Outsourcing / Government
Giga, 12/27/02: USA Patriot Act Compliance: When to Consider Outsourcing
Penny Gillespie
In general, outsourcing carries four key benefits: expense reduction, access to intellectual capital, flexibility and risk mitigation. These benefits can indeed be obtained by outsourcing various compliance dimensions of the USA Patriot Act as long as clients are comfortable with customer data leaving their physical domain. Clients are most likely to find a combination of software and services to be optimum, depending on their compliance approaches and strengths. At a minimum, clients will not want to be responsible for maintaining lists or databases associated with customer identification or suspicious activity reporting because these are cumbersome, challenging to maintain and best handled by those with experience and sources.
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Desktop Management
Giga, 12/26/02: Key Success Factors in Desktop Software Distribution and Management
David Friedlander
Successful desktop software distribution and management will depend heavily on the extent to which processes have been defined and are applied across the organization, and whether IT asset information is centralized. If no standards are implemented at the desktop, users are permitted to install their own software at will, there is no central source for asset information, and any efforts to automate software distribution are likely to fail. It isn’t necessary to lock down the desktop to achieve cost savings, but standardization and clear policies are a critical component of reducing desktop application support costs.
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Giga, 12/26/02: External Users' Laptops on Your Network: A Bad Idea
David Friedlander
Consultants and vendors often want to connect their own laptops to our network when they come on-site. What precautions should we take, and how should we provide access to resources that they do need?
External users such as consultants or vendors often want to connect their laptops to the customer’s network. However, this puts the company at significant risk of virus exposure, directed attacks or other security risks. Despite these risks, most companies allow external users to connect equipment to their network that hasn’t been scanned for viruses or other possible threats. Companies also risk being held liable for illegal or unauthorized activity that is initiated from their internal network.
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IT Outsourcing
Giga, 12/26/02: Price Reductions From IT Services Companies Should Put Customers on Guard
Richard Peynot
Giga has noticed a significant reduction in daily rates for IT service companies in France. Although notable in France, this may also be a global IT services trend. In these tough times, some IT houses prefer retaining resources and reducing prices — to the point of having no margin — for several reasons: firing staff affects the company’s reputation, social support plans (indemnities or employer-funded unemployment benefits) are costly, and when the economy recovers, IT shops will need ready resources. Nevertheless, most IT services companies have let higher-wage senior project leaders go, and consulting firms have reduced staff. In fact, some of their best assets are now independent contractors or are working in very specialized organizations (such as transition management companies).
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IT Management
Gartner, 12/24/02: CIO 'Must Do' Resolutions for 2003
In 2003, CIOs and other IS leaders must prepare for business renewal and growth while continuing to cut costs and inefficiencies.
Nearly all enterprises expect continuing restraint and difficult trading conditions throughout most of 2003. Vendors and suppliers in the IT industry face continuing turbulence and consolidation. At the same time, IS organizations are experiencing business skepticism about IT's ability to deliver strategic value. 2003 will be a year of uncertainty. CIOs need to manage short-term issues vigorously, to prepare skills and processes for recovery, and to invest for the future. CIOs and others in IS and IT leadership positions, and CEOs and other business leaders who direct and control IS and IT leaders can all obtain valuable lessons from this document.
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Support: Metrics
Giga, 12/30/02: Best Practice Metrics for Customer Support: SLA Adherence
What metrics should be tracked in regard to meeting or missing service-level agreements with customers at the support desk?
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Offshore Outsourcing
Giga, 12/26/02: Syntel: New Business Model Means Better Value for Clients and Increased Profits
Stephanie Moore
What is happening with Syntel? Its stock is soaring and its profitability is increasing. What is its history and is this company a strong bet for 2003?
Syntel is a US-based IT services vendor that offers on-site and offshore IT services. Although it was founded and incorporated in the US in 1980, Syntel is what Giga would call a hybrid Indian vendor (and what most people call an Indian vendor) because it relies on talent from India to support clients.
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Microsoft
The Wall Street Journal, 12/31/02: Risking a Flop, Microsoft Places Bets on 'Longhorn'
By REBECCA BUCKMAN
Will Longhorn take the blue ribbon -- or get slaughtered?
Microsoft Corp. is banking on the former. Others aren't so sanguine.
Longhorn is the code name for the next, top-secret version of Microsoft's cash-cow Windows software, a product Microsoft hopes will ring up new sales and stave off competitors such as the rival Linux operating system.
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eWeek, 12/31/02: Microsoft MOM Upgrade To Roll in January
By Mary Jo Foley
Microsoft's Management Business Group is set to start the new year off with a bang with a refresh for the Microsoft Operations Manager platform.
Microsoft's Management Business Group is set to start the new year off with a bang.
In early January, the group is slated to roll out a refresh for the Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) platform. Included in the refresh will be Service Pack 1 (SP1) updates and fixes, management pack updates, a new software development kit and a new resource kit.
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Linux
ZDNet, 12/31/02: The Year Ahead: Linux continues to push for the desktop
Matthew Broersma
The open-source operating system is making slow progress onto the desktop, but recent developments could mean it is there to stay
The good news for Linux as an operating system for the desktop -- as opposed to the server -- is that it is set to become No. 2 after Windows in the next year or so. The bad news is that its growth does not look to be as explosive as some advocates might have hoped.
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