My take on Google Apps Vs Office 365

I am writing this entry as an IT pro who has a few clients on Google Apps now for several months, and has recently switched one client to Office 365. Rather than make this even longer than it is going to be, I will be writing about the partner experience in a separate post.

I believe Google Docs is a nice tool - if you are creating a basic document in it and want to share it with other Google Docs users, or even download and run inside Office, it works well... but... I have had (many) issues with existing complex documents that I have uploaded to it.

On the other side, I have used Microsoft Office Online and believe it is perfect. Documents are preserved entirely.

The above being said, Google Docs offers a few nice features such as surveys/questionnaires that are a really nice touch and I have used several times. I have clocked a lot less time on Office Online, but, from my limited time, I would say that Google also has better sharing/multi user capabilities. I think that Microsoft make up for this with SharePoint, but cannot personally comment.

However, taking in to account the above, the majority of my clients are happy with the way they work - they only want hosted email and the only time they need to write documents is in their Office where they use Dropbox, VPN or network shares to sync things. Whilst Dropbox can get expensive for very large projects/teams, all of these solutions work very well for my clients.

Now, I have never really had a problem with Gmail... until one of my clients did, which cause me to spend many many hours researching it and trying to find a solution.

If you or your company are not big emailers, or are happy with the Gmail web interface, it is a perfectly adequate solution. That being said, IMAP support is just error filled, rubbish, flawed, and annoying.

One of my clients is a recruitment company who pretty much live in Emails - their business depends on it. In addition, they use software for their business that includes an Outlook Add-in and despite following guide upon guide online (and writing one myself), there are just frequent problems.

I do believe a few of these issues I have seen are due to Outlook's IMAP handling, but, some of the issues were also seen during my testing in Thunderbird.

After finally managing to get help from someone in Google, the only solution was to try to go back to pop3, which for sync issues to phone is just a no-go area.

So... I wanted to find an alternate solution and since Office 365 has just launched, I decided to switch to it - and email now works perfectly.

Personally as an administrator and someone who is responsible for support, I have a love/hate relationship with Microsoft Exchange. Exchange is a behemoth of a solution! It is quite expensive, requires a lot of planning, seems to touch everything... but... works very well indeed (once up!). I truly believe that there is nothing better for a business than Exchange with Outlook as a client.. One of my favourite words, but the only word that can really describe Exchange and Outlook is "Flawless".

The downside though is whilst the base functionality is there, it really lacks a lot of features that makes Exchange truly great. If you want some of the advanced features, you really need to learn PowerShell. An example is mailbox delegation which requires manually going in to a persons Outlook and setting (or using a PowerShell script). Annoyingly, this is a very easy task to perform in Google Apps.

When Gmail launched, it was sort of revolutionary - Very good anti spam, enormous storage space and labels instead of folders, but a few years on and I would say anti spam in Office 365 is just as good, Storage in Gmail is the same as Office 365 and... Labels are a fad... this was one of the big problems with IMAP Gmail access - deleting emails only removed the label. There are options, but without a central way to set it - it was annoyingly difficult.

Whilst I can not give a full account of Office 365 Vs Google Apps, I can give a fair review of Gmail Vs Hosted Exchange (which I believe is the main component people will be using).

With Microsoft offering the Kiosk worker plan and Hosted Exchange on its own, I think this is the way forward and I will no longer be offering any Google Apps services to my clients for the foreseeable future.

I feel that Microsoft have a truly superior product that simply lacks a good enough control interface and real world scenario/support - I can only hope they improve this soon. Whilst I am writing this in brief here, this is actually a major point, but will cover it in my next part which is about Microsoft abandoning partners on Office 365.

How to speed up Gmail IMAP in Outlook... No more hangs, not responding or timeouts!

I have now switched 4 clients over to Google Apps for Domains and they have all noticed various speed issues from time to time.

The most common is Google Mail hanging or not responding when doing various operations such as deleting or sending email.

I have tried to contact Google several times and have been getting no where, and searching the internet has come up pretty blank.

Anyway, straight to it... Examples/Pictures are based on Outlook 2010, but, you should be able to adapt to other versions.

The problem is because of both Gmail IMAP being bad, and Oulook's IMAP handling not being as good as it could be.

Firstly, Go to the "Send / Receive" Tab, and "Define Send/Receive Groups"

Next, tick all the boxes and change the send/receive timer down to one minute (or whatever you want).

Then, double click on the account, and whilst you can use any settings you like, I recommend ticking Inbox and choosing "Download complete item including attachments", then unticking all the other boxes.

Lastly and most importantly, put Outlook in to Offline mode.

And we are done!

The reason for this, as far as I can see, is that Outlook attempts to do all operations live on the server, however, Google's IMAP server constantly disconnects, and generally does not play nice with Outlook. This means that every time you try to do an operation, it has to reconnect - but it does this on the UI thread and causes everything to hang.

By forcing Outlook in to Offline Mode, it does every operation locally and instantly on your machine then because we set the account to send/receive whilst in offline mode, everything will still work as expected and because the send/receive happens in the background, nothing freezes!

The only downside is that this countdown to the minute is always running in the background, if you send an email, it will not actually go until the next cycle, so if on the phone or doing something urgent, you may want to click send/receive instead of waiting.

I have been racking my brain out on this, I really hope it helps you and please leave a comment/pass it on if it has!

How to clear a whiteboard that has dried ink / without scrubbing!

I really have no idea why I am blogging this!

As a geek, I have so many whiteboards around me - they come in so handy!

As many people know, if you leave the ink on for a while, it is possible for it to dry out and require a lot of elbow grease in order remove.

Instead, a little hint - just get out your dry wipe pen and go over the top of the text!

This techniques add another layer of the chemical carrier and allow you to remove the original ink as if you had only just written it!

I went to a client that hadn't used their meeting room in a while and they had this problem - They did not know this technique and I could see the bloke trying to scrub really hard! I hope I didn't come across big headed but this is something that a lot of people just don't realise you can do!

Hope it helps others!

Manually downloading Adobe Master Collection CS5.5 / Bypass Adobe Download Assistant

I don't know why Adobe are forcing everyone to now download using the new "Adobe Download Assistant", however, I hate it.

I have tried it on multiple computers and I have not yet managed to get a full complete download - my results have varied from downloads not even starting to getting stuck on ~20%.

The only reason I think they have used this is to try and "show off" or demonstrate their Air platform - but it really does not give me a lot of faith in it.

After firing up Fiddler and Network Monitor, I discovered that it does nothing more than log you in/set a cookie and establish an HTTP connection and pull the download, therefore, if you want to bypass it, simply:

1. Visit Adobe.com and log in (free registration).

2. Manually download This File

If this fails, instead of step 1, try visiting an alternate download link such as for Photoshop Elements - You do not actually need to download from here, you just need the authentication cookie.

I hope this helps.

Restaurant review : The Cattle Grid in Balham

Today (5th June 2011), I went for a family meal at The Cattle Grid in Balham...

My brother had Wagyu beef which was really a shock to see on the menu and cheaper than the steak he usually gets at Chez Gerard! - I wasn't feeling all that hungry (and have been cutting down again!) so just went for their weekend set menu - which included a steak (unknown cut... Guessing rump), two eggs and chips...

My brother loved his Wagyu, but said he didn't think it was worth the extra price over their other steaks which are brilliant quality - On the other hand, my steak despite the tiny £7.95 price was absolutely delicious - It was cooked just right and was packed with flavour.

Now... My grandma is the real test! She only eats fish out and only likes good/fresh fish. She asked for the tuna salad (My grandad made sure they had a fish item before taking us!)... and... apart from some weird potato(?) straw things, she loved it!

The only let down for me was the desert - (Don't know how we all had room!) - My uncle and grandad each ordered waffles with chocolate ice cream and loved it - with no complaints... However it wasn't so good for me and my brother. We both ordered cheesecake with strawberry ice cream.

The cheesecake had a horrible "tang"/after taste to it... We both thought the same and are not to sure what it was at all - We called over a staff member who apologised and straight away said that he would take it off the bill, he could not of been any nicer and asked if we would like anything else... We both declined... despite the cheesecake not being good, I thought it was one of the best Ice Creams I have had in a long while.

... The inner sceptic in me wonders if he knew it was past the date or if something was wrong as he was too quick to take it off the bill, however based on how excellent everything else was, I really hope he was just offering great service.

I have to say, despite the cheesecake, I think I may have a new favourite restaurant! Now, when I visit my grandparents, it will be a very hard choice between this and Clapham Bodeans.

Things that annoyed me, week ending 15th May 2011

Super Injunctions

Well I would tell you if I could!

Ok, I can! Super Injunctions are a subject that I just can not understand and whilst I do not have a law qualification, I believe from everything I do know that they are incompatible with UK law.

The fact is, under UK law, you need to knowingly commit a crime, a good write up is here - this was the big basis of the trial I sat whilst on Jury Service, the man who was accused admitted to doing the crime but not knowing what he was actually doing - an actual very interesting subject.

Now, I just want to say, how stupid is it, and how can anyone be in contempt of court for saying something that they have no way of checking is actually under an injunction?

People can ask genuine questions to friends such as "Have you heard xxx is with yyy?" and suddenly, they are a criminal in contempt of a court order!

I just think the whole thing is ludicrous - and whilst I do believe everyone deserves privacy, I also think that if they cheat behind the backs of their family, they deserve what they get - we are meant to have free speech and I will truly loose what little faith I have left in this country if people start getting "nicked" for speaking freely.

Probably my hero of the whole situation [this article is written after the week!] is John Hemming who is the official Super Injunction Buster, who uses parlimentary privilege to effectively be above the law! Video 1, Video 2.

Things that annoyed me, week ending 8th May 2011

I originally started this blog as a place to write interesting things and also... an outlet of anger - somewhere to write my rants and reflect on them in years time and laugh!

It didn't exactly turn out the way I planned, but, I decided to start a weekly post that I was going to originally call "Things that pi$$ed me off this week", but instead, I am calling it "Things that annoyed me".

Starting a few weeks back in a week when I took my brother down to Weston-Super-Mare for a performance in a show - overall it was really good... but...

Petrol Stations

I wanted to fill up before the long journey (My longest drive!), there was a long queue for paying, so I thought I would save some time and use the "Pay at pump" option. I stick in the card (It was either my Amex or Mastercard) and it flashes "Card not accepted for pay at pump, please pay at Kiosk", and then all throughout filling up, it kept flashing on the screen "You can save a lot of time when you next need to fill up, just select Pay at Pump"

Charity Shops & Minimum credit card fees

A little thing I do which I just can't help myself... If I go to a place I haven't been before, I always pop in to the local charity shop - I don't know what it is, but almost every other one seems to have Westie statues!

I am completely addicted to Westies and buy them when ever I see them! So... I see that the Heart Foundation in Weston-Super-Mare had about 6 or 7 statues and... I bought the lot!

Now, I hardly ever carry cash with me - I pay for nearly everything on card and I did that here - no problems, but then, just after I finished paying, the woman says that there is another statue around the back if I wanted it... It looked alright and I said "sure!"

After a nice talk, she put the statue through the till and it cost £3.50, I wanted to pay on the card and she said that they only take credit cards for over £5.

I did not have the money and there was nothing else I wanted so I asked her why they have that policy and she just said that it is because they charge too much.

I don't know if anyone is aware but, the real fees are anything from a maximum of around 4% down to around 1%, some charge a transaction fee on top of between 5p-30p, others don't.... Now, a chain as big as The British Heart Foundation, especially being a charity probably pay the minimum, Baring this in mind, and the fact I wanted the statue, I offered to pay 50p which should of more than covered their costs (if they only pay a percentage, it makes no difference how many transactions anyway!).

The lady said she did not want to do this as she couldn't accept it. I really did not fancy having an argument over something so small, but, it is annoying!

To add to this, whilst I was going out, I said in a jokey way "Can I have a refund for what I bought, and then buy them all together"... and... the lady said "YES"! Now, to anyone who doesn't know - credit card refunds can cost just as much as the initial fees - I said it was ok and I left!

By far, they are not the only ones who do it - If you look around there are so many high street chains that have a minimum transaction limit, and, if you did not know, this is not actually allowed in the merchant terms and conditions that they have to agree with (many cards also forbid small order extras). I am in no way going to complain about a charity shop, but, minimum transaction amounts/fees are one thing that has been annoying me for years!

My brother

Practically all the way back from Weston-Super-Mare, he kept asking "If I had heard?" and singing "Bird is the word"

And, that's it! This series isn't going to be a huge rant, it is just a bit of fun for me to get things off my chest... I am no good at keeping a diary as things happen, so I hope this will be a record that will be around for a long while!