Ebola Facts

What you need to know about Ebola virus

What is Ebola virus?

How to know who has Ebola virus

How to protect yourself from Ebola virus

This was gotten from www.ebolafacts.com during the Ebola spread in some countries in west Africa.

Contributors are needed for this blog, (guest posts) if you have anything that you know will add value or that someone can learn from and you are willing to share with others, please contact me via ucheagu@gmail.com

Contributors will be acknowledged in their articles.

Some Google Search Tricks

Like always we will keep this simple...

Calculator

Yes you can use Google search as a calculator. Let’s say you need answer to some problem like what we have below, just enter it in the Google search bar, hit the enter key and see what happens.

Just put your calculation problem in the search bar and hit the enter key and you will get the answer.

Time

If you want to know what the time is for a particular city, just type in time + city name and hit the enter key to see the time

Weather

If you want to know what the time is for a particular city, just type in weather + city name and hit the enter key to see the full weather report

Minus Sign

When you pre-fix a search term with a minus sign, you are telling Google that you don’t want results with the keyword. Let’s say I want to search for the name George... but I don’t want results containing the name Bush. I will do this:

Define

Yes Google search understands english and can actually define words for you. Use the define: operator to find out the definitions of words, can be helpful too when you are playing scrabble.

Timer

With this phrase set time for you can use it as a timer or for short period alarm, but ensure that your system speaker is ON. 

Currency Converter

Simply type name of currency you have’ to ‘name of currency you want to convert to

Freak me out

Just for fun, type this do a barrel roll and see what happens

Contributors are needed for this blog, (guest posts) if you have anything that you know will add value or that someone can learn from and you are willing to share with others, please contact me via ucheagu@gmail.com

Contributors will be acknowledged in their articles.

Content Delivery Network

Like always we will keep this simple...

A content delivery or distribution network (CDN) is a system of distributed servers deployed in multiple data centers across the globe, each server holds a copy of the WebPages and other web contents that the CDN is hosting (This is known as content replication). It delivers these webpages and other Web contents to users based on the geographic locations of the users. The closer the CDN server is to the user geographically, the faster the content will be delivered to that user (Now this is how it works; When a specific page or content is requested by a user, the server closest to that user in terms of the minimum number of nodes between the server and the user is dynamically determined. This optimizes the speed with which the content is delivered to that user).

This service is effective in speeding the delivery of contents with high traffic and have global reach, They also provide protection from large surges in traffic.

Content providers such as e-commerce vendors, live streaming media companies, on-demand streaming media companies, social network companies like face book, content management system companies like wordpress, etc all host their contents with CDNs. There are many reasons for this but the simple and common reason is speed (If you host your contents with a single host server and let’s say your main web server is based in New York, users from Europe or Asia or Africa must make a number of trans-continental electronic hops before they can access your files. But if your content is with a CDN, they provide many localized servers in data centers across the globe which are closer to the user and result in faster downloads).

Am sure this will help you decide whether to use a single server host or a content delivery network when next you have a content to put online.

Contributors are needed for this blog, (guest posts) if you have anything that you know will add value or that someone can learn from and you are willing to share with others, please contact me via ucheagu@gmail.com

Contributors will be acknowledged in their articles.

Focus Group

Like always we will keep this simple...

This requirement gathering technique was originally called ‘focused interviews’ or ‘group depth interviews’

Focus group is basically bringing together a group of individuals that have some common interest or characteristics by a moderator or facilitator, who uses the group and its interactions as a way to gain information about a specific or focused issue.

A focus group is typically 6-12 people who are unfamiliar with each other. These participants are selected because they have certain characteristics in common that relate to the topic of the focus group.

A couple of things to consider when selecting the participants:

·       Purpose of the interview should guide who to invite (I won’t invite a construction engineer when the purpose is to gain in-sight into what functionality should exist in a portal to be used by market associations)

·        Participants should be characterized by homogeneity (homogeneous group), but with sufficient variation to allow for contrasting opinions. Homogeneity is most often sought in terms of occupation, social class, educational level, age, education, or family characteristics, and gender (unless interaction across these groups is what is driving the study (heterogeneous group)).

·        Participants should not be familiar with each other (those who know each other tend to form small group discussions).

Preparing for a focus group session

·        Identify the major objective of the meeting

·        Set agenda

·        Develop the questions o   Questions should be carefully planned but appear spontaneous during the interview o   Use open-ended questions and avoid "yes" or "no" questions. o   "Why" questions are rarely asked in a focus group. Why questions tend to imply a rational answer. o   Questions should be systematically prepared but has a natural flow to them.  o   Arrange questions in logical sequence. o   Allow for unanticipated questions.

·        Determine Participants – homogeneous or heterogeneous

·        Plan venue and refreshment

·        Determine method of recording responses (will you use notes or use a tape recorder, which ever method you decide to use, you need an assistant that will take the note or operate the tape recorder)

Conducting the session:

·        Do the introductions

·        Review the agenda

·        Explain the method of recording the session (if it is in a work place and you are using a tape recorder, you need to reassure the participants that they are safe and that whatever is recorded is just for the purpose of the interview)

·        Ask the questions (please don’t at any point become bias)

·        Remain neutral

·        Ensure even participation (you must encourage everybody to participate)

Produce report

The moderator objectively analyzes and documents the participants’ agreements and disagreements and synthesizes them into themes.

As a general rule, numbers and percentages are not appropriate for focus group research and should not be included in report. Reporting should be descriptive and present the meaning of the data as opposed to a summary of data.

Contributors are needed for this blog, (guest posts) if you have anything that you know will add value or that someone can learn from and you are willing to share with others, please contact me via ucheagu@gmail.com

Contributors will be acknowledged in their articles.

Some Word Tricks

Like always we will keep this simple...

1. Write Anywhere on a Page

When you are using a whiteboard you can write anywhere on the board as you like (up, center, bottom, bottom right, etc. just anywhere you like). Good news, you can do same on the page of a word document. Just double-click wherever you want to type your text and start writing.

2. Change CASE

If you accidental left the caps lock ON when you need to type small letters or vice- versa, not to worry keep on typing. To play this trick, select some text and press shift+f3 to quickly change the case of the selection. It toggles between uppercase, lowercase and camel case (first letter capital)

 

3. Select Text Quickly

To select an entire paragraph, triple click (click 3x) anywhere within a paragraph to select the entire paragraph. Or press the CTRL key and click anywhere within a sentence to select the entire sentence.

You can also select rectangular blocks of text, and apply formatting to the selected area. Just hold the ALT key and drag the mouse across the area you want to select.

4. Convert to Plain Text

Do you copy and paste text from online sources, other documents, email, etc., and cringe when it pops onto the page in red at 18 point font in Verdana (because sometimes the styles and formatting are retained). Not to worry – just select the block of text, hold Ctrl and tap space bar (Ctrl+Space Bar)

5. Cut and Paste

Most people use the Cut-Paste (Ctrl-x Ctrl-v) route to move text from one location to another within a Word document but there’s an alternate way as well. Highlight any block of text, press F2 and then place the cursor at the spot where you wish to move that text. Press Enter and the selection will be moved.

6. Insert Bullets Using Your Keyboard

You are typing and suddenly you need to insert a bullet without touching the mouse? It's simple: type an asterisk and hit the spacebar to auto-create a bullet list.

7. Password Protect Work Documents

To stop your nose poking friends from invading the privacy of your word documents, you can lock them with passwords. To password protect a Word document, click on File > Info > Protect Document > Encrypt with Password.

8. Move table rows up or down

I love this one, this tip is probably most useful when you're working in a table, although you can use it to reorder paragraphs too. Let's say you decide you want the third row of a table to be the top row. Just click within the third row, hold down [Alt][Shift] and press the up arrow key twice. Each time you press the arrow key, Word will move the row up one. You can select multiple rows to move them as a block, and you can use the down arrow key if you want to move text down instead of up.

9. Duplicate selected text or objects using the mouse

This is my favorite technique for copying drawing objects and graphics because you can copy them and drag them into position in one step. Using ordinary copy and paste is old school, because objects tend to paste themselves in strange locations depending on the layout options of the original object.

To use this technique, click on the item you want to copy (it can be a selection of text or an object) and hold down Ctrl. Then drag the item--it will become a copy of the item--to the spot where you want it to go.

Contributors are needed for this blog, (guest posts) if you have anything that you know will add value or that someone can learn from and you are willing to share with others, please contact me via ucheagu@gmail.com

Contributors will be acknowledged in their articles.

Practical Solution

Like always we will keep this simple

Coming up with ideas (I mean good ones) can be difficult most times and relatively easy some other times. Transforming the ideas into workable and practical solution(s) is always the difficult and challenging part of the equation.

The steps and template below, if done well can help develop implementable solutions.

Step 1.  Write down the idea that you want to turn into refined practical solution

Step 2.  List the positives (advantages) and negatives (disadvantages) of the idea

Step 3.  Do some analysis to determine if the disadvantages are so dominant. If they are, it means that the idea has a fatal flaw and further thinking maybe a waste of time

Step 4.  Do some further analysis to determine if the idea can be modified to eliminate disadvantage(s) without losing any advantage

Step 5.  Think of ways you can build on the ideas advantages

Step 6.  Determine if some other advantages (maybe from some other ideas or incidental to this idea) can be added to the idea

Step 7.  Then determine the things that are required to make the proposed solution ‘implementable’

You can use the template below to do this.

Note: this can be done as a group or team or you can do it as an individual

You can try it out today with that ‘hot’ idea you have

Practical Solution Template

List the proposed idea to be refined into a practical solution.
Advantages (Pros)	Disadvantages  (Cons)
List how disadvantages can be eliminated or minimized.
List how advantages might be maximized.
List other advantages that can be added to this idea.
What else is required to make the proposed solution “implement-able”?

Contributors are needed for this blog, (guest posts) if you have anything that you know will add value or that someone can learn from and you are willing to share with others, please contact me via ucheagu@gmail.com

Contributors will be acknowledged in their articles.

BrainStorming

Like always we will keep this simple

I love using this great requirement gathering technique, it is beautiful and very practical but it all depends on what requirement you are trying to gather. But l can tell you one thing for sure ‘this technique is extremely effective; in short it is ‘terrific’.

When to Use It

This great technique (I call it great because it has made life easy for me on several occasions) should and can be used when the need is to generate or gather lots of new ideas (some guy calls it free-wheeling divergent ideas) and solutions. It is a quick way of grabbing list of possibilities.

Example

• When trying to identify range of new products
• Seeking ideas on how to reorganize the team or the business
• Developing list of criteria
• Thinking of an idea for the name of a new business

How to prepare

• Define the area of interest (please, please and please, this has to be very clear and concise there should be no ambiguity) 

• Determine time limit for the exercise, the larger the group the more the time (please note that it will be a big punishment to ask adults to seat for hours or a day doing this, they may get tired after a while and shut down, so timing is extremely important. You can plan for breaks at intervals and having refreshments is a great idea)

• Decide the number of participants (ideally 6 to 12) who represent a range of background and experience with the topic. When inviting individuals to the session, consider people with different backgrounds and degrees of expertise. Sometimes a fresh outlook comes from someone who isn't considered an expert or close to the problem. (If you are doing this in an organization be careful about mixing management levels. Often in the presence a senior-level manager, people either will be reluctant to participate or will completely overdo it).

• When you are sending invites to the participants, include a brief explanation of the problem and its history. This will help them prepare ahead of the session 

• Establish the criteria for evaluating and rating the ideas (this is so very important that without it you may not get the full benefit from this technique, but not to worry l will give you the most commonly used criteria and you can develop yours if you want and can)

Below are the commonly used criteria, which l also use most times:

Criteria	Meaning
Excellent	Definitely will work and can be implemented immediately
Interesting	Will possibly work or may require further analysis to decide if it will work. Needs more investigating. May work in the future
Useless	Will not work

Conducting the Session

When you have everybody seated and ready ‘to-go’

• Distribute a copy of the rules of brainstorming before the session begins. The rules are: 
• Criticism of ideas isn't allowed
• All ideas, no matter how wild, are encouraged the more ideas, the better
• Every participant should try to build on or combine the ideas of others

• Write the objective of the session where everyone in the room can see it. Put it in a question form, starting with either "How can we…?" or "What can be done to…?" For example, "How can we better understand the needs of our customers?" or "What can be done to improve the quality of this product?" 

• Like l mentioned earlier, in a long session, take plenty of breaks so that people can continue to concentrate

• Please ensure that no one criticizes or evaluates ideas during the session. Doing this may introduce an element of risk for group members when putting forward an idea. This stifles creativity and cripples the free running nature of a good brainstorming session.

• The participants can write their ideas on the small colored ‘stick it’ papers and stick them on the board or they can be saying them while the facilitator writes them down on the board

Concluding the session

• Create a condensed list of ideas, (grouping similar ideas together) combine ideas where appropriate, and eliminate duplicates. 

• Using the pre-determined evaluation criteria, discuss and evaluate the ideas 

• Rate the ideas. There are many techniques that can be used to prioritize the ideas, e.g. multivoting. 

• Distribute the final list of ideas to appropriate parties. 

• Close the session by thanking the participants (let them know they have been a wonderful bunch) and describing what will happen to the ideas.

Contributors are needed for this blog, (guest posts) if you have anything that you know will add value or that someone can learn from and you are willing to share with others, please contact me via ucheagu@gmail.com

Contributors will be acknowledged in their articles.