In 2008, there was a lot of talk around communications devices, but in many corporations one of the hottest IT topics was a technology called “virtualization”. So I’ll start the new year by explaining what virtualization is and why you might be interested in it.

Last year for the holidays I rallied the troops at my office to see if we could come up with tips and trick that you can use every day when using technology and we came up with quite a number of suggestions. Once again our staff gave generously and here is this year’s list for you to unwrap.

After the recent municipal election I met with Dean Smith, President of Intelivote Systems Inc. of Dartmouth, the company behind the online voting engine.  I was looking for some good lessons that I could relate to business situations, such as insights on data security and system integrity, but I quickly came to realize this story is more about  business processes and procedures than about technology.

In a recent article on Social Media, I discussed the power of online personal connections and mentioned the phenomenon that is Facebook. There is another social media tool which is similar to Facebook but is more intended for business contacts. It is called LinkedIn.

I recently dropped three new smartphones on the desktops of our technical support representatives at Nicom IT Solutions, and they immediately went to town with them. The devices, compliments of Andrew Sherbin of Rogers Communications, are the Nokia N95, the Blackberry Bold, and the Apple iPhone. All three were configured to work with Rogers’ 3G high speed wireless network that was launched this spring in Halifax and Moncton.