Tech Watch | InfoWorld Staff | February 2008

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February 2008

February 29, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Serena Software on Monday will tout plans to offer several of its products via SaaS.

The first product to be offered via this format will be Serena Mariner, the company's project and portfolio management (PPM) tool. Mariner offers visibility into project status and metrics to ensure the right persons are on a project at the right time, the company said.

Users can try the SaaS version free and buy it online. Pricing will be half the price of alternative PPM offerings for the first six months, Serena said.

Also planned for a SaaS implementation are solutions for Business Mashups and the agile space.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 29, 2008 05:50 PM

February 27, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Google transforms JotSpot into Web-site-building tool

Google Sites' ease-of-use, tight integration with Google services strengthens company's position in Web-app race

Google today unveiled a powerful new weapon in its arsenal of lightweight Web-based productivity applications: a tool for easily and collaboratively creating and editing Web sites. Dubbed Google Sites, it's built around JotSpot, the wiki platform that Google acquired in October of 2006 -- and whose previously unclear fate has been cause for quite a bit of hand-wringing.

The search behemoth appears to have a broad range of applications in mind for the freely available tool, from building a private company intranet, accessible and customizable by users on a permissions basis, to developing a public-facing Web site for all the world to see.

Google has aimed to make the Google Sites easy enough for a beginner yet feature-rich enough for a power user. For example, building a Google Site requires no HTML, according to the company: It's "as easy as editing a document," the company says. There's also a "growing list" of page templates to get users started, including "Web page, announcements, file cabinet, dashboard, and list," according to Google.

At the same time, Google Sites lets page creators easily insert content such as videos, docs, spreadsheets, presentations, photo slide shows, and calendars -- thanks in part to its integration with other Google apps and offering.

Ah yes, Google's collection of shining Web gems: Google Docs, Google Calendar, YouTube, and Picasa. By integrating Google Sites with those aforementioned services, Google boosts the value of the entire array significantly. "This is a key last hole in the Google Apps suite," Matt Glotzbach, product management director for Google Enterprise, told CNET. "It is the nucleus for other pieces to fit into for online collaboration."

Moreover, the unveiling of Google Sites further fortifies Google's enviable position in the increasingly important Web services space -- a point that Microsoft clearly can't ignore. (I say that as someone who buys into the theory that Redmond's bid for Yahoo had a lot to do with having an eye on extending its own Web-app reach.)

More information is available at the Google Sites home page.

Posted by Ted Samson on February 27, 2008 11:02 PM

February 26, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Google: Fate tied to the Web

Why would a search engine company like Google participate in social networking? Because of the indirect benefit the company derives, a Google official said at the Adobe Engage conference in San Francisco on Monday.

"Google really does believe that its fate is directly to the Web," said Joe Kraus, director of product management at Google. He is working on Google's OpenSocial social networking initiative to develop API standards for social networking platforms.

The more time people spend on the Web, the more likely they are to do a search and that is where Google makes money, Kraus said. Thus, Google is involved in social applications, he said.

"As goes the Web, so goes Google," said Kraus.

He also said Google would love participation in OpenSocial by Facebook, which has not been involved. Kraus also said he had no idea when the Google-backed Android mobile applications platform would support Adobe's AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime) for running Internet applications offline. AIR was the star attraction at the conference.

Also during the conference Monday, Salesforce.com Chairman/CEO Marc Benioff stressed how the company is firmly in the Adobe camp and is not pondering Microsoft's rival Silverlight browser plug-in software software - at least not at the moment.

"We are not looking at Silverlight today, so we have not really had the demand," Benioff said. If that changes, Salesforce.com of course would look at Silverlight, he said.

"Today the action and the excitement, especially interactive user interfaces on the the Web, remains in kind of the Flash, Flex, AIR area," said Benioff.

Adobe at Engage announced Force.com Toolkit for Adobe AIR, to add offline capabilities to the company's Force.com platform for third-party applications.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 26, 2008 06:23 AM

February 22, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Leap year birthday bug fix offered

The Honor Society of Leap Year Babies, which describes itself as the world's largest Internet birthday club, has released free software to correct the "invalid birth date" bug that can impact those born on February 29.

Persons born on that date, which only shows up on the calendar once every four years, can encounter this bug whenever they enter their birth date on a Web site registration screen, the Honor Society said. The software also can be used in automated birth date response systems that usually ignore people born on February 29, according to the society.

"I think the main [impact of the software] will be that when we get a birthday, it will sort of be treated like everybody else's birthday," said Peter Brouwer, a society representative who was himself born on February 29. He wrote the software as a six-line Perl program.

Intended for Web designers, the software determines if any year is a leap year and can be used for birth date verification. The code is posted on the organization's Web site. The society was formed in 1997 and has more than 6,000 members worldwide.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 22, 2008 04:11 PM

February 22, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Microsoft plans app dev boosts

Fresh from the delivery of its Visual Studio 2008 toolset and .Net Framework 3.5 this past fall, Microsoft is readying enhancements to these technologies in the area of client development, a Microsoft official said in a blog this week.

"We have put a lot of effort into addressing some of the biggest areas of customer feedback, while also trying to really push the envelope on the capabilities developers have when building Windows applications," said Scott Guthrie, general manager in the Microsoft Developer Division, in his blog. "All of these improvements build on top of VS 2008 and .NET 3.5, and will make .NET client development even better going forward."

Enhancements planned for the next few months include:

• Improved .Net Framework setup for client applications. Due this summer, the improvements will make it easier to build optimized setup packages and can be integrated with existing installation frameworks such as InstallShield. Windows Forms and Windows Presentation Foundation applications will be able to use the setup framework via a bootstrap utility.

• Improved working set and startup improvements for .Net client applications. This is intended to enable .Net client applications to launch faster in "cold startup" situations, in which no other .Net client applications are running and the OS must load lots of pages from disk. Also due this summer, the improvement will be made available via an update to the Common Language Runtime that features significant internal optimizations to data structures. An improvement of 25 percent to 40 percent is anticipated for cold startup performance.

• Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) improvements. A service update to WPF this summer will include performance optimizations for text, graphics, media and the data stack. A new WriteableBitmap API will enable real-time bitmap updates from a software surface. Support for a new effects API also is planned for building richer graphics scenarios.

• WPF control improvements. Due later this year, new controls being worked on include DataGrid, Ribbon and Calendar/DatePicker controls

• Visual Studio 2008 WPF Designer improvements. A servicing update to Visual Studio 2008 is planned including feature additions to the WPF Designer. Included are tab support within a property grid for control events, toolbox support within source code and other enhancements.

"The above improvements should make it easier to build great desktop applications," Guthrie said.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 22, 2008 07:26 AM

February 21, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Microsoft opening APIs

In a dramatic move, Microsoft is opening up documentation for it APIs and communications protocols, the company announced Thursday.

Developers do not need a license or pay a royalty or other fee to access this information, the company said. Open access is intended to ensure that third-party developers can connect to Microsoft high-volume products just as other Microsoft products do.

Interoperability principles announced by Microsoft apply to Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008, Office 2007, Exchange Server 2007 and OfficeSharePoint Server 2007. Future versions of these products also will be covered.

More than 30,000 pages of documentation for Windows client and server protocols previously available only under a trade secret license will be published on MSDN.

Microsoft also will indicate on its Web site which protocols are covered by Microsoft patents and license all of these patents under reasonable and non-discriminatory terms at low royalty rates, the company said.

Additionally, Microsoft is providing a covenant not to sue open source developers for development or non-commercial distribution of implementation of these protocols. Developers can use the documentation for free to develop products.

Also, Microsoft will design new APIs for Word, Excel and PowerPoint applications in Office 2007 to enable developers to plug in additional document formats and enable users to set these formats as their default for saving documents.

Microsoft also is launching an open source interoperability initiative to enable more interoperability between commercial and community-based open source technologies and Microsoft products.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 21, 2008 09:20 AM

February 20, 2008 | Comments: (0)

BPM growth, challenges cited

Business process management (BPM) is one of the fastest-growing software markets but faces organizational challenges, according to a BEA Systems study on the BPM market.

Completed January 25 and released this week, BEA's "The 2008 State of the BPM Market White Paper" drew on more than 100 analyst reports, articles and customer surveys, the company said in an executive summary of the report.

The market is estimated to grow from $500 million in 2006 to $6 billion in 2011, a more than tenfold increase. Respondents, however, cited organizational challenges to deployment as outweighing technical challenges. Organizational issues included internal politics, change management, a dearth of skilled business analysts and lack of organizational alignment.

BPM has seen rapid growth in recent years because it brings business analysts and technologists together with shared tools and strategies. Successful BPM deployments view continuous process improvement as imperative, BEA said. BPM is increasingly being used to manage processes spanning multiple packaged applications.

BEA reported that a survey of its AquaLogic middleware customers in November 2007 found that 68 percent of respondents connect BPM and SOA.

Market consolidation was noted, with the nearly 150 vendors in the BPM space in 2006 being reduced to just 25 in 2007.

Leading BPM products support collaborative and social process activities that today are lost in email, documents and hallway discussions, BEA said.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 20, 2008 06:41 AM

February 19, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Microsoft unveils giveaway program for students

Looking to entice a new generation of software developers, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates unveiled Monday a software giveaway program for college and high school students to access Microsoft developer and designer tools, the company said.

Available now to 35 million college students in several companies including China and the United States, the Microsoft DreamSpark program makes available a broad range of tools, the company said.

Tools included in the program include the Visual Studio 2005 and 2008 Professional Editions, XNA Game Studio 2.0, Microsoft Expression Studio tools and SQL Server 2005 Developer Edition. Also available through the program is Windows Server Standard Edition.

Global coverage and an expansion of the program to high school students could enable the program to reach as many as 1 billion students worldwide throughout the next year. The program will be expanded to additional countries as well, including Australia and Japan.

“Microsoft DreamSpark provides professional-level tools that we hope will inspire students to explore the power of software and encourage them to forge the next wave of software-driven breakthroughs," Gates said in a statement released by the company.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 19, 2008 10:58 AM

February 15, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Microsoft moves on MVC

Microsoft plans early next month to release the next public preview of ASP.Net MVC (Model View Controller) Framework, said Scott Guthrie, a general manager in the Microsoft Developer Division, in his blog this week.

The framework is set to be released at the Mix08 conference, which is being held in Las Vegas March 5-7; it will be downloadable off the Web so users do not need to attend the conference to get it.

The technology will add to ASP.Net support for developing Web applications using an MVC architecture. MVC features models, which are components of an application maintaining state; views, which are components for displaying an application user interface, and controllers, for handling end user interaction, manipulating the model and choosing a view to render to display UI.

A prior preview of the framework was offered as part of ASP.Net 3.5 Extensions CTP Release in December. Improvements in the March release include the ability to deploy the framework in the \bin directory and work in partial trust; enhanced routing and infrastructure and improved Visual Studio 2008 tools support. Also featured are HTML helpers and refactoring and design improvements.

Source code for ASP.Net MVC Framework will be downloadable as a buildable Visual Studio project solution, for viewing and debugging source code. A license will be included permitting users to patch the framework source code although they will not be able to redistributed their patched versions.

"But [the license] will enable developers who want to get started building ASP.NET MVC applications immediately to make progress - and not have to worry about getting blocked by an interim bug that they can't work around," Guthrie said.

The framework has been slated to ship as part of ASP.Net by the first half of this year.

Microsoft in March plans to discuss enhancements to ASP.Net AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) libraries, Guthrie said.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 15, 2008 02:24 PM

February 15, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Microsoft readies Unity for software development

Microsoft's patterns and practices group has released a February Community Technology Preview of Unity, a lightweight extensible dependency injection container for software development.

Dependency injection is a technique for building loosely coupled applications.

Offered on CodePlex, Microsoft's open source project site, Unity Application Block, or Unity for short, addresses the issues faced by developers using component-based software engineering, according to a CodePlex Web page on the project.

Modern business applications feature custom business objects and components that perform specific or generic tasks in addition to components that address cross-cutting concerns such as logging, authentication, caching and exception handling. The key to building these applications, according to Microsoft, is to achieve a decoupled or very loosely coupled design. These applications are more flexible and easier to test.

Dependency injection can handle dependencies between objects, such as an object that processes customer information, which may depend on other objects that access that data store, validate the information and check that the user is authorized to perform updates.

Unity is geared to Visual Studio 2005 but can work with applications built in Visual Studio 2008 if users set a reference to the binary assemblies. The final release of Unity is planned for March 15.

The CTP is accessible here.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 15, 2008 10:22 AM

February 13, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Early Android SDK updated

The "early-look" release of the Android SDK, for building mobile applications for the Google-backed Android platform, has been updated this week.

Release m5-rc14 is available now, featuring a new user interface that replaces the previous placeholder interface, according to a blog by Jason Chen, Android developer advocate. Also, developers now can build layout animations for their applications using capabilities introduced in the android.view.animation package.

A new version of the ADT (Android Development Tools) plug-in is available, featuring improvements to the Android developer experience. ADT enables developers to use the Eclipse IDE when building applications.

A "geo-coding" capability enables developers to forward and reverse geo-code, meaning they can translate an address into a coordinate and vice-versa as well as search for businesses.

Media codecs have been added for following formats: OGG Vorbis, MIDI, XMF, iMelody, RTTL/RTX and OTA.

A general release of the SDK is planned as an open source offering once the first Android-based consumer devices ship in the second half of this year, a Google representative said.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 13, 2008 12:41 PM

February 12, 2008 | Comments: (0)

XML 10th anniversary celebration set

The World Wide Web Consortium this year plans to mark the 10-year anniversary of XML 1.0 as a formal W3C Recommendation.

The now-ubiquitous markup language has found its way into multiple standards, including XSLT, for transforming XML content; XQuery, for querying XML databases and XML Signature and Encryption.

"There is essentially no computer in the world, desktop, hand-held or back room, that doesn't process XML sometimes," said Tim Bray, an executive at Sun Microystems and a co-editor of the XML standard, in a statement released by W3C. "This is a good thing, because it shows that information can be packaged and transmitted and used in a way that's independent of the kinds of computer and software that are involved. XML won't be the last neutral information-wrapping system; but as the first, it's done very well."

As part of the W3C XML10 Celebration, W3C plans to offer video interviews of people in the XML community and distribute XML10-related items at events this year. W3C also is seeking feedback on XML experiences via its XML10 Greeting Card initiative.

The W3C XML Core Working Group on February 5 published a Fifth Edition of XML 1.0, as a Proposed Edited Recommendation, inviting community examination of the latest round of changes.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 12, 2008 12:05 PM

February 12, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Sun buys open source virtualization company

Sun Microsystems said Tuesday it plans to acquire innotek, which provides the VirtualBox open source virtualization software package.

VirtualBox will extend the Sun xVM virtualization platform onto the desktop, enabling developers to more efficiently build and run applications on multiple platforms, Sun said. With more than 4 million downloads, VirtualBox enables desktop or laptop platform PCs running the Windows, Linux, Mac or Solaris OSes to run multiple operating systems side-by-side. Users can switch between them with a click of a mouse.

Developers can more easily build multi-tier or cross-platform applications while power users can take advantage of applications not available on their base operating system of choice, Sun said.

“Where Sun xVM Server is designed to enable dynamic IT at the heart of the data center, VirtualBox is ideal for any laptop or desktop environment and will align perfectly with Sun’s other developer-focused assets such as GlassFish, OpenSolaris, OpenJDK and soon MySQL as well as a wide range of community open source projects, enabling developers to quickly develop, test and deploy the next generation of applications," said Rich Green, executive vice president of Sun Software, in a statement released by the company.

Sun on January 16 announced plans to acquire open source database vendor MySQL for $1 billion. Terms of the agreement to acquire innotek were not disclosed, although Sun did note it is to be a stock purchase agreement. The deal is expected to close by March 31.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 12, 2008 08:48 AM

February 08, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Ruby.Net set to continue

The Ruby.Net compiler project to bring the Ruby language to the .Net environment is set to continue as a extension to Microsoft's IronRuby project, which also involves running Ruby on .Net.

The leader of Ruby.Net, Wayne Kelly, this week announced he would instead be supporting IronRuby. But another Ruby.Net advocate, M. David Peterson, in an email said he believed the Ruby.Net project now should center on extending IronRuby. Peterson said would be interested in taking over as Ruby.Net project lead but that the matter is open for discussion on the Ruby.Net list.

"If there is any one message I believe must be broadcast above all else it's that the Ruby.Net project should continue forward shadowing the work of the IronRuby project as it relates to the language features and syntax, not as an alternative Ruby language implementation for the .Net platform but as a complementary extension to IronRuby."

"In other words," Peterson said, "if as a developer I write code targeted towards IronRuby that same code should run exactly the same via Ruby.NET when compiled into a .Net assembly, whether that be an executable or DLL."

The primary focus of the Ruby.Net project could be on static compilation of Ruby code targeted at IronRuby while a secondary focus could be on experimental language and platform features, Peterson said.

Ensuring one-to-one compatibility with IronRuby also is a priority. Another area to ponder is concurrency via Actors/Agents, in which Actors or Agents, or objects, pass messages from one to another. This could become a core part of the Ruby language, Peterson said.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 8, 2008 08:27 AM

February 06, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Cape Clear ESB vendor acquired

On-demand business services vendor Workday has acquired enterprise service bus vendor Cape Clear Software, Workday said on Wednesday.

The Cape Clear ESB already is a component of every Workday deployment; it will no longer be offered as a standalone product and will be available only as part of the Workday Integration On Demand package. The acquisition will allow Workday to accelerate customer support packages, Workday said. Workday was started by former PeopleSoft CEO David Duffield.

Existing Cape Clear customers will continue to be supported by Workday.

Cape Clear is to become Workday's integration team based in Dublin, Ireland. Annrai O'Toole, CEO of Cape Clear, will become vice president of integration at Workday.

"This could be the day that the middleware industry finally broke the mold on how to deliver integration technology — this could also be the day that SOA finally stood up and announced its intention to be a real driver of business value, and not just a driver of technology innovation," O'Toole said in a blog entry.

"For those of you who may be a little surprised at a hosted applications company buying an SOA and ESB company, you shouldn’t be. This is really the logical outcome of many of the things I’ve written about on these pages over the last several years," said O'Toole.

O'Toole said Cape Clear and Workday share a vision of how applications should work.

Financial terms of the acquisition were not released; the purchase is expected to be completed in 30 days.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 6, 2008 05:37 PM

February 06, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Ruby.Net lead backing alternative

The maintainer of the Ruby.Net compiler project for running the Ruby programming language on the .Net platform is now supporting an alternative, IronRuby, according to a blog post.

In a Ruby.Net Compiler Discussion blog this week, Wayne Kelly, who has maintained the project, cited the Microsoft Dynamic Language Runtime, which is leveraged by IronRuby and supports dynamic languages on .Net.

"The release of IronRuby last year obviously caused us to question this unstated goal [of a production-quality release of Ruby.Net]. At the time we didn't know if the IronRuby project and the DLR would succeed, so we decided to continue with Ruby.Net at that stage."

"I've come to the conclusion that the DLR is clearly here to stay - it's becoming an even more important part of the Microsoft platform. I also believe that to obtain production-quality performance, Ruby.Net would need to reinvent (or adopt) something equivalent to the DLR. If we were starting the project today, there is no way we wouldn't use the DLR," Kelly said.

"Whilst Ruby.Net initially had a good head start on the IronRuby project, by incorporating the Ruby.Net parser and scanner and by leveraging the DLR, I now believe that IronRuby is more likely to succeed as a production-quality implementation of Ruby on the .Net platform. I believe that ultimately, there is no need for two different implementations of Ruby on .Net."

If Ruby.Net is not going to be that implementation, then Ruby.Net participants should not waste further developer effort, he said.

"Microsoft did not in any way suggest or encourage us to kill the project and we thank them again their support of the project," Kelly said.

In an emailed response to questions, Kelly on Thursday left open the possibility that the Ruby.Net project could carry on with other persons leading the way.

"Others are talking about picking it up. I haven't received any negative reactions to my announcement or support of IronRuby," Kelly said.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 6, 2008 12:25 PM

February 06, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Microsoft, BT host aspiring developers

Twenty-four aspiring software developers from around the world are in Silicon Valley this month with the mission of developing solutions to real-world problems and creating a business venture.

Sponsored by BT and Microsoft, six teams of developers are showing their work at the third annual Imagine Cup Innovation Accelerator program. Demonstrations of the six projects were held at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif. on Tuesday evening, as part of the 2007 Imagine Cup Worldwide Finals.

Teams include:

• From Ireland, the project Signal team, offering a sign language learning environment that teaches sign language and allows users to chat online using sign language.
• From Jamaica, Team Icad, with project Cadi, an e-learning solution that features a centralized learning environment that connects teachers, students and resources.
• From Korea, the En#605 team, with project Finger Code, featuring an educational system for people who are both deaf and blind. Users wear gloves that are wired to a computer and allow communication. The Braille system is incorporated into the application.
• From Mexico, Team Wisdom Spice, with project Wisdom Spice, offering software for students to share experiences solving homework problems or working on a project. Students can use video as part of their projects and then show their work in the Wisdom Spice environment.
• From Poland, Team Input, with project OneSpace, with software to enable users to work on a project at the same time by providing audio, video and data connections.
• From Thailand, the 3KC team with Project LiveBook, with software that converts a text-based book into an illustrated digital book.

A member of the Irish team cited his project's goal. "Basically, we're trying to teach sign language to friends, family and colleagues of people who are deaf," said team member Eric McLean, an interface developer.

During the workshop, Microsoft, BT and others will provide the teams with guidance to help develop their software applications into commercially viable projects. The teams also can interact with venture capitalists.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 6, 2008 07:04 AM

February 05, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Adobe names new CTO

Adobe Systems announced Tuesday the promotion of Kevin Lynch to chief technology officer.

Lynch, who has served as Adobe senior vice president and chief software architect, will oversee Adobe's experience design and core technology across business units, the company said. He will continue to "drive" the Adobe technology platform for designers and developers; this platform includes the Adobe Flash Player, Adobe Flex and Adobe AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime), which enables Web applications to run off the network on desktop systems.

Adobe last had a CTO around early-2001 when John Warnock served in the post. The new CTO position reflects the progression of Adobe's technology evolution, the company said.

Lynch joined Adobe in 2005 when the company acquired Macromedia. At Macromedia, Lynch served as chief software architect and president of products. He led the initial development of the Macromedia Dreamweaver Web development product line and the transformation of the Flash Player from an animation focus to being a rich Internet application and dynamic media runtime.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 5, 2008 04:10 PM

February 04, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Tribute planned for missing Microsoft engineer

A tribute to Microsoft engineer Jim Gray, missing at sea for more than a year, is being planned for May 31 at the University, of California, Berkeley.

Three organizations - the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), IEEE Computer Society and UC Berkeley - plan to participate with family and colleagues of Gray. He disappeared without a trace while on a sailing trip to the Farallon Islands, near San Francisco, on January 28, 2007.

Gray is known for work as a programmer, database expert and Microsoft engineer. He helped make possible technologies such as the cash machine, e-commerce, online ticketing and deep databases, according to a press statement on the event. In 1998, Gray received the ACM A.M. Turing Award, considered the most prestigious honor in computer science.

The event is open to the general public, free of charge. Speakers will discuss Gray's accomplishments; technical sessions are planned as well, focusing on the state of computer science. Among the speakers scheduled include Michael Stonebraker, who is a pioneer in object-relational database technology, and Microsoft Architect Pat Helland.

While serving on a panel at a software development conference in 2004, Gray questioned how the software industry could be sustained when software was being given away as part of the open source movement.

Also during his stint at Microsoft, Gray built a Web site called Terra Server, which featured high-resolution satellite imagery before the advent of Google Earth.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 4, 2008 02:14 PM

February 04, 2008 | Comments: (0)

SOA Consortium adds Sun

The SOA Consortium has added Sun Microsystems as a high-level Sponsor member, the consortium said on Monday.

Formed a year ago, the consortium advocates SOA adoption by Global 100 companies, government agencies and mid-market businesses. The organization is scheduled to disband in 2010.

“Sun is pleased to be an advocate for the SOA Consortium and the important work it does in moving the industry toward a distributed service-oriented enterprise environment based on open standards,” said Bill Vass, president and COO of Sun Microsystems Federal, in a statement released by the consortium.

Influencing standards organizations is a goal of the group as well as the exchange of "real-world" insights, redirection of the industry conversation to "business-driven SOA" and influencing technology vendors and service providers.

Other Sponsor-level members include Cisco, IBM, SAP and Sparx Systems. Participant members include organizations such as Software AG, Avis Budget Car Rental and Wells Fargo Bank.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 4, 2008 11:18 AM

February 04, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Microsoft set to ship Windows Server 2008

Microsoft released to manufacturing its Windows Server 2008 platform Monday, meaning the software should be available for purchase on March 1.

Customers with Microsoft's Active Software Assurance coverage or an enterprise agreement can get it a little earlier, with downloads available by the end of February, according to a Microsoft representative.

Featured in the operating system are automation of daily tasks, improved security and virtualization to improve hardware utilization and server availability, the company said.

Developed in tandem with the Windows Vista code base, Windows Server offers capabilities such as Network Access Protection and Group Policy. System-wide performance improvements include an integrated system architecture including network file-sharing, managed quality of service and reduced power consumption, Microsoft said.

Windows Server 2008 and Vista feature common tools to boost efficiencies, according to Microsoft. Also, a FastCGI module in Windows Server 2008 enables hosting of PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) systems. PHP and ASP.net applications can be hosted side by side.

The company is offering a Go Live license enabling users to deploy beta releases of Internet Information Services 7.0 into live production.

Posted by Paul Krill on February 4, 2008 09:37 AM

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