Here is this week's Editors' Choice; look for Readers' Choice later this week.
EDITORS’ CHOICE
From the front page
Eye of the hurricane: New Orleans prepares
New Orleans prepares its disaster-recovery plan the wake of Katrina, and it’s based on Wi-Fi, VoIP.
Dealing with worst-case scenarios
Imagine a natural disaster the likes of Hurricane Katrina or a terrorist attack on a major U.S. city wipes out business operations. In the mad dash to get back online as quickly as possible, security protocols and procedures take a back seat to regaining business continuity. That’s when information systems are vulnerable to attackers.
Companies look to streamline call center operations
Contact centers are becoming increasingly distributed as companies move away from building vast phone rooms in favor of smaller remote offices and home-based agents.
LinuxWorld showcases business cases for Linux
With Linux making deeper inroads into corporate data centers, the LinuxWorld Conference & Expo gave attendees some firsthand information about how open source is maturing to handle more critical business workloads.
In depth
The New Data Center: Spotlight on server virtualization
Dive into our virtualization package, which looks at VMware, gives you a taste of how some users (from a law firm to a large newspaper chain) are applying virtualization to a look at the costs.
10GBase-T taps twisted-pair wiring
While running 10G Ethernet over this type of wiring was once thought to be impossible, standards makers relied on four technical building blocks to make 10GBase-T a reality: cancellation, analog-to-digital conversion, cabling enhancements and coding improvements.
Can blogging boost your career?
Online journals can showcase your IT smarts, but make sure your employer is OK with it.
From the blogs and forums
Ken Fasimpaur writes it’s not just accidental data leakers like AOL we have to worry about – it’s the people who take advantage of that data. Paul McNamara wonders how much longer the US will still be number one in domain name registrations. Mark Gibbs wonders who all these dumb people are who keep falling for Nigerian e-mail scams. Keith Shaw looks at the slimmer TomTom GPS device. James Gaskin looks at Linux in schools.
ITVideo
How does Blue Lane try to ease the burden of ‘Patch Tuesday’ for server adminstrators? CEO Jeff Palmer explains on this week’s Network World Hot Seat.
A look at all the cool stuff at Siggraph 2006, including virutal reality gear from 5th Dimension and a video “table” Keith wants for the Network World lounge.
More news
Vendors tout virtualization features
Applied to servers or storage, virtualization lets users host dozens or hundreds of server operating system instances, or divide and control the amounts of storage on different disks, both from a few large machines. The technology provides lower operational costs and less complexity, proponents say.
IBM revamps Sametime package
IBM/Lotus says the next release – Version 7.5 – of its Sametime real-time collaboration server will be the last one that uses Domino for its underlying platform components.
Schools build mobile ‘study force’
A Canadian public school district has launched a mobile computing project that will eventually equip 20,000 students with laptop access anytime, anywhere over a pervasive wireless LAN.
Call center for hire helps sell blenders
When Homeland Housewares wants to sell lots of Magic Bullet blenders, it most often calls on call-center service provider LiveOps, which uses call agents who work from home in combination with sophisticated back-end software to boost the percentage of calls the agents convert into sales.
Managed VoIP services to star at VoiceCon
Hardware vendors will team with carriers at the VoiceCon conference this week in San Francisco to offer managed and hosted VoIP services that lighten management and capital costs as businesses transition from traditional PBXs to IP phones.
Bankers giving the finger to network security
For Daren Mehl, securing billions of dollars in transactions is so easy he can do all the heavy lifting with just a finger.
Vendors add to e-mail storage options
New software from Symantec and Mimosa Systems, along with changes to the federal court system’s rules of civil procedure, could encourage customers who routinely are at risk of being the target of litigation to archive e-mail and dcuments.
Cisco can’t reproduce Black Hat flaw
Cisco has been unable to reproduce a security flaw reported in its PIX firewall appliance earlier this month, the networking company said Tuesday.
In brief: Near field Communications Forum releases specs
The Near Field Communications Forum last week released its first four specifications, which will let devices and tags using this emerging short-range wireless technology work with each other.
Tropos bolsters multiradio wireless nets
Wireless mesh pioneer Tropos Networks has matched its rivals by unveiling a dual-radio access point that can use 2.4GHz and 5GHz radio bands to let customers more easily forge an outdoor mesh network.
Systems management wares debut at LinuxWorld
Systems management newcomers this week stormed LinuxWorld with software designed to manage the open source operating system.
Users keep tabs on vendor backdating
Some of the most recognizable and trusted names in the network industry are under scrutiny – both internally and from the U.S. government – for manipulating the dates of stock option grants to enrich their recipients further.
