ANDOVER, Mass. - Copanion, which makes tax workflow software, has hired Julie Pierce for the newly created job of vice president of engineering. In that position, she is responsible for overseeing development of Copanion's products.

With tax research, is there really an issue that is more important than making it easier to find results? Probably not, and along with the user efforts to improve navigation and user interfaces, the effort to gain quicker access to information will increasingly include support for mobile devices. But despite the pending mobile revolution, it's more traditional improvements that matter most to users this year.

Even if the rest of the economy looks weak, Intuit painted an optimistic picture for its year ending July 31. At this week's earnings conference call, company executives said they expected overall revenue would grow by 8 percent to 11 percent, consumer revenue by 10 percent to 13 percent, and revenue from the accounting professionals segment--its Lacerte and ProSeries business--by 4 percent to 7 percent. That came as the company's earnings for fiscal 2010 topped all of Wall Street's estimates.