IT-Sideways: Tech Blog Malaysia

Faronics Deep Freeze To Clone Your PC

2012-01-28T14:49:00.001+08:00

Faronics Deep Freeze works by taking an image of a computer's hard disk which can be used to restore at any time necessary. in other words, it is a cloning solution for Computer and IT management. It is part of the Faronics Software Suite.

Faronics Deep Freeze reduces IT helpdesk requests and costs by 63% by making computer configurations indestructible. It does this by ensuring each and every desktop, laptop, and server always remains in its perfect, original operating state that it was deployed in.

This is especially useful for businesses with multiple computers and servers to maintain. It provides a configurable, automated and added security solution for computer's image cloning and restore.

In terms of a more domestic use, it helps ensure performance. For example, one normally would need to format a windows pc from anywhere between 6 – 12 months due to slow down and various other issues. Plus, one don’t have to defragment your computer anymore when using deep freeze.

When a computer is wreaked havoc by security vulnerabilities, users can easily restore it back to its original state.

Deep Freeze is user friendly and fully integrated with Faronics Anti-Virus solution. Faronics anti-virus works in hand with windows defender and has firewall.

It supports SCSI, ATA, SATA, and IDE hard drives for image storage and FAT, FAT32, NTFS, basic and dynamic disks file systems. Operations can be performed on a network environment and even over the WAN with web based console interface. it offers silent install option for rapid network deployment.

The images are encrypted with password control.

Faronics is available from Meissa Group.

Symantec Security Response: Spammers on the Lookout for Valentine’s Day Bargain Hunters

2012-01-28T14:14:00.000+08:00

Spammers are on the lookout for Valentine’s Day bargain hunters, so be vigilant if you’re looking for great deals online!

Symantec researchers are observing a surge of spam as Valentine’s Day approaches. Unbelievable discounts on jewellery, dinners, and expensive gift articles are key themes for Valentine’s Day related spam. Other popular fake promotions include online pharmaceuticals, fake e-cards, gift cards, chocolates, and flowers, all designed with the goal of capturing a user’s personal and financial details.

In one spam sample, users are lured to purchase silver, gold, and platinum jewellery with promises of additional free gifts. By clicking on the link, the user is redirected to a page asking for the user’s personal information in order to receive the gift that they have selected.

Social network spam is also not far behind other information-stealing techniques when it comes to capturing a user’s personal data. There are many fake applications targeting Valentine’s Day that direct the user to a survey site. Below is an example of one such fake application.

For more information, please proceed to Symantec’s Security Response blog post here.

Symantec advises Internet users to adopt the following best practices to avoid falling prey to phishing attacks:

Do not open unsolicited emails from unknown sources.
Do not click on any links included in email messages. Instead, type the link in the address bar.
Do not open attached files that claim to be Valentine’s greeting cards, e-cards, etc.
Buy products from authentic websites that are protected by SSL certificates.
Install effective antivirus and antispam solution software.

Startup Competition For Entrepreneurs At IBM smartCamp Global

2012-01-27T09:43:00.000+08:00

IBM SmartCamps are designed to help entrepreneurs bring innovative new solutions to market quickly by providing mentoring and access to advanced technology and expertise. The nine finalist startup companies will meet with IBM and the venture capital community from Jan. 31 to Feb. 2 in San Francisco to vie to be named the IBM Global Entrepreneur of the Year. The finalists, with solutions designed to solve problems facing cities, were selected from nearly a thousand startup companies that applied to IBM startup events in 2011.

The finalists are:

BitCarrier - Vehicle traffic management solutions
C-B4 Context Based 4Casting - large scale retail patterns analysis
ConnectM - business analytics for telco, utilities and transportation
IDXP - consumer behavior solution installs
Localytics - real-time analytics for mobile application preferences
Palmap - mapping solution
Profitero - competitor analytics
SecureWaters - Analytics for water industry
Skinscan - Detect skin cancer

For more details.

Symantec Report Finds Spammers are Taking Advantage of New Year Holidays and Major Events

2012-01-27T02:37:00.000+08:00

Symantec Corp. (Nasdaq: SYMC) announced the findings of its January Symantec Intelligence Report, which shows that spammers are using holidays and major events to make their mail more appealing.

Symantec Intelligence has seen more than 10,000 unique domain names compromised with a redirect script written in PHP that contains a reference to the New Year in the file name. These redirect scripts were hosted on compromised Web sites and links to these were included in spam emails, which were subsequently blocked by Symantec.cloud.

To further entice recipients to open their messages, spammers used additional social engineering techniques by including parameters in the URL to suggest that the destination is a social networking site.

Symantec Intelligence expects to see spammers taking advantage of other “calendar events” with one of the most important traditional Chinese New Year celebrations (which started this week on January 23, 2012 and will continue for fifteen days), as well as the fast-approaching Valentine's Day.

“We also expect to see plenty of spam and malware taking advantage of some of the major upcoming sporting events this year. We are already seeing references to the Summer Olympics in London as part of 419 or advance fee fraud messages,” said Paul Wood, senior intelligence analyst, Symantec.

“By relating their mails to widely-celebrated holidays and current events with global interest, spammers and malware authors can (at first glance at least) make their messages more interesting, and increase the chance of recipients visiting spam Web sites or becoming infected,” Wood said.

During December, global spam levels dropped, but in January gradually returned to similar levels as in November 2011, which is still lower than the 2011 average.

Other Report Highlights:

Spam: In January 2012, the global ratio of spam in email traffic rose by 1.3 percentage points since December 2011, to 69.0 percent (1 in 1.45 emails). This follows a more noticeable drop in December when spam fell by 2.8 percentage points to 67.7 percent. The recent increase means that spam has almost returned to the same level as in November 2011.

Phishing: In January, the global phishing rate increased by 0.06 percentage points, taking the average to one in 370.0 emails (0.27 percent) that comprised some form of phishing attack.

E-mail-borne Threats: The global ratio of email-borne viruses in email traffic was one in 295.0 emails (0.33 percent) in January, a decrease of 0.02 percentage points since December 2011. In January, 29.0 percent of email-borne malware contained links to malicious Web sites, unchanged since December 2011.

Web-based Malware Threats: January saw an average of 2,102 Web sites each day harboring malware and other potentially unwanted programs including spyware and adware; a decrease of 77.4 percent since December 2011.

Endpoint Threats: The most frequently blocked malware for the last month was WS.Trojan.H. WS.Trojan.H is generic cloud-based heuristic detection for files that possess characteristics of an as yet unclassified threat. Files detected by this heuristic are deemed by Symantec to pose a risk to users and are therefore blocked from accessing the computer.

Geographical Trends:

Spam

Saudi Arabia became the most spammed geography in January; with a spam rate of 75.5 percent.
China was the second most-spammed with 75.0 percent of email traffic blocked as spam.
In the US, 69.0 percent of email was spam and 68.7 percent in Canada.
The spam level in the UK was 69.3 percent.
In The Netherlands, spam accounted for 70.7 percent of email traffic, 68.2 percent in Germany, 69.1 percent in Denmark and 68.6 percent in Australia.
In Hong Kong, 67.5 percent of email was blocked as spam and 66.7 percent in Singapore, compared with 65.6 percent in Japan.
Spam accounted for 69.5 percent of email traffic in South Africa and 73.1 percent in Brazil.

Phishing

The Netherlands became the country most targeted for phishing attacks in January, with one in 62.6 emails identified as phishing.
The UK was the second most targeted country, with one in 179.4 emails identified as phishing attacks.
Phishing levels for the US were one in 1,145 and one in 379.9 for Canada.
In Germany phishing levels were one in 797.6, one in 330.9 in Denmark.
In Australia, phishing activity accounted for one in 542.2 emails and one in 942.9 in Hong Kong; for Japan it was one in 5,692 and one in 1,156 for Singapore.
In Brazil one in 1,007 emails was blocked as phishing.

E-mail-borne Threats

The Netherlands had the highest ratio of malicious emails in January, with one in 61.4 emails identified as malicious.
The UK had the second highest rate, with one in 169.1 emails identified as malicious.
In South Africa, one in 305.9 emails was blocked as malicious.
The virus rate for email-borne malware in the US was one in 592.5 and one in 285.4 in Canada.
In Germany virus activity reached one in 471.7 and one in 318.1 in Denmark.
In Australia, one in 327.9 emails was malicious.
For Japan the rate was one in 1,573, compared with one in 482.9 in Singapore.
In Brazil, one in 681.7 emails in contained malicious content.

Vertical Trends:

The Education sector became the most spammed industry sector in January, with a spam rate of 71.0 percent.
The spam rate for the Chemical & Pharmaceutical sector was 69.0 percent, compared with 68.7 percent for IT Services, 68.4 percent for Retail, 68.9 percent for Public Sector and 68.2 percent for Finance.
The Public Sector remained the most targeted by phishing activity in January, with one in 99.1 emails comprising a phishing attack.
Phishing levels for the Chemical & Pharmaceutical sector reached one in 838.0 and one in 647.8 for the IT Services sector, one in 529.4 for Retail, one in 169.4 for Education and one in 253.7 for Finance.
With one in 90.2 emails being blocked as malicious, the Public Sector remained the most targeted industry in January.
The virus rate for the Chemical & Pharmaceutical sector reached one in 381.3 and one in 399.4 for the IT Services sector; one in 407.1 for Retail, one in 138.3for Education and one in 236.7 for Finance.

Market Trends:

The spam rate for small to medium-sized businesses (1-250) was 68.9%, compared with 69.1% for large enterprises (2500+).
Phishing attacks targeting small to medium-sized businesses (1-250) accounted for one in 225.2 emails, compared with one in 410.9 for large enterprises (2500+).
Malicious email-borne attacks destined for small to medium-sized businesses (1-250) accounted for one in 277.3 emails, compared with one in 281.5 for large enterprises (2500+).

The January Symantec Intelligence Report provides greater detail on all of the trends and figures noted above, as well as more detailed geographical and vertical trends.

About Symantec Intelligence Report

The Symantec Intelligence report combines the best research and analysis from the Symantec.cloud MessageLabs Intelligence Report and the Symantec State of Spam & Phishing Report. The new integrated report, the Symantec Intelligence Report, provides the latest analysis of cyber security threats, trends and insights from the Symantec Intelligence team concerning malware, spam, and other potentially harmful business risks. The data used to compile the analysis for this combined report includes data from December 2011 and January 2012.

Sourcefire Unveils FireAMP: Most Significant Anti-Malware Protection To Date

2012-01-27T02:19:00.000+08:00

Sourcefire, Inc. (NASDAQ: FIRE), a leader in intelligent cybersecurity solutions, today introduces its new FireAMP™ product, an intelligent, enterprise-class advanced malware protection solution that uses Big Data analytics to discover, analyse and block advanced malware.

According to Ivan Wen, Country Manager of Sourcefire Malaysia, FireAMP fulfils the company's 'Agile Security' vision for context-aware, adaptive, and automated security solutions.

"FireAMP is not just another anti-malware product. It is a highly intelligent cybersecurity solution that has unprecedented visibility and control to block threats missed by other security layers. FireAMP represents of what your enterprise really needs to address advanced malware.

Utilizing Big Data Analytics to Deal with High Malware Infection in Organisations' Computers

Over the past year, Sourcefire talked to over 100 enterprises and heard one common theme: they have the latest endpoint security products with the latest DAT files, but are still heavily infected with up to 10 percent of organisations' computers are being infected and the next scheduled scan will catch only 1% of threats.

"More importantly, they don’t know how these threats got in, how they are spreading when inside, or which computers have them. Current endpoint protection platforms (EPPs) consistently still do not protect endpoints against mass-propagated consumer threats or handcrafted targeted attacks," says Wen.

The FIRST Advanced Malware Solution

FireAMP, an advanced malware discovery and analysis solution that analyses and blocks malware by utilizing big data analytics, and first in the market to offer advanced malware solution with 5 new capabilities: -

FireCLOUD™ – Cloud-based infrastructure with detection capabilities that leverage big data analytics to identify and score threats missed by other security layers
File Trajectory – Tracks file movement to allow organizations to identify the entry point and propagation path of malware
File Analysis - Provides detailed information on malware behaviour backed by the elite Sourcefire Vulnerability Research Team (VRT™)
Outbreak Control – Customer-defined detections that automatically blocks malware immediately
Cloud Recall™ – Continuous in-the-cloud analysis of historical file activity to discover and remediate threats that were previously missed

Wen ends, “Even with the latest security technologies with all of the latest updates, most of the enterprises still suffer from malware infections. FireAMP offers visibility into the state of malware in an environment - identifying high-risk computers, threat root causes, applications which are introducing the malware, advanced persistent threats, and malware that could be unique to a customer’s environment."

For more information, please visit www.sourcefire.com/FireAMP.

SAS Achieves 12 % Growth to Revenue Record of RM8.7 Billion

2012-01-27T02:06:00.005+08:00

SAS, the leader in business analytics software and services, achieved record global revenues of USD2.725 billion (or RM8.7 billion) last year. SAS marked double-digit growth in its 36th profitable year as organizations sought more advanced analytics solutions to uncover business opportunity in their own burgeoning data stores in the current ‘Big Data’ phenomenon.

The Americas accounted for 46 percent of total revenue; Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) 42 percent; and Asia Pacific 12 percent. SAS growth was strong across the board in all major regions and countries, even in regions hardest hit economically.

SAS’ CEO, Jim Goodnight shares that SAS’ revenue surged across all solution and industry categories:-

Software to detect fraud saw a triple-digit jump,
Analytics and information management solutions grew double digit
On-demand solutions’ revenue grew almost 50 percent.

He also highlights the continued strong growth in financial services, government, health care and life sciences.

Worldwide organizations that purchased or further invested in SAS’ BA solution this year include: Philippine National Bank (Philippine), Resorts World Sentosa (Singapore), Westpac (Australia), DBS Bank (Singapore) and more.

Globally, SAS dominates minimum two major IT growth areas that identified by research firm Gartner Advisory Singapore -Next Generation Analytics and In-memory Data Analytics (Powered by high performance computing).

SAS’ Business in Malaysia: Latest

In Malaysia, SAS’ annual new software revenue grew over 21% in 2011, mainly driven by the demand for analytics for customer intelligence, data management, combating fraud and to mitigate risk.

Andrew Tan, Managing Director of SAS Malaysia says, “This is mainly driven by sales growth in the financial services industry of 31.2%.”

In 2011, SAS Malaysia recorded total software revenues of over RM36 million inclusive of new analytics software sales from Malaysia Building Society Berhad, UMobile, and Columbia Asia Hospital, Takaful Ikhas, Department of Statistics Malaysia, Pos Malaysia and more. Currently, the company has over 150 corporate clients across sectors in Malaysia that use SAS analytics solutions.

Tan shares. “The market is changing rapidly. More and more companies are looking to analytics to give them visibility and clarity on the vast information that runs through their business, to make more cost effective decisions.

“In Malaysia, we have also started to serve the very specific analytics needs of the Oil & Gas industry; helping companies to predict and prevent machinery failure.”

Expanding Workforce to Accommodate Analytics Demands

In conjunction, SAS announces its latest ranking of No.3 on the FORTUNE's Best Companies to Work For list in the U.S.

In 2011, SAS grew staff 9.2 percent and reinvested 24 percent of revenue into research and development.

In Malaysia, SAS plans to expand its current workforce to accommodate the growing demand for business analytics from across industries of Telecommunication, Financial Services, Retail, Commercial, Government and Oil & Gas.

The company expects its existing workforce to grow by 32% by mid 2012, focusing its investments in a larger sales workforce, solution architects and analytics advisory capabilities with experience and exposure in the areas of Risk Intelligence, Information Management and Customer Intelligence.

Symantec Security Response: Beware of the iPad 3 Scam

2012-01-25T21:42:00.000+08:00

Recently, Sean Butler came across a scam email that is trying to take advantage of the hype surrounding the yet-to-be-released iPad 3. The release date of the iPad 3 is still unknown but spammers are already jumping on the bandwagon in the hope of scamming people who will be eager to get their hands on one of these devices.

The scammers introduce themselves as Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook. The email then states how Facebook have joined up with Apple for a one time promotion – to give away an iPad 3 at no cost. This is, of course, all false information but the scam attempts to entice potential victims by stating how they have been randomly selected from a Facebook database. It is possible that a user could potentially be deceived by this ruse if they receive this email to the email address they have used to register with Facebook.

The user is then asked to click on a link and fill out a survey. The goal of the scammers here is to obtain personal information from the user and to verify that their email address is valid, which they will undoubtedly use to send more spam to in the future. The scammer might also be making money through click fraud, whereby they make money every time a user clicks on the link to the survey.

Even though this email was targeting a Symantec customer, our advanced monitoring systems were able to identify this scam. Upon investigating this email further, it is easy to ascertain that it is a scam email due to the poor grammar used in the email and the fact that there is a spelling mistake within the email itself. If you suspect an email you received from Facebook is a scam, you can report it to them.

Of course, no one will know for certain when the iPad 3 will be launched until Apple confirms the announcement themselves. Whilst it would seem that this particular scam was sent in a very low volume, it is likely that we will continue to see a build up of iPad 3 related spam right up until the official launch date. There will also undoubtedly be similar related scams doing the rounds on social networking sites as well.

An example of the message.

Symantec advises Internet users to adopt the following best practices to avoid falling prey to phishing attacks:

Do not click on suspicious links in email messages.
Avoid providing any personal information when answering an email.
Never enter personal information in a pop-up page or screen.
When entering personal or financial information, ensure the website is encrypted with an SSL certificate by looking for the padlock, ‘https’, or the green address bar.

Brocade Ethernet Fabric Technologies Awarded TechTarget Products of the Year

2012-01-25T11:56:00.000+08:00

Brocade (Nasdaq: BRCD), the leader in fabric-based data center networking solutions, announced that Brocade® VCS® Fabric technology and the Brocade VDX® 6720 Data Center Switch received industry recognition in two Products of the Year award competitions, according to the editors of TechTarget Inc.’s Data Center and Virtualization Media Group.

Brocade VCS Fabric technology, a foundational element to building Ethernet fabrics and revolutionizing the design of Layer 2 networks for cloud-optimized data center deployments, was awarded the top honor – Gold Product of the Year in the Hardware for Virtualization category of the SearchServerVirtualization.com 2011 Products of the Year awards competition. This technology provides advanced Ethernet fabric capabilities, including virtual machine (VM) awareness and network automation, enabling organizations to transition smoothly to highly virtualized and cloud-based environments.

The Brocade VDX 6720 was also named a Product of the Year, winning the Silver award in the Computing Hardware category of the SearchDataCenter.com 2011 Products of the Year awards competition. The Brocade VDX 6720 delivers innovative technology to enhance and simplify networks, offering a rich set of Layer 2 features. The high-performance, ultra-low latency, wire-speed 10 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) fixed port switch can be utilized as a classic Top-of-Rack (ToR) switch and can also be easily deployed in Brocade VCS Ethernet fabric mode with an additional software license.

The SearchServerVirtualization.com and SearchDataCenter.com 2011 Products of the Year awards recognize products that stand apart from the pack and provide exceptional benefits for IT organizations of all sizes. Winners were selected from a pool of products announced and shipped between Nov. 1, 2010, and Nov. 1, 2011. Scores of nominations were submitted by vendors and users, and then evaluated by the respective publication’s editorial staff, in conjunction with a team of users, industry experts, analysts and consultants, who selected the winners based on ease of integration into existing environments, functionality, innovation, manageability, performance, and value.

In its evaluation of Brocade VCS Fabric technology, SearchStorageVirtualization.com judges commented that, “Brocade’s product stands out because it knows where each virtual machine is and what exactly is attached to the fabric in a virtual infrastructure. These capabilities come in handy when trying to secure a fabric to support only VMs, for example. Another benefit of the product is that it works with VMware vCenter, so it can tell automatically what’s connected, instead of having to learn it over time.”

In awarding Silver to the Brocade VDX 6720, SearchDataCenter.com judges stated that, “The Brocade VDX 6720 delivers innovative technology to enhance and simplify networks. It also offers a rich set of Layer 2 features, making the Brocade VDX 6720 an ideal platform for traditional top-of-rack switch deployments – and putting the switch near the top of any enterprise data center’s wish list.”

“More than 300 customers have already deployed our Ethernet fabric solutions and are a testament to the simplicity, resilience and zero-touch VM manageability of our Brocade VDX data center switches and VCS Fabric technology,” said John McHugh, vice president and chief marketing officer at Brocade. “The rapid adoption of this Brocade innovation and recognition such as these awards, leads us to believe that we will more than double the number of data centers that are running our Ethernet fabric solutions over the next year.”

The Product of the Year award is the latest recognition for Brocade Ethernet fabric technologies. In January 2011, CTO Edge awarded the Brocade VDX 6720 as the “Most Important IT Product for 2010.” In an “Open Industry Network Performance & Power Test for Cloud Networks,” published in December 2011 by The Lippis Group, the Brocade VDX 6720 and 6730 switches achieved the lowest power consumption levels among reviewed top-of-rack systems, while delivering best-in-class performance and low latency across a variety of workloads and test scenarios.

About SearchServerVirtualization.com

SearchServerVirtualization.com is the best server virtualization resource for system architects and IT managers. Our editors, resident experts and news writers are dedicated to helping IT organizations determine if virtualization is appropriate for their environments and, if it is, use that technology to gain unprecedented data center efficiency. Access the latest news, articles, tips, expert advice, learning guides, white papers and Webcasts covering all areas of server virtualization, such as virtualization platforms, server hardware, managing virtual environments, virtualization architectures and strategies, application issues and more.

SearchServerVirtualization.com is part of the TechTarget network (www.techtarget.com). TechTarget publishes integrated media that enable information technology (IT) marketers to reach targeted communities of IT professionals and executives in all phases of the technology decision-making and purchase process. Through its industry-leading Web sites, magazines and conferences, TechTarget delivers measurable results that help IT marketers generate qualified sales leads, shorten sales cycles and grow revenues.

About SearchDataCenter.com

SearchDataCenter.com guides IT managers through the decision making and evaluation process they face when making key business choices for their corporate data centers. SearchDataCenter.com offers strategic and practical information on designing, maintaining, furnishing, staffing and running the enterprise data center, focusing on every aspect of the data center, including systems management, disaster recovery and backup, server consolidation strategies and more.

SearchDataCenter.com is part of the TechTarget network (www.techtarget.com). TechTarget publishes integrated media that enable information-technology (IT) marketers to reach targeted communities of IT professionals and executives in all phases of the technology decision-making and purchase process. Through its industry-leading Web sites, magazines and conferences, TechTarget delivers measurable results that help IT marketers generate qualified sales leads, shorten sales cycles and grow revenues.

The Next Generation IPS by Sourcefire

2012-01-25T10:14:00.000+08:00

Refer to 'Malaysia Technology News'

Sourcefire is the main steward of the Next-Generation Intrusion Prevention System (NGIPS) as an intelligent IPS solution powered by awareness, context, automation and a flexible architecture since 2003.

With reference to the independent NSS Labs testing results released earlier of this year, Sourcefire’s 3D8260 with FirePOWER technology is proven with i) best attack detection and, ii) highest performance of any device ever tested

Sourcefire defines four key components as requirement for NGIPS.

1.) Application Awareness and Full Stack Visibility

Full stack is referring to the OSI layer.

2.) Context Awareness

Covering a broad range of threats detection. i.e Applications, users, devices, operating systems, vulnerabilities, services, processes, network behavior, files

3.) Content Awareness

Content intelligence.

4.) Agile Engine

Automation and flexible architecture

Email encryption From eCrypt Technologies

2012-01-24T14:25:00.002+08:00

Two products available.

1.) eCrypt Me - using web based browser

Sending and receiving emails using existing email accounts (Gmail, Yahoo mail, hotmail and etc) by leveraging on eCrypt me system which is like an email wrapper. How it works is just like another web based email system which allows one to make use of existing email address. Recipient will receive links (encrypted) which will redirect to the real message (decrypted).

How it works
You log in securely to your eCrypt Me account.If youʼre sending a document to File Vault, you upload the document. On eCrypt Me, you send an email using your own email address, Gmail, Yahoo, or other address. eCrypt Me encrypts the email and sends a link to your recipient. Your recipient clicks on a link and opens the email. If youʼre sharing a document, thereʼs a link to File Vault.	You receive the your reply in your eCrypt Me inbox. eCrypt Me encrypts the reply or the document revisions and sends you a link. She sends a secure reply, downloads the document, or contributes to the document on File Vault.

2.) eCrypt one to one - only available for Blackberry.

This product is more sophisticated and complex. It only supports one-to-one communication and requires both parties to use the same software.

iPhone users may use the eCrypt me solution.

Remember the phone hacking scandal of NOTW ? Business sensitive information may require extra protection from cyber threats.

Check out the blog

Megaupload.com No More!

2012-01-20T16:36:00.001+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'.

It has been reported by Reuters that U.S. government shut down Megaupload.com content sharing website.

The same site was blocked by Malaysian government during June 2011, sparking protest from netizen.

Now, it seems that the root has been taken out totally. There is no point to bypass proxy, you cannot find it anymore.

According to reports, megaupload company's executives which include the CEO and CTO were arrested in New Zeland. They have been charged for copyright infringement as well as conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to commit racketeering.

The Mega Conspiracy group was accused of engaging in a scheme that took more than $500 million away from copyright holders and generated over $175 million in proceeds from subscriptions and advertising, according to the indictment unsealed on Thursday.

"In exchange for payment, the Mega Conspiracy provides fast reproduction and distribution of infringing copies of copyrighted works from its servers located around the world," the indictment said.

U.S. Justice Department officials said that the estimate of $500 million in economic harm to copyright holders was on the low end and likely significantly more.

This is most unexpected and unprecedented.

In Malaysia, piracy is common. It is a culture where people assume that piracy is fine because the originals are simply more expensive and that they can't afford it. This is most often true for computer software, a phenomenon which cripples the ICT and entertainment industry in Malaysia. People will only go for the best and they want it free.

Hardware business is not affected directly because counterfeits usually lack in quality.

Personally, this is a shocker for this coming chinese new year. Not that I have anything to do with it, just that I feel that many more people are involved and more shut down to come if those FBIs are serious into business.

Solarwinds Introduces Free Tools For Use With Microsoft Active Directory

2012-01-20T15:50:00.000+08:00

SolarWinds® Inc. (NYSE: SWI), a leading provider of powerful and affordable IT management software, today announced a set of three free tools designed to help manage routine tasks related to Microsoft Active Directory. These active directory tools will help IT professionals manage and remove inactive computers and users from Active Directory, and add users in bulk. The tools run on current Windows versions and are certified with Windows 7 through a relationship with Microsoft Corp.

“Our customers wanted tools that would help them manage their environment with Microsoft Active Directory and Windows 7,” said Josh Stephens, Head Geek and VP of technology. “We are pleased to be able to work with Microsoft to offer a suite of free tools that will help customers easily stay current with their environment, no matter the size.”

With the addition of these tools to the SolarWinds arsenal, the company now offers more than 25 free IT management tools made specifically to address the needs of today’s IT professional. The new tools include:

Inactive User Account Removal Tool – Enables users to scan Active Directory and optionally remove users who have not logged in for a certain amount of time.
Inactive Computer Account Removal Tool – Enables users to scan Active Directory and optionally remove computers that are over a certain number of days old.
User Import Tool – Saves time by giving you the ability to create users in bulk, using a CSV file. You can even specify the attributes.

SAS: Shift to 'Real Time' Operations is A Must in 2012

2012-01-19T23:27:00.002+08:00

SAS Malaysia, the country’s leading provider of business analytics solutions and services, shares the most pressing requirement for analytics deployment for companies across all major sectors in Malaysia in 2012; to shift to a ‘Real Time’ mode of operations.

SAS observes that in Malaysia, businesses have started to realize the power of analytics to give them a competitive edge. However, while advanced analytics technology is already available - powered by high-performance computing, in-memory analytics, advanced visualization and mobile platforms, “…the use of analytics in Malaysia remains at a basic level.”

According to Andrew Tan, Managing Director of SAS Malaysia, players in the local scene have entered the era of Big Data where the traditional methods of analyzing business information are no longer competitive.

“Businesses that use analytics extensively and systematically to out-think and out-execute the competition will win in an ultra-competitive business environment. In fact, we see that the top players within the major industries of banking, telecommunications, retail and manufacturing – are starting to upgrade their business and customer analytics systems.”

“With this, we start to see a leveling of the playing field in these respective industry sectors.”

“Those who want to stay truly relevant have to up their ante to a ‘Real Time’ analytics mode of operations in order to stay ahead of the game,” Tan shares.

Shifting to ‘Real Time’ Operations

Tan says that a ‘Real Time’ mindset should be applied to the three areas of Information Management, Collaboration and Skills & Culture:

Information Management – companies that progress faster through the analytics journey from enterprise data warehousing to advanced analytics powered by HPC, in-memory analytics and agile development techniques will be able to make decisions in near-real time.
Collaboration – companies that leverage on advanced visualization capabilities and mobile analytics platforms will be able to achieve true collaboration between currently silo-ed operations and from the field all the way up the management chain.
Skills & Culture – companies that hire, develop and retain a new breed of employees with advanced analytical skills otherwise known as ‘data scientists’ and create an environment where they can collaborate seamlessly with business domain knowledge experts will be able to innovate the fastest.

SAS Malaysia’s Sector Prediction

According to IDC’s Malaysia Business Intelligence (BI) Software Market report 2010, Malaysian organizations’ spend on BI will grow to about RM193.0 million by 2015 (from RM63.5 million in 2008).

Tan says, “The local banking industry will take the lead in the analytics race with the greater adoption of advanced information management, risk management as well as customer analytics.”

“This is followed by media and telecommunications service providers, government, retail and manufacturing,” he adds.

Sophos Names Regional Director for ASEAN

2012-01-19T17:46:00.000+08:00

IT security and data protection company Sophos today announced the appointment of Kelvin Lim as director of sales for ASEAN. Based in Singapore, Lim will report to the vice president for Asia Pacific, Stuart Fisher.

In his new role, Lim will lead the regional sales and marketing teams to devise go-to-market strategy and channel programmes, as well as drive accelerated growth and deliver on revenue plan for Southeast Asia.

An industry veteran with over 20 years of hands-on experience in sales, channel management and network infrastructure design, Lim was most recently with 3Com (HP Networking) where he was a sales director for the Philippines, Vietnam and Asia Emerging Countries.

“Lim’s demonstrated track record and vast industry experience will both prove instrumental to our regional growth, and in validating our longstanding commitment to our customers in Southeast Asia,” said Stuart Fisher, vice president for Asia Pacific, Sophos. “This appointment is also a timely one as we line up new and enhanced product offerings in endpoint protection, encryption and network security for 2012, where Lim will lead in bringing these solutions to market this year.”

Facebook 'Koobface' Malware Gang Unmasked - Sophos releases exclusive research

2012-01-18T15:09:00.000+08:00

Following media reports yesterday that Facebook has identified five people as responsible for the Koobface worm, IT security and data protection firm Sophos releases its independent and exclusive research into the Koobface gang, identifying the same alleged perpetrators as Facebook: Anton Korotchenko, Alexander Koltyshev, Roman Koturbach, Syvatoslav Polinchuk, and Stanislav Avdeiko.

SophosLabs malware expert Dirk Kollberg and independent researcher Jan Droemer worked with an extensive team across the industry. In this exclusive, Droemer and Kollberg share a wealth of findings, including the perpetrators' nicknames, online activities, physical locations and business dealings:

http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/koobface/

Koobface (an anagram of "Facebook") spreads via social networking sites, infecting PCs and building a botnet of compromised computers. It is so sophisticated it can even create its own social networking accounts, so that it can aggressively post links helping it to spread further.

The creators of Koobface, whose names have not been public until today, earn millions of dollars every year by compromising computers.

Droemer and Kollberg's research took place between October 2009 and February 2010, but the authorities requested that it be kept confidential to allow them the necessary time to build a case.

"It's an incredible detective story of tireless investigation, which involved scouring the internet, searching company records and taking advantage of schoolboy social networking errors made by the suspected criminals, their friends and family. We know the gang's names, their phone numbers, where their office is, what they look like, what cars they drive, even their mobile phone numbers." said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos. "Now we have to wait and see what, if any, action the authorities will take against the Koobface gang."

Much more information, including images, is available in this extensive online report: http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/koobface

Wikipedia To Go Offline for 24 Hours

2012-01-18T10:31:00.002+08:00

Starting Wednesday (18-Jan-2012) USA time, Wikipedia is expected to go offline for 24 hours protesting against anti-piracy legislation currently under construction in the congress.

The SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) contains clauses that would force search engines to stop listing infringing sites in their indexes.

Wikipedia founder sees it as a threat for Internet freedom and net neutrality.

For more information, refer to here and here.

Shortly after Malaysian lunch time, Wikipedia should have been gone offline.

Jerry Yang Resigns From Yahoo

2012-01-18T10:22:00.000+08:00

Yahoo announced that Jerry Yang has resigned from its board of directors and all other positions.

Yang co-founded Yahoo! Inc. in 1995 with David Filo and served as a member of the Board of Directors since March 1995 and as Chief Executive Officer from June 2007 to January 2009. The Company went public in 1996.

Updates on Hacker To Release Symantec's NAV Source Code

2012-01-17T09:38:00.002+08:00

Refer to 'Malaysia Technology News'.

The alleged source codes have been released to blackhat community.

In the mean time, Symantec has this to say.

The code for Norton Utilities that was posted publicly is related to the 2006 version of Norton Utilities only. That version of the product is no longer sold or supported. The current version of Norton Utilities has been completely rebuilt and shares no common code with Norton Utilities 2006. The code that has been posted for the 2006 version poses no security threat to users of the current version of Norton Utilities. Furthermore, we have no indications that the code disclosure impacts the functionality or security of any of Symantec’s other solutions. Lastly, there are no indications that customer information has been impacted or exposed at this time. As always, in general, Symantec recommends that users keep their solutions updated which will help ensure protection against any new possible threats.

Malaysian shoppers skipped the queues to shop online and on their mobile devices this festive season

2012-01-16T12:15:00.000+08:00

The festive season in 2011 was a busy period* for mobile and online shopping as Malaysians shopped online, and on their mobile devices in the hunt for the prefect Christmas gift and holiday buys. As per an earlier PayPal study**, Malaysia’s boom in online shopping is set to continue to reach its forecast of RM5 billion in 2014. For mobile shopping, nearly 7 out of 10 Malaysians said using their mobile device would be faster and more convenient because they can make a transaction “anytime, anywhere”***.

Elias Ghanem, managing director, PayPal Southeast Asia and India said, “Online shopping has become mainstream, especially during the festive season as many Malaysians skipped the long queues, searched online for great deals, and bought gifts from the comfort of their homes. This was the first festive season for mobile shopping to become popular as Malaysians reached for their smartphones and tablets to enjoy the convenience of shopping anytime, anywhere. Interestingly, Malaysians planned well ahead for their festive online shopping in late November whereas mobile shopping was widely used for purchases during the Christmas week.”

First festive season that mobile shopping becomes popular in Malaysia

Mobile shopping was driven by an increasing number of Malaysians going online via Internet-capable mobile devices. According to a recent InMobi report****, smartphone penetration in Malaysians is at a sharp increase and close to six in ten Malaysian digital consumers used their mobile phone to access the Internet in 2011. The InMobi "Mobile Impact on Media Consumption in Malaysia" report also revealed that mobile is the top choice for Malaysians going online.

Several interesting trends for mobile shopping by PayPal users in Malaysia over the festive season include:

Mobile shopping sales saw the biggest jump on Sunday, December 11, 2011 highlighting that Malaysians started looking for festive deals two weeks before Christmas via their smartphones and tablets.
The busiest mobile shopping date was December 24, 2011 revealing that even on Christmas Eve – Malaysians were using their mobile devices to purchase last-minute Christmas gifts for family and friends.
Popular mobile shopping sites in Malaysia during the festive season included:
- www.gsc.com.my and www.tgv.com.my indicating that Malaysians opted to skip the queue and purchase movie tickets on-the-go during the crazy busy year-end holidays.
- www.groupon.my and www.lelong.com.my, demonstrating the growing influence of daily deal and auction websites, and Malaysians accessing these websites from their smartphones and tablets.
- www.agoda.com showing that Malaysians were even buying holiday packages on their mobile devices, putting a world of hotels in the palm of their hands.
- www.rc711.com, revealing that Malaysians were buying gifts for future frequent flyers and boy racers like remote controlled miniature helicopters, airplanes and cars from their mobile devices.

Online shopping, a more convenient way to shop over the festive season

With a digitally-savvy society and growing broadband penetration, online shopping is becoming mainstream in Malaysia.

Here are some noteworthy online shopping trends by PayPal users in Malaysia over the festive season:

The busiest festive online shopping date was Tuesday, November 29, 2011 showing that many Malaysians took advantage of the fabulous online deals on ‘Cyber Monday 2011’ when U.S. retailers offer deep discounts online.
Online shopping sales saw the biggest jump on November 30, 2011 highlighting that Malaysians planned their gifts and festive buys well ahead of Christmas and the year-end festivities.
Popular online shopping sites in Malaysia during the festive season included:
- www.dhgate.com signifying that Malaysians were purchasing affordably-priced apparel, electronics and handbags from China as gifts for loved ones.
- www.hopshopgo.com and www.asos.com highlighting that Malaysians were shopping overseas from popular US and UK online retailers that offer the latest in fashion wear.
- www.naruko.com.my/shop/ showing that Malaysians were buying beauty and skincare products as gifts for family and friends to look good in the new year.

*Period tracked – November 24, 2011 to December 26, 2011.
** PayPal Online and Mobile Shopping Insights 2011
*** PayPal Online and Mobile Safety Insights 2011
**** InMobi "Mobile Impact on Media Consumption in Malaysia" Dec 2011

Sophos Virtualizes Secure Web Gateway Protection

2012-01-16T11:54:00.000+08:00

IT security and data protection company Sophos today announced the availability of Sophos Virtual Web Appliances providing complete web protection, a streamlined management experience and broad deployment flexibility in virtual environments. Available for download via the VMware Virtual Appliance Marketplace, the new Virtual Web Appliances can be set up in minutes, easily bringing the company’s award-winning hardware security capabilities to businesses of any size.

Virtualization has helped organizations reduce capital and operating costs, while driving greater levels of application availability. It has also yielded benefits in flexibility, agility and control. However, even as virtualization has helped reduce the number of physical servers, the number of virtual servers continues to rise, resulting in increased complexity and server personnel management costs.

Making virtualization easier

With this new release, Sophos reduces the complexity of a virtual environment by integrating its unique managed appliance experience to deliver an industry-first on-premise managed service. Sophos Managed Appliances include remote monitoring and automated maintenance at no additional charge. This approach combines the benefits of virtualization and on-premise control with the cost savings of a managed service, reducingoverhead and complexity. The Sophos Virtual Web Appliance also automates theupdate and upgrade process and provides proactive monitoring and support—further simplifying network management.

Streamlined provisioning and management

The Sophos Virtual Appliances streamline the provisioning and management processes with pre-configured performance profiles, built-in load balancing and an intuitive management console. Users can manage several virtual appliances within a single console, increasing performance and capacity while reducing management time and complexity.

Complete web protection everywhere

By integrating web appliance protection with the Sophos Endpoint security solution, the company delivers unmatched protection andmanagement visibility into users’ web activity—wherever they go. Administrators can quickly and easily set policies, report on activity and protect users, even beyond the secure perimeter of the corporate network. This is all possible without the need for costly and complex backhauling or added gateway infrastructure.

Sophos provides industry-leading web protection due to a unique three-stage filter which combines URL reputation filtering, advanced real-time malware scanning withbehavioral analysis and content control to guard against the latest threats.Sophos appliances also include advanced capabilities such as HTTPS scanning, dynamic anonymizing proxy blocking and call home detection to cover essential blind-spots.

“Organizations are increasingly looking to squeeze more out of less by further leveraging their investment in virtualization, but simply implementing virtualized versions of the same maintenance-heavy applications only helps to a limited extent,” said Chris Kraft, vice president of product management at Sophos. “Our Virtual Web Appliance allows IT departments to not only leverage all the benefits of virtualization, but also those of a managed service, all the while keeping their data on-premise and preserving complete control.”

Trials are available free of charge and licensing is simple, based on a per user, per year basis with no additional charges for the number of virtual servers.

Hacker To Release Norton Antivirus Source Code Coming Tuesday (17 Jan 2012)

2012-01-15T10:08:00.006+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'

Refer to Hackers Claim To Compromise Symantec Norton Antivirus

The latest updates from Reuters which acknowledges a claim whereby a hacker who goes by the name of 'Yama Tough', has threatened to release full source code for Symantec Corp's Norton Antivirus on coming Tuesday (17 Jan 2012), New Delhi's time.

Let's all of us just see what is going to happen and what Symantec is going to do about it.

Symantec apparently tracked down such claim by means of monitoring the twitter accounts of known hackers; in this case it is Yama Tough.

Based on the twitter feeds, I came to realized that Symantec has been waging cyber war with this group of hackers and has apparently paralyzes their cyber activities. As a result, the hackers are performing counter-strike.

It was all started by a lawsuit of a man against Symantec who sued the latter based on the claim that Symantec has, by means of business strategy, create scenarios which convinces consumers that their PC are vulnerable to certain security loopholes. Refer here.

Symantec stood that such claim is without merit.

By having access to source codes, the community will be able to review certain secrets of the operation of Norton Antivirus and the core architecture behind it. This may lead to clues on scale of complexity of cyber security in today's business.

From a software development point of view, it is possible to tell the source of vulnerabilities (such as computer virus infections) as detected by NAV. It is also highly possible to find out how NAV discovers such treats in advance and how it deals with them. All these will lead to clues on the business of Symantec NAV.

My personal thoughts are:

Hackers' claim of possession of source codes is not real.
Hackers have the source codes and do not have enough time and intelligence to unlock such information to help with their cause.
Hackers are just trying their luck to win community support to support their cause.

Either way, we will find out what's happening on coming Tuesday.

Nevertheless, on the ground of software development and business, such possession of Symantec NAV is illegal.

Stay tuned!

Green Packet Was Started Off in Silicon Valley USA

2012-01-14T09:46:00.001+08:00

Green Packet was started off in Silicon Valley USA in year 2000.

It envisions to be a leading global player in solution and product, developing and distributing modems and software across the globe.

It is still growing!

For more details, refer to Your 10 questions with Puan Chan Cheong

Echelon Fundings For Startup

2012-01-13T18:25:00.001+08:00

Echelon 2012 Startup Marketplace is now officially open for submissions.

The Startup Marketplace is now open for online submissions until 31 March, 2012. To simplify submissions, e27 has adopted Adeo Ressi of Founders Institute’s One-sentence Pitch format.

e27’s handpicked panel of judges will score all the valid submissions and shortlist qualified startups to pitch at e27’s four Satellites in Singapore, Jakarta, Manila and Hong Kong.

The Top 50 pitching startups will be selected to exhibit at Echelon 2012 on 11 – 12 June, 2012. Each two-day exhibition slot will cost SGD 400 and will provide the startups with some of the best opportunities to secure regional funding, partnerships and exposure. The best 10 pitches will also be featured at Echelon 2012 with an on-stage pitching opportunity to the main audience.

~~Previous winners are~~ Don't even bother to look. There is no single winning formula, no right or wrong. The only thing to remember is that your idea must solve a problem.

Malaysian can apply.

Apply online now.

For more information.

100 Gigabit Ethernet Industry Milestone Achieved; Brocade Delivers 100th Blade

2012-01-12T23:31:00.002+08:00

From initial customer shipments of 100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) in June 2011, Brocade established itself as a leading provider of carrier-grade 100 GbE routing solutions for service providers and enterprises worldwide. By November 2011 the Company delivered its 100th two-port blade to the European particle physics laboratory, CERN, one of the world's largest centers for scientific studies, as a critical component to accelerate its research.

Exponential bandwidth growth and the need for faster connectivity has forced network operators to carefully plan for future capacity requirement. This growth affects virtually all networks, including the public Internet where bandwidth is doubling every 18 to 24 months. CERN's demanding environment exceeds 15 petabytes or 15 million gigabytes of data traffic per year. To put this number in perspective, 15 petabytes is equivalent to approximately 200 years of continuously running HD-quality video. Similar to other organizations with high volumes of variable traffic flows and continued bandwidth growth requirements in the coming years, it was necessary for CERN to select a solution with dense 10 and 100 GbE routing capabilities today as well as the ability to deliver massive scalability for anticipated bandwidth spikes in the future.

Many of the world's top service providers and premier research institutes have surpassed the performance requirements that 10 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) can deliver via their high throughput networks and applications. This growing demand and requirement for greater bandwidth is clear; according to estimates by Infonetics Research, between 2010 and 2015, 100 Gigabit port sales are expected to have a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 214 percent compared to 58 percent for 10 Gigabit connectivity.

"We first selected the Brocade MLXe routers one year ago because it was a perfect fit for our stringent networking requirements in the near-and-long term (we test products to destruction); now that we are ready for 100 GbE, it was a simple line card addition to multiply our network performance," said Jean-Michel Jouanigot, Communication Systems Group Leader, IT Department, at CERN. "I do not see our appetite for data waning in the future, so with the addition of the Brocade MLXe with 100 GbE in our environment, I am confident we have a blueprint for success."

Service provider and high performance computing (HPC) environments must continually evaluate their networking requirements to manage a surge in Internet traffic due to expanding broadband penetration, bandwidth-intensive multimedia and research applications, and mobile application growth worldwide. Delivering up to four times the 100 GbE wire-speed density and nine times the system capacity of competing routers, the Brocade MLXe router helps ensure greater simplicity with significantly less infrastructure and operational overhead, by supporting 32 wire-speed 100 GbE ports and a total switching capacity of 15.36 Terabits in a single chassis.

"Gigabit Ethernet connectivity is still going strong in the enterprise LAN, but within performance-driven environments the CAGR is at a negative growth rate," said Zeus Kerravala, principal at ZK Research. "While some organizations will continue to grow incrementally by link aggregating multiple ports of 10 GbE, there is a growing group of ultra high performance research institutes and service providers that will need to jump immediately to 100 GbE to remain competitive. Since these organizations' bandwidth requirements are increasing exponentially, the use of a 100 GbE terabit trunk router will provide substantial scalability for future needs."

To help reduce operational expenditures and promote service provider expansion, the 2-port 100 GbE blades cost just a fraction of competitive offerings and offer the widest range of supported CFP optics. When installed in the Brocade MLXe routers, the Brocade 100 GbE blades enable service providers to deploy the industry's first Terabit-per-second trunk, which utilizes multiple ports in a single logical link for greater bandwidth and reduced management up to capacities of 1.6 Terabits.

In addition to CERN, Brocade has had successful 100 GbE deployments with large Internet Exchange Points (IXPs), content delivery network (CDN) providers, and research organizations, such as the Amsterdam Internet Exchange (AMS-IX), Limelight Networks and Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI).

New Yahoo's CEO Employment Package

2012-01-08T09:52:00.001+08:00

Yahoo recently hired Paypal's Scott Thomspon as CEO.

Annual pay: $1 million.

Bonus (if he’s very, very good): $2 million.

Bonus (even if he’s not): $500,000

Stock grant: $11 million.

Check out AllThingsD for detail.

Microsoft Has 28,000 Software Developers

2012-01-06T12:07:00.001+08:00

Microsoft News Center breaks that Microsoft has 28,000 developers all over the globe and maybe some in outer space.

So for those of you wondering how many man-days you need to compete with Microsoft as at for now, that is the number.

Eversendai Corporation Implements Oracle JD Edwards ERP

2012-01-06T11:05:00.003+08:00

Refer to Malaysia Technology News.

Eversendai Corporation Berhad, a leading structural engineering company responsible for such hallmark projects as the Burj Al Arab Hotel, Emirates Tower, Petronas Twin Towers and Burj Khalifa announced today that they have selected Oracle’s JD Edwards EnterpriseOne to augment their ICT competencies in Malaysia followed by other countries in the region.

Eversendai looked to Oracle to assist with developing solutions to overcome some of its regional integration challenges.

This project will be deployed by Sunway Business Applications, a Gold level member
of Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN).

F5 Malaysia Launches BIG-IP Version 11

2012-01-04T12:42:00.002+08:00

F5 Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ: FFIV), the global leader in Application Delivery Networking, today announced the release of its powerful BIG-IPR Version 11 software. This release builds on F5's vision for dynamic data centers to better support the increasingly demanding needs of local businesses in the financial services industry (FSI), telecommunications and public sectors.

Country Manager of F5 Networks (Malaysia), Kevin Chin says, "Currently in Malaysia, the top three banks in three leading telecom companies today are already F5's satisfied customer - using F5 technology to intelligently manage their extensive network data traffic for maximum bandwidth resource optimisation to achieve lower operation costs whilst providing better commercial decision-making."

Chin also shares that F5 Networks dominates the Application Delivery Networking space with over 60% market share space in the Malaysian market in 2010.

The F5 BIG-IP Version 11 is a free upgrade for existing F5 customers; promising companies to 100X in speed improvements in the provisioning of services on an application-by-application basis, has the ability to reconfigure dynamically, aligns IT functions and services more closely with business needs, and enables better visibility and reporting of IT resource utilization.

Chin also says that as Cloud is quickly becoming the model to consume IT resources, F5's solutions enable service providers such as banks, telecommunication companies and government agencies to provide their services (through the deployment of applications) via effective virtualisation.

As the service provider's network becomes an integral part of the application delivery infrastructure that ultimately defines user productivity, F5's BIG-IP technology is the solution that allows the service provider to do this effectively."

BIG-IP v11: Aligning Services with Specific Applications the F5 BIG-IP v11 provides a comprehensive view of users, applications, and the network, enabling IT teams to deploy and provision application services on a per-application basis as rapidly as they can provision virtual machines. Aligning the right services-such as authentication, data protection, traffic management, and acceleration-to each application provides a consistent user experience, especially as new applications are deployed or as existing applications are deployed across virtual and cloud environments.

"The BIG-IP v11 is set to give organizations especially Telco's and FSIs in Malaysia the power to configure, monitor, grow, and secure their business applications independently to gain greater efficiency, increase agility, and reduce CapEx and OpEx," concludes Chin.

Prominent Predictions for 2012

2012-01-03T19:22:00.005+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'

Company	Summary
Brocade	Brocade believes that cloud computing will take great strides in 2012, coupled with consumerization of IT trend, enterprises have no choice must to cope with bigger demands for networking connectivity. Those with private cloud may also want to venture out as PaaS providers. IT commoditisation will become more relevant to the industry and big data is heading for a flood.
Intel	1.) Ultrabook - Ultrabook is similar to Apple's Macbook Air. The challenge is creation of laptops which are way much thinner and equally powerful as it predecessor. 2.) Big Data - cheaper storage more capacity, more data, more analytics, semantic and patterns 3.) Secured Software - security, security, security 4.) Manufacturing Technology Goes 3-D 5.) DIY Data Creation - Analytics, social media.
Cisco	Top three trends for 2012 Cloud computing, mobile devices, remote access. Budget has always been a problem, however for 2012, it will be trade-off between the desire to implement technology that innovates and the need to meet corporate security and compliance needs.
Symantec	Rising risks of Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs), increase in data loss through smart mobile devices, cloud computing driving changes in organisations, and the critical need to strengthen disaster recovery planning as natural disasters increase.
Motorola Mobility	Mobility lifestyle will change retail industry in a bigger way. With the ability to be always connected to the Internet, retails industry must adopt changes to meet challenges of more dynamics in terms of customer acquisition and retention.
Fortinet	FortiGuard Labs is predicting a rise of mobile malware (with new worms and polymorphism),increased crackdowns on network run money laundering operations, renewed and successful collaboration between government and the private sectors, discoveries of exploitable SCADA vulnerabilities, an increase in sponsored attacks, and Anonymous hacktivists using their powers for good over evil.
Hitachi	The economic fundamentals of Malaysia remain strong, with the RM50 billion ICT industry expected to grow by 10% in 2011. Nevertheless, IT budgets are not likely to grow beyond current levels while the demands on IT will. Hence, there will be a renewed focus by the business on the efficiency gains from their IT investments. Virtualization will play a big role to help with such requirements.
Big Data and Cloud Computing	1.) There are currently too many PaaSes out there in the marketplace. 2.) Specialized databases will move in to deal with large data scenario where traditional relational databases are too slow. 3.) More enterprise (for-own-use) data centers to emerge to perform trial and error on cloud computing technology. 4.) Cloud standards has to emerge.

Refer to more on trends.

Running Start-up Is About Minimizing Failures

2012-01-02T11:52:00.004+08:00

Amobee, California-based end-to-end mobile advertising solutions company, helps brands turn customers into fans.

The strategy for Asian market is about partnership such as Merah Cipta Media (MCM) Group for Indonesia market and Ambient Digital for Vietnam.

Trevor Healy (CEO), considers Singapore to be the ground for deals making. He has this to say "You acquire the go-to market in Singapore. You sit with somebody in Singapore and have tea at the Peninsular Hotel and you walk out with $10 million dollars in a deal. It may be implemented in Indonesia, Vietnam or the Philippines, but it’s actually inked here in Singapore.

"You’ll acquire the go-to market here, you’ll implement it elsewhere. Singapore is very important,” says Trevor. He adds, “Singapore is the connective tissue of a lot of countries. When we look at Singapore we don’t think about Singapore as just this location here. We think about Singapore as the connective tissue to other parts of Asia.”

On mobile advertising, Trevor thinks that the market is still pretty much untapped. Most people have the perception that by having online advertisement campaigns, they are some how conquering the mobile segment as well. Mobile advertisement campaigns should be more focused, lean, fast, straight to the point and individual-oriented.

Trevor adds that running start-up companies is not about success, it’s about minimizing failures. He disagrees on the approach of US venture capitals which invest in the best people, products and the biggest market opportunity. Trevor thinks that the sure-win attitude is somehow less spirited and the industry should adopt a more spirited risk-taking approach.

I truly agree with Trevor on this regard.

Trevor hopes that technology start-up phenomenon can blossom in Asia, particularly in Singapore if the immgration restrictions become more relaxed and that more investors are willing to open up and take risks in this region.

Running start-up is about MINIMIZING failures, remember ?

For more details, refer to "Running startup companies is not about success, it’s about minimizing failures” – Trevor Healy, Amobee"

Blog Pageview Benchmark From Google Blog

2012-01-01T14:49:00.000+08:00

Google Blogging (and beyond) in 2011.

Just how much attention you can get from a blog post ? We can make use of Google Blog as benchmark.

The less popular amongst the top 10 posts of 2011

Google+ Pages: connect with all the things you care about - 237,467 unique pageviews.

The most popular amongst the top 10 posts of 2011

Ten years later - 1,731,280 unique pageviews.

So, over a million unique pageviews (over a period of 1 year) is the number.

Tech Blog Malaysia Statistics (Dec 2011)

2012-01-01T11:06:00.000+08:00

As usual, check out the analysis for 2010.

For month of Jan 2011.
For month of Feb 2011.
For month of Mar 2011.
For month of Apr 2011.
For month of May 2011.
For month of June 2011.
For month of July 2011.
For month of Aug 2011.
For month of Sep 2011.
For month of Oct 2011.
For month of Nov 2011.

For month of Dec 2011, we have the followings.

Latest PC trend
A famous actress from Malaysia
Name of this blog
Brand of this blog
A famous back-end program
Lifestyle trend in Malaysia
Cisco routing protocol comparison
A common CR 8.5 issue

Overview:

Total unique visitors decreased by as much as 0.007%.
Traffic from referring sites decreased by 0.22%.
Google still top contributor (77.25%). Down from last month.
Top 5 countries (Malaysia, US, India, Indonesia, Singapore). Refer here.
New visitors 86.94% (down from last month).

Mozilla Extended Contract With Google for Another 3 Years

2011-12-29T19:07:00.002+08:00

Refer to 'Malaysia Technology News'

$300 Million Per Year:

Earlier this week, Google and Mozilla said they had struck a deal to renew their search royalty agreement for another three years.

The search giant will pay just under $300 million per year to be the default choice in Mozilla’s Firefox browser, a huge jump from its previous arrangement, due to competing interest from both Yahoo and Microsoft.

Market Share:

Mozilla's Firefox has earlier been reported that its market share dropped to 26.59%. Microsoft's IE also dropped to new low of 40.92%. The latest information on market share for web browser (according to stat counter) stands at:

Microsoft IE 40.92%
Mozilla's Firefox - 26.59%
Google's Chrome - 24.3%
Safari - 5.77%
Opera - 1.77%
Others - 0.65%

Business Model:

The business of model of Firefox has long be subjected to many guesses and industrial debates. How can a company like that survive and yet able to keep up to date with latest trends and regularly provides software updates ?

By default, Firefox is a free and open source software. Most of it is tri-licensed under the Mozilla Public License (MPL), the GNU General Public License (GPL) and the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL).

Like most open source software, the brand name Firefox is trademark and is owned by Mozilla Corporation. The fate of open source software has always been a roller coaster one .

Take MySQL for example, its eventual fate was to be acquired by Sun Microsystem and later by Oracle. Other notable and common open source revenue making activities include:

Technical supports.
Technology consultancy.
Enterprise edition subscriptions.
Proprietary license for full features.
Advertisements.
Alliance with other software.

Firefox's alliance with Google search is another example of how open source software can create revenue from.

In my personal opinion, with its large user database, Firefox also makes money from selling information for market research.

Many analysts have different ideas on business model of Facebook. Most would agree that advertisement generates huge amount of income and also with Facebook credits for games, movies, ebook and etc.

Personally, I feel that companies like Google, Facebook, Yahoo have more to offer than just selling advertising spaces. The fact that these companies have huge amount of real time information just about anything particularly on people, location, date time, activities, behaviour and numbers. These information is most value to market research and consulting companies.

Opera's business model is very similar to Firefox.

Revenues come from almost any sort of activities which leverages on the brand and technology of Opera web browser. Typically, it makes money from content providers such as search engine providers and OEMs (Nokia, Motorola, Ford) who installed Opera browser into their products.

Bit Torrent hasn't got tremendous luck with previous business model such as selling SDKs and technology consulting, is now towards capitalizing on the world of streaming content. Its first major customer is reported as video-service provider Brightcove.

Refer to more on ideas.

Your Car Breakdown Assistance is just One Touch Away

2011-12-28T11:24:00.001+08:00

If your car ever broke down during this holiday season, there’s Kurnia One Touch mobile app that could save you. This app is able to exactly locate your current location and by a press of a single button, an immediate help request is sent to Kurnia Auto Assist 24 hours care line. By knowing your exact location, Kurnia could send immediate help to rescue you. Imagine the time you could save while waiting for the tow truck to find you, especially when you are at unfamiliar places.

This Kurnia One Touch application is available in 3 smartphone platforms; iPhone, Android and Blackberry. Non Kurnia Insurance holders could also use the app, but car towing charges may apply.

In case you’re involved in an accident, this application could also make insurance claims for your Kurnia Motor Insurance in just few taps. User can add up to 16 photos for four different categories (Own vehicle, Injuries, Third party and Sceneries photos), add up to three third party details and three witnesses details. With just few taps these information will be sent to the Kurnia Claim Department for processing.

Kurnia One Touch application has one more special function, where user can view the list of nearby Kurnia branches and workshops, this can ease the users to do further action during accident or car breakdown. Kurnia One Touch also enables the users to set reminder for their road tax and car insurance.

This Kurnia One Touch Application is now ready to download for free from itunes, Android Market and Blackberry Apps World.

These Kurnia One Touch application has been develop by Just Mobile Sdn Bhd, a MSC status company that rapidly developed quality Mobile Applications and Web Applications.

2011 A Year Flashback

2011-12-24T15:52:00.005+08:00

Refer to 2010 A Year Flashback

Top News/Happenings 2011

1.) Jan 2011

2.) Feb 2011

Nokia To Adopt Windows Phone Platform; Finally

3.) Mar 2011

4.) Apr 2011

1Malaysia Email

5. ) May 2011

6.) June 2011

7.) July 2011

8.) Aug 2011

9.) Sept 2011

10.) Oct 2011

11.) Nov 2011

12.) Dec 2011

Top Enterprise IT Trends

Cloud computing.
Security (especially on cloud computing)
Ethernet fabric
Appliances - i.e SAP Hana, Oracle appliances
Storage - i.e SAN, NAS
Green IT
IPv6
Consumerization of IT - this includes social media

Consumer Trends

The two biggest trends are proliferation of mobile devices (tablet PC and smartphone) and group buying (e-commerce).

Apple iPad and Samsung Galaxy Tab being the two most popular tablet PC in Malaysia. In terms of smartphone, it is the war between iPhone and Samsung Galaxy S.

Everybody is playing angry bird, including my young cousins, it is the killer app for 2011.

For group buying, there are more and more companies getting into the business. The ones that I know about are Groupon, Google's Offers, DealMates, MilkADeal, Yahoo MyDeal, Idealised and etc.

Cloud Computing

The year 2011 is the year of cloud computing, there is no single doubt about this.

If you are not into cloud computing, you are literally out of the game.

Here is summary of cloud computing product offerings.

In my personal opinion, I feel that enterprises will not adopt it immediately. The catalysts are developers and SMBs.

Developers want to make money and cloud computing actually provides a way for developers to build large and powerful solution in the garage!

For SMBs, especially those in Malaysia, cloud computing is a blessing because of three reasons:

1.) More developers are developing solutions deployed on cloud.

2.) Big vendors provide solutions on cloud at a lower cost.

3.) Adoption of cloud computing solution has lower entry barrier cost.

In term of entrepreneurship, cloud computing presents an great opportunity for start-ups to break the monopoly of big time players like SAP, Oracle, Microsoft, HP and etc in the enterprise market.

Believe it, this is your chance. And it is moving without de factor steward at the moment. Whoever capable of seizing the moment fast will be able to at least make a cut.

Refer to more on cloud computing.

Conclusion

Apple's iconic CEO Steve Jobs passed away.
Android becomes the most popular mobile platform in the industry, overtaking Apple iOS.
Thailand floods affected storage supplies worldwide.
Cloud computing started off with a bang, all major vendors have invested monies and energy into, resulted in all sort of cloud-oriented products. Year 2011 belongs to cloud computing. It is expected to take off in a bigger way in 2012 because 2011 was about marketing, 2012 should be on adoption. Microsoft predicts that intelligent systems is what comes next after cloud computing.
Google and Paypal created local presence in Malaysia.
Google has been most aggressive and is going into everything from acquiring Motorola to competing with Apple, Facebook, Paypal and Groupon.
Consumers are all into tablet PC and smartphones. The typical smartphone user (in Malaysia): 25-34 years old, high educated and working
Adobe finally relieved attention on Flash and starts to focus on HTML5. This presents a massive opportunity for HTML 5 conversion from Adobe Flash. For those in the graphic industry.

Thanks for reading. Happy New Year !!

Refer to more on trends.

Which Tablet PC To Buy In Malaysia ? #4

2011-12-23T23:57:00.005+08:00

Which Tablet PC To Buy In Malaysia ? (Apple, BlackBerry, HTC, Acer, AsusTek, Creative, Samsung, Motorola, HP, MSI).

Which Tablet PC To Buy In Malaysia ? #2 (Fujitsu, Sony, Dell, Huawei)

Which Tablet PC To Buy In Malaysia ? #3 (Amazon, Motorola, Quad, Toshiba)

Brand	Model	OS	Web	Pricing	Desc	Links	Remarks
HP	Multitouch Slate	Windows® Embedded Standard 7	Internet Explorer	RM 2,299	Intel® Atom™ Z670, Solid State Drive, 2 GB 800 MHz DDR2 SDRAM, Dual camera, battery life (up to 7.5 hours), WiFi? , Bluetooth, integrated 3G Mobile Broadband, Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 600, 8.9" diagonal WSVGA wide-viewing angle touchscreen, 2 USB 2.0 port, HDMI port.	Url	Intel processor, Intel graphics,, target enterprise users, A TPM Embedded Security Chip helps protects data, BIOS support for Computrace Pro(5), supports HP Slate Digital Pen
Fujitsu	Stylistic q550	Microsoft Windows® 7	Internet Explorer	RM 3,770	Intel® Atom™Z670 processor (1.50GHz), 10.1 inch WXGA Wide view high bright LED Anti-glare touchscreen display, 30GB / 62GB SSD SATA, WiFi, Bluetooth, 3G, Intel® GMA600 Graphics, Dual camera, 4 USB ports.	Url	Intel processor, target enterprise users, Windows® multi-touch capabilities, fingerprint authentication, smart card reader, embedded security chip and encrypted SSD

Conclusion:

The market has now 18 brands with more than 18 different models of tablets to choose from.
Android rules. Windows gaining momentum.
Nokia hasn't announced tablet.
Tablet PC is replacing laptops in the enterprise IT arena; cheaper, lighter, easier maintenance, durable and trendy.

More Updates on Tablet PC, Mobile Platform:

HP offers WebOS to open source - There is no way to defeat the open-source Android community which has grown out of proportion.
ARM Launches Free Toolkit For Android Application Developer Community - ARM® Development Studio 5 Community Edition helps Android™ application developers create native software that can run up to 4 times faster than Java code.
BlackBerry delay darkens RIM's future
Nokia first Windows Phone by Jan 2012
More than 10bn apps have now been downloaded by Google’s smartphone users
Singapore arm forces to deploy iPad - There is no chance of customized tablet PC for military purposes ? They are just going to use it 'off the shelves' directly.
Qualcomm's Quad-core Snapdragon Chips to Hit Tablets Next Year

IBM Reveals Five Innovations That Will Change Our Lives within Five Years

2011-12-23T09:57:00.004+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'.

1.) People power generation

Anything that moves or produces heat has the potential to create energy that can be captured.

2.) Fully integrated biometric solutions in everywhere

Imagine you will be able to walk up to an ATM machine to securely withdraw money by simply speaking your name or looking into a tiny sensor that can recognize the unique patterns in the retina of your eye. Or by doing the same, you can check your account balance on your mobile phone or tablet.

3.) Mind reading

Scientists in the field of bioinformatics have designed headsets with advanced sensors to read electrical brain activity that can recognize facial expressions, excitement and concentration levels, and thoughts of a person without them physically taking any actions.

4.) Digital divide no more

Cheaper mobile devices, equally powerfully computing power.

5.) Analytics, Automation, robotics and A.I

IBM is developing technology that uses real-time analytics to make sense and integrate data from across all the facets of your life such as your social networks and online preferences to present and recommend information that is only useful to you.

If you have having similar ideas, it proves that you are not crazy. You are a visionary!!!

It is happening in 5 years.

Honest speaking, many years ago, I actually thought about something similar to idea no.1 (People power generation). And recent years, I have ideas on idea no. 5 (Analytics, Automation, robotics and A.I). So, I am also a visionary.

For budding start-ups out there, I don't need to tell you more right ? If you can just own 1% of IBM's market share, it is much better than owning 99% of what you are having now. And the good news is that you have 5 years to prepare yourself.

Check out more on trends.

Symantec on Top Threats Targeting Mobile Devices

2011-12-21T00:59:00.000+08:00

Refer to 'Malaysia Technology News'.

Top threats targeting mobile devices to date.

Web- & Network-based Attacks
Malware
Social Engineering Attacks
Resource Abuse
Data Loss
Data Integrity Threats

Check out more on trends.

2012 Technology Trends from Intel

2011-12-18T09:58:00.000+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'

1.) Ultrabook - Ultrabook is similar to Apple's Macbook Air. The challenge is creation of laptops which are way much thinner and equally powerful as it predecessor.

2.) Big Data - cheaper storage more capacity, more data, more analytics, semantic and patterns

3.) Secured Software - security, security, security

4.) Manufacturing Technology Goes 3-D

5.) DIY Data Creation - Analytics, social media.

IBM Developed Best Practice for To Improve Safety of Pork Business

2011-12-16T17:39:00.001+08:00

IBM and a company in China (Shandong Commercial Group Co.Ltd) announced that they have built a system that will help with ensuring safety of pork products. The system will also help to improve efficiency of food supply chain in the region.

Pork is a big business in China. In 2006, a fatal outbreak of porcine blue-ear disease killed millions of Chinese pigs. These losses represented a tiny portion of the country’s total herd of more than 660 million, but led to soaring pork prices.

The core idea behind such system is to enable ability of monitoring and tracing of movement of the meat across all phases of the supply chain. It is expected to be fully deployed by 2013.

Using IBM WebSphere software running on IBM System x Servers, experts from IBM China Development Lab and China’s National Engineering Research Center for Agricultural Products Logistics have created a pork monitoring and tracking system that can extract and store actionable business information from the millions of interconnected sensors that make up the “Internet of Things.”

In the event that a consumer’s illness can be linked to pork produced in the Shandong Province, Lushang Group’s new system will be able to pinpoint the stores that have the tainted food is, arrange a targeted recall and in turn, minimize the number of people who get sick, while keeping pork that is safe available for purchase.

Such initiative is being categorized as IBM Smart Food initiative by IBM where it is providing technology and expertise to create a smarter, safer food supply for consumers around the world.

For more information, refer to 'Made in IBM Labs: China’s Shandong Province Teams with IBM to Improve Safety of Pork'

Malaysian pork businesses should look into this very seriously. The Malaysian pork industry has suffered couple of mishaps over the years, lately being the discovery that errant traders circulated expired pork products to consumer.

Networking Industry Veteran Doug Ingraham to Lead Brocade Alliances

2011-12-15T14:13:00.000+08:00

Brocade NASDAQ: BRCD) today announced the appointment of Doug Ingraham to the position of vice president of Alliances. Within this role, Ingraham will oversee the Brocade Strategic Technology and OEM Alliances business units, as well as the Strategic Program Council. Ingraham will report directly to Brocade CMO, John McHugh.

“Alliances is an extremely dynamic area within Brocade, and Doug’s impressive track record of business portfolio management—combined with his deep networking technology expertise—makes him the ideal person to lead this charter,” said John McHugh, CMO of Brocade. “In addition, his extensive background in strategic partner management will enable us to uncover fresh new business opportunities that leverage the power of partnerships to further innovation.”

In this new role, Ingraham will oversee several key areas relating to Brocade Alliances initiatives, with a specific focus on forging new alliances and deepening existing relationships with Strategic Technology Alliance and OEM partners. Ingraham will also oversee the establishment of a program framework for the development of cloud ecosystem alliance partners to educate and extol the benefits of solutions built upon Brocade® Virtual Compute Block technology and the Brocade CloudPlex™ architecture.

For over two decades, Ingraham has been a fixture within the networking industry, applying his leadership skills to a variety of roles. Prior to joining Brocade, Ingraham held positions at Cisco Systems, StorageTek and AT&T, where he oversaw engineering and marketing efforts related to data and storage networking products.

Ingraham joined Brocade through the acquisition of McDATA in 2006. Most recently, Ingraham served as vice president of Product Management for Brocade Data Center products, where he set the strategic direction for the company’s Fibre Channel business and led the market introduction of the Brocade VDX® family of products, the industry’s first true Ethernet fabric switching solutions for highly virtualized and cloud-optimized data centers.

A frequent speaker at industry trade shows and an active contributor to wide-ranging discussions on the networking industry, Ingraham holds a B.S. in Computer Science and an M.B.A. from the University of Minnesota.

“The networking industry is at an interesting crossroads in light of the IT transformation that’s currently underway and, with our strong reputation for innovation, Brocade is well-positioned to seize market opportunities as they present themselves,” said Doug Ingraham, vice president of Alliances at Brocade. “It’s certainly an exciting time to be in networking and I am looking forward to working in close collaboration with our partners to bring about continued innovation that results in best-in-class solutions that our customers can deploy with ease and confidence.”

Solarwinds Network Management Products Now More Integrated And Easier To Use

2011-12-14T19:26:00.001+08:00

SolarWinds® Inc. (NYSE: SWI), a leading provider of powerful and affordable IT management software, today rolled out enhancements and further integration of two of its flagship Network management products, SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM), and SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager (NCM).

Designed to be mixed and matched based on customers’ needs, SolarWinds robust suite of network management software includes NPM, NCM, NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, IP Address Manager, IP SLA Manager, User Device Tracker, Engineer’s Toolset, LANsurveyor, ipMonitor, and CatTools. In addition, SolarWinds offers IT software products to manage virtualization, storage, application and server, and log and event needs.

In 2011, SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) was awarded: Gold in the Windows IT Pro Editors’ Best and Community Choice Awards; Network Management Product of the Year by UK-based Network Computing; Best non-Microsoft Network Management Product by Microsoft’s Redmond Magazine; and won the Network Monitoring category in the WindowsNetworking.com Reader’s Choice Awards.

SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor (NPM) v10.2 includes the following features:

Enhanced discovery and protocol support for IPv6 devices, Windows servers using WMI, and SNMPv3 traps traffic
Improved native support for wireless devices, Juniper firewall sub-interface monitoring, and CPU and memory data monitoring for JunOS and Netscreen devices
Improved ease-of-use and reporting, including statistics on a per-CPU basis for many devices

SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager (NCM) v7.0 includes the following features:

New features and UI improvements including a change approval request feature that allows for approval by a reviewer of sensitive changes
Improved node discovery and management from web console and availability of Network Atlas to standalone NCM customers, to create topology maps on network devices
Improved Orion alerting integrated with other products in the Orion family; NCM users can seamlessly keep their device repository synchronized with their NPM repository
Improved account management including a new web-based user management feature and Active Directory integration improvements

SolarWinds Customer Feedback:

“I just tried out the beta and the first thing I did was run an import. IT WAS AWESOME! It was like seeing a sunset for the first time,” said customer and thwack user Donald Francis. “I want to say how awesome it is to see the features list for each new release contain at least one of the features that I have requested. I love that SolarWinds is so interactive with their user community,” said customer and thwack member Byrona.

Additional Resources

What’s New in NPM 10.2
What’s New in NCM 7.0
Orion Network Performance Monitor on Network Performance Management Resources (Videos on Best Practices, Products)
Orion Network Configuration Manager Resources (Product Tour, How-To Videos, Best Practices)

Pricing and Availability

SolarWinds Network Performance Monitor is available now and pricing starts at US$2,475. SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager is available now and pricing starts at US$2,495.

The first year of maintenance is included for both products. For more information, visit the SolarWinds website, download a free 30-day evaluation, or call +65 593 7600.

Proposed Computing Professionals Bill 2011 Generated Mixed Reaction

2011-12-14T08:35:00.001+08:00

Refer to Malaysia Technology News

The proposed Computing Professionals Bill 2011 for the setup of the Board of Computing Professionals Malaysia (BCPM) very recently was received with mixed reaction from the ICT community.

MOSTI, the body who proposed it, had organized an open-day on 13 Dec 2011 to gather feedbacks.

Most people in the industry thought that it is not very relevant to the industry.

Deputy Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Datuk Fadillah Yusof likened it to bodies such as the Malaysian Medical Association and the Malaysian Institute of Architects.

MCA Young Professionals Bureau has warned that the proposed Bill could potentially force companies to relocate or shut down due to a lack of human capital.

Personally, I feel that there is a need to encourage certain form of professional element in the software development, ICT networking industry which is currently vendor-technology-oriented.

For more information, refer to IT Qualification Draft Bill Proposed.

Oracle and Java Updates 2011

2011-12-11T11:50:00.004+08:00

Oracle bought Sun Microsystem in 2009-2010 and now Oracle is continuing the efforts on Java roadmap.

The core components of Java can be categorized into:

Java SE 8 - Java standard edition - desktop technology
Java FX 2.0 - Java on the client - rich client technology
Java ME - Java Micro Edition - mobile technology
Java EE 7 - Java Enterprise edition - web based technology

The updates (Proposed JDK 8 Features) announced by Oracle on October are:

Lambda expressions (”closures”) for higher developer productivity, better leveraging of multi-core CPUs, and bulk data-processing enhancements to the Java collections APIs.
A Java-native module system (“Project Jigsaw”) which will simplify the construction, packaging, and deployment of applications, and also enable a fully-modular Java platform which allows customized deployments on servers, clients, and embedded systems.
Improvements for JavaScript on the JVM, including Nashorn – a brand new JavaScript? engine optimized for the JVM -– and full * Java/JavaScript interoperability.
A next-generation Java Client in the form of JavaFX 3.0.
Modern device support, including multi-touch.
Completion of the HotSpot/JRockit JVM convergence project, including performance enhancements and a second-generation Java Flight Recorder.

Oracle Application Development Framework (ADF) Mobile:

Oracle ADF is an end-to-end Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) framework that simplifies application development by providing out of the box infrastructure services and a visual and declarative development experience.

It is provided for customers under the OTN JDeveloper License Agreement. It is similar to Microsoft .NET framework. Oracle Application Development Framework (ADF) Mobile sits on top of Oracle Application Development Framework.

The updates for ADF Mobile are:

Developers can benefit from the latest Oracle ADF Mobile capabilities to extend Oracle ADF to mobile users through:
- Simplified mobile application development: enables mobile developers to develop once and deploy to multiple device platforms, Oracle ADF Mobile prevents mobile applications from having to be re-developed from the ground up whenever a new mobile platform needs to be supported.
- Strong native device services integration: allows mobile developers to create rich enterprise mobile applications that leverage the full capabilities of smart phones, including calendars, cameras and GPS.
- Tight integration with Oracle Fusion Middleware and Oracle Applications: enables Oracle customers to easily extend enterprise processes and data to mobile users.
- Re-use existing Oracle developer skills: Oracle developers can leverage existing Oracle ADF application development expertise to declaratively create mobile applications without having to learn new languages or development paradigms.
- Consistent performance and availability: Oracle ADF Mobile applications can operate regardless of network condition or availability.

Why you should use Oracle ADF ?

Leverage on stable enterprise application framework.
Create apps which are capable of integrating with Oracle software ecosystem. This is good for startups who wanted to integrate applications with Oracle's software through Oracle Fusion Middleware.

Development Tools:

Developers can leverage on NetBeans IDE 7.1, the de facto software development tools for Java programming.

The NetBeans IDE is available for Windows, Mac, Linux and Oracle Solaris, and is the first IDE to support the latest specifications and standards in the Java Platform. It supports PHP, JavaScript and Ajax, and C/C++.

NetBeans IDE 7.0 also delivered enhanced integration with Oracle WebLogic Server 11g and industry leading Java EE 6 support for Oracle Database, GlassFish Server Open Source Edition 3.1 and Oracle Oracle GlassFish Server 3.1.

NetBeans Community Distributions are available under a Dual License consisting of the Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL) v1.0 and GNU General Public License (GPL) v2.

Cloud Computing:

Java Web Based application can be hosted on the following cloud computing environment.

1.) Redhat Openshift

A PaaS (Platform as a service) provided by Redhat which supports open source programming languages, namely Java PHP Ruby Python Perl.

2.) Google App Engine.

A PaaS (Platform as a service) provided by Google which supports open source programming languages, namely Java, Python, Go.

EITN Knows Everything

2011-12-10T10:41:00.000+08:00

The Enterprise IT News portal (EITN) knows everything in the ICT industry.

It is a good source for information to facilitate analysis, creating strategy and decision making before making the next business move.

To get yourself equipped with latest happenings, leverage on its rss feeds.

Microsoft Announces Metro Style App and Window Store

2011-12-10T10:12:00.001+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'.

Microsoft recently announced the Windows Store for metro style app.

What is metro style app ?

It is referring to writing apps using a combination of familiar technologies such as HTML5, JavaScript? , and Cascading Style Sheets, Level 3 (CSS3), or XAML, with C++, C#, or Microsoft Visual Basic code-behind.

Windows store is built as part of Windows 8 and Internet Explorer 10, for distribution of apps in many ways similar to Apple's AppStore.

The store app catalog will be indexed by search engines especially by BING.

Developers can also promote apps from their websites, not just with “available in the Windows Store” logos, but with built-in promotion through Internet Explorer 10. With just a line of markup, your website promotes your app via the app button within the browser, visible to anyone running Internet Explorer 10 on Windows 8.

The Windows Store will be available in 231 markets worldwide.

The store also empowers developers to reach enterprise market, transcending conventional layers of business barrier. This is a good thing for the economy.

On the other hand, it also allows enterprises to have more controls in terms of application management whereby enterprises can choose to limit access to the Windows Store catalog by their employees, or allow access but restrict certain apps.

The store provides full platform support for free apps, trials (both time-based and feature-based trials) and paid apps, including in-app purchase. And we have sales analytics that will help you target customers more effectively.

To get started, individual registration fee will be $49 USD ($99 USD for companies).

Microsoft will share up to 80% of the revenue generated from app sales. Microsoft will take 20%.

Windows Store presents a plaftorm for developers to have flexibility in terms of business model. Gone are those days where software are sold in CDs with serial number stickers. Subscription based supports time-based and feature-differentiated deployment and in-app purchases for trial version.

Using in-app purchase (especially for games), players can upgrade to new levels right in context, as they play the game. No app reloads or restarts required, and all the settings are retained.

Transaction platform is available to cater for time-based subscription.

And when it comes to time-based subscription, trust with highest integrity is most expected and this is what customers can rely on Microsoft.

Developers can also fund their businesses by embedding ads into the apps even using Google Ads because it supports web technologies, or any other ad platform they prefer.

In short, Window Store is a great way for Microsoft to kick off the concept of Metro style application development. Metro style app development is a new direction for software development which will embrace mobile app development in a comprehensive manner.

CBN Pilots New Cloud Computing Services in Indonesia with Brocade

2011-12-08T20:41:00.000+08:00

CBN, one of Indonesia’s pioneering Internet service providers, has broken new ground by establishing a cloud computing data center using Ethernet fabric switching from Brocade® (Nasdaq: BRCD). The new data center infrastructure enables CBN to build a new revenue stream by offering cloud-based application services that meet the increasingly sophisticated requirements of business customers.

In a service provider market dominated by large local and international state-owned enterprises, CBN has had to maintain a competitive edge through service quality and innovation. The move to build an infrastructure platform capable of delivering high-value cloud computing services places CBN ahead of the curve and gives it the opportunity to establish a valuable new market position in Indonesia’s vibrant Telecommunications sector, which has registered real GDP growth of 6.5 percent year-over-year in the first quarter of 2011, driven by private consumption and investment. (1) Indonesia reaffirmed its position as one of the more attractive emerging telecoms markets in Asia Pacific after the country overtook India in this quarter’s BMI business environment ratings update.

1. Indonesia Telecommunications Report Q4 2011 - BMI

To streamline development and deployment of new cloud-based services, CBN is leveraging CA 3Tera App Logic to virtualize conventional n-tier web applications and then running them on a scalable grid computing infrastructure. CBN turned to the Brocade VDX 6720 Data Center Switches to provide a single-layer 10 Gigabit Ethernet backbone network for the grid, enabling low-latency any-to-any connections among the grid servers and the virtual machines they host. CBN also deployed Brocade FastIron WS648G Ethernet switches in a separate front-end network that connects the cloud-computing grid to the routing infrastructure at the heart of the company's IP service network.

“We are once again pioneering new technology and new services in the Indonesian market,” said Tony Hariman, CTO of CBN. “In this position it is very important to invest in infrastructure that enables us to scale as the business develops, and to maintain low operational overheads. Brocade's Ethernet fabric solution enables us to start small as we develop our initial application service offering and then to easily expand the cloud-computing data center as these services are rolled-out and gain market traction. The level of automation provided by the Brocade VDX switches helps us create autonomic infrastructure that more or less manages itself.”

CBN is one of more than 300 Brocade customers that have deployed the Brocade VDX switches since their introduction in January 2011. Recently, Brocade introduced a second wave of Brocade VDX switches, the Brocade VDX 6710 and Brocade VDX 6730, which added new features, performance, and functionality all purpose-built for the rigors of highly virtualized data centers and cloud computing.

“Indonesia is a member of the G20 and one of the best-performing emerging economies, with a large and diverse domestic market,” said Gina Tan, director of Brocade South East Asia. “Viewed in this context, CBN's move into cloud-computing services makes perfect sense since it can offer cost-effective application services to meet the increasingly sophisticated needs of local businesses. Brocade Global Services, our professional services arm, has been deeply involved in helping CBN realize its technical vision and move toward its strategic business objective.”

Product details:

Brocade VDX and FWS Series

A Year in Malaysian Search: Google's Top Searches of 2011

2011-12-07T19:58:00.000+08:00

Today Google is releasing its annual Zeitgeist lists for Malaysia: this year’s hottest selection of search terms on google.com.my. The lists offer a unique glimpse through the collective eyes of Malaysian searchers into the big events, memorable moments and emerging trends that captivated us as a nation throughout 2011.

This year’s fastest rising searches reveal that in addition to social networking and launching Angry Birds at green pigs, Malaysians love a good laugh, with local reality TV show Maharaja Lawak landing the third spot.

When it comes to TV, Malaysians clearly love reality: America’s Next Top Model (ANTM), X Factor USA and American Idol 2011 were the most-searched for TV shows this year. ‘Tonton’ and ‘what is ppvrip’ were also popular searches, indicating that Malaysians are bringing their appreciation for TV online.

Tech-crazy Malaysians had plenty of technology trends to plug into this year. Gadgets both real and rumored grabbed four out of the top ten fastest rising search queries: iPhone5, iPad2, Samsung Galaxy and Android were all popular searches. Turning to Google with their tech-related questions, Malaysians asked “What is …” to find out more about ‘iPad,’ ‘hacking’ and ‘jailbreak.’

Singer-songwriter Bruno Mars, who visited Malaysia in April, leads a list of the fastest rising people searched which includes three other international music stars -- Avril Lavigne, Rihanna and of course Justin Bieber, whose baby face topped the list of most popular image searches this year. Malaysians also turned to image search to discover what fixed-gear bicycles look like as fixie culture took off, and to see Domo-kun, the furry mascot of Japan's NHK television station.

The fastest rising Malaysian searched for was YouTube sensation Cikgu Shida, who has garnered a large following miming to local and international hit songs. Other Malaysians making the lists are young bloggers Fatin Liyana and Haniz Zalikha, politician Anwar Ibrahim, cleric Ustaz Kazim and muslimah designer Hana Tajima, who created a wave of headscarf fashion locally.

When it’s time for travel, Malaysians stick to what’s familiar -- beaches and big cities. Searches for Su Mei Island, Maldives and Caribbean balanced with Hong Kong, Taipei and New York. Disneyland is also popular with Malaysians, with both Paris and Hong Kong Disneylands showing up as top international travel destinations.

Google spokesperson Zeffri Yusof says: “Google’s year-end Zeitgeist is a cultural barometer that reveals just about everything that has us excited, curious or plain wanting to know more. From leaders, celebrities, current affairs to pop culture, sports and everything in between, search trends reveal what’s on the collective Malaysian mind.”

Google Malaysian Zeitgeist: Most popular and fastest-rising searches for 2011

Fastest rising searches

Facebook
Angry Birds
Maharaja Lawak
iPhone 5
Samsung Galaxy
iPad2
Jawatan kosong
Android
Tonton
Aishiteru

Fastest rising people

Bruno Mars
Hana Tajima
Cikgu Shida
Avril Lavigne
Anwar Ibrahim
Fatin Liyana
Justin Bieber
Rihanna
Ustaz Kazim
Hanis Zalikha

Top news stories

ipad 2
Malaysian grand prix
Kennedy space center
Kentucky derby
Japan nuclear crisis
MTV movie awards
Michael Jackson funeral
Malaysian open
Thailand flood
Malaysia budget 2012

Top image searches

Justin Bieber
Background designs
Fixie bike
Domo Kun
Monster energy
Supra shoes
Jules Verne
Smiley face
Kartun muslimah
Chelsea Olivia

Top ‘what is...’ searches

what is bersih
what is g6
what is ppvrip
what is ipad
what are words
what is jailbreak
what is android
what is lmao
what is hacking
what is information

Top TV shows

ANTM
x factor usa
american idol 2011
amazing race 18
tvb drama 2011
nagamma serial
supernatural
bones season 7
Al Jazeera
My Princess

Top international travel destinations

Kowloon/Hong Kong
Su Mei Island, Thailand
Phuket Island
Bangkok
Maldives
Disneyland Hong Kong
Taipei
Paris Disneyland
New York
Caribbean

Top blogs

Blog Serius
Beautifunara
Papagomo
Jejariruncing
Honeykoyuki
Oh Bulan
Kari ngeri
Malaymoviesfull
My Resipi
IniBelogSaya

2012: Year of ‘Bring Your Own Device’, Big Data and Cloud’s Gathering Pace

2011-12-07T19:50:00.000+08:00

2011 was a year of significant IT innovation, with major advances in both consumer and business sectors. It was also the year of ‘cloud’, but as we say goodbye to 2011, what does 2012 have in store for us?

Gina Tan, South East Asia Regional Director at Brocade (Nasdaq: BRCD) looks into her crystal ball to outline the top five technology trends we should watch out for in 2012:

BYOD’ (Bring Your Own Device) changes IT procurement – the company PC is becoming a thing of the past, as businesses increasingly allow, and even encourage, employees to bring their domestic, consumer devices into the workplace and access corporate applications. This will allow application availability at anytime, from anywhere, and will help business slash procurement costs. The smartphone/tablet phenomenon will fuel this trend, and will drive uptake of Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), wireless networking and end-point security solutions in the corporate arena. However, it will create many problems for IT departments as they attempt to mitigate risk, and signals a tough future for PC and laptop manufacturers. Next year, I believe we will see at least one high profile security disaster as a result of this trend, and that will be a wake-up call for companies to get proper security processes in place before unlocking their networks to all and sundry.
Campus LAN gets smart – with ‘BYOD’, the growth of smartphone/tablet usage among consumers and the Unified Communications market set to triple by 2015, the Campus LAN will have to step up to the plate to meet demand - 2012 will be the year the campus gets smart. Legacy environments will not be able to cope with the huge pressures being placed on them; high-performance applications (such as video streaming, IPTV, real-time image transfer and distance learning) will suffer as a result and productivity/revenue/brand reputation will fall. I predict that by the summer of 2012, we’ll see enterprise-class characteristics introduced into campus LAN solutions at a more affordable price point. This level of innovation will, for the first time, give companies the simplicity and performance required to meet modern business demands and transform the way campus-wide networks are engineered.
Rise of ‘Cloud Service Revenue’ – 2011 saw organisations slowly moving towards the cloud and this pragmatic adoption will continue in 2012, but will also see the rise of a new form of revenue generation as enterprises from outside the technology sector move towards ‘Cloud Service Provision’. In the current economy, businesses look to sweat every asset at their disposal and more and more will look to leverage their data centre environments to offer cloud services as an additional revenue stream. Those companies wishing to address this burgeoning market will need to have the right data centre architecture in place – a highly virtualised, fabric-based network topology, delivering reliability and performance to meet strict SLAs – to respond to customer demands, and I predict that we will see some high profile casualties as a result of providers trying to make a fast buck.
Greater commoditisation – IT commoditisation will continue through 2012. The maturity of server virtualisation means that hardware is less important; as real estate/energy costs spiral and companies look to reduce capital outlay (CapEx), virtualisation strategies will permeate all companies and the CXO will become more vocal in whether or not their organization has a plan in place. Traditional, enterprise-owned, clients will become obsolete and businesses will turn to virtualised or even hosted, environments to reduce TCO through procurement of lower cost hardware. Companies that get this right will reap the benefits, but they will need to make sure that the network foundation upon which all virtual environments operate is fit for purpose; get this wrong and soldier on regardless and there will be many, many problems.
Data consumption continues to sky-rocket – 2011 was the year in which ‘Big Data’ stole headlines, but this trend will continue unabated through 2012. The last five years have been awash with new ways to generate, consume and store data – in 2011, the average smartphone user consumed 15Mb of data each day, but this will grow to 1Gb by 2020; as consumers, we will place huge demand on networking and storage resources because of this. Businesses will need to look at innovative solutions to increase network stability and performance while driving down costs to remain competitive. Those who ignore this trend will face major problems, and we may see one or two more examples!
And finally… the year of the FABRIC – Holistic data centre fabrics – from the storage environment through to the Ethernet network – are going to be the big trend in 2012. All my previous predictions will rely on this. Fabric-based architectures will become mainstream, building on the success of early adopter businesses that have reaped the benefits of flat, reliable, high performance networks that can offer simplified management and increased business agility. This trend will see a fundamental attitude-shift to data centre design, and will underpin many of the aforementioned predictions. After all, the network is the heart and lungs of modern business and without it simple actions like sending an email or accessing a document, taken for granted by all of us, would be impossible. Fabrics will revolutionise network design and change the networking landscape… forever.

For more information, please visit www.brocade.com.

EFO iPazzport Skype Voice Mini Wireless Keyboard, Mouse and Multi-Touchpad with Microphone and Speaker for SKYPE, Google talk, MSN Chat

2011-12-03T18:39:00.001+08:00

EFO iPazzport Voice Mini Wireless Keyboard, Mouse and Multi-touchpad with Skype Phone having the full remote control of computer as well as voice communication over 10 meters distance away. It is the new hot product that meeting the latest technology V Voice Assessment to Text in 10 meters away. The voice assessment is one of the new features that iPhone 4GS just announced.

EFO new design with the top case in Classic Chromed Bronze which is some kind of fashion, and creativeness beyond the old colors that either Black or White. It keeps with the traditional tiny and handy but full features.

The layout of the keyboard is similar to BlackBerry that can simply use two thumbs to type. Besides the fully QWERTY feature, it added with more function keys and hot keys in supporting of our unique features such as multi-languages keyboard, volume control, page flipping and voice recording etc. Other than keys, it also with additional features like rechargeable Lithium-ion battery and backlight etc.

EFO turns out a wider touchpad, because it provides more additional features than any other similar mini wireless Keyboard: EFO keyboard gives scrolling and multi-touch (two fingers for enlarging photo or flipping pictures).

EFO released the new model with Voice is because of the new wave of the Google TV or Android IPTV or Smart TV¡¦s that growing very fast and users happy with talking in Skype Phone privately or playing Android Games away from the TV screen or large monitor. A wireless keyboard that with headset is the necessary. EFO iPazzport Mini Wireless Keyboard with Mic/speaker for Skype Phone is customized to meet this need. Other than Skype Phone feature, Youtube is also very hot application. Most Youngster always download music or songs for Karaoke. EFO iPazzport mini wireless keyboard, mic and speaker also also suit for this need.

The EFO iPazzport Voice Mini Wireless Keyboard, Mouse, Multi-Touchpad and with Mic and speaker that having another unique feature as it can work as a "Wireless MUSIC Transmitter". Just simply plug the EFO¡¦s Audio outlet to a Hi-FI amplifier then the music at your Mac or any computer can transmit over 10 meters wirelessly.

Product Link
Price : US$50
Demonstration Video at Youtube

Tech Blog Malaysia Statistics (Nov 2011)

2011-12-03T18:30:00.000+08:00

A famous back-end program
Prepaid mobile broadband packages
Latest ICT trends
MS .NET reporting component
A celebrity in Malaysia
Cisco routing protocols

Overview:

Total monthly traffic increased by as much as 1.35%.
Traffic from referring sites decreased by 3.55%.
Google still top contributor (77.58%).Up from last month.
Top 5 countries (Malaysia, US, India, U.K, Singapore). Refer here.
New visitors 87.94% (up from last month).

Exabytes Flexi Cloud, The Future Of Websites, E-Commerce And Web Hosting

2011-12-03T10:13:00.002+08:00

Cloud computing or cloud hosting is the latest technology which makes use of the Internet to store applications, website files as well as data instead of on a physical server and in turn enables consumers and businesses to use the applications on their own websites such as a company's accounting system on any personal computer without installations, purchases of software licenses and upgrade of hardware. Undeniably the future of IT, cloud hosting offers numerous advantages to website owners and businesses such as unlimited computing and website power on demand, guaranteed website performance and experience, pay only as you use, self-healing website and virtual hardware, easy implementation, more internal IT resources as well as 24×7 reliable technical support. A good example of cloud technology users is Gmail which has millions of users who always enjoy the fastest website loading speed even in peak hours.

Exabytes Flexi Cloud, the one of its kind and the first full fledged Cloud Hosting Service in Malaysia is set to offer businesses and consumers greater flexibility and cost effectiveness. “First, Exabytes Flexi Cloud gives your websites unlimited computing power such as bandwidth, RAM, CPU power, etc on demand whenever you need it. Thus, issues like website or server downtime and slow website loading speed during peak-hour traffic surge are thrown out of the window while superb website experience and performance are guaranteed. Second, it enables users to pay less and save costs during web traffic off peak as users are only billed based on how much they use and not how long they use. The billing system of cloud hosting is likened to an electric meter. Third, if your server hardware or virtual machine fails, your site will automatically be moved to other servers within the cloud and recovers in minutes. Fourth, cloud hosting is very easy to implement as you no longer need to purchase any software licenses or hardware as no server setups are necessary. After confirmation, your website will be up in minutes. Fifth, with cloud hosting, you are shifting the burden of your in-house IT team to your cloud hosting provider, to take care of all your server needs so that your team can focus on eCommerce related tasks. Last, your virtual machines are supported by a team of highly professional IT experts who work 24×7 to eliminate all your technical concerns,” said KS Chan, CEO of Exabytes.

Applications of Cloud Hosting

Social Media Sites

For owners of social media sites on which members extensively share photos, videos and music, the adoption of cloud hosting allows smooth surfing during traffic surge in peak hours and cost saving during off peak.

Web Applications

For owners of e-Commerce sites that run multiple web applications such as order status check, file sharing, data storing simultaneously, cloud hosting improves website loading speed without having to make extensive investment on hardware.

Facebook Applications

For program / game developers of Facebook, hosting their applications / games on cloud ensures the websites run at optimum speed even if visitors access / browse them from a remote location.

Business Applications

Owners of e-Commerce sites can avoid site overloading when multiple customers simultaneously place their orders, make payments and chat on live chat. With cloud hosting, e-Commerce site owners focus on their e-Business and profits instead of the hardware.

For more information on Exabytes Flexi Cloud, visit: http://www.exabytes.com.my/cloud/flexi-cloud-nodes/

Why Exabytes Network?

Established in 2001, Exabytes Network has been the largest web hosting provider in Malaysia since 2005 in terms of numbers of subscribers and IT facilities and currently serves more than 50,000 clients in over 121 countries. Its commitments to customers include 24x7x365 professional technical support, 100% Customer Satisfaction Guarantee, 100-Day Money Back, friendly customer service team, 99.9% Network Uptime and 99.5% Server Uptime Guarantee.

Enterprise Disk Storage
Exabytes’ Cloud Storage is powered by multiple units of DELL Equalogic which provide you with extremely reliable and scalable enterprise grade SANS storage that's configured as RAID 10. It allows users to add more storage on demand without the need to migrate the servers or change to new hard drives. Nightly, Weekly, Monthly and on Demand backups are included while managed Snapshot and Incremental backup are optional.

For partner benefits and details of other promotions and products of Exabytes Network which include shared web hosting, dedicated server hosting, reseller hosting, SSL web certificate, website builders (InstantWebsite.my), Virtual Private Servers (VPS), Content Delivery Network (CDN), server management, Ebuzz Email/Voice/SMS Marketing, Kaspersky Hosted Email Security, TRUSTe Privacy Services, Server Co-location, student hosting, charity hosting, hosted eCommerce platform (Easy.my), domain registrations, etc, please visit http://www.exabytes.my

More on cloud computing.

Minister of Tourism Malaysia Launches Kaspersky Lab Protects Low Yat Plaza Cyber Security Protection CSR Program

2011-12-03T09:54:00.002+08:00

Kaspersky Lab, a leading developer of secure content and threat management solutions launched the continuation of its intensive cyber protection education and awareness campaign in partnership with premier IT lifestyle shopping mall Low Yat Plaza, to promote safer computing habits among Malaysians amid increasing web-borne threats, here today.

The signing of the memorandum of understanding for the campaign between Kaspersky Lab and Low Yat Plaza was witnessed by the Minister of Tourism, Dato’ Sri Dr Ng Yen Yen, with a colourful light up of the mall’s festive décor kicking off the campaign.

The Kaspersky Lab Protects Low Yat Plaza campaign which will enter its third year will see more than 600 retail outlets in Low Yat Plaza protected by the brand’s award-winning Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 security solution, at no charge to tenants, as part of Kaspersky Lab’s CSR campaign to educate retailers and end-users on the need for genuine, top-notch cyber security protection for a safer digital experience.

According to Dato’ Sri Dr. Ng, the Ministry of Tourism welcomes beneficial partnerships between brands and retailers as it will appeal to foreign tourists who view Malaysia as a prime shopping destination.

“Consumer technology related retail tourism is a lucrative market that more local organisations should explore, with Low Yat Plaza a prime example of how it can be done correctly – a well-organised, consumer-friendly specialist mall that has all the goodies that gadget-hungry tourists are looking for, under one roof. The mall’s partnership with a Kaspersky Lab further enhances its stature and reputation among tourists while protecting against the cyber threats,” Dato’ Sri Dr Ng said.

Based on a Kaspersky Lab study, the percentage of fraudulent emails in spam traffic increased significantly from 0.1% last quarter to 2% of all spam traffic in the third quarter of 2011 alone – an increase of 20 times, underlining that users are very much open to vulnerabilities when not well protected by high-quality, legal, up-to-date security solutions.

“A major vulnerability that cyber criminals leverage is the use of illegal, out-of-date security solutions. For users of technology devices such as computers, smartphones, tablets and other devices this is akin to leaving your house doors and windows open and hoping that no one will come in and misuse or steal your possessions, in this case your data and your very identity. We have found that by educating retailers and letting them experience the benefit of our security solution allows them to share their user experience with customers more effectively, thereby spreading the message on the importance of cyber protection,” explained Kaspersky Lab Channel Sales Director South East Asia, Mr Jimmy Fong.

According to Polis Diraja Malaysia’s data, reported losses in the country due to cybercrime was at RM 22.3 million[1] <#_ftn1> worth in 2009, with the figure rising to RM62 million last year. Based on their estimates over the next five years losses due to cybercrime will rise to RM 2.73 billion unless more is done to protect individuals and organizations against cyber criminals.

According to the General Manager, Property Management & Operations, Low Yat Plaza, Mr. Michael Lee, Plaza Low Yat tenants are at high risk of cyber threats since much of the business at the mall is conducted digitally.

“Our tenants need superior online security because an increasing percentage of their business transactions store credit card details, contact information, purchase history and other confidential information. By providing Kaspersky Internet Security 2012 to Plaza Low Yat tenants Kaspersky is protecting the tenants’ databases, transaction records and vital digital information, while educating them on internet security so that they can serve their customers even better. It is a win-win-win situation all around,” Mr. Lee said.

Kaspersky Lab Cybercrime Research Competition Returns

2011-12-03T09:43:00.003+08:00

Kaspersky Lab, a leading developer of secure content and threat management solutions is calling on Malaysian students from universities and other higher education institutions to participate in a research competition on cybercrime.

Kaspersky Lab’s IT Security for the Next Generation and The Asia Cup of Student Conference aims to assemble students, experts, scientists, law practitioners, economists and researchers in a collaborative environment to present and discuss issues relating to cybercrime.

The first phase of Kaspersky Lab ‘IT Security for the Next Generation’ will begin with the Malaysia Cup, of which the best three papers will be chosen as the winners. The three winners will then be enrolled to the next phase – MEA and Asia Pacific Conference for Young Professionals where the students will be competing with students from respective universities and institutes of higher education around MEA and Asia Pacific region, to be held at City University of Hong Kong in March, 2012.

“After discovering Asnita Hashim, one of the local brightest security expert to hit the international cyber security arena who won third place at the International Students Conference in 2010, the competition returns designed to discover and nurture the next generation to be well-equipped for the future cyber attacks. Her triumphant success in the previous competition means that there is a lot of hidden talents in Malaysia are yet to be noticed. Hopefully, the students in Malaysia would heed this competition as a platform to showcase their talents and knowledge in our universal effort in fighting cyber threats”, said Mr. Jimmy Fong, Channel Sales Director, SEA, Kaspersky Lab.

“We received tremendous feedback from Malaysian students and tertiary education institutions in last year’s Malaysia and Asia Cup. We foresee that we will receive a better response this year as cyber threats has grown and evolved in greater extend in just short period of a year like the industrial attack of Stuxnet and rampant hacking on corporate organizations. As such, we believe that the students across ICT, legal and economy backgrounds have their own distinctive viewpoints on the recent escalating of cyber security issues which could help us to find more alternatives in combating the rise,” added Mr. Jimmy Fong.

The papers submitted will be evaluated and vet through by the program committees chaired by Mr. Eugene Kaspersky, Chief Executive Officer of Kaspersky Lab, together with the Kaspersky Lab experts and university professors.

(From L-R): Ms. Svetlana Efimova, Head of Educational Programs, Kaspersky Lab, Ms. Asnita Hashim, participant from University Technology MARA (Malaysia) and Prof. Dr. Hajah Zainab Abu Bakar, Dean of Faculty of Computer and Mathematical Sciences, University Technology MARA (Malaysia) at Kaspersky Lab APAC & MEA Cup 2011 earlier this year. Malaysian Ms. Asnita emerged as second place in the compeitition and she also Malaysia proud by winning third place at International Students Conference in 2010.

The topics, which cover technical, social, economic and legal topics include:-

Technical topics

Trends in Anti-Spam Development - Techniques, Methods in the “Spam Arms Race” and new Innovations
Dangers of an increasingly Networked World
“In the Cloud”-Security
Future Technologies for Detecting and Combating Malware (e.g. artificial intelligence, fuzzy systems and p2p-networks)

Social, economic and legal topics

Emerging Threats (e.g. social network security, embedded systems security, mobile security, online banking security)
Challenges and Opportunities for IT – Security, Companies within the next 10 Years
Impact of technologies on Data Protection, Copy and Intellectual Property Rights and Jurisdiction
Education in IT Security – Trends and Questions

The three best papers from Asia Cup will be entitled to compete at the International Cup.

Conference Registration & Paper Submission Dateline:

9 January 2012

Announcement of Result:

6 February 2012

Conference date:

21-23 March, 2012, City University of Hong Kong

To register and submit the papers, kindly visit http://www.kaspersky.com/educational-events/it_security_conference_2012_asia.

Solarwinds Releases Storage Response Time Monitor Free Tool

2011-12-02T12:57:00.002+08:00

Server virtualization can greatly improve network efficiency; it can also bring about a variety of new challenges that demand unique responses. SolarWinds® Inc. (NYSE: SWI), a leading provider of powerful and affordable IT management software, today announced its latest virtualization and storage free tool – SolarWinds Storage Response Time Monitor, to help target storage IO problems caused by server virtualization in real time.

“If a user is experiencing a slow response time on a virtual machine (VM), SolarWinds Storage Response Time Monitor can quickly and easily give a snapshot report into how VMware datastores are performing direct from the user’s desktop in real time,” said Jonathan Reeve, SolarWinds’ Senior Director of Product Management. “Using this data, the user can then determine whether there is a VM issue or if the issue is related to storage.”

SolarWinds Storage Response Time Monitor connects to VMware vSphere and monitors the top five host to datastore total storage response times, providing users with the top five virtual machines (VM) using the connections from an IO (IOPs) perspective.

For iSCSI and Fibre channel datastore types, SolarWinds Storage Response Time Monitor breaks down the total response time into “kernel latency” (time spent in the host) and “device latency” (time spent in the SAN).

SolarWinds Storage Response Time Monitor highlights:

Get at-a-glance insight into host to datastore connections with the worst response times, and the busiest VMs using those connections
See a breakdown of the datastore including type, and device versus kernel latency to understand if the bottleneck is in the host or the SAN

Users that need more insight into storage performance and capacity should download a free trial of SolarWinds Storage Manager, Powered by Profiler to quickly and easily monitor storage performance, isolate hotspots, automate storage capacity planning, map VMs to physical storage, and more.

To gain a comprehensive and historical view of all datastores, users should trial SolarWinds Virtualization Manager.

Used together, SolarWinds Storage Manager and SolarWinds Virtualization Manager integrate to provide unprecedented visibility from the virtualization layer all the way to the underlying physical storage.

Pricing and Availability

SolarWinds Storage Response Time Monitor is free and available on the SolarWinds website.
Pricing for SolarWinds Virtualization Manager and SolarWinds Storage Manager start at US$2,995. For more information, visit the SolarWinds website, download a free 30-day evaluation, or call +65 593 7600.

IBM Demonstrates Social Media Analysis Capability in Predicting Economic Trend

2011-12-01T18:28:00.001+08:00

IBM is experimenting on using computer-based analysis on social media's content to make predictive data that can help with business decision making.

Many Chief Marketing Officers are recognizing social media platforms as part of business, however, not many actually is exploring the possibility of gaining insights out of social media's content.

A look back at the last 100 years of shoe fashion trends reveals that heel heights soared during the most prominent recessions in U.S. history. Low-heeled flapper shoes in the 1920s were replaced with high-heel pumps and platforms during the Great Depression. Platforms were again revived during the 1970s oil crisis, reversing the preference for low-heeled sandals in the late 1960s. And the low, thick heels of the 1990s “grunge” period gave way to “Sex and the City”-inspired stilettos following the dot-com bust at the turn of the century.

Now, it seems that in the period of economic downturn, consumers are doing away with heels' height, a trend much attributed to austerity drive. So consumers are going for the more plainer and simplier looks.

The analysis was done by filtering all related contents with policy driven algorithms which have ways to rate popularity and accountability and make use of statistic to derive the conclusion.

It is very mathematical based actually, not much sentimental element.

The IBM project illustrates how sophisticated analysis of social media could be used by manufacturers in planning future products, by retailers in choosing which products to stock, and by marketers in planning advertising campaigns.

Social media analytics is also applicable to politics in order for politicians to understand what people want.

Check out 'IBM Social Media Analysis Points to Lower Heels, Bucking Economic Trend' for details.

Brocade Selected as the Core for World’s Largest Single Site Deployment of 100 GbE in a Research Institute

2011-12-01T10:31:00.000+08:00

Some high-performance research institutes generate millions of digitized images in the course of a year that require complex algorithms and robust computational horsepower to analyze. Their research demands that the computing environment be ultra-responsive and extremely efficient. Janelia Farm Research Campus, the research facility for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), has turned to Brocade to advance data analysis and transform its network infrastructure to be up to 10 times faster than before.

The high-performance and simplified network architecture has a direct correlation to the effectiveness Janelia Farm scientists gain when analyzing complex volumes of data from their neuroscience and imaging research. With 56-ports of 100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) in multiple Brocade MLXe routers powering the network core, the Janelia Farm Research Campus is now the world’s largest single site deployment of 100 GbE in a research institute, significantly increasing operational efficiency for more than 250 staff scientists.

HHMI, a nonprofit medical research organization that ranks as one of the largest philanthropies in the U.S., plays a powerful role in advancing biomedical research and science education. HHMI invests approximately US$770 million in biomedical research per year and has an endowment of $14 billion.

“We have 200 Gigabits connections to each of our network wiring closets,” said Spartaco Cicerchia, director of network infrastructure systems for the Janelia Farm Research Campus in Ashburn, VA. “Then we have 10 GbE connections going directly down to researchers’ systems in order to support the massive volumes of data they have collected. This new infrastructure enables our research team to obtain results 10 times faster than before. This performance advantage will allow us to set a new standard for research process cycles.”

With more performance and advanced capabilities often comes complexity. Due to a limited networking staff, the Janelia Farm Research Campus sought to redesign its infrastructure to inherently remove obstacles and create a simplified infrastructure that operates with high reliability.

“We were able to reduce the number of routers in our network infrastructure and simultaneously enhance performance,” said Cicerchia. “Therefore we completely eliminated a layer of the network and improved our overall efficiency by about 50 percent.”

With performance, reliability and massive scalability as the critical factors for success, Janelia Farm Research Campus installed multiple Brocade MLXe-32 and MLXe-16 routers connected using Brocade Multi-Chassis Trunk (MCT) to simplify its data center network and increase resiliency. This advancement enables network-level virtualization and enhanced network reliability while greatly reducing management complexity. From the core, Janelia Farm Research Campus link aggregates or bonds two-ports of 100 GbE to create a single 200 gigabit logical connection allowing line rate bandwidth in both directions. The aggregation routers are two fully populated Brocade MLXe-32 routers with more than 2,400 GbE ports and a large subset of 10 GbE ports.

To ensure maximum performance and security on the research network, Janelia Farm Research Campus partitioned its IP communications and wireless LAN (WLAN) infrastructure using the Brocade FCX Power over Ethernet Plus (PoE+) stackable switches.

“For security, best practice design, and to make most efficient use of our bandwidth, we do aggregate the telephones and the wireless access point on a different set of Brocade switches. This has really proven to provide added flexibility and simplicity for us,” said Cicerchia

When evaluating networking vendors, Janelia Farm Research Campus looked at a variety of metrics from price/performance and reliability to the network equipments’ degree of scalability.

“When we decided to undertake this new infrastructure, we looked at several networking providers,” said Cicerchia. “We always try to select best-of-breed when we evaluate vendors. It was our goal to deploy multiple 100 GbE connections to the wiring closet so that we could face upcoming network performance challenges.”

“Major medical and scientific advancements not only better our lives but can have a direct impact on future generations,” said Ken Cheng, vice president, Service Provider Products for Brocade. “The work at Janelia Farm Research Campus is a critical element for medical progress. With the addition of the Brocade MLXe routers and 100 GbE connections, Janelia Farm Research Campus has taken a quantum leap in how networking can help transform science and Brocade is pleased to be a part of it.”

CEO of Seagate Technology Discusses Thailand Floods And The Hard Disk Industry

2011-12-01T09:32:00.007+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'

Steve Luczo, the CEO of Seagate Technology told AllThingsD that the whole industry's supply chain is going to be affected until the end of 2013 at least, in order to be able to restore the state back to pre-flood operating capacity. This can be worrying for traders who have seen margin cost goes up by as much as 100%. It is a challenging time which many are still struggling to uncover and looking for solution to mitigate.

More than one-quarter of the world’s hard drive manufacturing capacity has been disrupted in one way or another, including 45 percent of the capacity devoted to making hard drives for personal computers.

Steve Luczo reckons that the industry (in this regard) is just experiencing the tip of the iceberg and many people are still looking for answers.

Luczo gave us a preview of the hard disk industry where during pre-flood the industry had the capacity to ship about 190 million units a quarter. Pre-flood, we expected the demand to be pretty consistent at about 180 million a quarter, with a bump in September 2012 for Windows 8.

Now, after the flood, Seagate expected that 130 million for March on the optimistic side, and then 150 million for June, 170 for September and then 190 million for December.

On the issue with over markups in the channels, Luczo thinks that it is expected because channels are experiencing 70% shortage while OEMs are blessed with better supplies. The channels are selling the few drives that are out there to whoever needs them the most and is willing to pay for them.

Luczo commented that Seagate is actually not facing any critical scenario out of these floods. First of all, the demand has been on 10 year contant average and secondly, they are not playing the pricing game. Seagate is more focusing on technology transitions which will allow them to produce hard disks with fewer parts and that will bring down the cost as well as making use of manufacturing expertise to bring down further cost. The long-term business model of Seagate is to achieve gross margins of 22 to 26 percent.

For conclusion, the floods actually help Seagate because of two reasons. 1.) Seagate is manufacturer of hard disk and 2.) the demand for storage has been constant even after the floods. Only OEMs and channels will have to suffer the effects of lower supply.

And it is a good thing that the floods actually help to bring back the margin of the business for everybody.

SAS® Analytics 9.3 version reaches out to 7000 customers

2011-12-01T09:23:00.000+08:00

SAS, the leader in business analytics software and services, today announces more than 7,000 customers ordered the new version of SAS since its July release.

Thousands of new features of the new version improve how organizations tackle massive volumes of structured and unstructured data, enabling better and faster decisions. As evidence of its popularity, SAS continued to lead the analytics software industry with worldwide analytics revenue growing 13 percent over the same period last year.

According to SAS’ Malaysia’s managing director Andrew Tan, SAS 9.3 represents more than 10,000 individual improvements inspired by customer feedback. “Its capabilities, performance and stability honor our customers’ investments in SAS.”

SAS 9.3, now available at no cost for existing customers, is powering decisions worldwide.

“In Malaysia, we have about 12 organizations from across industries, including agriculture, banking, insurance, gaming and hospitality, academic and consulting, who are using SAS’ latest version of business analytics.”

Some of the international adopters include J.M. Smucker Co., Honda of America Mfg. Inc., Mitsubishi Motors North America, Kimberly-Clark, and Six Continents Hotels.

The reasons that drive organizations to upgrade to SAS 9.3 are the improvements on:

Scalability: Being able to analyze greater amounts of data to maximize hardware and database investments. It also leads to more accuracy and better assessment of risk.
Performance: Increased scalability enables organizations to analyze more information and answer more complex questions.“Computational speed is huge,” SAS Global CEO, Jim Goodnight shares. “When code runs in five minutes instead of five days, you use the time to solve business problems. Things are possible now that were out of reach before high-performance computing."
Productivity: Streamline analysis, freeing staff to tackle additional projects. For example, Intercontinental Hotels Group opted new options in SAS® Enterprise Miner™ and its component SAS Rapid Predictive Modeler to optimize marketing spends and improves brand performance.
Broader enablement: Incorporate nontraditional data sources and formats into analyses and workflows, allowing users to collaborate to solve bigger, more complex issues.

Customers excel using SAS® Analytics

Organizations want answers fast, with automated processes and accuracy. They use SAS to aggregate, analyze and process large volumes of data and analytic models to support critical decisions that must be made in hours, minutes or seconds.

“SAS 9.3 adds algorithms to SAS’ many analytical products that enable customers to tackle even the most complex business problems with confidence timely.”

SAS enhancements are extensive. For example, one new procedure in the SAS Predictive Analytics Suite models the size of losses or insurance claims, such as the magnitude of natural-disaster damage. Another analyzes the risk of large losses for operational risk management processes and more other more exciting enhancements on solution range.

Always innovating, this year SAS High-Performance Analytics rounds out the SAS High-Performance Computing family of in-database analytics and grid computing offerings to speed decision making.

MyIX Experiences Significant Membership Boosts; International Sign-Up include Google Inc.

2011-11-29T14:57:00.000+08:00

Persatuan Pengendali Internet Malaysia, the operator of Malaysia Internet Exchange (known as MyIX) today announces its membership increase of 76% from 25 members in early 2011 to 44 members as at to-date.

This update information was revealed by Chiew Kok Hin (pic), Chairman of MyIX at the Enterprise IT News Cloud Forum 2011 held in Kuala Lumpur recently, who also shared that this achievement was just within 10 months since it embarked on an awareness campaign to boost MyIX’s role in the routing of the country’s domestic Internet data traffic.

“This encouraging membership increase is important because it also translates to higher utilization of the Internet Exchange’s total bandwidth utilization by almost 50% percent. Initiated in 2006, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (SKMM) has so far put an investment to build the total of eight (8) nodes around the country; so we are working to ensure that its capacity is optimized.”

Chiew was delivering the Keynote address to an IT delegation of over 90 participants, where he shared the crucial role of Internet uptime and performance ‘connectivity’, for businesses to be able to leverage ‘Cloud Computing’ as a business model.

MyIX’s awareness campaign includes revamping its website to be more user-friendly, going on marketing road show, and participating in events like the Integrated Engineering Carnival 2011 organized by the Engineering Union of University Technology Mara.

International Tie-Ups for MyIX

Over the past months, MyIX has also captured the attention of major international broadband provider carriers. “Large, foreign giant like Google Inc is connected to MyIX and potential companies like Verizon Communications Inc and Akamai Technologies Inc are now aware of MyIX and see bigger picture commercial viability of operating in this region whilst being connected to Malaysia’s domestic Internet exchange,” said Chiew.

He explained that having the memberships of international broadband carriers hugely benefited MyIX as it helps promote the cross-sell of the national Internet exchange’s bandwidth capacity and connectivity routes to foreign ISPs operating at regional and international levels.

Moving forward, MyIX plans to move expand its membership to include ISP from APAC countries.

“Whether we do it directly by ourselves in marketing MyIX, or via leveraging our foreign ISP partners, I see MyIX becoming a much more active Internet exchange – to play an important role in increasing the standard of Internet broadband connectivity in this region.”

Redefines the Economics for Enterprise Campus Networking

2011-11-27T14:54:00.002+08:00

Brocade (NASDAQ: BRCD) today announced the introduction of new enterprise networking solutions that help organizations adapt to demanding new applications and ever-changing business requirements.

The first of these new products is the Brocade® ICX™ 6610 Switch, a high-performance Ethernet access switch that combines chassis-like reliability and performance with the flexibility and affordability of a stackable switch. Optimized for today's demanding applications and mobile workforce, it delivers five times the stacking bandwidth of the leading competitor. In addition, the Brocade ICX 6610 provides 8×10 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) uplink ports and the highest aggregation bandwidth in its class. As a result, the Brocade ICX 6610 offers a 35 percent improvement in total cost of ownership (TCO) compared to competitive offerings as well as a longer functional product life for an improved return on investment (ROI).

"We are impressed with what we have seen so far in the Brocade ICX 6610. The number of interfaces and layout of the switch allow for a great deal of flexibility in how we can deploy it. For a small sized network staff we need simple, reliable technology that scales and fits our business and the ICX 6610 can meet that," said Roger Holtsmith, network supervisor, Kelsey-Seybold Clinic.

Continuing its goal of improving the economics for aggregation and core networks, Brocade also announced new blades and significant performance and scalability enhancements for the Brocade FastIron® SX Series of chassis-based aggregation and core switches. The new high-density 8×10 GbE blades set a new standard for price-performance value, enabling the Brocade FastIron SX to scale up to 128 ports of 10 GbE. Featuring hitless failover to provide the highest levels of availability, the Brocade FastIron SX is ideal for today's business-critical campus LAN environments. Additional new features include Multi-Chassis Trunking (MCT) for active-active resiliency that delivers twice the bandwidth of traditional active-passive redundant designs, plus MACsec and Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE)-ready hardware for investment protection.

As the demands on enterprise IT have exploded in recent years, organizations are relying on applications such as video conferencing, unified communications and collaboration to improve productivity and enhance communication with customers and partners -- making a reliable and high-performance network a key business enabler. Any disruption to the network infrastructure can lead to lost productivity and a loss of customer confidence and revenue. Other key challenges for the IT organization include overpriced networking solutions that introduce unnecessary complexity and further stress already-tight budgets, aging hardware that can't support new business and application requirements and the proliferation of a wide variety of mobile devices that require always-on network access.

"In a time where many network offerings are either over-engineered, complex and expensive, or just can't meet the current needs of the campus environment, customers should consider alternative vendors that offer the right level of functionality for today at a fair price -- with seamless, non-disruptive upgrade paths for the future to extend the useful life of your investment," said Mark Fabbi, vice president and distinguished analyst for Gartner.

According to a recent report from Gartner, "... too many enterprises overpay for their network solutions. Despite all efforts by network managers to 'future-proof' their networks, too many enterprises complain about insufficient agility and flexibility when they need to adjust to changing business needs."(1)

Commitment to Channel Partners

With the introduction of these new networking solutions, Brocade is reinforcing its commitment to the channel by continuing to provide Brocade Alliance Partner Network (APN) partners with innovative, industry-leading solutions that enable them to offer highly reliable enterprise networking solutions to their end customers. To provide partners with the support and resources to effectively sell Brocade solutions, the APN program offers a broad range of benefits, including access to Brocade technical experts via the Implementation Help Desk and flexible use of marketing development funds, which are intended to promote deeper levels of customer engagement and increased profitability.

"Brocade's uniqueness lies in its ability to execute with innovation within both the SAN Fibre Channel and Ethernet network infrastructure realms, and its adept execution. Brocade innovations, such as 100 GbE, Ethernet fabrics and the new Brocade ICX 6610 Switch, allow us to deliver solutions that scale to our customers' business requirements, while lowering their overall TCO within their data center, wired and wireless LAN environments," said Rodney Turner, co-founder and president, Layer 3 Communications. "In today's budget-constrained world, the cost factor is top-of-mind with end customers. Working with Brocade enables us to drive our business forward, while staying competitive in an increasingly crowded marketplace."

Pricing and Availability

The Brocade ICX 6610 will be available this month directly through Brocade and its channel partners with a starting price of $5,595 USD. The new Brocade FastIron SX Series modules will also be available in November 2011, with a starting price of $4,495 USD. Multi-Chassis Trunking (MCT) will be available in early 2012 for the Brocade FastIron SX Series. As an extension to these product introductions, Brocade is also announcing a price reduction for Brocade FCX Series stackable switches effective immediately. Customers can enjoy a price benefit on average of 20 percent for these products.

These new products and other Brocade networking solutions will also be available through Brocade Network Subscription, which revolutionizes network acquisition by giving customers the flexibility to scale up and down according to actual network utilization -- with minimal risk and no capital outlay. With Brocade Network Subscription, customers pay for their network infrastructure on a monthly basis, allowing them to align network capacity with actual usage and thereby reducing costs and mitigating capital risk. Learn more at www.nonetworkcapex.com.

Videos:

Video featuring Jason Nolet, VP, Data Center and Enterprise Networking, Brocade, on the launch of the Brocade ICX 6610 and other product news.

Video featuring Rodney Turner, President, Layer 3 Communications, on the company's partnership with Brocade and new enterprise network solutions.

2-Minute Explainer Video

Which Tablet PC To Buy In Malaysia ? #3

2011-11-27T10:59:00.006+08:00

Refer to

Which Tablet PC To Buy In Malaysia ? (Apple, BlackBerry, HTC, Acer, AsusTek, Creative, Samsung, Motorola, HP, MSI).

Which Tablet PC To Buy In Malaysia ? #2 (Fujitsu, Sony, Dell, Huawei)

Brand	Model	OS	Web	Pricing	Desc	Links	Remarks
Amazon	Kindle Fire	Android OS 2.3 (customized)	Firefox, Chrome	US$199	1 GHz TI OMAP 4 4430 (dual core), 8 GB storage, 512 MB RAM, 7" multi touch gorilla glass display, 1024 × 600 at 169 ppi, 16 million colors. Capacitive touch sensitive, PowerVR SGX540, Micro USB 2.0 (type B), 3.5 mm stereo socket,802.11b/g/n WiFi	Url	Cheaper than iPad. As competitive as iPad due to availability of Amazon Appstore, streaming movies and TV shows, and Kindle's e-books
Motorola	E1 Tablet	Android 2.3.4 (hardened)	Firefox, Chrome	Nil	Dual core 1GHz each plus graphics accelerator, 1GB RAM,4GB Flash plus 4GB microSD (total of 8GB flash memory); user accessible microSD card slot (supports up to 32GB), 7 in. capacitive; 1024 x 600; 350 NIT; Corning® Gorilla® Glass, Capacitive multi touch, 4620 mA rechargeable Smart Li Ion (userreplaceable,rapid resume), two USB interfaces: 1 USB 2.0 OTG connector (docking connector) and 1 USB 2.0 Host connector (expansion module port); HDMI out; communication via cradle and expansion ports; USB 2.0 host via expansion module, WiFi, bluetooth, GPS	Url	Built for enterprise, 24 x7 usage. Front and back camera (supports barcode scanning), Motorola RhoElements for cross platform application, durable design to withstand multiple bumps and drops during a workday, optional hand strap for comfortable full-shift handling
Quad	Aakash tablet	Android 2.2	Firefox, Chrome	US$35 (RM105)	366 MHz processor, Flash memory 2 GB-32 GB microSD slot, 800 × 480 px 7 in (18 cm) diagonal, Multi-touch resistive touchscreen, headset controls, WiFi , GPRS, two USB ports	Url	Cheapest tablet in the world, targeted market are Indian public and educational sectors. Improvised model to be released on February 2012, projecting that specifications will include a revised screen, a front-facing camera and improved RAM.
Toshiba	REGZA Tablet	Android™ 3.1 Honeycomb	Firefox, Chrome	Nil	High resolution 10.1 capacitive LCD panel with LED backlight, 1,280 x 800 pixels (16:10) and multi-touch support,NVIDIA® Tegra™ 2, RAM 1GB DDR2, Internal memory up to 32 GB, 1xUSB 2.0, miniUSB, HDMI®, SD Card Reader, docking port, Wi-Fi™ (802.11b/g/n), Bluetooth®, HSPA+(3.5G)*, GPS, 3D Accelerometer, gyrometer, electronic compass, ambient light sensor, front and rear camera.	Url	Meant for mobility, optimized performance for entertainment.Supports Toshiba Resolution+, Toshiba AutoView Technology, Toshiba Audio Enhancement Technology, Toshiba Media Player supporting a wide selection of video, picture and audio formats

Conclusion:

Android rules now. Java programming is gaining back momentum.
Motorola E1 tablet looks cool. It is my choice out of this comparison. This is the second tablet offering from Motorola. The first one was Motorola Xoom.
Seems like only Nokia hasn't announced any tablet product yet.
The market has now 16 brands with more than 16 different models of tablets to choose from.

More Updates on Tablet PC, Mobile Platform:

Adobe Enables 3D Games With Flash Player 11, AIR 3
Samsung Galaxy recorded more than 10 million users worldwide.
Celcom offers exclusive plans for Media Professionals;Celcom Biz for Media. To facilitate the media’s inherent needs such as 24 hours access to information and internet connectivity that enable them get a story from the streets onto the web.
Yes and Samsung To Offer The Best Value in Performance and Mobility. Yes and Samsung are offering a special package that combines Malaysia’s fastest 4G mobile router, the Yes Huddle, with Samsung’s latest tablet, the GALAXY Tab 8.9.
Motorola Mobility Shareholders Approve Acquisition by Google. Now awaiting regulatory filings and other approvals. The whole deal may only happen by early 2012.

Toshiba Resolves Around Your Life

2011-11-25T10:22:00.002+08:00

1.) Toshiba Unveils Its New Range of Android Powered 7-inch & 10-inch REGZA Tablets

Toshiba Singapore Digital Products & Services Group today unveiled the company’s first Android™-powered tablets, REGZA Tablet AT1S0 and AT100. Featuring brilliant hi-resolution touch display, the REGZA Tablets offer a complete tablet experience with entertainment-optimized features in an incredibly portable design that fits comfortably in the palm of your hand. Toshiba will offer the REGZA tablets in two form factors – 7-inch and 10-inch, and will be available in the fourth quarter of 2011 in South and South East Asia.

Android™ 3.1 Honeycomb
High resolution 10.1‖ capacitive LCD panel with LED backlight, 1,280 x 800 pixels (16:10) and multi-touch support
NVIDIA® Tegra™ 2
RAM 1GB DDR2
Internal memory up to 32 GB
1xUSB 2.0, miniUSB, HDMI®, SD Card Reader, docking port
Wi-Fi™ (802.11b/g/n), Bluetooth®, HSPA+(3.5G)*
GPS, 3D Accelerometer, gyrometer, electronic compass, ambient light sensor
5.0 MPixel camera (rear), 2.0 MPixel camera (front)
Toshiba Resolution+, Toshiba AutoView Technology, Toshiba Audio Enhancement Technology
Toshiba Media Player supporting a wide selection of video, picture and audio formats
Starting from 765g

2.) Toshiba Unveils PORTÉGÉ Z830 Series as the World’s Lightest & Thinnest1 13.3-Inch Ultrabook.

Toshiba Singapore Digital Products & Service Group (DS) today unveiled the PORTÉGÉ Z830 Series, the company's first Ultrabook™ using 2nd Generation Intel® Core™ processors. Weighing a mere 1.12kg1 and only 15.9mm thick, the PORTÉGÉ Z830 series is about 20 percent lighter and 40 percent thinner than the award-winning ultraportable PORTÉGÉ R830 series. These new systems offer impressive portability, durability and essential features with truly smart styling. The Z830 series devices will be available during the fourth quarter of 2011 in South and South East Asia.

2nd generation Intel® Core™ Processor for Ultrabook™
RAM: up to 6 GB DDR3
128 GB SSD
13.3'' HD display with LED backlighting, 1,366 x 768 pixels
WLAN, Bluetooth™ 3.0, Gigabit Ethernet LAN
1x USB 3.0, 2x USB 2.0, SD Card Reader, RGB, HDMI®
Matt A4 tile keyboard large multi-touch touch pad
1.3 megapixel webcam
Stereo speakers enhanced with Toshiba Audio Enhancement Technology
Fingerprint reader*
Magnesium casing with honeycomb reinforcement
Toshiba Eco Utility, Toshiba Media Controller, Toshiba PC Health Monitor

3.) The art of smart entertainment: Toshiba introduces its first all-in-one desktop PC

Toshiba Singapore Digital Products & Service Group (DS) today announced the Qosmio DX730, Toshiba‟s first all-in-one desktop. The Qosmio DX730, featuring a large 23” Full HD multi-touch display, is a complete entertainment hub providing high-end audio, video and computing performance as well as premium computing capabilities to manage and create content. It offers a „front-row seat‟ experience for watching DVD movies and slide shows, and playing games. The Toshiba Qosmio DX730 will be available during the fourth quarter of 2011 throughout South and South East Asia.

Full-HD 23” LCD panel with LED backlight, 1,920 x 1080 pixels (16:9)
CPU: Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core, Intel® Core™ i5 Dual Core
GPU: NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 540M, 1GB (DDR3) video ram
RAM: up to 16GB DDR3 (1333MHz)
HDD with up to 2 TB capacity
DVD Super Multi drive or Blu-ray ROM drive*
HDMI®-In, 4x USB 2.0, 2x USB 3.0 (1x USB 3.0 supports Sleep-and-Charge), HDMI® out*
Multi-Card reader
WLAN (802.11b/g/n), Bluetooth® 3.0+ HS, Gigabit Ethernet
Onkyo® Stereo speakers with Subwoofer, Dolby® Advanced Audio™
1.3 M Pixel Web camera with Face Recognition
Resolution+, Toshiba Media Controller, Toshiba Bulletin Board & Reeltime , Touch Applications
Wireless RF Keyboard and Mouse

For more information

Juniper Network's Innovation Achievement (Update To Date)

2011-11-24T22:37:00.002+08:00

Refer to 'Malaysia Technology News'

Juniper Network recently published its innovation and contribution to the computer network industry.

Advanced Security Technologies – The new security functionality for mobile devices, including smart phones and iPads, and data centers protects the network and the integrity of the information it carries.
Internet2 – Juniper donated $2.5 million to support the development of the new, nationwide 100 Gigabit-per-second (Gbps) network that will enable advanced networking features for more than 200,000 public institutions.
A New Chipset – The Junos® Trio chipset requires less cooling and drives down energy consumption per unit of bandwidth, while increasing capacity and throughput.
The Next-Generation Core Router - The Juniper Networks® T4000 Core Router consumes just 2.7 watts of power per Gigabit of processed traffic.
A New "3-2-1" Architecture – Juniper's approach to data center networks reduces the amount of equipment deployed in the data center, from three layers to two and ultimately to one, reducing waste, energy consumption, operational costs and complexity.

Check out more on the Juniper's Corporate Social Responsibility and report.

PayPal and CyberSecurity Malaysia’s Top Tips for Shopping Safely Online this Festive Season

2011-11-24T16:02:00.000+08:00

In view of the numerous cyber-attacks affecting Malaysians, PayPal and CyberSecurity Malaysia are urging Malaysians to be smarter and safer about sharing their personal information online.

PayPal today released the first ‘PayPal Online and Mobile Safety Insights’ study in Malaysia, and interesting tips for a safer online experience.

And PayPal in collaboration with CyberSecurity Malaysia, through its outreach programme CyberSAFE (abbreviation of Cyber Security Awareness for Everyone), today announced that December 2011 will be promoted as the “Safe Online Shopping Month”.

Audit, Audit, Audit - Think twice before doing anything.
Employ password etiquette - Make use of stronger password.
Beware of phishing emails - Do not simply trust everything from email.
Protect your digital footprint and use a digital wallet when transacting online - make use of Paypal to buy online.
Browse safely, look for trusted sites - always look for the padlock icon on
sites before entering your account information and password. Also look for
websites that start with “https” as they provide an additional layer of
encryption often used for online payment transactions and for sensitive
transactions in corporate information systems.
Check your e-statements: - Always monitor your eletronic accounts which include eBanking, credit cards and etc.
Lock and password protect your phone
Beware of smishing - smishing means sms phishing.
“APP-ly” common sense – When choosing apps to download, use common
sense. Purchase or download apps from well-known, reliable companies or
do your research – such as checking reviews- before downloading an app
from an unknown source. Use the most up-to-date version of an app.
Unknown or repackaged apps can be armed with malware able to steal
details from a user’s phone.
Install updates ASAP - software updates such as Windows update, should be installed whenever available. Software updates not only fix bugs but also strive to make software hardened.

Also refer to

Check out more on Paypal.

Google, SKMM, .My Domain Registry and ITrain to Help 50,000 Malaysian Businesses Get Online

2011-11-22T16:45:00.000+08:00

For any Malaysian business today, having a website is as important as having a phone. Yet, four-fifths of Malaysian small businesses still don’t have a website -- which means they are invisible to two-thirds of the Malaysian population as well as the rest of the global market who are online.

17.5mil Malaysians regularly turn to the Internet to research local shops and services. They look for what to eat online, they go online to find information about movies, they search for a plumber, and they do research for their next gadget purchase online.

SME Corp figures show that out of the 700,000 Malaysian SMEs that are currently operating in Malaysia, only 100,000 have a website.

These businesses are not online because it’s either too expensive, too complicated, or they just don’t have the time.

What is GMBO?

It stands for ‘Get Malaysian Business Online’, a nation-wide initiative to help SMEs to get the businesses online, initiated by Google Malaysia and supported by Suruhanjaya Komunikasi dan Multimedia Malaysia (SKMM) .my Domain Registry and ITrain.

How does GMBO work?

GMBO offers participants a free website, free domain hosting (for the first 10,000 signups) and subsidised training, making it quick and easy to go online. People without a website can ‘walk in’ and register online and get an online presence in as little as 30 minutes.

How will GMBO help businesses grow?

All participating businesses will receive a free website which we believe is the first step in being found by customers. Today, more and more customers are going online for everything - banking, shopping, information etc. Research has found that Malaysians spent RM1.8 billion shopping online in 2010 (Nielsen 2011) and that figure is expected to grow to RM5 billion by 2014. Once a business is online, they are connected to the world. We want to help them to be successful by ensuring each business is aware of the free online tools available to them so that they can start realizing the true potential of the Internet.

Why launch GMBO in Malaysia?

Only 100,000 out of the 700,000 Malaysian SMEs have a website, yet research shows that many Malaysians go to the Internet to find products, services and local business information before they decide on their purchases. We see this as a great opportunity to directly assist small and medium sized businesses to go online and grow.

Why should Malaysian businesses go online?

GMBO takes away the barriers that stop most Malaysian businesses from going online - it’s free, it’s quick and easy and it offers a sustainable support network to help businesses go online and grow. So why go online? Because everyone benefits - individuals, families, businesses of all sizes, consumers, our economy, society and ultimately, Malaysia.

Why is a website necessary?

Malaysia currently has 17.5 million Internet uses and expected to reach 25 million by 2015 covering more that 75% of the population. Consumers understand the value of the Internet this is because most consumer in Malaysia use the Internet before purchasing a product, but businesses are still not seizing the opportunity. There’s an assumption that ‘Internet businesses’ are like Google or Facebook, but actually every business is an Internet business -- even if you sell nasi lemak.

What kind of support can participating businesses expect to receive?

Participating SMEs will be equipped with:

A free, easy to update website with free web-hosting
A free or discounted .com.my domain for their first year upon sign-up. The first 10,000 SMEs will get the domain free. Consecutive annual renewals are at a heavily discounted RM23 annual fee.
Free Ongoing business tips and education
Free online advertising and listing on Google Maps.
An RM200 AdWords coupon for all 50,000 sign ups that create their web presence.

What happens if a business already has a website? Can they take part?

Absolutely. Even if you have a website but it’s not really working out for you, we’d like to help. GMBO training welcomes people who want advice on their existing site(s) and will provide hands on consultation to help businesses understand how to optimize their sites and take advantage of a variety of existing online tools

What if I want a more sophisticated website than this basic site? Can I upgrade?

The GMBO website is designed to make it easy for small businesses to get online so they can be found by prospective customers and participate in the digital economy. At some point, participating businesses may want to build a more sophisticated website and will be able to copy their images, files and data from this website so that their web designer can re-use them.

What data am I required to submit?

You are required to submit your email address and work phone number to set up a website. You can then choose to submit more information about your business to include on your website. No billing information is required. After 1 year, you can choose to maintain your website for RM23/year.

What are the exact features of the GMBO product (the website)?

Our website creation tool called Business SiteBuilder lets you set up and maintain a website easily and in 30 minutes, so that your business information can be found online. The website lets you display photos, shares files and display your business location on a Google Map. It’s free to set up your website and hosting is free for the first 10,000 SMEs. After 12 months, if you choose to maintain your domain name there is an annual renewal fee of RM23.

What is Business Sitebuilder?

Business Sitebuilder is a Google platform which is a tool for website building. Available for the first time in the region, it is absolutely free-of-charge. Business Sitebuilder allows you to create your desktop browser and mobile-optimised web site, list your products and services, accept orders and be sent notifications of queries and orders, and maintain the store items and inventory. Feature includes:

Accept SMS and email orders
Easy install, easy maintain
Store on the Cloud with web hosting from Google
Sort items by NAME, PRICE by clicking at header
Click at thumbnail to see more detail picture
Store Gadget size can be adjusted and scrollable to fit your web design

It Pays to Partner – The Channel Profits with Brocade

2011-11-22T15:09:00.001+08:00

Brocade (NASDAQ: BRCD) has announced the introduction of several new channel initiatives designed specifically to enhance partner enablement and profitability. The new initiatives encompass a wide range of updates to the Brocade Alliance Partner Network (APN) program, including elements tailored to attract new partners who are looking for a compelling vendor alternative, as well as new aspects to better reward existing APN partners.

The APN program updates represent Brocade's ongoing commitment to the channel in helping partners establish and maintain viable business models to continue driving success. As the channel remains an area of strategic focus for Brocade, the company has invested significant monetary resources -- approximately three times the historical annual spend -- to implement and support the APN program. Specifically, Brocade announced today:

Enablement funding for new partners to accelerate engagement with Brocade

Expansion of the reseller Value Incentive Program (VIP)
Updated deal registration discounts to further protect presales investments
Enhanced enablement tools
Renewed focus on lead and demand generation activities

The continual maturation of cloud technologies, coupled with end customers' growing interest in integrating virtualization and cloud solutions into their IT environments, represents a tremendous opportunity for channel partners. End customers are increasingly looking to the channel for guidance and technical expertise to help them successfully navigate the journey to the cloud.

For distributor and reseller partners, who by virtue of their position within the channel ecosystem are best equipped to deliver these value-added solutions and services, this industry trend presents both a world of possibilities and increased pressure to adapt and refine their business objectives. Brocade continually evolves its APN program to help partners maintain a profitable business model and attain higher levels of in-house expertise at minimal monetary cost.

"Data center infrastructure vendors clearly recognize the vital role that the channel plays during any period of major IT transformation, and the transition to the cloud is no exception," said Chris Ilg, director of Market Research, Infrastructure Channels and Alliances at IDC. "IDC estimates that worldwide spending on private IT cloud services will top $13 billion by the end of 2011, and shrewd vendors are those who are adapting and augmenting their programs with inventive elements that bring value to a wide range of partners."

Recognizing the inherent capabilities of its partner base and the key attributes of the markets they serve, Brocade designed its APN program updates with built-in flexibility, enabling greater numbers of partners to gain value from the program. In particular, Brocade has introduced the following new partner initiatives:

Enablement Funding for New Partners

To attract and invigorate new partners, Brocade is committed to providing new APN partners with enablement funding to help streamline and accelerate their engagement with Brocade. These funds can be used for a multitude of activities, including demand generation and marketing activities, technical and sales training and the development of lab environments. Enablement funding is granted based on the alignment of a joint business plan between Brocade and participating partners.

Expansion of Value Incentive Program (VIP)

With an emphasis on partner profitability through growing skill sets and expertise, Brocade continues to expand its VIP with these core tenets in mind. As part of this approach, Brocade has added the Service Provider Specialization to its growing roster of technology-centric designations. Designed to help partners address the growing demand for skilled networking expertise within the service provider space, the Service Provider Specialization encompasses the technical and practical training necessary to help partners become trusted IT advisors to their end customers. Additionally, APN Elite resellers can now leverage the benefits of a revised cumulative discount structure that offers payout at a lower threshold, enabling them to realize greater levels of profitability.

Updated Deal Registration Discounts

In an effort to further protect partners' presales investments and help realize greater levels of profitability, the Brocade deal registration program now provides a higher discount level for all IP product sales. In addition, Brocade adapter products have been integrated into the SAN Deal Registration program, supporting partners that focus on building converged network architectures.

Enhanced Enablement Tools

Recognizing that partners will require a variety of resources throughout their engagement with Brocade, the company has rolled out new tools designed to help partners sell Brocade solutions. For new partners, Brocade has introduced an easy-to-use Onboarding Portal, which provides partners with the tools and information they need to initiate their partnership efforts with Brocade. All information contained within the portal is tailored to the needs of new partners and is intended to accelerate their integration into the APN program. In addition, Brocade has instituted updates with respect to its demo equipment program. Specifically, Brocade has significantly increased the discount on its demo equipment while simultaneously revising guidelines governing the use of marketing development funds (MDF), enabling partners to apply these funds to cover any qualifying expenses for demo equipment. Under the new APN demo discount schedule, this change enables partners to acquire demo gear at little to no cost.

Renewed Focus on Lead and Demand Generation Activities

Brocade has updated its lead and demand generation management processes to provide partners with wider access to qualified leads that increase sales success and shorten the sales cycle. To accomplish this, Brocade has fine-tuned its demand generation processes to identify qualified leads and efficiently funnel them to APN partners. In addition, inside sales and telesales resources have been repurposed to focus their efforts on lead generation for the channel. The delivery of qualified leads will enable partners to focus their resources on the sales process, thereby reducing time spent on the customer discovery phase.

"The cloud era has forced the channel to undergo a major transformation, which is both a source of opportunity and consternation for resellers and distributors," said Gina Tan, Regional Director, South East Asia at Brocade. "As part of Brocade's long-term commitment and overall company strategy of leveraging the strength of the channel, these new initiatives further enable partners to grow their skill sets, differentiate themselves and adapt with agility to changing market dynamics."

The Brocade APN program updates take effect immediately. To learn more, visit www.brocade.com/apn.

MY S.O.S, keeps YOU in charge, ALWAYS, even in times of trouble

2011-11-21T22:59:00.000+08:00

The general yet basic emergency help lines, 999, 944, 991, 112, which almost everyone knows of, which most probably in times of emergency, when quick response is needed, fails to fulfill its cause.

With the MY S.O.S app, smartphone users can now access rather a variety and detailed list of emergency contact numbers, such as funeral services, the various government departments, hotels, taxi services, hospitals, cinemas, banks, highway breakdowns, the general line of nearby police stations, general complaint telephone numbers that covers electricity and water cut, potholes on roads, water pipe leakages, and so forth. List of very important yet hard to find contact numbers that is infact, comes off as very handy to fellow Malaysians.

This mobile app, basically, brings together all the possible emergency contact numbers that would at one way or another, come in handy to Malaysians. Smartphone users could download this simple yet extremely functional and handy App, for FREE. And it’s available for iPhone, Android and Blackberry smartphones.

App Downloads

iPhone/iPad Version

MySOS - http://itunes.apple.com/my/app/my-sos/id470132689?mt=8

Android Version

MySOS - https://market.android.com/details?id=com.phonelist

Blackberry Version

MySOS - http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/63328?lang=en

By Just Mobile.

Getting the Most Bang for Your Gadget Bucks with an HP Coupon and More

2011-11-21T10:05:00.001+08:00

It’s hard to be in love with gadgets and technology. You want the newest, biggest, fastest, best, most interesting stuff that comes out, but you don’t always have the money to make it happen. Sometimes you wait for HP to put that computer on sale so you can use that HP coupon you’ve been saving, but the timing didn’t work out. Other times you need to have the latest and greatest, regardless of cost. Fortunately, there’s a time for everything, including when to buy the tech you need. All the big purchases have different strategies for getting the best price.

Game Consoles

If you’re a console gamer, you know how hard it is to wait for something new. If you’ve been waiting for a while to get an Xbox, it’s time to wait just a bit more. The current generation system is about to be phased out, which means great deals for people with patience. The same holds true for games. If you can wait just once, you can make it so you’re always one version behind everyone else. You might lose some cred when talking to your gamer pals, but you’ll also have money in your pocket.

TVs

The beginning of the year, starting in February and going through March, is the time to shop for a new TV. The demand for televisions goes up around the holiday time because people are getting them for gifts or in sales where the prices are supposedly the best. In reality, Black Friday and other deals are usually for the low-end options that are cheap to begin with. In February, some of the high-end TVs start being discounted to make room for newer models. Add in less demand, and stores are usually willing to cut you a good deal just to get more space for the big-ticket items.

Phones

If there’s one category that’s hard to pin down, it’s the smartphone market. Every phone that comes out is more powerful by leaps and bounds, and it seems like the advancement is never going to slow. You can make that work in your favor if you strategize a little. Your first option is to get a heavily discounted phone by signing up for a contract with your carrier. Most carriers are willing to give you a good deal if you’re willing to guarantee your business with them for the next two years. This is the route to take if you want to get the newest phone out there, but remember that you won’t be eligible for another discount until your contract is up. The speed at which advancements are being made also means that new phones (and versions of old ones) are coming out all the time. The best time to get a good deal on an older phone is the day the new version comes out. You might sacrifice a few features, but it’s well worth it to your wallet.

You’ve probably noticed a trend. Waiting pays. Keep that in mind the next time you’re planning a big tech purchase.

By ryanf@blogcontentguild.com

NETGEAR Launches Revolutionary Storage for SMB and Home Users in Malaysia

2011-11-21T09:32:00.003+08:00

NETGEAR®, Inc., leading US-based networking company launched its new version of network attached storage (NAS) systems for highly value-conscious SMBs and home users.

NETGEAR’s ReadyNAS systems (ReadyNAS® Duo and ReadyNAS NV) are ranked World Leader by Gartner in the sub-RM15,000 price brand for unified storage products.

According to NetGEAR’s ASEAN Regional Director, Soo Kean Thai, the new storage versions cost 30% less than similar products at twice the data access speeds. The NETGEAR storage products also have a long 3-year warranty and 24/7 support.

The NAS storage market grew over 37% to USD3.7 billion n 2010 (Gartner), becoming important as more digital content are accessed and backed up via mobile devices worldwide. “Many SMBs are experiencing a drastic increase in digital content such as imagery and archival records within the medical or professional service applications,” shares Soo.

NETGEAR ReadyNAS systems truly redefine reliability, affordability and simplicity of storage systems. The updated user-interface the creation of secure private/ personal clouds for as few as 8 mouse clicks – so that SMB and home users can store and access music, photos, videos and documents from anywhere in the world, and interact with more mobile devices.”

Other Competitive Features

Both NETGEAR ReadyNAS systems are an industry first being equipped by USB 3.0 ports, provide 20% faster backups, and include hot-swap disk drive bays and automatic capacity expansion.

The updated photo sharing application allows the private sharing of print-quality photos, without 3rd party services or fees. Both NAS storage systems allow the direct streaming of music, HD movies and photos to TVs, game consoles and TiVo.

Secure Data Access: The mobile app (‘ReadyNAS Remote’) for the iOS, Android, PC and Mac platforms deliver secure 128-bit SSL-level access to the NETGEAR ReadyNAS storage.

The retail prices for NETGEAR ReadyNAS® Duo and ReadyNAS NV start at RM600 and RM1200 respectively.

NETGEAR Penetrates into Malaysia

On 9th November 2011, NETGEAR announced its partnership with local IT-distributor Convergence Networks to establish its presence in Malaysia. According to Soo, the company is embarking on an aggressive partnership and marketing focus to expand the leading-US brand’s reach into the ASEAN markets via established regional value-added resellers and distributors.

"Convergence Networks has long been a top-notch IT distributor of IT solutions for the Malaysian enterprise market. We see them as instrumental in building our brand in the growing mid-range networking, storage and security equipments local market.”

In Malaysia, NETGEAR provides IT storage and networking offerings to SMBs and end consumers/ home users. Currently, the brand is also present in Singapore and Indonesia, with plans to establish in Thailand in 2012.

For more information about NETGEAR’s ReadyNAS systems, kindly contact Mr. Lee at lee@convergence.com.my.

LucidChart Nov 2011 Updates

2011-11-20T10:11:00.000+08:00

1.) Quick shape replacement

Quickly replace one shape with another seamless, without affect the whole structure.

When the shape changes, all of the text, connected lines and other properties will be preserved. This currently works for flowchart and BPMN shapes.

2.) Easy step insertion

Drag a new shape from the toolbox onto the existing line, it will show you the potential connection points. When you release, it will automatically insert that shape into the flow.

3.) Spell Check

When you are typing and misspell a word in LucidChart, it will now be underlined in red.

4.) Support for JIRA.

JIRA is a software development tool for issue management and planning agile development Atlassian..

This plugin is available at no additional cost for LucidChart Team accounts.

Video.

5.) Support for Confluence 4

Confluence 4 is a collaboration platform by Atlassian.

This plugin is available at no additional cost for LucidChart Team accounts.

Video.

More on LucidChart.

The Biggest Internet Giants Concern Over Possible Net Neutrality Threat

2011-11-18T09:55:00.003+08:00

SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act), which is supported by music and film industries, threatens the net neutrality of the Internet industry in USA with possibility of content censorship.

I would never believe this would have surfaced out of a country which premises its foundation on freedom and human rights.

This is a testing time for USA, with Google and Facebook and others all lobbying to prevent what is considered as draconian enforcement, and the world is watching heavily. If Internet freedom is not uphold successfully in USA, I doubt the future of net neutrality.

Much is said than done, the rise of SOPA is not merely related to content. It is also related to business power.

The bill also contains clauses that would force search engines to stop listing infringing sites in their indexes. This means that Google and other search engines will have to revamp their philosophy and lose power of autonomous system over to policy-oriented system.

It demonstrates that content providers are serious to wrestle more control over their businesses from channels such as search engines and social media sites which have proven to be in a commanding position and the latter is making much more business revenues.

The fact is that channels require contents, pretty much like an engine requires fuel to burn and vice versa.

The world is watching.

Refer to 'Google, Facebook warn against new US piracy legislation' for more details.

50 Years of Information Technology

2011-11-16T16:31:00.000+08:00

Online IT Degree has this article on 50 Years of Information Technology where for each decade (starting from 1950s), poignant moments of time that pushed the industry further and linked to some academic papers by authoritative professionals are highlighted.

Chief among them:

In 1950s, A.I (Artificial Intelligent) has been theorized.

In 1960s, the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) is the closest precursor to the Internet was announced.

In 1970s, Intel 4004 was released, the world’s first general microprocessing machine.

In 1980s, MS-DOS, Macintosh, IBM PC and the Morris Worm, the first Internet virus, was released in 1988.

In 1990s, the World Wide Web, Yahoo and Intel Pentium processor.

In 2000s, Google, weblog (blog).

Asia Pacific IT Decision Makers Look to Ethernet Fabrics to Realize Cloud Ambitions

2011-11-15T22:03:00.003+08:00

A new research report from Frost & Sullivan shows that with rapidly increasing usage of server virtualization, enterprises across Asia Pacific are now looking at Ethernet fabric technology to help fully realize the benefits of business agility, operational efficiencies and lower costs. Commissioned by Brocade® (NASDAQ: BRCD), Think flat with Ethernet Fabric - Importance of a Flat Network Architecture in Cloud Implementation is based on findings from a survey of 328 IT decision-makers from across the region.

The report revealed that two-thirds of the organizations surveyed have adopted server virtualization, of which 46 percent are now running production environments on virtual machines. More than a third of respondents said their organizations planned to pilot an Ethernet fabric architecture within the next six months and a further 25 percent said they intended to do so within 12 months.

"What jumps out from this new report is just how fast Asia Pacific enterprises are now moving towards cloud computing architecture," said John McHugh, Chief Marketing Officer of Brocade. "They are certainly not all there yet but road-maps are in place and there is a high level of awareness about the issues they need to address. Creating a data center networking architecture that is simple, secure, flat and virtualized is a top priority for the region's IT decision makers."

With virtualization initiatives underway at most companies covered by the Frost & Sullivan survey, 35 percent of respondents said their organizations had already adopted some form of cloud computing with private clouds more common than either the public or hybrid cloud delivery models. While software-as-a-service adoption has been steadily growing in Asia Pacific in the past decade, Frost & Sullivan's analysts found adoption of cloud-enabled infrastructure-as-a-service and platform-as-a-service seeing a huge spurt in the past 12 months.

"Rolling out cloud computing is complex, which is why it is recommended that organizations address the data center network challenges head on rather than waiting for bottlenecks to appear," said Andrew Milroy, Vice President - ICT Practice for Frost & Sullivan Asia Pacific.

"That means virtualizing the network layer; optimizing infrastructure through flat architecture; introducing VM-aware automation to enable elastic scaling; and pro-active management to maximize availability and minimize opex. We therefore see Ethernet fabric becoming the critical data center network technology due to its scalability, flatness and efficiency."

Anticipating these needs in 2010, Brocade introduced its vision -- Brocade One -- of a cloud and data center architecture with Virtual Cluster Switching (VCS) as the core technology for building large, high-performance and flat Layer 2 fabrics to better support server virtualization. Leveraging Brocade VCS fabric technology, Brocade VDX Data Center Switches are now being deployed as the Ethernet fabric foundation at leading-edge cloud data centers across the region.

For more information on the research paper, please go to: http://www.brocade-apac.com/thinkflat

EITN: Your Independent Marketing Analysis Companion

2011-11-11T16:39:00.006+08:00

EITN performs content aggregation on ICT news that is most relevant and up to date.

EITN is useful to help CEO, CIO, CTO and CMO to identify trends, know what your competitors are up to and serve as a channel to measure your own progress against the industry that you are in business.

EITN carefully filters out content and publishes only those related to enterprise IT. It makes value for money because it represents what the ICT world is thinking up to date.

For instance, since its inception, EITN has found the following interest facts, information which will take one many hours of hard work to compile; passion is necessary.

Top 5 market trends based on frequency of news, press releases

Cloud computing - 16% of enterprise IT news over a period of 3 months
Security
Networking
Storage
Business Analytics

Top 5 Most Aggressive Companies (worldwide) based on frequency of news, press releases

Oracle - 14.8% of enterprise IT news over a period of 3 months
SAP
IBM
HP
F5 Networks

EITN is useful to be your single point of reference for consultation before making the next decision. Google search can help a little but not directly because Google is too broad and unfocused.

So check out Enterprise IT News to save your time.

Application Delivery Controller Is More Effective In Safeguarding Enterprise Application Security

2011-11-11T15:49:00.002+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'

F5 Networks 2011 ADC Security Study measures the effects of increasingly complex network and application attacks on enterprise organizations, and details the security practices that enterprises are adopting to guard against these threats.

The study suggests that threats are getting harder to defense and older methods are failing. Application Delivery Controller (ADC) is considered to be the preferred method to defense against such attacks.

Common attacks are:

DNS Attack
DDoS - network layer and application layer
Encrypted data attack

The effects of DNS and encrypted data attacks are wide-sweeping across industries, with the typical cost per organization for a 12-month period being $682,000, according to the survey. More than 50 percent of enterprises claimed loss of productivity, 43 percent of respondents reported loss of data, and 31 percent reported loss of revenue. Other costs that enterprises incur from attacks include loss of customer trust, regulatory fines, and theft of money or goods. Recommendations from the study.

Unify the security framework
Understand attack context
Respond and adapt
Scale to combat attacks
Build a robust community

Honda Shows Off Improved Asimo Robot

2011-11-11T10:02:00.000+08:00

Honda started development of Asimo back in 1986 under its Research & Development Wako Fundamental Technical Research Center in Japan. The name is an acronym for "Advanced Step in Innovative MObility"

The robot has a child-like behaviour which mimics the movement of a energetic boy, walking back and forth over the demonstration as if playing hide and seek.

The new Asimo has improved hands, allowing individual movement of each finger, which was proudly shown off as the humanoid opened a Thermos bottle and gracefully poured juice into a paper cup.

Honda said elements of technology developed for Asimo was used to develop a robotic arm in just six months with the intention of helping with the nuclear crisis in northeastern Japan.

Tiny Evolta Robot Competes in Triathlon

2011-11-09T09:49:00.002+08:00

The Evolta robot (hand-sized toylike robot) by Panasonic, powered by merely just three rechargeable AA-batteries, will swim, bicycle and run for a total of approximately 143 miles.

It is going to compete in Hawaii's gruelling Ironman Triathlon course.

It has garnered a few significant achievements under its belt such as:

1.) In 2008, an it climbed 1,739 feet up the Grand Canyon in under seven hours.

2.) It also broke the Guinness world record for the greatest distance travelled by a remote-controlled car by completing the Le Mans race in 2009.

3.) The tiny robot proved its endurance once more by walking 310 miles from Tokyo to the old Japanese capital of Kyoto in 2010.

Google+ Pages: connect with all the things you care about

2011-11-08T16:24:00.000+08:00

In life we connect with all kinds of people, places and things. There’s friends and family, of course, but there’s also the sports teams we root for, the coffee shops we’re loyal to, and the TV shows we can’t stop watching (to name a few).

So far Google+ has focused on connecting people with other people. But we want to make sure you can build relationships with all the things you care about—from local businesses to global brands—so today we’re rolling out Google+ Pages worldwide.

People + pages, better together

Google+ has always been a place for real-life sharing, and Google+ Pages is no exception. After all: behind every page (or storefront, or four-door sedan) is a passionate group of individuals, and we think you should able to connect with them too.

For you and me, this means we can now hang out live with the local bike shop, or discuss our wardrobe with a favorite clothing line, or follow a band on tour. Google+ pages give life to everything we find in the real world. And by adding them to circles, we can create lasting bonds with the pages (and people) that matter most.

For businesses and brands, Google+ pages help you connect with the customers and fans who love you. Not only can they recommend you with a +1, or add you to a circle to listen long-term. They can actually spend time with your team, face-to-face-to-face. All you need to do is start sharing, and you'll soon find the super fans and loyal customers that want to say hello.

A number of pages are already available (see below), but any organization will soon be able to join the community at plus.google.com/pages/create.

Direct Connect from Google search

People search on Google billions of times a day, and very often, they're looking for businesses and brands. Today's launch of Google+ Pages can help people transform their queries into meaningful connections, so we're rolling out two ways to add pages to circles from Google search. The first is by including Google+ pages in search results, and the second is a new feature called Direct Connect.

Maybe you're watching a movie trailer, or you just heard that your favorite band is coming to town. In both cases you want to connect with them right now, and Direct Connect makes it easy—even automatic. Just go to Google and search for [+], followed by the page you're interested in (like +Angry Birds). We'll take you to their Google+ page, and if you want, we’ll add them to your circles.

Direct Connect works for a limited number of pages today (like +Google, +Pepsi, and +Toyota), but many more are coming. In the meantime, organizations can learn more about Direct Connect in our Help Center.

With Google+, we strive to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to software. Today’s initial launch of Google+ Pages brings us a little bit closer, but we’ve still got lots of improvements planned, and miles to go before we sleep. So stay tuned.

F5 Supports Mobile Traffic Growth with New DNS Services

2011-11-08T16:06:00.001+08:00

F5 Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ: FFIV), the global leader in Application Delivery Networking, today announced intelligent DOMAIN NAME SYSTEM (DNS) services for Communications Service Providers (CSPs) to scale their DNS infrastructures more efficiently with significantly reduce costs - so as to enable more quickly deploy new revenue-generating services.

With its DNS services, F5 meets its vision for Service Delivery Networking (SDN) by providing a unified platform for CSPs to deliver voice, data, and video services on a single IP-based network, “Currently, CSPs are realizing that their existing DNS infrastructures can’t sustain the huge mobile traffic demand, let alone handle the increases from voice over IP and other new service offerings,” said Kevin Chin, Country Manager for F5 Networks (pic).

Chin added “The traditional approach of adding more DNS servers no longer solves the problem—it’s prohibitively expensive, can’t scale linearly, and can’t deliver the capacity needed to handle millions of DNS requests per second.”

Today, the average high-performance DNS server only handles about 120,000 requests per second. F5’s new DNS services responds to more than 15x the volume of requests handled by traditional DNS servers.

F5 Solution Highlights

Leveraging F5’s carrier-grade DNS services, CSPs can build flexible, reliable, and secure IP networks that meet future traffic demands, reduce complexity and costs, to deliver quality of experience for subscribers. Benefits include:

High-performance DNS services – F5’s chassis-based systems deliver high performance, responding to more than 15x the volume of requests handled by traditional DNS servers.
Unparalleled scalability – By handling millions of DNS requests per second, F5’s DNS solution significantly offloads existing DNS servers. This enables CSPs to more efficient use network resources and eliminates the need to continually add more DNS servers to meet increasing traffic demands.
Policy-based global traffic management – User requests and application services can be distributed across data centers based on business policies, network conditions, and application performance for a more intelligent and responsive DNS infrastructure.
High availability of applications and services – F5’s DNS solution provides global server load balancing to help ensure high availability of mission critical applications and services. This reduces customer churn and protects average revenue per user (ARPU).
Superior security – Because F5’s DNS services can handle an extremely high volume of requests per second, the DNS infrastructure is able to withstand DDoS attacks. It can block known malware sites to ensure DNS responses are delivered from trusted sites.
Reduced complexity and cost – Providing intelligence, high performance, and unmatched scalability, F5’s DNS solution helps CSPs simplify their DNS infrastructures and more effectively manage their capital expenditures.

Sourcefire Extends Intrusion Prevention to Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Platform

2011-11-08T12:31:00.002+08:00

Sourcefire, Inc. (Nasdaq: ‘FIRE’), the creator of Snort® and cybersecurity vendor, announces its plans to add support for Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization to Sourcefire’s enterprise IPS (Intrusion Prevention System) portfolio.

Sourcefire has joined the Open Virtualization Alliance (OVA), in line with the company’s strategy to deliver heterogeneous hypervisor support to customers.

*The OVA is an organization founded by Red Hat, IBM, HP and Intel to foster the adoption of the open source Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) hypervisor, upon which Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization is based.

“We are very pleased to welcome Sourcefire into the OVA and include their support of Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization. Customers will have the ability to protect their virtualized environments with easy-to-deploy, advanced IPS,” says Navin Thadani, senior director, Virtualization Business at Red Hat.

With this joining of OVA, Sourcefire’s Virtual Sensor and Virtual Defense Center solutions support at least three leading virtual environments - Red Hat, Xen and VMware.

Ivan Wen, Country Manager for Sourcefire Malaysia says, “Sourcefire’s support for heterogeneous environments provides added flexibility to enterprises and cloud computing companies that rely on virtualization platforms for a range of applications – especially at remote sites where physical resources may be limited, or in data centers where little rack space remains.”

Enterprises in Asia Pacific Not Prepared for “Big Data”

2011-11-07T10:23:00.003+08:00

Refer to 'Malaysia Technology News'.

More than 50% of some of Asia Pacific’s large enterprises that participated in a recent survey are not anticipating or planning for the advent of 'big data'.

This generates a window of opportunity for cloud computing adoption, creating win-win situation for both vendors and consumers because cloud computing caters for scalability, plug and play and lowest cost of adoption for 'big data'

The survey results are published in a HDS-sponsored IDC white paper titled “The Changing Face of Storage: A Rethink of Strategy that Goes Beyond the Data”. The survey was conducted by IDC from August to September 2011 with 150 IT executives from large enterprises in Australia, New Zealand, China, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore. HDS commissioned the survey to better understand their storage management challenges and strategies.

Besides seamless-natured adoption capability of cloud computing and its lower cost of adoption, other benefits of having data and information in the cloud includes more capability and potential for future analytics and business insight.

The survey reveals top three concerns of IT executives in such area, which are:

Data growth
Increasing utilization level
Challenges of managing storage for virtualized servers.

Of the respondents, 67% believe their current storage infrastructure is sufficient for the next 12 months; however, 72% do not have a strategy to cope with the anticipated growth of unstructured data – the large multimedia, internet-based or other types of multi-gigabyte “big data” that is now increasingly important as a competitive resource for data mining and other business uses.

Indeed, 64% stated that business needs for deeper analysis outpace the ability of their systems to ensure the data they have is relevant, timely and useful. Their data growth is outpacing their ability to effectively manage it.

Many IT executives believe that adoption of latest technologies and increase in terms of investment in IT will actually help, even though many do not have concrete action plans yet.

In terms of latest technologies adoption, Virtualization is the most adopted technology (by 60% of respondents), followed by disaster recovery (44%) and data encryption for security (37%).

Besides that, the top concerns on adopting cloud storage are security (48%), followed by loss of control, pricing, and data sovereignty.

Interestingly, the survey also reveals Malaysia to be the country which ranked top in terms of least adoption and least concerned with virtualization. Malaysian prefer to make use of server optimization rather than cloud adoption to tackle data management and alignment of IT costs to business budgets is a key challenge in IT adoption.

Microsoft Hints That Intelligent Systems Is The Next Information Age

2011-11-06T10:17:00.001+08:00

Refer to 'Enterprise It News'.

Microsoft hints that after cloud computing, the next will be intelligent systems.

This is to be powered by embedded devices (hardware with micro processor and firmware built-in) to be vastly available in the next 5 years.

By 2015, shipments of embedded devices will surpass those of phones, PCs and servers combined. Developers around the world are building intelligent systems for manufacturers, retailers, healthcare providers and a host of other industries.

When all devices are capable of making decisions and connect to the Internet, it is possible that all devices can connect to information superhighway made possible by cloud computing to get information to be further utilized.

Cloud computing is still new even though the concept has been around for some time. The world is just seeing and waiting for major adoptions.

More on cloud computing.

Tech Blog Malaysia Statistics (Oct 2011)

2011-11-05T10:12:00.001+08:00

Latest ICT trend
Latest PC trend
A logo of Singapore's education institution
Cisco routing protocol comparison
MS Windows issue with MSSQL 2005 express updates
Crystal Report 8.5 issue
Comparison of prepaid broadband package

Overview

Total monthly traffic increased by as much as 8.9%.
Traffic from referring sites decreased by 0.29%.
Google still top contributor (70.34%).Up from last month.
Top 5 countries (Malaysia, US, India, Singapore, Indonesia). Refer here.
New visitors 86.94% (up from last month).

SAS one of the World’s Best Workplaces

2011-11-03T14:31:00.000+08:00

SAS secured the No. 2 spot on the elite “Top 25 World’s Best Multinational Workplaces” inaugural list from Great Place to Work®. SAS, the leader in business analytics software and services, was highlighted among the best for health care, child care and work-life balance.

SAS CEO Jim Goodnight said, "While we are delighted to receive this recognition, as a business leader I am most honored to know that the ranking is based on the feedback of our own employees around the world. Everything we do grows out of that philosophy. The real reward is what employees give back to the company and our customers."

SAS is recognized worldwide by Great Place to Work. SAS corporate headquarters in the United States and SAS Norway were both No. 1 on their country lists of " Best Companies to Work For " in 2010 and 2011.

To be eligible, companies must appear on five or more national Great Place to Work lists in the past year and have more than 5,000 employees worldwide, with at least 40 percent working outside the company’s home country. Companies on the World’s Best Multinational Workplaces list are rated by their employees to be among the best companies, and have excellent HR policies and practices that support a culture of trust.

PayPal Opens Global Operations Centre in Malaysia to Support Significant Demand for Online Payments Worldwide

2011-11-01T21:56:00.000+08:00

PayPal today officially opened the doors to its new global operations centre in Malaysia. This new facility offers service and support in English to PayPal’s customers across Asia and provides additional risk and financial services operations for PayPal’s business globally. Further Asian language support will be added in the near future. Hiring at the facility is well ahead of schedule with 200 staff already on-site. The company plans to hire up to 500 employees by end of 2013.

The facility is strategically located at 1 First Avenue, Dataran Bandar Utama, which is a Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) status building developed to support the growth of high-tech companies in Malaysia. To expand its facility, PayPal is recruiting Internet-savvy university graduates and providing extensive training programmes on site. Interested candidates can apply online for customer service representatives and operational specialist positions at http://www.ebaycareers.com/home.html.

“As PayPal’s business continues to grow globally, we are also expanding our operations and customer support to ensure we can deliver a great customer experience for anyone with a PayPal account,” said John McCabe, PayPal’s senior vice president of global operations. “We couldn’t be more pleased to open this new facility in Malaysia to help support our growth and better serve our customers in Asia and around the world.”

“We are happy to welcome PayPal to Malaysia as it puts the country on the global map for e-commerce and brings hundreds of higher-value jobs in the Internet and finance industries to our country,” said Dato’ Mukhriz Tun Dr Mahathir, Deputy Minister (Trade), Ministry of International Trade and Industry. “As a global leader in the payments industry with a well-known reputation as a quality employer, PayPal is the type of high-growth multinational company that we want to attract, invest and grow in Malaysia with our globally competitive workforce, world-class business environment and excellent technology infrastructure.”

“PayPal has an excellent track record in Malaysia with several global and regional firsts, including our partnership with Maxis for online bill payment and mobile commerce, our alliance with RHB for real-time top-up and send money services, and our co-branded prepaid card with MOL,” said Rupert Keeley, PayPal’s senior vice president for Asia Pacific. “Today’s grand opening ceremony is a milestone for the region as we expand our capabilities to help millions of consumers and merchants pay more safely online, and increasingly, on mobile devices.”

PayPal’s new facility in Petaling Jaya, Malaysia joins other global operation centres located around the world including Berlin, Germany; Chandler, U.S.A.; Dublin, Ireland; Omaha, U.S.A.; Shanghai, China; and Sao Paulo, Brazil. The company is noted for its exceptional work environments and its commitment to both employees and the local community.

Facts and Figures about Smartphones in Malaysia

2011-10-27T20:27:00.002+08:00

The typical smartphone user: 25-34 years old, high educated and working

Smartphones are not a gadget of the very young only – the majority of users are between 25-34 years old, are high educated with full time employment and an income of 5.000 RM and more. Many users are new to this smart world (80% first device), more than the half joined within the past 12 months.

Devices, their role and usage: Important accessory - always and everywhere

Nokia (35%) and Sony Ericsson (25%) with highest market share and with clear distance to other brands. Rather un-mobile location usage place number 1: at home followed by in restaurants. Important as purse and key, two thirds don´t leave the house without the smartphone. The users are driven by killing time and having instant information at hand by taking the smartphone along. Internet usage – especially browsing (41% last week) and accessing a social network (37%) – are very important for smartphone users. Only 13% of users do not have cross-media usage habits: the majority does something in parallel when using the smartphone like listening to music (63%) or using the internet on a further device (49%).

Internet Usage: High frequency and number of daily sessions

The typical smartphone user accesses the web almost every day (43% mobile, 73% fixed) with several sessions on a usage day – however rather short ones on mobile and longer ones on PC. One third expects to spend more time on the mobile web via smartphone in the future. Future web usage on PC is expected to be higher (52%).

Search: High frequency and Google followed by Yahoo!

Search engines of major relevance in everyday search (55% mobile, 88% fixed). Only 10% never use local search and more than 90% mention further actions after looking up specific information, with 41% making a purchase. For the majority Google is not only one of the used search engines but the number one search engine followed by Yahoo!.

Videos: Medium frequency and Facebook & YouTube on one level

Around every second smartphone is used to watch videos at least on a weekly base. Facebook (78%) is more used via smartphone than YouTube (62%) – on computer YouTube with higher usage rate.

Social Networking: High frequency and Facebook the one

Every second smartphone user accesses social networks via smartphone every day – 41% post personal updates daily. THE social network is Facebook (mobile and fixed with more than 90%).

Mobile Advertising: Accepted on high level with high awareness

Almost one half would not mind mobile ads as long as they receive a goody. Every fifth has used a mobile coupon in a store. 81% have noticed mobile advertising a least sometimes – mostly on search engines and apps. Two out of three have taken action after seeing a mobile ad.

Mobile Commerce: Growing shopping channel hindered by security and convenience

29% use the smartphone for price comparison or product information when shopping – about the same amount changed their mind on purchase as a result of retrieving information via smartphone. One third does not only use the smartphone when shopping physically but shops directly via this device – 47% of them within the past month. Preference of fixed PC and fear that purchase might not be secure are main barriers of mobile commerce. 32% anticipate a higher purchase rate via smartphone within the next 12 months.

Private smartphone users who use the internet in general

Age	18 - 24 Years	38%
	25 - 34 Years	41%
	35 - 44 Years	13%
	45 - 54 Years	8%
Gender	Male	29%
Gender	Female	71%
Education	Low	1%
	Middle	26%
	High	71%
Education	Employed - full-time	66%
	Employed - part-time	5%
	Retired	1%
	Student / Apprentice	20%
	Unemployed/homemaker	8%
Marital Status	Alone	54%
Marital Status	Together	45%
Household size	1 Person	2%
	2 Persons	6%
	3 Persons	17%
	4 Persons	22%
	5 Persons and more	53%
Number of children	0 Children	47%
	1 Child	25%
	2 Children	15%
	3 Children and more	13%
Annual household	Top (5.000 RM and above)	49%
	Middle (1.500 - 4.999 RM)	39%
	Low (1.499 RM and below)	5%
Region	Urban	74%
	Suburban	20%
	Rural	6%

Source:

Mobile Internet Insights Report Malaysia
Ipsos MediaCT Germany
The Media, Content and Technology Research Specialists

Survey Shows Malaysian Site Owners and Advertisers should Optimise for Mobile Web

2011-10-27T20:01:00.001+08:00

If you were asked to give up your smartphone or your TV, which would you choose?
Earlier this year, Google teamed up with IPSOS Research to learn the answer to this question and many others -- by asking 30,000 people in 30 countries, including Malaysia, about how they use their smartphones, giving us a detailed snapshot of how consumers around the globe think about their smartphones.

It’s the first time anyone has asked this many people the same questions, and it means we can compare and contrast behaviour and trends across countries: we can compare how someone in Malaysia uses mobile banking as opposed to someone in, say, France.

And as we’ve always made clear, we want to make this rich trove of information accessible to everyone -- journalists, marketers, advertisers, app developers, and academics--so that an app developer can make educated decisions about which countries to market their apps, or a reporter can learn how widespread mobile social networking is in his home country.

We’re pleased to announce that today, we’ve made this data publicly available in, via http://www.ourmobileplanet.com, which is also available in Bahasa Malaysia.

Now, anyone can go to Our Mobile Planet to create instant charts and graphs comparing, say, how many Malaysians notice mobile ads versus Australia.

To get you started, here are some interesting things we learned about Malaysia:

1 in 3 Malaysians say they would rather give up their TV than their smartphone.
On a daily basis: 43% of Malaysian smartphone users go onto the mobile Internet.
68% say they never leave home without their smartphones and 58% say they first access information on their smartphones and then follow up to find more info on their laptops / PCs.
64% of smartphone owners use their devices to get on the net to get information when not in front of a computer and 47% say their smartphones provide them with a quick answer to a question when they need an immediate answer.
And Malaysia compared to other countries in the region:
Japan, Korea & Taiwan have the greatest proportion (~80%) of smartphone users for whom this is their first smartphone. Australia, India & Malaysia are also at 80%, ahead of rest of world. A full 23% of Australian smartphone users have had their phone for less than 3 months, second only to South Korea with 28% having purchased their smartphone in just the last 3 months.
Southeast Asian consumers are as or more likely to have made a purchase on their smartphone than U.S. users. Consumers in Thailand, Singapore and Indonesia report
significantly higher likelihood to have made a purchase, while Malaysian consumers report a slightly higher propensity.
Intention to use more apps in the future seems to be significantly higher in developing Asian-Pacific economies, as compared to developed countries across the world. For example, 39% of US and UK consumers, and 45% of Japanese consumers, intend to use more apps in the future, while over 60% of Malaysian, Thai, and Indian consumers and 59% of Indonesian consumers intend to do so.

In addition to charts and graphs, Our Mobile Planet site visitors can also choose to download the data as an image, a spreadsheet file, or an open CSV (comma-separated value) format.

We hope that everyone finds this wealth of information as entertaining and useful as we have.

About the data

This study is a global effort conducted in partnership by Google, Ipsos and the MMA (Mobile Marketing Association) to get insights about the mobile user and its mobile usage. To better understand the mobile usage, the OurMobilePlanet site provides deep dives into the search, video, social and email behaviour, as well as mobile research and purchase intentions. Most of the data is set into context to the classical desktop internet to evaluate difference and similarities between these channels.

About the survey methodology

Timing - surveys were administered during March and July 2011.
Population - target population were the private smartphone user, who accessed the mobile internet on their device in each country surveyed. Frame population (sample base) was from Ipsos online access panels and partner panels in each country surveyed.
Sampling -samples in each country surveyed were aimed to be representative of the target population. Sample sizes are n=6,000 in the US, n=2,000 in Germany, UK, France and Japan, n=500 in Indonesia and Malaysia and n=1,000 in each other country surveyed. Quotas were applied in the sampling process with regard to age, gender, mobile internet usage and mobile brand, as to ensure representivity.

Motorola Solutions Enables the Developer Community to create Next Generation Enterprise Solutions

2011-10-21T21:00:00.001+08:00

Motorola Solutions, Inc. (NYSE: MSI), today shared its vision of next generation enterprise solutions with around 180 Asia Pacific developers and showcased a host of technology innovations to its growing community of independent software vendors, system integrators and application developers at its second APAC Developer Conference.

The company also reinforced its commitment to enabling its developer community with RhoElements, its new Operating System-independent framework for HTML5 application development, and showcased ET1, its first built for enterprise Android-based tablet to developers. The two-day conference covers a wide range of emerging technologies, development roadmap and enterprise solutions for tomorrow’s enterprise and businesses. The conference agenda include trends and technologies for advanced devices, enhanced information capture, integrated communications, adaptive networking and advanced application services.

The developer conference organised by Motorola Solutions serves to connect partners, developers, users and technologies across the Asia Pacific with an ecosystem of devices, tools, programs and support to enable them to create next generation enterprise solutions and deliver greater business impact and results.

Expert speakers include Luis Llamas, Product Management Director for Mobile Computing Device, Mark Kirstein, Product Management Senior Director for Solutions and Frameworks and Sanchit Gogia, Senior Analyst from Forrester Research, providing insights on topics such as Android for the enterprises, introduction of new development platform, mobile application development for the future and many more upcoming developments to add value to the developer community.

During the conference the developers can also tap into Motorola’s digital two-way radio technology expertise, and discuss industry trends and latest developments in this space. Experts will be there on hand to cover topics which help developers discover and create applications that leverage the full potential of digital radio systems to deliver new experiences to the users.

Key Facts:

RhoElements, is industry's first HTML5 application framework designed to allow businesses to quickly and cost-effectively develop and deploy web-based applications on their existing Motorola Windows Embedded Handheld (formerly Windows Mobile) and Windows Embedded Compact (CE) mobile computers. RhoElements also ensure business continuity by enabling the application to run, isolated from the operating system and provides a bridge for businesses to adopt future Windows Embedded Handheld releases, Android or other operating systems.
Defining a true enterprise tablet, the features of the ET1, Motorola’s first Android-based tablet, runs on an enterprise ready version of the Android Operating System. It offers enhanced security, durability and flexibility through its comprehensive suite of robust enterprise features and accessories, designed to meet the critical business needs across vertical markets from Retail, Hospitality, Healthcare, Manufacturing and Utilities.

RHOELEMENTS Key Facts

RhoElements provides a modern HTML5/advanced JavaScript/CSS application framework for high-performance web-based applications, enabling a seamless transition from terminal emulation solutions or legacy browser-based applications to more powerful and user-friendly web-based applications.
RhoElements allows enterprise customers and Channel partners to leverage on the productivity of web-based applications, cutting down the costs for application development, management and support.
RhoElements allows developers to offer enterprise users applications with a consumer-style look and feel with consistency across device type, screen size and operating system.
With support for HTML5 features such as application caching and web storage, developers can optimize network utilization and enable continuous operation when users temporarily lose connectivity.
RhoElements exposes web developers to device-level application programming interfaces (APIs) so that they may take advantage of the enterprise-rich features found in Motorola enterprise mobile computers.
The first version of RhoElements will provide support for the Motorola enterprise tablet (ET1) running the Android™ operating system and Motorola mobile devices running Windows Embedded Handheld 6.5, Windows Embedded CE 5 and 6 and Windows Embedded Compact 7.
RhoElements 1.0 is available immediately for download.

How To Disable the Parameter Prompt for Crystal Report Using VB.Net

2011-10-21T20:25:00.003+08:00

Just sharing, no big deal.

Refer to

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms227086%28v=vs.90%29.aspx

This applies to MS .NET programming using Visual Studio 2008 SP1.

Three things to take note.

1. ) Do not invoke CrystalReportViewer.RefreshReport Method

This method will refresh the data for the report currently displayed in the CrystalReportViewer control. The report will prompt for parameters or logon info is necessary.

So, this method is not needed unless the same CrystalDecisions.CrystalReports.Engine.ReportDocument object is reused.

2.) Procedures (Must follow this order)

2.1. Refresh ReportDocument object

2.2. Set ReportDocument object datasource

2.3. Set ReportDocument object as CrystalReportViewer.ReportSource

2.4. Set parameters to ReportDocument

3.) Two ways of setting parameters at step 2.4

3.1) Using a combination of

CrystalDecisions.Shared.ParameterField.CurrentValues
CrystalDecisions.Shared.ParameterField.HasCurrentValue

3.2) Using CrystalReports.Engine.ReportDocument.SetParameterValue

Sample Codes:

Public Sub LoadReport_1(Optional ByVal remoteDataCol As Collection = Nothing)

        Dim CrxReport As New CrystalDecisions.CrystalReports.Engine.ReportDocument
        Dim strReportName As String
        Dim paramV As CrystalDecisions.Shared.ParameterValues
        Dim paramDValue As CrystalDecisions.Shared.ParameterDiscreteValue


        Try

            Cursor.Current = Cursors.WaitCursor

            strReportName = Application.StartupPath & "\Rpt\Report1.rpt"
            CrxReport.Load(strReportName, CrystalDecisions.Shared.OpenReportMethod.OpenReportByDefault)

            '-1. Refresh ReportDocument object
            CrxReport.Refresh()

            '-2. Set ReportDocument object datasource
            CrxReport.SetDataSource(remoteDataCol)

            '-3. Set ReportDocument object as CrystalReportViewer.ReportSource
            CRViewer.ReportSource = CrxReport

            '-4. Set parameters  to ReportDocument ----
            paramV = New CrystalDecisions.Shared.ParameterValues
            paramDValue = New CrystalDecisions.Shared.ParameterDiscreteValue
            paramDValue.Value = "ABC Company"
            paramV.Add(paramDValue)

            '--- Method 1 (This works) ----
            CrxReport.ParameterFields.Item("MyCompany").CurrentValues = paramV
            CrxReport.ParameterFields.Item("MyCompany").HasCurrentValue = True

            '--- or Method 2 (This also work) ----
            'CrxReport.SetParameterValue(0, "ABC Company")
            'CrxReport.SetParameterValue("MyCompany", paramDValue)

            CRViewer.ShowExportButton = True
            CRViewer.ShowPrintButton = True
            CRViewer.ShowGroupTreeButton = True

            CRViewer.Zoom(100)
            Cursor.Current = Cursors.Default

        Catch ex As Exception
            MsgBox(ex.ToString & vbCrLf & ex.Message & vbCrLf & ex.StackTrace)
        End Try
    End Sub

Akamai Solutions for Cloud Computing

2011-10-21T20:18:00.001+08:00

Akamai Solutions for Cloud Computing is meant to accelerate, scale and fortify applications and platforms running in the cloud.

In other words, Akamai is in the ADN (application delivery network) business and it supports cloud computing platform.

The benefits of Akamai solutions for cloud are:

Cloud acceleration; performance
Cloud business continuity; fail-over, load balancing
Cloud security
Cloud applications and data storage;high availability

How does the EdgePlatform or Akamai Intelligent Platform work in this manner ?

First of all, it is a distributed computing platform, means it is client server architecture with peer-to-peer client capability.

Secondly, this distributed computing platform can be deployed into cloud computing environment.

To setup Akamai's ADN for cloud based application (SaaS), first of all, setup a cloud environment. Then deploy the application into the cloud environment. Finally, deploy ADN on top of the application for web traffic control and management.

Examples:

Company	Industry	Solution	Key Impacts
Standard Chartered Bank London, Hong Kong, Singapore	Financial services	1.) Dynamic site accelerator 2.) Web application accelerator	1.) Improved speed of delivery of web site by 500%. 2.) Increased secure online transaction performance by 100%. 3.) Enabled annual infrastructure and significant operating savings. 4.) Supports significant growth in online banking application adoption. 5.) supported 20% increase in online banking transaction volume. 6.) Gained ability to quickly expand into emerging markets.
Cathay Pacific Hong Kong	Travel	1.) Dynamic site accelerator 2.) Web application accelerator	1.) 100% increase in online bookings. 2.) Estimated annual savings of up to $1,500,000. 3.) Significant increase in agent extranet adoption. 4.) 65% increase in traffic without additional infrastructure. 5.) 65% increase in global site performance. 6.) Considerable infrastructure savings per year. 7.) Confidence in its online presence
HP Company, Palo Alto, CA	Technology	Web application accelerator	1.) 60% reduction in response times from Europe and a 50% reduction in Asia. 2.) Elimination of customer and partner complaints 3.) Zero capital expenditure.

Also refer to 'Akamai Provides the DDoS Solution to AIMS'

The Consumerization of IT – What and Why?

2011-10-19T10:28:00.000+08:00

Refer to this article from 'Enterprise IT News'

Consumerization of IT is referring to a phenomenon where consumer IT and enterprise IT is merging. It is one of the major enterprise IT trend.

This is driven by two main catalysts 1.) proliferation of smart devices 2.) cloud computing.

Consumerization of IT is that it is about shift of control that users are now decider of policies. I agree with that not just because it is lifestyle and trends, more importantly, empowering employees with mobile computing also serves more working efficiency, cost savings and business performance.

Another reason for 'consumer-driven IT' is that people tends to do comparison. Enterprise IT will each have own IT teams which can exist for many reasons such as development of internal and customized business applications. These applications are subjected to comparison with available alternatives applications and technology out there, such as social media apps which are actually provided for free. Users will compare the better of both and decide on the best ones to use.

The challenge of coping with such trend is enterprise security where security solutions simply have to scan for more possibilities.

Also refer to 'Apple Is Everywhere, Including the Enterprise Market'

Refer more on trends.