VR and AR in Enterprise Networks-Podcast Review

VR and AR. Theses are two of the hottest technologies in the world today. Yet, what is their limitations? Is one more useful than another, and if so, will this cause the other to become nothing more than a fad? Well, it seems that according to this podcast, AR may be the more fruitful technology at least in the enterprise world. According to the speakers, VR doesn't have any real enterprise use. Its main use is for gaming and training videos. On the other hand, AR is being utilized in both personal and professional settings. Home customers use it for entertainment, while business customers use it for their trade or establishment (e.g. marketing, manufacturing, and engineering).

Despite AR's edge, one of the speakers did mention one use of VR in enterprise environments and that is for big data presentations. Organizations can take advantage of VR to present their data in a way that is easier to comprehend. Rather than presenting their complex data on panels of 2d screens using AR or letting an automated machine process the data, VR can present data in a 3-d, immersive environment that allows people to process the data that is quicker and more efficient than 2-d screens or computers.

In my opinion, I believe we have not seen a pittance of what VR and AR can do. I do agree with the speakers that right now AR has more practicality in the business environment than VR, but I don't believe this will be permanent. As time marches on, VR's use in the enterprise world will grow. It happened to virtualization, it happened to cloud computing, and it will happen to VR.

Here is the link to the podcast if you wish to check out more: https://twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-enterprise-tech/episodes/184?autostart=false

Changing My Mind on Social Networking

After using social networking for all these weeks, I am beginning to understand the benefits of using Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+. If used correctly they can be an excellent tool for advertising your professional self. In addition, they can be a wonderful source of knowledge. There is still a lot of fruitless posts and tweets that do nothing but add more useless knowledge to my brain. However, if you filter them out and only pay attention to the interesting and important information, you can greatly increase your knowledge of any field you desire and subsequently become a more informed, hip, and well-rounded person.

Not Wi-Fi, but Li-Fi (Light Fidelity)

Combine Wi-Fi with fiber optics and you get Li-Fi! Well, not really. However, it does have characteristics of Wi-Fi and fiber optic cabling. It operates wirelessly like Wi-Fi and utilizes light pulses like fiber. Herald Haas explains it better in his Ted Talk posted here if you wish to check it out: http://www.ted.com/talks/harald_haas_a_breakthrough_new_kind_of_wireless_internet

Herald Haas argues that Li-Fi has the potential to expand and promote the Internet of Things even further by increasing the speed of network connections and by saving massive quantities of electrical energy.

Herald demonstrates Li-Fi capabilties by streaming a high definition on his laptop via a LED lamp and solar cell. The LED lamp acts as a Li-Fi transmitter, sending a light pulse to the solar cell. The solar cell then takes the light energy and converts it into electrical energy for transmission to the laptop. The laptop then of course converts the electrical energy into the bits of data that represent Herald's video.























This Ted Talk was particularly interesting to me given my Network Specialist program. Down the line, this may become mainstream so it would not hurt for me to become familiar with it now.

 

Day of Change

After reading my teacher's advice on using these social platforms, I've decided that I will be using these platforms much more than I have in the past. I still do not enjoy using Google+, Twitter, and LinkedIn, but I will use them to succeed in my class. From this point on, I will put more time in learning and using social media, and put less time in trifling entertainment YouTube videos, I must succeed in this class. I want an A. I must accomplish my goals even if it means using social networking site. Ugh, this is not going to be fun.

Microsoft's Twitter v. Nintendo's Twitter

Microsoft and Nintendo. These two billion dollar gargantuan conglomerates are household names that everyone and their great grandparents have heard or used in some manner or fashion. In this blog I will be contrasting the two in terms of how they use twitter to communicate with their fans, users, consumers, etc.

Nintendo of America utilizes Twitter strictly for advertising its games. From a quick search of Nintendo's recent tweets, it seems they offer little or no additional content other than the promotion of their games. The strategy in their tweets seems to be to use many exclamation points and inform the consumer about the new features in their games. Also their retweets are usually just positive reviews of their game or features of their games they failed to mention.

Microsoft's use of Twitter is more multi-dimensional than Nintendo. They utilize twitter not only for advertisement but also to offer support and advice and to alert of Microsoft-related events. If you check their Twitter account you will see a nice variety of tweets rather than just full-fledged advertisements. Their audience is geared toward consumers but also IT professionals as well. The pattern I noticed with their tweets is that they are mostly just simple sentences describing a product, event, or piece of advice followed by a url and picture/video describing the content in more detail. Lastly, it seems they retweet a little more than Nintendo and their retweets can be anything related to IT.

Why I am at MATC

The sole reason I am at MATC is the cost. I do not desire to be thousands of dollars in debt. Down the line though, I might switch to a four-year school if I find a program I'm interested in that is not available at MATC.


I graduated with my liberal arts degree in December 2015 and I'm currently testing out the network specialist program to see if IT is the right field for me. I am still not completely certain as I am not an all-out techie/nerd like most people in my field. I am still finding myself and have such a strange amalgam of interests and skills that make it difficult for me to decide what is my best career path.