More Data Center In Depth

HK firm ensures toy safety with PLM tool

Toys are fun to play with, but making them is serious business. Hazardous toys from Greater China make great headline-material for US media, so regional toy manufacturers must make extra efforts to ensure that both their materials and finished products are safe.

10 questions for LogMeIn CFO Jim Kelliher

Name: Jim Kelliher

Microsoft System Center 2012 review: Streamlined cloud service management

With System Center 2012, Microsoft delivers tools to help customers wring more efficiency, uptime and performance out of their existing hardware and software.

Can a New Analyst Firm Take Down Gartner?

For more than 30 years, Gartner has dominated the IT analyst market. CIO.com columnist Rob Enderle sees Ombud, a new analyst firm focusing on social CRM and pulling member profiles from LinkedIn, as a viable challenge to a firm founded before there were even PCs.

Backgammon NJ and FaceMe Backgammon for iPhone and iPad

Backgammon is a board game that is perfectly suited to iOS devices. The shape of the board fits the iPhone and iPad, and the gameplay--rolling dice and moving pieces--is greatly simplified when you tap to perform these tasks. Over the past few months, I've tried out a number of backgammon apps, and two stand out: Backgammon NJ (available for the iPad in a separate version called Backgammon NJ HD), and FaceMe Backgammon.

Enterprise IT Update

Keep up with the latest news, features, opinions and more about technology in the enterprise.

Adventure Bar Story for iPhone

Adventure Bar Story from RideonJapan looks like a classic JRPG, but with a crucial difference. You're not an adventurer who happens to take part in a cooking/crafting mini-game--you're a chef who goes on adventures to support her restaurant business. Wandering the wilderness and killing monsters yields ingredients to toss in the oven once you get back home. Characters don't gain levels through combat, but through eating the food you prepare. Your first nemesis is not an evil sorcerer, but a rival restauranteur.

Complete Coverage: Desktop virtualization

Computerworld's complete coverage of desktop virtualization

Computerworld continuing coverage of Hadoop

Latest news, features and more on Hadoop.

No big shift to the cloud for unified communications and collaboration

The 2012 IDG Enterprise Unified Communications and Collaboration survey highlights the uptick in adoption and investments. Insider (registration required)

Kinectimals for iPhone and iPad

As a kid, I really wanted a cat. My parents, however, were firmly opposed. Would that I had been able to seek refuge in something like Microsoft's Kinectimals for iOS, which provides plenty of the benefits of pet ownership without the need for the manifold downsides--like cleaning out a litter box.

Security Concerns Over a Data Center in the Cloud

When the company data center moves to various cloud configurations, the provisioning of servers will need to be addressed.

Madcoaster for iPhone and iPad

The thrill of riding a roller coaster comes from when the feeling of danger you get from every gravity-defying loop-to-loop. In Chillingo's lovably-addictive platformer, Madcoaster, that danger is very reala| if PG rated.

Monster Wars for iPhone and iPad

When being a do-gooder grows boring, why not switch teams? That's the route Liv Games takes with Monster Wars, an evil-themed sequel to the developer's popular tower defense game Legendary Wars.

Is it So Bad for the CIO to Report to the CFO?

Conventional wisdom says the CIO should report to the CEO. But not everyone agrees that's so important.

Technology defies the law of diminishing returns

One day while observing a lady next to me on her iPad, I noticed how this person was literally condensing an exercise that would normally require a happy shopper all day to complete within a period of 30 minutes at most. This person had within a blur of swipes and prods completed the purchase of at least eight items of clothing and accessories all from different well-known brands and all delivered to the doorstep within the week.

HCL CEO Vineet Nayar: Outsourcing is dead, and there's nothing innovative in cloud technology

The customer always comes first. Except when it comes to HCL, the $6 billion Indian outsourcing -- make that co-sourcing -- giant led by CEO Vineet Nayar, who literally wrote the book on a philosophy known as 'employees first, customer second.' In this latest installment of our CEO Interview Series, Nayar spoke with IDG Enterprise Chief Content Officer John Gallant about how that philosophy is fueling HCL's rapid growth and why more CIOs ought to consider adopting it.

Master MySQL in the Amazon cloud

Amazon Web Services offer new challenges and flexibility for database admins -- here's how to avoid the pitfalls and tune for performance

Holistic Virtualization

To take full advantage of virtualization's high-level benefits, companies must view the technology's capabilities across the entire IT organization. Here's some expert advice on creating a virtualization strategy that looks at the big picture. Insider (registration required)

CIOs' Cloud Strategy Must Include Public Cloud

For all the apprehension they may bring, public clouds demand a position in the enterprise IT strategy. CIO.com columnist Bernard Golden explains how CIOs and business leaders can make their peace with the public cloud, and how it's not incompatible with the much-revered private cloud.