Back to school September will always be back to school even though I'm now in Florida where everyone's already been back for up to two weeks. And, where it's still too hot and humid (a lot of you are with us this year) to be invigorating as I still expect it to be (I grew up in the Northeast). Working with IT can always bring us back to school; it keeps us in learning mode.
New things are happening in very different areas. Dual-core computers have become quad-core, and even multi-core with up to eight processors. BI (Business Intelligence) is merging into BPM (Business Process Management) and data quality has become a major issue, with deduplication, a common function of data assurance software. Have you seen the iPhone bills? The 300 page ones?* Well, they're already a thing of the past. New technologies usually do come accompanied by errors here and there. Luckily, this one's just funny, and already resolved.
Microsoft's move into open source is news in an article titled "25 Most Active Open Source Projects at Microsoft's CodePlex," and Sun Microsystems changed its NASDAQ stock symbol to "JAVA" from "SUNW" beginning Monday, Aug. 27. SUNW stands for: Stanford University Network Workstation. Both these moves reflect major IT vendors changing with the times.
Mergers and acquisitions stay in the news. This month's biggest announcement: Acer Inc. plans to acquire Gateway Inc. for $710 million in a deal that will push the Taiwanese company past China's Lenovo Group as the world's third largest vendor of personal computers.
*check youtube.com search for iphone bill.
Here's the schedule. Atlanta, on September 26th, is our next public classroom training. Or you can view the complete Schedule on our website.
CSTA Web sessions:
September 19, 20
October 17, 18
November 14, 15
December 12, 13
CSTA classroom sessions:
DC area - August 30
Atlanta area - September 26
New York City area - October 24
Chicago area - November 28
UITJ (Understanding IT Jobs) Web sessions:
September 20
November 15
TR Web sessions:
September 27
November 8
Keep in touch . . .
Back to top
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ITIL (IT Infrastructure Library)
ITIL is a set of standards for best practices in IT service management. It was originally started by the British government in the late 1980s, and is currently used throughout the world. Its use increases as companies understand that providing excellent service to their customers has become a competitive necessity. ITIL promises significant efficiency improvement, cost savings across service support and delivery systems, and greatly improved customer satisfaction. The reason for increased interest is obvious.
ITIL has actually become a de facto standard for service management. At its simplest level, ITIL is nothing more than a set of books. Version 1 was published in 1998 and was a loose collection of 42 books. Version 2 came out in 2000 and distilled these down to a set of 10 books by sharpening the focus on service management. The current Version 3 was defined in May, 2007 and consists of an Introduction to the Service Lifecycle volume, and five core volumes:
Service Strategy
Service Design
Service Transition
Service Operation
Continual Service Improvement.
Version 3 is a major change, and is aligned along the service life cycle. Version 2 only covered service delivery and support, but Version 3 adds coverage of the strategy that leads to the design, and the process of continual improvement. It goes through planning a service, building it, deploying it, operating it, and continually improving it. Each volume defines one of the phases of this life cycle.
In addition to the library, ITIL includes:
training and certification;
consulting services for organizations seeking to handle huge implementation projects;
tool vendors who design ITIL oriented workflows and definitions within their software;
trade associations involved in researching and promoting ITIL best practices worldwide.
ITIL is very flexible, and is not a defined methodology such as Six Sigma and TQM (Total Quality Management). It's really a library of advice and guidance, and organizations can adopt the best practices that are most relevant to their current needs. It also provides standards that improve the quality of service, reduce costs, and manage compliance with internal and external requirements. This standardization often results in controlling staffing if not actually reducing staff, meeting ever-growing business requirements without adding staff. Compliance includes government standards including SOX (Sarbanes-Oxley) and other government regulations. ITIL also helps companies manage diverse infrastructures. For instance, ITIL can help with such challenges as language, cultural and time-zone differences.
A growing number of CIOs are deploying ITSM (IT Service Management) as an overarching discipline for bringing IT into alignment with business strategies. ITSM is a popular methodology that focuses on improving processes through best practices, rather than sheer technology, to better serve customers. ITIL, in turn, is now considered the de facto framework for meeting those ITSM requirements. ITIL is also the basis of ISO 20000, the international standard for IT service management.
ITIL's popularity is unquestioned in Europe, but is fairly new in the U.S. The Gartner Group predicted that 4 out of 10 U.S. companies would utilize ITIL by 2007. Microsoft used the ITIL framework to develop the MOF (Microsoft Operations Framework). Procter & Gamble has used ITIL to great effect, letting them cut IT spending by tens of millions of dollars and improve IT service delivery. Major IT vendors are building tools to assist in installing ITIL. Gartner's prediction is coming true.
Back to top
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. What type of computer is quickly disappearing?
2. What operating system is growing the most?
3. Is a fuzzer part of fuzzy logic?
4. Flash memory is today's dominant memory. What's next?
5. What's that latest search engine technology (has nothing to do with Google)?
Back to top
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Technical Recruiting Whats Different? |
Well, recruiting is recruiting. But when you're working with a specific industry that has its own vocabulary, specific jobs and titles, and a range of specialists, there's something extra to learn. And, when that industry is dynamic, with skills and knowledge changing daily, you've got another problem.
That's why we developed Technical Recruiting - a one day Web seminar designed for, and attended by, Technical Recruiters. This seminar covers the recruiting life cycle, from the requisition to sourcing, screening, interviewing, post interview, and negotiating. And all the coverage is about techies.
How to find techies write a good job post for technical positions.
How to screen them what questions to ask.
How to interview different questions to ask.
After the interview what checks to make.
Negotiating what's important to techies.
If you're new to technical recruiting, this seminar is for you. It's updated continually, and we've included this year's IT surveys summarizing what CIOs (Chief Information Officers) and other IT staff say are the important skills and jobs for 2007/2008.
Check it out next session is September 27th.
Back to top
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Linux
Linux has become such an important part of IT, that it's worth a look. Not only is it the fastest growing server operating system in the world, its use as a client operating system is also growing. It's got some terms that are specific to Linux.
Desktop Environment - DE for short, are numerous applications bundled together in a package to provide the user with a nice working environment to use the computer. Typically comes with Window Manager (see below). The two most popular DE's are KDE and GNOME.
distribution, distro Terminology used with Linux. A member of the open-source Linux family which consists of the Linux kernel, a set of utilities and support libraries for functions such the GUI (Graphic User Interface), and other assorted software. Linux distributions differ from fully-featured desktop and server operating systems to minimal embedded systems. There are over three hundred Linux distribution projects in active development.
Gnome - GNU Object Model Environment is an environment like KDE but is more professional looking and doesn't go for all the bells and whistles KDE has.
KDE - K Desktop Environment is an environment that lets users browse the net, use apps, and such. Many users of KDE feel it has a Windows feel to it.
Linux desktop Operating system and application software for desktop systems. Includes OpenOffice.org general application suite, Mozilla Firefox internet browser, a multi-network instant-messaging client and the Novell Evolution open-source collaboration software as well as the Linux operating system. Version 9 released: November, 2004. Version 10 planned for release in 2006 will include a desktop search engine (named Beagle), desktop note-taking technology (named Tomboy), and F-Spot, a personal photo management program.
Linux-HA (High-Availability) Operating system software written to provide high-availability, or fault tolerance, through Linux clusters. Uses a program called Heartbeat to perform failure detection, communications and cluster management in one process. Included in many Linux distributions including SuSE, Gentoo, Debian, and others. Although written for Linux, it also works with FreeBSD and the basic functions work on Solaris. Available from www.linux-ha.org.
Linux kernel 2.6 Operating system. The kernel is the heart of the operating system, and release 2.6 is a major upgrade that turns Linux into an enterprise level OS. 2.6 supports 32 processors, 64GB (gigabytes - billions of bytes) of memory with 32-bit processors, and new file systems including JFS (Journaling File System) and XFS (X File System). It supports NUMA (Non-Uniform Memory Access) for multiprocessing systems. Available free for download from linux.org and released in December, 2003. Commercial distributions of Linux are including 2.6 in their next upgrades through 2004 and 2005. Latest version is 2.6.21 released: April, 2007.
kernel The control programs in any operating system. Term originated with Unix and most often refers to Linux and Unix systems although it can be used with any operating environment.
Tux The Linux mascot, the penguin.
Back to top
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
1. The desktop. By 2008 laptops will outsell desktop computers, and in five or six years only diehard desktop users will still have them. Laptops, or notebook computers, can have all the functionality of desktops and as users replace their computers (typically three years for a laptop and four years for a desktop), they are purchasing laptops instead desktops.
2. Got to be Linux. For the past couple of years, CIOs (Chief Information Officers) have said that they will be increasing the use of Linux servers, while not increasing the use of either Unix or Windows. The use of Unix is actually decreasing. But, the desktop world is also showing movement to Linux for client systems. Dell provides Linux as an option and laptop/desktop vendors could follow suit, and PalmOS is giving way to Linux in the PDA world.
3. Don't you love the words! No, a fuzzer is a testing tool that will send data to an application in unexpected ways. It might send millions of pieces of data in various combinations and its purpose is to check for vulnerabilities. Fuzzy logic is a mathematical field that defines working with imprecise data and is incorporated into BI (Business Intelligence) and BPM (Business Process Management) systems.
4. PCM (Phase Change Memory) is a new type of memory which promises to be more than 500 times faster than flash memory, cheaper, and consume less power than other forms of nonvolatile memory. PCM is more scalable, and is faster than flash memory. Some products might appear by 2008, but most predictions are that PCM will come into play in 2012 and replace flash memory within two years. Also called PRAM (Phase Change Random Access Memory)
5. Another name to love spock.com. This is a coming Internet search engine focused on finding people by crawling social networking sites such as MySpace.com and Friendster. So far Spock has about 100 million names. A search will provide biographical information including age, city of residence and job title as well as tagged descriptions and images aimed at providing a complete picture of a person. The site only collects information people themselves made public on the Web, and Spock will delete any details such as phone numbers and addresses. Users can search for specific traits, e.g., a user could search for a venture capitalist that enjoys golf and lives in the San Francisco Bay area or a Web developer who went to a specific university, studied a specific topic and who lives in a certain city. The producers plan to have everyone in the world on Spock.com. Released to beta: August, 2007, and intended to be released to the public by October, 2007.
Back to top
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SemCo Enterprises, Inc. respects your privacy. We do not sell, rent or share your information with anyone.
|
Forward to a Friend! 