Life Without Microsoft?

This bold move by Massachusetts bears watching:

The state of Massachusetts has laid out a plan to switch all its workers away from Microsoft’s Word, Excel and other desktop software applications, delivering what would be one of the most significant setbacks to the software company’s battle against open source software in its home market.

Two years […]

Linux 40% cheaper than Windows, claims IBM

After two years of Microsoft-sponsored research heralding the benefits of Windows over Linux comes this report from IBM:
Linux’s total cost of operation (TCO) is typically 40% lower than Windows, according to an IBM-sponsored report from Robert Frances Group, publicized by IBM this week.

Who to trust more, Microsoft or IBM? Hmmm… Read full article at […]

Internet Sieges and Cybercrime

Is the goverment doing all it can to deal with internet crime? 

In extortion e-mail’s broken English, someone identifying himself as Tony Martino proposed a classic organized-crime protection scheme. "You should pay $10,000," Martino wrote. "When we receive money, we stop attack immediately." The e-mail even promised one year’s protection from other attackers for the $10,000 […]

Google Talk

Google comes out to compete with Yahoo and Skype, offering a free, minimalistic IM client that integrates VoIP. Requires a GMail account. Need a GMail account? Anyone that joins LinkedIn and adds me as a contact (search on Stan Shinn with email can email me and I’ll send you one. 

Read more about Google’s new […]

Google planning IM service

Should be interesting! 

Google is set to introduce its own instant-messaging system, the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday. Such a move would mark an expansion by the Web search leader into text and also voice communications. Citing unnamed sources "familiar with the service," the Los Angeles Times said that Google’s instant-messaging program would be called Google […]

Dell customer rating plunges, Apple leads pack

People are starting to complain about the quality of Dell’s customer service, although not its products. In this recent study, Dell’s customer satisfaction is no simply on par with other PC vendors, while Apple has shot to the top of the consumer satisfaction list.

U.S. consumers lambasted Dell Inc. for poor customer service in a […]

IDC: IT Growth Healthy Through 2009

It’s not quite as nice as the days of double-digit growt, but worldwide IT spending is showing a healthy, steady growth that will be sustained through 2009, IDC predicted Tuesday.

Worldwide IT spending will grow at a compound annual rate of 5.9 percent through the end of 2009 to reach $1.34 trillion, up from […]

JBoss Woos Commercial App Server Users

JBoss, the open source J2EE server, is making commercial inroads: 

JBoss on Tuesday will boost efforts to lure users of commercial application servers to its open source alternative. The JBoss Migration Program being unveiled features an assessment to define a migration strategy, an implementation program, and a subscription to the JBoss Application Server. The implementation program […]

PHP: Boon or Bane?

PHP remains popular, so much so that vendors are either adding tool support for this language, or fighting against it, touting their alternative wares such as Java or Visual Studio. 

If Java developers are indeed picking-up PHP because - like almost anything else it seems - it is simpler to use than Java, then it will […]

On-demand Applications and Scalability

Industry pundits are pondering the scalability limits of enterprise applications delivered on-demand.
Case in point is Salesforce.com. Salesforce.com has had great success in small to medium sized business (93 percent of Salesforce.com customers had fewer than 500 users). But can they scale to 10,000?
… in a May report based on data from 29 Salesforce.com customers, […]