- Daily news beat for April 17, 2008
- Ubuntu: more doomed than ever
- Which desktop Linux is best of all?
- First look at Ubuntu 8.04 beta
- The current open source climate
- Microsoft will prevail against Freetards
- 50 open source alternatives to proprietary apps
- Raising the hackles of open source developers
- Ubuntu 8.04: Hardly worth a yawn
- The freewheeling days of open source are numbered
April 17, 2008 | Comments: (0)
Daily news beat for April 17, 2008
Red Hat says it will skip desktop Linux for consumers and opt, instead, to focus on the enterprise market, with the aim of aligning its desktop offering with its server and middleware. Novell's CEO, meanwhile, says that consumer desktop Linux will take years.
After a three-and-a-half year delay, Google ships Urchin 6 Web analytics server software designed to be installed on customers' servers rather than offered as a hosted service.
Chipmaker AMD's troubled Quad-Core Opteron is back on track and now shipping in five servers from Dell.
And this just might be the year that companies take the next major step in going green, and there's no better architecture to use as a foundation for that than SOA. Are you ready for green SOA?
Posted by Tom Sullivan on April 17, 2008 09:43 AM
April 10, 2008 | Comments: (0)
As an early Windows NT 3.x adopter, Randall Kennedy explains that when it comes to OS quirks and bugs, he's already put up with more than his fair share.
But that doesn't mean he's willing to ignore the ongoing ACPI support debacle under Ubuntu.
"Despite six months of user complaints, dozens of bug reports and one very public scolding (by me), Ubuntu still does not run reliably on notebook PCs," Kennedy writes.
Indeed, that pesky ACPI bug encountered with Ubuntu 7.10 "Gutsy Gibbon" has been carried over to Ubuntu 8.04, aka "Hardy Heron." Alas, the suspend/resume "black screen of death" is back, and nastier than ever! Kennedy adds.
Ubuntu, more doomed than ever.
"That Ubuntu 8.04 remains unpalatable because of a stale, well-documented holdover bug from the previous version is really disappointing."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on April 10, 2008 10:53 AM
March 25, 2008 | Comments: (0)
Which desktop Linux is best of all?
Faced with yet Ubuntu incarnation, Randall Kennedy is asking how best to scratch the six-month Linux itch?
Indeed, Kennedy is soliciting suggestions on possible alternate paths before he takes the Ubuntu plunge once again.
"So, what do you recommend? Stick with the tried and true Ubuntu? Or take the road less traveled and go with something more radical, such as Slackware or a BSD variant? I'm open to suggestions ..."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on March 25, 2008 08:07 AM
March 24, 2008 | Comments: (0)
First look at Ubuntu 8.04 beta
Nearly everything about "Hardy Heron" feels snappier and more responsive than its predecessor.
It also carries a new kernel, a new version of the Gnome desktop, improved windowing and graphics layers, configuration tweaks, integration with Active Directory and seamless installation from Windows.
"Judging by its stability and polish you'd be hard pressed to tell it's a testing release," Neil McAllister writes in Ubuntu 8.04 beta, an agile upgrade. "Installation may be Hardy Heron’s biggest revelation."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on March 24, 2008 08:04 AM
March 24, 2008 | Comments: (0)
The current open source climate
On the eve of our Open Source Business Conference, we've got a roundtable on the state of open source.
Eleven luminaries -- from Bruce Perens to Eric Raymond, to technology strategists at IBM and Google -- contribute to "to uncover the most vibrant themes and conflicts shaping open source today," Jason Snyder explains.
"Each of our roundtable participants sheds ample light on the opportunities and pitfalls ahead."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on March 24, 2008 07:46 AM
February 29, 2008 | Comments: (0)
Microsoft will prevail against Freetards
"Throw eggs at me if you like," Open sources author Savio Rodrigues writes.
Rodrigues, an open source proponent and IBM employee, explains that anyone who thinks the current crop of open source operating systems and applications is going to curtail Microsoft's dominance is simply not living in reality
"This should scare any OSS proponent. It seems like the folks at Redmond have been busy while the OSS movement has been prematurely readying Microsoft's eulogy," he writes in Microsoft will prevail in the face of Freetards.
Microsoft, in fact, is learning from open source developments and evidence of that emerged in Windows Server 2008.
"I hope I'm wrong. But Microsoft simply appears to be meeting the challenge of OSS better than OSS appears to be meeting the challenge of displacing Microsoft."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on February 29, 2008 09:01 AM
February 21, 2008 | Comments: (0)
50 open source alternatives to proprietary apps
Zack Urlocker points to Jimmy Atkinson's article, The top 50 proprietary programs that drive you crazy -- and their open source alternatives.
Zack's post is brief but gives us a taste of some apps he didn’t expect alternatives to, including Norton Ghost, McAfee Anti-Virus, and others.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on February 21, 2008 11:02 AM
February 21, 2008 | Comments: (0)
Raising the hackles of open source developers
First, a question: Is measuring open source contributions really useful?
Well, the folks at startup Ohloh would no doubt answer in the affirmative and then explain how it hopes to profit from doing just that.
But its effort to do so has raised the hackles of open source contributors in more than one way.
"There are reasons to be skeptical about Ohloh, but every new social force -- and open source is surely such a force -- goes through many iterations and takes many different turns before maturity," Bill Snyder explains, then puts a positive perspective on the whole thing. "Even if individual implementations fail, the next guy will have something to learn from."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on February 21, 2008 04:52 AM
February 04, 2008 | Comments: (0)
Ubuntu 8.04: Hardly worth a yawn
Open source: Based on the latest issuance of Ubuntu, dubbed 8.04, Randall Kennedy writes that the forthcoming 8.1, otherwise known as Hardy Heron, "is shaping up to be one of those releases that reminds of why I can't stand some of the more desktop-centric distributions." Ubuntu 8.04: Hardly worth a yawn. "Simply put, Hardy is nothing more than 'me-tooism' run amok. I mean, how many Windows Vista features do you need to rip-off before someone calls you a copycat?" Related: Taking the Ubuntu Plunge.
Special report: The InfoWorld Test Center journeys into the virtualization realm and returns with this Virtualization superguide. The package includes a review of VMware's VI3, a walk-through of deployment, and half-a-dozen case studies depicting the planning, execution and, ultimately, lessons learned in virtual virtualization scenarios.
Feature well: The Industry Standard -- the magazine that chronicled the dotcom boom and fell prey to the bust -- has staged a return. Only this time it's not a magazine at all, rather it's a Web site for predictive markets "where readers make mock-currency bets based on their predictions about trends and events in the world of technology." (Full disclosure: The Industry Standard is owned by IDG, the parent company of InfoWorld.)
The news beat: Google and Microsoft trade barbs over the proposed Yahoo deal, while executive editor Galen Gruman cuts through the hype and spin to get to the real reason Microsoft wants Yahoo. Intel lifts the veil from Silverthorne, its forthcoming processor tailored specifically for ultraportable devices. Linus Torvalds says that Microsoft is bluffing on patents, maintaining that the software giant's claims are just "a marketing thing" and convenient element of FUD. And Microsoft finalizes Vista SP1 code for a mid-March release but, even then, some devices may not work with the initial release due to driver issues that continue to plague the OS.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on February 4, 2008 10:30 AM
January 25, 2008 | Comments: (0)
The freewheeling days of open source are numbered
Tech's bottom line: Bill Snyder has some advice for Red Hat. Move over, open source ain't what it used to be. "Perhaps the most startling statistic is this: IBM's open source revenue in 2007 was equal to that of Red Hat, the largest and most influential open source company. Not only did IBM equal Red Hat's open source revenue, but the next largest revenue earners were Sun and Oracle," Snyder explains. "The days of the freewheeling open source movement are numbered. Is this bad news for open source? Not at all. Open source software is more than good enough to stand on its own merits, no matter who owns it. And it's about time that the hardworking visionaries of the open source movement were rewarded with good jobs and high returns on their money and sweat."
Storage: Even storage is going green these days, intentionally or not. Most recently, it comes in the form of 2.5-inch drives that populate Infortrend's EonStor B12, which Mario Apicella deems the first enterprise-class array based on 2.5-inch drives. Smaller drives nurture green IT. "It should be clear why the EonStor is an odds-on favorite to beat any same-class array with 3.5-inch drives: It delivers comparable performance using less energy and less space. It's that simple," Apicella writes. "So why aren't more small-drive storage arrays being offered? For the same reason SUVs still mount gas-guzzling engines: Because we didn't ask vendors to do better. Let's not make the same mistake with storage: Use the power of your budget to make those requests, and storage vendors will listen."
Careers: Uplogix, it seems, practices discriminatory hiring -- and it even puts a spin on non-diverse hiring. "Check the dictionary on this one, because it's not bad," Nick Corcodilos explains in The discriminating employer. "Who needs diversity when you can have productive uniformity? Fancy that: You hire only people you know." Corcodilos, who actually used to work for a company that had a similar practice, adds that hiring folks you already know results in people working with others they like and respect not only fuels that organization but also reduces turnover. "I have never heard anyone boast that they make hires like that through Monster.com. Yet HR spends cough a billion a year cough to hire cough who-comes-along."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on January 25, 2008 05:44 AM
January 03, 2008 | Comments: (0)
Open source: a conservative force?
Open source: Is open source automatically the best path to creativity and innovation? Savio Rodrigues takes exception with a recent article in Discover Magazine that concludes "that claim is not borne out by the facts. ... Even though the open-source movement has a stinging countercultural rhetoric, it has in practice been a conservative force." In his Open Sources blog Rodrigues writes "the conclusion is not that OSS projects don't innovate. Rather, that projects that are truly innovative are developed by vendors whose benefactors (VCs or Wall St.) want the biggest bang for their investment. Ipso facto, closed source is usually the path taken in these situations. This has nothing to do with the type of innovation that OSS can deliver."
Blade servers: The power efficiency and savings on cooling costs that blade systems provide are now within reach of smaller datacenters, as vendors prime these servers for entry-level to midsize requirements and give them a more affordable price. HP's BladeSystem c3000 is one of these new lean machines, and InfoWorld's Test Center puts it through its paces. Its conclusion? "The HP c3000 is a hard-to-refuse alternative to filling your datacenter with more loose machines. Its comprehensive administrative tools make the system an easy-to-deploy, easy-to-manage proposition for small businesses and remote offices." Read the full review.
In the news: At next week's Consumer Electronics Show Asus will unveil a laptop that comes with 1TB of storage space. The M70S is targeted at the fast-expanding multimedia sector of the laptop market. With its Swordfish project the Eclipse Foundation is developing an open source SOA framework for applications ranging from enterprise environments to embedded systems. The US-CERT is warning users of a possible problem with the latest version of RealPlayer.
Posted by Caroline Craig on January 3, 2008 06:31 AM
November 28, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Open source companies hitting their stride
Open source: It appears that "most open source companies" are headed into a strong end-of-year finish, Zack Urlocker writes. "Open source is no longer considered as 'good enough' when you don't have budget. In fact, I'm seeing a lot of cases where companies are choosing open source because of significant technical advantages in the offerings. Usually this comes down to better performance, ease of use, and scalability," he explains in this Open Sources post. "Of course, since open source does not always have all the features, you still need to make sure that your needs are met." (Full disclosure: Mr. Urlocker is the executive vice president of products at open source database company MySQL.)
Green IT: Hewlett-Packard today announced that it will use solar power for a datacenter it's building in San Diego, and wind for facilities in Ireland, Ted Samson reports. "The solar installation won't belong to HP; rather, it will be financed and owned by a third-party financier. That means HP won't put down a dime in upfront capital costs," Samson explains in HP taps solar, wind power. The vendor projects that will save it $750,000 over the next 15 years, and its contract with a renewable energy provider in Ireland will cut costs by $40,000 this year while reducing carbon output by 40,000 tons.
Best of the blogs: The iPhone launches today in France and the rest of Europe and when it does, unlike here in The States, users will have the option to purchase one that is unlocked. "Of course, consumers will have to pay dearly for the right to have a warranted, unlocked iPhone," Ephraim Schwartz explains in iPhone, what's good for U.S. is not good for Europe. In France that means it will run 650 euros ($964 in U.S. dollars) and in Germany it's 1,000 euros ($1,484 U.S. dollars). Ouch. Schwartz does see an alternative to the high ticket, though. "With the exchange rate extremely favorable to European shoppers some may get creative and fly to the U.S. buy an iPhone here, take it back and hack it so it can be used in Europe with a local SIM chip."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on November 28, 2007 04:38 AM
November 12, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Open source: Several days into his Ubuntu plunge, Randall Kennedy has learned that "when something doesn't work the response is most often to point fingers. Assign blame," he writes in Why Desktop Linux fails: a first-hand account. "This entire experience simply reaffirms what I believe is a key barrier to the widespread desktop adoption of Linux: A lack of accountability." Contrast this with Microsoft Windows, Kennedy adds, and you begin to appreciate just what a Herculean feat the Redmond giant has accomplished. "Pass the buck. Great for political rallies and Linux love-ins. Not so hot for enterprise desktop computing." Related: Taking the Ubuntu plunge, Day 1.
The news beat: IBM buys Cognos, one of the last standalone BI vendors. Google releases the Android SDK so that programmers can create cell-phone apps for its mobile platform. Microsoft says it is not happy with AV software performance, citing ongoing growing pains, though a company executive maintains that OneCare and Forefront have helped it combat malware. And the MySpace malware problems began days before the Alicia Keys hack, and such issues are likely to continue.
Notes from the field: Firing back at iPhone unlockers, Apple released version 1.1.2 of its OS which relocks the devices and kills third-party apps users may have installed. "But wait, it gets better," Cringe writes in The score so far: Hackers 2, Apple 2. Hackers shot back and managed to rebreak the app for activated iPhones, such that it takes about 10 minutes. "I don't know what's more galling for Apple -- having weeks of dev work scotched in less time than it takes to eat a hamburger, or being gamed by people whose nicknames make them sound like Teletubbies." Google might actually come to the rescue with Android, Cringe suggests. "A person can dream, can't he?"
Posted by Tom Sullivan on November 12, 2007 11:20 AM
November 05, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Platforms: Lest you thought Randall Kennedy would drop the Ubuntu topic after publicly disparaging the OS, he's now gunning to find out what's it's like to quit the Windows habit cold turkey. "Of course, this is not my first time down Ubuntu road ... however, I've never really jumped in with both feet, so to speak," he writes in this Enterprise Desktop post. "If a dyed-in-the-wool Windows user like me can make the switch, anyone can."
The news beat: Google details the much-rumored Android mobile platform, an open development offering for mobile devices, which is backed by Motorola, Qualcomm, T-Mobile and others. Dell plans to acquire EqualLogic for its iSCSI SAN wares optimized for virtualization. Gartner says IT leaders must prepare for a bumpy economy that holds the potential to change priorities and strategies of businesses. And EMC doubles its investment in China to $1 billion.
Notes from the field: Robert X. Cringely presents the great social networking swindle of 2007. "MySpace spam isn't new, but over the last two days something has gone seriously wrong with its junk mail filters," Cringe reports. "If Google and the social networks of the world really want to do something useful, open, and cross platform, how about fixing the security problem first, then move on to the sheep tossing? Otherwise, social networks will quickly become just another social disease." Related: Social media means business.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on November 5, 2007 10:52 AM
October 29, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Epilogue: The problem with Ubuntu
Open source: Concluding his controversial series Why Ubuntu (still) sucks, Randall Kennedy starts by explaining that few, if any, of the angry dissenting readers that commented have even figured out exactly what's going on here. In the process he learned that "engaging [the open source] community on an intellectual level was pointless" and Kennedy "got a glimpse of the 'real' face of the Linux community, the immature, mom's basement-dwelling, pimple-faced geek side that the Red Hats, Novells and Canonicals of this world don't want you to see." The final piece drew plenty of comments, as did the predecessors. My favorite: "You, sir, are evil. And I mean that in a good way."
Security: Many of today's worms and bots create tens of thousands of variants each month which, in the words of Roger Grimes, "has made many anti-virus software programs that use static signatures significantly less accurate." Stopping malware that mutates on demand. "Who cares whether anti-virus companies get the malicious sample and make a signature? The malware has never existed before and won't exist again. Server-side polymorphism has created another challenge in the anti-virus world."
Storage: Data is growing so much it could reach a point where IT cannot store it reliably. "But what if we could use disk drives differently to create reliable, secure single instances of our data?" Mario Apicella asks in Protect your data by breaking it apart. That's where dispersed storage comes in. Two startups, Cleversafe and RevStor, are advancing the model, which involves shredding data and storing each fragment, encrypted, on a separate node. "As with a shredded paper document, no single data fragment can give away the whole. Because of this, dispersed storage is inherently more secure than traditional methods. Only the owner can bring the data confetti back together." Related: CleverSafe takes a slice out of storage.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on October 29, 2007 05:10 AM
October 25, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Best of the blogs: Randall Kennedy has a rather contentious series over at his Enterprise Desktop blog. Why Ubuntu (still) sucks. He's up to part 4, which begins, "it's the applications, stupid!" To wit, "an operating system is only as good as the applications that run on it. Combine that with the old saw, 'you get what you pay for,' and you begin to appreciate why a thriving, commercial, 3rd-party development community is essential to building a lasting presence in the marketplace. Without it, you get something like, well, Ubuntu," Mr. Kennedy writes. Personally, I cannot wait for the epilogue he promised. Related: Part 1: Search; Part 2: Compiz Fusion; Part 3: x11.
The news beat: After at first refusing Oracle's offer, BEA Systems has countered, stating that $21 a share is a more realistic price. Microsoft takes a $240 million stake in Facebook, thereby beating Google to the punch. Trend Micro plans to acquire Provilla for its LeakProof software and, in so doing, step into the data leak prevention fray. NEC takes on the likes of Cray and IBM with what it claims is the fastest vector supercomputer, the SX-9. And an analyst thinks that Apple takes $18 per month from AT&T for every iPhone subscriber.
SOA: Word is, those building SOAs have had it up to their noses with registries. "While the number of JADRs is not the problem, the fact that there is no clear standard or integration mechanism between the registries is clearly a problem." That's JADR, as in Just Another Damn Registry. "So, what can be done? First and foremost, vendors need to come together on a common registry, and repository for that matter. Or, perhaps provide integration mechanisms between them." A novel idea, indeed.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on October 25, 2007 10:32 AM
October 25, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Linux: the Windows gateway drug
Columnist's corner: Microsoft just might be finding ways to reach a middle ground with open source. "And they usually involve money," explains Sean Gallagher in this week's Enterprise Windows. The deal with Novell is one such example, as are the subsequent similar pacts with other open source providers. Most recently the folks from Redmond reached an accord with TurboLinux. The upside, Gallager continues, is that "Microsoft can assure some level of compatibility with Linux servers running in its corporate customers' infrastructure, making their lives easier." What does Microsoft get in return? "If Microsoft makes money off of Linux, and invests in making Windows a better alternative to Linux, Linux becomes the Windows gateway drug."
Notes from the field: Robert X. Cringely purports that Arnold Schwarzenegger might be relying on his bad-guy-role strengths, at least in this latest escapade: True lies and data breaches. The Governator, you see, terminated a nifty piece of legislation called the Consumer Data Protection Act that would force California merchants to be responsible for data leakages. "Arnie says the law is too big a burden on small merchants, and that the credit card industry already has its own data security guidelines," Cringe writes. "The old 'industry self regulation is better' argument rises again, like a cybernetic assassin after it's been steamrolled by a semi." This one, like most Hollywood flicks, is set up perfectly for a sequel.
Careers: Speaking of ... Bob Lewis is back with more on when your boss tells you to terminate an employee. "For some semblance of balance, may I lend support to the minority side here (which appears to be the rather less-than-endearing Mr. GeorgeC)," a reader begins. This mini-manifesto ranges from management tricks and techniques to the notorious Nuremberg Defense to what commitment companies should have for the cogs in its wheel. "Promises aren't, and shouldn't be absolute. Situations change, and a promise that seemed like a good idea when made might be harmful when the time comes to deliver," Lewis asserts. Not everyone agrees, however.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on October 25, 2007 05:02 AM
October 23, 2007 | Comments: (0)
The great desktop switch: Choosing a Linux
Special Report: In this morning's post, I linked to Neil McAllister's piece about migrating to Linux desktops, wherein he recommends beginning with Ubuntu -- but you don't have to. Indeed, there are half a dozen alternatives, all viable. Red Hat, Suse, Xandros, just to kick things off. "Trying them all would be a time-consuming task, but here are some pointers to start you in the right direction," Mr. McAllister writes. Related: Linux desktop applications.
Notes from the field: Comcast, it appears, has been caught playing with customers naughty bits, Robert X. Cringely reports. The company has been accused of killing off BitTorrent file sharing when the Associated Press tried to transfer the entirely public domain work The King James Bible and received a bogus error message. Comcast into the fires of hell. "This is yet another reminder that it's not your computer (it's Microsoft's or Apple's), it's not your music (it belongs to the record companies), and it's not your Internet connection (it's your ISP's). How many more things can THEY get us to pay for and not own?"
Best of the blogs: By bowing to the European Commission's antitrust demands, Microsoft opens the kimono. "For the first time, Microsoft's competitors will have affordable access to the code needed to make their enterprise products fully interoperable with the company's own," explains Bill Snyder. "Since so many major software players are multi-national, the effect will be global." Related: Microsoft's European vacation.
Live Chat: The debate brewing at Nick Corcodilos' Ask the headhunter blog about whether or not to use a resume when pursuing job opportunities will be discussed live in the IT Careers Chat Room of InfoWorld IT Exec-Connect today at 11:00 a.m. Pacific Time. (Registration is required but, hey, it's free.)
Posted by Tom Sullivan on October 23, 2007 10:21 AM
October 10, 2007 | Comments: (0)
What Radiohead can teach open source
Best of the blogs: While it's "tempting to declare a full-on open source gold rush," Brad Shimmin continues that most providers are not tapping traditional business models. 'Rather, many of these vendors are looking to simplify and lower internal development costs, better support ISV partners, or just buy some street cred for solutions that would otherwise be considered frumpy by open source devotees." The price is right: Next open source business model. Think of the band Radiohead and its recent posting of a new album and then letting listeners choose how much to pay. "It can and should be the same for open source customers, who should be given the opportunity to place some value upon the excellent software developed these days."
From the Test Center: OpenProj beta 4 is "generally stable software with extensive project scheduling and resource management capabilities," Mike Heck writes in this preview of the product. What's more, compared to Microsoft Project it's tiny and runs fast. "With OpenProj's free access, it's just one more compelling case for going open source on the desktop."
Podcasts: Irony might be brewing in the storage cauldron as Sun Microsystems CEO Jonathan Schwartz, though not in so many words, proclaimed the demise of disk storage. "The days of developing storage solutions independently of application servers are gone -- at least at Sun, but other vendors take note." Back to the aforementioned irony cookin'. Tape drives just might become, not right away but in time, mind you, the sole survivors of the storage years. Tune into Storage Sprawl.
Careers: To hear Nick Corcodilos tell it, CIOs are worried about their jobs, and they ought to be. "Some IT pros are doing really well, and good for them, because they get it. The rest are sucking wind, because CIO's can't figure out what the CIO's job is: to cultivate and inculcate IT workers with business savvy," he writes in CIO punts to HR; IT loses. In other words, don't tell HR to go find good people, "while you're dissing older IT pros and failing to develop the kids [you] hire."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on October 10, 2007 04:57 AM
September 25, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Best of the blogs: The company's devout legion doesn't typically ask probing questions, so Zack Urlocker will. "I was wondering why it is that Apple is often thought of so well in open source circles," he writes in this Open Sources post. "Yet Apple is actually more closed than most companies. They use some open source in Safari and OS/X but as far as I can tell, they don't give that much back."
From the feature well: This week marks our Virtualization Executive Forum. Companies are forging ahead with server virtualization, such as Credit Suisse with some 20,000 servers to manage, which conceived of the environment as a shared service. Or Nationwide Insurance and its adoption of the technology for x86 boxes and mainframes alike. And lest I forget those on the road to desktops. Virtualization on the front lines.
SOA: With AJAXWorld happening this week, David Linthicum thought the time was right to revisit the links between the show's namesake and SOA. "As SOA becomes more of a standard way of looking at architecture, many are seeking new standards-oriented interfaces that are able to externalize services to user interfaces, in many instances, on the platform for the Web," he writes in the simply, but aptly, titled AJAX and SOA. "AJAX tools seem to fit the bill nicely, and many are more oriented toward SOA than others."
The news beat: Microsoft issues Release Candidate 0 of Windows Server 2008, formerly Longhorn, as a public test version to replace Beta 3. AT&T and Frontline appeal the FCC's spectrum auction rules and claim that it could shut out small bidders. Apple says that iPhone hacks will void the warranty because, the company asserts, they could irreparably damage the device's software. And Global Communications shows off Video over Untwisted Pair, or the ability to 'digitize light into six-foot diameter signals to deliver broadcast-quality content' at the DEMOfall '07 conference.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on September 25, 2007 10:48 AM
September 20, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Forking desktop Linux revisited
Best of the blogs: Randall Kennedy's assertion in Desktop Linux? Stick a fork in it! has sparked the ire of myriad readers with some well thought out responses and others unfit for print -- a degree of vitriol that he confesses to not being prepared for. "I'm just calling it like I see it. If and when someone provides me with a convincing rebuttal that's devoid of profanity, racial slurs and personal insults, I'll most certainly reevaluate my position." Forking Linux? Shoot the messenger.
Green IT: Despite the effort put forth by some of technology's biggest vendors, more and more research is coming out that demonstrates how companies really are struggling to get the power they need to run their business. "I'd have to say that healthy skepticism is bordering on either unhealthy denial or, with all due respect, outright ignorance," Ted Samson explains in Technology alone won't solve your power problems. "It's serious because it effectively translates to having to pull the reins on business growth until you can devise strategies and accumulate the resources to deal with those problems."
Columnist's corner: David Margulius is used to reading about "gender issues associated with hard-driving, play-to-win, boys-will-be-boys cultures in financial services, real estate or Washington D.C. politics," he writes in The end of booth-babe culture. "But IT? Aren't we more sophisticated than that?" Apparently not, as much as I might like to think so. "I do believe that we as the IT industry can do better overall on this issue, and it's not just up to the vendors. I think we're better than financial services and Washington, D.C."
The news beat: Apple CEO Steve Jobs has been subpoenaed by the U.S. SEC in a stock option backdating lawsuit against a former Apple general counsel. AT&T's chief security officer, Edward Amoroso, says that network perimeter security should be virtual. Sprint Nextel sees a place for WiMax in the enterprise and plans a national rollout of its service next year. And DRAM prices plunge to new lows, thanks to fierce competition.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on September 20, 2007 10:56 AM
September 19, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Why open source will triumph over SaaS
Quoteworthy: Ask any -- and I mean any of the new school SaaS companies what they built their sites on and 99 percent will tell you it's all open source -- primarily LAMP. (BTW, if you built on Windows just stop now. The costs will sink you as you scale.) Ask them if they pay for support and the response is less than 20 percent by my informal research. I do think that SaaS is a great delivery model and I am glad these guys are consuming open source to build their businesses. But, it's hard to see how the majority of the companies on display at Dreamforce will build sustainable revenue outside of the Salesforce.com -- Dave Rosenberg, SaaS vs. open source: open source will win. Disagree? Think it's an unfair comparison? Talkback below or at the prior link.
Hardware: Intel is not setting AMD's agenda anymore, Tom Yager explains. "AMD has outgrown Intel. Hardware and software vendors that utilize AMD platforms are now steering AMD's strategy. AMD is all about giving OEMs and ISVs what they want, and that's precisely the approach that originally put Intel on top," he writes in AMD leads by listening. AMD "will march to the drumbeat of IBM, Microsoft, Novell, Red Hat, Sun, and the handful of others who are probably a bit shocked to see so much of what they asked for in Barcelona."
Notes from the field: The venerable Robert X. Cringely reports that TD Ameritrade has been caught with its breaches down. Some six million customer records, in fact, have been exposed. "While Ameritrade assures us 'there is no evidence' customers' birthdates and Social Security numbers were taken, this doesn't mean they weren't -- it just means Ameritrade isn't aware of it." Yet.
The news beat: Intel says a version of Centrino with WiMax will arrive in 2008, though Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Apple have yet to pledge support. SAP gives its suite of hosted ERP a name, Business ByDesign, and reveals pricing. Google tests its Gadget ads service, which enables customers to build ads with audio, video, live data feeds, Flash and JavaScript that ultimately resemble small Web pages with a Web page. And hacker David Maynor publishes the technical exploits of his Apple Wi-Fi attack.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on September 19, 2007 11:02 AM
August 31, 2007 | Comments: (0)
The fuss about OSS community roles
Best of the blogs: Reacting to Sun's Simon Phipps, who posted about the different roles/stakeholders in an OSS community, Savio Rodrigues wonders if the discussion is even necessary. "Are there really folks at Sun who don't 'get OSS' today? And if there are, shouldn't these folks have been 'educated' prior to Sun open sourcing their software portfolio?" Rodrigues asks in this Open Sources post. Mr. Phipps weighs in here, too, with a bit of explanation.
Green IT: It's Christmas in August! Not really, but Ted Samson has the Green gadget guide for geeks just the same. We're talking bamboo hardware, eco-friendly chargers, power-measuring devices here, folks. This post would do J. Peterman proud, though it's a bit different. "My findings are more of the eco-friendly-tech variety, not exotic birch wood clogs and hand-woven wheatgrass sombreros," Samson writes. "Oh, and my travels tend to be limited to the San Francisco Bay Area, Sacramento, and the Internet, which is arguably environmentally friendlier than flying halfway across the globe to test-drive a camel-skin tote bag." What else is in this one? A jacket replete with solar panels, among other goodies.
Notes from the field: In an apparent attempt to anger both U.S. coasts, Cringe likens Microsoft to Boston's Big Dig. "More and more, new Microsoft operating systems resemble massive public works projects, with endless schedule setbacks, cost overruns, and diminished expectations," he grumbles in Vista SP1: You oughta know beta. It took Microsoft six months to release the schedule of when it will ship that beta, for instance. But, hey, it's all good for a chuckle and Cringe gets his from Microsoft saying that Vista SP1 will not break any applications already running on the OS.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on August 31, 2007 04:56 AM
August 24, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Linux use doubles, and then some, on the desktop
Open source: We're always skeptical of vendor-driven or funded surveys and while DesktopLinux.com does not technically sell the OS, this study is to be taken with a grain or two of salt. That said, the organization "found more than a doubling of Linux desktop users in the past year," Paul Krill writes in Survey: Desktop Linux use grows. The top choice is Ubuntu, with Firefox the most popular browser and Thunderbird the reigning e-mail client.
Columnist's corner: With new iterations of Lotus Notes, Domino and Sametime, IBM just might be getting something very few folks would have expected: a second chance at knocking off longtime market leader Microsoft Outlook. "Most industry analysts are now saying that this version of Notes is finally on par and competitive with Outlook 2007," Ephraim Schwartz reports in E-mail's future, pumped look. That does, however, raise the question of where this multi-faceted rivalry will be in 5 years. Schwartz predicts that, "e-mail will never go away, but it may get surrounded by so many other collaborative capabilities it will be unrecognizable from the e-mail clients we use today."
Green IT: Touring Hewlett-Packard's datacenter, Ted Samson gets a taste of Dynamic Smart Cooling (DSC), HP's technology to help customers more efficiently chill their hardware. Actually, it's more of a meal than a taste. "On the tour, I got to see the rows of server racks in HP's datacenter, all busily humming away -- yet the facility itself was surprisingly warm," Samson relates in Chillin' at the HP datacenter. Warm, that is, not hot. Watch the video tour with Samson and HP fellow Chandrakant Patel.
Wireless: Tom Yager is embarking on a mammoth mobile project that consumed all available space in his hotel room with wireless devices for professionals and the IT staff that support them. That list includes 15 pieces from several vendors spanning the gamut of phones (including the one that starts with a little "i"), handhelds, Bluetooth headsets and routers. "I test technology by living with it, betting my professional life on it, just as you do with the technology you buy. I keep testing devices and software in rotation until they let me down or otherwise lose their status as leaders in their class," Yager explains in 2 mobile 2 move, the first in a multi-piece package.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on August 24, 2007 05:02 AM
August 17, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Best of the blogs: Smart software vendors react directly to their customers, rather than letting feedback fall into the typical quagmire of departmental handoffs that inevitably delays improvements to the software. And no one knows this better than the open source companies. "When you draw from the Open Source community, it's like outsourcing in that you leverage the knowledge, interest and capability of the project team, rather than relying on yourself or your organization as the sole source of these," writes Harper Mann in this IT Troubleshooter post. "This is not the same as dealing with one-off tasks for customers."
Wireless: It's just a phone, for crying out loud, but already there are weird, scary and bizarre iPhone tales. "So prepare to be amazed, ladies and gentlemen! Step right up and take a front-row seat for Steve Jobs' unintended sideshow attractions," Computerworld's Mike Elgan writes. Within you'll find a lobster-thumb boy, the world's fastest iPhone and fattest phone bill, plus Karl Rove, among others.
The news beat: IBM finally issues Lotus Notes and Domino version 8, which ought to please current Notes users, even if it doesn't lure anyone away from Microsoft Outlook. Three Florida men are indicted on software piracy charges alleging that they sold millions of dollars worth of counterfeit software. After it seemed as if they'd been fixed, the latest word out of Skype is that its VoIP problems might continue throughout the day. And in their ongoing legal feud Nokia asks the U.S. ITC to ban Qualcomm imports that it claims infringe on Nokia patents.
Notes from the field: It's Friday and that means Cringe is back with the geek week in review. Appearing in this episode are Sprint's new WiMax service, otherwise known as Xohm, former CA CEO and current jailbird Sanjay Kumar and, believe it or not, Goofy, Daisy Duck and Pinocchio. Oh yes, and lest I forget, those You-Tube debatin' Republicans.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on August 17, 2007 10:01 AM
August 14, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Notes from the field: Cringely points out that Karl Rove and SCO have something in common. (Though I imagine neither would appreciate the comparison in the slightest.) "As for the company itself, SCO ain't dead yet, but it's on a respirator, and the Penguinistas are jumping up and down on the air hose," Cringe reports. SCO: going, going, gone? "SCO fans had better hope the company's move into the mobile space pays off, because it sure looks like the legal strategy won't." The bigger question, of course, is where have all the SCO fans gone?
Columnist's corner: The cast of characters in this week's Off the Record includes the author, Boss, Doom and the secondary Prez. It's a classic game with no winner. To set the scene, author hires Doom to help with growing company that wants to keep IT staff small, thus Boss and Prez happy. The two get on great at first. Work hard, play hard. Until a backstabbing occurs, that is, leaving no mystery about whodunit in this one, folks.
Applications: While Google's announcement that it will bundle Sun's StarOffice into Google Pack has Eric Knorr saying that the free suite means "Microsoft may be in a tougher spot than it's ever been," Ephraim Schwartz maintains that "there is an almost imperceptible undercurrent that could spell trouble for the search giant's future." In The demise of Google, Schwartz is referring not to office suites but, instead, to the crop of "niche, vertical, boutique -- call them what you will -- search engines."
The news beat: Nokia says that 46 million cell phone batteries are in danger of overheating, though a spokeswoman claims there is no threat of them catching fire. The record-breaking Storm Trojan is linked to a rise in spam. Oracle says it will charge for four add-ons to its 11g database, including some of the most anticipated features. And Scotland hopes to lure Indian outsourcers with the capability of setting up call centers that boast multilingual staff.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on August 14, 2007 10:20 AM
August 07, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Will proprietary software disappear in our lifetime?
From the feature well: Whether proprietary software is actually evil or not is a matter of debate in certain circles. "Some even hope that open source will be the David that stops these software Goliaths in their tracks: no more vendor lock-in, no more license fees, no more closed code," Neil McAllister reports in Open source upheaval. But could the proprietary software model really disappear in our lifetime? That's a whopping question but new business models have already made their mark, changes are here to stay, protectionist tactics are drawing to a close and, depending on whom you ask, the rise of open source may be barely even started. Related: Ongoing coverage of LinuxWorld 2007.
Best of the blogs: Continuing on that theme, Dilbert goes open source. That's right, the cartoon character has been alerted -- by his pointy-haired boss, no less -- to open source software and its ostensible pricing benefits.
Test Center review: RIA's are all the rage. "And for good reason," begins Martin Heller. That's because they hold the potential to marry Web apps' ease-of-access with desktops' ease-of-use. One such example is Curl 5.0 which, in Heller's words, "may well be the most interesting computer language that you don't already know." Read the full review.
The news beat: President Bush lets the Qualcomm ban stand but the company plans to appeal. Sun unveils Niagara 2 and deems the new processor 'a server system on a chip'. Apple gets blasted for negligent patching of the iPhone by a security researcher at the Black Hat confab. And VMware launches Fusion, thereby sparking a race with rival Parallels and its software for running Windows on a Mac.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on August 7, 2007 05:32 AM
July 02, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Companies that care about open source
Best of the blogs: Open source might not guarantee open standards, but that is the primary concern of enterprise decision makers, reports Savio Rodrigues in Companies that care about source. And while there is some truth to that notion of caring, there's more to the story. "Essentially, 'using for free' is the highest ranked OSS attribute remaining," Rodrigues writes. "OSS vendors are living with/through this attribute on a daily basis as they grow their businesses."
Wireless: Apple's iPhone debuted last week and that inspired hackers to begin racing to unlock the device from AT&T's service grasp. Some legitimate users, however, are experiencing activation delays when trying to get the phone operational. A watchdog group, meanwhile, calls on Apple to outline the iPhone battery-replacement policy. And Tom Yager acknowledges that "even a fact-based account of the iPhone phenomenon is impossible to deliver with a straight face," in the iPhone: Setting the record straight on the good, the bad, the silly and the sleazy.
The news beat: The JBoss portal gets Google Gadgets so developers can add components that work with the Google homepage, Desktop, or any page on the Web, to portals they build. A new study finds that hackers are increasingly targeting executives with the aim of stealing company data. And NASSCOM forecasts India's software and services exports to reach $40 billion this fiscal year.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on July 2, 2007 10:45 AM
June 21, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Dell: No Ubuntu Linux for business users
Open source: Dell won accolades when it began offering Linux pre-installed on PCs but, as Matt Asay reports, the hardware maker is only selling those systems to home users and, in fact, even refused a prospective customer who needed to use a business credit card as payment. "Why not let the market decide where Ubuntu will go today? Or was that part of some agreement with Microsoft? 'We'll only let individual Linux freaks buy Ubuntu -- we won't let corporate Linux freaks buy it,'" he writes in this Open Sources post. "Muppets."
Careers: Kicking off with a question John West asks If leadership is a journey, how will you know when you're there? No easy answer, it's true, but West does offer a benchmark of sorts, or at least an endpoint -- becoming the least important person in your organization. And that's a good thing. "So it's a little bit of hyperbole. There are decisions and responsibilities that you must take on your own. They are the job of the person in charge." Even for West, that takes some adjustment.
Columnist's corner: Even though he's spent much of his career finding and disarming artificial benchmark advantages that don't correlate to real-world computing scenarios, Tom Yager explains that, "the nut that I have yet to crack is an enterprise IT benchmark that passes the test of being portable, easy to run, consistent, realistic, fair, and capable of providing simple, meaningful results." But Greg Leake, an ostensibly solo and even stealth Microsoft employee, is working to create such a test for both Java and .Net. "Microsoft put a lot of time and money behind someone who was more committed to shooting straight than to handing his employer a big win over a competitor," Yager writes in J2EE against .Net. "It trusted a key competitive benchmark to an architect who made sure the competitor had every chance to win."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on June 21, 2007 04:47 AM
June 13, 2007 | Comments: (0)
The heart of open source: Naivete
Best of the blogs: Waxing reflective, Matt Asay writes, "what a blessing it is to be ignorant of just how hard some tasks really are, and to have it be too late to turn back once we're well into them." In this post he's referring, of course, to open source projects, almost all of which, Asay writes, were begun "on a hunch and some free time."
Notes from the field: Robert X. starts things off with a pop quiz involving not just Windows browsers but also Paris Hilton. "The new Safari beta brings some nifty features to Windows surfers, along with security holes big enough to swallow Steve Jobs' Mercedes," Cringe writes. 18 of them, in fact -- security flaws, that is, not Benzes. "Safari's biggest claim is that its rendering engine is faster than the rest; in my own extremely unscientific tests I found it a smidge quicker than Firefox, but nothing worth changing your boxers over." Surfin' Safari.
The news beat: Apple says that its iPhone requires an iTunes account in addition to the AT&T Wireless subscription before the device can be activated. Storage titan EMC inks its first pact with an Indian outsourcer. And despite reports to the contrary, Intel says it will not change its pricing for the Chinese market.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on June 13, 2007 10:51 AM
June 06, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Open source sets terms, Microsoft follows
Best of the blogs: It could not have been said the same way five years ago, but Microsoft must now live by open source's rules, or suffer, Matt Asay paraphrases MySQL CEO Marten Mickos. "Imagine a world where Microsoft is an island of proprietary software, surrounded by the real world of web sites, business applications, etc. that all run open source software," Asay writes in this Open Sources post. "Five years ago, it was open source that was accused of being religious. Now it's Microsoft."
Special report: Day three, here, of our 2007 InfoWorld CTO 25 awards. This morning's batch brings five new winners, including Jeremiah Grossman, founder and chief technology officer of White Hat Security, which in his words aims to "test what matters most: production code." Read the profile of Grossman, or view the slideshow with all those we've revealed thus far.
The news beat: IBM buys Watchfire for its Web application security products. Google kept its own acquisition streak alive by gobbling up Peakstream, which develops software for multicore and parallel processors. ARM's CEO says that the iPhone will ignite smartphone use. And Adobe aligns with Kinko's in a pact the companies claim will enable users to electronically send documents to stores for printing.
Notes from the field: Robert X. Cringely is going ape over evolution. Rest assured, Cringe's blog is not taking on an Earth sciences tone. "Naturally, some [readers] told me to stick to technology and leave religion and politics alone," he writes. "I think IT touches everything." In this particular case, he's talking science and education. "Our next philosophical question: If a man speaks in a forest and his spouse isn't there to hear him, is he still wrong?"
Posted by Tom Sullivan on June 6, 2007 10:50 AM
June 04, 2007 | Comments: (0)
IDC: Open source market going way up
Best of the blogs: The worldwide revenue from standalone open source software hit $1.8 billion last year, according to IDC. What's more, the analyst firm predicts that revenue will soar to $5.8 billion in 2011. "Open source revenues will lag open source adoption. This makes sense because subscription revenues are recognized over the life of a support subscription, and because there's a lot more free use than paid," Matt Asay explains in this Open Sources post. "And [the] future is looking brighter every day." (Disclaimer: IDC is owned by IDG, the parent company of InfoWorld.)
From the Test Center: Microsoft has three major goals for the Orcas beta of Visual Studio. Those are to improve developer productivity, manage application lifecycles through Team Foundation Server and employ the latest technologies. "One major improvement is a new design surface for WPF applications," writes Martin Heller. "I haven't been able to crash Orcas Beta 1 at all." Read the review here.
Careers: Like most folks, Sean McCown got into his profession primarily by virtue of availability. Rather than becoming an IBM or Oracle DBA, he leaned toward Microsoft products because, "I was in a very small company, and we had SQL Server 6.0 and Windows and Exchange. I also had full access to MSDN and a group of guys who were experts in MS technologies," he explains in Database Underground. It's hardly coincidence, though, and the other side of the coin is that companies who saturate the market with information about their products do much better than those tending to close themselves off. "So all you vendors out there who think you're too good for everybody, just remember this ... if you make it hard enough to learn your product people will stop caring."
Security: Malware is not just evolving but, in so doing, is becoming nastier. "When I began fighting hackers and malware in the second half of the 1980s, Apple viruses ruled the land," security guru Roger Grimes harks back. On to the present state of malware. "Good luck and keep your eyes open," he concluded in this installment of Security Adviser. Okay, okay, I'm getting ahead of myself. Grimes delves into a Google paper entitled "The Ghost in the Browser: Analysis of Web-based Malware", and calls it "one of the best reporting papers I've ever read."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on June 4, 2007 04:39 AM
May 30, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Private equity and Novell: Perfect together?
Best of the blogs: Here's a suggestion that might surprise some, though not all, of you readers. Private equity should buy out Novell. "What Novell needs is to be taken off the public market so that it can regroup and make difficult decisions that Wall Street doesn't have the patience to permit," Matt Asay asserts. "I think that it will be too hard to effectuate the necessary changes without getting off the quarterly Wall Street treadmill."
Hardware: While it's not quad-core, a magic key does exist to a quantum jump in virtual server density, according to Tom Yager. Getting much, much more per x86 rack. Host guest virtualization is one, faster server to server interconnects another. "This is the kind of leap in x86 server density that we've been waiting for...you'd be a fool not to invest the minor additional effort that pushes you higher, and quite possibly higher than my imagination has taken me."
Startups: This being the 30th of May, we're winding down the Month of Enterprise Startups, but the last two are just as important as their predecessors. Today's is ConnectBeam: Social Bookmarks behind the firewall. ConnectBeam's technology enables bookmarks to be made available to anyone else inside a corporation who is searching for similar information. And it relies on folksonomy to achieve that. Founder and CEO Puneet Gupta explains that a taxonomy has trouble telling the difference between, say, the element Mercury and the planet of the same name. Hence, that folksonomy. View the slideshow with all the companies we've thus far revealed.
The news beat: Samsung crams 4GB of storage into a mobile phone chip for 3G handsets and claims it could reduce the need for external memory cards. Adobe slides mark-up features into Acrobat 3D for working in CAD files. And Symantec delays its mobile security client, Norton Mobile Security for Smartphones.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on May 30, 2007 11:09 AM
May 24, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Freedom: a better business model
Best of the blogs: And that applies to more than just software. At least according to Marten Mickos, CEO of MySQL. Think eBay, Google, Skype and YouTube. Open source in and of itself, though, is not a business model, he says. But as Matt Asay points out, "it does nudge the vendor one direction or another."
Quoteworthy: There was, and still is, no such thing as an IT impulse buy, a system purchase or a switch in suppliers driven by the emergence of a new or updated CPU architecture. Indeed, institutional buyers are still unmoved by that great obsession of punditry, market share. It delights me whenever tech industry oddsmakers' projections, always presented with such certainty, are made hollow by the market that these pundits fancy themselves driving rather than watching. -- Tom Yager. The two technology markets.
Q&A: Google product manager Nathan Stoll defends the Google News practice of indexing media content, sans permission. In this interview with the IDG News Service, Stoll also discusses plans for video news and social networking sites.
Security: Microsoft could fulfill security dreams with NAP, or, then again, perhaps not. At Interop this week were, "Cisco, Juniper, and Microsoft clearly showing that endpoint security solutions can talk to each other if only they'd try," writes Oliver Rist in this installment of Enterprise Windows. Third-party providers have a fighting chance for the next year or so, but they'll have to deliver better management interfaces, better support for transient clients, much better support for unmanaged clients, and support from all the best anti-virus/anti-malware engines. "Just a few of the things on my endpoint wish list, and they'd better be there a year from now or the Redmondian version really will be a foregone conclusion."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on May 24, 2007 04:49 AM
May 22, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Apps: The rumored partnership between Google and Salesforce.com "could have far more significance than simply sharing and exchanging mashups," writes Eprhaim Schwartz in Google, Salesforce may make software history. The imprimatur of Salesforce's application with Google "may start as a ripple, but I predict it will end up as a tsunami that could, one day, wash away the largest software company of all time." It's only conjecture at this point, though.
From the feature well: Microsoft's patent claims over Linux are not the only threat to open source. "An accurate understanding of the relationship between open source code and intellectual property can help IT practitioners become better advocates for open source within their organizations," explains Neil McAllister in How risky is open source? Facts to understand include who owns the code, trademarks, patent issues. "Actual risk is impossible to measure, but probably minimal."
Best of the blogs: Reporting live from Interop in Las Vegas, Oliver Rist is "wading through carnage caused by dozens of SEs given free reign to setup the latest equipment, management software and geek toys," he writes in SMB IT. The vendors, meanwhile, are "making loads of announcements and bombarding my inbox with them."
Posted by Tom Sullivan on May 22, 2007 04:53 AM
May 17, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Defining the phrase open source
Best of the blogs: It had to happen. What with Microsoft's patent claims, the meaning of open source came into question once again. There are different takes on this, of course, and most recently Gartner weighs in. Tending toward the OSI description, Matt Asay agrees with Gartner in at least one capacity. "Whatever the definition, it needs to be consistent." The idea here is not to confuse buyers. Related: Hilf: Microsoft won't sue over Linux, for now.
From the Test Center: Handing off active voice sessions from one network to another is a formidable task, and one that DiVitas' wireless technology avows to achieve. Configuration is "fairly easy, considering its functionality," find Oliver Rist and Brian Chee. "DiVitas' solution is fantastic for companies with large fleets of roaming voice users." Read the full review.
Startups: Teqlo had a rather ironic origin. "We were a solution in search of a problem to solve," CEO Jacoby Thwaites says. Not your father's mashup. That solution is the company's mashup platform, the first application of which will blend Salesforce.com widgets, Outlook, Plaxo and BlackBerry. How? Each piece self-describes its capability and the Teqlo engine does the rest. View the Month of Enterprise Mashups slideshow.
The news beat: Oracle looks to ratchet up its product lifecycle management software via the $495 million bid for Agile Software this week. India's commerce minister cautions that a U.S. investigation into H-1B visas could have negative implications for other trade issues between the countries. And security firm Secunia says that Firefox users are more likely to install patches than folks who use IE or even Opera.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on May 17, 2007 10:59 AM
May 11, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Open source: Red Hat, like many a company, could be doing more with its resources, including it's brand. That sentiment comes from both Credit Suisse's Jason Maynard and contributing editor Matt Asay, in Red Hat's opportunity. In short: that involves the company expanding its footprint by acquiring the likes of Zimbra and others. "This may not be the time to be as prudent as Red Hat would like," Asay writes. "Oracle is not sitting still. Neither is Microsoft." The important thing, he adds, is for Red Hat to operate like it has to go it alone because, well, it does.
The news beat: In hopes of preventing further delays, Microsoft cuts key server virtualization features out of the first public beta of its hypervisor technology, Viridian. The Free Software Foundation claims it will iron out incompatibilities with other free software licenses and organizations, including the Apache Software Foundation. And the Truste group says that because building trust in downloads is no easy matter it unveils a program to certify downloadable software and, in so doing, is forcing white list members to disclose the impact on users' PCs.
Columnist's corner: Plenty of companies talk transparency, but hardly any actually walk the walk. "Imagine my shock the other day to receive a glossy, 32-page annual report in the mail from Intel. Not its corporate annual report, but its 2006 IT Performance Report," David Margulius writes in Intel secrets revealed. "The report opens the kimono on how a large corporate IT organization operates and thinks about itself -- making it a must-read for all top IT execs." It's available as a PDF right here.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on May 11, 2007 05:29 AM
May 09, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Best of the blogs: "We will never engage in interoperability discussions that are closed in nature and involve closed APIs." Paul Cormier, executive vice president of engineering at Red Hat says that, according to Matt Asay, in Overheard at the Red Hat Summit. Asay seconds that with "interoperability should be based on standards, and standards should not be closed."
Notes from the field: Even if it doesn't live up to Microsoft's promises, "Vista does seem to be more secure (or less insecure) than prior versions of Windows," Cringe explains. Don't get comfortable, though, as the company did just this week issue seven critical patches for 19 bugs. Microsoft and the age of insecurity. "The black hat hackers simply take Microsoft's new focus on security and turn it to their advantage. Give them lemons, and they make lemon-flavored poison." It ain't just Microsoft, or the Internet, either.
Startups: Today belongs to Varonis, which claims to help those companies drowning in information by matching data to fishy behavior. "We hook into the directories and file servers and pull in all the important information about users and file structure to show what's out there and what the entitlements are," says Yaki Faitelson, president and chief executive. "We're the only ones who can do a detailed audit like this." View the slideshow Month of Enterprise Startups with all we have revealed to date.
The news beat: Analyst house Gartner says that virtualization is still too expensive and recommends that companies "stick it out" until licensing, support and other issues are resolved. That didn't stop VMware from detailing an upgrade that adds support for Windows Vista as a guest or host OS. More users are evaluating and deploying that new Microsoft OS, meanwhile, but concerns are on the rise, particularly about hardware requirements and security.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on May 9, 2007 11:22 AM
April 26, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Open source: Just when it seemed "IBM was getting stodgy and provincial in its views on open source," Matt Asay writes in this post, Big Blue rearranged some borders and aligned with MySQL to resell the database, and then some. "I think this is fantastic news for MySQL, and I believe it will be good for IBM, too." Another bonus for both IBM and MySQL, of course, is that it could be bad for enemies Microsoft and Oracle.
Green IT: California's Governor Schwarzenegger is threatening to sue the EPA if it doesn't grant the state the right to implement its own regulations on greenhouse gas emissions -- a move that could lead to the state implementing a law calling for 25 percent decrease of carbon dioxide and other gases. Ted Samson writes in Sustainable IT that the law "would no doubt touch other industries -- including the state's high-tech companies, which not only make C02-producing hardware but also spew out large quantities to run their datacenter operations."
Columnist's corner: Towerstream shows telcos for the carpetbaggers they are and presents a model for escaping their clutches, but neither wireless nor wired bandwidth can really be free, Tom Yager explains. "Internet tiering, the practice of assigning smaller subscribers reduced qualities of service, bugs the hell out of me," Yager writes. WiMax bypasses the bells. "Telcos, the future of the Internet is way over your head."
The news beat: Microsoft releases the first publicly available beta of Longhorn server, bringing it out of private testing and giving users a first look at new scripting and command line technology. Cybercriminals might be gaming Google AdWords to serve exploits, according to security researcher Roger Thompson. And Gartner analysts warn of IT irrelevance by pointing to four distinct trends the consultancy believes will cause significant disruption in the technology sector.
Posted by Tom Sullivan on April 26, 2007 05:03 AM
April 25, 2007 | Comments: (0)
A funny thing happened to open source
Best of the blogs: Capitalism -- yes, as in money -- changed open source and for the better. It wasn't all that long ago that proponents such as Matt Asay insisted it would never touch the application market. "Suddenly, business models started to be discovered that would allow companies to form communities (or leverage existing ones) to monetize open source," he writes in Open source becoming more innovative? "The next decade goes to the innovators in new markets...not traditional, proprietary software." Related: Red Hat chides Oracle over Linux.
The news beat: With Apple's former general counsel planning to fight the backdating stock options charges the SEC brought against her, the case is sure to be closely watched. CA inks an outsourcing pact with Achievo to provide implementation, customization and maintenance services for CA's Chinese customers. And CollabNet buys SourceForge.
SOA: "I'm among BPM people that are really SOA people and perhaps don't know it," David Linthicum confesses in BPM and SOA. Of course, the idea of BPM in the context of SOA is anything not new, he writes. "The services carry out the work, while the process layer forms the use of services into solutions."
Se