InfoWorld.com articles from December 2008

InfoWorld.com archives from December 2008

You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz; Match your weekly tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 1, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan There are plenty of folks who feel a bit more thankful this week, like Connecticut schoolteacher Julie Amero and Facebook fans who hate spam. Somewhat less thankful: nosy ex-Verizon employees, SCO, Chinese censors, and...

IT survivor: 8 signs it's time for new employment; Timing is everything when it comes to jumping ship. Here's how to tell if your company's prospects are sinking.
December 1, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan If your company is headed for a fall, it's usually better to jump than to be pushed. Don't let yourself be blindsided by quickly dwindling company prospects. These eight signs are surefire indications that it is high time...

IT survivor: 7 tips for career growth in tight times; Recession fears have tech jobs in jeopardy. Here's how to outlast, outrun, and outsmart the competition.
December 1, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan Working in today's cutthroat economy has become a lot like the old joke about two guys being chased by a grizzly bear. One guy stops to take off his work shoes and lace up some sneakers. "Are you crazy?" says Guy No....

JetBrains build tool enhanced for software development; Team communication also highlighted in TeamCity 4.0.
December 1, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill JetBrains released TeamCity 4.0, a continuous integration server and distributed build management tool featuring enhanced build capabilities, this week. Version 4.0 offers build chains support for breaking down a...

InfoWorld launches mobile-friendly Web site; Content now optimized for next-gen devices such as the iPhone and BlackBerry Storm.
December 1, 2008... Byline: InfoWorld staff InfoWorld today has made the vast majority of its site content available in native format for the new generation of mobile devices, such as the Apple iPhone, Palm Treo Pro, and RIM BlackBerry Storm. Users of such...

Microsoft Response Point SP1 fills VoIP major gaps; Upgraded solution enables SMBs to make external calls using SIP.
December 1, 2008... Byline: Mike Heck Like their enterprise counterparts, smaller businesses constantly look for ways to operate more efficiently, increasingly so in today's economy. In the area of telephony technology, SMBs can make a relatively modest...

SpringSource fits Tomcat server for enterprises; Management and diagnostics capabilities featured, and the company is targeting the Web app server market as well.
December 2, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill SpringSource, maker of the popular open-source Spring Framework for Java, on Tuesday will reveal an enterprise-class Web application server based on the open-source Apache Tomcat server, the company said. The...

Flame war: The great Windows 7 debate; InfoWorld's Randall C. Kennedy and OSNews' Thom Holwerda go head to head over how to assess Windows 7's changes.
December 2, 2008... Byline: Randall C. Kennedy, Thom Holwerda Not a day goes by in which InfoWorld fails to receive a flaming comment or e-mail attacking InfoWorld's Enterprise Desktop blogger Randall C. Kennedy and his recent analysis of the pre-beta version...

Test Center review: Open source data aces; Jitterbit 2.0 impresses with easy GUI for mastering migration projects, while Talend Open Studio 3.0 scales gracefully to meet enterprise integration demands.
December 2, 2008... Byline: James R. Borck If any software market deserved to be shaken up by open source alternatives, it's enterprise data integration. Commercial, enterprise-grade integration tools -- typically cobbled together from M&A and legacy...

Why techies love games -- and why it's good they do; From World of Warcraft to Civilization, computer games hone skills, reduce frustration, and celebrate tech.
December 3, 2008... Byline: Tom Kaneshige Everyone knows that techies love "Dungeons & Dragons," where they can prowl the bowels of a castle and cast spells on clueless managers, er, mages. After all, it's just a game. Or is it? Many tech staffers are...

Test Center review: New Day dawns for Web CMS; Day Communique WCM 5.1 impresses with snappy GUI and rich features for business users, easy setup and management for techs.
December 4, 2008... Byline: Mike Heck Day Software may be best known for its CRX (Content Repository Extreme) Java Content Repository. But after testing the general release of its Communique 5.1 (CQ5) modular CMS, I think it's time to get reintroduced to the...

You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz; Match your weekly tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 5, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan The devil is in the details in this week's quiz -- and we mean that literally. From dead Web 2.0 startups to satanically inspired video games, our weekly brain buster bears the mark of the beast. Also: Apple endorses...

Python 3.0 upgrade incompatible with earlier versions; The Python Software Foundation is working concurrently on two upgrades to the core language and anticipates most people will stick with the Python 2 line for years.
December 5, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Python 3.0, a new version of the language released earlier this week, has incompatibilities with the 2.x line, according to the Python Software Foundation. While saying the language is mostly the same, the foundation...

You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz; Match your weekly tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 8, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan The devil is in the details in this week's quiz -- and we mean that literally. From dead Web 2.0 startups to satanically inspired video games, our weekly brain buster bears the mark of the beast. Also: Apple endorses...

Windows admin IQ test; The history, the architecture, the major players, the trivia, the technology -- what do you really know about Windows?
December 8, 2008... Byline: J. Peter Bruzzese You have sewn up every Windows hole on your systems and tattooed the Start icon on you arm. But how much do you really know about the Redmond OS? Test your mettle with these 20 questions designed to separate the...

Cybersecurity report offers Obama some far-reaching recommendations; Report says leaving cybersecurity in the hands of Homeland Security dooms the effort to failure and maintains that some IT manufacturing must remain at home.
December 8, 2008... Byline: Ephraim Schwartz A congressionally sponsored study conducted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, made public on Monday, recommends everything from the creation of a the National Office for Cyberspace outside the...

Is the WSTF one Web services forum too many? IBM and Oracle, among others, back the new organization focused on testing, but questions are raised about redundancies with an existing group.
December 8, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Vendors including IBM and Oracle are launching an industry organization Monday for Web services interoperability, despite the existence of another Web services interoperability group with many of the same members. ...

Microsoft BizTalk gets virtualization links; Pairing with Windows Server 2008 cited; company also adds RFID to mobile clients.
December 8, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Microsoft will offer on Monday the first public beta release of its BizTalk Server 2009 enterprise connectivity software, which can take advantage of virtualization and enhanced failover clustering featured in Windows...

Test Center preview: Fedora turns 10; Red Hat's open source standard bearer and mineshaft canary is still everything to every Linux power user.
December 8, 2008... Byline: Paul Venezia There comes a point in the life of any hard-core Linux user when the idea of digging about to find yet another obscure piece of software, compiling the code, and integrating it into your daily routine just seems...

Eight easy steps to iPhone security; Apple's irresistible iPhone is a prize for thieves, vandals, and hackers too. Follow these tips to protect your device and its data.
December 8, 2008... Byline: Tom Yager As someone who's been around the block a few times with mobile technology, I get a kick out of lengthy treatises on the practices one should follow to keep the information on your iPhone secure. They follow a commonsense...

Obama can't have a BlackBerry. Should your CEO? Information security is not as strong as you may think, and the execs with the most sensitive data are juicy targets.
December 9, 2008... Byline: Ephraim Schwartz The press has been all over President-Elect Barack Obama's addiction to his BlackBerry and the possibility that he might have to give it up for reasons of national security. But no one in the media seems to be...

Computer shortcomings cited by dignitaries; Alan Kay, Andries van Dam critical of current state of technology during conference.(Conference news)
December 9, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Computer industry veterans Alan Kay and Andries van Dam aired complaints about the current state of computing during a Monday evening conference panel session, with gripes about security, browsers, and system...

Collective intelligence pioneer hailed; Concept coming to fruition in search engines; proponent also created the computer mouse.
December 9, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill In a tribute to computer industry pioneer Doug Engelbart, dignitaries from IT and academic realms espoused the concept of "collective intelligence" at a technology event Monday, emphasizing developments such as search...

Windows Vista SP2: Second time's the charm; Test Center benchmarks show that Service Pack 2, along with addressing long-standing issues, provides a minor performance boost.
December 9, 2008... Byline: Randall C. Kennedy Good news, Vista users: Microsoft finally seems to be getting a handle on the Windows code base. First we learned that Windows 7 would not introduce any new performance hits (see "Windows 7 unmasked" and "Flame...

Cloud computing to the max; Some companies could move most of their apps to the cloud. Here's how one did it.
December 10, 2008... Byline: Dave Rosenberg Cloud services claim to provide nearly everything you need without requiring you to run your own IT infrastructure. From e-mail and Web hosting to fully managed applications to vast on-demand computing resources, the...

OpenSolaris upgrade unveiled; Open source Unix OS features new deployment capabilities; Sun also plans to have OpenSolaris running on a line of laptops in 2009.
December 10, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Sun Microsystems and the OpenSolaris community on Wednesday will unveil an upgrade to the open source version of the Solaris Unix OS, OpenSolaris 2008.11. They will also reveal plans to have OpenSolaris running on a line...

SOA modeling language readied; OMG's SoaML should be published next month as a UML profile.
December 10, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill SoaML (Service oriented architecture Modeling Language), an OMG specification tailored for SOA development, is anticipated for release probably next month, an OMG official said on Wednesday. Goals of SoaML are to...

No Java, Flash for iPhone this Christmas; The popular application deployment platforms remain shut out of Apple's celebrated mobile device.
December 11, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill There is still a little time left, but it doesn't look like Apple iPhone users will see Adobe Systems and Sun Microsystems get Flash and Java up and running on Apple's handheld device by Christmas. Although both Sun...

Red Hat, Intel, Aptana, JetBrains boost developer wares; Software development efforts range from Google Web Toolkit support to Language Oriented Programming.
December 11, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Red Hat, Intel, Aptana, and JetBrains are unveiling various software development efforts this week, ranging from support for the Google Web Toolkit (GWT) to a PHP IDE and a Language-Oriented Programming environment. ...

Test Center review: Adobe AIR soars to loftier heights; Version 1.5 of Adobe's cross-platform, desktop-integrated RIA framework bolsters the business case with database encryption and sweetens the deal with Flash and speed improvements.
December 11, 2008... Byline: James R. Borck Hot on the heels of Microsoft's Silverlight 2 release, Adobe AIR 1.5 adds impressive new features to the desktop extension of Adobe's Flex RIA (rich Internet application) platform. This is the second update since...

You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz; Match your weekly tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 12, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan Apple battles bugs and pesky lawsuits, the battle over Internet porn gets cartoonish, and Google Chrome ditches its learner's permit and gets the keys to ad's car. Also: Sony finally gets virtual, and surprising...

You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz; Match your weekly tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 15, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan Apple battles bugs and pesky lawsuits, the battle over Internet porn gets cartoonish, and Google Chrome ditches its learner's permit and gets the keys to ad's car. Also: Sony finally gets virtual, and surprising...

The 7 deadly sins of IT management; Beware these common IT transgressions before you inadvertently sabotage your company's tech agenda.
December 15, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan Let the IT manager who is without sin cast the first stone. OK, we're still waiting. Odds are, you've committed some venal sins at work -- if not mortal ones. Whether it's falling prey to gadget lust, hoarding...

Microsoft: The Wal-Mart of software; A Microsoft executive argues that company is economical choice during tough times, offering the same high-volume, low-cost arrangement as the retail giant.
December 15, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill At a time of economic uncertainty, Microsoft serves as a Wal-Mart of software, offering high-volume, low-cost products, a Microsoft executive said in an interview. Discussing Microsoft's economic value points and its...

Yahoo bolsters mail app; Integration with third-party sites called a game-changer; company also touts toolbar improvements.
December 15, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Yahoo unveiled on Monday improvements to its Web properties, including customization capabilities for Yahoo Mail and direct integration with third-party sites like Flickr. An advanced Yahoo toolbar also was revealed,...

Test Center preview: Windows Azure Services Platform gives wings to .Net; Microsoft's Community Technology Preview reveals a thoughtfully designed cloud computing architecture where seasoned .Net developers will feel at home.
December 15, 2008... Byline: Martin Heller Microsoft intends its new Windows Azure Services Platform to be a serious cloud computing platform for a broad range of developers and scenarios, from lone developers starting up a new Web-based company on a...

8 signs it's time for new employment; Don't tether yourself to a sinking ship. Here's how to tell if your company's prospects are dwindling.
December 16, 2008... Byline: InfoWorld staff High-profile layoffs in the tech sector have been ramping up as of late, and the sense of a deep freeze ahead for new IT opportunities is mounting. Yet opportunities still remain for IT pros savvy enough to know...

New ways to control your virtual machines; Parallels Desktop and VMware Fusion reveal a future where admins can more easily manage hypervisors and guests remotely.
December 16, 2008... Byline: Phillip J. Windley As virtualization becomes more commonplace, users will want to be able to interact with hypervisors and the guests they host from remote locations and via scripts. Parallels Desktop and VMware Fusion both support...

Windows on the Mac: Parallels vs. VMware Fusion, round 2; Both VMware Fusion 2.0 and Parallels Desktop 4.0 have made strides in bringing the Windows experience to the Mac.
December 16, 2008... Byline: Phillip J. Windley A little more than a year ago, I reviewed VMware's Fusion 1.0 and Parallels Desktop 3.0 to see how they stacked up. Since then, both products have undergone major revisions, so I thought I'd see how this horse...

The tricky math of server virtualization ROI; Virtualization is a good thing, but it's not a slam dunk when it comes to saving money.
December 17, 2008... Byline: Tom Kaneshige Server virtualization is supposed to save buckets of cash, largely from server reduction. After all, consolidating some 20 physical servers to three host servers means less hardware, power and cooling, and management...

Touch-enabled apps made easier; SensAble Technologies' software development kit leverages haptic devices.
December 17, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill SensAble Technologies, provider of haptic devices, applications, and toolkits, is offering OpenHaptics 3.0, a software development kit to simplify touch-enabling of computer applications. New categories of developers...

Road warrior power trip: Mobile workstations worthy of the workstation name; The beefy Dell Precision M6400 and polished HP EliteBook 8730w squeeze high-end graphics and serious horsepower into large but luggable chassis.
December 17, 2008... Byline: Randall C. Kennedy Among desktop computers, the term "workstation" refers to a high-end PC specially equipped for demanding tasks such as CAD/CAM/engineering, software development, audio and video processing, and heavy-duty...

Will Capgemini convince enterprises to trust the cloud? Several tech companies now support Amazon.com's Web services, though at different levels.
December 18, 2008... Byline: Tom Kaneshige Large tech vendors such as Sun Microsystems and Red Hat, small ones like Elastra and RightScale, and even consultancy Capgemini are all clamoring to help big businesses get on Amazon.com's Elastic Compute Cloud...

Google launches Cross-Language Enterprise Search; Cross-language search feature helps users find documents in 34 languages and get translated results back.
December 18, 2008... Byline: Ephraim Schwartz Google launched on Thursday an innovative cross-language search feature that is sure to be welcomed by any global organization. Cross-Language Enterprise Search works only with the Google Enterprise Search...

Linux Foundation names new CTO; Ted Ts'o, known as the first North American developer of the Linux kernel, takes over the post.
December 18, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill The Linux Foundation has selected a new CTO, Ted Ts'o, who has been known as the first North American developer of the Linux kernel, the foundation said on Thursday. Ts'o has served as a foundation fellow and chief...

Sun Web dev effort shifts to Icesoft; Third-party company providing replacement for Project Woodstock AJAX and JSF technology.
December 18, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill With Sun Microsystems having abandoned its Project Woodstock Web application development effort, Icesoft Technologies is picking up the slack. The project, discontinued last month, featured a group of user interface...

You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz; Match your weekly tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 19, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan Steve Jobs sneezes, and the rest of the world takes to bed with pneumonia. That's the way it seemed this week, as rumors real and imaginary swirled over the future of Apple, its savior, and the Macworld Expo. But Apple...

The SiIicon Valley tech celebrity quiz; Do you know as much about the movers and shakers of the tech industry as you think? Find out!
December 19, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan, Gina Smith Bill Gates. Steve Jobs. Bill Hewlett. Philippe Kahn. Marc Andreessen. You know the names from the pantheon of Silicon Valley pioneers who have made the tech industry the exciting soap opera it is. But what...

Microsoft boosts MVC Web app development; Company offers design assistance and readies a release candidate for the alternative to ASP .Net Web Forms.
December 19, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill Microsoft is moving forward on two fronts with its MVC (Model View Controller) software development platform for the Web, providing design assistance and readying a release candidate of the technology. The Microsoft...

You don't know tech: The InfoWorld news quiz; Match your weekly tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 22, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan Steve Jobs sneezes, and the rest of the world takes to bed with pneumonia. That's the way it seemed this week, as rumors real and imaginary swirled over the future of Apple, its savior, and the Macworld Expo. But Apple...

Hold your nose! IT's dirtiest jobs; Somebody's got to do them these tech tasks -- and hopefully that somebody isn't you.
December 22, 2008... Byline: Dan Tynan Working in IT isn't always pretty -- we can't work on the cutting-edge technologies all the time. Some of us have to get dirty -- in some cases, literally. Unfortunately, dirty jobs -- whether you're being chained to...

The Vista follies: Windows' tortured 2008; The successor to XP crashed and burned. But as Windows 7 nears, Microsoft has made Vista less bad.
December 22, 2008... Byline: Galen Gruman Microsoft is used to criticism; after all, it's a standing joke that the third version of any Microsoft software is the first one that works right. But the backlash against Windows Vista in 2008 was unprecedented. The...

Life after tech; Is your job shaky? Considering a career change? Then let these successful IT refugees provide inspiration.
December 22, 2008... Byline: Ephraim Schwartz The constant drumbeat of bad economic news has everyone worried about their jobs. But as several InfoWorld articles have pointed out recently, many are finding the growing pressures of IT work intolerable. Would it...

Need a job? Resume tips for techies; Avoid the common mistakes that torpedo many IT pros' job searches.
December 22, 2008... Byline: Tom Kaneshige Tech resumes are piling up faster than the local landfill. It's more important than ever to have a strong resume that is sure to stand out from the crowd. Unfortunately, techies are notorious for producing resumes as...

Visual Studio, Ruby improvements slated; Microsoft and OMG hash out plans for functionality improvements in their respective products.
December 22, 2008... Byline: Paul Krill In separate developments, Microsoft Windows platform developers and Ruby application builders both should gain functionality improvements with efforts afoot at Microsoft and the OMG (Object Management Group). With...

A year in the clouds; If we had a Trend of the Year award, cloud computing would be the lucky winner, even though what people mean by "cloud computing" remains up for grabs.
December 23, 2008... Byline: Eric Knorr If there was one big trend in 2008 -- and by that we mean the buzz phrase on the lips of every analyst and vendor -- it was cloud computing. As with all new IT trends, levels of adoption were low. But adoption of what,...

The craziest tech stories ever told; There are few jobs as, um, interesting as being in IT. InfoWorld has collected some of the most memorable experiences from the trenches.
December 23, 2008... Byline: Lisa Blackwelder Amid the everyday IT work of keeping businesses humming arise the ingredients that so captivate the techie's work life: the blundering coworker, be they manager, colleague, or contractor, or the problem-solving...

The future of open source; 11 leaders outline the challenges and opportunities ahead.
December 24, 2008... Byline: Jason Snyder There's no question that the open source community is a passionate one -- and one with significant influence on technology directions and options. We're way past the days when people asked if Linux or Apache was safe...

OS shoot-out: Windows vs. Mac OS X vs. Linux; 2008 saw Windows' market share drop to less than 90 percent. Should you switch to Mac or Linux, too?
December 24, 2008... Byline: Galen Gruman The Mac's been on a roll, both due to its highly regarded Mac OS X Leopard operating system and to an unhappy reception for Microsoft's Windows Vista. The result: For the first time in memory, the Mac's market share...

The geek gifts you didn't get for Christmas 2008; Thankful as you are for your presents, the techie in you wasn't quite satisfied. These 10 options may scratch that geek itch.
December 25, 2008... Byline: InfoWorld staff It's hard to be a geek at Christmastime. Sure, there are lots of cool tech toys and gadgets on display on store shelves, and a few may have landed under your tree this year. Perhaps Absolutely Mad: 50 Years of Mad...

Inside the perfect laptop; InfoWorld, with the help of its readers, designs the ideal notebook. Are you drooling yet?
December 25, 2008... Byline: Tom Yager It's fair to say that laptops have gotten boring. For years now, they've offered pretty much the same features and pretty much the same designs. Sure, there have been a few innovations such as Apple's multitouch trackpad,...

The InfoWorld news quiz: The year in review; Match your 2008 tech news wits against our snarky quiz master.
December 26, 2008... Byline: InfoWorld staff What a long, strange year for tech it's been. From Microhoon't to broken atom smashers to further adventures in DRM, InfoWorld quiz master Dan Tynan has been there to test how well you've kept on top of the latest...

Windows Server 2008: Windows also rises; While Vista crashed and burned, Microsoft's new server OS became the upgrade Windows shops can't refuse.
December 26, 2008... Byline: Doug Dineley We suppose it happens in families too, where one twin seems charmed from the start while the other lives under a shadow. Certainly that's the case with Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista, the one almost universally...

What future is in store for Microsoft? Bill Gates has retired, and Windows is at a crossroads. InfoWorld sketches out five paths the software giant may take.
December 29, 2008... Byline: Galen Gruman It's been six months since Bill Gates retired from Microsoft, though he remains an adviser, and the Redmond giant is chugging away as if business were usual. Work continues on Windows 7, Internet Explorer 8, Windows...

The top underreported tech stories of 2008; iPhone 3G, Windows 7, and cloud computing were important, but don't let them overshadow these key stories.
December 29, 2008... Byline: Bill Snyder Did you know that a vicious price war is threatening to upset the wholesale bandwidth market? If you didn't, you might not be prepared when your provider is "de-peered," leaving your Web site as isolated as a tiny...

Windows 7 takes shape; A better Vista is in store for both IT and consumers.
December 30, 2008... Byline: Galen Gruman We all knew it was coming, but now it feels real. With its debut to select developers in November, Windows 7 is no longer just a label but a real OS. And the public beta is expected this spring. Those expecting a...

InfoWorld's guide to the best mobile devices; iPhone? BlackBerry Storm? Windows Mobile? Let us help you decide.
December 30, 2008... Byline: InfoWorld Test Center staff The iPhone started it, but everyone and his brother now seem to have a fancy smartphone on offer. If it's time to join the "mobile 2.0" generation, the InfoWorld Test Center can help you make the right...

How smart are you really when it comes to tech? Do you know as much about IT and business technology as you think? Find out!
December 31, 2008... Byline: InfoWorld Test Center staff These days, being skilled is critical to keeping your tech or IT job, not just to advance. It's hard to know, of course, what you really know. That's where we can help. Perhaps job status is not your...