Lead stories
New generation of tech docs meld man and machine
Wearable computers and Interactive Electronic Technical Manuals (IETMs) are revolutionizing the way machinery and equipment is being repaired and upgraded.
Discover more...
Hard facts and hard figures boost the bottom line
New business intelligence software from Bristol-based firm, XTAQ, is reducing calls to call centres and improving back office productivity. Discover more...
Extra
Plain Words exhibiting at Government Computing Exhibition
Plain Words will be exhibiting at the Government Computing Exhibition (GC2004expo) on 22nd and 23rd June 2004 on stand number 442. Please feel free to drop in and say hello!
GC2004expo highlights the best ICT solutions to public sector buyers. It's a "must attend" event for anyone in, or supplying, the public sector ICT market.
For further information visit: http://www.gcexpo.com/
Runaway bestseller reveals people are sick and tired of falling standards in writing and communications
Lynne Truss's latest book, "Eats, Shoots and Leaves", has become an unexpected bestseller. Despite being about punctuation and grammar, it's a real hoot. Neither Truss nor her publisher imagined it would top the Amazon Christmas bestseller list, but it did. What's more, Truss got a £75,000 advance for the U.S. edition (the average author gets around £5,000 if they're lucky).
What does this mean? It means that people right across the world care about punctuation, correct grammar, and clear writing. Truss's book has struck a chord with a lot of people who are sick and tired of falling standards in writing and communication.
People notice bad punctuation and grammar. If you produce technical manuals, Help, training materials, and other documentation - maybe it's time to call in the professionals to make sure you don't get caught out? Plain Words technical writing services...
E-Business news
Will Google IPO create another bubble to burst?
Some time in the next few months, Google, the Internet search company, is expected to "go public," or launch an initial public offering (IPO). Depending on how Google's stock performs - and its effect on other Internet-related stocks - analysts say it may demonstrate whether the current recovery in high-tech stocks and technology mutual funds can be sustained, or whether this will turn out to be another technology "bubble" like the one that burst back in March 2000.
Not surprisingly, investors are watching Google's stock offering closely.
The Times last month reported that the IPO would not happen this Spring. But "nothing has changed" in the company's approach toward going public, says Google spokeswoman Cindy McCaffrey. So stay tuned and get ready to lay your cash down - Google's got to be the big one (or is that just bubble burst retro talk?)
To get the lowdown on Google, check out the in-depth report in this month's Wired News: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.03/google.html
Is your printer a drain?
Printing devices are often under-used and few firms properly understand how much they spend on printing - warn analysts, consultants, and vendors. Gartner puts the cost of printing for enterprises as high as three per cent of annual revenue, and estimates savings could be made of up to 30 per cent.
"For a typical enterprise customer, increased return on technology investment is achieved through increasing productivity, simplifying management, and optimising print environment asset utilisation," said Gartner analyst Peter Grant. "Combined, these elements can contribute up to a 30 per cent reduction in imaging and printing costs for most enterprises."
But many companies have no firm idea how much they spend, and do not see print costs as a big deal. A recent survey of US and European businesses by RS Consulting found that only 13 per cent had made reducing print costs a priority.
Separately, research conducted by printer firm Lexmark concluded that companies have no idea how much they spend on their printing processes, and fail to make the best use of the devices they buy. Over half of printers are under-used, the firm said.
Discover more at: http://www.vnunet.com/News/1152903
IT skills central to new training reforms
Better training for IT professionals is to be a key priority in new government plans to support vital national skills. Sector skills council, eSkills, is to carry out a detailed analysis of employers' future training and productivity needs, and will draw up a Sector Skills Agreement (SSA) with training providers to guarantee they are met.
"The government has said it will make contributions to higher level training where sectors can identify that they have skills shortages which are impacting on the progress of the sector and the economy, and the vehicle for that is the SSA. The agreement will give employers real influence," eSkills chief executive Karen Price said in a statement.
But timing will be crucial to meet the needs of the economic upturn, cautioned John Eary, head of staff consultancy at NCC Group. "The economy is picking up so there will be increased demand for professional IT skills - the trick is to identify them sufficiently in advance so the necessary training is in place," he said.
Discover more at: http://www.vnunet.com/News/1152848
Disaster recovery plans not up to scratch
Most UK firms have a false sense of security when it comes to their disaster recovery strategy, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) has warned. Although 95 per cent of UK companies have some form of back-up facilities in place, a third of them store back-up tapes on site, while less than 20 per cent back up desktop computers. And only 8 per cent of companies have actually tested their disaster recovery plans.
These are the initial findings from the 2004 edition of the DTI's biennial Information Security Breaches Survey, carried out by a consortium led by consultant PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). The full report will be published in April.
The survey spoke to 1,000 UK companies, with a particular emphasis this year on back-up and recovery. Two-thirds of the survey's respondents had suffered an incident over the last year that required data to be restored from back-up, so it was not surprising that 88 per cent of respondents said they found it easy to justify the cost of back-up and recovery.
Discover more: http://www.vnunet.com/News/1152819
Smart mobile packs in Microsoft Office tools
Panasonic has unveiled its first smart phone. It's based on the Symbian OS and Nokia's Series 60 user interface, and allows you to work on Microsoft Office files while away from your laptop or PC. The tri-band GSM/GPRS X700 is based on a clamshell design which incorporates a 640 x 480 digital camera with flash, a 16-bit colour main display, and a colour sub-display on the lid. Images and video shot on the camera can be stored on miniSD cards. And files can be sent to a PC or to other handsets using the phone's Bluetooth capability.
Panasonic is touting the handset's video editing software. But business users will be more interested in the range of preloaded office applications that come with the device. Users, for example, can view and edit documents created with Microsoft's Word, Excel, and PowerPoint programs on their handsets. Again, miniSD cards can be used to provide additional memory to store these files.
Discover more: http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,114948,00.asp
Employees lax on security
Most UK employees are not willing to take responsibility for securing their work computers, a recent survey by Novell has found. If this situation continues, computer attacks will increase rapidly this year, experts warned. Apparently, 9 out of 10 office staff feel they have no part to play in protecting their machines and that the responsibility should rest with their employer's IT department, Microsoft, or the government.
Of 1,000 respondents, two-thirds admitted to having no knowledge of basic virus-prevention measures. More than half regularly forwarded spam to their colleagues, and 10 percent left their password on a Post-it note on their desk.
Novell said this showed firms must do more to train employees to protect corporate networks. It said Internet and email usage policies and user-education programmes were a must. "Unless UK businesses start to take user education seriously, we are going to see the impact of cyber crime spiral in 2004," said Steve Brown, managing director of Novell UK.
Discover more: http://www.vnunet.com/News/1152809
Technology news
Blind plot course with GPS "audio maps"
A new device allows blind people to navigate, without the need for guide dogs. Called the VoiceNote GPS, the $2,000 device combines digital voicing with the global positioning system device, and allows a blind person to pinpoint his or her location. The device, in essence, makes an audio map.
"I can record a route," says Jim King, who has been blind since youth. "I can walk from one location to another location, and as I go along the way, I can record certain critical points in the route, and the next time I walk that route, the VoiceNote will tell me how close I am and tell me how I'm progressing."
King is currently using the machine for a trip to Nome, Alaska, on the National Iditarod Trail. He and seven other people, calling themselves the Alaskan Express Freight Sled Expedition, are taking snowmobiles to Nome as a promotion for both the VoiceNote GPS device and a non-profit educational organization called the Iditarod National Millennium Trail.
See: http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,62326,00.html
US paratroops to sprout "wings"
US army chiefs want to equip their paratroopers with the wings a stuntman used to glide across the English Channel. They reckon the hi-tech carbon fibre fins that Austrian Felix Baumgartner strapped to his back could enable troops to sneak behind enemy lines.
Felix, 34, jumped from a plane 30,000ft above Dover and used the wings to glide 22 miles across the water to land safely in France. Now the wings' designer has been asked to provide prototypes for the US Army to test.
See: http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_871793.html?menu=news.technology
Off-beat news
Fifty Dollar Question
When a programmer and an engineer played a quiz together for cash - which one made the biggest profit?
An American programmer and an engineer were sitting next to each other on an aeroplane. The programmer leans over to the engineer and asks if he wants to play a fun game. The engineer just wants to sleep so he politely declines, turns away and tries to sleep. The programmer persists and explains that it's a "real easy game".
He explains, "I ask a question and if you don't know the answer you pay me $5. Then you ask a question and if I don't know the answer I'll pay you $5."
Again the engineer politely declines and tries to sleep.
The programmer, now somewhat agitated, says, "O.K., if you don't know the answer you pay me $5 and if I don't know the answer I pay you $50!"
That got the engineer's attention, so he agrees to the game. The programmer asks the first question, "What's the distance from the earth to the moon?" The engineer doesn't say a word and just hands the programmer $5.
Now, it's the engineer's turn. He asks the programmer, "What goes up a hill with three legs and comes down on four?" The programmer gives him a puzzled look, takes out his laptop computer, looks through all his references and after about an hour wakes the engineer and hands the engineer $50. The engineer politely takes the $50, turns away and tries to return to sleep.
The programmer, a little miffed, asks, "Well what's the answer to the question?" Without a word, the engineer reaches into his wallet, hands $5 to the programmer, turns away and returns to sleep.
For more techie humour, go to: http://www.msd-corp.com/msd/humor.htm
The Plain Words eLetter is purely a technology and e-business news source. It does not endorse any of the companies, products, or services that are mentioned in news shorts and articles.
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