By most metrics, 2003 was a down year for IT. But against the backdrop of leaner budgets, thinner staffs, and a depressed economy, IT vendors refined existing products and developed new ones to better meet the needs of enterprise customers. InfoWorld tracked this steady march of progress step by innovative step, reviewing more than 200 products in categories of every description during the past year — .Net development tools, J2EE app servers, Web services integration solutions, 10Gig switches, wireless LAN gateways, NAS and SAN hardware, firewalls and VPNs, and on and on. In this 25-page roundup you’ll find reviews (listed alphabetically by category, vendor, and product name) summarizing what we liked, what could be improved, and links to the full reviews online. Technology Industry