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States that no matter what kind of business you run you need to examine the way you sell and the way your customers like to buy, then you need to figure out how computers can help you serve your customers better. Electronic data interchange (EDI) technology that would let customers bypass paperwork and place orders through their computers; EDI's requirement of specialized software. INSETS: The state-of-the art notebook computer.;Resources..

The article offers the author's insights on the techniques that can help reduce stored-data volume in the U.S. information technology (IT) sector. It states that reducing one's data footprint eases the pressure on networks and backup windows, aside from cutting costs for hardware, software, and data center space. It provides several techniques to reduce data volume which include deduplication, compression, and storage virtualization.

The article reports on the growth of facilities rebuilding their data centers in the U.S. It states that the move aims to save operating costs as well as enhance efficiency and effectiveness in carrying out information technology (IT) operations. Chief information officers (CIOs) and IT executives points out the significance of redesigning their data centers which will help them reduce real estate, infrastructure, cooling and electric costs. Among the facilities that plan to upgrade their data centers, include Christus Health, OhioHealth, and Newbridge Bank. INSET: Armchair Data Center Management.

The article focuses on the contribution of Rick King in the maintenance of the $3.1 billion information services business of the Thomson Corp. in the U.S. As executive vice president and chief operations officer for Thomson's North American Legal business, King has completed a 17,000 square foot upgrade of two 10-year-old data centers in May 2005. Moreover, to consolidate smaller data centers for the company's growing customer base, King plans to build a new 80,000 square foot data center that will house servers and storage for his company's growing customer database. He also aims to find and keep skilled staffers who understand the interplay of computing technology, power requirements and facilities design. INSET: Tape Tales.

The article discusses issues related to efforts to build the next-generation data center in the U.S. There are several challenges facing companies in the successful management of the next-generation data center. These major challenges include the lack of storage virtualization storage and the immaturity of the technology and multitiered or service-oriented applications. Another big problem is looking deep within complex, multitiered or service-oriented applications to see what hardware or software is causing a slowdown. INSET: Data Center Technologies: What's Next?.

Presents the decision of the Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordering Judge David Edelstein to drop his oversight of a 1956 consent decree on International Business Machines Corp.'s services operations.

Focuses on outsourcing programming work to programmers in developing countries. Cost savings; Incentives from the government; Rules on foreign investments; Arrangements; Interaction issues. INSETS: Wanted: Cheap OOP skills, by Aileen Crowley.;Citicorp, India: Good stuff cheap..

Features Client/Server Survival Training held in Quincy, Massachusetts. David Olson as instructor; Backgrounds of participants; Agenda. INSET: Editor hacks VB app; light damage reported..

Presents the results of `ComputerWorld' magazine's survey on 1998 information systems (IS) budgets of corporations in the United States. Increased spending on building, maintaining and managing electronic links vital to a business; Shortage of skilled IS staff; Greater willingness of companies to upgrade the infrastructures that drive client/server applications. INSET: Don't worry! We'll make it..

Reports that money is not the most important factor in weighing job offers according to the results of a survey of 200 information systems professionals in the United States. Opportunities to learn new technologies; Quality of bosses as a top-ranking issue when making job decisions; Importance of base salary with younger employees.

Discusses the vulnerability of corporate data to computer security problems caused by hacking. Tendency of information systems professionals to ignore basic problems in fighting electronic threats; Case of a hospital in the Southwest which has been exposed to sloppy procedures for information handling; Security threats arising from physical access to power supplies, modems and network cables. INSET: A mixed diagnosis..

This article presents tips on the upgrading and replacement of personal computers in the U.S. CIO Tim Link has replaced computers with one of three standard configurations from Dell Inc. He has carefully planned hot to minimize the number of configurations he must support as he replaces one-third of his systems each year. He is reluctant to go to a four-year life cycle for computers because although that would reduce computer purchase costs, it would mean more individual models. Trying to open files from different versions of applications running on various versions of Windows is a huge headache for users and information technology managers and can be a prime driver for an upgrade. Gartner Inc. analyst Mark Margevicius suggests that if system fails, after the standard three-year warranty period, it is better to replace it than spend time to fix it. For notebooks, Margevicius suggests sticking to the traditional three-year replacement cycle. He also says that adding memory is about the only work worth doing on an older machine. CIO Don Allen says rather than buy new systems whenever they find the money or download software from the Internet, users must accept getting hardware and software upgrades in a departmentwide schedule. INSET: THE THIN-CLIENT ALTERNATIVE.

Focuses on the actions taken by emerging technology companies in the United States to save money, get cash from investors and gain the confidence of information technology managers. Use of the Java Virtual Machine by Kada Systems which allows mobile users to run more robust applications; Chip sets used by Mellanox Technologies to the ease development of InfinBand products.

Details the preparations being done by United State-based public utilities concerning the embedded year 2000 problems. Tests conducted by Washington Water Power; Comments from industry officials; Impact of such problems; Things that officials need to consider.

Discusses the direct-response personal computer (PC) business. Gateway 2000 Inc.'s quarter-to-quarter revenue; Dell Computer Corp.'s loss per share; Increase in direct-response personal computer sales in the United States; Channel Marketing Corp.'s survey of PC users' future buying patterns; Elimination of the reseller middleman; Cost of advertising, telemarketing, custom-configuring PCs and telephone support.

Focuses on the use of broker-based information technologies by the US Army's Tactical Command and Control System (ATCCS). Linkage of front-line units with brigade-level headquarters to check their status and coordinate battlefield movements; Role of broker-based information networks in ensuring that messages get through; Selection of Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) as broker system. INSET: Transient PCs are a struggle for Army, IT, by R.L.S..

Reports that leading information technology (IT) organizations are embracing the Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) software. DCE as solution to large-scale computing problems; Interoperability among distributed applications; Deployment of DCE in 1995; Innovations of DCE.

Presents information on the new breed of chief information officers (CIO) and the roles that they have to play. Behavioral scientist; Economist; Technologist; Analyst. INSET: Deployment data..

Focuses on the retooling of information technology staffs with the proper skills to implement and maintain client/server systems. Honing of skills in key areas; Group categories; Need for managers to commit to their projects; Factor of stress. INSETS: Realistically speaking: Salaries for IT professionals.;When a headhunter calls.;A happy team is a dedicated team.;Guidelines for.., by Steven Guengerich & George Schussel.

Reports on the client/server meltdown causing baggage system failure at the Denver International Airport in Colorado. Cost of the project; Importance of allotting plenty of test and debugging time when installing high-technology equipment in complicated environments; Occurrence of `empty car starvation'; Attempts to fix problems.

Looks at the year 2000 project of five organizations in the United States. Lutheran Brotherhood; California State University at Northridge; Social Security Administration; Dayton Hudson Corp.; Reader's Digest Association Inc.

Focuses on the challenges in running Web sites in the United States. Profitability of Web site communities; Hidden costs and dangers of running Web communities; Web site fees; Types of Web communities. INSET: ParentPlace.com makes money...

Focuses on training programs designed to enhance the skills of information systems (IS) professionals in handling electronic commerce opportunities. MasterCard University's one-day workshop on `Internet and Emerging Payment Methods'; Importance of tighter technology and training standards as Web applications become more strategic; Effectiveness of hands-on training for IS staff.

Presents the lessons learned by various year 2000 conversion leaders in the United States during their first pilot conversion project. Importance of teaching all staff to explain the level of detail needed from application users; Need for the staffers to coordinate in every phase of the conversion project.

Reports on the growing practice among employers to tie information systems workers to contracts that would require them to reimburse training costs if they resign too quickly after the training is completed. Debate over whether employers can claim ownership of skills or information learned on company time and at company expense.

Focuses on criticisms that US President Bill Clinton and top Dept. of Defense leaders are not moving aggressively enough to counter the Year 2000 computer crisis. Need to threat the issue as a potential national emergency; Factors that bog down the military's millennium march.

Reports on the US Financial Accounting Standards Board's (FASB) July 1996 ruling that companies can not amortize works related to the year 2000 computer bugs as a capital expense. Impact on companies' short-term earnings; Information system (IS) managers' duty of informing business managers regarding the millennium's impact on computer systems; Ruling's provisions.

Focuses on the efforts by information systems (IS) staff members to learn and cope with advanced information technologies. Motivations for the self-study initiative; Comments from various IS managers.

The article features Dispersed Storage software developed by Cleversafe Inc., which divides data into "slices" using mathematical algorithms and dispersed them on a different server across the Internet or within a single data center in the U.S. According to Chris Gladwin, company's CEO, the software provides 99.99% reliability because data can be reconstituted using slices from any six nodes. John Webster, analyst at Illuminata Inc., the approach could completely change the way storage administrators conduct their daily operations.

The article reports on the plans of the EMC Corp. to incorporate data encryption technology in its disk arrays using software that the storage vendor expects to obtain through its $2.1 billion acquisition of RSA Security Inc. in the U.S. With the addition of encryption tools, the end-users are able to encrypt an entire database or multiple data volumes via their regular storage management tools without having to deploy new software or a separate appliance. Moreover, it allows customers to use the processing power of disk array controllers to speed up encryption and decryption procedures, which reduce the loads on servers and networks. Kelly Carpenter, senior technical managers at Washington University's Genome Sequencing Center, argued that developing encryption functionality into disk arrays would make it easier to encrypt data at the file system level.

The article features companies offering products and services for the next-generation data center in the U.S. One of the stronger companies in the segment is Opsware Inc. which has "done a good job in niche market" of server and network configuration and provisioning. Splunk Inc. uses search technology to help information technology managers find the causes of problems from unstructured data. Cassatt Corp. software can create virtualized hardware and software resources running on Linux, Solaris and Windows.

Presents news briefs on high-technology firms in the United States as of March 5, 2001. Estimated growth in the public-key infrastructure market by 2004 according to IDC; Acquisition of Network Solutions Inc. by VeriSign Inc.; Products and services offered by Entrust Technologies Inc.

Reports that Q-PC Real Car Computing company is offering personal computer available for cars compatible with the Windows 98 computer operating system.

Focuses on the effort to test a virtual control tower at United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California. Use of a Silicon Graphics Inc.'s Onyx2 supercomputer; Potential benefits of the virtual control tower.

Discusses the efforts of the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to determine the life saving medical devices affected by year 2000 date conversion problems. Number of foreign and domestic companies that supplied information; Web sites for the list of year 2000-compliant devices.

Reports on the first quarter results of sales and earnings performances of companies. Intel Corp.; Motorola Inc.; Digital Equipment Corp.; DEC's PC business; IBM; SynOptics Communications Inc.; Statistical figures.

Features the five recipients of the Project Leadership Awards, sponsored by Applied Business Technology Corp. Criteria for judging information technology project managers; Summary of how each information technology project manager managed to be successful.

Reports on the construction of the Denver International Airport in Colorado. Installation of the Airfield Lighting Control System that uses touch-screen personal computers to control the lights that direct aircraft along runways and taxiways; Target date for the completion of the project.

Features International Business Machines Corp. client representative Sue Ann Celentano. Job description; Personification of IBM's customer policy; Career background.

Reports on International Business Machines Corp.'s (IBM) acquisition of transaction-monitoring software developer Transarc Corporation. Transarc as original equipment supplier (OEM) to IBM; Forecast on convergence of IBM's CICS/6000 transaction-processing software with Transarc's transaction-processing monitor Encina; Feedback from Transarc's OEM partners.

Reports on the launching of International Business Machines Corp.'s Networked Applications Services Division. Aid for corporate accounts and on-line service providers in delivery of networked applications for the information highway; Service named Intelligent Communications project; Other services from the division.

Presents items related to the year 2000 computing crisis in the United States. Includes the establishment of the PHL Software Services Ltd. to handle Phoenix Home Life Mutual's year 2000 work; Letters as wake-up call from clients seeking year 2000-compliant hardware and software; Growth of awareness about the year 2000 problem in 1997.

Reports that Cap Gemini America offered to guarantee 100% year 2000 renovations of mainframe codes in four weeks. Terms of the guarantee offer; Criticisms from information system professionals.

Reports on Citicorp's plan to downsize and restructure its information technology (IT) and related operations. Plans to consolidate legacy applications and other functions; Company's shift from visionary tinkering with technology and toward more cost-effective use of IT.

Opinion. Presents the usual complaints of entrepreneurs about advertising on the World Wide Web. CyberGold Inc.'s payment of people to look at advertisements on its Web site; Advantages of Web advertising over direct mail; Lack of measurable results from Web advertising.

Reports on the projected onslaught of lawsuits related to the year 2000 computing crisis that could lead to legal costs amounting to $100 billion. Initiatives developed by information systems managers in anticipation of the crisis; Comparison of post-year 2000 costs with the costs of fixing the problem; Cost estimates on litigation and damages by analyst Capers Jones.

Reports on the increasing reliance of companies on computer vendors for outsourcing even as they experience disappointing results. Turnover of some information systems operations to outside vendors; Failure of outsourcers to deliver according to expectations; Dissatisfaction of chief information officers with the level of expertise and sophistication provided by outsourcers. INSET: Outsourcing bit by bit..

Presents issues, trends and statistics relevant to the year 2000 computer crisis in the United States as of July 14, 1997. Labor cost of conversion programming overseas; Percentage of information system managers planning to postpone application development until the end of the century; Techniques for making business owners realize the seriousness of the year 2000 crisis. INSET: Offshore programmers: Low cost for long?..

Commends how high-technology companies in the United States are using information technology (IT). Cost-cutting and cycle-time reduction; Reorganizing and simplifying chaotic workflow systems; Avoiding redundant, incompatible applications; Controlling IT spending to business units.

Discusses why computer service providers in the United States refuse to outsource personnel for year 2000 conversion work. Users' plan to replace old applications rather than fix them; Learning curve faced by information systems managers with the year 2000; Shortage of Cobol programmers and software testers; Problems faced by Pete Westlake in converting Orlando Regional Healthcare System's information service.