There were whispers in some corners that the company that  owns RCPU was crazy to start a virtualization magazine, 
Virtualization Review
,  not long ago. Well, we're looking a lot less crazy now with studies like  
Forrester's latest
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	Posted by Lee Pender on March 10, 20090 comments
          
	
 
            
                
                
 
    
    
	
    The late 
Patsy Cline
  would probably have loved Windows 7. Or, at least, she might have related to  it. In her tragically brief career (and life), Patsy was famous for falling to  pieces, and, in a sense, that's what Windows 7 will do. 
OK, so maybe falling to pieces isn't the perfect metaphor,  but Windows 7 will have a modular nature that will allow users to turn off all  sorts of features and applications...including Internet Explorer.  Now, that last bit is interesting, as everybody is noting this week, because  Microsoft has famously said for years that IE was the one "piece"  that Microsoft couldn't let "fall off" of Windows.
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	Posted by Lee Pender on March 10, 20093 comments
          
	
 
            
                
                
            
                
                
 
    
    
	
    The big distributor 
blew away estimates
 with its  fourth-quarter numbers, even though revenue slipped a bit. There's a  not-unexpected warning, though, that Q1 is going to be tough.
 
	
Posted by Lee Pender on March 05, 20090 comments
          
	
 
            
                
                
            
                
                
            
                
                
 
    
    
	
    In the Netherlands, there's a popular 
soap opera
  called "Goede Tijden, Slechte Tijden" -- don't  try to pronounce it unless you're Dutch -- which translates directly to "Good  Times, Bad Times." (You know I've had my share...yeah, we're singing it, too.)
Anyway, GTST, as  it's commonly known, probably won't feature a three-episode arc about the RCP reader survey any time soon, but it could. (And if the producers are out there reading, your  editor still remembers a little Dutch from his time in Rotterdam and would love a guest appearance.)  Because unlike in 2007, when credit default swaps and mortgage-backed  securities were still mostly wonky Wall Street terms, there's some trepidation  in 2009. Imagine that.
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	Posted by Lee Pender on March 05, 20090 comments
          
	
 
            
                
                
 
    
    
	
    There have probably been happier occasions for Stephen Elop,  head of Microsoft's Business Division, than this week's state-of-the-company  address in front of the undoubtedly nervous folks from Morgan Stanley and other  likely ledge-dwelling financial types.
But Elop performed admirably, it seems, answering questions  that were likely beyond his (no doubt considerable) pay grade. After all, Elop  runs Microsoft's Business Division -- think Office, Dynamics and unified  communications -- and while that's a pretty big chunk of Microsoft, it's not the  whole company, and he's not really a financial executive. Still, the up-against-the-Wall  Streeters wanted to know how Microsoft would cut costs and make money online in  a -- say it with us, everybody -- down economy. 
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	Posted by Lee Pender on March 04, 20090 comments
          
	
 
            
                
                
 
    
    
	
    Looking for a category of technology that won't be going  pear-shaped in the -- say it again, everybody -- down economy? Look to  virtualization, which the analysts at Gartner say will be a 
boom technology  this year
.  This gives us a good excuse to post a nice hypervisor comparison from Keith Ward's blog on 
 
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	Posted by Lee Pender on March 04, 20090 comments
          
	
 
            
                
                
 
    
    
	
    The Phoenix HyperSpace Linux quick-boot shell will 
now be  friendly
 with Microsoft's Word and Excel file formats.  We just love when everybody (sort of) gets along.
 
	
Posted by Lee Pender on March 04, 20090 comments
          
	
 
            
                
                
 
    
    
	
    Kurt Mackie  delves into the future of cloud computing at Microsoft by examining an  
interview
 with the company's Cloud Computing Futures project director.
 
	
Posted by Lee Pender on March 04, 20090 comments