Enterprise IT

For years, IT departments have had full control over their own infrastructure -- for better and worse -- and are naturally uncomfortable with anything that prevents them from being the sole resource for their own infrastructure. They have been trained to maintain tight control because of the comple...

A trend is not a fad. A fad comes and goes quickly, while trends have staying power. Great ideas become trends when they are widely adopted beyond their original driving force. Such is the case with the marketing trend of direct digital marketing -- relevant digital marketing communications that are...

As we approach the end of 2009, the hands-down winner of the hot IT trends award continues to be cloud computing. Yet the reality is that for many, cloud deployment strategies remain somewhat ethereal -- part theoretical, part vendor/marketing hype, and part vaguely defined future model. At the sam...

Fifty-nine U.S. senators are asking European antitrust regulators to conclude their review of the Oracle acquisition of Sun Microsystems. The move, led by Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, is an unusual one for the U.S. legislative body. It follows a similar action by the Depar...

The early indicators that Windows 7 is doing well seem to be piling up. CEO Steve Ballmer gave that perception a boost at the company's annual shareholders meeting on Thursday, announcing that Microsoft "has already sold twice as many units of Windows 7 than any other operating system ever launched ...

After more than two years of crowing about "software plus service" rather than Software as a Service for its cloud computing strategy, the finish line is finally in sight for Microsoft's Azure. The company announced Tuesday at its Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles that Azure will off...

Palm had its hands full over the weekend. The company's Sunday launch of its new US$99 Pixi smartphone had to compete with fresh rumors begun Friday that the company was a possible target of a takeover by Finnish telecommunications giant Nokia. Those rumors sent Palm stock soaring by 8 percent on Fr...

In a previous column, I described why many IT professionals within small- and medium-sized businesses, as well as in large-scale enterprises, are beginning to embrace Software as a Service, and why managed service providers can't afford to ignore SaaS. A recent industry event brought my previous obs...

By and large, IT favors grand pronouncements and overheated rhetoric, and the industry abounds with "unprecedented" efforts firmly rooted in precedent and "unique" solutions fashioned from the commonest clay. Is that the case with Cisco, EMC and VMware's new Virtual Computing Environment coalition? ...

Cisco is broadening its footprint with a major move into the cloud computing space. The company has formed a far-reaching partnership with EMC -- a joint venture in which VMware, a majority owned subsidiary of EMC, will also play a large role. Intel's Xeon processors and other data center technology...

Data migrations these days have become a necessary evil in every IT environment. The rapid rate at which hardware and software becomes outdated, coupled with a need to save costs by taking old assets off the books as soon as possible, means that data migrations are something no one can avoid. Vendor...

Microsoft has slashed the prices of its SaaS email offering and its online business productivity suite, making them more competitive with the low-cost premier edition of Google Apps. Exchange Online as a standalone app is now available for $5 per month instead of $10, while the Business Productivity...

Though it's officially less than two weeks out of the gate, Microsoft's Windows 7 already owns a 3 percent share of the market for personal computer operating systems, according to Net Applications. When Windows 7 was generally released on Oct. 22, it already had a 1.99 percent share of the market, ...

The Los Angeles City Council voted 12-0 on Tuesday to adopt Google Apps, which include Gmail and other office software tools, for its 30,000 employees. The deal places Los Angeles among the vanguard of public sector operations relying on cloud-based productivity software. Plans call for installation...

Cloud computing is perhaps the most talked-about shift in the technology industry today. The concept of running applications from the cloud is quickly evolving from a futuristic vision to a commercially viable alternative for mainstream business. A recent survey of global 2,000 companies revealed th...