Outsourcing
C|net, 9/4/03: Services megadeals not quite so mega
By Ed Frauenheim
Companies like IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Electronic Data Systems love to trumpet computer services contracts worth hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars.
But what's hiding behind the big numbers are the costs involved in following through on those megadeals--costs that can be substantial.
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Utility Computing
C|net, 9/4/03: The futility of utility computing
By Jon Oltsik
Back in the 1980s, the folks at Digital Equipment had a problem. While their VAX systems were selling like hotcakes, the systems still couldn't deliver the kind of scale found on mainframes.
Digital, which had no plans to build big iron, set out to find a way to use existing equipment to increase capacity--a search that led to the development of the VAX cluster and the concept of horizontal scaling.
[more]
Computerworld, 9/3/03: HP acquires Web services management company Talking Blocks
The deal is slated to close by the end of the month
Story by Matt Hamblen
SEPTEMBER 03, 2003 ( COMPUTERWORLD ) - Hewlett-Packard Co. announced today that it has signed a deal to acquire San Francisco-based Talking Blocks Inc. for its Web services management technology. The deal is expected to close by the end of the month, and until that time, no financial details will be released, said Nora Denzel, senior vice president of HP's Software Global Business unit.
[more]
IT Manageent
ZDNet, 9/4/03: Three-year-itch: Upgrade those PCs--or refurbish them as needed?
By Dan Farber
According to industry estimates, more than 40 percent of PCs deployed in business are at least three years old. Top-ranked PC makers Hewlett-Packard and Dell, as well as the other PC and notebook purveyors, would have you believe that PCs and laptops three years or older are a liability and in need of replacement rather than as-needed refurbishment.
[more]
AMR Research, 8/20/03: Blackout Provides a What-If Vision of Sarbanes-Oxley To Come
John Hagerty, Jill Feblowitz
Blackout 2003 should serve as a dark reminder of what Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOA) will mean to all companies. Section 409 of SOA mandates that companies provide timely disclosure of material events that affect financial performance. Current interpretation suggests “timely” means within 48 hours. While no compliance date has been set yet, Section 409 looms.
The Bottom Line: Companies must plan now to beef up analytics, including establishing an IT architecture that recognizes operational events as they occur and assesses their material effect on financial performance in near-real time.
[more]
TechWeb, 9/3/03: “Good Enough" Attitude Will Limit IT Spending Growth Sept. 3, 2003
IDC says its surveys show companies are still holding back on some spending because of the slow recovery from the IT recession.
By Gregg Keizer, TechWeb News
IT spending is rebounding, according to surveys recently completed by research firm IDC, but even as the economic recovery feeds more revenue into business coffers, caution remains the watchword among those with their hands on the purse strings.
[more]
Security
The New York Times, 9/4/03: Heart of Darkness, on a Desktop
By KATIE HAFNER with MICHAEL FALCONE
THE Kiblers of Santa Clara, Calif., thought they were doing everything right. Bill Kibler, a product manager in Silicon Valley and the unofficial system administrator for his family, was nothing short of diligent about running antivirus programs. He had also erected a software firewall to shield his computer from intruders, and he regularly downloaded patches to inoculate his PC when he heard about new viruses.
But over the course of six months this year, the Kiblers noticed their computer displaying some odd behavior. The automatic weekly scans by Norton AntiVirus mysteriously stopped, and when Mr. Kibler tried to run the software manually, the program would shut down before he could execute commands.
[more]
Computerworld, 9/3/03: Those who learn, avoid the worm
Advice by Douglas Schweitzer
SEPTEMBER 03, 2003 ( COMPUTERWORLD ) - The old saw "procrastination is the thief of our tomorrow" was corroborated with the emergence of this year's Blaster worm (and subsequent variants), which made national news. A recent e-mail survey conducted by Brainbench Inc. and the Information Technology Association of America shows that many workers still view IT security as someone else's problem. The success of the recent rash of computer worms reinforces the fact that Microsoft Corp. needs to incorporate improved security into its operating systems. It also makes clear that those who learn can avoid the worm.
[more]
eWeek, 9/1/03: Building a Safety Net
By Eric Lundquist
Who is responsible for the latest rounds of virus and worm attacks? While speculation includes the usual suspects—intelligent but twisted coders—the list has also lengthened to include digital terrorists. While we may never know who is responsible, the bigger question for technology professionals is who is responsible for keeping those viruses and worms away from your company's IT infrastructure.
[more]
Microsoft
Microsoft Watch, 9/3/03: The Blaster School of Hard Knocks
By Mary Jo Foley
Blaster is teaching Microsoft how to better communicate. But there are other lessons Redmond could stand to learn.
Microsoft learned a lot from the Blaster worm that blasted onto the scene last month. But it could have learned more.
Thanks to Blaster, the Redmond software giant has come to realize:
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Optimism
Fortune, 9/2/03: They're Back! Get Ready for Another Wave of Net IPOs
Thankfully this wave will build slowly—investors are smarter, and the hurdles higher.
By David Kirkpatrick
It's back-to-school time, so let's start with a quiz. In what year did a cocky young dot-com CEO whose startup was threatening the old guard tell me that the Internet was the "next wave": (a) Just before Netscape's IPO in 1995; (b) At the filming of Netpliance's Super Bowl commercial in 1999; (c) In the midst of the continuing ugly environment for tech in 2003?
[more]
C|net, 9/4/03: IDC bumps up PC forecast
By John G. Spooner
Market researcher IDC says notebook sales and business purchasing have boosted its 2003 growth forecast for PC shipments by two points.
The company now predicts that this year's PC shipments, which include desktops, notebooks and servers priced at less than $25,000, will grow by 8.4 percent globally and 7.2 percent in the United States. In June, IDC had predicted that global shipments would increase by 6.3 percent in 2003, compared with 2002, while U.S. shipments would increase by 5.3 percent.
[more]
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