KeyStone OnDemand increases office productivity by providing training videos, articles, and courses for virtually all the Microsoft and IT applications used by your organization, in an ondemand format. Now workers can get the training and answers they need, while the Helpdesk can focus on more important business goals.

Despite the release of Visual Studio 2008 earlier this year, the Visual Studio 2010 Beta was made available last week and should ship in final form by the end of the year.

According to Scot Guthrie, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of the .NET Developer division, Visual Studio 2010 (built using Windows Presentation Foundation), has a flashier interface, multi-monitor support, and ‘richer’ code editing and visualization. Other additions include multi-touch and Deep Zoom support, dynamic language runtime support, and customization of the widgets on applications – including use of the Ribbon User Interface from Office 2007.

Visual Studio 2010 and the 4.0 release of Microsoft’s .NET Framework also include programming modules for parallel programming and a new feature called concurrency, which will allow native C++ applications to execute code efficiently execute code in this model.

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I thought this was interesting….

According to a recent study, one in four workers take their laptops to bed and work on them before they go to sleep, most for 6 hours or more a week. That’s some dedication…

While I’m not planning to rush home and set up office in bed tonight, (I get in enough after-hours work from my couch, thank you very much!) I’m reminded how much our culture continues to become reliant on the web and on-demand technology.

Whether you are spending your weekend catching up on projects at a cabin, or checking your email before bed, it’s nice to know that you can get the technology you need, where and when you need it.

This is one of the fundamental reasons we developed the KeyStone OnDemand service. Our service provides 24×7 365-day access to your users, including training with subject and keyword search, full text articles, helpdesk support integration, and email notification.

Sign up for a free webcast and explore how we can help make your life more mobile.

Kurt Mackie, news editor for 1105 Media Inc., laid out the Windows Timeline as presented by Windows Business Senior VP, Bill Veghte, earlier this month.

Although expectedly vague on actual dates, Veghte confirmed that Microsoft expects to release Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 during the 2009 holidays.

Other product milestones included the current status of Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 (also known as Kilimanjaro) which is still in technical preview, and Microsoft Office 2010. Office 2010 is scheduled for a technical preview in July, but only to a select audience including Tech-Ed attendees. Part of the new 2010 product line, Exchange Server 2010 has already been released to public beta.

Will Microsoft be able to overcome the perceived disaster of Vista? Thus far, it seems they are taking the right steps – providing more visibility to the public and taking more time to test the product prior to release.

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Filtering your list with multiple criteria really isn’t a whole lot different from using single criteria.
Here’s what you need to remember:

- To create an AND criteria, put your criteria on the SAME row

- To create an OR criteria, put your criteria on SEPARATE rows

Using the Advanced Filter with Multiple Criteria
1. Create your criteria field in an area well to the right of or below your existing list
2. Click anywhere inside your list
3. Click the Advanced command in the Sort & Filter group on the Data tab
4. Choose to Filter the list, in-place or Copy to another location
5. Verify the List range
6. Enter the Criteria range
7. If you are copying the data to another location, enter the starting cell of the copied list location
8. Click OK

Clearing Filter Criteria
1. Click anywhere inside a filtered list
2. Click the Clear command in the Sort & Filter group on the Data tab

Turning Off the Advanced Filter
1. Click anywhere inside a filtered list
2. Click the Filter command in the Sort & Filter group on the Data tab

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Last week, we checked out the new Office 2010 site and signed up to be a charter member of the Technical Preview audience. Since Microsoft has released precious few details on what we can expect the next version of Office to look like, we can’t wait to see it!

Of course, we don’t know if we’re one of the lucky ones, yet. According to Microsoft, the Technical Preview is a “limited, invitation only program which will provide you with the opportunity to experience early, pre-release versions of Office 2010 which will include the following applications: Word 2010, Excel 2010, Outlook 2010, PowerPoint 2010, OneNote 2010, Access 2010, InfoPath 2010 and Publisher 2010.”

Microsoft, can you hear us? We’d love to be on that list!

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I saw an interesting article by eWeek this morning covering ten need-to-know things about Windows 7. Highlights below:

In order to address compatibility issues faced with Vista, Windows 7 will have an “XP Mode,” which is a virtual instance of the XP OS with SP3. However, this is only available on select versions, and requires hardware virtualization support.

Windows 7 will include increased access controls, full hard drive encryption, new remote access leveraging IPv6 and IPSec, and potential applications with Windows Server 2008 R2.

As with Vista, Windows 7 will have a variety of versions to choose from. Optional add-on tools and packs are available for a fee (as always). Some notable additions include a helpdesk recording tool and enterprise search capability.

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From what seems like a “can’t we all just get along” standpoint, Microsoft has added their “unified communications“ brand to it’s highly anticipated line of 2010 products including Exchange Server 2010 which is currently in beta and is anticipated with launch date late in 2009.

With precious little details being released on what will and will not change in Office 2010, we do know that Groove will become the new “SharePoint Workspace” and OneNote and SharePoint Workspace will be going into the ProPlus SKU. This is about all we’re getting from the Office 2010 blog.

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It stands to reason that if Windows 7 Release Candidate is available, exams will not be far behind.

Microsoft Learning has been running the beta for Exam 70-680 TS: Windows 7, Configuring since May 5th and wrapped up yesterday. Those who successfully completed the free beta earned the MCTS: Windows 7, Configuring certification.

It is rumored that two other Windows 7 exams in development are Exam 70-685, MCITP: Windows 7, Enterprise Desktop Support Technician, and Exam 70-686, MCITP: Windows 7, Desktop Administrator.

While it is doubtful that most companies will be jumping to Windows 7 in the upcoming year, Microsoft will ensure that exams are ready for those who do.

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At the end of April, Microsoft releases SP 2 for users of Microsoft Office 2007. A representative for Microsoft states that the new service pack will offer “…improved performance and stability of Outlook, better charting functionality in Excel, and more control over the appearance of SmartArt graphics.” But, that’s just on the user side. What will the IT professionals, those on the server side, notice? Microsoft says the IT pros can expect “enhancements to the security and performance of SharePoint Server 2007, including support for read-only content databases, improvements to forms-based authentication, and an STSADM command-line utility that enables administrators to scan sites that use the variations feature for errors. SharePoint Server will also feature better support for newer versions of the Firefox browser.”

Click here to read the full related article on Microsoft’s site.

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Posted just a few days ago on their official Twitter account, the Office 2010 team announced that Groove will be renamed in the new version of SharePoint as “SharePoint Workspace Manager.” The rename is probably a good move and just one of many that seem to be centered around the much anticipated release of SharePoint 2010.

Word from those “in the know“ who are following what may (or may not) be a part of the new Office products, is that SharePoint 2010 will probably see the biggest updates when compared to programs like Word and Excel.

But, for now, the only official word from Microsoft on the Office 2010 release date comes in the form of an official movie trailer that offers lots of hype and little information.

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The buz at Microsoft TechEd 2009 this week is that Microsoft will be rolling out Office 2010 (formerly Office 14) to a large audience of testers in July of this year.

The first Community Technology Preview (CTP) test build, originally promised by “third quarter” will be available to thousands of users and will include Office 2010 and SharePoint Server 2010 products as well as the web-based Office Web Applications for several Office 2010 apps. However, it is not clear when the promised Beta will be available to the public, or how many betas are planned.

During his briefing with Wall Street analysts, Steve Ballmer stated, ““The next big innovation milestone is Office 14, our next Office release… which will not be this year.” .

It seems that CTP aside, Office 2010 is still a distant promise.

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For those of you on Twitter we wanted to let you know we will be conducting some informal polls on twitter to get to know our customers and followers a little better. The polls will cover a wide range of topics. It should be fun, I mean look at this post’s title, it has to be fun (its just fun to say)! Anyway you can find us on twitter at @KeyStoneLearn where we will keep you updated on the latest KeyStone and IT industry news. As well some periodic deals on free stuff we’re offering. See you on Twitter!


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After months of rumors and whispers, Microsoft announced Monday that they will release the new version of the Windows 7 operating system in the fourth quarter of 2009.
With the original release predicted 3 years after the release of Windows Vista, Microsoft should be a few months ahead of schedule, but there is still speculation over whether Windows 7 will see more delays.

According to InformationWeek, Acer is rumored to start selling laptops running Windows 7 by October 23rd. However, also covered in that article, Bill Veghte, senior VP of Microsoft’s Windows Business unit, stated “It’s important to note that quality is key and we’re taking a milestone-by-milestone approach… We will not ship Windows 7 until it meets the quality bar we demand for our customers.”

If one thing is sure, it’s that Windows 7’s release and the resulting success or failure of this long-anticipated OS will certainly have a large impact on the Microsoft community.

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According to independent research (completed by Vanson Bourne), legacy ‘enterprise search 1.0’ solutions are “woefully inadequate at meeting the sophisticated data needs of enterprises, which is seriously impacting productivity and profitability.” Apparently, the knowledge capture gap is prevalant because much of the company-specific knowledge doesn’t reside on a server, but rather in the heads of your employees.

So, how do you access this, as of yet, untapped information in a succinct knowledge transfer to make it not only accessible, but also searchable?

We may have the solution in KeyStone OnDemand. In addition to enabling users to quickly find desktop solutions and build skills that generate business results, KeyStone OnDemand offers the unique ability to create your own, custom content. Your staff can create, edit and assign searchable knowledgebase articles that can be easily added to end-users’ Quicklists. This is a great way to get this “tacit knowledge” out of your employees’ heads and into a company-wide searchable format.

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Since we find we answer this question about KeyStone OnDemand quite a bit, we figured we’d answer it right here on the blog for all to access.

Q. What are the minimum technical requirements for a user to view your training videos within KeyStone OnDemand?

A. Here are the full technical requirements: Browsers: Microsoft Internet Explorer 6+, Mozilla Firefox 1.5+ or Safari 2.0+; Resolution: 1024 × 768 or larger; Plug-ins: Adobe Flash Player 9.0.115+; Internet Connection: A broadband connection (150Kbps or faster) is recommended. You see, because KeyStone OnDemand is a hosted turnkey learning solution, there is no software or hardware to buy, install, maintain, or upgrade. KeyStone OnDemand allows your organization to immediately start learning, so product licensing includes everything you need, so you don’t need to worry about hidden IT, support and/or technology costs that can quickly add up to as much as ten times the original licensing fees.

You can check out all of our Frequently Asked Questions here.

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