CompTIA Blog

It’s been a few weeks now and that check engine light is still illuminated on your dashboard. Your car seems to be working just fine, but that little orange reminder is nagging at you to get your car checked out. Who do you take your car to? Mechanic A looks good enough, but can you really trust him? Mechanic B looks just as good as the first, but he has an official designation of quality – something you know means his business will be efficient and honest. It’s no brainer &nda ...

The theme for Cloud Connect in Santa Clara this week is the growth of cloud as a platform for building IT solutions. In some ways, this means that cloud becomes a secondary consideration behind the specific solutions being built. John O’Farrell, general partner with Andreessen Horowitz, said the venture capital firm frequently takes cloud for granted as it evaluates investment options, a sentiment that was also shared by CompTIA in our 2013 IT Industry Outlook. As a platform, cloud computi ...

Last week, the New York Court of Appeals ruled in a case brought by Amazon and Overstock.com that non-resident sellers offering products through a New York website will be required to collect New York sales taxes on sales made into the state. This collection requirement would apply even though the out-of-state business has no other presence in the state. In its ruling, the court analogized selling through a New York-based website to having a physical present in the state: “ … if a v ...

The ongoing convergence of IT and telecom technologies, as well as the decision-making preferences of the customer, continue to drive more partnerships between traditional IT channel firms and the telecom agent channel. Both communities are looking to provide customers with an end-to-end solution encompassing both telecom and IT and have found that joining forces and blending skill-sets can be an efficient way to achieve this aim. That’s the conclusion of many respondents to CompTIA and Ch ...

People typically buy from those they trust and most industries recognize the companies that do more to earn that type of confidence from their customers. Perhaps that’s why business credentials have become more prominent in the IT community, with solution providers and vendors looking for new ways to validate the processes they put in place to offer top-quality services and products. After all, few accolades speak as loudly to current and prospective customers and other business partners as an e ...

Tracy Bicknell-Holmes, professor and engineering librarian at University of Nebraska-Lincoln created an online image management microsite for UNL students and staff, but it's publicly available and you can use it to. Clicking through the tabs of Bicknell-Holmes' website, you will find: Slide, audio and video presentations about managing your online presence by a wide variety of experts Direct links to multiple search engines (including Twitter, Dogpile, Google Blogs, Social Mention, and beyond ...

Congressman J. Randy Forbes (R-VA) has prepared a draft data breach notification bill that serves as the best effort this year to eliminate the patchwork of state data breach notification laws. The bill would require “entities that acquire, maintain, store or utilize personal information” to report a data breach of customer information within 14 days of the breach. An entity that provides customer notice would be considered in compliance with the proposed rule.The proposed rule also would impose ...

Yesterday the House Subcommittee on Health and Technology held a hearing titled “Protecting Small Businesses Against Emerging and Complex Cyber-Attacks.” CompTIA’s own Dan Shapero, founder of ClikCloud, participated on a panel comprised of the following speakers: William H. Weber, senior vice president, general counsel, Cbeyond, Atlanta – testifying on behalf of the COMPTEL. Justin Freeman, corporate counsel, Rackspace, San Antonio, TX – testifying on behalf of ...

The U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means is continuing its work to develop a consensus on tax reform. Last month, chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) and ranking member Sandy Levin (D-MI) announced that 11 committee working groups would be formed to develop discussion drafts on various aspects of tax reform. Just last week, one of these working groups issued a Discussion Draft on Tax Reform for Small Businesses. While this draft does include a permanent extension of section 179 small business expensing, ...

The very first CompTIA A+ certification was earned by Patrick Farley, a training systems developer for Compaq's server tech support, who was certified on March 19, 1993. Learn how CompTIA A+ has evolved since then.

With the national community college graduation rate dropping by 25 percent, businesses, government and schools are teaming up to form new education models to get students ready for a career. Primary is a focus on "STEM" (science, technology, engineering and math) education and preparing students for jobs in these fields. Experts have determined that they can't tackle the problem at solely the community college level, but all along the schooling pathway, from preschool to age 20. Making Jobs a C ...

A colleague of mine recently told me, “If it isn't in writing, it doesn’t exist.” This holds true when advocating on Capitol Hill. It’s always helpful to have a one-pager or a leave-behind of some kind to give to Hill staff that sums up what you covered in your meeting. In this spirit, I have worked with colleagues internal and external to CompTIA to put together such a document, titled “CompTIA Workforce Priorities,” that we can share with Hill staff during our advocacy visits. You can see it h ...

Regardless of their industry experience and knowledge of the topic, it’s not easy for channel executives to navigate the world of cloud services. The business prospects for and obstacles facing the industry here are as vast as the number of solutions available. While the delivery model and basic value propositions are fairly straightforward, deciding what types of cloud services to offer and which suppliers to choose can be a dizzying exercise for most solution providers. For example, should the ...

The training industry has entered the "Age of Personal Learning," where individuals expect to take control of their own personal learning experiences and organizations will have to adjust to meet those expectations, a training industry executive told attendees at CompTIA Colloquium this week. "They want it now and if you don't give it to them they will find it somewhere else," said Doug Howard, chief executive officer and founder, TrainingIndustry.com, a market intelligence firm that studies t ...

During the second of three General Sessions held at CompTIA’s Annual Member Meeting, happening this week at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel & Towers, the audience got a “Gut Check” in the form of a panel moderated by Carolyn April, director of industry analysis at CompTIA. The panel was comprised of Scott Barlow, vice president of sales and marketing at Reflexion Networks; Eric Long, CEO of Information Technology Solutions; Quy Nguyen, CEO of Allyance Communications; and Angela Trillhaase, a busi ...