Today's Technology for Tomorrow's Firm.
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4 May 2016 • www.CPAPracticeAdvisor.com FROM THE TRENCHES By Randy Johnston What Are Your Firm's Microsoft Alternatives? Productivity suites using Google Docs, Zoho Docs or Libre Ofce are used by many small businesses, but exercise caution if any of your key professional applications require Microsof Ofce. Te goal of this article is not to take a stand of recommending one technolog y system over another, but simply provide guidance on issues you will encounter. With enough technical expertise or money, all systems can be made to work today. Consider the following chart: Note that each major supplier has a strategic ofering in each of the major categories. W hile it is true you can be all Apple, Google (Linu x & A ndroid), or Microsof centric, you can mix technologies from all the vendors together. Apple has historically done the best job of making diferent devices seamlessly talk to each other and Google has done the best at sharing source code and being open. Apple Strengths and Weaknesses Apple creates fne hardware and has operated a closed ecosystem to control quality since inception. Tis means you typically have less hardware options available, and technicians cannot make low level or granular changes to the operating systems or applications easily unless the option desired is supported. Tis normally leads to more reliability, but with limitations. Consider the positives and negatives of Apple's approach: Positive: • Has (along w ith Google) the most mobile applications. • Revolutionized smartphones w ith the release of the iPhone in 2007; however, the pace of innovation in recent releases appears to be slower. • Curated hardware and sofware space makes it easier to work together. • Top market share for phones and tablets in the U.S. • Growing PC market share. • Chat with FaceTime. Negative: • Very litle choice in hardware designs, few third-party manufacturers. • Frequent ly aba ndon s bac k w a rd compatibilit y of applications and sofware to simplif y user experience. • Apple T V has met tepid customer demand. 4 M a y 2 0 1 6 • w w w . C P A P r a c t i c e A d v Randy Johnston is executive vice president and partner of K2 Enterprises and Network Management Group, Inc. He is a nationally recognized educator, consultant and writer with over 30 years' experience. He can be contacted at randy.johnston@cpapracticeadvisor.com . MOBILE TELEVISION/ INTERNET ECOSYSTEM PHONE TABLET BROWSER COMPUTER GAMING OF THINGS APPLE iPhone iPad/iPad Safari MacOS AppleTV HomeKit (Closed Mini App Store) GOOGLE Android Kindle Fire, Google ChromeBook, Google Brillo (Open Smartphones Galaxy Tab, Chrome ChromeTop Chromecast App Store) Android MICROSOFT Windows Windows 10 Edge, Windows 10 XBox One, Windows (Closed Phone 10 Internet Windows 10 for App Store) Explorer Media Center iOT M y earlier column on Microsof strategies mentioned two other technology ecosystems to support our computing needs: Apple OS & iOS, and Linux & Android. While it's clear the mainstream of the accounting profession in the U.S. market uses Windows, and should, alternative choices are possible. Why? SaaS products are improving, the operating systems make less diference, and future mobile versions of the products will run across all three ecosystems, including Windows.