Acer says Predator 8 gaming tablet primed for September launch

Acer couldn’t keep the mystery around the launch of its highly-anticipated Acer Predator 8-inch gaming tablet bottled up for too long.The tablet could launch sometime in September, with a big event planned for Europe, said a representative at the Acer booth on the Computex show floor this week.The tablet was first shown on stage in April at a lavish event at the World Trade Center in New York. At the time, Acer CEO Jason Chen said during an interview that the tablet details were being finalized and more details would be shared at launch. However, no specific launch date was provided.But details about the tablet starting trickling out much earlier at Computex in Taipei this week. It will run on Android OS and have Intel’s Atom processor code-named Cherry Trail, which has two times faster graphics than the aging predecessor chip code-named Bay Trail. The Cherry Trail chip is also used in Microsoft’s Surface 3, which started shipping last month.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Microsoft provides privacy dashboard ahead of Windows 10 launch

Microsoft gave its privacy policy and service agreement a facelift Thursday, and offered users a new central clearinghouse to manage privacy settings for all the data the company keeps about them.The newly-minted privacy dashboard (included in the Security and Privacy section of Microsoft’s account administration page) gives users links to control data stored for personalizing their experience on Bing, what apps and services use their information, whether Microsoft personalizes ads for them and whether the company can market to them via email. It’s part of a move by the company to unify and simplify most of its service agreements and privacy policies for various products under one document.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

What outsourcing engagement model is right for you?

Outsourcing should be a strategic partnership, not a simple hand-off of duties to a third-party. Getting that right requires smart preparation.

Implemented correctly, strategic partnerships are a happy collaboration where expectations of delivery and results are clear from the start. By bringing in outside minds, it’s possible to innovate and drive your product to levels beyond what your internal team might have accomplished. New ideas can come from anywhere.

+ ALSO ON NETWORK WORLD IT outsourcing deal values hit 10-year low +

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Week in Review

This week was a busy one. I had the opportunity to speak at a local NYC Ansible meetup, to a group of high school computer science students, and then on a panel at AnsibleFest yesterday in New York. Here is a short recap.

NYC Ansible Meetup - Tuesday June 2

Clearly the presentation was about network automation with Ansible. That probably goes without saying since it was an Ansible meetup! I’ve used these slides in other presentations throughout the year, so some are repetitive, but they usually hit some key points on the topic of network automation. Unfortunately, I did not know this was being streamed lived when it took place, but luckily the organizers recorded it too. Link is below.

Note: the presentation doesn’t start until about the 30:30 mark. From there on out, it’s about half presentation and then half live demo of using Ansible for Network Automation.

Here is the link to the video: Network Automation with Ansible

High School Talk - Wednesday June 3

A local high school about 20 mins from where I grew up asked me to come in to talk about a career in IT. The school is the Pascack Valley Regional Continue reading

Facebook’s lean Android app is less than 1MB in size

Facebook has released a stripped down version of its Android app aimed at growing its service in developing countries and other areas with poor connectivity.The Facebook Lite app is less than 1MB in size—far less than the regular app—making it quick to download and install. It retains core features including the News Feed, status updates, photos and notifications, Facebook said. The company had been testing the app since at least January.The app started to roll out Thursday in some Asian countries, and will be available in parts of Latin America, Africa and Europe in the coming weeks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

US reports massive breach of government personnel data

The U.S. is investigating a massive data breach that exposed personal information on around 4 million federal government workers, according to news reports Thursday.China is suspected of having a hand in the attack, described by an unnamed official as “one of the largest thefts of government data ever seen,” the Wall Street Journal reported.The attack targeted the Office of Personnel Management, a government agency tasked with hiring and retaining government workers. The same agency was breached last year, but this was apparently a separate attack.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

US reports massive breach of government personnel data

The U.S. is investigating a massive data breach that exposed personal information on around 4 million federal government workers, according to news reports Thursday.China is suspected of having a hand in the attack, described by an unnamed official as “one of the largest thefts of government data ever seen,” the Wall Street Journal reported.APOLOGIES: Sorriest Technology Companies of 2014To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Your next digital security guard should be more like RoboCop

This vendor-written tech primer has been edited by Network World to eliminate product promotion, but readers should note it will likely favor the submitter’s approach.

Humans are clearly incapable of monitoring and identifying every threat on today’s vast and complex networks using traditional security tools. We need to enhance human capabilities by augmenting them with machine intelligence. Mixing man and machine – in some ways, similar to what OmniCorp did with RoboCop – can heighten our ability to identify and stop a threat before it’s too late.

The “dumb” tools that organizations rely on today are simply ineffective. There are two consistent, yet still surprising things that make this ineptitude fairly apparent. The first is the amount of time hackers have free reign within a system before being detected: eight months at Premera and P.F. Chang’s, six months at Nieman Marcus, five months at Home Depot, and the list goes on.

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CA acquires Grid-Tools for agile development

Adding to a growing portfolio of software development applications, CA Technologies has acquired Grid-Tools, whose software automates the process of testing newly-built applications.CA customers will be able to use Grid-Tools’ products to build software using agile development methodologies, in which small teams work in close collaboration to quickly build and update large applications.Last week, CA announced it is purchasing for $480 million Rally Software, which offers a set of software and cloud services to help developers manage complex software projects.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Beyond Alerts: Using orchestration to realize network self-healing

Managing modern networked systems and applications is daunting because infrastructure is complex and things can go wrong in so many parts of the technology stack -- servers, storage, network devices, applications, hypervisors, APIs, DNS, etc. How can you address the challenge?

A good place to start: problems that can solve themselves, should.

This is called “self-healing” in the systems management space. As our systems are increasingly virtualized, the opportunity to have our systems work around and self-correct issues has grown greatly in recent years.

The simplest example of self-healing is automatically restarting a service or process that stops or otherwise becomes unresponsive. It is important to keep in mind that this is a workaround and that automated activity of all sorts needs to be logged and monitored, in turn. If an application leaks memory such that it needs to be automatically restarted several times a day, that restart is not the fix, it’s a Band-Aid that is mitigating the impact while the developers responsible fix the application.

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IDG Contributor Network: Brain uploads could become possible as PCs get more powerful

Living inside a machine is "definitely a possibility," according to a British neuroscientist. Dr. Hannah Critchlow,of Cambridge University, says that if a computer could be built to recreate the 100 trillion connections in the brain, it would be possible to live within programs.Critchlow's statement, at the Hay Festival, was reported by the Telegraph and Metro newspapers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Brain uploads could become possible as PCs get more powerful

Living inside a machine is "definitely a possibility," according to a British neuroscientist. Dr. Hannah Critchlow,of Cambridge University, says that if a computer could be built to recreate the 100 trillion connections in the brain, it would be possible to live within programs.Critchlow's statement, at the Hay Festival, was reported by the Telegraph and Metro newspapers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco partners prepare for Cisco Live

With Cisco Live fast approaching, many third-party vendors who rely on Cisco and its installed base for their own business are announcing products before and at the show. Two are start-ups Glue Networks, a developer of SDN software for Cisco router WANs, and Avi Networks, a maker of application delivery controller software.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Does Fortinet’s Meru buy mean we’re in for even more Wi-Fi industry consolidation?

Cybersecurity firm Fortinet’s purchase last week of wireless network manufacturer Meru Networks for $44 million is the second major acquisition of a Wi-Fi hardware vendor in three months – and, potentially, the start of a broader pattern.HP bought Aruba Networks in late February for $3 billion, in a move that upset the balance of the wireless industry by raising questions about Aruba’s OEM relationships with HP rivals like Dell. Now, that HP-Aruba deal looks as though it could be the herald of a more general consolidation in the wireless sector.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

iOS 9 rumor roundup, part deux

With June already in full swing, the Apple world is gearing up for arguably the most exciting and important part of the year - WWDC. Though Apple doesn't typically announce major new hardware announcements at WWDC anymore, the company's annual developers conference is still compelling because it's where we get our first glimpse into upcoming versions of iOS and OS X, the software that powers Apple's beloved hardware.Of course, because the iPhone remains Apple's primary moneymaker, the most interesting thing to keep an eye on at WWDC this year will be iOS 9. While we already covered a few items we can expect to see in Apple's next-iteration of iOS, we're back with a second round of iOS 9 rumors to keep you in-the-know ahead of what are bound to be some exciting Apple announcements come Monday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

NSA said to increase monitoring of US ‘Net traffic to catch hackers

The U.S. National Security Agency is reportedly intercepting Internet communications from U.S. residents without getting court-ordered warrants, in an effort to hunt down malicious hackers.The previously undisclosed NSA program monitors Internet traffic for data about cyberattacks originating outside the U.S., according to a New York Times article published Thursday and based on leaks from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.President Barack Obama’s administration launched the NSA cybersecurity program without public notice or debate, according to the report.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Open Networking for the Whole of Your Data Center Network

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In the past, I’ve designed, deployed and operated networks of various sizes, needs and scopes. One of the perennial design points common to all of them is how to approach the out-of-band (OOB) network. When it comes to making sure your production network operates in the face of issues, the OOB network is often a critical component. But it also raises the question of how to build it, what components to use and how much they affect the “day job” of running the production network. These decisions haven’t always been easy.

Generally, there is a spectrum of approaches.  On one end is the choice to go with the same gear that you are deploying in the production network. On the other end is the decision to just build the OOB network out of what you can get from the local or online electronics superstore.  One can cause you budget problems; the other raises the question if your OOB network will be there when you most need it.  All too often the most frugal designs win, and this can cause you to have to troubleshoot the OOB network before you can troubleshoot the production network. So the issue is more than just the initial acquisition cost, Continue reading

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