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The Schwartz Report

Microsoft Has Ambitious Plans To Broaden IoT Deployment

Microsoft has released the technical preview of IoT Central, the company's SaaS offering designed to let organizations roll out IoT-based solutions with minimal configuration or knowledge of the complexities of integrating operational systems with IT.

The company, which announced IoT Central back in April, said customers can use these preconfigured application templates to deploy IoT capabilities within hours and without the need for developers skilled in IoT. The new SaaS offering will compliment Microsoft's Azure IoT Suite, a PaaS-based offering that requires more customization and systems integration.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/06/20170 comments

It's no secret that Microsoft wants enterprises to migrate all their PC users to Windows 10 as a service and to move to its new modern approach to configuring, securing and managing those systems and the applications associated with them. This year's launch of Microsoft 365 -- a subscription service that bundles Windows 10 licenses, Office 365 and the Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) service -- is the strongest sign yet that the company is pushing IT pros away from the traditional approach of imaging and managing PCs with System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) in favor of Microsoft Intune in EMS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/04/20170 comments

The Box collaboration and enterprise content management (ECM) service is now available in Microsoft's Azure public cloud, marking the latest integration points between the two companies in recent years. Box and Microsoft, which are also competitors with overlapping collaboration capabilities, found it in their respective best interests two years ago to work together, staring with basic Office 365 integration.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/29/20170 comments

McAfee is filling a void in its security portfolio with its plan to acquire leading cloud access security broker (CASB) provider Skyhigh Networks. The deal to acquire Skyhigh for an undisclosed amount, announced today, will give McAfee one of the most regarded CASB offerings as the company looks to join the fray of vendors blending cloud security, network protection and endpoint management.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/27/20170 comments

Microsoft is adding MariaDB to the list of open source relational database platforms it will bring to Azure. MariaDB will join MySQL and PostgreSQL, announced earlier this year and now available in preview mode, in Azure. In addition to adding it to the menu of open source databases available in Azure, Microsoft has joined the MariaDB Foundation as a Platinum sponsor.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/20/20170 comments

Microsoft is looking to help remotely distributed development teams collaborate on code in real time with the introduction of Visual Studio Live Share. The new capability, demonstrated at the Microsoft Connect Conference in New York and streamed online, now works with both the Visual Studio IDE and multi-platform VS Code lightweight development tool, editor and debugger.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/16/20170 comments

Microsoft and Apache Spark creator Databricks are building a globally distributed streaming analytics service natively integrated with Azure for machine learning, graph processing and AI-based applications.

The new Datrabricks Spark as a service was introduced at Microsoft's annual Connect developer conference, which kicked off today in New York. The new service, available in preview, is among an extensive list of announcements focused on its various SQL and NoSQL database products and services, as well as productivity, cross-platform and added language improvements to Visual Studio and VSCode developer tools, as well as new DevOps capabilities, new machine learning, AI and IoT tooling.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/15/20170 comments

More than half of large enterprises that have implemented Cloud Foundry as their application runtime, orchestration and DevOps environment for business modernization projects are using it across multiple clouds, according to a results of a survey published last month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/13/20170 comments

Microsoft is readying a new lightweight database development and management tool that aims to give DBAs and developers common DevOps tooling to manage Microsoft's various on-premises and cloud database offerings. The new Microsoft SQL Operations Studio, demonstrated for the first time at last week's PASS Summit in Seattle, brings together the capabilities of SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) and SQL Server Data Services (SSDS) with a modern, cross-platform interface.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/06/20170 comments

Microsoft's Power BI can now query 10 billion rows of data, but a forthcoming release will blow that threshold to 1 trillion, a capability demonstrated at this week's annual PASS Summit, where the company also released the first on-premises version with Power BI Report Server.

Microsoft gave Power BI major play at PASS, held in Seattle, where the company also underscored the recently released SQL Server 2017 and its support for Linux and Docker, hybrid implementations of the on-premises database with SQL Azure and its next-generation NoSQL database CosmosDB.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/03/20170 comments

A version of the Microsoft 365 service for small- and mid-size organizations with up to 300 users is now generally available. Microsoft 365 Business, released today, is the last of four versions of the new service announced in July that brings together Office 365, the Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) device configuration and management service and Windows 10 upgrades and licenses.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/01/20170 comments

In a move to make Google's public cloud services more appealing to enterprise customers, the company and Cisco are partnering to bring hybrid cloud infrastructure that's compatible with the Google Cloud Platform (GCP). The pact, announced today, will enable workloads to run on Cisco UCS hyper-converged infrastructure hardware and the GCP.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/25/20170 comments

If existing high-performance computing (HPC) isn't enough for you, Microsoft is bringing the supercomputing capabilities provided by Cray to its Azure public cloud.

This is a noteworthy deal because Cray has been regarded for decades as the leading provider of supercomputing systems. Cray's supercomputers are capable of processing some of the most complex, high-performance and scientific workloads performed. The two companies today announced what Cray described as an "exclusive strategic alliance" aimed at bringing supercomputing capability to enterprises.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/23/20170 comments

Microsoft has given Azure Stack the green light to run on systems powered by Intel's next-generation Xeon Scalable Processors, code-named "Purley." By validating Azure Stack for Intel's new Purley CPUs, enterprises and service providers can run Microsoft's cloud operating system at much greater scale and expansion capability than the current Xeon CPUs, code-named Intel Xeon E5 v4 family ("Broadwell").

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/20/20170 comments

Looking to distance itself further from the highest-performing MacBook Pros, Microsoft is unleashing its most powerful Surface PCs to date with the launch of the new Surface Book 2. Microsoft showed off the newest Surface Book 2 today as an extra surprise tied with the release of the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, which comes with support for new mixed reality and improvements for IT pros including enhancements to the console.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/17/20170 comments

Nearly a year after rolling out its Azure Functions serverless compute option for running event-driven, modern PaaS apps and services, Microsoft has given it a cross-platform boost. The company announced it had ported the Azure Functions service to the new .NET Core 2.0 framework during the Ignite conference in Orlando, Fla., late last month. On the heels of that release, Microsoft made available a public preview of its Java runtime for Azure Functions during last week's JavaOne conference in San Francisco.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/13/20170 comments

If there was any hope that Microsoft had any plans to come out with any new phones based on Windows 10 Mobile, or add new features to that version of the OS this year, HP and Microsoft both appear to have dashed them.

The chatter about the all-but-forgotten Windows Phone emerged a week ago when The Register reported that HP will no longer sell or support its Elite x3 Windows-based phone after the end of 2019 and would only offer whatever inventory is still available. The report quoted Nick Lazardis, who heads HP's EMEA business, during the Canalys Channels Forum. Noting that HP had insisted as recently as August that it was committed to the platform, and specifically the Windows Continuum feature, Lazardis attributed the change to Microsoft's shift in strategy with Windows Phone.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/11/20170 comments

Amazon Web Services yesterday announced that it is the "preferred cloud provider" for General Electric, one of the world's largest industrial conglomerates. However, what was not stated in the announcement is that it only pertains to GE's internal IT apps. GE is moving forward with its plans announced last year to run its Predix industrial exchange on Microsoft Azure.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/06/20170 comments

Microsoft and NetApp are working to deliver a native version of the storage provider's Network File System (NFS) for Azure. The new Enterprise NFS Service is based on NetApp's flagship Data ONTAP storage operating and management platform and will be available for public preview in early 2018.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/04/20170 comments

As the world today awoke to the news of last night's horrific mass shooting that originated from a 32nd floor room of the Mandalay Bay hotel in Las Vegas, killing at least 58 and injuring more than 550, many IT pros had just arrived or were on their way to NetApp's Insight conference.

The NetApp conference was set to begin today with preconference technical sessions but as the shooting unfolded, the hotel was evacuated and all of today's activities were cancelled. NetApp later in the day said it had decided to resume the conference tomorrow for those who already attended with the keynote session to be kicked off by President and CEO George Kurian.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/02/20170 comments

Microsoft created some interesting buzz at this year's Ignite conference with the news that it is putting Bing at the center of its artificial intelligence and enterprise search efforts.

The new Bing for Business will be a key deliverable from the new AI Research Group Microsoft formed a year ago this week, led by Harry Shum, which brought together Microsoft Research with the company's Bing, Cortana, Ambient Computing and Robotics and Information Platform groups.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/28/20170 comments

Rackspace will secure Hyper-V workloads via its managed security service offering and has announced its Microsoft Azure offering is now PCI certified. The company, one of the world's largest managed services provider, is talking up the new Hyper-V protection capabilities at this week's Microsoft Ignite conference, taking place in Orlando, Fla.

The Hyper-V protection extends across the company's Rackspace Managed Security (RMS) service. Also, a new Rackspace Cloud Replication for Hyper-V will be offered under the umbrella of its Rackspace portfolio of Microsoft services, which provides overall threat protection using analytics and remediation across the company's managed services offering. The managed Rackspace Cloud Replication for Hyper-V offering is based on Microsoft's Azure Site Recovery and offers replication, storage and failover of Hyper-V virtual machines.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/27/20170 comments

The Azure management portal isn't just for Microsoft's public cloud. Microsoft kicked off its annual Ignite conference in Orlando, Fla. this week announcing that Azure Stack appliances from Dell EMC, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Lenovo are now available, along with news of bringing PowerShell, change tracking, update management, log analytics and simplified disaster recovery to the Azure portal.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/25/20170 comments

Veritas is upgrading its entire data management software portfolio with performance improvements and more extensive support for hybrid and public clouds with extended integration with Microsoft Azure.

The deeper integration for Azure is key among the announcements at this week's annual Veritas Vision customer and partner conference in Las Vegas, as well as the news of the company extending data deduplication and optimization of its flagship NetBackup, and Backup Exec backup and recovery and DR offerings. The company also today is introducing a software-defined storage offering designed for massive amounts of data called Veritas Cloud Storage, designed to apply intelligent analytics and classification to improve data discovery.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/20/20170 comments

Given the scope of a growing number of major data breaches, each one is harder to top, although security experts know there's no bottom limit to what could be next. The compromise of 143 million individual accounts reported by Equifax on Sept. 7 that included names, birthdates and credit card numbers, may be one of the most damaging breaches disclosed to date. Apparently tied to the Equifax breach, news surfaced Friday that information on more than 200,000 credit card accounts were also stolen.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/18/20170 comments

Once rumored as an acquisition target by a larger cloud provider, now it's Rackspace that's getting bigger. The company today said it is making its largest acquisition to date with its agreement to buy rival Datapipe, a combination that will bring together two leading providers of managed hosting and cloud services.

While terms weren't disclosed, the deal is expected to close by the end of the year, pending financing and regulatory approval. Bringing together the two companies will create a managed hosting and cloud service provider with a total of 40 datacenters throughout the world, making it the largest, according to Rackspace CEO Joe Eazor.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/11/20170 comments

Building on its goal to extend the single-sign on capability of its cloud-based directory service, Okta has added native LDAP support to its Okta Universal Directory and has extended its multifactor authentication (MFA) offering to bypass on-premises ADFS servers, among other services. The moves are among several upgrades to its SSO portfolio announced at the company's annual Oktane gathering, held last week in Las Vegas.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/08/20170 comments

VMware has upped the stakes in delivering unified client and application enrollment and management with broad extensions to its Workspace One platform. In addition to configuring mobile phones and tablets, Workspace One can now enroll and manage Windows 10 devices and Chromebooks with Mac support coming this fall, VMware announced at the company's VMworld 2017 conference in Las Vegas this week. VMware also revealed that Workspace One will enforce Office 365 data loss protection policies, peer-to-peer distribution of policies and patches via the Adaptiva software it licensed earlier this year, along with automation of Windows desktops in its Horizon offering.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/01/20170 comments

Samsung unveiled its widely anticipated new Galaxy Note8, a smartphone that will continue to tip the scale at providing PC power in a smartphone. It may also test the practical size limit of a phone with its 6.3-inch Quad HD+ AMOLED "Infinity Edge" display. The new Note8 will be available Sept. 15 and is among several major smartphone upgrades anticipated over the next month, including a new iPhone and Google's new Pixel 2.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/25/20170 comments

Leading up to today's solar eclipse, Intel's client computing team celebrated the launch of its new Intel 8th Gen Core i5 and i7 processors, which will fuel the next crop of PCs coming this fall for both the consumer holiday buying season and commercial and enterprise upgrades. Designed to give a major boost to its entire line of mobile, desktop, commercial and high-performance PC processors, including the release of a quad-core processor in a thin and light notebook form factor, the company used today's historic total eclipse to showcase how it can enable virtual reality experiences.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/21/20170 comments

Microsoft this week launched Azure Event Grid, a new managed service aimed at developers who are increasingly building event-based, responsive applications that require event routing and handling. This aims to fill what Microsoft said is a key missing piece in its serverless computing platform.

Azure Event Grid, available as a technical preview, extends Microsoft's existing serverless offerings including its Azure Functions compute engine and Azure Logic Apps, which provides serverless workflow orchestration. The addition of Azure Event Grid addresses the growth of the responsive applications appearing on Web sites and mobile apps, as well as from data streams generated from sensors, embedded systems and other IoT devices, according to Corey Sanders, director of Azure compute, who announced the new service in a blog post.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/16/20170 comments

Microsoft has acquired Cycle Computing, a leading provider of orchestration software designed to deploy and manage large workloads in the three major public clouds, as well as in on-premises and hybrid datacenter infrastructures.

Cycle Computing was ahead of its time 12 years ago with its orchestration software designed to deploy and manage virtual clusters and storage to enable HPC workloads such as machine learning, genomic research and running complex simulations. The company's orchestration software now can run those workloads using any combination of the three largest public clouds: Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud. Cycle Computing says its software is used by companies of all sizes including some of those with some of the largest workloads including JP Morgan Chase, Lockheed Martin, Pfizer and Purdue University.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/15/20170 comments

In a rebuke of Microsoft's Surface Pros, Surface Books and new Surface Laptops, Consumer Reports magazine last week removed its "recommended" designation from the PCs and tablets. The nonprofit, subscriber-funded publication rescinded its stamp-of-approval after a survey of its readership led Consumer Reports to forecast that 25 percent of Microsoft's Surface-based systems will "present owners with problems" within two years of owning them.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/14/20170 comments

Aaron Margosis (@AaronMargosis), a self-described "Windows nerd" and an 18-year Microsoft veteran who is now a principal consultant for the company's Global Cybersecurity Practice, is one of the leading experts when it comes to Sysinternals, a set of free Windows management utility tools. In addition to working with key customers on various security issues, Margosis focuses on his core expertise of Windows security, least privilege, app compatibility and configuring locked-down environment, according to his bio. He has also collaborated with Microsoft's Mark Russinovich on the recently updated book Troubleshooting with the Windows Sysinternals Tools, 2nd Edition (Microsoft Press).

Posted by Lafe Low on 08/11/20170 comments

Like it or not, IT pros must now cater to the whims and tastes of the millennial workforce to keep them productive and satisfied with their jobs. Giving employees of this digital generation, who expect more in terms of capability and less in terms of restrictions, is counter to the way IT organizations have traditionally run and requires a whole new mindset.

Posted by Lafe Low on 08/10/20170 comments

Almost every IT security professional is concerned that the latest advanced persistent threats (APTs) have made them potential targets of sophisticated cyberespionage campaigns. A survey of IT security leaders in the U.S. and several European countries conducted by security software provider Bitdefender found that 96 percent are concerned about APTs, while 61 percent worry about becoming victims of targeted corporate or industrial espionage.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/04/20170 comments

While a growing number of PCs now support Windows Hello authentication, many still can't take advantage of the feature aimed at letting users access their systems without a password. The new Microsoft Modern Keyboard with Fingerprint ID, launched last week, brings Windows Hello Authentication to any PC running Windows 10.

Biometric authentication was among many key new features introduced with Windows 10, released two years ago this week. The number of new systems that support Windows Hello is on the rise but many still lack the necessary hardware -- especially lower-end PCs and older ones upgraded to Windows 10. Microsoft is looking to encourage users to create unique passwords for various accounts and believes Windows Hello will encourage that practice.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/31/20170 comments

Microsoft's new Azure Container Instances (ACI) introduces a way to spin up workloads with the precise amount of CPU cores and memory needed on demand, use them for as little as a few seconds and instantly remove them and pay just for what was used. And it does so with the need to provision and manage Hyper-V or any other virtual machines.

ACI, revealed yesterday, is what Microsoft believes is the fastest and easiest way yet to deploy and manage container-based workloads in the cloud, pushing it up the infrastructure layer. Corey Sanders, director of Azure Compute at Microsoft announced the new service during a webcast, where he demonstrated the ability to spin up and take down container-based workloads.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/27/20170 comments

Looking to simplify the deployment of containers, Microsoft is ramping up a new service in Azure that will allow customers to deploy them on the fly. The company today announced its new Azure Container Instances (ACI) and a Kubernetes-based connector that will enable orchestration.

Microsoft is offering the new ACI service in technical preview, initially for Linux containers, with support for Windows planned in the coming weeks. The preview initially will be available in the U.S. East and West and Europe West Azure regions. The company has also released with the preview its new ACI Connector for Kubernetes, an open source tool that will allow for the orchestration of Kubernetes-based container clusters.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/26/20170 comments

When Microsoft last week posted an update of features that will be removed or deprecated with the release of the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, the flagship Paint image capture and illustration tool was among those on the list, which also included PowerShell 2.0 support, IIS 6 management tools, Outlook Express and the Reader app. Obituaries and tweets lamented the death of MS Paint, which was among the first free add-on tools offered in Windows.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/25/20170 comments

Growth of Azure once again was the center of attention following Microsoft's latest quarterly earnings report last week. But the company also gave a strong nod to continued expansion of its Office 365 business, buoyed by the news that Office 365 revenues for the first time surpassed sales of licenses of the traditional suite. Another important stat worth noting was that SharePoint Online usage nearly doubled last quarter over the same period last year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/24/20170 comments

Office 365 revenues were greater than licenses for perpetual software licenses during the last quarter, marking the first time that this has happened. Microsoft revealed that new milestone yesterday when it reported its quarterly earnings for the period ended June 30.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/21/20170 comments

Microsoft has created a new software-defined datacenter certification program for storage and hyper-converged systems running Windows Server 2016, which shares many of the same properties as Azure such as Storage Spaces Direct and software-defined networking (SDN). The new program is targeted at customers interested in some of the appliances coming in September from Dell EMC, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Lenovo that will allow enterprises and service providers to run some of Microsoft's public cloud technologies in their own datacenters.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/19/20170 comments

More than 500 people attended a panel discussion Wednesday to hear Microsoft officials explain the company's plans to become a leading provider of enterprise blockchain software and services. Microsoft is among a rising number of IT infrastructure providers and customers that believe blockchain, the distributed ledger technology that has helped enable Bitcoin and the mounting number of cryptocurrencies like it, is poised to disrupt almost every industry.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/14/20170 comments

More than two years after Microsoft revealed plans to offer its Azure Stack software to makers of hybrid cloud-based appliances, Azure Stack is now set for release this September. Azure Stack, which lets enterprises and service providers run their own mirror images of Microsoft's cloud platform in their own datacenters, is a strategic deliverable as the company looks to advance modern IT architectures including hybrid cloud, DevOps and serverless computing.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/12/20170 comments

Accenture has migrated nearly 75 percent of its 400,000 employees to Windows 10 and is on pace to complete the upgrade next year. It appears to be the largest known Windows 10 migration to date, Microsoft acknowledged this week.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/30/20170 comments

The massive Petya ransomware attack crippled companies and governments across the globe yesterday, putting many workers on the sidelines, thousands of whom were unable to access business-critical files. The attack is similar to last month's WannaCry ransomware attack, which exploited a flaw in Windows Server Message Block 1 (SMB 1). It affects those who didn't apply Microsoft's critical MS17-010 patch issued in March. WannaCry had a kill switch, but there's no known kill switch for the Petya ransomware (also called "NotPetya" by some researchers).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/28/20170 comments

Organizations that now use or are considering the Microsoft Teams chat tool offered with Office 365 business and enterprise subscriptions received both good and bad news last week. The good news is that Microsoft Teams can now integrate with third party cloud storage and file sharing services such as Box, Dropbox, Citrix ShareFile and Google Drive. The bad news is support for guest access that will allow external users to participate in Microsoft Teams groups will arrive later than expected. At the time Microsoft Teams was released in March, the company had targeted adding the guest access capability by the end of June.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/26/20170 comments

While Amazon's surprise deal last week to acquire Whole Foods for $13.7 billion is poised to upend the entire grocery and retail industry, as well as how suppliers distribute their goods, it also could impact which cloud services providers large retailers, distributors and goods suppliers use. Microsoft is in the middle of a battle that has already emerged in wake of last week's deal, where rivals are concerned about issues related to supply chain visibility and loath to enrich a fierce competitor attacking their margins.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/23/20170 comments

Lenovo has rebooted its entire datacenter portfolio with what it described as its largest and broadest rollout of new and refreshed hardware with the introduction of 26 new servers, storage and network gear and a new line of engineered appliances and hyper-converged systems. At a one-day event in New York City for hundreds of customers, analysts and press, Lenovo's top brass declared the company intends to extend its footprint in datacenters and become the leading supplier of high-performance and super-computing systems.

Posted on 06/21/20170 comments

Accenture today demonstrated a prototype of a technology it developed with Microsoft that can allow individuals to create digital identities based on the blockchain Ethereum protocol using biometric authentication. The prototype, demonstrated during the second ID2020 Summit at the United Nations, showed how an individual can create a digital identity on a blockchain tied to a biometric interface such as a fingerprint or facial recognition and maintain control.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/19/20170 comments

Microsoft this week unveiled plans to bring Windows Server into its semi-annual update release cycle, starting this fall, alongside a new Nano Server image configuration with a 50 percent reduced footprint. The company is stripping the infrastructure roles from Nano Server to optimize the headless configuration option for deployment of container-based environments. While Microsoft revealed the Nano Server changes during last month's Build conference in Seattle, along with other features coming to Windows Server including Linux container support and plans to offer the server OS into its new semi-annual cycle, the company on Thursday made its plans official and provided some additional details.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/15/20170 comments

Microsoft is giving a significant boost to its support for Cloud Foundry, the popular open source cloud platform for building and deploying cloud-based applications. The company announced yesterday it has joined the Cloud Foundry Foundation and is offering extended tools and integration between the popular PaaS architecture.

Cloud Foundry is quickly emerging as a DevOps platform of choice among enterprises looking to develop applications in any language and deploy in container images on any supported infrastructure. Conceived originally by SpringSource, which in 2009 was acquired by VMware, the Java-oriented Cloud Foundry project was later spun into Pivotal Labs. Pivotal contributed to the Cloud Foundry open source project, while offering its own commercial stack.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/14/20170 comments

Microsoft today is showcasing its aspiration to broaden the reach of analytics data and to bring new ways to integrate and visualize operational data. Kicking off the Microsoft Data Insights Summit in Seattle, Wash. today, the company announced the general availability of its new Power BI Premium offering, announced last month. Microsoft also revealed forthcoming capabilities to Power BI that it said will add more drill-down capabilities and more advanced ways of querying data using conversational input.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/12/20170 comments

Microsoft was among the numerous tech companies and leading businesses across all industries that spent the last few months with key officials in the Trump administration urging President Trump not to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. President Trump's decision last week to pull out last week was widely and sharply criticized by IT and business leaders, as well as elected officials at the federal, state and local levels.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/05/20170 comments

Microsoft is rebuilding its Skype client communications interface "from the ground up," and it's now available for those with Android phones and planned for iOS devices soon. Windows and Mac versions are slated for release over the next few months. Skype's new look is both cosmetic and functional as it offers a platform for intelligent bots that can let people use it to search for information, products and services.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/02/20170 comments

Microsoft is building on its Azure Site Recovery (ASR) service with a new disaster r ecovery option intended to ensure customers can restore Azure virtual machines running in its public cloud IaaS offering. The new service, released today as a technical preview, will let customers replicate IaaS-based applications in Azure to any different region of a customer's choice without having to deploy additional software or appliances to existing ASR subscriptions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/31/20170 comments

Former Secretary of State General Colin Powell is best known for his tenure as a one-time top diplomat and his role as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during Operation Desert Storm a quarter century ago. But he told an audience of several thousand IT pros yesterday that he's no luddite when it comes to enterprise technology and cybersecurity.

During a one-hour keynote address yesterday closing out this week's Citrix Synergy conference in Orlando Fla., Powell shared his IT credentials and his encounters with cybersecurity challenges over the years. Powell also emphasized the importance of strong leadership and the need to recognize the issues dealing with immigration and the diverse cultures, issues quite germane to any IT organization.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/26/20170 comments

Citrix Systems is developing a secure browser that it will host in the Microsoft cloud. The new Citrix Secure Browser Essentials, set for release by year's end, will allow IT organizations to present desktop images to users regardless if they run any of the company's VDI or app virtualization offerings.

Citrix's new secure browser, designed to isolate corporate desktop images and data from personal information and apps, is among a number of new wares Citrix revealed at this week's annual Synergy conference, taking place in Orlando, Fla. Citrix and Microsoft are working together to help deliver the new secure browser, which Citrix will make available in the Azure marketplace. The secure browser will offer a version of Citrix Receiver and a new analytics service and is the next step in the Microsoft and Citrix broad pact to build the Citrix Cloud on Microsoft Azure.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/24/20170 comments

When data protection provider Veeam last week held its annual gathering of customers and partners, the company outlined how the next release of its availability suite will offer near-real-time recovery, provide integration with a much wider range of storage hardware and use Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services for disaster recovery services. Veeam also said it will provide extended support for Office 365.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/22/20170 comments

Veeam this week explained how it plans to fulfill its goal of extending its popular virtual machine protection platform to offer near-real-time availability of mission-critical systems running in hybrid environments. The company outlined its ambitious plans, which center around the forthcoming Veeam Data Availability Platform 10.0, at its VeeamOn gathering of 3,000 customers and partners in New Orleans.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/19/20170 comments

VMware is bringing its new Horizon Cloud virtual app and desktop as a service to Microsoft Azure later this year. Microsoft Azure will represent the largest and only the second public cloud service available to date for Horizon Cloud customers.

By bringing Horizon Cloud to Azure, which VMware announced on Tuesday, customers will have another option for running managed apps and desktops in Microsoft's public cloud when it launches in the second half of this year. Rival Citrix Systems, which is set to have its annual Synergy technology conference in Orlando, Fla. next week, nearly a year ago launched a virtual client Windows-as-a-service offering hosted on Microsoft Azure as part of a broad partnership between those two companies.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/17/20170 comments

As the list of major apps joining the Windows Store continues to grow, albeit incrementally, Microsoft scored another coup this week announcing that the Apple iTunes music and app stores will be available by year's end.

Microsoft has struggled to get big names into the Windows Store but a number have jumped on board including Facebook and Spotify. In addition to iTunes, Microsoft announced that SAP's Digital Boardroom and the popular Autodesk Stingray 3D gaming and real-time rendering engine were being added to the Windows Store. Stingray isn't the first Autodesk modern app to join the Windows Store. Autodesk Sketchbook was added last year and Microsoft reported it's seeing 35 percent sales growth each month for the app this calendar year so far.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/12/20170 comments

Dell EMC is refreshing its compute storage and networking offerings with a broad portfolio of modernized infrastructure designed to underpin hybrid cloud datacenters of all sizes. At the core of the company's new lineup of datacenter offerings, outlined this week at Dell EMC World in Las Vegas, is an upgraded version of the flagship Dell EMC PowerEdge servers, the first developed by the newly merged company.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/10/20170 comments

When Microsoft introduced its Surface Laptop last week, the company boldly promised it would "reset" the mobile PC category. Besides some innovative mechanical engineering, an impressive high-resolution PixelSense display that renders 3.4 million pixels and a lightweight, thin form factor, company officials were especially proud of the battery life the Surface Laptop is poised to achieve: 14.5 hours when continuously running video.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/08/20170 comments

Today marks the two-year anniversary of Microsoft's first Ignite conference in Chicago where the company revealed plans to offer Azure Stack, the same software that runs its public cloud, and also unveiled the technical specifications allowing customers and service providers to run iterations of Azure in their own datacenters. While the company's vision for Azure Stack changed last year after the release of the first technical preview, Microsoft has signaled it will appear in the latter half of this year and there are now signs it will soon see the light of day.

Posted on 05/04/20170 comments

Microsoft wants to see Windows PCs, Office 365 and its forthcoming mixed reality wares in every classroom from kindergarten through high school and college. The company has taken the wraps off perhaps its broadest effort yet to accomplish that goal.

At an event in New York today, Microsoft unveiled Windows 10 S, a version of Office 365 optimized for educational environments and a new Surface Laptop that company officials said will exceed the capabilities of existing mobile PCs, Chromebooks and Apple MacBooks. The company also released a version of its Intune configuration and management service customized for educational environments.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/02/20170 comments

Microsoft this week showcased customers that are investing in the company's newest cloud-based offerings such as the Internet of Things (IoT) and machine learning using predictive analytics.

At an event held in New York called Microsoft's Digital Experience, the company showcased more than a dozen companies that have committed in some form to piloting or implementing a number of new wares aimed at either rapidly accelerating an existing process and/or enabling new revenue opportunities.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/28/20170 comments

Microsoft's announcement last week that it that it has combined the release cycles of Windows, Office 365 ProPlus and System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) should be welcome news to IT managers. Even better is the fact that Microsoft has designated that those releases will come out twice per year -- in March and September.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/26/20170 comments

Microsoft has unleashed numerous new offerings to build up its extensive suite of Internet of Things (IoT) technology. Looking to extend the reach of IoT for novices, the company is planning to release a new Microsoft IoT Central SaaS-based offering.

Unlike the rest of its IoT services and tools, Microsoft IoT Central is a managed SaaS solution for those that don't have experience working with and building automation and data gathering capabilities. Microsoft IoT Central aims to significantly accelerate the ability of those customers to deploy the variety of automation and data gathering capabilities using Windows 10 IoT Core and integrating them with existing applications and systems.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/24/20170 comments

Most organizations have either deployed their first hybrid cloud or intend to do so within the next 12 months. But many who plan to do so may not realize they already have a hybrid cloud, according to a new report published last week by Microsoft.

The Microsoft State of the Hybrid Cloud 2017 report revealed that 63 percent of mid- and large-size enterprises already have implemented a hybrid cloud. However, Microsoft discovered that of the 37 percent claiming they haven't yet implemented their first hybrid cloud (but intend to within the next 12 months), 48 percent already unknowingly have deployed one.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/20/20170 comments

Now that everyone has filed their tax returns, many may wonder where that money goes. A new effort spearheaded by former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer can now help. Ballmer has recently started talking about the new Web site, USAFacts.org, which is a massive database of information about federal, state and local government information presented just like the 10-K forms publicly traded companies must release.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/19/20170 comments

The results of what is believed to be the first independent survey to analyze the makeup of hybrid SharePoint environments are in and the findings reveal that nearly a third of organizations have SharePoint hybrid users, while nearly half (46 percent) still have deployments that are entirely on-premises and 22 percent use the SharePoint Online service offered via Office 365.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/17/20170 comments

McAfee is once again a freestanding provider of security software, following last week's completion of its divestiture from Intel, which was announced last fall. Private equity firm TPG acquired a majority 51 percent stake in the McAfee spinoff for $3.1 billion, though Intel has a strong vested interest in McAfee retaining 49 percent ownership. Now free from Intel's control, the new McAfee is no longer beholden to the interest of the chip provider, giving it a freer hand to compete with the likes of IBM, Symantec, Sophos and Trend Micro, among others.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/14/20170 comments

PC shipments have increased for the first time in five years, according to the latest quarterly report issued by market researcher IDC. The first quarter IDC PC Device Tracker report from IDC, which also showed HP regaining the top position from Lenovo, showed that the 60.3 million units shipped worldwide during the period represented a year-over-year growth of 0.6 percent.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/12/20170 comments

As Microsoft gets set to roll out the next major release of Windows 10, the company is also priming the pump for developers to take advantage of the latest new features coming to the OS -- 3D, mixed reality, improved natural language interaction with Cortana, enhanced inking capabilities and support for the new Surface Dial -- with this week's release of a new SDK.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/07/20170 comments

A Microsoft Store might not be the first place one might look for an Android phone but the company's retail locations are taking orders for the new Samsung Galaxy S8, launched last week.

Even as Microsoft stores already sell other competitive devices, such as the Facebook Oculus virtual reality headsets, and the company itself now supports Apple's iOS and Android in numerous ways, the idea of it now selling an Android phone -- and one from the largest supplier -- is somewhat striking.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/03/20170 comments

Pam Edstrom, who many say played a key role in shaping the image of Microsoft and its cofounder Bill Gates, passed away last week at the age of 71 following a four-month battle with cancer.

Microsoft hired Edstrom in 1982 as its first director of public relations where she crafted the company's communications strategy, which many believe helped bring visibility to what was then an obscure startup. Two years later, she joined Melissa Waggener Zorkin, who, at the time, had a boutique PR agency. The two later formed Waggener Edstrom, now known as WE Communications.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/03/20170 comments

Looking to protect sites running in its public cloud from malicious attacks, Microsoft this week released its new Web Application Firewall (WAF) option for its Azure Application Gateway and HTTP load-balancing service.

Microsoft said its new centralized WAF service, announced last fall at Microsoft's Ignite conference, will protect Web apps running with the Azure Application Gateway from common exploits such as SQL injections and cross-site scripting attacks.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/31/20170 comments

Among the slew of improvements to Microsoft's Skype for Business and Cloud PBX offering announced at this week's annual Enterprise Connect conference in Orlando, Fla., one that stood out was Polycom's new RealConnect, which will allow Office 365 users with Skype for Business to add Cisco devices to meetings.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/29/20170 comments

Microsoft's Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) service has come a long way over the past year with added integration and new capabilities as organizations grapple with what role it will play. If Microsoft has its way, EMS, bundled with Office 365 and Windows 10 will ensure customers won't choose third-party data tools to secure access to data, apps and cloud services and for authentication and policy management. But despite Microsoft's declaration that EMS is the most "seamless" enterprise information protection offering, the company is also showing a pragmatic view with the recent release of the Intune APIs, and partnerships with those who have rival solutions from VMware, SailPoint and Ping Identity, among others.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/27/20170 comments

Google has accused Symantec of improperly issuing 30,000 Extended Validation (EV) certificates and will immediately start distrusting them in its widely used Chrome browser.

The move, a stinging indictment against the giant Certificate Authority (CA) and security provider, means SSL/TLS-based certs issued by Symantec will be invalidated. Users who visit affected HTTPS Web sites will receive warnings that a site's cert isn't valid but will still have access if they choose to ignore the warning. It could force Web site operators to move to other CAs. Symantec is disputingGoogle's charge that the certs were improperly validated.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/24/20170 comments

Looking to make Outlook the center of the digital workspace, Harmon.ie has launched a new tool which brings together commonly used business apps and services into one place that gathers information from disparate apps and cloud services using AI and machine learning to apply context to a given task. Harmon.ie, which claims its namesake Outlook plugin is used in 1,200 organizations as a common interface to interact with information stored in SharePoint and Office 365 files, has widened its scope by supporting additional tools such as Yammer, IBM Connections, ZenDesk and Salesforce.com's Chatter and CRM offerings.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/22/20170 comments

Microsoft is expected to share what's next for SharePoint during an event scheduled for May 16 and it should come as no surprise the announcements involve further integration with Office 365, OneDrive, Yammer, Windows, PowerApps, Flow and the new Microsoft Teams chat service.

Corporate VP Jeff Teper, who oversees SharePoint and Office 365, is scheduled to lead the virtual event, joined by Corporate VPs James Phillips and Chuck Friedman, who will explain how Office 365, connected with Windows and Azure, "is reinventing productivity for you, your teams and your organization," according to the invite posted by Microsoft. In addition to introducing new products, the company at this point has only indicated that attendees will "learn how to create a connected workplace." Vague as that is, the teaser is consistent with Microsoft's focus on bringing a more social and connected user experience with SharePoint and Office 365.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/22/20170 comments

VMware has extended Windows 10 endpoint management and security options offered in its Workspace One platform, the company's new digital workspace platform released last year that brought together the company's AirWatch mobile device management (MDM) tooling and Horizon application delivery offerings.

The upgrade, released this week, is the first major update to Workspace One. In addition to adding new Windows 10 security and management controls to its AirWatch 9.1 MDM offering, which the company describes as unified endpoint management (UEM), the update also adds new support for Android devices, real-time threat detection and an advance rules engine for devices used in specific vertical industries and ruggedized computers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/17/20170 comments

While SharePoint Server now lends itself well toward hybrid deployments with Office 365, it's unclear to what extent organizations are doing so. A research project underway hopes to measure how many organizations are actively pursuing hybrid SharePoint deployments, what's motivating them or holding them back.

Graduate students at the Marriott School of Management at Brigham Young University and Christian Buckley's CollabTalk are conducting the research, which is sponsored by Microsoft, a number of ISVs and several media partners including Redmond magazine. The research includes an online survey of SharePoint and Office 365 customers and MVPs, and customer interviews with contribution from outside research firms.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/16/20170 comments

Okta, one of the largest identity-as-a-service (IDaaS) providers, is finally going public. The company, rumored for years to have its eyes on an initial public offering (IPO), this week registered plans with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to offer Class A common stock to be traded on the Nasdaq market.

The move is the latest sign that the company is undeterred by claims from Microsoft that organizations no longer need third-party IDaaS offerings (such as the Okta Identity Cloud) if they use Azure Active Directory Premium and the rest of its Enterprise Mobility and Security (EMS) services. Despite such claims, Okta and its customers point to the larger array of integrations offered with its cloud-based SSO service. Okta says it now offers 5,000 connectors to legacy and software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/15/20170 comments

It's the 30th anniversary of Microsoft's initial public offering. Since the company went public on March 13, 1986, the company's stock has grown 89,000%, though the vast majority of that was on Cofounder Bill Gates' watch.

Reporting on the anniversary was CNBC's Josh Lipton, who noted an investment of $1,000 at the time of the IPO would now be worth $900,000, presuming you held on to the shares. "Not a bad gain for those early employees," Lipton said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/13/20170 comments

It's a good thing Outlook.com isn't my main e-mail account. Otherwise it would have been a long month. That's how long I was locked out of my Outlook.com account. Strangely, I had no problem accessing Microsoft and Office 365 accounts, which are all tied to the same credentials as Outlook.com.

Though I've had an Outlook.com account for years, I rarely use it and never give it out since I have a personal e-mail domain and use Yahoo and Gmail as backup accounts. But given the recent upgrades to the service and its ability to synchronize schedules and contacts, I decided to check it out to consider my options. But when I merely tried to access Outloom.com while already logged into my personal Microsoft Office 365 account, I was redirected to a page which read: "Sorry Something Went Wrong." Trying directly from Outlook.com didn't work either. After trying with a different browser, then via another computer and finally with an iPad, I presumed Outlook.com was experiencing an outage. Since it wasn't critical I tried the next day but still was unable to access my Outlook.com account.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/10/20170 comments

Cybersecurity experts are mourning the loss of Howard Schmidt, the nation's first cybersecurity czar, who died last week at the age of 67 after a long battle with brain cancer. Schmidt, who served two U.S. presidents, was a onetime chief security officer (CSO) at Microsoft and played a key role in shaping the company's Trustworthy Computing initiative.

Schmidt was recruited from Microsoft by President George W. Bush in April of 2002 in wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks where he served as vice chairman of the President's Critical infrastructure Protection Board. President Barack Obama later tapped Schmidt as the nation's first cybersecurity czar -- his actual title was Special Assistant to the President, Cyber Security Coordinator.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/06/20170 comments

Looking to bolster the container-based software it has helped standardize, Docker has launched a new enterprise edition with the goal of helping DevOps teams build, deploy and manage business-critical applications that it said can run in production at scale across various infrastructure and cloud services.

The new Docker Enterprise Edition (EE), announced today, is what the company calls its open and modular container platform for building and maintaining cloud-scale applications that are portable across the operating systems and cloud services. The new Windows Server 2016, released last fall, includes the Docker runtime engine free of charge. In addition to Windows and Hyper-V, Docker is certified to run on with a wide array of Linux distributions, VMware's hypervisor platforms and cloud services including Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud Platform.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/02/20170 comments

Microsoft today has released the third and final technical preview of its Azure Stack, the software that will be offered on integrated appliances letting enterprises and hosting providers run Redmond's public cloud platform in their own datacenters. The company also revealed it will offer consumption-based pricing for Azure Stack.

Signaling it's on target to become generally available this summer, the new Azure Stack TP3 comes nearly eight months after the company released the second preview and more than a year since releasing the first test release. While the company has shifted course a number of times, most notably last summer, Microsoft says it has firmed up its roadmap for Azure Stack and with the release of TP3 is promising more continuous refreshes right through its release this summer.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/01/20170 comments

The premium ad-free version of Microsoft's Outlook.com e-mail service that offers personal addresses that can be shared by five people is now generally available. Outlook.com Premium will once again test the appetite among users to pay for personal e-mail services they've received for free for decades, if they ever paid for them at all. The new Outlook.com Premium service, which costs $49.99 per year, is available at a promotional rate of $19.95 until March 31.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/27/20170 comments

Amazon's entry last week into the crowded universal communications fray with the launch of its Chime service could pose a challenge to the likes of Microsoft's Skype for Business, Google Voice and a swath of fast-growing players such as Twilio, Bandwidth and Bluejeans, among numerous others. However, a quick look at the initial service suggests it has no obvious technical advantage over its rivals, hence it's not immediately likely to attract enterprises that use VoIP and UC offerings from Cisco, Avaya or Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/24/20170 comments

Veritas is migrating its Enterprise Vault.cloud data archiving service from its own managed datacenters to Microsoft Azure. The move to outsource EV.cloud is part of a global multiyear partnership announced today by Veritas to optimize its portfolio of data protection offerings for hybrid cloud environments using the public Microsoft Azure cloud storage as backup and archive targets.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/22/20170 comments

An overwhelming number of organizations appear to lack mature best practices when it comes to addressing identity and access management to their systems, making them more vulnerable to breaches, according to 203 IT decision makers surveyed by Forrester Consulting.

Results of the survey, commissioned by IAM provider Centrify, were shared this week at the RSA Conference in San Francisco. Centrify CEO Tom Kemp shared the findings Monday during the Cloud Security Alliance event. A report based on the survey's findings determined that the least mature organizations experienced twice the number of breaches as the most mature ones.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/17/20170 comments

Microsoft President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith's call for a "Digital Geneva Convention" convention would seek to forge ties with international governments and the tech sector committed to nonproliferation of cyberweapons and toward making "the Internet a safer place" with the goal of putting an end to nation-state attacks. Smith proposed the neutral organization, comparable with the International Atomic Energy Agency focused on non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, during his Tuesday RSA Conference keynote address.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/15/20170 comments

Microsoft has tapped Cisco Systems as the fourth partner to offer the forthcoming Azure Stack cloud platform. Cisco will offer Azure Stack in its UCS converged server and network appliance, which Microsoft today said both companies will engineer.

The datacenter and networking giant was conspicuously absent from the list of Azure Stack partners when Dell, HPE and Lenovo were first announced by Microsoft to offer the software on their respective systems. Microsoft is co-engineering the Azure Stack solutions on the respective three players converged systems as well.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/10/20170 comments

Microsoft's Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) service is getting a facelift. A unified EMS console will roll out in the coming months to customers with Microsoft's cloud-based platform for enrolling, configuring and securing devices and services including Office 365.

The upgrade comes as Microsoft is making an aggressive push to accelerate growth of its combined enterprise mobile device management and identity management-as-a-service offerings, announced less than three years ago, as a bundle of Intune for device configuration and management, Azure Active Directory Premium and Azure Information Protection (aka Azure Rights Management).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/10/20170 comments

VMware is upgrading its Horizon virtual digital workspace portfolio to make desktop-as-service (DaaS) more viable over low-bandwidth networks and for those requiring high performance. The company said it is implementing new protocols and deployment options including several different hyperconverged appliances and support for IBM's SoftLayer Cloud.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/08/20170 comments

Slack last week showed it's not about to let Microsoft walk away with the market for chat-based workgroup collaboration without a strong fight. Addressing some of the weakness in Slack, which has emerged as a widely popular service for creating ad-hoc workgroups based on its chat interface, the company announced its new Slack Enterprise Grid.

The move comes amid the pending release of Microsoft Teams this quarter, which will create a formidable challenge to Slack's namesake chat service. Slack Grid aims to counter some of the objections by IT and compliance managers to the company's current offering. Slack Grid answers those limitations by letting administrators control permissions and configure integrations on a per-workspace basis, the company highlighted in a blog post announcing the new release.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/06/20170 comments

Microsoft President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith today said that the company has formally requested that the U.S. government grant an exception from the travel ban enacted by President Donald Trump to its employees with nonimmigrant visas who live and work in this country. The president's executive order, enacted late last week, temporarily bans entry into the U.S. from seven countries: Syria, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Yemen and Sudan.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/02/20170 comments

Looking to chip away at Microsoft's growth in Office 365 subscriptions, Google this week added new enterprise, management and security features to its rival G Suite. Google will roll out the upgraded features this month to organizations with G Suite Enterprise edition licenses.

Google's G Suite remains the most direct alternative to Office 365, given that the search giant offers a complete and comparable alternative platform comprising of productivity, collaboration, messaging and voice communication services.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/01/20170 comments

President Donald Trump's stunning executive order late Friday temporarily banning visitors with visas from seven countries entry into the United States has hit home for several prominent tech leaders, including Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, an immigrant from Hyderabad, India. The global turmoil created by the immigration ban is predictably taking a huge toll on the technology community, which employs many immigrants.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/30/20170 comments

Cisco Systems this week made an offer to AppDynamics it couldn't refuse. Cisco's $3.7 billion deal to acquire AppDynamics, the leading supplier of application performance monitoring (APM) software, came just days before AppDynamics planned to go public.

Cisco reportedly paid more than twice the amount what AppDynamics was aiming to fetch at the time of its IPO, which was scheduled for Wednesday, leading some to shake their heads at the premium the networking giant was willing to pay. With this deal, Cisco is also acquiring AppDynamics for a whopping 20 times its earnings. AppDynamics recorded revenues of $158 million during the first nine months of its fiscal year 2016, according to the company's prospectus. While that pointed to more than a $200 million year for AppDynamics, the company's year-over-year growth during the nine-month period was 54%. Despite the premium paid, Cisco executives reminded Wall Street that it has a good track record for capitalizing on its big deals.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/27/20170 comments

In a sign that Microsoft wants to utilize the technical chops of talent it has brought in with last month's acquisition of LinkedIn, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has named Kevin Scott to the newly created position of chief technology officer (CTO). Scott, who was the senior vice president of engineering at LinkedIn, joins Nadella's senior leadership team. He will be in charge of driving company initiatives. It's a dual promotion for Scott, who will continue at LinkedIn in a stepped-up role as senior VP of infrastructure.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/24/20170 comments

After acquiring four companies over the past several years to extend beyond its core specialty of PC patch management, LANDesk has combined with Heat Software and the two companies effective today are now called Ivanti.

Heat Software is a SaaS-based provider of IT service management (ITSM) and endpoint configuration and control tools that are part of private equity firm Clearlake Capital's portfolio of companies, which earlier this month agreed to acquire LANDesk from Thomas Bravo. Terms weren't disclosed, through The Wall Street Journal reported the deal is valued at more than $1.1 billion.

Posted on 01/23/20170 comments

As many retailers are reporting declining in-store growth as consumers continue to conduct more of their shopping online, Microsoft last week emphasized how a growing number of its retail customers are deploying IoT-based sensors to capture data that can help improve operations and sales in stores.

The company was among almost every major IT player showcasing technology with that very same focus at last week's annual National Retail Federation (NRF) show, held in New York. At this year's gathering, there was a greater focus on the use of helping lift sales and control inventory by using beacons to deliver data that can give retailers the ability to replenish inventory more rapidly without overstocking, while also delivering promotional messages to customers on their phones based on their proximity to certain products.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/20/20170 comments

Microsoft has set its sights on retail as an industry that could benefit from Blockchain technology. The company hosted a demo at its booth during this week's annual National Retail Federation (NRF) show in New York that aims to help retailers streamline their supply chain operations by creating smart contracts based on Blockchain.

A solution developed by Microsoft partner Mojix, best known for its RFID hardware and data analytics software, lets retailers automate their supply chains to enable smart contracts, making the delivery of goods more reliable with less overhead, according to officials at both companies. While RFID, which uses RF signals to track the whereabouts of high-value inventory and pallets, has gained major inroads among certain segments of the retail industry, notably apparel, retailers that have adopted it still lack holistic visibility and control over their entire supply chains.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/18/20170 comments

Microsoft is taking another key step to move forward to advance artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning with its agreement to acquire Maluuba, a Montreal startup that promises to squash the limitations of search and AI. Maluuba, founded in 2011, has some of the most advanced deep learning and natural language research and datasets in the world, according to Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/13/20170 comments

In its latest effort to extend its AirWatch platform beyond core mobile device management (MDM), VMware today said it has tapped Adaptiva to integrate its OneSite peer-to-peer software distribution tool with its new AirWatch Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) offering.

Adaptiva's OneSite is a popular option among large enterprises with Microsoft's System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) for distributing OS and software images with thousands of client endpoints. OneSite's appeal is its efficient form of software distribution via content delivery networks (CDNs) using peer-to-peer distribution across end user endpoints, rather than a server-based approach. Designed specifically to bring this software distribution capability to SCCM, the pact with VMware, its first with the company, will extend OneSite's use, while also offering an important option to organizations with the new AirWatch UEM.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/11/20170 comments

Following on last year's plan to deliver new virtual desktops and application-as-a-service offering on Microsoft's Azure public cloud, Citrix today released its Windows 10 desktop-as-service VDI offering that will run on Microsoft Azure. Citrix also said its apps-as-a-service offering, poised to replace Microsoft's Azure RemoteApp, will arrive this quarter.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/09/20170 comments

Posted on 01/08/20170 comments

Looking to create a new way for digital content creators to interact with Microsoft's forthcoming Windows 10 Creators Update, Dell took the wraps off a novel desktop device with a next-generation display that promises to create more immersive user experiences. The new Dell Canvas debuted at this week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas and effectively merges display and input into a single device.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/06/20170 comments

Drivers of Volvo's newest 90 Series of cars will be able to initiate and participate in calls and conferences using Microsoft's Skype for Business. Volvo is displaying the new in-dash Skype for Business feature at this week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES), taking place this week in Las Vegas.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/04/20170 comments

After reportedly flirting with acquiring Slack -- the chat-based collaboration service is popular with millennial workers -- for $8.5 billion, Microsoft decided to build rather than buy. The result was Microsoft Teams, which the company unveiled last month, and will be added to Office 365 Business and Enterprise subscriptions early next year. Apparently, not taking the competition lightly, Slack ran a full-page ad in The New York Times on Nov. 2, the day of the launch, with a lengthy letter to Microsoft warning the company that chat-based collaboration is more complicated than it looks. The move was borrowed from the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who infamously ran the Welcome IBM, Seriously ad in 1981 when Big Blue unveiled its first PC.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/15/20160 comments

Deciding on which vendors' security tools to implement is a complex process, especially as threat and attack vectors frequently change, along with the environment itself (new infrastructure, apps and devices) that IT pros need to protect. But an even bigger challenge for IT professionals is finding skilled security experts.

A survey conducted by Intel Security's McAfee Center for Strategic and International Studies released last summer pointed to a global shortage of skilled cybersecurity professionals. The report gave a grim assessment of the current availability of those with security expertise across all disciplines. "The cybersecurity workforce shortfall remains a critical vulnerability for companies and nations," the report's introduction warned. "Conventional education and policies can't meet demand. New solutions are needed to build the cybersecurity workforce necessary in a networked world."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/14/20160 comments

Intel Security's True Key password manager can now work with Windows Hello, enabling multifactor authentication using biometrics.

The integration of both authentication capabilities comes nearly two years after Intel Security introduced True Key at the January 2015 Consumer Electronics Show. At the time, Intel Security saw it as a better alternative to Windows Hello, a feature delivered in Windows 10 six months later.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/12/20160 comments

Microsoft for the first time will require certificate authorities to institute minimum requirements for how digital certificates tied to Windows-based executables and scripts are verified. The move is being made in hopes of making it much more difficult to distribute malware. The new requirements apply to code signing, the process of applying digital signatures to executables and scripts to verify an author's identity and validate that the code hasn't changed and isn't malicious. Following two years of discussions, the Certificate Authority Security Council (CASC), a group that includes the top seven CAs, this week said they have agreed on the code-signing requirements for Windows-based systems.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/09/20160 comments

Rapid changes in technology and businesses finding they must become more agile if they want to survive means IT pros and developers need to calibrate their skills accordingly. That was the call-to-action by David Foote, founder and chief analyst at Foote Partners, who gave the opening keynote at the annual Live! 360 conference, taking place this week in Orlando, Fla.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/07/20160 comments

The European Union's approval of Microsoft's $26.2 billion acquisition of LinkedIn clears the final regulatory holdup, allowing the deal to close in the coming days.

If there was any potential for Microsoft to miss its target of closing its $26.2 billion acquisition of LinkedIn, announced in June, the European Union yesterday put that to rest by approving the deal, which is now set to close in the coming days.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/07/20160 comments

Box last week continued to show it can grow it's cloud-based file sharing and collaboration enterprise business despite competition from Microsoft and Google, among other players, by posting more than $100 million in revenues in a quarter. Despite competing with Microsoft's OneDrive file share for SharePoint and Office 365, Box CEO and Cofounder Aaron Levie believes his company's partnership with Redmond is beneficial.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/05/20160 comments

Amazon executives this week left no stone unturned with an extensive barrage of new deliverables covering a wide gamut of services -- many that will define its next generation of cloud services. This week's annual springboard of new offerings ranges from added instance types to services aimed at addressing the next wave of IT, which, for many business and technology planners rests on undergoing digital transformation efforts.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/02/20160 comments

One of the most important new products from Microsoft this year was the release of SharePoint Server 2016. In addition to coming closer into sync with Office 365, it's the best-suited version of SharePoint to run as an instance in an infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) cloud. Dan Usher, lead associate with Booz Allen Hamilton, believes Microsoft Azure is the most logical IaaS for SharePoint, though he said customers can certainly run it in cloud infrastructure environment that meets their needs and budgets.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/30/20160 comments

Love is a two-way street. Microsoft has shown considerable affection for Linux over the past two years and by some measure consummated its marriage to open source by joining the Linux Foundation. However, this news overshadowed the fact that Google has joined the .NET Foundation's Technical Steering Committee.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/28/20160 comments

Microsoft is hoping to finalize its acquisition of professional social networking giant LinkedIn by year's end. But it still has a key hurdle to meet -- gaining approval from European Union regulators. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, which was unable to outbid Microsoft's successful offer to acquire LinkedIn for $26.2 billion, is trying to convince the EU it shouldn't approve the deal, arguing it will stifle competition.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/17/20160 comments

If you have considered treating yourself or someone else to a new PC, next weekend's Black Friday and Cyber Monday might be the best opportunity yet to do it. Microsoft today revealed on its Windows blog that it will offer some attractive deals for some of its Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book models, and pointed to some notable markdowns for PCs from third-party OEMs from a number of retailers. As far as I can recall, this year's lineup of holiday discounts may be the best Microsoft has ever offered during the traditional holiday buying season.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/14/20160 comments

Whether you're pleased or shocked by the stunning upset Donald Trump notched last night, his election as the 45th president raises questions on how his administration will try to change Internet policy and address the wide number of cybersecurity issues facing businesses and end users.

If some of his remarks about cybersecurity, encryption and Internet regulation including net-neutrality during his 17-month campaign are any indication, there are reasons to believe big changes are in store. One big question is whether he will press for higher restrictions on encryption and the government's overall approach to encryption.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/09/20160 comments

Researchers at Microsoft achieved what they say is a breakthrough in speech recognition claiming they've developed a system that's as effective or better than people with professional transcription skills. The software's word error rate (WER) is down to 5.9 percent -- an improvement from the WER of 6.9 the team reported in September. The milestone was enabled with the new Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit, the software that enables those speech recognition advances (as well as image recognition and search relevance). Microsoft announced both developments two weeks ago, though the timing wasn't the best as IBM was holding its huge World of Watson event in Las Vegas.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/07/20160 comments

The launch of Microsoft Teams this week is an important building block in Microsoft's focus on digital transformation and ensuring a new generation of workers gravitate to Office 365. It's critical because many millennials hate e-mail, are more accustomed to using chat and likely use other productivity suites such as Google Apps.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/04/20160 comments

After mulling an acquisition of popular enterprise chat platform Slack for $8.5 billion earlier this year, Microsoft decided to build its own. The company today revealed Microsoft Teams, hoping it will emerge as the hub for user experience across Office 365 and third-party apps and services.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/02/20160 comments

Microsoft officials appeared to be fuming this week over Google's disclosure Monday of a 0-day vulnerability just days after alerting the company. The company said yesterday a patch will be available next week and said Google should have waited. Google defended its decision to disclose the vulnerability, saying it's a serious flaw that has been actively exploited.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/02/20160 comments

Having spent the past year rationalizing its mammoth $67 billion acquisition of EMC, the newly combined company this month hit the ground running. During the Dell EMC World Conference two weeks ago in Austin, Texas, Michael Dell and the senior executive team of the new Dell EMC outlined a laundry list of deliverables that will bring together the two organizations' respective technologies.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/31/20160 comments

The damage from last week's distributed denial-of-service attack suggests it was the most powerful to date and it could be a precursor to an even more sustained attack. A bipartisan committee of senators formed over the summer wants answers, but some critics want the government to act more swiftly. The incident also puts a spotlight on the vulnerability of Internet of Things-based components, ranging from sensors on gas meters to IP-connected webcams and thermostats. There are currently 6.4 billion IoT-connected devices in use and that figure is expected to grow to 20 billion by the year 2020, according to Gartner's most recent forecast.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/28/20160 comments

Microsoft today gave a new vision for the future of Windows, taking the OS into the realm of content and information creation and sharing.

Coming next spring, Microsoft said it will release the new Windows 10 Creators Update with support for 3D and virtual reality. Microsoft also took the wraps off new hardware designed to bring the best of the new Windows capabilities entering the high-end desktop all-in-one market with its 28-inch Surface Studio and updated Surface Books with twice the graphics processing power of the current top-end system and 30 percent more battery life.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/26/20160 comments

It was only a matter of time before hackers would find a way to unleash a massive distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack by taking advantage of millions of unprotected endpoints on Internet-connected sensors and components on consumer devices such as webcams, according to security experts. Friday's botnet attack on Dyn, a major DNS provider based in Manchester, N.H., was what Chief Strategy Officer Kyle York described as what will likely to be remembered "as an historic attack," which intermittently took down sites such as PayPal, Twitter, Netflix and Amazon. It also impacted business-critical service providers including cloud-based authentication provider Okta and various providers of electronic medical record systems.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/24/20160 comments

Microsoft tried to acquire Facebook in its early years for $24 billion, former CEO Steve Ballmer today told CNBC. The fact that he tried to buy Facebook nearly a decade ago is hardly a shocking revelation, given his appetite at the time to make Microsoft more relevant to consumers at the time. Ballmer's comment, though, appears to be the first public acknowledgment of the company's interest in sealing such a deal.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/21/20160 comments

Dell will deliver a new platform that combines its existing endpoint security offerings with those from its newly acquired EMC and its RSA and VMware AirWatch business. The new endpoint security and management portfolio is the first major new offering resulting from Dell's $67 billion acquisition of EMC, which closed six weeks ago, representing the largest-ever merger of two IT infrastructure providers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/19/20160 comments

When you think of Lenovo, ThinkPads, Yogas and servers may come to mind -- but not digital workspace technology. The company is hoping to change that view over the next few years as Lenovo aims to extend its software and cloud solutions portfolio.

Lenovo last week announced its new Unified Workspace Cloud, a managed service based on its on-premises Unified Workspace technology. Similar to the on-premises Workspace Cloud, a platform that it has offered since its acquisition of Stoneware four years ago, Unified Workspace Cloud is HTML5 based and uses RDP to access applications in a consistent manor on any PC or mobile device. Sal Patalano, Lenovo Software's chief revenue officer, in an interview said that unlike the digital workspace offerings Citrix and VMware have recently rolled out, that its Unified Workspace offering doesn't require an agent or plugins. "The big thing is being able to do it via browser. We don't deal with any desktop agents," Patalano said, adding it also doesn't require VPN connections. "The ability to negotiate and get into my corporate environment without having to deal with a VPN logon is huge."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/17/20160 comments

The release of Windows Server 2016 this week is a major upgrade to Microsoft's venerable server OS thanks to a number of significant new features. But it could be argued that the most distinct new capabilility is its support for containers. That's important because with containers, Windows Server 2016 will be able to run applications and workloads not built to run on Windows, notably Linux, but also those designed to run in cloud environments.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/14/20160 comments

I'm thrilled to share that David Foote, chief analyst with Foote Partners and a prominent expert in IT skills, certification and salary benchmarks, will be the keynote speaker at this year's Live! 360 conference, where he'll reveal some important trends and pay data and discuss the importance of choosing a set of IT skills amid digital transformation efforts that are taking priority in a growing number of organizations.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/11/20160 comments

Amazon Web Services and Microsoft have each brought native IPv6 connectivity to their respective cloud services as the need for the new addresses continues to rise amid new software that requires them and a limited pool of those based on those on the original IPv4.

AWS first added IPv6 to its S3 storage offering back in August and last week extended it to other services. Microsoft announced that Azure now supports native IPv6 addresses at last month's Ignite conference in Atlanta, though the move was overshadowed by the news that the company had quietly upgrade all of its network nodes with field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), providing 25Gbps throughput, a substantial boost. Internet service and cloud providers have been under pressure for years to upgrade their networks to support IPv6 and now fueling demand are compliance requirements and a proliferation of new devices.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/10/20160 comments

Artificial Intelligence is the hottest term in IT these days as players of all sizes talk up their latest AI projects. Google this week strutted its latest advances in AI by launching Google Home, a device similar to the Amazon Echo, that taps the Google search engine and has its own personal assistant. The company also jumped back into the smartphone market with its new Pixel. The slick new Android phone is the company's first with the personal assistant built in. Google's latest AI-based wares come on the heels of last week's Ignite Conference in Atlanta where Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella talked up how the company has deployed field-programmable gate arrays in every node of its Azure cloud to enable it to process the tasks of a super computer, accelerating its machine-learning, AI and Intelligent Bots framework.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/07/20160 comments

Update 10/10: An earlier version of this report stated that a third technical preview will have multi-node support. While there will likely be a TP3 prior to Azure Stack's general release, Microsoft said it won't have multi-node support. Also the statements were inadvertently attributed to Corey Sanders, who we met with at Ignite, but it was Mike Schutz, general manager of Microsoft's Cloud and Enterprise division, who explained the future Azure Stack preview plans.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/03/20160 comments

Thousands of IT pros and developers have now had their chance to see what the first Azure Stack systems might look like when the Microsoft public cloud platform is made available for datacenters and hosting facilities next summer.

Dell, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Lenovo each had prototypes spec'd for Azure Stack on display at last week's Microsoft Ignite conference in Atlanta, where the company also announced it has released the second technical preview of the software.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/03/20160 comments

Microsoft this week made the interesting revelation that it has quietly upgraded every node in its Azure public cloud with software-defined network (SDN) infrastructure, developed using field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs).

Described as a massive global SDN upgrade, it means that the Microsoft Azure public cloud fabric is now built on a 25 gigabit-per-second backbone -- up from 10Gbps -- with a 10x reduction in latency, which Microsoft believes translates to Azure having the highest speed network among cloud services. Combined with new GPU nodes, recently made available in the Azure Portal, Microsoft also clams its cloud can function as the world's fastest supercomputer, capable of running artificial intelligence, cognitive computing and even neuro networking-based applications.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/28/20160 comments

Microsoft kicked off its annual Ignite conference for IT pros and developers by announcing that Adobe's software-as-a-service offerings will run primarily in the Azure public cloud. Adobe President and CEO Shantanu Narayen joined Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella on stage in opening moments of the kickoff keynote session of Ignite, taking place all week in Atlanta.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/26/20160 comments

Surface Pro 3 users may have to wait indefinitely for a fix to a problem with the devices that appear to have even worse battery life than they had before a patch was released nearly a month ago, Microsoft is now indicating.

In a Microsoft forum post yesterday, a company official and moderator going by the name of "Greg" claimed that the Aug. 29 patch is not the cause of the degraded performance in its Surface Pro 3 systems and said the battery drain issue is only affecting "a limited number" of users. Yet that conflicts with the view of some users. "I am not understanding [Microsoft's] stance that the update did not cause the issues we are having," Jeremy Bronson stated in the forum. "Thousands of people did the updates and now have the problem."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/23/20160 comments

As Microsoft looks to bring its public cloud into to the datacenters of customers and other hosting providers with the forthcoming release of Azure Stack, its predecessor is still a viable solution for some organizations. The IT decision makers at The Henry Ford, a nonprofit museum complex situated on a 250-acre campus with a broad collection of historical items spanning 300 years, last year decided to use the Windows Azure Pack (WAP) to drive a new private cloud as part of an effort to modernize and digitize a massive collection of objects to make them more accessible to visitors -- both at its Dearborn, Mich. facility in kiosks and online.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/21/20160 comments

Oracle isn't the first company that comes to mind when asked who are the largest cloud infrastructure service providers, but apparently Founder and CTO Larry Ellison plans to change that. In his traditional keynote address to open up the annual Oracle OpenWorld conference, Ellison kicked of this year's gathering with a "cloud-first" focus that will apply to everything from its flagship database server, middleware and applications. He also made a brazen claim that Oracle will mount a challenge against Amazon Web Services (AWS) for cloud dominance.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/19/20160 comments

Microsoft Azure will finally become a native storage target for users of Backup Exec and NetBackup, which are among the most widely used data protection and DR software offerings. Veritas, the maker of the two backup and recovery suites, this week announced Azure as a target planned for new releases scheduled for next quarter. Moreover, Veritas said it will offer usage-based pricing in addition to the current subscription and perpetual licenses now offered with both Backup Exec and NetBackup.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/16/20160 comments

The IT security software landscape has changed quite a bit since Intel acquired McAfee Software back in 2011 for $7.7 billion. After rumors that Intel was considering exiting the security software business surfaced earlier this year, the company this week pulled the trigger, agreeing to sell a controlling 51% stake to private equity firm TPG for $3.1 billion in cash while retaining 49% in the new company (which will bring back the original McAfee name).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/09/20160 comments

Nearly a year after announcing the IT industry's largest acquisition to date, Dell Technologies today finalized its $67 billion acquisition of EMC, which includes a controlling stake in VMware and a portfolio of other business units including RSA Security, SecureWorks, Virtustream and Pivotal. The deal officially closed this morning after last week's regulatory approval in China cleared the final hurdle and paving the way for the formation of most expansive supplier of datacenter infrastructure.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/07/20160 comments

VMware believes it can lower the cost of deploying, configuring, managing and securing Windows 10 PCs by up to 30 percent with its new "modern" Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) approach with some key advances outlined at this week's VMworld conference, taking place in Las Vegas.

The new UEM approach outlined by VMware aims to further position the company as the "Switzerland" of endpoint and mobile device lifecycle management, in the worlds of Sanjay Poonen, executive general manager and VM of VMware's End-User Computing business, speaking in the keynote session yesterday, which he elaborated on in a meeting with press and analysts.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/31/20160 comments

VMware has developed new SaaS-based tools that will enable organizations to bridge applications and workloads across multiple private clouds including Amazon Web Services EC2 and S3, Microsoft Azure, IBM SoftLayer and the Google Cloud Platform. The company's new VMware Cross-Cloud services provide deployment, security and management of applications that can be shared across multiple clouds.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/29/20160 comments

Veeam Software sowed its oats by providing an easy way for VMware shops to back up their virtual machines. But now it appears Microsoft is playing a new role in the company's plan to extend the types of workloads it can protect.

Moving beyond the VM, Veeam is now looking to protect hybrid cloud infrastructure, physical servers and Office 365 Exchange Online. At a launch event in Boston this week and broadcast online, Veeam outlined an extensive pipeline of new wares that will appear in the coming quarters that promise to extend the range of IT assets its offerings can backup and restore.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/26/20160 comments

Microsoft's new open source czar, Wim Coekaerts, made his public debut at this week's LinuxCon in Toronto, where he gave a keynote address. Coekaerts, who spearheaded Oracle's Linux efforts, joined Microsoft in April as corporate VP for open source.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/24/20160 comments

Microsoft is giving Cortana, the company's AI-based personal digital assistant, a boost with the addition of Genee, a startup Microsoft today said it has agreed to acquire for an undisclosed amount. Genee, which launched just two years ago, lets users schedule meetings with individuals or groups by speaking to it.

The addition of Genee builds on Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella's plan to bring "conversations-as-a-service" to the mainstream as the next UI and framework for how applications are used and connected -- a strategy he outlined in late March at the company's annual Build developers conference. Enabling that is the Microsoft Bot Framework and the Cortana Intelligence Suite. Genee is a meeting and scheduling service that connects with all major e-mail and calendaring apps including Outlook, Gmail, Apple's iCloud and chatbot services offered by Facebook, Twitter and Skype, as well as all SMS-based services.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/22/20160 comments

Microsoft today announced that PowerShell has entered the open source community and versions for both Linux and Mac are now available.

The long-awaited move, which promises to broaden the use of Microsoft's popular command-line shell and scripting language that lets IT pros build task-based scripts to provide more automation to the Windows operating system, is consistent with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella's embrace of the open source community two years ago when he proclaimed "Microsoft Loves Linux."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/18/20160 comments

Rackspace last week said its new managed security service for the Microsoft Azure public cloud should be generally available next month. The Rackspace Managed Security service, announced nearly a year ago, is targeted at organizations that can't justify or don't want to operate their own security operations centers and want to turn over the management to another provider.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/17/20160 comments

Some early testers of the Azure Stack Technical Preview were angered last month by Microsoft's decision to say the software will only be offered on integrated systems provided by Dell, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Lenovo. Some say that the move will put the new offering out of their reach. Reading between the lines, it appears quite a few testers of Azure Stack's first technical preview weren't deploying the software properly.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/15/20160 comments

Microsoft today announced it will shut down the Azure RemoteApp service. The service launched two years ago as an online alternative to remote desktop Windows application services and the company's applications virtualization (AppV) technology. Microsoft will shift its efforts on helping Citrix build and roll out its new cloud-based iteration of its XenApp platform.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/12/20160 comments

Microsoft researchers have discovered a way to let parties share encrypted data using the cloud to transact secure trades of data, while giving users of the information exchanged complete control over specific datasets actually shared.

Using a cloud-based exchange and a concept the researchers call "secure multiparty computation," owners of data can encrypt and store it online with the ability to process and share pieces of information among specific parties earmarked specific to them. This is done without compromising the security and privacy of other information of the larger dataset, according to Ran Gilad-Bachrach, a researcher in Microsoft's Cryptography Research and coauthor of a paper published in June.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/10/20160 comments

When Microsoft announced that it has agreed to acquire $26.2 billion back in June, it raised a lot of eyebrows. The huge price tag was triple the amount it paid for Skype back in 2011, then Microsoft's largest acquisition. The jury is still out on that one but Microsoft's two other megadeals -- Nokia's handset business for $7.2 billion three years ago and aQuantive for $6.3 billion in 2007 -- were busts, and overall Microsoft's reputation for monetizing large acquisitions is poor.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/08/20160 comments

SharePoint is widely deployed among organizations. But getting employees and specific groups to use it as their enterprise content and document management system remains a challenge, according to AIIM's Impact of SharePoint 2016 report.

AIIM, the large nonprofit and influential trade association covering the enterprise and information technology markets, released the findings of its latest SharePoint report this week. Based on a survey of 274 AIIM members in June, the report found that SharePoint use has increased incrementally, but more than half (58 percent) said SharePoint remains a challenge. The key problem is that 43 percent said employees or groups have their own preferred file-sharing applications for everyday usage, according to the report.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/05/20160 comments

Migrating PCs to Windows 10 is the top end user computing priority of VMware customers, according to the results of a survey published yesterday. Yet another survey by systems management software supplier Adaptiva found more than three quarters see no urgency to upgrade, with 64 percent saying they'll upgrade within the next year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/03/20160 comments

Windows 10 users can now upgrade to Microsoft's widely anticipated release of its "anniversary update". It's the first major upgrade to Windows 10 since its release a year ago and the equivalent of a first service pack, though with a notable number of new features.

In a post announcing the release, corporate VP for the Windows and devices group Michael Fortin noted users don't need to do anything in order to get it as the company is pushing the update out automatically through the Windows Update process. Those that want to get it right away can go into the settings and manually request the update, presuming they have administrative rights to do so.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/02/20160 comments

Tomorrow's release of the Windows 10 Anniversary Update will give the operating system improved biometric log on capabilities via its Windows Hello feature but it will mean goodbye to Passport, the component of that enabled authentication. The demise of Passport is a change in name only, Microsoft said in late June. It won't be the first time Microsoft has cast aside the Passport brand, which was once the name of the single sign-on service also formerly known as Live ID (and now called the Microsoft Account).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/01/20160 comments

Unless you have spent the last year in a cave, it should come as little surprise that the deadline to receive Microsoft's free Windows 10 upgrade expires this Friday. If you're one of those who files your tax returns on April 15 at the stroke of midnight and have a similar strategy for upgrading your Windows PC, the deadline is similar. You have all day on July 29 in your time zone to upgrade until 11:59. So will there be a last-minute rush by the procrastinators? Perhaps, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/27/20160 comments

Gridstore, a company that has made a name for itself over the past few years in the rapidly growing market of hyperconverged systems with an emphasis in Microsoft Hyper-V environments, is casting a wider net with the acquisition of DCHQ, a supplier of container-based orchestration tools. The newly combined company will now call itself HyperGrid, offering what it claims is the first hyperconverged computing as a service. The so-called HCIaaS consists of its hardware, public cloud services and container-based development, orchestration, deployment and management environment integrated and delivered with consumption-based pricing.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/25/20160 comments

Microsoft is planning to put its new SharePoint Framework in the spotlight at the company's Ignite conference, scheduled for the last week of September in Atlanta. In addition to the likely release of at least some of the "Feature Packs" recently announced for the server edition and its revamped JavaScript-based SharePoint UI, Microsoft will hold more than 60 technical sessions centered around new and forthcoming features at Ignite focused on its flagship collaboration platform as well as Office 365, both of which will share this same framework.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/22/20160 comments

The Nano Server edition of Windows Server 2016 will only be available to customers with Microsoft's Software Assurance plan, offered with certain volume license agreements. Organizations will have to opt for the Software Assurance requirement to use Nano Server, which also must follow the Current Branch for Business update cycle.

While Microsoft revealed the Software Assurance requirement last week, it may have slipped under the radar for some because it was the subtext of the company's announcement that Windows Server 2016 and System Center will be available this fall.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/20/20160 comments

Microsoft will likely fall short of its prediction that Windows 10 will be running on 1 billion devices by mid-2018. Terry Myerson, executive VP of Microsoft's Windows and Clients group, delivered that bold forecast a year ago at the Build 2015 conference, just three months before releasing Windows 10.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/18/20160 comments

A federal appeals court today overturned a lower court ruling ordering Microsoft to turn over the contents of e-mails stored in an offshore datacenter. The decision is a major victory for Microsoft and all major cloud and data services providers seeking to ensure user data is protected under the laws of the countries where information is stored.

The closely watched case centered around Microsoft's refusal to comply with a search warrant by U.S. law enforcement demanding that it turn over the contents of specific e-mails residing in its Dublin, Ireland datacenter in connection with a criminal investigation. While Microsoft did turn over the data in its U.S. datacenters, the company argued that complying with the search warrant's demand to provde the e-mails was beyond the scope of U.S. law. Despite support from Apple, AT&T, Cisco and Verizon, along with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York upheld the search warrant issued nearly two years ago. Microsoft subsequently filed the appeal last year arguing privacy laws superseded the court's ruling. "This case is about how we best protect privacy, ensure that governments keep people safe and respect national sovereignty while preserving the global nature of the Internet," Microsoft President and Chief Legal Officer Brad Smith stated at the time.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/14/20160 comments

The release of Pokémon Go last week has gone viral at an opportune time for Microsoft. The new mobile game for smartphones, which is suddenly introducing augmented reality to the masses, arrived a few days before Microsoft's annual Worldwide Partner Conference kicked off where the company is showcasing its HoloLens headsets. Microsoft released a developer edition consisting of the headset and software at the Build developer conference in late March and now the company is looking to spread interest in augmented reality based on Windows among its 20,000 partners gathered this week.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/12/20160 comments

Last year, when GE launched its Predix cloud aimed at letting its industrial customers and supply chain partners build, deploy and run industry-specific applications, the company chose Amazon Web Services' compute, storage and other services.

That's not a leap of faith, considering AWS operates the most widely used cloud services. GE has since ported it to other clouds and today announced Predix will also run on Microsoft Azure.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/11/20160 comments

In the latest ambitious move by Microsoft, the company is bringing together its respective Dynamics CRM and ERP suites together into a new software-as-a-service offering called Dynamics 365. The new service, slated to arrive this fall, will offer what Microsoft is describing as "deep integration" with Microsoft's Office 365 suite.

It's perhaps the most aggressive salvo Microsoft has taken yet to try to challenge Salesforce.com in the market for SaaS-based customer relationship, HR and business process automation applications other than reportedly trying to acquire the company last year. Microsoft's move also takes aim at Oracle, SAP and ServiceNow, among others. In a company blog post announcing the new service, Takeshi Numoto, Microsoft's corporate VP for cloud and enterprise, described Dynamics 365 and a suite of tools called AppSource as a move toward offering more modern and intelligent business apps.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/06/20160 comments

Ink this on your calendar -- Microsoft will release its Windows 10 Anniversary Edition on Aug. 2, the company announced today. Microsoft is also looking to motivate customers to take advantage of the free upgrade offer, which expires in one month today with several promotional incentives including $300 off for students purchasing a Surface and Xbox One at Microsoft Stores, a free TV when buying Dell PCs priced at more than $699 and $150 off various HP systems and $100 discounts on certain ASUS and Samsung devices.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/29/20160 comments

When Microsoft and Red Hat late last year inked what they described as their most extensive joint development partnership to date, it covered a broad cross section of interoperability initiatives. The two companies this week are demonstrating the fruits of those efforts at the annual Red Hat Summit, taking place in San Francisco.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/29/20160 comments

Salesforce.com today released a connector that will give Office users dynamic and customizable access to their CRM data in their Outlook inbox. The new Lightning Connector is a key deliverable based on a partnership Salesforce.com and Microsoft inked two years ago.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/28/20160 comments

Fears that the unexpected decision by British voters to withdraw from the European Union is continuing to roil financial markets stoked by fears that the referendum will lead to a global recession. While it throws the value of the pound and Euro into flux, Britain's withdrawal from the EU will have a more far-reaching ripple effect on industries including IT that either reside or do business in there.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/27/20160 comments

Microsoft has ratcheted up its effort over the past year to build out a framework based on blockchain and to participate in helping build a standards-based ecosystem. Many experts believe blockchain will transform how payments and transactions are made and it's poised to create a trusted, self-sovereign, user-managed identity framework.

Blockchain, the distributed ledger technology enabled by smart contracts that underlies bitcoin cryptocurrency transactions, has existed for a while. But over the past year, it has advanced to the point where every major supplier of IT is building blockchain-based tools and scores of major banks and financial services firms that participate in trading networks are involved in pilots. Microsoft started talking about its potential late last year and has made aggressive moves ever since, which is why it is the cover story for the July issue of Redmond magazine.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/24/20160 comments

The Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) has finally certified Amazon Web Services and Microsoft's respective public cloud services with the highest level of compliance clearance. CSRA, a provider that offers IT services specifically to government agencies, also reached the long-awaited FedRAMP Joint Authorization Board (JAB) Provisional Authority to Operate (P-ATO) clearance.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/23/20160 comments

The new SharePoint Mobile app for iOS is now available and it represents an important milestone in Microsoft's effort to bring the corporate intranet and collaboration to users' phones. Given how many people use their phones more than their PCs for routine purposes, bringing the capabilities that have made SharePoint Sites so widely used over the past decade is critical if Microsoft wants SharePoint to remain relevant as people shift the way they search and access information.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/22/20160 comments

In its bid to appeal to more business users, Dropbox today has added a number of new features to its popular online file storage and sharing service, giving it more functionality for iOS-based devices and offering improved document management and sharing from Windows PCs and Macs.

Dropbox users can now create Office documents from their iPhones and iPads as well as use them to scan documents. All Dropbox users can now insert comments into PDFs, documents and images, a feature that was limited to those with premium accounts and they can now view version histories, among other new features.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/22/20160 comments

Microsoft Azure CTO Mark Russinovich appeared on stage today at the annual DockerCon conference in Seattle where he demonstrated the new Docker Datacenter (DDC) hybrid cloud development and management platform with nodes connected to the Azure public cloud as well as with the company's forthcoming Azure Stack hybrid cloud environment. Also running on the Azure Stack node was the first-ever public demonstration of SQL Server for Linux.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/21/20160 comments

Four years ago Dell won a protracted bidding war to acquire Quest Software, which has a wide portfolio of systems management and migration tools, primarily for Microsoft-based environments including Active Directory, SharePoint and Windows. Now Dell is casting aside Quest, along with SonicWall, a supplier of e-mail and content management security appliances.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/20/20160 comments

VMware this week fleshed out its app and device management portfolio with a new management suite that adds endpoint security, threat detection and Windows 10 image and OS migration. The company also revealed new identity management features to its forthcoming Workspace One digital workspace platform including multifactor authentication and Active Directory integration.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/17/20160 comments

Nutanix has become the third hardware company to ink a pact with Microsoft to deliver the hybrid iteration of its Azure Cloud Platform System (CPS). Until now, only Dell and Hewlett Packard Enterprise have offered CPS. Nutanix today announced a partnership with Microsoft to offer the CPS Standard edition. The Nutanix CPS, which will offer Microsoft Azure-consistent environments, will be available next month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/17/20160 comments

Looking to revive its struggling IT security business hampered by miscues and a tapped out market for its flagship endpoint security offering, Symantec Monday said it has reached an agreement to acquire Blue Coat, a provider of Web analytics, threat assessment and remediation software and services, for $4.6 billion. Blue Coat CEO Greg Clark will take the helm at Symantec once the deal closes. As part of the deal, Blue Coat majority shareholder Bain Capital will reinvest $750 million in the combined company and Silver Lake Partners is doubling its investment to $1 billion.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/15/20160 comments

Microsoft's announcement today that it is acquiring LinkedIn had many observers scratching their heads wondering how the company can justify shelling out $26.2 billion to bring the second largest social network into the fold. Executives at both companies now have to sell the deal to customers, partners and investors and convince them that the move will bring enough revenue and profit growth to justify the huge outlay in what will be Microsoft's largest acquisition to date.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/13/20160 comments

In a bold and stunning move, Microsoft today announced it is acquiring the professional social network LinkedIn for $26.2 billion in cash and debt. Presuming the deal goes through, it will be by far the largest acquisition Microsoft has made in its 41-year history, adding a roster of 433 million registered users, of which 105 million unique visitors access their accounts at least once a month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/13/20160 comments

Findings from a study conducted by three Microsoft researchers that analyzed the retroactive searches of people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer showed patterns that may help connect certain symptoms not associated with the disease in order to come to a diagnoses sooner.

Using anonymized data from Bing's Web search logs, the three researchers were able to associate those who diagnosed with pancreatic cancer to look for common queries prior to discovering they had the deadly disease. Pancreatic cancer is among the deadliest forms of the disease because it is fast spreading and symptoms rarely appear before very late stages.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/10/20160 comments

While the big news for Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop customers is the company's plans to offer Microsoft Azure as a back-end service for its virtual application and VDI offerings, updated releases of both offerings are also coming this month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/06/20160 comments

Every so often, someone reveals a major advance in keeping datacenter infrastructure cool -- the key to gaining efficiencies in running some of the largest deployments of server clusters. Dell, with major help from Intel, says it has found a breakthrough approach to using liquid-based cooling. Revealed yesterday, Dell said eBay will be the first to deploy this new hyper-converged system as a proof of concept.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/03/20160 comments

While Microsoft was the primary technology sponsor of last month's ID2020 Summit at the United Nations, about 100 other tech providers, ranging from consultants to startups and other large companies, had a presence as well. Less than two weeks following the May 20 event at the U.N., Microsoft indicated it was a fruitful gathering.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/01/20160 comments

Citrix and Microsoft have worked closely together for 25 years. At one point in the late 1990s, Microsoft even bailed Citrix out with a cash infusion and investment that kept the company going. While Citrix has carved its own niche in desktop virtualization ever since and the two companies have worked closely together, now they have extended their partnership in a new and potentially meaningful way.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/26/20160 comments

Leading and emerging technology providers, human rights activists and U.N. ambassadors from around the world gathered Friday for the inaugural ID2020 Summit to kick off a major and non-trivial effort of developing a technical, organizational and political framework that would ultimately ensure everyone in the world has a trusted digital identity. It's a significant undertaking considering 1.5 billion people, 20 percent of the world's population, don't have any form of identity today, subjecting them to exploitation, human trafficking and depriving them of any rights because they have no provable or traceable form of identification.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/25/20160 comments

Google last week put a new horse in the race of "bots," the technology that aims to bring virtual assistants to every computer, tablet, phone and embedded device. The search giant demonstrated its new virtual assistant at its annual IO developer conference at its Mountain View, Calif. headquarters.

It's hardly a surprise that Google wants to offer bot technology, given the massive amount of data it gathers from individual searches and the company's well-known machine learning technology. The new Google Assistant is hardware that will interface with Google Home designed to respond to voice commands. Conceptually it's similar to Amazon's Echo device, which is hardware that responds to voice commands. I have an Echo, which does some interesting things such as provide weather forecasts and, of course, lets me order merchandise from the online retailer. But at this point, it doesn't take much to ask it something it can't answer, although presumably that'll change over time.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/23/20160 comments

OneDrive for Business is evolving as the common denominator for all things SharePoint and Office 365. But as that becomes a common repository for data, migrating files and protecting them can be cumbersome. Companies such as AvePoint, EMC, Harmon.ie and Metalogix, say they can make it easier.

In concert with this month's release of SharePoint Server 2016 and Microsoft's new roadmap for the collaboration platform on-premises version and for Office 365, these companies are among those that are offering new tools to build upon what Microsoft offers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/20/20160 comments

Microsoft and SAP have inked a broad partnership that integrates some key offerings including Azure and Office 365 with the SAP HANA data platform. The pact, which includes ties with other products from both companies, was the big headline at the 28th Annual SAP Sapphire NOW user conference, which kicked off Tuesday in Orlando, Fla.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/18/20160 comments

Microsoft has released a number of test builds for the new Windows 10 Anniversary Edition since announcing its pending arrival this summer. The latest Windows 10 Insider Preview Build, released last week, gives testers a look at a number of enhancements and bug fixes. But the primary emphasis is on the management of extensions to the Edge Web browser. In addition to introducing several new extensions, users must now access all of them from the Windows Store rather than finding them in folders.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/16/20160 comments

It appears the partnership Microsoft and Red Had formed late last year is paying dividends. The release this week of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (6.8), which includes a variety of systems management and security improvements, offers cleaner ties with Active Directory.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/13/20160 comments

Long live SharePoint Server.

Given Microsoft's relentless focus on Office 365 and the online version of SharePoint in recent years, those vested in the future of the traditional on-premises offering often wondered if the newest server release was set to be the last major upgrade. Those rumors persisted for years. Microsoft last week put that issue to rest, at least for now that SharePoint Server 2016 won't be the last on-premises version.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/11/20160 comments

Microsoft last week released the preview of the PowerShell Module for its Azure Machine Learning (ML) service. The Azure ML PowerShell cmdlets library, available on GitHub, lets users interact with Azure ML workspaces, experiments, Web services and endpoints.

The .NET-based PowerShell DLL module will let users fully manage their Azure ML workspaces, according to a blog post by Microsoft Principal Program Manager Hai Ning. The module includes the entire source code, which Ning said has a cleanly separated C# API layer.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/09/20160 comments

The SharePoint and Office 365 community now have plenty to chew on now that Microsoft has articulated the future of its collaboration software and service. It's no surprise that Microsoft wants as much collaboration as possible to take place in the cloud via Office 365 and SharePoint Online but the company reassured the SharePoint Server community that this wasn't the last on-premises version. Clearly absent from any emphasis was Yammer, the enterprise social networking feature Microsoft acquired four years ago, which remains a silo in the Office 365 service.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/06/20160 comments

Google and Fiat-Chrysler in the coming months will jointly develop and manufacture 100 driverless cars. The search giant's driverless car technology will be added to 100 Chrysler Pacifica minivans for the 2017 model year. However, if you were looking to buy one, Chrysler parent FCA Group said they're not for sale -- the companies are building the vehicles for test purposes only.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/04/20160 comments

Microsoft said it is departing from past practice of contributing money to fund the Republican National Convention, to take place in Cleveland this summer. However, it will offer both parties the use of Azure, Office 365 and Surfaces at their respective nominating events. The company, which said it will also sponsor host committee activities taking place during the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, made its decision back in the fall and revealed the plan on Friday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/02/20160 comments

It was clearly a week Apple CEO Tim Cook, anyone on his team and those with an interest in the company's fortunes would like to forget. Though the first quarter wasn't kind to other key IT players, notably Google, IBM and Microsoft, Apple was beset with fallout from a disappointing quarter, continued grief from the FBI and even an employee suicide on its main campus in Cupertino, Calif.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/29/20160 comments

It's no secret the biggest obstacle for some organizations to consider moving their e-mail from Exchange Server on premises to Microsoft's Office 365 is security and the ability for organizations to meet compliance requirements. Microsoft's answer is the auditing features that come with Office 365.

Among the auditing capabilities offered with Exchange Online are the abilities by administrators to enable logging for user mailboxes using remote PowerShell, view records from the Exchange admin audit log and from user mailbox audit logs. IT can also run admin role group audit reports to see which users where added or removed from role groups, according to a Microsoft TechNet post, along with searching the Office 365 Security and Compliance Center.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/27/20160 comments

Microsoft is among 25 partners to join Dell's effort to create an Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem, launched last week. Dell, which unveiled its first IoT gateway nearly a year ago, has lined up a variety of players ranging from key IT players such as SAP and Software AG, as well as those that provide industrial automation wares and services including INEX Advisors, Kepware, OSIsoft and PTC.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/25/20160 comments

The embrace and extend philosophy that made Windows the standard for business computing is shifting to Office 365. That doesn't mean that philosophy is moving away from Windows but as developers shift to modern, cloud-scale applications and it's no longer a one-platform world, the jury is still out on where the Universal Windows Platform will fit in the next era of computing, though it appears it will surely have a place.

Posted on 04/22/20160 comments

Intel yesterday dropped the gauntlet showing it has abandoned hope of a sustained revival of the traditional PC business that put it on the map with its restructuring that will eliminate 11 percent of its workforce, totaling 12,000 employees.

In a letter to employees yesterday, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich said the company's primary growth is coming from providing datacenter, cloud, memory and Internet of Things. Those businesses provided $2.2 billion in revenue growth last year and accounted for 40 percent of the company's revenue. It also was the basis of the bulk of Intel's profit, Krzanich said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/20/20160 comments

Microsoft Founder Bill Gates said he's on board with the company's move last week to sue the U.S. Department of Justice seeking to restrict the number of court orders to turn over e-mails and documents residing in its datacenters. At issue is the vast number of those warrants that include gag orders, meaning customers are in the dark when they're under investigation, a violation of First and Fourth Amendment rights, according to Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/20/20160 comments

Microsoft's lawsuit yesterday against the U.S. Department of Justice sets the stage for a new showdown that could have major implications on the future of data privacy in the cloud era.

The numbers Microsoft revealed in its suit, filed yesterday in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, were alarming. Over the past 18 months, the government has filed 5,624 demands for information residing in a Microsoft cloud datacenter and has put gag orders on nearly half, 2,576 of those requests, meaning the company couldn't alert customers that their data was accessed. And in 68 percent of those cases, there's no end date for the order, the company claimed.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/15/20160 comments

Experts say administrators should apply an important security patch (MS16-047: Security update for SAM and LSAD remote protocols) released by Microsoft ASAP to repair a vulnerability that could let an attacker intercept network communication between Linux and Unix clients and servers running the open source Samba file and print services connected to Active Directory. Despite the advice, some are scrutinizing the alarm level over the bug, which has the ominous name Badlock.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/14/20160 comments

Facebook and Microsoft may exist in opposite ends of the IT industry spectrum but their worlds continue to come closer together. In addition to operating among the largest cloud infrastructures in the world, the two companies have overlapping efforts to change the way people communicate, collaborate and share information. Over a period of two weeks both companies have become the latest to step up their focus on bringing artificial intelligence delivered by bots to the mainstream.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/14/20160 comments

When Microsoft launched Power BI for Office 365 two years ago, the goal was to bring business intelligence to the mainstream. Microsoft last month claimed it has 5 million Power BI subscribers and now the company is reaching for more.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/08/20160 comments

Office 365 wasn't the main attraction at last week's annual Build Conference in San Francisco but Microsoft gave its popular productivity platform and cloud service reasonable airtime showcasing new capabilities that IT pros and developers alike should welcome

During Thursday's general session, Qi Lu, executive vice president of Microsoft's Applications and Services Group outlined a number of new capabilities for Office 365, which he said is now used by 60 million commercial subscribers with an installed base of 340 million mobile downloads.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/04/20160 comments

Microsoft's HoloLens virtual reality glasses have come down to earth -- literally. Making his first public appearance since spending nearly a year in space, Captain Scott Kelly today described his use of HoloLens with his NASA colleagues, representing one of several select pilot users of the company's Windows 10-based wearable computing device that renders 3D holograms.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/04/20160 comments

Microsoft executive VP for cloud and enterprise Scott Guthrie kicked of the second day of the company's Build conference for developers by announcing it will offer the Xamarin tooling for cross-platform free of charge. Xamarin offers popular tooling for developing mobile apps based on the .NET Framework and C# language. Guthrie said Xamarin, which Microsoft last month agreed to acquire, will be available free of charge to all Visual Studio developers including those using the company's free Visual Studio Community edition.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/31/20160 comments

Microsoft has already signaled it has ambitions to make Cortana and its machine learning-based engine more useful and today CEO Satya Nadella articulated a grand vision for the company to make "conversational computing" using artificial intelligence and machine learning pervasive.

In the opening session of Microsoft's Build Conference in San Francisco, Nadella described how Microsoft will enable AI-based conversational computing in everything from Windows, its Edge browser, Outlook, Skype and even the entire ecosystem of software, hardware and cloud-based SaaS offerings. Nadella sees conversational computing using speech as the next UI and framework for how all applications are developed and connected.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/30/20160 comments

Rumors that Microsoft has met with private equity investors interested in acquiring Yahoo and is weighing the possibility of offering significant financing to help them succeed in their efforts has many tech watchers feeling a sense of déjà vu. No evidence has surfaced that Microsoft actually wants to take a second shot at acquiring Yahoo itself but the whispers that surfaced late last week, suggest it may be a major player in the uncertain future brings back memories of the two companies' storied past.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/28/20160 comments

Docker has developed software that will allow Windows 10 and Apple machine users to use its native container platform as a packaged native application. The company yesterday announced the beta of Docker for Mac and Windows. Right now Docker is only offering it as a "limited" beta with GA planned for later in the year.

The new Docker for Mac and Docker for Windows are expected to offer a faster and more reliable native experience without requiring VirtualBox VM extensions. The improvements are the result of work between Docker, Apple and Microsoft engineers to provide the OS integration and allow for host- native hypervisor support, specifically Apple Hypervisor and Microsoft's Hyper-V.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/25/20160 comments

Citrix Systems today released its new Secure Browser service, a subscription-based offering that lets IT organizations deliver SaaS and custom Web apps to employees without requiring them to make any changes to their browsers such as installing plugins.

In addition to removing compatibility issues among different browser types and versions to ensure apps perform and present properly, the company said Secure Browser lets organizations lock down SaaS offerings such as Office 365 and Google Apps for Work, as well as the suite of business Web apps from Salesforce.com, Workday and Concur, among others.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/24/20160 comments

Many IT pros who have benefitted from the rise and growth of the Intel microprocessor that fueled the WinTel-based PC industry owe a portion of their careers to Andy Grove, who died last night at the age of 79. Although the cause is not immediately known, Grove, who survived prostate cancer in the 1990s, had suffered from Parkinson's disease in recent years and had contributed to finding a cure to both diseases.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/22/20160 comments

Apple today rolled out a smaller version of the iPad Pro that, for all intent and purposes, is an upgraded iPad Air with some noteworthy features that the company claims makes it a worthy alternative to Windows PCs. The new iPad Pro was among a number of new offerings Apple launched at an event held in San Francisco including a new upgraded version of its four-inch phone called the iPhone SE that'll have a notably lower price of $399, a new entry level Apple Watch priced at $299 and some new software including a new release of iOS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/21/20160 comments

While restoration of ties between the U.S. and Cuba became official last year, President Barack Obama's historic visit this week to the country and with President Raul Castro aims to seal relations and remove a longstanding trade embargo.

The opening of relations promises to vastly modernize information technology in a country where citizens have limited cellular and Internet connectivity. The few who have phones or computers have old technology and only 5 percent are said to have access to wireless data and the Internet. ABC News this morning aired an interview with Obama, who indicated that the Cuban government has reached an agreement with Google to expand broadband and Wi-Fi access in Cuba, as noted by Reuters. "Google has a deal to start setting up more Wi-Fi and broadband access on the island," Obama said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/21/20160 comments

When Microsoft pulled the trigger and agreed to acquire Xamarin, it hardly came as a surprise to those familiar with the company. Xamarin's tools let developers build and test their mobile applications to run on multiple platforms without rewriting them from scratch. They offer a framework for building apps in the C# programming language for not only Windows but other platforms such as Android and iOS. The Xamarin tooling has become popular with developers who have preferences for Windows as well as those focused on building applications for other platforms.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/18/20160 comments

IT systems management provider ManageEngine this week released a new tool that provides single sign-on access to software-as-a-service (SaaS) apps including Google Apps and Office 365. The company's new ADSelfService Plus offers password management and allows for the provisioning of single logon access to apps using Active Directory credentials.

The company said ADSelfService Plus lets organizations automate the process of basic password and credential management. It includes a Web-based portal that lets employees automatically reset their passwords and it issues reminders when the passwords expire. The self-service function aims to remove those tasks from IT help desks. The new tool also can synchronize passwords across platforms and provides search capability.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/18/20160 comments

Microsoft in recent years has tried to play nice with competitors, making it all the more surprising when it took a perceived potshot this week at one rival apparently encroaching too close to its turf. Okta, which offers single sign-on and device management tools that have emerged as a threat to Azure Active Directory, was notified by Microsoft this week that its request to sponsor and exhibit at this fall's Ignite show was denied due to competitive conflict.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/16/20160 comments

LANDesk, a software provider long known for its patch management and endpoint security tools, this week said it has agreed to acquire AppSense for an undisclosed amount. AppSense gives LANDesk desktop virtualization management tools, filling an important hole in its portfolio.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/16/20160 comments

Google today said it has configured its identity and access single sign-on tool to work with some unlikely partners' SaaS offerings, notably Facebook and Microsoft. The company's new SAML 2.0-based Google Identity offering released in October can now provide single sign-on access to Office 365 as well as Facebook at Work through the use of Google Apps credentials.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/14/20160 comments

Today marks the 10th anniversary of Amazon Web Services' (AWS) Simple Storage Service (S3) and the company is marking the occasion by noting some key milestones. In many ways, the launch of S3 on March 14, 2006 signaled the beginning of the cloud era.

Few IT professionals were aware at the time of the shift in computing that was about to take place. As Amazon saw it, storage and compute should have no limits in terms of capacity and scalability, and it should be accessible at much lower costs. "Amazon S3 is based on the idea that quality Internet-based storage should be taken for granted," Andy Jassy, AWS vice president, said at the time in the press release announcing S3's general availability. In the decade since its launch, Amazon claims S3 hosts trillions of objects and, at peaks, processes millions of requests per second.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/14/20160 comments

The U.S. Department of Justice has taken the gloves off, accusing Apple -- and the slew of tech companies including Microsoft that supported Apple -- of hypocrisy for refusing to comply with a court order that it help the FBI unlock the iPhone used by a suspected terrorist in December's San Bernardino, Calif. shootings that killed 14 people.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/11/20160 comments

The number of large enterprises that have moved to cloud e-mail is still relatively small, though growing, according to a recent Gartner survey, which found that 80 percent who do move are going with Office 365. However, the survey showed that smaller shops are evenly split between Google Apps for Work and Microsoft's Office 365.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/09/20160 comments

Both Google and Microsoft know data leakage is a big concern among organizations considering the move to cloud-based e-mail and collaboration and both companies are now touting the data loss prevention (DLP) in their respective offerings.

Microsoft stepped up its support for protecting against data leakage last fall when it announced the rollout of DLP for both OneDrive for Business and SharePoint Online. For its part, while Google doesn't support DLP in Google Drive yet, the company said it is planning on offering it later this year. But Google last week said it has added new DLP capabilities for Gmail shops that use Google Apps Unlimited, which the company describes as the premium version of its Google Apps for Work offering.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/08/20160 comments

Cisco Systems last week jumped into the market for hyper-converged infrastructure and software-defined store, which is emerging as a popular new way to deploy software-defined compute, storage and networking with shared policy management and automation. The company made the move at the annual Cisco Partner Summit, where it also launched new Nexus switches and said it will acquire CliQr, which provides orchestration tools to manage multiple cloud environments.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/07/20160 comments

The sender of the first e-mail between two different computers, Raymond Tomlinson, died over the weekend. Tomlinson famously chose the "@" sign followed by a computer hostname appended to a user name as the syntax for how messages should connect with one another.

"It is with great sadness we acknowledge the passing of our colleague and friend, Ray Tomlinson, read a Raytheon statement. "A true technology pioneer, Ray was the man who brought us e-mail in the early days of networked computers. His work changed the way the world communicates and yet, for all his accomplishments, he remained humble, kind and generous with his time and talents. He will be missed by one and all."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/07/20160 comments

Apple's refusal to help the FBI unlock an iPhone used by the suspected terrorist involved in December's mass shooting deaths of 14 people in San Bernardino, Calif., predictably took the spotlight at this week's annual RSA Conference in San Francisco.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/04/20160 comments

Microsoft is now letting developers order its new HoloLens and related software, representing an important step toward bringing its "mixed-reality" glasses to market.

The HoloLens Development Edition, consisting of the glasses and software APIs, will ship March 30. The release of the kits is Microsoft's first and critical step toward letting developers build applications for HoloLens, which the company unveiled over a year ago and has touted ever since, but has also kept at arms' length.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/29/20160 comments

Intel is rolling out multifactor authentication (MFA) technology that will work in any new PC equipped with its 6th Generation Core processors, code-named "Skylake." Tom Garrison, VP and general manager of Intel's Business Client Products, recently outlined new MFA technology called Intel Authenticate. Garrison announced Intel Authenticate, which is available in preview now, during a late January press conference. Following the press conference Garrison fielded our questions about the new technology and how it will work with Microsoft later this year to deliver and promote Intel Authenticate and the two companies' respective security capabilities. Also see the March Redmond magazine cover story about Intel Authenticate, which includes analysis and industry reaction.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/26/20160 comments

Microsoft President Brad Smith said his company "wholeheartedly" backs Apple's refusal to cooperate with the FBI's demand that it decrypt the data on an iPhone owned by suspected terrorist Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik, who killed 14 people in December's San Bernardino, Calif. shooting attack.

Smith appeared yesterday before a U.S. House Judiciary Committee hearing investigating the contentious legal battle between the FBI and Apple. The clash has escalated since Apple CEO Tim Cook said Apple will not comply with a California federal district court order issued last week by Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym that required Apple to cooperate with the law enforcement agency's demands. The showdown between Apple and the FBI has pitted civil liberties proponents against those who believe Apple and the IT community have a duty to cooperate with law enforcement in the interest of national security, as reported Monday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/26/20160 comments

HP is readying a new Windows 10-based combination of a phablet, laptop and desktop PC for business users, planned for release this summer. The HP Envy x3, revealed this week at the annual Mobile World Congress convention in Barcelona on Monday, could provide a promising new use case for Microsoft's Continuum technology and perhaps create a new niche for Windows 10 mobile among business users.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/24/20160 comments

A court's decision ordering Apple to develop the equivalent of a key that would unlock the encrypted data in a suspected terrorist's iPhone last week has quickly emerged as one of the most divisive issues in both the IT industry, politics and the law enforcement community to date. It has pitted civil liberties proponents against those who believe Apple and the IT community have a duty to cooperate with law enforcement in the interest of national security. Of course, it's not that simple.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/22/20160 comments

Microsoft is among nine leading companies that have formed the new Open Connectivity Foundation (OCF), a consortium launched today that aims to ensure interoperability of Internet of Things devices through standards. Among other initial backers of the new group are Arris, CableLabs, Cisco, Electrolux, GE Digital, Intel, Qualcomm and Samsung.

The OCF said it brings together the work of the former Open Interconnect Consortium and the UPnP Forum and is a nonprofit organization chartered with bringing together key providers of silicon, software platforms and finished products focused on interoperability. The OCF's initial emphasis is on its sponsorship of IoTivity, an open source framework designed to deliver device-to-device connectivity.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/19/20160 comments

Apple CEO Tim Cook has set the stage for a showdown with law enforcement that will have significant ramifications on the future of encryption used to ensure privacy on individuals' devices. A stunning court order last night ordered Apple to help the FBI decrypt the iPhone of the suspected terrorist who gunned down 14 people in December's infamous attack in San Bernardino, Calif.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/17/20160 comments

VMware's acquisition of AirWatch two years ago for $1.54 billion remains the company's largest buy. The company is now giving the popular mobile device management a boost that looks to improve employee privacy and IT security at the same time.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/17/20160 comments

Microsoft this week rolled out additional features to its Azure Stack Technical Preview. The release comes just two weeks after the long-awaited debut of the Azure Stack preview, which promises a means for organizations and service providers to run software in their clouds that's similar to the solutions Microsoft uses for its Azure datacenter public cloud.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/12/20160 comments

Some major IT tech companies saw their shares plummet late last week. Many of those whose shares are falling the hardest are the ones that appeared overheated for some time. Despite the unemployment rate dropping to 4. 9 percent, the lowest since 2008, the number of new jobs gained last month fell short of the 185,000 expected, with only 155,000 gained. Meanwhile plunging oil prices, less-stellar fourth quarter earnings and economic jitters over troubles in China and other emerging markets have plagued the markets since the beginning of the year. All of this is triggering concerns that tech spending and IT hiring is going to be hit hard this year, though some believe such fears are overstated.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/08/20160 comments

Microsoft this week released the preview of a new feature for its Power BI data visualization tool that lets users publish dashboards to the Web. However, its initial lack of IT controls quickly raised security concerns by IT pros, which the company is promising to fix.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/05/20160 comments

Alphabet, the parent company of Google, has unseated Apple as the world's most valuable publicly traded company, and it appears it's growing faster than analysts expected with no slowing down in sight.

It's the first time the company has broken out its businesses since creating the new structure back in August. Alphabet reported revenues of $21.3 billion for the fourth quarter of 2015, up 18% over the same period last year and $500 million higher than analysts had forecast for the quarter. Revenues for last year of $75 billion increased 14% over 2014. Operating income of $23.4 billion was up 23%, with Google's core business showing a 38% operating margin, up from 35% in the prior year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/03/20160 comments

Converged infrastructure has various meanings, depending on the supplier and IT professionals. For Gridstore, the company has decided to focus on offering hyperconverged infrastructure for Hyper-V-only environments. The company, which offers an appliance consisting of Intel-based multicore servers and scalable flash storage, last week said it has raised $19 million in equity finding from Acero Capital, GGV Capital and ONSET Ventures.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/03/20160 comments

Microsoft today has revealed a research project that shows promise for submerging and operating a cloud-scale datacenter in the ocean.

The experimental datacenter, dubbed Project Natick, was submerged into the Pacific Ocean about a half-mile off the coast from August to November of last year. Enclosed in a special 38,000-pound container that looks like a small submarine, the datacenter had the CPU power of 300 desktop PCs and validated the potential of developing the technology at a much higher scale. The researchers conducting last year's pilot called the container Leona Philpot, the name of the popular Xbox character.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/01/20160 comments

A growing number of retailers are relying on Azure and Kinect to improve in-store and online shopping experiences, according to Microsoft. I spent some time at the Microsoft booth at last week's National Retail Federation show in New York, where company officials showcased advances that are starting to (or poised to) appear in stores.

Microsoft for years has invested heavily in improving retail experiences. The best evidence of that is Microsoft's Retail Experience Center, which is a 20,000-foot facility with individual store experiences meant to allow visitors to see technology under development in a variety of environments -- from coffee shops and electronics stores boutiques that sell clothing, among others. New developments and solutions unveiled at NRF, the retail industry's largest annual gathering of IT professionals, will be brought into the Microsoft Retail Innovation Center, said Martin Ramos, Microsoft's CTO for retail consumer products and services.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/29/20160 comments

Microsoft today said it is letting Office Online users coauthor files in real time that are stored in third-party cloud storage services including Box, Citrix ShareFile, Dropbox and Egnyte. Until now, in order to coauthor Office Online files in real time, they had to be stored either in SharePoint or Microsoft OneDrive, a capability first added in 2013.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/27/20160 comments

When Microsoft launched its Surface Book back in October, it caught the industry by surprise. Not only did no one see this sleek new design in laptop computing coming from Microsoft, it became a must-have system for numerous Windows enthusiasts for its potential performance. Perhaps the most sought-after configurations of the Surface Book by power users -- the high-end unit with a 6th Generation Intel Core i7 processor, 1TB of storage, 16GB RAM and an NVIDIA GPU – finally became available last week before very quickly selling out.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/26/20160 comments

Microsoft's Surface tablets took an unwelcome hit during yesterday's AFC Championship game in Denver when the units used by the New England Patriots briefly stopped working. The issue, which Microsoft later said was a networking outage unrelated to the Surface tablets (not a BSOD), was briefly under the spotlight to everyone watching the game.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/25/20160 comments

Looking to forge better integration between container-based software and hardware infrastructure, Docker today said it has acquired Unikernel Systems, a Cambridge, U.K.-based company run by the original developers of the Xen open source hypervisor project. Docker acquired the company because it believes unikernels will be an important technology to enable more intelligent applications capable of automatically tying to the source code within datacenter and cloud infrastructure as well as endpoint devices used in sensors in Internet of Things-type scenarios.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/21/20160 comments

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella took to the world stage at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland to announce the company will contribute $1 billion in cloud resources over the next three years to nonprofit organizations, researchers and underserved communities. While Microsoft has a storied history of donating software, the latest is a huge contribution.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/20/20160 comments

Intel believes it has the broken the password barrier with new technology that will enable hardware-based multifactor authentication. The company today unveiled Intel Authenticate, firmware for Windows PCs running its new 6th Generation Core Processors that'll enable up to four factors of authentication based on policies determined by IT.

The company released a preview of Intel Authenticate for customers to test, though the company hasn't said when it'll be generally available. Intel is working with its key OEM partners and Microsoft to optimize and deliver the new technology. Though ideal for Windows 10, Intel Authenticate will work on Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 but requires the new CPUs, said Tom Garrison, vice president and general manager of the company's business client division.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/19/20160 comments

If there was any doubt that Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft would keep their cloud price war alive in 2016 and beyond, both companies jumped into the new year with their latest round of cost reductions.

AWS made the first move last week reducing pricing of EC2 instances by 5%, with Microsoft following suit yesterday by slashing the cost of Windows Server and Linux Azure Dv2 VM instances by up to 13% and 17% respectively. The moves come as both companies aggressively court enterprise IT decision makers to move or share datacenter workloads and data to their public clouds.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/15/20160 comments

Looking to move past the turmoil that forced out its longtime CEO Mark Templeton, giving activist investors a hand in sharpening the focus of Citrix, the company this week made some key announcements at its annual partner conference. Citrix announced the acquisition of Comtrade System Software & Tools management packs for Microsoft's System Center Operations Manager (SCOM). The acquisition covers just the technology IP of SCOM management packs for Citrix-specific environments. Comtrade, a provider of various management and monitoring tools, is a longtime Citrix partner, and its SCOM management packs cover XenDesktop, XenApp, XenMobile and NetScaler. (Note: an earlier version of this post said Citrix had acquired the entire company, however the deal covers just the Citrix management pack technology).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/13/20160 comments

Microsoft may not have its own keynote slot at the annual Consumer Electronics Show anymore but Windows and Devices Chief Terry Myerson made an appearance during an address at last week's confab by Samsung President Won-Pyo Hong where the two companies announced a new partnership centered around Windows 10.

During his keynote, Hong brought Myerson on stage to launch the new Galaxy Tab Pro S, an ultrathin detachable tablet PC that's 6.3mm thin and weighs just 1.5 lbs., which Myerson noted in a blog post is lighter than the iPad Pro. And while he didn't mention it, it's also lighter than the Surface Pro 4. It supports an optional active pen and claims 10 hours of battery life.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/11/20160 comments

Ed Bott takes over as Redmond magazine's Windows Insider starting with this month's edition. In his first column, Bott questions the way Microsoft handled its decision to offer unlimited storage for OneDrive only to take it away.

As a longtime expert on Microsoft, Bott is adding the Windows Insider column to his repertoire of activities. Bott is the author of the popular Ed Bott Report, a blog published by ZDNet. In his Windows Insider column, Bott will give opinions and advice for IT managers who administer Windows and the technology surrounding it.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/08/20160 comments

Microsoft will inform customers of its online and cloud accounts when they are compromised or targeted by representatives of nation states, the company announced late last week. The company revealed its decision to notify Microsoft Account holders of state-sponsored attacks Dec. 30, in wake of several other leading providers doing so including Facebook, Twitter and Yahoo.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/05/20160 comments

Windows 10 activations soared during the holiday season as Microsoft kicked off the new year saying a total of 200 million systems are now running the operating system.

That is nearly double the 110 million licenses last reported by Microsoft. More than 40 percent of new Windows 10 systems were activated since Black Friday six weeks ago, Microsoft said today. That represents the fastest growth trajectory of any version of Windows, Microsoft said in a blog post today. It outpaced Windows 7 by approximately 140 percent and Windows 8 by nearly 400 percent, the company said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/04/20160 comments

Posted on 01/04/20160 comments

Microsoft has acquired Ray Ozzie's latest startup Talko, a company that provides conferencing and telephony services, for an undisclosed amount. Talko developed a mobile messaging app that Microsoft believes will improve its Skype service.

While Talko's team is now a part of Microsoft, Ozzie is not coming back for a second tour of duty, as reported by Mary Jo Foley in her ZDnet All about Microsoft blog. Ozzie spent five years at Microsoft ascending to founder and former CEO Bill Gates' role as chief software architect. Microsoft had acquired Ozzie's Groove Networks, which became an integral part of SharePoint Server. Microsoft Office Groove evolved into what became SharePoint Workspace 2010 and now provides some of the core synchronization capabilities in OneDrive for Business.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/22/20150 comments

As 2015 comes to a close, it'll be remembered as a year full of surprises. Who thought back in April that the New York Mets would make the playoffs (along with the Chicago Cubs) and somehow make it to the World Series? While Microsoft was on pace to have a good year when 2014 was coming to a close, it was hard to imagine Redmond would gain such a high level of respect and dialog among so many longstanding critics.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/21/20150 comments

Passing the Federal budget before the end of the year was a key priority and became a fortuitous opportunity for Congress to slip in the controversial Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015 into the spending bill, which President Obama on Friday signed into law. IT providers Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft and others have opposed measures in CISA, which seeks to thwart crime and terrorism but facilitates mass surveillance via the sharing of information between companies and the government, notably the National Security Agency.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/21/20150 comments

Back in April of 2013, Goldman Sachs downgraded Microsoft to "sell" -- a rating infrequently cast upon large tech companies and a clear signal that the influential investment bank had little faith of a turnaround in Redmond. Goldman Sachs today said despite the uphill battle Microsoft faced and shared by most in the industry that it underestimated its ability to revitalize its business.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/18/20150 comments

The recent terrorist attacks in Paris and in San Bernardino, Calif. have led to renewed calls for technology providers and social network operators to make it harder for them to communicate and easier for law enforcement to track their activities. It was a point of contention in this week's Republican presidential debate in Las Vegas. Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton and President Barack Obama have weighed in over the past few days as well.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/17/20150 comments

Carbonite, one of the popular providers of backup services for consumers and small businesses, today agreed to acquire EVault for $14 million from disk drive vendor Seagate. EVault, which offers higher-end backup services with an on-premises appliance for mid-sized organizations, uses Microsoft's Azure public cloud to store data. The company also claims a one-hour failover.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/16/20150 comments

In its first quarterly financial disclosure since becoming a privately held company two years ago, Dell revealed its revenues and what it may do to finance its $67 billion acquisition of EMC and the storage giant's controlling interest in VMware. Dell acknowledged it may need to divest or spin off some of its assets in order to adequately finance the deal and pass investor muster. In addition to divestitures, Dell said it may buy back up to $3 billion of VMware's tracking stock.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/15/20150 comments

Microsoft today said its Speaker Recognition APIs and Video APIs are now available in public preview and said the company is accepting invites to those wanting to test its forthcoming speech-to-text service. The new APIs are the latest milestone by Microsoft Research to make machine learning mainstream under its Project Oxford effort.

The first Project Oxford APIs, designed for facial recognition, debuted last month. And like those, the newest interfaces allow developers to add functionality with just a few lines of code, according to Microsoft. When Microsoft released the facial recognition APIs, the company said it would also follow suit with the speaker recognition, video and text-to-speech APIs by year's end.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/14/20150 comments

Look for the lines between server, storage and network gear to blur further in 2016 as a new crop of converged systems arrive that offer what several key suppliers this year have begun describing as "composable infrastructure," which is especially suited for organizations that have moved to a DevOps model of building and managing distributed apps and systems. Hewlett Packard Enterprise last week was the latest to announce next-generation datacenter hardware called Synergy that falls under that description.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/11/20150 comments

IBM this week launched a new security marketplace that aims to integrate third-party tools with its QRadar security information and event management (SIEM) platform. The IBM Security App Exchange allows partners and security operation center (SOC) administrators to share security intelligence, workflows, use cases and analytics. It extends upon IBM's X-Force, a 700TB database of security threat intelligence data it gathers from its customers, which the company opened up back in April to anyone who wants to use it. X-Force is now used by 2,000 customers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/09/20150 comments

EMC and VMware are reportedly considering a stock buyback and a restructuring of its Virtustream cloud unit that would make Dell's agreement to acquire the companies for $67 billion more attractive to investors.

VMware shares have declined 18 percent since Dell made its historic and risky deal on Oct. 12 to acquire EMC and taking a controlling interest in the virtualization company. The drop in VMware's share price has lowered the stock per-share price Dell is ultimately paying EMC from $33 to $30, according to Bloomberg, which first reported on talks to restructure the deal.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/08/20150 comments

Apple's announcement last week that it has released its Swift programming language to the open source community could help Microsoft accelerate its effort to help developers port their iOS applications to Windows, some experts believe.

In case you missed it, Apple last week announced it has fulfilled its promise to contribute its rapidly growing Swift programming language under the Apache 2 open source license with a runtime library exception for building apps that can run on iOS, Mac OS X, watchOS, tvOS and Linux. The Swift open source code, a compiler, library debugger and package manager are now on GitHub. Apple said the open source move, which includes the launch of Swift.org site consisting of various resources, should allow other providers to incorporate Swift with their own software and port it to other platforms, stated Craig Federighi, Apple's senior vice president of software engineering.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/07/20150 comments

Amazon Web Services is now offering a set of new options to run Active Directory as a managed service in its EC2 cloud. The company this week said it's offering three options for its new cloud-based Active Directory Service.

The least expensive option is Simple AD, providing only basic Active Directory capabilities. Second is the AWS Directory Service for Microsoft Active Directory (Enterprise Edition) based on the most recent version included in Windows Server 2012 R2 and the third option is the AD Connector, which customers can link with on-premises AD domains.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/04/20150 comments

Nearly two years after Microsoft's former CEO Steve Ballmer left the company, he publicly rebuked his successor Satya Nadella for not adequately disclosing cloud revenues. The open critique took place at the company's shareholder meeting Wednesday.

While taking on Nadella might sound like sour grapes, Ballmer has a lot of skin in the game as he's Microsoft's largest individual shareholder. As reported by Dina Bass of Bloomberg, Ballmer takes issue with the fact that Microsoft only reports run rates calling that "bulls---," saying Microsoft should report actual revenues and margins.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/03/20150 comments

Demand for tablets has shifted to those with detachable keyboards, though global shipments this year are forecast to have declined 8.1 percent, according to IDC's latest report. The growing preference for detachables, or 2-in-1s, has helped Windows gain a bigger, albeit still marginal piece of the tablet pie, according to the IDC Tablet Tracker released Monday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/02/20150 comments

Hewlett Packard Enterprise CEO Meg Whitman today fulfilled the promise she made on last week's earnings call that she'd outline a new partnership with Microsoft to make Azure a preferred cloud service. It turned out Whitman needed some help in doing so, thanks to a poorly timed illness that made it difficult for her to speak during the opening keynote of HPE's Discover conference in London.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/01/20150 comments

Hewlett Packard Enterprise this week will announce plans to tap Microsoft Azure as a preferred public cloud provider, giving customers who were using its own Helion service a place to go when it shuts down Jan. 31.

CEO Meg Whitman revealed HPE will make Azure a preferred public cloud during the final earnings call for the company that was previously known as Hewlett Packard Co. for 86 years prior to splitting into two separate businesses (HP Inc. and HPE) Nov. 1.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/30/20150 comments

HP Inc., the new PC and printer business that spun off of Hewlett Packard Co. earlier this month, is planning to offer a combined Windows 10-based PC-tablet in January that it believes will appeal to businesses. However, like Microsoft's Surface Pro 4, it may have some limitations for their enterprise environments. The company has taken the wraps off the HP Elite x2 1012 G1, which looks like a Surface Pro by sporting a similar 12-inch display but is completely encased in aviation-grade aluminum, has more interfaces, added security support and a wider array of peripherals. Detailed pricing wasn't released other than the entry price will be $899, which will include a standard keyboard and pen.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/20/20150 comments

Google yesterday said it is combining its various cloud groups and has tapped VMware Diane Greene to lead its newly reorganized group. Greene will run a new group that includes Google for Work, the Google Cloud Platform and Google Apps. Bebop, the startup Greene has been running, has also been acquired by Google.

The move will provide a more coordinated group, said Google CEO Sundar Pichai, in a post on the company's blog. "This new business will bring together product, engineering, marketing and sales and allow us to operate in a much more integrated, coordinated fashion," Pichai said. It also brings one of the IT industry's most influential women back into the fold, more than seven years after she was ousted as VMware's CEO by EMC CEO Joe Tucci, when the two failed to see eye to eye.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/20/20150 comments

Microsoft today released Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview 4, providing a first look at Hyper-V containers, an additional deployment option for those looking to create multitenant environments. Hyper-V containers offer a higher level of isolation, which offers better security, according to Microsoft. It's available for download now along with the new System Center 2016 Technical Preview 4.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/19/20150 comments

Docker this week introduced the latest part of its commercial stack that it claims will provide the software to enable the sharing of distributed applications across cloud, operating systems and virtual machine environments without requiring developers to reprogram their code.

The Docker Universal Control Plane, launched at DockerCon Europe this week in Barcelona, runs on-premises on Windows and Linux physical or virtual servers or behind a firewall in a public cloud instance for the purpose of managing "Dockerized" distributed apps that are in production on any type of infrastructure. It's targeted at DevOps organizations looking for an operational system to deploy and manage distributed applications in production while creating limited tasks for developers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/19/20150 comments

Microsoft's Customer Lockbox and Advanced eDiscovery tools, announced earlier this year with the aim of providing higher levels of compliance for Office 365, will be available Dec. 1. The company announced the pending release as part of yesterday's broad initiative outlined by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella to build out the Operational Security Graph and plans to invest $1 billion per year in security alone for Azure, Office 365 and Windows.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/18/20150 comments

A month after Dell announced its definitive agreement to acquire EMC for $67 billion, making it the largest IT merger ever, it appear customers of both companies feel they'll be better off as a result of the deal. At least that's what one survey of 200 C-level IT execs conducted earlier this month by IT advisory firm Enterprise Strategy Group has found.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/18/20150 comments

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella today gave a holistic view of the company's focus on security and revealed it is building an intelligent operational security graph. Emanating from its Cyber Defense Operations Center in Redmond, this graph is a framework that allows for the sharing of real-time intelligence gathered and shared across every Microsoft offering ranging from sensors, Xbox and Windows devices to the datacenter and public cloud. Nadella said Microsoft is sharing the graph with a new ecosystem of partners and also revealed the company is investing $1 billion in R&D to build security into Windows, Azure and Office 365.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/17/20150 comments

Curious to see the new iPad Pro that began shipping last week, I went to Best Buy Saturday to check it out and, as I expected, it's an overgrown version of Apple's standard tablet. Indeed it has many fine refinements including a faster processor, sharper resolution and much better speakers. But it's very expensive for what it is.

Comparisons to Microsoft Surface Pros, other laptops and even MacBook Pros are to be expected and, for some, the iPad Pro might be a suitable replacement. Generally speaking though, they're different beasts. When Apple's original iPad came out five years ago, it was truly a novel device that let us do things we couldn't before. The iPad Pro does offer new capabilities such as an optional pen for drawing, which certainly give it new use cases in certain situations, but it's not anything revolutionary.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/16/20150 comments

In most cases it's relatively easy to get some sense how others are reacting or feeling in a live situation but online or via videoconference, such subtleties are much more difficult to detect. Microsoft this week released the public beta of an API and tool that lets developers program the ability to detect emotions into their apps.

The new emotion API, debuted at Microsoft's Future Decoded conference in London, was developed by the company's Project Oxford team and demonstrated by Chris Bishop, head of Microsoft Research in Cambridge, U.K., during his keynote address. Microsoft revealed Project Oxford at its Build conference back in April.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/13/20150 comments

Microsoft today has begun rolling out the first major update to its Windows 10 operating system and has effectively declared it ready for enterprise deployment.

The new update includes a number of usability improvements to Windows 10 including a boost in performance and added features to components of the OS including Cortana and the Edge browser. It also marks the launch of the Windows Store for Business.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/12/20150 comments

Could the historic deal reached by Dell to acquire EMC for $67 billion unwind if the IRS decides it wants a piece of it? Dell officials are reportedly concerned that the IRS could rule that the transfer of the tracking stock that comes with EMC's 81 percent stake in VMware could trigger a taxable distribution that would add $9 billion to the bill.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/10/20150 comments

One of the many stories of last month's Surface Pro 4 launch was the new keyboard, which is not only easier to use but available with an embedded fingerprint scanner that'll let you login using the new Windows Hello authentication feature in Windows 10.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/09/20150 comments

While IT pros have historically had to concern themselves with meeting compliance needs, the rise of hybrid cloud, mobility and the ability to more easily move data have put an increased emphasis on it by organizations. While that's especially the case for those who must meet certain governance guidelines, it's becoming common sense for any business or organization with a stake in maintaining better controls of their information putting the burden on them to ensure against data leakage.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/06/20150 comments

Intel Security last week made the case to partners and customers that it is now ready to be their primary supplier of enterprise security solutions. This culminates a year of a major revamping for the business.

Following last year's renaming of the business from McAfee to Intel Security, though keeping the latter branding on specific products, the company wants to be seen as one of the big boys, challenging the likes of Cisco, IBM, RSA and Symantec. It will do so by securing everything including sensors, mobile devices, PCs and all points in the enterprise datacenter and public cloud, while providing the needed wares to equip a security operations center (SOC).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/05/20150 comments

In what Microsoft is describing as perhaps its deepest partnership with another major enterprise infrastructure player to date, the company is joining forces with leading Linux and open source provider Red Hat to ensure that their respective operating systems and cloud platforms technologies interoperate.

The partnership, announced today, will involve a Red Hat engineering team moving to Redmond to provide joint technical support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux workloads running in the Microsoft Azure public cloud and on its hybrid cloud offerings. The pact also calls for applications developed in the Microsoft .NET Framework language to run on RHEL, OpenShift and the new Red Hat Atomic Host container platform.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/04/20150 comments

Microsoft giveth and Microsoft taketh away. In what has quickly resulted in unwelcome backlash, Microsoft last night announced it's withdrawing its unlimited storage option for consumer Office 365 accounts. Why? Apparently some customers felt that entitled them to store their entire digital movie collections in some case exceeding 75TB. The limit scales back to 1TB effective immediately. Customers will have a year to keep what's there but are unable to store more.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/03/20150 comments

Today marks the first day of business for two new companies spawned from the divestiture of one of the most storied and oldest technology companies in Silicon Valley. Hewlett Packard Co. completed its Nov. 1 split to form HP Inc., the former company's PC and printer business, and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), which provides IT infrastructure and services.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/02/20150 comments

Google has denied a report that it is two years into an engineering effort that would bring both its Android and Chrome OS together as one operating system. The plan, reported by The Wall Street Journal citing unidentified sources, calls for the effort to be rolled out in 2017, though a preview of the integrated OS could appear next year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/30/20150 comments

Having made a name for itself for its unique approach to backup and recovery by focusing on VMs rather than physical machines for small and mid-size datacenters, Veeam is gunning to move up the food chain with its new enterprise availability suite and cloud connectivity tool.

Veeam now wants to be known as the company that can ensure what is known as provider of "availability for the always-on enterprise." The company will take a key step toward that goal with the Veeam Availability Suite v9, slated for release this quarter. The new release adds an unlimited scale-out data repository and built-in replication in one solution. With its tight integration with Hyper-V and VMware, as well as storage devices of its alliance partners Cisco, EMC, HP and NetApp, the company claims it'll deliver real-time and point recovery objectives within 15 minutes.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/30/20150 comments

More than five years after opening its first retail stores, Microsoft finally has one in New York City, which opens today, which the company said will serve as the flagship of 100-plus locations. The new store, also by far its largest, opens on the same day Microsoft is making available for purchase its new lineup of Windows 10 devices, including the new Surface Book, Surface Pro 4, Lumia phones and Microsoft Band 2.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/26/20150 comments

IT systems management provider SolarWindows this week agreed to be acquired for a healthy $4.5 billion by private equity investors Silver Lake Partners and Thoma Bravo. That's a 44% premium over the company's share price as of Oct. 8, which was right before the company disclosed it was approached by an unsolicited bidder.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/23/20150 comments

As it gets ready to split into two companies in a couple of weeks, HP has confirmed its new enterprise business does not plan to continue its public cloud. HP said it will sunset its public cloud Jan. 31, 2016 which, despite huge ambitions to take on Amazon Web Services and others, never gained ground.

Amazon Web Services, Microsoft and Google have established themselves as the largest global cloud infrastructure providers, and while there a number of other major providers including IBM Softlayer, VMware vCloud Air and Rackspace, their footprints don't currently have the scale and customer base as the big three. Still there are thousands of small and midsize hosting and cloud providers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/22/20150 comments

One year after launching the Microsoft Azure Cloud Platform System for service providers and the largest of enterprises, Dell is looking to bring it to mainstream datacenters. Dell Founder and CEO Michael Dell, joined by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, introduced the new CPS Standard edition today during the opening keynote of the annual Dell World conference taking place in Austin, Texas

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/21/20150 comments

Docker has acquired Tutum, a startup that provides a platform for development, deployment and management of cloud-scale apps, for an undisclosed amount.

The two-year-old startup has built its entire platform and cloud service based on the native Docker APIs and has native drivers to Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, IBM Softlayer, DIgital Ocean, among others, to enable the movement of containerized workloads across clouds and private datacenters.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/21/20150 comments

In preparation for what it hopes is a larger corporate demand for the Surface Pro 4, Microsoft today announced what it's calling the "Enterprise Bundle," which includes the newest Surface device, keyboard and a warranty only available to large enterprises (those purchasing thousands of units). The announcement comes in advance of next week's general release of its new crop of Windows 10 devices, notably the Surface Pro 4, Surface Book laptops and Lumia phones

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/20/20150 comments

The rapid growth of Office 365 has become a thorn in the side of Google Apps team and the company is now fighting back. Google today said it will offer its Google Apps service free of charge to midsized enterprises (organizations from 350 to 3,000 employees) for the duration of their contracts with Microsoft, IBM or any other productivity suite provider. The offer applies to any business, but Google is aiming to target mid-market companies, i.e. those with seats usually between 250 and 3,000. So, no company will be excluded just because they don't fall within that range.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/19/20150 comments

Sphere 3D this week said its Glassware 2.0's containerization tools and its hypervisor now work with Microsoft's Azure cloud. The entire Glassware 2.0 offering, which includes its containers designed to migrate Windows and open source apps to the cloud, now runs on Azure. Both companies announced a partnership earlier this year to ensure the compatibility.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/16/20150 comments

Microsoft wants to broaden the reach of its Skype service and is doing so by making it possible for Skype users to invite those on other services such as Facebook Messenger, Twitter and WhatsApp to join a conversation. The move comes just a week after Microsoft released new previews of Skype for Business for Office 365 users.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/15/20150 comments

Dell's agreement to acquire EMC for $67 billion, which was announced this week, is by far the largest IT industry deal ever and Dell is poised to have the most comprehensive portfolios of server, storage and IT enterprise management software and services. The deal nevertheless was not welcome by VMware shareholders, who have hammered the stock in the days since the deal was reached.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/14/20150 comments

After a week of speculation, Dell Inc. has agreed to acquire EMC Corp. for $67 billion in what would be the largest IT industry deal ever. The deal, pending approval of EMC shareholders and government regulators, is slated to close sometime next year, and will clearly reshape the IT competitive landscape, giving Dell the leading enterprise storage business, a controlling interest in virtualization giant VMware Inc., the Big Data and analytics business of Pivotal, and the data security and encryption provider RSA.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/12/20150 comments

Popular systems management provider SolarWinds today said it is considering the outright sale of the company or other options, following an unsolicited inquiry by a third party.

After Reuters reported on the inquiry, SolarWinds acknowledged it has retained J.P. Morgan as its financial advisor and DLA Piper LLP to provide legal counsel, providing what the company described as a third party who expressed interest. It wasn't clear whether the third party made an outright offer to acquire SolarWinds or only wanted to discuss possible transaction. SolarWinds emphasized it's too early to determine whether the review will result in any type of transaction.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/09/20150 comments

Microsoft is taking its HoloLens virtual reality glasses to the next stage of its evolution from demoware to market development. The company will release an SDK next quarter and is kicking off a multicity road show next week to provide demos of the HoloLens.

At the Windows 10 Devices launch event earlier this week, the company gave airtime to HoloLens and demonstrated a game code-named" Project Xray" that would let players engage in shooting matches with holographic guns. Besides "mixed reality gaming" and entertainment, the company's top brass is bullish on the prospect for HoloLens in a variety of industrial settings.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/09/20150 comments

LogMeIn today said it has agreed to acquire LastPass, the popular password management service, for $110 million furthering the company's push into identity and access management (IAM).

By acquiring LastPass, LogMeIn believes it could help its customers address the common problem of employees using the same password for every application they access. LastPass provides single sign-on access with the ability to generate complex and encrypted passwords to each system accessed. LogMein said that 64 percent of Internet users use the same passwords for every application and service they access.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/09/20150 comments

Advanced talks between Dell and its backer Silver Lake Partners to acquire storage giant EMC for $50 billion would be the largest in the tech industry and potentially one of the largest leveraged buyouts of a public company. It also appears that Dell's primary interest in EMC is to take control over virtualizations giant VMware, which EMC now holds an 83 percent stake in.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/08/20150 comments

Microsoft's surprise entry into the laptop market with the launch of its new high-end Surface Book may have stolen the limelight at yesterday's Windows 10 Devices launch event in New York but the Surface Pro 4 will likely be the system that addresses the needs of most mainstream users.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/07/20150 comments

Microsoft's year-long process of laying out its vision for Windows 10 reached a crescendo today.

At an event for media, analysts and Windows Insiders in New York, the company rolled out two new Lumia phones, an upgrade to its Surface Pro line with an improved Windows Hello keyboard and the company's debut into the high-end laptop market with the new Surface Book. The hardware rollouts put some metal around Windows 10, which originally launched back in July.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/06/20150 comments

Microsoft took a decidedly low-key approach to the release of Windows 10 back on July 29, largely because the devices optimized for the new operating system weren't ready. But by making Windows 10 Pro available free of charge for users to upgrade on their existing systems, the company has given them a chance to see and interact with the new operating system.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/05/20150 comments

It's no secret that as far as most people are concerned, there two major mobile phone platforms: Android and iPhone. Windows Phones are out there but they represent such a small minority -- by most accounts, less than 3 percent of the market -- that only fans of the platform seek them out. And it appears those fans are few and far between.

Having attended this week's Visual Studio Live! conference in Brooklyn, N.Y., it was a markedly different world. A disproportionately large number of the 300 attendees were carrying Windows Phones. When I did have my iPhone in view, I was jeered on occasion, leaving me to feel like some sort of traitor. Of course, seeing lots of Windows Phones at a conference for Windows developers is hardly a surprise, even if it isn't in sync with the real world.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/02/20150 comments

Amid the slew of announcements at Tuesday's AzureCon (a series of Channel 9 videos released by Microsoft outlining milestones and the future of the company's enterprise cloud service), Microsoft revealed how its Azure Container Service will simplify the way organizations build, configure and manage clusters.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/30/20150 comments

Earlier this year, Microsoft revealed plans to offer a new HDFS-compatible Hadoop File System data store that could run large analytics workloads called Azure Data Lake. So far, the technical preview hasn't appeared but the company today reiterated that the service, which it will actually call Azure Data Lake Store, will be available later this year and also announced some new services planned for its Azure-based Big Data portfolio.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/28/20150 comments

Despite its continued woes, BlackBerry CEO John Chen is showing no signs of throwing in the towel as he continues to make acquisitions to shore up its position as a supplier of secure smartphones and device management infrastructure. However Chen apparently is finally backing away from the company's storied BlackBerry operating system, which has powered its flagship phones, and going in a different direction. The company today said it'll offer a new line of phones powered by Android.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/25/20150 comments

SAP was among 21 application providers that have joined an effort launched earlier this year by VMware's AirWatch business to support device-native, mobile OS standards for enterprise mobility management systems. That brings the total to 44 suppliers that have joined AirWatch's App Configuration for Enterprise group, the company announced today at its AirWatch Connect conference in Atlanta.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/23/20150 comments

At VMworld earlier this month, VMware promised support for Windows 10 and today the company explained how. The company's AirWatch business unit will add Windows 10 configuration and management to its namesake enterprise mobility management suite. The added Windows 10 support is among a number of announcements made at the annual AirWatch Connect conference, which kicked off today in Atlanta.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/22/20150 comments

Microsoft today released Office 2016, the latest version of its widely used productivity suite. Subscribers to the suite with Office 365 accounts can now upgrade by downloading the new version. With the new Office 365, Microsoft is looking to make the suite's core applications better suited for real-time collaboration on the fly. In addition to built-in real-time coauthoring in Word, IM via Skype for Business and connectivity to Office Groups are focal new features.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/22/20150 comments

Windows PCs are now the source of 80 percent of all mobile malware, according to a report released last week. That may offer little consolation if you're an iPhone or iPad user that has just learned about a malware program called XcodeGhost, a corrupted version of Apple's Xcode language that was embedded in a slew of apps, most notably the popular WeChat, representing the first time an exploit has gotten into the Apple Store.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/21/20150 comments

A former senior security strategist at Microsoft has filed a class-action lawsuit alleging gender discrimination. The lawsuit, filed this week in a federal court in Seattle, comes nearly a year after Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s infamous and poorly received remarks suggesting that "karma" was the best way women should expect to receive salary increases and promotions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/17/20150 comments

Active Directory is used by well over 90 percent of enterprises for authentication to core systems ranging from file servers to various other resources connected to organizations' networks. In a key step toward extending its reach to support partners and customers, Microsoft today is adding two new services to Azure AD that the company says can scale and manage external identities.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/16/20150 comments

By promoting Brad Smith to president and chief legal officer last week, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella elevated the company's signal that ensuring trust and privacy is a top and ongoing priority. Equally critical are Microsoft's longstanding desire to ensure digital equality and sustaining the environment – both of which Smith has emphasized.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/14/20150 comments

It should come as little surprise that the largest hardware and software providers surrounding the Microsoft ecosystem received the most votes in this year's annual Reader's Choice Awards (PDF). And once again, Dell Inc. won the most awards, this time in 46 categories.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/11/20150 comments

Apple's long-rumored iPad Pro surfaced (pardon the pun) this week and with it are comparisons to Microsoft's Surface Pro. Technically speaking, comparing the iPad Pro to a Surface Pro or any Windows Pro-based system is an apples-to-oranges comparison. One is a tablet and the other is a computer.

Yet functionally speaking, for some it may be possible, even desirable to ditch a Windows PC -- at least when out of the office -- in favor of the new iPad Pro. The question is to what extent this will happen or will some even replace their Windows machines in favor of Apple's new ultra-tablet?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/11/20150 comments

Things weren't going so good for mobile device management vendor Good Technology, which late Friday agreed to be acquired by rival BlackBerry for $425 million. While BlackBerry may be best known for its rapidly fading mobile phone business, the company also has a formidable mobile device management platform, deemed by many federal government agencies as the most secure. But both the BlackBerry Enterprise Server and Good's MDM suite continue to face pressure from larger rivals including Citrix, Microsoft, VMware's AirWatch unit and IBM, among others. By taking out Good, MobileIron is the last of the large independent mobile device management suppliers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/08/20150 comments

Microsoft has promoted Windows PowerShell inventor Jeffrey Snover to Technical Fellow.

Snover previously was a Microsoft Distinguished Engineer, another esteemed Microsoft title, although his new role is a step up. Snover joins an exclusive group of the company's top engineers. He acknowledged the news on Twitter:

"Bad news: I'll never get another promotion Good news: I've been promoted to Technical Fellow (there's nothing above that)."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/02/20150 comments

VMware announced a new service that looks to go head-to-head with Azure Active Directory (AD) for enterprise single sign-on at this week's VMworld, currently going on in San Francisco.

The company introduced a new iteration of the VMware Identity Management offering, which was first launched in June, that aims to give it broader reach. Identity Management was previously only available for premium AirWatch customers of either the Yellow or Blue editions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/02/20150 comments

VMware this week launched a new database as a service for organizations looking to move their SQL Server applications online without having to modify them. The company announced its new vCloud Air SQL cloud database, announced at this week's VMworld conference in San Francisco. It's available for testing through VMware's early access program and is planned for general availability by year's end.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/02/20150 comments

As competition in the IT industry has brought together strange bedfellows lately, it appears Microsoft and VMware are the latest to publicly share their love-hate relationship. Of course it's to mutual benefit. In the keynote session on the second day of VMworld 2015, taking place this week in San Francisco, Windows Enterprise Executive Jim Alkove became the first Microsoft executive to appear on stage at VMware's annual confab.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/01/20150 comments

While Microsoft this week said 75 million users have upgraded to Windows 10, an additional stat IT pros may find noteworthy is that 1.5 million of them were organizations upgrading their Enterprise Edition licenses.

Members of the Windows team meeting with journalists on the Redmond campus today revealed the figure to demonstrate the rapid adoption of Windows 10, which was released just a month ago. While the number pales in comparison to the consumers or users of the Windows 10 Home and Pro edition, the number of enterprises who have deployed Windows 10 in just four weeks after its released is "unprecedented," said Stella Chernyak, a senior director for Windows Commercial at Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/28/20150 comments

When Microsoft came out with its Fitbit-like band last year, it introduced some interesting new capabilities to the crowded market for such gadgets. But one of the reasons I returned the first iteration of the Microsoft Band after using it for a month was that it didn't appear to render precise and consistent heart rate data. I have come to learn I wasn't the only one to come to that conclusion and decided to wait and see what the next version offers before spending $200. In all fairness, not all share that view.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/28/20150 comments

PC sales growth may be on the downward spiral but expenditures on servers continue to rise, albeit at a single-digit rate. The latest quarterly reports from Gartner and IDC show revenues for servers increased 7.2 percent and 6.1 percent respectively in the second quarter of 2015.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/26/20150 comments

Microsoft's cloud-based SQL Database now supports row level security (RLS), a feature offered in a number of other databases. RLS lets administrators provide row-level access to data based on a user's identity or role.

The company released the RLS feature in its Azure SQL Database last week. RLS will appeal to organizations looking to restrict access to financial data based on an employee's region and role, ensure specific tenants of a multitenant app can only access their own roles of data and it allows analysts to query various subsets based on their position, according to Tommy Mullaney, Microsoft's program manager for SQL Database.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/24/20150 comments

Rumors that new devices including a Surface Pro 4 and a major launch event by Microsoft planned for October amplified this week following a number of published reports. Though the chatter comes from unnamed sources, all along we've said it makes sense that the next wave of systems would hit at that time presuming Intel's next-generation Core 6 architecture is ready. Even without it, October is the time all the major players roll out their lineups for the critical fourth-quarter holiday buying season.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/21/20150 comments

In what could be the most new product offering from Citrix in years, the company today said its new cloud-based offering for deploying and managing virtual and mobile devices is now available. The company unveiled the Citrix Workspace Cloud back in May, hailing it as architecture for the modern digital workplace.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/20/20150 comments

Microsoft today released the third technical preview of Windows Server 2016 and it will give IT pros and developers the first chance to see the company's new Windows Server Containers, which includes the open source Docker Engine. The latest Windows Server 2016 technical preview also includes improvements to Active Directory (both AD DS and AD FS), Hyper-V, failover clustering, remote desktop services and file and storage services. Microsoft posted an outline of all the new features introduced in this release. Not included in Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview 3 (in Microsoft lingo it's TP3) is the new Azure Stack announced back in May at Ignite that will bring Azure functionality to Windows Server or Hyper-V Containers, though Microsoft has indicated that it will show up in a technical preview later this year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/19/20150 comments

Looking to make OneDrive the cloud storage service of choice, Microsoft last week added improved synchronization, search and support for the new Apple Watch. The upgrade of OneDrive now includes the ability to synchronize shared folders from a desktop app, visibility to when someone edits a file and Microsoft says it's now easier to search for documents. While customers welcomed the improvements, many lamented the lack of a once popular feature called Placeholders, also known as Smart Files, which Microsoft removed in January.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/17/20150 comments

Ben Armstrong, Microsoft's Hyper-V and virtualization guru, will outline the company's participation in two open source projects: the Canonical-backed Linux Container LXD hypervisor project and OpenStack. Armstrong tipped off that he'd be speaking at ContainerCon 2015, a Linux Foundation event, and at OpenStack Day. Both will be taking place on Microsoft's home turf of Seattle.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/13/20150 comments

Long wishing to exit the business of backup and recovery and high availability to focus on IT security, Symantec today said it has agreed to sell its Veritas business to private equity firm The Carlyle Group and Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC for $8 billion in cash. Carlyle has tapped Bill Coleman, BEA Systems founder and CEO as Veritas chief executive, and former 3Com Chairman and CEO Bill Krauss was named chairman.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/11/20150 comments

Google has a new CEO and that's significant news for the company, its competitors, partners and those who use its wide array of offerings -- consumers and businesses alike. So it's hardly surprising that Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella was among those who yesterday reached out to Sundar Pichai, who was unexpectedly named to run Google as part of the largest restructuring in the company's history, via Twitter: "Congrats @sundarpichai well deserved!"

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/11/20150 comments

Google today said it will create a new publicly traded company called Alphabet, which will serve as the parent for its separate business units including Google itself. Larry Page, Google's cofounder and CEO, will lead Alphabet with Cofounder Sergey Brin as president.

The move is clearly the largest restructuring in the company's history and a major change in organizational makeup for any company its size. The creation of Alphabet aims to separate Google's core search and cloud business from other groups such as the company's investment companies, its Calico life sciences business and Xlab, the incubator for new technologies such as drones, Page said in a blog post announcing the planned move.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/10/20150 comments

IBM's partnership with Apple has taken a new twist as Big Blue plans to deploy up to 200,000 Macs. That could equate to more than half of IBM's workforce.

In an internal corporate video published by MacRumors, IBM CIO Jeff Smith revealed the company's plans to roll out up to 50,000 Macbooks to employees to replace their existing Lenovo Thinkpads. Of course it was IBM who developed the Thinkpad before selling its PC business to Lenovo over a decade ago. Nevertheless, Thinkpads remained the client device of choice at IBM. In a separate video clip, Smith recalled a conversation in which IBM Vice President Fletcher Previn told Apple CEO Tim Cook that one day 50 to 75 percent of IBM employees could have Macs.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/10/20150 comments

The revamp of Microsoft's certification process is under way and the newest offering will come in the form of skills-specific badges for those who don't want, need, or see the value in MCSE or MCSA certifications. For those who do want to pursue MCSE and MCSA certifications, Microsoft is rolling out major improvements to the testing process, to include performance-based exams and the ability to take them anywhere using the company's new online proctoring capability.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/06/20150 comments

Windows Server, System Center and every other key Microsoft product are now undergoing fundamental architectural and design changes, and if you don't adapt to them and embrace cloud computing, your career in IT likely will be cut short. Regardless of how much experience you have as an MCSE or MCSA, Pluralsight Curriculum Director Don Jones pointed to key changes coming from Microsoft that'll have a major impact on the careers of all IT pros and developers who specialize in all or any component of the Redmond stack.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/05/20150 comments

Last week's launch of Windows 10 was really about the release of the bits online to those who can get it -- mostly Windows Insiders. PC makers took a backseat because they only recently received the final bits. That's a historic deviation for new releases of Windows, but as the OS moves to a more continuous upgrade cycle, that looks to be a moot point going forward.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/03/20150 comments

Some 14 million devices are now running Microsoft's Windows 10 operating system. But many who have reserved their free upgrades will have to wait for days or weeks, the company reiterated last night.

"While we now have more than 14 million devices running Windows 10, we still have many more upgrades to go before we catch up to each of you that reserved your upgrade," wrote Yusuf Mehdi, corporate VP for Microsoft's Windows and Devices Group, in a post last night on the Windows Blog. "Rest assured we are working 24×7 to continue the upgrade process and are prioritizing the quality of your upgrade experience over anything else. We are grateful for your excitement and enthusiasm and we appreciate your patience over the days and weeks ahead as we carefully roll out Windows 10 in phases to all of you that have reserved."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/31/20150 comments

The Windows 10 launch Wednesday put its 110 retail stores worldwide in the spotlight as Microsoft decided to celebrate with local charities it supports such as The Girl Scouts, Habitat for Humanity and the YouthSpark Summer Camp program, among others. While the Microsoft Stores are intended for consumers, partners and IT pros often come in to peruse the store's wares.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/30/20150 comments

More Windows 10 Content:

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/29/20150 comments

More Windows 10 Content:

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/29/20150 comments

Citrix today said longtime President and CEO Mark Templeton will retire once the company appoints a successor. Simultaneously, the company has agreed to give activist investor Elliott Management, which holds 7.5 percent of Citrix's common stock, a seat on its board. The seat will be filled by Jesse Cohen, who will replace Asiff Hirji. Citrix also said that the company's board has formed an operations committee to work closely with the company's management team to find ways to improve margins, profits and its capital structure.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/28/20150 comments

Microsoft may be scaling back its hardware ambitions but the company claims it's still very much committed to its Surface tablet PC business, which several years ago gave the company a black eye following lackluster demand. These days, Microsoft's Surface business is on the rise.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/24/20150 comments

Anticipating another report of an unprofitable quarter by the margin-pressed Amazon.com, analysts were shocked by the e-retailer's $92 million profit for the second quarter on $23.2 billion in revenues, reported Thursday. Albeit the profit was miniscule, Amazon notoriously posts losses and last quarter wasn't projected to be an exception. Remarkably, taking the squeeze off margins was its Amazon Web Services (AWS) public cloud service.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/24/20150 comments

An industry group formed last month to create standards for containers is on a fast track to get its work done. The Linux Foundation today announced the formation of the Cloud Native Computing Foundation, which will take on the work of the Open Container Initiative (OCI), formed at last month's DockerCon gathering in Santa Clara, Calif.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/23/20150 comments

One year after releasing its Enterprise Mobility Suite (EMS), Microsoft says it's the "hottest" product the company now offers. Microsoft COO Kevin Turner last week said EMS is on pace to become the company's next $1 billion product (in annual revenue).

While Turner didn't indicate when that might happen, the company yesterday in its earnings release said it has 17,000 Enterprise Mobility customers, up 90 percent for its fourth fiscal quarter ended June 30, year-over-year. The overall installed base has increased 600 percent, the company said, though naturally from a small base. EMS is a cloud-based service consisting of Intune, Azure Active Directory and Azure Rights Management. Subscriptions start as low as $4 per month per user.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/22/20150 comments

When Microsoft acquired Nokia's handset business last year, many feared it was doomed on arrival. The new CEO, Satya Nadella, was stuck with the deal struck by his predecessor Steve Ballmer and stuck with trying to make it work. Clearly that didn't happen as Nadella earlier this month warned employees of plans to write off most of the business, resulting in Microsoft posting the worst quarterly loss in its history.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/22/20150 comments

The ad blitz for Windows 10 has begun. Microsoft last night premiered its first TV spot online for the new operating system, which the company is set to release over the air waves next week. The new Windows 10 spot introduces the personal assistant Cortana and Hello, the feature that aims to replace passwords with biometric authentication. Those two features promise to change the way people interact with Windows and Microsoft used babies and young children to bring this point home, saying that "these kids will grow up with Windows 10."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/20/20150 comments

In what may sound like an unusual arrangement even by today's standards of "coopetition," Rackspace will offer managed support services for Microsoft's Azure cloud. It's a curious arrangement in that Rackspace runs its own public cloud infrastructure as a service that competes with Microsoft Azure. At the same time, the two companies, partners for 13 years, obviously concluded both could benefit from offering the service.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/17/20150 comments

Higher advertising spending on YouTube and on mobile platforms, along with growth in programmatic ad buying helped Google post a stronger-than-expected second quarter. Cost cutting and hints by its new CFO Ruth Porat that Google may, for the first time, offer investors a dividend or repurchase shares helped push its stock and market cap today to an all-time high past $400 billion.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/17/20150 comments

Despite revealing that a new version of SharePoint Server is on Microsoft's roadmap for next year, many customers and partners have wondered how committed the company is to the on-premises version of Microsoft's collaboration platform. Those concerns escalated following the company's first Ignite conference back in May where the company emphasized Office 365 and its new tools such as Delve and left SharePoint Server 2016 largely in the background.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/16/20150 comments

Microsoft has alluded to it for some time but when COO Kevin Turner gave his annual pep talk to partners today, he said in no uncertain terms that the launch of Windows 10 will be the last major new release of the operating system.

Speaking at Microsoft's Worldwide Partners Conference, taking place this week in Orlando, Fla., Turner said the move to more continuous upgrades means the company is officially moving away from its model of releasing substantial new versions of Windows every three years. "This will be the last monolithic release we have that was built around the three-year upgrade cycle," Turner said. "We will continually be improving the product."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/15/20150 comments

As the July 29 Windows 10 release draws near, Microsoft today revealed its plans to debut the new operating system. The company will kick off a TV ad blitz next week (July 20) and planned events at its retail and third-party stores.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/13/20150 comments

It's not unusual for PC sales to fall off in advance of a new operating system release and last quarter was no exception.

PC shipments plummeted 11.8 percent in the three-month period that ended June 30 over the same period last year, according to IDC's quarterly PC Tracker report released Thursday night. The decline was 1 percent more than IDC had earlier projected but was overall in line with the fact that the comparative period last year was buoyed by Windows XP's end of life and the fact that sales channels were reducing inventories to make way for this month's release of Windows 10.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/10/20150 comments

With just three weeks until Windows 10 is scheduled to arrive, early indications continue to suggest that there will be significant demand among business PC users, though it's less clear whether the new OS will boost Microsoft's share of the tablet market.

More than half of 675 Redmond magazine readers responding to an online survey conducted last week said that they plan to upgrade their existing PCs to Windows 10 within one year. According to the survey, 55 percent will upgrade in the first 12 months and 21 percent will do so within the first three months of Windows 10's release. Thirty five percent say they intend to upgrade within the first six months.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/08/20150 comments

When Microsoft launched its new cloud-based Operations Management Suite (OMS) two months ago, the company emphasized that IT organizations could use it directly or as an extension to their existing System Center management implementations. Microsoft last week added that extension with the release of its System Center add-on for OMS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/07/20150 comments

As Microsoft wraps up another fiscal year, it appears it was a good one with significant changes that'll shape the company for years to come. Despite the tough choices that CEO Satya Nadella last week said that Microsoft must make, the company is also getting respect for the moves he's made in Silicon Valley over the past year as well as another important place: Wall Street.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/29/20150 comments

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella yesterday warned employees against believing the company's culture can remain "static" and cautioned that some "touch choices" will be made. The letter, obtained and published by Geekwire and confirmed as authentic by Mary Jo Foley's All About Microsoft blog, doesn't specify what those though choices will be but it's a reasonable guess they could have a major impact on Microsoft's smartphone ambitions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/26/20150 comments

A Silicon Valley startup led by former Microsoft Server and Tools President Bob Muglia has launched a cloud-based data warehouse service that it claims will significantly extend the limits of traditional analytics platforms. Snowflake Computing made its Snowflake Elastic Data Warehouse, which Muglia described as a big data platform built from scratch and designed specifically to run in the public cloud, generally available this week. Its release is the latest effort to bring data warehousing to the masses.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/24/20150 comments

A year ago, Docker was just the latest upstart promising to change the way software is developed, deployed and managed. With key industry players supporting its software container platform, Microsoft's partnership with Docker last June was quickly noted for its promise to enable developers to build applications that can work regardless of operating system, virtual machine and cloud. On the heels of joining the Docker-driven Open Container Project this week, Microsoft Azure CTO Mark Russinovich gave a keynote address at the annual DockerCon conference in San Francisco, demonstrating a key milestone toward building apps that can run on multiple server operating systems.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/24/20150 comments

The big headline behind last week's annual Microsoft reorganization was that Stephen Elop and several other longtime senior executives and engineering heads are leaving Redmond. But the bringing together of Windows engineering with devices and Dynamics under cloud and enterprise is a sign that CEO Satya Nadella is looking to further break down the siloes and, quite frankly fiefdoms, that stood in the way of successful products.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/22/20150 comments

Perhaps one of the most interesting announcements Microsoft made at its Build conference in San Francisco six weeks ago was the ability for developers to bridge their Android and iOS applications to the new Universal Windows Platform (UWP). Making it easier for developers to port their existing mobile apps, as well as new ones, to UWP could be critical to making Windows 10 an appealing OS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/19/20150 comments

Microsoft today said Stephen Elop, once considered a frontrunner to replace Steve Ballmer as CEO in 2013 following the company's $7.2 billion acquisition of Nokia's More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/17/20150 comments

The popular password management service LastPass disclosed yesterday that it discovered "suspicious activity" on its network in which e-mail addresses, password reminders and authentication hashes were breached, though the company said it doesn't believe encrypted user vault data was seized.

LastPass is among numerous cloud-based password management services that allow individuals and enterprise users to store their encrypted passwords in an online vault to provide single sign-on to Web sites and mobile application services. I have used the LastPass service for several years and have found it useful in an age where we have scores of passwords to remember. The inherent risk of using a password vault service such as LastPass is if your master password is compromised, every site you have registered is at risk as well. The LastPass breach is the latest evidence that passwords are indeed hard to protect, even by experts

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/16/20150 comments

Microsoft's decision to scrap the modern version of Skype for PCs means, effective July 7, you'll need to settle for the desktop version of the popular voice, video and chat application. Many PC users probably won't have an issue with the move, announced last week, but it's yet another black eye for Microsoft's Modern app model, which many still call "Metro."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/15/20150 comments

Activist investor Elliott Management wants to meet with the top brass at Citrix, one of Microsoft's largest partners, to discuss options that would boost the value of Citrix's shares, the hedge fund manager said this week.

In a letter to Citrix CEO Mark Templeton, Chairman Thomas Bogan and the company's board of directors Thursday, Elliott indicated it wants to see the company improve its operations and spin off its assets. Given Elliott's 7.1 percent stake in Citrix, and its history of targeting companies it believes are undervalued because of how they're structured, the move pushed Citrix shares up 7 percent yesterday and were up 2.6 percent midday Friday. Given Elliott's influence and holding in the company, Citrix can't ignore the request either.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/12/20150 comments

While Microsoft is expecting 1 billion devices to run Windows 10 within the next three years, the company better not count on large enterprises to hit that ambitious goal early. The results of a survey of enterprise Windows IT pros shows a vast majority will wait at least six months to begin deploying the new operating system and a substantial amount will wait more than a year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/11/20150 comments

Microsoft today said it has acquired BlueStripe Software, a popular provider of software used to monitor the performance of infrastructure and help systems administrators track down bottlenecks at the transaction layer of applications. The companies didn't disclose terms.

While BlueStripe's performance management platform is popular among enterprises that use System Center Operations Manager, its wares appealed to IT managers for their ability to monitor events throughout the infrastructure and applications stack. The two companies only started working together a few years ago but since BlueStripe talked up the SCOM management packs they've developed, I wondered if Microsoft would swallow the company.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/10/20150 comments

Microsoft apps are no longer linked to Facebook accounts. The news came in the form of an e-mail to millions of Microsoft account holders this morning. The social network severed the link between its Facebook Connect interface and Microsoft apps thanks to a change in the Facebook Graph API, which the company officially announced over a year ago.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/09/20150 comments

Two years ago, Edward Snowden took it upon himself to release classified documents that revealed widespread surveillance activities by United States and foreign governments, most notably the National Security Agency. In so doing, Snowden became one of the most wanted fugitives by U.S. law enforcement. Yet he also became the IT industry's most famous martyr for putting the spotlight on how the government was "monitoring the private activities of ordinary citizens who had done nothing wrong."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/08/20150 comments

Microsoft capped off the week by touting the latest expansion to its ever-growing global network of cloud datacenters. The company announced plans to add two datacenters in Canada and expansion of facilities in The Netherlands and in India.

In all, Microsoft said it will shortly have 22 cloud regions and datacenters for Azure and nine for Office 365 and Dynamics CRM Online. Microsoft COO Kevin Turner presided over this week's launch of its new Canadian datacenters this week, where the company announced it'll host its cloud services in Quebec City and Toronto sometime next year. "This data residency will provide Canadian businesses with improved latency and geographic redundancy to help them better operate and compete," said Takeshi Numoto, Microsoft's corporate VP for cloud and enterprise marketing, in a blog post today.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/05/20150 comments

The idea came off as a simple one: implement Microsoft's Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS) and you'll be on your way to a more secure infrastructure. That was the premise of this month's Windows Insider column by Greg Shields, which was quickly criticized by some well-known Microsoft security MVPs and PKI experts.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/04/20150 comments

It was the latest bruising battle among lawmakers but the U.S. Senate finally agreed on a compromise that will put an end to the Patriot Act, which has allowed government eavesdropping on telephone and electronic communications following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

The new Freedom Act, signed by President Barak Obama last night hours after its passage by the Senate with a 67-32 vote, takes away the National Security Agency's authority to gather calling data of millions of Americans and instead puts that in the hands of phone companies.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/03/20150 comments

Microsoft has finally revealed a delivery date for Windows 10. The official release date is slated for July 29. The company used the eve of the annual Computex conference in Taipei to make the announcement. It's not a surprise Microsoft chose Computex to make it official given that the event is the largest gathering of OEM systems (PC and device) manufacturers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/01/20150 comments

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is the most influential leader in the high-tech industry, according to Juniper Research's annual ranking released Tuesday. Nadella bested the likes of Apple's Chief Design Officer Tony Ive, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick, Netfix Cofounder and CEO Reed Hastings, Alibaba Founder and Chairman Jack Ma, Amazon Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos and Tesla Founder and Chairman Elon Musk.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/27/20150 comments

In a move that appeared timed to rain on Citrix's parade, VMware last week demonstrated technology it plans to unveil which aims to provide the control plane for managing user workspaces. VMware revealed its hybrid cloud architecture aimed at creating "next-generation" workspaces, and did so on its rival's home turf at Citrix's annual Synergy conference last week in Orlando.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/21/20150 comments

Rarely a day goes by when I don't receive a news release on behalf of a company announcing it was included in one of Gartner's Magic Quadrant as a leader. If I had a dollar for every one of those announcements I deleted, I could retire now. Today both Amazon Web Services and Microsoft notified me that their respective public cloud services were recognized as leaders in the research firm's infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) report.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/20/20150 comments

At its annual Synergy conference in sweltering Orlando, Citrix last week staked its future around the company's new Workplace Cloud and a number of new wares that aims to establish it as the purveyor of the modern digital workplace. The major focus of this year's Synergy conference centered around Workspace Cloud, a platform that aims to ease the design, deployment, orchestration and management of secure work environments for mobile workers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/19/20150 comments

Now that Microsoft has outlined its Universal Windows Platform and its new model for building and deploying modern applications for its Azure cloud, the company has hit the road to make its case to developers throughout the world.

The Build tour is taking place today in London and New York. These one-day developer confabs follow last month's annual Build conference, which took place in San Francisco. In the coming days and weeks Microsoft is hosting Build events in Atlanta, Berlin, Moscow, Tokyo and Mexico City, among numerous other locations.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/18/20150 comments

Companies looking for a large global cloud provider to store significant amounts of data will do well choosing either Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure, with the latter performing slightly better according to Nasuni's third biennial cloud storage report. Google, the only other cloud provider with a large enough global scale that could be compared with the two by Nasuni's standards, came in a distant third place.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/15/20150 comments

Yesterday was the latest of Patch Tuesday, the ritual which takes place on the second Tuesday of every month. But its days could be numbered. Patch Tuesday won't disappear anytime soon but the release of Windows 10 will set the stage for its ultimate transition to a different release cadence.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/13/20150 comments

Microsoft's effort to displace passwords with technology with its forthcoming biometrics-based Windows Hello and Passport technology has received a fair amount of attention over the past few weeks. But Microsoft has another new technology slated for Windows 10 called Device Guard, which aims to further protect Windows from malware and known and new advanced persistent threats.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/11/20150 comments

As rumors surfaced this week that Salesforce.com is seeking bidders to acquire the company, including possibly Microsoft, they were barely noticed in Chicago's McCormick Place, where the Ignite conference was taking place. The mere mention of it to an attendee garnered an uninterested look, where attendees were focused on taking in the wave of new wares Microsoft rolled out.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/08/20150 comments

When Microsoft rolled out Windows Server 2012 and System Center 2012, the company coined it and the then-new Azure Pack as its Cloud OS. While Cloud OS indeed provided the building blocks to build Azure-like clouds in private datacenters and third-party hosting providers, many say it's not seamless. Also Azure itself is a very different cloud than it was in 2012.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/06/20150 comments

Days after courting developers to build apps for its new Universal Windows Platform at the Build conference in San Francisco, Microsoft deluged more than 23,000 IT pros attending its inaugural Ignite conference in Chicago with a barrage of new offerings to manage and secure the new platform and the entire IT stack.

Ignite kicked off today with a three-hour keynote headlined byd CEO Satya Nadella, who talked up how the company's new wave of software and cloud services will enable IT and business transformation in line with the ways people now work. He also highlighted the need for better automation of systems, processes and management of the vast amount of data originating from new sources such as sensors.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/04/20150 comments

Microsoft spent the last two days trying to convince its own and the rest of the software development community that building applications to its new Universal Windows Platform (UWP) will let them create innovative and competitive apps. Indeed providing a common architecture for PCs, tablets and Xbox is a lofty goal and has promising implications. Likewise HoloLens, Microsoft's virtual reality headgear, is a worthy attempt to create new capabilities, though its success remains to be seen. The move to provide interfaces that will let Android and iOS developers extend their apps to Windows -- and vice versa -- raised eyebrows this week. It could be a last-ditch effort to save Windows Phone from fading to obscurity but even if it can't save Microsoft's struggling smartphone, UWP could still be a hit in other ways.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/01/20150 comments

Microsoft believes its new Windows 10 operating system will find its way onto 1 billion PCs, tablets, phones, Xbox gaming consoles and emerging device form factors like its HoloLens by fiscal year 2018, which begins in just over two years. Terry Myerson, executive vice president for Microsoft's Windows group, made the bold prediction in part of the opening keynote presentation at the annual Build conference which kicked off today in San Francisco.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/29/20150 comments

It's been a long time coming for Amazon.com investors who have grown increasingly impatient with the drag its cloud computing business has imposed on profits but the company last week gave them some good news. Under pressure to give a more detailed breakdown of revenues and profitability of its Amazon Web Services subsidiary, the company caved and promised it would share that information commencing with last week's Q1 2015 earnings report.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/27/20150 comments

Testing beta software is always fraught with unexpected challenges but the new Windows 10 Technical Preview Build 10061, released last week, might test your patience. If you've already downloaded it, you know what I mean. If you're not on the "fast ring" release cycle of the Windows Insider program and haven't seen it, prepare to roll up your sleeves.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/27/20150 comments

Microsoft is extending its bug bounty program , which pays up to $100,000, to include Azure, Hyper-V and the new Project Spartan browser that will be included in the new Windows 10 operating system.

Microsoft's bounty program has existed for several years and had already provided awards for detecting flaws in Internet Explorer and Office 365. Microsoft Azure CTO Mark Russinovich announced the addition of its cloud service, Hyper-V and Project Spartan to the bounty program at this week's RSA Conference in San Francisco. Among his three talks at the RSA Conference was an overview of the security of the Azure cloud service where he made the announcement at the end of his presentation.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/24/20150 comments

When the developers of the original RSA encryption algorithms built what has become the mainstream means of encrypting and decrypt data, it wasn't lost on them that some bad guys might also find malicious uses for it as well. Two of its inventors yesterday said they were alarmed at the use of encryption for ransomware, which has become a pervasive way of gaining access to users' PCs and enterprise servers using increasingly more sophisticated social engineering and phishing techniques.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/22/20150 comments

This is not your father's RSA. That was the message the company's new president, Amit Yoran, effectively gave in the opening keynote on Tuesday at the annual RSA Security Conference in San Francisco attended by more than 30,000 IT security professionals. While it's hosted by RSA, a subsidiary of EMC known for its development of the industry standard RSA public key cryptography algorithm, the conference is an industry event with participation by its partners and competitors alike.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/21/20150 comments

Microsoft late last week said it's shutting down the MS Open Tech subsidiary it formed three years ago to invest in open source initiatives and will absorb it into the company. The company announced the formation of Microsoft Open Technologies Inc. in April 2012, staffed with an interoperability strategy team in Redmond that aimed at accelerating its push into the open source community.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/20/20150 comments

Microsoft's efforts to support containers in Windows took another step forward yesterday with the release of the Docker Client for Windows. The release of Microsoft's Docker command-line interface for Windows comes with Docker's updated container platform, dubbed Docker 1.6.

It comes after an active week for Docker, which on Tuesday received a huge equity investment of $95 million, which the company said it will use in part to further its collaborations with partners including Microsoft, Amazon Web Services and IBM. Microsoft also just announced that Docker containers are coming to Hyper-V and for Windows Server.

Posted on 04/17/20150 comments

Ask most people what companies are Microsoft's biggest rivals and some will say Apple but most will identify Google. Several published reports even point to powers in Redmond as a key force behind regulators coming down on the search giant this week. IT pros may throw VMware and Red Hat in the mix of major Microsoft competitors but its neighbor Amazon Web Services is right up there having launched its famous cloud infrastructure services years ahead of Microsoft. Even the entry of Azure got off to a slow start, lacking a complete infrastructure service to rival the offerings of AWS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/16/20150 comments

The European Union has once again thrown the gauntlet down on Google, this time charging the company with violating antitrust laws by using its dominance in search by favoring its own comparison shopping service at the expense of others. The EU is also launching a separate investigation to see if Google has used its clout as the dominant supplier of mobile phone software to hold back providers of competing mobile operating systems, namely Apple and Microsoft. Google denied both allegations.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/15/20150 comments

Investors are so bullish about how Docker is poised to play a major role in the future of enterprise IT infrastructure and software development that they filled its coffers with $95 million in D Series funding. Docker, regarded as the leading provider of containers for enterprise developers to build service oriented, scalable and portable software, took the huge cash infusion even though the provider of containers hasn't used up last fall's most recent infusion of $40 million.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/14/20150 comments

Microsoft today as planned is releasing the Skype for Business client just weeks after introducing the Technical Preview. The company announced the release of the new Skype for Business as part of the Office 2013 April rollout. All Office 365 customers are scheduled to receive the update by the end of May.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/14/20150 comments

Microsoft last week filed a legal brief challenging a court order that is forcing the company to turn over a customer's e-mails stored in a foreign datacenter.

The brief, filed April 8 with the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, seeks to argue last summer's court order that Microsoft must turn over the messages from the customer, who is suspected in an alleged drug-related matter. The identity of the suspect is not known and Microsoft said at the time of the ruling, which was upheld by Judge Loretta Preska, that it would appeal the order.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/13/20150 comments

PC shipments have been on the decline. But if you want to look at the glass half-full, those declines aren't as bad as originally forecast.

IDC yesterday reported that 69 million PCs shipped for the first quarter of this year amounted to a 6.7 percent decline over the same period last year. Though that's the lowest number of PCs shipped for the quarter since 2009, this year's decline wasn't as sharp as IDC had originally forecast last fall when the market researcher had predicted volumes to drop by 8.2 percent.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/10/20150 comments

In a move Microsoft says will further advance container technology to more deployment scenarios and workloads and allow developers to build more scalable apps, too, Microsoft today said it will offer Hyper-V containers.

The introduction of Hyper-V containers comes just weeks before Microsoft plans to debut the preview of the next version of Windows Server, code-named "v.Next," which the company will demonstrate at its Build conference in San Francisco. As part of today's announcement, Microsoft also revealed plans to offer a container-based scaled down version of Windows Server called the Nano Server, aimed at modern, cloud-native applications. The latest report of the Nano Server under development surfaced last month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/08/20150 comments

Microsoft late Friday issued a short reminder that the Windows Server preview released in October is set to stop working on April 15. A new preview is slated to arrive in May, the company announced.

The company will release a fix so that testers can continue using it between April 15th and the release of the second technical preview, according to the Windows Server blog. "If you would like to continue your evaluation, we will soon deliver a solution until the next preview is released in May," read the blog post. "We will update this blog with more information shortly."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/06/20150 comments

Andreesen Horowitz last week invested on an addition $52 million in security startup Tanium, adding on to the $90 million the Silicon Valley venture capital firm last year infused into the endpoint security provider. Steven Sinofsky, the president of Microsoft's Windows group until his unceremonious departure more than two years ago, is now at Andreesen Horowitz and largely leading the firm's investment in Tanium.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/03/20150 comments

The 40th anniversary of Microsoft's founding is tomorrow, April 4. And in a twist of irony, its stock closed yesterday at just a hair above $40 per share ($40.29 to be precise). While that's still higher than the $35 it was trading at when Satya Nadella succeeded Steve Ballmer, the stock has declined 20 percent since November.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/03/20150 comments

If you were on the fence about attending next month's brand new Ignite conference, designed to bring together the former Tech-Ed, SharePoint Conference and other events into one mega show, you're too late. Microsoft says Ignite, slated for May 4-7 at the McCormick Place Convention Center in Chicago, is sold out.

According to the Web site Microsoft set up for Ignite, full conference passes are no longer available. But if you're just interested in attending the expo you can still get into that. A spokeswoman for Microsoft said that 20,000 attendees have registered for the inaugural Ignite conference. Ignite is targeted at enterprise IT pros and is expected to be the site where top executives outline the future of key products including Windows Server, System Center, Hyper-V, SharePoint Server and others.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/01/20150 comments

Two leading suppliers of tools that enable migration from SharePoint Server to Office 365, OneDrive for Business and other cloud services are coming together. Metalogix, which also offers Exchange migration tools, today said it has acquired rival MetaVis for an undisclosed sum.

The deal not only eliminates a key rival for Metalogix but it facilitates the company's move to offer a richer set of cloud services tools. Among the MetaVis portfolio are SharePoint Migrator, Office 365 Migration and Management Suite and the Architect Suite, which will extend Metalogix's Content Matrix, Migration Expert, ControlPoint and SharePoint Backup tools.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/01/20150 comments

Microsoft today introduced its thinnest and lightest model to date of its Windows 8.1 tablet. The new Surface 3, which will appear at Microsoft's retail stores tomorrow, will weigh just 1.37 pounds and a paper-thin .34 inches.

The new $499 device will include a one-year Office 365 subscription and, in keeping with its free Windows 10 upgrade offer, it will be eligible for the new operating system once Microsoft releases it this summer. Powered with Intel's latest system-on-a-chip, quad-core Intel Atom x7 processor, Microsoft makes clear this device is not aimed at those engaging in compute-intensive tasks. It's more suited for everyday productivity such as e-mail, Web browsing and other traditional office purposes.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/31/20150 comments

The first preview of Microsoft next-generation browser, code-named "Project Spartan," made its public debut yesterday. The Project Spartan browser is included with the latest Windows 10 Technical Preview build 10049. I downloaded the new build where Project Spartan made its presence known the first time I booted up Windows 10.

As promised last week, Internet Explorer 11 is included as a separate browser and is unchanged, deviating from an earlier plan to include Project Spartan's new EdgeHTML rendering engine, which the company argues is much faster, more secure and reliable. Microsoft claims that the new browser is better suited for modern apps than Internet Explorer. Project Spartan is said to lack Microsoft's legacy Trident rendering engine, but Microsoft has also suggested that Project Spartan will have good compatibility with Web apps and intranet sites nonetheless. For organizations not seeing that compatibility, though, IE will still be around.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/31/20150 comments

Many people remain skeptical that wearable computing and communications devices will grow at the pace of smartphones but growth this year is expected to double, according to a forecast released today by IT market research IDC.

Sales of "wristwear," which will account for 89.2 percent of all wearables, will grow from 17.7 million units in 2014 to 40.7 million this year, IDC is predicting. Wristwear, by IDC's definition, includes bands such as the Microsoft Band, bracelets and watches. Other types include clothing, eyewear, ear pieces and modular devices, accounting for the remaining 10.8 percent.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/30/20150 comments

In a move that could broaden the discussion on income equality beyond gender, race and status, Microsoft will require its suppliers of contract workers to offer them paid vacation and sick time. The new policy, which applies to suppliers with 50 or more employees ranging from engineering and development staff to maintenance and security personnel at its numerous facilities, requires they offer either 10 days of paid vacation and five days of paid sick leave or 15 days of unrestricted paid time off.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/27/20150 comments

In a move aimed at making it more appealing for developers and business decision makers to use its cloud platform as a service (PaaS), Microsoft is bringing together its separate Azure app services into one complete offering.

Microsoft describes its new Azure App Service, now available, as a fully managed service which provides a simple way for developers to build apps that are customer facing. The new packaging effectively brings together three offerings that, until now, were disparate services -- Web sites, Mobile Services and Biztalk Services -- to easily integrate with SaaS and on-premises systems.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/24/20150 comments

In its latest show of support for non-Windows hardware, Microsoft on Monday said that 11 device makers will preinstall key apps from its Office Suite onto the vendors' respective tablets and smartphones for consumers and business users. Leading the pack was Samsung, which said it will preinstall Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote on its tablets in the second half of this year. Microsoft said it will offer the apps via a new Microsoft Office 365 and Samsung Knox Business Pack.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/24/20150 comments

When Microsoft talked up the company's next-generation browser, code-named "Project Spartan," at this week's Windows Convergence conference in Atlanta, the obituaries came pouring in for Internet Explorer. It flashed on the screen of CNBC, it was on every general news site and was talked about all over social media.

Perhaps those outside of IT hadn't heard about Project Spartan, which Microsoft began talking about in some detail back in January. Microsoft explained at the time that the new browser will contain a new rendering engine, called "EdgeHTML." To create that new rendering engine, Microsoft forked the code in Internet Explorer's Trident engine. Spartan will offer both rendering engines, including the legacy MSHTML engine used for Trident. As reported by my colleague Kurt Mackie:

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/20/20150 comments

Microsoft's announcement earlier this week that users of pirated versions of its PC operating system can also take advantage of its free Windows 10 upgrade offer has an important caveat: it's no more official than the bootlegged version.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/20/20150 comments

In what may seem like a bizarre move, Microsoft said its free Windows 10 upgrade offer also applies to those with pirated older versions of the operating system.

Terry Myerson, executive vice president of Microsoft's operating systems group, made the startling announcement at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC), taking place this week in Shenzhen, China.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/18/20150 comments

Microsoft has put Windows 10 on the fast track saying in an unexpected announcement the new OS will arrive this summer. That's a surprise escalation in expectations from the fall timeline targeted by Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner back in December.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/18/20150 comments

Microsoft kicked off this week's annual Convergence conference in Atlanta by announcing the preview of Office 2016 for IT Pros and Developers. It was among several releases which also includes a general preview of Skype for Business.

Office 2016 is the first major upgrade of the Office desktop suite since 2013 and follows last month's preview releases of touch-enabled versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint apps for Windows 10. Today's Office 2016 release for IT pros and developers gives a far broader look at the new suite including some new features such as click-to-run-deployment, extended data loss prevention (DLP) support and the new Outlook 2016 client.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/16/20150 comments

Prominent Forrester Analyst James Staten is joining Microsoft today as chief strategist for Microsoft's Cloud and Enterprise division. Word of his move from Forrester to Microsoft spread quickly over the weekend when Staten updated his LinkedIn status.

In a tweet last night, Staten alerted followers: "Just landed in Redmond. Ready to start my new career at #Microsoft." When asked by a Twitter friend if he's relocating to Redmond, Staten replied: "Staying in Silicon Valley. Working w/VCs, startups and local companies r key to my job."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/16/20150 comments

Intel's warning that revenues could be off by about $1 billion weighed on its shares Thursday, stoking fears that PC sales may remain weak until Microsoft ships its new Windows 10 operating system.

The chipmaker's revised forecast for the first quarter is revenue of $12.8 billion, give or take $300 million, compared to the prior prediction of $13.7 billion, give or take $500 million. Intel said lower than anticipated demand for business desktop PCs across the supply chain spurred the revised forecast.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/12/20150 comments

Kemp Technologies is now offering a free version of its Loadmaster application load balancer, a move the company is hoping developers and DevOps managers will use for distributed workloads that don't require a lot of capacity.

While the move is aimed at seeding its virtual appliance, the company is letting companies use it permanently for production workloads. The catch is that operators will have to reregister it with Kemp's licensing server every 30 days, it will only support 20 Mbps applications and it doesn't support the high availability features of its commercial version, said Kemp Product Manager Maurice McMullin.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/12/20150 comments

News that Hillary Clinton operated an e-mail server out of her house in Chappaqua, N.Y. for both personal and official communications while serving as Secretary of State underscores how far people will go for convenience and control -- even if it means bypassing IT to do so.

While maintaining that she didn't break any laws or send any classified messages using her personal e-mail account instead of the official e-mail system the rest of the government uses, Clinton has raised fierce debate over the propriety of her decision to take matters into her own hands. Aside from the legal issues and obvious questions, such as did her use of personal e-mail really go unnoticed for four years and was the system she used as secure as government's network (some argue hers might have been more secure), her actions are far from unique.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/11/20150 comments

Many people have asked me if I plan on getting an Apple Watch when it comes out next month. The answer is, not the first version and probably not the second either. I'm not sure if I'll ever buy one but haven't ruled it out in case the price and performance are right.

Apple's launch event yesterday confirmed what we already presumed. The Apple Watch will ship next month (preorders begin April 10 and they'll appear in stores April 24) and the starting price is $350. If you want to spring for one with an 18-karat gold band, that'll cost $10,000 and if you must have the most expensive model -- with sapphire faces -- it'll set you back $17,000. If you collect Rolexes and the like, it'll be the perfect addition to your collection.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/10/20150 comments

In its push to simplify migration of Windows applications to cloud infrastructures without dependencies on hardware or software platforms, Microsoft has added Sphere 3D as its latest partner to deliver Windows containers. The two companies announced a partnership today to deliver Glassware 2.0 Windows containers for Azure.

Sphere 3D said it's collaborating with Microsoft to develop tools to simplify the migration of Windows-based end user applications to Azure. The two companies are first working to offer Glassware 2.0-based workloads in Azure for schools. Later in the year, Sphere 3D will offer other tools, the company said. Unlike Microsoft's higher-profile container partner Docker, which is open source, Glassware 2.0 is a proprietary platform designed to virtualize applications without requiring a virtualized desktop.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/09/20150 comments

Forget about next week's anticipated launch of the Apple Watch or the fact that the company will be added to the select 30 companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, knocking out AT&T. Apple's latest assault on the enterprise -- a market it has largely eschewed over its 39-year history -- is said to include a new iPad which, in many ways, could appeal to the same potential users of Microsoft's Surface Pro 3.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/06/20150 comments

LinkedIn, the popular social network for business users, has informed customers that its social connector will no longer work with older versions of Outlook after next Monday, March 9.

The announcement, sent in an e-mail to customers, stated that the connector will still work with the most recent release, Outlook 2013. Those with Outlook 2003, 2007 and 2010 will no longer be able to view information about their LinkedIn contacts, the company said in the e-mail.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/02/20150 comments

Failure to update your systems and applications running Windows Server 2003 could have deadly consequences. That's the message that Microsoft Distinguished Engineer Jeffrey Snover conveyed over the weekend when he tweeted his warning about what will happen to those who keep Windows Server 2003-based systems running after July 14:

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/02/20150 comments

Docker today released several new tools aimed at letting IT pros and developers build and manage distributed applications that are compatible across environments including Amazon Web Services, Google, IBM, Joyent, Mesosphere, Microsoft and VMware.

Over the past year, these players have pledged support for Docker's open source container environment, which has quickly emerged as the next-generation architecture for developing and provisioning distributed apps. Today's beta releases are key deliverables by Docker and its ecosystem partners to advance the building, orchestration and management of the container-based platform.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/26/20150 comments

The National Security Agency (NSA) continues to hold its stance that the only way to thwart terrorist attacks and other crimes is to continue the surveillance programs exposed by Edward Snowden nearly two years ago. The latest report alleges that the NSA, along with the British government counterpart Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), has hacked encryption keys from SIM cards on smartphones.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/25/20150 comments

Lenovo Chief Technology Officer Peter Hortensius yesterday apologized for the SuperfIsh spyware installed on several of its PC models, saying it shouldn't have happened and said the company is putting together a plan to ensure it never happens again.

"All I can say is we made a mistake and we apologize," Hortensius said in an interview with The New York Times. "That's not nearly enough. So our plan is to release, by the end of the week, the beginning of our plan to rebuild that trust. We are not confused as to the depth of that this has caused people not to trust us. We will do our best to make it right. In the process, we will come out stronger. But we have a long way to go to make this right."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/25/20150 comments

BlueStripe Software today said its FactFinder monitoring suite now supports distributed applications residing in Docker containers. The company said an updated release of FactFinder will let IT operations administrators monitor and manage application containers deployed in Docker containers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/24/20150 comments

Lenovo's decision to install the adware program Superfish on some of its PCs, notably the Yoga 2 models and Edge 15, was the latest inexcusable action by a company that we should be able to trust to provide a secure computing environment. It's hard to understand how Lenovo could let a system that was able to bypass the antimalware software it bundled from McAfee (as well as others) into the market.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/23/20150 comments

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella "loves" Linux. So it should come as little surprise that Microsoft is planning to support its Azure HDInight big data analytics offering on the open source server platform. The company announced the preview of HD Insight on Linux at the Strata + Hadoop World conference in San Jose, Calif. Microsoft also announced the release of Azure HD Insight running Storm, the popular Apache streaming analytics platform for streaming analytics.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/20/20150 comments

Many of us look forward to the day when we can get any information we want and have systems intelligently bring us what we're looking for. In a sense that's what Microsoft's new Azure Machine Learning service aims to do. While IBM is among those who have demonstrated the concept with Watson and is looking to advance the technology as well, Microsoft is looking to bring the service to the masses more easily and affordably.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/20/20150 comments

A number of prominent SharePoint MVP experts say they are confident that the on-premises server edition of SharePoint has a long future despite Microsoft's plans to extend the capabilities of its online counterpart -- Office 365 -- as well as options to host it in a public cloud service such as Azure. At the same time, many realize that customers are increasingly moving (or considering doing so) some or all of their deployments to an online alternative, either by hosting it in the cloud or moving to Office 365 and SharePoint Online.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/19/20150 comments

The latest Silicon Valley startup looking to ride the wave of cloud-based software-defined datacenters (SDDCs) and containerization has come out of stealth mode today with key financial backers and founders who engineered the VMware SDDC and the company's widely used file system.

Whether Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Springpath will rise to prominence remains to be seen, but the company's hyper-converged infrastructure aims to displace traditional OSes, virtual machines (VMs) and application programming models. In addition to the VMware veterans, Springpath is debuting with $34 million in backing from key investors with strong track records. Among them is Sequoia Capital's Jim Goetz, whose portfolio has included such names as Palo Alto Networks, Barracuda Networks, Nimble Storage, Jive and WhatsApp. Also contributing to the round are New Enterprise Associates (NEA) and Redpoint Ventures.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/18/20150 comments

President Obama issued an executive order aimed at persuading companies who suffer breaches to share information in an effort to provide more coordinated response to cyberattacks. Though it stops short of mandating that they do so, the president is also introducing legislation that will pave the way for greater information sharing between the private sector and government agencies including the Department of Homeland Security. The legislation also calls for the modernization of law enforcement authorities to fight cybercrime and the creation of a national breach reporting authority.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/13/20150 comments

Microsoft's announcement back in October that it has partnered with Docker to enable Linux containers to run in Windows was an important step forward for enabling what promises to be the next wave in computing beyond virtualization. While things can change on a dime, it looks like Microsoft is going all in by supporting a widely endorsed (including IBM, Google, VMware and others) new computing model based on application portability and a more efficient use of compute, storage and network resource.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/12/20150 comments

The popular Sysinternals site acquired by Microsoft nearly two decades ago with troubleshooting utilities, tools and help files is now SSL-enabled. The cocreator steward of the site Mark Russinovich, Microsoft's Azure CTO, tweeted the news earlier in the week.

Microsoft and many others are making the move to use the SSL protocol for Web sites -- the long-established Secure Sockets Layer standard used for encrypted Web sessions. Enabled for decades in sites where financial transactions and other secure communications are necessary, the move to HTTPS sessions from HTTP is rapidly spreading rapidly as the hazards of intercepted communications is on the rise.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/12/20150 comments

Microsoft's new ExpressRoute service could emerge as a key piece of its hybrid cloud story for customers wary of using the public Internet to link their private datacenters to Azure. ExpressRoute, introduced at last May's TechEd conference in Houston, effectively provides dedicated links that are more reliable, faster and secure. To encourage customers and partners to try it out, Microsoft is offering the service free of charge through the end of June.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/11/20150 comments

A little-known startup that offers data protection and SQL Server migration tools today released what it calls the first native container management platform for Windows Server and claims it can move workloads between virtual machines and cloud architectures. DH2i's DX Enterprise encapsulates Windows Server application instances into containers removing the association between the apps, data and the host operating systems connected to physical servers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/10/20150 comments

The White House late last week said it has named Tony Scott as its CIO. This will only be the third person charged with overseeing the nation's overall IT infrastructure. Scott, who served as Microsoft's CIO, also served that role for Disney and VMware and was CTO at GM.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/09/20150 comments

The news that the next version of Windows Server and System Center won't come until next year caught many off guard who were under the impression one would come later this year. Microsoft brought its enterprise product roadmap into fuller view with that announcement and the promise of a new version of SharePoint Server later this year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/06/20150 comments

It's been three years since VMware has upgraded its flagship hypervisor platform, but the company yesterday took the wraps off vSphere 6, which the company said offers at least double the performance over its predecessor vSphere 5.5. VMware describes its latest release as the "foundation for the hybrid cloud," thanks to the release of its OpenStack distribution and upgrades to components of the suite that integrate virtualized software-defined storage and networking.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/03/20150 comments

Goverlan last week said it's giving away its version of its GUI-based Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) tool for remote desktop management and control. The company's WMI Explorer (WMIX) lets IT pros with limited scripting or programming skills perform agentless remote administrations of Windows-based PCs.

The free tool -- an alternative to Microsoft's own command line interface called WMIC-- leverages WMI, a stack of Windows driver component interfaces supporting key standards including WBEM and CIM. WMI is built into all versions of Windows, allowing for deployed scripting to manage PCs and some servers remotely.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/03/20150 comments

Allaying concerns that Microsoft wasn't planning to develop any more on-premises versions of SharePoint, the company today said a new server release is scheduled for the second half of 2015. Microsoft's emphasis on SharePoint Online had many wondering at times whether the company was planning a new server release, although the company had indicated back in March that a new version was coming.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/02/20150 comments

When Microsoft last month announced that it will offer Windows 10 as a free upgrade to Windows 7, Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 users, the company said the deal doesn't apply to enterprise users. The company clarified that point late last week saying that the free upgrade is available to business users who have Windows Pro, but those wanting enterprise management capabilities should stick with or move to Software Assurance.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/02/20150 comments

Microsoft today released versions of its widely used Outlook mail, calendaring and contacts app for users of iPhones, iPads and a preview version Android devices. More than 80 million iPad and iPhone users have downloaded Office, according to Microsoft.

"We have received tremendous customer request for Outlook across all devices, so we are thrilled to fulfill this for our customers," said Julie White, general manager for the Office product management team. Microsoft was able to develop the new Outlook apps thanks to code developed by Acompli, which Microsoft acquired last month , she noted.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/29/20150 comments

Microsoft is giving its Power BI analytical service an upgrade with added connectivity sources, support for iOS and will be available for $9.99 for a premium edition to be called Power BI Pro. The company will also offer a free version with limited functionality that it will retain the Power BI name.

Power BI, a cloud-based business analytics service launched a year ago, was aimed at both technical and general business users. The browser-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) tool generates operational dashboards. As noted in our First Look at Power BI last year, this tool adds new functionality to existing Microsoft information management offerings, namely Excel 2013, Office 365 and SharePoint 2013.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/28/20150 comments

One day after Microsoft delivered a disappointing quarterly earnings report, Apple Tuesday did the complete opposite by posting its best quarter ever -- far exceeding expectations. In fact Apple is said to have posted the most profitable quarter of any publicly traded company ever, buoyed by the fact that it sold 74.5 million iPhones between Oct. 1 and Dec. 27.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/28/20150 comments

When Microsoft released the newest Windows 10 Technical Preview on Friday, testers saw some major new features the company is hoping to bring to its operating system designed to switch seamlessly between PC and tablet modes. Among the key new features are a new Start Menu and Cortana, the digital assistant that, until now, was only available on Windows Phone.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/26/20150 comments

After putting its plans to go public last year on hold, Box's widely anticipated IPO got out of the starting gate today with its shares up as much as 70 percent midday Friday. The company plans to use the estimated $180 million in proceeds to maintain operations and invest in capital infrastructure to grow its enterprise cloud offering.

Founder and CEO Aaron Levie launched the company in 2005 with the aim of offering an alternative to large premises-based enterprise content management systems. Over the years, Levie publicly put a target on the back of SharePoint. Levie's ambitions earlier this decade to establish Box as a SharePoint killer peaked before Office 365 and OneDrive for Business arrived. While Levie still has strong aspirations to become the primary storage and file sharing service for businesses, the market is more challenging now that Office 365 with OneDrive for Business, Google Drive and others are widely entrenched within enterprises.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/23/20150 comments

It's great that Microsoft will let Windows 7 and Windows 8.x users upgrade their systems to the new Windows 10 for free when it comes out this fall. But before you cheer too loud, beware of the fine print: the deal doesn't apply to Windows Enterprise editions.

A Microsoft official earlier in the week told me that the company will have an event in March emphasizing the enterprise features of Windows 10. Hopefully Microsoft will reveal whether it will offer the free upgrade or some other incentive for earlier users to upgrade. In the fine print discovered by my colleague Kurt Mackie, Microsoft noted the exclusions, which also include the small number of Windows RT users.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/22/20150 comments

One of the unexpected surprises at yesterday's Windows 10 prelaunch event and webcast was when Microsoft donned slick looking eyewear designed to bring holography to the mainstream. Whether Google got word of it days earlier when it pulled its own failed Google Glass experiment off the market is unknown. But the irony of the timing notwithstanding, Microsoft's new HoloLens appears to have more potential.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/22/20150 comments

Microsoft potentially removed a crucial barrier to the future of its Windows franchise by saying it will offer the next version -- Windows 10 -- as a free upgrade to existing Windows 7 and Windows 8.x users. The company is also adding some compelling new features that may make the upgrade worth the effort if these new capabilities live up to their promise.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/21/20150 comments

Mike Culver, who served a number of strategic roles with Amazon Web Services from the inception of the company's launch of its popular public cloud, lost his battle with pancreatic cancer this week. He was 63. Culver, who before joining AWS was also a technical evangelist at Microsoft in the early days of the .NET Framework rollout, was deeply respected in Redmond and throughout the world.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/21/20150 comments

However you feel about the emerging wearables market, many rightfully have found the notion of Google Glass over the top. Given its obvious potential to distract one's attention, it should be illegal to wear them on the streets and certainly when driving.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/16/20150 comments

It appears President Obama's forthcoming legislative proposal to crack down on cybercrime could impose additional liabilities on IT pros in that there could be penalties for not putting in place the proper policies, auditing practices and reporting of breaches.

The President this week spoke on his plans to propose the new legislation aimed at stiffening the penalties for all forms of cybercrime that put the nation's critical information infrastructure at risk as well as individual privacy, he said in a speech Tuesday. Obama will emphasize his legislative proposal to Congress in his annual State of the Union address.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/15/20150 comments

Facebook apparently does intend to enter the enterprise social networking market with its own offering targeted at business users. The new Facebook at Work will let Facebook users establish work accounts that are separate from their personal accounts.

Rumors that Facebook was developing a business network first came to light in November. News that the Facebook at Work pilot would launch today surfaced this morning in a report by Recode. A Facebook spokeswoman confirmed that the company has launched the pilot with some undisclosed participants testing the new service.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/14/20150 comments

Microsoft is making a big splash at this year's annual National Retail Federation (NRF) show in New York. The company is showcasing a number of major brand name chains that have kicked off efforts to improve their in-store experiences by using Azure, predictive analytics and new ways of interacting using apps delivered on mobile devices and kiosks.

While Microsoft emphasized that many of its customers were rolling out mobile devices for their employees at last year's NRF show, the types of apps that various retailers and restaurant chains are rolling out this year make use of Microsoft Azure in a big way. A number of big chains including GameStop and McDonalds are making use of applications that make use of Azure Machine Learning, Microsoft's predictive analytics tool rolled out last year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/13/20150 comments

At last week's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, there were robots, smartwatches, driverless cars, ultra-high-definition TVs and home automation systems. Even the traditional PC desktop display got a facelift.

Hewlett Packard was among a number of suppliers showcasing new curved desktop displays, designed to provide a more "immersive" experience, as Ann Lai, director of commercial displays at HP, put it in a briefing prior to the show.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/12/20150 comments

When Microsoft released Windows Server 2012 R2 back in the fall of 2013, one of the many features we pointed out at the time was "Workplace Join," which is designed to let organizations give single sign-on capability to their bring your own device (BYOD) employees -- or for anything not designed to join an Active Directory domain. Simply put, it lets you register a non-domain-based device running Windows 8.1, iOS and Android to Active Directory.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/08/20150 comments

IT pros apparently plan to give Windows 10 a warmer welcome than they gave Windows 8 when it arrived, according to an online survey of Redmond magazine readers conducted during December and early this month. A respectable 41 percent said they plan to deploy PCs with Windows 10 within a year after it ships and 30 percent will go with Windows 8.1, the survey shows.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/07/20150 comments

As the annual Consumer Electronics Show kicks off today in Las Vegas, you can expect to hear lots of buzz about driverless cars, home automation systems, the so-called "Internet of Things" and of course wearable computing devices (including smartwatches and fitness bands).

Having spent most of December using the new Microsoft Band, as I reported last month, it has some nice features but it's still buggy and, in my opinion, not worth the steep $199 price tag. When I returned my Microsoft Band, the clerk asked why. I mentioned the buggy Bluetooth synchronization with iOS, which she admitted is a common problem with the Microsoft Band. It was also a problem CNBC On-Air Editor Jon Fortt emphasized while interviewing Matt Barlow, Microsoft's general manager of new devices.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/05/20150 comments

Microsoft has taken a beating by critics over this month's security patch, which initially suggested that Windows 10 Technical Preview testers might need to uninstall Office before coming up with a less invasive workaround. Despite that and numerous other frustrations with the Windows 10 Technical Preview, Microsoft reported 1.5 million testers have their hands on a preview version of Windows 10, and nearly a third of them are "highly active." The company also claims that more people are testing it than any beta release of Windows to date.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/19/20140 comments

It's been a tough few months for IBM. The company has seen its shares tumble in 2014 amid weak earnings. But looking to show it may be down but not out, Big Blue said it has picked up the pace to build out its cloud footprint after getting to a slow start several years ago.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/18/20140 comments

Salesforce.com today launched a connector that aims to bridge its cloud-based CRM portfolio of services with enterprise file repositories. The new Salesforce File Connect will let organizations centralize their customer relationship management content with file stores including SharePoint and OneDrive with a connector to Google Drive coming in a few months.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/17/20140 comments

Like many cloud service providers, Microsoft has identified disaster recovery as a key driver for its hybrid infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) offering. Microsoft this year delivered a critical component of delivering its disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS) with Azure Site Recovery.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/17/20140 comments

Microsoft last month entered the wearables market with the Microsoft Band, which, paired with the new Microsoft Health Web site and app for the wrist band, is designed to track your physical activities and bring some productivity features to your wrist.

The Microsoft Band, in my opinion, does a lot of interesting things, though it doesn't really excel at any of them at this point. Among the productivity features included are alerts that let you glance at the first sentence or two of a message, texts, Facebook posts, Facebook Messenger, phone calls, voicemails, schedules, stock prices and an alarm clock that vibrates gradually for deep sleepers who don't like to jump out of bed.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/15/20140 comments

Once hailed as the future of in-vehicle communications and entertainment, a partnership between Ford and Microsoft has all but unraveled. Ford this week said it's replacing Microsoft Sync with BlackBerry's QNX software.

Ford launched its Sync 3 platform, which ushers in significant new features and will show up in 2016 vehicles sometime next year, the company announced yesterday. Though Ford didn't officially announce it was walking away from Microsoft Sync in favor of BlackBerry QNX, The Seattle Times reported in February that the automaker was on the verge of making the switch. Raj Nair, Ford's CTO of global product development, said in numerous reports yesterday that QNX is now the new platform. Some 7 million Ford vehicles are reportedly equipped with Microsoft Sync but the systems have continuously scored poorly in consumer satisfaction reports due to frequent malfunctions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/12/20140 comments

While IP address conflicts are as old as networks themselves, the growing number of employee-owned devices in the workplace are making them a more frequent problem for system administrators. By nature of the fact that PCs and devices have become transient in terms of the number of networks they may connect to, it's not uncommon for a device to still think it's linked to one network, causing an IP address conflict when it tries to connect to another network.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/12/20140 comments

During the Thanksgiving break, I had a number of simultaneous encounters with PCs in public places still sporting the Windows XP logo and it got under my skin. Among them was a computer near the checkout area at Home Depot. And within an hour I spotted another on a counter right next to the teller stations at my local Bank of America branch.

Given that we know Windows XP systems are no longer patched by Microsoft, the sight of them is becoming as uncomfortable as being near someone who has a nasty cold and coughs without covering his or her mouth. Speaking of spreading viruses, I've even been to two different doctors' offices in recent months that were running Windows XP-based PCs -- one of them is used to actually gather patient information and the other to schedule appointments. In both cases, when I asked if they planned to upgrade those systems, I got the equivalent of a blank stare. I don't think they had any idea what I was talking about.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/10/20140 comments

At Microsoft's annual shareholder meeting Wednesday in Bellevue, Wash., CEO Satya Nadella cashed in big. Shareholders approved his proposed $84 million pay package, a reward for a job well done. The pay package, which includes $59.2 million in stock options and a $13.5 million in retention pay, according to Bloomberg, has come under attack as excessive by Institutional Shareholder Services, an investor advisory organization.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/05/20140 comments

It was hard to ignore the hype over the Thanksgiving weekend's traditional Black Friday and Cyber Monday barrage of cut rate deals including this year's decision by quite a few retailers to open their doors earlier than ever. Many, including the Microsoft Store, opened as early as 6 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day, hoping to lure people away from their turkey dinner earlier to get a jump on their holiday shopping.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/01/20140 comments

Microsoft this week gave developers and IT pros a deep dive on major new features coming to Office 365, which the company has described as the fastest growing new product in its history. The demos, which include several APIs and SDKs aimed at driving existing SharePoint users to Office 365, gave a close look at how building and administering applications for collaboration is going to change dramatically for IT pros, developers and end users alike.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/21/20140 comments

Microsoft's Expanding Data Management Portfolio Gives DBAs and Devs Plenty To Digest

While Microsoft this year has rolled out extensive additions to its data management portfolio as well as business intelligence and analytics tools, SQL Server is still its core database platform. Nevertheless, Microsoft has unleashed quite a few new offerings that DBAs, developers and IT decision makers need to get their arms around.

"I think Microsoft needs to have the full stack to compete in the big data world," said Andrew Brust, who is research director at Gigaom Research. Brust Tuesday gave the keynote address at SQL Server Live!, part of the Live! 360 conference taking place in Orlando, Fla., which like Redmond, is produced by 1105 Media. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has talked of the data culture that's emerging, as noted in the Redmond magazine October cover story.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/19/20140 comments

Microsoft today said it has merged Windows code into Docker, allowing administrators from a Windows client to manage Docker containers running on Linux hosts. It's the latest move by Microsoft to jump on the Docker bandwagon, which began earlier this year with its support for Linux containers in the Azure pubic cloud, and continued with last month's pact by the two companies to develop native Docker clients for Windows Server.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/18/20140 comments

When Amazon Web Services announced Aurora as the latest database offering last week, the company put the IT industry on notice that it once again believes it can disrupt a key component of application infrastructures.

Amazon debuted Aurora at its annual AWS re:Invent customer and partner conference in Las Vegas. Amazon said the traditional SQL database for transaction-oriented applications, built to run on monolithic software and hardware, has reached its outer limits. Amazon Web Services' Andy Jassy said in the opening keynote address that the company has spent several years developing Aurora in secrecy.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/17/20140 comments

Facebook is secretly developing a social network aimed at enterprise users, according to a report published in today's Financial Times. The report said Facebook at Work could threaten Microsoft's Yammer enterprise social network as well as LinkedIn and Google Drive.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/17/20140 comments

When Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella last month said, "Microsoft loves Linux" and pointed to the fact that 20 percent of its Azure cloud is already running the open source popular platform, he apparently was getting ready to put his money where his mouth is.

At its Connect developer conference this week, Microsoft said it will open source its entire .NET Framework core and bring it to both Linux and the Apple Macintosh platform. It is the latest move by Microsoft to open up its proprietary .NET platform. Earlier this year, the company made ASP.NET and the C# compiler open source. This week the company released the .NET Core development stack and in the coming months, Microsoft will make the rest of .NET Core Runtime and .NET Core Framework open source.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/14/20140 comments

When Microsoft last month announced it has 100-plus partners adopting its burgeoning Cloud OS Network, which aims to provide Azure-compatible third party cloud services, it left out perhaps one of the biggest fishes it has landed: Rackspace.

The two companies are longtime partners, and as I recently reported, Rackspace has extended its Hyper-V-compatible offerings and dedicated Exchange, SharePoint and Lync services. But Rackspace also has a formidable cloud infrastructure as a service that competes with the Azure network. The news that Rackspace now will provide Azure-compatible cloud service, announced on Monday with Rackspace's third-quarter earnings report, signals a boost for both companies.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/12/20140 comments

If the Microsoft Azure public drive is going to be the centerpiece of its infrastructure offering, the company needs to bring third-party applications and tools along with it. That's where the newly opened Microsoft Azure Marketplace comes in. The company announced the Microsoft Azure Marketplace at a press and analyst briefing in San Francisco late last month led by CEO Satya Nadella and Scott Guthrie, executive VP of cloud and enterprise. As the name implies, it's a central marketplace in which providers can deliver to customers to run their software as virtual images in Azure.

Posted on 11/10/20140 comments

Microsoft got some positive ink yesterday when it announced that Office 365 users on iPhones and iPads can now edit their documents for free and that the same capability was coming to Android tablets. Indeed it is good news for anyone who uses one or more of those devices (which is almost everyone these days).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/07/20140 comments

BlueStripe Embeds App Monitor into System Center, Windows Azure Pack
BlueStripe Software is now offering its Performance Center tool as a management pack for Microsoft System Center 2012 R2 Operations Manager. The company earlier this year released the dashboard component of FactFinder, which monitors distributed applications across numerous modern and legacy platforms.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/07/20140 comments

A majority of some of the largest chief information security officers (CISOs) strongly believe that the sophistication of attackers is outstripping their own ability to fend them off and the number of threats has increased markedly. According to IBM's third annual CISO study, 59 percent are concerned about their inability to keep pace with 40 percent and say it's their top security challenge.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/05/20140 comments

A survey of small and medium enterprises found that only 8 percent are prepared to recover from an unplanned IT outrage, while 23 percent of them report it would take more than a day to resume operations.

Underscoring the risk to companies with fewer than 1,000 employees, a vast majority of the 453 organizations surveyed have experienced a major IT outage in the past two years. Companies with 50 to 250 employees were especially at risk. A reported 83 percent have gone through a major IT failure, while 74 percent of organizations with 250 to 1,000 employees have experienced a significant outage.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/05/20140 comments

In its latest bid to offer better failover and replication in its software and cloud infrastructure, Microsoft demonstrated its new Storage Replica technology at last week's TechEd conference in Barcelona.

Microsoft Principal Program Manager Jeff Woolsey demonstrated Storage Replica during the opening TechEd keynote. Storage Replica, which Microsoft sometimes calls Windows Volume Replication (or WVR) provides block-level, synchronous replication between servers or cluster to provide disaster recovery, according to a Microsoft white paper published last month. The new replication engine is storage-agnostic and Microsoft says it can also stretch a failover cluster for high availability.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/03/20140 comments

Microsoft used its TechEd conference in Barcelona this week to give customers a first look at the new Azure cloud in a box. The so-called Cloud Platform System (CPS), announced at an event held last week in San Francisco led by CEO Satya Nadella and Executive VP for Cloud and Enterprise Scott Guthrie, is Microsoft's effort to let customers or hosting providers run their own Azure clouds.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/31/20140 comments

Andy Rubin is leaving Google to join a technology incubator dedicated to startups building hardware, according to published reports. Whether you are an Android fan or not, it's hard not to argue that Google's acquisition of the company Rubin founded was one of the most significant deals made by the search giant.

While Rubin continued to lead the Android team since Google acquired it in 2005, Google reassigned him last year to lead the company's moves into the field of robotics, which included overseeing the acquisition of numerous startups.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/31/20140 comments

Microsoft kicked off what looks to be its final TechEd conference with the launch of new services designed to simplify the deployment, security and management of apps running in its cloud infrastructure. In the opening keynote presentation at TechEd, taking place in Barcelona, officials emphasized new capabilities that enable automation and the ability to better monitor the performance of specific nodes.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/28/20140 comments

Will Microsoft's final TechEd conference this week in Barcelona go out with a bang? We'll have a better sense of that over the next two days as the company reveals the next set of deliverables for the datacenter and the cloud. Microsoft has kept a tight lid on what's planned but we should be on the lookout for info pertaining to the next versions of Windows Server, System Center and Hyper-V, along with how Microsoft sees containers helping advance virtualization and cloud interoperability.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/27/20140 comments

While almost every part of Microsoft's business faces huge pressure from disruptive technology and competitors, the software that put the company on the map -- Windows -- continues to show it's not going to go quietly into the night. Given Microsoft's surprise report that Surface sales have surged and the company promising new capabilities in the forthcoming release of Windows 10, expectations of the operating system's demise are at least premature and potentially postponed indefinitely.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/24/20140 comments

Microsoft may be trying to compete with IBM in the emerging market for machine learning-based intelligence but like all rivals, these two with a storied past together have their share of mutual interests even as they tout competing public enterprise clouds. Hence the two are the latest to forge a cloud compatibility partnership.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/22/20140 comments

The launch today of the new Apple Pay service for users of the newest iPhone and iPad -- and ultimately the Apple Watch -- is a stark reminder that Microsoft has remained largely quiet about its plans to pursue this market when it comes to Windows Phone or through any other channels.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/20/20140 comments

Nearly a year after launching its Hadoop-based Azure HDInsight cloud analytics service, Microsoft believes it's a better and broader solution for real-time analytics and predictive analysis than IBM's widely touted Watson. Big Blue this year has begun commercializing its Watson technology, made famous in 2011 when it came out of the research labs to appear and win on the television game show Jeopardy.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/17/20140 comments

Apparently stung by his remarks last week that women shouldn't ask for raises but instead look for "karma," Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said he is putting controls in place that will require all employees to attend diversity training workshops to ensure not just equal pay for women but opportunities for advancement regardless of gender or race.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/17/20140 comments

In perhaps its greatest embrace of the open source Linux community to date, Microsoft is teaming up with Docker to develop Docker containers that will run on the next version of Windows Server, the two companies announced today. Currently Docker containers, which are designed to enable application portability using code developed as micro-services, can only run on Linux servers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/15/20140 comments

Satya Nadella's comments suggesting that women shouldn't ask for pay raises or promotions have prompted outrage on social media. But to his credit, he swiftly apologized, saying he didn't mean what he said.

To be sure, Nadella's answer to the question of "What is your advice?" to women uncomfortable asking for a raise was, indeed, insulting to women. Nadella said "karma" is the best way women should expect a salary increase or career advancement, a comment the male CEO couldn't have made at a worse place: The Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing in Phoenix, where he was interviewed onstage by Maria Klawe, president of Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, Calif. Even more unfortunate, Klawe is a Microsoft board member, one of the people Nadella reports to.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/10/20140 comments

In its bid to replace the traditional Windows and client environment with virtual desktops, VMware will release major new upgrades of its VMware Workstation and VMware Player desktop virtualization offerings in December. Both will offer support for the latest software and hardware architectures and cloud services.

The new VMware Workstation 11, the company's complete virtual desktop offering and the company's flagship product launched 15 years ago, is widely used by IT administrators, developers and QA teams. VMware Workstation 11 will support the new Windows 10 Technical Preview for enterprise and commercial IT testers and developers who want to put Microsoft's latest PC operating system through the paces in a virtual desktop environment.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/08/20140 comments

Veeam today said it will offer a free Windows endpoint backup and recovery client. The move is a departure from its history of providing replication and backup and recovery software for virtual server environments However, company officials said the move is not a departure from focus, which will remain targeted on protection of server virtual machines, but rather a realization that most organizations are not entirely virtual.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/08/20140 comments

Hewlett Packard for decades has resisted calls by Wall Street to divest itself into multiple companies but today it has heeded the call. The company said it would split itself into two separate publicly traded businesses next year. The two companies will leverage their existing storied brand, calling its PC and printing business HP Inc. and the infrastructure and cloud businesses HP Enterprise.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/06/20140 comments

Microsoft may have succeeded in throwing a curve ball at the world by not naming the next version of its operating system Windows 9. But as William Shakespeare famously wrote in Romeo and Juliet, "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." In other words, if Windows 10 is a stinker, it won't matter what Microsoft calls it.

In his First Look of the preview, Brien Posey wondered if trying to come up to speed with Apple's OS X had anything to do with the choice in names -- a theory that quickly came to mind by many others wondering what Microsoft is up to (the company apparently didn't say why it came up with Windows 10). Perhaps Microsoft's trying to appeal to the many Windows XP loyalists?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/03/20140 comments

Windows 'Drawbridge' Container Tech Sets Stage for Docker Battle

Untitled Document

As the capabilities of virtual machines reach their outer limits in the quest to build cloud-based software-defined datacenters, containers are quickly emerging as their potential successor. Though containers have long existed, notably in Linux, the rise of the Docker open source container has created a standard for building portable applications in the form of micro-services. As they become more mature, containers promise portability, automation, orchestration and scalability of applications across clouds and virtual machines.

Since releasing Docker as an open source container for Linux, just about every company has announced support for it either in their operating systems, virtual machines or cloud platforms including IBM, Google, Red Hat, VMware and even Microsoft, which in May said it would support Linux-based Docker containers in the infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) component of its Azure cloud service. Docker is not available in the Microsoft platform as a service (PaaS) because it doesn't yet support Linux, though it appears only a matter of time before that happens.

"We're thinking about it," said Mark Russinovich, who Microsoft last month officially named CTO of its Azure cloud. "We hear customers want Linux on PaaS on Azure."

Russinovich confirmed that Microsoft is looking to commercialize its own container technology, code-named "Drawbridge," a library OS effort kicked off in 2008 by Microsoft Research Partner Manager Galen Hunt, who in 2011 detailed a working prototype of a Windows 7 library operating system that ran then-current releases of Excel, PowerPoint and Internet Explorer. In the desktop prototype, Microsoft said the securely isolated library operating system instances worked via the reuse of networking protocols. In a keynote address at the August TechMentor conference (which, like Redmond magazine, is produced by 1105 Media) on the Microsoft campus, Redmond magazine columnist Don Jones told attendees about the effort and questioned its future.

During a panel discussion at the Interop conference in New York yesterday, Russinovich acknowledged Drawbridge as alive and well. While he couldn't speak for plans on the Windows client he also stopped short of saying Microsoft plans to include it in Windows Server and Hyper-V. But he left little doubt that that's in the pipeline for Windows Server and Azure. Russinovich said Microsoft has already used the Drawbridge container technology in its new Azure-based machine learning technology.

"Obviously spinning up a VM for them is not acceptable in terms of the experience," Russinovich said. "So we built with the help of Microsoft Research our own secure container technology, called Drawbridge. That's what we used internally. We are figuring out how to make that kind of technology available publicly on Windows." Russinovich wouldn't say whether it will be discussed at the TechEd conference in Barcelona later this month.

Sam Ramji, who left his role as leader of Microsoft's emerging open source and Linux strategy five years ago, heard about Drawbridge for the first time in yesterday's session. In an interview he argued that if Windows Server is going to remain competitive with Linux, it needs to have its own containers. "It's a must-have," said Ramji, who is now VP of strategy at Apigee, a provider of cloud-based APIs. "If they don't have a container in the next 12 months, I think they will probably lose market share."

Despite Microsoft's caginess on its commercial plans for Drawbridge and containers, reading between the lines it appears they're a priority for the Azure team. While talking up Microsoft's support for Docker containers for Linux, Russinovich seemed to position Drawbridge as a superior container technology, arguing its containers are more secure for deploying micro-services.

"In a multi-tenant environment you're letting untrusted code from who knows where run on a platform and you need a security boundary around that," Russinovich said. "Most cloud platforms use the virtual machines as a security boundary. With a smaller, letter-grade secure container, we can make the deployment of that much more efficient," Russinovich said. "That's where Drawbridge comes into play. "

Ramji agreed that the ability to provide secure micro-services is a key differentiator between the open source Docker and Drawbridge. "It's going to make bigger promises for security, especially for third-party untrusted code," Ramji said.

Asked if cloud platforms like the open source OpenShift PaaS, led by Red Hat, can make containers more secure, Krishnan Subramanian, argued that's not their role. "They are not there to make containers more secure. Their role is for the orchestration side of things," Subramanian said. "Security comes with the underlying operating system that the container uses. If they're going to use one of those operating systems in the industry that are not enterprise ready, probably they're not secure."

Russinovich said customers do want to see Windows-based containers. Is that the case? How do you see them playing in your infrastructure and how imperative is it that they come sooner than later?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/01/20140 comments

Microsoft Research today opened its new online Prediction Lab in a move it said aims to reinvent the way polls and surveys are conducted. The new lab, open to anyone in the format of a game, seeks to provide more accurate predictions than current surveys can forecast today.

Led by David Rothschild, an economist at Microsoft Research and also a fellow at the Applied Statistics Center at Columbia University, the Prediction Lab boasts it already has a credible track record prior to its launch. In some examples released today, the lab predicted an 84 percent chance that Scottish voters would reject the election held to decide whether Scotland should secede from the United Kingdom.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/29/20140 comments

Rackspace, which over the past few years tried to transform itself into the leading OpenStack cloud provider, is shifting gears. The large San Antonio-based service provider last week began emphasizing a portfolio of dedicated managed services that let enterprises run their systems and applications on their choice of virtual platforms -- Microsoft's Hyper-V, VMware's ESX or the open source OpenStack platform.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/26/20140 comments

Within moments of last week's news that Larry Ellison has stepped down as Oracle's CEO to become CTO, social media lit up. Reaction such as "whoa!" and "wow!" preceded every tweet or Facebook post. In reality, it seemed like a superficial change in titles.

For all intents and purposes, the new CEOs, Mark Hurd and Safra Catz, were already running the company, while Ellison had final say in technical strategy. Hence it's primarily business as usual with some new formalities in place. Could it be a precursor to some bombshell in the coming days and weeks? We'll see but there's nothing obvious to suggest that.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/24/20140 comments

Apple today said it has sold 10 million of its new iPhones over the first three days since they arrived in stores and at customers' doorsteps Friday. This exceeds analysts' and the company's forecasts. In the words of CEO Tim Cook, sales of its new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus models have led to the "best launch ever, shattering all previous sell-through records by a large margin."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/22/20140 comments

Microsoft earlier this week said two more longtime board members are stepping down and the company has already named their replacements, which will take effect Oct. 1.

Among them are David Marquardt, a venture capitalist who was an early investor in Microsoft, and Dina Dublon, the onetime chief financial officer of J.P. Morgan. Dublon was on Microsoft's audit committee and chaired its compensation, The Wall Street journal noted. The paper also raised an interesting question: Would losing the two board members now and others over the past two years result in a gap in "institutional knowledge?" Marquardt, with his Silicon Valley ties, played a key role in helping Microsoft "get off the ground and is a direct link to the company's earliest days."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/18/20140 comments

IBM's New M5 Servers Include Editions for Hyper-V and SQL Server
In what could be its last major rollout of new x86 systems if the company's January deal to sell its commodity server business to Lenovo for $2.3 billion goes through, IBM launched the new System x M5 line. The new lineup of servers includes systems designed to operate the latest versions of Microsoft's Hyper-V and SQL Server.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/18/20140 comments

As the IT industry looks at the future of the virtual machine, containers have jumped out as the next big thing and every key player with an interest in the future of the datacenter is circling the wagons around Silicon Valley startup Docker. That includes IBM, Google, Red Hat, VMware and even Microsoft. Whether it is cause or effect, big money is following Docker as well.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/16/20140 comments

Microsoft has pulled the trigger on a $2.5 billion deal to acquire Mojang, the developer of the popular Minecraft game. Rumors that a deal was in the works surfaced last week, though the price tag was initially said to be $2 billion. It looks like the founders of the 5-year-old startup squeezed another half-billion dollars out of Microsoft over the weekend.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/15/20140 comments

Apple today said preorders of its new iPhone 6 and its larger sibling, the 6 Plus, totaled a record 4 million in the first 24 hours, which doubled the preorders that the iPhone 5 received two years ago. But those numbers may suggest a rosier outlook than they actually portend.

Since Apple didn't release similar figures for last year's release of the iPhone 5s, which was for the most part an incremental upgrade over its then year-old predecessor as well as the lower-end 5c, it suggests customers are sitting on a number of aging iPhones. That includes earlier models which are now reaching the point of sluggishness due to upgrades to iOS running on slower processors and the fact they can only run on 3G networks.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/15/20140 comments

Hewlett Packard's surprising news that it has agreed to acquire Eucalyptus potentially throws a monkey wrench into Microsoft's recently stepped-up push to enable users to migrate workloads from Amazon Web Services to the Microsoft Azure public cloud.

As I noted last week, Microsoft announced its new Migration Accelerator, which migrates workloads running on the Amazon Web Services cloud to Azure. It's the latest in a push to accelerate its public cloud service, which analysts have recently said is gaining ground.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/12/20140 comments

Apple's much-anticipated launch event yesterday "sucked the air out of the room" during the opening keynote session at the annual Tableau Customer conference, taking place in Seattle, as my friend Ellis Booker remarked on Facebook yesterday.

Regardless how you view Apple, the launch of its larger iPhone 6 and 6 Plus models, along with the new payment service and smartwatch, were hard to ignore. Positioned as an event on par with the launch of the original Macintosh 30 years ago, the iPod, iPhone and iPad, the new Apple Watch and Apple Pay made for the largest launch event the company has staged in over four years. It was arguably the largest number of new products showcased at a single Apple launch event. Despite all the hype, it remains to be seen if it will be remembered as disruptive as Apple's prior launches. Yet given its history, I wouldn't quickly dismiss the potential in what Apple announced yesterday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/10/20140 comments

Back in the 1990s when America Online ruled the day, Microsoft's entry with MSN followed in AOL's footsteps. Microsoft is hoping its latest MSN refresh tailored for the mobile and cloud era will take hold and its new interface is quite compelling.

Launched as a public preview today, the new MSN portal is a gateway to popular apps such as Office 365, Outlook.com, Skype, OneDrive, Xbox Music as well as some outside services, notably Facebook and Twitter. The interface to those services is the Service Stripe. After just spending a short amount of time with it, I'm already considering replacing My Yahoo as my longtime default browser portal home page.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/08/20140 comments

In critiquing the lack of availability of apps for Windows Phone last week, dozens of readers took issue with my complaints, effectively describing them as trivial and ill-informed. The good news is there are a lot of passionate Windows Phone users out there, but, alas, not enough -- at least for now -- to make it a strong enough No. 3 player against the iPhone and Android-based devices. Though the odds for it becoming a solid three-horse race appear to be fading, I really do hope that changes.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/08/20140 comments

Microsoft is readying a tool that it says will "seamlessly" migrate physical and virtual workloads to its Azure public cloud service. A limited preview of the new Migration Accelerator, released yesterday, moves workloads to Microsoft Azure from physical machines, VMs (both VMware and Hyper-V-based) and those running in the Amazon Web Services public cloud.

The launch of the new migration tool comes as Microsoft officials are talking up the growth of its Azure cloud service at the expense of Amazon Web Services. Microsoft Technical Fellow in the Cloud and Enterprise Mark Russinovich emphasized that point in a speech at last month's TechMentor conference, which like Redmond magazine is produced by 1105 Media.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/05/20140 comments

Two key suppliers of enterprise tools yesterday said they're being acquired and another well-known software-as-a-service provider is reportedly in play. BeyondTrust and Compuware have agreed to be acquired by private equity firms while shares of SaaS provider Concur have traded higher following rumors that several software vendors have approached it, including Microsoft, Oracle and SAP, after hiring an investment bank to gauge interest.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/03/20140 comments

In my monthly Redmond View column I raised the question, "Can Windows Phone Defy Odds and Gain Share?" It's a valid question given the platform's recent falloff in shipments and the lack of widespread enthusiasm for Windows Phone.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/03/20140 comments

Steve Ballmer's decision to step down from Microsoft's board six months after "retiring" as the company's CEO (announced a year ago tomorrow) has once again put him in the limelight in the IT world, at least for a few days. The spotlight has already pointed to Ballmer in the sports world now that he shelled out an unprecedented $2 billion to purchase the Los Angeles Clippers and gave an infamous rally cry earlier this week on how his team will light the NBA on fire.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/22/20140 comments

NetApp Adds Hybrid Cloud Storage for Azure
NetApp Inc. is now offering a private storage solution that supports Microsoft private clouds and the Microsoft Azure cloud service. The new NetApp Private Storage for Microsoft Azure is designed to provide storage for hybrid clouds, letting organizations elastically extend storage capacity from their own datacenters to the public cloud service. The offering utilizes the Microsoft FlexPod private cloud solution consisting of converged storage, compute and network infrastructure from Cisco Systems Inc., NetApp and the Windows Server software stack. Organizations can create internal private clouds with the Microsoft Cloud OS, which includes the combination of Windows Server, System Center and the Windows Azure Pack. Those which require scale can use the Azure cloud service and Microsoft's new Azure ExpressRoute offering, which through partners such as AT&T, BT, Equinix, Level 3 Communications and Verizon Communications, provides high-speed, dedicated and secure links rather than relying upon the public Internet. NetApp Private Storage for Microsoft Azure offers single or multiple region disaster recovery and uses the public cloud service only when failover is necessary or for planned scenarios such as testing. When used with System Center and the NetApp PowerShell Toolkit, customers can manage data mobility between the private cloud and on-site storage connected to the Azure cloud.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/22/20140 comments

Microsoft will release the third version of its Virtual Machine Converter (MVMC) this fall and the key new feature will be the return of support for physical to virtual conversions. MVMC is Microsoft's free tool for migrating VMware virtual machines to Hyper-V and when it released the 2.0 version earlier this year, the company removed the P2V support and only allowed for V2V conversions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/20/20140 comments

Over the weekend I downloaded the Chrome Web browser on my iPad after it showed up as a suggested download. Somehow I forgot Chrome is now available on iOS and I was thrilled to see I could not only run the browser, but instantly have access to my bookmarks and Web browsing history from other PCs on which I work. Then I wondered if Internet Explorer would ever find its way into the iTunes App Store. After all, Office is now available on iOS, as well as other popular Microsoft offerings. However, it doesn't appear that Internet Explorer on iOS is in the cards.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/18/20140 comments

Could there be a day when the desktop or mobile operating system you use and developers program to don't matter? The age-old question may not be answered any time soon and don't expect to see any of this in Microsoft's next client OS. But IT pros should prepare themselves for the possibility that Microsoft or other players may someday successfully commercialize a "library operating system" where developers rely primarily on APIs to run their applications, not a client OS or even a virtual machine.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/15/20140 comments

Growing use of the Microsoft Azure cloud service, rapidly expanding features and a price war are putting the squeeze on cloud market leader Amazon Web Services, according to Microsoft Technical Fellow in the Cloud and Enterprise Division Mark Russinovich.

In the opening keynote at the TechMentor conference at the Microsoft Conference Center on the company's Redmond campus, Russinovich showcased the edge Microsoft sees that it has over its key rival. Russinovich argued that the company's squeeze contributed to Amazon's disappointing quarterly earnings report last month, which rattled investors. "Amazon Web Services is struggling in the face of pricing pressure by us and Google," Russinovich said. "People are starting to realize we're in it to win."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/13/20140 comments

Google wants Web sites to become more secure and said Wednesday it will do its part by motivating organizations to build stronger encryption for their sites. The company is giving a pretty significant incentive: it will reward those who do so by ranking them higher than sites lacking the added support to Transport Layer Security, also known as HTTPS encryption. Another way to look at it is Google will punish those who lack the extra encryption.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/08/20140 comments

Microsoft has extended its relationship with the NFL in a new deal for its Surface Pro 3 tablet-PCs to be used by coaches on the sidelines during games. Viewers of NFL games this season will prominently see team personnel and coaches using Surface Pro 3 devices to review images of plays on screen rather than on printed photos.

The NFL struck a deal last year with Microsoft for the Surface to be the league's official tablet. Now a new $400 million deal calls for Surface Pro 3s to be used on the sidelines during games. The arrangement calls for coaches to use the Surface Pro 3s for five years, according to a Wall Street Journal blog post.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/06/20140 comments

In a setback for U.S. cloud providers looking to ensure privacy of data stored in foreign countries, a search warrant ordering Microsoft to turn over e-mail stored in its Dublin, Ireland datacenter was upheld. Judge Loretta Preska of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York upheld the search warrant by a domestic magistrate judge ruling. The identity and locale of the suspect, which is suspected in an illegal drug-related matter, is not known. Microsoft has said it will appeal last week's ruling.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/04/20140 comments

If you've been holding off on buying Microsoft's Surface Pro 3, awaiting either a less expensive version or the higher-end model with an Intel Core i7 processor, they're now available. Microsoft announced the release of the new Surface Pro 3 models today.

The first units started shipping in June and featured mid-range models with i5 processors, priced between $999 and $1,299 (not including the $130 removable keyboard). Now the other units are available, as previously indicated. The unit with an i3 processor is priced at $799 for the device, while the i7 models, targeted at those with high-performance requirements such as those working in Adobe Photoshop or computer aided design-type applications, will run you quite a bit more. A Surface Pro 3 with a 256GB solid-state drive and 8GB of RAM costs $1,559. If you want to go whole-hog, one with a 512GB SSD will set you back $1,949.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/01/20140 comments

Microsoft has substantial plans for its flagship Office suite, as noted by Mary Jo Foley in her August Redmond magazine column. But for now its version for the iPad is getting all the love. Just four months after the long-awaited release of Office for iPad, Microsoft has upgraded it with some noteworthy new features. The 1.1 versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint are now available in Apple's iTunes App Store. Microsoft also updated OneNote for the iPad with its version 2.3 release.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/01/20140 comments

In its latest effort to apparently reign in large U.S. tech companies from expanding their presence in China, government investigators in China this week raided Microsoft offices throughout the country, according to several reports.

The raids by China's State Administration for Industry and Commerce included offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Chengdu, according to a report Monday in The New York Times, citing a spokeswoman who declined to elaborate due to the sensitivity of the issue. Another Microsoft spokesman told The Wall Street Journal that the company's business practices are designed to comply with Chinese law.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/30/20140 comments

Hedge fund holding company Elliot Management has taken a $1 billion stake in storage giant EMC, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal last week. The activist investor with an estimated $25 billion under management is reportedly looking for the company to spin off VMware and Pivotal.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/28/20140 comments

Veeam this week has released a new management tool to provide visibility into Hyper-V as well as VMware environments. While previous versions of the Veeam Management Pack only supported VMware, the new v7 release now provides common visibility and management of Hyper-V, Microsoft's hypervisor. Administrators can use the Veeam Management Pack from within System Center Operations Manager.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/25/20140 comments

The release of the Amazon Fire Phone this week adds another wildcard to the smartphone race largely dominated by Apple's iPhone and devices based on Google's Android OS. With Windows Phone in a distant but solid third place in market share, it remains to be seen if it's too late for anyone to make a serious dent in the market at this point.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/25/20140 comments

Despite seeing its profits shrink thanks to its acquisition of Nokia, Microsoft on Tuesday reported a nice uptick in its core business lines -- notably its datacenter offerings -- and strong growth for its cloud services including Office 365 and Azure.

CEO Satya Nadella appeared in his second quarterly call with analysts to discuss Microsoft's fourth quarter earnings for fiscal year 2014. The company exceeded its forecasts for Office 365 subscription growth and saw double-digit gains across its enterprise server lines.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/23/20140 comments

Pluralsight Hires Redmond Columnists Greg Shields and Don Jones

Longtime Redmond magazine columnists Don Jones and Greg Shields have joined online IT training firm Pluralsight, where they will provide courses for IT administrators.

The two will continue to write their respective Decision Maker and Windows Insider columns for Redmond magazine and other content to the publication's Web site. They will also continue to present at the TechMentor and Live! 360 conferences, which, like Redmond magazine, is produced by 1105 Media.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/23/20140 comments

After a protracted decline in PC sales, Intel last week said that enterprises of all sizes are refreshing their portable and desktop computers. In its second quarter earnings report, Intel said PC shipments rose for the third consecutive quarter. While the company acknowledged that the end of life of Windows XP has helped fuel the revival, the company appears optimistic the trend will continue.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/21/20140 comments

Microsoft moved quickly after last week's acquisition of InMage Systems to say that the InMage Scout software appliances for Windows and Linux physical and virtual instances will be included in its Azure Site Recovery subscription licenses.

Azure Site Recovery, a service announced at Microsoft's TechEd conference in Houston in May, is the rebranded Hyper-V Recovery Manager. Azure Site Recovery, unlike its predecessor, allows customers to use the Microsoft Azure public cloud as a backup target rather than requiring a second datacenter. Image Scout is an on-premises appliance which in real time captures data on a continuous basis as those changes occur. It then simultaneously performs local backups or remote replication via a single data stream.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/18/20140 comments

Microsoft this morning announced what was widely rumored -- it will kick off the largest round of layoffs in the company's history. The company will reduce its workforce by 18,000 employees -- much greater than analysts had anticipated. More than two thirds of them -- 12,500 -- will affect workers in its Nokia factories with the rest impacting other parts of the company. The layoffs are aimed at creating a flatter and more responsive organization.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/17/20140 comments

It's no secret that big changes are coming to Microsoft. CEO Satya Nadella made that clear in his 3,100-word memo to employees late last week. The key takeaways of that message were that Microsoft is now a platforms and productivity company and it intends to become leaner in a way that it can bring products to market faster.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/16/20140 comments

In what Apple and IBM describe as a "landmark" partnership, the two companies have forged a deal to bring 100 industry specific, enterprise-grade iOS apps and provide cloud services such as security, analytics and mobile integration for iPads and iPhones. The pact also calls for the two companies to offer AppleCare support for enterprises and IBM will offer device activation, supply and management of devices.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/16/20140 comments

In his annual address to partners, Microsoft COO Kevin Turner said the company will not provide any government access to customer data. Microsoft will fight any requests by a government to turn over data, Turner told 16,000 attendees at the company's annual Worldwide Partner Conference, which kicked off today in Washington, D.C.

"We will not provide any government with direct unfettered access to customers' data. In fact we will take them to court if necessary," said Turner. "We will not provide any government with encryption keys or assist their efforts to break our encryption. We will not engineer backdoors in the products. We have never provided a business government data in response to a national security order. Never. And we will contest any attempt by the U.S. government or any government to disclose customer content stored exclusively in another place. That's our commitment."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/14/20140 comments

If you thought Microsoft was looking to disrupt the storage landscape earlier this week when it launched its Azure StorSimple appliances, the company has just upped the ante. Microsoft is adding to its growing storage portfolio with the acquisition of InMage, a San Jose, Calif.-based provider of converged disaster recovery and business continuity infrastructure that offers continuous data protection (CDP). Terms weren't disclosed.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/11/20140 comments

When it comes to enterprise storage, companies such as EMC, Hewlett Packard, Hitachi, IBM and NetApp may come to mind first. But there are a lot of new players out there taking a piece of the pie. Among them are Fusion-io, GridStore, Nimble Storage, Nutanix, Pure Storage, SolidFire and Violin Memory, just to name a few high fliers. Another less obvious but potentially emerging player is Microsoft, which acquired storage appliance maker StorSimple in 2012.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/09/20140 comments

CA Technologies on Monday said it is selling off its Arcserve data protection software business to Marlin Equity Partners, whose holdings include Changepoint, Critical Path, Openwave, Tellabs and VantagePoint.

The new company will take on the Arcserve name. Mike Crest, the current general manager of CA's Arcserve business, will become CEO of the new company. Terms of the deal, expected to close at the end of this calendar quarter, were not disclosed.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/07/20140 comments

A study commissioned by VMware finds enterprise users "overwhelmingly" prefer Macs over Windows PCs. According to the survey of 376 IT professionals conducted by Dimensional Research, 71 percent of enterprises now support Macs and 66 percent have employees who use them in the workplace.

VMware, which of course has a vested interest in the demise of traditional Windows PCs in the enterprise, didn't ask to what extent Macs are deployed within respondents' organizations. While the share of Macs in use overall has increased over the years, according to IDC, the share of Macs dropped slightly to 10.1 percent last quarter from 11 percent year-over-year. However, that may reflect the overall decline in PC hardware sales over the past year. Nevertheless with more employees using their personal Macs at work and execs often preferring them over PCs, their presence in the workplace continues to rise.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/07/20140 comments

The preview of the next version of Windows could appear in the next few months and will have improvements for those who primarily use the traditional desktop environment for Win32-based applications, according to the latest rumors reported Monday.

"Threshold," which could be branded as Windows 9 (though that's by no means certain) will target large audience of Windows 7 user who want nothing to do with the Windows 8.x Modern user interface, according to a report by Mary Jo Foley in her All About Microsoft blog. At the same time, Microsoft will continue to enhance the Modern UI for tablet and hybrid laptop-tablet devices.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/02/20140 comments

Why SharePoint Admins Should Check Out Surface Pro 3

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Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 could benefit all types of workers looking for a laptop that they can also use as a tablet. Among them are SharePoint administrators.

As soon as the new Surface Pro 3s went on sale at BestBuy 10 days ago, Tamir Orbach, Metalogix's director of product management for SharePoint migration product, went out and bought one. Having seen my first-look write up last week, he reached out, wanting to share with me his observations on the device in general and why he believes every SharePoint administrator would benefit by having one.

Many of his customers who are SharePoint administrators tend to have a small, low end Windows tablet or iPad and a heavy laptop or desktop on their desks. Orbach believes the Surface Pro 3's high resolution, light weight and the coming availability of a unit with an Intel Core i7 processor and 8GB of RAM will make the device suitable as a SharePoint administrator's only PC and tablet.

"Pretty much all of us professionals want or need both a laptop or desktop and a slate," Orbach said. "It's so light that you can carry it anywhere you want and you would barely even feel it. And the screen is big enough, the resolution is good, the functionality is powerful enough to be used as our day-to-day computer."

We chatted about various aspects of the device:

New keyboard: The new keyboard is bigger and we both agreed the fact that it can be locked on an angle is a significant improvement over previous systems (which only could be used in a flat position). Orbach said one downside to that new angle is you can feel the bounce, which is true but it's not that bad in my opinion. "I'd definitely take it over the flat one though," he said.
Cost and configuration: Orbach bought the unit configured with a 128GB SSD and 4GB of RAM. That unit cost $999 plus $129 for the keyboard. A SharePoint administrator would be better off with at least the system with a 256GB drive and 8GB of RAM but there's a $300 premium. For one with a i7 processor, you're up to $1,549 without the keyboard.
Docking station: If the Surface Pro 3 becomes your only computer it would be worth adding the docking station if you have a primary work area.

If you're a SharePoint administrator or any type of IT pro, do you think the Surface Pro 3 would help you do your job better?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/30/20140 comments

I think it's great that Microsoft is now offering 1TB of capacity in its OneDrive service for Office 365 but that only makes the proverbial haystack even larger due to the lack of a suitable way of finding files when using the new Windows 8.x modern UI.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/27/20140 comments

Infrastructure systems management provider SolarWinds is extending into the Web performance monitoring market with the acquisition of Pingdom. Terms of the deal, announced last week, weren't disclosed. Pingdom's cloud-based service monitors the performance and uptime of Web servers and sites.

Web performance monitoring is a natural extension of its business and is a key requirement of those managing their infrastructure, said SolarWinds Executive VP Suaad Sait.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/27/20140 comments

Equinix, which operates the largest global colocation of over 100 datacenters, plans to join the OpenCompute Project and implement some of its specs by early next year. Open Compute is a consortium of vendors initiated by Facebook with a large roster of members that include AMD, Dell, Hewlett Packard, Intel, Microsoft, Rackspace and VMware.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/25/20140 comments

While Microsoft has extended the storage features in Windows Server and its Azure cloud service for years, the company is stepping up its ability to deliver software-defined storage (SDS). Experts and vendors have various opinions on what SDS is, but in effect it pools all hardware and cloud services and automates processes such as tiering, snapshotting and replication.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/25/20140 comments

Microsoft Targets Apple with Expansion of Retail Stores

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I don't make a habit of attending grand opening ceremonies but when Microsoft opened its second retail store in my backyard Saturday, I decided to accept the company's invitation to check it out. Microsoft opened one of the largest stores to date at the Roosevelt Field mall in Garden City, N.Y. on Long Island (right outside New York City). It's the fifth store in New York and arrives less than two years after opening area locations in Huntington, N.Y. (also on Long Island) and in White Plains, N.Y. in Westchester County. Roosevelt Field is the largest shopping mall in the New York metro area and the ninth largest in the U.S., according to Wikipedia.

The store that opened this weekend is one of the company's largest at 3,775 square feet and 41 employees. It coincidentally opened a day after Friday's Surface Pro 3 launch. "It just worked out that way," said Fazal Din, the store manager, when asked if the opening was timed in coordination with the launch. "But it's a great way to open the store."

While Microsoft's retail stores are primarily intended to draw consumers and are often strategically located near Apple Stores (as this one is), the stores are also targeting business customers, Din said. "We want this store to be the IT department for small businesses," Din said. The store is also reaching out to local partners, he added.

Microsoft corporate VP Panos Panay was on hand for the ribbon cutting ceremony Saturday, where a number of customers later asked him to autograph their new Surface Pro 3s. "This is not only the 98th store, but it's also the 12th store in the tri-state area [New York, New Jersey and Connecticut]. It's kind of a big deal," Panay said. "This is a great area for Microsoft to show its technologies."

Hundreds, if not a few thousand, teenagers camped outside the store in the enclosed mall to score tickets for a free Demi Lovato concert Microsoft arranged in the outside parking lot. The company also gave $1 million in donations to the local divisions of several charities including Autism Speaks, United Way, Variety Child Learning Center and the Girl Scouts of Nassau County.

Nine additional stores are in the pipeline, one of which will open this week in The Woodlands, Texas this Thursday. Most of the stores are in the U.S. with a few in Canada and Puerto Rico. By comparison, Apple, which started opening stores years before Microsoft, has an estimated 424 stores worldwide and 225 in the U.S. With retail sales of over $20 billion for Apple's stores, they represented 12 percent of the company's revenues. Like Apple and Samsung, Microsoft also has its own specialty departments in Best Buy stores.

Though Microsoft is touting the 98th store, by my count only 59 are full retail stores. The rest are smaller specialty stores. It appears Microsoft is largely opening retail stores in the suburbs of large cities rather than in urban locations. For example the only location in New York City is a specialty store in the Time Warner Center in Columbus Circle.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/23/20140 comments

The preview of Microsoft's Azure Site Recovery is now available, the company said on Thursday. Among numerous offerings announced at last month's TechEd conference in Houston, Azure Site Recovery is the company's renamed Hyper-V Recovery Manager for disaster recovery.

But as I reported, Azure Site Recovery is more than just a name change. It represents Microsoft's effort to make Azure a hot site for data recovery. While Hyper-V Recovery Manager, released in January, provides point-to-point replication, Microsoft says Azure Site Recovery aims to eliminate the need to have a secondary datacenter or hot site just for backup and recovery.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/20/20140 comments

A month after introducing the new Surface Pro 3 -- which Microsoft advertises as the tablet designed to replace your laptop -- the device is now available for purchase at select retail locations. But the first batch of units will require a quick firmware update to address an issue where Surface Pro 3 would occasionally fail to boot up even when fully charged.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/20/20140 comments

When Microsoft said it was targeting MacBook users with its new Surface Pro 3 last month, the company demonstrated how much lighter its latest device is by putting the two on a balancing scale. But to really tip the scales for the new tablet PC, Microsoft also talked up its new partnership with Adobe to enhance Photoshop and the rest of the Creative Cloud suite for the new Surface.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/18/20140 comments

If you're wondering where Microsoft stands with cloud standardization efforts such as OpenStack and Cloud Foundry, the general manager for Microsoft Azure gave his take, saying providers should innovate first. In the keynote address at this week's Cloud Computing Expo Conference in New York, Microsoft's Steven Martin questioned providers that have emphasized the development of cloud standards.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/13/20140 comments

As I reported the other day, Microsoft is getting tougher on surveillance reforms. Later that day, Microsoft stepped its battle of overreach up a notch by releasing a court filing seeking to overturn an order to turn over an e-mail stored in its Dublin datacenter. In its appeal released Monday, Microsoft is arguing the search warrant is in violation of international law.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/11/20140 comments

In the year since Edward Snowden stunned the world with revelations that the National Security Agency (NSA) had a widespread digital surveillance effort that included the covert PRISM eavesdropping and data mining program, Microsoft marked the anniversary last week by saying it had unfinished business in the quest for government reforms.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/09/20140 comments

Asus, Dell and Hewlett Packard are among the PC suppliers extending the boundaries of Microsoft's new Windows 8.1 operating system with several new enterprise-grade hybrid PC-tablets being revealed at this week's annual Comutex trade show in Taipei.

Some of the devices could even offer an alternative to Microsoft's new Surface Pro 3, a device the company believes is finally suited to combine all the functions of a commercial-grade laptop and a tablet. If the new PC-tablets challenge the Surface Pro 3, that's a good thing for the advancement of Windows for Microsoft. "Surface is a reference design for Microsoft's OEM partners," said David Willis, Gartner's chief of research for mobility and communications, when I caught up with him yesterday at the Good Technology Xchange user conference in New York.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/04/20140 comments

While Amazon Web Services (AWS) remains by far the most widely used cloud provider by enterprises, it appears Microsoft's Azure cloud service has gained significant ground over the past year since releasing its Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) offering.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/02/20140 comments

As Google targets everything from serving ads in your thermostat, to making a driverless car, machine learning and now broadband communications with its reportedly planned $1 billion investment in satellite technology, the search giant is also stepping up its less glamorous effort of developing an alternative to everyday enterprise services offered by Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/02/20140 comments

Would VMware and its parent EMC be better off as one company? A report last week by two Wells Fargo analysts suggesting the two should combine into one company was rejected by VMware CEO Pat Gelsinger. The analysts suggested the plans to offer federated solutions among the companies EMC controls, which, in addition to VMware, include RSA and the recently spun-out Pivotal, would make more business sense and offer more shareholder value.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/30/20140 comments

One thing that was apparent at this month's TechEd conference in Houston is that apparently everyone is joining the Hyper-V parade. While VMware still offers the dominant virtualization platform, Hyper-V has increasingly gained share in recent years and as a result, quite a few tools have appeared that offer improved support for Microsoft's hypervisor offering.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/30/20140 comments

While Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is willing to make acquisitions, he emphasized he's more focused on organic growth than making a big deal.

Taking questions at the Code Conference Tuesday, organized by the operators of the new Re/code site, Nadella was among several CEOs on the roster including Google's Sergey Brin, Intel's Brian Krzanich, Salesforce.com's Marc Benioff and Reed Hastings from Netflix. When asked what companies Nadella would like Microsoft to buy, he didn't tip his hand.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/28/20140 comments

Microsoft set the bar for its new Surface Pro 3 last week when it compared the new device, designed to combine the functions of a tablet and a full-powered computer, to a MacBook Pro. At the launch event in New York last week, Panos Panay, the corporate VP for the Microsoft Surface group, put the two devices on a scale to show how the MacBook Pro weighs more. At the same time, Panay emphasized the optional Intel Core i7 processor with 8GB of RAM in the new Surface Pro 3 makes it powerful enough to run the Adobe Creative Suite, including Photoshop.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/28/20140 comments

With the slew of announcements at TechEd last week, Microsoft's new RemoteApp was perhaps one of the most noteworthy ones. It certainly is something IT managers looking to offer secure remote applications or remote desktop services should consider.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/22/20140 comments

A few weeks ago, Microsoft sent out a press invite for "a small gathering" for news from the Surface team. It wasn't a stretch to presume Microsoft was planning to roll out a Surface "mini" to compete with the slew of 8-inch tablets based on Android, Windows 8.1 and of course the iPad Mini.

The lack of a Surface in that form factor represents a key gap in Microsoft's effort to make Windows a mainstream tablet platform. Analysts say small tablets account for half of all tablets sold. As we now know, there was no Surface "mini." Instead, Microsoft took the wraps off the Surface Pro 3. For IT pros and everyday workers who use both a tablet and PC, Microsoft may have broken new ground with the new Surface Pro because it promises to combine the two, as I told New York Post reporter Kaja Whitehouse yesterday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/21/20140 comments

If you were hoping that Microsoft was planning on launching the rumored Surface "mini" today, you'll have to wait another day. Instead, the company announced the Surface Pro 3, which appears to address key issues of the previous two versions. Microsoft debuted the Surface Pro 3 today at a press event in New York.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/20/20140 comments

Rackspace, the largest independent cloud hosting provider, said that multiple bidders have expressed interest in acquiring it. As a result, Rackspace has made it official that it's looking to sell. The company has hired the investment bank Morgan Stanley to evaluate proposals and the company's options.

In a filing late Thursday with the SEC, Rackspace revealed the move, saying it has "been approached by multiple parties who have expressed interest in exploring a strategic relationship with Rackspace, ranging from partnership to acquisition." Rackspace's future has been in question since CEO Lanham Napier stepped down in February. At the time, I wondered if Rackspace would put itself on the market. The board said it is looking for a new CEO but the company has yet to name one.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/16/20140 comments

It wasn't the most prominent topic at this week's TechEd conference in Houston, but PowerShell certainly wasn't left in the dust either. I caught up with Don Jones, author of Redmond magazine's Decision Maker column, after his TechEd session: "A Practical Overview of Desired State Configuration."

We met up at The Scripting Guys booth, where Don was signing copies of the book he coauthored with Jeffery Hicks: "Learn Windows PowerShell in a Month of Lunches" (Manning 2012). The book sold out at TechEd and Don was inundated with questions ranging from specific scripting practices to IT management issues.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/16/20140 comments

Not long after Microsoft released Hyper-V Recovery Manager, its tool for disaster recovery, the company is now giving it a new name: Microsoft Azure Site Recovery. But this is much more than a cosmetic change. Microsoft is stepping up its effort to make Azure your hot site for data recovery.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/15/20140 comments

If you're attending Microsoft's annual TechEd conference in Houston or watching the keynote and sessions on Channel 9, it's hard to escape hearing some of the many upgrades to the Azure cloud service that were made this week. Microsoft is emphasizing the newly added resiliency of its infrastructure, which now has 12 global datacenters in service with four more scheduled to go online by year's end.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/14/20140 comments

Microsoft has extended security for its Azure cloud service, will launch a new antimalware agent and will add encryption for its Office 365 service. The company talked up its enhanced cloud security offerings at this week's TechEd conference in Houston.

The new antimalware agent, released to preview, is available for both Microsoft's cloud services and virtual machines. Microsoft also announced partnerships with Symantec and Trend Micro, whose antimalware offerings will also be available in Azure.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/13/20140 comments

Microsoft kicked off its annual TechEd conference today and underscored its "cloud first, mobile first" mantra by debuting key new wares aimed at advancing the company's effort to deliver access to data and applications to users anywhere and on any device.

Though Microsoft didn't reveal plans for new releases of Windows Server or System Center, nor was it expected to, the company is using this week's event in Houston to emphasize the role its Azure cloud service and Active Directory can play to deliver secure enterprise infrastructure to all forms of mobile devices. Microsoft officials emphasized that these new tools for IT pros and developers will let organizations house their data on-premises, in the public cloud or in a hybrid scenario that will combine the two.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/12/20140 comments

Now that Nokia's handset business is part of Microsoft, it'll be interesting to see what compelling features come from the new devices and services group besides Cortana, the recently introduced voice-activated personal assistant. One improvement Microsoft might want to put on the fast track is its approach to encryption with Windows Phone.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/09/20140 comments

It looks like Microsoft is set to launch its long-anticipated Surface "mini" this month. Microsoft is holding what it described in an invite to media as "a small gathering" on May 20 in New York. While the invitation didn't offer much detail other than the time and place, it indicated it was a private press event regarding the Surface line of hybrid tablet PCs.

Given the subtle hint in the title of its invitation and the fact a small tablet is one of the fastest-growing device types these days, it's a reasonable assumption the company is finally filling this gaping hole in its Surface line. Also suggesting this will be a major launch, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella will preside over the event, reported Mary Jo Foley in her All About Microsoft blog.

Posted on 05/07/20140 comments

Did Microsoft blink? That's the first reaction one might have inferred upon learning of the company's decision to include Windows XP in repairing one of the most prominent zero-day vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer in recent memory.

Microsoft could have stuck to its guns by saying it's no longer patching Windows XP and customers are on their own to either upgrade to a newer operating system or seek costlier assistance. The company had long stated that it would stop issuing patches and updates to Windows XP on April 8 of last month. But the fact that this vulnerability -- revealed earlier this week by security firm FirstEye --- is so significant and that some attackers have already exploited it against companies in the financial services industry necessitated a swift decision by Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/02/20140 comments

Equinix, one of the largest datacenter colocation and hosting operators, is rolling out an exchange that will link its facilities to multiple cloud service providers.

The new Equinix Cloud Exchange, launched Wednesday, aspires to create a global cloud interconnection network much like Cisco recently announced with its $1 billion Intercloud effort. Just like Cisco, the Equinix Cloud Exchange is initially available in selected areas. The selection Equinix is starting with, nevertheless, is not trivial.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/01/20140 comments

When Microsoft released its Office app for iPad users last month, the company left out one key feature: the ability to print files. The company fixed that yesterday with an updated version of the respective Office apps. But if you have an older printer, you may be out of luck. At the very least you'll have to find a workaround without AirPrint, Apple's universal print driver for iOS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/30/20140 comments

In the first quarterly earnings report since taking over as the third CEO in Microsoft's 39-year history, Satya Nadella appeared on a conference call with Wall Street analysts. While it helped that Microsoft earnings beat estimates, his debut with financial analysts was significant in that he took questions from those who will play a key role in the company's stock valuation.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/25/20140 comments

Now that Microsoft has reassured customers that it will continue to offer new releases of SharePoint for on-premise implementations, deployments of SharePoint 2013 are on the rise. That's the assessment of several experts including Metalogix CEO Steven Murphy. "They did an excellent job of clarifying their position that there are in fact two worlds -- on prem and in the cloud," Murphy said. They will be maintaining both and that's a huge clarification."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/25/20140 comments

Flash storage is one of the fastest-growing new datacenter technologies these days and while critics warn it can cost a lot, proponents say it can vastly improve performance and reduce operational and capital expenses.

With the release of Windows Server 2012 R2, and more specifically Windows Storage Server 2012 R2, Microsoft is testing the limits of flash storage. Violin, a rapidly growing startup which went public last year, and Microsoft codeveloped the new Windows Flash Array. It's a converged storage-server appliance which has every component of Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 including SMB 3.0 Direct over RDMA built in and powered by dual-Intel Xeon E5-2448L processors.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/23/20140 comments

Microsoft's deal to finalize its acquisition of the Nokia Devices and Services business is set for this Friday, April 25, with the Nokia branch rumored to be renamed "Microsoft Mobile."

According to the Web site Ubergizmo, the Nokia handset and services business will remain headquartered in Finland under the new name Microsoft Mobile Oy. As my friend Mike Elgan pointed out, Oy is the equivalent of LLC or Corp. "It's also Yiddish for 'ouch,' but it's likely Microsoft has the Finnish one in mind," Elgan noted. Microsoft isn't commenting on the report. "We have confirmed the acquisition will be completed on April 25," according to a spokeswoman for Microsoft. "At that time we will begin the work of integration."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/21/20140 comments

If you were wondering if Microsoft Azure service would ever become an OpenStack cloud, it looks unlikely anytime soon based on statements by company officials Thursday.

Perhaps you never thought that was in the cards anyway, but given Microsoft's more-welcome approach to open source, I've always wondered what the future held for OpenStack on Azure. I usually get blank stares when I raise the issue.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/18/20140 comments

With so many tools released for IT pros every week, many of them often go under the radar. Looking to address that, I thought it would be a good idea to offer regular roundups with the latest bits of product and technology news. Here in the Schwartz Report, we'll call it "Tech and Tools Watch." Without further ado, here's our first installment:

Riverbed Improves Branch Office Converged Infrastructure
Riverbed has turned granite into steel. The company this week relaunched its Granite Solution, a converged infrastructure appliance it introduced two years ago, with the new name SteelFusion. But the change is more than cosmetic. The new SteelFusion 3.0 offers a six-fold improvement in performance and a three-fold improvement in capacity -- up to 100 terabytes, the company said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/18/20140 comments

It's no secret that the ease of procuring various cloud-computing applications and infrastructure services and the BYOD trend have impacted IT organizations' influence. Now a survey released yesterday suggests business leaders are broadly seizing influence over IT decisions from CIOs and enterprise IT decision makers.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/16/20140 comments

Nearly six months after Microsoft has shipped Windows Server 2012 R2, a growing number of IT pros now believe the Hyper-V hypervisor is ready for prime time. A growing number of third parties and IT pros say it's now practical to use Hyper-V for business-critical workloads.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/11/20140 comments

Microsoft yesterday issued its final patch for Windows XP and Office 2003. The operating system, arguably the most popular version of Windows ever, is now officially dead (though it's still a long way from the grave). It still lives on millions of PCs and it is well documented that many of them will continue to run the dead OS indefinitely.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/09/20140 comments

Tomorrow represents a milestone for many PC and Exchange administrators. It's the long-dreaded day when Microsoft will issue its last patch for Windows XP, Exchange 2003 and Office 2003 (which, of course, includes Outlook). It's also an important day because Microsoft will also issue the Windows 8.1 Update.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/07/20140 comments

Typically when I talk to experts about the public cloud, the usual refrain is that there's Amazon Web Services ... and then there's everyone else. When it comes to everyone else, Microsoft Azure is among the leading players with 12 datacenters now in operation around the globe including two launched last week in China. And with 16 additional centers planned by year's end and 300 million customers, the company has strong ambitions for its public cloud service.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/04/20140 comments

Microsoft opened its Build conference for developers with a keynote that focused on the company's attempts at breathing new life to its struggling Windows franchise while simultaneously embracing interoperability with other platforms.

In addition to unveiling its intelligent voice assistant planned for Windows Phone 8.1 and announcing the Windows 8.1 update, Microsoft's top executives talked of progress towards unifying its operating system across PCs, tablets, phones and its Xbox gaming platform. The company has lately described this and efforts to extend to open source and competitive platforms as a "universal Windows."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/02/20140 comments

As predictably as the sun rises, Microsoft yesterday followed Amazon's latest round of price cuts by reducing the rates for its Windows Azure – rather Microsoft Azure – cloud service. (In case you missed it, Microsoft last week shed the Windows name from its cloud service. Hence Windows Azure is now Microsoft Azure.)

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/01/20140 comments

Even though Microsoft had strong evidence that a former employee was transmitting via Hotmail stolen code and trade secrets, customers were unnerved when learning the company snooped at the suspect's e-mail account.

As reported two weeks ago, Alex Kibkalo, a former Microsoft architect, was arrested for allegedly stealing trade secrets and leaking Windows 8 code to an unnamed French blogger while working for the company. By delving into his Hotmail account, Microsoft was able to provide evidence to the authorities. If the suspect were smart enough to use any e-mail service not owned by Microsoft, the company would have needed to get a warrant from law enforcement authorities.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/01/20140 comments

As soon as Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella announced the long-expected release of Office for the iPad last week, I downloaded it on mine. Upon opening Word on the iPad, it displayed all of my documents stored in OneDrive and even sorted them in the order that I last accessed them in. Frankly, Office documents in OneDrive are easier to find and navigate on the iPad than the Microsoft Surface or Dell Venue 8 Pro using the modern Windows 8.1 interface because of how they're organized. Still, because it doesn't have native support for an external mouse, I won't be using Office on the iPad that often.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/31/20140 comments

Today is World Backup Day, created as an independent effort in 2011 on the eve of April Fools' Day. The goal is to underscore that it takes a fool not to back up their files regularly. Described as an independent effort created under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, it was founded because many people still don't understand the need to back up their data. Hence it's aimed at bringing awareness to the issue. While the intent is well grounded, it doesn't seem to have garnered much attention.

Posted by Kurt Mackie on 03/31/20140 comments

While virtual desktops represent a small niche of the enterprise client system universe, they're a reasonable option for organizations with PCs still running Microsoft's Windows XP operating system. Unless you've been hiding under a rock, Windows XP will shortly lose official support from Microsoft.

As I reported earlier this month, a survey of Redmond magazine readers found that 23 percent will continue to run their Windows XP-based systems after Microsoft releases the final patch for the OS on April 8. And while the survey also showed an overwhelming 85 percent will deploy Windows 7-based PCs and 35 percent will depoly systems running Windows 8 (multiple responses were permitted), 9 percent said they are looking to virtual desktops. That may include some form of VDI or desktop as a service (DaaS).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/28/20140 comments

Google today gave Microsoft shops a reason to consider its enterprise cloud services by adding Windows Server support and slashing the pricing of its infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) and platform-as-a-service (PaaS) offerings.

At the company's Google Platform Live event in San Francisco, the company also stepped up its effort to extend the appeal of its IaaS and PaaS services to enterprises by introducing a new blend of the two called Managed Virtual Machines, along with an improved big data analytics offering. The company expanded its menu of server operating system instances available with the Google Compute Engine IaaS with the addition of Suse Linux, Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Windows Server.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/25/20140 comments

Cisco today is bringing new meaning to the old saying, "if you can't beat them, join them."

The company today said it will invest $1 billion over the next two years to offer what it argues will be the world's largest cloud. But rather than trying to beat Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, Rackspace, IBM, Hewlett Packard, Salesforce.com, VMware and other major providers that offer public cloud services, Cisco said it will "join" them together, figuratively.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/24/20140 comments

A former Microsoft employee was arrested in Seattle earlier this week after the company searched his Hotmail account and found evidence he was allegedly leaking information and code to a blogger who ended up illegally selling pirated software.

Alex Kibkalo, a former Microsoft architect, is accused of stealing trade secrets and leaking Windows 8 code to an unnamed French blogger while working for Microsoft. Kibkalo, a Russian national who also has worked for Microsoft in Lebanon, also allegedly bragged about breaking into the Redmond campus and stealing the Microsoft Activation Server Software Development Kit, a proprietary solution aimed at preventing unauthorized distribution of the company's software and licenses, SeatlePI reported Thursday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/21/20140 comments

Just over a year ago, Symantec CEO Steve Bennett announced a plan to turn around the largest provider of security and data protection products. But as rivals continued to gain ground on the company, its board ran out of patience and showed him the door yesterday.

Bennett, a former GE executive and onetime CEO of Intuit, lasted less than two years as Symantec's chief after his predecessor Enrique Salem was also ousted. When Bennett presided over last year's two-hour analyst event dubbed Symantec 4.0, he positioned it as a reboot of the company. The reorganization focused on realigning R&D with its disparate product groups, integrating its technologies, removing the siloes and improving the company's lagging software subscription rates.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/21/20140 comments

Asus reportedly has put on hold plans to release a tablet PC that can switch between Android and Windows just two months after introducing the multi-mode device.

The company introduced the Transformer Book Duet TD300 at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas back in January and said it would ship in the first half of this year. But Digitimes last week reported Asus was shelving the release. It stood out as one of the few unique tablet PCs at CES because users can convert the device from a laptop to a tablet and switch between operating systems.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/19/20140 comments

When Microsoft announced last summer it had reached an agreement to run the Oracle database, WebLogic middleware and Java on Windows Azure, it seemed as though two worlds were colliding. After all, the two companies have maintained a bitter rivalry over the years, though tensions have eased recently as Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has had bigger fish to fry -- like IBM, SAP and Salesforce.com.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/14/20140 comments

There are dozens of free or low-cost file storage and sharing services but one of the cloud pure plays that has perhaps the most credibility among enterprise IT managers is Box. The service already has large customers such as eBay, Eli Lilly and Proctor & Gamble. Box CEO Aaron Levie has made no secret that he now has his sights on the Microsoft SharePoint market.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/12/20140 comments

While almost everyone uses a file sharing and storage service such as Dropbox, Google Drive and Microsoft's SkyDrive, among a slew of other free services, business and IT decision makers want to reign in on the use of those services for business.

One popular alternative is LogMeIn, which today launched Cubby Enterprise. It's described as a business version of its file synchronization and sharing service. The service gives administrators control over data with key security capabilities including the ability to remotely wipe data off devices, set and enforce policies (such as how data are shared) and allows IT to require four-digit PIN codes to access data.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/12/20140 comments

Looking to replace your traditional Windows desktop infrastructure with virtual desktops but don't want to put in the back-end infrastructure? VMware today is launching a new desktop as a service (DaaS) that will extend its Horizon View VDI to organizations that don't want to install hardware and software to support thin-client implementations.

The new VMware Horizon DaaS is an alternative back-end infrastructure required for VDI with the company's new vCloud Hybrid Service, its public IaaS launched last year. Customers adding the new Horizon DaaS can interconnect it with the on-premise Horizon View infrastructure, though it's not required. VMware gained entry to the DaaS market last year with its acquisition of Desktone.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/10/20140 comments

I was in a hotel lobby last week and saw a kiosk that had obviously suffered a system crash. It wasn't showing the dreaded blue screen of death but it displayed Windows XP powering down. The kiosk apparently froze while trying to reboot. Since it most likely runs Windows XP Embedded, I suspect whoever maintains that hotel's kiosks has no immediate plans to upgrade the operating systems before April 8th -- the last day Microsoft will issue a patch for the aging OS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/07/20140 comments

One month removed from Microsoft after decades with the company that included the last 14 as its second CEO, Steve Ballmer made his first public appearance yesterday in an interview with his longtime friend Peter Tufano, a professor at Oxford University.

In an auditorium full of mostly MBA students, Tufano and attendees asked Ballmer a variety of questions during the one-hour session. The most notable moment of the speech came when the former CEO commented on his biggest mistakes and successes while running Microsoft. Not surprisingly, letting Apple and Google dominate the tablet and smartphone market stung the most, especially considering Bill Gates a decade earlier had strong designs on that market.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/05/20140 comments

Microsoft's new CEO Satya Nadella this week will continue to reshape his leadership team with the departure of two senior leaders and the naming of Mark Penn as chief strategy officer. While it remains to be seen how much influence Penn will have, the move potentially give the controversial one-time aide to Bill and Hillary Clinton and current Microsoft marketing executive significant sway over the future direction of the company.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/03/20140 comments

Backup and recovery software supplier Acronis last week launched what it described as a simplified and more complete suite of data protection software for physical, virtual and cloud environments.

The newly branded AnyData line offers a simplified user interface and boasts a performance boost of 50 percent. It offers both disk, VM, file, single-pass and sector-by-sector backups, full or fast incremental or differential backups and allows for the exclusion of files during backups. On the storage side, it offers a unified backup format, universal restore, deduplication, backup and staging to cloud (as well as tape), encryption, staging to tiered storage and multi-destination staging and retention.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/03/20140 comments

When Microsoft jumped into the data protection market back in 2005 with the release of its System Center Data Protection Manager, most providers of backup and recovery and replication software shrugged their shoulders. It was easy to point out that it only supported Windows environments and was not very robust.

Now, the latest DPM release can backup and recover Linux virtual machines, enables deployment in virtual environments by configuring storage as VHD pool disks shared in a System Center Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) library and supports SQL Server clusters, as well as provide Windows Azure backup. DPM has come a long way since its release eight-plus years ago. Yet despite the improvements, most third-party suppliers of data protection software don't see it as a competitive threat.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/28/20140 comments

Even though Windows Phone's consumer base is smaller than those for Apple's and Google's mobile platforms, it's projected to be the fastest-growing mobile OS in the coming years. IDC today issued its latest forecast that predicts Microsoft's Windows Phone, which currently holds 3 percent of the market, will account for 3.9 percent of the market by year's end and 7 percent by 2018. Much of that growth could come from enterprise IT decision makers, according to IBM.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/26/20140 comments

Looking to boost its fortunes in the low-end tablets market dominated by Apple iPads and devices running Google's Android operating system, Microsoft is reportedly looking at sharply reducing the fees it charges manufactures to license Windows 8.1.

The news, first reported Saturday by Bloomberg, could be announced at this week's annual Mobile World Congress taking place in Barcelona. Citing unidentified sources familiar with the plan, Microsoft will lower the cost manufacturers pay to license Windows 8.1 on tablets by 70 percent from $50 to $15. The new fees would apply to tablets priced below $250 but they could be used on any size or type of device.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/24/20140 comments

Microsoft's new CEO Satya Nadella has acknowledged during the process of selecting who would replace Steve Ballmer that he asked Bill Gates to come back and dedicate time to key initiatives.

Skeptics may argue that of course he's going to say that. In actuality it could have been either Gates or the board who really made the call. But in any case Nadella appears comfortable with the arrangement. In what was billed as the first interview Nadella has given since he was named CEO earlier this month, he told The New York Times he's prepared to push back with Gates if he feels it's warranted. Nadella said he knows how to handle Gates.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/21/20140 comments

Metalogix this week released its first backup and recovery tool designed solely for protecting SharePoint environments. The new Metalogix Backup 4.0 is the fruit of the company's acquisition of Idera's SharePoint tools business last fall and offers improved performance and support for SharePoint 2013.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/21/20140 comments

Microsoft today launched its new OneDrive cloud storage service, which replaces SkyDrive. The new name change comes with a few new bells and whistles. However, OneDrive won't just show up and replace SkyDrive on your system or device -- you must transition to the new service by logging into OneDrive.com.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/19/20140 comments

Last September, Microsoft announced that Delta Airlines would be equpping its cockpits with Surface tablet PCs running Windows RT 8.1 and a Windows Store app called FlightDeck Pro, designed to replace bulky and oft-dated flight manuals and allowing for real-time updates. I met Darrell Haskin, IT director for Delta's crew department at an event in New York a few months ago held by Microsoft. The event showcased a few dozen customers using Windows 8x and Windows Phone devices. Some were giants like Delta, Siemens and Boeing and others using Windows 8x were small- and mid-sized business including a real estate firm and a medical clinic. This month's Redmond magazine cover story highlights six IT pros using Windows 8 devices and OS in their enterprises.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/14/20140 comments

While most people I know have iPhones and some have smartphones based on Android, Google's platform is clearly taking over the global market. Gartner and IDC released their annual smartphone reports and both showed that Android and iOS extended their dominance in the past year.

That may not be a revelation but the numbers show Android has an overwhelming lead over all platforms with 794 million devices shipped. Android phones now account for 79 percent of the market compared with 69 percent last year, according to IDC's report (Gartner's numbers were similar). I find that somewhat alarming given how often I hear Android is inherently more susceptible to malware and security risks than the other platforms.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/13/20140 comments

When the Linux Foundation brought together rival networking and infrastructure providers to join its new OpenDaylight Project last April to provide interoperable software-defined networks, it was interesting to see Microsoft sign on as a "platinum" member. Windows Azure, Windows Server 2012 and System Center 2012 already support the Open Network Foundation's OpenFlow standards for SDNs (and were enhanced with last fall's R2 releases). But by joining the OpenDaylight Project, Microsoft was committing to open source implementations of key SDN standards.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/12/20140 comments

Though it's well documented that former NSA contract employee Edward Snowden accessed many classified files stored in SharePoint repositories, it was the unfettered permission he had that let him steal and later release those files.

Giving him that access turned out to be an epic failure, whether or not you believe he did the right thing by sharing what he knew with the world. From a security standpoint, this administrator was an insider who was able to steal a lot of classified data that the agency didn't want disclosed.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/10/20140 comments

Ever since former CEO Steve Ballmer announced his retirement late last summer, some on Wall Street were buzzing that now's the time to sell or spin off certain Microsoft businesses "to provide maximum shareholder value."

Proponents of splitting Microsoft up date back to the Department of Justice antitrust trial in the late 1990s. At the time they spoke of creating "Baby Bills," a term derived from the Baby Bells that were spun off of AT&T back in 1984. Founder Bill Gates was dead against that idea for Microsoft and I'd imagine he still is.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/07/20140 comments

When Satya Nadella was in discussions with Microsoft's board to succeed Steve Ballmer as CEO, Nadella reportedly wanted to have Gates close at hand to advise him on technology and product strategy.

Perhaps that's true or maybe that was the message purposely leaked because it was the board and/or Gates who wanted the founder to work closely with the new CEO. Yesterday's news that Microsoft has tapped Nadella to take over as the company's CEO immediately is a huge milestone for the company. Yet the fact that Gates is handing off his seat as chairman to John Thompson to spend a third of his time working with Nadella and the product teams raises a number of questions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/05/20140 comments

Microsoft today named Satya Nadella as the third CEO in the company's history and Bill Gates will step aside as chairman but will serve as a technical advisor. Director John Thompson will replace Gates as chairman. Nadella takes over as CEO immediately.

Reports that the search was winding down and that the two would be named to take the company forward at a critical juncture in its history surfaced late last week. It was looking probable in recent days that Microsoft indeed was set to give Nadella the nod. But given the fits and starts of the search over nearly six months, there was reason to wonder if the decision was certain.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/04/20140 comments

Microsoft's Ad Scores in Super Bowl XLVIII

No doubt people are feeling euphoric in Redmond and throughout the Pacific Northwest today with their beloved Seattle Seahawks -- owned by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen -- trouncing the favored Denver Broncos and winning the Super Bowl. Microsoft also scored a victory of sorts last night with its one-minute commercial. This is the first time Microsoft has aired a Super Bowl spot.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/03/20140 comments

The tea leaves continue to point to Satya Nadella as the leading contender to replace Steve Ballmer as Microsoft's CEO. Since yesterday's report that Nadella is the leading candidate, additional reports have surfaced that Bill Gates may possibly cede the chairman's roll to board director John Thompson.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/31/20140 comments

Looking to ensure its foreign customers don't back off from using cloud services, Microsoft plans to give them the option of assuring their data is stored on systems outside the U.S. The move aims to ease concerns by customers outside the U.S. that the National Security Agency (NSA) or other U.S. agencies can intercept their encrypted communications.

NSA surveillance activities such as the PRISM program revealed last year by former contractor Edward Snowden have stoked fear in customers that their data stored on U.S. soil isn't secure. Microsoft's response will address concerns and cover data sovereignty requirements by those in foreign countries, particularly Brazil and throughout the European Union.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/30/20140 comments

The long search for Microsoft's next CEO may be coming to an end and it looks like the crown may go to an insider now that Ericsson Chief Hans Vesberg is no longer in the mix. The leading contender is now enterprise and cloud head Satya Nadella, according to a report this morning by Re/code's Kara Swisher.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/30/20140 comments

Cisco yesterday launched a new portfolio of software that it claims will let large enterprises and customers build more reliable, secure cloud-based infrastructure and, perhaps most pointedly, is designed to connect multiple clouds via key partnerships and industry standards. The company introduced its new cloud offering at its Cisco Live! conference taking place this week in Milan, Italy.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/29/20140 comments

Symantec last week rolled out the first upgrade to its NetBackup enterprise backup and recovery service in two years. The company said it gave NetBackup 7.6 a significant performance boost and tuned it up for environments using its replication engine for vSphere.

While Symantec is arguably the leading provider of enterprise backup and recovery software, a slew of challengers are targeting its dominance and have focused on the proliferation of virtual datacenters. Many have argued that NetBackup was not keeping up with this trend.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/27/20140 comments

It took six months but Microsoft has found a new name for its SkyDrive service. The new name, OneDrive will make its debut "soon," the company announced this morning in a blog post. Microsoft didn't say when the new name will appear but urged customers to sign up for alerts.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/27/20140 comments

Microsoft's stellar financial results for the second quarter suggest outgoing CEO Steve Ballmer's devices and services strategy and his "One Microsoft" corporate philosophy is working.

The company stunned Wall Street analysts yesterday with better-than-forecasted results for its second fiscal quarter. The company's $24.5 billion in revenues for the period ended Dec. 31 were $800 million higher than the projected figures. Earnings came in at a whopping 76 cents a share, 8 cents higher than the 68 cents anticipated.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/24/20140 comments

IBM's long-expected departure from the x86 server business is official. The company today said Lenovo will acquire the commodity business for $2.3 billion, nine years after the Chinese company bought IBM's then-struggling PC business.

The deal includes all IBM servers designed to run Windows and Linux, though the company is not selling off its high-end server business running its Power processor, which runs both Unix and Linux. By selling off its commodity server business, so goes IBM's last major tie to Microsoft as an official partner. All the same, many of IBM's wares and services sit side-by-side with Microsoft-based systems and Big Blue's consulting and services business supports Redmond's key product lines as well. Just last week, IBM said it will support Microsoft's Dynamics product line.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/23/20140 comments

Convirture, which provides a management platform and console for virtual servers and cloud infrastructure, said its solution now supports Microsoft's Hyper-V.

The new release of the company's namesake Convirt Enterprise lets IT pros and administrators provision and manage Hyper-V hosts and virtual machines. Convirt Enterprise had already supported VMware, KVM and Xen hypervisor platforms. It can also manage VMs running in various cloud services, namely Amazon Web Services EC2 as well as those compatible with OpenStack and Eucalyptus Private Clouds.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/22/20140 comments

A rumor surfaced yesterday that Microsoft may be considering John Thompson as its next CEO. Thompson, who after a long career at IBM and at Symantec as the company's CEO, is now on Microsoft's board and heading the search committee for Ballmer's successor.

According to CNET's Charles Cooper, there's buzz in Redmond that naming Thompson as CEO on an interim basis is a plan B that the company is considering, in wake of Ford's Alan Mulally falling off the list. If that were to play out, which I believe is a longshot (though stranger things have happened), that could be to groom an internal candidate such as Satya Nadella or Stephen Elop to take over at a future date.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/22/20140 comments

VMware today said it has agreed to acquire mobile device management vendor AirWatch for $1.54 billion. AirWatch is regarded as a leading supplier of software for securing and managing smartphones, tablets and other systems and personal cloud storage services.

IT managers are increasingly letting employees use their personal devices on their networks. Even on those networks that may not allow them, many people use their own devices anyway and IT managers need to ensure they can control how and where data is accessed and stored. While VMware has been rolling out its own mobile device management tools called Horizon, it appears VMware has now opted to go with the more established AirWatch, a privately held company based in Atlanta, Ga. with 10,000 customers and 1,600 employees. To what role Horizon will play in VMware's future remains to be seen but based on the company's initial statements, it looks like Horizon could be left out in the cold.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/22/20140 comments

Microsoft's Kinect camera is best known by those who attach them to their Xbox gaming consoles, although Microsoft also offers a version of the sensor for Windows PCs. While Kinect is a toy for some, for others it's enabling new business opportunities.

Kinect was prominent at last week's National Retail Federation show in New York. During my booth tour, I even had the opportunity to chat briefly with Chris White, the senior program manager for Kinect, who oversees its development and marketing. White confirmed that the eagerly anticipated next iteration of Kinect is on pace to arrive for Windows this summer.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/21/20140 comments

The good news is the share of PCs and tablets running Windows 8/8.1 is on the rise. But the bad news is that despite now surpassing the 10-percent share mark, according to Net Applications, some PC vendors are reportedly not pleased at the pace of uptake for the vastly altered operating system.

Many enterprises with Software Assurance or other licensing agreements can deploy Windows 7 when they roll out new PCs to users. Most PC vendors offer consumers a limited number of Windows 7-based systems or give the option to have a system shipped with it. But it's not something they have promoted in the past year. That is until now.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/21/20140 comments

Looking to strike a balance between maintaining security against major threats and ensuring individual privacy, President Barack Obama today ordered a halt to the current Section 215 bulk metadata program in its current form. The president also recommended a set of reviews and guidelines aimed at putting limits on the National Security Agency's surveillance activities.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/17/20140 comments

It's bad enough that 30 percent of the PCs in the world still run Windows XP and risk running an unprotected OS after April 8. Even more alarming is that many of those machines are ATMs at banks and other locations.

Does that mean ATMs will become vulnerable to malware or data theft once the deadline expires? As Bloomberg BusinessWeek reported yesterday, it depends. Those that run Windows XP Embedded have a little more time as Microsoft will continue to support that version until early 2016. But those with Windows XP will be susceptible to malware and other attacks, said Dean Stewart, an executive at ATM supplier Diebold.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/17/20140 comments

After laying low at the Consumer Electronics Show last week, Microsoft pulled out all the stops at the National Retail Federation Show in New York, which kicked off Monday. While the NRF show is focused on retail, the large trade show also encompasses the entire goods supply chain.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/15/20140 comments

Among the many priorities IT pros have on their agenda for 2014, one is considering new employment opportunities.

According to a survey of Redmond magazine readers conducted early last month, 26 percent of you will look to change employers this year. That's the same figure of those who responded to last summer's annual salary survey. It's also a two-fold increase over our 2012 salary survey, where only 13 percent said they might look to change employers. An improving economy and a lower unemployment rate were key factors, while many IT pros are unhappy with their current compensation, among other factors.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/13/20140 comments

After two decades of kicking off the annual Consumer Electronics Show with the opening keynote, Microsoft last year bid the largest tech confab in the U.S. adieu. Even with the first CES without Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer on stage, and no Microsoft booth in the exhibit hall, the company's presence still loomed large in Las Vegas this week.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/10/20140 comments

While a number of partners used this week's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas to launch a new crop of Windows 8 tablets and laptops, those same partners also launched new Android-based devices. But for those who want the best of both worlds, Asus announced at CES the first Intel-based dual-boot convertible laptop-tablet that can run both Android 4.2.2 and Windows 8.1, though not simultaneously.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/08/20140 comments

If there was any lingering doubt that Microsoft would name Alan Mulally to replace Steve Ballmer as CEO, Mulally has put that question to rest.

The Ford CEO intends to stay with the automaker through 2014, he told the Associated Press Tuesday afternoon. While Mulally was a favorite among Wall Street analysts, it became increasingly clear last month that Mulally was not headed to Redmond nor was he certain if he was still the top choice of Microsoft's search committee.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/07/20140 comments

One of the biggest stories in Redmond last year was Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's unexpected announcement of his upcoming retirement. Whoever succeeds him will undoubtedly define the company's agenda in 2014 and beyond. It remains anyone's guess who Microsoft's board will name as the company's third CEO but it appears the only two to sit at the helm -- Ballmer and Founder Bill Gates -- are the reasons why the search is taking so long.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/06/20140 comments

While Wall Street seems to want Microsoft to choose Alan Mulally as its next CEO, it's beginning to look more like that ship has sailed. Microsoft Lead Independent Director John W. Thompson, who also heads the search committee to find the next CEO, Tuesday revealed the search will continue into next year.

Technically, the search committee has plenty of time to make a decision. Ballmer gave his 12 months' notice back in August of his plan to retire. But most analysts and watchers have gone under the assumption that the board would announce a new CEO by year's end. Apparently realizing that won't happen, Thompson took the unusual step of saying so in a brief blog post that offered little evidence of where the committee was headed.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/19/20133 comments

Business users, field workers, students and anyone else looking for a mobile and functional tablet to run Office, handle e-mail, browse the Web and use various other apps almost anywhere should consider Microsoft's new Surface 2. Whether looking to get some work done on a long flight, at a local Starbucks or on the sofa while watching football, the Surface 2 is the best (relatively) low-cost portable unit for that purpose.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/18/20130 comments

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius today announced that Microsoft Executive Kurt DelBene will be taking over the struggling HealthCare.gov Web site. White House Press Secretary Jay Carney confirmed in a briefing today that DelBene will be a senior advisor reporting directly to Sebelius.

Aimed at providing entry to the insurance marketplace that is perhaps the largest signature effort of the Obama presidency, HeathCare.gov was a debacle from the day of its launch on Oct. 1. The HealthCare.gov site is pivotal to the success of the Affordable Care Act, commonly referred to as Obamacare, and its beleaguered launch is arguably one of the biggest failed IT efforts to date. At the time of its launch, the site repeatedly crashed and few were able to get into the healthcare exchange. Performance has vastly improved since then but the task is far from complete.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/17/20130 comments

Looking to fill key gaps in both the technology it offers and its addressable market of backup and recovery solutions, Unitrends Monday said it is acquiring PHD Virtual.

Unitrends itself was acquired earlier this year by the private equity firm Insight Venture Partners, which also counts PHD Virtual as one of its holdings. By combining the two companies, Unitrends can target smaller companies and offer solutions for environments that are purely virtualized, a limitation of its appliance-based solutions.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/17/20132 comments

Half a year after former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden started to unleash classified documents that revealed surveillance of data provided by telecommunications and key cloud and Internet companies, the NSA's top brass spoke out for the first time. But detractors, some who don't believe the NSA's claims, argue the agency has only inflamed the situation, according to those weighing in on social media, blogs and comments added to various reports.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/16/20130 comments

One of the keys to success for Microsoft's Windows Store effort will be getting major traditional software players to develop new modern apps. If you're expecting to see Adobe's Dreamweaver or Photoshop as an app in the Windows Store, that's not in the cards. And it's not because Adobe is ignoring the shift to mobility.

Adobe's move to go all cloud earlier this year (its software model moved from offering one-time license fees to subscription-based software as a service) gave little room to offer its wares in an app store. Adobe believes its new Creative Cloud is the best path to supporting mobile devices as well as traditional PCs and Macs.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/13/20130 comments

Microsoft today is taking a step forward to advance its Windows Azure infrastructure by launching its new Cloud OS Network. The company now has 25 global partners that will offer cloud services that are effectively compatible with Windows Azure and the latest combination of Windows Server and System Center running in customers' datacenters.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/12/20130 comments

As Steve Ballmer prepares to step aside as Microsoft's second CEO after a tumultuous 13-year tenure, his legacy may take years to fully appraise. Since announcing he would be stepping down in late August, some have joyously celebrated a long-awaited change in leadership while others feel, despite some key missteps, that he is worthy of praise for overseeing huge growth during difficult economic times and for making Microsoft a leader in the enterprise.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/11/20133 comments

Microsoft will be looking to create some consumer traction for Windows 8.1 devices with a new holiday themed sale. Its promotion, called "12 Days of Deals," kicked off this morning with a Dell Venue 8 Pro. Normally priced at $299, this door buster was listed at $99 for the first 20 customers at each store and online.

At just $99, it's a steal! Microsoft also promised after the first 20 people got their $99 tablets, it would offer more at $199 until they ran out. Even though it was a bait-and-switch, $199's not bad price so I figured I'd check it out. Since the store was scheduled to open at 10:00 a.m., I figured I'd get there at 9:30 guessing I'd face either a really long line or no crowd at all since the deal was not widely advertised.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/09/20131 comments

Google this week became the latest major player to launch an infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) cloud offering with the general availability of the Google Compute Engine. In so doing, Google is now challenging other major providers of IaaS including Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, Rackspace, IBM, HP, AT&T, Verizon and VMware.

But if you're looking to provision Windows Server in Google's new cloud, you'll have to wait. Right now Google Compute Engine doesn't support Windows Server or VMware instances. During the preview, launched in May, Google Compute Engine only supported Debian and CentOS. Now that it's generally available, Google said customers can deploy any out-of-the-box Linux distribution including Red Hat Enterprise Linux (in limited preview now), SUSE and FreeBSD.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/06/20133 comments

The mantra for 2014 will be "put up or shut up" when it comes to achieving IT revenue growth and market position in the coming year. That was a key theme outlined by IDC chief analyst Frank Gens during a one-hour webcast yesterday to discuss the influential market researcher's annual worldwide IT forecast.

Spending on IT technology in 2014, excluding telecommunications services, will grow 5.1 percent to $2.1 trillion, which represents a slight uptick over the current year, Gens said. In the coming year, IDC is forecasting a continued move to what it calls the "3rd Platform," centered around mobile devices and the migration to cloud architectures with substantially increased investments in enterprise social networking tools and technology that lets users mine big data.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/04/20130 comments

Microsoft's CEO search committee reportedly is honing in on Alan Mulally and Satya Nadella as the top two candidates to succeed Steve Ballmer.

A report by Bloomberg on Thursday said the committee is leaning toward Mulally, now CEO of Ford, and Nadella, who oversees Microsoft's enterprise and cloud business and is well respected within the company. Sources told Bloomberg that internal candidate Tony Bates and Nokia former CEO Stephen Elop "remain in the mix," though are less likely.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/02/20130 comments

On this Cyber Monday, if you were hoping to find a good deal on a Windows 8 PC and/or tablet you'll have to search long and hard. And even those that may appeal to cost-conscious shoppers are already sold out.

In an apparent effort to clear out inventory of its first-generation Surface devices, Microsoft slashed the price of its Surface Pro to $649 for the version equipped with 64 GB of storage -- down from $799. Unfortunately it's sold out. Though if you want the beefier Surface Pro with 128 GB of storage it was still available this morning for $749 (down from $899) at the Microsoft Store. That's $250 less than the Surface Pro 2 and you will sacrifice battery life and performance if you believe then the savings are worthwhile.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/02/20133 comments

Yesterday's latest Windows Azure cloud crash, caused by a DNS failure, overshadowed an upgrade to the service and briefly interrupted Microsoft's much-anticipated Xbox One launch last night.

The malfunction apparently brought down portions of the Xbox Live service on the eve of its midnight consumer unveiling. Microsoft is touting the Xbox One release as its most significant gaming launch to date. Fortunately for Microsoft, the outage's impact in Xbox Live didn't lead to major headlines that could have outshined last night's midnight launch.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/22/20130 comments

Salesforce.com announced Salesforce1, its new sales, marketing and service cloud-based platform, at the company's annual Dreamforce conference in San Francisco this week. Salesforce.com operates the largest software as a service (SaaS) cloud platform and this new addition aims to focus on social features, while making its apps and those of its large ecosystem of ISVs suitable for mobile devices.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/21/20133 comments

With last month's launch of Windows 8.1, the new Surface Pro 2 and the Windows RT-based Surface 2, Microsoft has made its SkyDrive service a key component of the company's "devices and services" strategy. The concept is great but the execution falls short because SkyDrive isn't as easy to use on any device as Dropbox.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/20/20133 comments

Microsoft's decision to do away with its so-called "rank and yank" method of evaluating the performance of its employees (made famous by GE's former CEO Jack Welch) is Redmond's latest effort to get them to work more closely toward CEO Steve Ballmer's vision of One Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/19/20130 comments

When Microsoft issued the stunning news that longtime CEO Steve Ballmer would retire, some observers questioned whether he jumped or was pushed. For the first time Ballmer answered the question with graphic detail in an apparent effort to etch his legacy in stone.

In his uncharacteristically self-effacing interview with The Wall Street Journal late last week, Ballmer maintained the decision to leave was his, which he made while in London back in May. Well aware Microsoft needed to change faster or risk becoming marginalized by Apple, Google and others, Ballmer recalled reaching an inflexion point that Microsoft would be able to change faster without him.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/18/20130 comments

Why Amazon Could See Slow Uptake for Its Cloud VDI Service

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When Amazon announced plans to disrupt the virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) market Wednesday by launching WorksSpaces at its re:Invent customer and partner conference in Las Vegas, Citrix shares dropped 4.5 percent on the news. Amazon pitched its desktop-as-a-service offering as a more affordable approach to traditional VDI offered by Citrix, VMware and Microsoft. That's because with WorksSpaces, IT can spin up virtual desktops without buying hardware or software just as they can with Amazon's cloud and storage portfolio of services.

Given its track record in upending traditional business models, one doesn't want to ignore Amazon when it offers anything new (remember Borders?). But analysts I spoke with following the announcement noted Amazon is not likely to take the VDI world by storm overnight for a variety of reasons. Maybe that's why Citrix shares are inching back up today?

One noteworthy barrier to adoption of Amazon WorkSpaces is the end user. When Amazon launched EC2 over seven years ago, it gave developers a way to bypass IT to quickly procure infrastructure. End users on the other hand are not clamoring for VDI, said Forrester analyst David Johnson. "There aren't employees inside a company that are going to run out and sign up for Amazon desktops," Johnson said. Desktop as a service will appeal to those who need "pop-up-desktops" for contractors or to quickly get projects started, Johnson said.

A Forrester survey last quarter found that 11 percent of SMBs and enterprises in North America and Europe are including desktop as a service within the next 12 months. This is up from 5 percent during the same time last year. Looking beyond one year, 12 percent said they are planning hosted desktops, up from 7 percent last year.

When it comes to overall plans for VDI, 52 percent said it was a high priority, up from 48 percent last year and 43 percent in 2011, according to Forrester. IDC's current forecast for client virtualization spending overall this year is $175 million. It projects next year it will rise to $311 million and hit $600 million by 2016.

Although VDI deployments that use public cloud infrastructure are part of a small but emerging piece of that market, Microsoft recently made its Remote Desktop Services (RDS) available for Windows Azure. Amazon WorksSpaces gives users their own instance using portions of Windows Server 2008 R2 and renders a user interface that looks like Windows 7. "There are positives and negatives to both approaches but at the end of the day it's similar for the end user," Waldman said.

Meanwhile VMware also has its sights on offering a desktop as a service VDI offering with its recent acquisition of Desktone and Citrix is also developing a similar offering. But Waldman said large enterprises are wary of putting user data in the cloud. "We see enterprises taking a slow cautious approach to cloud hosted virtual desktops. However, for small and mid-sized companies where VDI is too expensive and complex to get up and running, it makes it more accessible to them."

The most likely candidates for Amazon WorkSpaces are those that are already using Amazon's cloud infrastructure services, Waldman noted. But there's a case to be made that many IT pros will consider Microsoft's RDS, because of the application compatibility, Waldman said.

"While 95 percent of apps can work on client or server, many apps were poorly written and literally hard coded to run on a client operating system," he said. "Even though apps written for Windows can run on Windows Server, there are many instances it would not because of that one bad line of code."

While there are solutions to remediate that, such as Citrix's AppDNA, it could be a showstopper for those looking for quick deployments.

Are you considering a desktop-as-a-service VDI deployment? If so, which offering sounds most appealing?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/15/20130 comments

More than seven years after upending how IT consumes compute, storage and application services, Amazon is going up the infrastructure stack to the desktop. Amazon Web Services today said it's gunning to shake up the struggling VDI market with a cloud-based alternative that requires no hardware, software or datacenter infrastructure.

The company announced its plans to offer Amazon WorkSpaces, which it claims it can offer services at half the cost with better performance than traditional virtual desktop infrastructure platforms today. Amazon Web Services senior VP Andy Jassy revealed the new cloud-based VDI offering in his opening keynote address at the company's second annual re:Invent customer and partner conference taking place in Las Vegas.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/13/20130 comments

In its quest to build greener datacenters that are also more efficient and reliable, Microsoft is exploring the use of fuel cells installed in the server racks.

Microsoft announced that it is studying the impact of installing fuel cells directly into the racks as a more efficient means of bringing the power plant into the datacenter than using outside generators. A datacenter powered by fuel cells can reduce operational costs by 20 percent, Microsoft projects, according to a research paper the company published.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/13/20130 comments

Update: Joe Belfiore, Windows Phone corporate VP, will apparently oversee Internet Explorer's user experience and application development, according to a report by The Verge's Todd Warren.

Dean Hachamovitch, the Microsoft corporate vice president who oversaw the development of the company's Internet Explorer browser for nine years, is taking on a new role in the company. In a cryptic and brief blog post, Hachamovitch on Monday announced he will join a new team within Microsoft.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/12/20133 comments

Microsoft is joining the chorus of tech companies, notably Google, that plan to do away with cookies, the tracking component used on the Web that's typically exploited by advertisers.

AdAge last month reported that Microsoft is developing new ad-tracking technology that would work across PCs, tablets, smartphones and its Xbox gaming platform. The new ad-tracking component would also be integrated into Internet Explorer and Bing, the report noted.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/08/20130 comments

According to a Reuters report, Microsoft has reportedly narrowed its shortlist to at least three internal candidates and five external candidates.

Among those still in the running to replace Ballmer are Ford CEO Alan Mulally, former Nokia Chief Stephen Elop and two internal candidates -- Satya Nadella, executive VP for the Cloud and Enterprise Group and Tony Bates, the former CEO of Skype who is now executive VP for the Business Development and Evangelism group. The remaining candidates weren't noted, though the report pointed to Computer Sciences Corp. CEO Mike Lawrie as one on Wall Street's desired list.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/06/20133 comments

Once again the soap opera surrounding BlackBerry took an unexpected turn and the struggling former mobile handset leader's already uncertain future became even more questionable. The $4.7 billion buyout by BlackBerry's largest shareholder Fairfax Financial Holdings that was reached in September fell apart yesterday, resulting in CEO Thorsten Heins stepping down in the wake of the news.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/05/20130 comments

SharePoint Shops Eying Windows Azure as Office 365 Alternative

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A vast majority of Redmond magazine readers are holding off on moving their SharePoint infrastructures to the cloud and the small portion that are typically opt for Office 365. However a growing number of those planning on running SharePoint in the cloud are looking at Windows Azure at the expense of Office 365.

To be sure, even the majority of those planning to move to SharePoint in the cloud are leaning toward Office 365. But an online survey of nearly 500 readers last week showed a surprising and interesting trend: While 66 percent of current SharePoint online users have Office 365 subscriptions (compared with 14 percent using Windows Azure and 15 percent using other cloud providers), of those planning to run SharePoint in the cloud in the future, 55 percent will opt for Office 365 and nearly 29 percent will use Windows Azure.

That points to a segment of SharePoint shops that are turned off by the lack of code portability from older versions of SharePoint. By standing up their own SharePoint servers in Windows Azure, they get the benefit of running their custom or shrink-wrapped apps in the cloud.

"People don't do customization of SharePoint Online using the old method because the product limits what they can do," explained Forrester analyst John Rymer, who, along with colleague Rob Koplowitz, released a study late last month of their own enterprise customer reluctance to move SharePoint to the cloud. "Integration, for example, is pretty limited, and Microsoft will not accept 'just any random code' and the rules indistinct."

Most SharePoint experts I talk to agree with this but whether or not Office 365 is a real deal-breaker depends on the customer's application and overall requirements. "If you want to use all of the content management capabilities, deeper integration into other line of business systems, those are the kinds of customers that will continue to run SharePoint either in their own servers or Windows Azure," said Adriaan Van Wyk, CEO of K2, a provider of a SharePoint workflow app for Office 365 that uses Windows Azure.

When I shared the data with Forrester's Koplowitz, he was intrigued by the number of respondents who are looking to run SharePoint in Windows Azure. "That's a real interesting data point," he said.

For now, only 15 percent of respondents to Forrester's August survey said they were using Office 365 SharePoint Online, up just 3 percent over last year, prior to the release of the enhanced service. That's relatively consistent with our survey, which shows just 17 percent of our readers are running SharePoint in any cloud service.

While smaller organizations are the most obvious candidates to go to SharePoint Online Office 365, especially if they don't have a collaboration solution, larger shops have more complicated decisions to make. Whether or not larger shops are using Office 365, Windows Azure or third-party infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) or managed services providers (or any combination of those), the largest trend is toward hybrid implementations where they are adding capacity to existing SharePoint infrastructure incrementally.

"We're probably seeing 80 percent of our customers go hybrid cloud in some way, maybe for example moving My Sites and some of their extranets to the cloud, and keeping their line of business integration on premise for now," said Ben Curry, managing partner at Summit 7 Systems. Curry and a number of other SharePoint MVPs will be sharing their views on this in two weeks at the SharePoint Live! conference in Orlando, Fla., which, like Redmond magazine, is produced by 1105 Media's Enterprise Computing Group.

Are you among the growing number of SharePoint shops looking at Windows Azure (or other IaaS providers) to make your foray into the cloud? Or do you find SharePoint Online Office 365 more appealing?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/04/20132 comments

William Lowe, who led the engineering team responsible for bringing the first mainstream PC to market in 1981, died last month at age 72 from a heart attack.

News of his death was reported earlier this week by The New York Times. Lowe, a longtime engineer at IBM, proposed bypassing IBM's conventional development model and led a team of 12 engineers that produced the IBM Personal Computer 5150 using off-the-shelf parts and software from third parties. The move led to the creation of IBM's PC within a year. Had IBM opted to build it internally, it would have taken several years.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 11/01/20130 comments

While sales of Nokia's line of Lumia phones have shown steady growth in Europe and Asia over the past two years, they have failed to make strong inroads in North America. In a surprising turn, the company's third-quarter earnings report yesterday revealed a sudden spike in North America and the United States.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/30/20130 comments

Looking to further solidify its tooling offering for SharePoint administrators, Metalogix last week said it has acquired Idera's SharePoint business. The move aims to bolster Metalogix backup and recovery software for SharePoint with Idera's monitoring and diagnostic tools, and comes two months after Metalogix acquired Axceler's SharePoint tools business.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/28/20133 comments

Microsoft can talk up "devices and services," the consumerization of IT and BYOD all it wants, but it can thank enterprises for its unexpected surge in revenues and profits.

Overall, the company yesterday reported revenues for the first quarter of its 2014 fiscal year were $18.53 billion, nearly 5 percent higher than the $17.7 billion analysts had expected and up 16 percent year-over-year, while posting earnings of 62 cents per share, compared with consensus estimates of 53 cents per share. Moreover, Microsoft gave a positive outlook for the current quarter which ends Dec. 31. That was a welcome relief to investors after Microsoft reported one of its most disappointing quarters back in July.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/25/20130 comments

Nokia yesterday launched its first tablet, the new 10-inch Lumia 2520, while also adding two new 6-inch smartphones, the Lumia 1520 and Lumia 1320. Rumors of a Windows RT-based tablet from Nokia surfaced over the summer but it fell under the radar when Microsoft announced its plan to acquire the company's mobile handset business for $7.2 billion last month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/23/20130 comments

The botched rollout of the Web site built to let customers enroll in an insurance plan under the controversial Affordability Care Act -- aka Obamacare -- will go down as one of the most high profile IT disasters to date.

That's a high bar if you consider all of the major debacles over the years (think of widely publicized E-Trade, Schwab, eBay and Victoria Secret site meltdowns over a decade ago) to more recent Black Friday retail site failures, and over the past year outages that have knocked off Facebook, Twitter and major advertisers of the Super Bowl. Still fresh on many minds was last year's major meltdowns that shut down major portions Windows Azure, Office 365 and Amazon Web Services, which brought down many key sites with it including Netflix last Christmas Eve.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/22/20132 comments

One of the many notable improvements IT pros will find in Windows Server 2012 R2 is its improved support for flash-based solid state drives (SSDs). The new server OS, released last week, now offers automated storage tiering, which improves performance when using flash-based SSDs in servers and storage arrays.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/21/20130 comments

Salesforce.com's storied strategy of displacing premise-based apps with Software as a Service (SaaS) went deeper this week with the company's release of Salesforce Identity. The single sign on service aims to displace traditional software like Active Directory as the central repository for user authentication.

The company's new Salesforce Identity service extends beyond traditional enterprise directories like Active Directory by connecting employees, customers and business partners to any application, device or service, said Chuck Mortimore, Salesforce.com's vice president of product management, identity and security. In addition, ISVs and customers can white-label that single sign-on service into their applications.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/18/20130 comments

Microsoft's Windows 8.1 arrived yesterday, and as soon as I got to my desk I embarked on the task of upgrading my PC, which was running the preview release.

The experience was more challenging than I expected. In fact, it killed a good part of my morning and was fraught with frustration.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/18/20130 comments

While VMware might want to diminish Microsoft's role in the enterprise, the company understands that if it wants to play an even greater role in managing virtual and cloud infrastructures, it needs to acknowledge Hyper-V as a force to be reckoned with.

In a sign it has embraced that reality, VMware has extended its support for Hyper-V.

At this week's VMworld 2013 Europe conference in Barcelona, VMware announced several new products, but notably VMware vCenter Operations Management Suite 5.8, which provides improved performance monitoring of Hyper-V, as well as SQL Server and Exchange.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/16/20130 comments

Are Dark Clouds Forming Over SharePoint?

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Nearly a year since Microsoft disclosed that SharePoint is a $2 billion business, the collaboration platform has become the latest punching bag in the IT community.

SharePoint took its latest hits yesterday at the annual Gartner Inc. ITxpo in Orlando Florida where research vice president Jeffrey Mann led a session called "Should Microsoft Kill SharePoint," as reported by Kurt Mackie yesterday. The answer is no but Mann pointed out the dissatisfaction with Microsoft's latest release of SharePoint 2013 and the SharePoint Online service offered with Office 365.

"Many organizations using SharePoint cannot go to the cloud because they have regulatory restrictions or complex, customized implementations that prevent adopting SharePoint Online," Mann said in a prepared Q&A. "Some third-party add-ons they depend on are not available for the cloud version. Others do not trust the cloud or see no reason to change, so they won't make the move."

The second big issue, according to Mann, is IT's frustration with SharePoint. "We regularly hear end users and administrators complain about features or user-experience improvements that they would like to see in SharePoint," Mann noted. "Although they want new functionality, they are less keen to have more upgrades, which are seen as expensive, disruptive and time-consuming. It is difficult to see how users can expect to get changes without implementing new versions. If upgrades were easier, they might be less reticent to install new versions. This is a move Microsoft is trying to address with the app model introduced in SharePoint 2013."

Gartner isn't the only one sounding the alarm on SharePoint. A report released last month by the Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM) found that only 6 percent feel they have achieved success with their SharePoint implementations, while 26 percent say they have struggled to meet expectations and 28 percent report that while it's doing the job, progress has stalled to some extent. Seven percent said their SharePoint implementations were not successful. The findings are based on a survey AIIM conducted in July, consisting of a sample of 620 respondents who are among the trade association's 80,000 members.

As Evidence that there's still trepidation about the cloud, the AIIM survey also found that only 9 percent of small organizations plan to move all of their SharePoint content to Office 365, while 2 percent of mid-sized shops and 3 pecent of large shops plan to do so. Customers, analysts, consultants, integrators and key vendors including Microsoft agree enterprises will widely deploy hybrid cloud models. The AIIM report found that only 20 percent are looking at hybrid clouds, though half will use third-party cloud providers, not Microsoft's Office 365. It bears noting that the AIIM study wasn't aimed exclusively at SharePoint and/or Microsoft shops but at its audience of IT managers and decision makers.

The survey also found that 62 percent are using at least one cloud-based product but only 8 percent said it was SharePoint and 7 percent are using Office 365 as a complete software-as-a-service application. Twenty percent said they're using Exchange Online and 39 percent are using the cloud version of Lync.

When I asked Microsoft for its take on the AIIM study, a spokeswoman noted SharePoint is a leader in Gartner's Magic Quadrant -- two out of three information workers in the enterprise have SharePoint and more than 700,000 developers are building applications for Office 365. "Microsoft remains very committed to SharePoint for the long term, as the product plays a critical role in the future of collaboration and productivity and is a core pillar of the Office 365 suite," the spokeswoman said in an e-mailed statement. "Office 365 is Microsoft's fastest-growing commercial product ever. In fact, the Office 365 business is now on a $1.5 billion annual revenue run rate."

The statement also defended the security of Microsoft's cloud service. "Office 365 offers the most robust set of certifications and standards options of any major cloud based productivity service. In fact, each year, we undergo third-party audits by internationally recognized auditors to validate that we have independent attestation of compliance with our policies and procedures for security, privacy, continuity and data handling."

Another survey by SharePoint tools provider Metalogix Software Corp. earlier this year showed 55 percent intend to continue running SharePoint entirely in-house and only 10 percent plan to run it purely in the cloud. The remaining 35 percent are planning hybrid SharePoint implementations.

While naturally findings are going to vary depending on the audience that's surveyed, another alarming stat piqued my attention back in August: Overall salaries for SharePoint administrators -- though still six figures -- declined by 7 percent this year, according to Redmond magazine's Annual Salary Survey. That especially raised a red flag because our survey showed overall IT salaries increased 3 percent this year. It's not clear what has led to that decline, whether it's a glut of SharePoint experts or the fact that some SharePoint is now running in the cloud.

Yet many SharePoint consultants are seeing more movement to the cloud than these surveys suggest. "We're probably seeing 80 percent of our customers go towards a hybrid cloud in some way, maybe, for example by moving My Sites and some of their extranets to the cloud, and keeping their line of business applications on-premise for now," said SharePoint MVP Ben Curry, managing partner of Summit 7 Systems, a Huntsville, Ala., consultancy and systems integrator.

Curry knows all the pitfalls of SharePoint 2013 and Office 365 and will be among numerous experts talking about the future of SharePoint design and architecture at the SharePoint Live! track of the Live 360 conference in Orlando next month. Like Redmond magazine, the conference is produced by 1105 Media Inc.

In an interview last week, Curry told me he'll discuss the deployment of business-critical applications using SharePoint and how to maximize the performance of server farms, as hybrid environments emerge. Curry was once a skeptic of using SharePoint in the cloud but he now believes in it. "That's where a lot stuff's going – online. I'd say the rare client is going all SharePoint 2013 on premise. It really is upgrading pieces of it to 2013 on premise and pieces of it to the cloud, which makes performance a little bit more challenging because you have to first decide what workflows are on premise to know what to architect for."

What's your take on the future of SharePoint? Drop me a line at [email protected].

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/14/20132 comments

When Microsoft invited us to Monday's press conference in San Francisco for a rare appearance by the head of the company's newly created cloud and enterprise group, we were informed he'd discuss how Redmond is planning for future growth in that business and how it will differentiate itself from its competitors.

Packed with the typical vagueness of a press invite, we certainly weren't going to pass on the opportunity to hear what Satya Nadella had to say. Would there be a major unexpected announcement of a new product or service to come, perhaps a blockbuster acquisition or would he merely describe what those who follow Microsoft already know?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/09/20133 comments

While Dick Tracy's notion of a watch that enables two-way communications dates back to the 1960s, it's no longer science fiction. How quickly watches that extend the smartphone to your wrist catch on is anyone's guess but it seems like we're about to find out.

Samsung is kicking off an ambitious marketing plan for its new Galaxy Gear smartwatch (check out this commercial). Reviews have largely panned the $299 device for a variety of reasons including the fact it currently has limited functionality. As David Pogue noted in his review in The New York Times last week, the watch will alert you that you have a message, but you have to look at your Galaxy Note smartphone to see that message. It doesn't even work with more widely used Galaxy phones such as the more popular Galaxy S4, though that will apparently be rectified later next month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/07/20130 comments

Three of Microsoft's top-20 investors this week said the unthinkable: The time has come for fo Bill Gates to step down as chairman. I say "unthinkable" tongue-in-cheek as many with various motives have undoubtedly thought Gates should go. But it appears this may be the first time investors made a concerted effort to advance the idea.

The three mysterious investors told Reuters they feel Gates holds too much power considering he continues to sell off shares, holding only 4.5 percent of the company's outstanding shares today -- a figure that will give him no stake by 2018 if he continues to sell them off at the pace he has indicated he will.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/04/20130 comments

Dell this week refreshed its entire line of tablets and notebook PCs with its new Venue brand of systems, including a wide variety of form factors, price points and sizes ranging from a 7-inch tablet running Google's Android OS to a powerful 15-inch Ultrabook running Microsoft's forthcoming Windows 8.1.

I attended the launch at a hotel in New York and addressed the elephant in the room, asking if there are any Windows RT devices in the pipeline. After taking its existing Windows RT tablet, the XPS 10, off the market last week, I already had an idea how Dell officials would respond. The answer is no.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/04/20130 comments

Microsoft's Windows Azure cloud service can now be used for systems that require high levels of security. The U.S. government certified Windows Azure as meeting the FedRAMP Joint Authorization Board (JAB) Provisional Authority to Operate (P-ATO).

That means the Windows Azure meets the security requirements of federal agencies looking to use public infrastructure as a service (IaaS) and platform as a service (PaaS), said Susie Adams, chief technology officer for Microsoft Federal, in a blog post.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/02/20130 comments

Microsoft has taken a key step toward letting SharePoint and Office customers purchase apps on a usage-based subscription from the Office Store. The company is letting ISVs submit subscription apps in its Seller Dashboard starting today. By next month, customers will be able to purchase apps on a subscription basis.

Since its launch last year, Office Store customers could only purchase software with traditional perpetual-use licenses. By offering subscription-based apps in the Office Store, Microsoft officials believe it will increase the appeal of its Office 365 service and for using SharePoint in the cloud. Two-thirds of the applications in the Office Store are SharePoint apps, given participation from ISVs and developers, said Dene Cleaver, Microsoft's senior product marketing manager for Office.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/01/20130 comments

Despite turmoil in Redmond this year, Microsoft held on as the fifth most popular brand in Interbrand's Best Global Brands, released today. Microsoft's key rivals Apple and Google jumped in rank taking the number 1 and 2 spots respectively.

By becoming the leading brand, Apple ousted Coca Cola, which had topped the charts every year since Interbrand launched the survey 14 years ago. While the ascent of both Apple and Google is hardly surprising, Microsoft's ability to hold on to its spot as number 5 is a feat, considering a weak reception for Windows 8 and its Surface tablets, both released last year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/30/20130 comments

In wake of Metalogix acquisition of Axceler's SharePoint business, the remainder of the company is charting a new path and identity. The company, now called ViewDo Labs, will emphasize enterprise social networking, not just for SharePoint but for all collaborative environments.

Part of the deal when Metalogix acquired Axceler's SharePoint business last month was that Metalogix would retain the Axceler brand, hence the new name and focus. ViewDo Labs describes itself as a provider of enterprise social network (ESN) analytics and governance tools. Michael Alden, Axceler's former president and CEO, will hold the same title with ViewDo.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/29/20130 comments

Microsoft's first stab at tablets with the Surface RT and Surface Pro have made little inroads in enterprises, which is hardly a surprise given this summer's $900 million write-down of the devices. The company is hoping it can do better with the Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2, launched Monday and due to ship next month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/27/20132 comments

Ford CEO Alan Mulally is reportedly Microsoft's lead candidate to replace Steve Ballmer, who is set to retire within the next year.

Once viewed as a longshot, All Things D's Kara Swisher reported yesterday that Mulally has risen as the top contender to replace Ballmer, though it's not clear if he would take the job if offered. Mulally's work turning around Ford is not done and he promised the automaker he would stay on board through the end of 2014.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/27/20133 comments

While the recent NSA leaks have caused IT decision makers and individuals alike to reconsider their use of cloud services to store and selectively share their files, several SharePoint experts today said they believe online collaboration is inevitable. Nevertheless most mid- and large-size organizations that are using cloud-based implementations of SharePoint -- or considering doing so -- will continue to employ a hybrid strategy.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/25/20132 comments

It looks like Microsoft is going it alone with tablets running its Windows RT operating system -- the version of Windows 8 that runs only applications that support its Modern UI accessed from the Windows Store.

As reported by The Verge this morning, Dell's XPS 10 tablet, which sported an optional keyboard, is listed as unavailable in Dell's online store. As an alternative, Dell recommends the $499 Latitude 10, powered by an Intel Atom processor with the full version of Windows 8. As noted last month, the few PC suppliers offering Windows RT tablets were cutting bait including Acer, Asus, Lenovo and Samsung. I noted at the time that Dell appeared to be the last one standing with the XPS 10, though it could only be found online.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/25/20130 comments

When Edwin Snowden revealed the National Security Agency's covert surveillance of communications with the cooperation of the largest service providers, it validated what many cynics and security experts presumed as fact. But the leaks outlining blatant surveillance by companies including Verizon, Google, Facebook and Microsoft, among others caught the large universe of IT decision makers off guard.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/24/20130 comments

When Nirvanix last week abruptly informed customers they have weeks to find a new cloud storage provider because it was shutting down its operations, it left more than 1,000 enterprises scrambling to save their data. Many are likely to turn to Amazon Web Services, which has the most mature and advanced cloud infrastructure, but Microsoft will also likely become a beneficiary of Nirvanix's demise.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/23/20130 comments

Apple's iOS 7 Includes Improved Enterprise Management Capabilities

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In addition to the 9 million who stood in line to get their new iPhones over the weekend, millions of existing iPhone and iPad users were able to download the new iOS 7, released late last week. For those who are holding off, enterprise IT managers have good reason to encourage (perhaps even insist) users to upgrade their iOS devices to the latest operating systems.

Here's a list of some of the new capabilities in iOS 7 that Apple highlighted, which promise to improve security and management of corporate data accessed on user-owned devices:

Protect Corporate Data
IT can now manage which applications and accounts are used to open document and attachments. IT can prevent users from opening personal documents from managed apps, while allowing administrators to configure a list of apps available in the sharing panel.

Per App VPN
Administrators can determine which apps can connect to the VPN, ensuring data transmitted by managed applications only goes through the VPN, while ensuring personal activities do not go travel through it.

App Store License Management
Business can now purchase apps on behalf of users while maintaining ownership of the apps and retaining control of the licenses. Enterprises can now purchase licenses though the Volume Purchase Program (VPP) site and use their mobile device management (MDM) platform to assign apps to users. It lets employees enroll with their personal Apple IDs without providing it to the enterprise. IT can also revoke apps and reassign their use to others. The VPP also now supports purchase of Mac apps.

MDM Enhancements
IT can now set up managed apps wirelessly, install custom fonts and configure accessibility options. IT can configure company owned devices in line with corporate settings and policies. It also supports highly managed deployments.

Enterprise Single Sign-On
Now users can sign on and authenticate across apps including those from the App Store. All apps configured with SSO verify user permissions to access enterprise resources, logging users in without having to re-enter passwords.

Improved Exchange Integration
Exchange 2010 users can synchronize their notes with Outlook, while they can now view PDF annotations. Search is also improved.

Have you tested any of the new enterprise management features added to IOS7? Share your observations below or drop me a line at jschwartz@11105 media.com.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/23/20130 comments

Microsoft's departing CEO acknowledged his biggest regret was failing to lead Microsoft into the smartphone and tablet worlds before Apple and Google, which he blamed on Microsoft's botched development of Windows Vista a decade ago.

"I regret that there was a period in the early 2000s when we were so focused on what we had to do around Windows, that we weren't able to redeploy talent to the new device form factor called the phone," Ballmer said at Microsoft's annual financial analyst meeting yesterday. "The time we missed was about the time we were working away on what became Vista, and I wish we'd probably had our resources slightly differently deployed, let me say, during the early 2000s. It would have been better for Windows and probably better for our success in other form factors."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/20/20130 comments

While our annual Redmond Magazine Salary Survey showed average wages increasing 3 percent, we discovered a surprising anomaly in this year's report: SharePoint experts are making less this year.

Granted the average SharePoint administrator or developer still earns a six-figure salary, our survey found a decline of 7 percent. Last year the average SharePoint Salary was $107,063, dropping to $100,817 this year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/18/20130 comments

It appears Microsoft is planning a voice assistant for its Windows Phone platform after all. As Mary Jo Foley noted in her Redmond magazine column this month, Microsoft has spent the past decade working on natural language platform, though it has stepped up its effort over the past two years.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/16/20130 comments

Microsoft's latest attempt to garner interest in its Surface hybrid tablet-PCs is a trade-in program the company launched that will let customers swap out their iPads for a $200 gift card applicable toward a Surface.

Actually the $200 gift card can be used toward anything offered in the Microsoft Store but Microsoft is obviously trying to get people to trade in their iPads for a Surface RT or Surface Pro.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/13/20130 comments

By now you've probably heard Apple launched two new iPhones yesterday, the 5S and the 5C. The long-rumored devices were equipped as expected but analysts gave the lower-end 5C a thumbs-down due to its higher-than-expected price tag and lack of broad appeal to emerging markets.

Many reports have described the new higher-end iPhone 5S as an incremental upgrade but I think it could prove to be a key indicator whether the smartphone market will embrace fingerprint-based authentication. It uses technology Apple gained when it acquired AuthenTec for $356 million last year, which lets users unlock their phones and make purchases on the iTunes App Store, instead of using passwords.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/11/20130 comments

Microsoft is hoping those in the market for a hybrid tablet PC will find the second wave of Surface devices more appealing than the first. We'll get a better sense of that later this month when Microsoft likely unveils new Surface RT and Surface Pro devices.

The company is expected to disclose more details at an event in New York. An invitation to the event only indicated Microsoft will discuss "Surface growth and expansion, specifically pertaining to the commercial and business enterprise sector" and "Microsoft's ongoing commitment to Surface and its business customers."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/11/20130 comments

With Microsoft now in search of a new CEO, the noise level suggesting Microsoft should split itself up into multiple companies is predictably up. Yet the steps that "retiring" CEO Steve Ballmer and Microsoft's board have taken make that seem unlikely in the short term, though of course in business anything can happen.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/09/20130 comments

After a long and protracted battle, activist shareholder Carl Icahn has walked away from his effort to acquire a controlling interest in Dell, though he hasn't backed away from his insistence that shareholders are accepting an inferior deal.

The tide was clearly against Icahn's Southeastern Asset Management with founder and CEO Michael Dell's pending shareholder vote set for Thursday and all indications that its offer, backed by Silver Lake Partners with a lift from Microsoft, had enough support to win. But Icahn maintains the $13.75-per-share deal valued at $25.5 billion undervalues Dell even though they nominally sweetened the deal in July. After a Delaware court last month ruled in favor of the Dell team's contention that needed fewer votes in favor of the deal than Icahn's group claimed, momentum was in the favor of Dell.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/09/20130 comments

Microsoft and Nokia certainly caught the tech world off guard earlier this week when Redmond said it was acquiring the core business of the struggling phone maker for $7.2 billion. And if you don't think this changes everything for better or worse, think again.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/06/20130 comments

Not happy with the bonus or raise you received this year? Perhaps you're long overdue for an increase, want more recognition or you have a boss who knows less about IT than you do. If so, you're not alone.

The number of Redmond magazine readers that say they may change jobs has doubled since last year, according to the 18th Annual Redmond magazine Salary Survey, published Tuesday. Salaries overall are up 3 percent, slightly lower than the 3.25 percent average salary in last year's survey. But here's the most interesting finding in this year's report: More than a quarter of the 1,018 qualified respondents (26.8 percent) say they are weighing the possibility of changing employers up from 13.1 percent a year ago.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/04/20130 comments

Microsoft Buying Nokia's Devices and Services Business for $7.18 Billion

In an unexpected reversal, Microsoft has agreed to acquire Nokia's devices and services business for $7.18 billion (EUR 5.44 Billion), in cash, both companies announced early Tuesday morning in Espoo, Finland, where Nokia is based.

The deal is Microsoft's second largest, rivaled only by the 2011 acquisition of Skype for $8.5 billion and puts an even larger bet on its expansion into hardware. The company's third largest acquisition was aQuantive for $6 billion, which Microsoft wrote off last year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/02/20130 comments

Looking to round out its SharePoint migration and management platform, Metalogix Software Corp. today said it has acquired Axceler's SharePoint software business. The deal makes Metalogix one of the largest independent SharePoint ISVs. Terms of the deal were not disclosed but Metalogix is assuming ownership of the entire Axceler brand and SharePoint software portfolio. Neither company will have a stake in the other.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/28/20130 comments

How Will the Next CEO Save Microsoft?

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While the guessing game of who will replace Steve Ballmer as Microsoft's CEO is on, the bigger question is can any executive fix the troubles in Redmond?

Wall Street tech analyst Rick Sherlund this morning told CNBC perhaps no one can help Microsoft make up for the ground it has lost in the tablet and smartphone race. But he said that may not be the criteria the search committee of Microsoft's board, which includes chairman and founder Bill Gates, will be looking for.

"You can certainly continue to try but I think this is not about fixing the company in that regard," Sherlund said, adding the bigger priority will be creating shareholder value. Does that mean breaking up the company or using Microsoft's mountain of cash to buy back shares or pay hefty dividends? Or does creating value mean making some key acquisitions that would help increase Microsoft's share value, which has held relatively steady over the past decade?

Stakeholders including enterprise IT decision makers and those who manage their infrastructures with Microsoft products -- as well as those who use them for content creation and management -- might have different views on creating value and consequently how Microsoft should evolve. And that will also be critical to creating shareholder value.

The first thing the new CEO will need to consider is whether the company can deliver on the new "One Microsoft mantra," which really is just a marketing slogan for a concept Microsoft has long aspired. Remember Ray Ozzie's "three screens and a cloud" message, which referred to Microsoft's goal to tie devices, phones and TVs together with the cloud. And over a decade ago when Microsoft first announced the .NET Framework, its goal was to create intelligent devices and services, known as Project HailStorm.

"One Microsoft" looks to break down the organizational siloes -- and in many cases fiefdoms -- with a management structure that the company hopes can better achieve that model. Make no mistake, Apple and Google have similar goals and though unstated Amazon.com has shown signs that it also aspires to a similar goal. Companies like Citrix and VMware have similar worldviews.

It seems unlikely Gates would sign off on a CEO who would want to dismember that anytime soon. That would be a last resort. Despite Microsoft's troubles, they're not on par with the problems that plagued Apple when it was on the brink of collapse before Steve Jobs returned or IBM in the early 1990s when it appeared Big Blue was toast (and its CEO at the time, John Akers, had the wheels in motion to break up the company). Akers was replaced by Lou Gerstner, who was CEO of Nabisco at the time and had no background running a technology company.

Gerstner revived IBM in one of the most unlikely and remarkable corporate turnarounds ever. But I can't imagine that type of executive running Microsoft. And despite Microsoft's troubles, which aren't trivial, I don't see it in the dire straits IBM was in two decades ago. Ironically Microsoft was founded as a company looking to disrupt IBM's business model and prided itself on the fact that it didn't have the corporate makeup and legacy issues that faced Big Blue. In many regards, Microsoft has become what it once rallied against.

Along came Google, VMware and a re-christened Apple, who are now trying to do to Microsoft what it did to IBM. But if companies like Apple and IBM can return from the brink, it's certainly reasonable that the right leader can revive Microsoft's tenuous, though less severe issues and put it on a path to future growth.

In the meantime no one knows how long it will take to name a new CEO or how this will play out. The search committee has a big task on its hands and whoever it chooses will have a major impact on Microsoft's future.

Have any thoughts on who you'd like to see as Microsoft's next CEO and how he or she should take the company forward? Feel free to comment or drop me a line at [email protected].

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/23/20130 comments

While Microsoft continues to promote Windows RT, the version of its client OS designed to work only with software offered via its Windows Store interface, third-party support is fading fast.

Other than Microsoft's Surface RT, try finding anyone else who offers a tablet with Windows RT. I swung by my nearby Microsoft Store, Best Buy and Staples, and the only Windows RT device I could find was the Surface RT.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/21/20130 comments

Are VMware Veterans Jumping on the Hyper-V Bandwagon?

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A venture startup financially backed and run by a deep bench of VMware talent is hoping to re-invent the way IT pros manage their virtual infrastructures using a new cloud-based big data analytics service.

CloudPhysics last week went live with its namesake service aimed at simplifying the administration of virtual machines by using a vast real-time analytics engine that aggregates and analyzes billions of data points. Administrators will be able to use the results of these analytic queries to ease the burden of solving the multitude of complex operational issues that come up, according to the company.

The Mountain View, Calif.-based company also said it has raised $10 million in a second round of venture capital financing from Kleiner Perkins. The company's first round came from Mayfield Fund.

CloudPhysics operates a cloud-based software as a service (SaaS) consisting of what it described as a sophisticated real-time data analytics engine. This knowledgebase, which constantly takes in new data feeds, diagnoses and troubleshoots thousands of issues that might affect the function of a VMware ESX virtual server cluster environment such as incorrectly configured scripts, network configuration errors, and memory and IO utilization issues.

"The administrator has multiple questions, literally thousands of questions that are very well-defined explorations or responses to very well-defined problems," explained Founder and CEO John Blumenthal, who is among the VMware veterans who helped launch CloudPhysics in 2011.

Naturally I asked if this is a VMware-only play or if the company will support the growing presence of virtual machines powered by Microsoft's Hyper-V, as well as Xen and KVM hypervisors. Blumenthal said that is indeed the plan and by the end of the year it will support one of the above-mentioned hypervisors. While there's a good chance it will be Hyper-V, he said it's not a certainty. The company is still weighing whether it should consider KVM before Hyper-V.

"The commercial midmarket user who is our targeted customer as we go to market is looking more curiously at Hyper-V," Blumenthal said. "And as you move up in the size of organizations, we are encountering an increased presence and interest in KVM and OpenStack."

Blumenthal described the service as a big data repository that collects more than 80 billion pieces of data each day from a variety of sources, ranging from technical blogs to configuration data from customers and other sources. The data is all "anonymized" and used to create patterns that are subsequently analyzed.

Data fed from customer datacenters and other sources are kept anonymous by using sophisticated cryptography to debunk concerns about the privacy and security of data, Blumenthal said. While I didn't dispute the wisdom of those measures, especially with heightened concerns about surveillance, I asked Blumenthal why an organization would be worried about their memory utilization getting into the wrong hands.

"It's more of a policy issue than anything else," Blumenthal said. "When you talk to users, they make extensive uses of SaaS services, including Salesforce.com, where actually the most sensitive data in a corporation is now off-prem in the form of the customer contact list. Usually, in most of our discussions with our users who raise these concerns, they back down from it very quickly when they stop and think it through."

More than 500 enterprises globally tested the service, which is hosted on the Amazon Web Services EC2 service, though Blumenthal said it can easily be moved to another infrastructure as a service (IaaS).

"It's not tied to Amazon in any way," Blumenthal said. "Amazon's back-end provides the running infrastructure for compliance and security."

Customers install a virtual appliance on their VMware ESX clusters, which function as an agent. Administrators can discover and troubleshoot hundreds of operational problems using specific analytic components that CloudPhysics calls Cards, available from an app store-type environment also launched this week. In addition to accessing cards that offer pre-configured reports, a customer can create their own with a tool called Card Builder.

The analytics engine is designed to help administrators optimize storage, compute, network and other components using various modeling methods that can address performance and cost benchmarks. A planning component lets administrators simulate the effects of adding new hardware, software and other components.

CloudPhysics offers a free community edition. For a standard edition with more features and e-mail support, pricing starts at $49 for customers signing a one-year contract or $89 for those who opt to go month by month. An enterprise edition is available for $149/$189 per month and offers telephone support and the full menu of features.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/19/20130 comments

When President Obama last week called for the government to be more transparent about its data surveillance activities, critics saw it as a step in the right direction, though it's unclear how, when or if that will happen. As I noted at the beginning of the week, claims by Edward Snowden that Microsoft may be feeding the National Security Agency customer data -- which Microsoft insists is not true -- is having a chilling effect on customer confidence that data is safe in the cloud.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/16/20130 comments

While most watchers presumed Microsoft would deliver its next wave of Windows client and data center products sometime this fall, the company today has made it official: all will be released Oct. 18.

Microsoft didn't say if it was planning a major live launch event but the company will make all of the recently announced new software available on that date. PC makers will launch new PCs and tablets with Microsoft's new Windows 8.1 client, Microsoft senior marketing communications manager Brandon LeBlanc said in a blog post this morning.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/14/20130 comments

The leaks by Edward Snowden revealing the U.S. National Security Agency's (NSA's) classified but wide-ranging PRISM data-gathering effort -- which is aimed at intercepting and thwarting terrorist threats -- have had a chilling effect on customer confidence that data is safe in the cloud.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/12/20130 comments

Hardly a week goes by when Google or Microsoft doesn't announce a key win for their respective cloud-based productivity services. While analysts say it's premature to declare a winner, Google Apps continues to gain ground on Microsoft's Office 365.

While none of the major IT researchers have published data, Gartner back in April indicated Google Apps is gaining ground on Office 365. Under what it described as a narrowed analytical framework, Gartner analysts on a webcast suggested Google Apps had anywhere from a 33 to 50 percent share of the cloud productivity app market.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/09/20130 comments

Microsoft's announcement last week that it must find a new name for its SkyDrive and SkyDrive Pro cloud storage services is the latest blow to Microsoft's efforts to maintain consistent branding for its flagship products.

The company must stop using the SkyDrive brand after coming up short in a legal dispute with British Sky Broadcasting Group, which claimed it had dibs on the name. It's a setback for Microsoft, which has heavily marketed SkyDrive over the past several years and has described it as the key cloud storage component for Windows 8x and Office 365. Likewise Microsoft last year attached the SkyDrive Pro brand to the cloud-based online storage component for SharePoint 2013 and the SharePoint Online component of Office 365.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/09/20130 comments

Life Insurer Deploys 30,000 Windows 8 Tablets

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Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Company in Japan is rolling out one of the largest known deployments of Windows 8-based tablets. The company is giving Fujitsu tablets to 30,000 of its sales reps, both Fujitsu and Microsoft announced today.

The companies say it's the largest rollout of Windows 8 tablets in Japan and it probably ranks among the largest known deployments anywhere. Meiji Yasuda Life will start using the tablets next month at 1,200 locations, according to Fujitsu. Both Fujitsu and Microsoft worked together to develop what they describe as a sales terminal.

Equipped with a 12.1-inch display and just 15mm (.59-inch thick), it weighs approximately 880 grams (1.15 pounds) and is powered to last an entire day. In addition to sporting the typical Windows 8 touch interface, it's designed to allow for handwritten input, allowing customers to sign documents.

The tablet has a built-in mobile WAN module to work on the wireless NTT DOCOMO LTE-based network. The systems are also designed to encrypt data on the tablets' solid state drives.

Erwin Visser, Microsoft's general manager, Windows Commercial said in a blog post today that the tablets are replacing Windows XP-based PCs, where sales reps put together proposals and then printed them out. "Using the Windows 8 tablets, their sales efforts will be more efficient and the customer experience will be greatly improved," Visser said. "The company also expects to process contracts more quickly, while ensuring customer security is protected and eliminating the need for printed documentation altogether."

This is a big win for Windows 8 and Microsoft and probably welcome news after the release of last quarter's tablet market share report from IDC released Wednesday. Now Microsoft needs many more big deployments to get enterprises interested in Windows 8.

Many IT pros tell me they plan to pass on major Windows 8 rollouts for the mere reason that they typically skip releases after performing major upgrades. Most organizations have upgraded their Windows XP (and earlier) PCs with Windows 7 and don't see a need to transition again at this time. But there are still a huge number of Windows XP-based systems that will no longer be supported with security patches after April 8 of next year and Microsoft is encouraging organizations to consider Windows 8 rather than Windows 7.

As more organizations find use for tablets, perhaps the resistance to Windows 8 could subside. It remains to be seen how quickly enterprises will take a keener interest in tablets and even when they do, whether they'll choose those based on Windows 8, iPads or devices loaded with Google's Android or Chrome OS.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/07/20130 comments

Windows is now installed on 4 percent of all tablets (1.8 million licenses sold) in the second quarter. However, Windows RT only shipped on 200,000 systems, mostly Microsoft's Surface RT, IDC reported today.

The findings in IDC's second-quarter Tablet Tracker report presented the latest stinging data point that systems with Windows RT are not catching on with consumers, business users or IT pros despite rapid growth during the same period for iPads and Android-based tablets. Because the second quarter ended June 30, the numbers don't take into account the fact that Microsoft last month slashed the price of its Surface RT devices and took a $900 million charge on the extra inventory.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/05/20130 comments

Salaries for SharePoint developers and administrators have dropped 7 percent this year -- but they're still drawing six figures in pay.

As we pull together the forthcoming 2013 Redmond Salary Survey, which we'll publish in the coming weeks, the median compensation for SharePoint developers and administrators was $100,817, compared with $107,063 last year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/05/20130 comments

Ahead of Friday's scheduled vote -- or should I say re-scheduled scheduled vote -- Dell's Special Committee accepted last week's revised bid from founder Michael Dell and his investors led by Silver Lake Partners.

Consequently the vote was once again rescheduled until Sept. 12. Michael Dell and Silver Lake agreed in return to not require that shares not cast count as "no" votes, a sticking point over last week's revised bid. The committee also agreed to reduce the breakup fee to $180 million from the original $450 million.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/05/20130 comments

As the clock continues to tick for Microsoft's Windows XP, Microsoft and others are doing everything they can to motivate reluctant users to migrate off the aging operating system. Suffice to say, it remains an arduous process. In a token effort to remind people of the OS's limited life, Microsoft last week said it's holding a virtual retirement party for Windows XP, which it will officially stop supporting April 8 of next year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/01/20130 comments

As I scour the data from this year's 2013 Redmond Salary Survey, it appears salaries on average are on the rise. The average increase in compensation is almost as high as last year's annual salary survey but a notable difference is a growing number of you are looking for a new job.

While you'll have to wait a month for the final results, I'm looking for some of you to give some color to align with some of the trends I'm spotting. If the only thing holding you back is you don't want to tip off your employer or colleagues that you're not happy with your salary or job (or maybe you don't want to admit you're doing better than most), no worries, I won't identify you.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/31/20130 comments

Never one to miss an opportunity to taunt his rivals, Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff gave his unbridled assessment of Microsoft's struggling Surface: The alternatives are superior.

"The reason why they're not accelerating growth is for one simple reason," Benioff told The New York Times, in an article over the weekend breaking down Microsoft's quest to keep Windows relevant in the tablet era. "There's a better technology."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/30/20130 comments

It really gets under my skin when Microsoft's Surface devices are described as an abject failure. Indeed it's fair to say that Microsoft has failed to make a meaningful dent in the tablet market with the Surface including distribution blunders and poor marketing that led to Microsoft's $900 million write-down. But to suggest they're DOA is premature.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/29/20130 comments

At a party I attended last weekend, I met someone who provides outsourced support for Windows-based systems and clients. Naturally we got into a conversation about Microsoft and its challenges in the post-PC world.

This gathering was on Saturday, the day after investors bid down Microsoft shares 11.4 percent following the company's dismal fiscal fourth quarter earnings report that was lower than analysts expected. As we were talking, he predicted with a sense of inevitability that Bill Gates will return to Microsoft. I responded that's never going to happen and we had a friendly but spirited debate on the matter.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/26/20130 comments

Microsoft has hinted for some time that it expects demand for Windows 8 and Windows RT to accelerate with the release of smaller tablets aimed at competing with the iPad Mini, Samsung Galaxy Tab, Amazon Kindle Fire and others.

The topic came up on Microsoft's earnings call last week, and CFO Amy Hood gave a plug for the new smaller Windows tablets in the pipeline that has driven robust sales of competing tablets. I for one am curious if that means Microsoft is readying a Surface device that will take on the smaller tablets and, if so, whether it will include just Windows RT or a full-blown version of Windows 8. A competitively priced "Surface Mini" could be pretty remarkable if it has the right feature set.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/24/20130 comments

In the latest bid to salvage his offer to take the company he founded private, Michael Dell and his team of equity investors led by Silver Lake Partners sweetened their $24.4 billion offer by 10 cents a share, amounting to about $150 million. But tucked in with the drop-in-the-bucket increase to $13.75 per share is a rule change in the vote which this time wouldn't count votes that aren't tendered by proxy or in person.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/24/20130 comments

When Microsoft reported its worst quarter in recent memory last week, the company took its medicine after investors drove down its share price 11.4 percent Friday. On the surface (no pun intended), the culprit was Microsoft's unexpected $900 million charge related to the price reduction of its Surface RT devices.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/22/20133 comments

As a chorus of major investors including Blackrock and mutual fund giant Vanguard said they were going to vote against Dell's bid to buy out its shares to take the company private, at the 11th hour the vote, scheduled for yesterday morning, was postponed until next Wednesday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/19/20130 comments

The meltdown in the PC business has finally caught up with Microsoft. While the company has missed expectations four times out of the last five quarters, analysts and investors gave Microsoft a pass. In fact the company's stock has appreciated nicely in recent months.

But yesterday's worse-than-expected fourth fiscal 2013 quartery report showed Microsoft can no longer hide from the shrinking PC business, with Windows revenues declining 6 percent for the quarter and 1 percent for the entire year (take into account an upgrade offer and revenue deferral affected the numbers). Putting that aside, Microsoft said Windows Division revenues increased 6 percent for the quarter and 5 percent for the year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/19/20131 comments

Shareholders will finally vote on the proposed (and hotly contested) deal to take Dell private tomorrow. The outcome will either put Dell's fate to rest or at least set the next stage of the battle.

How tomorrow's vote will play out is too close to call but there's a good chance the team lead by founder and CEO Michael Dell and Silver Lake Partners may not have enough votes to complete the $13.65 per-share deal. This deal is valued at $24 billion, thanks to corporate raider Carl Icahn's counter-offer, which he sweetened Friday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/17/20130 comments

While PC shipments continued to fall off a cliff, declining about 11 percent for the second quarter, there was a changing of the guard as well. Lenovo has ousted HP as the leading global PC supplier in terms of units shipped, according to both Gartner and IDC. However in the U.S., Lenovo has a long way to go before catching up with HP and Dell, even though it made significant strides at all of its rivals' expense.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/15/20130 comments

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's realignment of the company's organizational structure is a major bet that removing the silos that existed in product groups will help fulfill his mandate of transforming Microsoft from a traditional software supplier to a devices and services company. While there are many nuances of the new "One Microsoft" organization Ballmer revealed yesterday, one of the biggest bets Ballmer is making is on Terry Myerson.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/12/20130 comments

When the third iteration of Microsoft's Hyper-V arrived with last year's release of Windows Server 2012, many regarded its virtual machine live migration capability as one of the hypervisor's key improvements. Hyper-V 3.0 offers faster migrations at speeds of up to 10 Gigabits per second, while allowing IT pros to conduct simultaneous live migrations. IT pros can also now perform live migrations outside a clustered environment.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/10/20130 comments

While it's hardly common to find someone with a Windows 8 PC and/or tablet, a Windows Phone and using Microsoft's portfolio of cloud services all at once, CEO Steve Ballmer today talked up his longstanding mantra that using the company's homogeneous collection of offerings will make individuals and IT pros more productive.

Speaking in the opening keynote address at Microsoft's annual Worldwide Partners Conference (WPC), taking place this week in Houston (keep up-to-date with the WPC news on our sister site, RCPmag.com), Ballmer spoke of that symmetry both from the standpoint of running Windows 8 on multiple devices but also extended that message to public, private and hybrid clouds, making the claim that customers want one provider for all of those topologies.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/08/20130 comments

The Start button is back in Windows 8.1 but depending on how you used it in the past, you may be extremely disappointed. That's especially true if you used the Start button to launch your favorite apps.

The revived Start button in Windows 8.1, released last week at the Build conference in San Francisco, doesn't let you do that. "Microsoft's Start button 'fix' is worse than doing nothing," wrote Earl Fargis, in response to my post Wednesday on the new Windows 8.1 Start button.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/01/20130 comments

Microsoft is moving Skype to its Windows Azure cloud service, thanks to its new auto scaling and a slew of other features demonstrated yesterday at the Build conference in San Francisco.

Corporate VP for Windows Azure Scott Guthrie disclosed the plan to move Skype off of its own servers onto Windows Azure to showcase the auto-scaling feature Microsoft is planning for the service. The idea is that Skype's need for capacity ebbs and flows and the ability to get dynamic compute and storage will serve Skype well, Guthrie said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/28/20130 comments

When Cisco said it was exiting server load balancing business last fall, a slew of vendors lined up to fill the void. Among them were Barracuda, Citrix, F5 Networks, Kemp Technologies and Riverbed Technology, looking to position their server load balancers -- also known as application delivery controllers (ADCs), as alternatives.

Cisco apparently decided to pull the plug on ACE, a plug-in load balancer the company offered for its Catalyst switches. Cisco first entered the ADC market back in 2000 when it bought a company called ArrowPoint for $5.7 billion, which is the third-largest acquisition it has made.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/27/20130 comments

The biggest objection to Windows 8 since its release last fall is its failure to appeal to longtime users of the operating system's traditional desktop while drawing them to the new modern interface.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer tacitly acknowledged that fact this morning as he gave the opening keynote of the Build conference in San Francisco, clearly the event of the year for Microsoft. Minutes into his keynote, Ballmer officially announced the release of the Windows 8.1 Preview.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/26/20130 comments

Citrix this week has taken the latest step in its open source onslaught by throwing its XenServer hypervisor platform into the mix. The move offers an affordable alternative to virtualization suites from Microsoft's Hyper-V, which is starting to gain appeal with the latest version released last fall, as well as from VMware's hypervisor and cloud management platforms.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/25/20130 comments

Microsoft has added a new security option for those using its Windows Azure cloud service. Administrators can block unauthorized users from accessing virtual machines, Microsoft quietly announced at its TechEd conference in New Orleans earlier this month.

The new option lets administrators put Access Control Lists (ACLs) on individual endpoints. By putting the ACLs on endpoints or subnets, administrators can control unauthorized access to virtual machines that are protected behind a firewall but are accessible in the public cloud.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/24/20130 comments

Chances are if you're considering a database to host unstructured data, MongoDB is high on your list. Experts say it's the leading so-called NoSQL database and the key commercial sponsor of the open-source repository. 10gen is clearly on a roll.

The company points to big commercial adopters including Cisco, Craigslist, Disney, eBay, Forbes, Foursquare, Goldman Sachs, Intuit, LexisNexis, Met Life, MTV, Salesforce.com, Shutterfly and Telefonica.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/24/20130 comments

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Server and Tools President Satya Nadella and Oracle President Mark Hurd will gather for a press teleconference Monday to announce a cloud partnership.

During last night's quarterly earnings call with analysts, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison strategically alluded to the forthcoming partnership with Microsoft to support its next-generation database, 12c. The Microsoft deal is one of several partnerships Oracle is inking in the coming days. Others include with the likes of Salesforce.com and NetSuite, Ellison said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/21/20130 comments

It seems Hyper-V is getting more respect every day. Five years after Microsoft entered the hypervisor market to challenge the standard bearer VMware, a growing number of holdouts are now finding Hyper-V has become a viable alternative.

My friend and longtime colleague David Strom last year made the case that Hyper-V has come of age, arguing more and more organizations are using it. He said Hyper-V has become more attractive to IT pros and partners alike, thanks to better management (System Center 2012) and development tools and integration with Windows 8. That argument came last August, a month before Microsoft started shipping Windows Server 2012, which of course included the third iteration of the hypervisor, known as Hyper-V 3.0.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/19/20130 comments

Todd Bradley, the longtime HP executive vice president who was in charge of the personal systems group (which includes the world's largest PC business along with tablets and printers), has a one-way ticket to China. HP today said Bradley is stepping down to help develop business operations over there. Bradley's official new title is executive vice president, Strategic Growth Initiatives.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/18/20130 comments

Thomas Penfield Jackson, the outspoken federal judge who oversaw Microsoft's antitrust trial in 1998 and ordered the company to divest its Windows business, died Saturday of cancer at the age of 76.

After finding Microsoft guilty of breaching U.S. antitrust laws and violating the 1994 consent decree in which it had agreed not to tie the sale of products to the sale of Windows, Jackson ordered that Microsoft split itself into two companies -- one focused on Windows and the other on the remaining software.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/17/20130 comments

Microsoft today released a version of its Office suite for the iPhone, the first time the company offered the combination of Word, Excel and PowerPoint on an iOS device. However, the app is only currently available for Office 365 subscribers.

While Microsoft has offered OneNote and Lync clients for iOS, customers have long pushed Microsoft to offer the full Office bundle for the iPhone and iPad. The new Office Mobile for Office 365 is intended for the iPhone, though Microsoft said it's possible to download the new app on the iPad as well. However Microsoft is advising those with iPads to use Office Web Apps with the tablet.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/14/20130 comments

Intel believes its latest solid-state drives are ready for conventional use in datacenters. The company yesterday took the wraps off its S3500 Series SSDs, which it says can be used for apps that require high-read performance.

"Our third generation of products we believe has the right features, the right cost points, the right capability to unleash SSDs into the mainstream of the datacenter," said Rob Crooke, corporate vice president and general manager of Intel's Non-Volatile Memory Solutions Group, speaking at a press conference in New York. "We're getting increasingly broad capability in our solid-state drive product family both in the breadth of the products as well as in features within those products."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/12/20130 comments

Google hasn't lit the world on fire with its Chromebooks -- client devices based on the company's Chrome OS. But some proponents of Chromebooks believe they are a viable alternative to Macs, PCs and tablets.

Indeed only 1 percent of those responding to Redmond magazine's 2013 Readership Survey say they envision replacing their Windows 7 PCs with Chromebooks. Nevertheless that's the same percentage who say they'll replace them with Macs. The only thing that fared worse were PCs running Windows RT, the stripped-down version of Windows 8 that only features the "modern" UI.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/12/20130 comments

Perhaps it will come as little surprise but IT pros say their organizations readily support iPads much more than tablets running Windows 8. The numbers are 61 percent and 15 percent respectively. This is according to 1,178 Redmond magazine readers who responded to our just-published 2013 Readership Survey. Only 9 percent support Windows RT -- a version designed for ARM-based tablets that only supports Microsoft's modern apps and can't join Active Directory domains.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/10/20130 comments

Revelations yesterday that telecommunications carriers and key technology providers including Apple, Facebook, Google and Microsoft share information with the intelligence community has put the Obama Administration and Congress on the defensive. But Microsoft yesterday sought to assure critics its scope is limited to data subpoenaed.

"We provide customer data only when we receive a legally binding order or subpoena to do so, and never on a voluntary basis," the company said in a statement. "In addition we only ever comply with orders for requests about specific accounts or identifiers. If the government has a broader voluntary national security program to gather customer data we don't participate in it."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/07/20130 comments

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Microsoft yesterday made official one of the worst-kept secrets in the world of Windows these days -- that it's bringing the Start button back when it releases Windows 8.1 later this year. Moreover, users will have the option of booting up to the traditional, or classic, Windows desktop rather than the tile-based modern user interface that defines Windows 8.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/31/20130 comments

A growing number of employees want to use social networking to improve collaboration, productivity and knowledge sharing. But within some organizations IT is standing in their way. That's the conclusion of a study released by Microsoft Tuesday, which found IT blocking the adoption of social network in many workplaces.

Thirty percent of those surveyed said IT organizations are putting restrictions on the use of social networking for business use, while 77 percent said they want better collaboration tools and 31 percent are willing to spend their own money to get the tools they want. The survey, commissioned by Microsoft and conducted by Ipsos, is based on a sample of nearly 10,000 individuals in organizations with 100 or more employees in 32 countries.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/29/20130 comments

When Hewlett Packard CEO Meg Whitman was asked by CNBC Thursday where she saw the bottom when it comes to declining PC sales, she didn't quite say. But Whitman argued there are 140 million desktops and notebooks that are more than four years old. While acknowledging tablets might be growing faster, she said users will ultimately need full-fledged systems as well.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/24/20130 comments

More than eight months after Microsoft released Windows Server 2012, and despite an 11 percent uptick in the company's Server and Tools business last quarter, it appears most enterprises, mostly with fewer than 1,000 employees, have yet to upgrade or deploy the new operating system.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/22/20130 comments

Microsoft's Windows 8/RT-based Surface devices are pretty slick and attractive to those who want both a tablet and a PC in one lightweight, ultra-modern unit. Yet most people are unaware of the benefits of the device despite a six-plus month ad blitz that's hard to miss. The commercials, slick in their own right, don't explain what a potential customer can do with a Surface.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/20/20130 comments

In a defining moment for Yahoo, the company today said it has agreed to acquire the popular micro-blogging site Tumblr for $1.1 billion in cash. Rumors had swirled for several days that Yahoo was the leading contender to acquire Tumblr, though Facebook and Microsoft were also reported to have engaged in serious talks to acquire the company.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/19/20130 comments

The rivalry between Google and Microsoft took on a new twist this week as the two companies accused each other of providing selective interoperability. While that's nothing new, the Google CEO Wednesday kicked off a tirade of barbs at a surprise appearance during the company's annual developer conference where he lashed out at Microsoft and accused the company of impeding interoperability.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/17/20130 comments

Yesterday Microsoft released some of the first details of its Windows 8 upgrade, code-named Windows "Blue."

Here's now what we know: The update now has the official name of Windows 8.1. And we also know that Windows 8 and Windows RT users won't need to shell out any more money for the update, which may or may not bring back the start button.

Posted by Chris Paoli on 05/15/20130 comments

While Rackspace typically emphasizes that its infrastructure as a service is now based on the open-source OpenStack cloud platform, the hosting provider still has a vested and significant interest in Windows. In addition to offering SharePoint hosting and development services, many of its customers use the Rackspace cloud to run Windows-based apps. The company also points to the improved Hyper-V support in Grizzly, the latest update to the OpenStack cloud OS released last month.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/14/20130 comments

The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 widely exposed the fact that if the CIA and FBI had data sharing capabilities, law enforcement could have thwarted the worst attack in U.S. history. Ironically it came to light just a week after Robert Mueller took over as head of the FBI.

As word quickly got out of the CIA's suspicions about the terrorists who carried out the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Mueller's key task as the then new FBI chief was to rectify that problem. Nearly a dozen years later, Mueller is set to retire this summer and he's confronted with the latest revelation that the suspected bombers in last month's deadly Boston Marathon attack had ties to Russian terrorists.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/10/20130 comments

A number of media sites over the past day or so have compared Microsoft's failure to wow the market with its Windows 8 operating system as analogous to New Coke, the ill-fated attempt in 1985 to change the flavor of the century-old popular soft drink.

The change was so widely rejected that three months later Coca Cola Corp. reversed course and brought back the original Coke. First it branded the revived version as Classic Coke while keeping New Coke on the shelves as Coke II, which was ultimately phased out.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/08/20130 comments

The Pentagon this week accused the Chinese military of what was long reported: that it was backing cyber-espionage by hackers attacking government and commercial computer systems.

It's the first time the U.S. government unambiguously accused China of backing and engaging in protracted cyber-warfare, potentially putting a rift in relations between the two countries.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/08/20130 comments

The U.S Senate has a pretty big problem on its hands. I'm not referring to its inability to arrive at consensus on most issues these days The latest setback is much more fundamental: the scarcity of ladies' rooms in the Senate chamber.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/08/20130 comments

Apple's iPad may be a market-leading tablet but Microsoft founder and chairman Bill Gates this morning dismissed its usefulness saying they lack the breadth and capabilities of new devices based on Windows 8 (including the company's own Surface).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/06/20130 comments

Intel's decision to name Brian Krzanich as its sixth CEO comes as the CPU giant is looking to breathe new life to its x86 PC architecture, among many other challenges facing the world's largest manufacturer of processors. Krzanich was an odds-on favorite to succeed Paul Otellini, who in November caught Intel's board off guard when he said he would step down three years earlier than expected.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/03/20130 comments

Many people I know have stopped wearing watches, opting to check their smartphones for the time. I’m among those who feel naked without my Seiko (having experienced that a few weeks ago when the battery suddenly died). I couldn’t change that battery fast enough. At the same time, I found a report in The Wall Street Journal that said Microsoft may be developing a Windows-based watch. Intriguing.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/01/20130 comments

If you had to double-check to make sure you didn't go to the wrong Web site, it's understandable. But you're at the correct place. Welcome to the complete makeover of Redmondmag.com!

As you can see, this isn't just a minor design tweak -- this is an entirely new look and feel, aimed to make it easier for you to find your favorite articles based on topics based on your areas of expertise and interest. While this new modern look may take some getting used to, I have no doubt you will discover more of the rich information available on the site.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/30/20130 comments

He's baaaaackkkkkk!!! As I'm sure you recall, The New York Times columnist David Pogue made a guest appearance in the pages of Redmond magazine last month to offer his Top 20 Windows 8 Tips. His first tip -- that those who bemoan the loss of the iconic Start button could use a third-party alternative to bring it back -- caused an uproar.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/27/20130 comments

GFI Adds Cloud-Based Patch Management

In a move that should broaden the appeal of its cloud-based antivirus and monitoring service for PCs and servers, GFI Software has added patch management. The company launched GFI Cloud last year and adding patch management addresses a critical pain point for IT pros looking to ensure systems are secure.

With its Web-based interface, GFI Cloud is targeted at mid-sized companies generally with fewer than 1,000 employees. However GFI's CEO Walter Scott told me it is used by some customers with many thousands of employees. As I reported last month, GFI spun off its security business into a new company called ThreatTrack, which will target large enterprises.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/26/20130 comments

Windows XP for Life

With the clock ticking on Microsoft's plans to pull the plug on Windows XP, analysts are warning the millions of enterprises users still running the 12-year-old operating system that time's running out. A careful migration can take many months and up to a year (depending on the shop) and waiting until the last minute or past the deadline means there will be no more security patches after April 8, 2014.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/24/20130 comments

Microsoft's Commitment to Green Datacenters

Many enterprises have stepped up their efforts to reduce the carbon footprints of their facilities to cut the costs of their operations. It makes good business sense but just as important, reducing emissions is a responsibility every organization should endeavor to provide a cleaner environment.

On this Earth Day many companies are using the occasion to share their contributions toward reducing the amount of power their facilities are consuming. For its part, Microsoft's multi-year cloud computing transformation has afforded the company to push the envelope in reducing the amount of power required to run its growing global datacenter footprint.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/22/20130 comments

Microsoft and Intel Disavow Fears of Doom

Over the past several weeks, it appeared the sky was falling for Windows and its longtime partner Intel. With PC sales falling more precipitously last quarter than analysts had originally forecast and IDC blaming it on disappointing uptake of Windows 8, we all were anxiously awaiting this week's earnings reports to hear from the horses' mouths themselves as to actually how bad things are now.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/19/20130 comments

IBM Bets Big on Enterprise SSD Flash Storage

IBM may be looking to get out of the commodity x86 server business but it's making a major bet on extending the use of solid state disk (SSD)-based flash storage technology in the datacenter, which holds the promise of enabling faster transactional and analytical applications. At the same time Big Blue believes it can be used for mainstream workloads such as boosting performance and removing latency of key operational systems such as Exchange Server, SharePoint and SQL Server.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/19/20130 comments

Can Microsoft Unseat Amazon in the Cloud?

Game on. Microsoft's launch yesterday of Windows Azure Infrastructure Services, armed with another round of price cuts, puts the two cloud giants in the Pacific Northwest on more equal footing. Three years after launching Windows Azure as a complete platform as a service, or PaaS, Microsoft finally is able to let customers stand up their own virtual machines in the company's cloud. That means for the first time Windows Azure's infrastructure as a service (IaaS) is now a viable alternative to Amazon's widely used EC2.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/17/20130 comments

Foxit Targets Adobe with Free PDF Creator

There are plenty of ways to create PDFs without spending a fortune on Adobe's Acrobat Standard software. Of course you can save Microsoft Office files as PDFs. But if you want to generate PDFs that you can annotate and enable extensive workflow capabilities -- including the ability to electronically sign and stamp them -- Foxit tomorrow will unveil a new free reader that the company said rivals Adobe's Acrobat Standard.

While less expensive alternatives to Adobe Standard offer many of these features from Avanquest, Nitro, Nuance and Wondershare (among others), Foxit is upping the ante with its new Foxit Reader 6.0. The Freemont, Calif.-based company says 150 million have already downloaded a Foxit Reader, which it believes makes it the second most used PDF reader behind Adobe's offering. With tomorrow's release, Frank Kettenstock, Foxit's VP of marketing told me: "We're expecting that to go up significantly."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/15/20130 comments

Intel's Uncertain Future

Microsoft took a lot of heat last week when IDC reported a 13.9 percent decline in PC shipments for the first quarter of this year. While it wasn't a shocker that PC sales were declining, the shortfall far exceeded the 7.7 percent shortfall IDC had originally forecast.

After IDC blamed disappointing sales of Windows 8, I begged the question if Microsoft can turn it around with the next wave of Windows wares code-named "Blue." We'll get more insights on that going into June. However, I'm still of the belief that a better crop of processors from Intel will make Windows 8 more attractive.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/15/20130 comments

Can Microsoft Fix Windows 8?

Microsoft over the past week has taken its lumps -- first with Gartner reporting a 7.6 decline in worldwide PC sales last quarter, followed by rival researcher IDC's more dire analysis saying shipments dropped a record 13.9 percent. And if reporting the worst decline in PC sales since IDC first started tracking shipments two decades ago wasn't bad enough, the analysts issued an uncharacteristically direct blow, blaming the deterioration on "weak reception" for Windows 8.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/12/20130 comments

Windows 7 XP Mode Is History Too

When Microsoft stops supporting Windows XP next year, hopefully using Windows XP Mode in Windows 7 isn't your fallback plan. I received an inquiry from a reader asking if Microsoft will continue supporting the Virtual XP within Windows 7. The answer is no.

"Windows XP Mode in Windows 7 aligns to the same lifecycle as Windows XP," a Microsoft spokeswoman confirmed. Some may see this as a double whammy since that pretty much puts the kibosh on running those legacy Windows XP-based apps that won't work on Windows 7 or above.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/12/20130 comments

HP Aims To Reshape Datacenters with Moonshot Servers

For once there's noise coming out of Hewlett-Packard this week that doesn't center on the dysfunction that has surrounded the company for the past two-plus years. As expected, the company this week started shipping its next-generation server architecture known as Project Moonshot.

This is not just about the latest update to a server line. Project Moonshot represents an entirely different system architecture. It also introduces the first major shift in server form-factors since HP's release of blade servers a decade ago. In these racks are cartridges that are half the size of a typical laptop PC. The company describes Moonshot-based systems as software defined servers that have networking and storage interfaces built into the racks as well.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/10/20130 comments

Windows XP Farewell Tour Begins

Presuming running a version of Windows supported by Microsoft is a requirement in your shop, you have one year left to rid yourself of Windows XP. On April 8, 2014, Microsoft will no longer support Windows XP. To commemorate -- or considering the wide proliferation of Windows XP, to give customers a kick in the teeth -- Microsoft has launched its one-year countdown.

The pending end-of-life support for Windows XP is a big issue for a lot of businesses. Anecdotally, I can't tell you how many businesses that still have Windows XP running rampant. Every time I'm at the gym, the doctor, at many restaurants and stores, and even my local Bank of America branch (which is a relatively new one), I see Windows XP on their desktops.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/08/20130 comments

Will IT Nix Facebook Phones?

Miffed that there still isn't a Windows 8/RT app for Facebook nearly six months after the launch of the new operating system, I tried in vain to ignore yesterday's launch of the new so-called Facebook phone. The new smartphone software, dubbed Facebook Home, and the HTC First phone coming next week, takes a forked version of Google's Android and puts the social network front and center.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/05/20130 comments

Ray Lane Finally Steps Down As HP Chairman

It was long overdue but Hewlett-Packard chairman Ray Lane yesterday said he was stepping down, but will remain on the company's board of directors. Two other board members, John Hammergren and G. Kennedy Thompson said they will exit the board when their terms expire next month.

The three were up for re-election this week and got by with a slim majority but the vote made clear investors were not happy with the three. Many fault Lane for the way he guided former CEO Leo Apotheker and the chaos that erupted under Lane's reign as chairman.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/05/20130 comments

VDI Demand Remains Tepid

A Forrester report released this week found that only 8 percent of IT shops in North America and Europe plan to deploy VDI and/or hosted Windows desktops. This is consistent with a recently fielded study by Redmond magazine.

Though we asked the question in broader terms than Forrester, about 1,130 responding to our online survey indicated that 63 percent will have a hosted desktop or VDI implementation -- though mostly for a small percentage of employees -- over the next 12 months, compared with 54 percent last year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/03/20130 comments

Victims of Cyber Attacks Lawyer Up

It's no secret to anyone in IT that the number of reported cyber attacks is on the rise. And while victims have historically avoided at all costs disclosing the fact their systems were penetrated, some now have to do so.

The result, The Wall Street Journal reports today, is that many victims are hiring law firms or seeking legal counsel so they can invoke attorney-client privilege. I'm not a lawyer or an expert in compliance but my first thought was: "really?" In one of several such examples cited by the Journal, Nationwide Insurance disclosed a breach in which customer records were accessed. Nationwide reported the breach in compliance with new state laws and under strong urging by the Securities and Exchange Commission that they do so.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/01/20130 comments

Microsoft Taps Silicon Valley for Build

Microsoft will court Silicon Valley developers when it holds its Build developer conference June 26-28 in San Francisco, where the company is expected to preview the future of the Windows platform and the apps that will run on it.

Steve Guggenheimer, Microsoft's corporate VP and chief evangelist for Microsoft's developer and platform group made the announcement at the Visual Studio Live! Conference in Las Vegas last week. (Disclosure: Like Redmond magazine, Visual Studio Live! is produced by parent company 1105 Media). Guggenheimer subsequently posted details on the planned conference in a blog post. Registration opens tomorrow.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/01/20130 comments

Spamhaus Suffers Biggest DDoS Attack of All Time

This week's attack on the Spamhaus Project was the worst known distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack raising the bar on the brute force weapons at the disposal of cyber assailants.

Spamhaus is often attacked by those who take issue with the fact that it blacklists spammers. But this week's DDoS attack started at 10 gigabits per second and peaked at an unprecedented 300 Gbps, The New York Times reported. "It is the largest DDoS ever witnessed," said with Dan Holden, director of Arbor Network's Security Engineering and Response Team, noting that the unknown attackers were well aware that Spamhaus already had sophisticated cyber defenses.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/29/20130 comments

Read Jeff's in-depth interview with ThreatTrack CEO Julian Waits here.

GFI Software earlier this month spun off its security business into a new company called ThreatTrack, whose core assets came from the 2010 acquisition of Sunbelt Software. The move is aimed at creating a separate business targeted at large government agencies and enterprises such as big-box retailers and financial services firms. GFI will continue focusing on its heritage customer base consisting of small and mid-sized companies with fewer than 1,000 users.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/27/20130 comments

Bidding War Leaves Dell's Future in Limbo

Dell's bid to go private is very much up in the air, and with it is the future of the company and who will run it. When founder and CEO Michael Dell lined up Silver Lake Partners and an ensemble of other investors, including Microsoft, early last month, it appeared reasonably certain the $24.3 billion deal would sail through.

However a week after Michael Dell and Silver Lake made the offer, some key shareholders felt it was a lowball bid and indicated they'd vote against it, hoping for a better offer. As the 45-day "go-shop" period to consider superior offers arrived Friday, the company received two bids.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/25/20132 comments

Will Microsoft Stand Out In the Big Data Fray?

Microsoft took a key step forward in its quest to bring "big data" to the cloud this week when it released the public preview of its Windows Azure HDInsight offering. The cloud-based service, first made available on a limited basis last fall, aims to let enterprise customers process huge volumes of structured and unstructured data using Microsoft's SQL Server and the Hortonworks distribution of the Hadoop file store.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/22/20130 comments

Should Microsoft Step Up OpenStack Support?

While software and service providers continue to support OpenStack, the open source cloud infrastructure initiative, there are still a healthy number of key players who haven't committed to it (or have done so in a limited way).

The behemoths that come to mind are Amazon Web Services, Google, Microsoft, Oracle and Verizon (including its Terremark business unit). That's quite a few heavy hitters missing, even though some 200 players have joined the OpenStack Foundation including AT&T, Cisco, Citrix, Dell, EMC, HP, IBM, Intel, NetApp, Rackspace, Red Hat, Suse, Ubuntu and VMware.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/20/20131 comments

Readers Chime In: Bring Back the Start Button for Windows 8!

Last week's post questioning whether Microsoft should have kept the traditional Start button in Windows 8 really hit a nerve. I can't recall a topic of late that has generated such a flood of comments and e-mails.

An overwhelming majority of respondents said Microsoft should bring it back -- some went as far to say the company never should have ditched it in the first place. The pushback comes as PC sales are on pace to decline for the second year in a row and analysts are predicting Windows 8 tablets will only have a single-digit share in 2017. That's not the only bad news. As I noted Friday, now it appears Microsoft has only sold 1.5 million of its Surface devices, according to a report by Bloomberg.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/18/201332 comments

Will Google's Android-Chrome Consolidation Threaten Windows?

Google's decision to pull the man known as the father of Android from that group is a huge gamble by CEO Larry Page and one that poses a new threat to Microsoft and Apple.

The unexpected move to bring Android under the auspices of Sundar Pichai, who already oversees Chrome and Apps, suggests Page remains determined to upend the PC business just as his company has done with tablets and smartphones.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/15/20134 comments

Google Moving In On Redmond, Literally

Hardly a week goes by when Google doesn't announce an enterprise signing on to its cloud services, notably Google Apps and to a lesser extent its Google App Engine platform as a service (PaaS), usually at the expense of Microsoft. But now Google is stepping up its assault on Redmond in more ways than one -- the company's moving in.

Google is doubling its capacity in nearby Seattle, The New York Times reported last night. In addition to embarking on an aggressive campaign to recruit engineers and other cloud experts in the area, the company is adding 180,000 square feet of datacenter capacity there. The new office in Kirkland, Wash., is about the size of a Walmart Supercenter, making the location its third largest -- outpaced only by its headquarters in Silicon Valley and its facilities in New York.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/13/20130 comments

Should Microsoft Bring Back the Start Button?

Perhaps the most controversial of David Pogue's Windows 8 tips was the first one suggesting third-party tools that let users effectively re-instate the Start menu that made its debut with Windows 95 but was removed from the new OS.

Pogue said those who bemoan the absence of the Start menu can get it back via third-party apps such as StartIsBack, Classic Shell, Start8, Power8, Pokki and StartW8. Admittedly, I tried Start8 and found it to be a nice crutch. It made me wonder, why doesn't Microsoft just bring it back in the next service pack?

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/11/201391 comments

Why Is Microsoft's Cyber Security Leader So Optimistic?

When Scott Charney spoke at last week's annual RSA Conference in San Francisco, he expressed optimism about the future of IT security despite a new onslaught of attacks and threats facing consumers, businesses and the nation's critical infrastructure.

I initially wondered why Charney, the Microsoft corporate VP for Trustworthy Computing was so upbeat? After all, we're under siege purportedly by the Chinese, Iranian and Russian governments. Organizations including the Federal Reserve Bank, The New York Times, NBC News, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, heck even Microsoft itself, have all recently sustained cyber-attacks.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/06/20130 comments

Breakdown in Procedures Caused Azure Outage

When Microsoft's Windows Azure cloud storage service went down worldwide late last month, the company confirmed within a few hours the cause of the massive meltdown. An expired SSL certificate crippled the service late Friday Feb. 22 into the next day.

Furious customers wanted to know how something as simple as renewing a SSL cert could fall through the cracks. Even worse, how could that become a single point of failure capable of bringing down the entire service throughout the world? It turns out the cause was a "breakdown in procedures," according to Mike Neil, general manager for Microsoft's Windows Azure service, in a contrite post-mortem posted Friday detailing the cause of the outage and plans to ensure the error isn't repeated.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/04/20135 comments

Do SharePoint Users Clamor for Yammer?

The release of SharePoint 2013 and this week's launch of an upgraded Office 365 for small- and mid-sized customers, offers enterprise a mind-numbing amount of new ways workers can find and share information. With My Sites and SharePoint Communities, the new collaboration platform offers social networking features such as activity streams aimed at fostering greater interactivity among enterprise users.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/01/20130 comments

Getting to Know Windows 8 and You

A few months ago, David Pogue, the personal technology columnist at The New York Times, penned his weekly column on how to choose a tablet.

The holiday gift-giving guide recommended the usual suspects: the various iterations of the Apple iPad, including its new sibling the iPad mini; a variety of Android-based tablets; and the latest Kindle Fire upgrade. But conspicuously absent was any mention of the recently released Surface RT from Microsoft and devices from other OEMs running Windows 8 and its Windows Store (aka Metro)-only Windows RT.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/27/20135 comments

Microsoft Is Latest Cyber Attack Victim

Microsoft joined a large parade of organizations to announce they are victims of hackers who've infiltrated and infected their systems with malware and/or stole data.

In recent weeks, The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, NBC News, Apple, Facebook and Twitter are just a handful to come out and say they've been hit. In a blog post late Friday, Matt Thomlinson, Microsoft's general manager for trustworthy computing security, revealed the attack it sustained was similar to those that hit Apple and Facebook. He said there was no evidence that customer data was stolen. Here's what he said:

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/25/20130 comments

The Irony Behind the Windows Azure Meltdown

Just as I was getting ready to call it a week late Friday afternoon, Microsoft's Windows Azure cloud storage service went down worldwide. As I reported, Windows Azure storage was unavailable because of an expired SSL certificate.

The global outage of Windows Azure late Friday into Saturday is ironic, considering the release of last week's study that Windows Azure storage offered the fastest response times of five large cloud networks -- namely those operated by Amazon Web Services, Google, HP and Rackspace. Good thing for Microsoft that Nasuni, the vendor that ran the shootout, wasn't testing Windows Azure at that time.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/25/20133 comments

HP Shoots for the Moon with Low-Power Servers

Hewlett-Packard shares shot up 13 percent this afternoon after reporting better than expected -- but still poor – earnings yesterday evening. Investors seemed to ignore the company's declining PC business perhaps paying attention to the company's plans to deliver its next-generation datacenter offering called Project Moonshot next quarter.

Project Moonshot is based on a revamped server architecture announced last year that replaces traditional Intel Xeon and AMD Opteron processors with low-power chips from ARM and Intel, the latter using Atom CPUs, both of which are found in tablets and smartphones. These servers are targeted at enterprises running large datacenters, cloud service providers and others running large Web sites.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/22/20131 comments

SharePoint in the Cloud Is 'Up in the Air'

Earlier this month, I pointed to a survey by Metalogix that found 55 percent of enterprises will run SharePoint on premise only, while 45 percent will deploy SharePoint in hybrid clouds that combine on-prem installations with Office 365 or third-party cloud providers. Only 10 percent said they are planning to run SharePoint purely in the cloud.

While that's not far off from the prevailing wisdom, it's important to keep in mind that it's hard to draw firm conclusions on a sample of 100 people, especially a crowd attending Microsoft's SharePoint Conference. Their mere presence suggests they may be ahead of the curve compared with typical SharePoint users.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/20/20130 comments

NewsGator Looks Beyond SharePoint Amid Yammer Tie

Microsoft today said its $1.2 billion acquisition of Yammer has resulted in record growth for the cloud-based provider of enterprise social networking. At the same time, Yammer's key rival NewsGator plans to extend the reach of its enterprise social networking platform beyond SharePoint.

In a vague news release announcing the growth of Yammer, Microsoft disclosed that sales quadrupled last quarter and the total user base grew to seven million. During the quarter, 290 new customers added Yammer including GlaxoSmithKline, SABMiller and TGI Fridays, among others.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/20/20130 comments

Microsoft Still Ranked Most 'Indispensable' to CIOs

While Microsoft may have dropped a few notches on the annual Harris Interactive Reputation Quotient this week, dropping from 2 to 15, Redmond does top a more important status list: it's the most indispensable vendor to big-spending CIOs.

At least that remains the finding in Piper Jaffray's quarterly CIO Survey released to its clients this week, which found Microsoft was by far their most critical "mega-vendor" for the future. In its survey of 135 CIOs, 61 (or 45 percent) picked Microsoft, which had more than double the mentions of the No. 2 vendor, Oracle. The ranking, in order, below those two include: SAP, Cisco, IBM, EMC, Hewlett-Packard and Apple. Interestingly only 10 percent or less picked the latter four, with only 4 percent choosing Apple.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/15/20134 comments

Obama Issues Executive Order To Tackle Cyber Threat

President Barack Obama yesterday issued an executive order mandating government agencies share information about cyber threats between state and local governments, and the private sector.

It's the latest effort by the President, who revealed the order in his State of the Union address, to combat the growing number of attacks that have hit the federal government, businesses and operators of critical infrastructure.

Just last week, the Federal Reserve was the victim of an "Anonymous" hack in which user data from the Fed's Emergency Communications System was breached, though reportedly no data was compromised. Reports of major cyber-attacks across the public and private sectors have become routine and the President made no bones that risks of cyber terrorism loom large.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/13/20131 comments

Influential Shareholders Oppose Dell Buyout

It's looking more like the leveraged buyout of Dell for $24.4 billion is not a fait accompli -- not that it was ever a sure thing.

When announcing last week's unprecedented agreement for Michael Dell to buy out the company he founded with an investor group led by Silver Lake Partners, key financial institutions and a $2 billion loan from Microsoft, they left the window open for 45 days to consider any better offers if they were to come along. The prevailing belief last week suggested that wasn't likely.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/13/20132 comments

Surface Pro Sellout!

I took my lumps from some of you over the weekend in response to Friday's prediction that the first edition of the Surface Pro, released over the weekend, would be a bust.

Based on reviews I read from respected critics such as David Pogue, the personal technology columnist for The New York Times, and All About Microsoft blogger and Redmond columnist Mary Jo Foley (granted she's not a technical review per se), among others, the consensus was it was a nice machine that lacked one critical component: the ability to run all day. Pogue only got three and a half hours out of his review unit. Microsoft rates the device as having at least 5 hours of battery life..

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/11/201313 comments

Surface Pro: Ironically Powerful While Lacking Power

Microsoft's Surface Pro hybrid tablet-PC goes on sale tomorrow, and based on the early reviews, the debut model is impressive yet shaping up to be a flop. It appears Microsoft is strategically rushing this device out to showcase how powerful a tablet can be, even if it lacks enough battery power to get you through half a business day.

In other words, don't expect the Surface Pro to share the fate of the Kin, Microsoft's short-lived consumer shartphone that the company pulled from the market in 2010 less than two months after releasing it. Rather, consider the Surface Pro a prototype of what's to come later this year.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/08/201313 comments

Microsoft's $2 Billion Dell Loan Could Yield Dividends (but No Guarantees)

If shareholders approve Silver Lake's $24.4 billion leveraged buyout bid for Dell, announced yesterday, Microsoft could reap a variety of dividends for its good will in the form of a $2 billion loan. But as far as I can tell, it's a no-strings-attached investment to offer support for a strategic partner with no assurances that Microsoft will get the return it may desire.

In a brief statement acknowledging the loan, Microsoft cryptically said: "We're in an industry that is constantly evolving. As always, we will continue to look for opportunities to support partners who are committed to innovating and driving business for their devices and services built on the Microsoft platform."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/06/20131 comments

Is Google's Chromebook a Windows 8 Killer?

While Hewlett Packard CEO Meg Whitman said she is in support of Windows 8, she never promised her company's exclusive support for the Windows OS. HP is apparently hedging its bets with today's launch of its first Chromebook laptop.

The HP Pavilion 14-c010us Chromebook has a 14-inch display, is equipped with 2 GB of RAM, 16 GB SSD and is powered by an Intel Celeron 847 (1.1 GHz) processor. It weighs 4.25 pounds, and HP claims battery life of 4 hours and 15 minutes. It's priced at $329.99.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/04/20138 comments

Oracle To Acquire Microsoft Lync Connectivity Tool Company

It appears Oracle wants to add networking to its broadening portfolio of datacenter and applications offerings. Oracle today said it will acquire Acme Packet for $2.1 billion, the company's largest acquisition since it bought Sun Microsystems in 2010. It's also noteworthy because the move puts Oracle in direct competition with Cisco, who was rumored for some time to have had its sights on Acme. Another interesting twist: Acme Packet counts Microsoft as one of its key ecosystem partners -- its Session Border Controllers (SBCs) are used to enhance connectivity of Redmond's Lync Sever unified communications (UC) platform.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/04/20130 comments

Reckoning Time for Office and SharePoint

This week's launch of Office 2013 has put the spotlight on Microsoft's calculated move to condition individuals to pay a yearly fee to use the suite in tandem with managing your e-mail and using SkyDrive to store content. The notion of installing Office on up to five devices (including tablets) is compelling, as contributing editor Brien Posey pointed out this week. Microsoft is betting the farm individuals and enterprises alike will pay an annual subscription like they do if they want to use all the features in an antivirus software.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/01/20132 comments

Can BlackBerry Make a Comeback at Microsoft's Expense?

Everything is on the line today for Research in Motion as the company launched its long-awaited BlackBerry 10 at a high profile launch event in New York. The company, which also renamed itself BlackBerry today, launched its first two next-generation smartphones -- the Q10 with its signature physical keyboard and the touch-only Z10.

"It's a new day in the history of BlackBerry," said the company's CEO Thorsten Heins, speaking at this morning's launch. Despite a much-improved app-centric model that looks to build on BlackBerry's reputation for offering real-time and secure communications for enterprises, no one expects the company to lead the smartphone market it pioneered. The best it can hope for is to duke it out with Microsoft for third place.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/30/20132 comments

Symantec CEO Reveals Long-Awaited Turnaround Plan

Six months after ousting Enrique Salem as CEO of Symantec and replacing him with Chairman Steve Bennett, the company last week revealed plans for a reboot, which includes plans to consolidate its management, reduce overhead and re-organize into 10 business areas. Bennett, the former CEO of software maker Intuit and onetime GE executive, outlined how he plans to remake the company with a plan called Symantec 4.0.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/28/20131 comments

Microsoft Financial Report: Is the Worst Over for Redmond?

When Microsoft reported earnings that slightly missed revenue forecasts but beat profit projections yesterday, investors reacted by trading down the company's stock 2 percent in after-hours trading. However, after sleeping on it, Wall Street seems to be seeing the glass half-full.

Microsoft stock was trading up about 1 percent midday today, following several analyst upgrades. While the jury on Windows 8 is still out and Microsoft certainly didn't hit it out of the park, the 60 million licenses sold -- albeit much from deferred revenues -- was enough to convince analysts that it's not a dud.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/25/20130 comments

Last Chance To Get Windows 8 Pro on the Cheap

At the risk of sounding like a car salesman, time is running out. Next Thursday is the last day to take advantage of Microsoft's $39.99 upgrade to Windows 8 Pro -- $14.99 if you purchased a Windows 7 machine after June 2 of last year. I'm not a pitchman for Microsoft, and at Redmond magazine we clearly understand many enterprises coming off Windows 7 upgrades are in no rush to move to Windows 8. Nevertheless, there are many good reasons why IT pros should use Windows 8.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/25/201310 comments

Lotus Notes Is Still Thriving -- or Is It?

I recall covering the launch of Lotus Notes two decades ago, when many companies were using it to improve their productivity. IBM's $3.5 billion investment in Lotus Development Corp. has served it well, even as it is now seen by many as a legacy platform.

Nevertheless I was surprised to read a report in The Wall Street Journal Monday that it was a $1.2 billion business, according to IDC, as of 2011. IBM, which yesterday exceeded analyst forecasts with revenues of $29.3 billion for the quarter ended Dec. 31 and earnings of $6.1 billion, said its Lotus business grew 9 percent for the period.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/23/20135 comments

Does a Microsoft Investment in Dell Make Sense?

Reports surfaced yesterday that Microsoft might pump up to $3 billion in Dell, a notion that until recently was unthinkable if not laughable. But times have changed.

As reported last week, Dell is purportedly lining up investors to take the company private led by private equity firms TPG Capital and Silver Lake Partners. The latter firm, the influential broker which brought the likes of Skype and Yahoo to Microsoft, seems to currently have the upper hand in leading a deal, which would include Microsoft, several sources close to negotiations told CNBC reporter Dave Farber yesterday.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/23/20132 comments

Does HP Want Autonomy?

Hewlett Packard this week denied reports that it's looking to sell its troubled Autonomy unit and the EDS services business it acquired nearly five years ago for $14 billion.

It's the latest scuttlebutt surrounding a company that continues to appear lost and can't seem to escape bad news such as yesterday's confirmed report that the architect of its public cloud effort Zorawar "Biri" Singh, senior vice president and general manager, has left the company. Singh's departure was first reported by All Things D. See more on that in my Cloud Report blog.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/18/20130 comments

New Dynamic Access Control Tips Posted

The cover story of this month's Redmond magazine looks at a key feature in Windows Server 2012 called Dynamic Access Control, designed to improve file server authorization and authentication by reducing Active Directory groups.

Microsoft has described DAC as one of the most important new features in Windows Server 2012. Of course there are many other key new capabilities in the new server OS, as Redmond contributing editor Brien Posey reviewed last summer.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/18/20130 comments

Is Dell on the Market?

While Dell hasn't publicly confirmed that it's considering leveraged buyout proposals from private equity firms, Wall Street continues to buzz at the prospect that indeed the computer giant is on the market and a deal could surface in the not-to-distant future.

Two bidders apparently in the mix include TPG Capital and Silver Lake, with Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays, Credit Suisse and the Royal Bank of Canada in the pipeline to provide financing. First reported by Bloomberg on Monday, CEO Michael Dell is not surprisingly a key player in any such deal -- he holds an estimated 16 percent stake valued at about $3.6 billion in the company he founded in his dorm room back in 1984.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/16/20135 comments

Microsoft's Role in Facebook's New Search Graph

In his opening monologue last night, Jimmy Kimmel took note of Facebook's announcement yesterday that it intends to use the mounds of data it has collected from its 1 billion users to enable a new form of search.

The new Search Graph, Kimmel pointed out, provides customized search results by incorporating data from your network of Facebook friends. "So you can ask questions like 'who are my friends that live in San Francisco?' Which by the way if you have to ask that, you don't have any friends in San Francisco," Kimmel quipped. "It's an interesting new feature. Soon you'll be able to find anything you want on Facebook, except for the thousands of hours of your life you lost going on Facebook."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/16/20130 comments

Cisco Releases New UC Tool

Cisco Systems this week took the wraps off a unified communications platform that combines chat, presence and voice messaging onto PCs, tablets and smartphones.

Cisco Jabber is the culmination of the company's 2008 acquisition of Jabber Inc. Cisco said Jabber works with or is set to support Windows, iPhone, iPad, Nokia, Android and the BlackBerry platforms. Support for the Mac is slated for this summer. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/02/20110 comments

Can Windows Phone 7 Succeed?

After attending Microsoft's launch of Windows Phone 7 Monday in New York, I walked away feeling that Microsoft has put its best foot forward in attempting to regain share in the hypercompetitive mobile phone market (see Microsoft Launches Windows Phone 7). The defining question: will Windows Phone 7, despite its positive attributes, get lost in the crowd that is clearly dominated these days by Google's Android, Apple's iPhone and Research in Motion's BlackBerry?

"I've never seen anything like it," said Forrester Research analyst Jeffrey Hammond, who was at Monday's launch event. We were talking about the rapid ascent of the Android mobile platform, which had virtually no share a year ago, and now has emerged as the fastest selling smartphone OS, according to data released by Nielsen last week. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 10/13/20104 comments

Microsoft Extends HPC's Limits

Microsoft is looking to up the ante with its Windows Server HPC platform. The company released its third iteration yesterday and signaled it would like to see broader use of its high-performance computing platform.

"Think of this as one of the key shifts in our fleet for what we look at as this future of technical computing," said Bill Hilf, Microsoft's general manager for technical computing. Hilf made his remarks in his keynote address at the High Performance Computing Financial Markets conference in New York. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/21/20100 comments

Microsoft Skipping Verizon for Round 1 of Windows Phone 7

Reports that Windows Phone 7 initially won't be available at launch on the Verizon Wireless network are hardly a surprise, given that all test units were assigned to AT&T. But now comes word that it might be awhile before Verizon Wireless users will be able to get their hands on Windows 7 Phones.

That's because, according to News.com's Ina Fried, Microsoft will need to create an upgrade to Windows Phone 7 to support CDMA networks. Both Verizon Wireless and Sprint's networks are CDMA-based while AT&T's and T-Mobile's networks are GSM-based. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/17/20101 comments

Microsoft Downplays Windows 1.0

Windows 1.0 got off to its auspicious start on Thursday Nov. 10, 1983, at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. Invitations to the launch were sent to the press in a box with a squeegee. The header read: "For a clear view of what's new in microcomputer software please join Microsoft and 18 microcomputer manufactures for a press conference…"

But, like many versions of Windows that would follow it, the first release didn't ship until two years after that fateful press conference, leading many to refer to it as "vapor-ware." Finally, Microsoft released Windows 1.0 in November of 1985 at Comdex. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/10/20103 comments

Apple iPads and iPhones to Get Flash?

Apple's decision to loosen the guidelines of its App Store means you ~~should~~ could soon be seeing Flash-based content on iPhones and iPads.

But that remains to be seen. While the company's move will allow developers to use third party tools including those used to create Adobe Flash code, that doesn't mean iPads, iPhones and iPod Touch devices will be able to run Web-based Flash content. Still, it suggests that may be in the cards at some point. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/10/20103 comments

Who Will Replace Elop?

The news that Stephen Elop is leaving Microsoft is hardly a surprise -- Elop was believed to have been coveting a CEO job for a long time and now he has one.

Elop will take the reins of Nokia Sept. 21, leaving yet another void in the executive ranks at Microsoft. In addition to looking to fill the hole left by the departure of Robbie Bach, who headed Redmond's Entertainment and Devices business, now CEO Steve Ballmer will oversee the Microsoft Business Division until he names a successor. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/10/20100 comments

Will MPN Drive Consolidation?

It's hard to believe it's already September. While that means back to school for many, it also means there's less than one month until the official launch of the long-awaited new Microsoft Partner Network.

Some may dispute whether it's long-awaited, I realize. After all, for some smaller partners, the new certification requirements could mean their once-coveted Gold Certified status will be no longer attainable. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 09/02/20100 comments

Should HP Be Split Up?

There's no shortage of opinions out there as to what should happen now that Hewlett-Packard has ousted CEO Mark Hurd.

Oracle CEO Larry Ellison blasted HP's board for taking what he felt was a minor infraction and cutting him loose as a result. "The HP board just made the worst personnel decision since the idiots on the Apple board fired Steve Jobs many years ago," Ellison wrote to The New York Times. "That decision nearly destroyed Apple and would have if Steve hadn't come back and saved them." More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/11/20103 comments

Microsoft Targets Mission-Critical Systems

Microsoft yesterday launched what it calls Premier Mission Critical Support Service, which, as the name implies, is intended to help users architect and maintain apps and systems that require constant availability.

These long-term services are for those who want to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars to perform architectural reviews, implementation and monitoring services thereafter, as reported by my colleague Kurt Mackie. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/11/20100 comments

HP's Hurd Had To Go

A top executive charged with sexual harassment or violating company policies is hardly a rarity in today's business world. Yet, the news Friday that the laser-focused Hewlett-Packard CEO Mark Hurd was effectively dismissed for such allegations has rocked Silicon Valley.

As the story played out over the weekend, and no doubt will continue to do in the coming days and weeks, some argue HP's board should have looked the other way, given the fact that the company's market cap has doubled and the company has substantially and consistently grown revenues and profits since Hurd took the reigns five years ago. More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/09/20101 comments

IBM vs. Microsoft: The Big Iron Battle

It appears either Microsoft has mainframe-envy or IBM is not too happy about Microsoft's data center ambitions of late. Most likely, it's a combination of both.

Consider the following: More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 08/03/20100 comments

MPN: Going for the Gold

Anyone who was hoping that Microsoft's partner organization would put the breaks on its plans to require unique certifications was disappointed last week.

"It's full speed ahead," said Julie Bennani, general manager for partner programs at Microsoft, in an interview during last week's Worldwide Partner Conference in Washington, D.C. "We are still going on with those requirements and landing those in October."

While she and Microsoft's new partner chief, Jonathan Roskill, signaled they were willing to consider alternatives at a later date, as reported, the plan looks baked to move forward with the Oct. 1 date for transitioning to the new Microsoft Partner Network (MPN). "If we said, 'If you could get Gold in three of the five in Core IO, we could give you a Core IO competency.' That's one thing that's interesting to think about," Roskill said.

Microsoft last week did say it's renaming the competency and advanced competency designations Gold and Silver, but many appeared to welcome a Silver designation like receiving a booby prize.

At WPC last week, I sat in on a session called MPN: The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly. It was moderated by Mo Edjlali, a management consultant, who, until recently, served five years as the president of the International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners Washington D.C. chapter.

Now a management consultant, Edjlali looked at the situation from both points of view. "I think Microsoft wants people to have focus, that makes sense," Edjlali said. Indeed there are many partners who are Gold who most would agree don't deserve that designation today.

"But I think the trouble is some products are so closely related that you can't say your good in BI and not in SQL Server, it confuses customers when they might feel that expertise isn't there when it's always been there," he added. "People say 'my staff hasn't changed but now we are going to come across like we're not as sharp as we used to and these big companies that have the manpower will have the credentials but not have the skills or actually put the billable people on project with those skills.'"

That is the center of the fear. The large integrators can afford to have Gold certified engineers across the board, but the small- and mid-sized firms can't. So they will have to decide which disciplines they want to be Gold certified in and accept Silver for the rest.

Perhaps a better idea would have been to introduce a Platinum tier, Edjlali said. "It's going to be difficult for people to go from Gold to Silver," he told me in an interview after the session.

Janice Crosswell of Microsoft Canada's Corporate Assurance Group, who was sitting in on the session tried to spin the situation. "Silver is better than [the current] Gold," Crosswell said to the group. "When you're talking about some of the math, and I am saying 'I am just Silver,' you are actually rank higher than the [current] gold. There are some more requirements."

That didn't go over too well. "Customers are never going to know that Silver is now better than Gold used to be," a partner in the session replied. "They see Gold and that's what they see."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/12/20100 comments

Compromise in the Works on MPN Competencies?

There is growing buzz that Microsoft will come up with some compromise over the certification requirements that some partners fear will put them out of business. But it is not clear to what extent.

Details of any changes to the new Microsoft Partner Network (MPN) are expected to be made public next week at the company's annual Worldwide Partner Conference, set to be held in Washington, DC.

"The word on the street is some changes have been made and will probably be announced at WPC," says Howard Cohen, northeast regional chairman of the International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners (IAMCP).

Cohen says it remains unclear what those changes will be but he was optimistic. "The people at Microsoft who were responsible for MPN have told us clearly that they are open to dialog and they appreciate the role IAMCP plays as the voice of their partner channel." A Microsoft spokeswoman said the company does not comment on rumors but said "we will be talking a lot about MPN next week at WPC."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/08/20101 comments

Fireworks in Redmond

Report suggests Microsoft's woes stem from lack of young developers and customers.

It was, no doubt, a rather unsettling beginning of Microsoft's new fiscal year.

First Microsoft kills the Kin, making it arguably its biggest flop since Bob. Then a report by Microsoft Kitchen's Stephen Chapman detailed some specifics about plans for Windows 8 including a Windows Store, faster boot-up, support for slate-type devices and facial recognition. Not a welcome move as Microsoft is looking to keep the focus on Windows 7.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/07/20102 comments

Kin May Outshine Bob as Microsoft's Biggest Dud

Microsoft cut its losses quickly with the Kin, even though it never should have been hatched in the first place. Not that it's a big shock that Kin failed or Microsoft had much choice in the decision to kill it. It just seemed that after the lack of logic in rolling it out in the first place, that Microsoft might be reticent to concede defeat so rapidly.

Kin, known internally at Microsoft as Pink, of course was borne of Microsoft's acquisition of Danger, maker of the Sidekick, which was marketed by T-Mobile until it yesterday pulled the plug on it as well, according to CNET's Ina Fried. Even though Kin was destined to be a dud, Andrew Brust blogged some interesting theories on why Microsoft had to launch it and let it fail. Check out his top 10 reasons why Microsoft may have launched Kin anyway. Brust notes:

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 07/02/20100 comments

Quest Reaches Out To MSPs

Quest Software wants providers of managed services to use its broad portfolio of systems management, migration and connectivity software. The problem is managed services providers, or MSPs, don't want to pay Quest's traditional lump-sum licensing fees. In order to make its software palatable to managed services providers, Quest has introduced a new consumption-based licensing model that it hopes will broaden its market.

The company earlier this month launched its new Service Provider Program, designed to let MSPs license its software the way service providers are accustomed to doing business -- by the month or quarterly and as applicable on a per user or account basis.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/29/20100 comments

Big Changes Afoot for Microsoft Partners

Time will tell whether the reshuffling of responsibilities between soon-to-be former Channel-chief Allison Watson and her successor, Jon Roskill was a chance to allow both execs to broaden their careers and put new blood into their respective organizations or whether there are more pronounced changes in the works to the way Microsoft goes to market with its partners.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 06/25/20100 comments

New Desktop Virtualization Licensing Looms

Microsoft is talking up application virtualization and there are some new technology, partnering and licensing considerations on the horizon. Also in its battle against VMware, look for Citrix and Microsoft to act as true partners-in-crime to take on the cause for desktop application virtualization.

First, in case you haven't heard, effective July 1, those customers who don't qualify for Windows Client Software Assurance will require a new license called Windows Virtual Desktop Access, or Windows VDA. According to a posting on Microsoft's site, the company came up with Windows VDA to allow organizations to license virtual copies of Windows in virtual environments for devices that don't qualify for Windows client SA such as third-party contractor PCs and thin clients, among others.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/28/20101 comments

Some Partners Unsure About Microsoft Partner Network Changes

Not feeling all that prepared for the forthcoming changes in the Microsoft Partner Network? You're not alone.

According to a poll of a small but very influential group of partners, only 29 percent said they feel very aware of the changes and requirements in the Microsoft Partner Network, while 58 percent are somewhat aware and 12 percent are either unsure or not aware. Meanwhile, 38 percent say they are not familiar what they have to do to prepare for the changes, while 46 percent said they were somewhat prepared. Only 15 percent feel very prepared.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/26/20100 comments

Are You Ready for MPN?

The International Association of Microsoft Certified Partners held its first-ever national meeting yesterday where the forthcoming new Microsoft Partner Network (MPN), the Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC) and Microsoft's emphasis on the shift to cloud computing were front-and center.

Nearly 1,000 partner firms are members of IAMCP. The goal of yesterday's held event was to reinforce the IAMCP's mandate that partners should network with one another and create relationships by which they go to market together in areas where their skills are complimentary.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/20/20102 comments

CardSpace 2.0 Headed for the Heap?

Active Directory Federation Services 2.0 is now shipping but Microsoft postponed the release of CardSpace 2.0, putting its future in doubt.

The current CardSpace is built into Windows 7 and Vista but it doesn't appear that it is widely used. Perhaps that's why Microsoft quietly announced that it was putting on hold the next version, CardSpace 2.0, which was to provide a common user-interface for managing multiple logins.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 05/06/20100 comments

HP with Palm Reshapes Mobile Landscape

About 10 days ago, I broke down and bought a Palm Pre Plus for a mere $49. The few people I've told have given me blank stares. I love the gesture-based interface and the way the device works. An added bonus was the free mobile hotspot built into the device that I can use to connect my netbook while on the road. I've been reluctant to reveal my purchase because I have 20 days left to return it to Verizon should I conclude it's a dud.

While I have been on the fence, HP announced yesterday that it has agreed to acquire Palm Inc. for $1.2 billion. This leaves me thinking Palm's webOS has a much brighter future. Here's why: The biggest knock against webOS and the Pre is its lack of apps. That has been the source of my dilemma -- not the device itself.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/29/20102 comments

Will ADFS 2.0 Boost Cloud Security?

The pending release of Microsoft's Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS) 2.0 is expected to play a key role in simplifying how organizations provide access control to systems and applications, including those running in the cloud.

Microsoft is expected to release ADFS 2.0, the free Windows 2008 Server add-in to Active Directory, this week, as reported. ADFS 2.0 provides claims-based authentication to applications developed with Microsoft's recently released Windows Identity Foundation (WIF).

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/26/20105 comments

Inside Microsoft's Private Cloud

I had the opportunity this week to see Microsoft's portable data centers, which the company showcased here in New York.

In honor of Earth Day, I thought it would be fitting to describe what Microsoft is showcasing because it does portend its vision for the next generation data centers that have self-cooling systems and servers that don't require fans.

Microsoft first demonstrated the portable data centers at its Professional Developers Conference back in November in concert with the launch of Windows Azure. It gained further prominence last month when Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer made his "we're all in the cloud" proclamation at the University of Washington with these huge units in tow. The one I saw in New York was 20-feet long by seven feet wide but Microsoft also has one that stretches 40 feet.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/22/20100 comments

Infosys Bags $100 Million from Microsoft

After declining to disclose the value of its outsourcing deal with Microsoft, Infosys CFO today reportedly revealed that it's worth a whopping $100 million.

Bangalore-based Infosys announced Tuesday that Microsoft is outsourcing its IT help desk, PC, infrastructure and application support to them in a three-year deal that involves 450 Microsoft locations in 104 countries.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/15/20106 comments

VCs Set Expectations

If you're looking for VC money, don't presume no one else has considered your unique idea, be prepared to show you have a solid customer roster and don't expect to find the easy money of yesteryear.

Those were among the takeaways of a panel presentation I attended earlier this month with five VCs and a company that received venture funding. It was moderated by Bloomberg TV's Taking Stock anchor Pimm Fox.

As a prelude to the panel, PricewaterhouseCoopers' partner David Silverman revealed PwC's annual MoneyTree report, which gave the lowdown on last year's dismal year for venture funding that was tighter than ever. Investors only pumped $17.7 billion into companies, down 37 percent over 2008's $28 billion.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/31/20100 comments

Should Microsoft Fear Google Apps?

Can Microsoft convince customers to upgrade to the full version of its forthcoming Office 2010, due for release May 12?

While that question has been looming large for awhile, today The Wall Street Journal's Nick Wingfield once again raises that specter focusing on the formidable challenge from Google. Wingfield said "Microsoft seems to be staring down the Google threat," pointing to wins by General Motors and Starbucks.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/29/20104 comments

Is Windows Phone 7 Following in Palm's Footsteps?

While many loathe writing off Palm, the company responsible for creating the first generation of PDAs, the prognosis isn't looking too good. At the moment, those predicting Palm's demise seem to be heavily outweighing those who believe the company is going to regain its former glory.

Palm's sustainability came into deeper scrutiny late last week when the company said it shipped 960,000 units and only sold 408,000 of them. That suggests the company has stuffed its channel with a ton of unsold inventory. The news caused its shares to drop 30 percent Friday. Though the shares rallied early on the news that AT&T would start selling its devices, the company's shares closed down half a point.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/23/20104 comments

Remembering Jerome York

Jerome York, best known for his association with the billionaire and activist investor Kirk Kerkorian, passed away late last week just days after suffering a severe brain aneurysm.

York, 71, was best known for playing a key role in helping save Chrysler and later IBM. He was brought in to both companies as CFO when their survival was very much in question. York instituted major cost-cutting initiatives and is credited with contributing to their respective turnarounds.

At the time of his death, York was still sitting on Apple's board, where he was a director since 1997. York joined Apple's board just prior to the return of CEO Steve Jobs. "He has been a pillar of financial and business expertise and insight on our board for over a dozen years," Jobs said in a statement. "I will miss him a lot."

More recently, York was in the spotlight for his efforts to lead Kerkorian's initiatives to salvage General Motors before its meltdown last year that resulted in its filing for bankruptcy. As his obituary in The New York Times noted, he foresaw much of GM's problems years before they played out, though his warnings were largely ignored.

His obituary pointed to "one rare miss" when he and some investors bought direct systems marketer Micro Warehouse for $275 million, looking to capitalize on the boom for selling IT goods online. I recall sitting down with York at Micro Warehouse's Norwalk, Conn. headquarters. At the time, York was still treading water, trying to transform the company from an inbound seller to an outbound marketer of systems. But Micro Warehouse ultimately filed for bankruptcy and was snapped up by rival CDW.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/22/20101 comments

Microsoft Plunges Into VDI Pool

While client and desktop virtualization was always something Microsoft knew it couldn't ignore, it has always loomed large as a threat to Redmond's Windows franchise. But a group of coordinated announcements today suggests Microsoft is going to put more emphasis on both application virtualization and virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) technology.

Microsoft has taken several key steps to make its Application Virtualization (App-V) and VDI stack both more appealing from a licensing perspective, as well as from an implementation standpoint.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/18/20100 comments

Are Microsoft Partners 'All-In' the Cloud?

A week after trying to sell customers on its "we're all in" campaign to the cloud, Microsoft is now trying to bring its vast network of partners onboard.

Allison Watson, the corporate vice president of Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Group, made her pitch Wednesday in a prepared and edited video presented via a 10-minute webcast.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/11/20100 comments

Will Novell Finally Be Acquired?

In more than two decades of following Novell, I've had many conversations with experts about who might someday acquire the company. In my mind, it was never a question of "if" but "when" Novell would be snapped up. But the company just chugged along.

Could that acquisition finally be arriving?

New York-based hedge fund Elliott Associates LP on Tuesday made a bid for Novell for $2 billion -- a 49 percent premium over Novell's share price Tuesday night before it catapulted yesterday by 28 percent. Elliott already holds an 8.5 percent stake in the common stock of Novell. The hedge fund was vague about its intentions with Novell but believes the company is underperforming.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/04/20100 comments

Will XP Users Upgrade Existing PCs to Win 7?

With today's deadline to sign off of the Windows 7 RC, many users have to decide whether to go back to Windows XP or Vista, or whether to pony up and upgrade to Windows 7.

Providers of PC migration software like Laplink and Detto Technologies can capitalize on that decision either way. In my news story, I described how I used Laplink's PCmover to upgrade to Windows 7 from the release candidate, but the software is really intended for those with XP or even older versions of Windows looking to a) migrate those systems to brand-new ones, or b) do in-place upgrades of existing PCs from older versions of Windows to Windows 7.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 03/01/20101 comments

Look Who's Tweeting: Microsoft's Channel Chief

Microsoft channel chief Allison Watson last week joined the Twitterati and has launched a new blog called Redmond View.

Watson, corporate vice president of Microsoft's Worldwide Partner Group, has invited partners to follow her on Twiiter @Allison_Watson or on Facebook "so I can get your feedback and chat with you about what's going on in the marketplace and in your business," she wrote in her inaugural blog post.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/24/20101 comments

Cisco Declares War on HP

Cisco's decision to pull the plug on its partnership with HP was a major salvo in tensions that have been brewing between the two companies over the past year. Cisco last week said that it's cutting HP off as a Certified Channel and Global Service Alliance partner, a move that could force the companies' respective partners to make some tough choices.

"There may be a push by one or both companies to push channel partners to an either/or situation," said Mark Amtower, a marketing consultant with expertise on selling IT to the federal government, in an e-mail. "Many companies carry both as partners right now -- I don't think that will continue. If you push HP, marketing support from Cisco will disappear and vice versa."

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/22/20100 comments

Seeking Funds for SMBs

Small and medium-size businesses have long been the salvation of IT recoveries, but this time that conventional wisdom may be falling flat.

The good news, as I reported earlier this month, is the economy surged last quarter by 5.7 percent, the largest such expansion in six years. Adding to that optimism, the Federal Reserve yesterday said business equipment output was up 0.9 percent in January, slightly higher that December's 0.7 percent.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/18/20105 comments

Will Partners Embrace New Win Phone 7?

Now that Microsoft has revealed its mobile ambitions, partners must wait to see what's underneath the covers.

Microsoft began its orchestrated rollout of the new Windows Phone 7 Series this week at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. The new platform replaces Windows Mobile 6.x with a completely revamped user interface that incorporates Microsoft's Metro, the basis of Zune and Windows Media Center.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/16/20101 comments

SAP Seeks Happiness

It's been a dramatic week for SAP, whose software runs the operational underpinnings of some of the largest enterprises. The company shook up its executive suite, replacing CEO Leo Apotheker with co-CEOs Bill McDermott and Jim Hagemann Snabe. SAP today also disclosed the departure of former SAP CEO John Schwarz.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/11/20100 comments

Feeling the Google Buzz?

Google's latest stab at social networking is creating a lot of "buzz," but it remains to be seen whether it will become as dominant as Facebook or Twitter. Based on initial reactions, it doesn't appear to be a threat. The real question, though, is whether it will make Google Apps Premier Edition (GAPE) a stronger contender in the enterprise.

Make no mistake: That's one of the company's goals with Google Buzz, which uses the inbox as a way of bringing together all of one's social networking activities.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/10/20100 comments

Microsoft Clams Up on BPOS-Lite Rumor

Microsoft has removed a job posting seeking a manager for a new hosted offering intended to bring e-mail and collaboration services to SMBs.

The service is code-named "BPOS-Lite," according to text of the posting, which was revealed Monday by ZDNet.com and Redmond columnist Mary Jo Foley. "BPOS 'Lite'...is part of the 'next wave' of services targeting professional individuals and smaller organizations, offering Microsoft's best collaboration, communications and productivity services," the now-removed posting said.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/02/20100 comments

Will Apple's iPad Define Slate Computing?

While there's no shortage of opinions as to whether Apple will catch lightning in a bottle for a third time with its new iPad, there's a good case to be made that the initial entry could be a boon to those developing PC-based slates.

As media critic David Carr reports today in The New York Times, the iPad "is a device for consuming media, not creating it." That's not to suggest that future releases won't raise the bar, but as many observers suggest, Apple also has to make sure not to offer too much and risk cannibalizing its MacBook product line.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 02/01/20100 comments

Undoing a 'Disaster,' Oracle Plans To Take Sun Sales Direct

Today could be a big day for those who implement data center technology, databases, applications and software based on Java.

As reported , Oracle today will outline its plans for integrating Sun Microsystems. Part of that plan includes hiring 2,000 engineers and sales people to sell integrated appliances that include provide integrated databases, app software, servers, storage and network gear, according to published reports. The integrated appliance model could be a multi-billion dollar business, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison tells More

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 01/27/20100 comments

Accenture's Mistake with Tiger Woods Transcends Fiasco

When Accenture last week ditched Tiger Woods as its sole pitchman, it served as a key reminder of what happens when you put all your eggs in one basket.

Accenture is one of the largest independent providers of IT consulting, integration and outsourcing services with annual revenues of $21.58 in fiscal year 2009. The company, which had blanketed Woods across all media in its "We Know What it Takes to be a Tiger" campaign last week scrubbed all vestiges of Woods from its Web site and removed all posters and other collateral from its offices, according to a front page story in The New York Times.

Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 12/21/20090 comments