IT Forum

Campus Management Corporation today announced that its June release of CampusPortal(TM) 9.0 will include a text messaging solution for students and staff. At no additional cost to the institution, the technology enables instant campus-wide communication in the event of emergencies, weather, and other critical news.

Staff authorized by the institution may use this free service to send:
    — Institution-wide emergency communications
    — Automated alerts from academic advisors
    — Reminders from registrar and other departments
    — Targeted communications by site, program, class and more
   

This release includes a number of new features to automate back office processes and to improve student self-service. For example, administrators of distance learning programs can automate billings to students based upon their individual activity levels.

Institutions using CampusPortal today receive enhancements like SMS text messaging service and integration of back office processing at no additional cost, as part of their standard annual maintenance agreement.

Wireless hotspot users are not getting value for money for service access as they are wasting minutes unnecessarily, according to Trustive, Europe’s leading wireless hotspot access provider. This along with: businesses failing to have a policy on hotspot access; Wi-Fi access becoming an important factor in hotel selection; Voice over IP (VoIP) will be the ‘killer application’ for Wi-Fi hotspots within 12 months; hotspot usage is on the increase; and Asia Pac operators falling behind on adopting WISPr, are some of the key findings from the second, annual Trustive WLAN Roaming Research 2007 launched today at the Wireless Event, Olympia.

Bram Jan Streefland, managing director and co-founder of Trustive, says: “The survey shows that many end users are paying excessively on a per minute basis. Around 60 percent are opting for ad hoc methods of purchasing wireless services such as scratch cards or vouchers, which are often sold in hour-long blocks. With just over half of end users averaging a session times of 30 minutes or less, it means that about half of the time purchased is wasted and users are unnecessarily losing unused minutes. No wonder that 70 percent of respondents believe pricing to be expensive and not offering value for money. It is also why Trustive’s ‘per second billing’ and innovative pooled subscriptions are proving such a success.”

Currently, 45 percent of operator revenues come from voucher and credit card payments compared to 32 percent from subscriptions, a figure which has risen from 28 percent in 2006.

Streefland says: “We anticipate that subscription levels will continue to grow over the next 12-18 months. For end users the three most important things when purchasing subscription schemes are coverage, price and easy connectivity. Certainly the first and third are improving dramatically as the number of hotspots, aggregators and roaming agreements grow and client software becomes available like our HotSpotter with its easy one-click access. It is interesting to note that for pre-paid services, end users are saying that price, validity period and minimum spend are more important than quality of service. This may mean that there is little impetus for operators to provide quality service to those customers, which is a concern. It is also interesting that 65 percent of users would ideally like a free service, but they also want to connect easily via a fast well msecured connection. Beggars can’t be choosers!”

As the debate over net neutrality continues, it has become clear that the issue is very polarized. Unfortunately, this often paints the issue in very extreme colors. For some, the fight for net neutrality has become a defense against the infringement of First Amendment rights and any type of bandwidth shaping/traffic management is despised.

While I don’t like the idea of ISPs slowing or blocking traffic to different Web sites (especially a competitor’s), I also have experienced the downsides of a network overrun by P2P traffic.

To read on, click here.

Companies are being urged to exercise caution in planning for Microsoft’s new 2007 Office system according to a new report from Basex, a knowledge economy research firm.

• The 2007 Microsoft Office system is so different that it should be considered a new product, not merely an upgrade, especially given extensive training requirements for the new user interface.
  
• Not all components have to be deployed but most organizations will probably need to deploy more than just one or two.
  
• How do these tools enhance organization-wide productivity?
  
• What productivity gains will I see?
  
• What are the various Office 2007 editions, and what components are included in each?
  
• What do I need to know about XML since documents are now XML based?
  

   
About the Report
   
Written for Microsoft customers and business partners, the new report evaluates all 2007 Office system products and  servers, including the Microsoft Office 2007 suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, among others), Microsoft Office  Communicator 2007, Microsoft Office OneNote 2003, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, Microsoft Office Groove 2007, Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007, and Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007.
   
This report can be purchased at http://www.basex.com/2007office.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve seen quite a few posts on listservs and forums inquiring about the pros and cons of allowing music and video downloads in public libraries. While there are certainly pros (increased usage, etc.), it would seem to me that they are far outweighed by the downsides.

Even though there may be a rise in library patrons, they won’t be there for the books. You’ll most likely find a backup of people waiting for computers (if there wasn’t already one) and a huge demand for bandwidth. This, in turn, might not only affect download speeds, but more importantly the Web surfing of those people doing research — that is if they could ever find a computer to use.

Another issue would be the potential that patrons will download copyrighted material or even viruses. Although there are plenty of positive and legal uses for P2P, it’s a given that patrons will look for free music or movies. This creates a completely different problem that could ultimately prove costly to the library.

I’m not saying that allowing music and movie downloads should never be allowed, but it can’t be done without certain expectations. It’s possible to prepare for the negative and thus prevent most major harmful consequences.

In my opinion, if music and movie downloads are going to be allowed, they should be done through a reputable Web site only (iTunes, etc.). This will hopefully prevent illegal downloads and probably reduce the amount of people who will be flocking to the computers. A second tip would be to allow these downloads on a certain number of computers. Just as some work stations can only connect to the card catalogue, a limited number should be set aside for downloads. Thirdly, some sort of regulation of bandwidth might be needed to make sure that downloads don’t interrupt the activities of those patrons using the Web for other purposes. Priority should be given to research and even just casual browsing. There are plenty of people that don’t have access to the Internet, and libraries should be a place where they can make that connection–at least for a few minutes.

So, while there will ceratinly be an upside, the downside can be much more troubling if a library is not prepared. The question is whether it’s worth it to make the preparations.