i am finalising a new survey at the moment to send to users for some feedback and will post this later in the week.

anecdotal feedback is good, but we need some firm mesures to prove the original business case from an enduser point of view. the impact on the systems team will take a little longer to realise, but we should see change within the next 2 months as user skills improve with the new version.

kim

No need for the backup, the process went as it should. This time on the 64 bit version as the driver issue for the WWAN adapter had been resolved.

Needed a couple of the tier 2 applications installed and didn’t even know it had happened later during the afternoon. The deployment process is working well. Excellent job Shaun!

189 down and about the same to go.

Kim

The options are upgrade or bare metal, but for me the new clean install is most important, if there are problems I don’t want to take them with me. Other choices 32bit or 64bit? Need to check the latest compatibility tests. 32bit at present due last time to WWAN hardware driver problems.

Will let you know how this goes

kim

Well the production deployment is well underway with this being week 2 in a five week program. This week includes the office in Melbourne and a group of users from our head office in Toowong.

My last comments were about training and where to draw the line in relation to how much was enough for the organization. The survey results were particularly useful to give an insight into the organizations self assessment of their skills at the OS level. The results left us with a fairly even spread with 60% responding with a need for training and this was split 40% for a “little” training and 20% for full training.

The 40% is being delivered through a “lunch & learn” approach run in all locations as indicated over lunch. The other 20% are receiving more in-depth coverage in a 1- 1.5 hour session depending on QA.

The actual survey results may be of interest to some so they are below:

1. I am confident with my knowledge of the operating system on my personal computer at work and home?

2. What Operating Systems do you use at work and at home?

3. Do you know how to change your screen resolution?

4. Do you know how to successfully add a network printer?

5. Where do you find the System Properties of your PC? Do you:

6. Based on my understanding of Windows 7, I will require:

1.       The first is easy, technology skills are omnipresent in most organizations, and probably have been for the past 10 years. So if you have a business that is growing then you will be hiring these skills whether part of the prerequisites for a position or not. But the volume and quality of the skill can vary quite a lot.

2.       Taking a close look at your organizations age demographic will aid in establishing where your organization sits as well. We run staff surveys each year as a way of establishing the satisfaction level of our employee’s one of the questions is a simple age grouping question. (payroll can of course provide this). 

3.    The third for us was to survey the employees in order for them to self access their own skills. The intent is to keep it short and simple in order to get the best result. I considered making the response mandatory prior to a user being upgraded but felt that was unnecessary, as the people that need help will respond, those that don’t wont. Don’t over complicate it. Questions are below.

I am confident with my knowledge of the operating system on my personal computer at work and home? 

a.        Yes

b.        No

What Operating Systems do you use at work and at home? 

c.        Windows XP

d.        Windows Vista

e.        Windows 7 Beta or Release Candidate

Do you know how to change your screen resolution? 

f.         Yes

g.        No

h.        Not sure

Do you know how to successfully add a network printer? 

i.         Yes

j.         No

k.        Not sure

Where do you find the System Properties of your PC? Do you: 

l.         Right-click on the desktop > Properties

m.      Right-click on the network places icon > Properties

n.        Right-click on the start button > Properties

o.        Right-click on My computer > Properties

p.        Not sure

Based on my understanding of Windows 7, I will require: 

q.        No Training, I’ll be just peachy thanks

r.         Perhaps alittle, just to get me started

s.         I may need an hour of your time to show me the ins and outs

So armed with this information formulate a plan …. Give me a few days to get the plan sorted … with an expert of course

clint … clint … clint … where are you when i need you

Kim

So what don’t I like about the win 7 build I am running ……

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Nothing, in comparison to XP for reliability, speed and ease of connectivity it is a dream.  So perhaps you need to refer back to my first post about credibility if you need to.

Kim

The closed pilot kicks of shortly and have a mix of people involved, mostly from the technical teams but have  some sales and senior execs in the mix. The intent is to insure we have our administrative and management tools for the SOE well sorted.

kim

Standby also seems more reliable when moving between wired, WLAN, WWAN and home networks ( no excuses for not being in contact )

We still need more work on the build, however I used the windows transfer utility and so believe I brought some configuration problems across from the beta build I was running.

I run a docking station and 24″ monitor for my laptop and the reconnection process is not always perfect. I will spend some more time on this as it is part of our standard laptop environment at present.

kim

most of our applications are web enabled and hence moving to any available computer means I am still 90 % functional so dependency on a personal device is not a major problem.

minor problems … the irritating flicker has gone, ie8 is less of a problem on some important internal web based apps, perhaps the start up time is a little longer (being picky here) far better than xp and vista.

running the forefront client for security as win 7 compatibility with our existing corporate solution is a problem … perhaps we will make a change, will give this some more serious thought.

kim

Have just received the report (a light read of 158 pages) and requires an in depth review to look for the take outs from the process.

I will look to update this thread after reading the report

Kim