Computer Weekly articles from May 2008

Computer Weekly archives from May 2008

News.(trends in medical informatics)
May 20, 2008... "There is no point in informatics trying to enable a change in one direction when budgets are encouraging maintenance of the status quo," said Sheila Bullas, secretary of the BCS's Health Informatics Forum, at a recent BCS leadership debate on...

News.(Alfresco Software's Alfresco Enterprise 2.2)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Alfresco Software has launched the latest version of its open source enterprise content management system. Alfresco Enterprise 2.2 is particularly aimed at supporting Web 2.0 properties and online communities. New feature enhancements...

News.(Hewlett-Packard Co's to acquire Electronic Data Systems Corp.)
May 20, 2008... Warwick Ashford warwick.ashford@rbi.co.uk End-users could be the big winners following Hewlett-Packard's announcement that it is to acquire outsourcing company EDS for [pounds sterling]7.13bn. The deal is widely seen as a bid by...

News.(British Computer Society lists sucessful government information technology projects)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... The British Computer Society (BCS) is seeking to overturn the negative image of government IT projects by listing top-ranking projects "that have demonstrated success". The BCS has published a booklet called Success - Public Projects can...

News.(Birmingham City Council's unpaid invoices )
May 20, 2008... Tony Collins tony.collins@rbi.co.uk Birmingham City Council - Europe's largest local authority with a [pounds sterling]3bn annual turnover - says it has about 10,000 unpaid invoices from its suppliers "stuck" in a SAP-based financial...

News.(British Gas sues Accenture because of customer billing system )(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... British Gas is suing Accenture for [pounds sterling]182m over problems with a customer billing system it says has severely impacted on customer service operations. The energy company employed Accenture in 2001 to design and implement the...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... HP is considering buying IT outsourcing firm EDS for as much as [pounds sterling]6.5bn, according to The Wall Street Journal. HP wants to expand its services business, and EDS has struggled of late to deliver good returns on some major US...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Google is countering European privacy laws over its forthcoming Street View service by blurring the faces of people caught by its cameras, reports the Guardian. Street View is expected to launch in Europe later this year, and adds...

News.(acquisitions)
May 20, 2008... Hewlett-Packard (HP) has confirmed it is to acquire IT services company EDS for [pounds sterling]7.13bn in a deal that is expected to be finalised in the second half of the year. It is understood that it will be business as usual until then...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... The UK technology industry is at a pivotal point, according to a report by industry association Intellect. The Intellect President's Report 2008 shows the sector is thriving despite the current economic crunch, but warns this is no time...

News.(Survey)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Three-quarters of IT professionals would recommend an IT career to their children, a survey has shown. Despite the current financial climate, IT professionals are positive about the technology industry and their immediate future in it,...

News.
May 20, 2008... This is a strong report by the NAO - factual and clear. There have been some achievements - the NPfIT has improved the profile, importance and training of IT staff in the NHS. It has made IT and its potential benefits a talking point at board...

News.
May 20, 2008... Plans for the NHS's national IT scheme are feasible - but the main software is running four years behind, and may not be fully rolled out until 2015, according to a report published today by the National Audit Office. Angela Hands, one of...

News.(Aviva Insurance Group signs outsourcing contract with Cable and Wireless)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Aviva Insurance Group, which owns Norwich Union, has signed a six-year IT outsourcing contract worth [pounds sterling]300m with Cable and Wireless. The company will provide 72 separate services, including voice telephony, data, local and...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... UK IT managers must develop a set of standards that foreign IT workers must adhere to when taking on offshored work if they are to enforce acceptable conduct, according to analyst Gartner. Partha Iyengar, analyst at Gartner, said IT...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... The Sun has reported on a potential security breach with the "Choose and Book" system - part of the NHS's National Programme for IT [NPfIT] - at a GP practice at Essex. The paper has an editorial piece about the potential breach under the...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... The police agency that fights e-crime in the UK has prevented the loss of millions of pounds by breaking up a group trading in stolen bank, credit card and identity information. The second annual report on development and effectiveness of...

News.(Gartner Inc)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Gartner Disruptive Technologies: Social networking and mash-ups top list Social networking technologies and the use of web mash-ups are among the top 10 disruptive technologies that will make headway in enterprises in the next four years,...

News.(Venters Solicitors)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Legal aid firm Venters Solicitors has saved [pounds sterling]50,000 in 12 months by implementing digital dictation workflow software. The firm said the savings equate to more than [pounds sterling]3,000 for each fee-earner per year because...

News.(Enterprise 2.0 technologies)
May 20, 2008... Businesses can leap ahead of their competitors by combining social networking and customer relationship management to help them develop innovative products, research firm Gartner has said. The opportunity for social software in enterprise...

News.(Information Commissioner's Office can impose fines on organizations that lose personal data)
May 20, 2008... Warwick Ashford warwick.ashford@rbi.co.uk The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has been granted new powers to impose fines on organisations that lose personal data, following the amendment of the Criminal Justice and Immigration...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Facial recognition technology has been tested in convenience stores to help stop children buying alcohol and cigarettes. The system has been developed for use in convenience stores at the point of sale to capture facial measurements that...

News.
May 20, 2008... Businesses are deploying mobile working technologies, but are failing to measure the impact they have on the productivity of mobile workers, said analyst firm Gartner. The result is that IT projects aimed at improving the efficiency of...

News.(Perot Systems Corp.)(Original Solutions)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Perot Systems has acquired Irish IT services firm Original Solutions. Based in Limerick and Dublin, Original Solutions employs 90 people and had sales of [pounds sterling]7.2m last year. Peter Altabef, CEO of Perot Systems, said, "With...

News.
May 20, 2008... The datacentre is the heart of the organisation. The network provides the arteries and the veins that distribute vital information to the various parts of the corporate body, but it is the datacentre that keeps pumping it out. Keeping the heart...

News.
May 20, 2008... Careers in the datacentre Liz Warren Working in a datacentre may not sound like the most glamorous corner of IT, but for staff who like to work in a close-knit team using the latest technologies and who can handle occasional periods of...

News.
May 20, 2008... Manufacturing and engineering companies have historically invested little in IT. However, companies that have survived the repeated recessions and downturns are now investing heavily, says Ian McKeand, a director at recruitment consultancy...

News.(resignation of Mark Bullock from Heathrow Airport Ltd.)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... The managing director of Heathrow airport has become the first management casualty at airport-owner BAA after the troubled Terminal 5 opening in March, the company announced yesterday. BAA said Mark Bullock, managing director since 2004,...

News.(BASF IT Services takes over management of BASF North America )(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... BASF IT Services in Germany is taking over the management of SAP systems of BASF North America to save the group money. BASF IT Services will host and manage the systems at its Ludwigshafen datacentres. Andrew Pike, head of information...

News.(British Telecommunications PLC)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Customer service to BT's business clients is likely to be hit as just under 14,000 BT managers vote on industrial action over pay, the Connect union said today (Thursday). The company, the largest network service provider for central...

News.(BT Group PLC)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... BT has posted another poor set of results, reporting flat pre-tax profits for the year and a tiny increase in sales. Sales crept up by 2% to [pounds sterling]20.7bn and pre-tax profits were [pounds sterling]2.5bn year-on-year. Despite...

News.(Apacs)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... CHAPS Euro clearing system to be switched off today Antony Savvas The Chaps Euro clearing system will close after nine years of service at the end of today (16 May). The system began operation in January 1999, and used the same...

News.(Electronic Data Systems Corp.)(Hewlett-Packard Co.)
May 20, 2008... Although Hewlett-Packard's acquisition of EDS was expected, the premium that HP paid was unexpected, and potentially unwarranted, given EDS's recent track-record and a depressed outsourcing market. This sentiment was reflected in the market's...

News.(young people shops online for inappropriate material)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Young people are bypassing the high street and buying explicit video games, adult DVDs, alcohol and even weapons online. A nationwide survey among 1,000 male and female teenagers aged 13-17 found that young people are consistently buying...

News.(HBOS banking group rolls out software-testing programs across its information technology departments)
May 20, 2008... Karl Flinders karl.flinders@rbi.co.uk The HBOS banking group has rolled out a software-testing programme across three of its four major IT departments to reduce the number of errors in thousands of applications it builds every year....

News.(International Business Machines Corp's research breakthrough in photovoltaics technology)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... IBM has announced a research breakthrough in photovoltaics technology, which could significantly reduce the cost of harnessing the sun's power for electricity. IBM scientists are using a large lens to capture the sun's power, generating a...

News.(Carl Icahn attempts to dispose Yahoo board)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Yahoo activist director Carl Icahn is attempting to depose the Yahoo board over its handling of the failed Microsoft takeover attempt. Icahn wanted Yahoo to strongly consider the Microsoft bid and has now put up ten of his own nominees to...

News.(MySpace wins case against US spammers Sanford Wallace and Walter Rines)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... MySpace has won a record payout of [pounds sterling]117m in the US against spammers on its social network. MySpace won its court case against US spammers Sanford Wallace and Walter Rines. The payout, the largest ever under the CAN-SPAM...

News.(Microsoft Corp.)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Microsoft is to release Office 2007 SP1 via Automatic Update from 16 June. The advance warning from the firm is designed to allow users to prepare for the major automatic upgrade. Users have been able to manually download Office 2007...

News.(agile methodology for software development)
May 20, 2008... Software development managers could reduce the risk of project failure by using an agile methodology to build applications, such as the one being used by Standard Life. The insurer is using an agile approach to build new applications,...

News.(Ask TV Licensing launched)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... TV Licensing, the organisation responsible for collecting UK TV licence revenues, has launched Ask TV Licensing, a new website service that aims to improve its online customer service. Ask TV Licensing, powered by technology from...

News.(Microsoft warns Windows XP users will not be able to change to different versions of the Internet Explorer browser once XP's third service pack installed)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Microsoft has warned Windows XP users they will not be able to change to different versions of the Internet Explorer browser once they install XP's third service pack. The firm says users trying out Internet Explorer 7 will not be able to...

News.(British Airways PLC)
May 20, 2008... British Airways has revealed the full extent of the IT problems that marred Terminal 5's opening on 27 March this year. Written evidence submitted to the Transport Select Committee shows that a myriad of problems struck during the...

News.(Becta refers its interoperability complaint about Microsoft to the European Commission)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Becta, the government's advisory body for IT in schools, has referred its interoperability complaint about Microsoft software to the European Commission. Becta says it welcomes the European Commission's current anti-trust investigation of...

News.(Digital Birmingham)(Birmingham Mail)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... A Birmingham family will soon begin a year-long experiment to demonstrate the difference digital technology can make to everyday life. Digital Birmingham, the organisation charged with ensuring the benefits of digital technologies can be...

News.(dialogue with Bennie Vorster)(Interview)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... BMW is two-thirds of the way through a three-year green IT programme to improve the efficiency of its datacentres and desktop IT systems. In a podcast interview with Computer Weekly, Bennie Vorster, vice-president of the BMW group, said,...

News.(BMW AG)(Intel Corp.)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Cliff Saran cliff.saran@rbi.co.uk Luxury car maker BMW has developed a prototype in-car PC with Intel that could become standard in the automotive industry. The company has worked for two years with the chip maker to develop a...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Prime Minister Gordon Brown this week proposed a law that will mean communications companies will have to keep logs of internet usage and make this information available to the police. This follows similar laws concerning telephone data. If...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Fujitsu has announced 150 new jobs in Northern Ireland to establish its Applications Services Centre of Excellence. The site will be based at Timber Quay site in Londonderry where the majority of the jobs will be based. There will be 130...

News.(computer hackers target Grand Theft Auto IV )(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Computer hackers have targeted Grand Theft Auto IV to spread destructive viruses across the web. The cybercriminals are tempting fans by illegally offering free downloads for bogus versions of the hit game for their PCs. John Safa,...

News.
May 20, 2008... The European Court of Human Rights' introduction of an ITIL-based IT helpdesk system has enabled it to both improve efficiency and target its resources more effectively. The Strasbourg-based organisation's IT department completed the...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... The One Laptop per Child project will now load Windows onto its cheap XO machines, as an alternative to Linux. The aim of the non-profit project is deliver [pounds sterling]50 laptops to poor countries. Trials of Windows machines in...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Lloyds TSB is offshoring as many as 450 extra UK IT jobs from the Technical Delivery part of its IT division to India. The move puts 250 permanent workers at risk of redundancy. The bank has said that it wants to utilise the skills of...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Nationwide Building Society has chosen EDM Group's hosted Scan on Demand business system for flexible access to archived customer data. Managing 2.5 million customer files (200 million pages of paper) and more than 1 million microfiche (40...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... The majority of broadband users would leave their ISP if it adopted the controversial Phorm targeted advertising system, a study has revealed. A poll of 1,090 readers of the ISPreview.co.uk site revealed that 57% of them would leave their...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... UK software piracy rates have dropped for the first time in three years, reports the Business Software Alliance. The Alliance says software piracy is down to 26% in the UK, going by research it had commissioned from analyst IDC. This...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Rackspace Hosting, a provider of IT hosting services, has built a green data centre, which will be powered by renewable energy sources. The data centre, in Slough, Berkshire, will draw power from a local combined heat and power plant that...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... A security researcher has developed malicious rootkit software for all Cisco routers. Sebastian Muniz, a researcher with penetration testing firm Core Security Technologies, has developed the software, and will demonstrate it at next...

News.(appointment of Angela Morrison )(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Sainsbury's has promoted IT director Angela Morrison to its operational board. Morrison joins an expanded operational board along with three others from other areas of the business. The operational board will now consist of 12 directors....

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Google allows website owners to add social networking to their sites Google has unveiled Google Friend Connect to allow websites to add social networking features to their sites. Google Friend Connect "lets non-technical site owners...

News.(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Sheffield City Council has so far short-listed Capita and Fujitsu for major IT contracts. Sheffield City Council began the process to select a new IT partner or partners last summer. The contract work will cover areas including human...

News.(resignation of Gordon Lovell-Read from Siemens AG)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Gordon Lovell-Read has stepped down as CIO of engineering and electronics firm Siemens, reports CIO magazine. Lovell-Read joined the group six years ago. He was previously with Hewlett-Packard. Siemens told CIO that Lovell-Read had...

News.(IT contractors)
May 20, 2008... Finance companies are cutting back on IT contractors as they battle against the credit crunch, research for Computer Weekly has revealed. Financial firms are delaying IT projects that will not provide an immediate return on investment,...

News.(Thales UK)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Thales UK has adopted risk analysis software to enable it to assess the commercial feasibility of potential new business. Risk analysis ensures the provider of mission-critical electronic information systems is fully informed when making...

News.(Survey)(Brief article)
May 20, 2008... Most firms say IT delivers business benefits, but many do not measure the performance of their IT, a survey has shown. Almost two-thirds of firms say they are convinced they get significant value from their IT activities, although a fifth...

Radar.
May 20, 2008... Cliff Saran cliff.saran@rbi.co.uk How can you maximise the chances that a large-scale IT project will succeed? While best practices exist for project management, it is hard to find comprehensive advice on how to deal with complex...

News.(IT jobs earnings)(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Warwick Ashford warwick.ashford@rbi.co.uk Earnings for entry-level IT jobs have declined in real terms in the past five years, while salaries for IT professionals in management roles have continued to beat inflation, research has...

News.(Centrica to reduce maintenance costs British Gas subsidiary)(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Centrica expects to halve the applications maintenance costs of its British Gas subsidiary with a [pounds sterling]2.1m outsourcing deal with Fujitsu Services. Fujitsu will supply the specialist skills required to manage the legacy...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Charnwood Borough Council is using a web-enabled system to improve community safety. The Leicestershire council has taken part in a three-year pilot of the Sentinel system. Sentinel records and monitors anti-social behaviour, and is...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Citigroup plans to cut [pounds sterling]1.5bn from its IT budget, reports CIO magazine. Last month, the loss-making bank said it planned to cut thousands of jobs across the board, with many of them in IT. It has now put a figure on the...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... UK educational institutions are to benefit from a connectivity software deal to improve remote access to applications. Hummingbird has signed a preferential pricing agreement with Eduserv, a not-for-profit, education professional IT...

News.(Computacenter quarter results)(Financial report)(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... IT services firm Computacenter says it has experienced a "difficult first quarter" in its UK and French markets, and has issued a profits warning. UK sales in the quarter, including acquisitions, were up 1.1% to [pounds sterling]346.6m,...

News.(payment delay at HR Revenue & Customs due to computer systems problem)(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... A computer systems problem at HR Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has delayed payments to 50,000 child trust-fund accounts. Kitty Ussher, economic secretary to the treasury, told a Treasury select committee this week that the delay had been caused...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Large firms should concentrate on making significant IT cuts to stave off the effects of a recession, says consultant The Hackett Group. As the recession looms, said Hackett, many companies are reacting by mandating across the board cuts in...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... International planning, management and design consultancy Halcrow has saved 10 days a month in administration time by implementing a web filtering service. The company has 70 offices around the world and provides consultancy services on...

News.(Identity and Passport Service)
May 27, 2008... Tony Collins tony.collins@rbi.co.uk The Identity and Passport Service has awarded [pounds sterling]1.5bn worth of contracts over 10 years as it seeks to gradually roll out national identity cards. The government plans to designate...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... The government is planning a massive database to hold the details of citizens' phone calls, e-mail messages and internet sessions, reports the Times, as part of the fight against crime and terrorism. ISPs and telecoms companies would be...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... IT salaries in the UK have risen 4.1% in the past year despite difficult economic conditions, a study has shown. The study of 11,000 advertised positions by IT recruitment company CV Screenshowed that the average advertised salary for an IT...

News.
May 27, 2008... The way IT is taught in schools is putting children off an IT career and causing problems for an industry that is struggling to find 150,000 new recruits, the head of the UK's training body for IT has warned. The current curriculum for...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Companies with the highest proportion of women in senior management have better return on equity and total returns to shareholders, according to the president of IT suppliers association Intellect. Intellect - whose 800 member companies...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Microsoft plans to give ad-funded cash rebates to customers who purchase products through a new programme called Microsoft Live Search cashback. Key partners have announced their participation in the scheme, including eBay, Barnes &...

News.(Microsoft Corp.)(ODF Alliance)(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... The ODF Alliance has greeted with scepticism Microsoft's announcement of its intention to include support for the Open Document Format in the first half of 2009. "The proof will be whether and when Microsoft's promised support for ODF is...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Nokia CIO John Clarke and Colgate Palmolive vice-president Paul McGarry have explained how SAP software had helped their businesses at the Sapphire conference in Berlin. "Where we are today is very clearly the result of using technology...

News.(Brief article)
May 27, 2008... Software company SAP has said it will ride out the downturn by pursuring a strategy of collaboration with its business partners. The firm's CEO, Henning Kagermann, said at the company's Sapphire conference in Berlin yesterday that...