When I read news about this new OS by Google being released and made available to download as an Image (.vmdk file), I couldn’t wait to try it out.

All I know about the Chromium OS is it’s supposed to start up very fast and allows us to gain access to our common applications such as email, web browsing, YouTube, google docs without much delay.

If you’re like.. wait a minute, I’ve heard of the Google Chrome browser but what is Chrome OS? Is it supposed to be an OS which replaces our Windows or Mac OSX?

Check out this video below if you’ve just heard of Google Chrome OS:

So now that the developer version is ready for us to try out, this is what I had to do in order to test the Google Chromium OS (Developer build):

1. Download the Chrome OS Image
2. Download and install Sun VirtualBox

Now with both VirtualBox installed and Chrome OS Image unzipped, it’s time to load the image into VirtualBox. If you have trouble getting this to work, check out TechCrunch’s guide on installing the Chrome OS.

I got  mine to work without much problem. Upon launching the image, this is what I got:

A standard login page! I entered my username and password, click Enter and it began to log me in.

So wait a minute! Does this mean that the Chromium OS require us to be connected to the Internet? Looks like it. Hehe.. this is cool. Stateless….

Once logged in, this is what I saw.

It looks like it’s a Google Chrome browser! Yippee… no desktop!

On the top left is a Chrome OS button, I think it’s a start menu.

On the top right is the time, battery indicator, wi-fi (on/off) capability and lastly the browser settings.

So looks like the task bar is being placed on top rather than at the bottom.

Clicking on the top left Chrome OS button, it shows a Google Account login page which required for my password again. Upon entering the detail, this is the screenshot:

Notice that it’s stated that the UI is under development and the designs are subject to change. But for now, I like what I’m seeing. Very simple and straight forward access to all our common web application. Even my mom knows what to do with it!

It looks like as more and more applications are being hosted on the cloud, the concept of this Operating System might just work for many.

If this OS allows us to install Virtual Machines to run Windows-based applications whenever necessary, I don’t see why I won’t be switching to this OS as the host OS, when it’s made available.

Most of my time are spent on emails and working on web-based application anyways. As long as the OS starts up quickly and doesn’t give me much problems with viruses or BSOD, it should work fine for me.

What do you think about this concept of Google’s Chromium OS? I’m definitely looking forward to its launch date!

The download file is about 684MB in size and after installation should take up about 3.5 GB of your hard disk space.

As I’m writing this post, I’m currently installing the Office 2010 Beta in a Virtual PC environment. The OS in the VPC is Windows 2008, so yea, I’m going to be testing the new Office Beta in a Windows 2008 environment. Hopefully it’s going to install well and run as smoothly as possible.

In today’s post I won’t mention my findings on the Office 2010 but rather just help spread the word about this download.

Somehow I feel more excited trying out Google Wave as compared to Office 2010. Maybe because Office is related to work while Google Wave is associated with fun and meeting new people.

I hope that with Office 2010, more of these capabilities are included:

• Web based office capabilities, just like what Google Docs has, so that we’re not just confined to working from one machine which has Office installed.
• Easier document co-authoring and editing, rather than having to send each other documents via email and merging the document.
• Backward compatible with previous versions of Office. Not everyone has the money to upgrade their Office everytime there is a new version.

Before I proceed any further, I will need to give the Office Beta a try before I have anything to write about. One that I’m particularly looking forward to try out is the Sharepoint Workspace. Hrrm… I wonder what does it do!

Will keep you posted on my findings after trying out the new Office.

Meanwhile, head on over to Microsoft’s site to download your copy of Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta today!

Of ya, have you seen the Office 2010: The Movie Trailer? Death of the Clippy… haha!

One of the key / heart for every organization which implements ITIL processes is the Configuration Management Database (CMDB).

When I was studying on ITIL, I always wonder what should go into a CMDB. Is it just a transactional database like the common MySQL or SQL Server databases?

Drilling in further about CMDB, I found out that the purpose of a CMDB is to store configuration items (CI) which acts as a structural unit in a CMDB.

Examples of configuration items (CI) include:

• Software applications
• People
• Network
• Documents
• Hardware devices

Basically anything related to IT which can be tagged with the following attributes can be considered a CI:

• Technical
• Ownership
• Relationship

Let’s take an example of a CI, say the database server. The database server can be considered a CI as we can identify its ownership, the relationship of the DB server with the other application servers as well as state its technical attributes such as MySQL or SQL Server.

In essence, the purpose of a CMDB is to store lots and lots of CIs and eventually be able to show its relationships for the analysis purposes.

In real life scenarios, IT Managers should refer to their CMDB prior to making an IT decision. For example, if an organization decides to remove their Exchange server and host their unified communications with Google, they can check through their CMDB. The CMDB might just reveal that the Exchange server has been tightly integrated with other critical applications within the organization.

In the past, I always had problems finding out how organizations can implement a CMDB to manage all their configuration items. Today, I stumbled on this site called EasyCMDB which provided me more insights as to how CMDBs work as a whole.

With EasyCMDB, you can record all your IT components and define the relationships between them easily.

One key feature of EasyCMDB is the Relationship Navigator which produces a diagram showing you the relationships to a CI.

From the screenshot above, you can see how the Relationship Navigator visualizes your CI relationships and even allows you to edit the CI record together with its relationship details.

Besides providing Configuration Management functionality, EasyCMDB included features from the other ITIL processes as well making it complete system which supports most ITIL processes. The additional features covers the following processes:

• Incident Management
• Problem Management
• Change Management
• Release Management
• and others

One feature which caught my attention was the change requests management, which allows users to submit request for changes. Before a change can be made, it must firstly be approved by the person in charge. Only then will the change be worked upon.

By implementing EasyCMDB, some customers have also benefited during their ISO 20000 audits as many of the processes and configuration items have already been recorded.

Check out EasyCMDB to find out more about the web-based ITSM application today.

These flower ornament pattern can be applied on websites, brochures, posters and even your business name card as it gives a clean and refreshing look.

There are two ways to apply these floral patterns.

1. Download Free Floral Ornaments Vector Pack (eps, ai, svg format)
2. Draw your very own flower ornament pattern using Livebrush.

Livebrush is a neat drawing and sketching application to help you create beautiful and stunning looking vectors. Livebrush is so simple to use, even non designers like me can use.

See these pieces of work that I’ve created using Livebrush.

The above three vector graphics were created in less than 5 minutes. All I had to do was select a style and to draw the shape, simply left click and move the mouse to draw the shapes / patterns however I wanted it to look like.

Livebrush can be installed on Windows, Mac and even on Linux but requires Adobe AIR to be installed as well.

The various styles in Livebrush allows you to create stunning looking art. The styles can even be further configured based on the following settings:

• Decorations
• Lines
• Behavior

In summary, I feel that Livebrush is a really simple to use Vector Graphics application that everyone should install on their machines. Whenever there’s a need to beautify a business document, or create a greeting card, Livebrush will help you do the trick.

Head on over to Livebrush.com today! Oh ya, don’t forget to check out the YouTube video on how Livebrush works below.

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

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

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

After some reading, I decided to go to a public wave, and to do that, all I had to do was type in with:public into the search box beside the New Wave button and Walla, a whole list of public waves (in orange below) are displayed for me to participate in.

In order to search more specifically for a particular public wave, simply type in with:public “KEYWORD”. I tried to search if there are any waves related to my university, Western Illinois University (WIU) and yes, there was one. I quickly participated in the wave just to see if there’s anyone that I know of.

Looks like Google Wave has some Facebook type social networking capabilities for us to find long-lost friends as well as to meet up with new people.

After playing around with it for a while, these are some of my comments about Google Wave:

• It’s really real-time collaboration as I get to see what others are typing. No need to click on send in order to send the message across. It’s definitely a lot more fun than using IM.
• The public waves feels like an IRC channel where people could meet, talk, video conference and even work on a document together.
• The playback functionality is really cool because I get to see the entire thread from when the wave began, who particapated and said what when.
• It’s really better than email because the messages are a lot more organized and grouped to a specific topic.

I believe when Google Wave launches in the future, organizations will utilize it a lot to:

• Organize online meetings.
• Co author and edit a business document as a team.
• Allow employees to work outside the office environment.
• Communicate with customers and suppliers more effectively.
• Engage new prospective customers while keeping in touch with existing clients.

These are some of my thoughts and comments after trying out Google Wave for just a day. There’s still much for me to learn and explore. Want to do it together?

I’ve got 7 more Google Wave nominations / invites to give out. Whoever is interested, just write a simple comment below like what’s the one thing you want like to try out with Google Wave. The first seven who comment will get a nomination from me.

Please note that even after I have nominated you, the invites may not be sent out immediately. It could take a day or two to reach your Inbox as it depends on Google to send out.

Hope to start waving with you soon!

For organizations withou ISA Server, this web monitoring software won’t work.

Today, I received an email about GFI releasing a new version of the software called, GFI WebMonitor 2009.

The best part about this new version, it’s no longer dependant on ISA Server. Yeap! Now everyone can use GFI WebMonitor even if they do not have ISA Server installed and thus can be installed on most Microsoft  Windows Server / Workstation OSes.

The new version, GFI WebMonitor 2009 which is currently already available is a

• Web security
• Web monitoring
• Internet access control solution

By utilizing GFI WebMonitor 2009, employee productivity can be increased and administrators are given more control over what employees are browsing and downloading in real-time.

With GFI WebMonitor 2009, you can:

• Manage employee’s web browsing thus increasing productivity at work
• Employees who are surfing on non work related sites such as adult sites, online gaming, social networking, personal emailing can be monitor, thus reducing cyberslaking.
• The network can be protected in real time from dangerous downloads made by Internet users.
• The multiple virus scanning engine ensures that any downloads made by employees are free from viruses and malware.
• Any form of data leakage can be prevented from socially-engineered websites

Head on over to GFI’s website to download the latest version today! On the download page you should now see two options:

• Option 1: GFI WebMonitor – Standalone Proxy Version
• Option 2: GFI WebMonitor for ISA Server

It’s good to give GFI WebMonitor a try as early as possible so that you can evaluate if this tool fits your organization well. If it does, there is a 30% discount if you purchase before 31st December  2009. A little over one month for you to try and decide.

Check out GFI WebMonitor 2009 today!

Check out the image above, it’s actually a screenshot of an animated photo gallery created with Photo! 3D Album – a free windows based desktop application.

The images on the wall were added on without the need for any Photoshop editing. All I had to do was select an empty frame on the wall, then drag and drop an image into it.

The most powerful feature of this 3D photo gallery tool is not the drag and drop capability but rather its ability to create a virtual tour of all the images you’ve added.

For the virtual tour capability, you can choose to allow it to run by itself automatically or manually.

Manually here means that you can control where to go to as if you’re playing a 3D CounterStrike game. Of course there is nothing to shoot at, but basically you can walk towards a particular photo, click Enter to Enlarge it. You can even run or jump. This is so amazing, you’ve got to try out the tool.

After adding in all pictures into the empty frames you can do the following:

1. Upload it to a web gallery in Shockwave Format.
2. Turn it into a 3D screen saver, which runs automatically.
3. Export the photo gallery to an executable file so you can pass it to friends and family members.

For organizations, I can think of several ways how this tool can be utilized:

• If you own a retail store, a virtual gallery of all your store’s products can be created and uploaded to your website. For a customer, rather than looking at a static image one by one, he or she can view it as if it’s a movie of all your products.
• Just came back from a company trip? Rather than uploading all the interesting photos into the intranet, create a virtual gallery of the images and impress your colleagues.
• Create a competition in within a group of people to see who can find a particular image in the fastest time.

Enough of reading what I wrote. Check out my actual 3D Photo Gallery below.

In order to navigate the virtual tour, use you directional arrows to move around. By default, it will move automatically. To move around manually, press the space bar.

If you have trouble viewing the flash shockwave above, try viewing it here instead. Check out Photo! 3D Album today! Hope you like it! Enjoy!

I told him, in order for organizations to be successful, they must firstly set for themselves some goals which can be achieved and measured by the entire organization as a whole.

Then he asked, how can organizations know if  they have achieved their goals?

That’s easy, through key performance indicators (KPI), I said.

Key performance indicators are commonly used by organizations to help define and measure progress towards an organization’s goals.

Defining goals for the organization without developing its KPI usually leads to goals which are forever moving, changing and unachievable. This is because people in within the organization do not know which area they need to do well and focus in order to realize an organization’s goal.

So the next big question is, have your organization set goals and defined its KPI?

If yes thats great, just keep working towards those KPI targets.

If not, then there’s this online web-based site called KPILibrary.com which provides help for all your KPI development needs.

All you need to do is join KPI Library for FREE and begin to use it to:

• Get help from KPI experts
• Search over 2500 KPIs by industry or process
• Compare benchmark scores with industry peers

Once you get your login access, you can begin to browse for

• Industry specific KPIs
• General process KPIs and business metrics

Some sample KPI by industries include:

• Aviation, Rail, Ship & Truck
• Banking & Insurance
• Education & Research
• Emergency, Police & Justice
• Farming & Agriculture
• Goods & Manufacturing
• Government

Some sample KPI by processes include:

• Finance, Legal & Compliance
• Human Resources
• Information Technology
• Innovation, Improvement & Quality
• Internet & E-business

The search function also allows you to easily search for KPIs within your industry or process.

Recently, Green IT has been mentioned a lot. Trying to search for some KPIs within those involved in Green IT reveals the following:

• Datacenter power usage effectiveness
• % of servers located in data centers
• % recycled printer paper
• % of energy used from renewable sources

If none of the KPIs that you need are available, you could also try to ask the domain experts who are more than willing to share their knowledge.

Another key feature of KPI Library is its Groups Directory which allows you to create a group to invite members to collaborate on KPIs.

You can also join existing groups such as the:

• Microsoft User Group – for users of Microsoft software for the support of their business processes
• Oracle User Group – for users of Oracle software for the support of their business processes
• SAP User Group – for users of SAP software for the support of their business processes
• and many more groups

So there you go, a site for all your KPI development needs. Check out KPILibrary.com today!

Also, check out the video below on KPI Wiki by SAP.

Possessing and utilizing pirated software may be easy and cost free, but in the long run, if an organization is caught using unlicensed or cracked software, the disadvantages include:

• Damaging the brand and reputation
• Having to pay heavy fines and penalty
• No software support and updates, more prone to security loopholes

For organization which are just starting out with their businesses, it is highly advisable that they go for genuine software to ensure their business isn’t disrupted by any software related problems.

If cost is an issue, do consider open source alternatives. Most open source software can be downloaded and utilized for free. A great site to check out open source software is SourceForge.net

But if some of your users feel it’s vital to own a particular software, try talking to the software vendors for discounts or partial payments for the software as your business grows. Some even have special programs to help out start-ups such as the Microsoft BizSpark program.

Now, if your organization is already profitable and making money, it’s really important to ensure that your business stays clean and legal in terms of all software and hardware assets.

It can be unfortunate if one bad employee breaks the rule by installing some pirated software in within the office environment which causes the company to get in trouble for it.

So the big question is, how can we easily find out what hardware and software has been installed and placed in within the organization’s network?

Today’s post will be about a free tool called ManageEngine AssetExplorer for your network administrators to scan all assets such as the hardware and software available within the office domain and network.

Do note that the free version of ManageEngine AssetExplorer allows you to manage up to 25 nodes. To try out with more nodes, simply download the trial version instead.

After downloading and trying out AssetExplorer, what I can say is that this free software is complete and comprehensive enough for all your asset management needs.

Some key observations include:

• The free version provides full features without any limitation.
• Great user interface. Navigating the web app is straight forward.
• Good help files during administration – with settings at the top and help card at the bottom to assist.
• Most settings can be customized. There are even email templates such as the contract expiry notification template.

AssetExplorer’s key features include:

• Schedule scans to run whenever convenient.
• Scan for assets via the domain or simply specify a network range.
• Contracts can be linked to assets and alerted on its contract renewal dates.
• Software asset management allows you to track software licenses, compliance and track its usage.
• Configuration wizard provides a step by step guide to help server administrators to begin asset assessment quickly.
• Purchase order management has a purchase order flow which helps to ensure the right purchasing process is being practiced. The best part to this is the purchasing incorporates an approval workflow whereby a supervisor can be assigned to approve a particular purchase before a PO can be released.

AssetExplorer screenshots:

Choose AssetExplorer Server Type

AssetExplorer Dashboard once logged in

AssetExplorer Purchase Order Flow

Step by Step, click Next type Configuration Wizard

Administration Page

——————————— End ———————————–

Here you go, a free tool for you to scan your office network for its hardware and software assets. Head on over to ManageEngine AssetExplorer website and begin tracking all your assets today!

Do you find yourself describing how the car accident happened to your friends and family members when they ask you about it?

It can be tough to explain how the accident occurred verbally, but a car accident diagram shows it all.

It may not be that important to show the car accident diagram to your friends and family members but it may be useful if you need to talk to the insurance company when making a claim.

A car accident diagram also helps when making a police report.

When I had a car accident a few years back, I remember that the police officer asked me a few details on how the accident occurred while he sketched / drew the event on a piece of paper for records purposes.

There’s nothing wrong with drawing on a paper, but if we want to be consistent and professional, we can make use of a car accident diagram software to help depict the event.

One such online car accident diagram software which is free and available online for you to use is AccidentSketch.com

With AccidentSketch, you can:

• Choose your vehicle details which includes the type of vehicle and its color

• Choose your opponent party’s vehicle details which includes the type of vehicle and its color

• On the left pane, you can select street, vehicles, traffic signs and drawing tools such as arrows.
• On the middle pane is your drawing area where you just need to drag and drop the various images from the left to the middle drawing area. As you can see above, I drew a simple sketch of my last car accident where by I got knocked at the back of my car by a van which caused me to hit the car in front of me.

The image on the left is another sample of  an accident sketch. It’s clear that the green car and the orange car collided from within a car park.

There are many ways how this road diagramming software can be utilized. Driving schools can also use this online tool to sketch some car driving instructions for their students to look through before they actually get on the car.

For more info about AccidentSketch.com, check out their site today!