Opinion

Now isn’t soon enough

Real-time databases are the next frontier

TechEd update #2: New Pocket PC phones

There are some surprises on the exhibit floor. Sprint and AT&T are both here, pitching new devices and touting data service plans. Both carriers are promoting Pocket PC Phone Edition devices–Sprint has a Hitachi phone, and AT&T has Siemens.

Offshore Mail

Readers comment … In your reply to "What's an American programmer to do?" you said, among other things, that maybe it's the Americans who want more money who are greedy. However, everything you said assumes an even playing field

Altered Reality

SCO. SCO. SCO. If nothing else, it's one hellua way to get their name in print, worldwide. <SCO THOUGHT> Uh-oh Linux is gaining ground in shops small and large, worldwide Linux is impacting Microsoft, but is affecting commercial *n

TechEd update #1: All roads lead to BizTalk

Residents of the Fort Worth/Dallas metroplex are mostly unaware of the Dallas Convention Center. The facility, though vast, seems to sink beneath the concrete when it isn't hosting a show. TechEd is Microsoft's yearly fete for mid-level IT

Employment lost

Dear Bob … I was gainfully employed in a large university until recently. Shortly after I was hired, friction developed with my boss, who had six direct reports, of whom I was the only one in a&nbsp

With a whisper

I got an interesting email from a client of mine today. He is the VP of IT for a far flung health organization. Most of his infrastructure is Citrix MetaFrame-driven thin clients, with travelers using laptops to connect from the office and the road.

Who, me?

Since it's raining again, and I find myself with a few minutes that aren't immediately required for some time-sensitive task, I had the chance to peruse the access logs on groove. This proved very interesting, to say the least. Since I star

What a Waste

Nullsoft, everybody's favorite independent geekshop-cum-AOL business unit was given a smack down of sorts recently. The issue is Nullsoft's newest application, Waste. Waste was released on Wednesday, May 25th, and pulled by AOL lawyers on t

Will Microsoft Office never let us rest?

Just as companies get accustomed to Office XP, Redmond prepares a new version

X marks the spot

Cross applications will demolish the old enterprise application silos

Academic Architects

Dear Bob … For a number of reasons my department formed an architecture group a couple of years ago. Since that time they've had very little practical impact – mostly they've published white papers and complained that nobody is following

What do readers want?

Workload and complexity make security management than it should be, readers say

Six CTO lessons from the War in Iraq

After the War In Iraq, the future of warfare and the future of enterprise IT look very similar

The soldier is the network

In the battle of the future, the helmet becomes a data retrieval device

Battle-tested tech: supply chain and logistics

The military uses RFID to keep tabs on a mountain of wartime supplies

Battle-tested tech

As IT takes center stage in the war theater, the military becomes the ultimate enterprise lab

Battle-tested tech: communications

Integrated military strategy provides a lesson for enterprise IT

Patterns of persistence

A new way to think about an old technique for dealing with databases

Battle-tested tech: robotics and automation

Robots that played a role in Iraq could keep enterprise employees out of danger in the future

Military’s past meets IT future

Generations of military R&D gave life to technology the enterprise takes for granted today

Battle-tested tech: security and data mining

Smart cards go through basic training on the battlefield

Technology at war

Peacetime IT could learn from the military

Dancin’ days

Network Associates, Microsoft doin' that jig

If it’s good enough for Fido …

Vendors need to follow Microsoft's playbook

Dear [x], SCO is suing you for $[y]B. Please pay before we go bankrupt.

This SCO business is getting stranger by the minute. Novell, which bought the rights to System V from AT&T, says it never granted SCO the intellectual property rights it claims in its lawsuit against IBM. If you missed our last episode, SCO is s

Mail Call

Readers responded to "Build vs Buy" … and since they actually work for a living, they're worth your attention. – Bob As a consultant, I helped several clients pick software packages — the traditional make vs. buy decision.

What’s an American programmer to do?

Note to readers: Normally, I don't include the names of companies involved in Advice Line inquiries, except in their roles as providers to the IT industry. I'm making an exception in this case because I think its identity is useful in unde

Build vs Buy

Dear Bob … I used to have a book and highlighted the passage that claimed it was cheaper in the long run to buy vs. build in-house software tools. Would you happen to have any such passage? – Shopping   Dear Shopping I'm afraid not, a

Life as a second grade classroom

I remember second grade fairly well. Lots of letters and numbers, learning how to tell time with an analog clock, listening to stories and getting hooked on phonics. I also remember the mentality of that classroom. It was an odd mixture of the primit

SCO, Microsoft and IBM, for better or worse?

Several weeks ago, I commented to a few friends and coworkers that Microsoft had to be behind the SCO lawsuit. I didn't put these thoughts in this space, as time has been my enemy as of late, but apparently, I've been proven correct. This i

Farewell to handhelds

GPS, Java, and push-to-talk give smart phones a clear edge over PDAs

Waiting for SMS 2003

Companies can benefit from some third-party SMS utilities

Hacking: it’s not just for teenagers anymore

Organized groups of hackers are targeting your business, combining high-tech crime with old-fashioned threats

Small drives get larger and faster

New disk devices for mobile computing beef up capacity and performance

Technology power

We honor 16 pioneers who advanced the science of IT

SCO lawsuit fallout

IBM was named, but there are potential problems for the entire Linux community in this legal action

APIs, protocols, and rogue plumbers

Who should unclog the Web pipes to keep information flowing?

More from the mailbag

Notions, ideas and comments from readers … You provided good advice to the first question you responded to in this article (Paperclip counter). I would like to add another question that might be asked of the business executive in the third option:

Sign of…

Last Sunday, Carrie wakes me up at 8am to see something I'd never seen in person. Suffice it to say that it was a breathtaking moment….

From the why-can’t-I files

WiFi. CDMA. 802.(11|16)(a|b|g), Bluetooth. Why am I still using a battery-powered low watt FM transmitter to connect my iPod to my car stereo? I would think that this was a no-brainer. Bluetooth is the obvious answer to the problem. If my iPod spoke

Unhappy Passover

Dear Bob … I'm a Network Administrator for a moderately sized company. The last few years has seen increased levels in tension between my boss and myself over different paths to reach objectives. This has essentially escalated into a personali

Microsoft stirs up CRM

Upstart's emergence has competitors scrambling to vertical markets

Directions in testing

So what is it you want, anyway?

A not-so-distributed file system

Windows 2000 Server's DFS Replication feature isn't WAN friendly

More with less

Thin is in

Capacity on demand may be just right for fat-to-thin transitions

Tools for rules

Rules-based programming will either help us out or create a different kind of mess

Surfing the services wave

Should you hire consultants' expertise to simplify storage selection?

Application performance and test management

CIO of vehicle management company PHH Arval outlines its testing, performance management strategy for launching PHH Interactive