Stories by Frank Hayes

Frankly Speaking: Feeling Cheated?

Are you feeling cheated by the Y2K bug yet? Don't worry - if you're an information technology professional, you will. After all that Y2K work, all the late nights and bleary eyes, the repairing and replacing and testing of things that could have broken when 1999 turned into 2000 - after all that, what you're getting at the end of the road is ... nothing.

Guest column: Sanity check, please

It happened again last week: another big-time gaffe at a retailer's Web site. This time it was English catalogue company Argos, whose online operation offered 21in Sony TV sets for £3 (about $US4.75) instead of the £299.99 they were supposed to go for. It was a simple glitch -- a rounding error, a couple of zeroes dropped -- but nobody at Argos noticed the problem until bargain-happy Britons had ordered more than £1 million worth of TVs.

Guest column: Hacker lessons

You can learn a lot from hackers. No, seriously. And not just how to send fake e-mail or sneak around a firewall.

Guest column: Heat mirage

Maybe it's the heat. But when I hear that Microsoft is now in the hacking business, I keep seeing visions of what these poseurs would be like as real hackers.

Guest column: Frankly speaking: What is cool?

So it turns out Java is dead meat at Microsoft -- or maybe not, depending on what report you read last week. According to various sources, Microsoft plans to license a Java clone and build its products around that. Or possibly kill its Java products completely. Or conceivably create its own new Javalike language.
Confused? So is everybody else, apparently.

FEATURE STORY: The Euro - the evil twin of the millenium!

When the world begins its transition to the Euro on Jan. 1, 1999, the 11 "in"nations of the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) will become the world's largest single trading partner. And unlike year 2000 projects - which merely allow companies to stay in business - converting your in-house systems to Euro compatability could give your company that extra bit of competitive advantage.

[]