Stories by John Dix

The new Novell

Novell, which was <a href="http://www.networkworld.com/news/2011/042711-novell-attachment-merger.html">acquired by The Attachmate Group</a> in April, wants to regain its status as an IT icon and will try to do so by focusing its efforts on its core assets and rebuilding relationships with its huge installed base. Network World Editor in Chief John Dix recently caught up with Novell President Bob Flynn and VP of Product Management and Marketing Eric Varness for a briefing on their rebuilding plans.

Communicate the value, not the tech

As we close out 2010 and welcome 2011 it is clear we're at an interesting juncture in IT, with new opportunities stretching out before us. The key will be what we make of the opportunities and how we position our efforts to capitalize on them.

Complexity of IT systems will be our undoing

Roger Sessions, CTO of ObjectWatch and an expert in software architecture, argues that the increasing complexity of our IT systems will be our undoing.  In fact, he just recently got a patent for a methodology that helps deal with complex IT systems. Network World Editor in Chief John Dix recently caught up with Sessions to get his take on the extent of the problem and possible solutions.

Are netbooks worth a look as PC companions?

While the Apple iPad and other emerging tablets may ultimately shift the playing field, netbooks from the big corporate suppliers offer an interesting mobile alternative to big, bulky laptops.

Juniper execs share network vision

Juniper Networks has always been about high performance and, since it straddles the carrier and enterprise markets, has an interesting perspective on where these worlds intersect. Network World Editor in Chief John Dix caught up with Kim Perdikou, EVP and GM of the Infrastructure Products Group, and David Yen, EVP and GM of the Fabric and Switching Technologies Business Group, to discuss converging needs, tech trends and the company's Stratus project, a single-layer network architecture.

Direction, strategy with Cisco's data centre guru

As a 13 year Cisco veteran, John McCool, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco's Data Centre Switching and Services Group, has seen a boatload of change. He is responsible for the strategy, engineering and marketing of Cisco's family of enterprise Ethernet switching solutions, including the Catalyst series, the Nexus data center switches and the MDS storage area network line.

Mobile tech can map human activity

At a recent IT symposium at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one area of study discussed was digitally augmented urban environments.

Riverbed's hot, but options abound

WAN acceleration vendor Riverbed is on a tear. It just released glowing financials for 2006 (the year it went public), said it will soon offer a half million more shares of stock, and Monday unveiled Version 4.0 of RiOS, the operating system that drives its acceleration appliances.

Study provides insight into hacks

A new study by the University of Maryland's A. James Clark School of Engineering shows the Internet wilds are still teeming with hordes of good old-fashioned brute-force attacks and quantifies how frequently machines are attacked and the methods used.

IEEE anoints tech winners, losers

It's the season for looking forward and back, and the IEEE's Spectrum magazine is in the middle of the fray with its annual issue of tech winners and losers. What makes Spectrum's efforts worth noting is the nature of the organization it serves: the IEEE is the world's largest professional technology association.

A peek inside Sun Labs research

We got a glimpse into the wide-ranging work going on at Sun Microsystems Laboratories in Burlington, Mass., last week,which includes everything from core systems science to developments in online gaming and collaboration.

Progress slow on compliance front

Companies question the benefit of compliance regulations, aren't wholly comfortable with where they stand on compliance, and are using a hodgepodge of tools to try to cope.

The benefits of thin clients

What do you do when two-thirds of your company's employees work in remote locations that don't have IT support?

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