Search

Features several chief information officers who are considered strategists in information technology. Roger Barry of Walt Disney World; Richard J. Fishburn of Corning Inc.; Pam Armstrong of City Utilities of Springfield; Their background.

Focuses on the ways of executives in managing their network-attached storage (NAS) systems. Companies that benefit from storage-area networks (SAN); Ways for weighing the cost of installing a NAS; Needs addressed by NAS and SAN.

Interviews Steve Mills, senior vice president and group executive at IBM Corp., about the firm's middleware strategy and Microsoft-related security issues. Value of IBM's middleware business; His views about the products of the company; Investment direction of the company.

This article reports that Robert E. Kahn and Vinton Cerf, developers of transmission control protocol/Internet protocol (IP), received the President's Medal of Freedom award. The two men made the Internet Age possible by creating the software protocols that tie together all the networks that make up the Internet. The IP suite had its origins in work done by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the early 1970's. After building the pioneering Arpanet, DARPA started work on a number of other data-transmission technologies, including packet radio and satellite links.

This article reports on the launch of a technology that makes it possible to speak one language yet be understood in another by scientists at Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Karlsruhe. At a demonstration of the capabilities of the system, computer science graduate student Stan Jou stood with 11 tiny electrodes affixed to the muscles of his cheeks, neck and throat. He then mouthed "Let me introduce our new prototype" in Mandarin Chinese. The sensors captured electrical signals from Jou's facial muscles as they moved to form the silent Chinese words. In a matter of seconds, the information traveled to a computer that recognized the words and translated them into English and Spanish. The system has the potential to bridge the language divide between countries and cultures.

The article reports that no one was able to win in the two contests sponsored by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The contests which were held in Mountain View, California are the Beam Power Challenge and Thether Challenge. The contests are competed by teams with the objective to develop technologies which could be used in space elevators. Since all the teams were not able to qualify the NASA's criteria, the 50,000 dollars price were not awarded.

This article cites a study by researchers at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, which indicates that people find being mimicked by artificial intelligence just as persuasive and likeable as being mimicked by humans. Participants in the study listened to an argument given by an artificial agent that either mimicked the listeners' head movements or repeated the movements of another participant. Listeners who were mimicked viewed agents as more likeable than did those who listened to agents that did not mimic them.

Presents statistics on online retail sales in the fourth quarter of 2001 to 2005 in the U.S.

This article focuses on the invention of the transistor beyond the vacuum tube technology. The transistor, which was invented at Bell Laboratories Inc., had been called perhaps the most important electronics event of the twentieth century, since it later made possible the integrated circuit and microprocessor, which were integral to modern electronics. Prior to the invention of the transistor, the vacuum tube was the only piece of technology that could provide regulation and switching functions. But the vacuum tube could be miniaturized only to a certain extent.

This article examines a way to improve maps of the western U.S. used by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, in order to determine the amount of land area within 100-year flood plains. The three-pronged approach, which is discovered by a research team from the University of Arizona, combines a numerical computer model with data from satellite-image analysis and observations from the field. In addition to providing better hazard information to the public, revising the floodplain maps could have major economic effects on the rapidly growing Southwest.

This article reports that Japan will conduct nationwide exercises in 2006 in order to prepare effectively for cyberattacks on computer networks. Mock cyberterrorists will simulate attacks on computer networks of businesses and government organizations to discover vulnerabilities. Participating in the exercises will be financial institutions, communications companies, Internet service providers, and the central and local governments.

This article reports that researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in the U.S. performed quantum chemical calculations to accurately predict the heat of formation of octane, a key component of gasoline. This study was conducted in order for scientists to know more about the complex chemical reactions involved in combustion processes, since rising oil prices have accelerated the push to develop more efficient combustion systems.

This article introduces a new computer chip design that will enable large amounts of data to be stored in small volumes by using a complex interconnected network of nanowires. This microchip also has computing functions and decisions performed at the nodes where they meet, similar to the way neurons and axons operate in the brain. Through this innovation, mobile phones could one day have the memory capacity of desktop computers, according to a group of scientists from three universities in Great Britain.

This article reports that Japan intends to build a supercomputer that will be 73 times faster than the current top computer. The current product, IBM Corp.'s Blue Gene, can handle 136.8 trillion floating-point operations per second, or TFLOPS. The Japanese education and science ministry plans to develop a machine that could operate at 10 PFLOPS, or 10 quadrillion calculations per second.

This article reports on the creation of the firs nanofluidic transistor, a device that allows the researchers at the University of California, Berkeley to control the movement of ions through submicroscopic, water-filled channels. According to the inventors, just as the electronic transistor became the main component of microprocessors and integrated circuits, nanofluidic transistors will anchor molecular processors, allowing microscopic chemical plants on a chip that will operate without moving parts.

This article shares the author's thoughts on the concept of model-view-controller (MVC) in software architecture. MVC separates an application's data model, user interface and control logic into three distinct components, or objects. This means that modifications to the view component can be made with minimal impact to the data model. The data model is the domain-specific representation of the information on which the application will operate.

This article focuses on the absurdities and complexities in the standards development process in the information technology industry in the U.S. This is demonstrated by Burton Group's Catalyst conference in 2003, which deals with the Service Provisioning Markup Language standard developed by the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards. The author comments that standards are often speak of as though they are the result of a logical exercise that promises to rationalize some technology sector or another. But in actuality, standards emerge both because of and despite a convoluted web of ideas, relationships, and business needs.

This article discusses the efforts of the United States government to improve its medical records system. The federal government has a plan to use information technology to fix this problem. The bad news is that the plan will take so long and cost so much to execute that it is hard to have confidence that it will ever come to fruition. Last month, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released its 10-year road map for the creation of a health information infrastructure. The aim is to create a consolidated electronic health record (EHR) for every American and to build a nationwide network for securely transporting those records to health care providers. Despite the complexity and un- certainty, few federal projects in recent memory have been as worthwhile as this one is.

The article highlights the launch of the Global Integration Framework (GIF) by the Integration Consortium in the U.S. in July 2004, in an attempt to codify and disseminate best practices based on consolidated standards and to provide the technical support necessary to make the practices work. Start with one statistic, and it is easy to understand the mission of the Integration Consortium: 95 percent of all application integration projects fail. That is, the information technology staff assigned to such projects significantly blow their budgets, exceed their schedules, or fall far short of goals. Standards groups perform a necessary function, but separate groups often produce warring standards that complicate rather than streamline integration projects. The need for a more effective, broad-based approach is urgent, because all those failed application integration projects add up to plenty of wasted money. The consortium points to its focus on end users and their concerns. It emphasizes that the GIF is vendor-neutral, but like most similar industry groups, it courts vendor participation and financial support. INSET: POWER TO THE USER.

This article comments on the use of electronic voting technology in the 2004 presidential elections in the U.S. Electronic voting in this election is a terrible idea because of both real technical limitations and the perception that the systems are unreliable and vulnerable to tampering. That is something of a problem, considering more than 30% of all voting the election will be done on electronic machines. This is not just a public relations issue or one that will go away when citizens get used to the technology. A mounting record of problems with electronic voting has tarnished elections in Georgia, California and Texas, among other places, and seems to justify widespread voter skepticism. Part of the problem arises from the complexity electronic voting systems. The code that make up these systems these systems is so large that there is no efficient way for election officials to ensure that it is free of malware or to completely debug it, according to testimony Johns Hopkins University professor Avi Rubin gave before the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. The technology simply isn't ready to be used for the most basic and critical function in any democracy. And even if it were, the processes and protocols needed to monitor even high-performing systems aren't in place, judging by the report from information technology security experts assembled by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights.

Oil field services provider Weatherford International Ltd. completes a companywide enterprise resource planning (ERP) deployment with enterprise search technology for user access. The oil field products and services company wanted to develop advanced search capabilities that would expose the information in its J.D. Edwards OneWord ERP software and the Parametric Technology Corp. Windchill product data management system installed with it. So the company brought in ProFind, an enterprise version of the Endeca Navigation Engine from Endeca Technologies Inc. Weatherford has grown through mergers and acquisitions, a process that left it with a patchwork of information technology systems across 440 locations in more than 100 countries. There are 60 different systems that people were using to run the business and the several of them did not talk to each other. It had become nearly impossible to track orders, assets and inventories. As the ERP deployment started, project teams identify products that have had businesses activity within the past 24 months.

This article deals with the need for computer software, which aligns with and supports the processes and policies of the business using it, to make information technology systems responsive to ever-changing market threats and opportunities. Information technology allegedly serves up the data and analysis needed in real time, and then makes way, leaving the informationally empowered user free to think strategic thoughts. Apparently, the better big corporate information technology systems conduct their jobs, the more they recede from the attention of the end users. Such systems alter the ways users think and behave, if in largely unnoticed ways. But some increasingly popular technologies are designed specifically to structure and alter users' thinking and behavior. Allegedly, such tools and systems are loosely categorized as collaboration, knowledge management, project planning and brainstorming software. Their use allegedly suggests an increasingly humbling perspective on human/computer interaction. The basic premise is that software can make people better by imposing order, policies and protocols, on the way people interact with it and with industry professionals, customers and partners.

This article presents an interview with Alan Trefler, Pegasystems founder and chief executive officer, on attaining business success. In its 21-year history, Pegasystems Inc. in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has evolved from an exception processing vendor to a major player in business process management software, which is one of the liveliest corners of the strong business-intelligence market. Trefler allegedly said that the common thread through the company's development has been a focus on business rules and processes rather than the traditional information technology concentration on data and how it is organized. In responding to a question concerning the path from exception processing to business process management, Trefler said that computers were allegedly about the rules and processes of conducting business. According to Trefler, the company, during the 1990s, looked for other ways beyond exceptions to pursue mainstream processes.

This article deals with the defensiveness of information technology organizations as one of the problems in the industry. It undermines their standing within their companies and reduces their influence in decision-making. Information technology has been demystified both by a simple process of increasing user familiarity and by design, as complex technology has been pushed down through organizations. It is essential to modern business and is not going to drive the business models of non-high-technology companies.

This article presents an interview with Satyam Cherukuri, CEO of Sarnoff Corp. Sarnoff aims to help its customers develop products and services that will disrupt the marketplace with breakthrough technologies or breakthrough pricing. Cherukuri wants to separate out continual evolution of the product line from introduction of product lines that create a disruption in the market either through performance or cost or both. He said that innovation is about bringing together technology, business model and capital. The key to innovation is possessing the ability to change the business model at a moment's notice.

Reports on the silicon-based fiber-optic modulator created by Intel. Description of a modulator; Materials that make up fiber optics; Advantages of using silicon photonics.

Interviews Ronen Feldman, president and chief scientist at ClearForest, on text mining technology. Details of text mining and getting information out of unstructured data; Discussion on performing information extraction; Identification of the technology with knowledge management; Legal issues that may arise from the use of the technology.

Predicts the technology areas that information technology managers should focus. Storage management; Computer security technologies; Business intelligence and data warehousing.

Comments on the need to address problem of computer software defects known as bugs. Estimate on the cost incurred by businesses worldwide in 2001 because of defects in computer software; Importance for the computer software industry to address the problem of software defects; Strategies to pressure software companies to stop selling defective software.

Provides information on Services Provisioning Markup Language or SPML. Organization which build SPML standard for exchanging user, resources and service provisioning information between applications and organizations; Processes of a business organization in which SPML is needed; Details on the SPML technology.

Discusses the use of identification management system to access different resources. Details on the use of passwords for computer system access; Problems with identity management; Relationship between a person and a business process in the corporate context.

Deals with treads in information technology (IT). Application of IT to business; Impact on privacy; Significance of the enactment of IT laws.

Reports on the Web services security user identity specifications released by a group led by IBM Corp. and Microsoft Corp. Instructions included in the Web Services Federation; Vendors that participated the drafting of the specification; Benefits of the convergence of WS-Federation and the Liberty Alliance Project.

Interviews Don Hatcher, vice-president of technology strategy at SAS Institute Inc. Efforts of SAS to distribute analytics throughout a company; Approach adopted by SAS in distributing analytics; Barriers to the implementation of business-intelligence and analytics.

Discusses the problem faced by companies in dealing with the growth of unstructured data. Percentage of unstructured data in corporate networks; Predicted growth of e-mail messages; Effects of unstructured data on work time of employees.

Interviews Siki Giunta, chief executive officer of Managed Objects Inc. Definition of service management; Technologies involved in service management; Role of information technology managers in Managed Objects.

Focuses on the role of real-time enterprise and its impact on business processes. Reason of consumer electronics company Maxtor Corp. for using the Data Integrator software from Business Objects; Risk posed by instantly available information; Negligence committed by the promoters of real time enterprise; Concept of real time data processing.

Interviews Carol Ptak, vice president of industry strategy, high technology and industrial manufacturing at PeopleSoft Inc. Kinds of technological issues that the company needs to address; Advantages inherent in an Internet-based architecture; Significance of real-time enterprise to the company and its customers.

Interviews Deepak Taneja, chief technology officer at Netegrity Inc. Changes in the technology focus at Netegrity from 1998 to 2003; Difference of Netegrity technology from its competitors; Views on security as a barrier to adoption of Web services.

Presents an article which focuses on Web-based self-service applications. Emergence of automated teller machines (ATMs); Percentage of bank customers who say that they use ATMs; Reason for the popularity of self-service applications.

Comments on the strategy released by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for protecting cyber-based critical infrastructure as of February 2003. Goal of the report; Views on the size and complexity of the DHS mission; Steps that should be taken by every company to ensure information technology security.

Discusses the importance of data hygiene to computers. Definition of data scrubbing; Causes of dirty data; Difference between data hygiene and data quality.

Focuses on issues related to the computer industry. Condition of the information technology market; Discussion on wireless networking; Factors influencing corporate information technology toward wireless.

Looks at the status of Web services in the information technology industry. Deployment of Web services in companies; Significance of Web services; Role of Web services technology in the IT industry.

Provides information on the development of Bluefin, a storage management protocol drafted and presented for review to the Storage Networking Industry Association in California in May 2002. Definition and function of Bluefin; Benefits from Bluefin; Key feature.

Interviews John White, chief executive officer of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), about the information technology. Details of the mission of ACM; Description of the relationship of ACM with the commercial world; How White foresees the future of the World Wide Web.

Focuses on the ACM1: Beyond Cyberspace 2001 conference of the Association for Computing Machinery. Overview of the conference; How researchers consider the increasing power of information technology (IT).