Team Windows7ako in Action: Another Successful Seminar / Lecture @ MAPUA Institute of IT

It’s an amazing or maybe funny thing for a Medical Technologist to stand right in front of graduating IT students talking about technologies which is not related to a medical profession at all.   Take note this students spent four years of their lives studying Information Technology which means that they are far more better than me when it comes to IT.  The thing is, even a Medical Technologist can amaze an Information Technologist.  My colleagues in my workplace are very amazed with my vast knowledge in information technology and they always ask me, “why did you became a Medical Technologist when you are far better to become an IT Pro?  I always answer “It’s because God knows where I’m most needed,” and now He gave me the chance to pursue IT in my own way wherein I can enjoy both worlds :)

Okay, enough with the dramatic  introduction.  Before our lecture / demo at DLSU, Christopher Ryan Abary already informed me that he was invited at Mapua Institute of IT to talk about Cloud Computing with SharePoint Collaboration and he wants John Erwin Magno and I to come and discuss MS Office 2010.  Tentative date of the said seminar is on August 19, 2010 but after talking with Kyle Villaflor from Mapua, the date was moved today, August 26, 2010 at 3 PM.  By the way Kyle is the one who invited us.  She’s a graduating IT student from Mapua School of IT. 

It was evening of August 19, 2010, after planning and collaboration at my workplace we (Erwin, Christopher, and I) met Kyle at a coffee shop located at Makati Cinema Square to give her an overview of what are we going to discuss in their seminar.  We asked her what they really want to hear from us because let’s admit it cloud computing is a broad topic.  In conclusion we agreed that Christopher will discuss Collaboration with SharePoint and Erwin and I will discuss MS Office 2010. Erwin and I divided the Office 2010 topic.  He’ll discuss and demo PowerPoint and Excel 2010 and as for me I’ll be discussing Word and OneNote 2010. 

After days and nights preparing our PowerPoint decks and studying our topics here comes the judgment day (haha)  wherein we are going to deploy and share our knowledge.  It’s 2PM of August 26, 2010, Erwin and Christopher fetch me at my workplace (Philcare, Inc).  After asking permission from my manager to allow me to have a 2 hour under time which she granted after telling her that I’ll be one of the resource speaker at Mapua (Thanks Dr. Espiritu for understanding and allowing me to leave the clinic premises 2 hours earlier).  We then proceeded at a coffee shop near Mapua where Kyle agreed to meet us. 

We started the lecture at about 3:30 in the afternoon.  Christopher started it by discussing what is Cloud Computing and Collaboration with SharePoint 2010.  Followed by a brief talk from Mapua’s MSPs introducing Windows Live, Imagine Cup and Microsoft Student Partner.  Now here comes my part, since our time is running out, Erwin and I decided to go fast track but without compromising quality.  Using the decks I prepared (enhanced by Erwin – the PowerPoint Master! Thanks Bro!), I started by giving them an overview of what’s new with Office 2010, followed by Microsoft Word 2010, then followed by Erwin’s deck  for PowerPoint and Excel, and lastly for my ending, OneNote!  Then we performed our live demo on Office 2010 new and improved features which amazed our audience and because Office 2010 has a lot to offer.  For our last demo we showed them the collaboration (co-authoring) feature of Office 2010 using the free Office WebApp in Windows Live.  We also raffled four special items to make our brief stay there more memorable. 

Team Windows7ako in Action (Mapua School of IT) VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

It was really amazing for me to stand of IT people discussing a topic that might be easy for them and a bit hard for me.  But as they said “do what you desire to do and do it well and you will be rewarded.”  If you’ll ask me what did I got from doing this, I’ll say happiness and fulfillment.  To Kyle and the Mapua IT students, thank you guys for inviting us!

My certificate of appreciation.  Christopher, Erwin, and I was presented with this certificate after the seminar. ;)

Windows Live Essentials just got updated!

A popup in the notification area in my taskbar tells that there’s an available update for the Windows Live Essentials Beta.  By just clicking the link my computer started to download the update, installed in a few minutes and prompted me to restart my computer.  Now let’s see what changes in the Windows Live Essentials 2011 Beta.

Some noticeable changes are the following.

The  Windows Live folder gets omitted in the All Programs menu in the Start Menu.  A new folder was created named Windows Live Accessories which includes the Live Family Safety Beta, Live Sync Beta, and Live Writer Beta.  Now you might might be wondering where did the other applications go? The Live Messenger, Mail, Photo Gallery, and Movie Maker Beta is now being relocated at the top along with Windows Media Player, DVD Maker, etc. right before the applications folders.

The splash screen of the Live Writer was changed to Windows Live Writer 2011.  Also the Writer has now better integration with Office retaining formatting when copied from MS Word and other office programs.

Just with evaluating it in few minutes, the best feature that amazed me is that Live Messenger has now the capability to connect with Facebook Chat! By just connecting my Live Messenger to my Facebook account, I can chat with my Facebook friends without logging on on to my Facebook the traditional way using a browser!  Another nice feature in the Messenger is that while chatting with two of my friends I noticed that the Messenger just used one window and created a tabs with my friends name on it (will it be called ‘Tabbed Chatting'” haha)

To prove that I can use Messenger to chat with my Facebook friend, here it is.  Our conversation both in Messenger and Facebook chat is just the same

There’s a lot more improvements out there, I’ll let you know in few days.  For now I strongly recommend that you update you Windows Live Essentials.  The updated Live Essentials can be downloaded here.

 

Want to know more?  Join Windows7ako the official Windows 7 community in the Philippines!  You can ask help and questions regarding Windows 7 there and also get to meet the members of the community during the meetups!

My First Lecture / Demo outside Microsoft Grounds! :)

The Preparation

Sometime in July, a member of the Windows7ako community, Justin Ryan Siy from De La Salle University asked me if I can have a talk about emerging technologies in their class.  He told me that it’s a lecture / seminar type so I ask him if Office 2010 will be a good topic, then he approved.  I was a bit hesitant before for this will be my first time, I mean I already have several demos about Windows 7 and Office 2010 but  it’s just within Microsoft grounds and in front of familiar faces.  This will be a challenge for me.  To my excitement I asked my friend Christopher to join me in my first official demo and I got a positive response.  We then collaborate with Justin and Ray Angelo (Justin’s group mate) what will be our topic and how long the talk will last.  It was agreed that we will be talking Windows 7 and Office 2010 for three hours including the question and answer portion after the talk.  A week after Justin ,informed me that the date is already finalized and it will be on August 14, 2010 at 2:30-5:30 in the afternoon.

It’s eleven days before the event, I met with Christopher and reminded him about the event, but unfortunately because of his hectic schedule in his job, he told me that he can’t come with me.  I was a bit frustrated after that.  August 5, 2010 during the Windows7ako meetup at Gweilo’s bar I asked John Erwin Magno (another active member of the community) if he can join me at De La Salle University, without any hesitation he said yes.  So I informed Christopher that I got another partner and he told me that he will still come if he can.

In short, I coordinated with Erwin about the topic that we will discuss.  Suddenly I received a private message in my Facebook account that says our lecture will be compressed to one hour instead of three.  The time is a bit short but I said it will do.  Erwin and I even meet at a nearby mall to discuss what will happen in the said seminar.  We agreed that I’ll be talking MS Word and Excel, and MS PowerPoint and One Note for him, and for the Web App we’ll just demo the co-authoring feature  since we have a limited time.

The Most Awaited Day

August 14, 2010 the day of our lecture / seminar, i ,m a bit nervous for it’s my first time to have a live demo outside Microsoft grounds or outside the windows7ako and Office2010tayo community.  During our Facebook chat, Erwin also told me that he’s a bit nervous too.  Even an experienced instructor like Erwin who teaches IT subjects can be nervous for the topic is not really his forte, so imagine me, a Medical Technologist who is going to talk about techie things!  So we proceeded at La Salle for our seminar.  We went to a convenience store first to buy a battery for my camera (for documentation of course hehe :p)  I sent Justin a message that were just in a nearby convenience store, he answered and ask us to wait for a while for he is still securing a gate pass for us.  Finally at exactly 4:30 PM, I received a message telling us to proceed to the south gate university.  He fetched us at the gate and after paying our respect to the guard, we’re on our way to the seminar venue.  We arrived the the venue at exactly 4:45 PM, setup our laptops and waited for some students to come.  We are expecting at least 50 attendees but unfortunately due to a conflict with schedules only 18 students came.  But it didn’t bothered me since we’re already there, our duty is to proceed with the lecture as planned.

I started by introducing ourselves, we also told the students that we are an active member of the windows7ako and office2010tayo community. As the first lecturer I asked them if they already seen Office 2010 or evaluated the Beta version.  Unfortunately I got a negative answer, all of them are still using either Office 2007 and some Office 2003.  To my mind it good for they will be amazed into what we will show them.   I  introduced what is MS Office 2010, talked about Word and Excel 2010.  On the other hand, Erwin discussed the power of PowerPoint 2010 and supposedly One Note 2010 but due to limited time he opted to discuss the Office 2010 plug-ins which is the Ribbon Hero and the pptPlex.  Our last topic should be the Co-Authoring feature of the Office WebApp but unfortunately we failed to hook up to the university’s network after several trials.  So we have just discussed how the co-authoring feature works and how will help them to be more productive in their daily tasks.

The students have a very positive response on the new productivity suite.  They were really amazed what Microsoft Office 2010 can do to their assignments, projects and daily tasks.  They learned a lot and also discovered some tools that are already present in the previous versions of Office but are rarely used can make their tasks easily.

We ended up by promoting the windows7ako and office2010tayo community.  We encourage them to join the community and asked them that if they have more questions they can always post there and we’ll be willing to answer.  We also raffled three Office 2010 shirts (courtesy of Microsoft of course – thanks Mellie!), and have a picture taken with the attendees. As a token of appreciation, Justin handed a DLSU paper bag, inside is a DLSU mug (thanks Justin!).

So there, this is my official demo / lecture on emerging Microsoft technology, outside Microsoft grounds. Hope this won’t be the last.  I really enjoyed the experience!  To the members of windows7ako and ofiice2010tayo community, thanks for the support and encouragement, it really helped me a lot, thanks Erwin, I owe you one!

Office 2010 Demo @ DLSU Taft VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Be a member of the windows7ako and office2010tayo community!  By clicking the picture below, you will be redirected to the community’s Facebook page.

                                   

Back to Basics? Helping a friend with some useful apps (Part 2)

Now my that my friend had completed setting up her YouTube downloader another problem emerged!  It appears that she’s downloading a music video and asked me if she can extract just the music in the downloaded video.  It appears that my friend needs a media converter.  One that can convert video clips into an audio file like MP3.  There’s a solution to that, Format Factory!

For those who doesn’t know, Format Factory is a free, Windows compatible application that can convert most your media file into another format. You can download the setup application here.  The setup file is usually in a compressed file (a Zip file) so you need to extract it before you can set it up.  After setting up you will have a full working version of this nice free software to convert your media files into another format.  Just select which format you would like your media file to be converted (ex. avi file to MP3 file) add the files you want to convert and click the start button! As simple as that! Happy converting!

Note: The output file (converted file) is by default will go the FFOutput folder in you’re My Documents.

 

Want to know more?  Join Windows7ako the official Windows 7 community in the Philippines!  You can ask help and questions regarding Windows 7 there and also get to meet the members of the community during the meetups!

Back to Basics? Helping a friend with some useful apps (Part 1)

A chat box just popped up on my Facebook account, my college classmate is asking me if I can help her to download a specific video from YouTube.  I told her to send me the link so that I can download the video and send it to her email.  So she did send me the link, I downloaded the video and send it to her email.  In the long run she asked me if I just can teach her how to do it for she might download more videos next time. So I instructed her to download the setup file of the YouTube downloader here and do the setup in her PC.  Few minutes after, I asked her if she’s done with the setup and told me “I guess, I already downloaded one video.” I’m very glad that it worked for I have a concern because YouTube Downloader has a compatibility issue with Windows 7, I won’t run smoothly until you’ll set the program into compatibility mode.  Here’s how to do it.

After downloading YouTube Downloader, right click on the setup file and click troubleshoot compatibility on the pop-up menu.

Windows will try to detect and resolve the compatibility issues.  Click on the try recommended settings to see what version of Windows environment  the application would most likely to run.

The next window will show you the Windows environment where the application will be most compatible to run. It appears that YouTube Downloader is more compatible to run with Windows XP Service Pack 2.  Click on the start program to start the setup process and you’re on your way to download all those favorite videos with your YouTube Downloader!

This the power of Windows 7! With the compatibility mode even the old applications can run with Windows 7!   Windows 7.. Your PC simplified!

 

Want to know more?  Join Windows7ako the official Windows 7 community in the Philippines!  You can ask help and questions regarding Windows 7 there and also get to meet the members of the community during the meetups!