spokesman said in a Tuesday statement. "It will not impact future installs of the November update, which is available today."

Microsoft yanked the upgrade from the download website -- and stopped serving it to Windows 10 users via Windows Update -- last week. According to the company, the upgrade had reverted four preferences within the operating system to the original "on" default settings.

"We will restore their settings over the coming days and we apologize for the inconvenience," the spokesman added.

The settings that were changed included two in Windows 10's privacy section -- one that lets the user's advertiser ID to be tracked across multiple apps, another that enables an anti-phishing filter for apps that display Web content -- and a second pair that synchronized devices and allowed various first-party apps to run in the background to, for instance, provide notifications.

Microsoft provided some information on the settings bug in a support document, and also rolled out a new cumulative update, the only kind for Windows 10.

While the bug may seem minor -- especially in the context of the roll call of louder complaints about the November upgrade on Microsoft's own support forums -- the company may have been ultra-sensitive to the privacy settings snafu, considering that the firm has been manhandled by critics over what they saw as a significant uptick in intrusiveness. Those who had turned off the advertiser ID tracking, for example, would certainly have been upset to discover that it had been switched back on after the upgrade.

After fixing the problem, Microsoft restored the upgrade to the download center, where current Windows 10 users can generate installation media -- usually a USB thumb drive, but alternately a DVD -- with the Media Creation Tool (MCT). Many have been using the MCT to cut the line for the upgrade, normally served through the Windows Update service, and skip the wait as Microsoft slowly rolls it out in its now-familiar staggered fashion.

Computerworld confirmed that the MCT now downloads the November upgrade, which Microsoft identifies as both 1511 -- a nod to the November 2015 release date -- and build 10586, rather than the original July 29 code that it had reverted to last week.

The gaffe with the November upgrade could be seen as a setback for Microsoft's strategy to convince customers that it can provide regular upgrades to Windows 10 two or three times a year, and more importantly, prove that it can do so with high-quality code that requires less testing than prior editions.

After the upgrade's Nov. 12 release, but before it was pulled from distribution, Gartner analyst Steve Kleynhans had called 1511 a milestone in Microsoft's scheme. "This is a proof case for the ongoing update process," Kleynhans said in a Nov. 13 interview. "It's only the first data point, of course, but having delivered it, more or less on time, is a pretty good sign."

Click here to view complete Q&A of 70-695 exam

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft 70-695 Training at certkingdom.com

74-338 Lync 2013 Depth Support Engineer

---

QUESTION 1
You work for a company named ABC.com. Your role of Lync Administrator includes the
management of the Microsoft Lync Server 2013 infrastructure.
Two Windows Server 2012 servers named ABC-DB01 and ABC-DB02 run SQL Server 2012.
ABC-DB01 and ABC-DB02 host a mirrored database for the Lync Server Central Management
Store (CMS). ABC-DB01 currently has the principle database and ABC-DB02 currently has the
mirror database. The mirrored database does not use a witness instance.
You need to manually failover the mirrored database to enable you to perform maintenance on
ABC-DB01.
Which of the following Windows PowerShell cmdlets should you run?

A. Invoke-CsPooIFailover
B. Invoke-CsManagementStoreReplication
C. Invoke-CsBackupServiceSync
D. Invoke-CSManagementServerFailover

Answer: D

Explanation:

---

QUESTION 2
You work for a company named ABC.com. The company has a Microsoft Lync Server 2013
infrastructure that includes two Lync Server pools. Your role of Lync Administrator includes the
management of the Microsoft Lync Server 2013 infrastructure.
An Edge server named ABC-Edge1 is configured to use a pool named ABC-LyncPool1.ABC.com
as its next hop. You plan to failover to a second pool named ABC-LyncPool2.ABC.com. Before
failing over the pool, you need to reconfigure the next hop for ABC-Edge1 to be ABCLyncPool2.
ABC.com.
Which of the following Windows PowerShell cmdlets should you run?

A. Set-CsEdgeServer
B. Set- CsAVEdgeConfiguration
C. New-CsEdgeAllowList
D. Set-CsAccessEdgeConfiguration
E. Move-CsApplicationEndpoint

Answer: A

Explanation:

---

QUESTION 3
You work for a company named ABC.com. The company has two Active Directory sites in a
single Active Directory Domain Services domain named ABC.com. Your role of Lync
Administrator includes the management of the Microsoft Lync Server 2013 infrastructure.
The Lync infrastructure consists of a single pool named ABC-LyncPool1.ABC.com.
You have been asked to design a disaster recovery (DR) plan in the event of a failure of ABCLyncPool1.
ABC.com. Part of the DR plan would be to configure a backup pool.
Which three of the following Windows PowerShell cmdlets would you need to run to recover the
CMS (Central Management Store) and the Lync user accounts? (Choose three)

A. Set-CsManagementServer
B. Install-CsDatabase
C. Set-CsLocationPolicy
D. Move-CsManagementServer
E. Invoke-CSManagementServerFailover
F. Invoke-CsPoolFailover

Answer: B,D,F

Explanation:

---

QUESTION 4
You work for a company named ABC.com. The company has a single Active Directory Domain
Services domain named ABC.com. The company has a datacenter located in New York.
The New York datacenter hosts two Microsoft Lync Server 2013 pools named ABCLyncPool1.
ABC.com and ABC-LyncPool2.ABC.com. ABC-LyncPool1.ABC.com hosts the CMS
(Central Management Store). All of the company’s 70,000 users are enabled for Lync. Your role
of Lync Administrator includes the management of the Microsoft Lync Server 2013 infrastructure.
The servers in ABC-LyncPool1.ABC.com suffer irreparable hardware failure. You need to recover
the Lync environment by failing over ABC-LyncPool1.ABC.com. All users will be hosted
permanently on ABC-LyncPool2.ABC.com.
Which of the following Windows PowerShell cmdlets should you run? (Choose all that apply)

A. Invoke-CSManagementServerFailover
B. Invoke-CsPoolFailover
C. Invoke-CsManagementStoreReplication
D. Invoke-CsPoolFailover
E. Move-CsManagementServer
F. Install-CsDatabase

Answer: D,E,F

Explanation:

---

QUESTION 5
You work for a company named ABC.com. Your role of Lync Administrator includes the
management of the Microsoft Lync Server 2013 infrastructure.
You receive reports from users that they are sometimes unable to make outbound calls. You
discover that the failures are caused by there being no available trunks.
To help troubleshoot the issue, you plan to run performance monitor counters to monitor the total
number of calls and the total number of inbound calls to determine trunk usage.
Against which server should you run the performance monitor counters?

A. Edge Server
B. Front End Server
C. Database Server
D. Mediation Server

Answer: D

Explanation:

Click here to view complete Q&A of 74-338 exam

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft 74-338 Training at certkingdom.com

Oracle just made its biggest Sparc announcement since buying Sun

The M7 is the first Sparc processor designed from the ground up by Oracle

When Oracle bought Sun Microsystems five years ago, Larry Ellison made a lot of noise about how owning the entire systems stack, from applications to silicon, would allow him to do unique things with Oracle's servers. After five years of bluster and hype, he may finally have delivered -- but will customers buy what he's selling?

Oracle is announcing a new line of servers at OpenWorld on Monday based on a new Sparc processor called the M7. It has the usual improvements you'd expect in a new chip -- more cores, bigger caches, higher bandwidth -- but more interesting are software functions Oracle has embedded into the silicon to improve the performance and security of applications.

They include a memory protection technology that could provide a new level of security for in-memory databases, and an acceleration engine that allows data to be decompressed in near-real time for analytics, allowing for wider use of compressed data.

"Both of those are very interesting, because they're features I don't think a company that makes just chips -- that didn't have the software guys working with them -- would have invented," said Nathan Brookwood, principal analyst at Insight64.

With each new processor Oracle has released, he says, he asked the company what new features it was able to include as a result of owning both the silicon and software. "Invariably they would say, well, you know, it takes time to do that, we don't really have anything yet," he said. "But with the M7, they do."

It's also the first new Sparc processor core designed entirely in-house by Oracle. It takes four to six years to design a new microprocessor, and it's been that long since Oracle bought Sun. "This is the first project that has Larry's fingerprints all over it," said Marshall Choy, Oracle senior director for Optimized Solutions.

The M7 will go on sale Monday in new models of Oracle's T- and M-series servers, as well as an upgrade to the Oracle Supercluster, a pre-configured system for running the Oracle database.

The memory protection technology, dubbed "silicon-secured memory," prevents malicious programs from accessing parts of main memory that they're not supposed to -- thwarting a common attack method for hackers.

When an application needs a new chunk of memory, the M7 creates a unique "color bit," or key, which ensures the application can access only the portion of memory assigned to it. When the application process ends, the key expires and a new one is created for the next memory allocation.

"That's how we can prevent a piece of malware from accessing a memory segment it's not authorized to, because it will do that color code checking and abort the program if it doesn't match," Choy said.

The feature is significant because customers are putting larger amounts of data in memory for analytics, where it's more to vulnerable to attack. The secured memory technology will be available to any application that runs on the M7 systems, Choy said, not just those from Oracle. It can also uncover low-level bugs in software because it exposes any problems with memory allocation, he said.

For decompression, the accelerator in the chip runs at the full speed of Oracle's in-memory database, meaning customers can use compressed data for in-memory computing without the performance overhead they would normally incur.

Oracle is offering the M7 chip both in its T-series servers, used for scale-out configurations, and in its M-series servers, which scale up to form big SMP boxes. It's the first time Oracle will use the same processor across both product lines. "We literally have one chip," Choy said. "We have exactly one part number for the M7."

The processor has 32 cores, up from 12 in the M6, and a clock speed that tops out 15 percent faster, at 4.1GHz. It has four times the cache per core as its predecessor, and doubles memory bandwidth.

Oracle claims its new servers run common benchmarks like SpecJ with full encryption and still best those of rivals like IBM. Real world performance will depend on a lot of customer-specific variables, but the M7 looks like a powerful chip.

The T series servers are offered with one, two and four processor sockets, and the M series servers with eight to 16 sockets. That's fewer than the 32-socket configurations supported by the M6, but Oracle apparently wasn't seeing a lot of demand for the biggest configurations. "We think 16-way will be very sufficient," Choy said.

The new servers also allow for live migration of virtual machines while encrypted, for tasks like disaster recovery or planned maintenance.

"If you have a rogue employee who puts a packet sniffer on the network, or malware that's able to commandeer VMs in transit, you'll get nothing back in terms of usable data," he said.

Oracle needs the new capabilities if it's going to win new customers for its hardware, at a time when the Unix market overall is declining and customers are putting more workloads into the cloud.

"The biggest challenge Oracle is facing is that it's still an uphill battle to get people who aren't already using Sparc and Solaris to move onto anything that isn't broadly industry standard," Brookwood said.

But Ellison has shown shown a continued willingness to invest in Sparc.

"He has the resources to keep this going as long as he wants, and that's important," Brookwood said. "It's a luxury Sun never had."

Click here to view complete Q&A of 70-341 exam

Best Oracle Certification, Oracle Training at certkingdom.com

The 33 worst lines ever said by tech recruiters

Tech recruiters say the darndest things. How many of these cringeworthy pronouncements have you heard?

Everyone loves to talk about terrible pickup lines from the world of romance, but there's a far worse kind of misguided enticement going on right here in the realm of technology. I'm talking about the delicate dance of tech recruitment -- if you work in any area of IT, you probably know precisely what I mean.

The men and women tasked with recruiting tech talent go to great lengths to attract the attention of their targets -- (often unsuspecting) tech pros viewed as valuable "gets." While some recruiters prove to be invaluable in improving your career, finding exactly the right words to pique your interest in a new gig, far more seem to stammer, stumble, and elicit exasperated sighs.

You don't have to take my word for it. Several brave tech workers from around the globe have taken the time to share their favorite (if you can call them that) tech recruiter horror tales, and we have highlights for you here.

From game- and/or world-changing concepts to oh-so-disruptive innovation, some tech recruiters resort to impressive-sounding catchphrases that don't actually mean anything. It's hard not to wonder how many of these cliché-inclined recruiters are relying on buzzword-generating algorithms to come up with their pitches. (Yes, such things do exist!)

I mean, really: For the love of vertical integration, can't someone think out of the box?

1. "We need someone who is bright and passionate. Our product is one of a kind and slated to be a total game changer."

2. "We are serious about changing the world."

3. "We need people who think so far out of the box that the box isn't even in the picture anymore."

4. "This will give you great exposure to big data in the cloud, and you will be working with some extremely intelligent technologists!"

5. "As a company that specializes in innovation, [we] want the best and brightest creative visionaries."

6. "I am working with the founders of a stealth mode startup disrupting the infrastructure/data center space."

7. "We are working on absolutely amazing things and will scale tremendously."

8. "We have a tight-knit dynamic team that is responsible for delivering consumer experiences."

9. "We're looking for a code ninja..."

10. "We're looking for a Java wizard..."

11. "We're looking for someone truly brilliant, and so we're willing to offer a lot:

12. "Want to work with a team of diverse rock stars?"

13. "Would it help if I told you that I was helping out with ninja engineer hiring for Facebook?"

14. "Chuck Norris coding skills required."

15. "EliteCoder you = new EliteCoder("Can you code with the best?");"

16. "The company is the first of its kind, as it is 100 percent focused on the integration of mobile/wearables and enterprise."

17. "Think of it as Box.com meets LinkedIn meets Facebook with real privacy."

18. "Our product combines many elements of Facebook, eBay, Blogger, PayPal, and Etsy."

19. "This is a ONCE-IN-A-LIFETIME OPPORTUNITY."

20. "We're building a dynamic team that lives on the bleeding edge of technology with a unique opportunity to work on the Silverlight platform. Prior experience with Adobe Flash highly desired."

21. "The best way to negotiate is not to negotiate at all ... so tell me exactly what you're making."

22. "What we can offer:

23. "The environment is hip and modern, and very inclusive and friendly to women and other weirder types."

24. "You have JavaScript on your resume. What do you mean you don't know Java?"

25. "[This job requires] experience of developing databases in HTML."

26. "[Looking for a] senior iOS architect with 10-plus years experience." (The first version of iOS was released in 2007.)

27. "What's the difference between a UI engineer and a Unix engineer?" (Posed to an IT employee by a recruiter hired to find engineers and programmers.)

28. "We are very impressed with all your Android work at [Company X] and we believe you would be a perfect fit for this great opportunity." (Sent to someone after his first day as a Company X employee.)

29. "What a beautiful morning, what a beautiful day! ... I am looking for people who don't follow roads, the Docs of the world. The people who take life and grab it, regardless of any paths or roads that have been set. We spend a lifetime of thinking 'what if'? But what if we spent a lifetime of 'I did!'"

30. "You'll be empowered to identify problems and dive head first into the equation. Risk is encouraged. Victory makes us who we are."

31. "I don't mean to be a nuisance, but there's really no way of knowing if someone might be interested or not without a response."

32. "I came across your profile and was very impressed by your pedigree."

33. "Due to the high volume of applicants, only shortlisted candidates will be shortlisted."

Well, that certainly clears things up. No word yet, however, on whether said shortlist could include any "women or other weirder types."

Click here to view complete Q&A of 70-341 exam

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft 70-341 Training at certkingdom.com

Review: Apple shines up OS X with 'El Capitan'

In Mac OS X 10.11, most of the improvements are under the hood

Apple's new Macintosh operating system, OS X 10.11 "El Capitan," is named after a prominent rock formation in Yosemite National Park. That's fitting because the new OS is designed with rock-solid stability in mind. El Capitan is the 12th iteration of the OS powering Apple’s desktop computer lineup, and as the name implies, it on the shoulders of its predecessor.

Just as iOS 9 was built on the foundation laid by iOS 8 for mobile devices, El Capitan improves on the many changes introduced in 2014's Yosemite -- which included new features such as Continuity and a smarter Spotlight search tool. El Capitan adds more polish than features, though there are quite a few of those to explore, as well.

Among the changes made to apps and sprinkled throughout the operating system are better security and a move to Apple's Metal graphics technology (which debuted in iOS) for the system and apps. (Metal replaces OpenGL.) El Capitan also cements in place the adoption of Apple's home-grown programming language, Swift, which allows developers to write apps with smaller latency and more efficient performance.

Like other recent OS X releases, El Capitan is a free download from the App Store. The system requirements are 2GB of RAM and 8GB of available storage. El Capitan will run on Macs that date as far back as mid-2007. (If you're still using a Mac from 2007, though, you should really look into upgrading your hard drive to an SSD for more 2015-like performance.)

But while older Macs can run El Capitan, those systems can't take advantage of all of its features. For instance, although El Capitan is designed to take advantage of both the CPU and the GPU for processing power, only Macs with modern graphics cards -- basically, those released since 2012 -- will be able to utilize this feature. (More on this below.)

Metal and Swift
The addition of Apple's Metal graphics technology is good news for gamers and other users. Metal is a set of application program interfaces (APIs) designed to supplant OpenGL. The Metal API is actually an Apple-designed combination of OpenGL and OpenCL, which debuted last year in iOS 8. (OpenCL is used to take advantage of every processor on a computer, CPU and graphics card included.)

Metal was designed for efficiency -- a requirement for mobile devices that need long battery life -- and is a much lighter API for graphics compared to OpenGL, letting the graphics card be used more effectively and freeing up the CPU for other tasks. For desktops and laptops, Apple rewrote OS X system software (like the Graphics stack) to take advantage of Metal, resulting in a 50% improvement in rendering performance system-wide and 40% better efficiency (the latter will help laptop users by prolonging battery-charge life).

Apple boasts that El Capitan is 1.4 times faster than previous OS X versions for app launching, twice as fast at switching apps and four times faster at opening PDFs. At the same time, Apple claims a 70% reduction in CPU usage compared to apps written using OpenGL.

Adobe representatives on stage during Apple's September 9th event claimed an eight-fold improvement in using the Adobe After Effects graphics software. Users should find that their systems are more responsive with smoother animations and faster application launches. There is also the promise of future improvements for games and other apps; however, those games and apps must first be rewritten to take advantage of Metal.

Another under-the-hood technology available to developers is Swift 2.0, which is designed to simplify coding (relatively speaking) while making it easy for OS X software to take advantage of the built-in hardware -- such as using the graphics card for data processing when possible. I'm not a programmer, but anything that allows developers to streamline their software is a good thing.

Not everything in El Capitan is behind the scenes and waiting for developers. There are some user-facing features as well.

The first thing astute users may notice is that El Capitan uses a new system font: San Francisco. This font is designed to make text more legible for Apple's high-definition Retina displays. It works as intended, but the difference will probably be overlooked by any but the most fastidious font fanatics.

OS X gets a new enhanced-for-Retina system font: San Francisco.
The updated Finder builds on Yosemite's improvements by applying a new split-screen app mode in addition to the full-screen mode that debuted in Yosemite. The split-screen mode can be enabled in a couple of ways. First, you can drag a Finder window to the top of the menu bar and then drop that window on an existing full-screen app space in Mission Control. Or you can press and hold the green button on an app window -- doing so will make that app fill up half the screen and any open windows display in miniature, letting you select one to fill the other side of the screen.

A clear divider separates the two apps, and each operates independently. The divider can be dragged from side to side to adjust each app's window size. The menu bar at the top of the display automatically changes to accommodate the front-most app, which is normal app behavior Mac users are accustomed to.

It's an elegant solution, one I like a lot, but it's not necessarily obvious to new users. Of course, it's also very similar to Microsoft's implementation in Windows 10.

Managing windows via Mission Control also received attention in El Capitan. Any window dragged to the title bar will activate Mission Control, which lets you move apps to different virtual desktops. Dragging an app window into any existing Space automatically places the window there; dragging the window into a Dpace occupied by a full screen app activates a split-screen view; and dragging a window to the upper right of the display creates a new Space with that window in it.

Spotlight, now with more Siri
Spotlight receives some really useful upgrades in El Capitan. Yes, you can move around the search field and results window; they're no longer locked in place at the center of your display. There's also added functionality in search results: Spotlight can check sports data (such as information about favorite athletes or scores, team schedules and standings); it can check weather conditions and forecasts; and when you search for a company's ticker symbol, it can look up stock prices.

The biggest improvement comes in the form of queries, similar to the ones you can ask Siri on iOS. Spotlight now supports natural language search, which generally means Spotlight is as useful as Siri, even though the searches have to be manually typed rather than spoken aloud as you would with an iPhone.

At the iPhone 6S launch event, Craig Federighi, Apple's senior vice president of software engineering, demonstrated this function by typing a search for emails from Phil Schiller that had been ignored. The search results showed unread messages from Schiller. I've used Spotlight to search for documents and videos created during certain time periods, as well as to search for New England Patriot game scores and standings.

There is one minor caveat: When you type a Spotlight search query, you can't press Enter; you have to wait for the results to display after you finish typing them in, even if that takes a while. While this is taking place, there's no obvious indicator that a search is in progress. It's a little annoying, because many users will be inclined to press the Enter key to make sure a search is in progress. That effectively selects the first result and closes the Spotlight search window. That could result in, say, an app launch you didn't intend. Big deal? No. Annoying? Usually.

For developers, Apple has designed a new API that can display search results of in-app content, which means better search results when developers incorporate this feature in their apps.
Apple app changes

Safari gets a number of useful additions this year, but they're mostly tweaks, such as pinned sites, audio muting and -- Apple TV users will welcome this -- built-in AirPlay support for videos.

About that last feature: Videos will now get an additional control icon; tapping the AirPlay icon lets you choose any Apple TV in range so that the video plays through it instead of in the browser window. Previously, this was only possible via third-party plugins, such as ClickToFlash.

While the built-in functionality lacks advanced features found in third-party plugins (ClickToFlash lets you download content instead of simply playing it, for instance), Apple's addition to Safari is stable and works well enough for most people who just want a no-fuss way to stream content to Apple TV. Safari also supports HTML 5 picture-in-picture to enable custom controls for HTML 5 videos and streaming of FairPlay content.

Pinned Sites, which keeps a small, active tab of any website you wish to keep in the Tab section of the app, just to the left; these tabs stay open, yet out of the way, for quick access to frequently visited sites.

A load-blocking API for extensions, which lets Web developers block content from loading from a large collection of sources, using minimal resources without hindering Safari performance -- and perhaps actually improving it.

Force Touch mouse events support, which will enable developers to add interactivity based on the amount of pressure exerted in a tap on supported laptops, as well as haptic feedback.
And better audio/video content control: You can now easily silence sudden audio/video from a background or foreground tab, such as when a video or ad loads that you didn't really want to play/hear. From within the Web address bar, clicking on the speaker icon will instantly mute all Safari content. Then Safari will show you which tab has the offending content when you click and hold on that speaker icon. Super simple and super useful.

Mail snags a feature from iOS by gaining more gesture support in the Mail list; the gestures perform different behaviors, depending on whether you swipe left or right with two fingers. These gestures can trigger events like deleting, flagging or marking mail as read (without actually opening the message).

Mail also fixes a problem inherent to full-screen apps that require multiple windows. In Yosemite, when a new message was created while Mail was running in full-screen mode, it wasn't possible to view other messages; they resided in the main window behind the message being composed. In El Capitan, it's now possible to minimize the message window and access other emails and mailboxes; and if you're writing more than one email, they show up in tabs, similar to tabs in the Safari browser.

While iOS 9 offers improvements aimed at predicting what a user will do or what information will be needed, there are now aspects of Mail in El Capitan that offer this, too. For instance, data detectors have been improved, offering suggestions at the top of an email body when they detect phrases in a message that could yield calendar entries, like "Let's go out for dinner at five." This is called suggested events; the same proactive behavior also accounts for potential contacts.

Notes
Notes has been updated to bring feature parity with its iOS 9 counterpart, including instant checklist creation, support for inline video and images, and URL snippets with preview. There's a new button that triggers an Attachments view, which organizes attachments from across all of your notes into one area, split into categories like Photos & Video, Sketches, Map Locations, Websites, Audio and Documents.

All of the new Notes features are accessible via the app's toolbar. And beyond the Notes app itself, there is now an extension in the Share button of supported apps that lets you add content from within that app to a new or existing note. Of course, any addition, subtraction or modification to your notes is synced across every device signed in with that Apple ID.

Maps
Like Notes, Maps has been improved in El Capitan to create functional parity with iOS 9. Specifically, you can plan routes using public transportation with Transit view, which supports walking directions as well as subway, train, ferry and bus information. Like iOS 9's Maps, Transit data has been surveyed so that Maps shows you the most efficient routes, exits and drop off stops to get to where you're going. As before, you can send those directions to the iPhone from your Mac.

Security
Behind the scenes improvements include security additions, with the most important one in El Capitan called System Integrity Protection (SIP). At its core, System Integrity Protection is a security policy that is applied to every running process. This process protects system files and only allows modifications from the system's installer app and software updates. Code injection and runtime attachments to system binaries are no longer permitted.

What this basically means is that SIP does not allow unauthorized manipulation of important system files, which should help prevent security breaches.

Bottom line
There's a wealth of new features in El Capitan that seem minor -- until you need them. (You can, for instance, find a lost cursor on the screen by shaking your mouse back and forth rapidly, and you'll be able to eventually download extensions to the Photos app for manipulating your images.)

These may not be ground-breaking changes to apps and the operating system, but this collection of small additions makes using El Capitan a little faster, smoother, easier and better. And the under-the-hood technologies lay the groundwork for richer apps down the road. It's these usability iterations found throughout El Capitan that make the biggest difference.

As with any major software upgrade, make sure your apps are supported before moving to El Capitan. If you're hesitant about upgrading, it isn't a bad idea to hold off a while and see if any major bugs are discovered. But because this version was vetted throughout the summer with a public beta program, I'm not expecting any showstoppers now that the final version has arrived.

In a nutshell: El Capitan does what it is designed to -- streamline OS X across the board, making it more efficient to run and flat-out easier to use. It's free, it runs well and I recommend it.

Installation advice
If you've decided to take the OS X 10.11 plunge, make sure to back up your system before upgrading. Apple's built-in Time Machine feature works well -- all you have to do to turn it on in System Preferences and plug in an external hard drive; the Mac will automatically ask if you want to use it to start a backup. (Alternatively, there are other third-party utilities like SuperDuper that offer more control if you're more technically minded.)

This is also a good time to run a diagnostic on your Mac's file system. To do this, restart your computer holding down the Command and R keys at startup and then use Disk Utility to check for unseen problems. You can also use Alsoft's DiskWarrior, a much better third-party alternative. My feeling is that DiskWarrior is the rare piece of software that should be in everyone's arsenal, regardless of experience level.

OS X 10.11 installer
Once backups and diagnostics are out of the way, El Capitan can be obtained from the Mac App Store and will download to your Applications folder. To manually install it, double-click the installer icon, enter your username and password and select your target destination. The installer does the rest.

Here's an important point: If you have more than one Mac in your home and/or limited bandwidth for downloads, you can use the same installer on multiple machines. Copy the file from the Applications folder to another Mac via AirDrop in a Finder window or transfer it to an external disk. Just sure to do this before running the El Capitan installer. If you don't, when the installation is complete, the Installer will delete itself.

Best Microsoft MCP Certification, Microsoft MCSE Training at certkingdom.com

User guide to Windows 10

Windows 10 officially launches this week, so if you’re going for an immediate upgrade from your Windows 7 or Windows 8/8.1 computer, this guide will get you up to speed as quickly as possible.

Ready for Windows 10?
Windows 10 officially launches this week, so if you’re going for an immediate upgrade from your Windows 7 or Windows 8/8.1 computer, this guide will get you up to speed as quickly as possible. It covers the main features new to Windows 10. We start -- appropriately enough -- from the Windows logo (Start) button.
user guide to windows 10 2

START MENU
The classic interface returns in a new form. Click the Windows logo button, and the Start Menu interface of Windows 10 pops up. It looks similar to the one last seen in Windows 7, but with the Windows 8/8.1 Start Screen sized down into a panel stuck to its right. You can resize the Start Menu by clicking-and-dragging on its top or right-side border.

Tile menu pop-up
As in Windows 8/8.1, clicking a Tile launches its corresponding Windows app or desktop application. To move a Tile, you click on and drag it to another spot on the layout. Right-click on a Tile and a small menu pops open which gives you options: Unpin from Start, Resize, Turn live tile on (or off), Pin to taskbar, and (if available) Uninstall.

All apps list
Situated at the lower-left corner of the Start Menu (and right above the Windows logo button) is “All apps.” Click these words and the left panel will switch to an alphabetical list of all programs (both Windows apps and desktop applications) that are installed on your computer, and their folders. Any of these listings can be turned into a Tile by clicking and dragging it to a spot on the right half with the other Tiles.

Windows apps now run in resizable windows
Windows apps now launch in resizable windows, just like desktop applications, that you can drag-and-move to other areas of the desktop environment as you please. Their title bars also have the familiar trio of Minimize, Maximize/Restore Down, and Close buttons at their upper-right corners.

Pinning an app
Alternately, right-clicking on a program listing will trigger a small menu, which lists, among its options, pinning the program listing as a Tile on the Start Menu, or onto the taskbar.
user guide to windows 10 7
See larger image
Look for the hamburger

In fact, it may be initially difficult to distinguish between Windows apps and desktop applications, but one clue is that most Windows apps have a settings button (an icon with three bars, sometimes referred to as a “hamburger”) located toward their upper-left corners.

Cortana takes center stage
A major new feature is Microsoft’s digital personal assistant technology. You speak to your computer’s mic, asking a question or making a request, and Cortana may reply by talking out the answer. Cortana can also be used by entering text into its search box labeled “Ask me anything.”

Cortana the weather girl
You can set Cortana to activate whenever you say aloud to your computer’s mic, “Hey, Cortana.” From there, you can ask her something, like “Hey, Cortana, what is the current temperature?” A card with a weather forecast will sprout from the search box, and a female voice (i.e. Cortana herself) will tell you the current temperature in your area. She can also be asked to perform basic calculations (“Hey, Cortana, what is 6 times 7?”) and even launch programs (“Hey, Cortana, start Word.”).

Cortana panel of info cards
Click inside Cortana’s search box, and a panel rises showing cards of real-time information that has been personalized for you, such as your local news and weather forecast. This information that Cortana presents to you throughout your day can be configured by clicking on the Notebook or Reminders settings.

Task View: The new way to switch among programs -- and desktops
Windows 10 ditches the inelegant “switcher” UI of Windows 8/8.1 that you used to jump from one running Windows app to another. Instead, you use the new Task View. Clicking the Task View icon (which is to the right of the Cortana search box) takes you to a screen that shows large thumbnails of Windows apps and desktop applications that are running on your computer. You can jump to any program by clicking its thumbnail. Or, programs can be closed by clicking the “X” on its thumbnail.

Double your instances, double your fun
Task View also lets you run multiple instances of the desktop environment. This may be helpful if you want to organize programs you are using for personal and work reasons into separate desktops. You do this by clicking “New desktop” on the lower-right corner; a new desktop thumbnail will appear to the right of the thumbnail of your first, current desktop. You can then jump to this second desktop by clicking its thumbnail.

Moving programs
When there are two or more desktop environments open under Task View, a program can be moved from one desktop to another by clicking its thumbnail and dragging it down and onto the thumbnail of the desktop where you want it to be moved.

Edge replaces IE
Windows 10 comes with a new web browser, Edge. It’s totally brand-new with a different codebase that Microsoft built from scratch. IE is still included in Windows 10, listed under Windows Accessories in the Start Menu, if you need it, but Edge is the default browser for Windows 10. Edge is a Windows app, so it shares the same design language as the other new Windows apps that are included with Windows 10. Compared to IE, Edge has a cleaner looking UI with simpler graphical elements in its toolbar.
user guide to windows 10 15
See larger image
Edge Reading view

Edge can re-render certain web pages to display only the main body of text and a related image, stripping out extraneous graphics and text from the original layout, to make an online article more visually comfortable to read. To do this, click the open-book icon to the right of the URL address bar. This function isn’t available when this icon is grayed-out: Not every page is able to be stripped down to its essentials.

Edge Web Note
Clicking the icon that’s an image of a square with a writing instrument will capture an image of the web page that’s open in the browser’s window, and then gives you basic drawing and highlighting tools to doodle over it. You can also annotate the image with notes you type in.

Action Center: Keeps you informed of your computer’s status
Click the Action Center’s icon in the notification area (to the immediate left of the clock and date) to evoke this new panel, which slides in from the right. It lists important notices about your computer’s hardware and programs that are running. Along its lower part, the Action Center provides several buttons that let you access hardware settings faster.

Settings: Doesn’t replace Control Panel or PC Settings
Clicking the “All settings” button on the Action Center panel will take you to a new Settings interface. This is the first attempt to merge the PC Settings (introduced in Windows 8) and classic Control Panel UIs into one. When you click the System icon here, you’re taken to a new version of what was called the “PC settings” menu under Windows 8/8.1.

Control panel
The Control Panel is still available in Windows 10, but some of its settings have been moved to PC Settings.

Start Menu in full screen
On the Action Center panel is a “Tablet mode” button. Click it, and the Start Menu expands to fill the entire screen whenever you click the Windows logo button. Tablet mode also locks out the user from interacting with the desktop environment. The desktop is grayed out to indicate this. As its name implies, this UI is designed to be used with a tablet, but you can still interact with it on a computer that doesn’t have a touchscreen. You may want to use it when you don’t want to be distracted by the desktop, for example.

Settings for showing programs on taskbar in Tablet mode
Two main things to keep in mind while you are in Tablet mode: Icons for actively running programs do not appear on the taskbar. (This can be changed under the System menu.) And Windows apps (and, for that matter, desktop applications) will display at full-screen when launched.

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCP Training at certkingdom.com

Comcast Business pushes into the national services market

Hires talent, acquires assets, teams with other provides to reach beyond its core footprint

Comcast Business, which began offering communications services to small businesses in its regional footprint in 2007 and broadened its portfolio in 2010 to appeal to larger organizations in that local realm, today announced an Enterprise Services unit that will go after Fortune 1000 companies regardless of geography.

“We have the right services in our portfolio now, the right performance levels, the right metrics, so we can target businesses outside of our footprint,” says Bill Stemper, president of Comcast Business, which has an annual run rate of $4.5 billion.

The company, which has been spending $1 billion per year to expand its business network, will offer Ethernet, Internet access, advanced voice services, and a range of managed services, including everything from managed router and security services to 3G and 4G backup services, Stemper says.

Comcast Business serves 39 states and 20 of the top 25 markets, representing roughly 45% of the US. To go after “bigger companies, even those not in our footprint, we did three things,” Stemper says:

* Hired a leader to lead the charge, Glenn Katz, who was the CEO of SpaceNet, a service aggregator that supported business customers by pulling together service offerings from different providers.

* Worked with fellow CATV-based service providers to hash out a “cable first solution,” whereby the companies have agreed to buy and sell from one another much like telephone companies cobble together services from different providers today to deliver end-to-end enterprise solutions. Comcast Business says it has reached network agreements with Brighthouse, Cablevision, Charter, Cox, Mediacom, Suddenlink and Time Warner Cable.

* Acquired Contingent Network Services for its expertise in offering managed services to many nationally known businesses. “The company will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Comcast Business and will continue to operate under the Contingent brand name,” Comcast Business reports.

Asked what will get Comcast Business in the door, Stemper says scalable bandwidth at great price points and the speed at which they can react to customer needs. The customer sweet spot will be banking and finance firms and hospitality and food service organizations that have some centralized offices and data centers and maybe 1,000 scattered branches/outlets, he says.

In terms of what comes next, Stemper sees software defined networking playing a big role. “The new world is Ethernet based, and the more sophisticated businesses want to prioritize apps, customize the manner in which the network works with the apps. So all of us are working on software defined capabilities that gives them that capability, but in a way that is more flexible than traditional MPLS. The new world is going to be more dynamic and customizable and software defined capabilities will be one of the next things we layer in.”

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com

Let users choose enterprise cloud applications

It will benefit your organization, make you look like a hero and increase your job security

This vendor-written tech primer has been edited by Network World to eliminate product promotion, but readers should note it will likely favor the submitter’s approach.

Asked whether he was considering a cloud application for his company, a CIO of a mid-size organization said the downside risk of ripping and replacing the company’s existing on-premises application outweighed the productivity gains the cloud application might bring. Part of that risk, he felt, was his job security.

That sentiment is common. IT professionals, after all, are responsible for keeping the organization’s applications running and ensuring the security of sensitive data. When they do decide to make a software change, IT leaders traditionally consider criteria such as:

Not that IT historically has had many options given the high barrier to entry for new enterprise technology companies. But that has changed with the emergence of thousands of cloud applications that specialize in every enterprise niche. Cloud applications enable incredibly quick and widespread adoption across an enterprise, often without committing to a long-term contract or agreement.

In fact, as we’ve seen with the BYOD/shadow IT phenomenon, end users are effectively conducting market research on cloud apps themselves, and this presents a significant opportunity. What if we flip the application selection process on its head by leveraging users to select new cloud applications? While this is not a popular suggestion, there is a way you can approach this opportunity that will not only benefit your organizations, but make you look like a hero and increase job security at the same time.

Empowering users
Going back to the CIO referenced earlier, the decision to make a change should not be focused on an IT leader choosing a cloud technology for productivity or collaboration. While chances are good the “safe” choice will guarantee one’s job, at least in the short term, the downside of this decision-making process is the likelihood that the organization will miss out on emerging tools and products that make users more productive and happy. Instead, that leader should understand what his or her users want and need, and guide the organization toward a solution that’s right for both users and IT.

For example, all of the modern mobile device management solutions and their features -- managed encryption, containerization, selective wipe and the general device-agnostic nature of most -- were driven by this ground-up trend. Nowhere is this more evident than in the emergence of Apple products in the enterprise. Even five years ago, workers needed to retain their Blackberry smartphones for office use while using their iPhones on nights and weekends. Today, Apple claims nearly 70% of the enterprise market and most users love carrying one device to get more work done.

If IT leaders empower their users to select cloud applications, they will experience fewer tickets and change management challenges, and cultivate more champions while reducing complaints within their user base. The now well-known advantages to the cloud come to play through this process by enabling instant acquisition and company-wide access.

Many cloud applications also offer free trial periods or monthly contracts rather than a large upfront investment, further easing the process. While this may result in more upfront work and interaction with the end users in the short term, the long term benefits of happier workers and a more productive and efficient company will quickly outweigh the initial investment.

Rather than forcing change, empowering users will position IT as a helpful guide. Here are some tips that will help the transition:
* Survey your users on their thoughts. SurveyMonkey and other free applications are great ways to anonymously gauge the applications people are already using and those they’re interested in trying out. If possible, determine what Shadow IT is already connected to business processes. Common tools like API Access Auditing, your Firewalls and 3rd party tools can let you approximate what's in use and where and is often very telling.

* Run internal betas of the most popular products within departments. Whether it be for mail, chat, storage, collaboration or other functions, there’s a good chance some user populations have already found a great tool for improving existing company processes. This step is the time to drive the tests, make sure the products work as intended, can scale, and has the level of security and management your organization requires.

* Develop software champions. The internal test groups will be your champions; incorporate them in the roll out to improve your likelihood of buy-in across departments, as a bubble-up approach will be much more effective than a trickle-down one. Often the best rollouts involve non-IT software champions with some sort of experience related to the domain of the new app.

* Merchandise success. Build internal case studies and document the metrics of success (time saved, email exchanges avoided, price reductions, user satisfaction improvements). Watch every new app closely. Use uptime or performance tracking tools so you can deliver metrics against the old system. Check your SLAs. For example, Forrester reports that users save an average of 12 minutes per day simply by using Google Apps as their communications suite, totaling approximately 52 hours a year per employee.

* Roll out. With buy-in from your key users and support from your team, it’s time to implement the new cloud software in a deliberate and controlled fashion across the organization. For more complex cloud apps your training needs to be highly tailored to specific use cases. Encourage good habits and reward power users with tips and advanced training.

* Gauge adoption. Once the product(s) have been rolled out take the organization’s pulse and measure total adoption. If there are units or departments with issues, focus on special training to bring them into the fold and ensure uniformity.

There are many new end-user cloud productivity applications gaining converts and boosting productivity across the world, including Dropbox, Slack, Hipchat, Google Apps and Office 365, to name but a few. In fact, your company probably already has a population using some of these applications, whether on work or personal accounts. There is a reason your users have these apps, and like them -- they are all class leading in what they do.

Pushing back against these upstarts only provides a temporary finger in the dike, ensuring people will figure out a way to use the applications they want to use – but in secret. After all, IT is not there to be punitive, it's there to enable users with awesome applications while keeping them secure.

Above all, you shouldn't delay the decision to implement new software out of fear. Users today have a much higher tolerance for change, and when it's really bad they're not even afraid to start asking directly for it, particularly when they understand how the new software will make them better at their jobs, save time and reduce menial tasks.
insider cloud

Thinkstock
Done the right way—with ample communication and empowering the very people who will be using it—migrating to new cloud apps will fundamentally change the way your business operates. It will even help you secure your position in the company as the hero and set your organization up for the coming decade or two. There’s no question that change is difficult. But champions exist in your organization right now, all you need to do is find them.

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com

Fujitsu brainstorm room lets you write

Fujitsu staffers demonstrate a digital brainstorming system, sending projected sticky notes from the table to the wall in the background. Credit: IDG News Service, Tokyo

If you take the concept of the paperless office seriously, Fujitsu has a meeting room just for you.

The electronics manufacturer is showing off a user interface (UI) designed for brainstorming. It features digital writing surfaces and digital sticky notes that can be linked to information on smartphones as well as projectors for the walls and tables.

Designed to go beyond electronic whiteboards and large tablets for meetings, the system is supposed to allow the seamless sharing of mobile device data over large projection surfaces, as well as the creation and sharing of new data. The company envisions companies, schools, banks and product showrooms using it in the future.

The UI differs from similar attempts to improve on paper-based brainstorming in its degree of complexity. At a workshop space in Tokyo, a table and nearby wall were outfitted with overhead projectors, cameras, a Kinect motion sensing system, infrared light pens, Wi-Fi linking participants' mobile devices and a server running the UI software.

Fujitsu staffers sat down at the table and shook their smartphones to activate an app that would send their phone data to the UI. Their phone screens were projected in large format on the table and various menu options were selected with the pens.

The staffers wrote in Japanese on projected windows on the table, and could select a feature that converted their handwriting into text. The words were automatically transferred to digital sticky notes, which were then "thrown" to the wall by dragging the pen across the table.

At the wall, another staffer arranged the notes on a projected graph. The wall also served as a digital writing space for notes, which could be sent between users and transferred to their phones.

Illustrated prompt cards with idea-stimulating subjects such as "office robots" were also projected on the wall, and could be thrown to the table and back.

Meanwhile, the staffer at the wall was surrounded by colored dots projected onto the floor, showing how his position could be tracked using the cameras, Kinect and inertial sensors in smartphones. The tracking allows for smart device information to be displayed easily on the wall.

The unique feature of this system is that on-site equipment and smart devices can be immediately linked, and the place itself is becomes a user interface where device information can be freely expanded, said Naoyuki Sawasaki, a project director at Fujitsu's Ubiquitous Systems Laboratory.

Fujitsu is also considering improving the system so that remote users can also participate in such brainstorming sessions. That would likely make them even more complex and prone to glitches, but the company hopes to commercialize the UI after a field test from August through next March.

---

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com

Windows 10's first update is already in the works

After surviving a slightly bumpy release, Microsoft is already preparing the first update for Windows 10.

Windows 10 is just hitting desktops and Microsoft is already working on its first update to the OS, which may be released as early as August. This may be out of character with its past, but it fits into Microsoft's new strategy of faster releases and updates to the OS.

The Verge reports that the first such update is referred to internally as "Service Release 1" (SR1). It will be a maintenance update, focused on fixing the current release rather than adding new features. There are some features promised for Windows 10, such as support for Chrome extensions in the new Edge browser, that did not ship with the final code.

There is also a second, much larger update planned for October that will also deal with stability issues and bugs, but which will also include new features. Formerly known as "Redstone" and now called "Threshold Wave 2," it will bring an updated Skype experience and the extensions in the Edge browser.

The launch was largely smooth for Microsoft, but not quite optimal. For starters, once again Microsoft and Nvidia can't seem to get along. If you remember the Vista debacle, many of the crashes were attributed to bad Nvidia drivers.

Well, history is repeating itself. Windows 10's auto update service is reportedly conflicting with the Nvidia GeForce Experience, which alerts GeForce users of new drivers. Early adopters are having problems, especially with multi-monitor setups, and in some cases are experiencing crashes when Windows 10 automatically updates its graphics card drivers.

The reason, according to Forbes, is that the latest driver version from Windows Update isn't very stable, yet Windows 10 automatically installs it anyway. The GeForce Experience app tries to download a newer, stable driver, but Windows Update blocks it. Needless to say, Nvidia users are upset. As I run a Nvidia card, this is a showstopper for me.

Also, Windows 10 began sneaking its way onto desktops in the days before the launch. The Verge noted that install files began downloading onto Insiders' PCs in the days before the launch. A few important files were missing so these users could not do the install ahead of schedule.

You can easily spot them. Turn on hidden files and folders in Windows and look for C:/$windows.~BT. I found the folder on my personal PC, weighing in at 4.04GB. That's a pretty big download to sneak past me, but I leave my PC on all the time so it could be done pretty easily at night time.

At 4GB, that means the majority of the OS is on your PC so you don't have to sit through a download if you install it during prime time. That's the good news. The bad news is a black eye on Microsoft's part; it got busted for using customers' bandwidth for distributing the content without permission.

Pushing out a 4GB download to end users is going to require a lot of bandwidth. Neowin says Microsoft acquired as much as 40Tbps with all of the major content delivery networks (CDNs) to push Windows 10 down to end users.

Microsoft used something called Windows Update Delivery Optimization, which works similarly to a torrent. Once the files are on your machine, you then become a seeder for other PCs, starting with your local network.

The problem is that no one told the end users or gave them the option to opt out. This is an appropriation of people's resources without permission and people will not like it, although I would expect that the early adopters (IDC puts first day installs at 14 million) are probably power users who were not significantly impacted. But I expect somewhere along the line a person with a 1.5Gbit broadband and heavily metered service will pop up eventually.

It would be foolish to expect a flawless release. They always have problems. But Microsoft is also much more responsive than in the past. Witness the tone deafness over the hate of Windows 8's new interface and MIA Start button. But they will get this right in due time.

---

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com

Deep-dive review: Windows 10 -- worth the wait

Deep-dive review: Windows 10 -- worth the wait

Microsoft makes up for Windows 8 by delivering a truly integrated operating system.

Finally, an operating system from Microsoft you can love.
With Windows 10, Microsoft undoes the damage wrought by Windows 8. This is a cleanly designed operating system that works equally well on traditional computers and tablets, brings back the much-mourned Start menu and introduces useful features such as the Cortana digital assistant and new Edge browser.

I've been following the progress of Windows 10 ever since the first technical preview last year, and wrote about the second technical preview back in January 2015. I lived with, tested and reviewed its major iterations. I've seen rough edges smoothed, new features introduced and some features dropped.
ALSO ON NETWORK WORLD: What if Windows went open source tomorrow?

This shipping version (which will be officially available on July 29) is much improved over the last time I reviewed it in late May. Since then, the overall interface and Start menu has been tweaked, Edge has been completed and bugs have been squashed. It's now a more complete and refined operating system. (Note: A separate version for smaller mobile devices is expected to be released in the fall.)

That's not to say that all is perfect. In this review, I'll give an in-depth look at the new operating system, including its best and worst features. Read on for the complete rundown.

Starting with the Start menu
In Windows 10, everything starts with the new Start menu. Tap the Windows key to launch it; tap it again to make it disappear. The Start menu is command central for the entire operating system, displaying live tiles with changing information from Windows 10 apps, letting you launch all your apps, giving you access to your settings and to File Explorer, and letting you shut down and restart Windows.

And note -- there's been yet another name change. Microsoft has a new designation for the touch-screen apps once called Metro and then called Modern: They are now simply Windows apps. Applications written for use with a keyboard are called desktop apps.



Windows 10 start menu
In Windows 10, everything starts with the new Start menu.

If you use Windows 10 on a non-touch desktop or laptop PC, you thankfully never need to see the touch-oriented tablet mode (what Microsoft called the Start screen in Windows 8) -- you boot right into the desktop. The Start menu and desktop is all you need and all you get. For me, this alone makes the new operating system a winner.

The left side of the Start menu has links to your most used programs, recently added programs, File Explorer, Settings and Power, along with a link that leads to a list of all the apps on your computer. At the top left of the menu is an icon that shows you which user account you're currently using and takes you to a menu that lets you switch accounts, log out of your account or go to the Lock screen.

Eye-candy fans (such as me) will appreciate that the Start menu is transparent. It's also customizable. You can change the menu's height (but not its width) by pulling down the double-headed arrow that appears at the top when you move your cursor over it and dragging it to make it the menu taller or shorter. Oddly enough, a double-headed arrow appears when you put your cursor on the right side of the menu, implying you can change its width, but I wasn't able to drag the arrow to do that.

There's a lot more you can do to customize the Start menu. You can group related applications and then name them -- for example, you might want to put the Groove Music, Movies & TV and Xbox apps into a group that you call Entertainment. You can also pin and unpin apps to and from the Start menu and Taskbar, and resize the tiles by right clicking on them. Depending on the app's capabilities, you might also be able to turn a live tile off so that it's static instead of displaying changing information. (I found this a surprisingly useful feature. With too many tiles flashing at me, I felt at times as if I was in a Vegas casino.)

Right-clicking also lets you uninstall apps. Some Microsoft apps, though, can't be uninstalled, including the Movies & TV, Calendar and Groove Music apps. They can, however, be unpinned from the Start menu; if you want to run them later, you can type their name into Cortana.

The upshot? The Windows 10 Start menu is more than just a redone version of its Windows 7 predecessor. With it, you run both Windows 10 apps and desktop apps, which goes a long way towards making Windows 10 feel like a truly integrated operating system.

Continuum and tablet mode
Also helping to unify the operating system is a new feature called Continuum, which lets Windows 10 perform a shape-shifting trick by detecting the type of machine you're running, and then changing its interface to the one suited for the device. It's particularly useful for two-in-one devices such as the Microsoft Surface Pro, which works as a tablet or laptop, depending upon whether you have a keyboard attached.

And the OS will change dynamically. If you're using the tablet with a keyboard attached, you see the desktop-based interface, complete with Start menu. Detach the keyboard and you get a pop-up notification that asks if you want to switch to tablet mode. If you don't want to be bothered by the notification again, you can select "Remember my response and don't ask again." From then on, you'll switch automatically from desktop to tablet mode and back again.


Windows 10 continuum
A new feature called Continuum lets Windows 10 detect the type of machine you're running and switch the interface to suit the device.

Continuum worked for me without a hitch, switching every time I unplugged a keyboard from my Surface tablet, or plugged the keyboard back in.

Tablet mode offers much the same Start screen interface that many Windows 8 users, including me, have come to hate: Big tiles representing the apps you want to run. It's ideal for tablets, though. And although most of the changes Microsoft has made in Windows 10 have to do with the desktop, the company has also made some improvements to the tablet interface.

Gone is Windows 8's kludgy Charms bar with links for sharing, settings, devices, moving to the Start screen and searching. Of all those links, the only truly useful one was for searching -- and in Windows 10, you search in tablet mode by tapping the Cortana search button at the bottom left of the screen. (For more about Cortana, head to the next section of this article.)

I won't miss the Charms bar. I think that few people will.

Windows 10 tablet mode
Tablet mode offers much the same Start screen interface that came with Windows 8, although with improvements.

There have been other changes as well. There's now what some people call a "hamburger menu" at the top left of the screen -- three horizontal stacked lines. In a way, it's a mini-Start menu for tablets: Tap it and you get a menu that lists your most-used and most recently added apps; it also contains links to File Explorer, Settings, the Power button and all your apps.

I'm a big fan. There's no longer any need to scroll and hunt through the Start screen for apps I frequently run. Instead, they're easily available from the menu. And you can run desktop apps from this menu, not just Windows apps. It's one more way in which Windows 10 now works as a unified operating system.


Windows 10 all apps
A "mini-Start menu" for tablets lists your most-used apps, your most recently added apps and links to useful system tools.

At the bottom left of the Start screen there's another menu icon that looks like a bulleted list. Tap it to see a list of all of your apps, including desktop apps and built-in Windows apps such as Settings.

Also new is that the Taskbar runs at the bottom of the screen in tablet mode -- the same Taskbar that is on the desktop. Although I risk sounding like a broken record, it's one more way that Windows 10 feels like a single interface spanning two modes, rather than two operating systems uneasily joined together.

Cortana
I'm not much of a fan of iPhone's Siri digital assistant or Google's Google Now -- I tried them briefly and found them only moderately helpful. They sometimes felt more like parlor tricks than practical features I could use throughout the day. So I didn't think I'd be happy with Cortana.

I was wrong. Cortana is more than a mildly useful appendage to Windows 10. It's embedded deeply into the operating system. The more you use it, the more useful it becomes, because it learns about you over time. Not that it's perfect, because it makes errors along the way and there are some important things it can't do.


Windows 10 cortana
The Cortana digital assistant is present primarily as a search bar under the Start menu.

Cortana is present primarily as a search bar under the Start menu; you can also launch it by tapping its tile on the Start menu. (In tablet mode, it's accessible from an icon on the Taskbar). You wake it up by saying "Hey Cortana" or "Hi Cortana." You can then ask it to do something, such as find a file, launch a program or find information. If you prefer typing to talking, type your request into the search bar.

What you'll see next depends upon your request. Cortana, which is based on Bing's search engine, looks through your files, your Microsoft OneDrive cloud storage account, your videos and music, the apps on your PC, your settings, your email and the Web. The actions it takes or the way it shows your search results varies according to what you've asked for.

For example, when I said, "Show me my photos from Italy," Cortana quickly found them on both my PC and on OneDrive -- and displayed them. At the top of the results, I could click a link to search for photos of Italy on the Web.

When I asked, "What's the weather?" it knew my location and told me it was 74 degrees and sunny, and also displayed the weather forecast. And when I said, "Add an appointment on Sunday," it asked me what time the appointment was scheduled to start, and from there I was able to quickly add an appointment to my calendar.


Windows 10 Cortana photos
The search results after a request to Cortana to see photos from a trip to Italy.
There are limits to Cortana's capabilities, though. I use Gmail as my primary email account, and Cortana wasn't able to reach into it to search through messages. In fact, it wouldn't even launch Gmail for me. Instead, it did a Bing search for Gmail and showed me a page of search results on the Web. If Cortana is going to become a truly useful digital assistant, Microsoft will have to figure out a way for Cortana to interact with all the major Web-based apps.

I will say this for Cortana, though -- it's a fast learner. When I said "Launch Google Chrome," it asked whether I wanted to launch Google Chrome or Chrome App Launcher. I told it to launch Google Chrome. Every time after that, when I made that same request, it launched Google Chrome without asking for clarification.

When Cortana runs, it displays a menu made up of a group of four icons stacked underneath a "hamburger" menu on the left side of the screen, which are both somewhat useful and somewhat confusing. The top one, Home, simply navigates you to the main Cortana interface. Beneath it, the strangely-named Notebook icon leads you to a tool to change Cortana's settings -- such as whether you want to get recommendations about places to eat or events to attend; what your home, work and other "favorite locations" are; how to change the name Cortana uses for you; and so on.

Beneath Notebook, the Reminders icon does exactly what it says -- lets you set reminders, which can be triggered by a time or a location you visit. And the bottommost icon, Feedback, lets you provide feedback about Cortana.

Cortana is tied to your Microsoft ID, so it has the same information about you on all the Windows devices you use, including smartphones.

Overall, Cortana is still a work in progress. It does an excellent job of reaching into your PC; searching the Web; knowing your location, likes and dislikes; and delivering you information based on that. But until it can also reach into Web-based apps like Gmail, Cortana can never be a complete digital assistant.

Gaining an Edge
Another big addition to Windows is the new Edge browser, which replaces the justifiably maligned Internet Explorer. Edge is Windows 10's default browser and with it, Microsoft hopes to eventually bid farewell to IE.

Microsoft can't entirely get rid of Internet Explorer yet, though, especially because enterprises have built apps based on it. So you'll still find it in Windows 10. But unless you have to run it for compatibility reasons, don't -- because Edge is a considerable improvement.

With Edge, Microsoft focused on creating a speedy browser -- and the work has paid off. I found that it displayed Web pages extremely quickly, much faster than Internet Explorer, and equal to or possibly faster than Chrome.

To check my impression, I ran three browser speed tests using Edge, Internet Explorer and Chrome. I ran each test three times for each browser and averaged the results. Edge scored faster than Internet Explorer in all three tests and faster than Chrome in the SunSpider and Kraken tests, while losing to Chrome in the Octane test.
Windows 10 Edge browser: Test results

But even though Edge is speedy, you may encounter rendering problems with some Web pages. It won't run Google Inbox, for example. And when I ran the HTML5 test, which tests for compatibility with HTML5 standards, it lagged behind Chrome, scoring 402 out of a possible 555 points, compared to 526 for Chrome. Internet Explorer did even worse than Edge, with a score of 348.

Edge takes much of its inspiration from Chrome, dispensing with as many menus and extraneous design elements as possible. For example, it has jettisoned Internet Explorer's oversized back and forward buttons, so that the content of a Web page stands out more. Edge will also support add-ins, but that feature is not yet available, and will be included at some time later.


Windows 10 edge
The Edge browser will eventually replace Internet Explorer.

The browser's basics are straightforward -- there are several icons to the right of the Address Bar that offer access to a variety of features.

To begin with, you click on a star to add a favorite. A menu icon just to the star's right lets you to browse favorites, view downloaded files, see your history list and use the browser's reading list feature (more on that in a bit).

Another icon lets you share a URL via Mail, Twitter, OneNote and the reading list. And over on the far right there are three small dots that, when clicked, bring up other features such as zooming, launching a new window, printing, pinning the current site to the Start screen, opening a new "InPrivate" window for anonymous browsing, and launching the current page in Internet Explorer.

There is an icon to the left of the star that resembles a book and activates Edge's Reading View, which is much like a similar Safari feature: It strips out everything extraneous to a page's content, including ads, navigation, sidebars and anything else that diverts attention from the content. You read the text in a scrollable window, with graphics included. The icon will be grayed out if you're on a page that Reading View can't handle, such as a page that is primarily used for navigation.

As for the reading list, it's a list of your Reading View favorites. So when you're in Reading View, click the star icon for adding favorites and the current page gets added to your reading list.

Edge also offers the ability to annotate and share Web pages. Click the annotation icon (to the right of the menu icon -- it looks like a pencil and paper) and you'll be able to mark up a Web page using highlighters and note-creation tools, save the annotated page and share it as a .jpg graphics file via email, OneNote or Twitter. You can also save the annotations to your PC via Microsoft OneNote. I personally found that feature less than useful; others may differ.


Widnows 10 Edge markup
Edge includes the ability to annotate Web pages.

On the other hand, one of Edge's most useful features is the way in which it takes advantage of Cortana, which inconspicuously appears at the top of pages for which Cortana can offer help. For example, when I went to the Web page of one of my favorite restaurants, the Cortana icon appeared to the right of the Address Bar with the message, "I've got directions, hours, and more." When I clicked it, a sidebar appeared on the right-hand side of the page with a map, address, phone number, description of the restaurant and reviews. There were also links for getting directions, looking at the menu and calling the restaurant.

For me, this is the biggest edge that Edge has over competing browsers. It doesn't just display specific Web pages, but it can also deliver useful information not found on that page.
Windows 10 cortana helps edge

Edge doesn't just display specific Web pages, but can deliver additional useful information not found on the page.


My verdict on Edge? Given its speed, Reading View, Cortana integration, simple design and eventual ability to use add-ins, it's a winner. For now, it may not render all Web pages correctly, but I expect that will be fixed eventually. When that happens, I may abandon Chrome for it.

Windows Apps on the desktop
One reason Windows 8.1 felt like two separate operating systems was the dramatically different behavior of the apps that were written for the touch interface (now called Windows apps, remember?) and those written for the non-touch desktop. Desktop apps could be run in resizable windows, but Windows apps ran either full-screen, "snapped" next to another Windows app (but not a desktop app), or minimized. So you couldn't have multiple Windows apps running in separate windows on the desktop alongside desktop apps.

That changes in Windows 10. Windows apps can now be resized, minimized and closed in the same familiar way as desktop apps. You can drag the edges of a Windows app to resize it and use the familiar desktop menu on the upper right for minimizing, maximizing and closing the app.



Windows 10 apps
The apps in the Windows touch interface can now be resized the same way that desktop apps can.
Windows apps have been redesigned in another way as well. On the left-hand side of the screen is a series of icons for accessing different features in an app. These icons change depending on the app. For example, the Weather app has icons for news, maps, historical weather and so on. And in the news app there are icons for local news and videos, and for customizing your news interests.

Another improvement: Windows apps in version 8 were low-powered and not particularly useful -- more like simple tablet apps than fully featured desktop apps. In Windows 10, that changes. Some are quite good. You may even find yourself wanting to run them.

Three apps in particular have been powered up: Maps, Mail and Calendar. Mail has been notably improved with a new interface and new features. Unlike the Mail app in Windows 8, it supports POP-based mail. It's also much simpler to manage your mail in it. When reading an email, icons across the top let you reply, forward, delete, archive and flag mail. You can click the menu at the upper right to get at more features, including moving mail, marking it as read, printing and zooming.

Text-formatting features are also better than in the Windows 8 version. When you compose mail, a large toolbar appears at the top of the screen, which lets you change text formatting; undo and redo text changes; insert tables, pictures and links; and attach files. You can also spell check your mail and change its language.


Windows 10 mail

The Mail app's text formatting features have been greatly improved.

Tablet users will be pleased to know that gestures work in the Mail app. Swipe an email to the right to archive it and swipe again from the right to unarchive it. Swipe to the left to flag a message.

The Calendar app is also much improved. I found the Windows 8 version so cluttered and confused-looking it felt unusable. If you wanted to do something simple like change the view (Day, Work Week or Month) it wasn't clear at first how to do it. You had to call up a menu, and then make your choice.

In the Windows 10 version, the Day, Work Week, Week, Month and Today views are all accessible by clicking an icon at the top of the page. I also appreciate that even when looking at a day's calendar, the month view is available on the right side of the screen.


Windows 10 calendar
The new Calendar apps has a much cleaner interface than the previous Windows 8 version.

As with Mail, improvements are more than skin deep. Notably, unlike in the Windows 8.1 version, the new Calendar supports Google Calendar. Just click Setting / Accounts / Add Account, click Google and follow the instructions on-screen. You can add an iCloud calendar in the same way.

Maps is also improved. Travelers who use tablets or laptops will appreciate that you can download maps and use them when you're not connected to the Internet. This is especially useful if you're travelling overseas and want to keep down your data use, or if you know you're going to be somewhere beyond the reach of an Internet connection.



Windows 10 maps
The app is much better designed than previously. Icons down the left let you search for a location or for places such as hotels, restaurants and coffee shops; add a location to a favorites list; get directions for driving, walking or for public transportation; change your settings; and visit what Microsoft calls 3D cities. Go to one of these 3D cities and you'll see a view of it similar to Google Earth. I didn't find them particularly useful, but you can't beat the feature if you want to virtually visit Aix en Provence, Paris or Barcelona. (I passed on Brownsville, Tex. and Abington, Penn.)

On the right side of the Maps app you'll find buttons for zooming in and out, tilting the map, changing its orientation and adding overlays for traffic and other tools.

One piece of big news is that the app now has a Street View-like feature called Streetside, which works much like the Bing Maps Streetside feature. With the addition of Streetside, the Maps app could give Google Maps a run for its money. It has much the same features and integrates well with Cortana. For example, if I tell Cortana, "Give me directions to Ithaca, New York," the Map app launches, complete with directions. If I ask Cortana to see a map of a city, Maps launches to it.
One Settings app to rule them all

In Windows 8.1, if you wanted to change your settings, you had to go on a treasure hunt. Some settings were in the Windows Settings app, which was accessible via the Charms bar, while others were in Control Panel. It was difficult to remember where each setting was located.

In Windows 10, you'll find almost all settings in the Settings app, accessible from the bottom of the Start menu. It's cleanly and logically organized, with nine sections: System, Devices, Network & Internet, Personalization, Accounts, Time & Language, Ease of Access, Privacy and Update & Security. Click on the icon for any section, drill down, and you'll easily navigate to what you need. There's also a search bar so that you can forgo browsing and search for a specific setting instead.


People who do a great deal of customization and tinkering (including me) won't find everything they need in Settings. If you want to assign your PC a static IP address, have your system display files that are normally hidden, display file extensions for common files or access a host of other techie settings, you'll have to go to the old standby, Control Panel. On the other hand, having settings that you don't use much relegated to the Control Panel makes sense, because it makes the main Settings app easier to navigate.
Hello, Action Center

New in Windows 10 is the Action Center, which is accessible via an icon on the right side of the Taskbar. The Action Center performs two functions: It displays notifications for such things as new emails and security and maintenance messages, and it gives you access to a handful of common settings for such tasks as connecting to Wi-Fi networks, turning Bluetooth on and off, and changing brightness settings. The notifications for new email, security alerts and others first appear on their own on the lower right of the desktop and disappear after a few seconds. But they live on in the Action Center, so that you can attend to them there when you want.

For example, if you tap an email notification, the email opens in the Mail app. Tap a security notification, and you'll be taken to the appropriate tool. When I received a notification that I could speed up my PC because three unnecessary programs were launching on startup, I was sent to the Task Manager, which let me stop those programs from running.


Windows 10 action center
The Action Center displays notifications and offers access to commonly-used settings.

At the bottom of the Action Center are icons for making quick changes to common Windows settings. You can turn Bluetooth on and off, change your screen's brightness, and switch between tablet mode and non-tablet mode, among other settings.

Other changes
There have been a lot of other lesser changes in Windows 10. The Taskbar now runs on the Start screen when you're in tablet mode, which helps to unify the tablet and non-tablet interfaces. It's now black, which makes the icons on it stand out more clearly.

File Explorer has seen changes as well. Its icons are more colorful and brighter. You can pin and unpin folders to it on the Start menu. You also get to OneDrive from inside File Explorer; it appears as a folder with subfolders underneath it. And you can share files -- click a file and select Share from the top menu and you get a variety of ways for sharing, including via email and Twitter. You can compress a file and burn it to disc from the same menu.

The Windows Store has also gotten a makeover. The design is simpler, cleaner, even elegant. More important than that, though, is that you can now download and install desktop apps from it, something not previously possible. Microsoft is also making a push to get more apps into the store by introducing what it calls Universal apps that will be able to run on any Windows device, including desktops, laptops, tablets and phones.

Also new is Task View and the ability to create multiple desktops. Tap the small icon just to the right of the Cortana search bar and you'll see all of your currently running apps and applications as thumbnails on the desktop. Click the X on any of the thumbnails to close it.

More importantly, though, you can create multiple desktops, each with different apps and applications running on them. To do that, when you're in Task View, you click New desktop to create a second desktop; you can then run apps and applications inside it. In fact, you can create several desktops; to switch among them, click the Task View icon, and then click the desktop you want to switch to.


Windows 10 task view running
Task View shows all of your currently running apps.

If you've got the proper hardware, Windows 10 supports a biometric security feature that Microsoft calls Windows Hello, letting you log into Windows via a fingerprint scan, face scan or iris scan.

Not everything about Windows 10 is an improvement over Windows 8, though. Whether you like it or not, Windows 10 updates are always automatically installed. In Windows 8 you could pick and choose which updates to install. Not so with Windows 10. What Microsoft sends via Windows Updates gets installed. Case closed.
The bottom line

It's this simple: Windows 10 is a dramatic improvement over Windows 8. It works as single, unified operating system rather than a Rube Goldberg kludge of two operating systems poorly bolted together. It changes its interface depending on whether you're on a tablet or a traditional PC, and runs well on both.

Cortana, despite some shortcomings, is a very worthwhile addition, and the Edge browser gives Chrome a run for its money. Built-in apps are greatly improved.

Despite some bugs and annoyances (like being forced to accept Windows updates), it will be worthwhile to upgrade from Windows 8.1 before July 29, 2016, when Microsoft's one-year free upgrade offer runs out. Windows 7 users should consider upgrading as well, thanks to Cortana, Edge and the advent of useful Windows apps. (That said, you do have that full year to upgrade, and there are compelling reasons to wait a little while.)

As for me, I'm upgrading every Windows device I have to it.

---

Best Microsoft MCTS Certification, Microsoft MCITP Training at certkingdom.com