Editorial: Cisco, Juniper face unique challenges, 01/30/06
Two weeks ago, I had the unique opportunity of speaking with two of networking's top CEOs within hours of each other: Cisco's John Chambers and Juniper's Scott Kriens. They're both eyeing the same big opportunity in the enterprise - the next generation...
Dzubeck: How smart should a network be? 01/30/06
This is not just an arcane philosophical issue; it is fundamental to how to design, implement, operate and manage a corporate SOA. Based on industry standards, an SOA is a multilayer framework that allows all computing concepts to exist in a single...
'Net Buzz: Can you hear me now? . . . Not my kids, 01/30/06
Are we headed toward the day when every elementary school desk comes equipped with a cell-phone pocket? Amoroso offers what will have to pass for words of caution: "There are always going to be parents drawing a line that says, 'My kid is too young ...
Johnson: Managing the providers of managed services, 01/30/06
I wish I had a nickel for every time an IT executive told me he wanted 'better managed services' from providers. Yet this perennial request seems to be perennially unanswered by service providers ... Obviously, the carriers are failing somewhere.
Brodsky: 802.11n reaches the starting line, 01/30/06
Standards are crucial to telecom market growth. But we should have no illusions about the standards-setting process. Vendors will always try to manipulate the system for their own advantage. The only way to create a standard to which everyone will ...
Bradner: King George I on privacy, 01/30/06
I'm left with the nagging feeling that the Google case is just an excuse to find out if there are characteristics of search strings that can be used to ferret out bad guys of one sort or another. If the government thinks that turns out to be the case ...
Backspin: The connected culture unconnected, 01/30/06
What we need is a national networking policy. We need to encourage community networking, Wi-Fi and ISPs. We need to find a way to let the telcos succeed and provide what we need. The policy needs to be business and consumer friendly, it needs to ...
Gearhead: DSL, Part III (in which we get back DSL), 01/30/06
Last week we were relating our ongoing struggles with DSL, which concluded with us being disconnected from the world. Our solution, at least until AT&T restored our service, was to set up a wireless connection to our neighbors, the commander and his ...
Bleeding Edge: Losing your brand in your services mix, 01/24/06
At CES 2006, AT&T was quick to show off a highlight of its exhibit, the Yahoo!-enabled Nokia 6682 phone. The Nokia phone has all this sexy functionality – it can do all of the standard “smartphone” organizer/calendar functions, acts as an MP3 music ...
Help Desk: Using VLANs on a small network, 01/30/06
I manage four Novell servers - two NW6.5sp2 and two NW5.0sp6a. These servers provide services to 5 buildings. These 5 buildings are part of a much larger campus encompassing approximately 40 buildings but I don't service those other buildings. The ...
Dr. Internet: Selecting the best RAID system for a small office, 01/30/06
We would like a RAID system to provide data protection in a small office. Can you say whether a hardware or a software RAID system is a better option? Also, is RAID 1 or RAID 5 the more reliable system for protecting our data?