There's a Virtual Storm on The Horizon

On Monday Microsoft put the last bit of polish on the newest edition of its System Center Virtual Machine Manager, but said Tuesday users won't see it next week in the software giant's booth at VMworld according to an article on ITnews.com.

"Next week at VMworld 2009 we can't show SCVMM [System Center Virtual Machine Manager] 2008 R2, or any other products, in our booth. … In short, it's their show, it's not an industry show, and they set the rules. So we'll make the best of it; always lots of Microsoft customers and partners on the floor. Stop by the booth to meet some of the best/brightest minds at Microsoft," Microsoft's Patrick O'Rourke wrote Tuesday on the company's Virtualization Team Blog.

Because of the increased popularity of virtualization, VMware altered its contract for exhibitors to include language that prohibits different exhibitors from demonstrating services that overlap/ substitute VMware’s products and capabilities.

VMware defended its positions by saying it has no plans to enforce the afore mentioned restriction, and that it is simply part of standard trade show procedure. The article said that a VMware spokesperson contradicted the contract by stating competitors are allowed to exhibit products, even those which compete directly with Vmware services.

Despite the backtracking on the VMware side Microsoft adhered to the contract and will not be showcasing its new virtualization software, which many think will cut into VMware’s current market domination. It seems that Microsoft is using the controversy created by the altered contract to its advantage by adhering to all the rules. I think they know they found a chink in the VMware armor, but refuse to make it a public feud. Instead, they are keeping the wheels of their relationship greased and hiding their “ace in the hole” out of the spotlight during VMware’s big night.

I find this move to be extremely smart and would be willing to bet that when Microsoft finally does come out with their virtualization manager, it will throw a wrench in the well oiled virtualizing machine that VMware has become over the past five years.

If you are considering virtualization and are unsure the difference between Microsoft and VMware, take a jump to the virtualization section of our website and hit me back with any questions you may have.

jcarretta@thetnsgroup.com

Like You Needed Another Reason To Virtualize

A management software vendor has released software that helps IT managers oversee and maintain the "personalities" of virtualized desktop PCs according to an article on ITnews.com

The article discussed how Tranxition Inc’s software, called AdaptivePersona, saves labor and storage resources for IT administrators and keeps employees happier and more productive. The firm plans to show off the software at the VMworld show in San Francisco next week.

The little-known 25-employee firm has been around since 2000 and has a small family of software called LiveManage, which helps corporate desktop administrators preserve the data and settings on workers' PCs as they are migrated to new hardware or upgraded operating systems.

This feature allows the transition to virtualized hardware appear seamless to individual PC users in the workplace. This software is key, the company says, in keeping employees happy during the sometimes bumpy road to virtualizing large scale environments.

This makes the client computers easier to manage, update, and make secure; this according to virtualization advocates. Unlike older solutions such as Microsoft Corp. or Citrix System Inc.'s terminal services, the virtualized desktops feel to end users almost like a full local desktop. Prior to this software’s debut, a full virtual machine with all of the user's Web cache and passwords, Outlook e-mail .PST files, instant messaging history, Microsoft Office files and customized Windows settings can quickly become big, slow, and complicated to manage. This is the complete opposite of the effect desired when corporations decide to virtualize.

Remember, 100% of Fortune 500 companies have already virtualized. This is not to say that without this software, virtualization will result in one big hunk of mess and unhappy employees after a virtualization project. Instead, this development can be chalked up to the “technological luxury” board and makes the virtualization process seem slightly more smoothed over than normally. For the average employee, retyping passwords, outlook configurations, and favorite websites is a task that can take only half of a dull Friday afternoon. However, in the eyes of employers, the software not only keeps employees happy but gives them more time to check out facebook…err work on those Friday afternoons.

In all seriousness, the program will only increase the efficiency of one of the smartest decisions any sized company with over 12 servers can make. This should provide YOU even more incentive to check out the virtualization section of our website and start adding commas to your bottom line.

Joe Carretta

A New Ally Against Malware

A new alliance has been created to organize and regulate information sharing on security protection and develop industry standards.

According to CNET, The Industry Connections Security Group is under the jurisdiction of the IEEE Standards association. It is founded and composed of big name software security companies such as Microsoft, Sophos, AVG Technologies, McAfee, Symantec, and Trend Micro.

The article goes on to say that the VP of Sophos Labs said the alliance is built upon the traditional practice of virus sampling sharing, but has taken on a new degree of organization and efficiency.

Malware has become an increasing problem for computer users, as well as security software designers. Malware has evolved into very dangerous and difficult to detect form of transmitting computer viruses. With so much information consistently transferred over internet connections, the industry of virally preying on PC users via Malware has become extremely lucrative and attracted many technical minds to the dark side of computing.

According to a July 20 presentation document, the newly created ICSG said it aims to improve the efficiency of the collection and processing of the millions of malware file samples handled by security vendors each month by focusing on an XML-based meta data sharing standard. The standard is expected to undergo ratification by the end of this month.

The group went on to say its focus is on setting up the infrastructure and protocols to allow rapid information sharing on threats and making the day-to-day operation of the members more efficient.

The alliance is another step in the ongoing battle previously documented here on our blog. Be sure to check in for all the latest updates on the ICSG’s battle against the ever impending threat of malware.

Joe Carretta

Computer Giant Facing the Heat

Microsoft, the software giant that brought you windows, word, outlook, and excel is in somevery hot water over a patent infringement lawsuite.

An article on CNET.com reported a judge ruled on Tuesday that Microsoft must stop selling Word, due to an ongoing lawsuit from i4Ia Toronto based technology company.

I4i sued Microsoft originally in 2007 for infringing upon its 1998 patent for a document system that eliminated the need for manually imbedded formatting codes the article said. Tuesdays ruling solidified the case in favor of i4i, and brought Microsoft’s total amount owed to the company upwards of $270 million.

In May, a federal jury in Tyler, Texas, ruled that the custom XML tagging features of Word 2003 and Word 2007 infringed on i4i's patent and ordered Microsoft to pay $200 million in the case.

In Tuesday's ruling, Microsoft was also ordered to pay an additional $40 million for willful infringement, as well as $37 million in prejudgment interest. The order requires Microsoft to comply with the injunction within 60 days and forbids Microsoft from testing, demonstrating, or marketing Word products containing the contested XML feature.

A spokesperson for the Microsoft said that are disappointed in the ruling and stand behind the belief that they did not infringe upon i4i’s patent. The case revolves around XML files, which enabled a document system that eliminated the need for manually embedded formatting codes.

XML--an integral feature in Microsoft Word--is considered a "page description language," with one of its key qualities being that it is readable by people, not just machines. Unlike HTML, which has predefined tags, XML allows developers and users to define their own tags for data, such as price and product.

The lawsuit is a big deal for Microsoft, because XMl is an integral feature of the new Word program. With Office 10 still in the BETA stages, Microsoft must now adapt to the ruling, and make significant changes to avoid facing this mess again in the future.

Either way it will be interesting to see how Microsoft reacts to this development moving forward with their line of products.

Joe Carretta

Team Building at Its Finest

While large corporate “business trips” and conferences have been toned down in accordance with the sagging economy many businesses are turning to a less extravagant team bonding exercise, video games.

An article on CNET.com focused on a company called Grinnel Computers, whose employees were obligated to finish their work day with two hours of video games.

According to the article employees are given the option of playing “Combat Arms”, a multi player team oriented first person shooter from 3:00 to 5:00, or leaving two hours early without pay. Execs at the company claim this time period is often the slow point of the week, and see benefit in building company unity without the cost and hassle of corporate events.

Another benefit of “team gaming” is breaking down office barriers without the addition of alcohol. In a gaming environment there are no classifications between a CEO and a sales associate. The gaming world allows the barriers within the work place to be taken down for a certain period of time within a virtual world. The activity encourages teamwork and gives employees a chance to “lead” their bosses into battle.

If video games don’t seem to wet your palate, take a look at these four “interesting" team building exercises that real companies implemented. If I happened to miss one your company tried out, or one you wish you could be a part of, speak out with some comments.

4) Wizards, Giants and Goblins

This game is a variation on the traditional rock, paper, scissors game. Form two teams of equal numbers, facing each other. For each turn, the teams will need to decide which of the three characters they will be:

Wizards - stretch out their hands, wiggle their fingers and go "kaaazaaaam".
Giants - put their hands in the air, jump up and down and make a low growling noise
Goblins - crouch on the ground, wave their hands at their ears and make a high pitch cackle.

The rules are exactly the same as the traditional rock, paper, scissors game.

3) Balloon Race:
Each team member has a balloon they blow up and let fly. When it lands, they must run to that spot and try again. They are attempting to get across a line twenty feet away. First one there wins.

2) Inflatable Sumo Wrestling

No explanation needed here. It definitely brings a company closer together.

1) American Idol Contest

Each participating employee must belt out their best American idol song. The song must be done by one of the season winners, or William Hung.

VMware Beefs Up for the Long Haul

A NY Times article reported that VMware, the market leader in Virtualization and affiliate of the TNS Group, proposed a 420 million acquisition of SpringSource, a popular maker of open-source Java development tools. The acquisition is evidence that VMware is looking to expand beyond its virtualization services and increase its already profitable business.

According to the article VMware said it expects the transaction, which contains $362 million in cash and equity and the assumption of $58 million in stock options, to be final by September. Spingsource structured itself around facilitating companies creating business software via the Java programming language.

These type of apps tend to run on top of Windows or the open-source Linux operating system. VMware, however, has been on a mission to bring a broad set of business applications closer to its virtualization software, which has become popular with companies looking to save on capital equipment costs. VMware has created technological advances that have been saving customers money since its inception. By reducing energy and operational costs by almost 80%, virtualization has become a very popular term for CFO’s and CIO’s abound. Recently, the company has moved to expand beyond this role through a broad suite of management tools. Ultimately, VMware aims to sell customers software capable of managing entire data centers. In June VMware took a 5 percent stake in Terremark, a hosting company based in Miami.

The SpringSource deal illustrates the latest success for an infrastructure software maker during the recession. SolarWinds, a networking management software seller, sold shares in an initial public offering of stock in May and LogMeIn, which makes software that lets consumers and administrators log into their systems from afar, had a successful I.P.O. in July.

With many devices now being made with open-source code, companies like Springsource have been able to find a niche in the sagging economy. VMware’s aggression into the ever expanding software industry is one that will benefit it in the future. While the company could remain in its current concentration of virtualization and still do just fine, it is taking a proactive step into another market. With Microsoft nipping at its heels in the virtualization department, I applaud VMware for proposing this large scale acquisition and think now would be a great time to jump on their bandwagon before the seats run out..

Joe Carretta

Ad-Spending Down; Google Spending Up

An article on the NY Times website this morning reported that the amount of money companies are spending on online advertising has been dipping in recent months. The article said worldwide spending on Internet advertising shrank by 5 percent in the second quarter of the year to $13.9 billion from 14.7 billion. This marks the second consecutive quarter of the year that internet ad revenues have dropped over the previous year’s quarter, which is creating all sorts of pressure on firms like Yahoo and AOL. The article went on to state that money spent on online display advertising in particular dropped 12 percent compared with the same quarter a year ago. Search advertising was the least affected, dropping only 3 percent, the company said, while “Google alone defied gravity, increasing its American search revenues by 3 percent in the period”. That’s a compliment when a NY Times says your company defies gravity.

This article is significant for two reasons. First, a downturn in internet advertising is something that should cause some worry amongst these online companies. While industries like print, and cable advertising fade into the past, online advertising was expected to be at the forefront of the industry. Instead, even the web is being affected by the global recession, and the fact that companies are just spending less money. While they still might decide to advertise on with companies like Yahoo, they will be doing more research and trying to attain a bigger ROI before plunging their brand blindly onto a website.

Secondly, the fact that Google “defies gravity” is plain nuts. Google has successfully entrenched itself as the WORLD’S go to spot for information. Google has no boundaries, and brings people useless and useful pieces on knowledge in a matter of nano seconds. Because of this cornucopia of information, and the extremely low learning curve of using Google (step one: type your question, step two: hit enter) Google is able to buck the downward spirals of its competitors. Search Engine Optimization is supplanting traditional advertising, and is continuing to evolve with the marketing world. People look to the vast world of Google when they need something, which creates a demand to companies to vie for that coveted “top of the page” spot when potential customers type in something related to any aspect of life. This constant flow of customer’s eyes combined with Google’s innate ability to adapt and move forward is the secret jet fuel behind its ascent against the gravity of the recession.

As of right now… it looks like they have a lot left in the tank.

Joe Carretta

ESPN Going All Big Brother on Twitter

We all know how hot Twitter is these days. I mean, it’s the ultimate lazy American social networking tool. No pictures, very little information, no groups; just 140 characters of whatever is going on in your head.

While the idea seems great in theory, giving even the most reserved person in the room a forum to speak, it has been skewed in reality. Celebrities and athletes attract the most attention, and have boatloads more followers than they follow. Unfortunately, Twitter has turned into the newest forum for muck sites like TMZ to show the world how stupid they are by blowing up tweets and turning them into feuds between athletes who don’t even know each other (Shaq and Becks had a fallout after this.)

In an effort to combat this madness, it is being reported that ESPN has taken a big brother type roll and is now putting some pretty heavy restraints on the “tweets” of its employees.

CNET.com reported that NBA analyst for ESPN Ric Bucher tweeted the following:

“the hammer just came down, tweeps: ESPN memo prohibiting tweeting info unless it serves ESPN; Kinda figured this was coming. Not sure what this means but.”

ESPN has gone full speed on the Twitter bandwagon and has an account for many of its shows. What ESPN underestimated was the amount of attention these twitter accounts, and the accounts of their more popular employees, would generate.

A big name anchor at ESPN like Stewart Scott could toss something on his Twitter having to do with sports and take potential audience members away from ESPN. It is unfortunate that ESPN is taking these steps because the whole point of Twitter is to give everyone a voice. This is a clear example of a company going against that mantra. The big corporation is shutting down the small individual because, well, it just doesn't benefit them.

Am I the only one angry here? This is a BIG problem that could very easily spread. Companies all bought into Twitter, and encouraged employees to start tweeting, but had no idea just how contagious a viral campaign could be. Twitter is up to the second news updates; something not even ESPN could rival in timeliness.

While the fact that ESPN is scared of Twitter is a story in itself, the real nut here is that companies should not be able to sanction personal Twitter accounts of big name employees. I think this is a trend that will continue, and bring about a bad turn of events for Twitter if other companies follow through on ESPN’s communist initiative.

Malware Finds Another Way

Malware is a thorn in the side of computer users from all walks of life. Malware, short for malicious software, is software designed to infiltrate or damage a computer system without the owner's informed consent. The expression is a general term used by computer professionals to mean a variety of forms of hostile, intrusive, or annoying software or program code. Software is considered malware based on the perceived intent of the creator rather than any particular features. Malware can include viruses, worms, trojan horses, most rootkits, spyware, dishonest adware, crimeware, badware and other terms for malicious and unwanted software.

According to a recent CNET article a new form of malware called Ippon, which means "game over" in Judo, allows an attacker to scan an unsecured Wi-Fi network for computers checking for new updates via HTTP (Hyper Text Transport Protocol). If the system detects a computer sending a software update request, the tool replies before the app update server can respond (This is similar to a "Man in the Middle" attack.) Ippon customizes messages for the particular application and sends a message indicating that there is an update available even when the system already has the most recent legitimate update. A malicious file is then downloaded from the attacker's server onto the victim's computer.

This program would not affect Windows updates as they use digital signatures as part of the process to ensure all updates are legitimate. The most susceptible users are those performing updates over an unsecured Wi-Fi network, similar to one which populate coffee shops and major airports.

After speaking with one of our knowledgeable consultants I gained a better understanding of how this program works, and where a PC would be most susceptible. If a user's laptop were automatically searching for updates for Skype, AIM, or other application while using an unsecured Wi-Fi connection it would be an easy target for the Ippon software.

While most secure wired connections, and reliable web browsers have a built in defense against this type of malicious software, this warning should be heeded by those who use unsecured Wi-Fi networks frequently. The danger in this new type of malware is that in the past, the best way to defend against it was to constantly keep your compute updated with the most recent version of all programs. While this is still the case, users need to be sure to perform these updates solely over a secured connection, and be wary of unusual update bubbles popping up on their screens.

For more information regarding this, and other security and privacy issues, let me know what you’re thinking at jcarretta@thetnsgroup.com

Joe Carretta