eWeek articles from March 2001

eWeek archives from March 2001

IT's role: Protect and serve.(Letter to the Editor)
March 5, 2001... Users cannot, and should not, be held responsible for spreading e-mail viruses, reader says 'Blame game' It appears that a serious case of "blame game" is taking place among companies burned once again by a Visual Basic script virus...

The Microsoft spin on Linux.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... If you want to tell the difference between a principle and a platitude, invert a statement and see if the result sounds absurd. If no one could possibly support the opposing sentiment, the original statement is merely a platitude that adds no...

We will pay for junk forever.(Industry Trend or Event)(Column)
March 5, 2001... Earth, like the larger planets, has a complex system of rings. Being blessed with intelligent life (or at least, complex, tool-using life), Earth didn't need natural processes to create those ornaments: Earth's rings are man-made litter. n...

IBM's Lotus story never ends.(Company Business and Marketing)(Column)
March 5, 2001... It was one of my first assignments for the newspaper formerly known as PC Week. The first days of June 1995, I tagged along with then- Executive Editor of News, John Dodge, to interview then-CEO of Lotus Development Corp., Jim Manzi, who...

DeWitt zips over to Zaplet CIO job.(Company Operations)(Brief Article)
March 5, 2001... Dante dewitt has joined zaplet Inc., of Redwood Shores, Calif., as CIO. DeWitt will spearhead IT strategy and operations at Zaplet, which provides enterprise collaborative applications delivered via e-mail or Internet browser. Prior to...

E-marketplace names new CTO.(Company Operations)(Brief Article)
March 5, 2001... Elemica Inc., a chemical industry e-marketplace founded by leading chemical companies, has snagged the technology leader of one of its investors to become its chief technology officer. Stewart McCutcheon, formerly global e-business...

Wired Channel - Manufacturers collaborate with distributors online.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... Two years ago, top executives at welding equipment maker Miller Electric Manufacturing Co. thought they had a red-hot idea: Sell the company's secondary brand of welders, Hobart, directly to consumers through its Web site, millerwelds.com. ...

The next step to unified channels.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... Building co-branded sites that allow manufacturers to control how product information is presented online by their retailers and distributors is becoming increasingly common. But, experts say, manufacturers shouldn't stop there. Doing so would...

Disability laws take flight - Regulations make Web sites be more accessible.(Government Activity)
March 5, 2001... Helicopter pilots the world over fly in fear of the dreaded Jesus Nut. A part on all rotor-powered craft, the Jesus Nut is so critical that, if it were ever to pop off while in flight, the helicopter would dive faster than a ripped parachute....

E-biz brains standing by-give us a buzz.(Industry Trend or Event)(Editorial)
March 5, 2001... Whenever I'm asked to define the focus of eWEEK's eBizStrategies section, I begin with one simple idea: Managers building e-business enterprises learn the most from other managers doing the same thing. Journalists and pundits are a dime a...

Project managers' next step - Firms find keys to keeping experienced managers.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... For Lee Blezard, being a project manager is the business equivalent of conducting an orchestra. "I apply my attention and send resources to the places that need it to make everything come together," said the veteran manager at Nortel Networks...

Looking before they leap - IT taking a wait-and-see stance on Jxta and .Net.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... Brian Moura needs to hear better arguments in favor of peer-to-peer networking technology before he gives it any consideration. "Peer-to- peer is not on our radar screen," said Moura, assistant city manager in San Carlos, Calif. "If we already...

Compaq crying server foul - Accuses RLX of using ex-employees to develop its new high-density tool.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... A startup's plans to market a new cooler-running high-density server is drawing heat from Compaq Computer Corp., which claims that the company is using trade secrets illegally obtained from ex-Compaq workers to "jump-start" the effort. In...

PGP creator Zimmermann moves on.(Technology Information)(Interview)
March 5, 2001... When Phil Zimmermann published Pretty Good Privacy, one of the first encrypted e-mail programs, in 1991, he had no idea it would become the most popular product of its kind. Nor did he know that it would spark a three-year investigation by the...

VerticalNet purchases exchange.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... Verticalnet Inc., a company that in the past few months said it would move away from the business-to-business exchange model to focus on becoming a software and services provider, late last month said it is buying another exchange. Commerx...

ThinkPads take note(s).(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... IBM has begun shipping a ThinkPad that looks like it really deserves to be called a notebook. The Armonk, N.Y., company's ThinkPad TransNote opens like a book, portfolio-style, with the right and left sides serving separate functions. On...

Fiber optics sans the fiber.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... Looking for private-line, building-to-building connectivity, but the wireline options are either unavailable or too expensive? SONA Communications Corp., in Richmond, British Columbia, this week launched an optical wireless product line to...

Reporting into the enterprise.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... Crystal Decisions Inc. will announce this week its next-generation Crystal Enterprise reporting and analysis system. The new system helps companies organize, categorize and deliver reports, analytical data and strategic business information...

An alternative to WAP - InVoke SMS delivers two-way text.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... Double-barreled Critical Path Software Inc. rolled out an upgraded version of its server designed to help service providers and businesses deliver two-way text messaging to users. Substitute for WAP Officials with the San Francisco company...

It's just plain hot technology.
March 5, 2001... It happened to security and storage, and now, thanks to problems of the modern age, it's happening to disaster recovery. This very unflashy area of corporate computing has taken on new luster with the rise of e- business and the advent of...

Free, fast-and more corporate.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... More open-source ware may be headed to your offices. In his review on Page 64, West Coast Technical Director Timothy Dyck reports that MySQL AB's MySQL 3.23 open-source database has entered the corporate realm, armed with new transaction...

As lights flicker... - E-businesses get serious about disaster recovery.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... It's an axiom of e-business: If you're running a Web site, you can't afford downtime, particularly unexpected downtime that knocks customers off line and threatens their transactions and data. With demanding customers expecting 24-by-7...

Outsourcing degrees of disaster recovery.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... Disaster recovery services are more than just insurance policies companies begrudgingly buy for their own peace of mind; eWeek Labs believes these services should be seen as the cornerstone of business preservation. With the evolution of...

Adding 9s to uptime can add up.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... The technology used for disaster recovery and business continuity service plans differs dramatically depending on the percentage of uptime that must be guaranteed. A two-9s guarantee (99 percent uptime), for example, would allow for a...

NetBackup guards client data on-site - But software doesn't support ME, tape backup.(Software Review)(Evaluation)
March 5, 2001... Veritas Software Corp.'s NetBackup Professional 3.1 is a powerful and cost-effective way to safeguard desktop and mobile client data in primarily Windows-based environments (with the exception of Windows Millennium Edition, that is). Version...

Pings and packets - Searching the industry for technical connections and returning analysis in byte-size packages.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... Who uses Netscape? One of the continuing problems Web developers face is how to develop pages that look good and work properly, no matter what browser, connection speed or screen resolutions visitors use. WebSideStory's StatMarket...

Geek speak - It gives you plenty of time to say 'cheese'.(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... About 2 inches long, this chunk of plastic looks as if it came from a Cracker Jack box, but it's actually the remote control that comes as standard equipment with an Olympus C-3030Z digital camera. Apart from its practical value (no more...

MySQL makes a move up-market - Transaction support, full-text search extend reach.(Software Review)(Evaluation)
March 5, 2001... MySQL AB's widely used open-source database, MySQL, is taking a big step forward in the corporate world with the addition of transaction support. Until now, MySQL has been most popular as a content back end for dynamic Web sites because it...

Interfaces: The good, the bad and the ugly.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... Magically, it appears that nearly every company has become an infrastructure company. This is odd because it seems that it was only yesterday that having infrastructure in your business plan got you booted out of the venture capitalists'...

WatchGuard's update eases minding the VPN - Version 2.0 speeds the creation of tunnels.(Software Review)(Evaluation)
March 5, 2001... Businesses expanding their networks to add VPNs using WatchGuard Technologies Inc.'s firewall appliances, including those for the SOHO (small office/home office) market, will find that the latest version of WatchGuard VPN Manager eases the...

Labs'-eye view.(Product Information)
March 5, 2001... Over the past few years, many companies have fallen for the seductive marketing of appliances. Just as the word "appliance" suggests, products like WatchGuard Technologies Inc.'s VPN and firewall appliances can typically be configured in a...

Potential for mobile meetings unplugged.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... During the recent mobile insights conference in Phoenix, I participated in an ad hoc WLAN, and the experience forcefully drove home the utility and advantages of a wireless LAN. Symbol Technologies set up three of its 802.11b-based WLAN access...

Flash unleashes multimedia - Developers get green light for Pocket PC apps.(Macromeida's Flash Player for Microsoft Pocket PC)(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... Developers testing the new wireless version of Flash Player said the extension of the multimedia player beyond the desktop will open new doors for building business and entertainment applications. The early release of Macromedia Inc.'s...

Package targets Exchange - IBM's iNotes Access software consolidates Microsoft mail platform on fewer servers, adds Domino functions.(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... IBM is after Microsoft Corp.'s Outlook and Exchange installed base. The Armonk, N.Y., computer company last week rolled out a package that will enable users of the Microsoft messaging software to consolidate operations on fewer servers using a...

HP to run some Qwest hosting centers.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... The reinvention of Hewlett-Packard Co. took another interesting twist late last month when the company announced a multi-faceted deal with Qwest Internet Solutions that involves multiple HP lines of business. The give-and-take deal, valued...

Creating one-stop shops for e-commerce - HP, Enfrastructure, IBM and EDS facilities aim to speed e-biz initiatives.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... There's nothing like getting out of the office to really get something accomplished. That premise is leading professional services operations such as Hewlett-Packard Co., Enfrastructure Inc., IBM Global Services and Electronic Data Systems...

Quantum stacks the tape deck - Company's backup tape drive technology rollout will compete with existing linear tape open drives.(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... Businesses looking for backup tape drive technology that's bulkier and faster now have another option from which to choose. Quantum Corp., of Milpitas, Calif., this week will begin shipping its BRC Super DLT (digital linear tape) drives to...

Triton gets applications to cooperate.(Tidal Software's Triton 1.5)(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... Tidal Software Inc. has taken the multiapplication, multi server scheduling and workload management functionality of its sysAdmiral job scheduling software and added an event-response mechanism. The new product, called Triton 1.5 and due to...

Tivoli Systems' name the last to go?(News Briefs)
March 5, 2001... When reports began to roll in about the seattle earthquake last week, the Kitty couldn't help but wonder whether the seismic vibrations were God's way of trying to help the Feds break up Microsoft or if Gates had just dropped his wallet.El Gato...

Litter box Lynx.(News Briefs)
March 5, 2001... Have some industry gossip? Found a funky Web site? Contact Rumor Central at spencer_katt@ziffdavis.com or call (781) 393-3700. world.honda.com/robot/ Check out movies and specifications for Honda's way-cool robots. Now, this is what...

Disaster plans tied to business success.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 5, 2001... It wasn't our intention to time our cover story on dis- aster recovery with a major earthquake in Seattle, but it happened. Disaster recovery too often falls into the same category as security considerations in building an IT infrastructure....

Earthquake rattles Seattle.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
March 5, 2001... Bill Gates spoke, and the earth moved. Actually, only a part of the earth moved last week when a strong earthquake-with a magnitude of 6.8-rocked the Pacific Northwest. The quake injured about 250 people and caused more than $1 billion...

Site layoffs, PGA lawsuit.(Company Financial Information)
March 5, 2001... Count eToys.com and Buy.com as the latest e-tailers to fall victim to the changing economy. eToys, saddled with about $274 million in debt, said last week that it will file for federal bankruptcy protection and warned investors that its stock...

Loudcloud, AOL partner.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
March 5, 2001... America Online last week signed an agreement to have Loudcloud host and manage AOL's merchant e-commerce services, including its QuickCheckout wallet technology. The partnership will give merchants that are unable to develop an in- house...

Smaller partners in IBM's big picture - NetGen initiatives include reselling managed services and launching GoingGlobal program.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... IBM has big plans for some of its smallest customers. Through its IBM Global Net Generation Business, the Armonk, N.Y., company is on a mission to get IBM products and services into the hands of service provider, portal, search engine and...

Tivoli gears up for service provider battle.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... Tivoli Systems Inc. is hoping a revamped strategy and a short list of new customers will put some much-needed momentum behind its service provider initiative. The IBM unit, which saw a slip in revenue growth in the fourth quarter, last week...

App conflicts cleaned up - Messaging protocols ebXML and SOAP consolidate, making it simpler, easier for developers.(Technology Information)
March 5, 2001... The convergence of two overlapping messaging protocols will be a boon for developers in their quest to get applications to interoperate over the Internet. At issue are two specifications, ebXML (electronic business Extensible Markup...

Web testing tools gain mind share.(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... In what many say is a sign of a maturing industry, several new products designed to debug, stress-test and monitor Web-based applications will be in the spotlight this week. Among the expected announcements at the Software Test Automation...

Trial And Error - Appeals court's critical review of findings, Jackson gives Microsoft edge.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... Microsoft Corp. fared so well last week in its first round of hearings before the U.S. Court of Appeals here that many believe the likelihood of splitting the company in two, as ruled by the U.S. District Court last year, is extremely slim. ...

Sprint, Compuware take on wireless Web.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... With the grand hope of making the wireless data experience more productive and less cumbersome, Sprint PCS Group and Compuware Corp. are working together to develop customized business applications for use on the Sprint Wireless Web. But...

Intel's grip shifts back to chips.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... For the past couple of years, Intel Corp. has pushed to diver sify its offerings and reduce its revenue reliance on what it is best known for: the microprocessor. That's been reflected in the products rolled out at the company's previous...

TI bets $100 million on 3G.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
March 5, 2001... To accelerate software development on its new mobile device architecture, Texas Instruments Inc. is investing $100 million in next- generation wireless applications. The Dallas company plans to disperse the money over the next 12 to 18 months...

Oracle lowers earnings outlook.(Company Financial Information)(Brief Article)
March 5, 2001... Oracle became the latest major high-tech company to feel the effects of the softening economy. Company officials said last week they expect third-quarter earnings to fall short of analyst expectations. Preliminary numbers indicate that...

Napster promises to block files.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
March 5, 2001... The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco heard arguments Friday regarding modifications to District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel's original injunction against Napster, the Internet music- swapping service. At the hearing,...

NAI rebuilds itself - Security vendor to put all of its services on Net.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 5, 2001... Looking to recover from what was a less-than-stellar 2000, Network Associates Inc. is set to embark on an ambitious strategy that will eventually result in the company's delivering virtually all its enterprise software over the Internet. ...

Open Market pins future on Content Server.(Product Announcement)
March 5, 2001... E-commerce software pioneer Open Market Inc. was one of the first purveyors of order management and storefront server software. But when the Burlington, Mass., company launches its Content Server Enterprise Edition and a new strat egy built...

EBM's dashboards let IT drive business operations.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 12, 2001... Enterprise software startup metricstream Inc. last week introduced its Enterprise Business Management suite, which manages business operations across distributed applications. Web-based EBM will let executive and IT management monitor the...

Wireless net for Phoenix.(Company Business and Marketing)(Brief Article)
March 12, 2001... Kite networks inc., an integrated communications provider in Ridgeland, Miss., has officially rolled out a wireless broadband network in Phoenix, giving small and medium-size businesses a new choice for high- speed network access. Phoenix...

Enterprise ties to partners.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 12, 2001... Three new products announced last week are designed to enable companies to quickly build enterprise application portals that connect internal systems as well as applications between trading partners. Developed by Portal Wave Inc., of...

Interactive support on way.(Brief Article)(Product Announcement)
March 12, 2001... K2 digital inc., of new York, has released a desktop customer support product called K2 Help. K2 Help can be used to create 360-degree product views, such as of a video camera or dishwasher, with a point- and-click interface to give customers...

Customizing Resolution.(Product Development)(Brief Article)
March 12, 2001... HP scanners focus on speed and clarity Sensors In a drive to enhance speed and resolution, Hewlett-Packard Co. next month will begin selling three scanners that include two separate sensors to determine the degree of resolution needed. ...

Security scans earning e-business confidence.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 12, 2001... In the early days of air travel, danger and glamour went hand in hand with the novelty of the experience. But as jet-set exclusivity turned to tourist-class ubiquity, passengers came to take safety for granted. So, too, must the security of...

Web site teaches a privacy lesson - eWeek's eXcellence Awards deliver hands-on experience.(Editorial)
March 12, 2001... Eweek labs this past year had up-close-and-personal experience with the data security, privacy and integrity issues that keep e-business managers up at night: the eWeek eXcellence Awards Web site (www.excellenceawardsonline.com). ...

It's the chips, stupid!(Company Business and Marketing)
March 12, 2001... It's a little like the united states building a working space-based missile defense and then being successfully invaded by Mexico. Such is the condition of microprocessor titan Intel. For some years, the chip maker has pursued a vast and...

OEMs: Light IT fire?(Letter to the Editor)
March 12, 2001... Readers address OEM management styles, rebut plug for data center's energy conservation Improving auto operations In the Jan. 29 issue, jeff moad makes reference to OEMs having to "light fires" under their IT groups ("Ford rebuilds IT...

Creating software gems.(Technology Information)
March 12, 2001... Food gets eaten. machines wear out. software lasts forever. n Unlike other commodities, which get consumed (directly or indirectly) in the course of producing other goods, software-at some point-becomes good enough to keep. (I realize this is...

We've seen this cycle before.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 12, 2001... We are all worried, justifiably, by the economic slowdown, and in the technology sector in particular. But there's one thing we do know for sure: Things will get better. Call it the economic corollary of gravity; whatever goes down, must come...

Yet more ads to bombard surfers.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
March 12, 2001... Web surfers already tired of ads appearing everywhere online had better brace for an even bigger marketing tsunami. By 2005, the average online user will receive 950 marketing messages a day, compared with a daily hit of 610 this year,...

Advertisers leery of post-PC devices.(Industry Trend or Event)(Brief Article)
March 12, 2001... Advertising on post-pc devices such as mobile phones, interactive televisions and Web kiosks will grow modestly and remain a small portion of overall online advertising through 2005 despite the proliferation of new devices, according to a...

Notice to e-biz: Taxes due - States get serious about collecting.(Government Activity)
March 12, 2001... Mark Twain may not have lived to see the Internet, but long ago he picked up on something that many e-business executives are unwilling to acknowledge today: Taxes are as certain as death. And that applies online as well as off. Since...

Going global? Scope out overseas laws.(Government Activity)
March 12, 2001... When I lived in japan in 1993, I regularly begged my Mom to ship sourdough pretzels from home.I can only imagine what I would have bought if I had had access to today's Internet. n The Web is a global channel. If you are a cybermerchant, sooner...

Be it bricks or clicks, a buck is still a buck.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 12, 2001... Nasdaq's precipitous drop over the past year has given us all a business refresher course. To wit: Companies that don't make money are not only questionable investments, they may not be around that long. n Of course, some people made some big...

Surviving a Web pass rush - IT team scores big during Super Bowl crunch.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 12, 2001... Weeks before Super Bowl XXXV, as John Stiening and his team huddled to plan strategy, they made a cold-sweat-inducing discovery: They would get sacked. Stiening and his engineers at eCreative Search Inc. weren't diagramming X's and...

Lessons learned in layoffs - Enterprises must cope with human, legal issues.(Company Operations)
March 12, 2001... Last october, less than six months into her job, Meena Patel prepared to tell co-workers they were losing their jobs. As human resources director and associate counsel for Goinvest.com Inc., Patel had never dealt with a layoff before, but she...

Collaborative Commerce - Software vendors expand e-trading products.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 12, 2001... When manufacturers set out to take advantage of electronic cataloging, many settled for simply listing the parts and products available. These days, as buyers demand more information and place more unique orders, such lists simply don't...

Economy, fewer upgrades pinching Oracle - Earnings projections below expectations; IT says spending unchanged.(Company Financial Information)
March 12, 2001... According to Larry Ellison, Oracle Corp.'s missed projections for its third-fiscal-quarter earnings were a result of the uncertain U.S. economy and not competitive pressures. Oracle earnings for the quarter ended Feb. 28 came in at 10 cents...

Gateway's outlook still grim.(Company Financial Information)
March 12, 2001... Gateway Inc. chairman Ted Waitt, who last month reclaimed the title of CEO following Jeffrey Weitzen's departure, has warned that the struggling PC maker's revenue outlook is even more dour than previously projected. Hard hit by an...

Cranking up DSL capacity - VDSL Systems' hardware allows copper networks to handle bandwidth-intensive applications.(Company Business and Marketing)
March 12, 2001... Hotels and office buildings with robust infrastructures need not build over the copper network to improve Internet access speeds for their diverse array of users. That's because new IP-based very-high-speed DSL technologies are on the way...

Opticom grades service performance.(Product Announcement)
March 12, 2001... Opticom Inc. hopes to take on larger players in the service-level management arena with what it says is a unique way to provide relevant reporting on most of the elements that make up a service. The Andover, Mass., company this week...

Microsoft blazes a new B2B trail.(Software Review)(Brief Article)(Evaluation)
March 12, 2001... Microsoft has taken an important step forward. As East Coast Technical Director Jim Rapoza reports in his review at the right, BizTalk Server 2000 is not only one of Microsoft's best first-version efforts, it's also a good foundation for the...

Linux manager steps forward.(Software Review)(Brief Article)(Evaluation)
March 12, 2001... Caldera's volution is the first complete management package for Linux that eWeek Labs has seen. As Contributing Editor Roger Hartje states in his review at right, this is a step in the right direction that will help move the open-source...

.Net gets XML right - Microsoft BizTalk Server 2000 sets usability standard.(Software Review)(Evaluation)
March 12, 2001... Perhaps creating a product in a new field where there are no established leaders to catch up to (or copy) is a good thing for Microsoft Corp. The company's BizTalk Server 2000 is an excellent platform for managing XML data processing among...

Caldera Volution good start for taming Linux.(Software Review)(Evaluation)
March 12, 2001... Caldera Systems Inc.'s new Linux management package, Caldera Volution, is a good first step toward centralized administration of Linux systems, but eWeek Labs found it to be an immature product that anyone but the Linux faithful may have...

Pings and packets - Searching the industry for technical connections and returning analysis in byte-size packages.(Industry Trend or Event)
March 12, 2001... Java's still brewing briskly Go to any coders' convocation, such as this month's International Conference for Java Development in New York, where I gave a keynote address, and the textbooks table is guaranteed to have a crowd. Programmers...