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On the road to the virtual desktop Click ‘n’ run. It seems like such a simple concept. Surf up to a Web page, select the desired application from a list, and click. Voila! Microsoft Word appears on your desktop. Or Excel, or Adobe Photoshop… you name it. Herd behavior demonstrated at Demo "Whatever happened to working alone?”  September 24, 3:00 a.m. PDT Credit Suisse plans virtualization a massive scale With 20,000 servers to manage, financial services powerhouse Credit Suisse had a long list of reasons to consider server virtualization: reducing the number of physical servers to manage, cutting power needs, improving software provisioning time, and deferring expensive datacenter buildouts. But it also needed a clear set of guidelines to determine when to virtualize, plus a clear set of procedures for managing a virtualization initiative. September 24, 3:00 a.m. PDT Best of open source in platforms and middleware Open source cut its teeth on operating systems, earned its street cred on Linux and Apache, and never looked back, continuing ever since to extend the kingdom to databases, middleware, and newfangled platforms such as hypervisors for server virtualization. Our Bossies in platforms and middleware recognize a few old faces, and some fairly new ones. September 10, 3:00 a.m. PDT Introducing the 2007 InfoWorld Bossies Not too long ago, open source meant starving developers; scant documentation; an ugly, outdated Web site; and software that lived in perpetual beta. Now open source software is becoming big business. “Now hiring” is a common sight on project home pages, and .org and SourceForge sites that used to point straight to source code archives are redirected to .com URLs that celebrate the commercial success of what started out as collaborations among unpaid coders of like mind. September 10, 3:00 a.m. PDT Databases: Packing larger sizes into smaller spaces One of the bigger problems databases face is the space crunch. As individual databases edge toward the petabyte range, it's getting much harder to find appropriate storage. And of course, the number of tables isn't growing in proportion, which means we're going from a large table size of a few million rows to that of a few billion rows. In fact, soon enough, few among us will be surprised to encounter tables in the tens of billions of rows. August 20, 3:00 a.m. PDT SMB technology: Replacing in-house software with applications in the cloud In the near future, there's only one way to go for SMBs when it comes to purchasing business software -- and that's out of house. Whether it's full-on SaaS (software as a service), where users access all facets of the application through a browser, or a hosted product (including hosted Exchange, where only the server component is off-site and users employ a standard desktop client such as Outlook), either model is simply too cost-effective for SMBs to ignore. August 20, 3:00 a.m. PDT Processors: Dividing chips into many virtual cores The current approach taken by x86 CPUs -- to stuff as many processor cores and as much cache memory as will fit on one chip -- will prove impossible to scale beyond a certain point. And adding more, big, hot processor cores may not be the best fit for server roles that call for managing large workloads over long periods of time. August 20, 3:00 a.m. PDT EMC strikes first partnership with Indian outsourcer EMC Corp. will train more than 1,000 Wipro Ltd. staff in the use of its storage technologies as part of an alliance announced by the companies on Wednesday. June 13, 4:09 a.m. PDT Former Hitachi Data Systems chief to head up HP storage In its quest to re-energize its storage business, Hewlett-Packard has recruited the former president and CEO of storage rival Hitachi Data Systems (HDS). May 25, 2:22 p.m. PDT Microsoft to ship next SQL Server in 2008 Microsoft is working on products that will support a massive growth of enterprise data and enable more people in enterprises and smaller businesses to access that data. May 9, 9:41 a.m. PDT Startups class of '06: Where are they now? In 2006, InfoWorld uncovered 15 startups that emerged after the nuclear winter that followed the dot-com bust with cool, useful technologies. Well, another year has brought a new crop of startup darlings, such as the companies we're profiling each day in May for our Month of Enterprise Startups (MOES) feature. But MOES got us thinking about last year's startups. In the year that has followed, how have these innovators fared? May 7, 3:00 a.m. PDT The smart business of diversity Carly Fiorina served as CEO of Hewlett-Packard from 1999 to 2005, the first woman to run a Fortune 20 company. After she was ousted, along with a $21 million exit package, Fiorina did what a lot of us would do if we had millions of dollars in the bank and some time on our hands: She wrote a book. In Tough Choices, published in October, Fiorina talks about rising to the top of a male-dominated culture. Fiorina spoke with InfoWorld correspondent Carmen Nobel for our upcoming feature on the issues women face in IT. January 22, 3:00 a.m. PST 2006 Year in Reviews: Storage In EMC’s march on the enterprise NAS market, two big feet fell this year in the form of the company’s Rainfinity (global file system) and Infoscape (file classification) releases, which we took for early spins in EMC’s labs. The year also brought a smooth rev of Windows Storage Server, a swell mid-range SAN from Compellent, and a slick tape library from Spectra Logic. December 18, 3:00 a.m. PST Technology with no past To the extent that it’s possible, I’m declaring today the beginning of recorded history in information technology. On this day, the phrase “information technology,” abbreviated IT, came into being as shorthand for electronic devices that aid humans in storage and sharing of, analysis of, protection of, and access to significant amounts of digitized content. Content? That’s anything you’re capable of holding in your brain for even a nanosecond. IT is not a department or a group of people. It’s a smart phone. It’s a room full of SPARC servers. A telephone headset? A keyboard? I don’t know. They’re new terms. We’ll work that out as we go. I do know that if we didn’t have such things, information technology would be inaccessible. September 20, 3:00 a.m. PDT Virtual databases: An alternative solution Server virtualization is an efficient way to save on server hardware costs, real estate, and management resources, but it isn’t the only way. Just ask the folks at Avanade, a systems integrator specializing in Microsoft solutions. For one government customer, Avanade had originally designed hundreds of SQL Servers in highly available MSCS (Microsoft Cluster Server) clusters, but the system was spiraling out of control. September 11, 3:00 a.m. PDT Inside IBM DB2 Viper The viper has struck. August 14, 3:00 a.m. PDT Evolving WinFS still needs to embrace the Web I was one of the lucky souls who saw the only public demonstration of Microsoft’s object-oriented file system, code-named Cairo, at the 1993 Professional Developers Conference. A decade later, in a column entitled “A Tale of Two Cairos”, I reflected on Cairo’s historical context and the modern context into which its successor, WinFS, would emerge -- which was, of course, the Web. Here’s what I said three years ago: July 5, 3:00 a.m. PDT IBM set to unveil DB2 Viper after five years in the making After almost two years of testing, IBM says it is finally pulling the covers off DB2 Version 9, the next iteration of its flagship database server, on July 28. June 12, 3:00 a.m. PDT InfoWorld CTO 25 The top technology slot in the enterprise has changed. Once, forward-looking CTOs and CIOs scanned the horizon for new technologies that would improve the lot of IT. Today, as many of this year’s top 25 CTOs can tell you, technology leaders must also focus on understanding the business goals of the enterprise -- and then craft technology strategies to meet those objectives. June 5, 3:00 a.m. PDT MySQL patches buffer overflow flaws MySQL AB this week issued a security patch for multiple vulnerabilities in its MySQL open-source database. May 4, 10:48 a.m. PDT Accessing the web of databases I've just posted the fourth installment in my new series of Friday podcasts. It’s an interview with Kingsley Idehen, CEO of OpenLink Software. OpenLink’s flagship product is a universal database and application server, Virtuoso, which I last wrote about in 2003. May 3, 3:00 a.m. PDT IBM DB2 "Viper" revs XML engine Code-named "Viper" and due for release in early summer, will be more worthy of its “Universal Database” tagline than previous versions. Not only does Viper contain an extensive list of enhancements that cover everything from security and development to storage and administration, but topping the list is a newly integrated XML storage engine that Big Blue says will put Microsoft and Oracle to shame. May 1, 3:00 a.m. PDT Users: Oracle Linux would be optimal Oracle Corp. customers are intrigued by recent musings from Larry Ellison, the company's chief executive officer, suggesting Oracle might offer its own Linux distribution. Users would welcome the tighter integration a complete Oracle software stack of operating system, database, middleware and applications could provide, they said in interviews this week. April 21, 10:35 a.m. PDT World Cup passes on smart soccer ball World Cup soccer players should be happy: A new chip-enabled soccer ball won't be ready for use at the World Cup soccer tournament in Germany this June, according to the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA). February 16, 3:22 p.m. PST Speeding retrieval with in-memory data management My first real Java application, back in 1997, was a servlet-based group scheduler. It wasn’t quite the smash hit that Hanson’s “MMMBop” was that summer, but as some of you may recall, it had its charms. February 15, 3:00 a.m. PST Microsoft ready to pull Office Live beta trigger Microsoft Corp. is readying a beta of its Office Live hosted service as new details emerged about an e-mail service the company plans to release as part of the offering. January 19, 11:28 a.m. PST SQL Server bulks up To call SQL Server 2000 a 90-pound weakling because it lacks certain high-end features is a bit like calling Hercules a wimp because he never ran a marathon. Not every strongman can perform every feat, and not every company needs every heavyweight feature. Many enterprises, large and small, have been running their businesses on SQL Server for years. January 16, 3:00 a.m. PST Data protection and change control drive database developments Most of the major vendors came out with major releases in 2005. Oracle Database 10g went to Release 2, giving customers transparent data encryption, enhanced grid management, and a number of performance and security improvements. MySQL released Version 5.0, which gives users the ability to use stored procedures, triggers, and views. Sybase ASE 15 brings truly integrated data partitioning and lays the groundwork for native encryption. January 2, 3:00 a.m. PST 2006 Technology of the Year Awards: The winners' list See correction at end of article January 2, 3:00 a.m. PST Top technologies of the year Welcome to our first issue of the year. For those of you who took a break, re-entry into the heady universe of work may be a bit discombobulating. Fortunately, last Saturday, the world’s ever-considerate timekeepers saw fit to give us an extra sliver of time -- a leap second-- to prep for the new year. And now, with the pop of the cork (or was that the buzz of a pager?), we’re ready to herald 2006, a potential banner year for the enterprise. January 2, 3:00 a.m. PST Oracle outlines new multicore pricing policy Oracle Corp. has changed its unique formula for determining the cost of running its software on new multicore processors, the company announced Monday. December 20, 4:34 a.m. PST Forrester index finds US tech sector healthy for now The U.S. technology industry has recovered from a recession of 2001 and 2002 and is about as healthy as it's been in three years, according to a new tech sector economic index released Monday. December 12, 9:49 a.m. PST Scaling your applications to 64-bit computing At Microsoft’s annual Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in April 2005, Bill Gates predicted that 64-bit hardware, operating systems, and software would “transform the way we work and play.” Systems using 64-bit processors would be mainstream by the end of 2006, he said, and 64-bit computing at the server level would happen more quickly than any other platform changeover in the past. December 12, 3:00 a.m. PST Is it time to scrap your Big Iron? See correction at end of article November 17, 3:00 a.m. PST When mainframes make sense Not everyone sees the mainframe as a relic of the past. In 1996, motor manufacturer Baldor Electric, beguiled by promises of lower costs and the desire to move to the SAP platform for all its CRM and ERP transactions, left the mainframe in favor of a Windows environment. According to Mark Shackelford, Baldor's IS director, the company was very unhappy with the results. November 17, 3:00 a.m. PST SQL Server 2005 piles it on Microsoft's first major release of SQL Server in many years includes such sweeping improvements that it's sometimes hard to see the old SQL Server underneath. Not a single area of the database remains untouched, and many portions have been rewritten from the ground up. Wherever you look -- performance, programmability, security, monitoring, tuning, diagnostics, BI, or system integration -- you'll find significant new features and greater capability. November 7, 3:00 a.m. PST Oracle wins big with its Innobase acquisition To the faithful, Oracle's acquisition of key MySQL partner Innobase is proof of what they've believed all along: MySQL's success is a threat to Oracle's database business and it's only a matter of time before the two companies collide. October 24, 3:00 a.m. PDT WinFS and social information management I saw my first demo of Microsoft’s Cairo OFS (Object File System) back in 1993. It was briefly unveiled at the Professional Developers Conference that year, and then shelved. This week I installed the beta version of its successor, WinFS. September 7, 4:00 a.m. PDT Startups vie to make Linux more attractive with bundled offerings Integrating open source applications is a task daunting enough to lead some companies toward proprietary products. To that end, several startups this week revealed plans to offer prebuilt, certified solutions so customers have fewer integration migraines. August 3, 6:00 a.m. PDT Oracle executive confirms new multicore pricing model Oracle confirmed a change to its multicore processor pricing and licensing model Friday after the news first appeared on the company's Web site Thursday. July 15, 10:45 a.m. PDT Oracle pays $8M to settle suit over training charges Oracle has paid $8 million to settle charges that from 1997 through 2003 it fraudulently billed the federal government for training through the company's Oracle University program. May 13, 3:58 p.m. PDT Oracle CFO jumps ship to head BearingPoint Oracle's chief financial officer plans to leave the company, two months after it acquired PeopleSoft and in the midst of a battle to acquire Retek. March 17, 5:10 p.m. PST Crystal shows a new sheen Since acquiring Crystal Decisions in 2003, Business Objects has been working to integrate Crystal Reports into its business intelligence suite. Crystal is now part of BusinessObjects Enterprise XI, but it also continues to be available separately. And Crystal Reports XI is no mere rebranding — it’s a significant advancement in the Crystal reporting world. Crystal XI has several new features that make it not only easier to author, but also to manage and view reports. January 28, 3:00 p.m. PST MySQL warning users, contemplating changes after worm Open source database software maker MySQL warned its users to tighten security Thursday, after news broke about a new Internet worm that targets the popular relational database, according to a company executive. The company is looking at making bigger changes to harden its product against future attacks, the executive said. January 28, 1:30 p.m. PST Oracle's Ellison takes aim at SAP With PeopleSoft vanquished, Oracle Chief Executive Officer Larry Ellison is setting his sights on the industry's leading business applications vendor, SAP. January 26, 3:17 p.m. PST Data under lock and key The year in databases saw its share of technology advances. The rise of commodity 64-bit hardware, native XML storage in relational databases, configuration wizards, auto-tuning … all these developments are making databases more powerful, flexible, and easy to manage. Perhaps the biggest trend, however, in terms of what will drive the direction of databases and related products in 2005, is to demonstrate compliance with the likes of HIPAA, Sarbanes-Oxley, and other regulations. December 30, 3:00 p.m. PST OpenWorld: Oracle to deliver VMware-ready software SAN FRANCISCO - Oracle and VMware are developing an easier way to install and configure Oracle's software, executives from the two companies said at the Oracle OpenWorld conference Thursday. December 9, 3:27 p.m. PST Oracle mixes messages on PeopleSoft support At its user conference on Wednesday, Oracle continued sending mixed messages to PeopleSoft customers concerned about how Oracle will support their products if it succeeds in its $9.2 billion takeover bid. December 8, 6:01 p.m. PST Oracle CEO: Centralizing data took 5 years Oracle's recently completed consolidation to a single, global system for enterprise data took five years, Oracle Chief Executive Officer Larry Ellison told OpenWorld attendees Wednesday during his keynote address at Oracle's user conference being held in San Francisco. December 8, 5:49 p.m. PST Oracle to tout business intelligence, content management Oracle at the Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco next week plans to focus on its “Data Hub” technology for business intelligence, content management for the masses, grid computing, and integration, an Oracle official said on Thursday. December 2, 4:00 p.m. PST Update: Former CA chief Kumar appears at Cannes technology show CANNES, FRANCE -- Former Computer Associates International Inc. (CA) Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Sanjay Kumar made a surprise appearance at the Etre technology conference in Cannes on Monday, three weeks after his indictment for securities fraud and obstruction of justice. October 11, 6:05 a.m. PDT RIAA files 762 new file-trading lawsuits The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has filed 762 new lawsuits against alleged file-traders using P-to-P (peer-to-peer) services, with the total number of lawsuits filed since September 2003 now reaching more than 5,500. October 1, 2:33 p.m. PDT Former CA chief Sanjay Kumar indicted on fraud charges Computer Associates International Inc. CEO Sanjay Kumar and CA's former head of worldwide sales, Stephen Richards, have been indicted on charges of securities fraud conspiracy and obstruction of justice, federal prosecutors announced this afternoon. September 22, 2:02 p.m. PDT CA to revive dormant database ISLANDIA, N.Y. -- Computer Associates is looking to breathe new life into a long-quiet database and, in so doing, is gunning to make it perform better than Microsoft's SQL Server and Oracle's 10g. July 28, 5:54 a.m. PDT FileMaker's time is now For deploying user-facing databases for departments and workgroups, FileMaker Pro has always played second fiddle to Microsoft Access, despite Access’ seemingly inherent unfriendliness to developers and users. To date, FileMaker Pro’s limitations have made replacing Access with FileMaker a thorny decision. With the release of FileMaker Pro 7, however, the case for conversion is now indisputable — it’s time to deep-six Access. May 28, 3:00 p.m. PDT Users praise plan to make Ingres database open source LAS VEGAS -- Users of the Ingres enterprise relational database heaped praise on Computer Associates International Inc.'s plan to release the code for the database to the open-source community under a new licensing scheme. May 28, 2:25 p.m. PDT Report: IBM tightens hold on databases IBM tightened its grip on the RDBMS (relational database management system) market just a little more in 2003, largely on the strength of versions of DB2 that run on its iSeries midrange servers and zSeries mainframes, according to a report released by Gartner's Dataquest division on Wednesday. May 26, 2:00 p.m. PDT Will Yukon strike XML gold? Expected to ship by mid-2005, Yukon represents a major step forward for Microsoft in the XML arena. Striving to match the native XML storage capabilities in IBM’s, Oracle’s, and Sybase’s relational databases, Yukon will finally store XML data in a structured fashion, along with supporting the shredded and unstructured storage methods already available in Microsoft SQL Server 2000. April 23, 3:00 p.m. PDT Databases flex their XML If you could do one thing to improve integration and automate processes with customers and business partners, it would be to implement XML, which has become the standard for exchanging information between disparate systems because it is easily transformed into any format. With very little effort, the same file can be sent to several different customers with their own specific needs. XML eases the development effort for the transmitting company and gives recipients a safety net for altering the way they use the data without having to alter how they receive it. April 23, 3:00 p.m. PDT Sybase, MySQL, IBM boost data management Database vendors Sybase, MySQL, and IBM are lacing products with features that improve access to information and offer clustering and fault tolerance. April 19, 5:00 a.m. PDT Michigan AG joins DOJ case against Oracle Michigan's attorney general said Wednesday his state will join the Department of Justice's case to block Oracle's proposed takeover of PeopleSoft. Michigan becomes the eighth state to join the case, which is expected to commence trial in June in a California district court. April 7, 5:16 p.m. PDT Longhorn beta likely to slip into 2005 A first beta release of the next version of Windows likely will be delayed until next year because Microsoft Corp. is concentrating first on a security-focused update to Windows XP, the Redmond, Washington-based company said Thursday. April 1, 5:06 p.m. PST Oracle argues PeopleSoft case in Europe BRUSSELS - Oracle Corp. tried to persuade European competition regulators at a closed door hearing Wednesday that their plan to prohibit its takeover of rival software firm PeopleSoft is based on too narrow a definition of the market, said people close to the merger review. March 31, 2:08 p.m. PST Gates talks speech, spam SAN DIEGO -- If Bill Gates gets his way, within 10 years speech technology will be ubiquitous and the unrelenting security headaches of today will be only a distant nightmare. Interviewed by Gartner CEO Michael Fleisher on stage here at the Gartner Symposium ITxpo 2004, Gates also touched on the importance of security, Web services, and visual modeling technologies. March 29, 3:46 p.m. PST > Applications > Databases > Data management > Databases > Platforms > Databases > Storage > Databases |
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