CM Group stays at the forefront producing the latest training for software giant

Published: Tue, 14 Oct 2008 11:57:36 GMT

CM Group's Content Master Division has just written the new four-day instructor-led training course for Microsoft called 'Tools and Creative Techniques for Designing User Interfaces by Using Microsoft® Silverlight™ 2'. Content Master has been working closely with Microsoft's Redmond based Expression Studio and Silverlight teams for the past year, producing a range of product launch collateral and training materials and using Silverlight for a variety of practical applications. This latest course is intended for designers and developers, showing them how to use the Microsoft Expression Studio 2 product set to build rich and compelling Silverlight 2 based user experiences. The course will be available through Microsoft's official training partners worldwide. Technical Director Alex Mackman said "Silverlight 2 represents a big step forward in comparison to earlier Silverlight releases. Designers and developers now have Expression Studio 2 as a toolset to enable them to capitalise on the new range of functionality and rich controls provided by the platform. The collaboration and workflow across the range of Expression Studio products provides a tremendous boost to help graphics and Web designers build the next generation of rich interactive applications for the Web."

CM Group Announces Luminosity courses are now available on your phone

Published: Tue, 14 Oct 2008 11:56:21 GMT

CM Group is excited to announce a mobile publication option for their Luminosity rapid eLearning course creation and management platform. Using the mobile publisher functionality within Luminosity, authors can output content to mobile phones and PDAs for offline study. Once downloaded to the mobile device, users can view the content in their own time and do not require a network connection. The Luminosity mobile publisher supports the full range of Luminosity templates and component types - repackaged specifically to suit the mobile phone. Authors can create non-interactive video or audio based ("show and tell" style) presentations or they can choose to add elements of interactivity including click tables, tab tables, walkthrough components, interactive graphics, assessment questions and more. Authors can also customise their mobile output by using different skins, which control the look, feel and branding of the mobile course or presentation. Accompanying the mobile publisher is a mobile catalogue application, which helps users manage and keep track of the content on their phone. The application displays all of the Luminosity content on their device in a condensed list. With a single tap or click, users can launch and display their selected course. The mobile solution is ideal for many different scenarios including company briefings for employees, new product briefings for sales staff, technical updates, help guides, and more. Luminosity Mobile output supports the main phone and PDA devices and additional specific ones can be easily added on request.

CM Group promotes Microsoft prize winner after success of Luminosity

Published: Tue, 14 Oct 2008 11:53:21 GMT

Following the successful launch of the new elearning publishing platform Luminosity, CM Group has this month promoted Tom Randell to the role of technologist. A former Microsoft student partner, during Tom's final year of university, he took part in the Imagine Cup, a student competition organised by Microsoft. The competition encourages students to develop technology-based solutions that tackle real-world problems. His team won the UK final and went on to represent the UK at the worldwide finals in India. One of the highlights after winning the UK final was the opportunity to travel to the Microsoft Campus in Redmond and meet Bill Gates. Tom started work for CM Group in September 2006 after completing a four-year course at the University of Hull, where he gained a Master of Science (MSc) degree in Distributed Systems Development. Tim Buff, managing director of CM Group, comments, "I'm over the moon at Tom's promotion. He's been with us for two years now and, even as a graduate, he's been an integral part of the team. His steady progression has underlined the success of the Company's graduate recruitment programme. "With our new business division Luminosity taking off so rapidly, we're keen to attract and retain the best of the best in order to maintain our reputation for exceptionally high standards." Tom adds, "When I left university, I told myself that I had to enjoy my work. I have achieved that goal here at CM Group. I'm working on the very latest technologies and my work changes from project to project, which provides me with many interesting challenges and opportunities."

CM Group is today announcing SharePoint integration to complement the Luminosity rapid eLearning course creation and management platform.

Published: Tue, 14 Oct 2008 11:58:56 GMT

Using the SharePoint Connector, courses from the Luminosity Content Server (LCS) course catalogue can be hosted within a company's existing SharePoint site. This enables organisations to deliver relevant learning content directly to their target audience via a SharePoint portal. Users no longer need to navigate to separate sites to find learning content. Instead, they can access the content that applies to them, straight from the SharePoint sites they use for their everyday work. Tim Buff, managing director of CM Group, comments, "Because the eLearning courses are managed by the Luminosity Content Server, the learning management capabilities of this system ensure that learner progress and assessment results are tracked. "This is great news for managers who can use the full range of LCS reports to increase their visibility of employee development and identify potential skills shortages effectively." The Luminosity suite of products enables large organisations to easily and quickly create and then update engaging eLearning materials themselves, then deliver them to delegates in a wide range of formats. The SharePoint Connector is available as an optional, add-on component for LCS and works with Windows SharePoint Services (WSS) 3.0 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007 systems.

Luminosity - Redefining Learning

Published: Wed, 03 Sep 2008 13:46:51 GMT

CM Group are proud to announce Luminosity - a revolutionary suite of products and services that enables large organisations to dramatically extend what you can achieve with eLearning. It enables your people, wherever they are based, to rapidly create and deliver compelling, interactive learning throughout the organization, across the Internet, through SharePoint sites, and even to mobile devices. Luminosity can slash the cost of eLearning creation, significantly increasing your content output and enabling you to reach your internal and customer audiences faster and in new and exciting ways with up-to-date materials. You can also manage learners easily, and track their progress to validate the effectiveness of your learning content and quickly identify new training needs; thus closing the loop and enabling a highly agile approach to transferring the skills and knowledge that your people need to keep your business at the leading edge. For more information see www.cm-luminosity.co.uk

Content Master "go green" with major new office expansion

Published: Wed, 03 Sep 2008 13:47:30 GMT

Communications company CM Group has moved into their newly expanded UK HQ offices near Bristol. CM Group's HQ is housed in a striking eighteenth century country house. The additional new building incorporates some existing 200 year old outhouses and a dramatic new state of the art building created with green credentials in mind. The offices are needed to provide additional space for CM Group's Content Master division, to cope with their continuing expansion. CM Group's Managing Director Tim Buff said "We already have a great operating base set in lovely grounds and didn't wanted to have to move away from our location just a mile from the motorway. So this green development complements our existing offices with something a little different". The existing 250 year old building had to be significantly rebuilt following a major fire just before CM Group moved in and the opportunity was taken to install the latest technology and ensure that the building was fully modernised, whilst keeping its unique character. The additional new buildings utilise the latest underground heat extraction technology and incorporate a "green" roof planted with grass and wild flowers. The new building increases the space available for Content Master's growing team of Technologists and multimedia designers.

John Sharp’s new Windows Communication Foundation book excels for Content Master

Published: Wed, 03 Sep 2008 13:41:22 GMT

Best selling author John Sharp is behind the standard setting WCF book from MS Press. It has been confirmedthat the new Microsoft MS Press book “Windows Communication Foundation Step By Step” by Content Master developer guru John Sharp has already become the best selling Microsoft title on this exciting new technology and has been described as the best book yet in the MS Press “step by step” series. John Sharp, a UK Principal Technologist with Content Master said “WCF provides a unified, robust, and secure programming model, enabling you to build highly interoperable solutions that can combine services developed by using a wide variety of technologies. If you haven’t looked at it yet, you should check it out”. Appropriately given his name, John is currently working on the next edition of his best selling book on C#, “Microsoft Visual C# 2008 Step By Step”

Content Master at two-week TechEd conference in Orlando

Published: Wed, 03 Sep 2008 13:41:35 GMT

Content Master will be at the big TechEd show in Orlando from 3rd to 13th June. The show is the premier event of its kind aimed at technical staff and training and education professionals working in the Microsoft technology field with over 12,000 delegates expected. For the first time the conference consists of two weeks, the first focused on the developer audience and the second on the IT Pro community. Content Master will be attending both weeks of this, the biggest Microsoft technologies educational conference and exhibition in the world. This year the two week event is in Orlando, USA and Content Master has a stand displaying some of the product launch and training materials we have created for Microsoft and other major IT companies. If you are planning to attend TechEd, why not stop by to say hello. We will be on hand to talk about Content Master’s ability to provide technical content from design, through development to deployment for new IT products. Or if you are a Microsoft technical trainer you may like to talk to us about opportunities to work with us on content creation, we are currently expanding and looking for talented experts in their field. During the Developer week, Content Master will be discussing launch support for products and solutions through our Excite, Engage, Enable framework. In week two, we will focus on how to reduce support calls to IT Pros through better documentation and training content. Over the past three years Content Master's multimedia department has grown exponentially and the Content Master team will also be available to discuss the latest techniques for incorporating graphics and animation into communication strategies and how Content Master can assist clients with their Silverlight and other multimedia needs.

Microsoft launches Customer Care training by Content Master

Published: Thu, 14 Aug 2008 08:57:44 GMT

Microsoft Corp has launched an integrated range of training and product launch materials produced by the leading UK technical communications company Content Master. The range of materials supports the launch of Microsoft Customer Care Framework (CCF) 2008, and includes media rich e’Learning courseware, 4 MSDN virtual labs, and a 2-day instructor led training course. The audience for the materials are developers and Microsoft’s partners that are introducing the Microsoft Customer Care Framework (CCF) 2008 into customer care solutions worldwide. Content Master Principal Technologist Derek Lakin described the Microsoft Customer Care Framework 2008 as "an exciting and powerful new software product that supports the flexible, rapid and cost-effective development and deployment of customer care solutions by large organisations. It provides a unified desktop view that pulls together data from line-of-business applications, application work flow and automated processes". The full range of materials have been written and produced by Content Master, the leading producer of technical training materials and product launch collateral. The innovative tuition resources provide hands-on experience of working with CCF 2008. It enables new developers to quickly get up to speed with the framework and existing developers to migrate from CCF 2005 and quickly understand and utilise the new features of CCF 2008. Content Master Technologists have worked previously with Microsoft’s CCF product team producing e’Learning courseware and MSDN virtual labs for CCF 2005. Content Master Technologists have also supported the launch by delivering instructor led training events around the world.

Content Master "masters" Microsoft Silverlight and Expression Studio

Published: Wed, 03 Sep 2008 13:43:11 GMT

Content Master has produced "Core Silverlight 1.0 for Designers", an instructor led three-day training course for Microsoft Corp. The course is the first to be available reflecting close collaboration with the Microsoft Expression Studio team and it will be available for Microsoft training partners worldwide. Microsoft Silverlight is a new cross-platform, cross-browser plug-in for delivering next-generation media-based experiences and rich interactive applications for the Web. Expression Studio provides a rich set of collaborative tools for designers to help them quickly and easily build Silverlight experiences. Microsoft Corp user experience product manager, Arturo Toledo says: “Working with Content Master was a pleasure. Thanks to their smart and creative team, they learned quickly to produce content oriented toward the creative designer audience, but even further, they pushed that understanding to create a training set that really communicates with, engages and inspires that audience. After this experience, we definitely see Content Master as a long-term partner in training and marketing content production.” Technical Director Alex Mackman said “Expression Studio provides an exciting set of new products to help graphics and Web designers build the next generation of rich interactive applications for the Web. The collaboration features and workflow supported by the toolset is impressive. The close integration with Visual Studio helps designers and developers work together much more efficiently and effectively than has been possible before. Developers no longer rely on design “mock-ups” and so the level of rework is significantly reduced. They use the exact same projects containing the graphical assets and interface designs created by the designers. This significantly speeds up the overall Web development cycle.” As with many of Content Master's projects, the work involved the Company's team working closely with the Redmond-based Expression Studio Product Group prior to the public release of Silverlight 1.0 and Expression Studio.