Exercise 1- Improving Decision Making: Using a Spreadsheet to Evaluate Hardware and Software Options In this exercise, you will use spreadsheet software to calculate the cost of desktop systems, printers and software. Use internet to obtain pricing information on hardware and software for an office of 30 people. You will need to price 30 PC desktop systems (monitors, computers, and keyboards) manufactured by Lenovo, Dell and HP. Also obtain pricing on 15 desktop printers manufactured by HP, canon and Dell. Each desktop system must satisfy the minimum specifications shown in tables. Also obtain pricing on 30 copies of the most recent versions of Microsoft office, Lotus Smart suite and Apache Open Office and on 30 copies of Microsoft Windows 7 Professional or Windows 8 Pro. Each desktop productivity package should contains programs for word processing, spreadsheets and databases and presentations. Prepare a spreadsheet showing your research results for software and desktop system, printer and software combination offering the best performance and pricing per worker. Because every two workers share one printer (15 printers/30 systems), your calculations should assume only half a printer cost per worker. Desktop and Printer Specifications Each desktop system must satisfy the minimum specifications shown in the following table: MINIMUM DESKTOP SPECIFICATIONS Processor speed 3 GHz Hard drive 500 GB RAM 4 GB DVD-ROM drive DVD-RW Monitor (diagonal measurement) 18 inches Each desktop printer must satisfy the minimum specifications shown in the MINIMUM MONOCHROME PRINTER SPECIFICATIONS Print speed (black and white) 20 pages per minute Print resolution 600 600 Network ready? Yes Maximum price/unit $700 Exercise II- Use Internet based Software The Foremost Composite Materials Company is planning a two-day sales conference for October 19-20, starting with a reception on evening of October 18. The conference consists of all-day meetings that the entire sales force, numbering 125 sales representatives and their 16 managers must attend. each sales representative requires his or her own room and company needs two common meeting rooms, one large enough to hold the entire sales force plus a few visitors (200) and the other able to hold half the force. Management has a set of budgets of $150,000 for the representatives' room rentals. The company would like to hold the conference in either Whistler, BC, or Montreal, QC, at a Hilton-or Marriott-owned hotel. Use the Hilton and Marriott websites to select a hotel in whichever of these cities would enable the company to hold its sales conferences within its budget and meet its sales conference requirements. Then locate flights arriving the afternoon prior to the conference. Your attendees will be coming from Toronto (54), Vancouver (32), Quebec City (22) Edmonton (19) and Winnipeg (14). Determine cost of each airline ticket from these cities. When you are finished creating a budget for the conference. The budget will include the cost of each airline ticket, the room cost, and $70 per attendee per day for food. Exercise III- Achieving Operational Excellence: Creating a Simple Blog Software Skills: Blog Creation Business Skills: Blog and Web Page Design In this exercise, you will learn how to build a simple blog of your own design using the online blog creation software available at blogger.com. Pick a sport, hobby, or topic of interest as a theme of your blog. Name the blog, give it a title, and use a template for a blog. Post at least four entries to the blog, adding a label for each posting. Edit your posts, if necessary. Upload an image such as a photo from your hard drive or the web to your blog. Add capabilities to other registered users, such as team members, to comment on your blog. Briefly describe how your blog could be useful to a company selling products or services related to the theme of your blog. List the tools available on blogger that would make your blog more useful for business, and describe the business uses of each. Save your blog. Marking Criteria Marks Application Exercises clarity, structure, and content Exercise 1 (6) Exercise II (6) Exercise III (4) Application Exercises should be completed and have all required contents. The Application Exercises should be well explained, analyzed, and covers all topics in organized manner with using diagrams, charts, and graphs. Examples and Research Based 3 Application Exercises explanation should be detailed Citations and References 1 All sources cited properly in accordance with APA style in Assignment.