Latest News from SYS-CON MEDIA

ESB Testing Strategies with Mule

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:00:00 EDT

To be able to do anything useful, an ESB must be configured with all sorts of parameters, from endpoint connection URIs to message transformation scripts to content-based routing definitions. Moreover, ESBs like Mule can host custom components, which will process messages and perform user-specific actions on them.

Fortify Predicts VMware Mega-Patch Move Will Be First Of Many

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 13:15:00 EDT

Fortify Software, specialists in enterprise application security, says that VMWare's release of a raft of patches this week - referred to many as a mega-patch - is likely to be the first of many such moves as hacker interest in the virtual environment takes off.

Logging for SOA

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 13:00:00 EDT

What could be a problem with logging in SOA in the presence of such wonderful tools like log4j, Java’s logging library and similar? Why might we need something special for SOA and why aren’t existing techniques enough? The answer is simple and complex simultaneously – in SOA we are dealing with distributed and composed entities that cause problems in log maintenance, not in log creation.

RFID Prospering at All Levels

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 13:00:00 EDT

While the RFID orders for half a billion dollars grab the headlines, RFID is in fact prospering at all levels. Consider the flood of orders at the one million dollar level, spread across the world. On Track Innovations has just supplied 1.5 million RFID cards to the Warsaw Transport Department in Poland. VeriFone has just taken an order for 20,000 readers for the Australian Cabcharge taxi payment cards.

Former BEA Exec Joins Cloud Computing Provider GigaSpaces

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 12:45:00 EDT

GigaSpaces Technologies announced that John Giubileo has been named as the Company's general manager of the Americas. Giubileo will oversee all sales and go-to-market activities in the Americas, including business development, partnerships, channels and OEM actions.

The Cloud Crowd: Top Cloud Computing Providers in 2008

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 10:35:00 EDT

Anyone allowing their search engine of choice to filter through the googols of bytes of data on the Web relating to "cloud computing" has during 2008 been rewarded with an exponentially increasing number of hits. But who are the companies currently most involved and what are their current offerings? SYS-CON's Cloud Computing Journal zeroes in on the facts and the faces behind this white-hot Enterprise IT technology trend.

Enabling an Infrastructure for Cloudbursting

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 06:00:00 EDT

Last week Jeff Barr from Amazon Web services came up with a great new term to describe the need to handle sudden and extreme spikes in demand by enabling a hybrid cloud computing model which combines both private data center resources and remote cloud resources such as Amazon Ec2. He called this model "cloudbursting"...

AJAX World RIA Conference & Expo 2008 West: Themes & Topics

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 06:00:00 EDT

A round-up of the overall themes and topics being presented at the 6th International AJAXWorld RIA Conference & Expo at The Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, CA, October 20-22, 2008 - including AIR & Flex, AJAX, ASP.NET, Business Case for RIAs, Cloud Computing, Comet, Google Web Toolkit (GWT), iPhone Development, JavaScript, Mashups, Mobile RIAs, Open APIs & Toolkits, SaaS, Security, Silverlight, Social Software, and User Interface & User eXperience Issues.

3Tera Takes Cloud Computing Global

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 21:00:00 EDT

3Tera announced the availability of global cloud services, based on 3Tera's AppLogic grid operating system. Driven by demand from multi-national customers and customers outside the United States, 3Tera has selected partners to offer cloud solutions on four continents and provide redundant online resources worldwide.

Lieberman Software Launches Server Virtualization Management Initiative

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 20:30:00 EDT

Lieberman Software's User Manager Pro Suite, a configuration management solution for Windows-powered servers and workstations, has achieved Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V certification. Several additional Lieberman Software products are scheduled for Microsoft's rigorous Hyper-V certification testing process.

Gomez Adds Cross-Browser Testing for New Google Chrome

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 20:15:00 EDT

Gomez announced the availability of cross-browser testing for Google’s new browser, Chrome, and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer (IE) 8 beta 2. Using Gomez’s Reality View XF service, developers can now visualize how new and existing web applications will appear and perform when rendered in the Chrome and IE 8 beta browsers.

rPath Launches New Technology to Accelerate Adoption of Cloud Computing

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 20:00:00 EDT

rPath announced the beta launch of its rBuilder Appliance Creator and rBuilder Catalog features for the Amazon Elastic Cloud Compute (Amazon EC2). When coupled with rPath's technology for release management, lifecycle management, and its comprehensive support capability for Linux technology, these new features offer one of the most comprehensive solutions for managing cloud application deployments in the industry. This solution is being offered to developers for Amazon EC2 deployments at no cost via rBuilder Online.

Akorri Continues Virtualization Channel Expansion

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 20:00:00 EDT

Akorri announced the company has added a number of new authorized resellers of its BalancePoint solution, and has expanded membership within its Optimize Partner Program by 50% over the past six months. Akorri's BalancePoint software helps enterprises troubleshoot problems, optimize and plan resource utilization, and improve performance across the virtualized data center.

RingCube Joins VMware Virtualization Partner Program

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 18:45:00 EDT

RingCube announced it has joined the VMware Technology Alliance Partner (TAP) program. The VMware TAP program helps technology vendors integrate their products with VMware virtualization software and deliver timely, joint solutions to mutual customers. As a member of the program, RingCube will utilize VMware resources and expertise to deliver desktop virtualization solutions that complement the VMware VDI architecture.

Dell Unveils its Nettop

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 17:48:00 EDT

Dell Thursday finally trotted out its widely anticipated nettop, giving it what HP and Asustek already have. Dell calls its 1.6GHz Atom-based widget the Inspiron Mini 9 and is selling the thing at www.dell.com in the US, Canada, Japan and some European countries starting at 399 with XP Home.

Red Hat Buys Qumranet

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 16:15:00 EDT

Red Hat never did like Xen. It liked it even less after Citrix bought XenSource a year ago and Microsoft cuddled up with Citrix, Virtual Iron and Novell, Xen’s first Linux promoter. Among other things, it didn’t have control of the technology.

Google Chrome Compatible with Lightstreamer AJAX

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 16:00:00 EDT

Chrome, the new Google browser, was released yesterday as a beta version for Windows Vista/XP and officially entered the browser war, where the primary competitors are currently Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox. Chrome offers many interesting features, aimed at making the browsing experience more robust, more secure, and faster.

JavaScript Powers Up the Server Side

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:43:00 EDT

Aptana Jaxer is a new open source application server built especially for AJAX application development in JavaScript. To say that "Jaxer lets you do JavaScript on the server-side" would be accurate, but an understatement. The core concept of Jaxer is that it provides a parity of environments at the client and the server to simplify the creation of rich AJAX pages, apps, and gadgets – and by so doing, gives the Web developer a unified runtime at both the client and server tiers.

Dale and Thomas Leverages Wireless Warehouse

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:18:00 EDT

Dale and Thomas Popcorn manufactures and distributes gourmet popcorn products in a wide variety of flavors such as chocolate and peanut butter, cheddar chipotle, and toffee crunch. At Dale and Thomas Popcorn, they do everything possible to ensure every item they ship arrives in perfect condition.

New Biometric Access for Citrix Clouds

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:15:00 EDT

Ceelox adapted Ceelox ID, a biometric Identity Access Management tool, to work with Citrix servers and client computers. "Using biometrics to secure access to centralized Citrix networks is a giant leap forward for Ceelox," Gerry Euston, CEO, said.

Sun Microsystems Unveils xVM VirtualBox 2.0 Virtualization

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:00:00 EDT

Sun Microsystems announced a new version of Sun xVM VirtualBox, its high performance, free and open source desktop virtualization software, as well as Sun xVM VirtualBox Software Enterprise Subscription, a new offering for 24/7 premium support for enterprise users. Enterprises will be able to fully reap the benefits of the xVM VirtualBox platform and deploy it across their organizations with guaranteed technical support from Sun. xVM VirtualBox software is an open source hypervisor that supports the most popular host operating systems (OS), including Mac OS X, Linux, Windows, Solaris and OpenSolaris.

A Methodology for Service Modeling and Design

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 14:45:00 EDT

When the programming model shifted from the traditional procedural model to that of object-orientation, a major paradigm shift occurred in the world of IT development. The focus was on encapsulating the state and behavior of entities and calling that encapsulation a class. Instances of a class were called objects, which occupied some space in the memory.

Red Hat Advances Virtualization Standing with Qumranet Acquisition

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 14:45:00 EDT

Red Hat announced the acquisition of Qumranet. The acquisition includes Qumranet's virtualization solutions, including its KVM (Kernel Virtual Machine) platform and SolidICE offering, a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), which together present a comprehensive virtualization platform for enterprise customers.

HP Designs Blade To Host Virtual Machines

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 14:15:00 EDT

HP has built what it calls the first server blade designed specifically to host virtual machines out of quad-core Opteron 2300 chips. Its name is the ProLiant BL495c. According to Jim Ganthier, director of marketing and solutions for HP’s BladeSystems, virtualization poses problems of memory, storage, network connections, access and power utilization.

Google Chrome: Full On Support From Auslogics

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 13:00:00 EDT

Auslogics says it will fully support the new web browser Google Chrome poised to become a powerful Internet Explorer rival. The users of Auslogics BoostSpeed may be the first to experience the full Google Chrome support. This computer performance optimization software will protect the privacy of Google Chrome users, as well as optimize the new browser speed, all by the end of September 2008.

Bostik at La Trinité-sur-Mer Waiting for the Gale

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 08:31:00 EDT

Bostik, currently moored at La Trinité-sur-Mer (Brittany - France) next to the IMOCA 60 Safran, is thus waiting for the gale force 7 to 8 (35 to 45 knots) which should sweep across Brittany at 0000 UTC on Friday 5 September i.e. mid-day this Friday.

SOA World Expo - SOA Software Announces Record Growth

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 08:00:00 EDT

SOA Software announced that the number of transactions processed by its systems each month grew by 400%, to over 2.5 billion transactions a month. The growth was due to the expansion of existing production systems and the deployment into production of new SOA Governance systems. SOA Software attributes this growth in production usage to the expansion of the market driving demand for SOA Governance solutions.

Cloud Computing: What Are Private Clouds?

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 06:00:00 EDT

The world of clouds these days is full of definitions and counter-definitions. There are many posts that try to define the concept of cloud computing; many that try to distinguish utility computing, grid computing and cloud computing; many that try to define public vs private clouds; and many that dismisses the notion of private clouds.

Microsoft's Cloud Platform Vision is Coming Together

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 04:10:00 EDT

We are seeing more being written about Cloud computing and cloud platforms today, and there is strong validation that the future of computing will include significant innovation and value in web/cloud platforms. Microsoft’s Cloud strategy is materializing, and as part of our overall Software plus Services strategy, our Cloud Platform vision is coming together.

Why I Like Google Chrome

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 02:45:00 EDT

It's simple and minimalistic, has a small memory footprint and is easy on the CPU. Flash player works fine on my Windows XP box. JavaFX developers should like it too.

Does the iPhone Over-Use Numeric Status Indicators?

Thu, 04 Sep 2008 00:45:00 EDT

I am a fan of my iPhone. I am still using my "old" first generation iPhone and am thrilled that I am now able to run custom applications on the device without having to Jailbreak it first. This is good stuff. I did notice something today that concerns me though. It's about the use of and best practices around the numeric indicators that are attached to my iPhone icons.

Instantiations Updates GWT Designer with Support for Google Web Toolkit 1.5 Release

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 23:30:00 EDT

Instantiations announced the release of GWT Designer 5.1. This major version upgrade of the product includes support for Google Web Toolkit (GWT) 1.5, released August 28, as well as basic support for GWT-Ext and MyGWT, both popular widget kits.

Surgient's New Virtualization Automation Platform Relieves IT Burden

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 22:30:00 EDT

Surgient announced Surgient Virtual Automation Platform 6.0, a solution enabling IT operations to deliver self-service computing resources to users while maintaining full administrative control. With physical provisioning and Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V support, the Surgient Virtual Automation Platform optimizes IT's ability to support critical business initiatives, effectively manage diverse virtual resources and eliminate physical server and virtual machine (VM) sprawl.

Embotics Unveils Free Virtualization Insight Tool to Help Enterprises Avoid Virtual Sprawl

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 22:15:00 EDT

Embotics announced V-Scout, a free insight tool that gives virtual machine (VM) administrators complete and detailed oversight of their virtual environment. Organizations can use V-Scout, free of charge, to assess their growing virtualization deployments, gain better control over their infrastructure and avoid common problems like virtual sprawl.

AMD Virtualization to Power New HP Blade Technology

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 22:00:00 EDT

AMD announced that Quad-Core AMD Opteron processors exclusively power the innovation behind the blade server designed specifically to eliminate performance bottlenecks for virtual server hosting, the HP ProLiant BL495c virtualization blade.

Raxco Software’s PerfectDisk 2008 Disk Defragmenter Available for Hyper-V Virtualization

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 21:45:00 EDT

Raxco Software announced that PerfectDisk 2008 Server contains support for Microsoft’s Hyper-V. Hyper-V, which provides server virtualization and consolidation, is part of Windows Server 2008. PerfectDisk 2008 Server achieved Microsoft’s Windows Server 2008 certification earlier this year. Microsoft certification ensures that third-party software applications operating on Windows Server 2008 meet specific technical requirements.

New Suit Puts Hans Reiser’s Company in Play

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 20:30:00 EDT

Hans Reiser’s children Rory, 8, and Niorline, 7, represented pro bono by Morrison and Foerster, the big-time San Francisco law firm, have sued their father for the wrongful death of their mother, seeking unspecified damages for being deprived of her “love, support, companionship, comfort, affection and society.”

Virtualization Expo - "Google-Like" Search Utility for Complex Environments

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 17:45:00 EDT

VKernel has released SearchMyVM, a free "Google-like" search utility for finding information within the expanding VMware ESX environments. The VKernel SearchMyVM Beta is now available to download. Vkernel SearchMyVM deploys exactly like each one of VKernel's virtual appliances. Users can find their virtual machines, hosts, clusters, storage, resource pools, files, snapshots, VMware tools, applications and configuration information.

Google Chrome: A First Look

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 17:05:00 EDT

Google Chrome is an open-source browser developed by Google using existing WebKit rendering engine (the one used in Apple’s Safari browser) and its own Google Gears technology for offline use of supported web applications. The browser developed by Google is described by the company as something of a new generation of browser - the one working mainly with rich interactive applications instead of simple text pages of the past. The browser has launched as a Windows-only beta version with versions for Mac and Linux claimed to be in the works.

VMware ESX Validated by Microsoft

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 15:30:00 EDT

VMware announced it has qualified its VMware ESX hypervisor under the Microsoft Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP). VMware ESX 3.5 update 2 (ESX 3.5u2) is a hypervisor to be listed under the program, providing VMware customers who run Windows Server and Microsoft applications with access to cooperative support from Microsoft and VMware.

Google Chrome: Some Preliminary Questions & Answers

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 15:00:00 EDT

I spend a fair amount of my time debunking misconceptions about Google. So when I found out that Google Chrome was going to be released, I put on my thinking cap about what objections people would throw out about Google Chrome. Here are the questions that I came up with, along with my personal answers.

NextIO Announces the Adaptive Connect Platform

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 14:43:00 EDT

NextIO announced its Adaptive Connect platform providing comprehensive I/O solution for today’s dynamic data center. The Adaptive Connect platform gives organizations the largest breadth of choice for any-to-any connectivity without the need to change existing infrastructure and lays the foundation for “cloud compute and storage” environments. Giving customers “I/O choice without infrastructure change,” provides savings, flexibility and manageability, while protecting existing infrastructure investments.

Genuitec Expands Strategic Membership of the Eclipse Foundation

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 14:30:00 EDT

Genuitec announced their expansion into “Strategic Member” status for the Eclipse Foundation. This highest level of Foundation membership ensures both financial and technological backing of the Eclipse platform, as well as increased influence on the platform's evolution through board membership.

Cloud Computing Expo - Google Chrome & Browser War III

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 12:45:00 EDT

With Chrome, Google gets to scare the bejesus out of Microsoft by revitalizing Netscape’s old browser-as-platform threat and keep Firefox around as a fallback position in case Chrome doesn’t catch on or is slow in catching on, all the while maintaining the goodwill of the “community.” Firefox currently holds ~18% of the market to Microsoft’s ~75%.

XNA, Game Development for Everyone

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 12:36:00 EDT

Maybe some of you remember a time when we created a sprite on a piece of graph paper and afterwards hacked zeroes and ones in so we could see something eventually move on a TV screen. I have to admit that those days have been gone for a long time and a lot of things have happened in IT since I developed simple games on my C64. And one of these new things is XNA Game Studio (the current version is 2.0).

Google Chrome: Will the Web Ever Become a Real Platform?

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 12:15:00 EDT

I have been reading a lot of reviews about Chrome. Most people seem to be comparing it to Firefox, which I think is underestimating Chrome's capability. I think it has nothing to do with the browser at all; it has everything to do with the platform.

Virtualization Expo - VMware Down Another Senior Executive

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 12:00:00 EDT

VMware said Tuesday that Richard Sarwal, executive VP of R&D, only with the company since December, had quit to go back to Oracle. VMware CEO Paul Maritz said he “expects to announce organizational changes to replace Richard in due course.”

AJAX Technology Leader Received Funding

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:35:00 EDT

Telerik announced that it has received an investment from Summit Partners, a private equity and venture capital firm that has raised more than $11 billion since inception. The investment will be used to fund both organic growth and acquisitions.

Virtualization, SOA, and the Rise of Social Media

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:30:00 EDT

At Hummer Winblad we often joke that we focus on the "boring side of software." By this we mean that many of our companies tend to be described with words like core, infrastructure, B2B, backend, etc. We believe that these companies provide the infrastructure under which the next generations of software are built. They will be interesting and successful companies but it is unlikely your mom will ever know their names.

Google Apps To Offer Video to Premier Edition Users

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:25:00 EDT

Is there a market for YouTube for business? We'll soon all find out, because Google is now offering a new Video tag to Premier Edition users of Google Apps - allowing for the easy embedding of videos in internal Web pages, along with functionality allowing for comment on videos, add descriptions and tags, search for any video to which they have access or download videos to their laptops or phones.