Those companies using the Windows XP operating system need to upgrade to Service Pack 3 (SP3) in the near future (July 2010) so as to continue receiving ongoing official Microsoft support.

Windows XP has had it’s support phase extended due to popularity – official XP support will now continue until April 2014. But, to receive this support, users need to have migrated to the newer service packs. Windows XP SP2 support ends on 13th July 2010 (with SP1 support already removed back in October of 2006.)

All XP users should install Service Pack 3 via the Microsoft Online ‘Windows Update’ service. If you haven’t moved to SP2 yet, then you’ll need to install this before SP3.

The UK, as a whole, is highly dependent on its national IT workforce; it effectively underpins our entire economy. The UK’s IT & Telecoms industry provides an annual contribution of around 71 billion pounds, equating to 8.4% of the total UK economy. It’s also estimated that it will provide a further 35 billion pounds of growth to the UK economy over the next 5 to 7 years.

Current Position

There are approximately 150k jobs available in the UK’s IT & Telecoms industry. 1 in 18 people (6%) of employed people in the UK are working in IT & Telecoms (1.52 million people.) This breaks down to around 860k people in the industry itself, with a further 663k working as IT or Telecoms professionals in other industries. Gross average earnings for IT & Telecoms professionals are around £670 per week, which is 33% more than the UK national average income of £450.

Market Growth

E-Skills and Experian have concluded that growth in the IT & Telecoms sector is predicted to continue strongly until 2018. While overall UK employment is expected to increase at just 0.3% per annum over the coming decade, the IT & Telecoms market is predicted to grow at an impressive four times this rate (1.2% per annum.)

Within IT & Telecoms jobs, an average of 110k completely new entrants are required every year to cover the approx. 130k job opportunities expected each year between 2008 and 2013. The largest recruitment source (over half at 52%) is expected to be those individuals who are currently employed in non IT related occupations (i.e. adults undergoing re-training.) Although Higher Education has always been an important source of talent for IT, over the last five years the number of applicants has fallen by 50% for computing-related degrees.

The Challenges

For many organisations, the absence of applicants with the right skills, qualifications and experience is still a problem – particularly in the case of the IT & Telecoms firms themselves, where some 43% of recruiters report a lack of suitable candidates. Common skills shortages are often reported around the areas of programming, technical support and management.

Approximately one-in-ten (11%) of companies employing IT professionals consider their workers to be below the level of training needed. 77% of employers state this mainly stems from not being able to find the time around work commitments. This obviously suggests that study outside of normal working hours is required.

Looking To The Future

Virtually all non IT related positions (92% of jobs) that were advertised during late 2008 were deemed to require some level of IT user skill; with 29% of employers reporting that the typical level of skill available was below that required by their company. The reality is that workers from all sectors must now be able to use IT systems more effectively. They will not only need increased skills in basic software and computer technology, but they will increasingly need to have a deeper understanding of IT security implications and technical support processes.

Going forward, all IT professionals will need to develop greater skills in the actual application of their technology. As well as having strong technical skills in areas like security and systems infrastructure, they will also need much greater expertise in networking and newly converging technologies & markets. IT management professionals will furthermore need to develop better skills in business process, change and project management, as well as risk management and security. Specialist web skills will be increasingly required to cope with the global shift to internet-based computing, along with the project and supplier management skills to manage that workload.

The Conclusion?

A disciplined and effective I.T. self-learning strategy is becoming essential to survive in today’s technology-led society. For those that are considering IT as a career move, there has never been a better time to start or improve your skill-set. And there’s no doubt that workers from every market will face increasing pressure to keep up with modern technology skills, as I.T. plays a larger and more fundamental role in the way they work.

Why not talk to a LearningLolly professional advisor today and start planning for your future.

Written By Regina Brett, 90 years old, of ‘The Plain Dealer’ in Cleveland, Ohio:

“To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I’ve ever written. My odometer rolled over to 90 in August, so here is the column once more…”

1. Life isn’t fair, but it’s still good.
2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.
3.Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.
4. Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.
5. Pay off your credit cards every month.
6. You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.
7. Cry with someone. It’s more healing than crying alone.
8. It’s OK to get angry with God. He can take it..
9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.
10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
11. Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up the present..
12. It’s OK to let your children see you cry.
13. Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.
15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don’t worry; God never blinks.
16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.
17. Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.
18. Whatever doesn’t kill you, really does make you stronger.
19. It’s never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.
20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don’t take no for an answer.
21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don’t save it for a special occasion. Today is special.
22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.
23. Be eccentric now. Don’t wait for old age to wear purple.
24. The most important sex organ is the brain.
25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.
26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words ‘In five years, will this matter?
27. Always choose life.
28. Forgive everyone, everything.
29. What other people think of you is none of your business.
30. Time heals almost everything. Give time, time.
31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
32. Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
33. Believe in miracles.
34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn’t do.
35. Don’t audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.
36. Growing old beats the alternative – dying young.
37. Your children get only one childhood.
38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.
39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.
40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d grab ours back.
41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
42. The best is yet to come.
43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
44. Yield.
45. Life isn’t tied with a bow, but it’s still a gift.

Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year/Decade to you all!

IP addresses are the way the internet and networks access each other. They’re similar to your house number, street, town and postcode. It’s how you’re found in the digital ether.

The current system is called IPv4 because there are 4 blocks of numbers “001.002.003.004″, but the problem is that this only allows for 4,294 Million unique addresses – which sounds a lot – but really isn’t in computer terms.

For over a decade now, the technical community has offered IPv6 – which gives 6 blocks of numbers (a trillion, trillion, trillion addresses!) – but worldwide take-up of this technology has been minimal. We’re quickly approaching the final 10% of available IPv4 addresses, so ignoring this technology to try and save money seems incredibly short-sighted.

Across Europe, the middle east and central Asia, it seems that only 17 percent of businesses have plans in place to adopt the new technology. And Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) are the biggest culprits, with 92 percent not having any IPv6 in use or no significant level of IPv6 traffic. Bizarrely, it seems that only 30 percent of EU organisations are even worried about this fact, compared to nearly half of organisations outside of the EU.

The major problem with all this is that the new IPv6 addresses are not backwardly-compatible. So all routers and network systems running IPv4 will not be able to understand or recognise the new IPv6.

Given how important the internet has become to the world economy, you’d think that government and business would be putting a higher priority on the transition. It’s essential to the continued expansion of both the internet and it’s users, otherwise we may face the situation where new devices and people will be unable to connect – and essentially become digitally-excluded.

Jason Kendall

…Or 11 Things, Kids WON’T Learn In School

Every now and then, we get an email or a story in our inbox that makes us smile, chuckle or just sit and think for a while. Being in the field of education, we often deal with young adults who are making their way in the world and looking for a little direction.

When this short list arrived, we did a little research and found that it’s actually a bit of an urban legend – but let’s leave that till the end and cover the meat of it first – because it’s the list that’s relevant…

Bill Gates supposedly gave a speech at an American High School about the things they did not and will not learn in school. He talks about how ‘feel-good’, ‘politically-correct’ teachings are creating a generation of kids with no concept of reality – and how this concept set them up for failure in the real world.

Rule 1 : Life is not fair – get used to it!

Rule 2 : The world doesn’t care about your self-esteem. The world will expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

Rule 3 : You will NOT make 60k a year right out of school/college. You won’t be a vice-president with a car phone until you earn both.

Rule 4 : If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

Rule 5 : Flipping burgers or stacking shelves is NOT beneath your dignity. Your Grandparents had a different word for this: They called it ‘opportunity’.

Rule 6 : If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault , so don’t whine about your mistakes, learn from them.

Rule 7 : Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now… They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you think you are. So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parent’s generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

Rule 8 : Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades – and they’ll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

Rule 9 : Life is not divided into ‘terms’. You don’t get summers off – and very few employers are interested in helping you FIND YOURSELF. Do that on your own time.

Rule 10 : Television is NOT real life. In real life, people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.

Rule 11 : Start being really nice to nerds: Chances are you’ll end up working for one.

Whether or not this list strikes you as an insightful and possibly much-needed dose of reality for the young people of today, or whether you disagree completely, you should probably know that this wasn’t actually delivered by the head of Microsoft at all. As often happens, a story gets attributed to someone in the public eye and from that point on – it just sticks.

The list itself is a heavily edited version of a news piece that appeared in the ‘San Diego Union-Tribune’ on 19^th September 1996. It was actually written by Charles J. Sykes, author of ‘Dumbing Down Our Kids: Why American Children Feel Good about Themselves, but Can’t Read, Write, or Add.‘

It seemed a shame that the original author didn’t get the credit deserved, but then as the man himself explains: Life ain’t fair: Get used to it!

Jason Kendall

The bill obliges ISPs (internet Service Providers) to notify copyright holders if they suspect copyright infringement. This will obviously involve monitoring a subscribers internet activity.

Virgin Media announced that they’ve already started testing a new tool on their cable networks, one which attempts to sort through the traffic and isolate illegal music downloads. It appears that many other UK ISPs are following suit.

Stephen Timms, the minister for Digital Britain, said that illegal file-sharing would definitely NOT be made a criminal offence (with a possible jail term.) But there are talks of heavy fines for those found and prosecuted. Figures of £50,000 were thrown around initially, but it seems now that this would only apply to those making commercial gain. It’s still not known what the likely or maximum penalty could be when a copyright holder brings a civil suit against an individual file-sharer.

Timms explained, “When a content rights holder identifies that somebody is doing things they shouldn’t be doing, their ISP will send them a letter telling them they shouldn’t be doing it. If that process proves to be insufficient, then we have the ability to put in place these technical measures. Among the technical measures, temporary account suspension is a possible temporary measure.”

A BIS (Dept. for Business Innovation & Skills) spokesperson said that a copyright-holder would know of an infringement when they “…go to a peer-to-peer hosting site, discover that someone is offering one of their works, and therefore that person must have downloaded it…”

Timms also commented that the sending of notification letters to unlawful file-sharers “…will do the trick in reducing the scale for illegal activity…” The Government and Ofcom are looking for a minimum reduction of 70 percent in file-sharing over the first year, or they will look at introducing stronger measures.

Whilst we fully understand the need for copyright holders to be able to protect their intellectual property, and for other illegal activity to be monitored and controlled, there remains a question in our minds: Is this truly the start of ‘Big Brother’ watching us? Once the government forces ISPs to monitor traffic, could there be an abuse of the information gained? And what freedoms and privacy will ultimately be sacrificed?

Jason Kendall

Their figures show that worldwide IT spending is expected to top £880 Billion throughout 2009, and this is expected to increase to over £1 Trillion by 2013.

Microsoft’s head of skills and economic affairs, Stephen Uden said, “Spending growth means that employment in the IT industry and of IT professionals in IT-using organisations will rise by 5.8 million jobs in the four years from the end of 2009 to the end of 2013.”

He also went on to say, “That represents a growth of three per cent a year from now through to 2013, which is more than three times faster than the growth of total employment.”

When viewed in conjunction with the latest research from the Recruitment & Employment Confederation and KPMG, (which shows demand for Permanent IT staff being up by 3.4% on the previous month,) it certainly looks like the IT market at least may be on the economic rise!

Great news for all certified IT professionals, as it further consolidate their long-term employment prospects, but even better news for those training into the IT marketplace over the next 1-2 years – as this can only accelerate their career advancement possibilities!

Jason Kendall

Several new surveys have shown that IT certification has yet again proved to be a highly sought-after commodity amongst employers in the UK and around the world.

With today’s economic challenges, businesses everywhere are looking to cut-costs, get more efficient and try to squeeze more productivity and profit out of their current operations. IT is very often the way to do this.

IT systems can signinficantly streamline any business, and the need for qualified personnel to maintain these systems is paramount. Common points raised were:

• The IT Skills gap was identified and commented upon in almost every survey of senior management. We have an acknowledged worldwide shortage of qualified IT people.
• IT Managers report the most important IT skills requirements were: Security, General Networking, Networking Infrastructure and Operating Systems.
• There were significant skills gaps also raised in Project Management and vendor-neutral server technology.
• The skillset expected to experience the most growth over the next 5 years is around Wireless/Wi-Fi technology.
• Business highlighted the need for verifiable and transferable certifications and credentials. Proper certification is becoming a pre-requisite of most IT employment now.

Surveyed businesses also commented on IT Certification itself, saying:

• Team skill was directly responsible for organisational performance.
• Concentration of certifications in a team was clearly linked to their capability and performance.
• Maximising the use of technology in business requires a well-skilled IT team.
• Business experiences higher productivity, higher customer satisfaction, better inter-communication and more insightful problem solving with a skilled IT team.

Of the many IT professionals that were surveyed:

• A massive 90% of them chose certification for career and professional development
• An incredible 74% of them expressed HIGH satisfaction with their job
  (How many career-tracks can claim that three quarters of qualified people experience high levels of job satisfaction!)
• 82% said that certification material was directly relevant to their job.
• 47% (almost half) claimed that their problem-solving capabilites were enhanced through certification.

All of these facts are further proof of what we already know: IT Certification is becoming increasingly important in today’s business market.

Can any of us really imagine a world where IT is going to become LESS important! Society’s reliance on IT becomes more ingrained every day.

For the vast majority of us, that means IT will play a key part in our work skill-set. The conclusion is therefore obvious: IT Certification needs to be planned sooner rather that later.

As our economy recovers over the next couple of years, will you be ready to maximise your income, career and and professional development? Or will you be one of the crowd who sat around waiting for the world to improve around them – only to find they missed the boat.

Request an information pack if you’d like to discover more, or talk to one of our independent professional career advisors. (Just click on the orange star button at the top-right of the page.)

Jason Kendall

Network Security, Ethical Hacking & Computer/Digital Forensics have become modern buzz-words, and because of highly popular TV series like “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation“, we’ve embraced this new area of technology with relish. It seems that a TV season doesn’t go by without yet a new investigative series being developed – and most of them feature science and technology as one of heroes!

It’s never been more hip to be a techie nerd!

And because of the whole Wi-Fi revolution, the corporate world is starting to demand Network Support Technicians proficient in the planning, design, installation and administration of this new wave of wireless technology.

Gone are the days when all our technology is plugged into the wall, apart from that last tether – the power supply (which is fast being dealt with by longer life batteries and power charging ‘plates’ – so that powering-up is done by merely laying the device on a surface, using similar technology to electric toothbrush chargers.) Now we can use powerful mobile-phones, MP3 players, PDA’s and handheld games and computers, all while on the move; surfing the internet, sending instant messages and accessing our email as we go.

Technology is having a bigger and more profound impact on all of us: Both in work and our social lives. Most of us probably can’t remember the last time we looked something up in a directory or reference manual – the search engines have seen those days off. And who hasn’t succumbed to the flat-panel, home cinema and DVD/Blu-Ray revolution? No self-respecting teenager or young-adult would be seen out without their hi-tech mobile phone and MP3/MP4 player these days.

So who’s going to deal with all this technology – as it expands and takes over more and more areas of our day-to-day existence?

Answer: The IT Technicians, Network Specialists & Wi-Fi Experts – all backed up by the new wave of Security and Forensics professionals that will be required to protect us and our personal lives from the less savoury aspects of society.

Doesn’t that sound like TRUE job security? What areas could be more exciting, cutting-edge and future-proof, than being part of that thrust to push the world into the next millennia!

Why not check out our new web-pages for some more background info:

Network Security :  Computer Forensics :  Wi-Fi Networking

And request an information pack if you’d like to discover more, or talk to one of our independent professional career advisors. (Just click on the orange star button at the top-right of the page.)

Jason Kendall

It’s not unreasonable for an eighteen year old today to think somewhat fuzzily that the internet’s probably been around as long as he has – but if we turn that into ‘probably been around as long as his dad has‘ you might think we were having a laugh!

Well, not everybody agrees exactly when it started – mainly because not everybody agrees exactly what the internet is (!?!), but there was definitely a strong case for celebrating the internet’s 40^th birthday last week.

At 10.30pm on October 29^th 1969 (yes – moon landing and Woodstock 1969…) a bunch of professors and students at the University of California remotely accessed their computer to a second computer at the Stanford Research Institute. The SDS Sigma 7 computer was connected to an ‘interface message processor’ which made contact with Stanford’s IMP and thus its connecting computer.

What words were used on such a momentous occasion, you might ask?

Actually, only one was attempted, – the very mundane but appropriate word LOGIN. Ironically, the message didn’t even get as far as the letter G though, and so the very first word in the dawn of a new era was the awesomely embracing term “LO” !

Peace & Love, and HAPPY 40^th BIRTHDAY WWW !