Posts Tagged ‘cloud computing’

DepEd Goes Google, Leaps into the Cloud!

The Department of Education (DepEd) proudly announced today that they have teamed up with Google to provide IT infrastructure that will enable quick and easy collaboration among the 600,000 teachers, staffs and administrators nationwide. DepEd will be using Google Apps, Google’s cloud-based collaborative IT solution which is basically composed of email (Google Mail), chat (Google Chat), calendar (Google Calendar) and document storage, sharing, and editing (Google Docs and Google Drive).

Department of Education (Philippines) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

With this move, the Department of Education is expected to save significant amount from their IT expenses. Also, DepEd will join over 16 Million students and and teachers around the world who uses Google Apps for Education.

Cloud Computing is a technology that allows the user to use software solutions without actually installing the software in their devices. The cloud-based software is typically used via internet browser. And because the software doesn’t need to be installed in many devices, cloud computing offers advantages in cost and ease of management because the data is centralized. One concern though with cloud computing is security.

Among the leading providers of cloud computing applications were Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Apple.

see press release here.

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Microsoft Unveils Office 2013 – Touching the Cloud

Microsoft have unveiled probably the most radical version of their popular productivity suite, the Office 2013. The new Office is now tailored to touch and mobile devices, instant access to Microsoft SkyDrive cloud services, and a more fluid and flexible user experience. Here’s a brief preview of the new features.

The new Microsoft Office 2013 and Office 365 beefs up the productivity software with new and exciting features. For example, in Word 2013, it would be very easy to attach videos from files or from online sources like YouTube. There’s also this feature called Object Zoom wherein objects like charts and images automatically zoom when clicked or tapped by the user. Upon tapping outside the object it returns to its original size. PDF files can now be opened in Word and act just like a Word document with the feature called PDF Reflow.

In PowerPoint 2013, Microsoft added many new templates that can make simple yet glamorous presentations.  There’s also this feature called Merge Shapes that lets you do Boolean commands such as  Union, Combine, Fragment, Intersect, and Subtract on the shapes you are using.

Excel 2013 has just become more smart than ever. Now Excel features Recommend Pivot Table where the program suggests different pivot tables and let’s you choose which one you want to use. With Recommended Charts, Excel will intelligently suggest charts that best represents your data. But of course the final choice is still yours.

Well, I mentioned just a few of the major revamps Microsoft has done in Office 2013 and 365. To know more why not try it yourself? Microsoft is offering Free Trial versions here.

Apple iCloud Service, What is it?

Apple iCloud is a hot news item today as Apple announces it in the 2011 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in San Francisco CA yesterday. But what does iCloud really do? How does it work?

Apple iCloud Service

Simply put it this way: iCloud is an Apple owned online storage of your contents. Or it can be analogous to an “online iTunes”. Before the iCloud service, we usually buy and store our files in our computer desktops or laptops and then we’ll just synchronize it with our device using iTunes. The problem usually arise when our computer was lost or damaged. If we do not backed-up our files, then it’s a real disaster. Apple’s iCloud service solves this problem by creating a centralized data-center capable of storing our files and backing it up systematically. if in case we lost our device or the computer, we can access all our files using internet connection. With Apple iCloud, the dependency of Apple devices to physical storage systems was dramatically reduced.

What can we do with the iCloud?
If you have experienced using Apple’s previous cloud-based service called MobileMe, then iCloud would be a familiar thing to you. It’s basically an expansion of the MobileMe service. For those who are totally new to iCloud, here are some of the many things you can store on it. And except for few features specifically mentioned below, all of the following services are FREE.

Contacts, Calendar and Mail. With iCloud, it is now easier to sync your calendar to all your Apple devices. You can also share your calendar with your family and friends.

App Store™ and iBookstore℠ . With the iCloud, you can now download all your purchased apps and books over-the-air on all you iOS devices, not only on the device you used in purchasing it. You can also view your purchase history.

iCloud Backup . With iCloud Backup, you can automatically and securely back up your iOS device to the cloud over WiFi when you charge your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad device. For busy people who have no time for wired syncing, this will be a great feature.

iCloud Storage. With iCloud, all your documents and files can be stored online and will automatically push changes to the documents on your other devices. For example, when you edit you Keynote presentation on one device, you don’t need to synchronize it with your other devices because iCloud will do it for you automatically. All you need to do is to push the button to allow the changes to take place. This service is free up to 5GB on space.

Photo Stream is an iCloud feature that allows you to automatically synchronize you photos to all you Apple devices over-the-air.

iTunes and iTunes Match. With iTunes in the cloud, all your previously purchased music can now be downloaded to all your devices at no extra cost. And with iTunes Match service, you can now replace your non-iTunes purchased music with that of a 256 kbps AAC DRM-free version if there’s an equivalent music in the iTunes online library of 18Million songs. iTunes Match service starts at $24.99 annual fee.

Availability

The above mentioned features can now be experienced in BETA mode in the US using iTunes 10.3 and iOS 4.3.3. The full version of iCloud can be used upon the release of iOS 5 this coming fall.

Summary

If we sum up all the things mentioned above, we can simply say that iCloud is Apple’s latest technology in simplifying the use of their products. As you may have already noticed, the most recurring adverb in this article is “automatically” and “simply” denoting the dramatic improvement on the aspect of usability.

Are you excited to ride with Apple into the world of cloud computing? Tell us by making some comments.

Apple Confirms iCloud Service – To be Launched Next Week at WWDC

Image via Wikipedia

Apple Inc. confirmed today the existence of their rumored upcoming product, the cloud-based service named iCloud. In a short press release regarding the its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) which will be held next week starting June 6, Apple included the iCloud among the products that will be featured.
Here’s the actual quoted statement from the press release:

“CUPERTINO, California—May 31, 2011—Apple® CEO Steve Jobs and a team of Apple executives will kick off the company’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) with a keynote address on Monday, June 6 at 10:00 a.m. At the keynote, Apple will unveil its next generation software – Lion, the eighth major release of Mac OS® X; iOS 5, the next version of Apple’s advanced mobile operating system which powers the iPad®, iPhone® and iPod touch®; and iCloud®, Apple’s upcoming cloud services offering. “

With these new information, we can finally say that Apple is completely armed and ready to take the ride into cloud. Although no details was officially revealed, there’s been a lot of rumors scattered in the web as to the nature of this service. One of them was that iCloud will be able to mirror your music libraries into their servers so it can be accessed anywhere and anytime.

In the previous months that passed, we saw major tech companies releasing their own take in the cloud-computing platform. Amazon launched its Cloud Drive service followed Google’s launch of Google Music and ChromeOS-powered notebooks. And now, Apple is poised to launch its iCloud service next week.

It seems that all these companies were already set to a cloud-battle. But one thing is yet to be seen, are we, the consumers ready to fly into the cloud? That question may meet its answer in the succeeding months as we analyze how consumers react with regards to these services.