Businesses have always relied on telephone communication systems to stay in touch with external and internal contacts. However, the traditional method of telecommunication has fallen behind the times, giving way to more flexible solutions that are designed to save businesses money and improve efficiency. In particular, Voice over Internet Protocol can be a valuable asset for small businesses that are experiencing growth. Rather than using telephone lines to transfer and receive calls, VoIP uses the Internet to send your voice to the recipient. Considering how most businesses need an Internet connection in the first place, using VoIP is simply utilizing a technology that?s necessary in order to eliminate an unnecessary expense. Differences Between VoIP and Traditional Phone SystemsDoes your business utilize VoIP? If not, you should consider doing so as soon as possible. It?s a great way to cut down on your operational costs and improve workflow. Here are some of the main differences and advantages that your organization can experience from using VoIP as a part of your communications infrastructure. Additional features: While your traditional phone system might support services like caller ID, user blocking, call forwarding, conference calling, etc, VoIP offers all of these services, plus some. Unlike the traditional phone system, which you need to be close to the receiver to use, VoIP works right from your desktop PC, laptop, or smartphone. As long as you have an Internet connection, you can use your work number from anywhere, allowing for flexibility that the traditional phone system envies. Plus, VoIP offers several other features, including video conferencing, which can be very helpful for bridging the gap between employees while working remotely. Decreased costs: If you?re paying for both a landline and an Internet connection for your office, you?re essentially paying for one too many services. Considering that landlines are often bundled with other services that you may not necessarily want, it?s more affordable and efficient to simply use VoIP as your preferred communications solution. Add in the fact that you can say goodbye to long distance, and you have a convenient and cost-effective package. Flexibility: Traditional phone systems require an immense amount of work to add new lines to an infrastructure. Depending on your office?s setup, new phone lines need to be installed, and you might even need to remodel your office. Both can be expensive, but with VoIP, you don?t need to waste time or money on improving your infrastructure. As long as your Internet connection and internal network can sustain the traffic and strain, VoIP will work as intended. If your organization is ready to implement a solid new communications infrastructure, a VoIP solution can go a long way towards improving operations. To learn more, give us a call at (603) 889-0800.

The success of ?software as a service,? or SaaS, is a significant trend that you need to leverage to your advantage. In essence, businesses that use SaaS are paying a flat rate for a productivity suite or similar service. This software can then be accessed through the cloud via an Internet connection, making it both flexible enough to add new users, and accessible enough to be used anywhere on most any device. According to BetterCloud, 91 percent of Google Apps users claim that SaaS helps them more than traditional desktop applications, while 68 percent of Office 365 users say the same about Office. The success of Software as a Service offerings can be attributed to paying less for more over time. Rather than buying software outright, businesses are finding it more economically feasible to pay a smaller monthly rate for services rendered. This presents several benefits in comparison to purchasing applications in full, like having more manageable payments over time, and always using up-to-date versions of business apps. Additionally, it?s much easier to add new users to a cloud-based productivity suite than it is to purchase new licenses for all of the software required for their position. Besides these benefits, BetterCloud believes that there are still some significant roadblocks that are preventing organizations from implementing cloud-based applications. One of them is the business?s dedication to the antiquated desktop application infrastructure. People are simply used to having their solutions available right on their desktop workstations. Even if they?re gaining ground, concepts like cloud computing, document sharing, and collaboration are all relatively recent developments in the business world. It will still be some time before these concepts are fully recognized and accepted. The modern business?s technology infrastructure is changing to adapt to a demand for an increasingly-mobile, highly collaborative work environment. Having access to critical software solutions while in the office isn?t enough anymore. Executives and employees alike want access to their data and applications at all times, and it?s this drive for mobility that?s fueling the cloud-based application revolution. Therefore, if you want to be at the forefront of the competition, you need to take measures now and begin the assimilation process as soon as possible. If your business is looking for a way to improve operations, you can contact White Mountain IT Services at (603) 889-0800. We can equip your business with the software solutions and cloud computing environment it needs to stay productive.

This feature, while great for quickly storing a file in your Drive account, has certain requirements which limit its functionality. For users of iOS, you?re out of luck; this feature is only present for Android users. Also worth noting is that Android doesn?t recognize handwriting as text, so it cannot be searched for with Drive?s search function. Regardless, it?s a handy tool to have on your smartphone that you?ll want to be familiar with. Create PDFs in Google DriveTo scan a document and convert it to a PDF in Google Drive, follow these steps with your Android smartphone. Open the Google Drive app. Tap the red plus button on the bottom right-hand side of the screen. Select the Scan option. It will look like a camera icon. Take a picture of the document you want to upload. Once you?ve taken the photo, you have a couple of options: Tap the checkmark icon to save it in your Drive. Select the Redo icon if you want to take a better picture. Tap the plus button to scan another page to the file. Once it?s been saved, you can use Drive?s search form to search the non-handwritten text in the document. You can imagine that there are several situations where this might come in handy. Here are a few of them: If you?re on a business trip and don?t have access to a computer, you can easily snap a picture of a document and upload it to your Google Drive account. You can easily store receipts from trips for later viewing and documentation, and give accounting access to your Drive account. Basically, this feature is useful any time you?re not within arm?s reach of a printer with a scanning function. What are some other ways that you can think of to take advantage of this PDF converting feature? Be sure to share them with us in the comments, and subscribe to our blog for more great tips and tricks.

Hosting provider Marco Marsala was brought under fire after he posted on a server forum seeking advice for dealing with a catastrophic error he made while trying to erase a few files. Stating that he had utilized the ?rm -rf? command with undefined variables, he had inadvertently destroyed all data on the computer. What?s worse, his backups were mounted to the computers and were wiped as well. This is actually a similar blunder that Pixar experienced, almost deleting Toy Story 2 prior to its release. As a result, everything Marsala had for his company was destroyed (including the websites he had created and hosted for his 1,535 customers) with no backups surviving to restore from. Needless to say, the responses from other users on the forum were decidedly negative – a few dismissed the possibility of his company surviving the error, and others questioned his abilities as a programmer. One poster recommended Marsala seek legal counsel rather than technical advice, as he predicted that Marsala was ?going out of business.? There was a consensus on the feed that the best chance for any data recovery was to recruit the help of a data recovery firm. Fortunately for Marsala, such a data recovery company was able to recover his files and his biggest hit was financial–both from the recovery company?s fees and from the reduced income due to the loss of business he suffered. By neglecting to follow best practices in regard to backups, Marsala essentially invited this disaster to strike. Following basic best practices would have mitigated much, if not all, of Marsala?s problem. What happened to his data is exactly the reason that all data backups should be kept offline, isolated from the original file on a separate system. Without such measures in place, your data is subject to not just human error, as was the case here, but also other dangers. Fire, electrical surges, accidental equipment damage, theft, all of these events have the potential to jeopardize data that?s critical to your business. Are your data backups as secure as they should be? Do you even have a backup and disaster recovery solution put into place? Be certain by calling White Mountain IT Services at (603) 889-0800. Our experts can advise you on what your business needs to survive the worst disasters, and assure that you and your clients? information are prepared for anything.

Wirelessly Charge Your Smartphone?s Battery Nokia is currently developing a way to use radio waves to charge a phone?s battery while it?s on standby. How?s this work? Here?s a fascinating video of one practical application of this technology known as the Nikola Case, named after the genius inventor and pioneer of wireless technology, Nikola Tesla. Smartphones Provide Live Traffic UpdatesHave you ever looked at Google Maps and wondered how they?re able to show live traffic updates on obscure roads? Well, it turns out that Google tracks the movement of Android phones using GPS technology and feeds the data to Google Maps for live traffic updates. Of course, one has to wonder if this is all Google is using this information for. Smartphones Deter Nuclear Warfare If, however, your smartphone?s GPS determines that the device is traveling at a speed of more than 1,200 mph, and at an altitude higher than 60,000 feet, it will automatically shut off, as required by law. This may explain why you never see Superman using a smartphone. In actuality, this is a regulation known as COCOM (Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls), designed to prevent GPS technology from being used to guide intercontinental ballistic missiles–just in case North Korea gets any bright ideas. The Reason Behind Waterproofing SmartphonesOne of the latest trends in smartphone technology is waterproofing, as seen in the latest line of Samsung Galaxy smartphones. For Westerners, this feature might feel like a bit of a novelty–something that?s nice, but not at the top of our wish list. However, in Japan, this waterproofing feature is a necessity, thanks to teenagers that prefer to use their smartphones while taking showers. How many of these smartphone facts have you heard of? Can you think of any more odd smartphone facts that you can add to this list? Share them in the comments!