SharePoint Vs. Azure
SharePoint Vs. Azure Last month, we gave you an overview of a couple of Microsoft’s cloud storage solutions, SharePoint and OneDrive, to see which one makes the most sense for your business. Today we’re back to do it again. The contenders this time: SharePoint Vs. Azure Files First: A Recap Of SharePoint. We’d recommend you read our last article to get a better understanding of SharePoint – you can find that article here. For now, here’s a recap of SharePoint’s highlights. SharePoint is designed as a business collaboration tool and content management platform, and gives the user the ability to control access to information and files, making it ideal for larger organisations with more complex needs. Importantly, SharePoint is included with Microsoft 365 at no extra cost, no matter what tier your business has. Next Up: Azure Files Azure Files is part of (drumroll) the Azure ecosystem, which is entirely separate from Microsoft 365, and is its own cloud platform with an emphasis on computing as opposed to productivity. With this, there’s an extra cost depending on your needs. Azure Files itself, is a fully managed cloud server which functions similarly to a traditional file server, meaning you can access your data from any connected computer. It serves as an easy way to replace your on-premise server, which is something we discuss in this article here. Azure Files comes with its own benefits to your business, such as Only needing to pay for the storage you actually use No need to buy, maintain and upgrade expensive physical servers A backend that’s protected and patched by Microsoft, meaning you don’t need to worry about external security A myriad of robust security controls that can limit data access to only those who need it. So, What’s Best? Like most choices in life, different options make sense for different people. SharePoint is designed as a way of collaborating with colleagues on documents and files, and increasing productivity, much like the rest of the Microsoft 365 suite. On the other hand, Azure Files is a traditional file server replacement, and offers a like-for-like alternative to an on-premise physical server, which fits in with the rest of the positioning of the Azure suite, focusing on computing power as opposed to productivity. To find out more about Azure Files from Microsoft themselves, click here. In Conclusion Both solutions offer a brilliant and modern alternative to traditional file sharing and on-premises servers. If you’re looking for seamless integration with Microsoft 365, and are already heavily using apps like Teams, OneDrive and the Microsoft Office suite, then SharePoint is the obvious answer for your business. With SharePoint, you get superior levels of collaboration with internal and external team members, plus the added benefit that you’ve probably already got SharePoint without even knowing it if you’re using Microsoft 365. However, if you want the functionality of accessing all of your data via a mapped out drive, or need the ability to store much larger quantities of data, then Azure files is probably the way forward for your business. Whichever you might choose – Evorio can help get you set up with the latest technologies. Get In Touch
SharePoint Vs. OneDrive
SharePoint Vs. OneDrive Microsoft has no end of cloud storage and solutions – but which is best for you? We’ll be comparing some of the bigger and more well-known options over the next few weeks. Today fighters – SharePoint vs. OneDrive. First Up: What Is OneDrive? Microsoft OneDrive is a cloud storage solution which is mainly aimed at individuals, to store and share files and folders. It can still be used as a collaboration tool between smaller teams, but it’s not designed to handle larger projects and workloads between multiple members. Your best bet with OneDrive is to use it for individual storage and sharing the odd file with a colleague. If you’ve got a Microsoft 365 subscription, no matter the tier, you’ll have at least 1 terabyte (1000 gigabytes) of OneDrive storage to use. OneDrive is also baked into the Windows File Explorer on Windows 10 and 11, meaning your files are readily available whenever you need them, and uploading files to OneDrive is as easy as dropping them in the OneDrive folder in Windows Explorer – no need to upload manually via a website. But What About SharePoint? Where OneDrive focuses on individual storage, SharePoint is designed to be a business collaboration and content management platform and serves as your company intranet. It operates using SharePoint sites that are tied to organisations, as opposed to individual accounts, like OneDrive. In other words, SharePoint works best when used between larger teams within a business. SharePoint also gives businesses the ability to control access to information and automate workflow processes, meaning its a great choice for large organisations. As with OneDrive, SharePoint comes with all tiers of Microsoft 365 at no additional cost, although its recommended you get an expert to set SharePoint up for you, and handle your data migration. Contact us here for more information on how Evorio can help with this. So What’s Best? In most cases, we’d recommend SharePoint for your business. Here are 5 reasons why: Data Retention: Since SharePoint sites don’t tie data to individual user accounts like OneDrive, data is kept regardless of any changes in accounts, such as a team member leaving. With OneDrive, data is deleted after 30 days of an account being removed or deleted. Permissions: Using SharePoint, you have much greater control over permissions and the ability to restrict certain users from certain locations within your data structure. This is a great feature for larger organisations with complex data structures, or for those dealing with sensitive data. Version Control: A brilliantly useful feature that SharePoint boasts. Whenever a file is edited or modified, a version is created that tracks and lists changes and gives the ability to revert back to a previous version if needed. This is great for correcting accidental edits, or seeing how a document has evolved over time. File Organisation: SharePoint grants you the ability to better organise your files using metadata. Metadata provides additional information such as a modified date, modified by, original author, as well as any custom metadata columns you want to create. These different metadata views can even be used to create your own views, similar to how views operate in Dynamics 365, making SharePoint a familiar interface to those already using Dynamics CRM. Offline Syncing: OneDrive and SharePoint can actually work hand-in-hand – namely to allow you to sync your SharePoint files to your local computer, in exactly the same was that OneDrive does. This is extra handy for when you need to access a crucial file without an internet connection. ability to control access to information and automate workflow processes, meaning its a great choice for large organisations. As with OneDrive, SharePoint comes with all tiers of Microsoft 365 at no additional cost, although its recommended you get an expert to set SharePoint up for you, and handle your data migration. Contact us here for more information on how Evorio can help with this. In Conclusion While SharePoint and OneDrive have some overlap, and even share some of the same technology, both are aimed at different types of organisations with different purposes. If your business needs the ability to collaborate and share between several team members, with content and documents that belong to the company, then our verdict is that SharePoint is best for you. If you want to store content privately for your own use, then we recommend that you store this in your own OneDrive. Learn more about SharePoint and its benefits here.
Why Should I Move My Servers To The Cloud?
Why Should I Move My Servers To The Cloud? Everyone seems to be talking about moving their server hosting to the cloud – but why? What is cloud hosting? What’s so special about it? Evorio is here for an overview into what exactly cloud hosting means, and why you should consider migrating away from your on-premise servers. What Is Cloud Hosting? Cloud hosting is simply delivering computing services over an internet connection – this could be servers, storage, databases or analytics. Instead of buying physical servers which often is expensive and time-consuming, you can purchase these services on a monthly subscription from a cloud provider. Your data and resources are stored in data centres owned by your chosen cloud hosting provider, rather than your own server hardware, which can come with a whole host of benefits. Azure is one such cloud hosting provider and sits within Microsoft’s ecosystem. But why would you choose Azure over hosting on your own server hardware or premise? Azure Vs. On-Premise Hosting There are pros and cons to both sides of the table, and one solution doesn’t necessarily fit every business. First up, the pros and cons of On-Premise hosting: Pros Total control – your data, hardware and software are all yours to control and do with as you please. Allocate resources where you see fit. Internal IT teams can address all potential vulnerabilities. Cons Large upfront cost to buy the server hardware. You are responsible for the maintenance and any costs that come with it. Longer implementation/setup times. Subject to fluctuating power costs. Requires a suitable environment to store an on-premise server with ventilation. Azure Hosting Pros Predictable costs. Higher levels of security. Simple scalability. Quick deployment. Access anytime and anywhere. Maintenance is handled by Azure. Easier to limit downtime, compared to an on-premise server.. Cons Less control compared to an on-premise server. Requires a constant internet connection. What Do We Recommend? Overall, we believe hosting your servers via Azure makes sense for most businesses. It’s cheaper on maintenance costs and setup fees, and gives you peace of mind knowing that if something were to go wrong, your data and resources are being handled by experts. Coupled with the flexibility of not having to purchase and power physical server hardware, this makes Azure a great choice for most organisations. Azure even offers reserved subscriptions, which can nearly half your costs compared to hosting an on-premise server With the approaching end-of-life of Windows Server 2012, there’s never been a better time to move your servers over to Azure. Find out more about the Windows Server 2012 end-of-life here. How Do I Move To Azure? Migrating your servers from on-premise to Azure can seem like a daunting task – but you don’t have to do it alone. We can help to move your resources and databases over to Azure smoothly and swiftly, and help you take care of your on-premise server hardware, so you only need to worry about using your shiny new hosting platform. Contact us at the button below to get the ball rolling on an Azure migration, or click here to look at Azure in more detail. Contact Us
Introducing Microsoft Loop
Introducing Microsoft Loop On March 22nd, Microsoft announced the public preview of their newest Microsoft 365 app – Microsoft Loop. But what is Loop? How do you access it? Most importantly, what can Loop do for your business? So, what is Loop? Microsoft Loop is a shiny new collaboration tool you can use right now. While Microsoft has a few different collaboration apps and tools, like Teams, Loop is on a whole new level. Imagine having one document that has all the project details from everyone involved, which is sharable across different platforms with real-time updates and edits. Gone are the days of needing to send emails to colleagues for their input on a project, now everyone can add their thoughts to the same place. Collaborative projects are the heart of the new app which seamlessly integrates with the Microsoft 365 ecosystem, meaning you can add spreadsheets, slide decks and Word documents directly into a Loop project. It even offers convenient Outlook and Teams widgets to eliminate the need for constant app switching. Loop works via an iOS app (with an Android version on the way) or via your favourite desktop browser. Keep in mind that Loop is still in public preview, so there are one or two kinks that need to be ironed out and plenty of features that Microsoft has promised to deliver. Microsoft Loop has 3 main elements Workspaces Pages Components Workspaces are your main project wrapper, these contain the pages you’ll use to organise your ideas. Loop pages are similar to OneNote pages, and will feel really familiar to regular OneNote users. Pages are where you add your ideas, files and data with other colleagues in real time. Loop components are your standard app integrations, namely Teams, Outlook and Whiteboard, as well as your lists, tables, text and checklists; anything you add to a page is a component. Some of the useful features that Loop currently has to offer include: Automatically search to find relevant documents when you start a new project Page templates to get your project off the ground quicker – avoid that dreaded blank page angst! Tables, checklists, tasks and more from a handy dropdown menu wherever you need. Customisable notifications when mentioning a team member, as well as the ability to leave comments and ‘nudges’. The aforementioned mobile app so you can keep up to date on project progress, wherever you are. Microsoft has also promised that Loop will heavily feature their new comprehensive AI tool, Copilot, powered by ChatGPT. Copilot will give you AI-powered suggestions to transform the way you create and collaborate. You’ll be able to give it prompts like “help me write a mission statement” to help with your ideas, as well as tailor your documents and tidy up your projects. Copilot is currently in a closed preview and is presumed to make its release sometime this year. To find out more about Loop from Microsoft themselves, click here and check out this press release announcing the public preview Have you used Microsoft Loop yet? What are your thoughts? Let us know on LinkedIn by clicking here! Or, to see more about what Microsoft 365 has to offer, click the button below. Click To Learn About Microsoft 365
A Deep Dive Into The “New” Outlook
A Deep Dive Into The “New” Outlook A few weeks ago, we reported on the brand new public preview of the “New Outlook”, with some first impressions of the fresh coat of paint, and new features that Microsoft has added. We still don’t have an exact date for when Microsoft plans to make this new version the only available version, but after a few weeks of using the latest updates, we’ve got a deeper dive into the good, the bad, and the frustrating. Be sure to keep in mind that this new version is still in public preview, and has been getting very frequent mini updates to fix bugs and improve performance, so some of the problems we mention may be fixed by the time you read this, or may be due to be fixed soon. We’ve put together a short list here of the pros and cons for a quick overview, but for a more in-depth review, see below for the detailed thoughts. Pros Seamless integration with the rest of Microsoft 365, including the newer apps like Loop and Viva Quality of life improvements like being able to pin emails, schedule sends and snooze emails you want to read later Quicker and easier to use the calendar, create meetings and even denote when you’ll be working from home. Better visual customisation, including being able to incorporate your company branding onto the app. Cons You’re unable to rearrange or reorganise your mailboxes, including shared mailboxes. Saving attachments is more limited, you’re unable to save directly to SharePoint, only a local folder or personal OneDrive. Some pre-release bugs are still present, such as Outlook ignoring your theme choices to default to whatever your system theme is. Currently, the new Outlook doesn’t have an offline mode, meaning you’re unable to even start the app unless you’re connected to the internet. The Good… Most of the good stuff comes from the improved integration with the rest of the Microsoft 365 suite – including Microsoft Office apps, the brand-new Microsoft Loop and even the new Viva engage – we’ll have more details on Viva in the coming weeks. The new Outlook is also more customisable, with you being able to add your company’s own branding as a theme. But these aren’t the only things the new Outlook brings to the table. This update comes with a host of quality-of-life improvements we’ve noticed. For example, you can now pin emails to the top of your mailbox, snooze those that you want to read later, and even schedule an email to send whenever you want. Text autocomplete and autocorrect both seem to be better and more consistent, and the new Outlook generally seems to be faster than its older counterpart. The calendar specifically seems to have been a focus for Microsoft in this new update. Quickly creating a meeting has been made easier, with you now being able to just click on a time and it brings up the meeting options. You can customise your calendar views, including who’s calendars you want to be viewing, making it easier to find time to talk to a colleague when they’re free. You can also add in emojis in your meeting or event titles too. You can even specify in your calendar when you’re working from home, adding a layer of transparency, although this is completely optional. Overall, the new Outlook does make a good case for switching over from the old version, but, as with any preview build, things aren’t all good. …And The Bad While there are a lot of quality-of-life improvements within this new version, there are also some problems ranging from annoying to downright confusing. For example, the inability to customise the order your mailboxes sit in, meaning any shared mailboxes only appear under the “Shared with me” or “Groups” folder, with no option to move them somewhere more convenient or change the order they’re listed in. This isn’t exclusive to the shared mailboxes, as you are unable to rearrange any of the folders no matter the mailbox. You’re also more limited in where you can save attachments, you can download locally or into a personal OneDrive, but saving an attachment to SharePoint is no longer an option. In fact, in our experience, we’ve found that the new version tends to save files in odd, random locations when you try to download an attachment, although we’d expect this will get fixed in an update soon. We’ve also found that, despite the new theme options, the new Outlook tends to just ignore your selection and default to whatever theme Windows is set to, be that light or dark. Again, this is something we expect will be fixed soon in an update. The biggest issue we’ve found, which stops us from recommending you switch just yet, is the inability to start the new Outlook while offline. An internet connection is required even to look at past emails. This is one of the few features that Microsoft has commented on and announced to get fixed within their roadmap. What Do We Recommend? For now, we’d recommend you stick with the old version of Outlook. There’s lots to love about the new version, but for us, there’s just a few more kinks that need to be ironed out before we can recommend you run this new version daily. We’d recommend you wait for a few more of these mini updates. As yet, there’s still no official word from Microsoft on when this new version will be come the only version, but to stay up to date, follow Evorio on LinkedIn here!
What Is Teams Premium?
What Is Teams Premium? Microsoft Teams is about to get even better. Microsoft’s chief collaboration and communication platform, Teams, has become the foundation for modern hybrid working – and it’s about to get even better! Launching in February 2023, Microsoft will offer a paid version known as Microsoft Teams Premium, joining the existing version that’s included in all Microsoft 365 business packages. But what does this mean for you and I? What’s the difference between these two versions? And most importantly, is it worth upgrading? What Do You Get With Teams Premium? The biggest addition in Teams Premium would be new AI (Artificial Intelligence) features. Microsoft is betting on AI becoming a bigger part of our lives in the coming years, investing billions of dollars to make sure that it does. With this in mind they’ve added multiple AI-powered features to Teams Premium, focusing on improving communication between cultures, and enhancing collaboration. Intelligent Recap Intelligent Recap will use AI to automatically summarise meetings Teams will identify the important points and any actionable items It can even provide insights into attendees’ engagement levels – a useful feature for those who need to stay informed and on track. Translations Live translation can translate a person’s speech in real-time, and in over 40 spoken languages. Even better, if the meeting organizer has Teams Premium, all attendees can enjoy live translated captions regardless of their Teams package. To preview live translation and other Teams Premium features, click here. Some other key features Even better security, with watermarked content and video feeds End-to-end encryption for important and confidential meetings SMS reminders and branded lobby rooms – a fantastic way of improving and personalising the customer experience You won’t need to download the Teams app on mobile devices – you’ll be able to access the meeting from your choice of web browser (although the mobile app will still be available if you prefer) These new features are all designed to make communication, collaboration, and teamwork easier and more productive. These features enable users to be more focused and on-task, give better insights during meetings, and share relevant information easily with one another, without a language barrier. Who Is Teams Premium For? Microsoft Teams Premium is a one-stop-shop for collaboration and communication tailored for businesses who want to streamline their team’s workflow and maximise their efficiency. Microsoft is giving you the power of AI technology to improve your productivity and your communication, both internally and to your customers. Businesses that need to comply with regulatory standards will find the enhanced security features are worth the price alone to protect sensitive data and make sure what needs to be confidential, stays confidential. Contact us for updates on pricing and availability of Microsoft Teams Premium Contact Us
What Is Windows 365?
What Is Microsoft 365? Windows 365 is a subscription-based cloud PC service – essentially a service to host a Windows 11 computer in the cloud Designed for businesses who do not want to replace expensive laptops and PCs every 3-years, and those looking for greater flexibility. What are the benefits of Windows 365? Out of the office without a computer? No problem! As long as you have an internet connection and a smart phone, then you are in business. Operational across Apple and Android devices It removes the need to replace old hardware at the end of its life, or hardware that is under-performing and out of warranty It comes at a fixed monthly cost, so makes for predictable budgeting Great if you have a number of employees on short term contracts, as licenses can be transferred easily to someone else when they leave It’s secure! Built and hosted within Microsoft’s Azure platform which is trusted by hundreds of thousands of companies around the world. This means you can also harness the power of Azure data backups. Windows 365 is available in two editions: – Business – Designed for companies with less than 300 seats. – Enterprise – For larger companies who require unlimited seats, the ability to create custom cloud computers and greater control. Windows 365 Business offers a fixed-price service for a Windows 10/11 computer depending on the amount of resources you require. E.g. if you require more RAM or CPU power then the price is reflective Windows 11 FAQ Can I install my own applications? Yes, this is your computer. Install whatever you need! Can I print documents? Yes. If you have ever used Terminal or Remote Desktop Server then it works in the same way. As long as the printer is connected to the physical device, then it will be re-directed when you logon to you Windows 365 computer. Can I upgrade from Business to Enterprise? At present, you cannot make the jump from Business to Enterprise and vice versa. If I need more RAM, can I resize my instance? Enterprise customers will be able to resize their instance of Windows 365 but at present, Business users will not be able to. What happens to my data if I cancel my subscription? When your subscription ends, standard Microsoft 365 data retention policies apply.