ADVERTISEMENT Feature Aspasia Cloud Informational Series – No.12 Google Apps – the glue that makes the difference
CLOUD COMPUTING does not mean just hosting an application on the Internet and making it available via a browser. Web based products like our own traditional Aspasia software and many other competitor products, bring many benefits in terms of minimal IT infrastructure requirements, cost, ease of deployment and maintenance. But if you are still using a traditional desktop based email client, word processor or spreadsheet for example, you are not using a true ‘cloud’ based product (certainly not in our terminology). A true ‘cloud based’ product involves the
integration of other web based services from other providers which come together to form one seamless solution. This will run in any browser on any platform and which will for example, let you use your normal mobile phone, smartphone, tablet computer or any such technology to operate away from your office at any time of the day or night even if the device can’t run a browser. It is this flexibility that sets a ‘cloud based’ product apart from the current generation of web based software solutions and to achieve this Aspasia Cloud has been integrated at a core level with Google Apps. To illustrate this, if you have a Google email
account you also automatically have the facility to maintain contact information online, setup and maintain diaries, create documents, and spreadsheets, store photographs and videos, and many other things too which can all be shared with anyone you wish via the Internet. Google will also enable you to utilise all this information anywhere at any time and will automatically replicate key information like emails, contacts, diaries and so on to your mobile phone or other device with no effort from you. Where Google Apps takes this a stage further is to make all this available within your own strictly defined domain (‘
yourcompany.co.uk’) and to provide you with appropriate corporate functionality to maintain standards and controls from a central point with a professional level Service Level Agreement regarding availability. For example, with Aspasia Cloud all your communications, contacts and diaries are available for two way interactive use from any device you wish to use. On more sophisticated
devices like tablet computers and smartphones this facility can be extended to documents etc. This can have a dramatic effect on how you choose to run your business and will provide you with a significant competitive advantage.
future-proofing Moreover, this Google Apps infrastructure also
provides many other facilities such as the ability to make payments online through Google Checkout, the ability to use Instant Messaging, Video Talk, hosting of web sites, corporate Intranets and so on, which can greatly enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of your business. Additionally, Google also provides the Android and Chrome operating systems for mobile devices using touch screens or keypads together with the Chrome Internet Browser. All these elements can be integrated with Google Apps accounts and offer us unrivalled opportunities for future developments in residential property software through Aspasia Cloud offering our customers unparalleled future proof protection in terms of their investment. It is also worth mentioning that email, contact
information and diaries are also contained within Aspasia Cloud’s core Oracle database offering another level in terms of ease of use and security. Everything that exists in terms of functionality within the traditional Aspasia product will be available within Aspasia Cloud but the real bonus is that it will also offer all the additional functionality and opportunity arising from the integration with Google Apps. And at the heart of Google Apps sits email, not just as many people experience through
Aspasia Cloud is the first fully integrated cloud technology software solution for agents involved with residential sales, lettings and property management. This informational series has been designed to explain how the software differs from other solutions and what that means for agents who use it.
For further information and to read previous articles in the series, please go to
www.aspasia.net.
PROPERTYdrum APRIL 2011 25
their free Gmail accounts, but in the very sophisticated Postini format provided within the Google Apps Business version of the product. It is this facility that provides all the extra features and functionality regarding security, reliability, spam and virus management, monitoring and the ability to control corporate standards that businesses of any size may require. It is particularly important that this crucial element of Google Apps sits at the core of Aspasia Cloud because email forms the most important aspect of communication between customers, staff and suppliers. As such, it needs to be easy to use and,
particularly important, it needs to be easily audited which is why email within Aspasia Cloud in both directions is automatically integrated and duplicated within the Oracle database for various uses within the software. Traditionally email is handled by software solutions as a separate entity involving a great deal of cutting and pasting to achieve any degree of integration. Within Aspasia Cloud we acknowledge the centre stage position email now deserves and accordingly it is now embedded deep within the core of the software and automatically integrated. So the integration of Aspasia Cloud and
Google Apps is more than just providing a facility to create emails, documents or whatever online. It is the recognition that the world is embracing ‘true’ cloud computing (as endorsed by RICS in a recent press release) and the fact that so many of us expect to conduct our business online. Obviously we are not suggesting that all property transactions will be dealt with 100 per cent online, simply that more aspects of the overall transaction can, and will be, handled this way. It therefore follows that Google, an Internet company through and through, with no desktop computing legacy whatsoever, is ideally placed to provide the overall Internet based infrastructure for all the surrounding aspects that relate to interactions with people within Aspasia Cloud. This is why we have integrated with Google Apps and why it can be thought of as the glue that holds all the specific professional aspects of residential property agency dealings together within Aspasia Cloud.
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