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Noughties gadgets and goodbye

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Over the last decade there have been many technological advances. Here are just a few of them:

Mp3 players: who would have thought that the music industry would be revolutionised by mp3s, downloading music rather than buying CDs? But the iPod and the related iTunes must have an iconic place in the music industry for changing the way that people listen to music.

Mobile phones have advanced getting smaller, having a longer life and becoming multifunctional devices. Most phones that you can buy today have internet access, built in cameras and mp3 players. You can build or buy applications for your phone to personalise what you use your phone for.

The internet although established before the noughties decade has involved with faster broadband speeds, wireless access and mobile broadband. TV programmes are increasingly being streamed over the internet, with application such as the iPlayer leading the way of 'catching up' on missed TV broadcasts.

Devices are becoming smaller with larger memories. Faster and easier to use perhaps? If we have advanced this much in the last 10 years how much will we do so in the next 10? I would love to see teleportation devices developed (as suggested by T3 in their Top 10 Tech Wishes for 2010). This would make travel/commuting much quicker and easier. So as I sign off from my last post I say 'Beam me up Scottie'.

 

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Online Security & Education

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In the past few weeks there have been news stories about email addresses and passwords being posted online for user accounts for Hotmail, Gmail and other web based email clients (BBC News). Should we have more information on how to stay safe online? Is it necessary that everyone sits through an education program before they can log on?

The majority of internet users should know about Phishing and Key logging attacks, which were used to capture the most recent breach of account details. There are plenty of articles online willing to offer advice on how to prevent/detect these. The US has gone one step further and had a National Cyber Security Month in order to educate people about being online. It ‘urged all internet users to play their part in protecting the network from attack’ (BBC News). This implies that not all internet users do this – so perhaps education would be a good idea.

I think that some sort of training before people go online might help educate those who are new to the internet on what can happen. Yet it might also  discourage people, or push them to become complacent with their security. With more people aware of traditional scams it would also force the perpetrators to think of new schemes and ways to trick people - so perhaps there wouldn’t be fewer victims of these scams!?!

Bottom line is: anyone who uses the internet should be aware of current scams, be particularly careful who they give any secure information to, choose a secure password and change it either monthly or quarterly.

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Smartphone - smart choice or security risk?

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Over the past couple of years there has been an increase in the use of smartphones like the Blackberry or iPhone. People tend to use them for receiving email, internet browsing as well as making phone calls. But are they susceptible to security breaches?

Barack Obama - a self confessed Blackberry addict - was forced to switch to a Windows based Sectera Edge Smartphone when he became US president, since apparently there is something lacking in the security of the everyday blackberry. However he will be able to get his hands on the so-called 'BarackBerry' (Blackberry 8830 International) with its enhanced security that meets the National Security Agency standard very soon. So if the US government seem to think that Blackberrys are not secure enough should regular users worry? Possibly not - I guess my latest mail to my friends is not an issue of national security, but client sensitive information is obviously a worry for any business. So should we be thinking twice about what we send over our smart phones?

A recent BBC News article suggested that once a certain amount of the population share smartphones with the same operating system then widespread mobile phone viruses will start to spread. I suppose it is similar to the first computer viruses that only infected Windows based operating systems, rather than the Apple Mac. Once sales get to a level which scammers believe will be of benefit to them then we may see many more viruses affecting unsecured smartphones.

What do you think? Is security such a buzz word these days that everyone is overly sensitive to its use?

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SOA in the 'Trough of Disillusionment'

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In my previous post I discussed what appeared to be the demise of distributed computing, when in reality it had been subsumed into the whirlwind of hype that is cloud computing.  Building on ideas and repackaging them as revolutionary concepts is not a new thing in IT, and cloud computing is the latest example of this.  Another good example, and what I will be discussing in this post, is the effect distributed computing has had on another industry shaping concept - Service Orientated Architecture.
 
SOA takes the notion of distributed computing, focussing primarily on sharing of hardware services, and extends it to software in the form of shared services.  A shared infrastructure in a 'grid' format is used to support a range of software services which execute simple reusable business tasks, such as ‘Get Data’, ‘Store Data’ or ‘Print’.  Using this example, a business requirement such as ‘the system should be able to retrieve a file, store it locally and print a physical copy’ can be satisfied by linking the three individual services together. 

Hanging a number of fine grained (helper services performing simple tasks such as ‘Store Data’) and coarse grained services (long running services that often orchestrate a number of other fine grained services) together will perform the end to end functionality required by a single project; mixing and matching this pool of reusable services enables you to perform the functionality of multiple projects.  To improve flexibility of the end solution and facilitate this ‘pick and choose’ pool of reusable services, each service should be loosely coupled, maintainable, adaptable and extendable, allowing for easy bug fixing and future enhancements without having to worry about users of a service.
 
In 2007, SOA was named by Gartner as the predominant approach for building IT solutions in the coming 3-4 years.  Now, Gartner recognise that, given how fickle and fast-paced the IT industry is, SOA has passed the peak of inflated expectations and is now in the trough of disillusionment, as defined by the Gartner ‘hype cycle’ - now is the time to prove that SOA is a viable method of delivery.  Capgemini, amongst other IT Consulting companies, has shown that SOA can be used in the real world to deliver mission-critical solutions at Corus and highly available, scalable and secure solutions at ING Direct.
 
SOA, contrary to what many may say, is here to stay - proof of this can be seen by the magnitude of blue-chip vendors releasing stable design time governance SOA tools, such as Oracle Enterprise Repository, and runtime governance tools, such as IBM Trivoli Composite Application Manager.  Have you experienced SOA delivery?  If so, did it live up to expectations?

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@twitter #twitter

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In my last post I was gibbering on about using facebook for business, since that post I have dabbled in the art of twitter and I have to say I am not convinced by it... yet. I am a user of facebook and it was when my housemate came back from work one day and openly said “that Stephen Fry is a funny bloke” completely out of the blue that I found out he was referring to his twitter feed.

 

Needless to say 30min later I was signed up and following @Stephenfry, @Wossy, @chrisdjmoyles, and a few other friends on there. It’s a Micro blogging site for those no in the know. Basically people have the freedom to write up to 140 characters in the theory that people would update it more and it would be more interesting and relevant than a blog. If you are following Stephen Fry then you would defiantly agree that people do it more often (some 25 posts a day!).

 

So what are its uses? I can’t see any other than I can find out what people are doing, so add me , I will add you and we can see if this is going to enrich my life... or is it just going to be another internet fad that lasts for a couple of months?

 

On a similar note, you can add companies, and I am thinking that this could be useful, however is it just another form of RSS and distributing news? I would be interested to hear if anyone can think of some good business reasons for companies using this as a form of marketing.

 

Why not also check out http://twitter.com/CapgeminiUKgrad.

 

 

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What Ever Happened to Distributed Computing?

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What ever happened to distributed computing? I was having a look through the technology pages of the BBC News website today and came across an old article from just over 5 years ago proclaiming that distributed computing would be the next big thing to transform the Internet…and it would be transforming it very soon! So if 5 years ago it was set to turbo-charge your computer using the reservoirs of power connected to the Internet, why aren’t we seeing the fruits of this revolution now?

Distributed computing is the means of harnessing the power of idle computers connected to a network by distributing the processing between them, allowing multiple machines to accomplish what a single, stand-alone super-computer could achieve for a fraction of the cost. The power of distributed computing can be amplified when you choose to split up and process data across the largest network in the world, the Internet – this is known as grid computing. Classic examples of previous success stories for distributed computing have been SETI@home, where radio-telescope data is analysed to find evidence of intelligent signals from space, and Folding@home, where machines are used to replicate protein folding to find cures for diseases and understand biophysical systems.

So, with all this potential and the power it could have harnessed with some 500 million devices connected to the Internet worldwide in 2003, what ever happened to distributed computing? Well, the truth is that distributed computing is no longer the ‘hot topic’, meaning it doesn’t come up in conversation anymore and people therefore assume it is no longer around, when in reality it has actually been absorbed into a much bigger hot topic; Cloud Computing.

You might be wondering why, before being absorbed into Cloud Computing, the average user didn’t utilise distributed computing… Quite simple really – the average user didn’t need to utilise distributed computing. Moore’s Law dictates that every other year the number of transistors that can be inexpensively placed on a circuit board will double, and with processing power being directly linked to this law, new technology provided us with all the power needed in a single machine.

The advancements in hardware explains why the average user didn’t need distributed computing, so if it is not a prehistoric theory shelved in the archives of the London Science Museum, where is it being used today? The answer is data centres; warehouses packed with technologies that handle and store of massive amounts of data, distributing the processing across hugely powerful servers, and as you might have guessed, the next ‘big thing’ to make use of data centres is Cloud Computing.

With Cloud Computing, the data and corresponding application to utilise that data is stored in a data centre (or a cloud, as it is not tangible to a user of the service), and when the Cloud Service is used to access the data, all the processing is completed in the data centre with the output being subsequently streamed via the internet to the user’s substantially less powerful device. If the processing required is too much for one server in the data warehouse, it can distribute the load to surrounding servers, and voila; you have a fully functioning Cloud Computing service where a network of servers completing distributed processing within a data centre provide a service to a third party device via the internet, effectively outsourcing your in-house distributed computing to a CO2 efficient cloud.

Alternatively, you could look at it from a different angle; if your machine has fallen victim to a virus and joined the ranks in the botnet army would you think then that distributed computing has lost favour in the IT world, or just that it has been exploited by hackers on a global scale?

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Facebook for Business... you must be joking?

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In a report by the BBC a week or so ago it concluded that Facebook is the most searched for word in Google. In another interesting article by the BBC they say that bosses should embrace Facebook. So I am asking the question of whether there is real benefit for a business to allow their users to surf on Facebook or other social networking sites.

In my opinion, the keyword here is 'social network'. I don’t know many businesses that would allow their employees to go to work to socialise. That poses the following question: are these sites just being used for social reasons or can they be used for business reasons? I think that they can and it stems to the reason that I am a firm believer of creating opportunities from any situation. The ability to see what friends are doing in such an open way, and to a point see what your friends network are doing allows you to extend your network and seek out opportunities.

From day 1 in the BTC we are told about the technique used for selling, and how it's all down to us! Everyone here at Capgemini is encouraged to seek new opportunities as well as strengthen existing ones, because we are on the ground with the customers and often get that coffee shop conversation (or that Facebook chat) that leads to a new exciting project.

So here's a tip: don’t discount Facebook as a way to get business, I could tell you of a CTO that flew out to the USA just 2 hours after he received a message on Facebook and within a week had signed a multimillion dollar deal with a new customer. These things do happen, and may happen to you!

 

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Being Green and the Impact of Technology

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In today's world we are asked to put emphasis on reducing our carbon footprint. The government has released their own campaign to encourage us all to help the environment and save money by doing such things as using energy saving light bulbs and switching the television off stand by mode to name just two. But  exactly how does the IT you use effect your carbon footprint?

In 2007 Gartner published a report which said that ICT (computers, servers, printers) accounts for around 2% of the worlds global CO2 emissions. A figure which they claimed was equivalent to aviation! And recently in the news a study by a Harvard academic stated that searching by Google uses about as much energy as boiling a kettle. Google of course say these figures are incorrect and claim it is more like 0.2 grams rather than the 7 grams quoted.

So how can we reduce search engine emissions? One suggestion is to use a search engine other than Google. For example Blackle uses a custom Google search, but because the screen is black they claim it takes less energy to view. To date they state they have saved 1,053,096.222 Watt hours of energy compared to Google. However there is much debate about whether or not reducing the colours on the screen helps modern laptop screens. And at the end of the day you will always be using energy to power search engines.

It could be argued that in the long term technology is actually saving energy. Global meetings can be scheduled online so participants do not need to travel extensive distances. And the amount of paper which can be saved from emails being sent, rather than letters, and online billing, instead of paper documents, has the potential to reduce carbon emissions. 

But what else can you do to reduce technology related emissions? There are a few simple things which can help to save energy from computers:  Change your power settings so if you are away from your desk your monitor will automatically switch off, saving energy. Or switch it off if you know you won't be using it for some time. I know it sounds so simple but do you really need to have you laptop plugged in overnight? And if you are wanting to invest in a new computer, laptop computers are traditionally more energy efficient than desktop computers.

What do you think? Do you have any of your own energy saving tips for technology?

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WOA a top 10 strategic technology! SOA dead! What’s going on?

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I recently stumbled across Gartner’s Top 10 Strategic Technologies for 2009.

WOA (Web Oriented Architecture) was on the list.  SOA on the other hand has been declared deceased. 

I asked myself, "how can SOA be dead and WOA still survive?"

As explained in SOAs "obituary" it’s the acronym that leaves a bad taste in the mouth not the benefits SOA can deliver or the methods used to achieve these benefits.  The term SOA has just fallen out of favour.

Web Oriented Architecture on the other hand has a feeling of the new and fresh around it, like you may catch some of the Web2.0 bug if you implement it.

So what's the difference between SOA and WOA?

I believe that WOA is a subset of the PHILOSOPHY of SOA, a chapter from the book if you will. Both SOA and WOA aim to satisfy the same end result, scalable, loosely coupled services that enable an enterprise to react to rapidly changing business environments.  One just does it with different tools than the other. WOA uses web services such as http and Representational State Transfer (REST) while SOA has a wider selection of technology to choose from.

The key here is the shared focus of SOA and WOA.  Both are looking to make improvements to how the business operates, to this end the business architecture (the why) must recieve as much attention as the technical architecture (the how) of an SOA/WOA adoption.

Service based architectures must be integrated with the way an enterprise carries out its business and the architects must understand WHY the business needs SOA or WOA.  SOA/WOA has to be developed in close quarters with the business and not just give a nod to it, it must span organisational silos where neccesary and not be constrained by the traditional thinking of "1 system to do this, 1 system to do that".  This ensures fit for purpose services are created on top of a well designed platform. 

SOA is also key to the development of few of the other technologies in Gartner's Top 10.  Cloud Computing and Enterprise Mashups have been made possible by the technical concepts of SOA.  WOA will invariably make the adoption mashups and the cloud in the enterprise easier due to web standards...but only if the business has been prepared for their arrival.

So to answer my question; SOA is not dead. If it goes we lose SaaS, The Cloud, Mashups and WOA along with it all of which have a bright future ahead of them.

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Women and Technology

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A while ago I was asked to answer some questions for the Women in Technology website. The questions made me think about the role that women can play within Capgemini and in the technology sector as a whole.

Why should women choose IT? Personally I did not know much about careers in IT until I was at uni. Half my degree was computer science, chosen because I thought most jobs need some form of computer skill. But actually I found that there are a number of jobs which fall under the IT umbrella: Project Management; Business Analysis; Database Administration; Software Engineering; Technical Support; Test Analysis; Web design; Systems Integration and Technical Architect just to name a few. I am not claiming to know exactly what all those people do, but there is quite a bit of variety to choose from.

Do I need to know stuff about computers? You definitely need the basics, like emails, the internet and word processing. But you don't need to have done a degree in IT as the BTC graduate scheme takes people with different degree backgrounds. You will get training and on the job experience which will help you learn skills for your particular area. What you will need is to be adaptable and willing to learn.

I found that there were far fewer women enrolled on IT programmes at university. I thought this might be because of the stereotyping of people working in IT. I'm sure you will have seen tv shows or movies which portray anyone who works in IT as a geek. I have to say, just for those of you who do not know, this is not true. This stereotype of people with limited social interactions, who live in front of their computers programming all day is discouraging people from looking at jobs in IT.

Why should women choose Capgemini? I chose Capgemini because of the atmosphere, from walking through the door I knew it was somewhere where I could work. People are always helpful and I knew I would get variety in roles, some of which I never would have imagined myself doing. And of course Capgemini were voted in the Top Fifty places where women want to work (according to the Times).

IT is a well established community, I think that there will always be jobs for people skilled in this area. What do you think? Should we be encouraging more women into IT?

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