by Ero Gray - This is one post in a continuing series aimed at nonprofit organizations with limited access to IT staff. The advice and opinions here will tend to be most useful to small and startup nonprofits, which often need to make IT decisions and accomplish IT tasks despite not having qualified folks to help. It should be assumed that all suggestions here are my attempt to recommend the simplest/easiest/most effective options for most offices. Your office may be quite different (or it may not even be an office). Also, as I'll frequently note, IT staff are necessary for any organization to function for long. Links to all posts in the series follow this post.
Most of our client base currently uses Windows XP, which is much less demanding in its hardware requirements than Windows 7. Vista is pretty much already obsolete-- if you're not already using Vista, don't start. Windows XP is nearing the end of its useful life (it's been around a long time) but it's still a mature and very useable platform. Windows 7, still pretty new, shows signs of being a great operating system, but won't work well on old computers and may provide some compatibility issues. Here at CRE we've begun moving toward Windows 7, but slowly. Note that in most cases you'll want to make sure you're getting the 'Pro' version of Windows; even if you don't use the features that differentiate this from the home version now, you may need to later.
Operating system software is available from Techsoup for startlingly low prices; XP downloads are available at $8 per license, and Windows 7 is only $9 per head. The approval process at Techsoup, which you'll need to do before ordering, can be tricky and time-consuming, but their staff are helpful and patient: give them a phone call and you're likely to get a real person on the line. Note that most software donors (including Microsoft) institute strict restrictions on how many software products you can buy, and when. Some research should be done if you wind up planning a purchase; if you feel overwhelmed by this, ask Techsoup staff for help.
Installing an operating system usually isn't too tricky; most new computers come with one preinstalled and even installing or reinstalling from scratch largely involves clicking 'Next' and 'OK'. If you've never done it before, though, you may want to borrow an IT person to be on hand or at least on call, just in case you see question marks. You'll want to set up Windows with a password-protected Administrator account and a password-protected User account (name it the job title of the primary user, i.e. Development Assistant or Outreach Worker). Before you do much else, go into the Control Panel and change your User account to make it Limited. You'll want to do any installing or uninstalling of programs or hardware, logged in as Administrator, and everything else as the limited User. Write down your passwords. Don't lose them. Don't share them.
While we're at it: don't share your software. It's very common for Windows discs or other software discs to get passed around and wind up at the brother-in-law's house. This is trouble waiting to happen for a couple reasons: 1) Microsoft doesn't like it when donated license keys find their way onto the internet; 2) You will need those discs again. Once you're done with it, lock it up in your IT Cabinet (now's a good time to designate one).
Once you've got a computer and an operating system (and, as stated previously), I'm assuming this is a Windows operating system), you'll need other software. For most staff, all you need to purchase is Microsoft Office ($20 per license at Techsoup. That's really it. Anything else they need is going to be available for free. In fact, to be truthful, almost everything Microsoft Office does is also available free, either via the ever-evolving Google Docs (which I'm using to type this, and which is a great tool for working collaboratively) or via a free downloadable package called Open Office. For a measly $20 per license, though, most organizations might as well buy Microsoft Office, if only because it's what everyone's used to. Make sure to plan this and any other TechSoup purchases ahead of time.
One exception is Adobe Acrobat: it's very helpful in most cases to have an Acrobat Professional license in the house, so that you can edit PDF documents (the Acrobat reader, as you probably know, is a free download). The TechSoup price on Acrobat Professional is pretty reasonable, and most small organizations will only need one copy. While you're at it, you might also want to look at the Adobe Creative Suites: some organizations have good reasons for purchasing stuff like Photoshop and Dreamweaver. It's still expensive even at TechSoup's low price-- but if you need it you need it. (And if you're not sure, I'd argue that you really don't need it).
Now that we've covered Operating Systems, next week we'll talk about Antivirus Software.
The introduction to the series can be read here:
http://www.crenyc.org/_blog/News_and_Views/post/IT_without_IT/
Last week's installment (IT Without IT, Part 2: Choosing and Acquiring Computers, Continued) can be read here:
http://www.crenyc.org/_blog/News_and_Views/post/Choosing_Computers_Continued/
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