Cloud upstarts: Too cheap to trust?

New Amazon competitors offer some compelling deals in the cloud, but at what price?

Hosting provider Atlantic.net launched a $0.99 per month cloud server this fall, which is significantly less expensive than the $0.013 per hour starting price for market-leader Amazon Web Services’ on-demand Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) virtual machines.

SherWeb, another mid-size hosting provider that is pivoting into the Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) market, launched a Hyper-V/SSD-flash/InfiniBand-fabric/Intel-powered cloud offering that it says beats AWS on a variety of input/output capability benchmark tests. Providers like DigitalOcean, ProfitBricks and Concerto are among others attempting to differentiate their services from AWS, Microsoft and Google on price, performance and usability.

It’s a story of David vs. Goliath in the cloud. As the public IaaS cloud computing market matures, incumbents are facing pressure left and right. Smaller and mid-size providers are aiming to steal workloads away, and some offer compelling value, at least on paper.

All of which has cloud users wondering: Are these smaller providers too cheap to trust?
The cloud computing market in recent years has been rife with horror stories of service providers going dark with little or no warning. Nirvanix, the cloud storage company that suddenly went belly up in the fall of 2013 was perhaps the most notorious case. Code Spaces was another example - after getting hacked the company, lost all its data. Cloud storage provider MegaCloud inexplicably went dark in 2013, too.

So at least one worry for customers who use small or mid-size cloud providers is whether you can trust them to be around for the long haul. There are precautions any customer should take, no matter what cloud provider is used. But backers at some of these lesser-known IaaS vendors say it’s unfair to compare them to failed businesses. “We’ve been in business 20 years,” says Manoj “Marty” Puranik, president and CEO of Atlantic.net.

Apples to Oranges
Gartner IaaS analyst Lydia Leong says there’s a fundamental difference (other than brand awareness) between big-name vendors Amazon, Microsoft and Google, and the new breed of providers entering the cloud market. Some of these new entrants are more appropriately categorized as virtual private server (VPS) vendors. Atlantic.net falls into this realm. Many of these companies have a hosting heritage and now they’re rolling out self-provisioned cloud services.

The use cases are different though, Leong says. VPS hosters tend to be ideal for small-use workloads – one or two VMs at a time. Some vendors overprovision their servers, allowing them to offer bottom-of-the-market costs. “It’s different from enterprise-class IaaS,” Leong says.

(SherWeb Product Marketing Manager Guillaume Boisvert says the company limits overprovisioning for its IaaS offering.)

The bigger issue is that these vendors don’t have nearly the product portfolio, nor the breadth and depth of features compared to bigger-name vendors. AWS is the market-leader for a reason: The company has the widest set of cloud-based tools and a network of third-party tools integrated on top of it. It’s an apples-to-oranges comparison between AWS and these other vendors. Even Microsoft, which is spending enormous money in the cloud, is still just beginning to turn heads in the IaaS market.

cloud prices
James Staten, an analyst with Forrester, says efforts by some of these small and mid-size vendors could likely end up being futile. “These are all typical tactics by smaller players who have little R&D to innovate and little opportunity for true differentiation - they fall back on price or performance,” Staten wrote in an email. “Both of these tactics are fleeting as they are easily counteracted by the big players and thus are short-term differentiators at best.”

There’s a better way for competitors to approach this market. Big vendors by their nature offer general-purpose, hyper-scale clouds. Smaller vendors could focus on specific workloads and industries, like retail, government, health care or finance, Staten says. GoGrid, for example, has successfully developed a specialty in the big-data workloads hosting market. “The better tact for these players is to focus on their customers, understand what kinds of workloads they want to run, what vertical market differences they face and specialize on complementary capabilities,” Staten says. “These are more sustainable differentiators against the big guys.”

Puranki, founder of Atlantic.net (the $0.99 server folks), said he’s not looking to take business from Amazon. He’s merely offering a significantly less expensive service for people looking to test out a cloud service. There will be room for multiple vendors in what IDC expects could be a $127 billion cloud industry. “There’s not one company that can provide services to the whole market,” he says.

Despite these providers lacking the name brand recognition of larger vendors, some companies like PlaceWise Media are happily using them. “We collect a lot of data,” says Roger Heaston, CTO of PlaceWise, which handles digital services for shopping centers, such as by hosting websites, manages social media outreach, etc. A cloud-based platform that can scale up and down based on capacity needs is ideal for PlaceWise, he says.

A couple of years ago Heaston evaluated AWS but wanted to compare it to another vendor before signing up. That’s when he found ProfitBricks, a provider that offered clear and competitive pricing and what Heaston found to be ample performance. The CTO hasn’t looked back since signing up with ProfitBricks.

Executives at smaller vendors are right: There will be room in the hosting market for a variety of providers. For enterprise customers, going with one of the big brand names like Amazon, Microsoft or Google is usually a no-brainer, but for certain workloads or price considerations, smaller providers could be an adequate fit.

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Data from wearable devices could soon land you in jail

Health privacy laws don’t cover your wearable and information it's collecting

While that fitness band or smartwatch you own may help you get in shape or never miss an appointment, the data it collects is now also fodder for criminal or civil litigation.

In what's thought to be a first-of-its-kind civil lawsuit, a personal injury lawyer in Canada used data from a Fitbit wristband in an insurance fraud case to support his client's claims.

Simon Muller, a partner in the Personal Injury Group of McLeod Law in Calgary, Alberta pushed his client's Fitbit data through an analytics platform from Vivametrica, a startup company. Vivametrica's Functional Activity Assessment tool compares activity data against that of the general population, offering a way to benchmark the results. (Muller's client voluntarily shared several months of Fitbit data with Vivametrica so it could be compared with data from other Fitbit users. His client, a former personal trainer, had been in an accident that affected her ability to work; the data was used to back up her claim.)

Cloud aggregation services for wearable data
Rick Hu, an orthopedic surgeon and CEO of Vivametrica, said the analytics software can currently only be used with activity trackers, but the company is in the process of expanding it to work with other wearable devices.

"One of the shortcomings right now is that each of the device manufacturers collects their own information," Hu said. "So it's hard to compare that data with other people's data who are not using that particular device. There is no standardization in terms of the activity data."

The company hopes to collect data using APIs from multiple wearable brands and anonymize it for research purposes.

Vivametrica's software will also be able to use APIs from health tracking platforms such as Google Fit, Apple HealthKit, Samsung Sammy and Microsoft HealthVault to aggregate data from wearable devices for comparison.

With that in mind, Hu sees the day coming when prosecutors and defense attorneys alike could use data collected from wearable devices.

"I think there are many hurdles to make it routine," he said. "But in my discussions with legal colleagues...they're quite willing to do this. I think it's better to have an open discussion...rather than have a serendipitous kind of surveillance and all of a sudden you realize your entire day has been charted on someone's computer, like Uber for instance."

"Police use social media accounts like Facebook and, going forward, will police find some way to use this data? Sure they will. That seems pretty clear," said Scott Valentine, president of Vivametrica.

Wearables are a perfect fit for litigation, according to Neda Shakoori, an attorney who leads an eDiscovery initiative with the law firm of McManis Faulkner.

Wearables not only track physical activity, but they can transmit geolocation information, and more sophisticated wearables, like Google Glass, can also take photos and videos and perform web searches.

Shakoori said she is not aware of any other civil case where data from wearables is being used to prove or disprove a claim, but "I do think that's coming down the pike. It's just a matter of time."

There are clear obstacles to gathering and using wearable data in a case where the user isn't willingly sharing it with the courts to buttress their own case. For one, the accuracy of the data could be called into question.

"I could be sitting at desk shuffling my feet and the device could track that as me walking for three hours or walking three miles a day," she said.

There are also privacy and evidentiary rules. And the cost of retrieving electronic data through legal avenues could be prohibitive, Shakoori said.
Privacy obstacles are easily circumvented

Rainey Reitman, activism director for privacy advocacy group Electronic Frontier Foundation, said wearable device companies that collect data from users in cloud services can be subpoenaed -- just as Google and Microsoft have been for years.

In just the first half of 2013, Google received requests from the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance (FISA) court for information on between 9,000 and 10,000 user accounts; that was up from requests for info affecting between 7,000 and 8,000 accounts in the first half of 2011.

The FISA court hit up Microsoft for data related to between 15,000 and 16,000 accounts during the same period, up from requests affecting 11,000 to 12,000 accounts in the second half of 2011.

There is a clause in the privacy policies of most service providers that states they will release data in response to valid legal requests, Reitman said.

For example, Fitbit's privacy policy states it will release data "necessary to comply with a law, regulation, or valid legal process."

Another misperception about personal data is that if it contains health-related information, it is protected under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

"Health privacy laws generally only cover certain, specific medical entities -- and wearable technology manufacturers aren't one of them," Reitman said.

Even if medical privacy laws did cover data recorded by a Fitbit band, it wouldn't matter, Reitman said, because there's an exception to HIPAA for law enforcement queries, national security and many other legal requests.

"To be clear, Fitbit and other companies could choose to challenge the subpoena. That could be a way for Fitbit to prove it's willing to stand up for the privacy of its users," Reitman said.

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20-plus eye-popping Black Friday 2014 tech deals

hone 6, iPad Air, Samsung Galaxy gear and big cheap TVs among the hottest electronic deals for Black Friday and Cyber Monday in 2014.

Black Friday is upon us
Word is that more retailers will relent to public pressure – I mean do the right thing for their employees – and close on Thanksgiving Day this year. But that won’t prevent them from going all out online, where much is automated and the workers are less prominent. Here are some of the best deals on network and technology offerings for Black Friday, Cyber Monday and in between. (Compare with last year’s deals)

Dell: Inspiron 15-inch laptop
Powered by an Intel Celeron processor and running Windows 8.1, this system boasts 4GB of RAM and a 500GB hard drive. Dell’s special pricing for those getting through online beginning at 12 a.m. on Friday, Nov. 28, is $190, a $110 discount off what Dells calls the “market price” (though Dell appears to regularly sell the laptop for $250.

Target: Apple TV
Like other retailers, Target has a number of deals on Apple products. Among them: $11 off an Apple TV device, which you can get for $89 on Black Friday.

Target: iPhones, iPads and gift cards
Apple gives retailers little leeway in terms of discounting its products, so Target and others often resort to selling the Apple products for the regular price, but bundling the with gift cards. Target is offering a $100 Target gift card with an iPad Air 16GB WiFi tablet ($400), iPad mini 3 16GB WiFi tablet ($400) or iPad mini 2 16GB WiFi Tablet ($300).

Best Buy: Samsung Gear Fit Fitness watch with heart rate monitor
Best Buy is slashing the price on this gadget, which comes in black, from $150 to $100. Count your steps taken and calories burned in style, with this device, which syncs up with various Android phones. Best Buy’s online sales will run Thursday/Friday, with stores opening at 5 pm on Thanksgiving Day where allowed, and again at 8 am on Friday.

Best Buy: Surface Pro 3
The retailer is cutting $50 to $150 off the price of Microsoft Surface Pro 3 tablets with 128GB of storage or more (they start at $1,000 before the discount). Note that this does not include the keyboard for the flexible 12-inch touchscreen device.

Best Buy: Panasonic 50-inch LED TV doorbuster
This 33-pound Panasonic TV, which serves up a 1080p and 60Hz HDTV picture, usually costs $550. The pre-Black Friday price is down to $500, but will go for just $200 in this in-store-only deal on Thanksgiving/Black Friday.

Microsoft: Tablets and games
The Microsoft Store lists a slew of deals, some for which you need to wait until Thanksgiving or Black Friday, and others that you can snag ahead of time. Among the early bird specials is a Lumia 635 phone for 1 cent with a new service contract. The phone has a 4.5-inch screen, runs Windows 8.1 and has 8GB of storage. Microsoft also has lots of Xbox and game deals available in its store this holiday shopping season.

Staples: Asus x205-TA Laptop computer
This bare-bones Windows 8.1 machine, with a 32GB hard drive and 2GB of RAM, normally goes for $250. It’s already been marked down to $200, and for Black Friday, Staples is cutting that price in half. The laptop, featuring 802.11abgn WiFi, is powered by an Intel Atom processor and has an 11.6-inch screen.

Staples: JLab Pro-7 Tablet
OK, can’t say we know this brand either, but for $40, it could be worth a shot if you just want to play around with a small Android tablet. The device usually sells for $70. It only packs 8GB or storage, but has a MicroSD slot for adding up to 32GB more.

RadioShack: RC Surveyor Drone
Satisfy your drone curiosity and freak out your neighbors with this 2.4GHz quadcopter that’s been marked down from $70 to $35 for Black Friday. This lightweight flyer comes with a built-in 1080x720 camera, can be controlled up to 65 feet away and can even do stunts. RadioShack will be opening on Thanksgiving morning, again late in the afternoon, and then at 6 am on Black Friday.

Costco: HP Envy 15.6-inch TouchSmart Laptop
This computer is powered by an Intel 4th generation Core i7 processor, runs Windows 8, features Beats audio and a 1TB hard drive. Costco, which is tossing in a second-year warranty, is slashing its $800 warehouse price by $150 for Black Friday shoppers who come into the store.

Office Depot/Officemax: Samsung Galaxy Tab 4
The price on this 10.1-inch Android tablet has been axed to $250, which is $100 off the usual price. Yes, this isn’t Samsung’s latest model, but it only came out in April. The device features a 1.2GHz quad core processor, and 16GB of storage, expandable to 64GB.

Meijer: Samsung Galaxy Tablet Lite
This 7-inch, 8GB tablet will run you $99 on Black Friday, which is $40 off the regular price. Plus, you’ll get a $20 coupon for your next shopping trip. The touchscreen tablet boasts a 1.2Ghz dual-core processor.

Sears: 55-inch Samsung LED TV
This 1080p Smart HD-TV, usually priced at $1,400, is available for $800 starting on Thanksgiving night (though note that Sears already lists TV for $1,000, not $1,400). It comes integrated with services such as Netflix and Pandora.

Belk: iLive Bluetooth Soundbar
This 32-inch black bar will enable you to wireless boom your tunes for $70 -- $30 off the usual price. Works with iOS gadgets and most Android and BlackBerry devices. Can also sync up with your TV, game systems and more. This is an online deal.

Shopko: Kindle Fire HD tablet
This lightweight 7-inch WiFi tablet (with 8GB of storage, 1GB of which is internal memory) will have its price shaved by $20, so you pay $80. The retailer’s Black Friday deals start at 6 pm on Thanksgiving Day, though look for additional doorbusters as early as Wednesday.

Various retailers: Record Store Day specials
Got an MP3 hater in your life who prefers to spin big ol’ discs? Record Store Day, an annual April event designed to accommodate record lovers, expands for a Black Friday event that will feature limited-edition offerings from a variety of singers and bands, including The Afghan Whigs, The Beatles and Chvrches.

Walmart: iPhone 6
The monster retailer, which has said it will match Amazon prices in all its stores to kick off the holiday shopping season, has a pretty fine deal on the iPhone 6, which will cost $179 for a 16GB model with a two-year contract (typically $199). What’s more, you’ll get a $75 Walmart gift card, plus another $200 gift card for a smartphone trade-in. (Some industry watchers have warned about whether the 16GB size will only lead to frustration for iPhone 6 users...)

Walmart: iPhone 6
The monster retailer, which has said it will match Amazon prices in all its stores to kick off the holiday shopping season, has a pretty fine deal on the iPhone 6, which will cost $179 for a 16GB model with a two-year contract (typically $199). What’s more, you’ll get a $75 Walmart gift card, plus another $200 gift card for a smartphone trade-in. (Some industry watchers have warned about whether the 16GB size will only lead to frustration for iPhone 6 users...)

Walmart: 65-inch Vizio LED TV
This behemoth set will go for $648 this Black Friday, a savings of $350. Walmart says a 60-incher last holiday season went at $688, so you can see where pricing for big TVs is going…

Walmart: Xbox One Assassin’s Creed Unity Bundle
This package, including the Microsoft game console, the new edition of Assassin’s Creed and Version IV: Black Flag, will be available for $329 starting on Thanksgiving Day at Walmart. That’s down from the usual price of $400, though actually that price has already been marked down to $349.

Toys R Us: 5th generation iPod touch
You don’t hear about these much anymore, but it makes sense that Toys R Us would sell this Apple mainstay. The 16GB model is selling on Black Friday for $150 -- $50 off the usual price. It comes in many pretty colors, too!

Kohl’s: Innovative Technology portable power bank
Kohl’s isn’t the first retailer we think of for tech products, but we did come across this possible stocking stuff: a Justin 2200mAh Power Stick Portable Power Bank for $10, which is $15 off the regular price. USB-pluggable, works with most smartphones to keep you from running out of juice when not able to plug in.

Hhgregg: LG 50-inch smart LED TV
The electronics retailer has a ton of TVs on sale, with many prices slashed by $100 or more. One example: The LG 1080p 120Hz LED WebOS Smart HDTV, which will go for $658, down from $800. You get a free 6-month Spotify subscription to boot.

eBay: LG 60-inch Plasma Smart TV
The online auction site is offering this big HDTV, with two pairs of 3D glasses, for $750 starting at midnight EST on Thanksgiving Eve, Nov. 26.

Newegg: CyberpowerPC Gamer Xtreme H710 Desktop PC
This machine, boasts an Intel Core i7 4790K (4.0GHz) processor, 8GB DDR3 and 2TB of storage, and runs Windows 8.1 64-bit. The price has been slashed from $1,100 to $800.

Newegg: Asus 13.3-inch Chromebook
The online retailer is knocking $50 off a $250 Asus 13.3-inch Chromebook with Intel Celeron N2830 (2.16GHz) processor, 2GB of DDR3 memory and 16GB SSD.

Amazon: HP Chromebook
Amazon’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday lines are blurred big time, with the online retailer rolling out deals early and often. Among them: This 11.6-inch Chromebook with 2GB of SDRAM and a 16GB solid state drive for $150 — $130 off the regular price.

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Microsoft updates Windows 10, gets an earful from users about OneDrive changes

Testers call OneDrive sync changes in Windows 10 'stupid,' 'big step backwards'

Microsoft yesterday rolled out the next update to its Windows 10 Technical Preview, just three weeks after the previous version arrived.

But one change that Microsoft trumpeted -- an alteration to how OneDrive, the company's cloud-based storage service, synchronizes files -- got a big thumbs down from users.

The update, tagged "Build 9879," followed the Oct. 21 release of Build 9860, which came 20 days after the initial Technical Preview.

So far, Microsoft's cadence for Windows 10 has been faster than what analysts anticipate will be the practice when the new operating system publicly launches in mid-2015. Then, updates will ship as often as monthly for consumers, while businesses will be able to choose between that and two additional tempos that Gartner has tagged "near-consumer speed" and "long-term servicing." The former will roll up the "consumer-speed" updates every four to six months to versions that fast-acting enterprises will test and deploy, while the latter will remain feature- and UI-static for as long as two to three years, receiving only security updates.

In the technical preview, customers have an update frequency choice of only "Fast" or "Slow," with the former representing the final's consumer speed while the latter will probably have no corresponding cadence.

"If you're in the Slow ring, you won't receive the build right away -- we'll publish to Slow after we see how everything goes with the Fast ring," said Gabe Aul, the engineering general manager for Microsoft's operating system group, in a blog post yesterday.

Microsoft is using the Technical Preview to not only show customers what Windows 10 will include, but also to test the faster release pace. Build 9879, however, is a full, in-place upgrade, and not one of the smaller updates that next year will include only changes since the last version.

Aul touted several changes to Windows 10 in the latest build, including one that users bashed as a step backwards.

"We're also introducing changes to how OneDrive syncs your files in this build," Aul wrote. "In Windows 8.1, we use placeholders on your PC to represent files you have stored in OneDrive. People had to learn the difference between what files were 'available online' (placeholders) versus what was 'available offline' and physically on your PC."

In other words, OneDrive on Windows 8.1 did not automatically place actual copies of all files in the cloud storage service on a device, but instead showed placeholder icons, what Microsoft calls "smart files," that included a thumbnail image of the file -- useful when searching through photographs -- and searchable metadata. When clicked, the placeholder/smart file kicked off a file download to the local device. That was counter to, say, Dropbox's method of everything-is- available-locally-on-every-device, but also saved local storage space and the bandwidth necessary to download and synchronize large OneDrive collections.

With Windows 10, OneDrive will use what Aul called "selective sync" in that users choose which files are synched with actual downloads. Other files remain on OneDrive, but do not show up in File Explorer, Windows 10's file management tool. To see everything in OneDrive, users must instead open a browser and comb through OneCloud's online interface.

Users hated the change.
In comments appended to Aul's blog, on a short thread on Microsoft's support discussion forum, and also in a much larger collection of complaints on Microsoft's Windows Feature Suggestion Box, customers gave Aul a piece of their minds.

In nearly 60 comments linked to the feature request, "Add an advanced option to restore showing ALL OneDrive files in Explorer, synced or not," Windows 10 Technical Preview users lambasted the OneDrive change.

"Stupid to remove a perfectly working and very useful feature," said Asbjarn today. "And how does this square with the recently announced unlimited storage for OneDrive? Or perhaps that is the real reason. Theoretically unlimited storage, but in practice limited by the storage capacity of your smallest device."

"The change to OneDrive is unbelievably stupid in this release," echoed one of several anonymous commenters.

"I was about to get a subscription for Office 365 Home Premium just for the OneDrive space -- but if this will be the way it works in the future it offers me zero advantage over Dropbox or Google Drive," added Kyriakos Ktorides.

"OneDrive has reverted back to how it was in Windows 7, big step backwards," complained Øystein Johnsen. "Unusable now."

"Yeah, you guys screwed the pooch on this change," said Nate Laff. "I get what you were trying to do..., but I just uploaded my entire family photo collection to OneDrive in the last week (200+ GB). Obviously it's impossible to sync that entire folder down to each device."

Mary Branscombe, a freelance writer who has blogged for ZDNet and written for CITEworld -- the latter, like Computerworld, is operated by IDG -- was the one who kicked off the request to restore the Windows 8.1 smart files functionality in Windows 10.

Branscombe reached out via Twitter to Omar Shahine, the partner group program manager for OneDrive, to ask if Microsoft would reconsider.

"It was a tough change to make," Shahine replied on Twitter. "It is certainly the future but there were significant issues with the model that required change."

In a tweet a little later, Shahine said, "Yes. It's a huge change. Not denying it. Yes it is worse in some ways. But it was necessary."

Late Wednesday, Shahine added that Microsoft would be posting a response to the outcry on the feedback thread. As of mid-day today, the promised reply or explanation had not appeared.

Shahine did not immediately reply to a request for more information on Microsoft's position regarding the OneDrive changes in Windows 10.

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Nasuni raises the bar for hybrid cloud storage

As growth in cloud-based storage products continues to accelerate, enterprise vendors have taken cloud storage to the next level. The hybrid model, which utilizes both local and offsite storage, offers organizations a way to more seamlessly scale up and manage large amounts of data with a single-vendor service.

We tested Version 6 of Nasuni’s hybrid solution, which it calls Enterprise Storage as a Service. The components of Nasuni’s subscription-based service include a local storage appliance (Nasuni Filer), management tools, built-in antivirus, cloud gateway/cloud broker and cloud storage, currently offered on either the Microsoft Azure or Amazon EC2 cloud platforms.

The Nasuni Filer is available as a hardware appliance or virtual machine. We tested the Nasuni Filer appliance NF-440 model 2U unit with 20+ 600 GB drives, which is similar to the standard subscription of 12TB. We also tested the Filer configured as a virtual appliance on a server running Windows Server 2008 R2 hypervisor, and the Nasuni Management Console (NMC), also configured as a VM.

The basic startup and configuration of the Nasuni Filer was quick and uncomplicated. Using DHCP we were able to access the Filer’s Web GUI over SSL in less than 10 minutes from power up. There are only a couple of steps involved in getting the Filer ready for first use, such as configuring the network, providing a user name and password and assigning a serial number, which starts the process of registering the Filer on the Nasuni network.

+ Also on Network World: Storage on a budget: GlusterFS shines in open source storage test +

Once the home page appears you have the option of uploading your own encryption keys, integrating with Active Directory security and performing other basic setup tasks such as setting date/time and adding an email for notification purposes.

The Filer comes with a default volume named ‘files’ already created, which the user can rename or create additional new volumes. With no data yet stored in the cloud, the Filer starts out as essentially a file server or attached storage on the local network. Volumes are mapped just like a regular file server or other storage device. However with over 13TB (22 x 600 GB drives), the local storage capacity of the Nasuni Filer we tested was truly impressive, worth all 80+ pounds. But of course local storage is only part of the story.

Once data is copied to a volume, the Filer goes to work uploading snapshots to the cloud. The initial snapshot copies all data currently on the Filer to the cloud and subsequent snapshots only synchronize changes made since the initial snapshot. Data that has been moved to the cloud is saved back to the local cache when requested as opposed to being accessed directly from the cloud. The default interval for snapshots is once per hour, but this can be modified to as frequent as every minute. Our initial batch of data, which was about 3GB, including several files in the hundreds of megabytes, initially took over 12 hours to be copied to the cloud. At first we were concerned about the seemingly sluggish transfer, but a deeper dive showed that we needed to tweak a few settings to boost performance.

Settings can be applied by volume or by Filer. As data is stored to the Filer it is in what Nasuni calls the cache, stored locally. The percentage reserved for new incoming data can be set from 5% to 90%; a larger number means less data is stored locally and more data is moved to the cloud. The default setting is ‘automatic’, meaning the Filer manages the best use of the cache. In order to keep the local cache from filling up, data is ‘evicted’ to the cloud as needed. In order to keep certain data always available in the local cache, you can "pin" folders, and if "pinned" data is taking up too much storage, an alert is issued.

The system is designed to ensure that frequently used data is stored on a local Filer for rapid retrieval, using what Nasuni refers to as a Least Recently Used (LRU) algorithm. Some of the settings depend on the intended usage of the Filer; one organization may only want to use the Filer for backup purposes whereas another may use it as their primary file storage or for high performance shared applications. It is also possible to set up different volumes for different purposes, customized for each task.

After specifying a more frequent snapshot interval on our Filer, and using QoS settings to allocate more bandwidth for the cloud transfer, performance on our test Filer increased dramatically. With a shorter snapshot duration, smaller files were sent to the cloud almost immediately, making the Filer seem almost like local storage. However unlike local storage, the Nasuni Filer only sends snapshots to the cloud one volume at a time.

Each Nasuni Filer can be managed individually using a built-in Web interface. Multiple Filers can be centrally managed using the Nasuni Management Console (NMC). We set up the NMC as a virtual machine under Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V. After setting the Filer to be centrally managed by the NMC, we noticed that some of the previously-available configuration options in the local management interface had been disabled. This is by design, as the NMC at that point has taken over the bulk of management tasks.

Initially, the NMC displays an overview of the storage environment; e.g. how many Filers and volumes are under management, how much storage is used and how much is available. It also displays graphs showing live network traffic, file types and the health status of each managed Filer. A notification system displays system alerts.

Ours kept reminding us that one of our virtual machines was low on memory until we allocated more. On the hardware Filer, we forgot to plug in one of the power supplies and the Filer kept notifying us of this condition until we corrected it. Notifications can be sorted by various parameters, such as severity and date, and each notification must be acknowledged in order to drop off the list.

Overall, we found the web-based NMC and Nasuni support to be among the best we’ve ever tested. We called customer support on a Sunday evening to resolve an issue with the VM used for the management console. We were pleasantly surprised to get a call back in less than 10 minutes and several pointers to get the issue resolved. However it was later explained to us that late night phone support is usually reserved for more critical issues like unresponsive systems and situations more serious than ours. Throughout the test experience we found the Nasuni support teams to be knowledgeable and responsive to the few issues we encountered.

Depending on subscription levels, Nasuni cloud storage can be virtually limitless, provided you don’t exceed the subscription capacity at any given time. With north of 12TB of available cache space on our Filer we did not run into a problem with this. Snapshots settings offer granularity that will fit most common storage scenarios.

For instance, you can customize the ‘Quality of Service’ setting, which is essentially the bandwidth made available for uploads/downloads, depending on the time of day. With QoOS settings, snapshots taken during business hours could be limited to give precedence to user traffic, and re-prioritized during non-peak hours to allow snapshots to be performed at a faster pace.

In addition to accessing Nasuni-managed data as a shared volume, it can also be accessed via FTP, Web browser and mobile devices. Mobile access is available for Android and iOS devices through respective Nasuni apps available for both platforms. Currently only CIFS-enabled volumes are accessible from mobile devices. Most file operations can be performed by mobile users, such as viewing, deleting, uploading and downloading. There is also a Nasuni desktop client that provides portal access to a Nasuni Filer. It is available for Linux, Windows and OS X. The only downside is that the desktop version only allows access to one Filer at a time.

On the security front, Nasuni-managed data is encrypted over SSL both locally and in the cloud. Encryption keys are generated and kept by the user, rendering the data useless and unreadable without the proper key. User access can be defined on a more granular level by assigning roles and read/write permissions to volumes on the Filer. The Filer also has built-in antivirus protection that, if enabled, scans each new or modified file saved to the Filer. For external monitoring, the Filer supports SNMP access.

New features in Nasuni 6.0 include global locking, file virtualization and desktop file synchronization. Global locking takes traditional locking typically used with a local file server and extends it across multiple geographic locations. Global locking can be configured on the folder level allowing for granular control where it is needed. When a file lock is requested, it is submitted to the Nasuni Global Locking Service. If no lock is already present, a lock is issued. The local cache is then checked to make sure the latest version of the file is available and updates from the cloud are merged if necessary before the file is opened.

Data virtualization uses Nasuni’s patented UniFS Global File System to make the same data globally available to all users by storing only one master source of the data. This is accomplished without physically replicating the data, thus reducing the need to locally manage end-user file data. In combination with caching on local filers, data virtualization provides "global" access essentially the same as if the data was accessed from a local file server.

Desktop File Synchronization gives users the ability to create a local folder that is synchronized to the Nasuni cloud. This synchronized folder provides global access to user files from multiple devices such as tablets, smartphones and computers.

Strategically, Nasuni views its solution as a best fit for organizations currently using NAS storage that have 5TB or more of data to manage across multiple locations. A starter bundle of 5TB of licensed storage, five virtual filers and a mid-range physical filer, start-up services, and ongoing maintenance, support and upgrades is $25,000.

Aimed at smaller businesses with less data to manage, Nasuni is introducing a lower-cost Filer, the NF-100, with exact specs and pricing to be announced. There is also a new desktop Filer in the works, slated for release in the fourth quarter of 2014.

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2014's most significant cloud deals have OpenStack at heart

The most important cloud acquisitions this year have one thing in common: OpenStack.

2014's slate of cloud deals reflect a few important trends in the market for the open source cloud software. One is that traditional enterprise vendors continue to see potential in OpenStack and they're willing to shell out the cash to buy the expertise and technology they need to pursue the market.

The second is that despite interest from those big vendors, actual adoption of OpenStack hasn't happened as quickly as some people might have hoped. The result is that some of the startups, even trendsetters like Cloudscaling, are open to acquisition as they realize they may not be able to make it on their own.

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The impact of these deals is still unknown. On the downside, the acquiring vendors all have other flagship businesses they need to protect. In many cases, that means they'll limit customers of their new OpenStack products and services to using their legacy products. The result is users won't have as much choice as they might like.

The upside, however, is that the traditional vendors know how to ship stable, well-supported products. That's a plus for any business that's been reluctant to go with an OpenStack startup.

Here are the top five cloud deals of the year, so far:

EMC buys Cloudscaling for an unconfirmed $50 million
The rationale: With more workloads moving to the cloud, EMC knows its storage products have to be in the running for businesses building cloud operations. While EMC is an obvious option for VMware shops given that it owns VMware, it's not always top of mind in the open source world. With its platform for building private OpenStack clouds, Cloudscaling gives EMC a foot in the door in the OpenStack community.

It remains to be seen if a culture clash will lead to hiccups, however. Cloudscaling, with its outspoken founder Randy Bias, has a reputation as a scrappy upstart. EMC, on the other hand, is more of a staid, traditional vendor.

Who cares? It's possible that Cloudscaling won't be quite so open once it gets absorbed by EMC.Cloudscaling currently names EMC competitors including Dell, HP and Supermicro as partners on its web site, and Nexenta's CEO is on Cloudscaling's board. Also, Cloudscaling's platform allows users to build hybrid clouds with Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud Platform. Given that those businesses compete with EMC or VMware in some way, it wouldn't be a surprise if EMC restricts Cloudscaling's openness in the future. That could be a disappointment for potential Cloudscaling users.

Impact: With the backing of a giant like EMC, Cloudscaling is likely to stabilize and become more attractive to enterprises. But being backed by a giant often means slower innovation. Combined with the potential for less choice for users, this deal slightly tips negative in terms of potential benefit to users.

HP buys Eucalytpus for an unconfirmed $100 million
The rationale: HP's press release about the deal focused heavily on the fact that Marten Mickos, Eucalyptus's CEO, will run HP's cloud business. There was essentially no mention of Eucalyptus's technology – a private cloud platform that's compatible with AWS. It's hard not to think that HP bought Eucalyptus primarily to get Mickos, who was also previously CEO of MySQL.

Who cares? If Mickos gets his way, users might get a unique and valuable capability. In an interview on the day the acquisition was announced, Mickos said his hope was to use Eucalyptus technology to bring AWS compatibility to HP's OpenStack cloud products. That could be attractive for businesses that want to build private OpenStack clouds that burst to AWS when additional resources are needed.

Impact: The fact that Eucalyptus couldn't go it alone seems to prove that a community-based open source project like OpenStack has a better chance of success than an open source platform driven by one company, like Eucalyptus. Chalk this up as a win for the OpenStack community.

Cisco bought Metacloud for an undisclosed sum
The rationale: With Metacloud, Cisco gets a unique technology that delivers an OpenStack private cloud as a service, remotely managing the cloud for customers. Cisco has actually had its own OpenStack distribution for years, but you'd be forgiven for not knowing it existed. The Metacloud deal lets Cisco sell customers server hardware combined with a well-known platform for running a cloud.

Who cares? VMware might. Cisco and VMware have had a curious relationship over the past few years, at one moment, partners, and the next, competitors.

For instance, Cisco, EMC and VMware started VCE, which offers packaged compute, storage and networking from those three companies. (Just this week Cisco reduced its stake in VCE to 10%.) Cisco also makes it easy for users of its server hardware to run VMware's cloud products. With Metacloud, however, Cisco now opens the door for customers to go OpenStack instead of VMware.

Impact: Customers and potential customers lose another independent service provider, which offered users lots of choice, but gains a backer determined to be successful in OpenStack. This one is a wash.

Red Hat buys eNovance for $95 million
The rationale: Red Hat wants to dominate OpenStack and with eNovance it gains deployment expertise, since eNovance is in the business of helping customers build OpenStack clouds.

Who cares? While eNovance was open to using the best technology to meet a customer's needs, including sometimes recommending AWS instead of an OpenStack cloud, that's likely to change under Red Hat. For instance, eNovance will surely steer customers to Red Hat's OpenStack distribution rather than any available from competitors.
No deal!

This year has also been a year of cloud-related acquisitions that didn't end up happening. For instance, for months there was buzz around Rackspace looking for a buyer. Eventually though, Rackspace said it had decided to continue go it alone.

There were also rumors about EMC wanting to acquire HP. There's more to both companies than the cloud, but after HP's announcement of earmarking $1 billion for OpenStack, it's clear the cloud is becoming an important business for the company.

Impact: The presumed loss of choice for eNovance customers pushes this deal into the negative column for customers.

Red Hat buys Inktank for $175 million
The rationale: Adding Inktank's Ceph object and block storage software to its existing Gluster file system storage gives Red Hat a more complete portfolio of storage offerings. Also, as Ceph is popular among OpenStack users, the deal makes sense as part of Red Hat's enthusiastic support of OpenStack.

Who cares? Red Hat tends to do its best to herd customers exclusively toward its own products, but it has pledged to keep Ceph open. For instance, Red Hat has said that Ceph will continue to run on non-Red Hat operating systems.

Impact: If Red Hat does indeedallow Ceph to continue to support non-Red Hat products, this deal should be a solid win for OpenStack users. Ceph has proved valuable to the OpenStack community and can benefit from Red Hat's experience running open source projects and delivering open source products.

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Google, Facebook continue massive lobbying efforts in Q3

Google is on track to spend more money this year attempting to influence lawmakers than any other tech company

Google and Facebook continued to pour millions of dollars into political lobbying in the third quarter in attempts to influence U.S. lawmakers and have legislation written in their favor.

Google spent $3.94 million between July and September while Facebook spent $2.45 million, according to disclosure data published Tuesday.

The only tech-related company to outspend Google was Comcast, which is trying to persuade politicians to look favorably on a merger with Time Warner and spent $4.23 million during the quarter.

But Google stands as the largest spender in the entire tech industry to date this year. It has run up a $13 million bill lobbying Washington politicians and their offices on a range of issues as diverse as online regulation of advertising, cybersecurity, patent abuse, health IT, international tax reform, wind power and drones.

If industry spending continues at its current level, 2014 will mark the fourth year that Google has spent more money on federal lobbying than any other technology company.

Facebook began lobbying Washington in 2009 and has quickly risen to become the fourth-largest spender in the tech industry so far this year, behind Google, Comcast and AT&T.

The company's lobbying hits an equally diverse range of areas including cyber breaches, online privacy, free trade agreements, immigration reform, Department of Defense spending and intellectual property issues.

Another notable spender in the third quarter was Amazon, which plowed $1.18 million into its lobbying efforts. That represents a quarterly record for the Seattle company and is the second quarter in a row that it has spent more than $1 million on lobbying.

Amazon's lobbying was aimed at many of the same areas targeted by Google and Facebook, but covered additional subjects close to its business, including postal reform, online wine sales, mobile payments and Internet tax payments.

The money is funneled to D.C. lobbying firms that use it to push their clients' agendas to politicians and their staffers. The lobbying disclosure reports are published quarterly by the U.S. Senate and detail spending in general areas, but do not go into specifics.

Lobbying has long been an effective tool used by major companies, but it's only been in the last few years that Internet companies have started spending money in amounts to rival traditional tech giants.

During the third quarter, other major spenders included Verizon ($2.91 million), CTIA ($1.95 million), Microsoft ($1.66 million) and Oracle ($1.2 million).

Apple spent just over $1 million in the quarter lobbying on issues including consumer health legislation, transportation of lithium ion batteries, international taxes, e-books, medical devices and copyright.

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Best Places to Work in IT 2014: The three best organizations

What makes a company No. 1 in the eyes of its employees? We take a look at Quicken Loans, LinkedIn and Noah Consulting to find their secrets to success.

Work hard, have fun

What makes an organization a Best Place to work for IT professionals? If any one element can capture "bestness," it's the combination of rewarding work in an atmosphere that encourages camraderie.

This year, Quicken Loans, LinkedIn and Noah Consulting topped our large, midsize and small rankings, respectively, by keeping employees well compensated, challenged in their jobs and supported with extras like free lunch and foosball.

In the case of Quicken Loans, at left, the occasional three-wheeled transportation option is thrown into the mix as well.


A culture of excellence

Quicken Loans, the No. 1 large organization for 2014, is no stranger to the Best Places list. The online mortgage lender was No. 1 overall last year, and also topped the list between 2005 and 2007. (Large organizations have 5,000 or more U.S. employees.)

This year, the company additionally earned the top slot among all 100 Best Places organizations for employee retention, and was No. 4 for career development and No. 10 for benefits. (See Best Places by the Numbers for details.)

Quicken Loans proudly takes its place among firms driving the revitalization of downtown Detroit, as evidenced by this Motor City-inspired pool table.


Building skills, on the court and off

IT staffers at Quicken Loans are offered 200 hours of technical training each year, and in 2013 the company created a training program specifically for members of its IT team, with the goal helping them further their tech careers while also teaching them a wide range of soft skills, including communication, time management and leadership. A mentoring program helps identify which skills staffers need in order to reach the next level in their careers.

Employees are invited to blow off steam on the company's basketball court, which overlooks the Detroit skyline, or enter to win tickets to an NBA game; Quicken Loans founder Dan Gilbert owns the Cleveland Cavaliers.

LinkedIn: Fast-track career growth

The No. 1 midsize Best Place is LinkedIn, the Mountain View, Calif.-based company that runs the popular business-oriented social network. (Midsize organizations have between 1,000 and 4,999 U.S. employees.)

IT had a training budget of $350,000 last year for its 112 employees. Beyond that, each year employees are reimbursed up to $5,000 in tuition costs and/or the cost of technology certifications.

In addition, the firm ranked No. 7 of the 100 Best Places for employee retention, perhaps owing to the four weeks of paid time off that employees receive after one year of service, fully paid health insurance, a profit-sharing plan, stock options, overtime pay and individual employee bonuses.

Customer service is key for IT

LinkedIn is expanding globally, which creates opportunities for techies. IT hired 50 new employees and promoted 17% of its IT employees in the past year.

Unparalleled technical chops and a commitment to customer service is absolutely imperative for anyone working in IT at LinkedIn, according to Mike Jennings, senior director of LinkedIn's $31 million enterprise IT organization.

Per Jenning's directive, being a pleasure to do business with is a point of pride for IT at LinkedIn. IT support analysts like D'Artagnan Felarca, shown here, staff tech lounges where users are encouraged to make themselves comfortable in beanbag chairs and listen to music as they get their computing problems solved.


Having fun, pushing the limits

LinkedIn is now an 11-year-old company with nearly 3,500 employees, yet physically it still has the look and feel of an oh-so-cool Silicon Valley startup.

Workers cruise around the company's college-like campus on colorful beach bikes. There's free, made-to-order food in the cafe, an on-site health club, yoga and kickboxing classes, plus legendary parties hosted by IT, which has been known to transform the workplace into a full-on nightclub.

Then there is the great outdoors to conquer. Here, senior director Mike Jennings, right, goes in for extreme team-building with IT staffers Chris Arrington and Alex Lacayo.

Noah Consulting: Small footprint, nationwide reach

The No. 1 small Best Place is Noah Consulting, which specializes in the oil and gas, energy trading, and power and natural resources industries. Noah a virtual company, with consultants all over the country and just a small staff in its Houston headquarters. (Small organizations have fewer than 1,000 U.S. employees.)

The firm bridges the physical distance with highly sophisticated collaboration tools and annual all-company gatherings like the one shown here.

With just 60 IT employees, Noah prides itself on building a culture where consultants are willing to collaborate and pool their knowledge. Senior business analyst Jim Briggs says that team spirit pays off in the form of "a virtual network of people I trust" in California, Atlanta and Chicago.

All hands on deck

Tug-of-war is a highlight of Noah's annual summer gathering, where consultants and their families are flown in, put up in a hotel and treated to a weekend full of festivities, such as picnic suppers, themed entertainment and other family-friendly activities.

The summer gathering is just one way the small consultancy fosters work/life balance for employees who spend a lot of time on the road.

"Consulting is a particularly challenging environment to work in," says Shannon Tassin, who co-founded Noah in 2008 with two colleagues. "Our intention was to create a company where not only do employees feel valued and make connections, but we got to know their families as well."

Accessible bosses, engaged employees

Employees like Prasanna Balakrishnan, who has 13 years of consulting experience and has been a principal at Noah for two years, appreciate the firm's collaborative environment. "I don't see any kind of issue with seniority -- it's an environment where you can be comfortable asking questions. They are very open to sharing knowledge and teaching you," he explains.

"When you are at a large company, you don't have access to top-level management," Balakrishnan says. "Here, the partners are very approachable; you can book a meeting with them anytime."

At left, principal Bob Bush and senior recruiter Jory Teno bond during a community service event.

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8 cutting-edge technologies aimed at eliminating passwords

In the beginning was the password, and we lived with it as best we could. Now, the rise of cyber crime and the proliferation of systems and services requiring authentication have us coming up with yet another not-so-easy-to-remember phrase on a near daily basis. And is any of it making those systems and services truly secure?

One day, passwords will be a thing of the past, and a slew of technologies are being posited as possibilities for a post-password world. Some are upon us, some are on the threshold of usefulness, and some are likely little more than a wild idea, but within each of them is some hint of how we’ve barely scratched the surface of what’s possible with security and identity technology.

The smartphone
The idea: Use your smartphone to log into websites and supply credentials via NFC or SMS.

Examples: Google’s NFC-based tap-to-unlock concept employs this. Instead of typing passwords, PCs authenticate against the users phones via NFC.

The good: It should be as easy as it sounds. No interaction from the user is needed, except any PIN they might use to secure the phone itself.

The bad: Getting websites to play along is the hard part, since password-based logins have to be scrapped entirely for the system to be as secure as it can be. Existing credentialing systems (e.g., Facebook or Google login) could be used as a bridge: Log in with one of those services on your phone, then use the service itself to log into the site.

The smartphone, continued
The idea: Use your smartphone, in conjunction with third-party software, to log into websites or even your PC.

Examples: Ping Identity. When a user wants to log in somewhere, a one-time token is sent to their smartphone; all they need to do is tap or swipe the token to authenticate.

The good: Insanely simple in practice, and it can be combined with other smartphone-centric methods (a PIN, for instance) for added security.

The bad: Having enterprises adopt such schemes may be tough if they’re offered only as third-party products. Apple could offer such a service on iPhones if it cared enough about enterprise use; Microsoft might if its smartphone offerings had any traction. Any other takers?

Biometrics
The idea: Use a fingerprint or an iris scan -- or even a scan of the vein patterns in your hand -- to authenticate.

Examples: They’re all but legion. Fingerprint readers are ubiquitous on business-class notebooks, and while iris scanners are less common, they’re enjoying broader deployment than they used to.

The good: Fingerprint recognition technology is widely available, cheap, well-understood, and easy for nontechnical users.

The bad: Despite all its advantages, fingerprint reading hasn’t done much to displace the use of passwords in places apart from where it’s mandated. Iris scanners aren’t foolproof, either. And privacy worries abound, something not likely to be abated once fingerprint readers become ubiquitous on phones.

The biometric smartphone
The idea: Use your smartphone, in conjunction with built-in biometric sensors, to perform authentication.

Examples: The Samsung Galaxy S5 and HTC One Max (pictured) both sport fingerprint sensors, as do models of the iPhone from the 5S onwards.

The good: Multiple boons in one: smartphones and fingerprint readers are both ubiquitous and easy to leverage, and they require no end user training to be useful, save for registering one’s fingerprint.

The bad: It’s not as hard as it might seem to hack a fingerprint scanner (although it isn’t trivial). Worst of all, once a fingerprint is stolen, it’s, um, pretty hard to change it.

The digital tattoo
The idea: A flexible electronic device worn directly on the skin, like a fake tattoo, and used to perform authentication via NFC.

Examples: Motorola has released such a thing for the Moto X (pictured), at a cost of $10 for a pack of 10 tattoo stickers, with each sticker lasting around five days.

The good: In theory, it sounds great. Nothing to type, nothing to touch, (almost) nothing to carry around. The person is the password.

The bad: So far it’s a relatively costly technology ($1 a week), and it’s a toss-up as to whether people will trade typing passwords for slapping a wafer of plastic somewhere on their bodies. I don’t know about you, but even a Band-Aid starts bothering me after a few hours.

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Gartner: Top 10 Technology Trends for 2015 IT can’t ignore

Rise of smart machines, ubiquitous access and software-defined architectures will reshape IT, Gartner says

ORLANDO—Gartner defines its Strategic Technology Trends as those technologies that have the most potential to drive great change in the enterprise IT arena in the next three years.

Indeed this year’s crop has that potential as trends like software-defined networks and 3D printing take center stage in Gartner’s list.

“You need to be looing at linking to customers in new and unique ways; what technologies set the foundation to enable these moves,” said Gartner vice president David Cearly. IT will be dealing with everything from virtual technologies to intelligent machines and analytics data everywhere, he said. “And in the end all things run through a completely secure environment.”

So Gartner’s Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2015 list looks like this:
1. Computing everywhere: Cleary says the ithe trend is not just about applications but rather wearable systems, intelligent screens on walls and the like. Microsoft, Google and Apple will fight over multiple aspects of this technology. You will see more and more sensors that will generate even more data and IT will have to know how to exploit this—think new ways to track users and their interactions with your company—in an effective, positive way.

2. The Internet of things: Yes this one is getting old it seems, but there’s more to it than the hype. Here IT will have to manage all of these devices and develop effective business models to take advantage of them. Cearly said IT needs to get new projects going and to embrace the “maker culture” so people in their organizations can come up with new solutions to problems.

3. 3D Printing: Another item that has been on the Gartner list for a couple years. But things are changing rapidly in this environment. Cearly says 3D printing has hit a tipping point in terms of the materials that can be used and price points of machines. It enables cost reduction in many cases. IT needs to look at 3D printing and think about how it can make your company more agile. C an it 3D printing drive innovation?

4. Advanced, Pervasive and Invisible Analytics: Security analytics are the heart of next generation security models. Cearly said IT needs to look at building data reservoirs that can tie together multiple repositories which can let IT see all manner of new information – such as data usage patterns and what he called “meaningful anomalies” it can act on quickly.

5. Context-Rich Systems: This one has been a Gartner favorite for a long time – and with good reason. The use of systems that utilize “situational and environmental information about people, places and things” in order to provide a service, is definitely on the rise. IT needs to look at creating ever more intelligent user interfaces linking lots of different apps and data.

6. Smart Machines: This one is happening rapidly. Cearly pointed to IBM’s Watson, which is “learning” to fight cancer, and a mining company – Rio Tinto—which is using automated trucks in its mines. Virtual sages, digital assistants and other special service software agents will about in this world, he said.

7. Cloud/Client Computing: This trend was on last year’s list as well but Gartner says the need to develop native apps in the cloud versus migrating existing apps is the current issue.

8. Software-Defined Applications and Infrastructure: In order to get to the agility new environments demand we cannot have hard codes and predefined networks, Cearly said. IT needs to be able construct dynamic relationships. Software Defined technologies help on that scale.

9. Web-Scale IT: This trend remains pretty much the same as last year. Gartner says Web-scale IT is a pattern of global-class computing technologies that that deliver the capabilities of large cloud service providers. The likes of Amazon, Google and others are re-inventing the way IT services can be delivered. Still requires a cultural IT shift to be successful.

10. Risk-Based Security and Self-protection: Cearly said all roads to the digital future success lead through security. Trends here include building applications that are self-protecting.

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Windows 10 revealed: Microsoft's next OS fuses Windows 7 and 8

 At a press event on Tuesday, Microsoft launched the next version of Windows: Not Windows One, not Windows 9, but Windows 10, which combines the reborn Start menu with Windows 8’s colorful live tiles and adjusts its behavior depending on how you’re using your device.

Windows 10 will officially launch in the middle of next year, but you’ll have a chance to try it out before that via a new Windows Insider program, launching Wednesday. The platform’s most vocal fans will have a chance to download the technical preview before it launches next year.

Microsoft’s Joe Belfiore showing off Windows 10’s reborn, revamped Start Menu.

Microsoft executives unveiled the new OS at a small press event in San Francisco, where the company tried to position the Windows 10 OS as a “natural step forward” for both Windows and Windows Phone, which will also be renamed Windows 10.

Windows 10 will be designed for the enterprise, Terry Myerson executive vice president of Microsoft’s OS group, said. It will have a “familiar” interface, whether it be for Windows 7 or Windows 8. “They will find all the tools they’re used to finding, with all the apps and tools they’re used to today,” he said.

Windows 10 will be compatible with all the familiar management systems, including mobile device management. MDM tools will manage not just mobile devices, but PCs, phones, tablets, and even embedded devices inpart of the Internet of Things, Myerson said. Enterprise customers will be able to manage their own app stores, so that ther employees get the right apps for them. As Windows 8 did, data security will be a priority, he said.

“Windows 10 will be our greatest enterprise platform ever,” Myerson said.
Windows 10 revealed

Joe Belfiore, who runs part of the OS team focused on the PC experience, showed off the new OS, which he called a “very early build.” Yes, the new build has the Stat menu, combining the icon-driven menu from Windows 7, plus the added Live Tiles to the right.

Belfiore used the analogy of a Tesla to describe how Windows 7 users would feel when they upgraded—something that Microsoft desperately wants them to do: a supercharged OS, but one that will feel familiar.

One of the things that Microsoft wants to ensure is that Windows 10 is personalized results, including search results, Belfiore said.

Windows 8 had a universal app platform, with a common Windows Store that handle updates independently. Belfiore said that Microsoft wanted all those Windows 7 uses to get all the benefits of Windows 8 apps. Apps will be shown in the Live Tiles, with no real indication whether they are “classic” apps or modern, Windows 8 apps. Apps can be “snapped,” like Windows 8. Users will also not have to leave the Windows desktop to use modern apps, as expected.

Multitasking will also be a priority, with a stated goal being able to “empower” novice users, Belfiore said. On the taskbar there will be a “task view” where users can switch back and forth between different environments—whether it be 32-bit Windows 7 apps or modern apps. And yes, they will include virtual desktops, with the ability to switch back and forth between virtual environments. A “snap assist” feature will allow users to select similar windows to snap alongside other apps. And up to four apps or windows can be snapped to the four corners of the desktop, Belfiore said.

Even more advanced uses will be able to take advantage of new keyboard shortcuts, with the ability to ALT-TAB between desktops. “It’s a nice forward enhancement to make those people more productive,” Belfiore said.

Microsoft even improved the command line interface, with an improved keyboard interface. (You can use Crtl+V to paste now!)
Touch when you need it

Belfiore wrapped up by talking about touch: “We’re not giving up on touch,” he said. But he did say that that massive numbers of users were familiar with the touchless Windows 7 interface, while supporting those who have jumped to Windows 8.

So that means that the Charms experience will be revamped. When you swipe right on Windows 10, the Charms bar is still there. But Belfiore said that the Charms experience would change. When people swipe in from the left, Windows 10, you’ll get a task view. “I’m using touch in a way that accelerates my use of a PC,” Belfiore said.
windows10 continuum start screen

Microsoft is also working on a revamped UI that isn’t is in Windows 10, yet. For two-in-on devices, a “Continuum” mode will adjust the UI depending on whether or not the mouse and keyboard is present. When a keyboard is disconnected, the Windows 8-style Start menu appears and a back button is available so that users can easily back out to a prior command. Menus grow larger. Bu when a mouse and keyboard is connected, the desktop mode reappears, Windows apps return to desktop windows, and the Start page disappears.

Now, Microsoft needs to take the next step: pitching enterprise customers, Myerson said. And that’s critical for Windows’ future, analysts said. Expect more details on the consumer flavors of Windows 10 early next year, more application details at BUILD, and then a launch of Windows 10 near the middle of next year.

“For businesses, I think there are some businesses who have picked it up and they are really early adopters, but in general, the sense—when we engage with customers, we’re not hearing a lot of reception out there,” Wes Miller, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, said in advance of the briefing. “We’re hearing a lot of businesses even before whatever that thing comes out tomorrow, before that came out, businesses were saying, we’re going to hang out on Windows 7, it’s stable, it does what we need to do.”

Starting Wednesday, Microsoft will launch a Windows Insider program, distributing the technical preview of Windows 10, Myerson said. Through Window Insiders we’re inviting our more vocal Windows fans” to help refine the Windows experience, executives said. Users wil be able to sign up at preview.windows.com, he said, where they will be able to hold private discussions with Windows engineers and give feedback.

“Windows 10 will be our most open, collaborative OS project ever,” Myerson said.

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Sneak Peek: New features coming to Internet Explorer

Microsoft’s new Developer Channel offers glimpse into upcoming features of IE.
Microsoft recently released a “Developer Channel” edition of Internet Explorer, launching a new way in which upcoming features will be previewed, and laying the groundwork for a business strategy focusing on web services. Here’s what you need to know about the future of Internet Explorer.

Developer Channel version offers sneak peek at new features
Though it’s available for the public to freely download and install, Internet Explorer Developer Channel is not meant for everyday use, whether business or casual. As its label implies, IE DC is primarily geared toward developers with which to play around. But anyone can try out the browser to see what new features are being worked on by the IE development team.

No more betas
Instead of releasing betas, the IE development team will update IE DC with the latest features, fixes and optimizations. Throughout this process, you’ll be able to keep up with the work-in-progress of IE by downloading the most current release of IE DC. When the IE team determines this code is ready for public consumption, it will then be rolled out as the next version of IE.

Compatibility is limited to Win 7/8.1
IE DC is available for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 only. Either OS also must have Internet Explorer 11 installed on it. You should probably also ensure your Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 system has the latest official updates for the OS installed, as recommended by Windows Update, prior to installing IE DC.

Caveats
IE DC runs within a virtualization system, which keeps the browser in a “sandbox” operating separately from the rest of your Windows environment. This is for reasons of security. The consequences are that IE DC cannot share add-ons or settings that you already have in place with your installation of IE 11; IE DC may run slower than IE 11; and it cannot be used as the default browser.

Tracking features in development
The IE development team set up a web page where you can follow the latest features they’re working on to possibly add to future versions of IE. It also lists features that are already in the most recent final releases of the browser, and ones they are considering, but not officially developing yet. You can easily set this list to show only features that are in development, under consideration, under which version number of IE they first appeared, or their interoperability with the other major web browsers.

New features in IE DC
As of this writing, release of IE DC includes only a few new technologies being actively worked on. Two are interesting for the average user: GamePad and WebGL Instancing. They obviously tell that the IE development team is expanding the capabilities of the browser for gaming. (WebGL Instancing utilizes a system’s GPU, graphics processing unit, to more efficiently draw copies of an object without hitting up the system CPU for this task.) These technologies could alternately be integral for less leisurely pursuits, like using a controller to interact with a productivity web app.

Features in development
Other technologies listed as “In Development” (which also means they are not yet implemented into the actual IE DC browser) include Media Capture and Streams, and Web Audio. The first indicates a web app in IE would be able to access audio or video from your computer’s or device’s mic or webcam. Web Audio would enable a web app to produce audio through JavaScript.

Features that are being considered
Listed as “Under Consideration” are features that point to granting web apps even more access to control or receive feedback from the hardware of a computer or device (Ambient Light Events, Battery Status, Vibration). Web apps could also be allowed to encode audio or video from within the browser (MediaRecorder), incorporate speech recognition and synthesis (Web Speech), and manipulate the local files on a Windows system (Drag and Drop Directories, FileWriter).

End of numbered versions?
This new system of providing early looks at IE under a continuous development cycle could suggest Microsoft may de-emphasize version numbering. If this happens, then, as far as the general public is concerned, the upcoming 12th release of IE could be referred to by Microsoft as simply “Internet Explorer.” As for new features, IE appears to be becoming a more technologically capable browser for using with sophisticated web apps. The IE development team isn’t just looking to make a better browser; they’re aiming to make Internet Explorer a better web app platform.

 

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Cloud BI: Going where the data lives

As more companies store data in the cloud, they're increasingly crunching the numbers there, too.

Even though cloud-based business intelligence has been around for nearly a decade, a recent trend is driving renewed interest: Companies are generating and storing more data in the cloud.

"What I think will happen is people will move the analytics app closer to the data," says Joao Tapadinhas, a Gartner analyst. "As more data sources move to the cloud, it makes more sense to also adopt cloud BI solutions because that's where the data is. It's easier to connect to cloud data using a cloud solution."
" In each of the last four years, around 30% of respondents to a Gartner survey said they'd run their mission-critical BI in the cloud. This year, however, nearly half -- 45% -- said they would adopt cloud BI. "

Researchers at Gartner say that 2014 may be the tipping point for cloud BI. In each of the last four years, around 30% of respondents to a Gartner survey said they'd run their mission-critical BI in the cloud. This year, however, nearly half -- 45% -- said they would adopt cloud BI.

Historically, cloud BI products have been most appealing to smaller businesses, in part because those are less likely to have an IT department that can manage an on-premises product. However, analysts are starting to see larger companies adopting cloud BI, typically starting with individual groups or departments.

Shifting data analytics to the cloud doesn't come without its challenges, though. For example, it's unlikely that all corporate data will move to the cloud, particularly in larger enterprises. That means many businesses will have to map data from both cloud and on-premises sources to the BI software, whether that software itself is on-premises or in the cloud. Also, bandwidth constraints may slow down data transfers and can lead to increased costs, if a business must upgrade its connectivity to improve data transfer.

Nevertheless, some businesses have already adopted cloud BI services, analysts report anecdotally, though specific figures aren't available. Many companies that have made the move say that the benefits -- including fast time to market, no need to maintain on-premises software and simplicity of use -- outweigh any downsides.

Mixing up data sources
Take Millennial Media, which sells a mobile advertising platform. It needed to pull together data from disparate sources, both on site and in the cloud.

Around two and a half years ago, Bob Hammond, CTO for Millennial, began looking into BI as a way to marry data from Salesforce with transactional and financial information from in-house systems and then let decision makers at the company visualize it.

"No human I know of can . . . make business decisions based on data that hasn't been brought together into a single source," he says. The company needed BI, he says, because "we weren't able to take data from multiple systems and connect that data logically and view that data in a UI so that we could understand what was going on."

He also wanted to let more people in the organization, like data analysts, assemble reports, rather than limiting report-making to technologists who know how to code and interact with back-end databases. Plus, he needed a system that was flexible so the software would be easy to maintain and it would be easy to create new use cases.

Hammond eliminated on-premises BI software options in part because he didn't want to incur the costs associated with managing and maintaining it. Time to market was also important.

Millennial ended up choosing Good Data's cloud BI offering and had its initial project in place in about three months. Subsequent projects have taken closer to a month to get up and running, Hammond says.

Sending on-premises data to Good didn't turn out to be much of a problem for Millennial. Each day the company generates around 10TB of raw data but transfers only around 18MB of compressed data to Good. "We do all the transformation of raw data into only the specific data we want in our systems before we transfer it into the cloud," he says.

Not all businesses do such a great job of managing that data transfer, though. "What we tend to see is it's rather difficult to keep the amount of data moving between the database and the analytics tool small," says Gartner's Tapadinhas. In other words, keeping data transfers small is important in cloud BI to manage both costs and upload/download bandwidth issues.

At Millennial, engineers handle the job of extracting data from the various sources and uploading it to Good Data. In addition, two data analysts have now created 500 reports. Around 40 additional people at Millennial have access to those reports and can combine them, drill down into them and create portfolios of reports to share.

Building tiers of users, each with different permissions, allows more people in the organization to work with the data -- but safely, Hammond says. That means business executives, who aren't necessarily trained to be data scientists, have some latitude to combine and rework reports but are less likely to make mistakes because they don't have the permission to, for instance, pull in new data from a back-end database, he says.

Speed and flexibility drive cloud adoption
Athenahealth, a provider of Web-based software and services to medical practices, had most of the data it wanted to analyze in one place internally. About a year ago, the company set out to find a better way to track the hundreds of customer implementations it might be working on at any given time, says Adam Weinstein, director of core analytics at Athenahealth.
" Because we have a cloud-based platform, we have real-time access to see what's going on. " Adam Weinstein, director of core analytics, Athenahealth

"Because we have a cloud-based platform, we have real-time access to see what's going on," he says. The biggest challenge: "Taking the data we have about what our clients are doing and how they're progressing in the implementation process and turning that into what we call a nerve center, or a way we can actively monitor exceptions to the process."

Athenahealth wanted a system that would collect information about every point in the implementation life cycle in order to easily find problem areas. For instance, clients route their fax machines to the Athenahealth system. If no faxes are coming in for a given customer, it could mean the customer hasn't yet rerouted the fax number. Or, for a long-time customer, if the percentage of fax information coming in increases relative to electronic information, that could mean someone mistakenly changed a setting.

When Athenahealth started looking for a BI product that could meet its needs, it had a few additional requirements. The vendor "had to be able to move quickly because we had a fairly strict timeline, in the two- to three-month time frame, to deliver on this project," Weinstein says.

Also, the company wanted a product that would meet analytics needs going forward, too. "We wanted to invest in more of a platform, not just a one-time solution," he says.

Weinstein quickly found that some of the large, traditional BI vendors were not going to be able to roll out Athenahealth's initial project quickly enough. In addition, some were too complicated to use, potentially limiting future projects. Athenahealth considered products from both IBM and Oracle, and then moved on to the cloud BI offerings, ultimately choosing Birst.

Athenahealth didn't run into problems with having most of its data stored on-premises and not in a cloud environment. The company has over 50,000 provider clients and tracks more than 100 metrics about each one every day, Weinstein says. That data is pulled from an internal data center into a separate internal data warehouse. From there, the relevant data is uploaded to Birst.

The data uploads happen automatically, several times each day, as part of a process that the company built using tools and scripts, some of which were provided by Birst, he says. "It doesn't keep me up at night," Weinstein says of the process. He has to intervene only if there's an error. "But that is part of our standard monitoring and would be expected as part of a complex data warehouse environment."

Possible pitfalls
Millennial Media, Athenahealth and DMA (see "Early adopter") all say that using a cloud BI service meets their needs. But there are a few roadblocks that companies should look out for when considering cloud BI.

One is "cloud washing." Some vendors say they offer a cloud BI product but in fact may still require software that runs on users' computers or may offer only cloud storage, says Gartner's Tapadinhas. In that case, users may not get all the benefits of a true cloud offering, like offloading software maintenance.

A cloud BI service might also not be as flexible as an on-premises offering. "Although they are quick to deploy, in some cases cloud BI solutions don't offer enough customizations or at least not as much as we have now on-premises," Tapadinhas says.

On-premises products might also offer more possibilities for integration with third party-products, he says. Good Data, for one, has made some strides to allow third-party tools to access data repositories stored with Good, but even its openness is limited, he says.

Plus, traditional BI tools typically have a broader feature set and may make a better option depending on what a company is trying to achieve, says Carsten Bange, founder and CEO of Business Application Research Center, an analyst firm that specializes in enterprise software.

There's also the chance that, like any cloud offering, a particular cloud BI service might be slow. "There are other issues, like performance and latency of cloud solutions," Tapadinhas says.

The transfer speed of data could be slow too. That could impact the reliability of the data analytics if users end up making decisions based on old data because the latest data hasn't made it to the cloud BI tool. "This could be a real bottleneck," Bange says. "Upload speeds are often not really good."

One common reason that companies give for passing up cloud BI -- concern over privacy and security, given that BI products tend to analyze a company's most important data -- actually isn't worth worrying about, some experts say. "Most cloud vendors tend to have more strict security processes and follow security certificates that are more advanced than most companies have internally," Tapadinhas says.

Whether a business goes with cloud BI or an on-premises product, Athenahealth's Weinstein offers valuable advice. Once Athenahealth implemented Birst and workers were able to quickly access useful information, they were spotting a lot more issues than they used to. The company had to figure out how to respond to the increased number of problems that it found. "Net net it's a good thing," Weinstein says. "Just be prepared for what the transparency is going to bring."

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10 SharePoint success stories

Historically, Microsoft SharePoint has been associated with intranets and content management. But customers are now using it for everything from communications to business intelligence, enterprise search, even process integration and workflow automation.

10 innovative examples of Microsoft SharePoint in action
Since its launch in 2001, Microsoft SharePoint has grown to become a leading enterprise platform for intranets and content management. However, customers are increasingly using it to enable a much broader range of capabilities.

They're building intranet portals, but they're also leveraging SharePoint's system integration, process integration and workflow automation capabilities for knowledge sharing, business intelligence, social collaboration, document and file management, communications and more. Here are 10 success stories built on Microsoft SharePoint.

Aker Solutions
Aker Solutions is a Norwegian provider of oilfield products, systems and services to oil and gas industry customers worldwide. It employs 28,000 people in more than 30 countries. In 2010, management set a goal of doubling its revenues of NOK44 billion ($7.7 billion) by 2015.

To meet those goals, the company hired 13,000 employees in four years. Faced with assimilating many employees in a short period, the company deployed a knowledge-sharing platform based on SharePoint Server 2013.

The platform, dubbed Knowledge Arena, combines personal profiles, employee pages with summaries of current responsibilities, areas of expertise, past experience, blog posts, key documents, newsfeeds and more. Within four months, 56.4 percent of employees had created profiles.

Arkansas Department of Corrections
Contraband is a source of criminal activity within prisons: drugs, money, mobile phones, weapons. Stopping it has fallen to 4,000 statewide guards.

The Arkansas Department of Corrections opted to turn to BI and predictive analytics to identify trends.With Microsoft's help, it built a Fusion Core Solution based on SharePoint that allows the department to analyze previously siloed databases ranging from population tracking and visitation tracking to banking and telephone records.

"We had access to this data before, but we could not visualize it to see the patterns and trends," says Daniel Potter, assistant IT administrator. "Our analysts are able to clearly see developments. Over the last two weeks, we have been able to execute 11 confiscations and interdictions on incidents."

iGATE
iGATE is a global provider of IT services and consulting with more than 300 active global clients, many of them Fortune 1000 companies. It also has 28,500 employees, with an average age of 25.

It needed an internal social collaboration tool that allowed them to share process updates and knowledge more efficiently and effectively. With the help of Microsoft Consulting Services (MCS), it deployed SharePoint 2010 for its iSocialize platform, with SQL 2008 as the database management system.

Leveraging an existing license, iGATE was able to connect its global workforce at minimum cost. The company says about 15 percent of employees log in to iSocialize daily and it expects traffic to increase as the content and management improve.

MWH
MWH Global is a "wet infrastructure" firm that provides engineering, construction and management services for some of the world's largest water-related projects: public water distribution, hydropower, environmental reclamation and more. It has 8,000 employees and believes it must foster innovation by helping them share their talent and experience.

It has an integrated working strategy that calls for keeping collaborative processes and tools simple and universally available. It uses a combination of Lync Server 2013, Yammer, Microsoft Exchange Online and SharePoint Server 2010 as part of its comprehensive collaboration solution.

The company says it is now able to foster creativity within and across organizational boundaries. Federation and external SharePoint team sites are allowing it to extend those benefits beyond corporate borders.

Dutch Public Prosecution Service (DPPS)
With 20 offices in the Netherlands, DPSS investigates crimes and decides whether to bring cases to court, prosecutes offenders and supervises sentences. Its 800 prosecutors spend time out of the office, at crime scenes, meeting colleagues and presenting cases.

DPSS needed a better mobility experience, with easily managed endpoints that met data security and confidentiality requirements. DPSS turned to Windows 8 tablets with applications that connect to data stored on its SharePoint-based intranet and an Oracle database.

The 24/7 Quick Reference Application gives them access to legal protocols and procedures stored on a SharePoint site. The People Guide application connects them to colleagues and their expertise, while the Case File Viewer functions like an offline client for a case management system.

Dutch Public Prosecution Service (DPPS)
With 20 offices in the Netherlands, DPSS investigates crimes and decides whether to bring cases to court, prosecutes offenders and supervises sentences. Its 800 prosecutors spend time out of the office, at crime scenes, meeting colleagues and presenting cases.

DPSS needed a better mobility experience, with easily managed endpoints that met data security and confidentiality requirements. DPSS turned to Windows 8 tablets with applications that connect to data stored on its SharePoint-based intranet and an Oracle database.

The 24/7 Quick Reference Application gives them access to legal protocols and procedures stored on a SharePoint site. The People Guide application connects them to colleagues and their expertise, while the Case File Viewer functions like an offline client for a case management system.

ASB Bank
Based in Auckland, New Zealand and founded in 1847, ASB Bank has 4,500 employees and provides personal and business banking services for 25 percent of New Zealanders. Aiming to give its employments maximum mobility, it needed a comprehensive workflow and social collaboration environment for collaboration tools that work with tablets, smartphones and other mobile devices. It also wanted to reduce its dependence on paper by moving most documents online.

It deployed SharePoint 2013 Team Sites to give departments the ability to manage document scanning, storage, archiving and security. It also provided employees with the ability to share information through personal sites, team sites, newsfeeds, wiki sites, forums and blogs.

Toyota Motor Corporation
With 2012 revenue of $181.3 billion, Toyota is the world's largest automaker by sales volume. Its GAZOO.com website has 1.7 million registered users and delivers car owners and Toyota employees and dealers with vehicle information, social networking, news and entertainment.

Aiming to enhance site content, increase scalability and reduce the cost of ownership, Toyota wanted to leverage the cloud. It turned to Windows Azure for its cloud development environment, with SharePoint 2013 for content management and blogs.

"Toyota has 300,000 pages of content, and the SharePoint 2013 search capability lets us quickly retrieve information," says Hidehiko Sasaki of the e-TOYOTA division. "We are also using blogs—and, in future releases, other social features like yammer.

Aegon
Aegon is one of the world's largest insurance and pension groups, with 24,000 employees working in more than 20 international markets. Aiming to build a global intranet that made it easy to search for people and information across businesses, while also facilitating social collaboration and real-time sharing of data, Aegon used SharePoint Server with integrated social networking features from NewsGator Social Sites.

Aegon says it has given its employees easier, more specific access to subject matter experts, and that it allows employees to share experiences and best practices more effectively on their PCs and mobile devices. It also lets the company recognize and reward top contributors to the network while maintaining effective control for governance and regulatory purposes.

Kindred Healthcare
Kindred Healthcare has 76,000 employees and is one of the largest diversified providers of post-acute care services in the U.S. After acquiring RehabCare Group in 2011, the company gained 22,000 mobile employees who used Gmail and needed a solution to integrate them into its communication infrastructure.

Kindred already had an on-premises deployment of Exchange Server 2013 for its existing 54,000 employees. The company opted for Office 365, including SharePoint Online, to meet its needs while also fulfilling security requirements and regulatory and legal compliance.

All of Kindred's therapists now receive corporate communications directly via a SharePoint portal instead of through their managers. The system allows everyone to send messages more quickly, accurately and consistently.

JSC "Dobeles dzirnavenieks"
JSC is one of the leading cereal products in Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania. In 2008, it partnered with an international food company, requiring rapidly growing output. Many of its functions are managed electronically, like management of production processes, monitoring, accounting and customer relations.

The company has about 75 computer users, and the growing output meant upgrading and improving its IT infrastructure and eliminating previous infrastructure errors. JSC leveraged SharePoint Online, together with Office 365, Lync Online and Exchange Online to dramatically improve communication between employees.

Employees now use the SharePoint document sharing options, which provide them with reminders when files are updated or republished, while also providing the ability to share files over their mobile devices.

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