HP Blogs - When the Cloud disappears, IT will transform itsel... - The HP Blog Hub an article about how Cloud computing is becoming the norm rather than the exception.

Clear Books - speed

So far I have found Clear Books to be fast to very fast (evenings and weekend).  Monday night at about 6:30 pm was slow though.  Could have been a once off or a problem my end, but something to monitor.

Clear Books - electronic invoicing (good and bad)

Clear Books has some good tools for electronic invoicing.  Not only can you capture a pdf, there is a tool to click to email the invoice.  The good part here is that instead of sending a pdf as an attachment, it sends an email with hyperlinks to both the invoice and a live statement.

The advantage is that the client can see the latest details.  The disadvantage of course is that if for any reason you were not up to date, the client can see that too!

Security thought: if the hyperlink remains valid for that client for all time and continues to show live information, a former employee of the client with the hyperlink would still have access to live statements and by drilling down, to the invoices.  Need to follow this up.

Clear Books - banking and scans

Spent a few more minutes playing with Clear Books and made a major discovery: you can now add attachments.  The last time I looked at Cloud accounting systems (about a year ago) none supported this.  It now looks likely that this system could support paperless accounts in a good way.

I'm starting to get enthusiastic but will need a bit more testing before I drop my old Quick Books desktop version.

Clear Books - testing

I have signed up for a free 30 day trial of the web based accounting software Clear Books.  First indications are that it is quick and very easy to use.  I dived straight in and was able to create a sales invoice in a few minutes.  Customisation and creating of sales lines seemed easy.  Receipting too was fairly intuitive.  It was refreshing to see how well catching invoices as pdfs was built in - using with Evernote would be easy.

Definitely seems worthy of investing a bit more time to test the banking side.

Intuit's New QuickBooks Online Accountant Brings the Cloud – and Its Benefits – to Accountants | AccountingWEB.com

Information about Quickbooks online (cloub based) and a new service they have provided for accountants supporting clients using QB.

Intuit's New QuickBooks Online Accountant Brings the Cloud – and Its Benefits – to Accountants | AccountingWEB.com:

'via Blog this'

Pearltrees

This clever idea lets allows you to make 'trees' out of web sites and then share them (mindmap meets shortcut).  I haven't had the chance to play with it but image if you could use it with local content too and share directories not just pages  How many places have you seen company hard drives with data stored one way for one reason but for other users would be much more useful another way?

For example, one department looks after day to day data input but creates an accrual at the month end.  Another department collects the journals and posts them.  This idea could allow sharing in a better way than just shortcuts so that each party can find the data where it is logical for them..

Pearltrees:

'via Blog this'

A really interesting article predicting an IT implementation boom, mainly lead by the Cloud revolution.  I think this could be possible, especially when you consider how many companies have held back on IT implementation for the last 5 or probably 10 years.  As soon as the economy picks up it will be upgrade time.  Of course the forward thinking companies will be doing this now so that the investment is in place before their rivals so they can concentrate on growth when boom times come.

Tech - Companies

SMEs want accountants to work online - Accountancy Age mobile

And Accountants want their clients to work online!

Cloud computing for disaster recovery

Now that the notion of cloud computing has gained some stature in the IT community, a lot of vendors are looking at cloud computing as a disaster recovery solution. After all, if you can provision a cloud to take over for your IT operations afte ... http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/readwriteweb/~3/Y4HgXXILF4Q/disaster-recovery-and-the-clou.php Shared via my6sense

Keynote speech (video) on Cloud Accounting

More about the Cloud from CIMA.  Watched the first clip - more for watching later.

What is Cloud Computing

CIMA CPD event that completely changed my view of Cloud Computing.

I had thought of Cloud Computing in fragmented terms with each application being in a separate cloud eg Gmail, Evernote etc.  This opened my eyes to the advantages of having a single private cloud.

The disadvantages of the fragmented cloud are:

1. You do not know where your data is and it may be hard to back it up (not an issue with Evernote) and although Google's reputation depends on protecting my data, if there is a problem I have no redress.
2. May not have control over version control

Advantages of personal cloud are:

1. Clear where data is and option exists for backups.
2. Running desk top applications from cloud.  I would have licences for applications and could run them from my own server or another cloud supplier if fell out with first one.

Effect is very much like having outsourced IT.  This could be very much of interest for running small to medium sized offices, although not of interest to me at present since much of the time I am working directly onto clients' systems.

Presentation was by System Host which came across as a very credible and competent supplier.

Further details (sorry requires password as contains confidential and copyright information).

Computers make nurses more efficient

This article in the HSJ (sorry link only works for me as could not find this article on HSJ on line and copyright prevents me sharing publicly) shows the results of a case study.  In the study, community nurses were given ruggedised laptops with 3G cards.

The expected result was that travels costs would go down but in fact that did not happen (they stayed static).  This is because instead of going back to the office, the nurses made 5% extra visits.  Using the computers allowed them to make their notes as they went along.

Data is not stored on the machine, making sensible use of the cloud.

Can Cloud Computing Clear the Air?

Read this article from CFO exploring some of the corporate effects of Cloud computing.

The Cloud - battle of the Titans

Read this article in Bloomberg.  A long article, it looks at some of the strategic and structural issues of moving to the Cloud.  I like the analogy at the end - computing is like electricity generation.  Most companies now have their computing power in-house but soon they will realise that it's better to get one of the big suppliers to do it so them - it gives more capacity and ultimately, is cheaper and more reliable.  Includes brief mentions of data security concerns.

First impressions of Microsoft Office 365

See my main blog for this post.

Cloud computing could lead to more adaptive finance function

Interesting article from CIMA - not necessarily new but good revision.

The gap in the market seems to be ultra-cheap start up solutions. At present there is no cost incentive for small business and personal users to switch from their already paid for legacy systems.

Cloud computing could lead to more adaptive finance function