IT BUSINESS UPDATES

IBM LEGAL VICTORY CRUSHES NEON'S JPRIME FEE-DODGING SOFTWARE

2011-07-24T00:14:00.000-07:00

On May 31 IBM obtained a permament injunction barring Neon from selling its zPrime product, software that enabled many general-purpose mainframe jobs to run on specialty engines. Once moved, these jobs let users dodge software charges based on the use of general purpose computing capacity. The technical tricks were, as IBM seems to have shown, a violation of IBM's policies and practices and a breach of IBM's mainframe software licensing agreement. Game over.

The injunction appears to permit users of the jPrime product to continue running the code under the terms of their contracts with Neon. Neon appears to be obliged to do everything it can to unwind these deals short of defaulting on its obligations.

The personnel behind jPrime are specifically prohibited from using their knowhow to outfox IBM. They are also enjoined from sharing or making public their understanding of the IBM software that attempts to govern and meter workloads on IBM mainframes. Basically, IBM found a legal solution to the problems posed by jPrime but from the looks of things Big Blue could not come up with a technical remedy for the bill-beating technology.

Chips Hold the Key to Understanding the Human Brain

2011-07-10T05:53:00.000-07:00

ScienceDaily (July 8, 2011) — Chips based on ARM processor technology will be linked together to simulate the highly-complex workings of the brain, whose functionality derives from networks of billions of interacting, highly-connected neurons.

The chips upon which this work critically depends were delivered last month, and have passed their functionality tests with flying colours.

They will form the system architecture for a massive computer, called SpiNNaker (Spiking Neural Network architecture), which aims to map out the brain's individual functions.

SpiNNaker could be a vital tool for neuroscientists, psychologists and doctors to help them understand complex brain injuries, diseases and conditions, and identify the most effective therapies.

The University of Manchester was selected to design the system architecture for the project, and received half of the £5m EPSRC grant which supported the work, while the universities of Southampton, Cambridge and Sheffield share the rest to work on other parts of the project.

Even though there will be up to one million ARM processors, -- technology used in most of the world's mobile phones- in the final SpiNNaker machine, computer scientists point out that this will enable them to recreate models of only up to 1% of the human brain.

The researchers, lead by Professor Steve Furber, believe the machine will be a vital tool for neuroscientists and psychologists to test hypotheses on individual brain characteristics.

The key challenge is developing and understanding the information processing of the brain and the extremely high connectivity of the brain cells. There are 100 billion neurons with 1,000 million connections in the human brain. In this system, the neurons emit spikes which are relayed as tiny electrical signals. Each impulse is modelled in SpiNNaker as a 'packet' of data, a very-much scaled down version of the way the internet carries information.

This packet is then sent to all connected neurons. Neurons are represented by small simple equations which are solved in real-time by software running on the ARM processors.

The electronic connections in SpiNNaker convey these spikes much quicker than the biological connections in the brain, hence SpiNNaker can transmit spikes as effectively and quickly with many fewer connections.

Test chips were brought out in 2009, but now the full chips, designed in Manchester and manufactured in Taiwan, have been delivered and will allow the scientists to develop much larger systems which can model the brain. Each chip contains 18 ARM processors.

The bespoke microchips are integrated in a single 19mm square package with a second microchip that provides substantial memory using 3D System-in-Package technology from Unisem Europe Ltd, who have packaging facilities in south Wales. This package delivers the computing power of a PC in a tiny space and for around one watt of electrical power.

Professor Furber, from the School of Computer Science, said: "We hope the machine will be able to model important functions of the human brain and help us gain key insights into their principles of operation.

"Developing and understanding the information processing in the brain is the key. We are actively engaging with neuroscientists and psychologists, both here at the University and elsewhere.

"This could ultimately be of great help for patients, for example, who have presented with reading problems caused by strokes or similar brain injuries. Psychologists have already developed neural networks on which they can reproduce the clinical pathologies.

"They then use these networks to test alternative therapies, to identify which is most effective in treating the patient's symptoms. At present they are limited in the fidelity they can achieve with these networks by the available computer power, but we hope that SpiNNaker will raise that bar a lot higher.

"We don't know how the brain works as an information-processing system, and we do need to find out. We hope that our machine will enable significant progress towards achieving this understanding."

ARM was approached in May 2005 to participate in the SpiNNaker project. A subsequent agreement paved the way to make ARM processor Intellectual Property (IP) available to the project, along with ARM cell library IP to aid design and manufacturing. The agreement allowed University of Manchester to manufacture chips for a system with 1 million ARM-based processors, as well as some smaller test systems.

"The ARM architecture is all about enabling the ARM partner ecosystem to produce smarter systems that are optimized for performance and power consumption," commented Mike Muller, Chief Technical Officer, ARM."SpiNNaker seeks to create a working model of the ultimate smart system, the human brain. Steve is part of the ARM family, so this project was a perfect way to partner with him and Manchester University, and for ARM to encourage leading research in the UK."

Video games sell more than DVDs and albums

2011-04-02T06:58:00.000-07:00

The most popular item of entertainment last year was a video game, proving that adults are increasingly turning to games consoles as their main way of unwinding in the evening, rather than music or films.

For some years of the British video games industry has trumped the film industry in monetary terms, but that has been because the average video game costs in excess of £30, while most new DVDs cost less than £15 and a cinema ticket is usually less than £10.

However, statistics from the Entertainment Retailers Association (ERA) show that in 2010, two of the top three titles in volume terms were video games, beating all forms of music, both physical and digital and DVDs. The most popular title of the year was Call of Duty: Black Ops, a so-called "shooter" game, involving the player pretending to be a soldier behind enemy lines during the Cold War. It sold 3.27 million copies between its launch in November and the end of the year, beating Avatar, the futuristic film, which sold 3 million.

This was despite Call of Duty's hefty price of between £35 and £50.

The third most popular tile was Fifa 11, the football video game, which sold 2.39 million copies. The DVD of Toy Story 3, the animated film, was the fourth most popular title, with 2.08 million copies sold.

In the top ten there was just one music title, Progress by Take That, which sold 1.93 millon copies.

Steve Redmond, spokesman at the ERA, said: "We've long been used to the idea that in value terms the video games industry is bigger than film or music. But it is a significant moment when a game outsells all over forms of entertainment.

"It's also a sign that the biggest titles, be it for music, film or games, are getting bigger and bigger, while the mid-range titles are getting squeezed."

Sales of video games actually fell by 12 per cent last year, with 62.9 million in total sold, hindered by the lack of new consoles or hand-held devices being launched by the hardware manufacturers, and the recession.

Guy Cocker, at Gamespot, the games industry website, said: "Many people will be surprised by how popular video games have become, but they are a key part of many people's lives and a hugely profitable industry."

He pointed out that the statistics would not have captured the increasing number of games that are played by people on their mobile phones, via "apps" or software applications, the most famous of which is probably Angry Birds, which has been bought by at least 12 million worldwide.

Last week Nintendo launched its 3DS, a hand-held games console that allows players to play 3 dimension games without the need to wear glasses. Nintendo said it sold 113,000 units during the first two days of sales, making it a faster seller than its previous hit, the Wii.

Macworld Expo 2011: Vito Technology updates the Walk apps

2011-02-10T07:11:00.000-08:00

Russian company Vito Technology was in one of the booths around the Mobile App Showcase at Macworld 2011 last week, and they kindly sat down to show off new versions of their apps, all coming up in the next month or so as free updates on the App Store. Popular astronomy app Star Walk was first. It's getting a visual enhancement in the next version, with a brand new sky and a new look to the stars that's more visually interesting than the current setup. The other feature that will be added is a "calendar of celestial events," where things like meteor showers or lunar eclipses will be tracked (per your location) so that you can see when something interesting is coming up.

Later on, Vito wants to add other cultural displays to the app, including constellation charts and other star maps from Hawaiian, Arabic and Native American viewpoints. Star Walk is also going to be integrated into some of Macmillan's science textbooks, so students will be able to work directly with the app as they learn.

We also got to see updates for the other Vito apps, including Solar Walk and a very different Geo Walk.

Solar Walk is probably the slimmest of the three updates. It's also sporting a visual upgrade, though it's not as sweeping as the update to Star Walk. There's a new "galaxy view" featuring a zoomed-out view of the entire Milky Way, with stars aplenty shining all the way across the galaxy. There are also some interactive "movies" to view, which automate the app to show various heavenly bodies in motion. There's a size comparison in the app as well, so you can compare various stars.

Geo Walk is by far the most updated app in the latest beta; it's been completely redesigned. The globe is now placed in a classroom setting, and it's much more dynamic and colorful than the current version. There's a brand new view that lists points of interest from around the world in a browsable circle, so users looking for information have an easier method than just randomly wandering the globe. There's also a trivia mode, with information about POIs turned into a nice and casual trivia game. From what I saw, there aren't a lot of extras to trivia mode (it doesn't penalize for wrong answers or even keep score), but it's another interesting way to get at information in the app.

Vito is definitely keeping up on all of their apps, and customers are benefiting. All of these upgrades will be free to app owners, and we should see them on the App Store within a few weeks.

In future, cars might decide if driver is drunk

2011-01-29T06:39:00.000-08:00

WALTHAM, Mass. – An alcohol-detection prototype that uses automatic sensors to instantly gauge a driver's fitness to be on the road has the potential to save thousands of lives, but could be as long as a decade away from everyday use in cars, federal officials and researchers said Friday.

U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood visited QinetiQ North America, a Waltham, Mass.-based research and development facility, for the first public demonstration of systems that could measure whether a motorist has a blood alcohol content at or above the legal limit of .08 and — if so — prevent the vehicle from starting.

The technology is being designed as unobtrusive, unlike current alcohol ignition interlock systems often mandated by judges for convicted drunken drivers. Those require operators to blow into a breath-testing device before the car can operate.

The Driver Alcohol Detection Systems for Safety, as the new approach is called, would use sensors that would measure blood alcohol content in one of two possible ways: either by analyzing a driver's breath or through the skin, using sophisticated touch-based sensors placed strategically on steering wheels and door locks, for example.

Both methods eliminate the need for drivers to take any extra steps, and those who are sober would not be delayed in getting on the road, researchers said.

The technology is "another arrow in our automotive safety quiver," said LaHood, who emphasized the system was envisioned as optional equipment in future cars and voluntary for auto manufacturers.

David Strickland, head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, also attended the demonstration and estimated the technology could prevent as many as 9,000 fatal alcohol-related crashes a year in the U.S., though he also acknowledged that it was still in its early testing stages and might not be commercially available for 8-10 years.

The systems would not be employed unless they are "seamless, unobtrusive and unfailingly accurate," Strickland said.

The initial $10 million research program is funded jointly by NHTSA and the Automotive Coalition for Traffic Safety, an industry group representing many of the world's car makers.

Critics, such as Sarah Longwell of the American Beverage Institute, a restaurant trade association, doubt if the technology could ever be perfected to the point that it would be fully reliable and not stop some completely sober people from driving.

"Even if the technology is 99.9 percent reliable, that's still tens of thousands of cars that won't start every day," said Longwell. Her group also questions whether an .08 limit would actually be high enough to stop all drunken drivers, since blood alcohol content can rise in people during a trip depending on factors such as how recently they drank and how much they ate.

"It's going to eliminate the ability of people to have a glass of wine with dinner or a beer at a ball game and then drive home, something that is perfectly safe and currently legal in all 50 states," she said.

LaHood disputed that the technology would interfere with moderate social drinking, and said the threshold in cars would never be set below the legal limit.

In Friday's demonstration, a woman in her 20s weighing about 120 pounds drank two, 1 1/2 ounce glasses of vodka and orange juice about 30 minutes apart, eating some cheese and crackers in between to simulate a typical social setting, said Bud Zaouk, director of transportation safety and security for QinetiQ.

Using both the touch-based and breath-based prototypes, the woman registered a .06 blood alcohol content, Zaouk said, so she would be able to start the car.

Laura Dean Mooney, president of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, said the technology could "turn cars into the cure."

While she did not foresee the alcohol detection system ever being mandated by the government, Mooney, whose husband died in an accident caused by a drunken driver 19 years ago, said she could envision it someday becoming as ubiquitous as air bags or anti-lock brakes in today's cars, particularly if insurance companies provide incentives for drivers to use those systems by discounting premiums.

PTCL establishes free PCOs for IDPs

2011-01-17T07:38:00.000-08:00

Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) in an effort to connect the displaced families from Swat with their loved ones and missing family members has established PCOs at five different relief camps. These PCO’s will provide free communication services to the IDP’s. Besides the company has also established medical teams and has donated medicines. PTCL doctors and paramedical staff will visit all the major relief camps on a rotation basis.

PTCL President and CEO Walid Irshaid, has stated that the PTCL will do its utmost to provide relief to the IDPs especially PTCL employees affected by this crisis. PTCL stands by the government of Pakistan to ensure that we fulfill our responsibility to help these war affected people, he said.

Around 300 PTCL staff families have been displaced on account of the confrontation going on in Swat. The management has decided to provide financial assistance to each of these families. The company has also arranged accommodation facilities for fourteen of these families and this number is growing on a daily basis as more and more staff families contact for accommodation.

PTCL has always played a proactive role during all difficult times to provide help to the people in the camps. It had generously donated during the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir, during the Baluchistan earthquake and for Benazir Income Support Fund created for assisting poor families.

PTCL with its growing concern and empathy is certainly pulling all the strings to make things easier for the IDP’s, and its efforts are being highly acknowledged and applauded by people from all walks of life.

Microsoft counters Google with Hotmail overhaul

2010-05-19T06:40:00.000-07:00

Windows Live Hotmail will get new online editing capabilities for Office documents as well as other enhancements for business users

Microsoft is trying to counter Google by overhauling Windows Live Hotmail with new online editing capabilities for Office documents, and more than two dozen other enhancements for business and home users.

Microsoft's refresh of Hotmail is being announced Tuesday, less than a week after the release of Microsoft Office 2010.

[ Take a look inside Office 2010, Microsoft's newest suite. | Discover what's new in business applications with InfoWorld's Technology: Applications newsletter and Killer Apps blog. ]

Microsoft strikes blow against Google with Office 2010

"The moment you receive an Office document as an attachment in Hotmail -- Word, Excel, or PowerPoint -- you can open and view the attachment online in any popular browser, on PC or Mac and even if Office is not installed," Microsoft said in its latest announcement. "This results from the seamless integration between Hotmail, SkyDrive [Microsoft's free online storage service] and the Office Web Apps, so you can send, receive and work on a document with others."

Google, of course, offers online editing of documents through Gmail's integration with Google Docs, and the ability to import Microsoft Office documents into Google's online office suite.

Microsoft is increasingly adding to its lineup of Web-based office tools, while offering integration with existing on-premise software installations of Microsoft Office.

New Hotmail features announced this week will be incorporated into the service over the next few months, Microsoft said.

Microsoft promised improvements in the visual quality of Office documents displayed in web browsers, and said it will be easy for users to move back and forth between the Web-based version and the Office software installed on their PCs.

The announcement acknowledges that users may still need to use the packaged software version of Office for "intensive editing tasks."

"If you need to perform intensive editing tasks, you can go from editing the document in your browser with the Office Web Apps to editing it in an Office application on your PC," Microsoft said. "When you're finished, any edits you made to the document on your PC will be automatically saved back into the cloud where you can then keep the document stored for only you to see or share it with others."

Hotmail and Gmail are locked in a battle for second place in the webmail market. Each have more than 40 million users in the United States, with Hotmail claiming a small lead over Gmail. Yahoo still has more than twice as many users as its nearest competitors.

In addition to further Office integration, Microsoft said the new Hotmail will have enhanced security with full-session SSL; smarter junk mail filters; and a "Trusted Senders" feature making it easier for users to distinguish between legitimate messages and scams.

Hotmail will also have conversation view -- a feature Gmail already has -- making it easier to view a single conversation that is spread out over many emails.

Hotmail users will be able to send up to 10GB of photos per message, and Microsoft, not surprisingly, is rolling out new mobile features to take advantage of the expanding smartphone market. For example, Microsoft said Hotmail will be optimized for rich mobile browsers and touch screens, while supporting "filters, in-line message previews, HTML messages, offline email viewing, conversation threading, the ability to flag messages, the option to turn header details on or off, and more."

Users will be able to synchronize email, calendar, and contacts between their phone and the Web using Exchange ActiveSync, and download new mobile Hotmail apps. Microsoft said Hotmail mobile apps will be unveiled on "BlackBerry, Nokia, and many other phones," but did not mention the iPhone or Google's Android platform.

Armed, Autonomous Robots "A Threat to Humanity"

2009-09-22T05:08:00.000-07:00

Noel Sharkey of the University of Sheffield said that military leaders in several countries "are

quite clear that they want autonomous robots as soon as possible, because they are more cost-effective and give a risk-free war."

Unmanned surveillance aircraft have been used for years and are currently deployed by the U.S. military in Iraq, along with 4,000 military robots on the ground. Some of these robots are armed with large-caliber machine guns. Armed robot border guards are also used by South Korea and Israel, and other robots are in use by China, India, Russia and the United Kingdom.

To date, none of these machines are able to fire without a human pushing a button or pulling the trigger in some other deliberate way. But such robots are already under development, with the U.S. planning to invest $4 billion in research by 2010 and $24 billion by 2032.

"I have worked in artificial intelligence for decades, and the idea of a robot making decisions about human termination terrifies me," Sharkey said.

Even non-autonomous robots would be easy for terrorists or other unauthorized personnel to capture, reverse engineer and then use for their own purposes, Sharkey warned. Such robots could provide an attractive alternative to suicide bombers.

"I don't know why that has not happened already," he said.

Technical obstacles to the development of autonomous killer robots include imbuing a machine with the ability to properly distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate targets, especially in a changing battle situation. This does not even take into account the ethical questions posed by abdicating decisions about life and death to a machine.

According to Ronald Arkin of the Georgia Institute of Technology, the U.S. Department of Defense's $230 billion Future Combat Systems Program calls for three classes of aerial and land-based robots, "but nowhere is there any consideration of the ethical implications of the weaponization of these systems."

New Breathalyzer Technology Detects Cancer, Asthma

2009-08-24T17:16:00.000-07:00

(NaturalNews) Researchers are working to develop ways to test for various diseases simply by having patients breathe into a machine, according to an article published in the online edition of Optics Express.

"If you go to the medical literature you will see tons of studies that correlate certain diseases with particular molecules found in the breath," said researcher Jun Ye. "One common example is nitrous oxide, which is associated with asthma."

Ye and colleagues have successfully created a device that can analyze the millions of molecules contained in a single human breath. They believe the machine can easily be adapted to detect for a variety of lung-diseases as well.

"It's very non-invasive," Ye said. "There's nothing to be scared of. No blood test, just a breath test."

The machine is analyzes the content of a breath by bouncing lasers back and forth between two curved mirrors. These lasers excite the air, causing each molecule to give off a unique light signature. These signatures are then analyzed to determine the chemical composition of the air.

This composition can provide important medical clues. In preliminary tests, for example, the breath of a smoker was found to contain five times the carbon monoxide concentration of other participants.

"If you have asthma, your breath will have nitrous oxide, but nitrous oxide does not necessarily mean you have asthma," said Ye. "But if you see several different molecules all at once, and they are associated with asthma, then you have found a real fingerprint of a certain disease."

Ye and his colleagues are working to make the machine even more sensitive, in the hopes that it can one day be used to identify even diseases that do not involve the lungs.

"Once it's mass produced, the cost could be quite low," Ye said. "It could be put into every doctor's clinic so people could walk in and do painless breath tests and then walk away. They would get results in a day or so."

Intel Xeon® 'Nehalem-EX' Processor Presented by Intel

2009-08-19T09:20:00.000-07:00

A new Intel® Xeon® processor codenamed "Nehalem-EX" has been revealed by Intel. Being able to deliver a number of new technical advancements and boost enterprise computing performance, the processor will be running the next generation of intelligent and expandable high-end Intel server platforms.

The Nehalem-EX processor, being ready to enter production later this year, will feature up to eight cores inside a single chip supporting 16 threads and 24MB of cache. Offering the highest-ever jump from a previous generation processor, its performance increase will be dramatic.

New reliability, availability and serviceability (RAS) features usually found in the company's Intel® Itanium processor family, such as Machine Check Architecture (MCA) Recovery will be available with Nehalem-EX.

the new Nehalem-EX processor, being ideal for virtualized applications, server consolidation, data demanding enterprise applications and technical computing environments, will be able to boost up to nine times the memory bandwidth of the previous-generation Intel Xeon 7400 platform, also doubling the memory capacity with up to 16 memory slots per processor socket, and offering four high-bandwidth QuickPath Interconnect links. Without the need for third-party chips to "glue" the platform together, Nehalem-EX will provide tremendous scalability, from large-memory two-socket systems through eight-socket systems capable of processing 128 threads simultaneously, while, with third-party solutions, additional scalability options including greater sockets counts will also be possible.

Some of the main advantages of Nehalem-EX are:

* Intel Nehalem Architecture built on Intel's unique 45nm high-k metal gate technology process
* Up to 8 cores per processor
* Up to 16 threads per processor with Intel® Hyper-threading
* Scalability up to eight sockets via Quick Path Interconnects and greater with third-party node controllers
* QuickPath Architecture with four high-bandwidth links
* Integrated memory controllers
* 24MB of shared cache
* Intel Turbo Boost Technology
* Intel scalable memory buffer and scalable memory interconnects
* Support for up to 16 memory slots per processor socket
* Up to 9x the memory bandwidth of previous generation
* 2.3 billion transistors
* Advanced RAS capabilities including MCA Recovery

Nehalem-EX, having new RAS capabilities for high-end enterprises, will be able to accelerate IT adoption of Intel-based platforms over RISC-based platforms by delivering a lower total cost of ownership, higher performance, lower electricity bills and the ability to standardize on a flexible IT environment.

LED light bulbs yield big savings in energy

2009-08-13T23:39:00.001-07:00

August 13th, 2009 By Renee Schoof

LED Lamp with E27 Edison screw. Image: Wikipedia.

One way the United States could slash its electricity use, dependence on fossil fuels and emissions of heat-trapping gases is really quite simple: better light bulbs.

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The Department of Energy is backing research and development aimed at getting light-emitting diodes into common use in homes and businesses at a price that saves money. Hurdles remain: Costs are still high, the quality of what's on the market varies and not all the technical issues have been worked out. Energy experts are confident, however, that this new lighting is the future and that energy savings will be enormous.

Lighting consumes 22 percent of electricity in the United States. The DOE predicts that solid-state lighting -- which uses semiconducting materials to convert electricity into light, and includes LEDs -- has the potential to reduce energy use for lighting by one-third by 2030. That's the equivalent of saving the output of 40 large (1,000-megawatt) power plants, the greenhouse gas emissions of 47 million cars and $30 billion.

LEDs already light universities from Miami to Anchorage, Alaska, streets in many cities and an increasing number of businesses that need lights on all the time.

"In your home, lighting may be 10 percent of your bill. But in an office building it's probably 40 percent, and so if you reduce your lighting energy consumption by a large fraction, the savings will be huge," said James Brodrick, who leads the DOE's solid-state lighting program.

A fact sheet from Brodrick's office says this about LEDs: "In the coming decade, they will become a key to affordable net-zero energy buildings, buildings that produce at least as much energy annually as they use from the grid."

The technology is advancing quickly, and costs will continue to drop, Brodrick said. The DOE tests LEDs and sets performance and efficiency guidelines under its Energy Star program.

LEDs are directional lights, used in recessed lighting and under-counter lights, for example. They're not yet available as bulbs that cast light all around and fit in ordinary sockets.

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"There's an enormous and exciting potential, but we have a long way to go before we see anything besides directional lighting," said Jeffrey P. Harris, the vice president for programs at the Alliance to Save Energy, a nonprofit group that promotes energy efficiency.

Even so, LEDs already are used to light offices, hotels, restaurants and other businesses.

The DOE predicts that LEDs will have better performance capability than fluorescent lighting in the next few years, and that they'll continue to improve after that. They're now comparable with fluorescent fixtures in efficiency, and the DOE says its Energy Star LEDs last two to five times longer.

Cost is the biggest reason that LEDs aren't used more widely, Brodrick said.

A common PAR 38 floodlight at Home Depot, for example, costs about $35 online as an LED, about $3.70 apiece in a pack of 15 as a halogen floodlight and about $11 for a compact fluorescent.

Chuck Swoboda, the chairman and chief executive officer of Cree Inc. of Durham, N.C., a leading company in LED lighting, said that commercial use of LEDs would drive down costs, and that a lower initial cost plus the value of energy savings would make them attractive. "It's not that different from the argument of why you should put insulation in a home," he said.

LEDs have other advantages: They can be dimmed, don't emit heat, don't contain mercury -- unlike compact fluorescents -- and can produce warm-toned light.

Swoboda said that Cree was focusing on commercial sales now because that market was bigger than the residential market and commercial users got quicker paybacks from reduced energy and maintenance costs.

In April, Cree announced that it had a new LED PAR 38 bulb designed for stores and museums that uses 12 watts of power instead of 50 to 90 watts for a halogen bulb.

"What happens with LEDs is people think of them as things that go in your cell phone or things you put in the car dashboard, but they don't think of it as truly a lighting product," Swoboda said. "And so this was the latest innovation to kind of go out and show people you can pretty much do anything you can do in an incandescent bulb technology or in fluorescents with LEDs."

Home Depot, the world's biggest retailer of light bulbs, is starting to stock LED bulbs this summer and plans to have 10 kinds by September, said Jorge Fernandez, who's in charge of light bulb purchases for the company.

"There's definitely a lot of interest, but the price is high, and a lot of people say they're waiting to see when the price drops," he said.

Felicia Spagnoli, a spokeswoman for Philips Lighting Electronics North America, said commercial users could make up for the higher costs of LEDs in as little as a year or two.

"We can address environmental concerns at the same time we improve the quality and use of light," she said. "Many people when they think of doing good for the environment think it means going without or having lesser quality, but that's absolutely not the case with LEDs."

Philips is working on many kinds of LEDs, including one to replace a 40-watt incandescent bulb that's scheduled to be available next year, she said.

Derrick Hall of RE/Construct Inc. in Asheville, N.C., said that residential customers weren't asking for LEDs because of the high upfront cost. Still, he's hearing of some nonresidential customers who are looking into LEDs for the energy savings.

LEDs are much better than other lighting options, Hall said. The quality of the light is "far superior," they offer big energy savings and there's no cost to society for dealing with mercury, he said. Mercury, a neurotoxin, is found in small amounts in compact fluorescent bulbs.

Swoboda said that some of the biggest commercial users for LEDs now were fast-food restaurants, because LEDs' light makes food look appealing.

A McDonald's that opened in July in Cary, N.C., is lit almost entirely with daylight and LED lights. Ric Richards, the franchise owner, said the restaurant used 78 percent less electricity than a traditional one.

And the quality of the light?

"Awesome," he said. "The restaurant has great ambience."

Richards estimated that the upfront costs of the lighting would be paid back in two to four years with lower electricity bills.

In Washington, the Pentagon is installing LED lights in a large renovation.

Mark Buffler, an official in charge of technology in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, said in a report that switching from conventional fluorescents to LEDs would conserve large amounts of energy _ 240,000 kilowatt hours annually _ and save money on maintenance and mercury disposal. Buffler also wrote that the project was meant to demonstrate the energy savings potential of LEDs for the rest of the federal government.

ON THE WEB

Department of Energy information on LEDs: http://www1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/ssl/index.html

Energy Star information on LEDs: http://tinyurl.com/mlgeqq

Online MS Office 2010: for free or not?

2009-07-25T23:39:00.000-07:00

It was last week when Microsoft announced that they will offer a "Free" lightweight online version of Microsoft 2010, which includes Word, Excel, Powerpoint and OneNote. Since then, I started to read reviews and press releases of this move from Microsoft and started to draft a post regarding this big change that the company does. But what made me changed my mind to post that said draft is because of Michael Hickins's report on the Hidden cost of Microsoft's Free online office suite.

[Microsoft Office 2010 Logo and its Applications new logos]

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Just a quote from his post, "But wait – there’s more! A Microsoft spokesperson told me that customers will need to buy a SharePoint server, which ranges from $4,400 plus CALs or $41,000, all CALs included if they want to share documents using the online version of Office 2010"
I bet its really clear that there is always a hidden agenda on that Free offerings. And as usual, at the end of the day, business is business.

At first, i enjoyed comparing these two online applications; namely Microsoft office live workspace and Google Docs, but at the end i would prefer to use Google docs than any other, most especially when i used it to convert office 2007 files into 2003. The two web versions of applications, have offer lots of advantages, doing some documents online anytime and anywhere but do Microsoft risks its sells of Office Applications (as we know, Office is the company's big cash drawer) and goes with online versions?

[Google Apps VS Office Live Workspace]

Office 210: The Changes

And now, as what i am always looking forward, is the idea and inquiry what could be the changes that Microsoft can offer rather than the online version thingy?

[2007 VS 2010: Ribbon Changes]

First of all, is the revision of the Microsoft Office 2007 trade mark, the Ribbon. In the offline version, Microsoft designed the Ribbon enclosed with a circular form on which at first i thought it was just another nonfunctional design until such time i learned that it is somewhat like a functional button having there the sub menus; New, Open, Save and others.
Another offering is the photo editing tools, which can now be accessed inside the Ribbon. You just need to open a picture file, then a format tab will show and you can now do some photo enhancement.

[Office 2007: Sub Menus under the Ribbon ]

And another ribbon inclusion program (which is excluded last 2007 version) is the Outlook 2010. It do now have full marked ribbon and is offering the same overall interface except its new feature Quick Steps. Excel and Word have no lots of new features on them not like outlook and of course the PowerPoint which give a video features in it.

Just a note, to access the lightweight version of office 2010, you all need a Windows Live ID (formerly hotmail account). But not so sure if you can have a total access on that package since Microsoft has not released any news about it although they have appended the word "free".

Cyber Attack Code Starts Killing Infected PCs

2009-07-11T09:10:00.001-07:00

By Thomas Claburn

Read the Original Article at InformationWeek

Infected computers participating in the distributed denial of service attack on U.S. government and South Korean Web sites are set to destroy their own data.

The botnet-driven cyber attack on government, financial, and media sites in the U.S and South Korea includes a newly discovered danger: The malicious code responsible for driving the distributed denial of service attack, known as W32.Dozer, is designed to delete data on infected computers and to prevent the computers from being rebooted.

"Your machine is completely hosed at this stage," said Vincent Weafer, VP at Symantec Security Response.

The malicious code includes instructions to start deleting files when the infected computer's internal clock reaches July 10, 2009. That's today.

According to Weafer, the malicious code will attempt to locate files with any of more than 30 different extensions, such as .doc, .pdf, and .xls, copy the data to an encrypted file that's inaccessible to the user, and then overwrite the data in the original files. It targets files associated with office, business, and development applications.

The malicious code is also programmed to modify infected computers' Master Boot Records. The change renders computers inoperable following any attempt to reboot.

The impact of this self-destruct sequence should be minimal, however. Weafer said that he expects only a few thousand machines will be damaged. "I don't expect this to be a major issue, except perhaps in South Korea," he said.

The cyber attack against sites in the U.S. and South Korea began on July 4 and temporarily interfered with access to the Web sites of the Treasury Department, the Transportation Department and the Federal Trade Commission.

The South Korean Intelligence Service estimated that about 20,000 compromised computers -- mostly in South Korea -- had been ordered to conduct a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack on U.S. and South Korean sites.

Given the timing, which coincided with a North Korean missile test, suspicions have been raised about the involvement of hackers in North Korea or possibly China.

In a press briefing yesterday, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said, "[The attacks] are continuing, and we are taking measures to deal with this and any potential new attacks." He said he had no information about whether North Korea was involved.

It is possible to direct an attack of this sort from anywhere. According to Alan Paller, research director at The SANS Institute, the compromised computers participating in this attack are located all over the world, including the U.S. The bots that participate also vary over time, so that the source of the attack is constantly changing.

"The attacks have become increasingly sophisticated since the end of last week -- it started as a flood that was easy for network service providers to filter and then went through at least two increases in sophistication so that the flood looks more and more like legitimate traffic," said Paller in an e-mail. "Network providers have to work much harder to filter out malicious traffic that resembles legitimate traffic."

But with W32.Dozer already deleting files and crippling its hosts, the attacks should soon subside.

Google Chrome OS: Web Platform To Rule Them All

2009-07-11T09:07:00.001-07:00

By Thomas Claburn

Read the Original Article at InformationWeek

With Chrome OS, Google aims to make the Web the primary platform for software development.

Google's plan to release its own operating system based on its Chrome browser is at once audacious and laughable. Microsoft Windows represents slightly less than 90% of the personal computer operating system market, a position it has held for years.

Google's industry ally, Apple, has managed to steal a few percentage points of market share away from Microsoft in the past twelve years under the singular leadership of CEO Steve Jobs. But Windows remains the dominant operating system, more dominant even than Google is in search.

And with the forthcoming release of Windows 7, Microsoft appears to be well-prepared to defend its empire.

It's hard to imagine a less promising business for Google to enter, especially given that Google plans to give Chrome OS away for free. And Google's grand plan to shake up the operating system market isn't made more credible by the absence of any actual programming code or substantive information about Chrome OS.

Yet, the fact that Google has partners that share its vision says something about the shakiness of Microsoft's position. Acer, Adobe, ASUS, Freescale, Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, and Toshiba are all working with Google to help it re-imagine the operating system. So too is Intel, as The Register reports.

Google's decision to target the netbook market may help the prospects of Chrome OS. Although Microsoft has made a concerted effort to push Windows on netbooks to fend off low-cost Linux-based challengers, Google may find it easier to compete in the netbook market because access to cloud-based services and software is more valuable on devices with constrained resources than on high-powered desktop computers.

Steve Andriole, professor of information technologies at the Villanova School of Business, observed in an e-mail that Google's announcement comes at the right time, just as the industry is moving to smaller, more mobile devices.

He believes that both pricing and Google's vendor relationships will play major roles in determining the acceptance of Chrome OS.

The fact that Chrome OS applications will be written using open Web standards like JavaScript, HTML, and CSS might seem like a liability because Web applications still aren't as capable as applications written for specific devices and operating systems.

But Google is betting that will change and is working to effect the change on which its bet depends. Within a year or two, Web browsers will gain access to peripherals, through an infrastructure layer above the level of device drivers. Google's work with standards bodies is making that happen.

According to Matt Womer, the "ubiquitous Web activity lead" for W3C, the Web standards consortium, Web protocol groups are working to codify ways to access peripherals like digital cameras, the messaging stack, calendar data, and contact data.

There's now a JavaScript API that Web developers can use to get GPS information from mobile phones using the phone's browser, he points out. What that means is that device drivers for Chrome OS will emerge as HTML 5 and related standards mature. Without these, consumers would never use Chrome OS because devices like digital cameras wouldn't be able to transfer data.

Womer said the standardization work could move quite quickly, but won't be done until there's an actual implementation. That would be Chrome OS.

And as the long-foretold Internet of Things emerges -- allowing everyday objects to be addressed via online queries -- Chrome OS will be well positioned to help Google organize even more of the world's information than the company already handles.

Chrome OS will sell itself to developers because, as Google puts it, writing applications for the Web gives "developers the largest user base of any platform."

Iphone 3gs Lines

2009-06-19T08:45:00.000-07:00

As you may have heard by now, AT&T has released official word that those who preordered an iPhone 3GS line will be able to pick them up from one of 2, 200 retail outlets or 211 Apple stores. However, some people won’t get theirs tomorrow but if you check your inbox you’ll find a email verification with your pickup date. In terms of pricing, new AT&T customers will pay $199 for the 16 GB version and $299 for the 32 GB. Existing customers that have fulfilled their contractual obligations will also be eligible for the same pricing while iPhone 3G customers whose contracts end in July, August or September of this year will be as well.

Existing AT&T customers who contracts aren’t up but want to upgrade early will have to pay a little bit (alot) more. In fact, it’ll be $399 for the 16 GB version and $499 for the 32 GB. Check out the press release after the cut for additional pricing plan details, what you’ll need to pick up your iPhone 3GS and a few feature explanations.

iPhone 3G S Available at AT&T Tomorrow

Locations Open Early at 7 a.m. For Customers Who Preordered In Store

DALLAS, June 18 AT&T* begins selling iPhone 3G S nationwide tomorrow morning in its more than 2,200 company-owned retail locations. In addition, AT&T today will begin shipping devices to customers who preordered online for arrival beginning tomorrow. iPhone 3G S will also be available tomorrow morning at all 211 U.S. Apple retail stores.

“The time is finally here. We’re more than ready to open our doors tomorrow and begin selling the fastest, most powerful iPhone yet,” said Ralph de la Vega, president and CEO, AT&T Mobility & Consumer Markets. “We understand that customers are eager to get their hands on this great new device. So we’ve worked hard to make the experience as easy as possible.”

EARLY HOURS FOR PREORDER CUSTOMERS

Many customers have chosen to preorder iPhone 3G S in an AT&T store or online.

AT&T Store Preorders: Customers who preordered in AT&T stores can return to the same store beginning tomorrow morning, with their receipt, to pick up their order. Customers should be sure to check the e-mail notification they received for their actual arrival date as some preorders will arrive after June 19; dates are based on when preorders were made and available inventory. All stores will open at 7 a.m. local time to exclusively serve preorder customers whose orders are expected to arrive on June 19. Any customer is welcome to visit beginning at normal business hours, at which point all customers will be served on a “first come, first served” basis.

Virtual Smart Home Controlled By Your Thoughts

2009-05-28T10:36:00.000-07:00

ScienceDaily (May 26, 2009) — Light switches, TV remote controls and even house keys could become a thing of the past thanks to brain-computer interface (BCI) technology being developed in Europe that lets users perform everyday tasks with thoughts alone

The technology, which was demonstrated at CeBIT in Hannover in March, provides an innovative way of controlling the interconnected electronic devices that will populate the smart homes of the future, granting increased autonomy to people with physical disabilities as well as pleasing TV channel-surfing couch potatoes.

“The BCI lets people turn on lights, change channels on the TV or open doors just by thinking about it,” explains Christoph Guger, the CEO of Austrian medical engineering company g.tec that developed the application.

g.tec teamed up with a group of international universities and research institutes as part of the EU-funded Presenccia project to incorporate its BCI technology into virtual environments. As part of the project a fully functioning smart home was created in virtual reality (VR).

“It has a kitchen, bathroom, living room… everything a normal home would have. People are able to move through it just by thinking about where they wanted to go,” Guger says.

Electroencephalogram (EEG) equipment is used to monitor electrical activity in a user’s brain via electrodes attached to their scalp. After a period of training, the system learns to identify the distinctive patterns of neuronal activity produced when they imagine walking forwards, flicking on a light switch or turning up the radio.

Liberating possibilities for people with disabilities

Being able to move and control objects in virtual reality solely by the power of thought could offer new and liberating possibilities for people with physical disabilities. It could help amputees learn how to use a prosthetic limb, for example, or allow people confined to a wheelchair to experience walking in virtual reality, as one experiment conducted by the Presenccia researchers showed.

“A virtual environment could be used to train a disabled person to control an electric wheelchair through a brain-computer interface,” explains Mel Slater, the coordinator of the Presenccia project. “It is much safer for them to learn in VR than in the real world, where mistakes could have physical consequences.”

One application developed by g.tec lets people control a small robot with their thoughts, though the same system could easily be adapted to control a wheelchair instead. Four lights on a small box set to flicker at different frequencies provided the control mechanism using a method known as Steady State Visual Evoked Potentials (SSVEP).

“The top light, for example, was set to flicker at 10 hertz so, when the user stared at it, the EEG equipment registered that particular frequency in the user’s brain and instructed the robot to move forward. Looking at another light flickering at a different frequency would tell the robot to go left and so on,” Guger explains.

Thought-provoking typing

g.tec has adopted a different approach to allow people to type with their thoughts. Users sit in front of a grid of letters and numbers on a computer screen which flash in sequence and are told to stare at the character they want to type. The system registers their brain activity when the letter they are looking at is illuminated.

“With experience people can learn to type quite fast. I can average about one letter every eight-tenths of a second, a rate similar to typing with one finger,” Guger says.

Better hardware, software and a deeper understanding of EEG data has now made typing by thought power a practical application, particularly for paralysed people suffering from so-called locked-in syndrome who have few means of communication.

“Just two years ago, it took up to a minute to type a single letter and a whole day to train someone to do it. Now most people can learn to use the system in five minutes,” Guger says.

The accuracy of BCI technology has also greatly improved: g.tec was involved in a study that showed 82 percent of people could achieve 100 percent accuracy. “Five years ago there was only one person in the world known to be able to do that,” Guger notes.

Where will such rapid progress lead?

The g.tec CEO initially expects BCI technology to continue to gain ground in medical applications for the disabled and for rehabilitation, helping people who have suffered a stroke, for example, to regain use of their limbs. However, he believes it could become common in everyday environments. Having been tested in virtual reality, g.tec’s smart home application will soon be deployed in a real smart home being built as part of the SM4all project, which has received funding under the EU’s Seventh Framework Programme.

g.tec, which was founded by Christoph Guger and Günter Edlinger in 1999 as a spin-off from the Graz University of Technology, sells its award-winning technology to companies, universities and research institutes in 55 countries.

This is the second of a two-part special feature on virtual reality and the Presenccia project funded under the FET Pro-active scheme of the EU’s Sixth Framework Programme for research.

Goldman Sells $2 bln in Notes Not Govt-Guaranteed

2009-04-30T04:53:00.000-07:00

Goldman Sachs Group Wednesday sold $2 billion of notes not backed by a government guarantee in a sign of an incipient thaw in credit markets, analysts said.

"That's a good sign for the banking sector," said William Larkin, portfolio manager with Cabot Money Management in Boston. Both Goldman and JPMorgan are starting to issue bonds that are not backed by the U.S. government after a virtual drought of such issues, he added.

Even so, with investors still wary about the fragile banking system, it is much more expensive for banks to issue debt outside the umbrella of government protection.

Goldman sold the five-year, dollar-denominated global issue at about 410 basis points over comparable government Treasury yields, according to IFR, a Thomson Reuters service. That was broadly in line with initial price talk earlier Wednesday of 412.5 basis points over Treasuries, IFR said.

Soon after the issue was priced, it was trading about 30 basis points tighter, or about 380 basis points over equivalent Treasuries, said Bob Gorham, managing director and head of investment-grade bond trading at Broadpoint Capital in New York. Gorham said demand was quite brisk for new corporate bond issues on Wednesday as the market's tone firmed.

An uptick in new debt sales after a two-week lull for earnings season is also lending support to the strong sentiment in the market, analysts said.

However, Goldman had to offer investors much higher compensation for the risk of holding its stand-alone debt by selling the Wednesday issue for much higher yields than its government-backed notes.

Goldman's FDIC-backed notes maturing in December 2012 were trading at a spread of about 47 basis points over equivalent Treasuries according to Tradeweb data, compared with about 410 basis points for the bank's Wednesday issue when it was first sold.

Since the panic in the financial markets in the fourth quarter of 2008, investors have generally shunned U.S. bank bonds that are not backed by government regulator the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

Goldman's five-year senior global notes were the bank's first issue since January that were not backed by the government.

On April 16, JPMorgan made a stand-alone issue, selling $3 billion in debt without U.S. government backing for the first time since August.

Goldman's issue represents the latest inroad into a sector of the corporate bond market that investors have mostly avoided for months, hinting the market for this type of debt is starting to open up again, analysts said.

However, bond investors generally view Goldman and JPMorgan as among the strongest major U.S. banks.

Both have signaled they now have the resources to repay bailout funds which the government injected into the banking system late last year to save it from implosion. (Additional reporting by Tom Ryan, Caryn Trokie and Dan Wilchins in New York and Natalie Harrison in London; Editing by James Dalgleish)

IBM Adds Social Networking To DeveloperWorks Portal

2009-04-30T04:49:00.000-07:00

Just as IBM's popular developerWorks site for IT professionals turns 10 years old in September, the company is sprucing it up with new social networking capabilities.

The new features being unveiled on Thursday will allow developerWorks members to create personal profiles, helping them promote their technical expertise, expand their professional networking, and create online groups for shared projects and interests.

Approximately 8 million people worldwide, including enterprise software developers and other IT professionals, are registered members of developerWorks, and about 4 million of them visit the portal at least monthly, said Stephanie Martin, IBM director of developerWorks.

DeveloperWorks is a free, online portal providing IT professionals with access to skills development and technical resources related to open standard technologies, including Linux, Java, XML, and cloud computing.

The new MydeveloperWorks site has been "retooled" by IBM on Lotus Connections enterprise networking and collaboration technology, which enables members to create "vertically" focused groups related to their interests, said Martin.

For instance, if MydeveloperWorks members are interested in beefing up their skills and knowledge related to emerging technologies that are supported by the U.S. government's stimulus programs, like electronic medical records, they can tailor their homepage to receive real time feeds and other content about healthcare IT standards. The members can also create new groups related to the subject and invite others to join.

Users can search MydeveloperWorks personal profiles by keyword, tag, location, or name, allowing users to find other individuals with shared interest or specific expertise. Members can also check out the credentials of individuals commenting on forums or participating in online groups -- as well as promote their own expertise, said Martin.

In coming months, MydeveloperWorks users will also be able to connect with their social networking profiles on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

When existing developerWorks members visit the site now, they'll be requested -- but not required -- to create a personal profile for the new MydeveloperWorks functionality, said Martin.

Apple May Be Prepping For Blu-Ray

2009-04-30T04:45:00.000-07:00

The next version of iTunes, which has been released to developers, indicates that Apple may add support for the Blu-ray high-definition format.

ITunes version 8.2 was included with the latest update of the iPhone 3.0 beta software shipped to developers late Tuesday. Within the "About iTunes" section of the pre-release version of the software was a reference suggesting the Apple media player would support Blu-ray disc playback, according to reports .

How far Apple will take Blu-ray support is not known. As a matter of company policy, Apple does not comment on future products.

However, supporting the HD format in any of its products would be a first for Apple, which does not offer Blu-ray disc players as an option for its Mac computers. Apple chief executive Steve Jobs has implied in comments that Blu-ray licensing fees are too high.

Growing adoption of Blu-ray by consumers may force Apple to change its stance. From January through March, Americans bought 9 million Blu-ray movies, nearly double the number sold in the same period a year ago, according to Adams Media Research. Helping to drive sales are lower prices for Blu-ray disc players, which are currently available for less than $150.

Apple last month started offering high-definition movies for rent or purchase on the iTunes stores. HD titles are more expensive to buy and cost a dollar more to rent. Movies and TV shows downloaded from iTunes can be played on an Apple Mac, iPhone, and some iPod models, as well as a Windows PC. The films also can be played on a digital TV through the Apple TV set-top box.

Apple isn't alone in trying to entice people with HD content. Netflix and Blockbuster also offer HD movies online.

Google Flu Tracking System Suggests Flu Is Spreading

2009-04-29T11:34:00.000-07:00

Google has released an experimental version of Google Flu Trends to track the spread of the swine flu in Mexico. Google on Monday said flu activity remained low, as seen by its flu tracking system, but the country-specific version published on Wednesday shows a spike in flu activity.

Google said that its system detected increases in flu-related queries in Mexico City and several other Mexican states during the April 19-25 time period.

At the same time, Google cautions that Experimental Flu Trends for Mexico is, as the name suggests, an experiment and that the data should be viewed as such.

"While we would prefer to validate this data and improve its accuracy, we decided to release an early version today so that it might help public health officials and concerned individuals get an up-to-date picture of the ongoing swine flu outbreak," explained Google engineers Jeremy Ginsberg and Matt Mohebbi in a blog post. "As with our existing Flu Trends system, estimates are provided across many of Mexico's states and updated every day."

Ginsberg and Mohebbi say that flu activity in the United States remains low, as might be expected given the relatively few cases reported in the country. But Google plans to continue its monitoring to look for rising infection.

Google introduced Google Flu Trends in November 2008 as a way to visualize the correlation between flu infections and flu-related search activity. Google maintains that searches provide an early warning about the spread of the flu because search data can be gathered and analyzed almost instantly, unlike traditional epidemiological reporting methods.

Ginsberg and Mohebbi explain that Google's "model tries to filter out search queries that are more likely associated with topical searches rather than searches by those who may be experiencing symptoms." Thus the spike shown in the graph on the Experimental Flu Trends for Mexico Web page should correlate with actual flu activity rather than searches prompted by worry.

As of 11 a.m. EDT, April 29, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicates that 91 confirmed swine flu cases have been detected in the U.S. and that 1 person -- a child in Texas -- has died as a result of the outbreak.

Google planned to hold a media call at 11 a.m. PDT on Wednesday to field questions about its flu tracking project.

5 Things To Do With Dead PC Hardware

2009-04-25T23:47:00.000-07:00

Sooner or later, the PC I'm typing this on is bound to drop dead. One day I'll walk in here, push the power button, and hear a scrape and a clunk that tells me my hard drive is out of commission. Or, worse, I'll get nothing at all. Failing that, it's going to end up dying a different kind of death, although one that's every bit as ignominious -- it'll be yanked out and replaced with something a little more cutting-edge, because time and technology have moved on.

Whatever my PC's exact fate, there's one thing I know won't happen: This machine will not sit at the curbside and wait to be heaved into a garbage truck. In this piece I'll talk about four possible fates for dead hardware. "Dumped into a landfill" is not one of them. That's a fate worth working to avoid, especially since so many of the electronic goods that come into our hands can still be reclaimed, no matter what they're like when we're done with them.

What's A "Dead" PC?

Let's start with a definition or three. The most common definition of "dead" is "I can't use this thing anymore." Sometimes dead means too slow or clunky for your chosen use; time and utility have passed it by.

That Pentium III 650 that used to run Windows 2000 but barely boots anymore, the range of software (and hardware) it can support has narrowed drastically? It might be useful to someone who has fewer expectations from their PC, but to you, it's dead.

Sometimes dead means you've simply outgrown what you have. The system runs fine, but you've moved on to bigger and better things. For example: my 1GB single-core Centrino notebook, which I replaced with a 4GB dual-core 64-bit model -- one which, irony of ironies, cost less than half what I paid for the previous one; such is the march of technology. (Keep reading to find out the fate of the old machine.)

And sometimes dead is just dead. Billy Crystal's character Miracle Max in The Princess Bride put it best: "There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive." In other words, even a machine that doesn't boot or power on may still be good for something -- even if it's something you can't think of.

1. Revival

Let's start with hardware that hasn't died, but has outlived its current use. Rather than deep-sixing it completely, perhaps it's worth putting that device to use in another context. The most common version of this is to give the hardware in question to another family member or a friend. Usually you'll do this after cleaning it up and making sure it's a) marginally functional and b) not likely to break in a way that will stump its new owner.

Cleaning up and resetting an existing system for re-use has gotten a lot easier in recent years, thanks to most systems shipping with either a restore / recovery partition, a set of recovery disks, or both. Sometimes the former are used to build the latter, when you first uncrate the machine.

That said, unless you're about as organized as my mom or as big a packrat as my dad, the odds of those tools surviving any number of office straighten-ups, household spring cleanings, and I-think-I-threw-out-the-wrong-thing shocks goes way down with time.

If you don't have the disks or the recovery partition anymore, call the PC manufacturer (they're still around, one hopes) and ask them for a recovery CD/DVD. They should be able to sell you one if you have the original OS license key sticker. Note that if you bought your system as a "whitebox" from a local, independent reseller, they probably gave you the CD. Lose that and you're generally out of luck.

Even if you haven't lost the original OS, you might do well to install a new one --Linux or Windows, depending on what's within your budget and what seems to work best. Bear in mind that Linux is no longer a one-size-fits-all proposition and hasn't been for some time; you want a variety of Linux distros that will complement your hardware well.

Linux Installation Guidelines

1-2 Years Old / Multi-Core: Any of the recent, big-name Linux distributions will do fine -- e.g., Ubuntu, Fedora, OpenSUSE, CentOS, etc.
2-3 Years Old / Single-Core: Generally the same as the above, but if performance turns out to be an issue, you can go with a scaled-down build designed for economy of space and speed. Xubuntu is the most common example.
Anything Older: Go with a distribution built to be minimal. Puppy Linux is a good one, but the still-in-progress Moblin is worth a look even at this stage of its development.

2. Repurposing

Another option with an older machine is to set it up as a file / print / media server -- a way to offload duties that you don't want to foist upon your existing PC. Since a file server generally doesn't need to be the fastest machine in the world as far as user interaction goes -- it just needs to have a decent network pipe -- you can get away with surprisingly minimal hardware to make this work. For my own file/print setup I used a four-year-old notebook with a USB-attached hard drive in an external cage (a 320GB drive from another machine, which I'd replaced with a 1TB drive). Streamed HD video is probably out of the question, but MP3s and print jobs all work fine.

3. Cannibalization
This means, of course, salvaging what pieces you can and using them elsewhere. Your average "dead" PC has at least two or three parts which by themselves are probably fine. They can generally be cycled over into another PC without trouble, especially if you're buying a new machine and want to save a few dollars here and there. Still, as with anything else, caveats apply.

Peripherals Keyboards, mice, headsets, USB hubs, removable-storage bays (such as those used for memory cards), and so on are the most common things that can be cycled over are.

If they're still in good shape, there's no reason to dump them as long as they still do what you need and will work with future hardware. One exception is PS/2-connected mice or keyboards, which can be connected to USB-only machines but only through specially-designed connectors. If you're hanging onto an older PS/2 keyboard for dear life (some people get very attached to their hardware -- me included!), the cost of an input dongle is negligible.

Hard Drives Any type of storage device is well worth keeping and re-using. Obviously anything with sensitive data on it needs to be wiped down first; see Darik's Boot and Nuke, for more on how to do this easily.

TIP: Always use new cabling, both data and power, when moving an old device. The cables you used with the hardware in its original setup may have developed crimps or bends that turn into full-blown shorts when moved into another machine. I've had this happen to me more than a few times; a hard drive that was working fine in one machine was "dead" in another—actually, just mostly dead, since all it took was a new SATA cable to bring it back to life.

Memory Modules These can usually move between machines that support them with little difficulty. There are two caveats here, though:

You might not always be getting the best possible performance on the target system.
Two, you may run into finicky behaviors you didn't see before. Systems that use server memory -- i.e., registered or ECC memory -- are a lot fussier with memory than regular machines.

The last computer I had in this regard refused to work reliably with two separate sets of DIMMs and finally only worked with a Compaq-branded set.

Video Cards These are worth pulling and saving, since what's old or outdated for one user is more than cutting-edge for another -- provided, of course, it's the right bus type. Also bear in mind that video cards can be a source of unexpected power consumption, something I discovered and wrote about here

Notebooks are tougher to cannibalize, since they tend to be all of a piece. About the only things that can be reliably reused are power supplies (best used in either the same variety of notebook or one with the same wattage requirements) and hard drives.

As an aside, a good many types of hardware can go bad for no visible reason, even after years of perfectly reliable service. A lot of this depends on how it was used. If the user smoked, had a dusty office or ran everything off unfiltered wall current, any one of those alone is going to shorten the lifespan of the device in question.

Sometimes it's not possible to know whether or not these things have happened, although there are giveaways: musty odors, encrustations of dust or dirt on the fan or air intakes, etc. Rule of thumb: if it looks (or smells) like it's been through a war, it probably has been.

4. Donation

If space is more important to you than anything else, take the hardware you have and donate it. The good news is that there are dozens of non-profit organizations, both local and national, that will take used computer equipment of almost every conceivable variety and make good with it.

The best place to start -- if you have working hardware in good condition -- is the Cristina Foundation, dedicated to putting computers into the hands of "people with disabilities, students at risk and economically disadvantaged persons". They may take in hardware that can be repaired and put to use, but you're best off making sure whatever they get is in decent working order (if not always cutting-edge).

Other groups have similar demands but different aims:

The OnIt Foundation
PCs for Schools
Computers with Causes prefers functional hardware whenever possible.

For a massive rundown of just about every charitable group out there looking for PC hardware, check out the TechSoup site, which you can search based on needs and location.

No discussion of donations and reuse would be complete without some mention of both Freecycle and Craigslist. Craigslist we all know about, but Freecycle is less well-known; it's an aggregate of local groups, each dedicated to providing a place for people to provide things for re-use; computer hardware is just one thing they cover.

Subscribe to a local Freecycle mailing list and pay close attention to the rules about posting and soliciting, as the etiquette on these lists is crucial to getting good results. The disadvantage of both Freecycle and Craigslist is that you typically know very little about the pedigree of the people at the other end of the transaction.

5. Recycling

An old superstition goes, "Never throw away a key!" Never throw out a computer, either. There are better things to do with all that metal, copper, plastic and lead than put it into a landfill. If there doesn't seem to be any other fate left than the trash for a piece of hardware, by all means dispose of it -- but do it the right way.

Many major electronics retailers now offer programs above and beyond the usual recycling of cellphones, used CFLs, or dead batteries. Best Buy (http://www.bbycommunications.com/crnew/recycling.asp) does this routinely for appliances and TVs, and furniture-retailer IKEA regularly hosts e-cycling events albeit only in California at the moment. Many Staples outlets now also accept computer parts for recycling, albeit for a fee of $10 per system (peripherals can be thrown in for free).

On a more upscale, professional level, IBM has its own IT buyback program, and east-coast based data-erasure experts Guardian Data Destruction also offers e-cycling as an adjunct to its more conventional drive-wiping and document-shredding services. Network Liquidators is an outfit that deal specifically with used telecom and networking hardware, a lot of which can be resold fairly easily since it tends to be in strong demand, even if it's not up-to-the-second new.

A fairly comprehensive and regularly-updated list of recycling programs by U.S. region is maintained by the Telecommunications Industry Association at EIAE.org. The EPA's resource page is here. And Earth 911 also maintains similar lists, and supplies detailed information about who takes what.

Whichever one you pick, be sure the recycler can show documented proof of compliance with the EPA's R2 practices ,which minimizes the chance they're dumping waste on the sly or shipping it overseas.

InformationWeek has published an in-depth report on Windows 7. Download the report here (registration required).

Analyze Your Computer Configuration with WinAudit Analyze Your Computer Configuration with WinAudit

2009-04-24T00:34:00.001-07:00

If you want to know about each and every component of your computer, WinAudit can do it for you and that too without any special knowledge on how to use it. WinAudit is an easy to use application and even a newbie can use it without any fuss. Continue reading ‘Analyze Your Computer Configuration with WinAudit’

Download RichCopy to Pause and Resume Copying of Files

2009-04-24T00:33:00.001-07:00

I always wanted to resume and pause the copying of files in Windows like we do when we download any files from Internet. If we are copying large files and folders from one location to another, it certainly takes a bit of time especially if you are copying them to some external storage device. Continue reading ‘Download RichCopy to Pause and Resume Copying of Files’

Authorities in Nainital install CCTV Cameras as a Security Measure

2009-04-22T02:31:00.000-07:00

Authorities in Nainital have decided to install Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV) cameras at several crowded places as precautionary measure and to prevent untoward incidents.

About five CCTV cameras have been installed across the hill resort for keeping a watch on the everyday incidents and also to solve problems like traffic jams and pick-pocketing.

“These cameras have been really beneficial for us. We have placed the cameras in the crowded place to avoid any incident like pick pocketing or scuffle. These cameras have been very beneficial in finding out if people are facing any problem especially in crowded places,” said K S Hayanki, inspector in charge, Nainital.

Residents are also happy with the security measure taken as they believe any incident can happen anytime.

“Nainital, is a tourist town and lakhs of tourist come here, so there was requirement of such cameras. With the help of these cameras, police can keep a watch on the movement happening. We have to be vigilant always because any untoward incident can take place anytime,” said Rajesh Shah, a resident.

Deriving its name from the Naini lake around which the town is located, Nainital is a major tourist destination in the Kumaon Himalayan region of Uttarakhand.

Microsoft’s netbook-tailored Windows 7 Starter Edition a ‘gamble’, WSJ

2009-04-22T02:28:00.000-07:00

The Wall Street Journal Monday has described Microsoft’s netbook-tailored Windows 7 Starter Edition as a ‘gamble,’ saying that the company was trying to hook netbook customers to upgrade to the new version, sans Linux-based alternatives.

Apparently, Microsoft is trying hard for Windows to remain the netbook OS of preference, more so as it is involved in a tough competition with the recent netbook-favorite operating system - Linux.

The limiting factor of the new version is that it can only run three simultaneous applications, implying that users can only keep two applications open, along with an antivirus program; and its graphical interface is also less robust than the complete version of Windows 7.

According to critics, the noticeable limitations of Windows Starter can spell problems for Microsoft, that too at a time when the Windows Vista fiasco not so far back in the past!

Nonetheless, in the opinion of John Kistler, of St. Louis-based system builder J&B Technologies, with the kind of speed and performance boosts that Microsoft has woven into Windows 7, it might entice customers to upgrade. Kistler said: “I think people will accept the application limitation. Windows 7 looks like Vista, but it runs 10 times faster, and that’s going to be a big deal for a lot of people.”

How To Completely Remove Anti-Virus Software

2009-04-21T05:44:00.000-07:00

Which is your favorite Anti Virus application? As far as I am concerned it’s ESET NOD32 but if you had asked me this question few months back, definitely I would have been in a state of dilemma while answering it. It took me quite a bit of time to figure which Anti-virus is best suited to me. During this whole process of identifying the best, I ran across hell lot of antivirus applications, tried each one of those and finally ended up with frequent install-uninstall process. But then I found that even though you have uninstalled your antivirus through Windows Add/Remove utitlity, yet there are few files and registry entries that remain and are left untouched. Now the question is how to remove those? Continue reading ‘How To Completely Remove Anti-Virus Software’

Organize Your Windows 7 Desktop with BumpTop

2009-04-21T05:38:00.000-07:00

Are you in a habit of keeping your desktop so clustered that at the time of need you couldn’t find the right thing at the right moment? It can happen with anybody. If you are downloading many things from the Internet or if you are installing so many softwares everyday, in a long run your desktop will look like a graveyard - a common place for many (dead) files that are seldom used. Desktop is meant to keep shortcuts of all the files that you frequently use but people use their desktop like a dustbin, when you don’t know where to keep files, just ram them into desktop. Real bad way to use your computer. But let’s not go deep into what is good or bad instead just concentrate on how to organize and reinvent your desktop. Continue reading ‘Organize Your Windows 7 Desktop with BumpTop’

Hide All Opened Windows with ClickyGone Portable

2009-04-20T04:41:00.000-07:00

Everybody wants to have privacy when they are doing some important and personal work. But that level of privacy may not be achieved when someone suddenly knock up the door and enter your room without permission. Or, there are times when at work you do all sorts of things, except work and suddenly you get caught by your boss. So there are times when you want to hide all your windows application so that no one else can see what you are actually doing. Continue reading ‘Hide All Opened Windows with ClickyGone Portable’

Convert DVD Files to 3gp Format for FREE

2009-04-20T04:39:00.000-07:00

If you have a mobile phone with extended memory and a good battery backup then that’s for sure you are not going to use it just like any other cell phone. It will be used as a music player and if you are a movie freak like me you can even watch movie on your mobile phone anytime when you’re free. Almost all mobile phones support video files of 3gp format and if you have DVDs of many good movies, you can easily convert them to 3gp format. Continue reading ‘Convert DVD Files to 3gp Format for FREE’

SnagIt Screen Capture Plugin for Windows Live Writer

2009-04-19T05:32:00.000-07:00

SnagIt Screen Capture for Windows Live Writer comes to your rescue. It just adds more functionality to Writer by integrating SnagIt directly into your blogging client. Now don’t tell me you don’t know about SnagIt?

After installation a link will appear under the” Insert” section of your Writer by the name “Insert SnagIt Screen Capture…”. Clicking on that link will popup a windows wherein you can configure various SnagIt Capture options. Once you click on Capture button, it can optionally open SnagIt Preview Window where you can edit the captured image just like you do in normal SnagIt utility.

The best part about this plugin is that you need not to safe the captured image to your disk. Windows Live Writer will pick up the image and then it will be deleted automatically.

So if you like to blog frequently and love to combine articles with images, SnagIt Screen Capture plugin will come in very handy that’s for sure.

EC takes UK and Phorm to task over privacy

2009-04-15T09:16:00.000-07:00

The European Commission has sent an infringement notice to the United Kingdom Government over privacy oversights related to the use of Internet snooping technology from UK-based Phorm.

Phorm runs a behavioural marketing service used by several UK ISP's to serve contextual advertisements to ISP subscribers based on their surfing habits.

The service has been the subject of several complaints from privacy groups which claim Phorm's interception of user web surfing traffic is unlawful.

The European Commission says it has been in "extensive" consultations with the UK authorities over the complaints. Concerns remain, its said, around "structural problems in the way the UK has implemented EU rules ensuring the confidentiality of communications."

European Union privacy rules insist its member countries ensure "the confidentiality of communications by prohibiting interception and surveillance without the user's consent."

The Commission wishes the UK to establish an 'independent national supervisory authority' to deal with communications interceptions.

"Technologies like internet behavioural advertising can be useful for businesses and consumers but they must be used in a way that complies with EU rules," said EU Telecoms Commissioner Viviane Reding in a statement.

"These rules are there to protect the privacy of citizens and must be rigorously enforced by all Member States.

"We have been following the Phorm case for some time and have concluded that there are problems in the way the UK has implemented parts of EU rules on the confidentiality of communications.

"I call on the UK authorities to change their national laws and ensure that national authorities are duly empowered and have proper sanctions at their disposal to enforce EU legislation on the confidentiality of communications."

Controversy over Phorm erupted in April 2008 after BT revealed it had tested the service in 2006 and 2007 without informing its users. UK authorities also recieved a significant number of complaints after the ISP launched an invitation-based trial late last year.

The EC says it has the right to commence infringement proceedings against member states under the EC Treaty, and if unresolved can refer cases to the European Union's Court of Justice.

The UK Government has two months to respond to the infringement notice.

Bottle Domains dumped by auDA over security breach

2009-04-15T09:14:00.000-07:00

The Australian domain name administrator has ruled out a review of its registrar agreements in the wake of its decision to terminate Bottle Domains accreditation today over a security breach.

auDA took the action after it emerged Bottle may have hidden the hacking of its database for almost two years.

A spokesperson for Bottle was "not available" for comment.

The termination has left Bottle resellers such as Melbourne-based Cove "between a rock and a hard place" - with Cove, Bottle's largest reseller, now making a play to become a registrar in its own right.

Bottle, which counts some 11,000 registrants as customers, is the subject of an ongoing investigation by the Australian Federal Police after it was revealed in February that usernames and passwords had been compromised in a ‘security breach'.

It has now emerged, however, that the February ‘breach' may not have been the first.

In a statement today, auDA said it "has since discovered that Bottle Domains was the subject of an earlier security incident in April 2007, which auDA believes may have caused or contributed to the security incident in February 2009."

iTnews understands that the hack reported in February this year may actually have taken place back in April 2007 - some two years earlier than first thought.

This could mean data over the range of 2007 to 2009 may have been compromised, although the extent of the breach is still under police investigation.

auDA said in a statement that Bottle's failure to notify it at the time of the April 2007 security incident breached its obligations under the Registrar Agreement.

"Information recently provided to auDA by Bottle Domains about the April 2007 incident revealed that it did not reset customer passwords or alert its customers to the possibility that their account information had been accessed by third parties," auDA said.

"Bottle Domains also failed to conduct an independent security audit to verify that the security vulnerability had been fixed, and that there was no other unauthorised access to its systems."

aUDA chief Chris Disspain told iTnews that although the definitions for what does and doesn't constitute a security breach under current guidelines "is a matter for discussion", he expected all Australian registrars "to err on the side of caution".

He did not believe the Bottle case warranted a review or tightening of the agreement.

"You can argue that tighter rules are more dangerous because it's easier to argue a breach that doesn't fit into a tighter ‘box' of rules," Disspain said.

Disspain also said he had ‘absolutely no idea' whether Bottle would turn to legal action over the decision.

"They're entitled to take whatever action they deem appropriate," he said.

"We're very comfortable the action we've taken is appropriate. We believe we simply didn't have a choice."

Bottle resellers are now faced with a choice of forming a relationship with another registrar or - depending on their size and lobbying power - becoming a registrar in their own right.

Cove's national sales manager, Cheyne Jonstone, told iTnews that since news of the termination leaked out of auDA, Cove had been approached "by just about every [other] registrar in Australia".

But few offers had been able to offer flexibility in the API and pricing that Cove had received from Bottle.

"Our entire system has been built around Bottle's," Jonstone said.

"The problem for us is that no other registrar offers the comprehensiveness in their API as Bottle did."

Jonstone revealed that Cove is in the process of making an approach to auDA to reopen its registration process - which has been offline for approximately 18 months - to admit Cove as a registrar in its own right.

"We've been trying since March last year," he revealed.

"We have 3000 dot AU domains with Bottle now. We're large enough to be accredited anyway and for us that would be ideal because our system is already built to interact with auDA."

He said the phones "had been ringing off the hook" with domain owners seeking next steps. All customers had been notified of auDA's decision by email.

auDA has released its own set of guidelines [PDF] for both customers and resellers. While Disspain said there was no risk for either customers or resellers, he urged the latter to contact him directly to resolve any potential issues.

Skype to spin off in early 2010 IPO

2009-04-15T09:12:00.000-07:00

Skype parent company eBay plans to spin off consumer voice-over-IP company Skype in an initial public offering in 2010.

Skype, which boasts over 400 million users, US$551 million in annual revenues and a claim to being the world's largest long distance communications carrier, has been an uneasy fit with parent company, auction house eBay.

eBay purchased Skype for close to US$4 billion in September 2005.

eBay representatives today said Skype will be spun off to standalone on the stockmarket at some stage in early 2010 - pending market conditions.

"Skype is a great stand-alone business with strong fundamentals and accelerating momentum," said eBay president and CEO, John Donahoe.

"But it's clear that Skype has limited synergies with eBay and PayPal. We believe operating Skype as a stand-alone publicly traded company is the best path for maximising its potential.

"This will give Skype the focus and resources required to continue its growth and effectively compete in online voice and video communications."

Donahue has been reviewing eBay's investment in Skype since his appointment as eBay CEO in April 2008.

Donahue installed a new management team at the VoIP company, led by CEO Josh Silverman - with whom the eBay CEO credits as the driver for much of Skype's growth.

Earlier this week it was revealed that Skype's founders were in discussions with private equity firms to make their own bid for the company.

eBay also revealed that two million people have downloaded the Skype for iPhone application within a week of it being made available -making it the number one free download for the iPhone in 40 (national) markets at the time.

The company claims this saw half a million new users register for the Skype service.

More giants buckle in CSIRO Wi-Fi patent case

2009-04-15T09:11:00.000-07:00

Microsoft and Asus have settled with Australia's CSIRO over its claim to Wi-Fi patents, following similar moves by HP and Fujitsu to bail out of a continuing court battle contesting CSIRO's claims.

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), currently fighting a patent case against over a dozen technology companies in the US District Court in Texas, is slowly managing to solicit royalties out of some of the world's biggest technology companies via out-of-court settlements.

CSIRO spokesperson Huw Morgan has confirmed CSIRO settled with software giant Microsoft and PC manufacturer Asus early this week, after settling with Fujitsu last week and HP the week prior.

CSIRO claims to have patented core elements of the technology used in 802.11a and 802.11g wireless devices.

Its US patent for Wireless LAN technology (US Patent 5487069) was granted in January 1996 and has since been appealed by several of the world's largest technology companies.

There are still nine technology companies battling CSIRO in the Texas court.

Morgan said CSIRO will not make any comment on the research organisation's prospects until the case concludes.

Business intelligence, business smart?

2009-04-13T10:38:00.000-07:00

Pratima Harigunani of CyberMedia News checks it out with Dr. Mukund Deshpande, head - BI and Analytics Practice, Persistent Systems who has spent eight years of action in BI that also covers heuristic driven algorithms, classification and prediction algorithms after PhD in Computer Science from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, USA with a thesis on 'Data Mining Techniques for Sequences and Graphs'. He talks on a range of issues flanking BI today.

When it comes to day-to-day business, what role does or can BI play? How much information derived in BI is indeed actionable?

BI is important because the company wants to know about the customer, wants to analyse the competition, wants to study customer churn properly for corrective action, specially in context to today's scenario and the crowded marketplace wherein competition has become more fierce.

Churn identification, for instance, helps at the decision-making level directly for customer or campaign management. It's done by churning out reports, dashboards, predictive analysis etc from data warehouses.

How best can BI be applied to broader issues like national security?

Security is a hard management problem. It's all about how best to identify and focus on the priority areas. It's all about expanding relationships. Information in security incidents is mostly divided and scattered, but it's there. You have to find how best to link them.

The inference part is where the human comes in. But linking and tracing information is where technology can play a role. Today terror attacks are planned and managed often on Internet. What can be done better is that in reflection, one can connect the dots and we can have a frame of reference.

If we take a frank look at BI's evolution so far, how successfully has the reactive to proactive gap been covered?

Yes, EPA (Enterprise Performance Management) is where we are doing proactive work. Unlike the earlier report-generating work and focus on time-cutting, there is need for proactive work. A lot of BI is still reactive but EPM is a new breed. BI is trying to look at decisions the other way round with stuff like 'what-if' questions and scenario-based analysis.

What's the connection status, between BI and higher realms like human intelligence, artificial intelligence, robotics, cybernetics etc?

These are advanced analytics areas whereas BI is an analytics area focusing specifically on data and business problems. Its focus is mainly on decision-making.

With new scenarios like clouds and grids redefining computing and data, how does BI realign itself?

BI may go to cloud or Grid if privacy and security are taken care of. That's a challenge. But for that big leap in mindset is required. More so on areas like support and control. Guys like Google and Amazon can afford the infrastructure to do it.

What's your take on future trends and the status of BI in India?

As we move ahead, BI would graduate to real-time BI. The quicker, the better. DWA (Data Warehousing Applications) is another area that helps in how to deal in hardware to solve big data problems.

Apart from that, open source BI would be something to watch out for. The way open source has made inroads in areas of OS, Internet browser etc with Linux or Firefox, we have to see what happens in BI space.

Talking of India, the problem here is that unlike in the West, there is no unique identifier for data like the SSN in the US. I heard it's about to come in India too, and if that happens, it will take away the identification problem for BI. Not all data is captured here. Industry is still tactical in its approach towards BI.

What has been Persistent's ground of action so far in BI?

It's been traditionally an area of database. We have focused on building tools. Our work happens around BI tool vendors, and product development for some major DB and DWH vendors, which is the OPD flavour. We also build lots of applications and tools. The spectrum so far covers product engineering for leading ETL vendors where we have data cleaning, de-duping.

We also cover predictive analysis consulting area with churn analysis, targeted advertising, risk-modeling and cross-selling as some constituents. Apart from this, we have various domain-specific practices in industries like telecom, retail etc for reporting, dashboards.

Industry says cheers to Tech Mahindra, Satyam bid

2009-04-13T10:35:00.002-07:00

BANGALORE, INDIA: So the mystery is over. Satyam has got a new hand to control it; and a chance to shed the image of "the fraud-hit Indian outsourcer"!

Immediately after winning the bid, Tech Mahindra has made it clear that it will give the highest priority to restoring confidence in Satyam.

Tech Manhindra chairman Anand Mahindra also said that he would personally reach out to Satyam's top clients including Citigroup, Cisco and General Motors.

Of course, this has given a breather to the India IT industry as a whole, because the scam and the uncertainty over Satyam had cast a shadow over the entire India Inc. Though only time can tell as to how the new deal would help revive Satyam, the industry feels Tech Mahindra winning the bid is a welcome development.

In the words of NASSCOM president Som Mittal the deal was synergistic for both companies. "All three bidders were worthy," he said, commenting on the bid process.

Expressing the relief that the Satyam issue is finally put behind us, S Gopalakrishnan, CEO, Infosys Technologies, said: "It is commendable that the government-appointed board at Satyam has been able to bring a closure to the uncertainty surrounding Satyam's future. The government has addressed the issue quickly and responsibly."

For Tech Mahindra, winning the bid also means the entry into a new vertical, as Wipro CFO Suresh Senapathy has observed. Saying that he was glad the Satyam bid process was successfully completed, Senapathy said, "Satyam will also bring in non-telecom expertise for Tech Mahindra."

It is this possibility of entering a new vertical that Chandramouli, director - Advisory Services, Zinnov Management Consulting Pvt. Ltd points to.

"Tech Mahindra will be able to de-risk from being a single vertical focused organization and will be able to acquire marquee clients going forward across other verticals," he said.

According to him, Tech Mahindra will be able to expand to various geographies using Satyam's spread and they will be in the league of top 5 IT services companies.

However, on the other hand, Tech Mahindra will have to deal with not just internal challenges of integration but also external challenges which would necessitate new business models and flexibility, he warns.

Moreover, "Tech Mahindra will lose its advantage as a niche player in a fast growing vertical and this would impact its competitiveness in the telecom space," Chandramouli points out.

So ultimately the outcome of the deal depends on how Tech Mahindra tackles the challenges of the new possibility!

Tech Mahindra and Satyam: a cake worth the bite

2009-04-13T10:35:00.001-07:00

PUNE, INDIA: Tech Mahindra has emerged as the winning bidder in the Satyam fray. This could bring the much-awaited turning point in the Satyam saga. But more than that, it could be a big wise step that could redefine Tech Mahindra's future.

As analysts see it, for a telco-domain specialist like Tech Mahindra, going forward for a broad spectrum services major, could change the game a lot and be the slingshot to the top bracket of IT global biggies.

With about 95 per cent of revenues coming from telco space, quite a niche business area, this deal is the only way, Tech Mahindra could have put its tents pitched well inside verticals beyond telecom.

As Girish Trivedi, deputy director, ICT Practice, Frost & Sullivan, South Asia & Middle East views it, "This is very good strategic move by the company and a quick smart way to be in a league where thanks to Satyam, it would have good visibility, revenues, good Fortune class customer base and stellar clients like GE. It will also help it move away from the image of a BT-Driven vendor and look out for other multi-year plum global contracts."

According to some analysts, "this deal would establish Tech Mahindra as a serious player among the Top Five global vendors and make it rub shoulders with the likes of IBM, HP as well as be in the Top 3 consideration list for multi-million contracts. If it can take the deal ahead smartly."

Now the 'if' part could indeed be the clincher. Integration, blending the 50,000 employee base of Satyam with about 25,000 of its own, integrating the people and process areas successfully and handling the legal and image baggage of Satyam would add a lot to that 'if'.

Schooner, IBM partner on data access appliances

2009-04-13T10:28:00.000-07:00

Schooner Information Technology Inc., a provider of data access appliances for Web 2.0 and cloud computing data centers, said Monday it is collaborating with IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM) on fully integrated data access appliances.

Menlo Park, Calif-based Schooner said the first two products in a family of data access appliances with Armonk, N.Y.-based IBM (NYSE:IBM) are for MySQL enterprise and for Memcached and are built on IBM System x server technology.

“It was natural that we aligned with IBM,” said Michael Pray, vice president of sales and marketing for Schooner. “Each party brings significant benefits to the relationship. By leveraging IBM’s proven server platform, global reach and world-class sales and support resources, Schooner can bring its breakthrough technology to customers worldwide who are trying to solve scale-out data center challenges.”

Under the guidance of the IBM Venture Capital Group, Schooner partnered with the IBM System x group for server technology, co-branded sales and after-market support.

Financial terms of the collaboration were not disclosed.

IBM has about 11,000 employees in Research Triangle Park.

Tech Mahindra Buys India's Scandal Tainted Information Technology Company

2009-04-13T10:10:00.000-07:00

India's scandal-tainted Information Technology company, Satyam Computer Services, has been bought by a telecommunication firm, Tech Mahindra. The sale is expected to restore confidence in India's I-T services sector.

Three months after Satyam Computer Services was hit by a massive accounting fraud, Tech Mahindra won an auction for a controlling stake in the high tech giant.

On Monday, Tech Mahindra agreed to buy a 31 percent stake in Satyam for $351 million, edging out other bidders. The bid has to be approved by the government.

In January, Satyam's founder, B. Ramalinga Raju, shocked investors by admitting the company's profits had been overstated by more than $1 billion. The fraud had been going on for years, and it raised doubts about the survival of the I.T. giant, at that time India's fourth largest outsourcing company.

The country was rocked by its biggest corporate scandal, and the government moved quickly to protect the image of its booming Information Technology sector. It sacked the board of directors and appointed a new one, which set out to find a customer for the company.

Satyam Chairman, Kiran Karnik says the sale signals a new stage, and will restore customer confidence in the outsourcing company.

"We are very pleased," he said. "We think it is a very valuable company, we view this as a very successful event today."

The Satyam scandal has also raised questions whether accounting standards and corporate governance are adequate in India.

After Satyam's sale was announced, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh gave assurances that a similar scandal will not be repeated.

"I am confident that our regulatory system has the resilience and the strength to ensure that no such "Satyam" will ever take place," he said.

Satyam has about 53,000 employees and operates in nearly 70 countries. Its clients include some of the world's largest corporations like U.S.-based General Electric. Satyam is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, and faces several lawsuits in the United States.

In recent months, India's I.T. sector has been reassuring customers that Satyam represents a "stand-alone" case. The $50 billion I.T. industry has grown massively in the last two decades.

Complete protection with the help of Small Body Worn Spy Cams

2009-04-11T12:45:00.000-07:00

f we want to fulfill our prospects , it has become very easy for us these days because there are not only extraordinary innovations at our aid but also new techniques to make use of them sensibly as much as possible so that we can get flawlessness for whatever we are using the product for. Manufacturers are widely introducing many more equipments and procedures for us so that our working patterns can be altered where we can not only save our time and energy but also money to a great extent. They are promising to give us many products such as Spy Nanny Cams so that we can use them the way we like. There are several types of cameras which are not only innovative but also affordable . In the earlier days cameras were supposed to be used only by the wealthy people because they were considered to be luxurious products. The professionals used them to capture the images of particular events like weddings or anybody’s birthday or so on. They were also used to capture the images of the celebrities’ who worked in the movies or the models who worked for the commercial agencies. But these days’ cameras are assumed as some of the significant products which can be used by one and all. They can be used by college going children to protect themselves from any untoward incidents while they are alone on their way home, working moms can use them to capture the photographs of the baby sitters while they are away from home leaving their children behind with them. The business men are opting to install them in their office so that they can keep an eye on their staff when they are busy with some other work. So, there are several reasons to why it has become compulsory to make use of the innovative cameras these days. There are several pioneering cameras in the market and they are being used for various purposes including surveillance and other benefits. These cameras are popular and are being used worldwide for several reasons by all. They are available in number of colors, shapes and designs. All are well-built with tremendous technique and they all are planned to give accuracy while making use of it.

When there are several hidden andSpy Nanny Cams, the Video Camcorder are some of the latest and easy to use cameras. These types of cameras are planned in small objects like the neck tie, the wrist watch, the gum stick, a pen and so many other objects which can be carried with no trouble and used according to our convenience. Surveillance becomes easy using these objects and cameras.

This is a useful spy cam which has the capacity to record the videos for approximate 6 hours even prior to the recharging is needed. If this Small Body Worn Spy Cams has to be used indoor then also it can be easily used and recharged with the help of the DC 5V adapter. The grasping speed of this Small body worn spy cams is up to 15 frames in one second. It also offers 320×240 lines of resolution. These cameras appear with a hauling clip so that the Video Camcorder w/IR LED - KB-DV250 [C6000 MG] very easily can be fastened with the belt and carry it along where ever it has to be. The Portable Camcorder W/IR LED - KB-DV250 [C6000 MG] is indeed the best gift I could present it to my wife.

Hands Free Devices for Refurbished Cell Phones

2009-04-11T12:44:00.000-07:00

It is becoming more and more common for states to pass laws that make it illegal for drivers to talk on their cellphones while driving if they do not use a hands-free device. People caught without a hands-free device are issued a ticket and are forced to pay a fine for their first offense. Repeat offenders face harsher penalties with each repeat offense. The theory behind these new laws is that they allow drivers to keep both hands free to steer, shift, etc. and allow the driver to focus more on driving instead of holding a phone against their ear.

The most common hands free device is a Bluetooth earpiece. This wireless solution simply clips over the ear, allowing you to speak without holding the phone. To use a Bluetooth device, just associate it with any Bluetooth capable cell phone. Today, most new cell phones, as well as many used cell phones, are Bluetooth capable.

If you own an older used cell phone, it may lack Bluetooth technology. Do not worry, however, as there are still hands-free solutions that will work with any kind of phone. The most common is a wired headset that resembles ear buds and connects to your phone with via a headphone-like jack. These devices perform the same function as a Bluetooth headset except they use a wire to transfer data to and from your phone and are also generally cheaper. They are available for nearly any model of phone made in the past 10 years, so even if you’re still using an older refurbished Sprint cell phone, you will be able to find a hands-free solution.

A hands free accessory is not just beneficial for driving. Even if you live in a state that does not require hands-free devices for driving, chances are you will find some benefit from being able to talk on your phone without using your hands, such as being able to type while on the phone (not while you’re driving!).

Another choice if you are looking for a way to make your used Blackberry hands free is to use a plug and play kit for your car, which usually draws power from your cigarette lighter. This tiny attachment contains a microphone and speaker, and can be attached to your dashboard, air conditioning vent, or another area in your car. Unlike a Bluetooth headset, you need not attach anything to your ear when using a car kit. While some of these are wireless and rely on Bluetooth technology, others can be attached with a wire to your cell phone.

The bottom line is that there are numerous options for hands free devices for all phones and they should not prevent you from taking advantage of the great deals you can get on used phones. Hands-free devices can be found for nearly any phone with a headphone jack and/or Bluetooth. Even if you live in a state that does not currently have a hands-free law, they probably will eventually, and the other benefits are often worth it.

4 New Models Launch by Czech Automaker Skoda in 2010

2009-04-11T12:42:00.001-07:00

With the aim to strengthen its presence in the Indian market, Skoda, a Czech automobile maker and part of the fourth most established automotive company in the world, has decided to launch four new models by the coming year.

The company said that it will make foray into the small car, MPV and SUV segments with its new launchings.

Moreover, Skoda plans to increase local content in its cars to bring down their cost of production by 2010.

It is also looking to terminate the Octavia by the next few years.

On the sidelines of the launch of the diesel version of the Skoda Superb, Thomas Kuehl, board member (sales and marketing), Skoda Auto India, said, “We will be introducing the small car at a little over Rs 3 lakh.”

Mr. Kuehl said that the country will be the initial market where this car will be launched.

An estate/variant of the Skoda Fabia is also being tested for the Indian market.

Mr. Ashutosh Dixit, GM, sales and dealer development said, “Feasibility studies are on for that, and also for the Roomster, which is an MPV.”

He said that Skoda is planning to launch a small sized SUV Skoda Yeti in India by next year. The Yeti model will be launched to woo the buyers who want to buy a SUV but don’t want to spend too much money on it.

Later this year, the Skoda Yeti will be unveiled at the Geneva Auto Show, and Skoda plans to launch it in India in the first half of next year.

With the introduction of the diesel edition of Skoda Superb, and the V6 petrol version launch earlier, the Czech auto manufacturer is getting high in the D-segment that has posted 55% growth during the last quarter.

The company will enter into the mid-market segment with the revamp of the 7-year old Octavia model.

Mr. Kuehl added that the new Octavia, to be revealed later this year, will be moved back to this segment from the current C+ entry segment.

“The model will eventually be phased out and replaced by another model in the next couple of years or so,” Mr. Kuehl said.

Digital Camcorder Features - A - Z Significant Information Concerning on Features

2009-04-11T12:37:00.000-07:00

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Microsoft ordered to pay US$388m in patent case

2009-04-10T12:09:00.000-07:00

Microsoft has been ordered to pay US$388 million in damages for infringing a patent held by anti-piracy software maker Uniloc.

Microsoft, the world's largest software maker, said it was disappointed in the verdict, and plans to appeal.

The verdict was reached by a jury in a long-running case in federal court in Rhode Island, which found that Microsoft infringed Uniloc's patent on software that generates unique identities for licensed users and prevents unauthorized use or copying of programs.

"We believe that we do not infringe, that the patent is invalid and that this award of damages is legally and factually unsupported," said a Microsoft spokesman. "We will ask the court to overturn the verdict."

Uniloc USA and its Singapore-based parent originally filed suit against Microsoft in 2003, claiming that Microsoft infringed its patent with security software it was using to prevent unlicensed use of its Windows XP operating system and parts of its Office suite of products.

After six years of legal wrangling, the jury trial started in March. The damages award is one of the largest on record in patent law disputes.

The case: Uniloc USA, Inc., et al v. Microsoft Corp., et al, U.S. District Court District of Rhode Island (Providence), 1:03-cv-00440-S-DLM.

KPMG embarks on global IT consolidation project

2009-04-10T12:07:00.000-07:00

EXCLUSIVE The Australian operations of KPMG will be an international test bed for the firm's global plan to consolidate IT services from 130 countries into 14 regional service clusters.

The Integrated Business Systems (IBS) project will see KPMG consolidate the data centres and associated infrastructure that runs four key systems from 130 countries into 14 regional service clusters.

The professional services firm is a federation of partnerships around the globe, with its head office serving the IT needs of 30 small countries and 100 other partnerships catering for their own needs.

KPMG will consolidate Exchange e-mail systems, Interwoven document management systems, portals running SharePoint 2007 and a SAP practice management system into regional clusters over the next four to five years.

KPMG Australia CIO Ian McBride said Australia will host one of the clusters, supporting systems for four to five countries and 7000 to 8000 users.

Regional clusters vs global consolidation

It will take applications such as an Australian-developed practice management system to some countries for the first time.

But for applications used across KPMG globally, the consolidation is driven by savings.

"You could imagine that going from 100 systems down to 14 would have to result in raw savings," McBride told iTnews. "Each of these 130 countries has their own Exchange system, their own support staff, policies and operations and infrastructure."

But more importantly, McBride said the arrangement will enable the financial services firm to be "more agile and nimble" in its service delivery while gaining the savings of consolidation.

It was a far more appropriate arrangement than sending operations offshore to the cheapest countries, he said.

"I have a view that there are certain physical limitations to where you provisioning services versus where you consume them," he said.

"With a system like Exchange, it is fundamentally store-and-forward - there is no real-time requirement. But applications that require a real-time experience need to operate relatively close to where they are being used.

"When you are serving hefty applications like SAP to users, there are limitations in terms of distance, latency and network capacity. You can't make the distance between India and Australia get any shorter."

Australia as test bed

McBride confirmed KPMG Australia will be a test bed for the Integrated Business Systems (IBS) project.

"Australia has a great size and scale to get a sense of what issues might occur," he said. "We have good skills locally that can contribute to KPMG's global thinking."

He said the business here is "driving ahead faster than the global project plan" to exploit unified communications.

The Australian office kicked off a unified communications project in January 2009, integrating a Nortel-powered Voice-over-IP system with Microsoft's Office Communications Server (OCS).

OCS is an enterprise software system that integrates instant messaging, VoIP and video conferencing into the popular Microsoft Exchange/Outlook messaging system.

KPMG's "trigger event" to adopt a national approach to unified communications came when the professional services firm moved its Perth office to a new facility last month.

With the Perth office now running on the new OCS and VoIP system, the rest of the country's KPMG offices will abandon their old PABX systems and roll out unified communications in June and July of 2009.

The local office is also trialling the upcoming Exchange 14 platform, currently under beta release, to deploy by June 2010.

Greg Patten, senior manager of infrastructure at KPMG Australia told iTnews the upcoming Exchange 14 "tightens up on Exchange 2007" in some areas, while there are "surprising gaps" in others.

"Holistically, it starts to pull together an Instant Messaging, mail and SMS capability - blending all of these into one window," he said.

IT department escapes green policy setting

2009-04-10T12:02:00.000-07:00

IT managers are waiting on a corporate directive or more resources in order to implement practices to reduce energy consumption, a Fujitsu survey has found.

The survey of 310 CIOs and IT managers commissioned by Fujitsu Australia found 60 per cent of respondents didn't have a green IT policy in place.

Of those that did, however, 95 per cent reported cost savings and other efficiencies from having it.

But the survey seemed to dispel the idea that having a green IT policy would increase customers attracted because of it.

Only 21 per cent of respondents reported this to be the case.

One reason IT is lagging on green IT is the idea that green policies are seen as enterprise-wide initiatives that incorporate IT.

This is backed by the finding that less than 10 per cent of the CIOs surveyed said they were directly responsible for setting their company's sustainability policy.

The survey also claimed that IT managers didn't understand the specific environmental metrics of relevance to their work - despite them reporting "higher levels of understanding of green issues than the general public does", the report said.

"This low level of understanding calls into question how equipped IT managers are to make environmental-related decisions," the report said.

Most IT managers were looking at things like server consolidation, virtualisation or setting power shutdown policies, but these initiatives were designed to save money rather than contribute directly to a green IT policy setting.

French Internet piracy law defeated in parliament

2009-04-10T12:01:00.001-07:00

The French parliament rejected a bill on Thursday that proposed disconnecting internet users if they download music or films illegally, with the ruling UMP party failing to turn out in force to approve the law.

Backed by President Nicolas Sarkozy's government, the legislation was meant to quell the flow of free songs and films on the internet, that has hurt the revenues of artists and production companies.

However, opposition politicians managed to defeat it at a final vote in the National Assembly on Thursday when only a small number of UMP lawmakers turned up for the session, handing the centre-right government an embarrassing defeat.

Socialist parliamentarians broke out in applause after the vote went their way.

Under the proposed law, users caught illegally downloading files would have received two warnings and then, after a third infraction, disconnected from the Internet for up to a year.

Some consumer groups warned that it might have hit the wrong people, saying honest users risked being unfairly punished and forced to prove their innocence if hackers had hijacked their computers' identity.

Socialist parliamentarian Patrick Bloche described the bill as "dangerous, useless, inefficient, and very risky for us citizens".

Under pressure from a struggling music industry, governments have long been trying to crack down on online file-swapping.

"It's a balanced bill for a legal and civilised internet," said Culture Minister Christine Albanel.

The government has the right to demand that the bill is re-introduced to parliament later this year.

In January, Irish internet provider Eircom agreed to disconnect users who download music illegally in a settlement with four major record companies. Irish media said it was the first deal of its kind in the world.

Microsoft virtual machine 'mythbusting' backfires

2009-04-10T11:54:00.000-07:00

A Microsoft marketing video designed to "bust myths" around the lack of virtualisation functionality in its products has only served to remind users of how far it has to catch up.

The video features David Greshler, director of virtualisation strategy at Microsoft, and Edwin Yuen, technical project manager at Microsoft, taking apart ten "myths" they said were perpetuated by virtualisation technology rival VMware.

Titled "Microsoft Mythbusters: Top 10 VMware Myths", the duo attacked what they saw as misinformation as presented on the "Why Choose VMware" section of their rival's web site.

Number one in their 'top ten myths' was that "Microsoft offers no live migration" as VMware does with its VMotion technology. Second was the "myth" that Microsoft offered no Clustered File Systems in Windows.

The best the two Microsoft employees could do to de-bunk these assertions was to suggest that their next version of Windows 2008 will feature similar technologies to VMware.

"In our Windows 2008 R2 release, our next release, coming up very soon, we have migration built right in, the same way VMotion works," said Yuen. "It allows you to move a virtual machine from one host to another, without any perceptible downtime."

"Myth one, gone!" said Greshler, smacking his hands together.

Comments on the Microsoft site, even from posters purporting to be Microsoft Gold partners, were highly critical of the duo's attempt to suggest Microsoft has these features commercially available.

"Of course you don't have stuff like Live Migration and such. Sure, you will have it in the future, but right now you don't, and that is the current truth," said one comment.

"So you are busting the myths of not having a VMotion/VMFS equivalent by stating your next product will have them," said another. "When is that expected out again...2010?"

Other assertions the duo attempted to discredit included that Microsoft's Hyper-V was only at version 1.0 and therefore less likely to be reliable or scalable.

"We're running a lot of Hyper V internally," said Yuen, "...on sites like TechNet, and Microsoft.com."

The duo said Hyper V had the same performance benchmarks as VMware's ESX server, better device driver support, the same memory footprint, and a better pricing model.

Greshler also accused VMware of being selective about what management tools of Microsoft it chooses to compare with its own.

"They only talk about VM manager," he said, rather than the complete suite of Windows System Center - which he believed to be an "apples and oranges comparison."

The 10^th supposed 'myth' was that IT shops "need VMware."

"We've built virtualisation into Windows Server," said Yuen. "You don't have to pay what equates to a virtualisation tax. You can leverage and use virtualisation with what you have now."

Greshler said VMware added an extra layer of "cost, complexity and security" on top of the hardware, operating system and applications stack Microsoft is known for.

His take on virtualisation has become the subject of ridicule.

"You might be wondering where the hypervisor is in this model - I know I am. Frankly, that is a problem," was the response from blogger Eric Gray, a VMware employee. "To get [to Microsoft's] "three layers" you'd need to forgo virtualisation."

"As a long time Gold Partner, I find the video embarrassing," said another comment underneath Microsoft's video. "Come on guys, if you are going to release something like this, at least wait until you have a real released solution. You're ten years too late and hundreds of features short."

"We deserve better than this," said Mike Laverick, a Microsoft-certified Instructor.

Hackers breach US electric grid

2009-04-09T11:59:00.000-07:00

News of a recent security breach in the US electrical grid is prompting new security worries and calls for better protections.

A Tuesday report by the Wall Street Journal claimed that spies from China and Russia had breached security protections on American electrical grids and had installed software which could have been used to cripple systems such as water treatment centres and power plants through the compromised grids.

The report noted that no malicious activity had taken place. However, given the severity of such an attack, security experts are issuing dire warnings that protections must be improved.

Phyllis Schneck, vice president of threat intelligence for McAfee said the incidents show just how deep our dependence on IT has become, and how vulnerable populations can be when electrical grids are compromised.

"The very high level of this is that a cyber event can cause a catastrophic physical event," Schneck explained.

"As humans it tends to be our habit to build for availability before we put security in, this is awake up call in building sec into every layer of our infrastructure."

The possibility of a cyber attack on public utilities is not new. Last year, the US government released the findings of its Cyber Storm 2 exercise which simulated an attack on both corporate and government IT systems across a number of countries.

At the time, the groups admitted that all sides needed to improve, particularly regarding communication and interaction in the event of an attack.

To Schneck, today's events only reaffirm the need to improve understanding and protection of those government and private infrastructure systems.

"Today's story is not the first, it won't be the last and it's not new," said Schneck.

"This really should be a wakeup call, because we have not yet made securing these systems the priority that it needs to be."

Apple sued over touch screen technology

2009-04-09T11:57:00.000-07:00

Apple is being sued for patent infringement by Taiwanese chip design house Elan Microelectronics over its use of touch screen controls.

The suit, filed in the US District Court in San Francisco, states that Apple’s MacBook computer, iPhone and iPod Touch all infringe the patents owned by Elan.

“We couldn’t find a common viewpoint with Apple, so we decided we had to take action,” Dennis Liu, an Elan spokesman, told the New York Times.

He added that the company had been in talks with Apple for about two years over the issue but had decided to go to court after not reaching an agreement.

This is not the first time Elan has sued over the patents it holds on touch screen technology. In 2006 it sued US firm Synaptics over infringements of one of the patents in the Apple suit and eventually settled on a cross licensing arrangement.

“From their previous victory in the case with Synaptics, I think they should be quite confident,” said Jessica Chang, a Credit Suisse analyst based in Taipei

“Elan believes they have a unique edge with this patent, and they want to send a signal to the market” and set an example for others.”

Victoria University overhauls data centres

2009-04-09T11:55:00.000-07:00

Victoria University has contracted IBM to design and build a green data centre and will rebuild its existing Footscray Park facility as part of a major program of works.

The University, which caters to some 45,000 students, will run both centres in an ‘active-active' configuration, instead of the existing ‘primary-secondary' set-up.

This means the two centres will operate as a single logical data centre across two physical sites, rather than have one data centre act as the ‘main' and have a second used only for disaster recovery (DR) purposes.

The two sites are to be connected by redundant 1-2 Gbps fibre paths using the VERNet network.

Although part of the "incentive" to build the new 100 square metre facility in Sunshine, approximately 11km away, was initially DR, it is also intended the new facility will form part of energy efficiency initiatives being rolled out across the institution, according to director of information technology services Phil County.

IBM has been contracted to design and build the Sunshine data centre. It will replace an end-of-life secondary facility located at Footscray Park.

Arrangements for re-development of the primary facility, also in Footscray Park and currently the University's main data centre, haven't been announced.

"We've got one main data centre at the moment that we're keeping but will be rebuilt inside and out," County said.

"We've also got a smaller one like a back-up that is going to be replaced by the new [IBM-designed] one."

IBM said it had adopted a modular design employing a combination of in-row cooling targeted at the heat load source, combined with free cooling chiller plant technology.

Smaller uninterruptible power supply (UPS) modules will be used in the design, according to Malcolm Mackay, executive for site and facilities services at IBM Australia.

The University is one of the first in Australia to implement a free cooling system. Fujitsu has previously announced its intention to run a similar set-up in its new data centre in Perth.

The free cooling system will only cut in when the outside temperature in Melbourne drops under 15°C.

"It'll do it automatically," County said.

The data centre is also being designed to maximise air flows and floor grate positioning in a hot/cold aisle configuration.

Although IBM admitted the free cooling system would add a premium to the cost of the centre, County believed the return on investment was there.

"It pays itself back within the first year in our situation," he said.

The new combined total of data centre floor space in the facilities will be 340 square metres.

County said the University had already rationalised some 350 servers down to 240 using VMware as part of a previous server centralisation project, but he was unsure the University would continue down this path with respect to further virtualisation in the centres.

Both Microsoft's Hyper-V and Xensource are understood to be being considered as alternatives, given the University's reliance on Unix, Linux and Windows systems.

County said he is also actively exploring cloud computing.

"If you want to provision something that isn't critical it doesn't always have to be in your own data centre," he said.

Web Hosting Talk payment system hack revealed

2009-04-09T11:53:00.000-07:00

A hacker has dumped active credit card numbers of users of the popular Web Hosting Talk forums online less than 24 hours after the site restored the lion’s share of data deleted in an initial breach.

The latest development is said to have occurred on an old payment system containing 9,561 credit card numbers.

The forum's operators, iNET Interactive, said "current research indicates that that data breach encompassed 318 valid credit card numbers with CCV codes and about 1,900 expired credit card numbers with CCV code".

However, "we are still assessing how many of the 9,561 potentially exposed credit card numbers are valid," administrators said.

Names and expiry dates for the cards are also thought to have been included in the dump.

The credit card hack caps off a torrid three weeks for the forum, which is a regular place of discussion for hosters globally.

The Australian hosting community also participates via its local operation, Webhostingtalk.com.au.

Several participants have been contacted for comment by iTnews, however it is unknown how the breach impacted the local site.

At least one local user has taken the precautionary measure of cancelling their credit card, according to a thread on Whirlpool.

The WHT forum was first compromised on March 21 by a lone hacker that deleted data from operational systems and all offsite backups.

It was restored to an October 2008 version before the site announced Tuesday Australian time that 75 per cent of data, including people's profiles, had been re-instated.

But less than 24 hours later, the hacker re-contacted administrators claiming they had also breached a payment system at the time of the original attack.

The admission is an embarrassment for iNET, which had earlier stated that no credit card data had been compromised.

The latest breach is understood to affect a range of payments prior to December 2007, including premium memberships.

It does not affect customers who paid using other gateways such as Paypal.

"At one point, this system handled all billing related to Web Hosting Talk - display advertising, premium memberships and sticky posts," administrators said.

"We transitioned premium memberships to an updated system in early 2006, and we transitioned display advertising to an updated system in December 2007."

But the system is still used for sales of self-service sticky posts, the administrators said.

Web Hosting Talk has apologised to the community.

"First, we regret the impact this situation [the March breach] continues to have on the WHT community," administrators said.

"We are responsible for maintaining security and privacy, and we take that responsibility very seriously."

The breach comes after an Australian IT worker uncovered a major dump of 19,000 active credit card numbers last month.

Hostworks lands Jetstar win and former Sun MD

2009-04-09T11:52:00.001-07:00

Former Sun Microsystems Australia boss Jim Hassell has been named as interim CEO at Hostworks after the departure of founder Marty Gauvin.

Hassell, who led Sun Microsystems in Australia for seven years until his departure in November 2007, is already chief operating officer at Hostworks' parent company, Broadcast Australia.

Hostworks sales and marketing manager Klaus Bartosch said Hassell has been brought on board at Hostworks to assist he and chief operating officer Peter Wildy to manage the hosting company "while Broadcast Australia evaluates internal and external candidates over the next eight weeks to decide who the permanent CEO might be."

Gauvin's departure has not slowed down Hostworks, which will next week announce that budget airline Jetstar has signed over the management of its hefty web presence to Hostworks for the next two years.

Jetstar's web sites enable passengers from Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam to book flights online.

"We now run and manage the online platform for Jetstar, which has something like 100,000 unique visitors a day," Bartosch told iTnews.

Jetstar's general manager of distribution and commercial systems, Jamie Perry said the airline was attracted to Hostworks' specialists skills and virtualised environment.

"If we need more capacity than we currently have, virtualisation means it's a straightforward process to bring them on," he says. "Hostworks has the specialists on board to make it happen."

While Hostworks will manage the airline's front-end presence, for risk management reasons Jetstar's back-end booking systems are managed by Accenture-owned airline technology specialists Navitaire.

Financial terms of the Hostworks-Jetstar deal are yet to be disclosed.

Bartosch paid tribute to the departing Gauvin, saying he regards his former boss as "an exceptionally smart guy and good entrepreneur."

Bastosch said his and Gauvin's plans for the company "would not have differed greatly."

"We are expanding and growing and have new products and services to take to market," he said.

He and Wildy have been with the company for seven years, he said.

Telstra compensation risk cited for NBN RFP collapse

2009-04-07T12:14:00.000-07:00

The liability of the Commonwealth or one of the private sector bidders to have to compensate Telstra for exclusive or near-exclusive access to its last mile sub-loop was a key reason for the collapse of the RFP, new documents reveal.

An extract from the expert panel's evaluation report dated 20 January 2009 shows the RFP had collapsed due to a number of factors.

These include the ability of the bidders to raise appropriate capital and the fact that "no proposal submitted a business case that supports the roll-out in five years of an NBN to 98 per cent of Australian homes and businesses with a Government contribution of $4.7 [billion]."

"All proposals were to some extent underdeveloped," the document said.

"No proposal, for example, provided a fully-developed project plan. None of the national proposals was sufficiently well developed to present a value-for-money outcome.

"[But] each proposal contained attractive elements that, taken together, could form the basis from which a desirable outcome might be achieved."

The expert panel opposed the rollout of fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) technology, stating it was "unlikely to provide an efficient upgrade path to fibre-to-the-premises [FTTP]", which it favoured.

The panel also recognised that going down an FTTN path would "likely require exclusive or near-exclusive access to Telstra's existing copper sub-loop customer access network".

"Providing such access to a party other than Telstra runs a risk of liability to pay compensation to Telstra," the panel said.

"The proposals have this risk remaining with the Commonwealth but they have not addressed to the potential cost... of any such compensation.

"In any event, the panel considers that no proponent could accept the cost risk and continue to have a viable business case."

The panel also revealed that it "was not attracted to what it saw in some cases as proposals for excessive overbuild protections".

That finding will undoubtedly be a victory for Telstra, which has been campaigning heavily for the right to build rival HFC and high-speed wireless networks that will compete with the NBN.

The Government announced this morning that it had taken the expert panel's advice and terminated the NBN RFP because "none of the national proposals offered value for money."

Instead, it announced it will form a state-owned enterprise to build an FTTH network in combination with private suppliers.

It anticipates selling off its interest in the enterprise within five years - but only if the network is "built and fully operational."

The plan has already gained support from leading ISPs such as Internode and iiNet.

Internet industry welcomes NBN re-think

2009-04-07T12:13:00.000-07:00

The Federal Government's National Broadband Network, announced today, has been widely welcomed by ISPs and ICT industry groups.

The Federal Government has announced it will build its own 100 Mbps fibre-to-the-home broadband network, spending $43 million in conjunction with private investors over the next eight years.

Internode 'gobsmacked' by decision

Internode has welcomed the plan subject to reading the fine print - "and there will be a lot of it", managing director Simon Hackett posted to Whirlpool.

"I'm gobsmacked," Hackett said.

"If they do what they promise, they've actually got it right, and we might just turn into a broadband front-runner country ten years from now after all."

The fact that the proposed network is wholesale-only should give Telstra no grounds to delay or stop the build, he said.

Additionally, focusing on fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) avoids upgrades to the copper network and negates regulatory changes, Hackett said.

"The existing access regime can continue unchanged while the new network is put in, in parallel," he said.

"[Leaving the] existing copper network in place leaves [the] existing ADSL2+ market and competition un-impacted - meaning we've got many more years of useful ADSL2+ network building ahead of us in parallel to the emergence of the new network, to which we'll have access too, on an equal footing with everyone else.

"[It also means that] people who have invested in that [ADSL2+] landscape can recover that investment before the new network renders it obselete. But even then (like dialup) - the old stuff will stay around for ages too - and no-one loses."

Telstra: "no impact" in the short term

Telstra chairman Donald McGauchie said the NBN announcement will have little impact on Telstra in the short term.

"The new NBN will have little short- to medium-term financial impact on Telstra's business as it would take at least eight years before it is completed," he said in a statement.

"This announcement does not change our forecasts or our guidance for financial years 2008-2009 or 2009-2010."

McGauchie said he is looking forward to having "constructive conversations" with the Federal Government "at the earliest opportunity."

"Senator Conroy has said today that the Government does not have a pre-determined view on regulatory matters," he said.

"Telstra welcomes the opportunity to provide input on the regulatory reform discussion paper."

Primus: an historic decision

Primus CEO Ravi Bhatia applauded the Government's decision and said he was particularly keen on the regulatory reform packages announced along with it.

"The decisions taken today are truly historic, and are clearly decisions that only a confident and decisive Government could take," he said.

"It is clear the Government is serious about addressing Telstra's stranglehold and unlocking the competitive potential of the industry. As an industry we have been arguing for better competitive rights and raising many of these issues for some time now so it's satisfying to see a Government with the courage to deliver on the competition rhetoric and take these issues on. "

AIIA: Conroy is Captain Courageous

The Australian Information Industry Association said the new approach was necessary in a tight fiscal environment, but warned that the eight year timeframe may prove problematic.

"We support the revised national approach to the NBN outlined by Prime Minister Rudd and Senator Conroy, along with the associated review of the national telecommunications regulatory environment, as courageous steps designed to deliver essential components of Australia's digital future," said AIIA CEO Ian Birks. "We congratulate the Government on this decision."

"This approach is an innovative solution to delivering necessary outcomes in a market now constrained by capital; it provides a new and open opportunity for all industry to contribute to a successful broadband model in Australia."

"Australia must now rise to the challenge of using the National Broadband Network in an innovative and productive way to address our current economic and societal issues or else we run the risk of building a six lane highway to nowhere," said Mr Birks.

Optus - The end of Telstra's fixed line monopoly

Optus chief executive Paul O'Sullivan said the historic decision will "change the competitive landscape" and "create a true level playing field" in telecommunications.

"It will end Telstra's monopoly control of the national communications network into Australian homes," O'Sullivan said.

Optus also took credit for the Government's new model.

"The Government appears to have adopted a similar model to the one Optus put forward in our NBN proposal - a structurally separated, wholesale only, open access network - but taken to the next level of investment with FTTP technology," O'Sullivan said.

IIA: A stunning decision

Speaking of trying to take credit for the Government's decision, the Internet Industry Association would like to believe it was their recommendations the Government followed.

"In 2006 the IIA called for a nation-building approach to broadband," said IIA chief executive Peter Coroneos. "The ALP picked up on our targets and turned that into a policy."

"This is both momentous, and visionary in its scope," he said.

Terria: Commonwealth "comes up trumps"

Terria Chairman Michael Egan said the Government has "come up trumps".

"Terria had campaigned long and hard for a structurally separated, open access network with cost-based pricing and effective regulatory oversight," he said.

iiNet: best news this decade

Fellow ISP iiNet's managing director Michael Malone said the Government's plan was the best news made for the Australian telecommunications sector in decades.

"This is the best of all possible outcomes and will ensure Australians have access to fast, affordable and competitive broadband," Malone said.

"In terms of the key criteria we were looking for in a National Broadband Network - open access, structural separation, fixing backhaul 'black spots' and regulatory reform - the Government has delivered."

Macquarie Telecom: Best thing since deregulation

Matt Healy, head of regulatory and government affairs at Macquarie Telecom said the new network has the potential to make Australia "the envy of other economies."

"This has the potential to be the most significant change this industry has seen since deregulation in 1997," he said. "And just as deregulation kick started competition, today's announcements have the right ingredients to set a solid foundation for a truly competitive 21^st century telecommunications industry."

Competitive Carriers Coalition: better prices and services ahead

Telecommunications lobby group Competitive Carriers Coaltion (CCC) welcomed the new network, predicting that it will lead to better prices and services for Australian broadband users.

"We are very pleased that a process is now underway to reform the structure of the market in the short-term together with extending fibre to the front door," said David Forman, executive director of the CCC.

"It is critical that with this new momentum for change comes regulatory reform that will be achieved this year and a new fibre build that starts as soon as possible.

"The reforms are long overdue, as evidenced by the internationally high prices and poor services Australians have suffered for more than a decade.

"Where ever competitors have been able to gain a foothold in Australia, prices and services have immediately been transformed and consumers have been the winners," Forman said.

Comms Alliance: Surprised!

Industry self-regulator Comms Alliance and its members were completely unprepared for today's announcement, according to CEO Anne Hurley.

"While today's announcement was not the outcome expected by many in the industry, it will have a significant impact on skills and employment throughout the ICT sector," Hurley said.

"Communications Alliance looks forward to working with Government and industry on reforms to the telecommunications regulatory framework. "

ACS lobby for digital strategy

The Australian Computer Society welcomed the announcement while renewing calls for the development of a national digital economy strategy "as [a] matter of urgency" in the same breath.

ACS national chairman Kumar Parakala said that whilst the NBN "is a crucial step towards improving Australia's ICT infrastructure and digital economy, it is important to keep in mind that the NBN is a facilitator of Australia's Digital Economy and not an end in itself.

"The NBN is a critical infrastructure investment which is long overdue. However, there remains a missing link - a national strategy for the development of our digital economy.

"It is imperative that the telecommunications industry, the ICT industry and the Government now work together to not only ensure immediate construction of the NBN, but also to think ‘beyond the pipe'".

Turnbull: Rudd is building a new Telstra

2009-04-07T12:10:00.000-07:00

The Federal Opposition has discredited the Rudd Government's revamped NBN, accusing the Prime Minister of failing to deliver on key election commitments.

"Mr Rudd has broken his key election commitment to build a fibre to the node broadband network for 98 per cent of the population," said a joint statement by opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull and shadow communications minister Nick Minchin.

"His initial commitment of $4.7 billion has now blown out to a $43 billion exposure for the taxpayer."

The duo also pointed out that the NBN network, originally promised by 2008, is unlikely to be finished by 2018 once the Federal Government's scoping studies are completed.

The opposition accused the Rudd Government of wasting 18 months and $20 million on "a failed tender process that has not delivered a single new broadband service to a home and won't for a long time yet."

The alternative model proposed today by the Government was tantamount to the "building of a new Telstra," the opposition said.

"Mr Rudd is building a second Telstra owned by the Government. With one Telstra having been sold to the public, Labor is now proposing to build a second Telstra to compete with the first."

The Opposition estimates that at $43 billion of cost, the average broadband user would have to pay $200 per month to make new broadband services enabled by the project to be commercially viable.

"No evidence has been provided that there will be sufficient demand for this service at prices that will deliver a commercial return," the opposition said.

The rhetoric stepped up a notch further when Senator Stephen Conroy addressed the opposition's concerns in a statement late this afternoon.

Conroy said the opposition's objections "condemns Australia to a broadband backwater."

"If the Liberal party wins the next election their first act will be to scrap the biggest job supporting infrastructure project in Australian history," Conroy said.

"The Liberal Party and Nick Minchin need to stop living in the past and join the broadband revolution."

Telstra separation and HFC sell-off on the cards

2009-04-07T12:07:00.000-07:00

The Government has put Telstra on notice that functional separation is back on the agenda and that it may force the incumbent to sell off its HFC network as well.

In what could be a significant blow to Telstra, the Government has called for submissions on a regulatory reforms paper in an attempt to redress the failure of accounting and operational separation regimes enforced in 2002 and 2005 respectively.

Two reform options are proposed, consisting either a strengthening of current operational separation arrangements or a mandate for full functional separation of retail and wholesale.

The first option would see stronger governance and so-called ring-fencing arrangements enforced so that Telstra network and wholesale staff could not undertake retail functions or receive whole-of-business incentives.

But the Government has also laid out functional separation as a real option to prevent Telstra from favouring its retail business over wholesale customers while the NBN is still being rolled out.

"What needs to be considered is whether functional separation of Telstra would be more consistent with the type of wholesale-retail market structure the Government envisages for the NBN environment of the future," the paper said.

"Adoption of functional separation would impose strict ring-fencing and reporting requirements around certain business units within Telstra.

"These units would be required to operate at arm's length from the rest of Telstra."

The Government does not appear to put stock in concerns that functional separation would be detrimental for Telstra's shareholder value.

"This is not necessarily the case, particularly if Telstra were cooperative in its implementation," the paper said.

But the chance of Telstra being cooperative with functional separation procedures is unlikely, given its vehement opposition to the proposal last year.

Given recent announcements of its intention to upgrade its HFC network, the incumbent will likely be even less happy with suggestions it be forced to divest the network to improve competitive arrangements.

"Divestment of the cable network could provide the basis for additional infrastructure-based competition for the provision of voice, broadband and subscription television services in metropolitan areas where this cable footprint exists," the paper said.

"If Telstra was required to divest its HFC network restrictions would also need to be placed on its future activities to prevent re-integration."

Competitive Carriers Coalition executive director David Forman said "there should be absolutely no doubt" that Telstra will be structurally separated.

"The new regulatory changes flag the potential for separation of Telstra's retail and wholesale business," he said.

"The discussion paper doesn't just talk about whether to do it, but the best way of doing it."

Matt Healy, national executive for regulatory and government for Macquarie Telecom said it is a "given" that Telstra will be forced into structural separation.

He is also supremely confident the Government will inevitably force Telstra to sell off its cable business.

"The divestiture of Telstra's HFC network is absolutely on the table - not just for discussion, but execution."

Healy recalls the ACCC recommending to the Howard Government some five years ago to force Telstra to sell off its HFC network.

"I am not aware of any country we would want to compare ourselves to that allows the monopoly copper provider to also be the dominant cable company," he said.

Healy expects Telstra's structural separation will be implemented via a combination of new requirements inserted into Telstra's license conditions and legislative change.

The Government's ability to change licensing conditions has already been tested in the High Court, Healy said, in a case which the Government won.

"Will Telstra try to fight it? I hope not. I would like to think Telstra's new management will finally see the world for what it is. I don't think any new manager of their business would be wise to take Sol Trujillo's approach."

"When you see the Prime Minister, the Treasurer, the Finance Minister and the Communications Minister standing shoulder to shoulder, you can bet the Government is aligned on this. What business is going to attempt to rail against that kind of Government mandate at a time when markets really aren't performing that well?"

Analyst Paul Budde said the regulatory documentation "doesn't give Telstra any room to manoeuvre."

"The company can of course participate [in the NBN] but based on the rules of the Government and not based on the monopolistic structure of its current vertical integrated service offerings," he said.

Ford vehicles to get dashboard PC with mobile broadband

2009-04-06T10:41:00.000-07:00

Ford is to introduce what it claims to be "the world’s first broadband-capable in-dash computer system," to selected US models.

As part of the Ford Work Solutions package, drivers of Ford F-150, Super Duty, E-Series and Transit Connect trucks will have internet access through US operator Sprint Nextel's mobile broadband service, with computer hardware from Italian-based automotive systems vendor Magneti Marelli, running under the Microsoft Auto operating system.

The Opera Mini browser is being pre-loaded onto the system, with LogMeIn Pro also being offered with the system giving drivers the ability to access Windows desktops and servers remotely.

Opera's Americas senior vice president Rod Hamlin said: "This solution will allow Ford truck and van owners to maintain a virtual work environment with access to all of the important files, information and applications they need."

Ford Work Solutions in-dash computer sits in space normally occupied by the standard radio. It has a 6.5-inch touch screen, 4GB of memory, a secure digital (SD) slot, a USB port and a wireless keyboard and mouse. An onboard Ford-certified, Bluetooth battery-powered HP Officejet H470wbt mobile inkjet printer is also available.

Other options are a DeWalt RFID kit for tagging tools and valuables, Garmin satellite navigation, and the Microlise vehicle fleet management application installed as part of Ford's in-vehicle telematics package.

Pricing for the system is currently US$1,195.

Verizon touts platform collaboration amid mobile OS war

2009-04-06T10:39:00.000-07:00

The mobile industry needs to settle on a few open, interoperable operating systems for application development to mature, according to Verizon Wireless CEO Ivan Seidenberg.

Speaking at the CTIA Wireless Conference and Expo in Las Vegas, Seidenberg revealed the telco's plans to join the international collaboration, Joint Innovation Lab (JIL).

JIL was established in April 2008 by China Mobile, Softbank and Vodafone.

It aims to create a single, global platform for mobile widget developers.

To explain the need for the collaborative effort, Seidenberg compared mobile application development with the PC software industry.

"If you think about the PC world, it's only when the industry coalesced around a few operating systems that software development really took off," he said.

"Similarly, we need an open, interoperable environment for mobile application development to grow."

While Microsoft, Apple and certain Linux distributions are clear leaders in the PC operating systems arena, the jury is still out on mobile platforms.

According to a Gartner report on smartphone market share, Nokia's Symbian accounted for 47.1 percent of the market in Q4 2008.

RIM's Blackberry platform, Microsoft Windows Mobile, Mac OS X and Linux accounted for 19.5, 12.4, 10.7 and 8.4 percent market share respectively.

Gartner research director Roberta Cozza predicted that "In 2009, mobile platforms will be a major battleground as the associated user experience and role of the ecosystem grow in importance."

Meanwhile, vendors are battling to attract and retain consumers and developers with the launch of device-specific online application storefronts.

Apple's App Store has enabled independent application developers to quickly and easily take their creations to market since its launch in July 2008.

RIM launched a similar offering. Named ‘Blackberry App World', the portal provides a new distribution channel to application developers in North America and the U.K.

Nokia also has announced plans to launch its own mobile application storefront, Ovi Store, in May, estimating a userbase of 300 million consumers by 2012.

"This is a tremendously fertile moment for the mobile industry," Seidenberg concluded.

"Customer satisfaction is on the rise, innovation is thriving, and a new business model is emerging," he said.

"The next 25 years is going to be even better."

Swedish net traffic halves after new law

2009-04-06T10:36:00.000-07:00

Internet traffic in Sweden has plummeted after a tough new anti-piracy law was enacted in the country earlier this week, potentially casting interesting new light on the extent to which illegal file-sharing occurs.

The new law makes copyright holders such as record and entertainment companies to go through the courts to determine the identities of those suspected of piracy, via their IP addresses.

The anonymity illegal file sharers have had hitherto made the practice widespread, although figures vary as to exactly how commonplace it is in various countries.

However, traffic to Netnod Internet Exchange AB, a Swedish firm which manages many of the country’s key internet exchanges reported a drop of around half since Wednesday, when the law took effect. Throughput has yet to pick up.

Data transmission rates have slumped from a peak of around 190/200 Gbit/sec to daily highs since Wednesday of about 100 Gbit/sec. At the time of writing, the figure was around 80Gbit/sec.

Along with its Scandinavian neighbours, Sweden has one of the most mature internet industries in the world, with a highly developed fibre-optic network broadband infrastructure. The figures will be a shock to many, pointing as they do to a potentially high prevalence of illegal file sharing.

France yesterday showed its commitment to eradicate illegal file-sharing after passing a “three strikes law” which decrees that persistent offenders can be suspended from using the internet for a period of time.

However, moves to get the law enacted at a European level have met with more opposition.

In his Digital Britain interim report released in January, Lord Carter proposed the creation of a 'Rights Agency' to deal with the problem of people illegally copying and sharing music and films over the internet.

However, controversially, he stated the funding may have to come from ISPs, who in turn could pass the costs on to their customers.

Last summer, six leading UK ISPs agreed to establish a code of practice for dealing with the sharing of copyright material over the internet, to be developed in conjunction with the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.

OptiComm FTTH rides first home buyers boom

2009-04-06T10:35:00.001-07:00

OptiComm wants five of Australia’s top ten ISPs offering retail services on its wholesale fibre network before the end of the year.

The company, which is a 50/50 joint venture with Hills Industries, builds and operates fibre-to-the-home networks in ‘greenfield' housing estates.

It already counts Internode, Adam Internet and Cirrus Communications among the retail ISPs selling services on its network - and is expected to finalise negotiations with several more within months.

"There's a number of other major ISPs we're in negotiations with in Sydney, Perth and Melbourne," general manager Phil Smith said.

"The challenge for us has been bringing retail service providers on because when you start an estate, there's only a handful of customers going on [to the network] at any one time.

"We believe by the end of the year we'll have five out of the top 10 ISPs as providers on our network. We've set our wholesale prices to attract ISPs, not to send them away."

It is still relatively early days in terms of the rollout of the OptiComm network. Six estates nationally have FTTH (fibre to the home) operational and another 20 are anticipated to begin network construction this year.

"We've gone from zero to quite a large rollout plan within 12 months," Smith said.

Although Smith said he is seeing widespread development of housing estates nationwide to cater to a "major pent-up demand", NSW, Victoria and South Australia are leading the boom, while demand in WA and potentially Queensland is tailing off.

Much of the current housing boom has been attributed to stimulus incentives such as the first home buyer's grant, but the future of such incentives beyond June is unknown.

Smith said he believed OptiComm had limited exposure to a potential reduction in greenfield developments if the incentive scheme was to be discontinued.

"We've built our business model to cope with the starts and stops of the new housing market," he said.

"As to whether greenfield developments will be cut back if the Government doesn't extend the current incentives, my personal view is I they might extend the program but they're being tightlipped about it."

Regardless, OptiComm is looking at a potential market of 50,000 sites - with growth in that number "every day", according to Smith.

Despite its investments in FTTH, Smith did not believe OptiComm would be ‘punished' by the rollout of the NBN. An NBN announcement is hotly anticipated some time this week.

"We haven't been directly involved in the NBN but being in the industry and fibre-to-the-premises market we've been talking to people about it," Smith said.

"Whoever wins will be very focused on brownfield [older sites] rollout and I think they'll leave us alone for some time as a result. The good side of the NBN for us is that we'll get better access to other fibre backhaul."

Smith said the ACCC had examined OptiComm's business model and pricing structure. OptiComm operates a wholesale, open access model for its network.

The network is also set up to allow residents to have multiple service providers on the same connection - a principle that forms part of other international next generation networks such as the UK's Ofcom.

"We're a wholesale access carrier. We are not now and never intend to be a retail service provider," Smith said.

"The government land agencies like Landcom, Land Management Corporation and VicUrban are really pushing this barrow of open access fibre-connected communities. It's good that it's a different level of government that is mandating this.

"To some degree we've set up a model that the NBN is trying to emulate."

OptiComm recently inked a gigabit passive optical network (GPON) equipment deal with NEC Australia. It will compliment an existing supplier arrangement for similar kit from the US-based Alloptic.

"We have a two-supplier policy for active equipment," Smith said.

"The majority of broad-acre rollouts will start using NEC equipment from now on, whereas fibre-to-the-business and some other smaller estates will continue to use Alloptic [kit] because there is some flexibility that Alloptic gives us over NEC."

Smith said OptiComm has also just inked an agreement with Juniper Networks to supply core router networking equipment in the back-end.

It is also looking at product from Tyco, in addition to existing supplier arrangements with Hills, Optical Cable Services and Corning.

NetApp backs storage guarantee with $1m offer

2009-04-06T10:32:00.000-07:00

NetApp is offering a whopping 50 terabytes of enterprise data storage, worth about $1 million, to an Australian organisation willing to be iTnews' guinea pig in a benchmark test to prove the validity of NetApp's storage virtualisation guarantee.

That's right, NetApp will give an Australian organisation $1 million of storage hardware, software and services.

All you have to do to get your hands on this spiffing piece of storage kit is fill out this simple application form describing your storage environment.

The background

Announced last September, NetApp's storage virtualisation guarantee promises customers will save at least half of their data requirements by migrating from a RAID 10 array to NetApp's latest storage virtualisation technologies such as thin provisioning, cloning and data de-duplication.

NetApp added a 35 per cent guarantee in February for customers moving from its competitors, prompting rival EMC to bite back in iTnews last month.

NetApp managing director Peter O'Connor says it is time for the companies to "put their money where their mouths" are.

"We absolutely stand behind the storage guarantee and we are prepared to prove it," O'Connor told iTnews.

"What NetApp would like to offer is 50 terabytes of free data storage to an Australian company to provide a live benchmark of how much storage NetApp technology can save," he said.

NetApp says the value for the 50TB array, controllers, software licences and associated services is about $1 million.

He expects the exercise to save the selected Australian company half of its storage capacity in a VMware environment as promoted under NetApp's storage efficiency guarantee.

He calls on EMC to offer its own storage systems for a benchmark test: "What I am saying to them is, put up or shut up."

Applications

Applications to host the benchmark are open and will close at 5:00pm EST on 17 April.

Stay tuned to iTnews for updates.

Apple hints at launch of Nehalem-based Xserve

2009-04-05T11:55:00.000-07:00

Apple's Hong Kong online store is ready to take orders for the product

An Apple online store is set to take preorders of new Xserve servers carrying Intel's new Xeon chips, hinting at launch of the devices in the near future.

A notice on Apple's Hong Kong online store is offering to take preorders of the Xserve based on Intel's latest Xeon server chips. However, preorders cannot be placed as the link hasn't been activated yet, and customization capabilities for the old Xserve products have been disabled.

[ Keep up with Windows Server and related developments in InfoWorld's Enterprise Windows blog. ]

"Preorder the new Xserve with Intel Xeon (Nehalem)," the Web page states.

Apple does not comment on future products, an Apple spokesperson said. It is unclear when the servers would be released, though enthusiast sites including AppleInsider have predicted availability in a few weeks.

The upcoming servers could carry quad-core chips from the Xeon 5500 and 3500 family, which Apple has already included in its Mac Pro workstations launched last month. Intel has said the Xeon chips are its fastest server chips to date, which can be cranked up to run at speeds of 3.46GHz.

Intel's Nehalem microarchitecture improves system speed by cutting bottlenecks that plagued Intel's earlier chips. In certain circumstances, the chips could double server performance while consuming less power compared to its predecessors.

The chips' improved energy consumption relative to performance gives users a reason to upgrade, said Dean McCarron, principal analyst at Mercury Research

"The idea of saving power is more pervasive in Nehalem. You're seeing a much more fine-grained level of power control across [switches] on the chip," McCarron said. The current Xserve servers run chips belonging to Intel's earlier Penryn family.

One of the major improvements involves Intel integrating the memory controller on the CPU, which helps processors communicate faster with memory. It removes the memory latency affecting earlier Intel processors, which should translate to better server performance.

Data-intensive applications like video processing frequently require processors to fetch information from memory, and Intel's earlier chips had to go through a bus called the front-side bus (FSB). After years of criticism, Intel removed the FSB and integrated the memory controller into the CPU with Nehalem chips.

Nehalem also offers a faster pipe for a CPU to communicate with other processors and system components. That helps servers execute more tasks in parallel and tackle larger workloads. The faster communication improvements are bundled under a technology Intel calls QuickPath InterConnect, or QPI.

Nokia hopes new app store will replicate App Store

2009-04-05T11:52:00.000-07:00

The world's largest handset maker is refreshing the way it handles applications

Nokia has spent four years working on building an application distribution system, attracting millions of developers eager to sell to the hundreds of millions of Nokia phone users around the world.

But today few Nokia phone users actually download applications. It took Apple about a year to craft a system that its 15 million iPhone customers use to download applications at a far more frequent rate. According to research from ComScore, 59.2 percent of iPhone users have downloaded apps, a much higher percentage than among average mobile users.

[ Get the latest on mobile developments with InfoWorld's Mobile Report newsletter. ]

With its soon-to-launch Ovi store, Nokia hopes it has addressed the problems that have held it back in the past.

"When we started doing this, the state of the art was selling a photo of a cat," said George Linardos, vice president of Nokia Services, during a lunch meeting at the CTIA conference in Las Vegas on Thursday. Four years ago when Nokia started promoting the idea of downloading applications to phones, the most sophisticated option was adding photos.

Nokia progressed over the years, but in a disjointed fashion. About a year ago, it had several "first-generation" application services and none of them were linked, he said. A user could open the Download service folder on their phone and then navigate through different folder categories to find applications. Or the user could visit the Mosh Web site, which offered user-generated applications. The phone customer could also open the WidSets application to look for available widgets. "And by the way, there was a different user name and password for each," said Linardos.

About a year ago -- prior to the launch of the iPhone App Store, he says -- Nokia decided to look at the problems with its current systems. "It was obvious we needed just one store," he said.

The Ovi store, expected to open in May, is designed to take the best of the past offerings and add some new capabilities that Nokia hopes will give it a leg up over competitors. It is also designed to take the best ideas from other successful stores.

Apple's App Store is "a very user-friendly experience with a well-integrated buying process and a valuable business model for developers. It's a nice formula for Apple. We're applying the same principles to our hundreds of millions of devices," Linardos said.

One of the main differences with how the Ovi store works is the way it aims to solve possibly the biggest problem in the competitive stores: discoverability. The App Store, for example, ranks applications by number of downloads, and because there are tens of thousands of apps in the store, users focus on those top applications, ignoring the rest.

Hackers seize on zero-day flaw in Microsoft's PowerPoint

2009-04-05T11:45:00.000-07:00

Independent security company Secunia has rated the PowerPoint vulnerability 'extremely critical,' its highest-risk ranking

Microsoft warned Thursday that hackers are actively exploiting a software vulnerability in PowerPoint, the company's presentation application.

There's no patch yet for the bug, which could allow an attacker to completely control a computer. It affects Office 2000 Service Pack 3, Office XP SP3, Office 2003 SP3, and Office 2004 for Mac, Microsoft said in an advisory. Office 2007 is unaffected.

Microsoft said it has seen limited, targeted attacks. The Danish security company Secunia ranked the problem as "extremely critical," its most severe rating.

Secunia said the vulnerability "is caused due to an unspecified error that may result in access to an invalid object in memory when parsing a specially crafted PowerPoint file."

Microsoft advised users to not open or save Office files that come from untrusted sources. If the file is opened, users won't have much of an indication that it's a malicious file.

"Usually, these files look legit when opened, so it is quite easy to fall prey and not even notice that something malicious ran in the background," according to a post on the company's Malware Protection Center blog.

Hackers frequently hunt for vulnerabilities in commonly used software products, as it's another avenue other than the operating system to infect a computer with malicious software.

To be hacked, a user would either have to download a malicious file hosted on a Web site or open a file sent through e-mail, Microsoft said.

Microsoft has added a signature that will block access to PowerPoint exploit files in its Windows Live OneCare and Forefront Client security products. The signature is included in definition update 1.55.975.0 or higher.

The company noted that the exploit files have been recently submitted to VirusTotal, a Web site that aggregates antivirus engines.

Malware can be submitted to see which security products detect it. The site is often used by hackers to determine if their malware will be blocked by certain security software.

Samsung Launches S8300 UltraTouch Smart Phone in India

2009-04-05T11:44:00.000-07:00

It’s the world’s first AMOLED touch screen phone; it’s an ultra-slim 12.7mm full-touch slider phone; it’s the phone featuring 8 mp camera; well, it’s Samsung S8300 UltraTouch smart-phone, which was launched by Samsung India on Wednesday.

The Samsung S8300 UltraTouch smart-phone, in its brushed metal frame, features a 7.2 cm wide AMOLED scratch resistant touch-screen, 8 mega pixel camera features with dual power LED flash and smile shot mode, a 3×4 keypad slide,

With 3G capability (HSDPA 7.2 Mbps), the Samsung S8300 UltraTouch offers high speed internet access, video telephony, video streaming and DivX video player support, and multimedia services. The phone also features GPS navigation, geo-tagging through GPS chip, 30fps VGA video recording and support for HSDPA 7.2 Mbps.

Commenting on the Samsung S8300 UltraTouch at its launch, Samsung India President and CEO Jung Soo Shin said, “We are committed to strengthening our portfolio of full-touch phones by introducing a variety of handsets to suit every lifestyle. Samsung UltraTOUCH leads this portfolio as our most iconic, high-end phone and will further enhance Samsung’s leadership in the premium full-touch market.”

According to Samsung India, the Samsung S8300 UltraTouch comes equipped with their Touch Wiz interface with support for Mobile widgets. The widgets can be pulled from the menu bar and positioned anywhere on the screen for one-click access to applications like Music Player, FM, Games, Calendar, etc. The Samsung S8300 UltraTouch comes with 80 MB of in-built memory, but it offers support for Micro SD cards up to 16GB.

The Samsung S8300 UltraTouch screen phone first appeared just before the Mobile World Congress 09. The Samsung S8300 UltraTouch screen phone is priced at Rs 27,500 in India. The phone is not officially available in the United States yet, however an Amazon seller is reportedly offering the S8300 unlocked with quadband GSM (850/900/1800/1900) for $499.95.

Sunil Dutt, Samsung Telecom Division’s Country Head, stated that “With this latest offering, we now have four touch-screen phones in the Indian market.” The phones include the i900 Omnia, F480, the Pixon, and the Samsung S8300 UltraTouch. These Samsung touch-screen phones are 3G enabled and priced between Rs. 17,790 and Rs. 32,200.

Samsung India has got into deal with Bharat Sanchar Nigam and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam to fetch their recently launched 3G services to its handsets. According to Mr. Dutt, Samsung is offering a special package offer for BSNL customers on its handsets to allow them to enjoy 3G services. He said, “The special offer on Samsung phones — F480, L700 J800 and S7330 — in BSNL circles entails free SIM card, free airtime and free data downloads for pre-paid and post-paid customers.”

Inflation up Marginally To 0.31 %

2009-04-05T11:41:00.000-07:00

Inflation rose marginally to 0.31 per cent for the week ended 21st March as prices of certain food items such as tea, gur, aerated water and imported edible oil went up.

Inflation as measured by movement in wholesale prices was 0.27 per cent for the week ended 14th March and 7.8 per cent in the corresponding period a year ago.

The price of blended tea went up by 48 per cent, while packaged tea and aerated water became expensive by 22 and 10 per cent, respectively.

Among other items which became dearer were soft drinks, oil cake, bajra, condiments and spices, while among non-food items cement, rubber, plastic products and PVC fittings became expensive.

Soyabean, niger seed, raw rubber, groundnut, mustard seed and raw cotton too became dearer.

On the other hand, fruit and vegetables, barley, jowar, raw silk, khandsari, salt, mustard and coconut oil became cheaper.

Similarly, prices of furnace oil, textile items, hair oil, steel ingots and bars went down.

Meanwhile, inflation for the week ended 24th January has been revised downwards from 5.07 per cent to 4.7 per cent.

2009-04-05T11:22:00.000-07:00

IT managers planning to freeze headcounts

2009-04-04T10:40:00.000-07:00

Nearly half of IT directors plan to freeze staff headcounts during the next year, according to new research by an IT recruitment firm.

The survey found that a third of IT departments have already cut staff in the past year, and 20 per cent plan to reduce headcounts as the recession deepens.

However, IT managers are fairly optimistic about taking on new staff, according to ReThink Recruitment director Michael Bennett, and a third intend to increase staff levels over the next year.

"On balance IT directors remain reasonably optimistic about taking on new staff and skills. Very few expect a repeat of the job cut carnage that followed the 2001/2 post dot-com downturn," he said.

"In fact the real and growing concern among many IT directors is that further cuts in budgets will start to jeopardise the quality of work and support they provide to the rest of the organisation."

Nearly a quarter of IT directors have concerns about delivering IT support and projects under their new budgets, while 18 per cent are concerned that further staff cuts would jeopardise the quality of their service.

Domain-hoarding may have hamstrung Conficker

2009-04-04T10:39:00.001-07:00

Prior to the April-1st update for the Conficker worm, security researchers scrambled to snatch up domains which the botnet's controllers were thought to be targeting.

In a follow-up posting on the company's security blog, F-Secure researcher Patrik Runald said that in the days leading up to the April 1st scheduled update, a group of security vendors and researchers working under the name "Conficker working group" worked to prevent Conficker's operators from registering targeted domains.

The Conficker.C revision was programmed to generate a list of domains which could then be contacted by infected machines to receive an update and possibly new attack instructions.

In an effort to thwart such an update, Runald said that researchers scrambled to prevent the registration of those domains, leaving controlled machines to 'phone home' to empty sites.

"What really happened was that the Conficker Working Group was able to prevent them from registering any of the domains used by the worm," wrote Runald.

"Never before have we seen such a global cooperation within the industry and we're proud to be a member of that group."

However, Runald acknowledged other factors which also likely contributed to Conficker's no-show, such as the amount of media attention given to the date.

Runald also cautioned that the passing of the April 1st deadline does not mean the end of a threat from Conficker.

The botnet's controllers could still issue an update for the worm, and the peer-to-peer capabilities of Conficker could have already allowed for an update to begin circulation.

Apple iPhone 3.0 cracked before release

2009-04-04T10:36:00.000-07:00

Apple's forthcoming upgrade to its iPhone operating system has purportedly been cracked before it has officially been released.

A crack for the iPhone 3.0 beta operating system has been posted on the QuickPWN blog, and claims to allow the phone to be opened up to unofficial iPhone software.

The crack is the work of a Russian hacker known as 'Vortex'.

"This is an unofficial release and it's not created by the iPhone Dev Team. I know there are iPhone developers out there who want to upgrade to iPhone 3.0, iPod Touch 3.0, or iPhone 3G 3.0, but also want to keep their jailbreak," says the site.

"The Russian hacker Vortex has once again released an unofficial jailbreak at iPhoneApps.ru. I tried it on my iPod Touch with firmware 3.0 beta 2 and it works!"

However, it seems that the crack may have bugs, and people are advised to use caution. The iPhone Dev Team, which has done much of the cracking work on previous versions of the iPhone operating system, said that it was not endorsing the crack, partly because it feels there are unresolved software issues but also because the software is still in beta.

"It's silly to play cat and mouse with Apple during a beta period, when relatively few people are willing to actually use the beta software in their everyday lives," the group said in a blog post.

"There are ways Apple can tighten the screws, and we'd rather not burn methods just for a beta release."

The news will be a blow to Apple's attempts to stop users running unauthorised applications on their iPhones. The company has reportedly amended its terms and conditions to specifically ban the use of jail-breaking software.

The relevant sections of the terms and conditions are as follows:

(e) You will not, through use of the Apple Software, services or otherwise, create any Application or other program that would disable, hack or otherwise interfere with the Security Solution, or any security, digital signing, digital rights management, verification or authentication mechanisms implemented in or by the iPhone operating system software, iPod touch operating system software, this Apple Software, any services or other Apple software or technology, or enable others to do so.

(f) Applications developed using the Apple Software may only be distributed if selected by Apple (in its sole discretion) for distribution via the App Store or for limited distribution on Registered Devices (ad hoc distribution) as contemplated in this Agreement.

Clause (f) seems aimed specifically at the growing number of unofficial iPhone application sites which sell software that Apple has declined to carry in its App Store.

Google close to buying Twitter?

2009-04-04T10:35:00.000-07:00

Reports on blog TechCrunch claim that Google is in advanced negotiations to acquire micro-blogging site Twitter.

Citing two separate sources, TechCrunch said that the asking price is more than the US$250m valuation that Twitter's recent round of funding would suggest.

A third source, however, recently added to the TechCrunch report, suggests that talks are only in the early stages.

Twitter has recently reworked its search feature, prompting many to think that this makes the firm more appealing to potential suitors. Search facilities have been added to the 'tweet' pages, and users can search tweets from this view. Twitter claims that the new additions were planned from the start.

Such features would have obvious benefits for marketing and advertising purposes.

"Twitter Search is an engine for discovering what is happening right now," said Twitter co-founder Biz Stone in a blog post.

Stone and co-founder Evan Williams have already sold Blogger.com to Google, and TechCrunch guesses that any deal would involve a straight cash or stock transaction.

Analyst firm Gartner said that a deal makes sense for both firms.

“The culture and ambitions of Twitter and Google match,” Gartner research vice president Jeff Mann noted. “Other tie-ins short of an acquisition could m ake sense, but would be harder to sustain since Twitter already uses such open interfaces. It will be hard to do something that others can't replicate.”

He added that Twitter should look for a buyer now as it is currently at “the top of its hype range” and would otherwise face a long and difficult process of trying to generate revenues as a standalone company.

However, other firms might also be interested in buying Twitter.

"Where's Microsoft in all this? Letting Twitter go to Google only hurts them, badly, in the long-term search game. This is an asset they need to be competing for aggressively," the report said.

Google declined to comment on the reports. In a statement the firm said, "We don't comment on rumour or speculation".

Intel sheds light on low-power transistors

2009-04-04T10:32:00.000-07:00

Researchers at Intel are coming forward with a new process which could cut the power consumption for transistors.

In a recent posting from its research labs blog, the company said that it had developed a way to make processors with compound semiconductor materials that require less power than traditional transistors.

The company said that the new devices are known as 'III-V' P-channel transistors because they include elements which lie on either side of silicon on the periodic table of elements.

Intel said that similar N-channel transistors have been available for roughly a year. By combining the two, the company believes that it could construct new CMOS logic circuits which could ultimately lead to processors which require roughly one tenth the power of current designs.

As chipmakers look to adopt smaller fabrication methods and more efficient designs, improving transistors has become an important focus.

The use of Hi-K transistors has become an essential feature for new processors, and researchers continue to explore the possibility of photonics and nanotechnology for future designs.

HCF picks out problems from customer calls

2009-04-03T13:04:00.000-07:00

Health fund HCF is pioneering speech analytics in its call centre that listens to calls and can pinpoint customer problems before they escalate.

The provider is said to be the first company in Australia to buy a Verint analytics system.

It purchased the system from integrator NSC Group.

The Verint system is designed to provide "crucial" business intelligence from the recorded voices of customers and call centre agents, according to Belinda Sproule, call centre manager for HCF Direct.

"Speech analytics wasn't something we necessarily had on our radar, but once we were shown what it could do, we immediately recognised its potential for our business," Sproule said.

Working from "a huge dictionary", the analytics software listens and records every call that comes into the HCF call centre.

Audio indexing and emotion detection then categorises audio interactions and identifies the top reasons for calls within each category.

"The ability of speech analytics to pinpoint problems before they escalate or track campaigns in real-time so we can provide immediate feedback to our marketing team provides us with a powerful business tool," Sproule said.

The HCF call centre handles more than 660,000 calls a year and generates more than one fifth of all new business, she said.

IBM close to US$7bn offer for Sun

2009-04-03T13:01:00.000-07:00

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that IBM is close to finalising a deal to buy Sun Microsystems.

IBM is said to be considering an offer of US$9.55 a share for Sun, which would value the company at around US $7 billion.

Shares in Sun are currently trading at around US$8.20 and have risen today on the news.

However, the reports indicate that Sun is trying to negotiate a deal where it will cooperate as long as IBM agrees to rigorously defend the merger against anti-trust action, a considerable worry for the deal.

If completed IBM and SUN would control the vast majority of the tape storage market and nearly two thirds of the high-end UNIX server market.

Competitors like would be highly likely to appeal to regulators over the deal.

Sun apparently fears that if the deal is called off for anti-trust reasons then its stock price will suffer, as Yahoo’s did when Google was forced to of negotiations for similar reasons.

Edward Henneberry, a Washington, D.C., antitrust attorney and former antitrust regulator in Ireland and Brussels, told the paper that Sun may seek an agreement that IBM will go to court if challenged rather than canceling the deal. Or Sun may demand the buyer go through with the deal no matter what remedies or divestitures the regulators order.

Hitachi leaves ‘cloud’ to likes of Optus, Vigabyte

2009-04-03T12:58:00.000-07:00

Hitachi Data Systems is unlikely to follow other storage vendors into the cloud storage market directly, preferring to provide the infrastructure underpinning the likes of Optus and Vigabyte instead.

In Australia for a series of roadshows, CTO Hubert Yoshida described Hitachi as a conservative industry player.

"We're not the first out there with new trends," he said.

"When you're first to market, you may not have a complete solution or understanding of what you need to do. We look at that and try to improve on it."

Yoshida said Hitachi would most likely work with existing and new cloud providers than operate as one.

This contrasts with storage competitor EMC, which has been heavily rumoured to be working on a cloud service, in addition to its Mozy offering.

"We haven't announced anything in the cloud area. I don't know if we'll ever get into the hosted service market ourselves - we prefer to remain on the infrastructure side," Yoshida said.

HDS has sold storage infrastructure that underpins two local ‘cloud' offerings - Vigabyte and Optus Expan managed storage.

"Optus offer clients disk and backup services on demand and leverage our infrastructure as an enabler of that cloud service," said HDS marketing manager Tim Smith.

"[It means] we've had a cloud offering per se for many years."

Vigabyte's cloud offerings use an HDS adaptable modular storage (AMS) array, Smith said.

Yoshida confirmed industry speculation that Singapore is firming as a logical hub for cloud computing systems in the Asia Pacific, in part due to its strong undersea bandwidth links and also trust in its governance and transparency processes.

"Certainly China and India would like to be in that space but the infrastructure isn't there yet," he said.

Analysis: Are there worse alternatives to net filtering?

2009-04-03T12:57:00.000-07:00

The Internet is already filtered, says cyber-law academic Alana Maurushat, often in ways even less transparent than legislated ISP-level filtering.

Maurushat, an academic at the University of New South Wales' Cyberspace Law and Policy Centre, is firmly opposed to the Federal Government's proposed Internet Filtering scheme.

Her concerns are the lack of clarity around the aims of the trial and the legal ramifications of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) being appointed 'sheriffs' of the internet.

But any analysis of the filtering trials, she said, should take into account some other, potentially more challenging means by which our Internet experience is already censored.

"Filtering happens today," she said. "It is just not occurring en-masse like what is being proposed."

Censorship by self-regulation

First and foremost, our experience of the internet is already censored by the internet industry itself.

"Google and other search engines, without a shadow of a doubt, are already blocking content," Maurushat says.

"Google is in effect the Internet's policing agency. It does a lot of the functions soon to be expected of ISPs already."

Her assertion is confirmed by Rob Shilkin, communications manager at Google Australia.

"We remove results from our index only when required by law and in a small number of other instances, such as spam results or results including unauthorised credit card numbers," he said.

"Where feasible, we tell our users when we remove results, for example by forwarding DMCA notices to Chilling Effects for publication."

ISPs too, "conduct all kinds of censorship," according to Maurushat, "but we don't know the extent to which they are doing it."

Service providers need to follow Australian law on one hand, being "required to remove access to a locally-hosted site with expediency when material is deemed illegal," but also follow an industry code of conduct, which can sometimes present further challenges.

ISPs the world over tend to follow a code of conduct, Maurushat says, but "the effect of these codes on the law can be dubious.

As an ISP, you are not legally bound to self-regulation. But in some jurisdictions, not abiding by the code might risk your license not being renewed."

This form of censorship can potentially result in less accountable outcomes than a legislated form of filtering, she says.

"At least legislation is transparent," she says. "In Canada and the United Kingdom, internet filtering is not legislated but there have been initiatives from the ISPs themselves to get together and filter the internet behind the scenes."

ISP's generally "do not want to perform" policing functions, she says, which suggests this kind of self-regulation is politically motivated.

"This filtering was politically coursed. The politicians told the industry in no uncertain terms that if they didn't do something now, we'll regulate and it won't be pretty for you."

Self-regulated or not, Maurushat says it is inappropriate for a commercial organisation such as an ISP to be charged with a censorship role.

It both abdicates the responsibility of the State to the ISP, and allows the State to "externalise" the cost and discretion of policing to the private sphere.

Telstra takes tougher stance on premium SMS

2009-04-03T12:53:00.000-07:00

Telstra will introduce tough new rules on premium SMS providers before the end of June, including double opt-in requirements and a process to terminate providers with “continued high and unacceptable complaint levels”.

Executive director of mobility products, Ross Fielding, said Telstra will amend its premium SMS service provider conduct policy to extend the double opt-in arrangement to all services regardless of the method of subscription.

A process to terminate providers that have had continued high and unacceptable complaint levels associated with their services will also be introduced, as will an "incentive arrangement" which rewards providers that maintain a good customer service record, Fielding said.

"Telstra recognised, based on the high number of customer complaints received in relation to premium SMS, further measures were required and we are confident these new steps will improve customer service and satisfaction in this area," he said.

"The first and easiest way for Telstra customers to control access to premium SMS services is to simply request a bar on these services - as far as we know, Telstra is the only carrier to provide this option".

The industry, through the Communications Alliance, recently released its own code of conduct to ACMA for registration.

It took 12 months to formulate, although it has been requested by governments for some five years.

The code has already come under criticism from the likes of Communications Minister Stephen Conroy for not going far enough.

It does not include, for example, double opt-in and call barring provisions - something that Telstra will now introduce on its own.

Carriers are not currently required to cut off rogue service providers, although the ACCC has flagged the potential to introduce requirements for this under the Trade Practices Act, should the industry fail to act first.

Telstra has previously introduced measures to combat unwanted subscriptions, including a monitoring program where advertised services are "mystery shopped" and tested to check compliance against Telstra's Conduct Policy.

It also said it had suspended "a number" of premium services as a result of unacceptably high escalated complaint levels.

US plans national cybersecurity upgrade

2009-04-02T10:48:00.000-07:00

A new bill presented to Congress would see mandatory computer security standards imposed on government and private companies that control the critical infrastructure of the US.

The bill, sponsored by Senators John D. Rockefeller IV Olympia J. Snowe, would see the creation of a National Cybersecurity Advisor (NCA) with direct access to the president.

The NCA would have the power to shut down any part of the US critical infrastructure, such as power, telephony or environmental supplies if an attack took place.

In addition the NCA would be able to enforce common security standards (set by the National Institute of Standards and Technology) across the national infrastructure and would set up state and regional cybersecurity centres to provide local advice to businesses. Scholarships would also be set up for students learning about computer security.

"America’s vulnerability to massive cyber crime, global cyber espionage, and cyber attacks has emerged as one of the most urgent national security problems facing our country today" said Senator Snowe.

"Our failure to implement effective policies and procedures to protect critical infrastructure, prevent invasive intrusion and conduct an aggressive threat assessment has proven extremely consequential, putting the American information system at grave risk. It is abundantly clear we must unite on all fronts to confront this monumental challenge, if we fail to take swift action, we, regrettably, risk a cyber-Katrina."

The wide-ranging bill would also set up a Cybersecurity Advisory Panel, made up of representatives from industry, academia and security organisations to advise the president on online security issues. It would also require the licensing of cybersecurity professionals.

"We must protect our critical infrastructure at all costs – from our water to our electricity, to banking, traffic lights and electronic health records – the list goes on. It’s an understatement to say that cybersecurity is one of the most important issues we face; the increasingly connected nature of our lives only amplifies our vulnerability to cyber attacks and we must act now." said Senator Rockefeller.

Silicon Graphics sold off cheap to Rackable

2009-04-02T10:44:00.000-07:00

Rackable Systems has agreed to acquire embattled Silicon Graphics (SGI) for US$25 million.

Datacentre specialist Rackable said that it would be using the SGI assets it obtains in the deal to bolster its high-performance, cluster and cloud computing business.

"The combined company will be positioned to solve the most demanding business and technology challenges our customers confront today," declared Rackable president and chief executive Mark J. Barrenechea.

The deal came shortly after Silicon Graphics filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US. The company had been struggling to stay afloat following a 2006 restructuring and last month was faced with a delisting from the Nasdaq stock exchange.

"We have been working very hard to strengthen our company, and today, we've taken another big step in that direction," said Silicon Graphics chief executive Robert Ewald.

"This transaction represents a compelling opportunity for Silicon Graphics' customers, partners and employees, who can all benefit from the emerging stronger company with better technologies, products and markets reach."

The transaction is expected to close within 60 days, pending an approval of the deal from the US Bankruptcy Court.

HP settles with CSIRO over Wi-Fi suit

2009-04-02T10:43:00.000-07:00

The CSIRO has one less target in its ongoing litigation battle with the big guns of the ICT industry over its claims to patents on Wi-Fi technology.

The Australian Government funded research organisation has confirmed it has settled with HP for an undisclosed sum.

"CSIRO can confirm that a settlement has been reached with Hewlett-Packard Company (HP) in relation to the wireless patent case," said CSIRO spokesperson Huw Morgan, in a brief statement.

"There will be no further comment at this time due to confidentiality and on-going litigation."

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation claims to have patented core elements of the technology used in 802.11a and 802.11g wireless devices.

The CSIRO's US patent for Wireless LAN technology (US Patent 5487069) was granted in January 1996.

In June 2007, the CSIRO won a case in the US Federal Court against Japanese manufacturer Buffalo Technologies, the basis of which the research organisation has used to demand royalties from a broader set of manufacturers that market Wi-Fi equipment.

In December of last year the same court lifted the injunction banning Buffalo from selling its Wi-Fi wares until the outcome of CSIRO's patent claims are finalised.

HP was among several major technology vendors - including Apple, Intel, Dell, Microsoft and Netgear that have brought cases against CSIRO in an attempt to have the research organisation's patent invalidated.

The CSIRO had filed patent infringement suits against 3Com, Accton, Asus, Belkin, D-Link, Fujitsu, Marvell (manufacturers of Apple's iPod), Nintendo, SMC and Toshiba.

Analysis: App Stores in detail

2009-04-02T10:40:00.000-07:00

iTnews takes a comprehensive look at the app store strategies of Apple, RIM, Microsoft and Android to show which is best for developers.

In the last few months, RIM (Blackberry), Microsoft, Nokia and the Android consortium have all moved to emulate Apple's highly successful App Store model.

The new app stores coming online create a great deal of choice for mobile application developers, but also present a challenge around developer resources.

Developers need to make some important calls now on which platforms provide the most opportunity. Which are the most popular among users? Which are the most cost-effective to develop for?

Hopefully, this table and the accompanying analysis will assist in making these choices.

NB - Nokia was offered over several weeks to reveal details of its Ovi store, but declined. iTnews will update this information should Nokia go public with its plans.

	Apple AppStore(iPhone)	Microsoft Windows Mobile Marketplace	Blackberry App World (RIM)	Android Market (open source)
JOINING FEE	Standard Program US$99, Enterprise Program (for companies with over 500 staff to develop iPhones for in-house use) is US$299	US$99 annually	US$200 (includes ten app submissions).	US$25 - but only available to developers in the US and UK at present
PRICE PER APP	FREE	US$99 Five free apps until close of 2009. App updates are charged as new applications	US$200 for ten application submissions. App updates count as separate submissions	FREE
MARGINS	Developer earns 70 per cent of sale.	Developers receive 70 per cent of sale	Developers receive 80 per cent of sale	Developers receive 70 per cent of sale.
TERMS	Developers paid via monthly direct deposit into bank account	Customers purchase via credit card - other options being explored.	Customers purchase using PayPal. Developers paid via PayPal.	Credit card processing via Google Checkout
MARKET SIZE	30 million devices (17m iPhones, 14m iPod Touch) as of Dec 08	Undisclosed. 18 million licenses sold in 2008 for Windows Phones	21 million Blackberry subscribers	N/A
MARKET REACH	App Store in 77 Countries	Global	United States, Canada and the United Kingdom	US and UK only
DEVELOPER BASE	50,000	480,000	1000+	N/A

The market

Apple's App Store boasts a mind-blowing 800 million downloads for its first eight months of operation - a complete game changer for mobile telephony. Competing with that kind of demand is going to be difficult for any challenger.

That said, there are as many Blackberry-enabled phones and Windows Mobile devices in the wild as iPhones. There is certainly opportunity aplenty should these platforms, and their associated app stores, provide the ease-of-use that has helped bring about Apple's success.

The potential reach for Blackberry App World and Android Market are both geographically limited at present. Both Google and RIM are expected to make announcements on this matter in the near future.

Terms

The terms available to developers are markedly similar, but the devil is in the detail.

Three app stores offer a 70 per cent share of the sale to the developer, but RIM's late entry to the market is compensated with an offer of 80 per cent.

Apple product marketing manager Marcus Annett told iTnews that the company keeps 30 per cent of sales for profit and payment of credit card interchange fees, while Android developer relations lead Dan Morrill said the 30 per cent cut is used to pay carriers and billing settlement costs.

All four offer registration fees to cover the cost of accrediting developers to ensure a certain degree of quality.

The Android Market registration fee of US$25 certainly offers the best value - Microsoft Marketplace represents the worst, given that its US$99 fee is charged annually.

The more interesting fees are those charged for every new application uploaded for sale or free download.

While Apple and Android offer development teams the ability to spin out as many new applications as they see fit, Microsoft and RIM charge on a per app basis (US$99 per app at Microsoft, US$200 per ten apps at RIM). And to make matters worse, both count an update to an existing app as a new one for the purposes of these fees.

RIM may also face challenges if it insists on its users only being able to pay for apps on Blackberry App World via PayPal.

Skip Navigation LinksHome > News > Internet > Conroy slammed over 'stunning' iiNet trial comments [RSS Feed] iTnews Mobile | Site Map | Conroy slamm

2009-04-02T10:38:00.000-07:00

Senator Conroy's damning commentary on iiNet's copyright infringement defence might be "grossly improper", but not in contempt of court, say legal experts.

The Federal Opposition has accused Senator Stephen Conroy of prejudicing a Federal Court case during his address to the CommsDay Summit earlier this week.

Referring to ISP iiNet's battle over copyright material with major film studios due to go to trial in October, Senator Conroy claimed he had "seen iiNet's defence under oath" and found it "stunning", comparing it to a Yes Minister episode.

Conroy had previously stated that the outcomes of the iiNet trial will influence his future policy decisions around file sharing.

In a joint statement released by Shadow Attorney General George Brandis and Shadow Minister for Broadband, Communication and the Digital Economy Senator Nick Minchin, the opposition described Senator Conroy's speech as "grossly improper", with "the potential to prejudice a matter before the Federal Court."

"Senator Conroy's comments were both reckless and irresponsible; particularly considering iiNet was yet to even file that aspect of its defence and has every right to a fair hearing," said Senator Nick Minchin.

Brandis described the comments as "reprehensible" and said iiNet was "well within its rights to seek legal advice about their potential impact on its defence."

"A senior Cabinet Minister of all people should know better," Senator Brandis said. "It is totally unacceptable and could prejudice a matter before the court and damage the company's reputation in the eyes of the public."

But legal experts predict Conroy will escape legal action.

Steve White, principle of IP law group White SW ComputerLaw, said "convention" says public figures should "refrain from commenting on matters before a court," but he does not feel it would be productive to create a scenario in which the Federal Government refuses to comment on matters so vital to the public as internet copyright and filtering issues.

Legal affairs commentator Peter Moon also said it was "difficult" and "unlikely" the comments would land Conroy in hot water.

In 99 per cent of 'contempt of court' cases, Moon explained, the case is brought about because the judge presiding over a matter accuses a public figure of influencing the opinion of a jury.

In the case of iiNet vs the movie industry, the matter is being argued in front of a sole judge, without any jury.

"If Senator Conroy had said what he said about a case that involved a jury, Conroy would be standing before a court today on contempt," Moon said.

"The traditional view is that a judge has the capacity to remain unbiased, to be free of influence," he said. "I can't think of a judge-only trial where a charge of contempt was levelled.

"It would be difficult for the judge presiding over the iiNet matter to say to Senator Conroy, you are in contempt for influencing my thinking!"

It is this same legal concept that protects journalists from publishing commentaries about matters before judge-only trials and appeals cases, Moon said.

Moon said Conroy had made a "political error more than a legal one."

"I still regard Senator Conroy's comments as extraordinary," he said. "iiNet are entitled to bring a matter before a court without this kind of distraction. Normally as a matter of course a minister of state would keep his mouth shut about matters before a court."

Final chapter nearing for Encarta

2009-04-01T10:55:00.000-07:00

Microsoft has revealed that it will be shutting down the Encarta online encyclopedia.

The company's notice page says that the site will be shut down on October 31 for most of the world.

The Japanese version of the site will carry on until December 31.

Users who subscribed to premium features will have their accounts credited for fees paid beyond April 30.

Additionally, the company will cease with the distribution of the Encarta Student and Encarta Premium software by the end of June.

Emerging in the early 90's, Encarta was one of the first encyclopedias to be offered in electronic form on CD-Rom discs. The collection was later taken online, but has since struggled in the face of sites such as Wikipedia and other online news and history collections.

The company said that the decision was based on an inevitable shift in the way people access information, making a hosted encyclopedia format impractical for the company.

"People today seek and consume information in considerably different ways than in years past," the company said.

"As part of Microsoft’s goal to deliver the most effective and engaging resources for today’s consumer, it has made the decision to exit the Encarta business."

Telstra brings regional exchanges up to speed

2009-04-01T10:54:00.000-07:00

Telstra is one week into an upgrade of 421 regional exchanges to ADSL2+ and has also announced a $42 million investment in Next G base stations to be rolled out before the end of June.

Speaking at the Comms Day Summit in Sydney, Telstra chairman Donald McGauchie said the exchange upgrade program had started last week and would be completed "in the next 200 days".

He said this would add to the approximately 1,400 exchanges across Australia that are ADSL2+ ready.

McGauchie also announced Telstra will roll out another 141 mobile base stations for its Next G network before the end of June.

"It means that more Australians are getting the voice and data services they need," he said.

"The mayors, the chambers of business and local council get it. The number of people using BlackBerrys in country areas is quite astonishing. We know getting this level of service out to regional areas keeps them vital."

McGauchie lamented the lack of capital investment in the telecommunication sector, particularly outside of the metropolitan areas.

"Historically capex growth in the telecommunications sector has significantly outperformed capex growth in other industries," McGauchie said.

"Since the introduction of open competition into the telecommunications sector, there has been a significant period of under investment.

"Capex growth in the telecommunications sector is slower than in the previous decade for the first time. Investment is simply not forthcoming under the current regulatory regime."

McGauchie also claimed that while Telstra had been excluded from the process, it "had never been of the view that the NBN specified in the [RFP] process was right".

"The global economic situation and changes in consumer behaviour makes us more certain," he said.

He also made motions to the Government and successful bidder to re-engage Telstra to ensure the NBN is successful.

"The NBN is a massive and highly complex upgrade of Australia's fixed network - which Telstra owns and operates," he said.

"It is the most ambitious project of its type ever contemplated anywhere in the world and will require assumptions that we fear certain proponents have little chance of getting right.

"The entire process to decide the builder of the biggest infrastructure project in Australian history has been done behind high walls, without consulting the company that owns the network that is being upgraded.

"We simply have to take on trust that the Government is fully informed about the critical technical, operational issues and national security risks entailed in the NBN before it makes its final decision.

"We certainly stand at the ready to assist in explaining them - although we have not been asked to do so."

Microsoft Office absent from Telstra T-Suite launch

2009-04-01T10:52:00.000-07:00

Telstra shone the spotlight on local software makers selling applications through its T-Suite, leaving Microsoft's Office conspicuous by its absence.

T-Suite graduated from a beta, launched last June, to a commercial service today.

Telstra hopes its customers will choose to rent their business software each month through an online site instead of buying it on CD-ROMs.

Although its Office programs were not in evidence, Microsoft is providing hosted versions of its Exchange mail server, Dynamic CRM package and SharePoint collaboration software.

Also on offer are hosted security packages from MessageLabs (recently bought by Symantec) and McAfee, file-sharing utility Skoot (an enterprise version of YouSendIt) and Telstra's remote back-up services.

But it was the smaller, local companies such as WORKetc, which writes billing software, and a HR software service called Workplace Guardian that Telstra highlighted at the launch today.

Workplace Guardian offers online employment contracts, policies and form letters verified by lawyers Clayton Utz that are updated to comply with Australian industrial relations laws.

But the number one business software suite, Microsoft's Office, was nowhere to be seen. Organisations will continue to buy the software as they always have.

Microsoft communications sector director Kevin Brough said the launch of an online version of Office on T-Suite will be "jointly announced in due course".

"If it was available, we'd be launching it," Brough said.

He said Microsoft will train its local software makers through an incubator to sell applications through software-as-a-service portals such as T-Suite around the world.

Brough said they need new technology to help them move to hosted software distribution systems

"Their models need to change. They are used to selling a CD."

Telstra Business group managing director Deena Shiff said there were about 50 vendors who will soon provide their software on T-Suite.

"We intend to partner with a lot of local (software makers) to bring the best applications in this market," Shiff said.

Next up is e-health, education and accounting software services such as New Zealand's Xero that has account reconciliation with some Australian banks.

Shiff said Telstra began investing in rented software before the global financial crisis.

"Difficult times have beset small businesses," she said. "It has become terribly relevant to use tools with low upfront costs, with no big investments in hardware and software licences up front. We did not anticipate just how relevant this would be."

She said T-Suite will appeal to software makers s because of its "broad distribution and reach".

A Telstra spokesman said the carrier expected the 4000 hits a week that T-Suite had during testing to rise significantly.

And Telstra will consider bundling applications once it learns about customer preferences, he said.

New IBM Nehalem servers feature altimeters

2009-04-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

IBM's Nehalem-based servers are likely to use less power in low-lying Sydney than in cities with higher elevation.

The fans in IBM's Nehalem-based X-series servers, announced yesterday, are fitted with altimeters - devices that adjust fan speeds according to how high above sea level the machine is sitting.

Traditionally, servers have been provisioned with fans that spin at a fixed speed assuming the highest altitudes, where the atmosphere is the least dense.

These fixed speeds were set because a fan has to work harder (spin faster) to cool a piece of equipment in areas where the density of the air is thinner.

In locations of lower altitude, server fans have tended to run at faster speeds than necessary - which in turn consumes more power than necessary.

"In Sydney for example, we are at sea level, a denser atmosphere," said Peter Hedges, manager of the technology and systems group for IBM Australia. "The fans are moving a greater volume of air which has a greater cooling effect. With the introduction of an altimeter, the fans won't have to spin as fast at these lower altitudes."

The technology appears to have been patented by IBM, but local representatives have been unable to confirm this.

The altimeter-adjusted fans were announced as part of IBM's launch of four energy-efficient servers based on Intel's Xeon 5500 series processor (Nehalem).

Rather than push for GHz gains, Intel's Nehalem series of processors are focused on allowing for increased memory and energy efficiency to meet the needs of today's virtualised data centres.

Hedges said the best of these rack servers offer up to a 100 per cent increase in the amount of virtual workloads the machine can carry, while offering up to 50 per cent reductions in energy use.

"Virtualisation requires constant amounts of memory and requires higher levels of reliability functions to be built into the hardware," he said.

Beyond the processor itself, energy savings are achieved using new IBM power supplies, lower wattage capacitors and new counter-rotating, altimeter-fitted fans within the machines.

IBM released two families of rack-based servers which share a common motherboard, the IBM System x3550 M2 (priced from AUD$4879 - AUD$8799 including tax) and the IBM System x3650 M2 (priced from AUD$5509 - AUD$10109 including tax).

Big Blue also announced a new two-socket blade for its Bladecenter chassis - the IBM BladeCenter HS22 (priced from AUD$3929 - AUD$4979 including tax).

And specifically for ISP and web hosting companies, IBM has released the iDataPlex dx360 M2, a rack-style server which leverages "radical new designs" around cooling and energy requirements.

The new iDataPlex dx360 server sits on a wider, shallower rack, allowing for greater density and therefore lower floor space. It boasts a shorter channel from front to back to cool the rack and IBM claims that with rear-door heat extraction, it can actually remove more than 100 per cent of the heat generated by the rack.

Hedges said the iDataplex series will only suit certain applications, such as service providers, as it does not boast the 'zero single point of failure' that a blade server configuration offers.

ACCC takes issue with Voda-Hutch merger

2009-04-01T10:44:00.000-07:00

Australia’s telecommunications regulator has tabled some initial reservations to the proposed merger of Vodafone Australia and Hutchison, concerned the merger will remove the industry’s most aggressive price competition.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission released an issues paper on the proposed merger late last night, calling for the mobile telecommunications industry to respond to its concerns.

"The ACCC's preliminary view is that the proposed merger raises competition concerns in the short to medium term," the paper says.

While the issues paper does not represent the regulator's final view, it clearly indicates the ACCC is uncomfortable with the merger.

The regulator's prime concern is that Vodafone and Hutchison are each other's direct competitors in that they both focus their services on "price-sensitive customers in metropolitan areas."

"Hutchison has competed aggressively for market share in the national market for supply of retail mobile telecommunications services, consistently attracting a relatively high proportion of customers from the other three Mobile Network Operators," the paper says. "The ACCC is concerned that the removal of Hutchison as a vigorous and effective competitor will lead to increased prices for customers."

Telstra, Optus and a combined VHA would command a 95 per cent share of the mobile telephony market.

The ACCC is concerned the merger will result in "increased concentration" of major mobile carriers and that the proposed entity's reseller partners would be "unlikely to constrain the merged entity."

The regulator is also concerned that existing network sharing and joint venture relationships between a merged VHA, Telstra and Optus could lead to price collusion or some other form of anti-competitive behaviour.

The ACCC does not, however, take issue with the amount of combined mobile spectrum a merged VHA might hold.

"The ACCC considers that a substantial lessening of competition is unlikely to arise in relation to the aggregation of spectrum."

Submissions to the Statement of Issues are welcome until April 17, 2009.

The ACCC expects to make a final decision by May 6.

Microsoft rolls out Windows Embedded Server

2009-03-31T11:55:00.000-07:00

Microsoft has unveiled a new version of its Windows Server platform for embedded devices.

The aptly-named Windows Embedded Server will allow users to remotely monitor and manage systems which rely on embedded software.

The company hopes that the offering will lead original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to design a new class of server which can be used in embedded environments to supplement and control traditional embedded software systems.

The offering could also allow OEMs and IT support staff to better manage and repair embedded devices remotely through web-based support systems, according to Microsoft.

"The combination of software-plus-services from Windows Embedded will establish new revenue channels for embedded OEMs and partners by utilising Windows Embedded Server and the complete Microsoft portfolio of embedded platforms and technologies in scenarios such as device maintenance and support services," said Kevin Dallas, general manager for Microsoft's Windows Embedded business.

Microsoft plans to offer the platform under its software-plus-services banner, which combines traditional installed software applications with web-based services, as an alternative to the more recent wave of web-based 'cloud' computing products.

Microsoft recently declined to join the newly formed Open Cloud Manifesto.

IBM wins a slice of Energy Australia's smart grid

2009-03-31T11:54:00.004-07:00

IBM has won a $3.2 million systems integration deal to help Energy Australia capture and make use of the data drawn from its world-leading $170 million Intelligent Network or "smart grid".

Energy Australia's Intelligent Network project involves the building of an IP-based nervous system that sits behind the utility's electricity grid to aid the operating and monitoring of its equipment.

IBM has been engaged as a systems integrator, charged with implementing systems that aggregate the data Energy Australia collects in the field via thousands of network-connected sensors, and converting that data into information the utility's operations and field staff can use to make decisions.

Adrian Clark, manager of intelligent networks for Energy Australia told iTnews that IBM and the utility are "aligned" at a senior level around the concept of smart grids.

In mid-March, IBM Australia announced the "Smarter Planet" initiative - aimed at connecting data from areas outside of traditionally IT-centric organisations to enable a more efficient world.

Working on Energy Australia's Intelligent Network project will allow Big Blue to "put that think-tank into practice," Clark said.

Clark also hinted that IBM is also pitching for "future work in the pipeline around what we need in the back office."

The IBM deal comes at a crucial juncture of Energy Australia's three-year long, $170 million Intelligent Network program.

The utility has already rolled out a carrier-grade, IP MPLS transmission network across its grid that allows for two-way communication between smart sensors in the field and the feeding back of important data to the organisation's operations centre or field staff.

This saw some 800 kilometres of optical fibre rolled out between the 30,000 substations in Energy Australia's electricity network, connected via Alcatel-Lucent switches and routers.

In April, Energy Australia will begin deploying the smart sensors that connect with this network to monitor, control and automate the electricity grid.

These sensors bring back a "minute by minute" account of what is happening to the network at street level.

By the end of June 2009, Energy Australia will have completed a pilot to determine how to connect the "last mile" between the substation and the customer to gain an even more granular view of its network.

The utility is currently trialling WiMAX technology in an area that serves 80,000-100,000 customers in Newcastle. It is also trialling narrowband and broadband power line transmission technologies, standard 2G mobile networks and a wireless mesh network.

Clark said it will take another six to twelve months to make a decision on which "last mile" technology to apply.

Energy Australia is the first utility in the world that is "committed to getting a street level view" of its electricity network, Clark said.

"Ultimately we will be able to detect faults when they occur, and find and restore power much faster. It also prepares us to cope with a more energy-constrained future."

Google announces funding arm

2009-03-31T11:54:00.003-07:00

Google has announced a new arm of its business, Google Ventures, a technology investment fund.

The firm said that it had started Ventures as a way of opening up its own resources to new technology development, and will seek out and help start-up firms operating across a diverse range of industries.

"This is Google's effort to take advantage of our resources to support innovation and encourage promising new technology companies," noted Rich Miner and Bill Maris, the managing partners at Google Ventures, in a blog post.

"By borrowing the best practices of top-tier, financially focused venture capital firms and bringing to bear Google's unique technical expertise and brand, we think we can find young companies with truly awesome potential and encourage their development into successful businesses."

Falling with ease into the vernacular of venture capitalists, the firm said that it would focus on "early stage investments" with firms operating in consumer internet services, green and clean technology, biotechnology, healthcare and many others.

Google will draw on its people resources, as well as its financial and technological ones, particularly for investment recommendations.

The managing partners explained, "Central to our effort will be our fellow Googlers, whom we view as a critically important resource to help educate us about potential investments areas and evaluate specific companies."

Interested participants are requested to apply via email through the Google Ventures web site, and the firm is expecting a lot of interest.

"Unfortunately, due to the large volume of email we receive, we can not promise a response to all inquires (sic)," it said.