eWeek articles from May 2004

eWeek archives from May 2004

Can Real Business Value Be Gained from Sarbanes-Oxley?
May 1, 2004... Judging from the results of this month's research (a joint CIO Insight/Gartner EXP survey of CIOs on the status of their Sarbanes-Oxley compliance programs), most CIOs feel optimistic about their efforts. Their compliance mechanisms will be...

Microsoft Unveils New Copyright Software.(Brief Article)
May 3, 2004... REDMOND, Wash. (AP)--Microsoft Corp. is unveiling copyright protection software to allow rented songs or movies to be used on portable players, cellular phones and other devices. The company's latest "digital rights management" software,...

Security Experts Tracking New Sasser Variant.
May 3, 2004... With two variants of the Sasser worm already infecting computers through a recent vulnerability in Windows, security experts now are tracking a third version of the worm and an exploit that attacks the same flaw. Sasser.C is closely...

Network Card Theft Causes Internet Outage.
May 3, 2004... A handful of corporate customers were left without e-mail and Internet access Monday after the theft of networking equipment from a New York City office late Sunday. Law enforcement officials said four DS-3 cards were reported missing from...

Adobe Adds Workflow Technology with Acquisition.
May 3, 2004... Adobe Systems Inc. on Monday acquired a small business-process software vendor to build greater workflow technology into its document management offerings. Adobe, of San Jose, Calif., said it had bought Q-Link Technologies Inc. and its...

OASIS Frees Universal Business Language for General Use.(Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards)
May 3, 2004... E-business standards consortium OASIS, which stands for the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards, on Monday announced that the Universal Business Language (UBL) 1.0 specification has been approved as an OASIS...

WellPoint Starts E-Prescribing.(Wellpoint Health Networks Inc. planning to electronic prescriptions)
May 3, 2004... One of the largest health plans in the United States, WellPoint Health Networks Inc., is moving ahead with its implementation of electronic prescriptions. The adoption of e-prescribing by WellPoint may well encourage more health plans to adopt...

SMTP Authentication Hits Standards Track.(simple mail transfer protocol)
May 3, 2004... SMTP authentication is coming. But in what form? There is a broad consensus among experts that SMTP authentication, by which Internet mail servers will be able to confirm that messages sent to them come from the domains from which they...

IBM Changes CFO, Other Exec Positions.(International Business Machines Corp. appointments )(Brief Article)
May 3, 2004... IBM Corp. shook up its executive lineup Monday, replacing its chief financial officer and head of global sales, but a spokesman said the moves were part of a longstanding company strategy. John Joyce, 50, chief financial officer since 1999,...

Siebel: Step down from CEO Spot Planned for Past Year.( Michael Lawrie replaces Tom Siebel at Siebel Systems Inc)
May 3, 2004... Tom Siebel's transition out of the CEO's office at his namesake CRM software company has been planned for the past year, Siebel said during a conference call with financial analysts Monday. Siebel is stepping down as CEO of Siebel Systems Inc....

E-Voting Oversight Overwhelms U.S. Agency.(Election Assistance Commission)
May 3, 2004... SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP)--As alarm mounts over the integrity of the ATM-like voting machines 50 million Americans will use in the November election, a new federal agency has begun scrutinizing how to safeguard electronic polling from fraud,...

Hardware Makers Look to OS Support at WinHEC.(Windows Hardware Engineering Conference)
May 3, 2004... Although it's difficult to find just one hardware company with a love-hate relationship with Microsoft Corp., one candidate might be Advanced Micro Devices Inc. A vast number of chip and device companies depend on Microsoft to build a...

Gates to Pay $800K for Rules Violation.(Bill Gates pays for voilating federal rules)(Brief Article)
May 3, 2004... WASHINGTON (AP)--The world's richest man is out $800,000 for violating federal rules by making a large investment in a pharmaceutical company. Bill Gates, the billionaire chairman of Microsoft Corp., agreed to the civil penalty for the...

10-Gbit Ethernet Adapter Debuts at Intel.
May 3, 2004... Intel Corp. introduced a new 10-Gbit Ethernet adapter for data centers on Monday that should cost about 40 percent less than a previous model. The Intel PRO/10GbE SR Server Adapter is available now for $4,770. The "SR" prefix means that...

DOJ, Oracle Ready Witness Lists for Trial on Takeover.(Department of Justice)
May 3, 2004... For a battle that's dragged on for nearly a year, next month's trial is looming as perhaps an end to the question: Will Oracle Corp. prove successful in its $9.4 billion hostile takeover bid of rival PeopleSoft Inc.? If it's up to the U.S....

Mozilla Updates Thunderbird E-Mail Client.(enhanced product )(Brief Article)
May 3, 2004... The Mozilla Foundation on Monday updated its standalone e-mail application, bringing it a step closer to a full release. The open-source software developer announced the availability of its Thunderbird Version 0.6, a release that remains a...

AT&T All Out for MPLS-Based IP-VPN.
May 3, 2004... AT&T on Monday announced a new virtual private network offering via the carrier's multi-protocol label switching-enabled core IP network. MPLS uses digital shorthand to label data packets, allowing network routers to run at faster speeds...

U.S.-China Deal Tweaks Export Controls.
May 3, 2004... The U.S. Commerce Department last month announced a deal with China to tighten export-control procedures on U.S. dual-use technologies shipped to China. The deal on exports creates "procedures to strengthen end-use visit cooperation and...

Innovators Step Up.
May 3, 2004... There seemed to be some symbolic harmony in that I--one of the 100 worst golfers in the world--was going to play in a media-day event last week at one of the country's 100 best courses. Alas, it was not meant to be, as a steady rainfall kept me...

DELMIA Builds a Better Factory.
May 3, 2004... CAD revolutionized the automotive industry two decades ago. Now the new frontier in auto-industry IT is in visually modeling the manufacturing process. By creating a virtual assembly line, it's possible to learn what works and what doesn't...

Chrysler Portal Eases Access.
May 3, 2004... Chrysler dealers in the United States are going through a new portal to get to headquarters: DealerConnect. "We have everything from ordering cars, looking at warranties, diagnosing cars--all the applications for the dealers--through the...

Council Governs Corporate Technology Standards.
May 3, 2004... As the merger of Daimler-Benzag and Chrysler Corp. unfolded, the need for corporate technology standards came to the forefront and resulted in the creation in 2001 of the Global Technology Council. "We understood we needed some governing...

Juniper Appliance Guards Conferences.
May 3, 2004... Security should always be a top concern when using Web conferencing services or software. Juniper Networks Inc.'s NetScreen Secure Meeting is a good choice for companies that want more control than most products provide over security for Web...

Gateway Rolls Out Pair of Entry-Level Servers.
May 4, 2004... Gateway Inc. on Tuesday is rounding out its server lineup with the addition of two entry-level, single-processor systems. The rack-optimized Gateway 9115 is a 1U (1.75-inch) system that features Intel Corp.'s Pentium 4 chip with an 800MHz...

Hitachi Introduces Application-Optimized Storage.
May 4, 2004... Enabling storage devices and software to more tightly align with application workload and service level requirements, Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) will announce the availability on Tuesday of a new set of HiCommand business and application...

Sasser.D Worm Arrives, Ready to Do Damage.
May 4, 2004... A fourth version of the Sasser worm is now at work infecting Windows machines, and this one has the potential to cause serious network slowdowns and outages, experts say. The Sasser worm family, like its namesake, journeyman major league...

The Man Behind the Windows Marketing Machine.
May 4, 2004... With so much of Windows client's future in flux at the moment, you can bet the guy in charge of Windows marketing, product management and product planning is busy. And, indeed, Tom Button -- the corporate VP in charge of the Windows product...

IBM Upgrades Java Tools.
May 4, 2004... With simplified development and broad platform support as key goals, IBM Corp. Tuesday announced new versions of its Java development tools and its Rational suite of application lifecycle tools. IBM's Lexington, Mass.-based Rational...

Microsoft, HP Unveil New PC Designs.
May 4, 2004... SEATTLE--Welcome to the home--and the office--of the future. Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft Corp. will use a Windows hardware conference in Seattle this week to unveil updated concepts of consumer and business PCs, plus a glimpse into the...

Microsoft Preps New Enterprise IM Server.
May 4, 2004... Microsoft Corp. announced Tuesday that it is opening the beta program for the next version of its instant messaging and presence server, dubbed Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005. The product, formerly code-named "Vienna," is...

Apple to Unleash Tiger.
May 4, 2004... Apple will offer developers an early look at the next version of Mac OS X at June's Worldwide Developer Conference in San Francisco, the company has announced. Apple CEO Steve Jobs will show off the new Mac OS X--presumably Version...

Veritas Advances Utility Computing Mission.
May 4, 2004... To help drive its utility computing agenda, Veritas Software Corp. on Tuesday is introducing new and revitalized products from its CommandCentral family and is outlining the direction of MicroMeasure, the usage-metering technology acquired...

Clarke to Keynote eWEEK Security Summit.
May 4, 2004... Richard Clarke, the former top cyber-security adviser to the president, will be delivering a keynote speech at the eWEEK Security Summit next week in New York. Clarke will be addressing the wide range of security risks that enterprises are...

Microsoft's Next Wave: Media Products.
May 4, 2004... SEATTLE--Microsoft Corp. executives took the stage at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) here on Tuesday morning to give a strong push for the company's next wave of media products. "The next wave for us is the media wave...

SCO Confirms 'Minor' Layoffs.
May 4, 2004... Rumors that The SCO Group Inc. laid off some workers last week turned out to be true. According to Blake Stowell, communications director at SCO, the embattled Unix company laid off "a minor numbers of employees across the board." Stowell...

Web Services for Devices Pushed at WinHEC.
May 4, 2004... WinHEC is the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference, and while Longhorn, Microsoft's next version of Windows, remains the big topic, this is a hardware show--and one of the few times we get to look at what is coming in hardware. And it...

No Business in Social Networking.
May 4, 2004... Social networks are a good thing. Everybody should have one--and everybody I know does, in some form or fashion. But whether you need an online social network and, particularly, whether you need one whose primary purpose is separating you from...

EDS' Fixed-Price Follies.
May 4, 2004... To Marine Corps Sgt. Marco Garcia, the Navy Marine Corps Intranet sounds like a great project, in theory. "They sold me on it," he says, when he attended training in December on the new network. "The transition itself, though, seems to be a...

IBM's 'Stinger' Pokes Holes in Oracle's Open-Source and Grid Ambitions.
May 4, 2004... IBM on Monday released the beta of "Stinger," the next version of its DB2 database. With the move, IBM lobbed yet another volley in the battle over which major enterprise vendor will provide the database of choice for the open-source Linux...

CEO Hire May Prove Too Little, Too Late for Siebel.
May 4, 2004... It was a wise decision for Tom Siebel to give up the post of CEO of Siebel Systems Inc. in favor of a newly hired outsider. But the move comes none too soon. This is a decision Siebel should have made at least two years ago as the company...

Microsoft Must 'Nail the Fundamentals,' Button Says.
May 4, 2004... SEATTLE--Microsoft executives on Tuesday admitted that the company and its partners must do a far better job of "just the basics" and said they need to "nail the fundamentals," starting with security. "We have a lot of work to do to make...

SCM Vendors Prep Products with More Integration.
May 4, 2004... After spending the past couple of years redefining internal management, strategy and product directions, supply-chain-management vendors are now focusing on moving forward with new product capabilities and bolstered balance sheets. ...

Sasser Worm Attack On The Decline.
May 5, 2004... NEW YORK (AP)--Far fewer computers would have been disabled by the latest Internet worm had their owners configured them to automatically get the latest security fixes. Sasser's spread began to stabilize Tuesday, but not after infecting...

Finding an Open Source Programming Job.(MySQL AB)(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... Brian Aker, director of architecture for MySQL AB, says one good way to find an open source programming job is to contact him. He's looking. And his criteria are uniquely open source. "I'm not looking for someone who sends a resume to my...

Xerox Rolls Out Multifunction Printers for SMBs.(small and medium sized businesses)(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... Xerox Corp. on Monday unveiled two new monochrome multifunction machines for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and small workgroups. The WorkCentre M20, for $1,649, allows copying, printing and color scanning. The WorkCentre M20i,...

HP Doubles Processing Power of Itanium-Based Systems.(Hewlett-Packard Co.)
May 5, 2004... Hewlett-Packard Co. is rolling out new hardware, software and services designed to push forward the company's Adaptive Enterprise utility computing strategy. At the company's ENSA@Work conference in Munich, Germany, HP officials on...

Microsoft: 'Palladium' Is Still Alive and Kicking.(conference)(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... SEATTLE--Microsoft Corp. spent much of Day 2 of its Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) here refuting a published report claiming the company has axed its Next Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB) security technology. ...

EC's Oracle Probe Delayed Again.(European Commission)(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... The European Commission's probe into Oracle's takeover of PeopleSoft is facing another delay, as the EC in mid-April halted proceedings and asked Oracle to provide more information on discounts. The verdict was originally due May 11. At this...

10g Beta Testers Mostly Happy.(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... They're not necessarily hopping on the grid train, but beta testers of Oracle Database 10g are finding things they like, including HTML DB--an application development tool that lets users with little or no programming experience create...

Mazda Takes DB2 Information Integrator for a Spin.(Mazda Motor Corp.)(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... The car company Mazda has hooked up IBM DB2 Information Integrator to automatically connect multiple Microsoft SQL Server databases with a DB2 server, thereby enabling sales staff to click on real-time sales information at dealerships across...

HP, BT Ink $1.5 Services Deal.(Hewlett-Packard Co., BT Group plc)
May 5, 2004... NEW YORK--Hewlett-Packard Co. has signed a $1.5 billion, seven-year services deal with UK-based telecom provider BT Group plc. The duo starting this summer will roll out joint telecom and IT services to enterprises in Europe and prepackaged...

Veritas Stretches Reach of App Performance Management.(VERITAS Software Corp.)(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... Veritas Software Corp. burrowed application performance management deeper into its offerings Wednesday by announcing at its Veritas Vision conference in Las Vegas that Veritas i3 7.0 will couple more tightly across its software storage product...

McAfee AntiSpyware.(Brief Article)(Product/Service Evaluation)
May 5, 2004... As if the recent proliferation of viruses and worms weren't enough, now spyware and adware--including programs that can hijack your browser and track your behavior--pose a fast-increasing threat. And while traditional antivirus and Internet...

Google Chooses Top IPO Offender for Offering.(initial public offerings)
May 5, 2004... NEW YORK (AP)--With all the anti-establishment, power-to-the-people refrains sounded in its IPO manifesto, it's curious that Google Inc. chose to reward the most notorious investment bank of the IPO boom to spearhead the initial public...

Some Legacy Subsytems Won't Get Windows 64-Bit Support.
May 5, 2004... SEATTLE--While Microsoft's upcoming Windows 64-bit client for extended systems will be almost feature-compatible with Windows XP Professional, some legacy subsystems and transport protocols will not be supported in that release. "Not...

CDs and DVDs Not So Immortal After All.(CD rot)
May 5, 2004... Dan Koster was unpacking some of his more than 2,000 CDs after a move when he noticed something strange. Some of the discs, which he always took good care of, wouldn't play properly. Koster, a Web and graphic designer for Queens University...

The Hidden Message of WinHEC: 64 Bits or Bust.(Windows Hardware Engineering Conference)
May 5, 2004... The subtle message at WinHEC this week was that 64-bit computing is coming--whether you like it or not. And one of the biggest drivers of that is something called NX. The first time I'd heard of NX was in a prebriefing for the Microsoft...

Rambus Files Antitrust Suit against Memory Chip Makers.
May 5, 2004... Memory chip technology company Rambus has filed an antitrust lawsuit against four DRAM manufacturers, whom it has accused of colluding against using its products. The suit, which Rambus Inc. filed Wednesday in Superior Court in San...

Intel Showcases Advanced Computing Research.
May 5, 2004... Not to be upstaged by Microsoft's WinHEC conference, Intel Corp. on Wednesday showed off some of its current research on advanced technology that will start finding its way into products over the next two to six years. Leading the way were...

Microsoft Contracts with IronPort for Bulk E-Mail Service.(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... NEW YORK (AP)--Microsoft Corp., whose Hotmail and MSN services are inundated by spam, has contracted for a service that lets e-mail from legitimate companies more easily reach people's inboxes. By marking certain bulk mailings as "good,"...

WinHEC 2004 in Pictures.(Brief Article)
May 5, 2004... SEATTLE--The creative juices are flowing at the Windows hardware conference here this week. Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft, among others, have shown off updated concepts of consumer and business PCs, plus offered a peek into the future of the...

FCC Hones In on Wireless Broadband.(Federal Communications Commission)(Brief Article)
May 6, 2004... Federal Comminications Commission Chairman Michael Powell this week unveiled the agency's "Wireless Broadband Access Task Force." The new group will study existing wireless broadband policies and make recommendations for possible...

Riding Radio Waves.
May 6, 2004... As project leaders ponder pilots of radio frequency identification systems this summer, in the rush to meet the mandates from Wal-Mart, Target, the Department of Defense and others, the real action may be at the theme parks where they'll take...

IBM Rolls Out Alpha-Code Life Sciences Tools.(International Business Machines Corp.)
May 6, 2004... The life sciences are one of the fastest growing industry segments for IBM. In an effort to further explore the software needs of biological researchers, the company is releasing Thursday several publicly available life sciences software tools....

Is Google at Risk with Outsourcing?
May 6, 2004... Search provider Google's highly anticipated initial public offering filing featured a folksy letter to shareholders, stellar financials and plans to allow small investors to purchase shares. But it also listed a technology project as a key risk...

Is Application Development Ready to Be at Your Service?
May 6, 2004... When I'm pressed for time on a Monday, I remind myself that this newsletter column is really only supposed to be about 250 words of commentary on current topics that are addressed at greater length by the hard-working news staff of eWEEK.com....

NaviSite to Buy ASP Surebridge.
May 6, 2004... Technology services provider NaviSite Inc. announced its largest acquisition to date Thursday, signing a definitive agreement to acquire application services provider Surebridge Inc., the largest ASP for Microsoft Corp.'s CRM applications. ...

Veritas CEO: Incremental Strategy Will Win in Utility Computing.
May 6, 2004... LAS VEGAS--With the sun shining on a clear day outside of the Venetian Hotel here, the site of this week's Veritas Vision conference, Gary Bloom, president and CEO of Veritas Software Corp., envisions a bright future for his storage company in...

Microsoft Unveils Future Of Tablet PC.
May 6, 2004... SEATTLE--Microsoft on Wednesday gave WinHEC attendees a behind-the-scenes peek at future technologies the company is preparing for mobile PCs. Darin Fish, business development manager in Microsoft Corp.'s mobile platforms division,...

Topspin Rolls Out Virtual Server Software.(Topspin Communications Inc.)
May 6, 2004... Topspin Communications Inc. is rounding out its server virtualization offerings with the release of its VFrame software suite. The software--the fourth component of Topspin's virtualization strategy--is based on InfiniBand interconnect...

Foundry Networking Hardware Looks to IP V6.
May 6, 2004... Foundry Networks launched new networking hardware this week that is designed to prepare users for the coming of IP Version 6. Although adoption rates for IP V6 are slower in the United States than in Japan and other parts of the world, the...

Could a Worm on Mac or Linux Ever Get Traction?
May 6, 2004... Will we ever see something like the Sasser worm for the Macintosh or Linux? It's an interesting question, and not just for academic reasons. Undoubtedly, many people who choose these platforms do so because they think it immunizes them from the...

IBM VP: 'Stinger,' 'Masala' Will Make Most of Data Flood.
May 6, 2004... As IBM's Dr. Patricia Selinger puts it, if the supply of database administrators were to increase in lockstep with the data that's flowing into database from the Internet, the world would now be populated entirely with DBAs. Whether that's...

Intel Labs' Natural Born Killer Technologies.
May 6, 2004... Disclaimer: Intel and Microsoft are both clients. Every now and then, Intel pulls a bunch of journalists and analysts together and showcases what the company is working on in its labs. The last time I went to one of these Intel showcased a...

Mono Development Platform Moves into Beta.(Brief Article)
May 6, 2004... Novell on Thursday released the first beta version of an open-source development platform that allows developers to create Microsoft .NET applications for other operating systems. The Mono 1.0 beta release comes out of the Mono project,...

Health IT Czar Appointed.(Tommy Thompson )(Brief Article)
May 6, 2004... Just a week after President Bush created the position of health IT czar by executive order, Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson filled the post with a medical doctor who holds a doctoral degree in economics. David...

AMD Ships Athlon64 Chips for Thin, Light Notebooks.(Advanced Micro Devices Inc.)
May 6, 2004... Advanced Micro Devices took aim at the thin-and-light notebook market Thursday, releasing two new microprocessors for the slimmed-down PCs. Advanced Micro Devices Inc., of Sunnyvale, Calif., said mobile versions of the Athlon64 chip in...

Sun Opens RFID Test Center.(Sun Microsystems Inc.)
May 6, 2004... CARROLLTON, Texas--Sun Microsystems is looking to RFID expertise as an avenue to deepen customer relationships--and eventually to foster the need for more Sun servers. The company cut the ribbon Wednesday on a 17,000-square-foot warehouse...

Up Close with the Latest Longhorn Build.
May 6, 2004... At this year's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC), Microsoft released another sneak peek at its next generation operating system, code-named Longhorn. PC Magazine, along with the rest of the WinHEC attendees, received a DVD with...

Making RFID Work for Pharma.(Brief Article)
May 6, 2004... Two software giants, Oracle and Microsoft, both announced initiatives recently to help pharmaceutical companies integrate radio frequency identification (RFID) technology into existing systems. Oracle unveiled its Oracle Sensor-Based...

Computer Associates to Revise Filings.(Brief Article)
May 6, 2004... ISLANDIA, N.Y.--Computer Associates International Inc., the software company under investigation for its accounting, said Thursday that it will revise its filings for the second half of 2003 to defer recognition of about $9 million in revenue,...

Telemedicine May Bring Medical Care to Remote Regions.(Brief Article)
May 6, 2004... NASA is funding and testing a combination of television and computers that can allow physicians in remote geographical areas to easily interact with specialists. Over the past several years, NASA's Medical Informatics and Technology...

China Shuts more than 8,600 Internet Cafes.(Brief Article)
May 6, 2004... BEIJING--China has shut down more than 8,600 Internet cafes since February, many of them for illegally admitting juveniles, the official Xinhua News Agency reported Thursday. "Any such place allowing juveniles to enter or allowing...

A Guide to Dealing with Vexed Vendors.
May 6, 2004... Computer Associates ousted its chairman and chief executive over accounting concerns. Ditto for Nortel Networks, which booted its CEO and chief financial officer. What will you do if your vendor hits turbulence? It's a question worth...