eWeek articles from July 2004

eWeek archives from July 2004

Apple Seeks Rendezvous with Windows, Linux Developers.(Apple Computer Inc.)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... Apple this week released updated versions of developer tools designed to boost acceptance of its Rendezvous zero-configuration networking software in the Windows and Linux developer communities. At the annual Worldwide Developers Conference...

Microsoft to Pay Up to $241M to Settle Minn. Overchage Case.
July 1, 2004... MINNEAPOLIS (AP)--Microsoft Corp. will pay up to $241.4 million to settle a class-action lawsuit brought by Minnesota computer users who claimed the software company overcharged them. The settlement outlined in court for the first time on...

RealNetworks Brings Player to Linux Distros.
July 1, 2004... The Linux desktop is about to get a lot more musical thanks to deals RealNetworks has made with Red Hat and Novell, which will lead to the Linux bundling of RealNetworks' Helix Player with their Linux distributions. But open-source...

The DOJ's High-Function Ability to Just Make Stuff Up.(Department of Justice)
July 1, 2004... When Judge Vaughn Walker said last week that he was still fuzzy on the meaning of terms that have been bandied about quite a bit already in the trial against Oracle's merger with PeopleSoft, both Oracle and many antitrust experts quoted in the...

New WLAN Security Has Its Price.(wireless local area networks)
July 1, 2004... Last week the IEEE gave its official stamp of approval to 802.11i, the long-awaited security specification that replaces Wired Equivalent Privacy, the original--and basically insecure--802.11 security scheme. In its place, we're getting the...

HIPAA Reprieve: Five More Days for Compliance.(Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... Medicare providers now have a few more days to file electronic claims that do not contain all the information required by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, or CMS, had...

Vonage Wins Another Round--for Now.(Vonage Holdings Inc.)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... Vonage Holdings Corp., the much-publicized consumer VOIP service provider, has won another, temporary round in its fight to avoid telecom regulation by the states. On Wednesday, the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York,...

Protecting Kids Online: Why Legislation Fails.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... The Supreme Court's ruling this week that rejected the Child Online Protection Act (COPA) is the right decision. Of course, we should protect our children from filth on the Internet, but COPA raises a lot of First Amendment issues and could...

Oracle Sought Buyout Advice from Former CA Chief Kumar.(Computer Associates International Inc)
July 1, 2004... SAN FRANCISCO--Oracle Corp. Co-President Charles Phillips met over lunch with Sanjay Kumar, former chairman of Computer Associates International Inc., to get his advice on how to win U.S. Department of Justice clearance for its $7.7 billion...

StorageTek Pitches Simpler Tape Library.(Storage Technology Corp.)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... Storage Technology Corp. this week unveiled a mid-range, rack-mounted system that features much more simplified robotics than the company's high-end tape modules. The base unit of StorageTek's SL500 can accommodate up to 50 slots and the...

Microsoft Cuts Prices as Paris Eyes Linux.
July 1, 2004... PARIS--In another sign that competition is heating up in the software industry, Microsoft Corp. has slashed prices by more than half for Paris City Hall as the French capital considers switching to low-cost open-source programs. The...

SSA Global Buys Marcam to Extend ERP Reach.(SSA Global Technologies Inc.)(enterprise resource planning)
July 1, 2004... Continuing the trend of consolidation in the software market, SSA Global Technologies on Thursday announced its acquisition of Marcam, the ERP (enterprise resource planning) arm of Invensys, for an undisclosed sum. Chicago-based SSA Global...

Oracle Says PeopleSoft Buyout Is Inevitable.
July 1, 2004... SAN FRANCISCO-Oracle rested its case Thursday by presenting testimony supporting its argument that competition in the enterprise application software market is so intense that sooner or later PeopleSoft will have no choice but to accept a...

Oracle Trial: IBM Documents Show Impact of Bid.(International Business Machines Corp.)
July 1, 2004... SAN FRANCISCO (AP)--Rattled by Oracle Corp.'s hostile takeover bid for PeopleSoft Inc., IBM Corp. considered making defensive investments in other software makers and lobbying the government to discourage other mergers, according to company...

Wiretap Ruling Could Signal End of E-Mail Privacy.
July 1, 2004... A federal appeals court ruling this week has put a spotlight on the increasingly public nature of e-mail messages and has unraveled expectations that e-mail would gain the same privacy protections as traditional communications. The 1st...

Vendors Debate Perks of an Open Java.
July 1, 2004... SAN FRANCISCO--What was billed as a possible rumble turned out to be little more than a discussion among rivals, as industry leaders and observers debated the merits of open-sourcing Java at the JavaOne Conference here Thursday. Included...

Verizon Says It Overstated Customers.(Verizon Communications Inc.)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... NEW YORK (AP)--Verizon Communications Corp. said Thursday it had overstated the number of its long-distance subscribers by 9 percent in its latest quarterly filing. The company said in a new filing with the Securities and Exchange...

Court Refuses to End TI-Qualcomm CDMA Deal.(Texas Instruments Inc.)(CDMA technology)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... DALLAS (AP)--A Delaware court has ruled that Texas Instruments Inc. violated an agreement with cell-phone chipmaker Qualcomm Inc. but that Qualcomm is not entitled to break off the deal, the companies said Thursday. The companies sued each...

Beyond the Call: Six Multi-Function Cell Phones.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... Convergence is upon us, and it's nowhere more evident than in mobile phones. The latest models go above and beyond the duty of calls. Six are reviewed here. Four work on GSM/GPRS networks, making them particularly useful to globe-trotters:...

MSI Offers Refund, Upgrade for 'Grantsdale' Boards.(Micro-Star International Company Ltd.)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2004... Motherboard maker Micro-Star International Co. (MSI) is offering a free upgrade to consumers worried that they may have been stuck with one of the bad Intel "Grantsdale" boards. MSI said it will test and screen all upcoming boards using the...

RBC's Account Imbalance.
July 1, 2004... A foul-up at RBC Financial Group, Canada's largest bank, stifled payroll deposits and left as many as 10 million customers uncertain of their bank account balances last month. That has prompted an internal review of the bank's technology and...

Microsoft Releases Security-Related 'Configuration Change'.(Brief Article)
July 2, 2004... Microsoft Corp. on Friday released what the company termed a "configuration change" to several versions of Windows in response to the recent attacks designated Download.Ject against its Internet Explorer browser. The change disables a...

Apple: New iMac in Works.
July 2, 2004... Apple Computer Inc. has confirmed that the iMac is to be replaced in September with an entirely new model. With few of the iMac models still on the shelves of distributors and dealers, the company faces two months with no mainstream consumer...

Single Sign-On Gains Liberty Support.(Brief Article)
July 2, 2004... Liberty Alliance, a group dedicated to forging an open identity standard, this week certified nine single sign-on products. The certification, which covers Liberty Alliance Identity Federation Framework (ID-FF) version 1.1 and 1.2 for single...

Network Associates Changes Its Name to McAfee.(Brief Article)
July 2, 2004... Network Associates Inc. on Wednesday announced that it has changed its name to McAfee Inc. The company said it will focus on intrusion prevention solutions that allow customers to block both known and unknown attacks. McAfee will be traded...

Rivals Create IE Alternative for Browser Plug-Ins.(Internet Explorer)
July 2, 2004... A group of Web browser makers has banded together to make software plug-ins as functional in their own browsers as in Microsoft's dominant Internet Explorer browser. The Mozilla Foundation, Opera Software ASA and Apple Computer Inc....

IE Users, Proceed with Caution--If at All.(Internet Explorer)
July 2, 2004... Is your enterprise safe running Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser? In many cases, no, and it's time that organizations started taking security seriously enough to consider a switch. IE, along with the rest of Windows, is designed with...

Crackers Unleash Spyware Tactics on IE Holes.(Internet Explorer)
July 2, 2004... The rash of recent attacks exploiting vulnerabilities in Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer browser is evidence that crackers are adopting tactics favored by spyware purveyors and could just be the beginning of a wave of highly targeted,...

Welcome to the Finance Industry Center.(eWEEK.com's Finance Center)
July 2, 2004... Welcome to the online destination for decision-makers interested in keeping up-to-date on financial technology. Our goal is to create a virtual home both for producers of financial technology and services as well as for buyers. It's been a...

Company Plugs RSS as Alternate to E-Mail Marketing.(Really Simple Syndication)(MessageCast Inc.)
July 2, 2004... MessageCast Inc. is developing technologies designed to help enterprises conduct legitimate marketing campaigns that differentiate themselves from spam in the eyes of both customers and spam filters. The company's LiveMessage message...

Slideshow: Apple's Mac OS X 10.4, aka Tiger.(Brief Article)
July 2, 2004... Mac programmers attending Apple Computer Inc.'s recent Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco found a special treat tucked into their knapsacks: A preview copy of Mac OS X 10.4, aka "Tiger." The forthcoming client and server versions...

Maxtor Cuts 400 Jobs To Cut Costs.(Brief Article)
July 2, 2004... Disk-drive maker Maxtor Corp. said Thursday evening that the company would trim 400 to 500 positions worldwide in a bid to cut costs, part of a lowered earnings forecast. Maxtor said second-quarter price declines would drop the average...

Microsoft Beefing Up Customer Service.
July 4, 2004... SEATTLE (AP)--As Microsoft Corp. enters more competitive markets and faces increased grumbling over its litany of security flaws, the company is trying what--for it--is an unusual tack: paying more attention its customers. Yes, it sounds...

More Online Retailers Accepting Checks.
July 4, 2004... NEW YORK (AP)--Online retailers are trying to bring in new customers by allowing them to pay for goods with some old-fashioned methods--checks and invoicing. Credit cards are the most popular form of payment online. But for retailers...

Activist Warns Upcoming E-Voting to Be a 'Train Wreck'.
July 4, 2004... SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP)--Ambushing registrars and tracking down executives at their homes and offices, a literary publicist has uncovered conflicts of interests and security flaws inside the companies that make electronic ballot machines. ...

Official Rules For The Ziff Davis Media eWEEK Network Security Survey Sweepstakes.
July 4, 2004... Official Rules For The Ziff Davis Media eWEEK Network Security Survey Sweepstakes ELIGIBILITY: Employees, officers, and directors of Ziff Davis Media, Inc., SurveyMonkey.com LLC, their subsidiaries and affiliated companies (collectively...

Scriptless IE Not Worth It.(U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team's advisory on recent Internet Explorer attack)
July 5, 2004... The U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team gained a lot of attention with its advisory on the most recent Internet Explorer attack. In the "solutions" section, it suggested--as the last of six things you might do--that you could use a...

Nielsen: It's Time for a Redesign.(Dr. Jakob Nielsen views about intranet technology)
July 5, 2004... Danish-born Dr. Jakob Nielsen, 46, who completed his doctorate in computer-human interaction at the Technical University of Denmark in 1988, made a name for himself in Silicon Valley during the late 1990s as a champion of minimalism and...

Know Your Storage Technologies.(definitions)(Brief Article)(Glossary)
July 5, 2004... Use this handy cheat-sheet to help keep straight the evolving list of storage terminology. *Direct-attached storage (DAS) Storage connected directly to a server. *Fibre Channel An expensive short-distance networking technology used...

Two Men Accused of $11M Internet Scam.
July 6, 2004... PORTLAND, Ore.--The FBI is investigating an alleged Internet scam that has raised $11 million from 1,600 investors nationwide during the past 17 months. The scam involve nonexistent products and a bogus Internet business named in documents...

Yoxos to Help Unlock Eclipse's Potential.(Innoopract introduces Yoxos software)
July 6, 2004... Innoopract, a German provider of tools and services around the Eclipse open-source development framework, has announced Yoxos, an open-source Eclipse distribution featuring Eclipse 3.0. The Karlsruhe, Germany, company, dubbed Innoopract...

Court Sets Date for Microsoft Meeting.(Brief Article)
July 6, 2004... BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP)--The judge presiding over Microsoft Corp.'s appeal of the European Union's antitrust decision has scheduled a first meeting for July 27, the court announced Tuesday. Bo Vesterdorf, presiding judge at the Court of...

Bang the DRM.(Digital Rights Management)(Brief Article)
July 6, 2004... Digital Rights Management (DRM) marketplace was worth $36 million in 2003, according to a Jupiter Research survey of 800 people. Jupiter expects the DRM market to increase to $274 million by 2008. "I think there's a stigma around DRM," said...

Software Piracy Worldwide.(Brief Article)
July 6, 2004... Pirated software exists in homes, schools, businesses and government offices, according to the Business Software Alliance. Software piracy costs software makers some US$13 billion annually. The Internet is a major channel for pirated...

New IBM Templates Tutor More SMBs.(Small and Medium Business)
July 6, 2004... Building on its $500 million investment in Small and Medium Business Advantage (SMBA), which provides support for its SMB software partners, IBM on Tuesday announced a handful of new enablement templates and some midyear metrics that prove the...

McAfee Sends Out More Pink Slips.
July 6, 2004... Security software vendor McAfee Inc. has laid off about 100 employees in a number of groups throughout the company as part of its ongoing effort to cut costs and improve the company's operating margins. Officials at McAfee, based in Santa...

IBM to Attune Quality Tools on Open-Source Hyades.(Brief Article)
July 6, 2004... IBM's Rational division on Tuesday announced plans to standardize its automated software quality tools on an open-source platform, and the company also launched its new Continuously Ensure Quality (CEQ) initiative. IBM Corp.'s Rational...

Don't Mess With Wal-Mart's RFID Pilot.(radio frequency identification)
July 6, 2004... At a Wal-Mart Supercenter in Denton, Texas, a hallway leading to the retail floor has two pairs of gray and black, 6-foot-high silhouettes with yellow eye-like lights within 10 feet of each other. The mission: Detect and record goods that...

Enterprises Slow to Dump IE.(Internet Explorer)
July 6, 2004... The calls to dump Internet Explorer may be getting louder, but they are falling largely on deaf ears among enterprise users. IT managers and users say that while the rash of security flaws associated with IE has drawn new attention to its...

U.N. Aims to Bring Spam 'Epidemic' to End.
July 6, 2004... GENEVA--The United Nations is aiming to bring a "modern day epidemic" of junk e-mail under control within two years by standardizing legislation to make it easier to prosecute offenders, a leading expert said Tuesday. "[We have] an...

Loss of Focus at Microsoft Worries Top Exec.
July 6, 2004... Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer on Tuesday sent his annual e-mail update to all full-time staff telling them what the company's business priorities are and how the company is faring in meeting its areas of strategic focus. In the lengthy...

Dell Reseller Offers Lindows-Loaded PCs.
July 6, 2004... A Dell VAR on Tuesday began offering OptiPlex desktops for sale in Italy with a Linux operating system from Lindows. Although the announcement was positioned as an official Dell release, a spokesman from Dell Inc.'s headquarters in Round...

Sony Storage Gizmo Uses 1-Inch Hard Drive.
July 6, 2004... Consumers interested in portable storage gained a new option Tuesday, when Sony Electronics unveiled a 2-Gbyte solution that takes up the space of a business card. The $249.99 Micro Vault Pro will be available later this month, Sony said....

Security Watch Letter: Lovgate is a Quiet Yet Dangerous Lover.(trojans)(Brief Article)
July 6, 2004... The past few weeks we have seen a shift in the threat landscape from bothersome worms with performance-killing propagation, to a rash of financially motivated Trojans and phishing attempts. According to BitDefender's real-time threat report ,...

30-inch Apple Cinema HD.(high definition)(Brief Article)
July 6, 2004... Part of a new display lineup that also includes 20- and 23-inch models, Apple's new 30-inch LCD offers an unprecedented 2560-by-1600 pixel resolution for a total of over four million pixels. It requires a Power Mac G5 professional desktop...

Microsoft's Three Biggest Threats.
July 7, 2004... Just as there are theories about how the Earth will eventually meet its end, so there are theories about what will happen to Microsoft someday. Not that the death of a software company--even the software company--is very significant compared...

Bayfront Health System Goes Wireless with MercuryMD.
July 7, 2004... MercuryMD Inc., a software company that supports mobile devices for hospitals, has added a 48th health system, Bayfront Health System, to its list of clients. The company's Mdata Enterprise System allows physicians to use handheld devices...

Making Genomics Work for Pharma.(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... With the explosion of data-intensive research tools, pharmaceutical companies are still struggling to understand how to most effectively make use of them. This package has the first few of a series of interviews with pharmaceutical executives...

PeopleSoft Blames Oracle for Poor Results.(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... PeopleSoft Inc. announced Wednesday preliminary results for its second quarter ended June 30--poorer-than-expected earnings that company officials blame on bad press stemming from Oracle Corp.'s $7.7 billion bid. PeopleSoft has been...

Caller ID Hackable in VOIP Systems.(voice over internet protocol)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... The softswitches that route VOIP calls get caller ID info off the PSTN (public switched telephone network), but they don't play by the PSTN's FCC-mandated rules. Those rules and switching protocols make regulated telcos validate that caller ID...

nLayers Optimization Aims to Cut Risk, Costs.(Insight application optimization appliance)
July 7, 2004... An innovative application optimization startup launched itself and its first product this week with a mission to bring both cost and risk reduction to IT. Rather than measuring response time for service-level management, nLayers with its...

Hong Kong Officials Bust Software Pirates.(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... HONG KONG (AP)--Customs officials busted an alleged software piracy syndicate Wednesday and said they will try to freeze the counterfeiters' assets. The Customs and Excise Department said it had broken up one of the largest fake disc...

IE Exploit Attacks Another Piece of ActiveX.(Internet Explorer)
July 7, 2004... Using Internet Explorer hasn't gotten any safer in the past few days as a Dutch security hacker, Jelmer Kuperus, pointed out yet another unblocked security problem in the popular Web browser. The latest exploit, an attack on a Windows...

Microsoft Readies New Hosted Services for SMBs.(small and medium sized businesses)
July 7, 2004... Microsoft Corp. soon will launch soon a number of IT services developed together by the MSN, Windows and Office teams that are aimed at small businesses and consumers. Or so foreshadowed the company exec in his yearly virtual address to rally...

Legislators Scramble to Prevent VOIP Regulation.(voice over internet protocol)
July 7, 2004... WASHINGTON--Lawmakers admit that they were caught by surprise by Voice-over-IP service and its capacity to radically disrupt the country's legacy telephone system. Still, the legislators are urging preemptory steps to ensure that state...

Yahoo: Ads, Premium Services Helped Double Earnings.
July 7, 2004... Yahoo doubled its earnings in the second quarter, continuing a string of record quarters but failing to wow Wall Street on Wednesday. Yahoo Inc.'s net income for the quarter ended June 30 rose to $113 million, or 8 cents per share, compared...

Bad Code at Canada's Largest Bank.
July 7, 2004... A foul-up at RBC Financial Group, Canada's largest bank, stifled payroll deposits and left as many as 10 million customers uncertain of their bank account balances in June, 2004. That has prompted an internal review of the bank's technology and...

Gateway Shoots Back at HP in Patent Feud.(Hewlett-Packard)
July 7, 2004... Gateway this week fired the latest salvo in its ongoing patent dispute with Hewlett-Packard, asking the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) to prohibit HP from importing certain computers and monitors that Gateway claims infringe on three...

IE Flaws Boost Browser Switching.(Internet Explorer)
July 7, 2004... Alternative browser makers say they are seeing a huge boost in downloads spurred by the most recent Internet Explorer (IE) security concerns, but industry observers caution that switching browsers isn't necessarily a panacea. While the...

Wi-Fi Becomes a Commodity.(market value)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... It's official--Wi-Fi has reached commodity status. On Tuesday, Conexant Systems Inc. preannounced lower earnings for the current quarter, based on an influx of low-cost Wi-Fi chips produced by Taiwan manufacturers. Conexant executives said...

Tomorrow's Internet: Far More Fences.(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... Robert Frost's famous line "good fences make good neighbors" continues to gain supporters. In a 21st-century spin on Frost's axiom, executives at Silicon Valley software firm Opsware (formerly Loudcloud) are predicting that encryption will not...

Tiny Hard Drives Coming to Cell Phones.(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... As manufacturers cram many more features into cell phones, there's one glaring problem: storage capacity. So hard drive makers are looking to spin up tiny drives for wireless handsets. "Beyond one gigabyte, a hard drive can deliver more...

Apple Airport Express 802.11g Access Point.(Brief Article)
July 7, 2004... If you're parked in a hotel room with a wired broadband connection, a new Wi-Fi solution can come to the wireless rescue. The Apple AirPort Express, a new $129 802.11g mobile Wi-Fi base station, offers what may be the most efficient design yet...

Judge OKs Microsoft Settlement With Calif.(Brief Article)
July 8, 2004... SAN FRANCISCO (AP)--A judge granted final approval Wednesday in a $1.1 billion settlement between Microsoft Corp. and California consumers, who accused the software giant of violating state antitrust and unfair competition laws. California...

Microsoft Buddies Up to ISVs.(Brief Article)
July 8, 2004... "He Ain't Kooky. He's My Buddy." So say the posters adorning Microsoft Corp.'s Redmond, Wash., campus, announcing the launch of company's latest independent-software-vendor partner initiative. Microsoft quietly has taken the wraps off...

Trek Bicycle Corp: Tour de Force.
July 8, 2004... The day was sunny and warm in Waterloo, Wis., a low-key place where a truck stop operator can commute to work on a 16.5-horsepower Craftsman riding mower. It's 1997. Paul Andrews is taking a 20-minute spin on a Trek Y-Foil road bike. The...

Accruent: Contract Worker.(Company Profile)
July 8, 2004... When Accruent CEO Mark Friedman was a commercial real-estate broker in the early 1990s, he regularly saw clients get cheated by landlords because someone in the accounts-payable department hadn't read the lease carefully enough. For...

Groove Updates Product Name, Pricing.
July 8, 2004... Groove Networks next week will release Version 3 of its flagship peer-to-peer collaboration suite, changing the name and increasing the price to allow for new functionality. The product, formerly known as Groove Workspace, becomes Groove...

Regional Bank Ties in Branches with VOIP.(Brief Article)
July 8, 2004... Birmingham, AL-based SouthTrust Bank, with more than 700 branches across the south, is saving more than $5 million annually in telecommunications and other costs after installing an IP PBX from Cisco Systems, and moving from BellSouth to AT&T...

What Makes RIM Run?(Research In Motion)
July 8, 2004... The business profile for the wireless sector, it seems, has caught up with the rest of the industry--or down, as the case may be. An influx of inexpensive 802.11 components from Taiwan is making it harder and harder to earn a decent margin...

IE's Failings Point Way to RSS.(Internet Explorer, RDF Site Summary)
July 8, 2004... Internet Explorer has come under attack in recent weeks not just from malicious coders but also from CERT (the U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team) and now, the most devious opponent of all, RSS. The latest exploits have leveraged IE's...

FCC OKs Plan to Swap Nextel's Bandwith.(Federal Communications Commission)
July 8, 2004... WASHINGTON (AP)--Federal regulators unanimously approved a plan Thursday aimed at eliminating cell phone interference with hundreds of public safety communication systems around the country. The Federal Communications Commission plan calls...

Computer Associates Lowers Sales Outlook.
July 8, 2004... NEW YORK--Computer Associates International Inc. said fiscal first-quarter sales could fall as much as 5 percent below its forecast, but the company reached its profit goals thanks to lower expenses. The Islandia, N.Y., company said...

Analysts: Ballmer's Pep Talk Underrates Linux.
July 8, 2004... Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's annual e-mail update to the Microsoft troops revealed much about the Redmond, Wash., giant's views on Linux and its other operating-system competition. In turn, we asked analysts and Linux leaders what they thought...