Computerworld articles from February 2008

Computerworld archives from February 2008

Entitled to nothing.(Editorial)
February 4, 2008... IT'S SOMETHING that has intrigued me for years. I can't remember the last time I spoke with an IT executive who didn't list recruiting and retaining workers as one of his top five biggest headaches. And yet we can't write about those concerns...

Tired of lame quotes.(Letter to the editor)
February 4, 2008... Security expert Roger Thompson is quoted in the article "Flash Attack Could Take Over Your Router" [Computerworld.com, Jan. 15] as noting that online criminals haven't started using the Flash/UPnP attack. He may be correct, but since a negative...

Reading intent.(Letter to the editor)
February 4, 2008... I just read Don Tennant's Jan. 14 Editor's Note, "Crossing the Line," in which he decries government intrusions. When I got to the part about determining what people are thinking, I was reminded of a way to do just that. At a dog show in...

IT will 'take head out of sand' on Web 2.0 in 2008.(WEB 2.0)
February 4, 2008... CORPORATE IT managers who have long resisted implementing Web 2.0 technologies such as wikis, blogs and social networks will likely start adding them to their priority lists this year, according to a report released last week by Forrester...

Microsoft says SQL Server 2008 needs more time.(DATABASES)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... MICROSOFT CORP. isn't sticking to its release schedule for SQL Server 2008 after all. The company made timely shipping of the database upgrade a priority, after it took five years to develop SQL Server 2005. But it has pushed back the release...

Users fear Oracle will drop acquired products.(ENTERPRISE SOFTWARE)(Oracle Applications Users Group)
February 4, 2008... MOST USERS of business applications acquired by Oracle Corp. believe they ultimately will be forced to migrate to Oracle-built software, according to a survey of 449 members of the Oracle Applications Users Group. The survey found that 61%...

Two fiber-optic underwater cables.(Short Takes)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... A ship's anchor ripped two fiber-optic underwater cables in the Mediterranean Sea near Egypt, resulting in Internet traffic delays for some U.S. users trying to link to India and the Middle East. Repairs could take days.

Intel Corp.(Short Takes)(new processor at the International Solid State Circuits Conference in San Francisco)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Intel Corp. this week will offer a detailed look at a new processor at the International Solid State Circuits Conference in San Francisco. According to the conference program, the unnamed low-power 45-nanometer chip is designed for mobile...

Motorola Inc.(Short Takes)(spin off its handset business)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Motorola Inc. has announced that it may spin off its handset business, the weakest part of the wireless giant, which reported a $341 million fourth-quarter loss and recently shook up its management ranks.

Bernard Liautaud.(Short Takes)(resigned as chairman and chief strategy officer of Business Objects SA)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Bernard Liautaud resigned as chairman and chief strategy officer of Business Objects SA, following the close of its sale to SAP AG last month. Liautaud founded the BI vendor in 1990 and was its CEO until 2005.

CIO sells school's mainframe on eBay.(HARDWARE)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... PALM BEACH Community College bought an IBM zSeries mainframe for about a half-million dollars in 2005. Last month, the school agreed to sell it--for $40,000 on eBay. IT systems "depreciate worse than cars," lamented Tony Parziale, CIO at...

Microsoft courts Yahoo to help it fight Google.(INTERNET)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... IN OFFERING $44.6 billion in cash and stock for Yahoo Inc. on Friday, Microsoft Corp. executives openly acknowledged that the software vendor needs help competing against Google Inc. in the search and online advertising markets. "This is a...

Between the lines.(News Digest)(Cartoon)
February 4, 2008... IT managers start thinking about Web 2.0 [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Microsoft Corp.(BENCHMARKS LAST WEEK)(antitrust consent extended)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... A federal judge extended portions of Microsoft Corp.'s antitrust consent decree until November 2009--two years beyond when government oversight of the company had been scheduled to end.

ChoicePoint Inc.(BENCHMARKS LAST WEEK)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... ChoicePoint Inc. said it has agreed to pay $10 million to settle the remaining portions of a class-action lawsuit filed over the data breach it disclosed in early 2005.

Two years ago.(BENCHMARKS LAST WEEK)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... General Motors Corp. awarded IT outsourcing contracts worth a total of about $7 billion to six vendors.

Australia renews push for privacy.(Global Dispatches)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... SYDNEY -- Australian Privacy Commissioner Karen Curtis last week renewed her call that organizations be required to report all data security breaches to her office. In a 786-page submission to the Australian Law Reform Commission, which...

Nokia plans to buy open-source firm.(Global Dispatches)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... ESPOO, FINLAND -- Nokia Corp. has agreed to buy Trolltech ASA, an Oslo-based provider of open-source development tools, for 844 million Norwegian kroner ($155 million U.S.) in cash. Nokia said the acquisition will boost its software...

Briefly noted.(Global Dispatches)(IBM acquires Cognos Inc.)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... European Union regulators late last month agreed to approve IBM's $5 billion (U.S.) acquisition of business intelligence software vendor Cognos Inc. because it "would not give rise to competition concerns." Robert McMillan, IDG News...

Corporate IT warms up to online backup services: major vendors are entering the fray, seeking to address pricing and security concerns.(STORAGE)
February 4, 2008... LARGE BUSINESSES are looking more closely at online backup options as a way to ease systems administration headaches and avoid security concerns linked to physical backup procedures. Analysts said they expect corporate interest in hosted...

Cisco puts server, storage networks on single-switch path: the vendor says its Nexus 7000 switches can support all data center resources on one Ethernet fabric. If it works, it could help users reduce IT costs.(NETWORKING)
February 4, 2008... CISCO SYSTEMS INC. last week broadened its push to play a leading role in the data centers of the future, introducing the first of a planned line of switches for supporting computing, storage and IP networks on a single Ethernet fabric. ...

Mobility onslaught explodes.(On the Mark)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... AT THE Demo '08 conference here, barrages of new mobility tools are being heaved at CIOs from every direction. Behind the attack are clever start-up companies targeting savvy end users, since, as LegiTime Technologies Inc. CEO Eric Strauss...

Ribbit lets you hop between Web, phone.(On the Mark)(SmartSwitch software, Amphibian from Ribbit Corp.)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Mountain View, Calif.-based Ribbit Corp., mentioned here in December when it launched its telco-grade SmartSwitch software, showed a service called Amphibian that lets you hop between your mobile handset and a virtual cell phone on any Web page...

Make mobile Web less like 1995.(On the Mark)(smart phone software, Skyfire)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Nitin Bhandari, CEO of Skyfire Labs Inc., says that using mobile browsers on smart phones is akin to using browsers in 1995: "It's mostly text and very slow." At Demo, he demonstrated his company's eponymous browser, which works with Web sites...

Craig Newmark: the Craigslist founder talks about doing what he's good at, living by shared values and sticking with a simple tool that works.(THE GRILL)(Interview)
February 4, 2008... How did Craigslist happen? The effort started in 1994. I was at Charles Schwab, working on overall security architecture. While I was looking around at the Internet, I saw a lot of people helping each other out and thought that I should do...

5 tips for a leaner, greener desktop: energy efficiency isn't just for the data center. Here's how to cut back on power and expense in the front office.
February 4, 2008... CONCERNED ABOUT soaring energy costs, IT organizations have begun to make significant changes to how their data centers are powered and cooled. But many IT departments haven't yet looked at saving energy throughout the rest of their companies'...

Open source in the data center: it's here, but it's not for everybody.(SOFTWARE)
February 4, 2008... MANY COMPANIES are using Linux, Apache and other open-source software to power Web and file servers, but when it comes to managing the data center, most have held back. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] That hasn't stopped Sabre Holdings Corp., a...

The 5 users from hell: difficult IT customers can drive you crazy--here are some tips on how to deal with them.(MANAGEMENT)
February 4, 2008... AH, TECHNOLOGY USERS! We sure do love them. Why, most of us wouldn't have jobs without them. But that doesn't mean users don't drive IT crazy sometimes, or maybe most of the time. IT customers represent a broad spectrum of personalities and...

Potentially, relief from adminisdribble: just when our manager thought she might drown in unfinished projects, an offer of help appeared. Could this really work?(SECURITY MANAGER'S JOURNAL)(Column)
February 4, 2008... IF YOU'VE read my column a few times, you probably know that I hate what I call "adminisdribble" and that I pretty much wish there were two of me. My clone and I would at least stand a better chance of making headway with the many challenges...

Fixing--or fixing in stone?(OPINION)(Column)
February 4, 2008... TECH PEOPLE are steeped in the ways of problems. It's one of the fundamental organizing principles behind nearly everything we do. We find problems, define them, analyze them and solve them. So it's not surprising that when we move into...

Gimme a break.(Career Watch)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... 24% Percentage of workers who said they play video games during the workday. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] 61% Percentage of those who said they play games during their lunch or other breaks. 14% Percentage of those who...

Les miserables.(Career Watch)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... The "three signs of a miserable job," according to author Patrick Lencioni in his book of that name: [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] ANONYMITY: The feeling that your manager has little interest in you as a human being and knows little about...

Some #@&% academics will study any *$%# thing.(Career Watch)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Network configuration taking longer than you imagined? Go ahead, turn the air blue. That's the advice of Yehuda Baruch, a professor at England's University of East Anglia, who led a study on the use of profanity in the workplace. Swearing can...

Scott Marean: the vice president of IT at brokerage R.J. O'Brien & Associates discusses career aspirations.(Q & A)
February 4, 2008... I have a master's in computer science and work in data communications and networking. Would an MSCE add value to my resume? Certifications never hurt. Very few employers require them, but most look at them as nice to have. If anything, they...

About that long.(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... LAN admin has just returned to his desk in the "geek area" when this desktop support pilot fish notices something. "A few weeks earlier, the LAN group installed a collection of big monitors on the wall," fish says. "The monitors were connected...

Another satisfied customer.(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... This IT pilot fish works for a small county office, and that means his job duties, um, expand as required. "I was sitting at my desk and a member of the public walked in to hand me an old motherboard and a greasy old trackball," says fish. "He...

What's it all about?(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Upset student: "I can't find my instructor's files on the intranet. Where is it?" College computer lab pilot fish: What's the folder name you're trying to access? Student: "The it folder." What? "The it folder!" Sighs fish, "After reading her...

Lifetime repair.(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 4, 2008... Pilot fish gets an off-the-clock call about a friend's wife, whose 2-year-old twins have just stuffed the DVD drive on her husband's laptop full of Yu-Gi-Oh trading cards. "Knowing it would cost a bundle just to have someone look at it, I told...

Fragile Internet.(FRANKLY SPEAKING)(Column)
February 4, 2008... IT'S USUALLY CALLED "backhoe fade." Not this time, though. Last week, two underwater communications cables were accidentally cut near Alexandria, Egypt. Internet service was disrupted throughout the Middle East and North Africa and as far away...

The green pall.(EDITOR'S NOTE)(Editorial)
February 11, 2008... LAST FALL, I had the opportunity to moderate a roundtable discussion in which a group of CIOs and other senior executives gathered to share their ideas, experiences and priorities as corporate IT leaders. To prepare, I interviewed each...

Some guidelines for disaster recovery.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
February 11, 2008... I sympathize with C.J. Kelly: It is very difficult to get people who are already overstretched to consider something they think may never happen ["Planning a Recovery That Isn't a Disaster," Security Manager's Journal, Jan. 21]. She wrote,...

Three HP user groups agree on merger plan.(SERVERS)
February 11, 2008... THREE INDEPENDENT Hewlett-Packard user groups announced last week that they plan to merge into a single organization in an effort to increase their clout with the IT vendor. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The groups, which have a combined...

Dell revamps corporate support model.(HARDWARE)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... DELL INC. last week unveiled a corporate support program that can be customized to provide specific services on a firm schedule. The older support model, which required that users select from a predefined set of services, has been scrapped,...

IBM adds integrated BI bundles after closing acquisition of Cognos.(BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE)
February 11, 2008... LESS THAN a week after completing its $5 billion acquisition of Cognos Inc., IBM announced a set of new product offerings that integrate some of its technologies with the business intelligence vendor's Cognos 8 software. For instance, IBM...

Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.(Short Takes)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, a nonprofit organization that supports research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has filed a lawsuit charging Intel Corp. with using a patented technology in processor architectures, including...

Dell Inc.(Short Takes)(Dell EqualLogic PS5000 Series )(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Dell Inc. announced a new line of EqualLogic PS5000 Series network storage products just five days after completing its $1.4 billion acquisition of EqualLogic Inc. Pricing starts at $19,000.

Transportation Security Administration.(Short Takes)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Less than a week after launching a blog to gather feedback from air travelers, the Transportation Security Administration instructed local TSA teams to stop requiring people to remove all electronics from carry-on bags during screenings....

Mozilla Corp.(Short Takes)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Mozilla Corp. has issued 10 patches for its Firefox browser--three for critical flaws, including one that can be exploited to run arbitrary code on a machine.

Body heat may power new energy-saving chip.(HARDWARE)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... A NEW ENERGY-EFFICIENT chip designed by a research team led by MIT may one day run implantable medical devices using human body heat as an energy source. The new chip design, unveiled last week at the International Solid State Circuits...

IBM Community Grid helps cancer database.(HARDWARE)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... A TEAM OF RESEARCHERS overseen by The Cancer Institute of New Jersey has received a National Institutes of Health grant to expand a database of digital medical images to include patient data from cancer centers around the country. ...

Between the lines.(News Digest)(Cartoon)
February 11, 2008... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Microsoft Corp.(BENCHMARKS LAST WEEK)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Microsoft Corp. released Windows Server 2008 to manufacturing, three weeks before the official launch of the operating system, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008, at a Feb. 27 event in Los Angeles.

Gartner Inc.(BENCHMARKS LAST WEEK)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Gartner Inc. said that 271.2 million PCs were shipped worldwide last year, up 13.4% from the 2006 total. The research firm said Hewlett-Packard Co. was the top vendor, with an 18.2% market share.

Three years ago.(BENCHMARKS LAST WEEK)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... HP's board ousted Carly Fiorina from her job as the company's chairman and CEO.

IBM India raises standards for staff.(Global Dispatches)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... BANGALORE, INDIA -- IBM has implemented new procedures for evaluating its workers in India as part of an effort to improve quality. "We are pioneering new ways for our people to certify their skill levels, as both a validation of their...

Pay for U.K. IT contractors jumps.(Global Dispatches)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... LONDON -- Pay for IT contractors working in the U.K.'s financial services sector has increased 11% over the past six months, according to the Association of Technology Staffing Companies. A survey by the London-based IT recruiting...

Briefly noted.(Global Dispatches)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Grantly Mailes, the former CIO for the state government of South Australia, has joined IBM's global services division in Melbourne. He was replaced in the state government post by Andrew Mills. Mailes had been the state's CIO for three years....

Better Mac management tools weigh in Apple's favor: admin features become more PC-like, removing a roadblock to enterprise Mac use.(HARDWARE)
February 11, 2008... AS A SENIOR technical support analyst at Harcourt Inc., Randy Rowles is happy that he gets to manage the educational publisher's 1,000 or so Macintosh systems. He's perhaps even a little smug about how their stability and ease of use helps...

Users in holding pattern on Vista SP1 because of driver problems: Microsoft released the Vista update to manufacturing--but not to users. That may not be a big deal for most IT execs, though.(WINDOWS)
February 11, 2008... MICROSOFT CORP. didn't win many fans in online discussion forums when it decided last week to delay its first service-pack update for Windows Vista because of compatibility problems with some third-party device drivers. [ILLUSTRATION...

Planning with uncertainty.(On the Mark)(LiquidPlanner)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... PROJECT PLANNING software has proved itself a useful but not particularly precise tool for predicting when a project will come to fruition. That may change with the beta release of LiquidPlanner (free for now), announced here last month at the...

Virtual testing for IT operations.(On the Mark)(StackSafe Test Center)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Most problems that hit smooth-running IT operations occur after a change to the production system. Any change--a security patch, a router configuration shift, an application upgrade. You know that. That's why IT shops often invest in test...

With databases, less is more.(On the Mark)(Info-bright BrightHouse 3.0)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... When you're trying to get at something in a hurry, it helps to know where not to look. That's the theory behind BrightHouse, an analytical data warehouse engine from Info-bright Inc. in Toronto. CEO Miriam Tuerk says BrightHouse digests data...

Edgar Masri: the 3Com CEO talks about the Bain buyout, but the China connection and playing on a field dominated by Cisco.(THE GRILL)(Interview)
February 11, 2008... Edgar Masri rejoined 3Com Corp. in August 2006, after six years at Matrix Partners, a venture capital firm. Prior to that, he had been general manager of 3Com's network systems business unit. Last September, 3Com announced that it is being...

The business of IT: best practices, theories and technologies for managing agility and alignment, collaboration and intelligence, power and networking.
February 11, 2008... Leveraging Information Tapping Business Intelligence Now There's a lot of data out there, but using it wisely is a challenge. Business intelligence (BI) doesn't have to be a pie-in-the-sky, big-bang, strategic project that takes...

Tough times mean tough choices.(OPINION)(Column)
February 11, 2008... GROWTH IN U.S. IT spending is lower than it was even at the depths of the post-Y2k and dot-com bust; it's projected to barely kiss 3% this year. That's not enough to cover salary and benefit increases, much less vendors' maintenance-fee...

Xtreme ROI: four projects with payback that blew the doors off.
February 11, 2008... IT HAS BECOME A CLICHE to talk about IT project cost overruns and blown deadlines. When an IT project achieves a good return on investment, that's news. [??] But particularly in tough economic times, starting a project without knowing whether...

The touch of tech: touch interface technology has been around a long time, but it may be at a tipping point. Move over, keyboard and mouse!(FUTURE WATCH)
February 11, 2008... IS THE WIMP'S dominance about to end? Windows, icons, menus and pointing devices have constituted the main human-computer interface for some 15 years. The keyboard, mouse and display screen may not disappear, but technologies based on human...

Never too soon to think security: every initiative should have a security review early on. Waiting can cost money and cause delays.(SECURITY MANAGER'S JOURNAL)(Column)
February 11, 2008... "EARLY AND often" is my mantra when it comes to considering the security aspects of any new initiative. More often than not, security is an afterthought, and that can cause delays and add costs. It's far better if I'm aware of each initiative...

10 things we hate about laptops: users' favorite tool is IT's support nightmare.(MOBILE & WIRELESS)
February 11, 2008... AT BURLINGTON Northern Santa Fe Railway Co., one laptop was frozen solid (a liquid crystal display is a liquid, after all), another was recovered from the bottom of a creek bed, and another was sliced in half by a train. [ILLUSTRATION...

The pitfalls of social networking.(OPINION)(Editorial)
February 11, 2008... THE USE of social networking is rising dramatically, and its scope has expanded far beyond the personal realm. Politically oriented videos and blogs are being posted to YouTube in an effort to influence primary elections. Even Britain's Queen...

No big rush to offshore.(Career Watch)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Offshore outsourcing may not be the great hollower of IT departments that it has been portrayed to be. A survey conducted last month found that even companies with 1,000 or more employees aren't likely to be offshoring: only 11% of those...

Web manager 2.0.(Career Watch)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... A NEW BREED of Web manager is emerging to replace the traditional webmaster, says Tony Byrne, founder of CMS Watch, an analyst firm in Olney, Md., that evaluates Web content management systems. The title of webmaster--which implies lots of HTML...

Elizabeth Holloran: the product marketing manager at training firm SkillSoft Public Ltd. talks about balancing hard and soft skills.(Q & A)(Interview)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Which certifications are most likely to help IT professionals stay employed? The kinds of certifications that assist an IT professional in getting ahead or getting noticed are those that provide additional knowledge about a particular...

Good news.(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... This organization is six months into a multisite, big-ticket ERP project staffed by consultants and employees at each site. "The small tech team at one site requested a walk-through of the 700-task project plan, to get a better understanding...

Mail call.(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Construction company user complains to pilot fish about intermittent problems retrieving e-mail on his Treo. "Lately, every time I go to my job site, I never receive my e-mail. As soon as I return to the office, e-mail is working again." Do you...

Not superstitious, just careful.(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... When it's upgrade time for this organization's security software, pilot fish downloads the latest version--and begins to get just a little nervous. "Following our naming convention, I used the product initials and the version number: SEP 11,"...

How to tell a ...(TRUE TALES OF IT LIFE)(Brief article)
February 11, 2008... Pilot fish is buttonholed at a party by an acquaintance who has just launched his own IT consulting company. "He was sure that if we stood side by side for a job, he would win hands down," fish says. "My almost 30 years in IT without finishing...

Gone wrong.(FRANKLY SPEAKING)
February 11, 2008... THE MESS at Societe Generale is still unraveling. The big French bank took a $7 billion loss last month because of a rogue trader, and government investigators are continuing to spot new problems in the bank's story that it was all the fault of...

The main stem.(EDITOR'S NOTE)(green information technology)(Editorial)
February 18, 2008... IN MY Editor's Note last week, I wrote about what I called the "green pall" that has settled over the IT community. I explained that the pall stems from a backlash to the frenzy that the green IT topic is creating, and I stressed that the...

A PM framework for disaster recovery.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
February 18, 2008... Crises can be managed using project management processes ["Planning a Recovery That Isn't a Disaster," Security Manager's Journal, Jan. 21]. This understanding can help provide a framework for staffers to work through the complexities of...

Iran's engineers.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
February 18, 2008... We're not the problem, as Don Tennant had it in his Dec. 17 Editor's Note, "They Were Like Us." Iran's political and religious leaders are the ones perpetuating the "darkness" by not agreeing to the world community's demands on many issues,...

Microsoft-Yahoo could help consumers.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
February 18, 2008... There are some analysts in Washington who take a different stance than the folks at EPIC ["Would a Microsoft-Yahoo Deal Out-Google Google?" Computerworld.com, Feb. 1]. The acquisition could prove to be great for consumers. Microsoft-Yahoo would...

Salary cuts prompt online protest by IBM tech workers.(CAREERS)
February 18, 2008... LABOR PROTESTS by IT workers are rare, but IBM is in the midst of one that is unfolding entirely online. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Instead of waving protest signs outside company gates, some of the IBM employees affected by a 15% salary...

Forrester cuts IT spending forecast--again.(DATA CENTER)(Brief article)(Statistical data)
February 18, 2008... THE DECLININO U.S. economy has moved Forrester Research Inc. to lower its expectations for 2008 U.S. and global IT spending for the second time in less than two months. In a report released last week, the research firm predicted that U.S....