SOA: These Three Letters Now Officially Endorsed in Redmond
I've been pretty interested in Service-Oriented Architectures (SOA) for a while,
but the deeper I looked, the less I saw Microsoft using the term. Instead of
"SOA," everything was "Web Services" or "Windows Live."
Don't believe me? A search of Microsoft.com reveals 6,019 instances of the term
"SOA." Sounds impressive, until you realize there are 351,162 results
for "Web Services." You do the math.
I know these are two somewhat different concepts, and many of the folks at
Microsoft agree -- except for them, "Web Services" has relevance while
"SOA" doesn't.
But more
and more Redmond folks are getting it. The company even put on an SOA conference
last week that promoted the concept, especially from Microsoft's standpoint.
Do you care about SOA? Let me know at [email protected]
or comment below.
Cheap Windows Math
Windows XP Starter Edition is a cool idea. This less expensive version of Windows with fewer features is designed to make it easier for those in poor countries
to afford a personal computer. I think it should be available worldwide. Like
there aren't poor folks in the United States, Canada, Italy or Germany? (Maybe
they should keep it out of Luxembourg and Monaco.)
Over a million copies have been sold, which led an overzealous Microsoft PR
type to write this headline: "Windows
XP Starter Edition Milestone: Helping Millions Cross the Digital Divide."
Maybe the math is right; maybe that many people cluster around each individual
PC. There's one trying to create a document, another watching and a third explaining
how to hit ctrl-alt-del all at once!
Storage Virtualization Hits New Low – Price, That Is
DataCore is making it cheaper to give storage virtualization a whirl. For
a cool grand, you can see what it's like to treat your hard drives with
the same flexibility that some of you now treat your virtual servers and PCs.
And unlike storage virtualization of the past, this one doesn't require Fibre
Channel, which almost no one in IT understands.
About the Author
Doug Barney is editor in chief of Redmond magazine and the VP, editorial director of Redmond Media Group.