Back to the IT subjects

After a long time without changes in this blog, starting from this month I will try to get back to the articles and write at least once per week. It will be a mix of news with personal opinion, always related to IT subjects.

As a few friends already know, this year I've being dedicated myself on mobile development - initially as a hobby only. And for this to happen I had to dip into books and courses to rewind how to program after being away of programming for more than 10 years.
To start with, I had an idea of developing a simple app to put in practice the concepts studied and make myself more confident. So after analyzing the possibilities, I got the idea of developing and app for the newspaper Curitiba in English (CIE) where I am contributor.

An an important instrument of communication, the CIE could take the advantage of having an app to bring readers closer to the subjects for discussion, boost page views but mainly make it easier for sharing - by social networks, email or even sms. The idea is pretty simple, no big features implemented but its expected to have many other great features still to be implemented for the further versions.

Feel free to comment and rate.
Click here and go to the iTunes App Store.

Brazil leads time use of tablets and smartphones

Brazil leads the time use of smartphones and tablets in the world, says a survey conducted jointly by CONNECT and the Worldwide Independent Network of Market Research (WIN).

According to the survey, the Brazilian spends on average 84 minutes per day on smartphone against a global average of 74 minutes. Despite the larger screens, the tablets do not attract people for longer: the Brazilian is 79 minutes per day on gadgets with screens from 7 inches while the world average recorded by the study is 71 minutes.

Even with these numbers and with smartphone penetration doubled between 2011 and 2012, going from 9% to 18%, Brazil is still far from the world average recorded last year with 48%.

So far with few options in the market, Amazon arrived in Brazil with its virtual store and the Kindle in December 2012, e-readers are still very shy presence in the country. According to the survey, only 1% of Brazilians have such a device, the global average is 12%.

The survey interviewed a total of 1,000 Internet users over 16 years in Brazil, through the panel CONECTAí conducted between November and December 2012. Moreover, the survey had a total of 54.000 interviews in 54 countries around the world.

Bring Your Own Device *

With all the recent additions in technology gadgets, one more abbreviation has come up – BYOD – which stands for “bring your own device”. It simply refers to the use of personal mobile communication tools at work.

As we have seen recently with the popularization of smartphones and tablets, our technology behavior is changing: People are carrying their portable devices everywhere. As a result, an issue of multiple and/or overlapping devices has arisen at large companies, which often provide their employees with their own technology. Therefore, users must now become accustomed to a mix of devices in order to accomplish their duties.

Some people complain that it would be better if they could choose what kind of device they work with in the office. It can be confusing and time-consuming, for example, to remember the set-up for two different operating systems. Wouldn’t it be better for us to choose which operating system we are more comfortable and familiar with? In this way, professionals would have greater freedom and flexibility to use the hardware and software that best meets their day-to-day needs.

Luckily, some companies are recognizing the value of giving their employees more technology freedom. It is getting more and more common for people to bring their own laptop, Mac or PC, to work. Individuals are using operating systems such as Windows, Linux or Mac OSX on laptops, netbooks, and tablets depending on their personal preference, and all of these are mixing together in the corporate environment.

Unfortunately, despite some companies’ efforts to permit greater technology freedom among their employees, it is not always simple. For example, with a mixing of operating systems and devices, how does the company manage technical support, or ensure security for the information stored on those devices? With this new BYOD trend becoming more common, there is no way to avoid many questions and challenges. It’s time for companies to deal with this issue.

When we talk about what should be allowed or denied regarding technology in a company’s policies of usage, there is an important point to consider, which is the legal regulations. As an employee has access to his personal device anywhere and anytime, who is in control of the company’s proprietary information? How does a company control an employee when he is not in the office if he has access to the company’s information whenever he wants? If an employee is up late at night at home checking his personal emails, and he decides to answer a business email, should this constitute overtime work? What about if he answers a text message from work on the weekend or during the week on his lunch hour?

For starters, it would be wise for companies to begin to think about these issues and setting the appropriate policies of usage so employees are clear on what is expected of them. Companies also need to concern themselves with the information stored on the mobile devices. For example, a company could be developing a product that is not ready for marketing but for some reason information or images of the product are accidentally spread over the Internet. Thus, companies should consider having employees sign confidential disclosure agreements to avoid information leaks.

Additionally, companies need a policy for loss, damage, theft or breakdown of personal equipment. If an employee is making daily use of his personal mobile devices for his company, then the company must assume the responsibility to immediately replace or repair the device if it is stolen or damaged; otherwise their competitors can take advantage of this loss. Also, if a loss or theft happens, how should this be treated? Does the company have the right to investigate the equipment and check for the minimum use of information security, illegal software, piracy or unauthorized and inappropriate content? Even if an employee’s personal devices are working fine, if he is using them for company projects, does the company have the right to access those devices for security purposes?

Initially, BYOD sounds very complex and hard to manage, but it is already happening and thus will require more and more attention in business. The sooner a company is prepared for BYOD issues, knowing the ways to manage and control the scenario, the faster and more safely the issues will be addressed.

One policy currently being used by companies to address BYOD issues is called Mobile Device Management, which allows companies to focus on mobile devices allied with network administrators to apply security policies according to the characteristics of each type of access for smartphones and tablets.

In conclusion, there are many questions and issues raised by BYOD. According to specialists in technology, the place to begin is with the process of education. There must be the creation and formalization of usage policy, plus training, acquisition, and installation of technologies required to manage the processes such as Mobile Device Management. The challenge is to provide convenience and productivity for employees and to keep their equipment and personal devices secure. As companies rely more and more on technology to do business, addressing this issue will be a key to success.

* Article published on Curitiba in English. 

Mobile Lives of College Students

Look at how smartphones are changing the students' life according to the study from OnlineDregree.org!
The info-graphic below says everything.

Information consumption on smartphones:

Smartphone use throughout the day:

Brazilians are increasingly connected to the internet

ComScore, a company that specializes in measuring the digital world, recently released its annual report some insights on key digital trends in Brazil and its implications for the coming months.

The digital media reached a new level in Brazil in 2011, driven by activities such as social networking, search, video, and online shopping, showing consumers increasingly turning to the web and spending more time with digital content.

Here are some of the trends that were measured by ComScore:

- Brazil is now the 7th largest internet market in the world, with an audience of 46.3 million visitors aged 15 or more who access the Internet from your home computer or work. The number of users increased by 16% over the previous year.

- Brazilians spent an average of 26.7 hours online in December 2011, an increase of 10% over the previous year (equivalent to more than 2 hours). The portals were online activity that generated the most engagement, with 39.2% of total minutes in December 2011, followed by social networking, with 23% - an increase of 6.3 percentage points in the year.

- In December 2011, the Brazilians viewed more than 4.7 billion videos online, an increase of 74% over 2010. Growth was driven by a 19% increase in unique visitors and 46% in videos per visitor, and watch videos has established itself as one of the most important online activities.

- 6.9 billion online searches were made in Brazil in December 2011, an increase of 37% over the previous year. The searches peaked in October and November, spurred by the search shopping season.

- The Brazilian digital advertising market continues to grow. In December 2011, 62.9 billion impressions were published online in Brazil, reaching 50.8 million Internet users.

- Phones and tablets continue to change the digital landscape, accounting for 1.5% of all digital traffic in Brazil in December 2011. Of this total activity, over 42% of pageviews originated in tablets.

90 Years of Radio in Brazil *

This September marked the 90^th anniversary of the first radio transmission in Brazil. It occurred on September 7, 1922 in Rio de Janeiro, with President Epitácio Pessoa celebrating the centennial of the Independence of Brazil. Amid the festive mood of the event, the president’s speech opened the exhibition through a 500-watt transmitter, supplied by the American company Westinghouse and installed on top of Corcovado. Only 80 receivers scattered in the capital and others cities such as Niterói and Petrópolis followed the experimental transmission, which also played classical music, including the opera The Guarani from Carlos Gomes.

Behind the initiative was the scientist and educator, Edgar Roquette Pinto, considered the father of Brazilian broadcasting. With his efforts, more receivers were installed in Rio de Janeiro in the following years. Other stations began to appear not only with informative programming, but taking the first steps to broadcasting Brazilian music. With technological developments in the 1930s, radio talk shows were created, which made the radio a popular vehicle. In the 1950s, radio began broadcasting sports, such as the 1958 World Cup. In 1953, there were already more than 500 radio stations in the country and almost half a million receivers.

However, 1950 saw the first transmission of a TV signal in Brazil. With the popularization of television, many experts believed the radio wouldn’t survive. TV provided much more entertainment with both voice and a black/white images. However, in the 1950s the TV was a new invention and it wasn’t affordable for all Brazilians. Thus the popularity of the radio continued to grow, culminating in the first transmissions on FM in 1970, which provided double the capacity of the electromagnetic spectrum (compared to AM) and brought much better sound quality. Later, another important step was taken with the arrival of satellites that allowed for the formation of national networks, and with them, the economic feasibility of various stations of small and medium sizes across the country, which gave shape to the new process of national integration launched by radio and later adopted by television.

So much for a short summary of radio’s history — what about the future? Everything being written by technology experts points to the radio of the future being linked with the Internet. As with the invention of TV, the spread of the Internet worldwide has prompted some pessimists to argue for the final blow to both AM and FM radio. Some think radio will simply cease to exist, even with the availability of digital broadcasts. However, it is still too soon to “put the nail in the coffin.” Digital radio combined with the Internet has opened up a new world for radio because distance is no longer an obstacle. We can now capture favorite radio stations from around the world without interference problems or noise. Even poor sound quality is bypassed with high-quality stream-of-data over the Internet. Many cellphones already include FM radios, even tuning stations via traditional analog signals. There are predictions that the future of radio will involve the use of wireless technologies, today most widely used in computers and peripherals such as WiFi. Imagine a radio from the past like a Walkman, but with access to any wireless router connecting to the Internet, inside your home. You wouldn’t need a computer to listen to the radio; instead with your small portable radio you could tune in any station in the world, of which there are currently over 20,000!

Even though the radio today through the Internet is far ahead of its past capabilities, it still is anchored to a computer platform or a smartphone. Luckily, one more revolution is about to happen for us Brazilians. The government is in the process of choosing a technology standard for a digital radio system. The process is being conducted by the government with great discretion. Digital radio will bring many benefits, such as improved sound quality — AM radio with FM quality and FM radio with CD quality — and more options for the listener, like digital panels with additional information such as news and weather forecasts. The digitization of radio and its partnership with new media will offer more efficient use of the radio spectrum, interactivity, lower power consumption, possibilities for new business models, and greater participation in the advertising market.

With so many new possibilities on the horizon thanks to the newest technology, one thing we can safely say — the radio will never go away. No matter which technology will be employed, the radio will still play your favorite songs, introduce new singers, and tell you which areas of your city to avoid at rush hour because of heavy traffic.

* Article published on Curitiba in English. 

The 10 oldest Internet domains

Since the Internet arrived in Brazil on 1995 at that time with dial-up connections, and nowadays with the broadband and the mobile 3G connections, Brazilians have been using a lot the services and also changed its behaviors due to the World Wide Web (aka www).

But do you know which are the oldest Internet domains?

1. symbolics.com - on March 15th, 1985 the computer manufacturer Symbolics Inc. registered the first domain ".com" on the internet. The company already doesn't exist anymore, but the page is still up and celebrating. The website brings several mentions about the 25 years of the first domain .com on the Internet. on 1997, the symbolics.com recorded impressive (for the time) 1 million hits.

2. bbn.com - this domain has been registered on April 24th, 1985 and belongs to a technology company from the United States.

3. think.com - the domain dates back on May 24th, 1985 but the website is not up anymore. Actually when you try to access, you will be redirected automatically to the website ThinkQuest, from Oracle.

4. mmc.com - this domain has been registered on July 11th, 1985. Today gathers information from universities that have initials with these acronyms.

5. dec.com - it has been registered on September 30th, 1985 and today belongs to the group Hewlett-Packard, the HP.

6. northrop.com - the domain has been registered on November 7th, 1985. The website was bought by the global security company Northrop Grumman.

7. xerox.com - among the largest technology companies, the Xerox was the fastest on registering the domain on January 9th, 1986.

8. sri.com - this research institute nonprofit existed for over 60 years but only registered their domain on January 17, 1986.

9. hp.com - although it has acquired the domain dec.com shortly after its registration, HP decided to register its own address on March 3, 1986 to avoid problems in the future.

10. bellcore.com - registered on March 5th, 1986, now belongs to the technology company Telcordia Mobile Broadband.

Life Without Paper *

Since paper was first invented by the Egyptians, called papyrus, and later reinvented as the paper we use today by the Chinese, we have been consuming more and more paper every day.

Do you know how many trees are required to produce paper? It’s hard to believe, but twelve trees are needed to produce one ton of paper, and that doesn’t include the many necessary chemicals. Additionally, only 37 percent of the paper produced is recycled.

Trees are not the only precious resource being used to produce paper — 540,000 liters of water, on average, are needed for the production of one ton of paper. There is also the fuel consumption in transporting the trees and paper.

According to experts, 44 kilos of paper are consumed annually by every Brazilian, nearly one tree per inhabitant. In the United States, per capita consumption is 200 kilos of paper per year.

In your office or at home, you’ve already had the experience of wasting time looking for a piece of paper, like a receipt or invoice lost in the midst of many other papers. Perhaps you wished you had a search engine for your documents like you do on your computer when looking for a file or folder.

When computers first entered our lives more than 20 years ago, the idea of having electronic communication was born. Soon the Internet and email brought electronic communication into reality; however, after 20 years, we are far from eliminating the need for paper.

The arguments for getting rid of paper are even stronger today than in the past. By eliminating paper in cabinets, a company can create more space and reduce storage costs outside the workplace. Through the exchange of electronic information with suppliers and customers, a business can make information quickly accessible anywhere, ensuring privacy and security with the use of encryption, passwords and other security measures.

On the other hand, when trying to cut down on paper consumption, companies must consider the cost of computer equipment and software programs, as well what to do with the paper already in the office. Trying to eliminate paper in an office is not easy, as there are decisions on how and when to convert to electronic documents; what kind of paper or document to be considered; what to do with the documents still coming from suppliers and customers; providing training to the employees involved in adapting to a new system; and the most important, maintaining a normal work flow during this transition.

An additional hurdle faced by companies wishing to eliminate paper is the fact that no matter what they do, a person or company never can be completely paperless, at least not yet. Some documents, such as signed and sealed legal contracts, or paper records for audits for income taxes must remain in their original form for legal reasons, particularly those involving financial services to ensure regulatory compliance.

There is still no precise study on the statistics of paper consumption in the business world in Brazil. However, experts point out that in today’s digital world, a great deal of paper is being wasted from the lack of experience dealing with new technology. For example, 45 percent of office documents that are scanned end up being printed anyway. Part of the problem is many people still feel more comfortable having a document on physical media; they suffer from the syndrome whereby they need to touch it to believe it’s real. Because of fire, deterioration, water damage or loss, paper files also disappear, so paper documents are hardly one hundred percent safe either.

Our government agencies are at the forefront in the process of this revolution to move away from paper, as they are enormous consumers of paper and can also set standards for companies and consumers. The abandonment of the physical forms of Income Tax statements and returns; initiatives for electronic invoices; and digitizing legal proceedings in the new electronic environment are obvious examples of our government today moving away from paper.

To continue our efforts to use less paper, it is time for everyone - companies and individuals and the government - to invest in more computer equipment and software programs, employee training, and awareness campaigns. For example, you can start reducing the paper you use at home by asking your bank account manager to stop sending your account balance in hard copy every month to your home. Many banks already offer this solution, and instead you will receive a protected email with your current account statement or even your credit card invoice.

Another step for individuals is to stop using an appointment book to schedule events. Instead, try using a calendar on your computer or mobile phone. Even simple cellphones (aka dumb cellphones) have this feature, and as a bonus you can set reminders for appointments with an alarm so you won’t forget. With smartphones you can go even further: your personal appointment calendar can be synchronized with the Internet. Additionally, there are many applications available that can take a picture of a document and transform it into a scanned document and generate an image in pdf format ready to be sent by email, or to be stored on your computer or on the cloud, making it much easier to retrieve

As a last resort, if you really need to use paper, try to make notepads with scratch paper that can be reused. And when printing is absolutely necessary, use both sides of the sheet. There is no question that with a simple change of attitude and a few easy adjustments, many trees will be preserved.

* Article published on Curitiba in English.

Put Your Computer In A Cloud *

Brazil now has almost 80 million Internet users, an explosion of growth thanks to many factors including tax incentives given by the government to purchase computers, as well as the rise of other gadgets such as smartphones and tablets. Thus, there is a constant exchange of information through many different sources, which often leaves users in the position of having many files to store. The files might be text documents, spreadsheets, presentations, pdf documents, music, etc. It doesn’t take long before the size of the information being stored exceeds the capacity of the smartphone or tablet. Therefore, the latest questions we are hearing from technology users are, Where is the most suitable place to store all my files? Also, what is the a simplest way to share my files with friends and colleagues? Do I need to worry about backups for all my files? If I lose a file, can I get it back?

If we look back on the 1990’s, computers had very limited space for storage because the technology was still young and also storage space was an expensive part of the computer. The storage space on a computer, known as the hard disk or hard drive, is a fixed part of the computer and not easy to detach because the operating system is installed on it. As a solution, in the 2000s, computer companies created portable storage devices such as the pen drive, also known as a USB flash drive or thumb drive. A pen drive is a storage memory device about the size of a cigarette lighter and thus easy to carry around. It soon became the preferred device for carrying personal files and backing up.

However, pen drives were limited to a single copy of the files and were smaller in storage size than a typical computer’s hard drive. Also, they were only available when you had one with you. However, recently a new Internet service has arrived to take the place of pen drives. This service is called the “cloud” and offers faster and greater access. It is a new way to store personal files. The concept is to store your files on the Internet with a synchronized copy on your computer (desktop or laptop, PC or Mac), on smartphones and on tablets. Even if those devices are not available to you at the moment, with a simple Internet connection you are able to access any of your stored files from anywhere.

In essence, we are talking about an Internet-based service that is emerging and could become your new hard disk. It is quickly becoming popular because of the proliferation of mobile devices and the need to have larger personal files available anywhere, anytime.

Regarding the different types of Internet storage cloud services already available, the most popular are the DropBox from DropBox; the iCloud from Apple; SkyDrive from Microsoft; and most recently the Drive from Google. Of course there are many others with different services, however, those mentioned are the most popular because of their features, ease of use, and openness to many platforms.

Cloud services such as these include some very interesting features, such as “free” backups. Once you place a master copy of your file on the cloud, several others copies can be distributed to multiple locations. If you lose your computer or portable device, or it breaks, once it’s fixed or you get a new one, the cloud synchronization service will do the rest for you. Another interesting feature offered by Internet cloud service is you can share files with anyone simply by granting them permission to a specific file or folder. Then an email with the link will be sent to the other user for access. Also, depending on the cloud service provider, you can share and also edit a file online in collaboration with other users without the need to download, edit, and then upload the file again.

You might be thinking that there is not enough space for all the files on your hard disk to be placed on a cloud service provider. It’s true, depending on the provider, the default size of storage might not be adequate. Cloud services start with 2 GB (gigabyte) of storage and go up to 25GB for free. However, you can purchase more space, as much space as you need, with very reasonable prices compared to other storage devices. In this way you will have everything in a safe and protected place and never have to worry about your own storage devices breaking or getting lost. We have seen in the past decade great progress in increased storage capacity both inside and outside the computer, but once files are moving in larger quantities and more quickly to the Internet via online services, it will be obvious what a great leap forward we are making to alter the way we store information using cloud storage.

* Article published on Curitiba in English.

The Internet And Small Companies *

Certainly you have already had an experience like this: You are looking for a product, service or company you need, and the first place you look is the Internet. Using the Internet is convenient, plus there’s the possibility of finding detailed information such as comparing prices from different companies for the same product. However, as you begin your search on the Internet, you realize that only large and well-known companies are represented on the Internet. Small companies like the ones in your neighborhood don’t even have their phone number published, much less their products or services available through the Internet.

A recent study published in Brazil by the Internet Management Committee (CGI) called “Information Technology and Communication,” analyzed small businesses on the Internet. CGI focused their research on companies having at least 10 employees. The study examined the period from 2007 and 2010 and concluded that small businesses in Brazil still are not investing in the Internet as a way to promote their products or services. Their lack of reliance on the Internet is all the more surprising since during the past few years Internet connections have vastly improved in Brazil. We have migrated from the dial-up connection to ADSL, and even more important, businesses have been adopting local networks (also known as LAN) in order to connect more computers. Some companies and even home users now have gone beyond this and adopted wireless connections.

Nevertheless, with these vast improvements in Internet service thanks to new technology, the study shows that small businesses are not doing enough to take advantage of the power of the Internet as a way to boost revenue. More than 60 percent of these companies don’t even have a web page to present their products or services. More than 80 percent don’t have any type of simple customer service, such as an e-mail address where the customer can establish contact with the business.

Some small companies still maintain they don’t need the Internet to promote their business. They have Internet access inside the company only for their employees to use e-mail or search engines. Companies also complain they don’t have the expertise to employ this technology to expand their business, and they are also concerned about the security of information, theirs and their customers, such as with Internet identity theft.

If we look around, it is obvious that many traditional and small companies have found a way to move to the Internet. In some cases, the Internet has allowed small companies to grow into big companies and even trade shares on the stock exchange. New business lines were created specifically for the Internet, while the traditional ones had to adapt, and they are achieving great success.

So what prevents a small company from utilizing the tools of the Internet to expand its business? At the beginning, it seems to many of them like a waste of money with no return in the short-term. However, these companies are forgetting about consumers like you and me who today have high-speed Internet connections at home or in our offices, and we are likely to go to the Internet to look for something we need. When we are looking at our search results, don’t small companies want to be included?

This reluctance to change among small businesses is something we saw in Brazil some years ago — it looks like the paradigm for the adoption of credit cards as a way of payment. In the past, small businesses did not accept credit cards, but now all of them provide this service because they eventually realized how it would increase their business. As a result, today more than 80 percent of consumers’ purchases are paid for with credit cards.

In summary, the Internet is infinite so there is always adequate space for all kinds of products and services, big or small companies, suppliers and competitors. Moreover, there are several ways to develop a presence on the Internet, such as simple web pages, blogs, social networks, collective purchase websites, etc. The first step toward this new business model is not such a difficult challenge, so if you are a small business and considering it, a little research will reveal many ways to enter the Internet business arena. Sebrae, a public service organization that is well-known for offering assistance to small companies can definitely help you and guide your first steps. All of us consumers hope to see you here!

* Article published on Curitiba in English.