“Software-defined,” like any new trend that technology companies rush to attach to has suffered from marketing hype. Starting in mid-2012 with the acquisition of Nicera by VMware, most traditional infrastructure technology vendors across compute, networking, and storage have some messaging around how software-defined fits into their product strategy. But software-defined is not a traditional concept. Since the transition from mainframe to distributed computing, corresponding with the rise in networking, most technologies in the data center have been very hardware specific. For many years, the way to get the right amount of intelligence in the right place to execute the functionality has been with specialized hardware.
AccelOps on Thursday announced its global survey of 140 IT security professionals found that while cloud usage continues to rise, cloud security remains stagnant. Results indicate that 73 percent of survey respondents are running a greater number of mission-critical applications in the cloud this year, while only 42 percent of respondents’ networks are more secure. The survey was conducted at the recent Cloud Expo 2013 Silicon Valley in Santa Clara, Calif. The survey’s findings underscore the critical need for visibility into security threats. Ninety-two percent of respondents said visibility into potential network threats would be “very important” or “fairly important,” and 77 percent of the respondents’ organizations use multiple tools to monitor security and network performance.
Recent high-profile events (2010 Haitian Earthquake, 2011 Tōhoku Earthquake and Tsunami, 2013 Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda) have highlighted the growing importance played by the international community in successful humanitarian assistance and disaster response. These events also showcased the critical importance of quickly providing robust information technology resources to response effort participants. In June 2010, in support of its continuing effort to foster international collaboration, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) initiated a dialog with the Network Centric Operations Industry Consortium (NCOIC) to discuss this and other aspects of geospatial data information-sharing across the international community. In response to this request the NCOIC through the use of a cloud services brokerage paradigm, built and demonstrated a federated cloud computing infrastructure capable of managing the electronic exchange of geospatial data. The effort also led to the development of the more generalized NCOIC Rapid Response Capability Pattern (NRRC), a process that could improve the effectiveness and reduce the cost of emergency situations that require an international joint civilian/military response.
Are you re-creating existing technology silos in the cloud? If so, your entire enterprise investment in the cloud is at risk. From the perspective of IT, organizational silos seem to be the root of all problems. Every line of business, every department, every functional area has its own requirements, its own technology preferences, and its own way of doing things. They have historically invested in specialized components for narrow purposes, which IT must then conventionally integrate via application middleware – increasing the cost, complexity, and brittleness of the overall architecture. Now those same stakeholders want to move to the cloud. Save money with SaaS apps! Reduce data center costs with IaaS! Build a single private cloud we can all share! But breaking down the technical silos is easier said than done. There are endless problems: Static interfaces. Legacy technology. Inconsistent policies, rules, and processes. Crusty old middleware that predates the cloud. And everybody still has their own data model and their own version of the truth.
When I read the Programming iOS 5 version of this book about 2 years ago I started my review off with the paragraph below. A little background so you know what type of experience I have. I have been a Microsoft .NET architect and developer since the first beta release. Before that C, C++, ColdFusion, ASP, JavaScript and of course HTML. Being a .NET developer has many advantages, but the one major disadvantage we suffer has driven me to Java and Objective-C over the past year. That one disadvantage? Microsoft themselves. They come off as completely lost and have wreaked havoc on .NET developer community the past few years. That was Thursday, April 12, 2012. In my opinion nothing has changed except for Microsoft being a little more lost, and I have floated towards iOS much more than Java (Android).
When I read the Programming iOS 5 version of this book about 2 years ago I started my review off with the paragraph below. A little background so you know what type of experience I have. I have been a Microsoft .NET architect and developer since the first beta release. Before that C, C++, ColdFusion, ASP, JavaScript and of course HTML. Being a .NET developer has many advantages, but the one major disadvantage we suffer has driven me to Java and Objective-C over the past year. That one disadvantage? Microsoft themselves. They come off as completely lost and have wreaked havoc on .NET developer community the past few years. That was Thursday, April 12, 2012. In my opinion nothing has changed except for Microsoft being a little more lost, and I have floated towards iOS much more than Java (Android).
This article is based on the experience of Jan Swaelens, Software Architect at Sofico. He is responsible for automatic performance testing of the company’s new web platform based on GWT and SmartGWT. Sofico is specialized in software solutions for automotive finance, leasing, fleet and mobility management companies. About two years ago Sofico started a project to replace its rich desktop application (built with PowerBuilder) with a browseribased rich Internet application. The developers selected GWT and SmartGWT as core technologies to leverage their in-house Java expertise because they believed in the potential of what these (fairly) new technologies had to offer. Their goal was to replace the existing desktop client with a new one that ran in a browser. Their eyes where set on a better user experience and high degree of customization possibilities to give their customers the flexibility and adaptability that they need to run their businesses.
Over the past few years, the importance of a positive customer experience has risen and solidified itself as a major differentiation for brands. Meaning, companies today have to offer great service along with their products. WebRTC communications, combined with the cloud and building upon the foundation provided by VoIP and the Internet, is making a single network a reality by eliminating the need for the expensive servers, software, landlines and phones required by traditional contact center technologies. Customer service agents with WebRTC-enabled devices will be able to provide better customer experiences across all channels – including voice – and contact centers will continue to become even more streamlined, cost-efficient and productive than ever before.
Enterprises need an API tier to meet the demands imposed by mobile technology. The impact of next generation of API servers on mobile and middleware development can be equated to the impact J2EE application servers like WebLogic, JBoss or WebSphere had on web development. It enables enterprises to surface business critical data residing in traditional back ends, databases and service tiers on-premises or on the cloud to multi-channel mobile apps. An API tier is technology “super glue” that ties together endpoints of disparate enterprise systems, then exposing a uniform API to all clients. The clients include web browsers, mobile smartphones, tablets, and wearables. Each has its own set of capabilities and limitations and therefore unique user experiences. An API tier works on top of existing data and services to leverage existing systems in the context of mobile and next-generation clients. It acts as a natural bridge between front end and back end, providing for increased efficiency as well as rapid iteration to meet changing requirements.
HP today announced HP Access Catalog, a SaaS-delivered mobile app and content store that allows corporations to quickly and securely deliver resources across mobile and desktop devices to their employees anywhere. IT organizations are facing pressure to deliver a marketplace experience to employees who expect access to content and apps from their device of choice. But non-business controlled exchanges and app stores lack enterprise security and control. Companies must also protect their apps from access by outsiders.
The initial wave of data efficiency features for primary storage focus on silos of information organized in terms of individual file systems. Deduplication and compression features provided by some vendors are limited by the scalability of those underlying file systems, essentially the file systems have become silos of optimized data. For example, NetApp deduplication can’t scale beyond a 100 TB limit, because that’s the limit in size of its WAFL file system. But ask anyone who’s ever used NetApp deduplication if they’ve done it on a 100 TB file system, and you’re likely to hear “are you crazy?” It’s one thing to claim that data efficiency features can scale, quite a different one to actually use them with performance at scale.
IDenticard® Access Control is a leading manufacturer of integrated access control solutions to protect employees, visitors, and facilities. Owned by Brady Corporation (NYSE:BRC), a $1.15 billion manufacturer of identification products, IDenticard Access Control draws on its 30 years of experience in security software development to provide innovative products based on its customers’ requirements and the needs of the marketplace. With an in-house engineering team, IDenticard Access Control has developed a patent-pending, revolutionary physical security solution that secures and monitors server rack access at the cabinet level. The system features easy-to-use dynamic mapping and customizable reporting capabilities to identify and track who accesses server racks and specifically where, when, and for how long.
First and by way of clarification – as all fans of archaic English colloquial language will know, ‘poppycock and bunkum’ are appealing euphemisms for a useful four letter word starting with C that rhymes with clap. Nuances of language out of the way so that we all know what we’re talking about, there are (more than ever) an increasingly bewildering set of terms used today to describe our state of enterprise IT. How long have we been talking about converged clouds, Big Data analytics, new mobility considerations for touch-enablement and perhaps even converged infrastructures to bring all the above together?
The way we use technology in today's businesses is always changing. Here are five quick takes on tech trends that used to be hot but are now not, along with an even hotter list of upcoming technologies and tech trends will shape Information Technology (IT) in 2014. What’s out: Mobile, especially Mobile First. What’s in? Experience First. Mobility has become a means to an end now. People now demand compelling, engaging, context-aware experiences that catch them in the moment, that deliver services when they most need or want them. People want an emotional connection to the companies they do business with, and mobility is definitely one tool that can be used to deliver that. Certainly, mobility is going to continue to grow, people are still catching up in certain areas. and it will be a critical delivery channel, but it’s not only about mobility any longer. It’s really about the experience. And it’s a multi-channel experience, that will grow to include wearables.
HP today launched the HP Vertica Marketplace, a hub for developers, partners and customers to create and share extensions, enhancements, and solutions that integrate with the HP Vertica Analytics Platform. These add-ons and solutions include connectors and third-party extensions, business intelligence (BI) tools, exact transform load (ETL) and data transformation products, connectors and tools for HP HAVEn big-data analytics platform, as well as industry and other original equipment manufacturer (OEM) solutions.
The vast volumes of new data produced by the Internet of Things provides a valuable new source of business insight through advanced analytical techniques, but it requires new tools and approaches. In his session at 14th Cloud Expo, Tim Negris, SVP, Marketing & Sales at Yottamine Analytics, will show how cloud-based machine learning on M2M data streams can be used to enhance strategic business decision making.
Last year’s revelations of government surveillance programs by the NSA and others, along with possible lack of enforcement of the Safe Harbor program by the FTC, caused the European Civil Liberties Committee to recommend suspending the entire EU-U.S. Safe Harbor approach. If the recommendation was followed, the implications for businesses would be dramatic. U.S. companies would no longer be able to enjoy the simplified data sharing policy currently in place for those that are able to meet EU requirements to earn Safe Harbor certification. Certified companies are able to transfer private customer data out of the EU and receive transfers of data from EU companies as long as they properly meet renewal requirements each year. While the repeal has not taken place, just recently, a high-level EU official called for suspending the agreement if the US did not meet some new and stricter data sharing policies by this summer.
Want VM agility with near bare metal performance? How about [milli]second provision/stop/start/restart times? Looking to achieve greater VM density on your hardware assets, or provision applications without worry of dependency hell? Look no further than next-gen virtualization with Linux Containers. In his session at 14th Cloud Expo, Boden Russell, an Advisory Software Engineer at IBM Global Technology Services, will provide a Linux Container technology overview including underpinnings, throttling, monitoring, tooling/commoditization, images, security, use cases, pros/cons and why containers are poised as “the next VM” in our modern cloud era. By the end of this session you will have a firm understanding of the Linux Container landscape in today’s industry and an appreciation for their realization.
As Netuitive's Chief Data Scientist, I am fortunate to work closely with some of the worlds' largest banks, telcos, and eCommerce companies. Increasingly the executives that I speak with at these companies are no longer focused on just detecting application performance anomalies - they want to understand the impact this has on the business. For example - "is the current slowdown in the payment service impacting sales?" You can think of it as detecting IT operations anomalies that really matter - but this is easier said than done.
Worldwide IT spending is projected to rise US$3.8 trillion in 2014 according to recent Gartner research, a 3.1 percent increase from spending in 2013, which was $3.7 trillion. While not a huge jump in dollars, it does indicate that companies have been conserving cash over the past few years and are ready and willing to invest – albeit conservatively – with the recovery in place. The promise of the Cloud has been validated and tested now over several years and organizations are increasing budgets and plans accordingly, more liberal spending is being seen by Cloud service providers who are witnessing an uptick in demand from businesses that are planning to address outdated infrastructure in 2014. Even organizations that are wary of significant cash outlays are recognizing the long-term IT savings it represents and are willing to take the steps to integrate solutions that eliminate CAPEX, and future-proof their infrastructure while providing predictable cash flow.
A tag-team of service and network virtualization for testing has emerged just as the mobile and cloud era requires unprecedented focus on DevOps benefits and rapid quality assurance.
Given the business expectations at each stage of the SDLC, Continuous Testing delivers a quantitative assessment of risk as well as actionable tasks that help mitigate these risks before they progress to the next stage of the SDLC. The goal is to eliminate meaningless tests and produce value-added tasks that truly drive the development organization towards a successful release. The following Infographic explains how Continuous Testing helps organizations accelerate the SDLC and release with confidence...
A newly released report from McKinsey & Company, Risk and Responsibility in a Hyperconnected World: Implications for Enterprises, highlights the findings of a year’s worth of McKinsey research conducted in partnership with the World Economic Forum. Based on the interviews with over 200 enterprises and organizations the findings highlight the importance of protecting online proprietary data and information and puts forth 7 ideas for how to protect the enterprise. The report first observes that with the rise of new and novel ways to access information via mobile devices, data security risks have dramatically increased. Despite the billions of dollars spent to secure data, cybercriminals have proven themselves to be a highly adaptable, sophisticated, well-funded crew, equipped to take advantage of any weaknesses in an enterprise’s security technology. Recent examples of large breaches at Target and Adobe could potentially really just be the tip of the iceberg.
How can your business benefit from using the cloud? We hear the term all the time in the tech world, but it's never really clearly defined. Those of us who are using social media or saving data with online sources are already using it. Perhaps you just didn't know it. Amazon is one of the largest cloud service centers. It houses information on behalf of Netflix, Dropbox and Autodesk. Other remote servers are Google, Microsoft and Rackspace.
Rob Wigley is Director, Cybersecurity Consulting Services at HP Enterprise Services, U.S. Public Sector. He has more than 30 years of information technology experience supporting manufacturing, high tech, healthcare, and public sector market segments. For the last 10 years, he has focused on developing and delivering cybersecurity consulting solutions for public sector clients. SecuritySolutionsWatch.com: Thank you for joining us today, Rob. Can you please tell us a little about your background and your role within HP. Rob Wigley: I have more than 30 years of information technology experience supporting manufacturing, high tech, healthcare, and public sector market segments. For the last 10 years, as regulatory requirements for information security have increased in association with mounting threats facing government and businesses today, I have focused on developing and delivering cybersecurity consulting solutions for public sector clients. This market has unique IT security requirements and is facing a significant increase of cyber threats. HP Cybersecurity Consulting Services are soundly structured to help our clients manage risks to their environment.