Applications

Enterprise Architecture and SOA Topic Center

News, technology trends, in-depth analysis and more about enterprise architecture and service-oriented architecture

Consumerization trend creates IT worries, worker benefits

Fully 95% of 600 businesses surveyed by Cisco permit the use of employee-owned smartphones and tablets at the office and found productivity gains for workers who use their own hardware.
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Deep dive: Cloud applications

The path to launching a cloud service is not so straightforward. Here's how to find likely services among your existing applications -- and get them ready to roll Insider (registration required)

IBM goes after enterprise mobility projects

IBM took steps on Monday to help enterprises go mobile, introducing a set of software and services called Mobile Foundation.

Bull seeks to move Cobol and C apps to Java

Bull has unveiled a new transaction processing application platform, Libert TP, which it says will allow businesses to move legacy applications from Cobol or C to a Java environment at their own pace.

P100 Profile: Cynthia McKenzie, Fox Entertainment (video)

Cynthia McKenzie, senior vice president, IT, Enterprise Application Services, at Fox Entertainment, talks about the company's SaaS projects and its BYOD policies.

P100 Profile: Tim Theriault, Walgreens (video)

Tim Theriault, senior vice president and CIO at Walgreen Co. outlined the Walgreens 2.0 project, four different IT initiatives that helped upgrade legacy systems at the company.

Bank IT spending to be 'rocky' through 2013

Tech spending by banks will grow this year at a slower pace than in 2011, a trend expected to continue until global economic conditions improve and banks begin to see the benefits of new IT, according to Celent.

How 26 hospitals deployed e-order systems in 28 months

All 26 of Adventist Health System's hospitals rolled out computerized physician order entry systems -- the biggest barrier to attaining the U.S. government's meaningful-use certification -- in just 28 months.

Q&A: Nimsoft CEO Chris O'Malley touts new 'supply chain of IT'

Systems monitoring and management may be headed to the cloud as management-as-a-service. Nimsoft CEO Chris O'Malley explains what that means and how it will affect IT in this Q&A -- part of the ongoing IDG Enterprise CEO Interview Series. Insider (registration required)

4 lessons from the Springfield, Ill. SCADA cyberattack

The recent cyberattack on a public water utility in Springfield, Ill. has stoked concerns about the vulnerability of critical infrastructure equipment across the U.S.

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.

Legacy Application Fixer-Uppers

Justifying the cost of legacy software replacement isn't easy. Here's how three shops approached the issue. One common theme: identifying business challenges and opportunities.

Rethinking the ESB: Building a simple, secure, scalable Service Bus with an SOA Gateway

For years the Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) has been seen as a corporate integration and messaging backbone upon which application architectures are built. However, this concept must evolve to meet the requirements of today's corporate landscape, where IT boundaries are blurring, driven by the need to integrate with partners, cloud and mobile applications.

Are Google's best days behind it?

Slowing product development, legal woes, and rising bureaucracy may signal trying times ahead for Silicon Valley's favorite company

10 essential MySQL tools for admins

The MySQL community is a hotbed of free, open source tools to enhance the performance and health of your MySQL systems

NoSQL standouts: New databases for new applications

Cassandra, CouchDB, MongoDB, Redis, Riak, Neo4J, and FlockDB reinvent the data store

IT jobs: Winners and losers in the cloud era

We survey the cloud's effects on nine classes of IT jobs: Architects and sys admins win, middle managers and tech specialists lose -- what about you?

After OpenOffice and Hudson, will Oracle stick with open source?

NetBeans, MySQL, and GlassFish are all likely to remain in Oracle's software portfolio as they have profit potential

The Good, Bad & Ugly of Dropbox Authentication Error

Online storage service Dropbox made an embarrassing error Monday, turning off password authentication for millions of users.

Best Buy Laptop Warranty: What Does It Cover?

In 2009, I bought my teenage son a MacBook from Best Buy, and I added a two-year extended warranty with "Accidental Damage From Handling" coverage based on the sales associate's recommendation. Lo and behold, my son accidentally ran over his MacBook with his car after leaving it on his trunk. I filed a claim with Best Buy, and an associate advised me to purchase another computer, saying the company would issue a credit if the original MacBook couldn't be fixed. But Best Buy eventually denied the warranty claim on the grounds that this type of incident isn't covered in the accidental-damage plan. I thought that my extended warranty covered all accidents. Can you help?