Stories by Carol Sliwa

Linux kernel to adopt server virtualization

Support for open-source software that provides server virtualization capabilities is due to be added to a future version of the Linux kernel, sources familiar with the technology said last week.

Red Hat to focus on architecture, stability

Open-source software will be a hot topic in the month of February, between next week's OSDL Enterprise Linux Summit in Burlingame, California, and the LinuxWorld Conference & Expo, which begins Feb. 14 in Boston. With that open-source focus as the backdrop, Red Hat CEO Matthew Szulik spoke recently with Computerworld about what's most important to his customers, the company's upcoming 4.0 release and the competition.

Users stay with iSeries, despite Microsoft entreaties

Microsoft and several partners last month teamed up in hopes of enticing IBM iSeries users to extend or migrate their applications to Windows and .Net. But while some iSeries users have shown interest in Microsoft technology for their Web applications, several said last week that they have no intention of moving off their iSeries servers anytime soon.

The long and winding road

On a road map, the data encoded in a RFID (radio frequency identification) tag will endure a long but clear-cut journey, traveling thousands of miles from a manufacturer's warehouse to a retailer's distribution center in a chip no bigger than the head of a pin. But the data's path gets more complicated as it wends its way through the various middleware and back-office applications that will ultimately make it useful in the retail supply chain.

Longhorn to allow OS tuning for servers

Microsoft officials last year highlighted three new subsystems as the key pillars for the next major release of Windows -- WinFS for data storage, Avalon for 3-D graphics and Indigo for building advanced Web services. The company disclosed in August that WinFS won't be part of the next release, which is code-named Longhorn. But Bob Muglia, senior vice president of Microsoft's Windows Server division, told Computerworld during an interview this month that role-based configuration tools "were always the most important feature set that I thought was going into" the server version of Longhorn, which is due in 2007. Excerpts from the interview follow.

Microsoft, Sun claim progress on interoperability deal

Microsoft and Sun Microsystems said Wednesday that they're pleased with the progress they have made in the early stages of the 10-year alliance they forged in April. But major pronouncements by the two vendors at the eight-month mark were missing during a conference call Wednesday in which officials discussed their plans.

Best Buy hit with lawsuit over layoffs of IT workers

Richard Walstrom said this week that he sensed something was wrong during a job fair in May, when he saw some of his IT co-workers, who had also been told by Best Buy that they were losing their jobs. "There were a high percentage of people with gray hair," said Walstrom, who's 57. "It was a lot of us. I didn't really realize what had happened until you look around and say, 'What's wrong with this picture?' "

Microsoft plots next Office release for '05 or '06

A Microsoft vice president this week confirmed that the company intends to continue its track record of shipping a new version of its Office System software every two to three years. That would place the release date for the new product suite, referred to within Microsoft as "Office 12," between October 2005 and October 2006, since the last version shipped in October 2003. But Chris Capossela, vice president of Microsoft's information worker product management group, said he isn't ready to discuss any specific dates.

Woolworths deploys .Net app in J2EE

Before the start of the upcoming holiday season, Woolworths Holdings wanted to improve the capabilities of the Java-based data-monitoring and alerting system it had hired an outside contractor to build. But the Cape Town-based retailer had a problem.

EPCglobal: Users to get RFID progress update

Corporate users facing mandates to adopt radio frequency identification technology will get a chance at this week's EPCglobal U.S. Fall Conference in Baltimore to gauge how much progress vendors, service providers, consultants and standards bodies have made.

Exec: Linux commercialization helps Microsoft

Martin Taylor recently marked his one-year anniversary as Microsoft's chief Linux strategist. Taylor, whose official title is general manager of platform strategy, spoke with Computerworld about the insights he has gained.

Microsoft updates Visual Studio 2005 beta

Microsoft has yet to release a feature-complete beta version of its upcoming Visual Studio 2005 development tools. But at last week's VSLive conference in Orlando, it announced a refresh of the existing beta release and disclosed more details about the product.

Microsoft won't ship WinFS with Longhorn

Microsoft Friday announced a significant change in plans for the next major release of Windows, code-named Longhorn. The new Windows storage subsystem code-named WinFS will not be part of the Longhorn operating system, as had been previously planned.

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