Latest News from SYS-CON MEDIA

Business.com Announces Open Source CloudBase at 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 19:45:00 EST

Business.com has announced the availability of CloudBase, a high-performance data warehouse system that scales horizontally on commodity hardware or a cloud computing network. Built on top of a map-reduce architecture, this technology enables business analysts using ANSI SQL to directly query large-scale log files arising in web site, telecommunications or IT operations. Now even small businesses will be able to quickly analyze log data without the cost and complexity of maintaining large relational database management system (RDBMS) clusters.

Microsoft’s Mike Neil Keynotes at SYS-CON's 4th International Virtualization Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 19:45:00 EST

"Virtualization will help our customers be more agile and efficient," noted Mike Neil this morning at SYS-CON’s Virtualization Conference & Expo, in San Jose, CA, "and there are three areas these companies are focused on." These areas are to drive costs down, increase efficiency, and using virtualization to provide new capabilities.

Photo Album of the 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 19:45:00 EST

SYS-CON's 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo, on Nov. 19-21, 2008 in San Jose, CA, attracted more than 40 sponsors and exhibitors with over 1,000 preregistered delegates. The three content-packed days emphasized value with a rich array of sessions led by exceptional speakers about the business and technical value of cloud computing.

Level 3 Selected to Support Pando Content Delivery Cloud

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 19:15:00 EST

Level 3 Communications has announced that it has been selected to provide caching and downloading services to Pando Networks. Pando will use Level 3's content delivery network (CDN) to support the delivery of rich media content for commercial customers. Level 3's caching and downloading services will enhance Pando's content delivery cloud platform and enable users to download and stream large media files, including full-screen high-definition (HD) video.

Cloud Envelops Exchange & SharePoint

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 19:00:00 EST

Microsoft on Monday pushed multi-tenant SaaS versions of Exchange and SharePoint out of the beta nest. Some 7,000 concerns participated in the beta. Now the stuff’s available to all comers. Exchange Online will cost $10 per user a month; SharePoint Online will cost $7.25. Eventually a browser-only Exchange/SharePoint combo will go for $3 and a Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) with e-mail, instant messaging, web conferencing and SharePoint for $15. The IM component is still missing.

Cloud Power Panel at SYS-CON's 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 17:16:00 EST

The future of cloud computing is all about lowering costs and getting the ability to easily move between service providers. At the Cloud Power Panel on Friday at the 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo in San Jose, CA, the power panelists – Songnian Zhou, CEO of Platform Computing; Thorsten von Eicken, CTO of RightScale; Peter Nickolov, President & CTO of 3tera; Erik Carlin, Sr. Cloud Architect, Mosso/Rackspace, and Steve Herrod, CTO, VMware – examined the risks and rewards of Cloud Computing for the enterprise.

Intel’s New Chip is Here

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 16:00:00 EST

Intel’s most complex x86 desktop chip ever, a tiny part loaded with an incredible 731 million transistors that’s been five years in the making, has been released to the most dubious demand environment ever, especially for desktops – dubious enough for Intel to have cut its guidance last week. We’re talking here about the first of the company’s long-expected new-microarchitecture Nehalem chips, officially called Core i7, its first AMD-like “true” quad with all four cores on a single sliver of silicon and – also AMD-like – no front-side bus.

SAP's Roland Wartenberg Presents Session at SYS-CON's 4th International Virtualization Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 15:40:00 EST

In his virtualization session on Nov. 21 at the 4th International Virtualization Conference & Expo in San Jose, CA, Roland Wartenberg, SAP's director of virtualization strategy, discussed the supported virtualization solutions provided by partners of SAP's virtualization ecosystem. Simply running an SAP solution in a virtualized environment is not enough.

Symantec and Intel Present General Session at SYS-CON's 4th International Virtualization Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 14:45:00 EST

With an ever increasing variety of physical and virtual endpoints, companies are rapidly facing the next big challenge – manageability. So stated Symantec's Brian Duckering and Intel's Chuck Brown in their general session on Friday at SYS-CON’s 4th International Virtualization Conference & Expo held in San Jose, CA. In order to manage hybrid types of models, companies need to balance the datacenter with the needs of the users.

Transmeta, Sun, Mozilla and Salesforce

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 13:40:00 EST

Transmeta, the uppity microprocessor wannabe that pushed Intel to create low-power chips before Intel crushed it, is getting bought by Novafora Inc for $255.6 million in cash, roughly what Transmeta has in the bank thanks largely to an IP licensing deal with Intel. Novafora is a fab-less semiconductor house that makes digital video processors and wants Transmeta’s power management widgetry to give its parts broader range. Separately, Transmeta cut a patent license with AMD, which is paying for it with 700,000 Transmeta Series B preferred shares.

MySQL Add-on Could Make Sun Money

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 13:35:00 EST

Sun, which desperately needs to monetize its software, has put out a new release of MySQL with a gold-level subscriber-only Query Analyzer tool that it’s praying users will pay for. The tool monitors query performance and quickly pinpoints and corrects problem SQL code. It promises to “turbo-boost” the speed and uptime of MySQL database applications. One user reported it tripled his performance; 30% appears more normal. It’s integrated into the MySQL Enterprise Monitor, a key part of Sun’s MySQL Enterprise subscription offering. Subscriptions, as usual, go for $599 to $4,999 per server per year. The gold level costs $2,999 a year. An unlimited site-wide subscription starts at $40,000 a year.

Taking Yahoo Apart Brick by Brick?

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 13:25:00 EST

Seems Microsoft, which doesn’t want to buy Yahoo anymore, has rustled Yahoo’s VP of search technology Sean Suchter, the Inktomi legacy who ran Yahoo’s search engine, responsible for engineering and P&L. He’s due to leave Yahoo right before Christmas. Microsoft said at press time that he would be general manager of its Silicon Valley Search Technology Center working on Live Search. Meanwhile, Kara Swisher of BoomTown, who’s had the inside track on all things Yahoo from the beginning, thinks that Microsoft is trying to hire the former EVP of engineering of Yahoo’s Search and Advertising Technology Group Qi Lu, who quit in disgust in June.

Amazon CTO Keynotes at Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 12:15:00 EST

In his Cloud Computing Keynote in San Jose, CA, on November 20th – entitled "A Head in the Cloud - The Power of Infrastructure as a Service" – the CTO of Amazon.com, Werner Vogels, discussed the many challenges when building a reliable, flexible architecture that can manage unpredictable behaviors of today's Internet business.

Enabling Desktop Virtualization in High-Risk Environments

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 11:15:00 EST

Server virtualization has moved well beyond the arena of early adopters and is an accepted solution to many of the challenges faced by IT organizations. However, desktop virtualization has not made the same inroads. Certainly, there have been some key uses for desktop virtualization, such as development and test, but there has not been broad penetration into the non-technical desktop market.

SOA Innovation Applied

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:45:00 EST

Are you a victim of outdated call center design syndrome? Symptoms include chaotic agent desktops, frustrated agents, miserable first-contact resolution rates, and angry customers calling back again and again. If you recognize these symptoms, then you're most likely a victim. This article will offer a service-oriented architecture (SOA)-based cure for outdated call center syndrome.

Firstservis to Offer Cloud Computing Solutions Powered by 3Tera’s AppLogic

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:30:00 EST

Firstservis and 3Tera have announced that 3Tera has chosen Firstservis as the first reseller and distributor of 3Tera's AppLogic cloud computing platform for Australia and New Zealand. Beginning immediately, Firstservis will resell, support and offer cloud computing solutions and services using 3Tera's AppLogic. "Firstservis' approach to IT is very compatible with 3Tera's vision and market goals," said Bert Armijo, senior vice-president, Sales, Marketing and Product Management, 3Tera, Inc. "Their unique knowledge of the Australian IT market and vast consulting experience with organizations of all sizes makes Firstservis a great partner to educate and deliver cloud computing based solutions in the region.

The Soul of the Web - Why AJAX Standards Matter

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:30:00 EST

I spoke on a panel at Mashup Camp this week on why Ajax Standards matter. I was quoted by Doug Henschen of Intelligent Enterprise as saying that we are locked in a struggle for the soul of the web, so I thought I would expand on that theme. Just because the web has been open so far doesn't mean that it will stay that way. By open, I mean that content has been searchable, linkable and servable without paying fees.

Clerity Introduces New Legacy Modernization and SOA Solutions

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:25:00 EST

Clerity Solutions has introduced new software and services that enable legacy mainframe applications and rehosted workloads to play strategic roles in SOA and Web Services initiatives. Building on a heritage of maximizing the value of core IT assets while lowering total cost of ownership, Clerity Service Builder and Clerity Web Connect allow organizations to easily expose legacy assets as secure Web Services and rapidly transform inflexible screen-based applications into modern, user-friendly Web applications.

Microsoft Sues WebXchange over IDE

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:15:00 EST

Microsoft has filed one of its rare lawsuits against online transaction service provider WebXchange because WebXchange sued FedEx, Allstate and Dell, three of Microsoft’s big customers, back in March. WebXchange claims FedEx, Allstate and Dell’s online services trample on its patents because they use Visual Studio, SOAP and Web Services. Like when FedEx’ online system lets people send their print job to FedEx’ Kinko shops. WebXchange apparently has an e-commerce routing patent. Microsoft wants the court to tell WebXchange to take a hike, invalidate its patents based on prior art and declared Visual Studio free of taint.

Debug JavaScript in Adobe AIR Apps Using Aptana Studio 1.2.1

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 10:00:00 EST

JavaScript is pretty much everywhere you look these days, reaching far beyond your desktop browser. Adobe AIR lets you use JavaScript to create desktop installed HTML and AJAX apps. Apple uses it in its gadgets and in the iPhone's browser. And Nokia recently announced support for installed, local JavaScript apps on its phones with APIs to the camera, GPS, etc... You can even use JavaScript to create extensions for Aptana Studio and Dreamweaver too! With all this JavaScript out there powering so many things we use every day, having great JavaScript debugging capabilities is paramount to development.

Antitrust Claim Against Apple Fails

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:45:00 EST

Paystar, the unauthorized Florida "cloner" with dreams of breaking Apple's lock on its hardware, has had its horns broken by a California federal court, which threw out its antitrust counterclaim against Apple's EULA. Back in the summer, Apple charged Paystar with copyright and trademark infringement for selling a hacked Mac OS X on so-called OpenComputer white box gear aiming to stop it dead in its tracks.

Intel Presents General Session at SYS-CON’s SOA World Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:30:00 EST

"SOA evolves in a set of micro domains," stated Intel's Joshua Painter, as he examined the state of SOA practices at SOA World Conference & Expo, in San Jose, CA. Despite the many instances of SOA that are emerging within the global 2000 today, the ability to leverage common services and a common metadata layer in a secure and scalable manner is paramount, but rarely addressed.

rPath Announces Cloud-Based Support at SYS-CON's Virtualization and Cloud Computing Conference

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:30:00 EST

rPath has announced support for the Ubuntu and CentOS Linux operating systems as part of rBuilder and the rPath Lifecycle Management Platform. rBuilder is the category-defining build and release management system for creating virtual appliances and application images. The rPath Lifecycle Management Platform extends rBuilder with a comprehensive system for controlling the cost, complexity and risk of deploying, managing and maintaining application images in virtualized and cloud-based environments.

Antivirus Software Is Not Dead – It's Evolving

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:15:00 EST

Contrary to some industry observers, antivirus software is not dead. It is, however, undergoing a game-changing transformation. It has to. After all, the current model of detecting viruses through blacklisting simply cannot keep pace with the unprecedented volume of malware released every day. To continue to be effective, antivirus must transition from the current signature-based model to a new hybrid model that uses whitelisting to allow trustworthy applications, blacklisting to block prevalent known malware, and reputation-based ratings to automatically categorize the "long tail" of unknown malware and legitimate software.

Microsoft Says No to Yahoo Acquisition – Again

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:15:00 EST

Microsoft is open to a collaborative search deal with Yahoo, “very open” apparently, but CEO Steve Ballmer again nixed the thought of revisiting an acquisition, according to both the AP and Reuters. The AP quotes him as saying, “Let me be clear. We are done with all acquisition discussions with Yahoo.”

ARM to Get Flash

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:15:00 EST

Adobe and ARM are gonna put Flash Player 10 and AIR, the stuff of web video and rich Internet apps, on ARM widgets by the second half of next year. They mean phones, set-tops, MIDs, TVs, car mojo and personal media devices, which have so far only had access to Flash Lite, not the best in browsing. iPhone happens to be based on ARM though whether that'll be true a year from now is unclear since Apple bought Power chipmaker PA Semi.

Final Results of 2008 JCP Executive Committees Elections Are Out

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:15:00 EST

The Java Community Process (JCP) Program Management Office has announced the final results of the 2008 JCP Executive Committees (EC) elections. After two ballot rounds – for ratified and elected seats – the winners are Ericsson, SpringSource, SAP, Intel, and Werner Keil for the Java SE/EE EC and Nokia, Philips, IBM, Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB and Sean Sheedy for the Java ME EC.

OpenSpan and TIBCO Team on Desktop Integration for SOA and BPM

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:15:00 EST

OpenSpan and TIBCO have announced a technology and business partnership designed to extend TIBCO solutions to desktop environments. The partnership will enable TIBCO Service-Oriented Architecture, Business Process Management and Business Optimization solutions to more rapidly integrate with desktop applications without requiring changes to those desktop applications. “The OpenSpan technology helps our joint customers service and event enable any desktop application without changing the code and with nearly zero impact to that application,” said Tom Laffey, executive vice president, products & technology at TIBCO.

Capgemini Announces Cloud Computing Center of Excellence at SYS-CON's 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:15:00 EST

Capgemini has announced an agreement signed between Capgemini UK plc and Amazon Web Services, extending its Outsourcing portfolio with cloud computing services. Capgemini’s new Center of Excellence, focused on cloud computing, will help its enterprise clients take full advantage of integrating cloud computing into their IT and business strategy. Capgemini’s Cloud Computing Center of Excellence will initially have a team of Amazon Web Services-trained professionals located in North America, Europe and India to help clients evaluate and implement Amazon’s current offering; this will evolve as other provider’s cloud computing capabilities mature.

Open Source Data Processing in the Cloud

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:15:00 EST

Hadoop, an open source implementation of map/reduce, has garnered tremendous momentum in large scale data processing, marting, and on occasion warehousing. This session will examine: The current state and industry adoption of Hadoop and cloud-based data processing; The programming model, capabilities, common patterns, and best-practices for Hadoop deployment and usage; The ecology of value-add technologies and services in the grid computing and data processing world; Models for using grid-based data processing alongside traditional technologies and techniques.

Virtualization Expo: Cute Trick Saves Dell’s Bad News from Being Worse

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:00:00 EST

At the end of one of the worst days in the history of Wall Street, when every metric ultimately reacted like acid eating through a thin plate of copper, Dell posted its third-quarter results, returning a surprise 9% increase in EPS on deflated revenues and net earnings apparently because of stock buybacks. The company made no quantitative forecast. It only said that it believes global end-user demand “will continue to be challenging” and that it would focus on optimizing “liquidity, profitability and growth,” particularly profitability.

EMC Announces Data Protection Software at SYS-CON's 4th International Virtualization Conference & Expo

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 09:00:00 EST

EMC has announced the newest versions of data protection software. These new updates are part of integrated solutions that meet specific data protection requirements for analysis and reporting, backup for Microsoft and VMware virtual environments, data de-duplication and replication, helping customers slow data growth, reduce capacity and lower total cost of operations. The products with new and expanded capabilities include: EMC Data Protection Advisor– The next-generation of EMC Backup Advisor, providing proactive analysis and reporting software that helps users make the right decisions at the right cost, faster. Now new features include support for VMware and EMC Celerra unified storage systems, in addition to expanded support of EMC Avamar, and Data Domain platforms.

Mind Mapping in the Cloud

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 08:57:00 EST

Apple’s not the only one telling people to "Think Different." So is an outfit called Mindjet. It's into mind mapping, which isn't as chilling as it sounds. It's merely a way of brainstorming and diagramming non-linear thinking that actually goes back to Porphyry of Tyros in the third century. He used the technique to visualize the concept categories of Aristotle, which of course makes it alright then. But we digress.

Keynote Expands On-Demand Mobile Test and Measurement Network

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 06:00:00 EST

Keynote Systems has expanded its on-demand mobile test and measurement network to include Beijing, China; Chennai, India; Mexico City, Mexico and Madrid, Spain. Keynote and its subsidiary Keynote SIGOS give its customers the ability to test mobile performance in over 700 locations on over 200 mobile networks across more than 70 countries.

Security Implications of Virtualization Platforms in the Virtual Data Center

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 05:00:00 EST

Referred to by many names – server virtualization, OS virtualization, kernel virtualization – virtual machine (VM) platforms, such as VMware ESX and Microsoft Hyper-V, are typically the first forms of virtualization introduced to the data center. These technologies are becoming both less expensive and more accessible, making them attractive candidates to be the first virtual "guinea pigs" in the data center.

SOA World Conference & Expo Session to Discuss How Social Governance Brings Viability to Web 2.0

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 19:00:00 EST

SOA brings together people, not just software. That’s why integrating Web 2.0 concepts into a SOA—such as comments, feeds, ratings, tags, and automatic search alerts—holds so much promise for breaking down business silos and enabling many people to work together for the first time. However, the unfettered communications associated with consumer Web 2.0 also need to be more controlled once they move into an enterprise SOA. IT professionals require social governance that balances the agility enabled by Web 2.0 capabilities with adherence to policies, visibility into changes, security, and access control.

Adobe MAX. Blog #6. Two conferences in one day.

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 16:23:00 EST

This is my final blog from the Adobe MAX 2008 conference.

Red Hat's Brian Stevens Explores the Evolution of the Cloud at 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 13:05:00 EST

"The days of Cloud 1.0 are here," stated Red Hat CTO Brian Stevens in his session this morning at SYS-CON’s Virtualization Conference & Expo, in San Jose. He discussed the evolution of the cloud, and how to build a cloud. Over the last five years, the open source community has turned its attention to virtualization, and Stevens discussed what has been achieved so far, and what is under development.

What's Really Industry Changing About Cloud Computing?

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 11:00:00 EST

This is an incredibly important time for the cloud computing area. What are some of the new directions in the massively parallel cloud computing space? I’ll mention four that I’m particularly interested in, that are exciting and challenging, and that I think will have a huge impact on the industry.

Microsoft To Kill Windows Live OneCare for Morro

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 10:45:00 EST

In a move that looks tailor-made for an antitrust suit, Microsoft says it’s going to give away a consumer security kit that it’s building code named Morro. It should be available in the second half of next year – probably more like mid-year. The freebie widgetry is supposed to defend even smaller PC form factors against malware like viruses, spyware, rootkits and Trojans and means that Microsoft will dump the retail sales of its Windows Live OneCare subscription service on June 30. The company said direct sales of OneCare will be phased out when Morro becomes available.

XAware to Speak at SOA World Conference & Expo

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 10:45:00 EST

XAware has announced that Kirstan Vandersluis, founder and chief scientist, will be a featured speaker at the 14th International SOA World Conference & Expo 2008 West to be held November 19-21, 2008 at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, Calif. Mixing and mashing multiple data sources, all of different formats, into something that makes sense is a headache for software architects.

Adobe MAX. Blog #5. Day 2. Flash Catalyst

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 10:10:00 EST

New releases of Flex software were announced at MAX. How Flash Catalyst works.

Amazon Launches CloudFront

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 09:00:00 EST

Amazon has launched an HTTP content delivery service (CDN) called CloudFront that works with its S3 cloud storage widgetry and EC2. It's now a public beta, having been privately tested the last couple few months. It's the stuff Amazon promised in September and may someday give the likes of Akamai and Limelight some bad nights if and when it gets more sophisticated and appeals to bigger accounts.

IBM Buys Transitive

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:45:00 EST

IBM is going to buy Transitive, the British cross-platform virtualization firm that salvaged legacy Macintosh programs and made Apple's move from IBM to Intel chips as graceful as a prima ballerina’s pirouette. Transitive is clever at running applications written for one kind of microprocessor and operating system on multiple platforms with little or no modification and could probably be made to run all legacy apps in virtualized form on a single hardware platform.

Cloud Has Shrinking Effect on StarOffice Price Tag

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:45:00 EST

Last Friday Sun Microsystems, its fortunes about as low as a snake’s belly, moved its StarOffice franchise into a new Cloud Computing unit with clear instructions to “grow revenues.” StarOffice 9, the latest rev of the Microsoft wannabe, was sent to market Monday priced at $34.95 for a one-off download, half the price of its predecessor.

SOA World: The Road to SOA Performance

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:00:00 EST

Focusing your service-oriented architecture (SOA) performance management efforts on the application testing stage or attempting to manage production SOA applications solely with traditional point solutions and network management tools is a recipe for disaster, putting your customer's satisfaction and your company reputation on the line. Production SOA Performance and Service Level Agreement (SLA) management must be built into the overall SOA strategy.

RIA and Cloud Computing Apps

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 01:30:00 EST

We are using software applications more than ever before. As the demand for new capabilities and functions grows, companies strive to provide an adequate response to business needs. The rate of application evolution places an ever-larger burden on the shoulders of software producers, vendors, and even consumers. In addition, much of the costly software used by organizations was not designed to respond to a rapidly changing marketplace or highly dispersed workforce, requiring its substitution or modernization.

CA & VMware to Integrate Management Solutions

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 01:00:00 EST

CA and VMware are going to jointly develop a management solution and, to start, have signed a deal to make CA Data Center Automation Manager interoperate with VMware Stage Manager. The joint solution is designed so enterprises and cloud service providers can seamlessly provision applications and resources from both corporate datacenter and service provider clouds.

Symantec Announces Veritas Operations Services at Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 01:00:00 EST

Symantec has announced Veritas Operations Services, a new cloud computing-based online services platform to help organizations identify hidden risks in their data centers - improving service availability and increasing productivity of the operations staff. Veritas Installation Assessment and Veritas Storage Foundation Health Check are the first two services immediately available, providing an alternative to traditional reactive operations models and enabling IT organizations to perform prioritized, preventative maintenance using the latest known good configurations, best practices and data center risks. Symantec's new Operations Services proactively manages the storage and server environment to deliver rapid time to value and expands the Symantec portfolio to help organizations secure and manage their information.

Appistry to Conduct Cloud Survey at SYS-CON's 1st International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo

Thu, 20 Nov 2008 00:45:00 EST

Appistry announced findings from the first in a series of surveys the two organizations are conducting among CloudCamp participants. The inaugural Appistry/CloudCamp "Inside the Cloud" survey showed Amazon besting Google by a nearly two-to-one margin as the company expected to play the largest role in the future of cloud computing.