The UPA recognizes organizations that encourage employee well-being through policies promoting work-life balance, employee involvement, employee growth and development, health and safety, and employee recognition.

XMission received particular recognition for its commitment to covering health and dental insurance premiums 100% for employees, their families, and domestic partners. Like our fellow award recipients – Gastronomy, BYU Center for Service and Learning, and Green Valley Spa – XMission and Pete Ashdown believe in promoting a “culture of caring.”

We sincerely appreciate the kudos. For more information about the Psychologically Healthy Workplace Awards, visit http://www.phwa.org/ or contact the Utah Psychological Association.

A heartfelt thank you to all of our incredible customers who have supported us throughout the years. We can’t wait to see what the future holds for XMission, and for the Internet!

To celebrate this sweet day, we have a special 24-hour promotion for new and existing customers:

Mention “16″ when you sign up for a new XMission service and receive two free months! (additional line charges may apply)

Remember, this promotion ends quickly, so please contact us as soon as possible!

If you have any special memories of XMission please share them in the comments section of this post.

Our deepest gratitude and many thanks, XMission staff and families

I’ve been using Windows 7 since early beta and have overall been pleased with the OS.  I won’t bore you with a lengthy review (there are plenty of other articles on the Internet for that); instead, I’ll give you some basic information that you should be aware of before you install Windows 7.

Like Windows Vista, there are several different versions of Windows 7 that you can buy. Which version you decide to purchase depends on the features you’re looking for. For example, bitlocker encryption isn’t available in the home or professional versions. For more information, see the “Which one is right for you” page on Microsoft’s website.

If you’re upgrading from Windows Vista, you should be able to simply launch the installer from within Vista and go from there. However, if you’re upgrading from Windows XP, you’ll need to upgrade in a completely different way by rebooting with the Windows 7 install disc, and selecting the drive where your current install lives. This is essentially a clean install of the OS (which is actually a good thing). Back up all of your important data such as documents, pictures and emails before proceeding, and prepare to reinstall any programs you had running under Windows XP since they will also be deleted in this process.

One important thing to remember: Windows 7 no longer comes with a mail client. If you aren’t using XMission Webmail, You can download a copy of Mozilla Thunderbird which is an excellent mail program. You can also download Windows Mail by itself or as part of Microsoft’s Windows Live Essentials.

Finally, if you were worried about not being able to use some of your favorite free programs such as Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird, FileZilla and free virus scanners AVG and Avast, fear not! We’ve tested out all of these programs under Windows 7 and they all run wonderfully.

If you’re wondering whether or not your existing XP or Vista computer can run Windows 7, there’s an app for that (Windows 7 upgrade advisor).  If you need help backing up your important data or installing the upgrade, give the guys at geekbox a call and they can help you out.

I can assure you that the Internet did not evolve with your privacy in mind. Did you know that every search you make is recorded and archived by the search company? This is standard practice for every major search engine such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.

A friend pointed me to a Firefox web browser plug-in called Scroogle which would allow me to privatize my searches. Scroogle serves as a Google search proxy making it so Google cannot track searches to build a profile and gather information on you. Scroogle destroys cookies and purges all logs within 2 days.

Scroogle plug-in for Firefox works great and even blocks the ads within your search. The company is run by GoogleWatch.

You may also refer to proxy.org for a list of web browsing proxy sites. Web proxies are not as convenient as a browser plug-in but are ideal for some situations.

XM

Register now at http://attend.utosc.com. Registration lasts until October 10, 2009 but you’ll save some money if you register before September 19.

To read about the presenters, keynotes, activities, workshops and more, please visit http://2009.utosc.com

Thanks to the Utah Open Source Conference for extending this discount!

Apple’s ‘Software Update…’ will not notify of this critical update. Please head to Version test for Adobe Flash Player to test if you are running an old version 10,0,23,1. If so, download and install the update.

Here are the details:

Ignite Salt Lake 3 (visit their website)
Thursday, August 20, 2009
6:00 – 10:00 pm
Admission is Free

Murray Theater
4959 South State Street
Murray, Utah

In partnership with Utah Free Media, XMission will sponsor a live video broadcast from the event. You can access the broadcast at www.utahfm.org

XMission is the primary sponsor for tonight’s Twilight Concert Series.

Come on down to the Gallivan Center Plaza to hear Sonic Youth and Awesome Color along with a few thousand of your closest friends.

Click on image to see larger sized version of this poster by Casey Burns (posted by Sonic Youth):

Don’t forget that XMission provides free wifi on the plaza so you can stay connected whenever you are at the Gallivan.

Stop by our booth and say “Hi” to the XMission crew!

When:
Friday, June 19, 2009
9 p.m. to 10:30 p.m.

Where:
BFS Warehouse
555 South 400 West
Salt Lake City, UT 84101

This collection, which focuses on graphics hardware, includes:

• SGI workstations and servers from the Personal Iris 4D/25 through a 4 rack SGI Reality Monster
• Tektronix graphics terminals from storage scope terminals like the 4010 and 4014 to raster terminals like the 4105 and 4205.
• Evans & Sutherland products including ESV workstations with CDRS 6.0 and Advanced Rendering System, Freedom series graphics accelerators, and ESIG image generators
• Aesthedes graphic design system
• Control Data Corporation CC545 Console
• Megatek 3D graphics terminal with the coolest keyboard you’ve ever seen

Additional information about the museum can be found here.