Stories by Bill Snyder

Red Hat the latest proof that cloud computing is serious business

You know a technology is getting some traction when imitators jump into the game. That's the case these days with cloud computing. Just this week, Amazon added Red Hat's JBoss to its EC2 cloud computing platform, and an established hosting service -- ServePath -- jumped into the fray with a version of cloud computing called GoGrid.

Why open source needs an attitude adjustment

Recession be damned. The first quarter of the year saw a record $203.7 million of venture capital flow to young open source companies. You'd think that would be a cause for celebration, but for too many members of the open source community money is, well, icky.

The top 10 tech startups for 2008

There are few clearer bellwethers as to the imminent direction of technology than where venture capitalists put their money. They're about making money, so they look for industry patterns they think will lead to sure bets. And that means they invest where the tech industry has begun to coalesce its thinking, not on exotic new science fiction. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, VCs have invested a total of US$57 billion in startups -- mostly tech ones -- in 2005, 2006, and 2007.

Out in the cold: small businesses' ERP deficit

It took the United States just 45 months to defeat the combined forces of Germany, Japan, and Italy. It has taken SAP 48 months to get Business ByDesign, its SaaS (software as a service) play for the SMB market, off the ground. And it still isn't ready for prime time.

What to do when developers take code snippets with them

Every good carpenter has a box of tools he carries from job to job: a hammer of just the right weight, a selection of drill bits, and so on. As he gains experience, his toolbox gets heavier with new, and sometimes specialized, equipment. Similarly, programmers accumulate their own tools as they move from job to job, but these tools are digital and often include snippets of code written over the years.

Battle brewing in the cloud

Amazon, better known for peddling books and CDs than selling leading-edge technology, surprised much of the tech world by rolling out, and actually attracting customers to, its version of cloud computing. Sure, there's still plenty of reason to be skeptical -- indeed, cloud computing is one of those technologies that can sound more like a buzzword than a solution to real-world IT problems -- but other players are jumping into the game.

Open source databases: the 97-pound weakling

Linux, Apache, JBoss, and other open source technologies are kicking sand in the faces of the big boys on the operating system and middleware tiers, but when it comes to the database world, open source is still a 97-pound weakling. And despite some heady growth numbers, that's not likely to change anytime soon.

Cloud computing begins to emerge from the haze

I hate technology buzzwords. And when I hear one, my impulse is to bat it away like an annoying mosquito. But before you do the same about one of this year's hot buzzwords -- cloud computing -- give it a little more thought.

Is desktop virtualization's promise overstated?

Citrix Systems, EMC's VMware unit, Microsoft, Symantec, and other big dogs have shelled out more than US$2 billion on acquisitions related todesktop virtualization in less than two years. But now that they've got the technology, it's not at all clear that customers will buy it.

Microsoft's mobile mistake

By the standards of its US$45 billion offer for Yahoo, Microsoft could have found the $500 million it is rumored to have paid Danger in Steve Ballmer's couch.

Bugs at the core delay AMD's next-generation chips

With Christmas just 11 days away, you have to wonder what Hector Ruiz is going to find under his tree. It's been a terrible year for Advanced Micro Devices, and the chipmaker's analysts conference on Thursday did nothing to spread holiday cheer.

How to avoid jobs ripe for outsourcing

It's not enough to be a hot code jockey anymore. There are thousands in India and China -- not to mention U.S.-based outsourcers -- just waiting to take your job.

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