We’re in the process of building a number of short “how-to” type videos that are being added to our user support system. These videos are typically less than 2 minutes and cover just a single topic.
We are using YouTube to host these videos and we’ve created a channel to house them all. You can find the My Docs Online YouTube Channel here.
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Use file locking when collaborating on the content of Microsoft Office Word documents and files in the internet cloud.
Using “file locking” technology is important when you are sharing a Word or other word processing document with others. A file lock is used to prevent two people from opening and updating the same document or file at the same time, because that would result in one person’s updates wiping out the other’s.
On an office LAN this happens automatically and easily because Word can directly open the file on a LAN server, or even on a colleagues Mac or PC if they are on the same LAN network.
When you share a Word or other word processing file “in the internet cloud” File locking requires special software to do the same thing.
The WebDAV protocol used by Web Folders (and supported by My Docs Online) does this only for Word and Excel, because each application needs to use and understand “WebDAV Locks” and Word and Excel are essentially the only applications that do.
Although Microsoft and Office have supported WebDAV since XP and Office 2003, the support in more recent versions of Windows and Office (notably the combination of Windows 7 and Office 2010) is less reliable. This can be an issue as people upgrade from XP to Windows 7.
File Locking is also implemented in the My Docs Online Desktop App, which has additional benefits, including working with all versions of Windows and Mac OS X, all versions of Microsoft Office Word, and other word processing applications such as OpenOffice, Word Perfect, iWork, and others.
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If you’re in business for yourself you know that in small companies you get to wear a number of different hats. One of the hats that I wear for My Docs Online is a QuickBooks hat, meaning that I do the majority of the accounting work.
During the course of a given week I may need to access the QuickBooks file from my home, from the office, or when traveling. There may also be others who need access to QuickBooks so I can’t just keep the file on my computer and hope I have the computer with me all the time.
My solution? Well, it’s My Docs Online of course, right?
(Best viewed Full Screen)
I store the QB data file on My Docs Online and I can access it from wherever I happen to be. The problem with that has always been that if I’ve downloaded the file myself how do I let others know not to use it until I’m through? In the past we’d cobbled together a “check-in” and “check-out” method for accessing the file but it was not a great solution. What we really needed was file locking for QuickBooks so that anyone trying to access the file would know when it was in use.
Well, since we needed functionality we figured you might need it as well so we build it into the new My Docs Online desktop app.
Now when I’m ready to access the QuickBooks file I just launch the desktop app, highlight the QuickBooks file and click the “Lock and Open” button which locks the file and launches QuickBooks so that I can work.
Then when I’m done I reverse the process. I just close QuickBooks, then click the “Unlock and Save” button, which uploads the new file into our account and removes the lock so that someone else can use it. It also moves the file to the top of the date ordered list so that anyone can see that it’s been recently updated.
Being able to apply file locking to QuickBooks has been a real benefit to me while I’ve been testing the My Docs Online Desktop App. If you have the same need for file locking please check it out.
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The short answer is a resounding no, at least according to John Lynn, the man behind the popular EMR and HIPAA blog. In a recent post titled, Email is Not HIPAA Secure, John makes a compelling case for why email is not HIPAA secure and lays out the reasons why.
To quote from the article:
There is a way to encrypt email sent between 2 email systems, but so far a standard and mechanism for encryption between all the vast number of email providers has not been established. I won’t go into the details of why this is the case (cost of encryption, standards for encryption, etc), but suffice it to say that almost none of the email systems send encrypted email that would satisfy the HIPAA requirements.
Meeting HIPAA requirements when communicating secure patient data can be daunting task. If you’re in the business of handling medical dictation the rules are pretty clear. You need a secure method of moving both the voice files and the finished transcription documents. If you’re going to transfer those files using a computer you need to be using a HIPAA compliant method of transferring them.
My Docs Online offers a easy way of moving those files, that satisfies those complex HIPAA requirements, using our Transcription Edition. The cost is modest (beginning at less than $10 per month) and the benefits to you are numerous. For more information please check out the Transcription Edition page link above.
If you’re really interested in learning more about HIPAA there is a wonderful e-book titled The HIPAA Survival Guide (affiliate link) that is available online. The book, written by Carlos and Deborah Leyva, costs $9.95 and is is a valuable resource. You can purchase and download the book from the HITECH Survival bookstore site.
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The My Docs Online website is a great way for you and I to store files in the cloud. Using the website is easy – it’s accessible from anywhere and using it is simple. However, there are a few things that we’d like to do that we just can’t do through the website.
The My Docs development team has heard our requests and they’re in the beta test phase of introducing a new desktop based application. This application will do a number of things that, because of the nature of web browsers, can’t be done through Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome or other browsers.
I’ve been working with a number of you who are beta testing this new product and you’re telling me both what you like about it and the features that you’d like to see added.
Here are the top five things you say will help you with the new app:
Not surprisingly there were also features that are not yet in the beta version of the Desktop App that you’ve requested as well. The most requested feature available through the website that is not yet available in the Desktop App is the “give” feature that you use to share files with people who may not be My Docs Online users.
The Dev team hopes that you see the Desktop App as a useful addition to the My Docs Online website. If you’d like more information on the beta test program, or if you’re interested in helping us test the new product (we’d love to hear your feedback) please send me an email using the beta@mydocsonline.com email address.
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