AirDefense (Profile, Products, Articles) on Tuesday introduced AirDefense Mobile (Overview, Articles, Company), a wireless LAN analyzer that coordinates with the company's AirDefense Enterprise product to perform real-time assessments
of all 802.11 a/b/g wireless activities and devices in the immediate vicinity, thereby enabling network administrators to
quickly locate rogue devices. Other features of AirDefense Mobile include location tracking, real-time reporting, and LiveView,
which provides insight into network performance and traffic analysis. AirDefense Mobile runs on Windows 2000 or XP, and installs
on any laptop with an Atheros-based 802.11 a/b/g wireless card. It is available now priced at $995.
Yahoo launches cell phone shopping in Japan
July 5, 5:35 a.m. PDT
Yahoo Japan has opened a version of its shopping portal for cell phone Internet users, the company said Monday. Mobile Yahoo
Shopping can be accessed from all three of Japan's major wireless Internet services and brings together about 2,000 merchants
and 2 million items for sale, according to estimates from Yahoo. Like the company's PC shopping site, users of the cell phone
version can search or browse for goods and retailers by category. Online shopping from PCs is popular in Japan, but it has
yet to take off in a big way from mobile devices. In a recent government survey, 89 percent of respondents said they shopped
online using their PC, versus only 18 percent who shopped online with a cell phone. Satisfaction levels with online shopping
are much lower among cell phone users, with ease of use and security among the biggest complaints.
Samsung to invest $618 million in memory chip lines
July 5,
5:35 a.m. PDT
Samsung Electronics Co. is planning to invest 636.7 billion won ($617.5 million) in upgrading its production lines for flash
and DRAM (dynamic RAM) chips, a company spokeswoman said Monday. Samsung is among the world's largest manufacturers of both
types of chip. The company will use part of the money to increase production capacity on its number 14 manufacturing line,
with a view to using it for all high-end flash chip production. Samsung currently produces 2Gb flash chips on the line, and
also plans to use it to make 4Gb chips, its most advanced flash chips. The rest of the money will be used to upgrade several
DRAM lines from the current 90-nanometer production process to the more advanced 80-nanometer process. The company, based
in Suwon, South Korea, did not say how much money would be spent in each area.
Micromuse
to acquire GuardedNet
July 1, 7:50 a.m. PDT
Micromuse has entered into an agreement to acquire GuardedNet for $16.2 million in cash. The acquisition of privately held
GuardedNet will broaden Micromuse's portfolio in the area of security information and event management. Combining Micromuse's
suite of Netcool business and service assurance solutions with GuardedNet's neuSecure product family of centralized security
management solutions will provide customers with enhanced capability to assure services, monitor infrastructure, and mitigate
security risks within a single, integrated management platform. The acquisition is expected to close during Micromuse’s fourth
quarter, which ends September 30. GuardedNet was founded in 1999 and has approximately 42 employees.
Apache announces XMLBeans 2.0
July 1,
7:05 a.m. PDT
The Apache Software Foundation (Profile, Products, Articles), a community of developers and users that provides support for the Apache open-source software projects, has announced the
availability of XMLBeans 2.0. XMLBeans uses XML Schema to generate Java interfaces and classes that can then be used to access
and modify XML instance data. Version 2.0 of the tool offers enhancements such as improved XQuery/XPath integration; DOM Level
II support, which improves performance and reduces the memory footprint; extensions for adding custom functionality to generated
XMLBeans; and improved error handling.
Nortel appoints new chairman
June 30, 5:45 a.m. PDT
Nortel Networks (Profile, Products, Articles) named former Hughes Electronics Chairman Harry Pearce as the new chairman of its board of directors following a meeting
of shareholders Wednesday. Pearce has been a director of the company since January and is a firm believer in the leadership
of CEO Bill Owens, according to a statement from the company. The appointment is just one of many recent changes at the top
for Nortel. Earlier this month, the company's president and COO, Gary Daichendt, resigned after disagreements with Owens over
management style. Owens took control of the company barely a year ago. His predecessor was fired as a result of an accounting
scandal which forced the company to restate several years' financial results. That scandal, and the delays in reporting of
financial information that resulted, angered shareholders present at the meeting, according to press reports Thursday. Shareholders
present at the meeting criticized board members for not spotting the company's financial troubles earlier, according to the
reports.
W3C issues XKMS 2.0 as Recommendation
June 28,
8:45 a.m. PDT
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has approved the XML Key Management System 2.0 (XKMS 2.0) as a W3C Recommendation. XKMS
2.0 is part of the W3C XML Security Framework that includes the XML Signature, XML Encryption, and Canonical XML Recommendations.
XKMS makes public key infrastructure (PKI) practical to implement in Web applications, including Web services. XKMS 2.0 was
developed by the W3C XML Key Management Working Group, including W3C Members DataPower, Microsoft (Profile, Products, Articles), Nokia (Profile, Products, Articles), Oracle (Profile, Products, Articles), Sun Microsystems (Profile, Products, Articles), VeriSign (Profile, Products, Articles), and webMethods (Profile, Products, Articles). For more information see
http://www.w3.org.
(InfoWorld) - I could probably fill up my column just reporting on who's buying whom -- or who's...
