Computerworld articles from July 2003

Computerworld archives from July 2003

Feds push standards for health care IT: technology to enter public domain, but adoption seen as slow. (Data Exchange).
July 7, 2003... The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services last week announced a pair of initiatives to kickstart development of a standardized electronic medical records system that could be used nationwide. But some top health care companies said it...

Antiterror IT problem isn't technology: lack of funds, turf wars, complacency threaten info-sharing.(and related article )
July 7, 2003... Improvements in IT interoperability and information-sharing at the federal level have reportedly helped foil several recent terrorist plots. But policy barriers, turf wars and a growing sense of complacency in the private sector threaten to...

Far from legacy, but far more challenged. (New Special Report).(Unix vs Linux)(and related article)
July 7, 2003... With Windows and Linux becoming increasingly attractive options in the data center, IT managers have good reason to reassess their Unix strategies IN MAY, United Parcel Service Inc. moved a sendmail messaging application from a...

Unix compensation, skills demand remain strong. (News Special Report).
July 7, 2003... It's a good time to be a Unix technician, so long as you're Currently employed. The weak economy and the bursting of the dot-coin bubble have forced high numbers of Unix professionals into the ranks of the unemployed, especially in places...

With or without the RISC. (Q&A).(with Shane Robinson of HP and Greg Papadopoulos of Sun Microsystems)(Interview)
July 7, 2003... The chief technology officers of HP and Sun discuss their respective Unix strategies in view of their diametrically opposed hardware positions. SHANE ROBISON Chief strategy and technology officer, Hewlett-Packard Co. ROBISON: ...

Microsoft plugs .Net Passport hole. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... Microsoft Corp. said it has patched a security hole in its .Net Passport identity management service that attackers could have used to hijack end-user accounts. The flaw was in a Secret Question feature that aids users who forget their...

i2 delays financial statement again. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... Dallas-based i2 Technologies Inc. missed a target of filing its delayed Form 10-K financial statement for 2002 by the end of June. The struggling vendor of supply chain software, which is revising its results back to 1999 [QuickLink 37514],...

SEC sues, deals with Peregrine. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... The SEC filed a lawsuit charging asset-management software vendor Peregrine Systems Inc. with improperly booking revenue between March 1999 and the end of 2001. The agency also announced a partial settlement under which San Diego-based...

Short takes. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... STORAGENETWORKS INC. in Waltham, Mass., announced that it has completed a planned exit from the managed storage services business....New York-based DICE INC., which operates an IT-oriented online job board, said it has emerged from Chapter 11...

ID management guessing game gets. (News).(Industry Overview)
July 7, 2003... ... "curiouser and curiouser," as Alice once remarked from Wonderland, though not exactly about the varying paths vendors have taken to make end-user identification, provisioning and other functions "simple" for IT. Still, given the radically...

Support ends for Windows NT 4.0 Workstation. (News).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... The extended support phase for Microsoft Corp.'s Windows NT 4.0 Workstation operating system ended last week as expected. So corporate users m need of assistance will now have to rely on the company's self-help online option or seek a custom...

Microsoft Metadirectory services gets new identity: release adds automatic account provisioning, password management. (Identity Management).(now known as Microsoft Identity Integration Server 2003)
July 7, 2003... MICROSOFT Identity Integration Server (MIIS) 2003, which was released to manufacturing last week, is more than just a name change for Microsoft Corp.'s Metadirectory Services software, the company said. MIIS 2003 goes beyond the...

Oracle antitrust probe leaves users in limbo: gives PeopleSoft, J.D. Edwards merger chance to proceed. (News).
July 7, 2003... The U.S. Department of Justice last week requested more information from Oracle Corp. about its proposed takeover of PeopleSoft Inc., putting a roadblock in place that could aid PeopleSoft's effort to fend off Oracle but result in months of...

Sun upgrades Java client software. (Briefs).( Java 2 1.4.2 Standard Edition)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... Sun Microsystems Inc. released Version 1.4.2 of its Java 2 Standard Edition software for client-level application development. The upgrade includes more than 2,400 bug fixes, plus enhancements to the software's Swing graphical user interface...

BMC sells storage software to EMC. (Briefs).(Patrol Storage Manager)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... EMC Corp. will acquire the rights to BMC Software Inc.'s discontinued Patrol Storage Manager technology under a deal announced by the two companies. Hopkinton, Mass.-based EMC said it will support users of the storage management software and...

CA adds wireless tools to Unicenter. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... Computer Associates International Inc. announced four new or upgraded Unicenter network management products, including performance monitoring and troubleshooting tools designed to help users manage wireless LANs. CA said it developed the...

Short takes. (Briefs).
July 7, 2003... MICROSOFT CORP. announced that the release candidate of a Windows Server 2003 version for small-business users is now available for testing.... Reston, Va.-based NEXTEL COMMUNICATIONS INC. submitted a high bid of $144 million during an auction...

Sources say IBM to drop Windows-based storage: Linux-based file server is expected to replace TotalStorage NAS devices. (News).(IBM TotalStorage NAS 100 and NAS 200)(and related article)
July 7, 2003... IBM PLANS to discontinue its line of Windows-based network-attached storage (NAS) devices in order to focus on higher-end products, including a file server that's expected to run Linux, sources said last week. The sources said IBM has told...

Shareholders to drag EDS into court: allegations about false financial statements surface. (News).
July 7, 2003... Lawyers representing shareholders in Electronic Data Systems Corp. today plan to file a class-action lawsuit against the company, alleging that it artificially inflated its stock price with misleading financial reporting statements. In...

Cyber rights overdue. (Opinion).(Editorial)
July 7, 2003... EVERY TIME some new business regulation comes up, a mob of people materializes, decrying the impacts it will have on companies. It will cost huge sums of money! It will put people out of work! Entire industries will collapse! The sky will fall...

Celebrate IT. (Opinion).(Editorial)(Industry Overview)
July 7, 2003... WHAT'S GREAT about IT? In today's tough economic climate, in which IT has been especially hard-hit, this may seem like a strange question. We see bad news almost everywhere we turn: layoffs, stagnant IT budgets, reduced opportunities and...

Imagining IT's future. (Opinion).(Brief Article)(Editorial)
July 7, 2003... VISITORS FROM another planet scouting the state of IT today might report back to their superiors that Earth's technology industry is very sick and probably dying. The extraterrestrial analysts might be misled by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison's...

Readers' letters. (Opinion).(Letter to the Editor)
July 7, 2003... Buying No Panacea I ENJOYED Steve Ulfelder's article ["Buy! No, Build!" QuickLink 38533], taking comfort in knowing that we're not the only ones debating this issue. The city of Olympia instituted the practice of buying rather than...

Laptops for the long haul: Intel's new CPU delivers extended battery life in Centrino notebooks. (Hands on Reviews).(and related article)(Hardware Review)(Product/Service Evaluation)
July 7, 2003... THE BIGGEST problem with laptop computers has always been too-short battery life. Sure, it has improved over the years, and you could always carry an extra (heavy and expensive) battery, but having enough power to last through a coast-to-coast...

Sticking to policy at OneBeacon: the insurance company uses a Web-based policy administrator to put its IT house in order. (Case Study).
July 7, 2003... TWO YEARS AGO, OneBeacon Insurance Group was bleeding out $50 million a month from inefficiencies throughout the company, including an IT department rife with cost overruns, poor accountability and poor communication with the business side of...

Call centers build on IP: IP telephony is bringing new flexibility to the call center. (Technology).(and related article)(Industry Overview)
July 7, 2003... WITH IP TELEPHONY just starting to gain a foothold in many organizations, it's not surprising that research firm McGee-Smith Analytics in Pittstown, N.J., estimates that just 1% of the 80,000 call centers in the U.S. today are using...

Mumu worm makes a mess: a worm leaves its mark-and exposes security deficiencies at remote offices. (Security Manager's Journal).(and related article)
July 7, 2003... SOMETIMES in a large organization that has offices all over the world and only a small IT security staff, it takes a significant event to reveal security failures in remote offices. This is exactly what happened this week. Until now, it has...

Red Hat Linux now supports Itanium 2. (Briefs).
July 7, 2003... Red Hat Inc. is selling new versions of its Enterprise Linux AS and WS server operating systems that will run on Intel Itanium 2 processors. The operating systems are available now, according to Raleigh, N.C.-based Red Hat. Servers equipped...

DYS releases new Collaboration suite. (Briefs).(Collaboration Control)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... DYS Analytics Inc. has released its Collaboration Control performance management suite, which is available for IBM Lotus Instant Messaging and Web Conferencing, formerly known as Same-time. Collaboration Control provides real-time availability...

Serena builds in support for Solaris. (Briefs).(TeamTrack 5.8)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... Serena Software Inc. in San Mateo, Calif., last week announced general availability of TeamTrack 5.8, the latest release of the process management tool it acquired last month from Colorado Springs-based TeamShare Inc. The tool now supports Sun...

LANDesk adds patch management. (Briefs).(LANDesk Management Suite 7.0)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... LANDesk Software Inc. in South Jordan, Utah, last week announced a patch management product to integrate with its LANDesk Management Suite, which will ship in the fourth quarter. Pricing wasn't disclosed, but LANDesk Management Suite Version 7...

Era of expansion ends: time for restructuring. (Technology).(Industry Overview)
July 7, 2003... WE ARE AT THE END OF AN ERA in which the objective for IT managers was to acquire as many IT resources as possible. From now on, we'll have to squeeze as much value out of IT budgets as rapid restructuring will allow. In the past 20 years,...

With turnover rates at an all-time low, these companies make sure the people they hire will fit the company culture for a long time to come. (Match Makers).
July 7, 2003... WHEN JOB SEEKERS sit down for an interview with John Golden, chief technology officer at CNA Insurance Co., he sometimes hits them with this question: "You're stuck in traffic. What do you do?" Some candidates say they would grab their...

IT does so matter!: A panel of big thinkers rebuts Nicholas G. Carr's assertion that IT has lost its strategic edge. (Management).(Interview)
July 7, 2003... Our recent interview with Nicholas G. Carr about his article in the May issue of Harvard Business Review caused an uproar in IT circles. His thesis, that IT has become a commodity that no longer provides strategic advantage, was so passionately...

Piecing it all together. (Management).(using enterprise application integration)(and related article)
July 7, 2003... These IT managers are pleased with the business results of their high-priority EAI projects that began a year ago. A YEAR AFTER Steve Kaufman and his staff at Goshen, Ind. based health care insurer Mennonite Mutual Aid Association (MMAA)...

Feds start bank system overhaul. (Briefs).(contract with Unisys)(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Reserve Board awarded a 10-year, $39 million contract to Unisys Corp. in McLean, Va., and its development team to overhaul the system federal...

EDS wins $27m contract-labor deal. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... Electronic Data Systems Corp. and World Wide Technology Inc. (WWT) in St. Louis announced a five-year, $27 million contract under which EDS Procurement Services, a unit of EDS Business Process Services, will provide WWT with a managed process...

Kanbay, Household sign $65m SLA. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 7, 2003... Consumer finance firm Household International Inc. in Prospect Heights, Ill., has signed a four-year, $65 million service-level agreement (SLA) with Kanbay Inc., a global integration and managed solutions company in Rosemont, Ill. Kanbay and...

Use 'real options' to assess IT options. (Management).(Industry Overview)
July 7, 2003... WALL STREET invented stock call options to give investors a powerful risk-hedging technique. Like a sorcerer's crystal ball, options provide visibility into the future economic effect of a pending investment decision before the full investment...

IT careers: e-tailers give away network to build future. (Advertising Supplement).(Industry Overview)(Advertisement)
July 7, 2003... The shakeout over the past two years of start up e-tailers left a trail of dead companies and ideas. The survivors, however, are proving their mettle and have much bigger plans, including changing the way consumers look at their buying power....

Required management. (The Back Page).
July 7, 2003... I CALLED BRUCE BARTON because I wanted to know something about requirements management. Barton is a systems engineer who has been using requirements management software for years. He says he can't imagine doing development without it. What real...

Users--can't live with 'em. (The Back Page).
July 7, 2003... This user is having trouble installing the latest update far an in-house application, so she calls support pilot fish. "I remember that I had problems last time," she tells fish. "So this time, to make sure I didn't mess anything up. I deleted...

Rapid-reporting mandate adds to compliance woes: companies need systems overhauls to meet Sarbanes-Oxley's 'material events' requirement.(and related article )
July 14, 2003... Most companies that have taken steps to comply with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act have focused their energies on Section 404, a provision that requires businesses to document their financial-reporting controls and procedures. But most IT managers...

Feds ponder MCI's future: despite settlement, carrier could lose government contracts. (Worldcom Fallout).
July 14, 2003... WorldCom Inc. may have overcome its problems with the Securities and Exchange Commission, but its political battles on capitol Hill and throughout the halls of government are just beginning. A U.S. District Court last week approved the...

Businesses see Wi-Fias potential lure: restaurants, hotels wooing customers with wireless access.
July 14, 2003... As public-access Wi-Fi "hot spots" percolate out of coffee shops and into the wider world of hotels, fast-food chains and other locations, many companies are starting to view the wireless technology as an essential amenity for attracting...

Sun confirms Unix deal with SCO. (At Deadline).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Sun Microsystems Inc. confirmed that it has signed an expanded Unix technology licensing deal with The SCO Group Inc., which earlier this year filed suit against IBM for allegedly incorporating patented Unix code into Linux. Sun and Lindon,...

And offers HP migration program. (At Deadline).(Sun Microsystems)(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... In other Sun news, the company said it plans to announce next week a server migration program aimed at users of Hewlett-Packard Co.'s Tru64 Unix operating system. The HP Away offering will include discounts aimed at enticing users running Tru64...

Peregrine creditors agree on revamp. (At Deadline).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Peregrine Systems Inc., a San Diego-based vendor of asset management software, said it has reached agreement with its creditors and shareholders on a financial reorganization plan. Peregrine, which had to amend its original plan after some...

Oracle readying database upgrade. (At Deadline).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Oracle Corp. said it's beta-testing a database upgrade and plans to announce the software in September at its Oracle World conference in San Francisco. The new version, which is being referred to as Oracle10i for now, will include new database...

Peoplesoft users fear forced database move: doubts linger, despite Oracle's promise that it won't require use of its software. (News).
July 14, 2003... SOME PEOPLESOFT users last week said they fear that in addition to putting their business application investments at risk, Oracle Corp.'s $6.3 billion bid to buy PeopleSoft Inc. could force them to migrate to Oracle's database. Oracle...

IBM expands Linux support in WebSphere: company uses scalability bait to lure Sun defectors. (News).
July 14, 2003... IBM announced last week that its WebSphere Application Server for the first time will run on Linux on its pSeries and iSeries hardware with its Power4 microprocessor. WebSphere already ran on IBM's Linux-based xSeries servers with Intel...

IBM takes aim at automating privacy enforcement: new language goes beyond compliance. (News).(IBM's XML-based Enterprise Privacy Authorization Language (EPAL))
July 14, 2003... A new programming language announced by IBM last week promises to help companies automate the enforcement of corporate privacy policies. IBM's XML-based Enterprise Privacy Authorization Language (EPAL) can be used to build privacy-related...

EMC to buy Legato as part of storage software push: its latest acquisition continues plan to diversify revenue. (News).(and related article )
July 14, 2003... EMC Corp. last week announced a planned acquisition of storage software vendor Legato Systems Inc. that's intended to boost its presence in the data backup market and help it offer an integrated set of tools for managing the entire life cycle...

Microsoft revamps stock awards plan. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Microsoft Corp. said "a significant portion" of the stock-based compensation awarded to more than 600 of its top managers will now be based on improvements in customer-satisfaction rates as well as growth of the company's user base. The new...

Patches issued for new Windows hole. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... In other Microsoft news, the company issued patches for a security hole that affects all supported versions of Windows and could be used by attackers to run malicious code on unprotected systems. The problem involves a buffer-overrun...

Dell offers PC security service. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Dell Computer Corp. announced an optional service under which it will implement security benchmarks developed by the Bethesda, Md.-based Center for Internet Security on the PCs it sells. Dell will activate more than 50 security settings in...

Oracle Corp. (Short Takes).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... ORACLE CORP. said it plans to more than double the number of software developers and customer service workers it has in India, to 6,000-plus employees.

Information Builders Inc. (Short Takes).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... New York-based INFORMATION BUILDERS INC. released a mainframe Linux version of its WebFocus business-intelligence software.

Open-source spells doom for Oracle, DB2. (On the Mark).
July 14, 2003... Sybase and other general-purpose databases, predicts Tim O'Reilly. "MySQL might do to databases what Apache did for Web serving," says the president of technical book publisher and conference organizer O'Reilly & Associates Inc. in Sebastopol,...

IBM shifts life-cycle management focus. (News).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... IBM will launch by year's end bundled Express versions of its product life-cycle management (PLM) software as part of a recently announced campaign targeting small and midsize manufacturing companies. Under the first phase of the...

Unisys tunes JVM for ES7000: provides Unix alternative by enabling Java applications to run on Datacenter. (News).
July 14, 2003... UNISYS CORP. today is making available a Java virtual machine (JVM) that it has specially tuned for its 32-processor ES7000 system running Microsoft Corp.'s high-end Windows Datacenter server operating system. The Blue Bell, Pa.-based...

Group led by IBM Microsoft releases user identity spec: must converge with user-backed Liberty Alliance's work. (News).(and related article )
July 14, 2003... The fifth of seven parts of a Web services security plan drawn up 15 months ago by IBM and Microsoft Corp. emerged last week. But it will have to be reconciled with work already done by the user-backed Liberty Alliance Project. The newest...

Software market hit by purchasing delays: while vendors' financials fall short, users benefit from tough sales climate. (IT Spending).(Industry Overview)
July 14, 2003... CITING PURCHASING delays stemming from the troubled economy, quite a few software vendors are already warning that the numbers will be grim when they release their financial results later this month for the quarter that ended June 30. ...

House cuts Pentagon's IT budget: lawmakers cite lack of oversight. (News).
July 14, 2003... The U.S. House of Representatives last week passed a defense spending bill that, if approved by the Senate, would significantly reduce investment in technology that's key to the U.S. Department of Defense's so-called transformation effort. ...

HP agrees to buy security software. (Briefs).(from Baltimore Technologies)(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Hewlett-Packard Co. said it has agreed to buy Web-based user identity management software from Baltimore Technologies PLC in Hemel Hempstead, England. HP will pay about $13.6 million in cash for the SelectAccess technology, according to...

Symbol's chairman steps down. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Symbol Technologies Inc. said Jerome Swartz has resigned as chairman and chief scientist of the Holtsville, N.Y.-based company, which is being investigated for accounting violations by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S....

While two top execs exit Proxim. (Briefs).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Proxim Corp., a Sunnyvale, Calif.-based maker of wireless LAN equipment, announced that Chairman Jonathan Zakin and Vice Chairman David King will both resign from its board and give up their positions as corporate officers. Proxim also said...

Avaya Inc. (Short Takes).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... Thomas Lesica was named group vice president of global IT and business operations at AVAVA INC. in Basking Ridge, N.J.

Intel Corp. (Short Takes).(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... INTEL CORP. said it has acquired WEST BAY SEMICONDUCTOR INC., a Vancouver, British Columbia-based maker of optical networking chips.

CA event to focus on security, on-demand technologies: software vendor expected to announce release of security portal at conference. (CA World).
July 14, 2003... As it tries to cope with the continuing lull in IT spending, Computer Associates International Inc. is expected to make big pushes on security and on-demand computing technology at its annual user conference this week. Among the...

Hotel goes wireless with voice/data IP net: uses new SIP standard to offer voice and text messaging via wireless phones. (News).(Hotel Commonwealth in Boston)
July 14, 2003... HOTEL Commonwealth in Boston opened last month with an IP network infrastructure that supports voice and text messaging to in hotel wireless phones and other interactive applications for guests, all relying on the Session Initiation Protocol...

Dog days of Unix? (Opinion).(Editorial)
July 14, 2003... THE FORTUNES and misfortunes of Unix have always fascinated me, and honestly, I consider this something of a personal problem. Like voting for Democrats or trying to house-train a dachshund (both clearly wasted efforts). I trace my Unix...

Microsoft, lead the spam war! (Opinion).
July 14, 2003... MIX INDEPENDENT, trusted authorities with best practices, authorize them to mediate disputes, add in a negligible dose of government interference, and what do you have? The technology industry's get-tough policy on a pernicious problem:...

Consolidation claims lead to FUD. (Opinion).(Editorial)(Column)
July 14, 2003... IN MY COLUMN last month [QuickLink 38788], I argued that a simple trip to the dictionary should be enough to remind us that IT isn't a mature industry; no matter how fashionable it has become to claim otherwise. Similarly, much of the rationale...

Readers' Letters.(Letter to the Editor)
July 14, 2003... Security risk is a phantom menace. IT'S SAD to see IT and security managers struggling to measure and manage security risk ["IT Managers See Need for Risk Metrics," QuickLink 38973]. I have conducted research for 35 years. interviewing...

Editor's note.
July 14, 2003... RISK IS EVERYWHERE. Just stepping out your front door in the morning involves some risk. So does staying inside with the furniture. As author Bill Bryson points out, government figures show that more than 400,000 people in the U.S. are...

The story so far: an all-too-successful computer experiment eventually spawns the antivirus software industry. (Knowledge Center Security).(and related article)
July 14, 2003... FRED COHEN ALREADY knew about worms, Trojan horses and hackers in November 1983. But as a graduate student participating in a weekly seminar on computer security, Cohen was interested in a new class of security threats: a program that...

65 tips from security pros. (Special Report).
July 14, 2003... Know Thy Users With the right identity management system, you can save money make users happy and improve your IT security. Woe to those who ignore it. YOU'VE GOT thousands of employees tapping into a dozen internal enterprise...

Snapshots.(Brief Article)
July 14, 2003... SNAPSHOTS Does your company currently have a business continuity plan? More than one-third of the chief financial officers who responded to a recent poll said they don't have a business continuity plan to recover from disasters. ...

Feeling insecure.
July 14, 2003... THE FIRST TIME MY NAME got me into trouble was in high school. A football player heard that I had taken his girlfriend out on a date, and rumor had it he was "gonna pound" me. When I met the big fella, it took a lot of time and people to...

The Almance: an eclectic collection of research and resources. (Knowledge Center Security).
July 14, 2003... Spyware Bats: They're Everywhere Some of them are innocuous, just tracking Web site visits. But "spyware bots" -- software modules deposited onto a PC without the user's knowledge -- are the truest form of Trojan horses, says Jim Hurley,...

Buffer overflow. (Quick Study).
July 14, 2003... DEFINITION A buffer overflow occurs when a computer program attempts to stuff more data into a buffer (a defined temporary storage area) than it can hold. The excess data bits then overwrite valid data and can even be interpreted as...

The next chapter: a web services security breach will wreck the supply chain. And stolen fingerprints or eye scans will thwart biometric systems. (Predictions).(Industry Overview)
July 14, 2003... * BYE-BYE INCOMPETENTS The fakers, charlatans and incompetents will be purged from the IT security industry. In three years, 40% of the current gaggle of alleged security professionals will leave the industry -- some to other professions,...

Lack of licensing revives criticism of settlement: Microsoft's terms draw DOJ's concern.
July 14, 2003... A KEY PROVISION of the U.S. settlement with Microsoft Corp., the licensing of server interoperability protocols, has attracted scant interest from vendors. And that has brought renewed criticism of the settlement, which was announced nearly two...