News


DDoS Attacks in the Crosshairs

The massive Distributed Denial of Service attack earlier this week against the backbone of the Internet has created a classic game of "Is the glass half empty or half full?"

IDC: Full-Fledged Web Services at Least a Decade Away

Analysts at market research house IDC are throwing cold water on the idea that the revolutionary phase of Web services -- delivering software as services -- will take hold soon. According to IDC, that development is at least 10 years away.

Security Firm Finds 9 IE Flaws

An Israeli security firm, GreyMagic Software, documented nine new vulnerabilities in recent versions of Internet Explorer, eight of which the firm calls "critical."

SP1 for Windows XP Embedded Ships

Microsoft updated the componentized version of Windows XP this week with the delivery of Windows XP Embedded with Service Pack 1. The SP1 release brings expanded foreign-language support, the Microsoft .NET Framework, remote boot and diskless operation.

First Beta Ships for Office 11

Microsoft's Office 11, which will include a major overhaul of the Outlook e-mail client and XML integration across the product line, went into its first beta testing phase this week.

Stratus Makes 100% Windows Uptime Guarantee

Stratus Technologies upped the ante on uptime guarantees this week with an offer promising 100 percent uptime on Windows servers.

Microsoft: Servers, XP Growing Revenues

Microsoft used its recent financial earnings report to highlight momentum in its server and business products. Strong performers, according to the company, included SQL Server Enterprise Edition, Windows 2000 Server and Windows XP Professional.

Unisys Runs Itanium 2 on Industry Standard Benchmark

Unisys ran its first TPC benchmark with one of its 16-processor, Windows-optimized systems using the 64-bit Itanium 2 processor.

IDC Sees Turnaround in Server Spending

IDC forecasts that in the third quarter of 2002 the standard Intel architecture server market will show growth for the first time since the beginning of 2001. Don't get too excited, the market research firm warns. After the awful first half of 2002, worldwide server sales should still be down 9 percent in 2002 compared to 2001.

Microsoft Issues 3 Patches, 1 Fixes Critical SQL Flaw

Microsoft released three security bulletins late Wednesday, including one with a patch for a critical flaw in its SQL Server database. The other two bulletins included patches for moderate threats to the Windows XP Help and Support Center and to a seldom-used feature of Word and Excel. The flurry of security bulletins takes Microsoft to 61 bulletins so far in 2002, one more than the software giant issued for all of 2001.

Microsoft Lays Out Support Lifecycle, Policy

Microsoft introduced consistency and predictability into its formerly haphazard product lifecycle support on Tuesday by laying out a policy and creating a single Web site where customers can check on the support status of all Microsoft's software.

DYS Analytics Ports Enterprise E-mail Management Tool to Exchange

Messaging and groupware toolkit vendor DYS Analytics ported its Email Control! tool for monitoring and managing e-mail in large environments to the Exchange 5.5 and Exchange 2000 platforms.

Support Deadlines Loom for Exchange 5.5, SQL 7.0, NT 4.0

Microsoft laid out the end dates for regular support of most of its products on Tuesday as it detailed its first Software Lifecycle policy. Windows NT 4.0's support deadlines stayed consistent with what the software giant announced last December. End dates for regular support of Microsoft's other major enterprise products: December 2003 for Exchange 5.5, March 2004 for SQL Server 7.0 and March 2005 for Windows 2000.

Microsoft CIO Details Internal Security Measures

Ever wonder what the alpha user of Microsoft software, Microsoft's internal IT Group, is doing about security? Microsoft corporate vice president and chief information officer Rick Devenuti offered a glimpse last week during MEC 2002 in Anaheim, Calif.

BizTalk Making Headway in EAI Market

While the combination of Microsoft Corp.’s BizTalk Server and XML Web services is showing promise as an enterprise application integration tool, it’s still too early to tell whether Redmond will stake a claim to turf along side traditional EAI heavyweights.

How Microsoft Eats its Own Dogfood

Every time Microsoft rolls out a major new enterprise product, the software giant claims itself as a long-running early adopter in production systems. At MEC 2002 in Anaheim, Calif., Microsoft corporate vice president and CIO Rick Devenuti explained how his IT department reconciles its top priority of being "Microsoft's best and first customer" with its more standard role of making sure employees in this global Fortune 500 company always have access to the applications they need to do the jobs that keep the revenue flowing.

Microsoft Claims Internal Benefits From Windows .NET Server, Titanium

Microsoft corporate vice president and CIO Rick Devenuti is seeing several benefits from an internal early deployment of Windows .NET Server 2003 and expecting others with the Exchange Titanium release.

HP, Intel Push Itanium, But Sun Goes to 32-Bit

It's been a rough year for large IT providers, but some major industry leaders say they are bullish on their near-term prospects, and will continue to aggressively pursue new technologies. At Gartner's ITXpo/Symposium in Orlando, the CEOs of HP, Intel, and Sun Microsystems all say their organizations are weathering the economic storm, and seeing growth in some areas.

Ballmer Owns Up to Microsoft Licensing Flap

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer had a lot of explaining to do about Microsoft's new licensing and Software Assurance policies Wednesday morning at Gartner's ITXpo/Symposium, being held in Orlando, Florida. Owning up to customer disenchantment with Licensing 6.0, Ballmer admitted that the process and ensuing customer pushback resulted in a "lot of learning for us." The CEO also provided further clarification to Microsoft's .NET approach, stating that the intention of the architecture is introducing XML into Microsoft's products.

Unisys Tests High-Performance Wintel Computing at CTC

Unisys will collaborate with Cornell University’s Cornell Theory Center (CTC) to test high-performance computing solutions based on its ES7000 servers.