Chat is an old tool that’s newly popular. From Slack and HipChat to Salesforce Chatter and Microsoft’s new Teams tool (and a myriad of others), these collaboration tools supplement rather than replace enterprise social networks like Yammer or Jive. Microsoft’s Office division director Richard Ellis likens it to the difference between Facebook and WhatsApp: “The chat-based workspace fills a gap where people can talk rapidly, share content and work as a team.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Bringing SQL Server to Linux is one of the bigger steps in Microsoft’s plan to help developers build any app for (and from) any platform. And despite the fact that it was only announced in spring 2016, you shouldn’t think of SQL Server on Linux as being a subset of the full Windows offering, says Rohan Kumar, general manager of the Microsoft database systems group.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Despite some significant arrivals, 2016 also failed to deliver some long-awaited technologies. And some of what we eagerly ripped the wrapping paper off proved to be a letdown.Here’s a rundown of the gifts IT didn’t get in 2016.Professional-grade 3D printing
If you want to print out a stand for your phone or a model for a new product, you can easily find a 3D printer for the office that can do that — as long as you want to print them out in plastic. You can spend more and get a 3D printer that can UV cure resin and make small objects like custom-fit earplugs in about 10 minutes (I watched my ACS Custom in-ear monitor headphones get printed from digital scans of my ear canals earlier this year). Even HP’s $140,000 Multi Jet Fusion printers — promised for this year and offering multi-color printing — only just went on sale, and they still only print nylon. You can prototype a (plastic) circuit board with conductive ink circuits with the Voxel8 Developer Kit, as long as you pause the printing and add the chips by hand.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please Continue reading
Despite some significant arrivals, 2016 also failed to deliver some long-awaited technologies. And some of what we eagerly ripped the wrapping paper off proved to be a letdown.Here’s a rundown of the gifts IT didn’t get in 2016.Professional-grade 3D printing
If you want to print out a stand for your phone or a model for a new product, you can easily find a 3D printer for the office that can do that — as long as you want to print them out in plastic. You can spend more and get a 3D printer that can UV cure resin and make small objects like custom-fit earplugs in about 10 minutes (I watched my ACS Custom in-ear monitor headphones get printed from digital scans of my ear canals earlier this year). Even HP’s $140,000 Multi Jet Fusion printers — promised for this year and offering multi-color printing — only just went on sale, and they still only print nylon. You can prototype a (plastic) circuit board with conductive ink circuits with the Voxel8 Developer Kit, as long as you pause the printing and add the chips by hand.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please Continue reading
Your business spends a lot of time analyzing the market you sell to, but can you take a step back and instead create the market that you want? Experts in the little-known field of behavioral economics and market design say “yes.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Microsoft has joined the Linux Foundation as a Platinum member. Google is joining not just the .NET foundation but the steering committee, alongside RedHat and Samsung, which is supporting .NET code on all of its Tizen devices, from smart TVs to wearables and IoT devices, running on ARM. The preview of SQL Server on Linux is ready for IT teams to try out and it has key security and data warehouse features, not just the basics. A version of Microsoft’s premier development tool, Visual Studio, has even come to Mac OS.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Machine learning features have the potential to transform your marketing and customer support, but they’ve been out of reach for most companies. Now both Microsoft and Salesforce are building them into their cloud CRM tools, putting AI within the grasp of most enterprises.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
A hyperscale cloud data center looks different from an enterprise data center, or even a large hosting provider. The problems they face are different from the problems you face. And your approach to everything from how you choose a site to how you manage power to how long you keep servers is not their approach.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
A hyperscale cloud data center looks different from an enterprise data center, or even a large hosting provider. The problems they face are different from the problems you face. And your approach to everything from how you choose a site to how you manage power to how long you keep servers is not their approach.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Every version of Windows — client and server — has promised improved security. But with Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016, Microsoft is going beyond the usual incremental improvements and closing of loopholes and giving you the tools to reduce the dangers of phished credentials, over-privileged admins and untrustworthy binaries.“In the past, security was always something that was part of another technology” says Jeff Woolsey, principal group program manager at Microsoft. “We needed to pull it out.”Security and protecting identity comes up in every conversation Microsoft has with customers, he says. And the scale of attacks means that security isn’t just something for the IT team to worry about any more, adds Jeffrey Snover, lead architect for the enterprise cloud group and the Microsoft Azure stack. “When we asked customers ‘what are your IT concerns?’ there were some messages we heard consistently. There were too many stories about getting hacked and not knowing for months.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Every version of Windows — client and server — has promised improved security. But with Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016, Microsoft is going beyond the usual incremental improvements and closing of loopholes and giving you the tools to reduce the dangers of phished credentials, over-privileged admins and untrustworthy binaries.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Much like the mainframe, tape still has its place. It’s a veteran technology that is heralded for being cheap, reliable and simple, and advancements continue. Even so, by the time you’ve invested in tape robots for automation and verification steps to make sure your backup actually captured your data, all that labor and infrastructure means tape isn’t as cheap as the per-megabyte costs make it look.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Last year, hybrid cloud was a priority for many enterprises, although with a certain amount of confusion about what it involved. This year, those ambitious plans are showing up as an approach to hybrid cloud that relies on platform as a service (PaaS) to take full advantage of cloud models.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
As web and mobile development have become increasingly important, .NET has faced an increasing amount of competition from open source platforms, as well as some confusion over its direction.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Microsoft’s key, .NET-based scripting and management framework is now open source and available for Linux (initially Ubuntu, RedHat and CentOS) and Mac OS, and both cloud and traditional infrastructure companies are stepping up to support it.Open source, Linux and Mac OS announcements from Microsoft are becoming routine under CEO Satya Nadella, but making PowerShell fully open source and making it cross-platform is particularly significant — and not just because PowerShell for Linux is something that customers have been requesting for a long time.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Microsoft’s key, .NET-based scripting and management framework is now open source and available for Linux (initially Ubuntu, RedHat and CentOS) and Mac OS, and both cloud and traditional infrastructure companies are stepping up to support it.Open source, Linux and Mac OS announcements from Microsoft are becoming routine under CEO Satya Nadella, but making PowerShell fully open source and making it cross-platform is particularly significant — and not just because PowerShell for Linux is something that customers have been requesting for a long time.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Augmented reality isn't new. Boeing has been using it since the 1990s to speed up installing the hundreds of miles of writing inside its planes. But those early systems were both clunky and expensive, and, so far, more portable augmented reality wearables like Google Glass haven't taken off. Microsoft's mixed reality HoloLens looks set to change that.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
With SQL Server 2005 now out of support, if you haven’t already started migrating your older databases onto a newer, supported release to stay in compliance with regulations like PCI DSS, that’s now urgent.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
With SQL Server 2005 now out of support, if you haven’t already started migrating your older databases onto a newer, supported release to stay in compliance with regulations like PCI DSS, that’s now urgent.
But even if you don’t have an urgent need to migrate, there are several reasons why you may want to consider SQL Server 2016.
The new security options will be significant for many businesses. Integration with Azure gives businesses a new approach for both availability and bursting performance to the cloud. And Power BI is an option today that will become a key part of SQL Server reporting in the future. Plus, this is the version that Microsoft will be bringing to Linux, giving you a new option for moving off Oracle.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
Mary Branscombe